Susannah Bussard

20. Susannah Bussard (Married Albert Gillespie Kenney (#19), 16 August 1827 by Reverend David Martin of the Methodist Church in Fredericktown, Maryland).

Died: March 25, 1893, at the age of 91 [Note: her obituary states she was 90 and 6 months] near Sugar Valley, Preble County, Ohio, at the home of her daughter, Susan Morton. She is buried with Albert (#19) at East Liberty Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio.

This photograph of Susannah is from a cartes de visite photo album now in the possession of the webmaster. A copy of the photograph was sent by Russell Leach (#3) to Ruthella Bussard circa 1970 to use in her book The Genealogy of Peter Bossert-Bussard 1761-1802, Ruthella compiled the information 1970-1974 and it was published by Jeanne Bussard Workshop, 101 West South Street, Frederick, Maryland 21701. The photograph appears on page 52 of Ruthella's book.

a) Sarah (Salome) Bussard: (Married: George Road or Rhodes, 4 March 1806) Born: 24 April 1785. Died: ?;

c) Catherine Bussard: (Married 1st: John Weaver, 6 June 1809; Married 2nd: Mr. Heminger) Born: 8 July 1788. Died: ?;

d) Samuel Bussard: (Married: Mary Delaughter, 9 September 1812). Born: 3 May 1790. Died: 6 April 1868;

e) Peter Bussard: (Married: Sarah Lowery) Born: 6 May 1792. Died: 27 November 1864;

f) John Bussard: (Married: Susan Delaughter in 1815) Born: 14 February 1794. Died: 11 August 1868;

h) Elizabeth Bussard: (Married: George Washington Delaughter, 10 January 1814) Born: 23 November 1797. Died: before 1839.

i) Sophia Bussard: (Married: George Philip Fox, 3 January 1822) Born: 6 April 1800. Died: 19 May 1875]

Miscellaneous: Susannah and her brother, Samuel, were blind. [Note: It is unknown what caused their blindness, but the webmaster wonders if the cause was glaucoma. Glaucoma is a disease that damages an eye's optic nerve. It usually occurs when fluid builds up in the front part of the eye. That extra fluid increases the pressure in the eye, damaging the optic nerve. This disease will lead to blindness if untreated. Susannah wasn't blind until later in life (exact age is unknown). The age when Samuel became blind is also unknown. Genetic factors contribute to the development of most types of glaucoma. Adult-onset glaucoma is complex due to the influence of multiple genetic and/or environmental risk factors. Susannah's grandson, Russell Leach, was diagnosed with glaucoma a few years before he died at age 79. Susannah's Great Granddaughter (Russell's daughter), Susan, was diagnosed with the disease in her mid 60's. Please e-mail the webmaster at the e-mail link at the bottom of this page if you are a descendent of the Bussards and have been diagnosed with glaucoma, or you know of another family member that has been diagnosed.]

Susannah was the youngest of ten children. [Note: Her father died the same year she was born. He was kicked in the head by a horse. Susannah was born in September and her father died in November. After his death, Susannah's mother raised the children alone. It must have been a very tough life for the family.]

The following information is quoted from The Genealogy of Peter Bossert-Bussard 1761-1802, compiled by Ruthella Bussard 1970-1974 and published by Jeanne Bussard Workshop, 101 West South Street, Frederick, Maryland 21701 pp. 51-57.

“Susannah was the tenth child born to Margaret and Peter Bossert. The event occurred on their farm in the Catoctin Mountains six weeks prior to the death of her father. Since there is no baptismal record at the Apple’s Reformed Church for Susannah, one must assume that the family affiliated with a church located closer to the Flat.

In August 2022, Matt Kenney, a great great great grandson of Susannah and Albert made a trip to Frederick County, Maryland to attend a Buzzard reunion. He took the picures below of Susannah's birthplace. Matt shared that the home " is a land trust and the Bussard family has access in perpetuity as long as they tend to the family cemetery once a year."

[Note: On June 18, 2016, Donna Rader sent this webmaster the two photographs below that she found in her grandmother's belongings. Donna is the great-great granddaughter of Susan Smith Shaffer. Susan was the sister of Annie Salina Smith, first wife of Susannah's son Alavander Kenney. The second photograph below is the same image that appears in Ruthella Bussard's book and is shown at the top of this webpage. Donna noted in her e-mail that Susan and Annie had a brother named James Kenney Smith. Donna said, "So obviously, the Kenney/Bussard family was very important to the Smiths.]

Susannah was married at the home of her birth to Albert Gillespie Kenny on August 16, 1827 by the Reverend David Martin of the Methodist Church in Fredericktown, Maryland. Susannah and Albert had ten children”

Below are images made from tintype pictures, copied by Doug Hart. They are believed to be early pictures of the married couple.

In 1830, Susannah and Albert were living in Fairfield Township in Tuscarawas County, Ohio. The 1830 U.S. Census verifies that they had two children (Joseph and Eliza), both under the age of 5.

By 1840, the family had moved to Porter Township in Delaware County, Ohio. The 1840 U.S. Census lists the family as including one male "5 and under 10" (Joseph almost 10), one male "20 and under 40" (Albert age 37) , three females "Under 5" (Sophia almost age 5, Louisa age 4, and Mary Ellen age 2), one female "5 and under 10" (Susan age 8), one female "10 and under 15" (Eliza age 11), and one female "20 and under 40" (Susannah, age 38.) Four more children would be born in the next six years: George Washington later in 1840, twins John and Sarah (Catherine) in 1843, and Alavander in 1846.

Below are copies of charcoal images of Albert and Susannah. The originals are framed and in the possession of Tom Kenney, a great-great-great grandson of Albert and Susannah Kenney. In an e-mail to the webmaster in March 2020, Clyde Perfect, a great- great grandson (now deceased), and the former owner of the images, remembered as a young boy, staying at their brick house homestead in Porter Township in Delaware, Ohio and seeing these photographs in an upstairs room where he slept. Clyde remembered that the house had a brick floor and fireplace in the cellar where they cooked and ate. He thought they probably spent winter awake hours down there as the cellar would be warmer being underground and would take less wood to keep warm.

In 1850, the family was still living in Porter Township in Delaware County, Ohio. The 1850 U.S. Census lists both Albert's and Susan's ages as 47. [Note: Susan was actually one year older than Albert and would have been 48]. They had ten children, listed as: Eliza (age 22), Joseph (age 21), Susan (age19), Sophia (age17 [ She would have actually been 15, if born in 1835]), Louisa (age 14), Ellen (age 12), George W. (age 10), John (age 7), Catherine (#10) (age 7), and Alavander (age 3). Albert was farming and his real estate was valued at $2000. All of the children except Alavander attended school.

The 1860 Census for Porter Township, Delaware, Ohio shows Albert (age 57) and Susan (age 57) with their children: twins John (age 16) and Sarah (age 16), and Alexander (age13).

The 1870 Census for Porter Township, Delaware, Ohio shows Albert (age 66) and Susan (age 66) and their children George (age 29), Sarah (age 26), and Alexander (age 23).

The 1880 Census for Porter Township, Delaware, Ohio shows Albert (Age 77) and Susan (Age 78) are living alone. [Note: Many of their adult children live nearby.]

Seventy-nine years ago today
A little babe was born
In a forest that was dense and deep,
Scarcely tell when it was morn.
The babe is now a pioneer,
Has passed through cares and woes
And she would fain write up her life
In poetry or prose.

But they no education had
Those early pioneers
Had no teachers, had no books,
For long and weary years;
Had not much of anything,
Not half enough to eat,
Out of cracked corn
The bread was made,
Dried venison was their meat.

Sometimes the deer failed to come up,
Of course the meat gave out
But I never heard a pioneer say
That he tho’t he had the gout.
They had no water fit to drink,
It came from swamps and bogs,
If you dug a spring it soon would fill
With tadpoles, then with frogs.

It was not long till most got sick
A shaking with the chills,
Not a doctor in the township
So we paid no doctor bills;
There was no road, no not a path,
How could the men begin?
Quit shaking and cut beech trees down
And let the sunshine in.

A cabin Pa built of the logs,
Had neither nails or bricks;
The chimney, it was out of doors
Made it of mud and sticks,
They split some of the logs in two,
They had to have a floor
And of a nice coverlet
Was made a splendid door.

And when the timber was cut down,
The stumps were large and green,
Not a furrow could be plowed
So they planted corn between;
It was not more than planted
Till the crows came swooping down,
The squirrels came right in after,
Help dig it from the ground.

Oh, I wish I could describe it all.
My soul is often stirred
To think I dream and dream of it
But can’t put thoughts into words,
One night when Mother made the mush
She tho’t with hopes forlorn
Alas, the meal is almost out
Where can we get some corn?

Then in the dusk of evening
A stranger she espied
Attracted by her fire light
That shone out far and wide;
Said the stranger, 'I seek shelter,
A morsal for to eat,
I’ve been lost and wandering all day long,
I’m tired out and weak.'

'Come in, you’re welcome stranger,
I’ll divide my scanty fare,'
He took the proferred mush and milk,
And said, 'Ah, but it’s good,
The very best I ever ate
And know I ever could,'
Mother said, 'I am alone tonight,
My husband’s gone for hay
The horses both had glanders and may die any day.'

'I started out quite early
A turkey for to kill,
My name is Louis Rhinehart.
I live near the Rich hill,
The hill is in Knox County,
Mt. Vernon is our town,
And here is the turkey that I killed
For all my tearing ‘round.'

So they had a breakfast of wild turkey
And I think they had corn cakes,
Their tea was made of spice brush
That a pioneer breakfast makes.
'I feel as tho fate had sent me
That I must be your friend,
I’ve raised corn plenty and to spare
And our friendship must not end.'

But their troubles just begun,
God bless their memories dear,
How they chopped and toiled and worked,
Each one a home to clear.
A long, long time the horses died
And so the cows did too,
the wolves came in and killed the sheep
But yet they did pull through.

It took so long to clear a farm;
The trees were large and green,
Grew large and close together
And bushes grew between;
But then the beech trees we thinned out,
There was a harvest given, sent in the way of beechnuts,
‘Twas like Manna sent from Heaven.

When the beechnuts ripened
The pigeons came to stay;
They laid their eggs
And raised their squabs
And never went away.
Yes, they came by millions,
They roosted all around,
They hatched and came in daily
Till they broke the timber down.

But say, where are the forests now?
Where are the pioneers?
The pigeons and wild turkeys,
The howling wolves, wolves or deer
Or wild Indians on the Darby plains?
In any of those early years
I’ve seen four generations go
And they won’t come again.

There were ten of us at home one time,
Alas, where did they go?
One perished on the battlefield,
One died in Idaho.
Out of the ten there were four boys,
Two can yet be found,
Broad minded woodland pioneers
Near to the stamping ground.

There are four sisters living yet.
One far in the West;
All married stalwart pioneers
In families of the best,
They all learned domestic science,
That is where their strength began;
Could spin or weave or knit or sew,
A help mate for a man.

Four of those brother-in-law are gone:
Their toil is at an end;
But they all filled their mission,
They were everybody’s friend.
They will all be long remembered,
Every one of them left heirs,
Some in the East, some in the West,
Scattered here and there.

Father’s birthplace was Virginia;
To Maryland he did go,
There he met and married Mother,
Then they came to Ohio.
My grandfather was a soldier
Of revolutionary fame:
Ancestors came from Wales,
But I think now it is all the same.

Near by the old Cuyahoga road
That once passed through swamps and bogs,
There stood on an elevation
A cabin built of logs.
Smith’s Section, Porter Township,
Delaware the County-seat,
The grand state of Ohio,
That never has been beat.

The morning breezes of life’s meadow
With me have long been dead;
The noon and evening also
Has passed away and fled;
Night of Life is all that’s left me now,
Soon it will changes bring;
The pioneers shall live again,
The same as flowers in spring."

Below are maps showing Albert and Susannah's property in Porter Township, Delaware, Ohio. Maps, left to right, are 1848, 1866, and 1875. (Click to enlarge each map.)

The pictures below, taken 20 August 2006, show property that is thought to be land cleared and owned by Albert and Susannah. By overlaying the 1875 map on a modern map (1998) of Delaware and Morrow Counties, Albert's property can be located. Directions to this property from Columbus, Ohio are as follows: Drive North from Columbus on I-71 to Rt. 36. Turn right toward Sunbury. In Sunbury, turn left at the first traffic light (Rt. 61.) Turn right at SR. 656. Proceed to Peerless Road on the Delaware County/Morrow County Line. Turn right onto Peerless. Turn right onto Trimmer. On the right side of Trimmer Rd about 1/4 mile down the road, Albert's property begins. It extends for more than a mile south and to SR. 656 on it northwestern corner.

Below: This picture is actually a composite of three pictures that were taken by this webmaster from SR. 656 about 1 mile south of Peerless Road, facing East toward Trimmer Rd. Albert's land extends all the way to Trimmer Rd.

Below: These pictures were taken from Trimmer Rd. of Albert's land, facing West.

Albert and Susannah had 10 children: Eliza, Joseph L , Susan, Sophia Jane, Louisa, Mary Ellen, George Washington, John Peter and his twin Sarah Catherine (#10), and Alavander.

Following Albert Kenny’s death in 1886, Susannah moved to Preble County, Ohio to live with her daughters. Mrs. Bertie Kennedy of Texas recalls bribing her grandmother (Susannah) to hear her sing in ‘dutch.’ she always wore her black bonnet. She was blind for a number of years before her death."

In her book, The Genealogy of Peter Bossert-Bussard 1761-1802, Ruthella Bussard states, "Pause a moment to concentrate upon the face of Susannah. One can see and almost feel the strength so necessary to be a pioneer lady. Strength, determination, and yes, loneliness. Susannah never knew her father; the majority of her brothers married and moved from home; she had little time to share in her mother’s life span; she married a man who heard and felt the call to the wilderness, and she followed. Through her strength, she made the life for the next generation a little more comfortable. Her descendants can be proud to be a part of her life, and our family can be proud to have had this lady’s life to share through the pen of her daughter, Mrs. Sue Morton.”

Susannah's obituary (courtesy of Matt Kenney, Great- Great- Great Grandson of Alber and Susannah) is transcribed by this webmaster below. The original obituary transcription obtained from Matt is linked here. The original transcriber is unknown.

SUSANNAH KENNEY

Susannah Kenney was born in Frederic Co., MD., Sept. 27, 1802. Died near Sugar Valley, Preble Co., O., March 25, 1893, aged 90 yrs. and 6 mo. She was united in marriage at the home of her birth to A.G. Kenney, Aug. 16, 1827. After their marriage she, with her companion, emigrated to Porter Twp., Delaware Co., Ohio., where she resided in the then vast wilderness for 59 years and after her home was broken up by the death of her husband, she moved to Preble Co. where she remained with her daughters until the day of her death.

She was the mother of six daughters and four sons, of which two daughters, Sophia Jane and Sarah Katherine Leach and two sons, Joseph and John have preceded her to the spirit land.

During her early life, she recognized the necessity of a Saviour, and united with the Lutheran church of which she was a faithful member until moving to this place, where she joined the Christian church.

Her illness of about four months duration was very severe and painful, until near the end when God in his infinite mercy bade her be calm. Among her many afflictions, she was deprived of her eyesight and during her illness she spent most of her time in prayer and quoting scripture and Psalms, which gave her many friends the comfort of believing and knowing she died trusting in Jesus. She sleeps the sleep that knows no waking. The gentle winds will sing such sad sweet strains as will seem cadences wafted from the shores of song, and the gates of Heaven will be opened and Mother shall enter, saying, “farewell, farewell, dear friends, I enter Heaven, where the blind are healed, and all is joy and peace.” “Dreams cannot picture a world so fair. Sorrow and trouble cannot enter there. Time does not breathe on its faded bloom. Far beyond the clouds, and beyond the tomb.”

Albert G Kenney and Susanna Bussard were married August 16, 1827 by Rev. David Martin, of the Methodist church in Fredrickstown, Md.

The webmaster's DNA has matched no less than 10 other members in a Susannah Bussard DNA Circle in ancestry.com.