Where have the centuries gone?  Did you know we are only two years away from the bicentennial of the Robbins family in Decatur County, Indiana?

In 1822 the Robbins family first came to Decatur County, Indiana.

In 1922 the Robbins family, and all related families, celebrated the first 100 years of the family being in that county.

In 2022 we could celebrate the family’s bicentennial in Decatur County.

 

1822

The Robbins families, and in-laws, seem to have first arrived in the area of Decatur County in 1821.  By spring of 1822 (our “official” year of arrival), many of them had filed on land claims.  We have a narrative history of the Robbins family, written and read by William F. Robbins, at the 1922 reunion.  While not always accurate in the details, the gist of the document has proven more endurable.  W. F. Robbins described the arrival of the family in Decatur County, led by children of William Robbins, Sr.:

However, the [earlier] expedition was not entirely fruitless, for our ancestors saw something of what was to them at least the unexplored territory of Indiana.  After returning to their homes, they organized a hunting and trapping expedition and again entered the wilderness exploring along the streams and following them north towards their sources until they had penetrated as far north as the present site of Greensburg, and along Clifty to the present site of Milford.  This expedition killed the last of the beavers on the extensive beaver ponds in the vicinity of Alert and along Sandcreek and Clifty Creek.

Thus, it came about that when these hardy people decided to seek a home in what was then called the New Purchase, they were not entirely strangers to the locality in which they intended to make their future residence.

In August 1821 they came to Decatur County which had then been surveyed and named, and in which a government was being organized.  Having selected their locations they went to Brookville, Ind., where the Government Land Office was then located, and filed for entry.  John filed on eighty acres just north of where Mt. Pleasant Church is located, William took eighty acres east of Horace where John E. Robbins now (1922) lives.  Nathaniel filed for eighty acres of what has since been known as the Isaac Taylor farm.

Daniel Herrin came with them and filed for one-hundred and sixty acres between the last named locations in the spring of 1822.  At the same time Sarah Anderson took up land adjoining John E. Robbins.  These people were accompanied by a number of their kin.

If their father came with them, which is not unlikely, he undoubtedly settled as a squatter, as he did not take any entry until 1832 when he filed on the eighty acres adjoining that of his son Nathaniel on the west.  Soon after, all of William’s children came except Elizabeth Wadkins and settled near the location of their father.  Jacob and Marmaduke settled on what is known as the Jesse Styer’s farm now; Polly who had been married to John Kirkpatrick, on the farm known by that name; Docia, who married John Herrin, where Burks Chapel now is; and Abe Anderson who married Lottie settled on what is now known as the Levi Whipple farm.

The family of William’s brother Absalom soon followed:

The first of Absolem’s family to come was Nancy who had married her first cousin Nathaniel.  She was soon followed by her oldest sister Elizabeth who had married Philip Starks and they constructed their first cabin just across the road from the present residence of Orange Logan in Clay Twp.  About the same time came Absolem himself and located on the Alex Purvis place.  Next came Micajah who entered forty acres of what afterwards became the DeArmond farm.  Then came Mahala who married David May, also her brother Greenburg, and located in the same neighborhood but did not purchase land, and soon afterward moved on to Missouri.  About 1830-32 the rest of Absolem’s family arrived, John and Absolem the second, located on Sandcreek west of Pin Hook where they built a mill later known as Layton’s Mill.  There is still part of a dam visible by the mill-site but no mill by the dam-site!  George came, settling on forty acres west of the Whipple Bridge, on a hill, Charity, his sister who married James Hanks was a cousin of Abraham Lincoln.  (“A history of the Robbins families,” by W. F. Robbins, Greensburg Standard, 16 June 1922).

Jacob Robbins Jr., Nathaniel’s later partner in the trek to Oregon in 1852, was the first of Jacob Robbins’ children to move to Decatur County.  The elder Jacob appears to have lived in Scott County before finally moving north.  (The parents of William, Absalom, and Jacob, probably never lived in Indiana.  The last confirmed record of Jacob the eldest is in 1804 in Shelby County, Kentucky, when he gives permission for his daughter Margaret to marry.)

1922

In June of 1922 there was a huge celebration just outside Greensburg at the Liberty Baptist Church, where the descendants of the original settlers gathered in one huge reunion.  The reunion also celebrated the recent birthday of James Gilman Robbins, grandson of William Sr.  A more recent historical article in the Greensburg Daily News (“Hard to find anyone but ‘robins’” by Pat Smith, Local Column, 12 Dec. 2018) provided some information about that reunion:

After the morning service, there was a “magnificent dinner” at noon that was spread in a huge tent on the lawn of the church. At least 500 persons attended the service, the dinner and the all-day family meeting.

Roy Kanouse, who had married into the Robbins family, presided and was said to have put a lot of “pep” and fun in to the service. Kanouse had a shoe store on the east side of the Courthouse Square and was well known for his humor. The ads he made up for his shoe store in the Daily News were said to be anticipated by readers because of his brand of humor.

The Floethlyn Orchestra was there. Many of you will remember Florine Tillson, who taught piano and played piano in that popular orchestra. She lived on N. Franklin Street in Greensburg.

The orchestra played several selections with Ethel Shellhorn Evans singing one of them. Gladys and Martha Robbins played a piano duet. Corrine Thurston and Marie Whipple sang a duet. Mr. and Mrs. Cliff Davis and son sang a selection, and the song “God Be With You Till We Meet Again” was sung by all those present.

William F. Robbins gave a history of the early Robbins pioneers that was full of reminiscences of the founding fathers of the family. He and his cousin, Will S. Robbins, agreed that the Robbins men had for a century stuck close to the farm and were regular dirt farmers. He said the first Robbins explored Decatur County before the county was settled, and when they came here in 1822 they knew the lay of the land and scattered from Westport to Greensburg so numerously that it was “ hard to find any other birds except robins.”

Family and friends came from Indianapolis, Michigan, Kokomo, Letts, Horace, Greensburg, Westport, Hartsville, Tipton, Burney, Hope, Chicago, New York City, Lebanon, Carthage, Franklin, Muncie, Milroy, Adams, and St. Paul.

2022

In two years we will arrive at the 200^th anniversary of the Robbins family in Decatur County, Indiana.  Should we have another reunion to celebrate?  What do we need to do to make this happen?  Who wants to be involved?  Do we have contacts in Greensburg and Decatur County who can help work on this?

There are a lot of things to consider but initially the two most important are:

• is the interest great enough to warrant a bicentennial celebration?
• do we have people who are willing to work on planning the event?

We would need to create a planning committee that would set to work determining a date and venue, deal with financial considerations, create a Facebook page or website about the reunion, get the word out to family members around the country, and more.  Remote meetings in today’s climate – whether online in a format like Zoom or through email and phone – would be quite easy to do.  Who’s with me?  Such an event only happens once every 100 years!

Kevin Mittge

(mittge@yahoo.com)