Born January 4, 1802, in Ohio County (now Tyler County) West Virginia, the son of Mary Ankrom and William Waugh Delashmutt. Mr. Delashmutt married Martha “Patsy” Wells Inghram on March 7, 1821. He served as sheriff in Virginia in 1829, and was elected to the Virginia legislature for the 1834 term. Later in 1834, Mr. Delashmutt and wife moved west, stopping in Jefferson County by 1840. Halted by Dragoons at the “Dead Line” of westward expansion, he remained in the Jefferson County area until new territory opened in 1843. One of the first to cross over into what became Mahaska County, Mr. Delashmutt settled in Scott Township, near Talley’s Ford at old BelleFountaine, in the neighborhood known as the Six Mile Prairie. Upon coming west, he was elected in 1841 at Burlington, Iowa, to the first Territorial Legislature. After arriving in Mahaska County he served as delegate to the 1844 state constitutional convention and in the following years served in every county capacity. Mr. Delashmutt’s wife Martha died in 1853, and he married her sister Mary H. Inghram in 1869. Mr. Van Delashmutt died February 16, 1882, in Oskaloosa.