Rev. Henry W. Wissler, Jr.

WISSLER, SCHNELLBACHER, KRELL, POWELL, ORTH

Posted By: Kent Transier (email)
Date: 3/18/2005 at 16:00:52

Reverend Henry W. Wissler Jr. was born in Donegal Township, Lancaster, Pennsylvania on 14 November 1793 to Henry and Anna Wisler. Nothing is known of Rev. Henry's early life other than that he almost certainly learned the skills of farming as he grew up. He migrated with his parents and siblings to Pickaway County, Ohio, in 1806, where an 1100 acre farm was started.

In July, 1813, at the age of 19, Henry enrolled in Caleb Odle’s Company, serving as a sergeant in the War of 1812. The Company was disbanded by mid November.

At the 17th Conference of the Evangelical Association, June 7-10, 1824, held in Strassburg, York County, Pennsylvania, Henry Wissler was accepted into the itinerancy as a circuit-riding preacher. He was the first circuit rider for the Evangelical Association from Ohio. He was assigned to the York Circuit and his first year's salary was $35.88 plus traveling expenses. During 1825 he rode the Canton Circuit and in 1826, he was ordained a Deacon and rode the Somerset Circuit. These were not easy assignments. Typical circuits had about 40 appointments scattered over a 600 mile route that took 4 weeks to complete. There were few roads, no bridges, and lots of swamps and wilderness. It was also the custom of early preachers to fast severely, including total abstinence from food and drink...some did it every Friday for 24 hours.

Henry continued to be a circuit rider (Schuykill, 1827; Lancaster, 1828...salary $41.76; Somerset, 1829) until 1830. Henry served as secretary to the 1829 E.A. Conference held on May 4th. All church business was conducted in German until the mid 1840s so Henry had to be literate in that language.

By May, 1830, Henry had "located due to bodily infirmities." This meant that he quit the itinerancy and had settled in a specific place. There is some indication that he first settled in Pennsylvania where he stayed until after his father's death in 1832 when Henry inherited 105 acres.

On 11 Sep 1831, Henry married Mary Powell, daughter of John Powell, Jr. and Fanny Boyer, at Stoystown, Somerset, Pennsylvania. To this union, 6 children were born; Catherine Powell who married John Orth and lived in Darke County, Ohio; Jonathan William; Fannie B.; Henry (died in infancy); Mary S. who married John Henry Krell; and Elizabeth Ann. In 1850, the family was living in Pickaway County, Ohio. In September 1855, Henry accompanied his daughter-in-law's brother and fellow Evangelical Association preacher, John Schnellbacher, to Madison County, Iowa where they were to start a settlement of Evangelicals. Henry’s son, Jonathan, moved to Madison County a year later, in Sep 1856. By 1860, both Henry and Jonathan had both moved back to Ohio.

By mid 1860, Henry and his family had moved to Ross County, Colerain Township where, at age 67, he was a day laborer. Sometime between 1866 and 1875, Henry and Mary moved in with their daughter, Mary, who had married John H. Krell in 1865. Also during this period, Henry lost his eyesight.

In the fall of 1875, Henry, Mary, their two unmarried daughters, and a number of their kinfolk moved to Webster Township, Madison County, Iowa, very near the Schnellbachers who had now been there 20 years. The elder Wisslers lived with their two daughters, Fannie and Elizabeth who farmed forty acres started from unbroken prairie. They remained there until their deaths, Mary on 2 May 1885 and Henry on 3 April 1887. Both are buried in the Winterset Cemetery.

Sources: Wissler Family Bible; Federal Censuses 1850, 1860, 1870 & 1880; Winterset Madisonian, The History of Madison County and Its People; History of the Evangelical Association, Volume II, by W. W. Orwig, Cleveland, Ohio, 1858; Roster of Ohio Soldiers in the War of 1812.

Madison Biographies maintained by Linda Griffith Smith.
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