Alexander McCracken : Short Biography

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Alexander McCracken was born in Caledon, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland in 1749. In the 1770's he worked as a stone mason on the Alexander family estate. In 1782/3 he eloped with a local girl, Margaret Marshall, daughter of Henry Marshall of Derrykintone Cottage. About a year later, they emigrated to the United States. Their first son, Henry, died during the voyage and was buried at sea. The family continually moved westward, by 1785 Alexander and Margaret settled in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, where most of their children were born - Sarah, Lillian, William, Robert, James, Alexander, Henry II and Martha. (The 1790 census lists the family in Butler County.) Around 1796 the family moved again, this time to Westmoreland County where four more children children were born - Margaret, John, Jane, and Arthur. Another move took place around 1806 to Allegheny County, where their last child, Mary ‘Polly' was born. As the children became adults they continued to migrate westward, settling primarily in Ohio. By 1820 Margaret and Alexander also moved to Ohio, where they purchased land in Sugar Creek Township, Greene County. Margaret died 19 June 1827 in Xenia, Greene County. Sarah J.Smith, wrote in 1877, "My grandfather (AlexanderMcCracken) was a great singer. He used to amuse us children from dark til bedtime after he was 70 years old, singing the songs he sang to his wife." In his later years Alexander lived with his eldest son, William, in Cambridge, Ohio. He died at the age of 102 on 9 September 1851, Cambridge, Ohio. "He was living at the home of his son, William, was in good heath and in active possession of his physical and mental faculties. There were two doors, side by side on the porch, one opening into the kitchen, the other to the cellar stairs. In the dusk he opened the wrong door and stepped off,
falling down the stairs and resulting in his death."