Mudhouse Mansion

A story of neglect

     Christian Rugh was born October 9, 1803 and died August 18, 1873 in Berne, Fairfield, Ohio, USA. He married Eleanor Spohn on June 10, 1835. She was born in 1813 and died between 1900 and 1910 in Lancaster, Fairfield, Ohio, USA. 

     Christian Rugh and his wife Eleanor Spohn had four children: 

1. Mary Ann Rugh (1836-1907) married James Bright and lived in Walnut Township

2. William Henry Rugh (1839-1940) married Maria L. Sites & Clara Miller

3. Thomas B. Rugh (1842-1862) Union soldier died in Kentucky

4. Benjamin Franklin Rugh (1844-1925) married Catherine Martha Bunn and lived in Lancaster

     I don't know for sure who he purchased his land from. He probably got some of it from his father Peter Rugh. In early census records Peter Rugh is living in Pleasant Township next to or very close to Solomon Rugh. Christian's nearest neighbor until 1859 was Solomon Rugh. That was the year Solomon died and he ordered that his property be sold and the proceeds divivded amongst his heirs. Solomon's son David lived on the property for many years after his death. I'm unsure if he purchased the property from his father's estate or it took several years to sell. By 1866 the tract was owned by Henry G. Miller.

 

       Christian's brother-in-law Abraham Kagy moved to Seneca County, Ohio before 1830. This is one of the people commonly referred to as having sold him some land. Henry Byler was the other person often referred to as selling him a tract of land. No mention as to whether it was Senior or Junior. Henry Byler Sr died in 1846, and Henry Byler Jr lived very close to Christian Rugh until 1859 when he sold his Pleasant Township farm and moved to Wayne County, Ohio. 

     By 1860 Christopher Rugh owned his complete farm. It was valued at $11,520 and totaled 288A at the time and was still listed as a 288A plot on the 1866 map in section 23 of Pleasant Township. At the time of his death in 1873 it was 270A. He had lost the 13A top right corner to John Martz. 

Did he sell it or was there a border dispute? 

1866 Pleasant Township Map

     Sometime between 1866 and 1870 Christian Rugh purchased two plots of land in Berne Township totaling 183A from Abraham Stutzman. His oldest son had married Maria L. Sites in 1865 and was given the Pleasant Township farm to live on. Christian Rugh, his wife Eleanor, and his youngest son Benjamin Franklin went to live on the newly purchased farm in Berne.

1875 Berne Township Map

      

 

1875 Pleasant Township Map

     In 1873 Christian Rugh died and in his will he left all of his real estate to his wife and most of his personal property. In lieu of his wife's life estate or after her death, his oldest son William Henry Rugh was to have the Pleasant Township farm and his youngest son Benjamin Franklin Rugh was to have the Berne Township farms. His daughter was to get $7000 in profit from "Pleasant" and $3000 from "Berne".

     So, William Henry Rugh  "inherited" the Mud House Rd farm. He and his wife Maria L. Sites (1848-1890) had two children there; Thomas E. Rugh (1866-1887) and Minnie B. Rugh Dennison (1867-1959). 

     The house that sat on the property at that time was a typical farmhouse in the Federal style. It is immortalized in the 1875 Atlas of Fairfield County, Ohio. If you look at the photos of the farm below you can see the house in the background.

1875 Atlas of Fairfield, Ohio

 

Close up of the house with his children and dog playing on the right side

     After the death of his wife in 1890, William Henry Rugh moved to Madison Township in Pickaway County, Ohio. At this stage it is possible that the farm in Pleasant Township was either leased or just sat empty. No doubt there were still farm hands that ran the farm itself. Eleanor Spohn Rugh was still living and still technically owned both the Pleasant and Berne farms. 

    Sometime after 1875 the new brick 10 room mansion was built. It was a stately Victorian built in the Second Empire Style.  The smaller brick house on the property was probably a remodel of the older Federal Farmhouse. We know that it was a fairly new house because there are two later articles describing it as "newly improved" and "modern pressed brick house".

     Benjamin Franklin Rugh retired from farming and his mother died sometime between 1900-1910. In 1917 the farm is advertised for sale. 

   

     It was almost purchased by Lewis E. Ruff, of the Fairfield Oil & Gas Company. In the end it was purchased by Henry Hartman in 1919.

     

     The house probably would have been better off had it been bought by Lewis Ruff or anyone else for that matter. It appears that the house sat empty for most of it's life. Every time Henry Hartman was enumerated he was listed at his Pitcher Street address.  Did they lease the farm? Was it occupied by caretakers? Henry Hartman (1855-1930) and Martha Huffman (1862-1948) had three children; Helena W. Hartman (1884-1963), Lulu Victoria Hartman Mast (1888-1952), Harold J. W. Hartman (1892-1930).

      The house definitely had a lonely history filled with neglect but there doesn't seem to be anything sinister attached to it. There were no slaves. The Rugh family and many of the early families involved had a Mennonite background so they were likely against slavery. Thomas Rugh died in the Union Army. I can only find one person who likely died in the house and that was Maria L. Sites Rugh. Families very frequently had stillborn babies, young children die of fever's etc.,  so it's possible that there were a few more unreported deaths. There is also the chance that they leased the house but the families that owned it didn't seem to live in it. If anything happened in recent years it would be very unlikely that it would already be forgotten. 

     Final Verdict! The neglected nature of the house made it look sad and creepy but the ghost stories are a hoax perpetuated by troublemakers. It hastened it's demise by convincing people that it was okay to trespass on someone's privately owned land and destroy the little bit of beauty that was left.