Gravestone in the Factory Point Cemetery in Manchester, Vermont of John Smith

Gravestone in the Factory Point Cemetery in Manchester, Vermont of Mary Bull, wife of John Smith

My first two Smith ancestors were John Smith and his wife Mary Bull of Manchester, Vermont. He is certified as a veteran of the Revolutionary War by both the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) and the Sons of the American Revolution, with him having helped start and then serve as a Captain the Green Mountain Boys. For this reason, there is a statue of him in the middle of the square in downtown Manchester, Vermont. It was his son Abraham "Essence" Smith that moved to Ohio, and that I am descended from, with the last person named Smith in our family being my great-great-grandmother Flora Vanetta Smith who married Taylor Kern Hunsicker (see below). It is also from my Smith and Foster ancestors that I am descended from Charlemagne and much of European royalty (again, see below).

My great-great-grandmother, Flora Vanetta Smith, was the daughter of William Reuben Smith and Driscilla Ryland. She was born on the family farm in Relief, Ohio just above Beverly - along the Muskingham River. She became the nation's first woman telegraph operator during the Civil War by dressing up and pretending that she was a man. Through this job, she met and married my great-great-grandfather, Taylor Kern Hunsicker. As a railroad man, they moved from job to job, When a depression gripped the country, they briefly lived on the farm in Relief with her father, William Reuben Smith, but afterwards Taylor Kern Hunsicker was able to obtain a job as a stationmaster in Macon, George. They eventually bought a small farm and retired to Milford, Clermont County, Ohio where, after the death of Taylor Kern, Flora Vanetta continued to live in the house on the hill in Milford with her daughter, my grandmother, and my grandma. Flora had a love of music and played the hammer dulcimer.