BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES
Ezra Fletcher Stuntz and Jane Ann Stitt
Ezra Fletcher Stuntz was born on October 8, 1838 in Pennsylvania, the only child of George and Sarah (Ball) Stuntz and the last of George's eleven children. George was 49 when Ezra was born.
Jane Ann Stitt was born June 25, 1836 to Israel T. Stitt and Sally Sherman in Pennsylvania.
Ezra and Jane were married on October 16, 1860, the same year that Abraham Lincoln was elected President. They had two children, Emma Jane Stuntz, born in 1862, and Charles Otho Stuntz, born in 1864.
The Civil War officially began when South Carolina militia forces attacked Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was issued in September of the following year. The Proclamation had the interesting effect of slowing the flow of volunteers into the Union army when Northern workers began to perceive that the war was less about preserving the Union and more about freeing slaves who might travel north and compete for jobs. The decline in enlistments led to the passage of the Conscription Act in March of 1863. The Act generally required the enlistment of men between the ages of 20 and 45.
Ezra, who was 24 in March of 1863, was subject to the Conscription Act. The legislation, however, allowed for the hiring of a substitute or the payment of $300 to avoid service. Ezra opted to pay the $300 rather than join the army.
Jane died on August 18, 1864, four months after the birth of her son. She was 28 years old. She was buried in Hope Cemetery in Wellsburg, Pennsylvania.
Ezra married Caroline Pierce on September 10, 1865, with whom he had six children:
Caroline died in 1899.
Ezra died on June 23, 1906 in Elk Creek Township, Erie County, Pennsylvania and was buried in East Springfield, Pennsylvania.
Ezra reportedly had in interest in family history and was said to have had a notebook in which he recorded genealogical information. A copy of an anonymous handwritten record about the family of his grandfather, Conrad Stuntz, is in the possession of his descendants and may have been part of that notebook.
Sources & Related Information
Jane Ann Stitt
Jane and Ezra