Our Cumberland County Roots

Our Cumberland County ancestry begins with John Thompson, a Scotch-Irish Presbyterian immigrant, who arrived in what is now Newton township in the mid-1740's with two of his brothers, Thomas and William. John first took up land along the Green Spring, next to his neighbor Alexander Scroggs, who had arrived about the same time with his two brothers. Although we have no clear information about either of these families prior to their arrival in America, family legend holds that the Thompsons were from Letterkenny, Ireland while the Scroggs came from Scotland.

John married Jane Laughlin in 1745 and she gave birth to Jane, John, Anne, Elizabeth and Matthew. Jane died in 1754 and John married another Laughlin, this time Susanna. He and Susanna had a further six children: Susanna, William, Alexander, Margaret, Leacy, and Hugh. John died in 1777 and had by that time acquired a good deal of farmland, some of which he deeded to his son Matthew.

Matthew and several of his descendants, who stayed in the area for some time, are buried in the eastern portion of the Big Springs Presbyterian Church graveyard.

My line descends not from Matthew but from Alexander, who continued the farm and was active in the Big Springs Presbyterian Church. He and his wife, Sarah Scroggs, had nine children and one of these was Alexander Newton Thompson who eventually married Mary Blean. Mary was the grand-daughter of John Craig, a minister in the seceder Presbyterian Church who died almost immediately upon his arrival in Newville. Although the area is fairly small, there have been two Presbyterian churches in Newville since the mid-1700's.

In 1835 Alexander Newton and Mary left the Cumberland Valley in search of another place to live and settled in Smicksburg, in Indiana County, PA, where Alexander took up a trade. Five years later they decided to return to farming and went west to Whiteside County, IL. Some of Alexander's brothers, as well as his father and other friends, had already relocated to this part of Illinois a few years earlier. In 1845, after having worked his new farm for only a short while, Alexander died. Mary continued the farm for a few years, but finally gave up the struggle and sometime just prior to 1850 she returned to Cumberland with her sons. Sometime between then and 1858 she was living with a niece in Newville, in a house on Main Street. This house still stands today.

One of Alexander and Mary's sons, also Alexander, had by this time become a Presbyterian minister but the other sons, Robert, Joe, and John all stayed close to the land. In 1878 Robert and Joe left Newville, Robert taking up homesteaded land in Nebraska and Joe continuing his trade as a saddler. When Mary left Newville about 1885, to join her sons on the farm near Steele City, NE, she took with her my last remaining direct connection to Cumberland County.

I have done considerable research on these Thompsons, as well as on the Bleans and Scroggs. I am also a member of the Newville Historical Society but, unfortunately, live some distance away so am unable to spend any real quality time there. My wife and I travelled to Newville in 1996 and hope to do so again soon.

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