The Snapps of Frederick County

By Eilene Lyon

Continuing with my ancestors from Germany who settled first in Pennsylvania, but then moved further south, we’ll look at the family of Christiana Snapp, wife of John Lewis Beard. Her father, John Snapp (Johannes Schnepp) came to America earlier than most, arriving at the Port of Philadelphia in 1733, immigrating from the Alsace region with his family and younger brother, Lawrence (Lorentz).¹

Philadelphia passenger manifests go back at least to the 18^th century. With these records, it may be possible to show that there were connections between some of my ancestral families back in the Old Country (particularly since they seem to have originated in the same area). However, some of the surnames (Mack, Huber) were quite common, making it nigh on impossible to be sure.

Daniel W. Bly, in the first volume of his book From the Rhine to the Shenandoah (1993), digs deeply into Schnepp family roots in Alsace. John Snapp and his siblings descended from a long line of herders and husbandmen. They roamed the region, thus birth record locations tend to vary for each child. As the commons became restricted and fenced in, the herding life was less feasible for John and Lawrence’s generation. Migration to other parts of Germany and America became common.²

John Snapp did not remain long in Philadelphia before relocating his young family (wife Barbara, two sons, and a daughter) to Orange County, Virginia. This large county encompassed nearly the entire western portion of the colony. The area the Snapps lived in became Frederick County in 1738. Barbara Snapp had four more daughters, including Christiana in 1737.

The John Snapp family belonged to the Opequon Lutheran congregation, established a few miles south of Winchester in 1736.³ Two of their daughter’s baptisms (Catherine and Christiana) are found in the records of circuit rider Rev. John Casper Stoever, but not the two sisters who followed (Margaret and Salome).⁴

John settled on 400 acres in the Shenandoah Valley, southwest of Winchester and Opequon Creek, and west of the Blue Ridge. The first permanent settler in the Valley is believed to have been Jost Hite, also from Alsace, who arrived in 1732.⁵ Many German settlers there migrated from southeastern Pennsylvania.

Snapp’s land was not officially surveyed until 1750. Shortly after, he received his grant from Lord Fairfax. He sold this land to his son John Jr. (who already held adjacent property) after Barbara [Dutt] Snapp died in 1758. John Sr. died four years later.⁶

The Snapp family of Winchester was later known for their foundry. Francis R. Snapp, a descendant of John Sr. and Barbara through their son Lawrence, established the foundry after the Civil War. Francis’s wife, Theodora, ran the business after he died in 1872.⁷ It existed well into the 20^th century, known throughout the region, eventually passing out of family hands.

John Sr.’s brother Lawrence (the immigrant) relocated to Rowan County, North Carolina, possibly at the time Christiana and her new husband, John Lewis Beard, moved there in the 1750s. It was probably comforting for Christiana to have her uncle, aunt, and cousins nearby—no other members of her family moved to North Carolina.

Land was much cheaper there than in Virginia. Migration from Virginia to North Carolina surged during and after the French-Indian War (1757–1763) because of the violence and the post-war tax increases to pay for it.⁸ It was possibly due to the war that violence came to Rowan County anyway.

Letters sent north in April and May 1759 indicated that somewhere from 13 to 17 settlers along the Yadkin River and environs in Rowan County had been murdered by Indians. Some thought the culprits were Cherokee, but others speculated they had been driven from Fort Duquesne (Pittsburgh) along with the French, and had migrated south. Lawrence’s 20-year-old son, John, was one of the victims.⁹

If you’re having trouble keeping names straight, welcome to the club! Immigrant brothers John and Lawrence gave their children the same names. John’s: John, Lawrence, Barbara, Catherine, Christiana, Margaret, Salome. Lawrence’s: John, Lawrence, Elizabeth, Catherine, Margaret, Christina, Barbara. The same thing happened with the next generation. It’s crazy difficult to deal with.

A couple more items of interest I came across while researching the Snapps: Like John Lewis Beard, Christiana’s family members were also involved in the slave trade. Her father’s will does not give particulars as to his property, only that it be divided equally among his children. But I found a runaway-slave ad that indicates her brother, Lawrence, was an enslaver.

Will ran away from the Marlborough Iron Works of Frederick County, Virginia, on December 10, 1780. He possibly belonged originally to Henry Bradford. Lawrence Snapp purchased Will from Bradford in 1773. In turn, Snapp sold Will to David Pancoast, who then put him to work in the foundry. Will was 24 years old at the time the ad appeared in February 1781.

The ad describes him as “near 6 feet high, straight limbed and rather slim made, has large eye[s], and turns up the whites of them remarkably when spoken to : had on and took with him a suit of blue cloaths, a brown waistcoat, a coarse shirt, two pair of yarn stockings, an old hat and shoes ; is supposed to have stolen a brown Horse, near 14 hands high…”¹⁰

The last item involves Christiana Snapp Beard’s first cousin, Elizabeth Snapp. Like Christiana, Elizabeth was the daughter of German immigrants, but born in America. Her family undoubtedly spoke German at home in Rowan County, North Carolina.

Elizabeth never married. She inherited some property from her father, Lawrence, who died a widower in 1771. She wrote her will in October 1773, not long before she died in 1774 at age 32.¹¹ Her father’s will was written in English (not by him) as that was the language of commerce and law. Elizabeth’s, however, is written in old German script. I used Google AI mode for transcription and translation of this unusual document. Look for a future post on that.

Feature image: Sheep by a watermill at the Écomusée d’Alsace, Ungersheim, Haut-Rhin, France (Wikimedia Commons). My Snapp/Schnepp ancestors were herders from Alsace.