GENERAL GARFIELD'S ADDRESS.
MR. CHAIRMAN AND FELLOW-CITIZENS: When I accepted the invitation to address you on this interesting occasion, I did not assume that I could contribute anything in the way of original materials for the history of this portion of the Western Reserve. I hoped, however, that I might be able to point out some of the resources from which these materials may be drawn, and to express my interest in the effort you are making to rescue a portion of them from the destroying hand of time.
From the historian's standpoint, our country is peculiarly and exceptionally fortunate. The origin of nearly all great nations, ancient and modern, is shrouded in fable or traditionary legend. The story of the founding of Rome by the wolf-nursed brothers, Romulus and Remus, has long been classed among the myths of history; and the more modern story of Hengist and Horsa leading the Saxons to England, is almost equally legendary. The origin of Paris can never be known. Its foundation was laid long before Gaul had written records. But the settlement, civilization and political institutions of our country can be traced from their first hour by the clear light of history. It is true that over this continent hangs an impenetrable veil of tradition, mystery and silence. But it is the tradition of races fast passing away; the mystery of a still earlier race, which flourished and perished long before its discovery by the Europeans. The story of the Mound Builders can never be told. The fate of the Indian tribes will soon be a half-forgotten tale. But the history of European civilization and institutions on this continent can be traced with precision and fullness; unless we become forgetful of the past, and neglect to save and perpetuate its precious memorials.
In discussing the scope of historical study in reference to our country, I will call attention to a few general facts concerning its discovery and settlement. First—The Romantic Period of Discovery on this Continent.
There can scarcely be found in the realms of romance anything more fascinating than the records of discovery and adventure during the two centuries That followed the landing of Columbus on the soil of the New World. The greed for gold, the passion for adventure, the spirit of chivalry, the enthusiasm and fanaticism of religion, all conspired to throw into America the hardest and most daring spirits of Europe, and made the vast wilderness of the New World, the theatre of the most stirring achievements that history has recorded.
Early in the Sixteenth century, Spain, turning from the conquest of Grenada, and her triumph over the Moors, followed her golden dreams of the New
* Delivered at Burton, before the Historical society of Geauga county, Ohio, September 16, 1873, on the discovery and settlement of the Western Reserve.
+ General Garfield mentions the following as among the chief books consulted in the preparation of the address : " Bancroft's History of the United States, " Vols. I, II, III, IV; "Annals of the West, James H. Perkins, St. Louis, 1850; " Notes on the Early Settlement of the Northwestern Territory," Jacob Burnet, New York, 1847; " History of the Discovery and Settlement of the Valley of the Mississippi," 2 vols., John W. Monette, New York, 1846; Irving 's Conquest of Frorrda; Francis Parkman's four histories; "The Jesuits of North America;" "The Discovery of the Great West:" "The Pioneers of Civilization in the New World;" "The Conspiracy of Pontiac;' " Diplomatic Correspondence, 1776 to 1783," by Tared Sparks; "Early History of Cleveland, Ohio," Col. Charles Whittlesey, Cleveland, 1867; "History of the Maumee Valley, "H, Knapp, Toledo, 1872; "Land Laws of Ohio." He mentioned last in this connection what he regarded as very important, the Margury Papers, in 9 volumes, of French Discoveries, from this archives of France.
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World, with the same spirit that in an earlier day animated her Crusaders. In 1528, Ponce de Leon began his search for the fountain of perpetual youth, the tradition of which he had learned among the natives of the West Indies. He discovered the low-lying coasts of Florida, and explored its interior. Instead of the fountain of youth, he found his grave among its everglades.
A few years later, De Soto, who had accompanied Pizarro in the conquest of Peru, landed in Florida with a gallant array of knights and nobles, and commenced his explorations through the western wilderness. In 1541 he reached the banks of the Mississippi river, and crossing it, pushed his discoveries westward over the great plains; but, finding neither the gold nor the South sea of his dreams, he returned to be buried in the waters of the great river he had discovered.
While England was more leisurely exploring the bays and rivers of the Atlantic coast, and searching for gold and peltry, the chevaliers and priests of France were chasing their dreams in the North, searching a passage to China, and the realms of Far Cathay, and telling the mystery of the Cross to the Indian tribes of the far west. Coasting northward, her bold navigators discovered the mouth of the St. Lawrence, and in 1525 Cartier sailed up its broad current to the rocky heights of Quebec, and to the rapids above Montreal, which were afterwards named La Chine, in derision of the belief that the adventurers were about to find China.
In 1606, Champlain pushed above the rapids, and discovered the beautiful lake that bears his name. In 1615, Priest La Caron pushed northward and westward through the wilderness and discovered Lake Huron.
In 1635, the Jesuit missionaries founded the Mission St. Mary. In 1654, another priest had entered the wilderness of Northern New York, and found the salt springs of Onondaga. In 1659-1660 French traders and priests passed the winter on Lake Superior, and established missions along its shores.
Among the earlier discoverers no name shines out with more brilliancy than that of the Chevalier La Salle. The story of his explorations can scarcely be equaled in romantic interest by any of the stirring tales of the Crusaders. Born of a proud and wealthy family in the north of France, he was destined for the service of the Church and of the Jesuit Order. But his restless spirit, fired with the love of adventure, broke away from the ecclesiastical restraints, to confront the dangers of the New World and extend the empire of Louis XIV. From the best evidence accessible, it appears that he was the first white man that saw the Ohio river. At twenty-six years of age we find him with a small party, near the western extremity of Lake Ontario, boldly entering the domain of the dreaded Iroquois, traveling southward and westward through the wintry wilderness until he reached a branch of the Ohio, probably the Allegheny. He followed it to the main stream, and descended that, until, in the winter of 1669 and 1670, he reached the Falls of the Ohio, near the present site of Louisville. His companions refusing to go furthur, he returned to Quebec and prepared for still greater undertakings.
In the meantime the Jesuit missionaries had been pushing their discoveries on the Northern Lake. In 1673, Joliet and Marquette started from Green Bay, dragging their canoes up the rapids of Fox river, crossed Lake Winnebago, found Indian guides to conduct them to the waters of the Wisconsin, descended that stream to the westward, and, on the sixteenth of June reached the Mississippi, near the spot where now stands the city of Prairie Du Chien. To-morrow will
be the two hundredth anniversary of that discovery. One hundred and forty-two years before that time, De Soto had seen the same river more than a thousand miles below; but during that interval, it is not known that any white man had looked upon its waters.
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Turning southward, these brave priests descended the great river, amid the awful solitudes. The stories of demons and monsters of the wilderness which abounded among the Indian tribes, did not deter them from pushing their discoveries. They continued their journey southward to the mouth of the Arkansas river, telling, as best they could, the story of the Cross to the wild
along the shores. Returning from the Kaskaskias, and traveling thence to tribes Lake Michigan, reached Green bay at the end of September, 1673, having on their journey paddled their canoes more than twenty five hundred miles. Marquette remained to establish missions among the Indians, and to die three years later, on the western shore of Lake Michigan, while Joliet returned to Quebec to report his discoveries.
In the meantime, Count Frontenac, a noble of France, had been made governor of Canada, and found in La Salle a fit counselor and assistant in his vast schemes of discovery. La Salle was sent to France, to enlist the court and the ministers of Louis; and in 1677-78, returned to Canada, with full power, under Frontenac, to carry forward his grand enterprises. He had developed three great purposes. First, to realize the old plan of Champlain—the finding of a pathway to China across the American continent; second, to occupy and develop the regions of the northern lakes; and third, to descend the Mississippi river, and establish a fortified post at its mouth, thus securing an outlet for the trade of the interior and checking the progress of Spain on the Gulf of Mexico.
In pursuance of this plan, we find La Salle and his companions, in January, 1679, dragging their cannon and materials for ship-building around the Falls of Niagara, and laying the keel of a vessel, two leagues above the cataract, at the mouth of Cayuga creek. She was a schooner of forty-five tons burden, and was named "The Griffin." On the seventh of August, 1679, with an armament of five cannon, and a crew and company of thirty-four men, she started on her voyage up Lake Erie, the first sail ever spread over the waters of our lake. On the fourth day, she entered Detroit river; and, after encountering a terrible storm on Lake Huron, passed the straits, and reached Green Bay early in Sep- tember. A few weeks later, she started back for Niagara, laden with furs, and was never heard from.
While awaiting the supplies which the "Griffin" was expected to bring, La Salle explored Lake Michigan to its southern extremity, ascended the Saint Joseph, crossed the Portage to the Kankakee, descended the Illinois, and, landing at an Indian village, on the site of the present village of Utica, Illinois, celebrated mass on New Year's day, 1680. Before the winter was ended, he became certain that the "Griffin" was lost. But, undaunted by his disasters, on the third of March, with five companions, he began the incredible feat of making the journey to Quebec on foot, in the dead of winter. This he accomplished. He re-organized his expedition, conquered every difficulty, and, on the twenty-first of December, 1681, with a party of fifty-four Frenchmen, and friendly Indians, set out for the present site of Chicago, and, by the way of Illinois river, reached the Mississippi, February 6, 1682. He descended its stream, and on the ninth of April, of 1682, standing on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, solemnly proclaimed to his companions and to the wilderness, that in the name of Louis the Great, he took possession of the great valley watered by the Mississippi river. He set up a column and inscribed upon it the arms of France, and named the country Louisiana. Upon this act rested the claim of France to the vast region stretching from the Allegheny to the Rocky mountains, from the Rio Grande and the Gulf to the farthest springs of the Missouri.
I will not follow further the career of the great explorers. Enough has been said to exhibit the spirit and character of their work. I would I were able to inspire the young men of this country with a desire to read the history of these
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stirring days of discovery, that opened up to Europe the mysteries of this New World.
As Irving has well said of their work, “It was poetry put into action; it was the knight-errantry of the Old World, carried into the depths of the American wilderness. The personal adventures ; the feats of individual prowess; the picturesque descriptions of steel-clad cavaliers, with lance, and helmet and prancing steed, glittering through the wilderness of Florida, Georgia, Alabama, and the prairies of the far west, would seem to us mere fictions of romance, did they not come to us in the matter of fact narratives of those who were eye witnesses, and who recorded minute memoranda of every incident."
Second - The Struggle for National Dominion.
I next invite your attention to the less stirring, but not less important struggle, for the possession of the New World, which succeeded the period of discovery.
At the beginning of the eighteenth century, North America was claimed mainly by three great, powers. Spain held possession of Mexico, and a belt reaching eastward to the Atlantic and northward to the southern line of Georgia, except a portion near the mouth of the Mississippi held by the French. England held from the Spanish line on the south to the northern lakes and the Saint Lawrence, and westward to the Alleghanies. France held all north of the lakes and west boundary lines were but vaguely defined; others were disputed; and the general of the Alleghanies, and southward to the possessions of Spain. Some of the outlines were as stated.
Besides the struggle for national possession, the religious element entered largely into the contest. It was a struggle between the Catholic and Protestant faiths. The Protestant colonies of England were developed on three sides, by the vigorous and perfectly organized Catholic powers of France and Spain.
Indeed, at an early date, by the bull of Pope Alexander VI, all American had been given to the Spaniards. But France, with a zeal equal to that of Spain, had entered the lists to contest for the prize. So far as the religious struggle was concerned, the efforts of France and Spain were resisted only by the Protestants of the Atlantic coast.
The main chain of the Alleganies was supposed to be impassable until 1713, when Governor Spottswood, of Virginia, led an expedition to discover a pass to the great valley beyond. He found one somewhere near the western boundary of Virginia, and by it descended to the Ohio. On his return, he established the "Transmontane Order," or " Knights of the Golden Horse Shoe." On the sandy plains of eastern Virginia, horse-shoes were rarely used; but, in climbing the mountains, he had found them necessary; and, on creating his companions knights of this new order, he gave to each a golden horse-shoe, inscribed with 1714, the motto:
"Sic jterat transcendere monies."
He represented to the British ministry the great importance of planting settlements in the western valley; and, with the foresight of a statesman, pointed out the danger of allowing the French the undisputed possession of that rich region.
The progress of England had been slower but more certain than that of her great rival. While the French were establishing trading posts at points widely removed from each other, along the lakes and Mississippi, and in the wilderness of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois, the English were slowly but firmly planting their settlements on the Atlantic slope, and preparing to contest for the rich prize of the Great West. They possessed one great advantage over their French rivals. They had cultivated the friendship of the Iroquois Confederacy, the most powerful combination of Indian tribes known to the New World. That confederacy held possession of the southern shores of Lakes Ontario and Erie; and their
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hostility to the French had confined the settlements of that people mainly to the northern shores.
During the first half of the eighteenth century, many treaties were made by the English with these confederated tribes, and some valuable grants of land were obtained on the eastern slope of the Mississippi valley.
About the middle of that century, the British government began to recognize
the wisdom of Governor Spottswood, and perceived that an empire was soon to be saved or lost.
In r 748, a company was organized by Thomas Lee, and Lawrence and Augustine Washington, under the name of The Ohio Company," and received a royal grant of one half million acres of land in the valley of the Ohio. In 1751, a British trading post was established on the Big Miami; but, in the following year, it was destroyed by the French. Many similar efforts of the English colonists were resisted by the French; and, during the years 1751-2-3, it became manifest that a great struggle was imminent, between the French and the English for the possession of the West. The British ministers were too much absorbed in intrigues at home, to appreciate the importance of this contest; and they did but little more than to permit the colonies to protect their rights in the valley of the Ohio.
In 1753, the Ohio Company had opened a road by Will's creek into the western valley, and were preparing to locate their colony. At the same time the French had sent a force to occupy and hold the line of the Ohio. As the Ohio Company was under the especial protection of Virginia, the governor of that colony determined to send a messenger to the commander of the French forces, and demand the reason for invading the British dominions. For this purpose he selected George Washington, then twenty years of age, who, with six assist- ants,•set out from Williamsburg, Virginia, in the middle of November, for the waters of the Ohio and Lake Erie. After a journey of nine days, through sleet and snow, he reached the Ohio at the junction of the Allegheny and the Monongahela; and his quick eye seemed to foresee the destiny of the place. "I spent some time," said he, "in viewing the rivers. The land in the fork has the abso- lute command of both." On this spot Fort Pitt was afterwards built, and, still later, the city of Pittsburgh.
As Bancroft has said, "After creating in imagination a fortress and city, his party swam arcoss the Allegheny, wrapped their blankets around them for the night on the northwest bank." Proceeding down the Ohio to Logstown, he held a council with the Shawnees and the Delawares, who promised to secure the aid of the Six Nations in resisting the French. He then proceeded to the French posts at Venango and Fort Le Boeuf (the latter fifteen miles from Lake Erie), and warned the commanders that the rights of Virginia must not be invaded. He received for his answer, that the French would seize every Englishman in the Ohio valley.
Returning to Virginia in January, 1754, he reported to the governor, and immediate preparations were made by the colonists to maintain their rights in the west, and resist the incursions of the French. In this movement originated the first military union among the English colonists.
Although peace existed between France and England, formidable preparations were made by the latter to repel encroachments on the frontier, from Ohio to the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. Braddock was sent to America, and, in 1755, at Alexandria, Virginia, he planned four expeditions against the French.
It is not necessary to speak in detail of the war that followed. After Brad- dock's defeat near the forks of the Ohio, which occurred on the ninth of July, 1755, England herself took active measures for prosecuting the war.
On the twenty-fifth of November, 1758, Forbes captured Fort DuQuesne,
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which thus passed into the possession of the English, and was named Fort Pitt, in honor of the great minister.
In 1759, Quebec was captured by General Wolfe; and the same year Niagara fell into the hands of the English.
In 1760, an English force, under Major Rogers, moved westward from Niagara, to occupy the French posts on the upper lakes. They coasted along the south shore of Erie, the first English-speaking people that sailed its waters. Near the mouth of the Grand river they met in council the chiefs of the great warrior, Pontiac. A few weeks later, they took possession of Detroit. "Thus," says Mr. Bancroft, "was Michigan won by Great Britain, though not for itself. There were those who foresaw that the acquisition of Canada was the prelude of American independence."
Late in December, Rogers returned to the Maumee; and setting out from the point where Sandusky city now stands, crossed the Huron river to the northern branch of White Woman's river, and, passing thence by the English village of Beaverstown, and up the Ohio, reached Fort Pitt on the twenty-third of January, 1761, just a month after he left Detroit.
Under the leadership of Pitt, England was finally triumphant in this great struggle; and, by the treaty of Paris, of the tenth of February, 1763, she acquired Canada and all the territory east of the Mississippi river, and southward to the Spanish territory, excepting New Orleans and the island on which it is situated.
During the twelve years which followed the treaty of Paris, the English colonists were pushing their settlements into the newly acquired territory; but they encountered the opposition of the Six Nations and their allies, who made fruitless efforts to capture the British posts, Detroit, Niagara and Fort Pitt.
At length, in 1768, Sir William Johnson concluded a treaty, at Fort Stanwix, with these tribes, by which all the lands south of the Ohio and the Allegheny were sold to the British ; the Indians to remain in undisturbed possession of the territory north and west of those rivers. New companies were organized to occupy the territory thus obtained.
"Among the foremost speculators in western lands at that time," says the author of "Annals of the West," "was George Washington." In 1769 he was one of the signers of a petition to the king for a grant of two and a half millions acres in the west. In 177o he crossed the mountains and descended the Ohio to the mouth of the Great Kanawha, to locate the ten thousand acres to which he was entitled, for services in the French war.
Virginians planted settlements in Kentucky; and pioneers from all the colonies began to occupy the frontiers, from the Allegheny to the Tennesse. Third—The war of the Revolution, and its relations to the west.
How came the thrirteen colonies to possess the valley of the Mississippi? The object of their struggle was independence, and yet, by the Treaty of Peace in 1783, not only was the independence of the thirteen colonies conceded, but there was granted 'to the new republic, a western territory bounded by the Northern Lakes, the Mississippi, and the French and Spanish possessions. How did these hills and valleys become a part of the United States? It is true that, by virtue of royal charters, several of the colonies set up claims extending to the "South Sea." The knowledge which the English possessed of the geography of this country at that time, is illustrated by the fact that Capt. John Smith was commissioned to sail up the Chickahominy, and find a passage to China! But the claims of the colonies were too vague to be of any consequence in determining the boundaries of the two governments. Virginia had indeed extended her settlements into the region south of the Ohio river, and during the Revolution, had annexed that country to the Old Diminion, calling it the County of
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Kentucky. But, previous to the Revolution, the colonies had taken no such action in reference to the territory northwest of the Ohio.
The cession of that great Territory under the treaty of 1783 was due mainly to the foresight, the courage, and the endurance of one man, who never received from his country any adequate recognition for his great service. That man was George Rogers Clark; and it is worth your while to consider the work he accomplished. Born in Virginia, he was, in early life, a surveyor, and afterwards served in Lord Dunmore's War. In 1776 he settled in Kentucky, and was, in fact, the founder of that commonwealth. As the war of the Revolution progressed, he saw that the pioneers west of the Alleghanies were 'threatened by two formidable dangers: First, by the Indians, many of whom had joined the standard of Great Britain; and, second, by the success of the war itself. For, should the colonies obtain their independence, while the British held possession of the Mississippi valley, the Alleghanies would be the western boundary of the
new Republic, and the pioneers of the West would remain subjects to Great Britain.
Inspired by these views he made two journeys to Virginia, to represent the case to the authorities of that colony. Failing to impress the House of Burgesses with the importance of warding off these dangers, he appealed to the governor, Patrick Henry, and received from him authority to enlist seven companies to go to Kentucky subject to his orders, and serve for three months after their arrival in the West. This was a public commission.
Another document, bearing date Willliamsburg, January 2, 1778, was a secret commisssion, which authorized him, in the name of Virginia, to capture the military posts held by the British in the Northwest. Armed with this authority, he proceeded to Pittsburgh, where he obtained ammunition, and floated it down the river to Kentucky, succeeded in enlisting seven companies of pioneers, and in the month of June, 1778, commenced his march through the untrodden wilderness to the region of the Illinois. With a daring that is scarcely equaled .in the annals of war, he captured the garrisons of Kaskaskia, St. Vincent, and Cahokia, and sent his prisoners to the governor of Virginia, and by his energy and skill won over the French inhabitants of that region to the American cause.
In October, 1778, the House of Burgesses passed an act declaring that " All the citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia, who are already settled there, or shall hereafter be settled on the west side of the Ohio, shall be included in the District of Kentucky, which shall be called Illinois county." In other words, George Rogers Clark conquered the territory of the Northwest in the name of Virginia, and the flag of the Republic covered it at the close of the war.
In negotiating the Treaty of Peace at Paris, in 1783, the British commissioners insisted on the Ohio river as the northwestern boundary of the United States; and it was found, the only tenable ground or. which the American commissioners relied to sustain our claim to the lakes and the Mississippi as the boundary, was the fact that George Rogers Clark had conquered the country, and Virginia was in undisputed possession pf it at the cessastion of hostilities. In his "Notes on the Early Settlement of the Northwest Territory," Judge Burnet says: "That fact" (the capture of the British posts) "was confirmed and admitted, and was the chief ground on which the British commissioners reluctantly abandoned their claim."
It is a stain upon the honor of our country that such a man, the leader of the pioneers who made the first lodgment on the site now occupied by Louisville, who was, in fact the founder of, Kentucky, and who, by his personal foresight and energy, gave nine great States to the Republic, was allowed to sink under a load of debt incurred for the honer and glory of his country.
In 1799, Judge Burnet rode some ten or twelve miles from Louisville into
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the country, to visit this veteran hero. He says he was induced to make this visit by the veneration he entertained for Clark's military talents and services.
"He had," says Burnet, "the appearance of a man born to command, and fitted by nature for his destiny. There was a gravity and solemnity in his demeanor, resembling that which so eminently distinguished the venerated father of his country. A person familiar with the lives and character of the military veterans of Rome, in the days of her greatest power, might readily have selected this remarkable man as a specimen of the model he had formed of them in his own mind; but he was rapidly falling a victim to his extreme sensibility and to the ingratitude of his native State, under whose banner he had fought bravely, and with great success.
"The time will certainly come when the enlightened and magnanimous citizens of Louisville will remember the debt of gratitude they owe the memory of that distinguished man. He was the leader of the pioneers who made the first lodgment on the site now covered by their rich and splendid city. He was its protector during the years of its infancy, and in the period of its greatest danger. Yet the traveler who has read of his achievements, admired his character, and visited the theatre of his brilliant deeds, discovers nothing indicating the place where his remains are deposited, and where he can go and pay a tribute of respect to the memory of the departed and gallant hero."
This eulogy of Judge Burnet is fully warranted by the facts of history. There is preserved in the war department at Washington, a portrait of Clark, which gives unmistakable evidence of a character of rare grasp and power. No one can look upon that remarkable face without knowing that the original was a man of unusual force.
Fourth—Organization and Settlement of the Western Reserve.
Soon after the close of the Revolution our western country was divided into three territories; the territory of the Mississippi; the territory south of the Ohio; and the territory northwest of the Ohio. For the purposes of this address, I shall consider only the organization and settlement of the latter.
It would be difficult to find any country so covered with conflicting claims of title as the Territory of the Northwest. Several States, still asserting the validity of their royal charters, set up claims, more or less definite, to portions of this Territory. First, by royal charter of 1662, confirming a council charter of 163o, Connecticut claimed a strip of land bounded, on the east, by the Narragansett river; north, by Massachusetts; south, by Long Island Sound, and extending westward between the parallels of forty-one degrees and forty-two degrees and two minutes north latitude, to the mythical "South Sea;" Second, New York, by her charter of 1614, claimed a territory marked by definite boundaries, lying across the boundaries of the Connecticut charter; third, by the grant to William Penn, in 1664, Pennsylvania claimed a territory overlaping part of the territory of both these colonies; fourth, the charter of Massachusetts also conflicted with some of the claims above mentioned; fifth, Virginia claimed the whole of the Northwest Territory by right of conquest, and, in 1779, by an act of her legislature, annexed it as a county; sixth, several grants had been made of special tracts to incorporated companies by the different States. And, finally, the whole Territory of the Northwest was claimed by the Indians as their own.
The claims of New York, Massachusetts, and part of the claim of Pennsylvania, had been settled before the war, by royal commissioners. The others were still unadjusted. It became evident that no satisfactory settlement could be made, except by congress. That body urged the several States to make a cession of the lands they claimed, and thus enable the general government to open the Northwest for settlement.
On the first of March,. 1784, Thomas Jefferson, Samuel Hardy, Arthur Lee,
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and James Monroe, delegates in congress, executed a deed of cession in the name of Virginia, by. which they transferred to the United States the title of Virginia to the Northwest Territory, but reserving to that State one hundred and fifty thousand acres of land, which Virginia had promised to George Rogers Clark, and to the officers and soldiers who, with him, captured the British posts in the west. Also, another tract of land, between the Scioto and Little Miami, to enable Virginia, to pay her promised bounties to her officers and soldiers of the Revolutionary army.
On the 27th of October, /784, a treaty was made at Fort Stanwix (now Rome, New York), with the Six Nations, by which these tribes ceded to the United States, their vague claims to the lands north and west of the Ohio. On the 3ist of January, r785, a treaty was made at Fort McIntosh (now the town of Beaver, Pennsylvania, with the four Western trrbes, the Wyandots, the .Delawares, the Chirnwas and the Tawas, by which all their lands in the northwest territory were ceded to the United States, except that portion bounded by a line from the mouth of the Cuyahoga up that river to the portage between the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas; thence down that branch to the mouth of Sandy; thence westwardly to the portage of the Big Miami, which runs into the Ohio; thence along the portage to the Great Miami or Maumee, and down the southeast side of the river to its mouth; thence along the shore of Lake Erie to the mouth of the Cuyahoga. The territory thus described was to be forever the exclusive possession of these Indians.
In 1788 a settlement was made at Marietta, and soon after other settlements were begun. But the Indians were dissatisfied, and, by the intrigues of their late allies, the British, a savage and bloody war ensued which delayed for several years the settlement of the State. The campaign of General Harmar in 1790, was only a partial success. In the following year a more formidable force was placed under the command of General St. Clair, who suffered a disastrous and overwhelming defeat on the 4th of November of that year, near the head waters of the Wabash.
It was evident that nothing but a war so decisive as to break the power of the western tribes, could make the settlement of Ohio possible. There are but few things in the career of George Washington that so strikingly illustrate his sagacity and prudence as the policy he pursued in reference to this subject.. He made preparations for organizing an army of five thousand men, appointed General Wayne to the command of a special force, and early in 1792, drafted detailed instructions for giving it special discipline to fit it for Indian warfare. During that and the following year, he exhausted every means to secure the peace of the West by treaties with the tribes.
But agents of England and Spain, were busy in intrigues with the Indians in hopes of recovering a portion of the great empire they had lost by the treaty of 1783. So far were the efforts of England carried that a British force was sent to the rapids of the Maumee, where they built a fort, and inspired the Indians with the hope that the British would. join them in fighting the forces of the United States.
All efforts to make a peaceable settlement on any other basis than the abandonment on the part of the United States of all territory north of the Ohio having failed, General Wayne proceeded with that wonderful vigor which had made him famous on so many fields of the Revolution, and, on the 2oth of August, 1794, defeated the Indians and their allies on the banks of the Maumee, and completely broke the power of their confederation.
On the third day of August, 1795, General Wayne concluded, at Greenville, a treaty of lasting peace with these tribes, and thus, opened the State to settle- ment. In this treaty, there was reserved to the Indians the same territory
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west of the Cuyahoga as described in the treaty of Fort McIntosh of 1785.
Fifth.—Settlement of the Western Reserve.
I have now noticed briefly the adjustment of the several claims to the northwestern territory, excepting that of Connecticut./ It has already been seen that Connecticut claimed a strip westward from the Narragansett river to the Mississippi, between the parallels of forty-one degrees and forty-two degrees two minutes; but that portion of her claim which crossed the territory of New York and Pennsylvania, had been extinguished by adjustment. Her claim to the territory west of Pennsylvania was unsettled until September 14, 1786, when she ceded it all to the United States, except that portion lying between the parallels above named, and a line one hundred and twenty miles west of the western line of Pennsylvania and parallel with it. This tract of country was about the size of the present State, and was called "New Connecticut."
In May, 1792, the legislature of Connecticut granted to those of her citizens whose property had been burned or otherwise spoilated by the British, during the war of the Revolution, half a million of acres from the west end of the Reserve. These were called "The Fire Lands."
On the 5th of September, 1795, Connecticut executed a deed to John Caldwell, Jonathan Brace and John Morgan, trustees for the Connecticut Land Company, for three million acres of the Reserve, lying west of Pennsylvania, for one million two hundred thousand dollars, or at the rate of forty cents per acre, The State gave only a quit-claim deed, transferring only such title as she possessed, and leaving all the remaining Indian titles to the Reserve, to be extinguished by the purchasers themselves. With the exception of a few hundred acres previously sold, in the neighborhood of the Salt Spring Tract, on the Mahoning, all titles to lands on the Reserve east of
"The Fire Lands," rest on this quit-claim deed of Connecticut to the three trustees, who were all living late as 1836, and joined in making deeds to lands on the Reserve.
On the same day that the trust deed was made, articles of association were signed by the proprietors, providing for the government of the company. The management of its affairs was entrusted to seven directors. They determined to extinguish the Indian title, and survey their land into townships five miles square. Moses Cleaveland, one of the directors, was made general agent; Augustus Porter, principal surveyor, and Seth Pease, astronomer and surveyor. To these were added four assistant surveyors, a commissary, a physician and thirty-seven other employes. This party assembled at Schenectady, New York, in the spring of 1796, and prepared for their expedition.
It is interesting to follow them on their way to the Reserve. They ascended the Mohawk river in batteaux, passing through the locks at Little Falls, and, from the present city of Rome, took their boats and stores across into Wood creek. Passing down the stream, they arossed the Oneida lake, down the Oswego to Lake Ontario. Coasting along the lake thence to Niagara, after encountering innumerable hardships, the party reached Buffalo on the seventeenth of June, where they met "Red Jacket," and the principal chiefs of the Six Na- tions, and on the 23d of that month, completed a contract with those chiefs, by which they purchased all the rights of those Indians to the lands on the Reserve, for five thousand pounds, New York currency, to be paid in goods, to the Western Indians, and two beef cattle and one hundred gallons of whisky to the Eastern Indians, besides gifts and provisions to all of them.
Setting out from Buffalo on the 27th of June, they coasted along the shore of the lake, some of the party in boats and others marching along the banks.
In the journal of Seth Pease, published in Whittlesey's History of Cleveland, I find the following:
Monday, July 4, 1796.—We that came by land, arrived at the confines of
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 19
New Connecticut, and gave three cheers precisely at five o'clock P. H. We then
proceeded to Conneaut, at five hours thirty minutes; our boats got on an hour after; we pitched our tents on the east side."
In the journal of General Cleaveland is the following entry:
"On this creek ("Conneaught"), in New Connecticut Land, July 4, 1796, under General Moses Cleaveland, the surveyors and men sent by the Connecti-
cut Land Company to survey and settle the Connecticut Reserve, and were the first English people who took possession of it.
* * We gave three cheers, and christened the place Fort Independence; and, after many difficulties, perplexities and hardships were surmounted, and we were on the good and promised land, felt that a just tribute of respect to the day ought to be paid. There were, in all, including women and children, fifty in number. The men, under Captain Tinker, ranged themselves on the beach, and fired a Federal salute of fifteen rounds, and then the sixteenth in honor of New Connecticut. Drank several toasts. * * * Closed with three cheers. Drank several pails of grog. Supped and retired in good order."
Three days afterward General Cleaveland held a council with Paqua, chief of the Massasaugas, whose village was at Conneaut creek. The friendship of these Indians was purchased by a few trinkets and twenty-five dollars' worth of whisky.
A cabin was erected on the bank of Conneaut creek; and, in honor of the commissary of the expedition, was called "Stow Castle." At this time the white inhabitants west of the Genesee river, and along the coasts of the lakes, were as follows: The garrison at Niagara, two families at Lewistown, one at Buffalo, one at Cleveland, and one at Sandusky. There were no other families east of Detroit, and with the exception of a few adventurers at the Salt Springs of the Mahoning, the interior of New Connecticut was an unbroken wilderness.
The work of surveying was commenced at once. One party went southward on the Pennsylvania line to find the forty-first parallel, and began the survey; another, under General Cleaveland, coasted along the lake to the mouth of the Cuyahoga, which they reached on the 22nd of July, and there laid the foundation of the chief city of the Reserve. A large portion of the survey was made during that session, and the work was completed in the following year.
By the close of the year 1800, there were thirty-two settlements on the Reserve, though, as yet, no organization of government had been established. But the pioneers were a people who had been trained in the principles and practice of civil order; and these were transplanted to their new home. In New Connecticut, there was but little of that lawlessness which so often characterizes the people of a new country. In many instances, a township organization was completed, and their minister chosen before the pioneers left home. Thus they planted the institutions and opinions of Old Connecticut in their new wilderness homes.
There are townships on this Western Reserve which are more thoroughly New England in character and spirit than most of the towns of the New England of to-day. Cut off as they were from the metropolitan life that has gradually been molding and changing the spirit of New England, they preserved here in the wilderness the characteristics of New England, as it was when they left it at the beginning of the century. This has given to the people of the Western Reserve those strongly marked qualities which have always distinguished them.
For a long time, it was difficult to ascertain the political and legal status of the settlers of the Reserve. The State of Connecticut did not assume jurisdiction over its people, because that State had parted with her claim to the soil.
By a proclamation of Governor St. .Clair, in 1788, Washington county had
20 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
been organized, having its limits extended westward to the Scioto, and northward to the mouth of the Cuyahoga, with Marietta as the county seat. These limits included a portion of the Western Reserve. But the Connecticut settlers did not consider this a practical government, and most of them doubted its legality.
By the end of the century, seven counties, Washington, Hamilton, Ross, Wayne, Adams, Jefferson and Knox, had been created, but none of them were of any practical service to the settlers on the Reserve. No magistrate had been appointed for that portion of the country, no civil process was established; and no mode existed of making legal conveyances.
But, in the year 1800, the State of Connecticut, by act of her legislature, transferred to the national government, all her claim to civil jurisdiction. Congress assumed to the political control, and the president conveyed by patent the fee of the soil to the government of the State for the use of the grantees and the parties claiming under them. Whereupon, in pursuance of this authority, on the twenty-second of September, 1800, Governor St. Clair issued a proclamation establishing the county of Trumbull, to include within its boundaries the "Fire Lands" and adjacent islands, and ordered an election to be held at Warren, its county seat, on the second Tuesday of October. At that election, forty-two votes were cast, of which General Edward Paine received thirty-eight, and was thus elected a member of the territorial legislature. All the early deeds on the Reserve are preserved in the records of Trumbull county.
A treaty was held at Fort Industry, on the fourth of July, 1805, between the commissioners of the Connecticut Land company and the Indians, by which all the lands in the Reserve, west of the Cuyahoga, belonging to the Indians, were ceded to the Connecticut company.
Geauga was the second county of the Reserve. It was created by an act of the legislature, December 31, 1805; and by a subsequent act, its boundaries were made to include the present territory of Cuyahoga county, as far west as the fourteenth range.
Portage county was established on the tenth of February, 1807, and on the sixteenth of June, 1810, the act establishing Cuyahoga county went into operation. By that act all of Geauga west of the ninth range was made a part of Cuyahoga county.
Ashtabula county was established on the twenty-second of January, 1811.
A considerable number of Indians remained on the Western Reserve until the breaking out of the war of 1812. Most of the Canadian tribes took up arms against the United States in that struggle, and a portion of the Indians of the Western Reserve joined their Canadian brethren. At the close of that war occasional bands of these Indians returned to their old haunts on the Cuyahoga and the Mahoning; but the inhabitants of the Reserve soon made them understand that they were unwelcome visitors, after the part they had taken against us. Thus the war of 1812 substantially cleared the Reserve of its Indian inhabitants.
In this brief survey, I have attempted to indicate the general character of the leading events connected with the discovery and settlement of our country. I cannot, on this occasion, further pursue the history of the settlement and building up of the counties and townships of the Western Reserve. I have already noticed the peculiar character of the people who converted this wilderness into the land of happy homes which we now behold on every hand. But I desire to call the attention of the young men and women who hear me, to the duty they owe to themselves and their ancestors, to study carefully and reverently, the history of the great work which has been accomplished in this New Connecticut.
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 21
The pioneers who first broke ground here accomplished a work unlike that which will fall to the lot of any succeeding generation. The hardships they endured, the obstacles they encountered, the life they led, the peculiar qualities they needed in their undertakings, and the traits of character developed by their work, stand alone in our history. The generation that knew these first pioneers is fast passing away. But there are sitting in this audience to-day a few men and women whose memories date back to the early settlement. Here sits a gentleman near me who is older than the Western Reserve. He remembers a time when the axe of the Connecticut pioneer had never awakened the echoes of the wilderness here. How strange and wonderful a transformation has taken place since he was a child! It is our sacred duty to rescue from oblivion the stirring recollections of such men, and preserve them as memorials of the past, as lessons for our own inspiration, and the instruction of those who shall come after us.
The material for a history of this Reserve are rich and abundant. Its pioneers were not ignorant and thoughtless adventurers, but men of established character, whose opinions on civil and religious liberty had grown with their growth, and become the settled convictions of their maturer years. Both here and in Connecticut, the family records, journals and letters which are preserved in hundreds of families, if brought out and arranged in order, would throw a flood of light on every page of our history. Even the brief notice which informed the citizens of this county that a meeting was to be held here to-day, to organize a pioneer society, has called this great audience together; and they have brought with them many rich historical memorials. They have brought old and colonial commissions giveg to early Connecticut soldiers of the Revolution, who became pioneers of the Reserve, and whose children are here to-day. They have brought church and other records which date back to the beginning of these settlements. They have shown us implements of industry which the pioneers brought in with them, many of which have been superseded by the superior mechanical contrivances of our time. Some of these implements are symbols of the spirit and character of the pioneers of the Reserve. Here is a broad-axe brought from Connecticut by John Ford, father of the late governor of Ohio; and we are told that the first work done with this axe, by that sturdy old pioneer, after he had finished a few cabins for the families that came with him, was to hew out the timbers for an academy —the Burton academy—to which so many of our older men owe the foundation of their education, and from which sprang the Wester Reserve college.
These pioneers knew well that the three great forces which constitute the strength and glory of a free government are, the family, the school and the church. These three they planted here, and they nourished and cherished them with an energy and devotion scarcely equalled in any other quarter of the world. On this height were planted in the wilderness the symbols of this trinity of powers; and here let us hope may be maintained forever the ancient faith of our fathers in the sanctity of the home, the intelligence of the school, and the faithfulness of the church. Where these three combine in prosperous union, the safety and prosperity of the nation are assured. The glory of our country can never be dimmed while these three lights are kept shining with an undimmed lustre.
22 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO
HON, LESTER TAYLOR’S CENTENNIAL ADDRESS,
DELIVERED AT THE ANNUAL MEETING OF THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO, IN AUGUST, 1877.
[In compliance with a vote of the Geauga County Agricultural society, at their annual meeting, at Burton, January, 1876, in accordance with a resolution of the State Agricultural convention, held at Columbus, January 5, 1876, recommending each Agricultural society in the State to select some suitable person to write an historical address, to be forwarded to the secretary of state of the State of Ohio.
Subsequently, there was a mutual understanding with the Historical society to have the address delivered at the annual meeting of the latter association, and in the interest of both societies, this matter was prepared.
General Garfield's address, delivered at the formation of the Historical society, in 1873, gave such a connected and comprehensive history of the Western Reserve and the conflicting claims thereto, that the officers of the society unanimously agreed to make it the opening chapter, and, therefore, I omit that portion of my manuscript relating thereto.]
FELLOW alums—Accepting the trust, I have the honor of submitting the following brief history of Geauga county:
It is worthy of record, and has proved of inestimable value to the residents of the Western Reserve, and a source of devout gratitude to all thoughtful owners of land, that the final arrangements, whereby the State of Connecticut had such an indisputable right to the lands, that all titles tracable to the deed of trust, executed by the Connecticut Land company, has been held so sacred and inviolable as to give security to the purchasers, and has saved that litigation which has been such a source of annoyance, bitterness of feeling, and, often, absolute loss of their possessions, once paid for, or the expense incurred by litigious suits, equal to the value of their farms, if they retained them by judicial decisions, in so many sections of the western country.
Prior to 1800, there were some settlements on the Reserve, like "angels visits, few and far between." It has been claimed that up to the above date, there were no municipal laws to protect the settlers in their rights of property, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and no certain allegiance to the rightful claimants of jurisdiction over said territory.
The good sense and moral integrity of those who came for the laudable purpose of obtaining farms for themselves and their heirs—who found so much work on their hands to put up their cabins, and make openings to plant and sow, that they might reap supplies for their families' support, and realizing a sense of dependence upon their neighbors, whether far off or near, were incentives as strong as heavy " bonds to keep the peace." Tradition says that in a certain locality on the Reserve, a man was so fortunate as to have in his possession a swine mother with a litter of pigs. Having bargained one to a distant settler, to be taken at a given price, and at a certain time, he came at the appointed day, and was informed that it had been sold to another for a higher price. In reply to the first purchaser, he said that there was no law to compel him to fulfill his engagements. Then, said the other, I will make one. From the war of words, there came a war of blows, with the belligerent parties. The
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 23
first purchaser won the victory, and took the pig as a trophy of his natural rights to purchased property, rather than on the modern policy, "to the victor belong the spoils." When Washington county was organized, in 1798, by proclamation of Governor St. Clair, it included within its limits all of the Western Reserve east of the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers, and the old portage trail connecting those rivers. Under the above civil division, a few families lived in Cleveland, Mentor, Burton, and in some other places before the organization of Trumbull, and within the limits of the territory subsequently embraced in Geauga.
Trumbull county was erected by proclamation of the governor of the northwestern territory, on the tenth of July, 1800. The first organization of the county, by holding court, was on the twenty-sixth day of August, 1800, at Warren, the established county seat. This county, covering an area of such a great territory, was called after Governor Trumbull, the then governor of Connecticut.
The civil division of the county into townships was made at that court term, as follows: Richfield, Painesville, Cleveland, Middlefield, Vernon, Youngstown, Warren, and Hudson. December 31, 1805, an act was passed creating the county of Geauga. This took effect March 1st, following: "That all that part of the county of Trumbull lying north and east of the line, beginning on the east line of said county, on the line between townships number eight and nine, as known by the survey of said county, and running west on the same to the west line of range number five; thence south on said west line of range five to the northwest corner of township number five, to the middle of the Cuyahoga river, where the course of the same is northerly; thence up the middle of said river to the intersection of the north line of township number four; thence west on the said north line of township number four to the west line of range fourteen, wherever, the same shall run when the county west of the Cuyahoga river shall be surveyed into townships, or tracts of five miles square each ; and thence north to Lake Erie, shall be, and the same is hereby set off and erected into a new county, by the name of Geauga." February to, 1807: "That all that part of the Connecticut Western Reserve which lies west of the Cuyahoga river, north of the township number four, shall belong to and be a part of the county of Geauga, until the county of Cuyahoga shall be organized."
On the first Tuesday of March, 18o6, Geauga was organized, and the court of common pleas was held at New Market, on the river, at the Skinner farm, between where Painesville and Fairport now are. Present—Aaron Wheeler, John Walworth, and Jesse Phelps, esqrs., associate judges for said county of Geauga. Edward Paine, jr., was appointed clerk pro ten:pare. The court also appointed Robert B. Parkman, esq., prosecutor for said county, and Abraham Tappan, county surveyor. Joel Paine was the first sheriff.
The following were the first grand jurors: Abraham Tappan, foreman; Eleazer Hickox, Samuel Holmes, William W. Williams, Nathaniel Doane, John A. Harper, Ebenezer Merry, Joseph Pepoon, Isaac Palmer, Joel Paine, Anson Sessions, Elijah Button, Elah S. Clapp, and Joseph Clark. Petit jurors: James Lewis, Joseph Rider, Theddore Roys, George Russell, Jonathan Root, Ira Blanchard, Ezra Sprague, Benjamin Hopkins, John Paxton, J. A. Andrews, Henry G. Edwards, and Jonathan Hubbard.
FIRST COURT HOUSE.
Contract entered into March, 1807, between the commissioners of Geauga county and Abraham Skinner, whereby he agrees to build of logs, hewed on two sides, a house Aithin the prison bounds (as established by the court of common pleas), twelve by fourteen feet on the ground, with two good log or plank floors, and one window with iron grates, with a good and sufficient chimney, and made
24 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
in every other respect to the acceptance of the commissioners and sheriff of said county, said Skinner, on his part, doth agree to rent said house (when built) to the commissioners or their successors in office, for a jail, and keep the same in sufficient repair, without expense to the commissioners, so long as they shall wish to use it for a jail, for the sum of fifteen dollars a year.
The name, Geauga, is said to have been taken from the Indian name of the river running through the county, and emptying into the lake at Painesville, now known as Grand river; its meaning in the significant language of the tribe on its borders ("Sheauga sepe,") Raccoon river. Geauga was reduced in its eastern limits by the organization of Ashtabula county, which included all the territory east of the sixth range of townships on the reserve, formerly included in Geauga. June 16, 1810, all that part of Geauga lying west of the ninth range, was organized with, and into Cuyahoga county. In 1840, Lake county was organized, taking off seven northern townships from Geauga, leaving but sixteen townships, (being the least amount of constitutional territory for a county) within its limits. Subsequently, nine hundred acres from the southwest corner of Russell was taken into Cuyahoga county, including about half of the village of Chagrin Falls, and the same number of acres taken from the northeast corner of Orange, Cuyahoga county, taken in exchange, after legislation returned the tract from Orange township to Cuyahoga (for particulars see Robinson's History of Russell). It is not my purpose to sketch the early history of those counties taken from Geauga, leaving it to be more appropriately written by their own historians. Much of the materials for an elaborate history was destroyed by the burning of the public buildings in Chardon, July 24, 1868. A few facts only are selected relating to adjoining counties once connected with us, such as will be more immediately interesting to Geauga readers.
The first meeting of the county commissioners' board was held at New Market, on June 6, 1806. It was ordered that the following bounties for wolf and panther scalps be paid, to wit: For every wolf or panther over six months old, one dollar and twenty-five cents; under six months, seventy-five cents. In ao8 rates increased to two dollars, and one dollar for young ones. In aro the rates doubled for scalps.
The board, at various times, established ferriage, and the rates therefor, at Conneaut, Ashtabula, Grand, Guyahoga, Black, and Vermillion rivers. One of the heaviest appropriations found on the commissioners' books was for opening a road from the mouth of Cuyahoga river to the west line of the Fire-lands, under the superintendence of Ebenezer Merry, esq. The courts were held at New Market and Champion (now Painesville), until the fall of 1811. The county seat was then established at Chardon, then an unbroken forest. Abram Tappon wrote me, not long before his death, that Gen. Rozen Beall, of New Lisbon, and — Hunter, of Jefferson, and another whose name he did not recollect, were the commissioners who located it at the above place. It was named "Chardon" after Peter Chardon Brooks, owner of the tract of land where
the town now is.
TOPOGRAPHY AND GEOGRAPHY OF THE COUNTY.
The county is well diversified with hills and valleys ranging along the water courses. The highest points are on the dividing ridge of highlands, running parallel with the lake shore, and averaging about ten miles from it. The highest point is claimed to be Thompson ledge, in the northeast part of the county. Little mountain, in the northwest corner, is computed to be seven hundred and fifty feet above Lake Erie—the surface of that lake lies five hundred and sixty- five feet above the ocean. There are places in almost every township where the summit will not vary much from six hundred feet above the lake. Assum
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 25
ing the mean surface to be five hundred feet, it will carry the isothermal lines, representing the climature degrees, much farther north of that belt of land on the lower plane along the south shore of the lake; thus accounting for the excess of cold, rain and snow over many places, lower, and far to the north. The rule for the decrease of temperature, as we ascend above the earth's surface, is about one degree for ever three hundred and fifty feet.
Geauga is bounded north by Lake county, east by Ashtabula and the north part of Trumbull, south by Portage, and west by Cuyahoga.
Geauga county lies between 41̊ 21' 44" and 41̊ 43' 28" North Latitude, and between 80̊ 38' 21" and 81'" 21' 2" West Longitude from Greenwich, according to calculations of M. L. Maynard, based on Von Steinwehr’s tables.
Meteorology, at Little Mountain, Ohio, Latitude 41̊ 38' N., Longitude 81̊ 16' W., at an elevation of 126o feet above the sea level, for the year 1876. Given by E. J. Ferris.
Thermometer in open air, Maximum July 18th Maximum July 19th - 84̊
" Minimum December 10th 8'
" Range - 92̊
Mean for the year - 44. 825̊
Amount of rain - 40.27 inches
" snow - 171.20
The wannest month of the year was July — mean temperature - 68̊
The coldest month of year was December - mean temperature - 19.5
The leading ridge of table land from which the waters rise and flow north and south, is generally in the northern part of the county. The Cuyahoga, Grand, and the eastern branches of the Chagrin rivers rise in this county. The Cuyahoga is a circuitous stream (meaning, in the Indian language, crooked), rising in the northeastern port of the county, flowing southerly, with a sluggish current, until it enters Portage, thence curving into Summit, thence in a northern direction, emptying into the lake at Cleveland—making a circuit of more than a hundred miles and discharging its waters almost as far north as the foun, Lain head, in Montville, and only about thirty-five miles from it. The head waters of the Chagrin branches in this county rise in Munson and Chardon, their sources being below the conglomerate rock, at the base of which the filtered pure water gushes forth in streams—where the speckled brook-trout, so uncommon in this State, may be found.
On the river bottoms grew gigantic elms, white maple, black ash, swamp oak, birch, and a dense growth of shrubs, notably on the Cuyahoga, and its branches, where alder, nettles, and wild grasses, grew in profusion. The soil on these bottoms was generally a deep muck, sometimes many feet deep; the surface in many places being covered with water far into the summer months, were fearful sources of intermittent fevers. The uplands were heavily timbered with beech, maple, chestnut, white and black oak, whitewood, white ash, cucumber, hickory, black walnut, butternut, wild cherry, and many other varieties of less note and value. Burton has pine sufficient for lumbering, in a small way—this being all the evergreen timber in the county. There are in this county several natural ponds, or lakes, which were formerly known as ponds, and called after the townships in which they were situated. Recently they have been christened —Geauga Lake, in Bainbridge; Crystal Lake, in Newburg; Bass Lake, in Mun- son; Aquilla Cake, in Claredon. (For particular description see histories of townships in which they are located.)
GEOLOGY OF THE COUNTY.
In the geological survey of Ohio, Vol. I., it is said: "The geological formations of this county, while simple and easily understood, afford an interesting example of the manner in which the geology and topography of a county determine the pursuits of the inhabitants and the boundaries of separate communities. These boundaries were fixed with no reference to the geology, but the latter has formed the tastes and determined the pursuits of the inhabitants,
26 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
and grouped them into a civil community. The debris of the clay shales, mingled with the drift, has formed the basis.of a strong tenacious clay soil, especially adapted to grazing, and the county has, from this cause, and not from the choice of the inhabitants, become noted for the excellence and abundance of its dairy products. The elevated position of the county, added to the peculiarities of the soil, has especially fitted it for the production of fruits, particularly for
apples, pears, quinces, and grapes, and these are largely cultivated."
The sand-stone formations which so often crop out, together with the coarse, loose sand-stone on the surface or within reach of the plow, where the disintegration has been so long going on by means of wet, heat and frosts, has greatly ameliorated the adhesive qualities of the clay, so that it is not such a tenacious "clay soil" as is found on oak and chestnut clay soils. A close observer, traveling in any direction in this county, will .notice that the prevailing varieties of timber changes often, so that a leading variety in any location is soon super- ceded by a different variety, or more abundant, even on the same farm. Such frequent changes of timber and shrubs affords a good index of the frequent changes of soil—or a different mixture of the constituents of the soil.
As the farmers are studying the adaptation of the different variety of grasses, and cereal crops, and fruits to the various soils, mixed husbandry is becoming more general, and is superceding the specialty of cheese making. The farmers are now raising all the necessaries and luxuries of life, which are congenial to the climate.
In the Ohio Historical collection, Geauga is represented as having been subject to terrible high winds and tornadoes in the first part of the present century, the particular accounts of which will be found in some of the township histories. In the surrounding counties the evidence of sweeping winds leveling the forests in tracts, generally laying them in an eastern direction, is as apparent, and, perhaps, to the same extent, as in this. Certainly, during the past three-fourths of the present century, this county has been as exempt from destructive winds and storms as any part of the western country.
The early settlers in this county were mostly from New England, and a large majority from Connecticut. The original land-holders of the Reserve living in that State, offered facilities for such as wished to move to the, then, far west, by taking their farms and giving them lands here.
The pioneers were generally men of small means, and consequently the land was divided into small farms, compared with such division in most of the western country. The families came into a dense forest remote from any settlement, experiencing all the trials, privations, difficulties and embarrassments incident to their isolated situation. As "necessity is the mother of invention," their inventive genius was taxed to the utmost tension in providing shelter, rude implements of husbandry and means of support, but the strong arm, the clear head—"the industry that never slept," was equal to the emergency.
Whilst gratitude has done much to snatch from oblivion the names and heroic deeds of the men, it is to be regretted that the mothers and daughters have been so much neglected in traditions and manuscripts relating to the early history of this country. The change from pleasant homes to the solitude of wilderness, the genial company of refined society to loneliness, the conveniences, comforts and luxuries of former life, to a rude cabin, with ruder utensils, and rudiest substitutes for former furniture, their fortitude and presence of mind in danger, their intuitive tenderness, their happy faculty of substituting clothing and food to hold soul and body together, from new and untried resources, their patience and sufferance in sickness, in bearing and raising of children, in traveling through woods and following trails to visit and comfort the sick, and attend at the birth of infants, and instruct their own children without schools, in intel-
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 27
lectual, moral and religious culture, was worthy of all honor, and entitles their names as "mothers in Israel" to equal, if not pre-eminent notice in their enrollment among the worthies in pioneer history.
It is worthy of note, that the heavy, hard timber which so profusely abounded and made it so laborious and protracted in making necessary openings to cultivate the necessaries of life, was not without some corresponding blessings; being rich in potash, the ashes from the burnt log heaps were carefully saved, the lye was boiled down to black salts, which found a ready market in Pittsburg, and could be exchanged for leather, salt, nails and a portion of the avails in money which grain would not bring.
One of the greatest impediments to pecuniary progress, or the limited means of support for the families, was the prevalence of "that pestilence that walketh in darkness" amongst the cattle, known as the bloody murrain.
The fatality appeared to be the greatest on the river bottoms, but no part of the county was exempt. The loss of an only cow so much relied upon as means of support, or an ox, breaking up the team, were embarrassments, somementimes almost overwhelming. Instances were known of an ox working with his third mate, the others having fallen victims to that disease. It was a common saying when the vultures were gathering in any location, that some creature was spoken for, which generally proved very true.
The wild animals, common in this State, that destroyed and hindered the raising of domestic ones, has generally been spoken of as one of the evils incident to the settlement of a new country. True, bruin lik'd his pig, and the wolf lik'd to gorge his stomach with veal and lamb, yet it is questionable, whether the meat of the elk, bear, deer, and turkeys so numerous in the woods, with the furs and peltries of other wild animals, were not of more value than detriment to the pioneers. Many families must apparently have abandoned their location, or starved, without such help. It is noteworthy that the decrease of destructive wild animals was graded to the increase of domestic ones, and when the supply of domestic animals were sufficient for the inhabitants,
the wild ones who had held the country by pre-emption right, yielding to "manifest destiny" sought new and more congenial wilds.
ROADS.
The first road laid on the Reserve has been known as the "old girdled' road." It commenced at the southeast part of Trumbull county, running near or from the salt springs passing through the northeast part of Middlefield, southwest part of Huntsburg, central part of Claridon, east of Chardon to, or near Perkins' camp in Concord, from thence to the ridge on the lake shore. It was laid out and girdled by Colonel Thomas Sheldon, of Suffield, Connecticut, for, and at the expense of the Connecticut Land company. The same year the road from Conneaut to Cleveland was laid out by the same gentleman. For the above road history I am indebted to the late Thomas D. Webb, of Warren, Trumbull county, by letter in 1852.*
The old "Chillicothe road" was laid out under the laws and supervision of the territorial government, with Chillicothe as its capital in 1802. Captain Edward Paine, t of Chardon, was one of the committee laying out the road which passed through the western tier of townships in the county from the lake shore road to its terminus at Chillicothe. For the Chillicothe road history I am under great obligation to C. C. Bronson, esq., of Tailmadge, Summit county, who has
* Geauga and Lake History speak only of the old girdled road parallel with the lake shore ; the committee to lay this out was appointed in rm.
+ Some have it.—General Edward Paine, of Painesville.
28 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
done much to bring light out of darkness, and facts from obscure early manuscript history.
The old State road, from Painesville to Warren, was laid out in 1805. Judge Abram Tappan, of Unionville, Lake county, was the surveyor in surveying this road from Painesville to the north line of Trumbull county—voucher—letter from him, dated 1852.
The county road from Painesville to the south line of Parkman township, was laid out in 1806. Justice Miner, Noah Page, and Daniel Kellogg, commissioners ; Chester Elliott, surveyor. The road was laid through Chardon and Burton. A remonstrance against adopting the report of the committee, by James Thompson, of Middlefield, and others, was submitted. The commissroners confirmed the report. (For other roads see township histories).
RAILROADS.
The topographical situation of Geauga is not as favorable for construction of railroads on a low grade as most parts of the State, rising from the lake at a distance from ten to fifteen miles from it, some five hundred to six hundred feet, the streams running generally in a northern and southern direction through the county, leaving high ridges through its whole extent.
"The certificate of incorporation of the Painesville and Hudson railroad company was fited August 4, 1852. Corporators—Timothy Rockwell, Benjamin Bissel, Storm Rosa, Aaron Wilcox, and Seth Marshall. The Clinton Line railroad, with the following corporators, filed their certificate of incorporation July 6, 1852, to wit : Van R. Humphrey, H. R. Day, H. Wheedon, Moses Messer, and F. Baldwin, The rights of way were secured, and a large amount of capital used in providing materials for construction and grading, building culverts and bridges, when a tinancial crisis caused a complete suspension of any further appropriations and work. The latter made an assignment for the benefit of its creditors; the former sold their franchise, road bed, etc., to individuals, as a basis for the formation of a new company. A certificate of incorporation of the Painesville and Youngstown railroad company was filed November 17, 1870, Joseph M. Hurlburt, William Markham, Samuel Moody, Homer H. Hine, Samuel Mathews, A. L. Tinker, Cornelius V. U. Kitridge, corporators. The Painesville and Youngstown railroad company used the road bed of the the Painesville and Hudson road from Painesville to Chardon, and laid out a road from Chardon to Youngstown. through Claridon, east part of Burton, and through Middlefierd, in this county. This road was opened to Chardon, and excursions to and from the above named places, July 1872. First freight train forwarded July 5th, freight received, 6th; East Claridon, first freight received November 4, 1873, forwarded 6th; Burton. received December 17th, forwarded 7th; Middlefield, received April 1, 1874, forwarded sand; Farmington, received August 6th, forwarded August 7, 1874. The railroad was opened to Warren and Niles about the same time as at Farmington, and about a month after, to Youngstown."
For much of the above information as to dates of opening the Painesville and Youngstown road, I am indebted to W. T. Rexford, esq., of Chardon.
It is not my purpose to enter into the personal details of the history of individuals or families, or of townships, as there was an historical society formed at Burton, on the sixteenth of September, 1873, under the name of "The Historical society of Geauga county," its expressed constitutional object being "the gathering up, and preserving in permanent form, the names of early settlers, with date of their arrival in the county; facts, incidents and reminiscences connected with the early settlements, together with such relics as may be of interest and value."
The society has held its regular annual meetings, which are increasing in interest. Able and efficient members in every township have completed, or are engaged in writing the history of their respective townships. (For local particulars see township histories).
The first settlement made wiithin the present limits of the county was in number seven, range seven, subsequently organized as Burton township. In 1798, two families from Connecticut, following township lines, pushed into the heart of the county, remotely a day's journey from any settlement, and made their location. What labor better represents perseverance than a man whose family had no shelter but his wagon, taking his axe to chop down a big tree that
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 29
might endanger his log cabin—blow after blow, chip after chip, until some monarch of the forest, after hours of labor, reels and falls, letting in the first sunlight upon the selected place of future residence. Such is not an ideal picture; it portrays, with slight variations, the experience of many a pioneer.
PIONEER CHEESE-MAKING.
The pioneer women of this county were generally skilled in cheese-making in their eastern homes. As soon as a log-cabin was up, and the family domiciled, the welcome sound of the tinkling bell, as the returning cow neared the house with that treasure of milk, "new every morning, fresh .every evening" during the season when the earth was carpeted with green herbage, might often be seen a rail or pole, with one end under the lower log of the cabin, and lying across a rudely constructed cheese-hoop, with a weight attached to the outer end, sufficient to press the cheese. To an epicure, there would have been a serious drawback in the quality of the dairy products, as the leeks covered the earth and tainted the milk in every manufactured form. When the early settlers had succeeded in enclosing and seeding pastures, cheese-making increased. The great difficulty was access to market.
In order to ascertain more fully the rise and progress of dairy productions, and the difficulty of marketing, I addressed a letter to Royal Taylor, esq., of Ravenna, a pioneer in the cheese trade, and from the reply, promptly made, I make the following interesting extracts:
" Mr. Harvey Baldwin was, undoubtedly, the first man who carried cheese to the southern market. Atom Aurora he took his first cargo of cheese down the Ohio river, in the summer of 1820. He had less than two thousand pounds, hauled to Beaver Point, Pennsylvania, by wagon, and there transferred it to a pine skiff, on which he embarked as captain, supercargo and owner, and commenced his voyage down the La Belle river, selling his cheese as he journeyed along, at Wheeling, Marietta, Catliope is, Portsmouth, Maysville, Augusta, Cincinnati, Madison, and Louisville, Kentucky, where he made sate of it, and terminated his voyage, at a good profit above cost and transportation.
" My brother, Samuel Taylor, and Aporros White, united with Harvey Baldwin. and purchased Several dairies in Bainbridge and Auburn, in 1825, and sent cheese down the Ohio. In September, 1826, Russell G. McCarty and myself gathered a cargo of thirty tons of cheese in Aurora and Bainbridge, and took it to Louisville, Kentucky, where we divided the rot into two parts. McCarty took his part to Florence and Huntsville, Alabama. I found the market at Nashville overstocked. I hired two six-horse teams, with rarge Pennsylvania wagons (as they were then called), to haul eight thou- Sand pounds each, over the Cumbertand mountains, to Knoxville, East Tennessee, at two doltars and fifty cents per hundred pounds.
“I accompanied the wagons on foot, and sold cheese at McMinnville, Sparta, and other places Where we stayed over night; and the teamsters assisted me, cheerfully, in making sares, as they thereby lessened the burdens which their teams were compelled to haul over the rugged and almost impassable mountain roads. The people with whom we stayed over night usually purchased a Cheese, called the family together around a tabte, and they generally eat nothing but cheese until they had fully satisfied their appetites, and then the balance (if anything was left) was sent to the negro quarters, to be consumed by the slaves. Frequently another cheese woutd be purchased the next morning to be consumed in the same manner. The people usually inquired where the cheese Was made, what it was made from, and how the process of making was performed. Having had some experience in that line, I took great pleasure in explaining to them the process.
My sales in Tennessee and North Carolina, at that time, ranged between twenty-five and thirty- Seven cents per pound. The trip was somewhat protracted, as the teams could not travel more than tan or fifteen miles each day, and sometimes less than ten, where the mountains were very steep, and lie mud deep. On my return to Knoxville, from the Warm Springs, in North Carolina, I purchased horse, and came home on horseback, via Nashville, Louisville, Lexington, Maysville and Chillicothe, having been absent about six months and a half.
" In 1827-8-9 bought cheese in Auburn and Bainbridge. In 830 Sherbum H. Williams & Bro. lathered about thirty tons of cheese, made in Parkman, Burton, New bury and Claridon, which I sold at Cincinnati, Louisville and Nashvitle. Continued to do business for the same parties, and sold in the market during 1834-5 to 1841-2, inclusive. During most of these years, some cheese was shipper to New York from the centrar and northern part of the county in a small way, merchants taking in some on debts."
The Messrs. Williams, of Parkman, were the pioneers of the cheese trade in Geauga county, who, by their enterprise and perseverance in connecting themselves and their interests with the first pioneers of the trade in the State, emanating from Portage county with the Messrs. Baldwins, and those subsequently associated with them, and started that trade which has grown to be a leading interest
30 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
and speciality in northeastern Ohio, the Western Reserve having manufactured more than thirty million pounds of cheese in a year. What a change! Now cheese manufactured here can be sent to any commercial port around the world in less time and at less expense than the marketing of cheese at that time, within so short a distance from us. Mr. Taylor further says:
" Until after 1834 the Western Reserve cheese had entire control of the southern markets. About that time the Yankee population, who settled on the Darby ptains, in Ohio, commenced Its manufacture, and their cheese came into competition with ours at Cincinnati, Louisville and some other markets, and was sold at lower figures than we had usually sold at, because they were much nearer to Cincinnati, and their transportation was less expensive than ours. The article they offered for sale was equal, if not superior, in quality to ours, but the quantity was muds less; consequently, they did not greatly diminish our sales. The increase of the consumers at the south and west kept even pace with manufacturers in the north, and hence the enormous quantities now manufactured find a ready sale. I only regret to say that that the quatity has not improved in the same ratio as the quantity has increased.
“In 1875 I joined a neighbor of mine, who had been a large operator, in purchasing dairy products in Ohio; and we selected some of the cheese manufactured at the best fartories of Trumbull and Portage counties, and purchased a cargo and shipped it to Liverpool. When we arrived there New York and English cheese was setling readily at $7 shillings and o pence per 113 pounds. The best offer we could get was only 45 shillings per cwt. Our cargo would have been called an A No. r, in Ohio, but, when placed alongside and examined with the cheese of other scctions, it fell far below them in quality. We pocketed a loss of less than two thousand dollars very cheerfutly, because the cheese had been paid for before we started it from home, and no one could complain of us; but, if the manufacturers, who sold it to us for "cream cheese," had sustained the same loss, I very much doubt whether they would have been so very amiable.
In 1850, the dairy productions of Geauga county were as follows: Butter, 424,547 pounds; cheese, 2,273,723 pounds. In 1876, centennial year, butter, 672,641 pounds; cheese, 4,136,231 pounds. Only three counties in the State made more than that amount—and those counties much larger in territory.
In 1862 a notable change commenced in the manufacture of cheese; dairymen sending their milk to factories to be worked up on a co-operative system, at a given price per pound, for making, curing, boxing, selling or forwarding to market, and making the necessary dividends. Anson Bartlett, of Munson, was the first to suggest, and active to introduce the change.
In 1862, Anson Bartlett, Arnold D. Hall, Burton Armstrong, and Elnathan Chace, went to Rome, and other places in Oneida county, New York, to study the process, and learn the management and progress, which had brought the Oneida dairies into such good repute in the best markets.
Bartlett put up his factory, in Munson, in the spring of that year, and Mr. Hall worked the milk of one hundred cows, on the Oneida system, and in the spring of 1863, in company with Nelson Parker, built a factory in the west part of Claridon; Burton Armstrong and Elnathan Chace erected one in East Claridon, and Budlong and Stokes one in Chardon.
When Messrs. Bartlett and Hall had determined to introduce the factory plan in Geauga, Mrs. Bartlett, of Munson, and Mrs. Hall, of Claridon, went to Oneida, spent some time in the factories, that they might bring back a competent knowledge of the practical operations, and, returning, went into their husband's cheese factories to put into operation their acquired skill and teach others to work at the same business for other localities.
In a few years every township in the county had one or more cheese factories, until, at the present time, they number fifty-six. By this revolution in the manufacture of cheese, the women in the families were relieved from that hard and heavy branch of domestic labor, which had broken down many of the mothers, who had bravely endured the privations, and cares of a family in pioneer days.
Butter is now being shipped from this county directly to Liverpool. The margin on prices of new and superior butter, over that of a common quality, is greater than most, if not any other production of our farms. Observing and calculating dairymen are looking at this subject, not merely with a view of immediate profits, but as to the loss of those constituents in the soil necessary for
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 31
supplying grass food for our pastures. Chemical analysis shows that the present cheese manufacturing business will, and has reduced the grass land on which the cows feed, by carrying off the milk from the dairy farm, much faster than the growing and fattening of stock. To obviate the loss of such an amount of fertilizing matter from the soil, in sending away the milk, Mr. Burton Armstrong commenced butter dairying on his farm, in Claridon, in 1876, by putting up a suitable building over a cold spring of water, with all of the modern improved fixtures, feeding the skimmed milk to growing stock, thereby retaining for farm improvement most of the characteristic fertilizing quality. If such consideration and practice should add largely to the benefit of the farm, the fact that springs of pure cold water are more numerous here than in other counties in the State, they may all yet be utilized, in a most important sense, for superior productions in that trade, thereby lessening the amount of cheese, and increasing the value by such reduction.
By writing an account of the rise and progressive productions of the farm and stock, it may have a tendency to correct an erroneous opinion, prevalent in many places, remote from us, in this State, and in other places, that in "Cheesedom the dairy was the great, and only staple relied upon for support and pecuniary advancement. In no part of the Union is mixed husbandry more general. While in some sections wheat, corn, tobacco, cotton, or sugar, in their several localities, are relied upon as the staple, when such fail their income for that year is lost, if the season is unpropitious for grass; here, the farmers fall back upon their cultivated crops and fruit The historic relations of agricultural progress are so nearly allied to efficient associations for the encouragement Rt. industrial development, that the marked improvements will be noted in con- Section with the proceedings of the Geauga Agricultural society.
The first organization of the Geauga County Agricultural society was at Chardon, February 10, 1823. The farmers left their log cabin homes and gathered from all parts of the county, interested in a union for the diffusion of practical knowledge in their occupation, and the cultivation of social, moral and pficumary improvements. A constitution was adopted, and the following officers elected for that year: Judge Peter Hitchcock, president; Eleazer Hickox mad Samuel Phelps, vice presidents; Ralph Granger, Lemuel G. Storrs, Lewis Runt, corresponding secretaries; Eleazer Paine, recording secretary; Edward aine, jr., treasurer; John Hubbard, Daniel Kerr, Vene Stone, prudential committee; Warren Corning, Abram Skinner, John Ford, first awarding committee; Jesse Ladd, Nathan Wheeler, Nathaniel Spencer. second awarding committee; Benjamin F. Tracy, S. H. Williams, Augustus Sissons, third awarding committee, Solomon Kingsbury, R. B. Parkman, Asa Cowles, fourth awarding committee. This was the first agricultural society formed on the Western Reserve. This society has held its annual fairs for fifty-six years.
The writer of this address was present, and one of the original members of the society. He looks back with pride upon those substantial men assembled at its first meeting, the bone and sinew of the farming community, with their strongly marked countenances of mental strength and courage, whose achievements and perseverance in clearing their farms and making improvements were Worthy of all praise. The social element was a strong incentive in that enterprise. The courts and trainings had been their principal holidays. Now a fair would give an opportunity to renew old, and make new acquaintances; to see the stock, and the samples of productions and home manufactures, were charms Sufficient to awaken much enthusiasm, and brought a large collection of both Ilexes, old and young, to witness the first fair at Chardon, October 23, 1823. The fair was a success. Only a very fery few.of the original signers to the constitution are now alive. Our fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live
32 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO
forever? Amongst those following Judge Hitchcock, as president, until the adoption of a new constitution, were General Edward Paine, Abram Skinner, John Hubbard, Nathaniel Spencer, Vene Stone, Zenas Blish, and Ralph Granger. For more than twenty years the fairs occupied only one day annually, the forenoon for exhibition and inspection by committees, and in the afternoon to hear the reports of committees, and an address on appropriate agricultural subjects. Amongst the orators of the day under the old dispensation, were Ralph Granger, Judge Hitchcock, Zenas Blish, James H. Paine, and Lester Taylor.
It would be interesting to compare the quality. of stock of those first fairs with that of the present day; but there is no criterion from which to judge, as neither the size, weight, or condition of cattle has been kept. It would be well to offer premiums to be adjudged on such conditions, and keep a record of cattle so exhibited. Other premiums are omitted, because the records do not generally show the weights or measurements—only the best exhibited.
The foundation for an improved stock of cattle was laid in this county by the introduction of breeding stock, from the east, by Deacon Holbrook, of Kirtland, and Stephen Bassett, esq., of Chester. They were of the long-horn Durhams, or a cross of that breed, and frequently known by the local names of the owners or places from whence they came—as Holbrook, or Bakewell. They were certainly the means of improving the stock in that section, taking the premiums for several years over other kinds of stock. Eleazer Hickox, of Burton, was one of the early enterprising pioneers in the improvement of stock, who bought a fine, full-blooded Devonshire bull, in Philadelphia, about 1823 or 1824, and had, him driven home. The journey was accomplished on foot by driver and animal. Thus was commenced a cross of that beautiful, blood-red, active stock, famous for working qualities, and well-known in home and eastern 'markets. Other enterprising dealers in stock—Hon. Peter Hitchcock, and other associates—have, from time to time, introduced the red Durham cattle, thereby perfecting that class of the finest stock, and of superior quality, commanding high prices, of which Burton has been an acknowledged centre. In 1824, Colonel Stephen Ford, of Burton, was principal in collecting, fitting up, and driving to Chardon, at the fair, sixty-two yoke of oxen and steers, well broke, and led by a large Devon bull in a yoke fitted for that purpose, which excited universal admiration. Philander Thompson, Alanson and Lester Moffet, of Middlefield; Virgil Barnes, of Huntsburg, and the Messrs. Carrolls, of Munson, are among the number who have introduced blooded stock. Lyman Millard, in 1832, purchased, in Onondaga county, New York, a cow and bull calf of Durham, crossed with some other valuable stock, had them shod, and drove them to his home, in Huntsburg, in person, in the winter time, being six weeks on the road on the account of being detained by snow drifts many times. What does "Young America" think of such an experience? Colonel Erastus Spencer, introduced, from the famous Blue Grass region of Kentucky, the "Land of the Clays," those heavy-quartered, clean-limbed, strawberry-roan Durhams, known as the "Improved Durhams," which were very popular in some sections. At other times he introduced the same breed from the Scioto valley, from which the farmers crossed to great advantage, for beauty, weight, and commanding high prices.
THE INTRODUCTION OF SWINE AND SHEEP.
Hon. Ebenezer Merry, one of the early pioneers of Mentor, and subsequently one of the early settlers of Huron county, 'informed me, during the session of the general assembly of 1831-32, that he purchased some hogs in Pennsylvania, drove them through Trumbull county, and found the west branch of the Cuya-
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 33
hoga, above Claridon pond, had overflowed its banks by the fall rains, and had to push them into the water, and direct them by a pole, wading until he came to the main channel, and, when they had swum across, he found a tree across the channel on which he passed over. was then raining, and growing dark. On reaching the uplands he found a ledge of rocks, under the shelter of which the swine bedded, whilst he lay under a tree, wet and cold, and in the morning found some snow, and reached home, in Mentor, that night. I do not remember the date; but in Judge Kirtland's diary I find an allusion to the subject, which fixes the date in October, 1799.
Mr. Elijah Hayes, now eighty-three years of age, one of the respected patriarchs, standing almost alone from his generation, informs me, by letter: "My father, Eli Hayes, brought a few sheep to Burton, in 1802. We came, in ifloz, with a yoke of oxen to the wagon; bought a cow in Bedford, Pennsylvania, tied her to the wagon, and brought her thus to Burton." I have no information of any earlier introduction of those kinds of stock.
The marginal difference in value of productions, between good farming and slovenly farming is far greater now than formerly, when, with a virgin soil, crops were generally abundant, which reduces the aggregate product of the present time at the expense of good husbandry.
Wheat raised in the county, in 1850, 37,096 bushels; in 1870, 64,815 bushels; in 1876, 38,964 bushels. Corn, in 1850, 238,436 bushels, in 1870 this crop decreased to 185,731; in 1875, 236,058, and, in 1876 (report of 1877), 297.851 bushels. Potatoes, in 1850, 85,464 bushels; in 1870, 185,731 bushels; in 1875, 325.285 bushels. Oats, in 865, 123,534 bushels; in 1876, 338,337 bushels. Maple sugar, gallons in molasses: 18l0, ,34 pounds and 2,000 gallons of molasses; in 1876, 529,414 pounds and 6,512 gallons of molasses.
Charles Morton raised the premium crop of potatoes-16o bushers on one-fourth of an acre of land.
The number of cattle in the county, in 1876, was 22,353, rained at $468,570; number of horses,
5,179, valued at $284,218; number of sheep, 18,761, valued at 52,502. The total value of personal property was $2,232,054.
From 1840, to 1854, the fairs were held at Burton and Chardon, alternating at those places, generally. The inconvenience was so great that the society located permanently at Burton in 1853-4, after a spirited competition. About twenty acres of land was appropriated near the town, with a beautiful grove on the eastern part, a circular trotting track, graded with half a mile drive, large and commodious buildings for exhibition erected, with suitable offices, and conveniences for seating attendants.
Notwithstanding other local agricultural societies have been formed and sustained by local enterprise, the county society has flourished, and is one of the fixtures of the county. The society now numbers four hundred and sixty-two members. The largest receipts for any one year, including those from the horse fair, were two thousand, five hundred and nineteen dollars and fifty-nine cents.
It appears from the records that the following persons have discharged the executive duties as president of the society: John P. Converse, Vene Stone, Seabury Ford, Alfred Phelps, Lester Taylor, Harvey Harrington, Lyman Millard, Erastus Spencer, Peter Hitchcock, David Robinson, Chester Palmer, R. K. Munn, Delos Williams, Thomas Carroll, D. L Pope, P. T. Thompson, Edwin Tuttle, Daniel Johnson, Luther Russell, L L Reed, W. E. Dutton, E. P. Latham, in 1879, Q. D. Millard.
The distinctive breeds of horses have not been kept with purity of blood, as horses of all kinds of business are mostly raised and sought for. The Morgan and other popular blooded horses have been introduced and crossed with apparent improvement.
The fine merino sheep are rapidly being superseded by the long wool breeds.
* Other premium crops are omitted, because weights and measures have not generally been given.
34 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
The county is indebted to Lewis Hunt, esq., of Huntsburg, for the introduction and propagation of improved fruit. He was an honorary member of a Massachusetts horticultural society. His knowledge of fruit and cultivated taste, induced him, at an early period of our settlement, to put out an orchard of pear and apple trees of superior fruit, which has proved a great blessing to a large section of country around that town. The only extensive nursery now in, or ever established in Geauga, is that owned by J. V. Whitney & Sons, in Montville, where every kind of fruit and ornamental trees, shrubs and flowers, indigenous and exotic, usually grown in extensive nurseries, may be found. In that vicinity, and in every locality where there is a good nursery, a marked improvement is noticeable in the superior fruit and more numerous trees adorning the yards and road sides, the parks and cemeteries, and their arrangements in better taste than at a distance from such an establishment.
A good nursery, with an intelligent and honorable proprietor, is a blessing to any community. The progress of science has developed that knowledge of natural law by which intelligent beings can exercise a controlling influence over the climate.
We have experienced the climatic changes which always occur in the cutting off the forests. A general cultivation of forest trees, by the road sides, along the wash banks and ravines, with a suitable proportion of wood land for building, fencing, and fuel, would not only result in a pecuniary advantage, but produce a greater equilibrium between the extremes of heat and cold, humidity and drought, so that future generations might rise up and call you blessed.
COUNTY BUILDINGS.
The first court house in Chardon was a log building, and had but one door and one room. The fire-place had no jams, and the chimney was built of split sticks, laid in mortar, and the floor was laid with rough boards, had one window in the east end, and no floor overhead. The judges occupied a large split log, or puncheon, supported by blocks, for a seat, and a similar one for a desk. For the lawyers, was placed a long, cross-legged table, belonging to Captain Paine, and the only table owned by him. Of course, the jury, witnesses, spectators, and parties, were provided with very rude and uncouth seats.
When a case was submitted to the jury, they retired to a log, in the woods, for deliberation. Perhaps the court, jury, and council, with all their primitive surroundings, might have been actuated by as high a sense of honor, as keen a sense of right, as just perception of facts, and as unsullied and unwavering integrity, as could then, or now be found, amidst all the splendor, pomp, and magnificence of court edifices or the most wealthy and cultured communities.
The first jail built in Chardon was art eight-by-ten, low-roofed, unpretending structure of logs, attached to the west end of Norman Canfield's tavern; was without fire-place' and only a primitive mode of fastening. Its first and only inmate was Hugh McDougall, for nonfulfillment of promise to pay.
There was no tavern in Chardon when the first court was held there, and the court and council traveled more than three miles to Norman Canfield's, on the old State road, in Bondstown (now Hambden), to stay at night, and return next day. They persuaded Mr. Canfield to remove to Chardon, which he did, on the fourth of March, 1812, into his log cabin—first-class hotel.
The next court house was built in 1813, by Samuel King, for the sum of seven hundred and fifty dollars, and court was held in it in the fall of that year. Captain Edward Paine was the first clerk of the court of common p:eas, and remained as such until 1828. The first jail, referred to above, cost 23.50. I find in the "Ohio Statistics," for 1876, that the estimated value of the Geauga county buildings is $108,950.
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 35
The present court house is a substantial and elegant fire-proof brick, erected the year after the destruction, by fire, of the county buildings, July 25, 1868.
The only conviction and execution for murder, was that of Benjamin Wright, jr., who was executed on Thursday, May 15, 1823. The murder was committed in Leroy township, without the limits of the present county lines.
For the benefit of the legal profession, and to show the genius of the criminal laws in 1809, I select the following recorded criminal case:
"State of Ohio vs. Robert Meeker—indictment for larceny. Defendant, being arraigned, plead guilty, and put himself upon the mercy of the court. Whereupon it was considered, sentenced and adjudged, that the said Robert Meeker shall be publicly whipped, ten stripes, upon his naked back, that he return the property stolen, and confess and pay to William A. Harper, the person (tom whom the property was so stolen, the value thereof, to wit:—one dollar and fifty cents. That he pay a fine of three dollars into the treasury of the county of Geauga, and also pay the costs of suit, and be committed to prison for the term of twenty-four hours, and stand committed until sentence is complied with."
COMMON SCHOOLS AND ACADEMIES.
The organization and efficiency of our common school system are well understood. The first settlers showed the importance they attached to common school education, from which they had received so much benefit, by voluntary associations for district schools, wherever a sufficient number of youths and children could be gathered in any locality for a school, and school-houses built before any legal organizations were effected. From such a beginning the result of universal school educational facilities has answered the most sanguine expectations. Not only common schools, but academical education was instituted. Burton academy was instituted in 1804. The first building burnt, and a commodious one was erected in 1819. In Chardon a brick academical building was put up in 1825, and a school for the higher branches of education commenced that fall. Burton and Chardon academies have been merged into hip graded schools, with fine, costly buildings, modern improvements, and convenient arrangements. Parkman academy was built in 1839. Chester Geauga seminary was established in 1842, large and suitable building put up in 1843, and the school has been in successful operation since. Every township has, more or less, kept up a school for the benefit of advanced scholars, to study higher branches, during winter months. From all classes of these schools there has been graduated a ctass of qualified teachers, largely in excess of the home demand, who have for the last forty years gone south and west to teach in the winter, leaving in the fall as uniformly as the wild geese and other migratory birds, and returning to spend the slimmer in labor.
The number of youths, between six and twenty-one years, enjoying school privileges and funds in Geauga county, in 1876, is 3,704. Amount of moneys paid teachers, in 1876, $22,372 48. Total expenditures in 1876, $33,371 11. Local tax for school and school-house purposes, $26,907.
PERIODICALS.
The eminent British statesman, Burke, signalized "newspaper circulation as a more important instrument of the popular intelligence than was generally imagined." A popular Greek scholar was accustomed to say, that "a single newspaper, published in the days of Pericles (had that age produced any such phenomenon), would, if handed down to us, he a better index of Athenian life
and manners than can now be found in any existing memorial of the Grecian civilization."
36 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
Periodicals taken at the several post-offices : Auburn, 290; Bainbridge, 220; Burton. 574; Chardon, 1,123; Chester, 348; Claridon, 339; Hambden, 228; Huntsburgh, 243; Middlefield, 268; Montville, 204; Munson, 287; Newbury, 292; Parkman, 267; Russelr, 215; Thompson, 260; Troy,
309. Total number periodicals, 5,367.
A part of Bainbridge and Russell townships take their mail at Chagrin Falls. Claridon, Hambden.
and Munson take, for some parts of their township, their mail from Chardon, and other townships receive more or less mail matter from other offices, so that the division is not equal.
The following census returns were taken and forwarded to me by Hon. Peter Hitchcock, copied from returns of the Ohio State library:
POPULATION OF GEAUGA COUNTY FROM 1820 TO 1870.
Townships. - 1820 - 1830 - 1840 - 1850 - 1860 - 1870
Auburn 215 428 1,198 1,284 942 783
Bainbridge 199 439 988 1,014 798 660
Burton * 506 646 1,022 1,063 1,045 1,004
Chardon 430 881 2,064 1,622 2,539 1,772
Chestern 269 550 962 1,103 865 727
Claridon 398 637 897 1,029 993 909
Hamden 767 902 919 846 410 296
Huntsburgh — 449 921 1,007 265 824
Middlefield 335 336 771 918 872 732
Montvil — 226 567 702 760 705
Munson — 354 1,263 1,143 1,006 761
Newburg 337 594 1,209 2,253 2,048 861
Parkman 522 732 1,181 1,383 1,007 953
Russell — 115 742 1,083 959 805
Thompson 332 737 2,028 1,237 1,211 1,095
Troy 102 262 1,228 1,254 959 832
Totals 3,919 7,916 16,297 17,827 15,817 14,168
The township of Middlefield was known as "Batavia" until 1850, and Troy as "Welshfield" until 1840. Huntsburgh, Montville, Munson, and Russell, were not down in the census returns of 1820, and their population is probably credited to other townships.
* From other sources we learn that Burton in 1800, had a population of 42, which had increased, in 1809, to 237; and that the total population of the county, in 1809, was 2,917, then embracing the larger portion of the Reserve.
INTERNAL DUTIES IN THE NINTH COLLECTION DISTRICT OF OHIO IN 1818
In the summer of 1877, whilst looking up documents in Chardon, relating to ..the early settlement of Geauga, and making inquiries about materials for its history, E. V. Canfield, esq., courteously informed me that he had in his possession an official document, which he put in my hands.
COPY OF THE DOCUMENT.
"Statement of the amount of internal duties imposed by the United 'States (except those on watches and stamps), paid by each person in the Ninth collection district of Ohio, from the first day of May to the thirty-first day of December, 1818, inclusive:
Carroll, Thomas, jr - $108 29
Ford, Eli and E - 62 28
Fleming, Matthew - 81 62
Greer, David - 22 60
Graham, John - 107 72
Hall, Levi - 98 87
Mason, Peleg S - 70 44
Wetmore, William - 159 19
Westbrook, James - 54 18
Youngs, Silas - 45 78
Total - $812 83
"I do here certify that the foregoing statement exhibits the full amount of duties aforesaid, paid to me in the ninth collection district of Ohio, from the first day of May to the thirty-first day of December, 1818, inclusive.
DANIEL. MILES,
Collector of the Ninth collection district of Ohio.
Collector’s office. Newbury, January 1, 1819."
The thoughtful mind will recognize the changes wrought within the present century of discoveries, improvements, inventions, and their results in application to industrial pursuits. It has opened and amplified sources of wealth and intelligence. The early laborers here strained the muscles of their strong arms to the utmost tension with rude tools—the axes of the common blacksmith, the
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 37
scythes, the flail, the forks; they used the wild goose drag, and the pointed iron share on the wooden plow, made by themselves or neighboring mechanics. Such implements are now superseded by modern improvements in the skill of manufactured tools, and the motor power of steam has worked a great revolution in the industries and exchanges throughout the world. The old domestic implements of labor, with the large and small spinning-wheels, hand-cards, swifts and looms, may be found in the museum halls, as relics used in the first quarter of the present century. At home, and all around us, such changes of base with labor-sPving power may be seen. Large numbers of our laboring classes have improved the opportunity of attending the Centennial exhibition at Philadelphia. The numbers in this rural county visiting there, would equal about one-fourth of the voting population, as found by a canvass taken in many of the townships. Such had an opportunity to examine the natural productions of every nation and every clime, the achievements in the arts and sciences of every nation, kindred, and language. The responsive exclamations of the wise and curious were, "the half was not told us." Whilst the devout in view of such an exhibition of the ornamental and useful in art and science, up to the triumph of the great force of the Corliss engine, would intuitively turn their thoughts to the Great Unseen, with ascriptions of honor, dominion, power, majesty and glory to him that sitteth on the throne, who has delegated to his finite intelligence such wisdom to devise and execute such improvements within the last hundred years.
The remarks on the establishment of the first newspaper in the county, the number subsequently established, and time of each, are omitted. (See J. 0. Conver's article on the "Press").
We have no known mines of wealth below the reach of the plow, no railroads of such magnitude, or such large manufacturing establischnents as to intensify the labor question and excite fears of riotous uprising of the employes. No where is there more regard for law and order. No where are reputation, property, life, and the pursuit of happiness more respected and safe. No where do the rural population travel more on business and recreation. In no locality probably within the State has a greater percentage of the population (from as great a distance) availed themselves of the opportunity of attending the Centennial exhibition at Philadelphia.
Now, in this centennial year, standing on this hill, more than six hundred feet above the lake's surface, over a thousand higher than old ocean's restless waters,
"Let us roll back the world on its axle of fire.
Let us halt, if we can, just a breath or two higher."
Where the woodman's axe first resounded, the first cabin built, the first crops raised, the first white child born, the first school established, the first church organized. A retrospective view of! only seventy-eight years reveals facts that some of the old pioneers who have stood like faithful sentinels on the watch towers of time, until the frosts of' so many winters have impressed the white seal on their heads like the summit of old hoary Alps, witnessing the magical changes and wonderful developments since the curling smoke of the wigwam rose amongst the wild shrubberry and thick branches of forest trees, where the Aborigines chanted their war songs with their chorus of avenging "whoops," or celebrated their festivals or religious rites; where no sunlight reached the earth's surface, except occasional rays through the foilage of shrubs and trees in summer months, where were only foot-prints along their hunting trails and tramping courses, and the burthen of transportation was the trophies of Indian experts hunting for sustenance, and carried on the backs of their squaws.
38 - HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO.
Now, from this standpoint, around which these buildings have been dedicated to industrial exhibitions, where are now gathered a large well-dressed and cultivated audience with "upturned faces, evidently entering into the spirit of this pioneer meeting, where thrilling speeches, both humorous and grave, have been made, interspersed with enchanting music from the Burton brass band with all the improvements of modern musical science, and where are near us, temples of learning and worship—turn your eyes which way you please, what marvelous developments, industry and art have added to the natural scenery, on, and around this beautiful town, "set on a hill" within the hearing of the locomotive's whistle and the rumbling of the railroad cars, and along the line of which the lightning is made subservient to man's control, carrying messages over continents and under the deep ocean's waters. Not exclusively so, within the vision of this hill's landscape, but all along the highways throughout the whole length and breadth of the county, the diversity of ridges and intervals, the varied productions of the soil, the grazing stock of "the cattle on a thousand hills," with houses and out-buildings for convenience and comfort, as seen from farm to farm, many such, elegant in design and beauty of finish, with orchards of delicious fruit, and choice vines congenial to the climate, where the yards and buildings are so beautified and protected from the burning sun of summer and the piercing winds of winter by ornamental trees, the road sides being so often adorned with shade trees, where so many well-arranged and well-painted school-houses meet the eye, where, at convenient centers, so many church buildings may be seen, dedicated to Almighty God, with their steeples pointing heavenward, catching'the first rays of the morning sun and the last brilliant hues of evening— all along, the occupants are owners of the soil, and their houses are castles of their sovereignty.
Their occupation imbues them with the love of order by constantly beholding their surroundings, the regularity of day, night and the seasons, of seed time and harvest, looking to heaven through its dews, rains and sun light, that their labors may be crowned with success. Around their homes are entwined the consecrated affection of birthplace, childhood and maturer years. May not such be depended upon for that patriotism which will defend their country in case of emergency,",and that piety that shall find solace in the hour of extremity.
HISTORY OF GEAUGA COUNTY, OHIO - 39
THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY.