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120	HISTORY OF CAMBRIA COUNTY.
band she continued to live in Alsace nearly twenty years, and then in company with her only son, Aloysius, came to America, settled in Allegheny township, Cambria county, Pennsylvania, and died there in the year 1857. Her brother, Frank Gerber, came to America with Lafayette and his army and fought with the Continental forces during the revolution until the famous battle of Yorktown, when he was killed.     Aloysius Swope, only son and only child of Joseph and Mary (Gerber) Swope, was born in Pheterhausen, Alsace, August, 15, 1811. In 1833, when twenty-two years old, he came to America with his widowed mother and settled in Allegheny township, Cambria county. He bought a farm and farming was his occupation in life. He lived on the farm he first purchased for about fourteen years, and then removed to what was then White township, but now is Chest township. In this locality he acquired possession of two of the very oldest as well as the largest farms of Chest, township. The one he first occupied was known as the Glen Connell place, with which settlement much that is interesting in the early history of Chest township is associated. He purchased the farm from the McConnell heirs and built a house, the material for which, except the stone and logs used in its construction, was brought by wagon from Philadelphia. It was a very large house and for the time and place was considered almost a mansion. Here Mr. Swope lived a number of years and then bought what was known locally as the Proudfoot place, about two miles distant from the Glen Connell place. This locality, too, has its history, and here once lived Richard J. Proudfoot, a distinguished member of the Pennsylvania legislature in 1857 and 1861. Here Mr. Swope spent the remaining years of his life and died April 12, 1879.     Aloysius Swope was a capable and successful business man. Many years before his death he saw the importance of the ownership of considerable tracts of land and made purchases accordingly. These lands have since become quite valuable and are still owned by his descendants. He took little interest in the affairs of the community, and being an invalid led a rather quiet life. At the beginning of the late civil war he was too old to enlist, but sent three of his sons to the service, one of whom, Peter J. Swope, died in the Broad and Cherry Streets Hospital in Philadelphia, October, 1863. His death was due to fever contracted while at the front.     In 1838 Aloysius Swope married Mary Noel, a daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth (Spiecher) Noel, then of Allegheny township. Mr. Noel was a native of Rhenish Prussia and came from the Fatherland to America in 1834. He was a farmer by principal occupation. Children of Aloysius and Mary (Noel) Swope: 1. Joseph Peter, see forward. 2. Peter Jacob, died unmarried. He enlisted in Company A of the Eleventh Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry in 1862, and died in the Hospital in Philadelpbia, October 1863, from fever contracted in the service. 3. John Michael, married Emma Lamborn and lives at Westover, Clearfield county, Pennsylvania. He enlisted in Company F of the Fourth Pennsylvania Volunteer Cavalry, and served one year during the war of 1861-65. 4. Henry, married Helena Farabaugh and lives near Patton, Pennsylvania. 5. Annie, unmarried, lives on a farm near St. Lawrence, Cambria county. 6. Elizabeth, unmarried, lives on the farm near St. Lawrence with her older sister Annie and her younger sister Rachel. 7. Rachel Matilda, unmarried, lives on the farm with her sisters Annie arid Elizabeth Swope.     Joseph Peter Swope, eldest of the children of Aloysius and Mary

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