Daughter of "Daughters" Wins 2013 John Hoyle Scholarship

Hannah Pauline Johnston, Hickory, daughter of Keevan and Polly Johnston (JHCDAR) and granddaughter of Polly Shook(JHCDAR), received the John Hoyle Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution Scholarship given for academic and leadership excellence.  At a national level, DAR awards over $150,000 in scholarships and financial aid each year to high school and college students from diverse backgrounds pursuing many disciplines.

A Hickory High senior, Hannah ranks in the top 10% of her class.

Ms. Johnston has been accepted at Wake Forest University, where she also received a president's scholarship.  She plans to major in Biological Sciences in preparation for Medical School.  Hannah's dream is to specialize in Oncology following her passion to help those who are battling cancer.  Congratulations Hannah!

NSDAR Program "Colonial Medicines and Cure Alls"

The majority of us are more or less superstitious; we are governed by our emotions and
not by reasoning, allowing little things to govern our everyday life.
Few of us like to sit down with thirteen at the table, we rather begin a task on any day but
Friday, and we dread to spill the salt or break a looking-glass for fear of the seven years bad
luck.

Queen Elizabeth like most people of her time made no secret of her superstitions. To
ward off disease, she wore suspended from her neck, a piece of gold engraved with mystical
characters.

Superstition has always centered about rare stones or gems and birth stones in jewelry are
supposed to bring good luck to the wearers.

The bezoars stone similar to a gall stone, found in the alimentary organ of ruminants, was
highly prized in Europe as an antidote for poison. Gov. Endicott possessed one of these stones
and Gov. John Winthrop sent to the East Indies for one.

In the past, the agate cured spider-bites, stopped headaches and bleeding of wounds. The
beryl, when swallowed, healed quinsy and cured eye disease when pressed to the eyelids. Coral
drove away malaria fever and prevented rabies in a dog, if set in the dog's collar. The diamond
cured malaria and swallowed as a powder was erroneously believed to be a poison. An emerald,
worn from the neck on a cord, warded off convulsions in children; and swallowed, it would cure
dysentery. Jade powder relieved heart burn and jasper would cure heart disease, while the
sapphire was a remedy for snakebite and typhoid fever. The topaz insured a long healthy life,
intelligence and beauty, and pearls dissolved in wine were a remedy for all the remaining ills one
might develop.

There were certain remedies known in the middle of the 16th century such as opium,
castor oil, gentian, aloes, mint, myrrh, caraway, honey, goose-oil, turpentine and sea salt; and we
presume the people in the colonies knew the uses of most of them. However, many disgusting
substances were used as remedies, for example, dung of the gazelle and the crocodile, fat of the
serpent, mammalian entrails.

In colonial days, obstetrics did not receive the attention in this country that it did abroad.
Child birth in the early days of American civilization was considered a simple physiological
process to be carried out in secrecy with a friend or midwife.

The wife of Dr. Samuel Fuller, who landed from the Mayflower, was the first midwife of
the colony. The next was Mrs. Hutchinson of Boston, who was banished for her political heresy.
She was succeeded by Ruth Barnaby who lived to be 101 years of age. The first person to be
executed in the colony of Mass. Bay was Margaret Jones, female physician who was accused of
witch-craft.

From the manuscript of Dr. Zerobabel Endicott of Salem, (son of Gov. Endicott by his
second wife) we read this prescription for relieving painful childbirth---"For Sharpe and Difficult
Travel in Women with child---Take a Lock of Vergins haire on any Part of ye head, of half the
age of ye women in travill out in very small to fine Powder---then take 12 ant's eggs dried in an
oven after ye bread is drawn out other wise make them dry and make them to powder with the
haire, give this with a quarter of a pint of Red Cow's milk, or for want of it give it in strong ale
wort." This concoction was less disgusting than many used at that period.
Cotton Mather used crushed sow-bugs in his practice also crushed body lice and
incinerated toads
.
The sole of an old shoe "worn by some man that walked much"---ground up and taken
internally was a remedy for dysentery.

The medical care and medical education that has made America safer for mothers had its
beginning here in the days of our Revolutionary War. In no war and in no country was there ever
a greater example of patriotism than that of Dr. Joseph Warren of Boston. He dispatched Paul
Revere to arouse the "minute-men", and declined to accept a proffered commission, preferring to
shoulder his musket and take his place in the ranks under Col. Prescott at Bunker Hill. He gave
his life the same day on which he joined in the struggle. His brother, Dr. John Warren was
director of Cambridge, Mass., military Hospital.

There was Dr. Hugh Mercer, who served as Brig. Gen., mortally wounded at the battle of
Princeton and in his last moments attended by Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of five medical men, who
signed the Declaration of Independence.

Then there was Dr. James Thacher of Mass., our first medical biographer, who has left us
one of the best word pictures of personality of George Washington. Also Dr. James Tilton from
Delaware, Dr. Benjamin Church of Boston, Dr. John Morgon of Philadelphia, Dr. William
Shippen, Jr. of Philadelphia, the second in seven generations of American physicians bearing his
name, and Dr. John Cochran.

Thomas Thacher, the first minister of the Old South Church of Boston, wrote the earliest
medical treatise printed in this country.
Smallpox was the first contagious disease which was found preventable, and Boston had
ten to twelve outbreaks before a cure was discovered.

The colonists of New England were brought in contact with smallpox from two sources.
In the early part of the 16th century the Spaniards introduced the disease into Mexico. It spread to
the American Indians, and one half of them are said to have died of it in a short time. Then it
spread to the colonists and in a century six epidemics occurred in Boston. The last of these
started in 1721 and more than one half took the disease. During this epidemic, inoculation was
used in America for the first time. Inoculation, the acquiring of smallpox in a mild form, was
introduced into America by Cotton Mather, son of Increase Mather, one time president of
Harvard.

George Washington had smallpox in 1751 and was an advocate of inoculation and
ordered that all recruits to the Continental Army, who had not already had smallpox, should be
inoculated. Martha Washington also protected herself in this way.

Dr. Edward Jenner, an English physician 1749-1823, perfected vaccination, and Dr.
Benjamin Waterhouse of Boston was the first physician in America to use vaccination as
prevention against smallpox.

Thomas Jefferson was the first president to be vaccinated against smallpox.

Syphilis appeared in the colonies in 1646 in Boston as recorded in the diary of John
Winthrop, and there was a disease called itch caused by the itch-mite, which burrowed under the
skin and caused small itching blisters in the days when there were few or no bath tubs or baths,
but no one thought it the result of uncleanliness at that time.

Sanitation is medicine's greatest contribution to general history and has made the modern
village and city possible and safe.

In the 17th century all sorts of silly remedies and cure-alls were resorted to, and belief in
witch-craft to heal reached its height.

The following are a few of the old remedies and prescriptions:
To prevent tooth decay, eat a whole mouse twice a month.
For colic, take ½ gill good corn brandy, fill a pipe full of tobacco, soak in brandy,
then drink the brandy.
To make children's teeth grow without pain, boil the brain of a hare and rub the
gums of the children with it and the teeth will grow without pain.
To drive away warts, roast chickens feet and rub the warts with them; then bury
the chicken’s feet under the leaves.

The old mustard plaster still holds its own. Likewise does the combination of rhubarb and
soda, which is now put up according to doctor's prescriptions for sufferers from digestive ills.
Then there was the good old sassafras tea to build up one's blood in the spring. Chamomile tea
was a good stomach tonic for convalescents. Tansy, senna and pennyroyal are still used as
remedies for the various ills they are supposed to cure. Aconite tea was an old favorite in fever
cases. Saffron tea was credited with "bringing out" measles and chickenpox, while sage tea was
reputed to be able to help the air preserved its color.

One of the queerest doses of the early settlers was "snail water." The recipe for this
"water", which is one of early New England's greatest curiosities, follows: "Take a peck of
garden shell snails and put them in an oven till they have done making noise, then take them out
wipe from them the green froth that is upon them, and bruise them, shells and all, in a stone
mortar.---Then lay in the bottom of the distilling pot, angelica (two handfuls), and two handfuls
of celandine upon them, to which put two quarts of rosemary flowers, bearsfoot, agrimony, red
dock roots, bark of barberries, betony wood, sorrel, of each two handfuls, rue one handful; then
pour-over them three gallons of the strongest ale, and let it stand all night; in the morning put in
three ounces of cloves, beaten, six pennyworth of beaten saffron and on top of them six ounces
of shaved hartshorne; then set on the limbeck and receive the water by pints, which will be nine.
Take two teaspoonfuls in four spoonfuls of small beer in the morning, the like in the afternoon."
This concoction was given to children internally as tonic and was used on them as a lotion for
rickets.

A remedy for a case of Dysentery taken from a medical book "The Practice of Physick"
published by Peter Cole in Leaden Hall, September 2, 1657, London, gives the following
observation. "A Dysentery." "A young man 20 yrs. of age, born about the end of August 1643
was troubled with a dysentery 12 daies together; which he took no medicine for, until being
brought into the hospital, he took by order of the Physician thereof, one dram of Salt of viteriel,
dissolved in water. He vomited much flegmatick and cholerick matter, and so the humor flowing
into his guts was revelled, and he, cured by this only medicarment."

V. G. Cramer
Notes from: "The Lame, the Halt and the Blind"
"The Pathfinder."
H.W. Haggard, M.D.

John Hahn, Revolutionary War Patriot

Johannes (John) Hahn was born in Frechenfeld, Pfalz, Germany on 12 Jun 1712, to Maria Otillia Eichenlaub and Johan Jacob Hahn. Around 1737, he married Elizabeth Margaretha Forster, daughter of Jonas Forrester, in Freckenfeld, Pfalz, Germany. They had seven children in Germany before emigrating from Germany to Philadelphia, arriving 7 Oct 1751, on the ship Janet and taking the Oath of Allegiance. John Hahn had to work for at time in Philadelphia to finish paying his passage. After his debt was paid, he worked as a laborer until he had enough money for a small farm.

According to Hahn historian, Linda Setzer, “Johannes Hahn and his family lived in Philadelphia for 14 years [until about 1765], before coming to North Carolina's Rowan County, which today is Catawba County. By then his first wife had died, and he had married Agnes, whose last name has been alternately shown as Langle, Legnin and Langnin and perhaps some others. It is uncertain which is correct. By the time his family was complete, he had fathered more than 20 children, some of whom had left North Carolina for parts West. In some cases, their children did so. Along the way Johannes's last name changed from Hahn to Hawn or Honn or Haun or even Hohne or Hahne. There may be other spellings of which I am unaware. One record says Johannes had changed his name to honor King George but I have been unable to find proof.”
Agnes Langlin married John Hahn on 26 Jul 1757 at Canadochly Union Church, in York, PA. Five children were born before they came to NC. The story is told that their sixth child was born in a wagon on the night they first arrived on what was later to become their home. They crossed the Catawba River at Sherrill’s Ford and moved to the southwestern side of the county, near the Wideners (Whiteners) who were friends. Historian Walter Hahn says, "Johannes Hahn took up camp at that location for four weeks and within this period of time, in company with his sons, set about to locate their home in the south. After a few days prospecting, he located and selected a homesite on both sides of Henry's River, now Burke and Catawba County line. After a house, the next building erected was a building to shelter the stock, and a loom house, for his loom, since he was a weaver by trade. The location of the above homesite of Pioneer Hahn is five miles east or southeast of the present city of Hickory, N.C.” (Source: Linda Setzer, Johannes Hahn Family History).

This is the time when Johannes began to use the name John. Though they attended Old St. Paul’s Lutheran in Newton, for a while, they built a church, Zion Lutheran, nearer to their home, which still stands and where Johannes Hahn and Agnes Langlin are buried. Zion Lutheran Church is just off Highway 321 S in the Mountain View community on Zion Church Road.

The inscription on the tombstone is in German, and translated reads, "The one on the cross is my love, My love is Jesus Christ, Johannes Han, born June 12, 1712." John Hahn died 12 Apr 1793. Agnes died 13 Apr 1814.

During the Revolutionary War, John Hahn gave aid to the Americans and is considered to be a Revolutionary War patriot. His grave is on the Revolutionary Patriot register. His DAR patriot number is A049131.

One other story that helps give personality to the family is told by Catawba County historian George Yoder: “After the Revolutionary war there was a gang of bandits, who was headed by one Joe Brown, roving over the country plundering and robbing the people. So it happened while this old pioneer, John Hahn, was in his loom house weaving, he spied this gang of plunderers come to his house. It is said that he threw his money purse under the floor. They came to his loom house and demanded his money. They told him if he did not tell where it was they would hang him. This had no bearing and he still refused to tell where it was hidden. So, according to their threatnings [sic], they gathered a rope that was found in the loom house and fastened it around his neck. They again demanded he tell them where his money was but, true to his word, would not tell them. So they drew him up until he got, as it was said, blue. Then at last they let him down and told him that if he would not tell them where his money was they would take his fine steed, and two of his daughters heard their remark. And it is said that they ran to the wood pile and gathered the axes and ran to the stable and took their stand at the door; and, when they came to the stable and demanded the door to be opened, they stood there with drawn axes and said that the first one who attempted to open the door they intended to make sausage of him. They were stout and robust young women and possessed the courage of lions. They scared the bandits so bad that they left in a big hurry and never got the fine steed.”