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| Edward Harned 1831-1904 (colorized by My Heritage) |
Quakers John Harned and Phebe Laing married 27 March 1811 and ten months later, Jennette was born. Then came Rachel, Jonathan, Jacob, Mary, John, Phebe, Benjamin Franklin, Joseph, Rebecca and bringing up the rear, child #11 was our direct ancestor, Edward Harned. He arrived 10 Jan 1831 in Woodbridge, New Jersey. On a side note, I had a Harned 'cousin' challenge me on whether Edward was in this family or not. As you can see, he was the last born, there at the bottom left. There is also a Quaker Meeting record showing his birth and his parents.
Quakers believed in the inner light – the idea that God was a spiritual presence within each individual and could speak to all humans through the words and actions of anyone. Quaker meetinghouses were unadorned spaces where men and women worshipped equally. On Sundays, which they called ‘First Day,” they worshipped in silence, waiting until “the spirit found them,” and inspired them to speak. They tended to reject worldliness and became easy to recognize because of their use of the pronouns ‘thee’ and ‘thou’ and their refusal to doff their hats to social superiors since they believed in a spiritual equality. Edward’s father, John, passed away in 1848, when Edward was just 17. At age 20, Edward received his legacy from his father’s will: $300. [Today this would be almost $10,000.] In the next year or so, he married Hannah Anne Yardley. They had 6 children: Lydia, Harriet (our ancestor), Horace, Ruthanna, John, and Anna. From tax records in the mid-1850s we can see that Edward bought himself a farm in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, probably made possible by his legacy from his father. He had 35 acres of land worth $48/acre, 2 horses and 3 cattle. The taxable value was $1793. By 1860 he and his family are living in Bel Air, Maryland, on a farm valued at $6000. But in 1870 they are back in Bucks County. Wouldn’t we like knowing what that move was about?
In 1863 he registered for the draft, but his record says “Paid Commutation.” The Quakers took this stance: “We utterly deny all outward wars and strife and fighting with outward weapons for any end or under any pretense whatever; this is our testimony to the whole world.” [George Fox] In the North, if a man called to military service could provide a substitute or pay a $300 Commutation Fee, he was exempted from serving. It appears that Edward’s conscience didn’t allow him to serve, though where he would have come up with $300 is not known. In 1873 a “Certificate of Removal” from Rahway, NJ (Plainfield Monthly Meeting) recommended him as a member in the Mt. Holly Monthly Meeting, Burlington, New Jersey. So they’ve moved again.
He has been hired to take care of the Mt. Holly meetinghouse in 1880. He was to be paid $32 per year! Later that year the Mt. Holly Meeting was informed that Edward Harned was not satisfied with his pay, so they raised it to $40/year. In 1884 his pay was raised to $4/month! In 1891 Edward requested that his Certificate be transferred to Haddonfield from Mt. Holly because he would be nearer the Camden Meeting. His daughter, Harriet had married William C. Forman in 1886 and was living in the Camden area, as was his son, Horace, so they probably wanted to be near their children as they got older.
