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Note: The Neel Family as we know it today descended from Neel, Yarnell, Hall, and Simmons families. The earliest Neel identified today is Samuel Neel who lived in upper Tyrone Township in Fayette County, Pennsylvania. The 1850 U.S. Census shows a large number of Neels to be living in that area in the early 19th Century. name spelling varied from Neel to Neil to Neal to O'Neil to Neill, etc.
Our Samuel Neel is listed in the 1850 US Census for Lancaster County, PA., (p161) with his wife Martha and four children. One child, Jane Ellen, is shown to have been born in 1838 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He is indicated as being a blacksmith. This fact corresponds to information provided by Lola Neel that her Aunt Jane Ellen was born in 1838.
A brief biography written by Jane Ellen and told to us by Arlene Krings (husband a descendant of Jane Ellen (Neel) Hartwell) states that Samuel Neel and wife, Martha, moved to Uniontown, PA. in 1842 and lived there until 1853. They then moved to Indiana. Winfield, was born in Uniontown in 1852.
A Samuel Neil is recorded as a taxpayer in in 1785 Franklin County (near Uniontown) in Ellis' History of Fayette County, Vol II, 1882. This Samuel Neil paid taxes on one cow and one horse. It is not clear how this Samuel Neil may have been related to out Samuel Neel. There is also a Robert Neil listed in the same tax records as paying taxes on 299 acres of land in nearby Bullskin Township.
Samuel Neel is not shown in the Uniontown area in the 1840 nor the 1860 census. Jane Ellen was born in Lancaster in 1838; Winfield was born in Fayette County, Pennsylvania; the family is not in the Fayette county census of 1860; therefore the family lived in Lancaster area in the 1835-1840 time frame, in Fayette County in the 1850-1855 time frame and then moved on to West Point, Illinois where they lived when Winfield married Huldah Simmons.
According to a History of Marysville, Kansas, on the Winfield Neel Family, Samuel and Martha had left Pennsylvania when Winfield was an infant and moved to Switzerland County, Indiana where they lived for 9 years. They then moved to Newport, Kentucky before moving on to Hancock County Illinois. The 1870 Census shows Winfield as the only child still living at home.
A record of land sale in Hancock County shows David Simmons as acquiring land from a Joseph M. Yarnell, born in 1841 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
The History of Hancock County, Ill, p546 shows a Joseph Yarnell born in 1841 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, son of David and Margaret (Nell) Yarnell. Daivd Yarnell had been raised a Quaker. Mother was of Irish descent.
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