John Doutt & Elizabeth/Catherine Good

John Doutt (traditionally given as Johannes Daut or Dautt) was born on February 18, 1778, in either west-central Germany or eastern Pennsylvania. John and/or possibly his parents came to America sometime in the late 1700’s. Like so many other German families the Doutt’s were Lutherans or Mennonites and most likely fled Germany seeking religious freedom and land ownership opportunities. They probably sailed from the Hamburg or Bremen, with a brief stop in England, before reaching the entry port of Philadelphia after a long and difficult journey.

Many of these Pennsylvania-based German immigrants (including John Doutt), from various religious backgrounds including Lutherans, Anabaptists, Amish, and Mennonites, formed traditional, tight-knit religious sects and came to be referred to as the Pennsylvania Germans or more popularly as the Pennsylvania Dutch.

After reaching adulthood John, a tanner (maker of leather hides) by trade, moved around in various counties in the vicinity of Philadelphia. In 1801, John was living in Whitehall Township, Lehigh County, and was married to a woman named Elizabeth (maiden name unknown). She was born in Manheim Township, Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania, on October 21, 1782. They eventually had a total of six children: Reuben in October 1801, Daniel in June 1803, John in January 1805, Absalom in August 1806, Catherine in April 1811, and Salome in March 1813. Elizabeth passed away on March 13, 1813, a week after giving birth to son Salome. At the time they were residing in the village of Freidensburg in Wayne Township, Schuylkill County. Elizabeth was buried in the cemetery at the nearby St. John’s Lutheran/Reformed Church.

John was remarried to Catherine Good (or Guth) and bought some land in Northumberland County in partnership with another man. John and Catherine had at least three children: Amon in 1816, Amos in 1817, and Aron in 1824. In about 1818 - not long after son Amos was born - John sold his share of the land and they made their way west by wagon train to Butler County in western Pennsylvania. They settled in or near Harmony, the former self-sufficient communal village and home of the German religious sect known as the Harmony Society. Harmonist leader Johann Georg Rapp founded the village in 1804, but sold it to a group of Mennonites in 1814.

John may have taken on the occupation of a farmer in rural Connequenessing Township, Butler County. He died on March 9, 1830, and was buried in an unmarked grave in the Mennonite Cemetery in Harmony. He must have been an educated man because among his possessions were forty-two books, which was unusual in a time when most families only had a Bible. His wife Catherine moved in with son Aron and his wife Susan, who lived in (or later moved to) nearby Beaver County. Catherine’s date and place of death remains a mystery, though it is known that Aron later died in Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, in August 1900.

(NOTE: My direct line of ancestors is descended from Amon Doutt, who died in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, in 1896. He is the father of Joseph Henry Doutt and the grandfather of Margaret Matilda Doutt.)