Henry J. Smith was born around 1838 in Pennsylvania to Jacob and Eliza Smith. His father was a farmer who owned $8,250 of real estate by 1850. He grew up and attended school in Falls, Pennsylvania, and he married Rachel White on May 13, 1858. They had at least three children: Sarah, born around 1859; Eliza, born around 1860; and Luella, born around 1866. He worked as a farmer in Falls, and by 1860, he owned $9,000 of real estate and $1,000 of personal property. The family may have moved to St. Joseph, Missouri, in the 1860s, and his wife died on October 25, 1866. By 1870, he was living in Morrisville, Pennsylvania, with his mother-in-law and his children. He died sometime after 1870.