Henry Jacob Simmon (1831–1910)
This is a slightly edited version of a post that was published on the Descendants of Henry Peter and Eva Catherine Simmon Facebook group on July 24, 2020.
Henry Jacob Simmon in 1897
Henry Jacob Simmon was born in December of 1831. He was the seventh child of Peter and Catherine’s, and the last one to be born in Europe before the family journeyed across the Atlantic. Young Henry was just 16 months old when the family departed Meisenheim in April of 1833 (the oldest of the seven children, Phillip, was 14).
After the Simmons arrived in the U.S. (their journey is quite a story, for another time), they settled in Bedford County, Pennsylvania, and lived there for about nine years.
In 1841, the eldest daughter, Louisa Simmon, married a German immigrant from Tuscarawas County, Ohio, and a year or so later the whole family (except for the eldest son, Phillip, who remained in Bedford and got married) joined Louisa there. By the late 1840s, Phillip Simmon and his young family had relocated from Bedford, PA, to Rock Island County, Illinois. Peter and Catherine then moved their family from Ohio to join Phillip in western Illinois (Louisa remained in Ohio with her family). Henry Jacob was 19 years old when the family landed in Rock Island at the end of the 1850 (HJ’s obituary says he was 17 when he arrived in Rock Island, which could be incorrect, or it could be that he preceded the family in order to join his older brother, who operated a draying business in the county).
Henry Jacob became a farmer, like his father. The family began working a piece of land in Rural Township along Mill Creek. In 1852 the land was officially purchased and the original Simmon farm was established.
Henry Jacob Simmon married Mary Allemang on February 23, 1860 in Rock Island. HJ was 28 and Mary was 18 years old. Henry Jacob and Mary Simmon had seven children together. They were:
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Henry Peter Simmon (1862-1950)
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George William Simmon (1863-1934)
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Albert Joseph Simmon (1866-1943)
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Catherine (Simmon) Couch (1870-1936)
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Isabell Simmon (1868-1946)
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Perry Louis Simmon (1874-1959)
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Arthur Eaton Simmon (1880-1961)
Family of Henry Jacob and Mary Allemang Simmon, ca. 1905
In 1871, before Perry or Arthur were born, Henry Jacob purchased a 160-acre parcel of land just south of his father’s farm, on Mill Creek in Rural Township.
Later in life, Henry Jacob would talk his youngest son, Arthur, into taking over the farm (Arthur had wanted to be a mortician). Henry Jacob continued to own the farm until shortly before his death in 1910, but for a few years around the turn of the century, he resided in the city of Rock Island and was the town’s tax collector for a time. In the last few years of his life, Henry and Mary had a house in Bowling Township.
Henry Jacob Simmon died at home on May 7, 1910. He is buried with his wife, Mary, and their daughter, Isabel, at Chippiannock Cemetery in Rock Island.
Arthur Eaton Simmon officially purchased the Simmon farm from his father in February of 1910 (just three months before HJ departed this world) for the sum of $5,600. He would go on to raise his own family there (his wife, Mary Jane, and their four girls and one boy). The land would finally leave the Simmons’ hands for good in 1969, after having been in the family for 98 years.
I still have a small collection of Indian arrowheads that were found on the farm by my grandfather, Orville Simmon.
