Cousin Bruce,
The Family came over from Germany between 1732 and 1743 as DERST and maintained that spelling among the "Pennsylvania Dutch" in Southeastern Pennsylvania. Our Abraham DERST family moved to the Shenandoah Valley in the early 1750's with the name spelled DERST, DURST and DUST.
When the descendents of our Abraham DERST (and those of uncle Johann Paul DERST) moved to Ohio after 1797, the family name changed almost exclusively to DARST (in Miami, Montgomery, Greene, Delaware, Fairfield, Licking, Perry, Muskingum, Gallia and Meigs Counties).
What you had was a unique phonetic shift among all the lineages that can be contributed to the diverse linguistic make up of early Ohio settlers. You do not see this from later unrelated DURST families from Germany or Switzerland after 1840, with one glaring exception. There is an early group of DURST's that settled in the Miami Valley near our Dayton DARST family. They changed their name to DARST, I assume because of social standing of our lineage there.
As to our David DARST lineage (who records state as DARST, DURST and DUST), when David and wife Christena ROUSH resided at Cheshire Township and prior to moving to Letart Township, Gallia (now Meigs County), they were DARST but in Meigs County in later years after his death at Worthington, the children's names were DURST (eldest son Michael was married as DURST, enumerated in the 1820 Census of Meigs County as DARST, the 1830 and 1840 Census of Mason and Jackson Counties of Virginia (West Virginia) and the 1850 census of Lee County, Iowa as DUST).
When the family moved just miles away across the Ohio River in what is now Cologne District, Mason County and Union District of Jackson County, West Virginia in the late 1820's, the linguistic makeup of those in early Virginia (West Virginia) differed enough (along with formal education challenges) to perpetuate the DURST spelling (with some records as DIRST and DUST).
In the case of Henry Harrison DURST (DARST) and sons Jasper McClellan DURST (DARST) and William Garfield DURST (DARST), they lived in the Point Pleasant area near the Andrew Rife DARST family (who moved across the Ohio from Addison Township of Gallia County in circa 1847), whose father Abraham DARST 1778-1858 was a younger brother of our David DARST (both sons of Abraham DARST, son of Abraham DERST of Shenandoah County, Virginia by way of Pffedersheim (Worms), Germany).
Grandfather Jasper McClellan DURST (DARST) moved with brother Harry Francis DURST to Middleport, Meigs County, Ohio prior to 1910 among several DARST family from Cheshire Township. While Jasper assumed the DARST spelling along with his children (son, Dale Denver DARST was my father), brother Harry and his numerous children maintained the DURST spelling.
I recall that when grandfather died in 1970 and was to be buried at Lone Oak Cemetery at Point Pleasant, there was pressure placed upon the family to bury him among family there as DURST.
Years ago I corresponded with a gentleman from Marietta, Ohio who was a German Linguist who stated that the family origins of our Calvinist Reform family "DERST" (and of Derscheidt, Derscheid and Dorscheid) had their origins along the northern reaches of the Rhine River (possibly at Friesland, Holland/The Netherlands, near Denmark and/or from Switzerland).
I guess what you can take from the variant spelling of the family surname is that it varies because of the American Melting Pot (socially and linguistically) influence of our language with its numerous dialects and regional conformity, compounded at times with educational deficiencies leading to what is not uncommon among American surnames, i.e. Zirkle, Zerkle, Circle and many others.
Cousin Vince
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