Biography of Barnard VanZant Stoughton

Barnard VanZant Stoughton was one of ten children of John Stoughton, of English descent, and Catherine Covert, of Dutch descent. They had settled in Butler County, PA by about 1802, and were members of the Muddy Creek Baptist congregation.
Barnard, known to his family as "Barney", married at about age 20 to Susan Harvey. They had six children together. Susan Harvey (Stoughton)died in May 1847. Four of their six children were under six years old. The infant Susan was taken in to be raised by Mary Ann Harvey (Dustin), her mother's sister and, with the Dustin family, lived in Illinois for a time.
Barnard Stoughton moved north to the area of Venango & Clarion counties, where he met Susan Myer and remarried in 1848. They had three more children by 1854. All of his children were born in Pennsylvania, but the two sets of half-siblings were born in different counties. Susan Myer was the widow of John Hagan, and had a son, John Edward Hagan; he does not appear in the 1850 census to be living in the Barnard Stoughton household.

In Pennsylvania, Barnard worked as a shoemaker. (Note that his grandfather, William Stoughton, was also a shoemaker.) Barnard's daughter Jennie writes in her family history, "Memories", of watching her father make wedding boots. She also says that when the family moved to Clarion County, to a farm owned by one of her mother's brothers, her father tried farming "but father could not farm and do much at his trade too". They stayed there only one year, then moved to Bellville, a small crossroads settlement apparently in Piney Twp., Clarion County. Jennie tells the story of a man coming to the house looking for liquor while the family lived in Bellville. Many families routinely distilled whiskey and stored it, but the Stoughtons did not. This man walked into the kitchen demanding liquor of Mrs. Stoughton and would not leave. Barnard came home and taking the man by collar and seat of the pants and threw him into the street.
After the Civil War, Barnard and Susan Myer Stoughton migrated westward. By 1870 they were in Mt. Pleasant township, Lawrence Co., Missouri. Only the three children of Barnard and 2nd wife Susan Myer(Hagan)are living at home with them. Next door is the family of Susan's son, John E. Hagan. John E. Hagan had married Martha Jane Boyle (Barnard's niece, the daughter of Barnard's sister Jane Stoughton and Thomas Boyle).
By 1880 all the children of both marriages are grown. Barnard & Susan, by then in Barber County, KS, lived alone, but still next door to the Hagan family. John Hagan was then a widower, wife Martha Jane Boyle(Hagan) having died in 1873, when her youngest was about age five. Both Barnard Stoughton and John Hagan reported being unemployed for 12 months, although the interpretation may be that they were not wage earners; they report their occupations as farmers.
Barnard died in March of 1887, a short time after jumping into a river. It seems that Barnard had a drunken neighbor that was of great concern to him. Finally the man reformed, and was being baptize. The convert was a huge man, and the pastor was unable to lift him out of the water. Barnard jumped in to help, but in doing so, took pneumonia and died soon thereafter.
Susan Myer (Hagan) Stoughton died in 1888, living at the residence of her daughter Jennie S. Stoughton (Osborn), author of the family memoir.