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Henry A. Ritner
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HENRY A. RITNER, the popular and efficient postmaster of Bruin, Pennsylvania, is a leading citizen of this place and he is also an honored veteran of the great Civil War.
Mr. Ritner was born at Darlington, Beaver County, Pennsylvania, April 22, 1837, and is a son of Nathaniel and Isabella B. (Vogan) Ritner. Mr. Ritner can trace a distinguished ancestry. His great-grandfather Ritner was a native of Alsace, France, and after coming to America, established his home in Lancaster County. His son, Joseph Ritner, founded the Crawford County branch of the family, and he bore the same name as did his cousin, Governor Joseph Ritner, who was once the chief executive of Pennsylvania. On the maternal side the family was noted for its military valor. Great-grandfather James Vogan serving with distinction in the Revolutionary War and Grandfather James Vogan being equally prominent in the War of 1812. The latter was one of the early settlers in Butler County, coming before the first courthouse was erected — a simple log structure which stood on the site of the present fine building — and he attended the first session held there. Henry A. Ritner was about nine years old when his father died and three years later he accompanied his mother, stepfather George Clupper, and other members of the family, to Mercer County. His educational opportunities were meager and when fourteen years of age he was apprenticed to a shoemaker, at Grove City, with whom he remained for three years. Following this he worked as a journeyman until the opoening of the Civil War. He was then twenty-four years of age and, like thousands of other young men, had probably planned a life with which the booming of cannon and the terrors and dangers of war had nothing to do. Nevertheless, when duty called he answered the summons and on October 17, 1861, he enlisted in Company H, Fourth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, commanded by Col. Robert J. Phipps, of Franklin, Pennsylvania. After three years of hard service, Mr. Ritner was honorably discharged. In the interim he had participated in many of the most decisive battles of the whole war, including those of Fredericksburg, the second battle of Bull Run, Antietam and the long series of engagements in the Shenandoah Valley. Although at all times a brave and fearless soldier, he escaped all serious injury and practically unharmed he returned to his home. In 1872 he came to Martinsburg, now Bruin, and for a time was engaged in the oil fields and then started his shoemaking shop and has been interested more or less in working at this trade ever since, although, since 1900, when he was appointed postmaster, his time has been mainly given to public duties. Mr. Ritner married Ann E. Davidson, who was born at Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania, and they have two children, Frank L. and Mary W., both residing at Bruin. Mr. Ritner and family belong to the Methodist Episcopal Church. In his political views he is a strong Republican. Formerly he served as commander of Lysander Robb Post, No. 530, Grand Army of the Republic, at Bruin, which subsequently was discontinued, but he has never lost his interest in this great organization of his comrades. Source: 20th century history of Butler and Butler County, Pa., and respresentative citizens, McKee, James A., 1909, page 613. |
