Piatt and Cist family Connections

DAVID:          Now we are over here at the -- what we call the Stone Church.  This is outside of West Union, Ohio, right in the middle, a lot of where the Piatt families were.  Of course, a lot of the Piatt's were farmers, so a lot of them didn't get necessarily moved to cemeteries.  But this old Stone Church was built in the early 1800s and several of the Piatt names are carved along the base of it and stuff.  This is the Piatt end of the cemetery, down through here (camera pans cemetery).  Unfortunately, a lot of these stones are marble and they haven't weathered over the hundred and fifty, two hundred years that they've been in here.  Some of them have not weathered very well, so there's a lot of fading and stuff like that.  But this is one of the oldest documented cemeteries where there are Piatt's and stuff at.  But like I said, the names are carved into the stones along the walls and stuff.  And as a matter of fact, the generation, my brother's stone and his wife are -- carved their names into the church, too.  So it's been just a tradition that the families, when you get married into the Piatt's, you bring them over here and they carve their name in the stone church, and then when they get divorced, we sand it out and put the new name on.  Sort of --

ANDREW:     Okay.  (Laughs.)

DAVID:          It's sort of an -- also a family tradition.

ANDREW:     Yes.

DAVID:          Back in the old days when the wife died -- a lot of women died unfortunately during childbirth, so like my grandfather was one of four, was actually born (phonetic) -- was one of the youngest children of the fourth wife.  The other wives had died in childbirth and stuff like that.  But after the medical advances and stuff like that, it turned out that the Piatt men weren't having to change wives four and five times.  So then Moses created divorce and so we use that process now to change wives four or five times --

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          -- during our lifetime, and it works easier.

ANDREW:     Okay.  David, do you know anything about the history of this old tree (indicates)? 

DAVID:          No.  I know some of these are old cedar trees and stuff around here and things.  This one -- that one is -- for a cedar tree, that is a humongous old tree (camera indicates tree).

ANDREW:     What?  That tree right there?

DAVID:          Yeah.  Yeah.

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          They don't get that big --

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          That's a -- that's probably a hundred and fifty, two hundred years old.

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          But when they put that fence and stuff up in the early '20s, they thought they had most of the cemetery fenced in.  There is some question about whether or not there weren't more graves up here under these old oak trees and stuff, so --

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          But that's where they put the fence and that's where it's at.  But a lot of the stones were literally like this right here (indicates).

ANDREW:     Uh-huh.

DAVID:          A stone.  I mean, they might be carved and they might not be carved at all.  But a lot of the graves -- and the -- the church, if the church was open today, we could go in and I could show you the plat and they would show you who was in some of these graves or who they think were in some of these graves.

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          But you're basically -- this is the Piatt end of it right here.

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          We were talking about that Burr that was up there that you took a picture of and stuff.  That is the descendents Aaron Burr's family.  This is where he came when he -- after the duel with Alexander Hamilton, when he killed Hamilton, he came over here and hid -- or basically low-profile, and West Union is just about as low-profile as you can get.

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          But it's kind of funny because it's a very surprising size town.  But it was a crossroads and it was a farming community, and this is where people came.  But as you can see, the old marble stones did -- do not and have not weathered well.  (Indicates headstone.)  You know, they just don't.  It makes it very difficult.  And like you were talking about, the small ones were usually for children and stuff.  See, look how many of these have fallen and laid down and stuff.

ANDREW:     Yes.

DAVID:          But you're also in the flats up here, and this is a -- not a necessarily what -- this would probably what you'd have to consider -- Ohio is tornado alley.

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          There's been a lot of storms and stuff go through here.  And this is mostly sandy soil and it doesn't stand up well.  You see how all the stones are leaning or tilting and no matter what you do or how you try, it seems like that over the years…

ANDREW:     Now, when I've been on Route 32, I've seen signs for Seaman and it looks like the Seaman's and the Piatt's married into each other or --

DAVID:          They were, and that's what -- this is the Seaman's…

ANDREW:     Oh, I see.

DAVID:          These are the Seaman's that founded Seaman, Ohio.

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          But they're here, buried here because this is where the family was.

ANDREW:     I see.

DAVID:          And there's two Civil War generals buried in here. 

ANDREW:     Well -- well --

DAVID:          Sam Mason (indicates headstone), he was in the Civil War.

ANDREW:     That's --

DAVID:          He died --

ANDREW:     -- Colonel Samuel Mason?

DAVID:          Yes.  And then there's a…

ANDREW:     Okay.  And he fought for the Union side, correct?

DAVID:          Right.  Yeah.  And…

(Camera pans headstones.)

DAVID:          I'm not sure who the other one was, where he's at.  He has a white marble stone. 

ANDREW:     And who's on up here? 

DAVID:          Well, that's like my -- that's like I told you, my grandfather always said he married a black woman.  This is -- this is Sarah Piatt.  This is Ann Troy (phonetic) Piatt, Jacob Piatt.  These go all the way back to 1800, born in 1800s and died, what, 1802.

ANDREW:     Okay.  Jacob Piatt, I think, was the merchant in Cincinnati.

DAVID:          Right.  Well, this is his grave.

ANDREW:     Okay. 

DAVID:          Yeah. 

ANDREW:     Very interesting.

DAVID:          Yeah.  And that's a -- Benjamin.

ANDREW:     Oh, Benjamin. 

DAVID:          Benjamin --

ANDREW:     Okay.

DAVID:          -- Piatt right here (indicates).

ANDREW:     Yes.

DAVID:          And it doesn't seem like much, but you got to remember in that time, a lot of these people did not have elaborate stones.  And then this (indiscernible) outlandishly ornate for a -- over the period.  So you can see right down from the Piatt's, you've got -- this is where the black (indiscernible) down here, and that's where Papaw always said he married a black woman.  That's -- that's what the joke was. 

But what's amazing is these people live -- you know, back in a time when people were only living to be 30, 40 and 50 years old, these people lived to be -- now, this one is not, but like the Piatt, he lived to be 80 years old, and there are several of them that lived to be 75 and 80 years old, which was kind of unheard of.  But my grandpa, when he was born, his dad was 70 years old.  He was on his fourth wife and was 70 years old when grandpa was born, was the youngest.

ANDREW:     Amazing.

DAVID:          Amazing.

ANDREW:     (Laughs.)

DAVID:          (Indiscernible.)

ANDREW:     And the date, 1859, is on the top of the --

DAVID:          That's one of the ones that's carved in.

ANDREW:     -- building, yeah.

DAVID:          (Indiscernible) I'm trying to think of where the -- like I said, if they couldn't afford the stones, sometimes they carved their name in the building.  But this is sandstone, locally quarried and it weathers so the names fade.

(End of recording.)

Thank you Krista Willis of quilstranscription.com for transcribing videos.

This video was produced before my trip to Philadelphia this spring before I met new Cist family cousins. During my trip to Philadelphia I have learned that Jacob Cist (son of Charles Cist, printer) had information about Jefferson County, Ohio in his family papers from the late 1790's- to early 1800's when Jacob Cist was living in Washington, D. C. Why would an individual from Philadelphia / Washington, D. C. areas have information about Jefferson County, Ohio? Was Jacob Piatt who is buried in Piatt cemetery named after Jacob Cist? Could Piatt family and Cist family married into each others before Henry M. Cist was the Don Piatt family lawyer? This is a piece of the puzzle when the Cist family decided to move west to Cincinnati, Ohio.
Andrew C. Allen
pewabic34 at gmail.com