Sarah, Daughter of Jacob and Nancy Christlieb
1802–1885
Sarah Crislip was the youngest of fourteen children born to Jacob Christlieb and Anna "Nancy" Singer. She was born in Harrison County, Virginia, on 10 April 1802, about ten years following her family’s arrival from Hampshire County and two years after the Lewis and Clark expedition left St. Louis, Missouri, on their expedition.
Shown below is Sarah’s birth entry as it appears in an old family record.
Sarah was provided for in her father’s will. Drafted in April 1821, “I desire that my said two daughters Patty[Margaret] & Sally [Sarah] have out of my personal estate one cow, one bed & furniture, thereof and one spinning wheel each.” It is apparent that Jacob was making every effort to provide for his two youngest daughters, who were unmarried at the time.
Harrison County Marriage Bonds, Book 4, p. 207.
Four years after her father’s death, Sarah married her 29-year-old first cousin, Solomon Christlieb, in Harrison County, Virginia, on 19 October 1826. Solomon Christlieb was born 18 February 1797, in Mifflin Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. He was the youngest child of Sarah’s uncle, Carl Christlieb.
Sarah and Solomon’s marriage bond, which was procured sixteen days earlier on October 3rd, is shown above. It contains the signatures of Solomon and his Uncle Samuel Chrislip. Note the variety of surname spellings that occur in this document.
After their marriage, Sarah and Solomon Christlieb settled in Mifflin Township, in a log house on the farm that had belonged to the groom’s father. All of Sarah and Solomon’s children were born there.
In a letter to his cousin, Ervin G. Chrislip, in 1896, Benjamin Franklin Christlieb mentioned that his Aunt Sarah’s nose “had a slight inclination to the Roman.” He described Solomon as not having a high forehead or Roman nose, but he was of fair complexion with brown hair. Of this generation, he wrote that their eyes varied from gray to blue. It is unfortunate that his descriptions of Sarah and Solomon didn’t include more details, as there are no known photographs of either of them.
The Federal Census of 1870 for Mifflin Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, mentions Lucinda Christlieb living with her brother, Solomon Christlieb, Jr., along with mother, Sarah Christlieb, born 1804. According to the census, Sarah Crislip/Christlieb was born two years later than the old family record, which shows her birth in 1802.
After 24 years of marriage, Solomon Christlieb died in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania at age 53, on May 11, 1850. Sarah lived on for another 35 years, dying in 1885, at age 83. Sarah and Solomon are buried in Ziegler’s Graveyard in Mifflin Township, Cumberland County.
Benjamin Franklin Christlieb reported that, after Solomon died, Sarah often sought the advice of her relative, Jason W. Eby. Their familial relationship is explained thusly:
Simon and Elizabeth Singer were the parents of Sarah’s mother, Nancy. Upon the death of Simon Singer, his widow, Elizabeth, married Henry Eby, grandfather of Jason W. Eby. A highly respected man of the community, Mr. Eby was a half-second cousin to Sarah.
Ned Crislip at the site of Sarah and Solomon's farm in 1983.
Children of Sarah Crislip and Solomon Christlieb
Josiah Christlieb (Friedrich Carl Christlieb1, Carl Christlieb2, Solomon Christlieb3 & Sarah Crislip3) [832], born 12 April 1828; died 8 July 1852; Josiah Christlieb “married Catherine Saunders and died within a year after his marriage without issue.” The Christlieb Family, p. 26. Josiah died, 8 July 1852; buried Ziegler’s Church graveyard, Mifflin Township in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. After his death, Catherine Christlieb sold her husband’s share of his father’s estate to her mother-in-law, Sarah.
Lucinda “Cynthia” Christlieb (Friedrich Carl Christlieb1, Carl Christlieb2, Solomon Christlieb3 & Sarah Crislip3) [833], born 11 July 1829; died 29 July 1910; buried, 31 July, Ziegler’s Church graveyard, Mifflin Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. Said to have had blond hair, Lucinda married, at age 46, in December, 1876, John Lay, born 20 October 1819; died 26 June 1885. No issue. This was John Lay’s second marriage.
Matilda Ellen Christlieb (Friedrich Carl Christlieb1, Carl Christlieb2, Solomon Christlieb3 & Sarah Crislip3) [834], born 29 October 1830, Mifflin Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania; died 29 June 1856, Mifflin Township, Cumberland County; married Joseph Edward Heckman, born 1828. Matilda and Joseph Heckman reportedly removed to Indiana.
Solomon Christlieb, Jr. (Friedrich Carl Christlieb1, Carl Christlieb2, Solomon Christlieb3 & Sarah Crislip3) [836], born 3 July 1833, Mifflin Township, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania; died 26 April 1907, Mifflin Township, Cumberland County. Solomon was buried in Ziegler’s Church graveyard in Mifflin Township.
