Stuntz, John

Born: 1780-04-10 Pennsylvania

Died: 1853-12-24

Stuntz and his wife, Elizabeth Hill, moved to Illinois in 1804, settling in St. Clair County. A tanner and furrier by trade, Stuntz purchased several tracts of land south of Belleville, Illinois. From 1824 to 1830, he served as a member of the Board of Commissioners. In 1825, he signed a document while serving on the board to organize the county's first school districts. During the Black Hawk War, Stuntz was a captain of a company of the Illinois Volunteers. In 1832, St. Clair County voters elected Stuntz, a Whig, into the Illinois House of Representatives. He lost his re-election bid in 1834, but in 1836, he was elected again into the Illinois House of Representatives. His wife, Elizabeth, with whom he had seven children, proceeded him in death in 1839.

Gravestone, Plot: Row 5, Grave 20, Spitznass-Wilderman Cemetery, Freeburg, Illinois; Gravestone, Plot: Row 5, Grave 18, Spitnzass-Wilderman Cemetery, Freeburg, Illinois; Newton Bateman and Paul Selby, eds., Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois History of St. Clair County, ed. by A. S. Wilderman and A. A. Wilderman (Chicago: Munsell Publishing, 1907), 2:1146; Portrait and Biographical Record of St. Clair County, Illinois (Chicago: Chapman Bros., 1892), 342; History of St. Clair County, Illinois (Philadelphia: Brink and McDonough, 1881), 77, 111, 224; John Clayton, comp., The Illinois Fact Book and Historical Almanac, 1673-1968 (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1970), 203, 206; Illinois Public Domain Land Tract Sales, St. Clair County, 9:516; 10:61; 31:7, 26, Illinois State Archives, Springfield, IL; Theodore C. Pease, ed., Illinois Election Returns, 1818-1848, vol. 18 of Collections of the Illinois State Historical Library (Springfield: Illinois State Historical Library, 1923), 270.