As with much of the Underground Railroad, very little can tell us whether John Crawford knew what Basil Biggs was up to when he lived on as a tenant farmer on Crawford’s land. Biggs and family moved to the area from Maryland in 1858, seeking to be in a non-slave-holding state and looking for educational opportunities for their children. The whole Biggs family, in some form or fashion, was involved in the Underground Railroad, and the Crawford/Biggs farm was frequently a conduit from the South to the mill of James McAllister and then on to Mathews’ Hill or other points north.

But there are some hints—John Crawford was a friend and associate of Thaddeus Stevens, the renowned lawmaker, lawyer, and abolitionist. It’s almost certain that they shared similar views on issues of the day. So who was John Crawford?

Early Life and Family Background

John S. Crawford was born in Pennsylvania in the late 18th century (circa 1797). He was the son of Dr. William Crawford (1760–1823), a distinguished physician-turned-politician, and his wife Ann. Dr. William Crawford had emigrated from Scotland and settled near Gettysburg, purchasing a farm along Marsh Creek in 1785. There he practiced medicine and later served as an associate judge of the new Adams County and even as a U.S. Congressman in the early 1800s. John grew up in this prominent Scotch-Irish family, rooted in the Cumberland Township area just outside Gettysburg. The Marsh Creek homestead that John would later inherit – often called the “Crawford farm” – was established by his father and became a productive farmstead on the western outskirts of town. With such lineage and resources, John S. Crawford was well-positioned in the community from the start.

Marriage and Children

In March 1833, John S. Crawford married Jane “Harriet” Paxton. Harriet was the daughter of Rev. William Paxton, the longtime Presbyterian minister of Lower Marsh Creek Church, and his wife Jane Dunlap. This marriage allied John with another of Adams County’s respected families. The young couple settled in the Gettysburg area and started a family. Their first child, Annie Dods Crawford, was born in January 1834 in Gettysburg. They also had a daughter Margaret Dods Crawford (born 1836) and a daughter Sarah B. Crawford (born 1839). Tragically, Harriet Paxton Crawford died on January 12, 1841, at only 29 years of age. The year 1841 was especially cruel to John – in June of that year both five-year-old Margaret and an infant daughter (Harriet J. P. Crawford, born late 1840) died just days apart. These losses left John a widower with two surviving young children: Annie (not yet 7) and Sarah (age 2).

A few years later, John found a new partner and mother for his children. On October 23, 1844, he remarried, wedding Elizabeth Irwin Smith of Mercersburg. Elizabeth came from a well-connected family herself – her father was William Smith (a War of 1812 veteran) and her mother Mary Johnston, so Elizabeth brought additional social ties. John and Elizabeth had a large family of their own. Their eldest son William H. Crawford was born in 1846 and later served in the Union Army during the Civil War. They had at least four other children: Anne Elizabeth Crawford (who later married J. M. Hawxhurst of Chicago), Mary Johnston Crawford (who married John M. Krauth of Gettysburg), Robert Smith Crawford (who settled in Hagerstown, MD), and George Douglas Crawford (who became a resident of Washington, D.C.). The names given to these children reflect both John’s family and Elizabeth’s – for example, “Mary Johnston” honored Elizabeth’s mother, and “Robert Smith” echoed Elizabeth’s maiden name. In total, John S. Crawford fathered around eight children between his two marriages, though not all survived to adulthood. Notably, his eldest daughter Annie D. Crawford grew up to marry Edward McPherson (on November 12, 1862), a prominent Gettysburg attorney, newspaperman, and politician who served as Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives during the Civil War and Reconstruction. Through Annie’s marriage, John S. Crawford became connected by family to one of Gettysburg’s most influential figures of that era (McPherson himself was the namesake of McPherson’s Ridge on the first day’s battlefield).

Legal Career and Civic Roles

John S. Crawford was trained in the law and became an attorney (“Esquire”) based in Gettysburg. He was admitted to the Adams County bar sometime in the 1820s and quickly established himself in legal practice. References from local records show him active in legal and civic affairs by the 1830s. For example, he served as a delegate or secretary at political meetings; one Democratic county convention in the 1850s lists “John S. Crawford, of Adams” as a secretary for the proceedings. His contemporaries knew him as John S. Crawford, Esq., a mark of respect for his profession and standing. During the war, he organized a local group to assist in Union efforts.

He remained active in the post-war period, hosting events that brought in speakers and luminaries like Thaddeus Stevens. As well, Crawford joined other Gettysburg citizens (including the wife of David Wills and other local leaders) in appealing for a Soldiers’ Orphans Home to be established in Gettysburg. An April 1870 petition to Congress bore his name among those seeking funds to shelter and educate the many children left fatherless by the war, showing Crawford’s sense of civic responsibility in the community’s recovery.

Religiously, John was almost certainly Presbyterian, in keeping with his upbringing and family ties (his first father-in-law Rev. Paxton led the Presbyterian church for over 50 years). John likely worshipped with the Presbyterian congregation in the Gettysburg area, and he maintained close ties with church families. His second wife Elizabeth was from a Presbyterian family in Franklin County, and John would have moved in those circles socially. There is no record of him holding a specific church office, but as a prominent Presbyterian’s son-in-law he would have been a respected member of the flock.

Economically, Crawford became quite prosperous. By 1860, he was listed as the 13th-wealthiest resident of Gettysburg. The federal census that year recorded his real estate holdings at $12,000 and personal estate at $5,500 – a considerable sum on par with the town’s elite. His occupation in 1860 was left blank, suggesting he may have semi-retired from active law practice and was living as a gentleman of means. In that year John was about 62 years old and residing with his wife Elizabeth and a household full of children (ranging from mid-teens down to a 7-year-old) on the north end of Gettysburg. The family’s home at that time was a substantial brick residence at 444 Harrisburg Street in Gettysburg. In fact, just prior to the Civil War the Crawfords moved into that house after it was vacated by the president of Pennsylvania College (now Gettysburg College) in 1861. The home was a large, sturdy brick building north of the town center – reflecting the family’s social stature.

Landholdings and the “Crawford Farm”

Aside from his town residence, John S. Crawford owned significant land in Cumberland Township, most importantly the family farm along Marsh Creek. This property, often referred to simply as the Crawford farm, was the same farm originally purchased by his father in the 1780s. It lay a few miles west of Gettysburg, near Marsh Creek and the old Black Horse Tavern road (sometimes called the “Plank road”). By the 1850s, John did not farm this land himself; instead, he leased it to tenants.

In 1858, an African American farmer and livestock veterinarian named Basil Biggs moved with his family to Gettysburg and became the tenant on Crawford’s Marsh Creek farm. Biggs was a free Black man from Maryland who sought better opportunities for his children in free soil Pennsylvania. John S. Crawford’s decision to lease to Basil Biggs is noteworthy – at a time when racial prejudice often made it hard for Black farmers to rent good land, Crawford’s arrangement with Biggs suggests a level of trust and open-mindedness. Biggs worked the Crawford farm (which was about 60–100 acres of arable land) and also practiced as a horse doctor. Local lore holds that during these years the farm became a stop on the Underground Railroad – fugitive slaves following Marsh Creek northward would find shelter at the Crawford/Biggs farm on their way to freedom. It’s said that Basil Biggs acted as a conductor on the Underground Railroad in Adams County, an “illegal and dangerous act” that likely could not have occurred without the tacit consent of the landowner. Whether John S. Crawford was directly aware of this activity is unknown, but at the very least he did not prevent his tenant from harboring freedom-seekers on the property, which speaks to Crawford’s reputation as a fair and perhaps progressively minded landlord in the community.

The Battle of Gettysburg: Impact on Crawford’s Properties

When the Gettysburg Campaign erupted in the summer of 1863, John S. Crawford was about 65 years old and a well-known figure in the area. As the Confederate Army approached, Basil Biggs and his family – along with many Black residents of the county – made the wrenching decision to flee northward for their safety. They knew that Confederate troops were abducting free African Americans to send south into slavery. Thus in late June 1863, the Biggs family hastily evacuated their home on the Crawford farm, leaving the property in the care of fate. John S. Crawford himself was likely in Gettysburg town during the battle. (There is no record of him evacuating, and as an older white resident he would not have been a target for the Confederates. He probably stayed in his Gettysburg house with his wife and younger children, bracing for the coming battle alongside other townsfolk.)

The Battle of Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863) brought devastation to Crawford’s holdings. On July 1, Confederate forces swept west and north of town, and by July 2–3 the area around Marsh Creek – including the Crawford farm – was behind Confederate lines. The farm became an emergency field hospital for wounded Confederates from Maj. Gen. Lafayette McLaws’ division, particularly the brigades of Generals William Barksdale and Paul Semmes. Ahead of the Confederate ambulance wagons “lay the John S. Crawford farm, which was worked by Basil Biggs, a black tenant farmer”civilwartalk.com. There, Confederate surgeons took over the farmhouse and barn. An operating table was set up in the dining room of the Crawford house, and “hundreds of wounded” were sheltered in every available space – the house, barn, sheds and yard. Witness accounts describe grisly scenes: amputated limbs piled up and makeshift graves being dug on the property as soldiers succumbed to their wounds. The farm’s proximity to the battle’s western flank (near the Peach Orchard and Wheatfield fighting) made it a critical hospital site just behind the lines. Soldiers who died there were hastily buried on the grounds. In fact, an estimated 45 Confederate soldiers were buried on John Crawford’s land in 1863. Among them were men of the 42nd Mississippi (a Captain Thomas Clark and his son Jonathan, who fell on July 1) and others in Georgia and Mississippi units who crawled or were carried to the Crawford farm for aid. The Cunningham farm across Marsh Creek (adjacent to Crawford’s) was used as a hospital for a neighboring brigade, and a footbridge connected it to the Crawford farm, shuttling wounded back and forth.

Meanwhile in town, John S. Crawford’s own house was not spared involvement in the battle’s aftermath. During the fierce fighting of July 1, Union Brigadier General Francis C. Barlow was severely wounded north of Gettysburg. After the battle, Barlow (who had initially been left for dead and then recovered) was taken to a Gettysburg residence to recuperate. Local tradition and some accounts indicate that he was cared for at John S. Crawford’s brick home on Harrisburg Street, which was used as a refuge for wounded Union officers. The Crawfords’ town house was “one of the locations” where Gen. Barlow was treated after his injuries. If so, then John S. Crawford can be said to have sheltered a high-profile Union survivor under his own roof while simultaneously, out on his farm, Confederates were being treated (and dying) under his absent roof. It is a striking dual role – his property aided the wounded of both sides in those grim July days.

When the battle ended and Confederate forces retreated on July 4, 1863, Basil Biggs and family returned to the Crawford farm to find a scene of utter ruin. The toll on the farm was appalling. Basil Biggs later filed a damage claim detailing the losses: 8 cows, 7 steers, 10 hogs gone; 8 tons of hay and 92 acres of crops destroyed or consumed. The family’s furniture and food stores had been ransacked – “ten crocks of apple butter, sixteen chairs, six beds” all missing or ruined. Fences were down, the fields were trampled, and the buildings had been scarred by their use as a war hospital. Basil Biggs also now had the grisly task of dealing with dozens of shallow graves on the property – 45 Confederate dead buried in his fields and garden. John S. Crawford, as landowner, faced the reality that his once-thriving farm had become a charnel ground. In the months after the battle, Biggs and Crawford would have had to cooperate with burial crews and possibly with Confederate reburial efforts years later. (Most of those Confederate dead were disinterred in 1872–73 and reburied in Southern cemeteries, but until then the Crawford farm was literally a cemetery for Barksdale’s men.)

For his part, Basil Biggs would earn recognition after the battle for his role in the creation of the Soldiers’ National Cemetery. In the fall of 1863, David Wills (Gettysburg lawyer and agent for Pennsylvania’s governor) advertised for contractors to exhume Union dead from battlefield graves and rebury them in the new national cemetery. Basil Biggs answered the call. He was hired to help supervise and carry out the exhumation of over 3,000 Union soldiers – an immense but vital task to honor the fallen. Biggs’s knowledge of the local terrain (including places like the Crawford farm where bodies lay) was invaluable. He eventually was paid about $1.50 per body and earned a substantial sum, which, combined with state compensation for his property losses (over $1,300), greatly improved his financial position.

After the War: Later Years and Legacy

After the Civil War, John S. Crawford was nearing 70, and he largely withdrew from active public life. He continued to own the Marsh Creek farm, but with Basil Biggs moving on to his own land, Crawford likely found a new tenant or left day-to-day farming to one of his sons or hired hands. In 1869, he sold the farm to Ed McPherson, and the farm remained in the Crawford family for many years – the descendants of Dr. William Crawford did not sell it until 1948.

John’s focus in the late 1860s and 1870s was on community affairs and family. As mentioned, he lent his name and effort to charitable causes like the soldiers’ orphans initiative. He also would have seen his older children marry and start their own households. His daughter Annie D. McPherson lived in Gettysburg where her husband Edward McPherson led a political newspaper and served in Congress. John’s son William H. Crawford survived his Union Army service and later married into a physician’s family in Warren, PA. Other children went on to notable careers: Robert S. Crawford became a businessman in Maryland, and George D. Crawford became a government clerk in Washington, D.C.. In these successes one can see John S. Crawford’s legacy of education and opportunity – he had raised a next generation that prospered beyond the farm.

John S. Crawford’s standing in Gettysburg remained one of a venerable elder. Neighbors and local historians remembered him as a man of substantial property and old-family prestige. In local memory he was sometimes overshadowed by his famous relatives – his father as an early congressman, his son-in-law as a political leader, etc. – but John himself was regarded as a solid, community-minded citizen. The fact that he employed and empowered a Black tenant like Basil Biggs, who went on to become a leader in Gettysburg’s African American community, speaks to Crawford’s fair reputation. There is no evidence that Crawford ever held partisan office himself (he was never an elected official), but he was politically active behind the scenes and was respected enough to be chosen as a convention secretary and to help lead postwar civic projects.

In 1876, John S. Crawford died in Gettysburg at approximately 79 years of age. (One source notes that he died in the “84th year of his age,” which may have counted from a slightly earlier birthdate, but most evidence points to 1797–1876 for his lifespan.) He was laid to rest in Evergreen Cemetery in Gettysburg, the same cemetery where his father Dr. William Crawford and mother Ann had been interred decades before. His widow Elizabeth lived on until 1899. John’s estate included several properties, which were divided among his surviving children. The Marsh Creek farm passed through the family line; the stately Harrisburg Street house would later be known as the “Crawford House” and remembered as a battle hospital site.

Local historians have not forgotten John S. Crawford’s role in the Gettysburg story – albeit a role often in the background. His name lives on in accounts of the battle’s hospitals and burial parties. For instance, guides on the battlefield still point out the Crawford farm site along Marsh Creek and note that “at the time of the battle it was occupied by tenant Basil Biggs,” and that it “contained wounded mostly from Barksdale’s and Semmes’ Brigades.” In a sense, John S. Crawford’s property became a part of the Gettysburg battlefield’s grim legacy.

Beyond the battle, John S. Crawford’s life reflects the broader currents of 19th-century Adams County: he was the son of a Revolutionary-era settler who helped found local institutions, he was himself a professional man and gentleman farmer bridging the agrarian past and the new post-war era, and he engaged with issues of race and nation (through Basil Biggs and the war’s aftermath) in a time of great upheaval. The community regarded him as a man of substance and integrity. He was wealthy but also generous in support of causes like the orphanage. His Presbyterian faith, family connections, and long residency made him a familiar patriarchal figure in Gettysburg.

In summary, John S. Crawford (c.1797–1876) led a noteworthy life as a landowner, attorney, and community leader in Cumberland Township. He managed to leave his mark not through flashy personal exploits but through his land and family. His farm became a stage for crucial events during and after the Battle of Gettysburg, and his tenant Basil Biggs’ success and prominence indirectly highlight Crawford’s positive role. In the local community John S. Crawford was seen as an esteemed elder statesman – the kind of man referred to with the honorific “Esquire” – and his economic status was among the top tier in Gettysburg society. Even though he did not seek the spotlight, history pulled his name in with the events of 1863. Today, one cannot tell the story of Gettysburg’s civilian experience – especially the story of the Black residents like Basil Biggs – without encountering John S. Crawford. His land, his family, and his choices all became threads in the larger tapestry of Gettysburg’s saga.