History of Dearborn County, Indiana : her people, industries and institutions, Part 10

Author: Archibald Shaw
Publication date: 1915
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1123

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During Wayne's campaign, that general had detached a battalion of his men, under the command of Major Byrd, to occupy the high ground on the west bank of the Miami just above its mouth. Here the major erected a stockade and remained until the treaty of Greenville. The purpose of the occupancy of this place was to protect the keel boats that were carrying sup- plies from Cincinnati and Pittsburgh to. Ft. Hamilton. While the Ohio and Miami were at a good stage, especially in the winter season, when the trail from Ft. Washington to Hamilton was almost impassable, the river route was found to be most convenient and the supplies for Wayne's army were taken by that route. The regiment from which the detail was made was called the "Rowdy Regiment." Wayne's army was nearly two years prepar- ing for the final and decisive campaign against the Indians and the camp was occupied during that time. The name "Rowdy Camp" is to this day ap- plied to the spot where the stockade stood. It is a narrow point of land just above the Baltimore & Ohio railway, where it crosses the old bed of the Miami, between the city of Lawrenceburg and the bridge over the Great Miami. The place is covered with forest to this day. The Dearborn county history, published in 1885, says, "In the summer of 1794 John Tanner, who had built the station where Petersburg now stands, ran a keel-boat from his station to Ft. Hamilton for the purpose of supplying the troops at that place with provisions. While rounding the island in the Great Miami, near the mouth of the Whitewater, the Indians in ambush fired on his boat. killing a colored man, his bowsman. That island ever since goes by the name of 'Negro Island.' Not long after the above occurrence Eli Gerard. of the Hayes Station (now known as the Goose Pond), was sent over west of the Miami river to hunt horses which had strayed off. Three Indians gave chase to him and pursued him to the Miami river. Gerard plunged into the river and swam across : when the Indians came upon the bank he was two-thirds of the way across and a tomahawk was thrown at him." This "Rowdy Camp" is not above extreme high water but moderate floods do not reach it. From the best information obtained the settlements established at the mouth of Laughery creek : at the mouth of the two Hogan creeks, and the families who settled at Hardinsburg and at the state line were made at near the same time.

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Just which of the places was first cannot at this day be well determined. Cap- tain Hayes had been at North Bend and at the station erected by himself and Alexander Guard, about one mile above the mouth of the Miami, on the east bank, ever since the spring of 1791, and was familiar with every foot of ground on the west side; knew the height of the floods during those years, and where the best locations were to be found. It is very probable that just as soon as he learned of the terms of the treaty, he moved over to occupy the land he had selected.

EARLY AUTHORITIES QUOTED.

The first families to select locations in the broad bottoms at the mouth of the Big Miami are given in the Dearborn county history published in 1885, quoting from the writings of Samuel Morrison, as follows: "Early in the spring of 1796, Captain Hayes and family and the families of Joseph Hayes, Jr., and Thomas Miller, Sr., removed west of the Great Miami river, and set- tled in this county (then Knox county, Northwestern Territory)." The same authority says that "Alexander Guard, who had occupied the same station on the Miami one mile above its mouth with Hayes, settled on the west side of the Miami near where the town of Elizabethtown, Ohio, now stands." From the same source, the following is taken: "Among others living at the (Hayes) station referred to, who moved into the county in 1796 and set- tled in the township, were William Girard and wife and two sons, Eli and Elias, and daughter, Mrs. Crist, and husband, George Crist, and three step- children, Rees, Rachel and William. They settled one mile above Hardins- burg. The same year Henry Hardin and family, consisting of William, Mary, James, Catherine, John and Philip, settled on the site of the hamlet of Har- dinsburg. Other families settling in the vicinity in the same year were those of William Allensworth and Isaac Allen, who occupied the land subsequently known as the Samuel Morrison farm."

The settlers at the mouth of the two Hogan creeks were on the ground about the same time as those farther up the valley. When the corner stone of the present court house was laid the following historical item was deposited: "Early in January, 1796, Adam Flake and family settled on South Hogan creek. In February, 1796, Ephraim Morrison, a soldier of the Revolutionary War, built the first log cabin and cut away the forest trees on the bank of the Ohio just below the mouth of Hogan creek, where Aurora now stands." Quoting from Samuel Morrison in the Dearborn county history of 1885 : "When Ephraim Morrison arrived at the mouth of Hogan creek to make

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his settlement, there was already some cleared land both above and below the creek. Ephraim Morrison found at this place an Indian hut about sixteen feet square, without floor or roof, which he repaired and occupied until he could build a better house. Here on the site of the city of Aurora, March 1, 1798, was born Samuel Morrison, who, so far as is known, was the first white child born in this part of the territory of Indiana. After a residence of four years at the mouth of Hogan creek, Ephraim Morrison removed to a place he had selected on Laughery creek, three-fourths of a mile from its mouth."

A CONTESTED HONOR.

George W. Lane, writing during the centennial period in 1876, says: "In 1796 Adam Flake and family settled on South Hogan creek, about one mile from the Ohio river. In the same year Ephraim Morrison landed just below the mouth of Hogan creek-where the city of Aurora now stands-with his family of one daughter and three sons, Agnes, Ephraim, Jr., William and Thomas. Samuel Morrison was born after their arrival, and he has often been spoken of as the first male child born in the county. But this honor was contested by the friends of William V. Cheek. During this same year the Cheeks settled above where the city of Aurora now stands, near Wilson creek, with their families. Soon after their arrival, William V. Cheek was born and, if not the first, was certainly the second male child born in the county."

On Laughery creek, Benjamin Walker settled in 1796. He came from Pennsylvania, and later moved to the south side of the creek, where he built a grist-mill and laid out the town of Hartford. William Maroney, Daniel Lynn, William Blue and David Blue all came to the Laughery valley in this same year and located. William Ross likewise came to the Laughery valley, settling at its mouth, but afterwards moved farther up the creek.

The first colony to settle at Columbia, near the mouth of the Little Miami river, comprised the names of persons afterwards somewhat familiar in the early settlement of Dearborn county. On the list of names given for that settlement are found that of Hugh Dunn, Elijah Mills, Abram Ferris. John Ferris and Ezra Ferris. Among those who settled at Ft. Washington were the Ludlows-Israel and John, both of whom were well known by the first settlers in Dearborn county. Their nephew, Stephen Ludlow, in 1808, came to Dearborn county and became one of the county's most prominent business men. Hugh Dunn afterwards moved to Ft. Hill, just above the

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mouth of the Miami, where he built a stockade and resided several years be- fore coming to this county.

MURDERED BY REDSKINS.

It is related that his son, Isaac Dunn, afterwards one of Lawrenceburg's most prominent citizens, along with Isaac Mills, Benjamin Cox, Thomas Wal- ters, Joseph Randolph, Joseph Kitchel and Isaac Vanness came over to the bottoms late in the fall of 1794 to hunt for hogs to use for the winter's meat. After hunting pretty much all day it was proposed by some of them that they return across the Miami to the stockade for the night and renew the hunt the next morning. All agreed to the proposition but Benjamin Cox and Thomas Walters, who thought it best to go into camp where they were, so as to have the advantage of an early start in the morning. The rest of the party not favoring the idea of risking a camp in such an unprotected place returned to the stockade above the mouth of the river. Towards midnight people at the stockade were much alarmed at hearing the reports of several guns in the direction of the camp that Cox and Walters were supposed to have made, and the little settlement, knowing the ways of the savages, feared for the safety of the two men. Early the next morning a party of men started to learn the fate of their comrades. Searching near where they were left the evening previous, Isaac Dunn and Garrett Vanness came upon the body of Benjamin Cox scalped, and a bullet hole told the tale of how he met his fate.

Searching further, some seventy-five or eighty yards from the former, they found the body of Walters. From appearances it was thought he had been shot in the camp, but attempting to escape had been followed, toma- hawked and scalped. It is claimed that these two men were the last to suffer such a fate in Dearborn county. The scene is described by a former writer as follows: "These bodies presented a horrible appearance and they were the last killed in the Miami country. The barbarity the savages exercised on them gave little evidence of a disposition on their part to make peace. The traveler passing from Lawrenceburg to Elizabethtown, as he crosses the creek near the stone house, lately the residence of Thomas Miller, may at any time, by turning his head to the right, glance his eye over the spot where Benjamin Cox and Thomas Walters, the last victims of savage barbarity in the war closing with Wayne's treaty, were cruelly murdered."

Dr. Ezra Ferris, a prominent man of pioneer days, and a writer on local history, as well as a noted Baptist divine, was the authority for the foregoing.

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A file of the Sentinel of the Northwest Territory to which another writer had access says that, in its issue of February 7, 1795, the following item may be found. "Arrived here yesterday from the mouth of the Great Miami, Mr. Isaac Mills who informs us that on Monday evening last the Indians killed two men by the name of Benjamin Cox and Thomas Walters, about one mile and a half from that place."

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CHAPTER VII.

PIONEER DAYS IN DEARBORN.

Although the Wayne treaty was made with the Indians in August, 1795, yet it was 1798 before the general government put surveyors to work platting the land and getting it ready for entry by private individuals. The wonderful Ordinance of 1787 had attracted attention throughout the Atlantic states, and thousands of people there were casting their eyes toward the Ohio valley as a land of promise. Families in Virginia, North Carolina and South Caro- lina were far-seeing enough to discern that slavery was an evil, and desiring to locate their families remote from its menace, were looking forward to the time when they should be able to pack up their goods, their lares and penates, and seek an abiding place in this rich valley where freedom's corner-stone had been laid. The Eastern states, too, that had relinquished claims to the coun- try, were attracted by its superior soil and kindly climate, and this same ordinance that repudiated primogeniture, feudalism's relic of tyranny ; that respected liberty of conscience; that set a high value on education; an ordi- nance that will serve as a model for all free governments the world over. Hence, just as soon as the war clouds had drifted away, might be seen set in motion the moving wagon from a hundred different directions all set in the one common purpose and in the one direction, to the Ohio valley, where the justly celebrated ordinance had guaranteed them the liberty they longed for. Although the government was apparently slow in surveying and prepar- ing the land for the settlers, yet the country along the Ohio was soon dotted with the cabins of those who were busy selecting their locations for a home for their declining years.

FIRST FAMILIES OF DEARBORN.

By the time the surveyors, in 1798, had commenced the survey, a fringe of pioneer cabins bordered the north side of the Ohio from the mouth of the Big Miami to the point opposite the mouth of the Kentucky river, the western line of the Wayne purchase. These families were hoping to be so fortunate as to secure the lands, selected by so much sacrifice, when the land office was once opened. Many of them succeeded and a few failed. By the spring of

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1801, when the office of the land department was opened at Cincinnati, the country as far up the Whitewater as Brookville had been settled upon and the settlements had extended up the creeks flowing into the Ohio several miles. Yet during the first year after the office was opened there were comparatively few families that availed themselves of the privilege of making sure their choice of lands and of the improvements already made on their choice. Among those who were in the county before the sale of land com- menced the following is a list. Many have been forgotten and others, per- haps, were of the restless, roving class who stayed only a short time and moved on to what was to them more inviting places :

In the Miami bottoms-Henry Hardin and family; William Gerard and family, with his sons, Eli and Elias; George Crist and family; Capt. Joseph Hayes and family ; Joseph Hayes, Jr., and family ; Thomas Miller and family ; James Bennett and family ; Benjamin Walker and family, Samuel, Joseph and John, and daughter, Jane; and Isaac Polk, Garrett, Vanness, Joseph Kitchell, William Allensworth, Isaac Allen, John Dawson, John White, Ezekiel Jack- son, Daniel Perrin and John Livingstone.

In the Hogan valley-Adam Flake and family; Ephraim Morrison and family; Nicholas Cheek and family ; Tavern Cheek and family, and Amos Henry, James Bruce, Ebenezer Foot, Stephens Peters, Charles Wilkins and Daniel Connor.

In the Laughery valley-George Groves and family; Benjamin Walker and family ; Daniel Lynn and family, and William Maroney, Daniel and Will- iam Conaway, Benjamin and Jesse Wilson, William Ross and William and David Blue.

These men were here with their families awaiting the action of the gen- eral government in opening the country for settlement. On February 2, 1798, Oliver Wolcott, secretary of the treasury, reported to the United States Sen- ate that no contracts had yet been made for surveying the public lands below the mouth of the Great Miami, but that surveys were expected to be com- menced during the coming season. On October 11, 1798, Israel Ludlow com- menced to run and mark the first principal meridian, now the state line be- tween Ohio and Indiana. Benjamin Chambers and William Ludlow were the United States surveyors who surveyed most of the land in Dearborn county. James Hamilton and Stephen Ludlow are supposed to have been the rodmen, or assistants, in making the survey. Notwithstanding the fact that there were quite a number who had settleed in the county prior to the opening of the land office, yet we find that when the office did open on the first Mon-

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day in April, 1801, that only three men availed themselves of the opportunity the first day and secured land.

FIRST FORMAL LAND ENTRIES.

On April 9, 1801, Joseph Hayes entered fractional section I, range I, in this township, and all of section 36, lying in congressional township, No. 6, range I. These two pieces of land lie adjoining the state line and on the Elizabethtown pike, where the road enters Ohio. The hill land in the tract is now the property of Joseph and Thomas Fitch, descendants of Joseph Hayes. The same day John Brown entered the east half of section 24, in township 7, range I, which is just south of where the town of West Harrison now stands. And Lewis Davis and Benjamin Chambers entered fractional sections 1, 2 and 3 in township 3, range I (now in Ohio county).

A few days later, on April 27, 1801, fractional section 2, township 5. range I, was purchased by George Crist and Henry Hardin. On July 14, 1801, Richard Mainwaring entered the west half of section 10 in township 7, range I, which is about the mouth of Logan creek, in Harrison and Logan townships. On July 23, 1801, Samuel Vance entered fractional sections 13, 14 and 15, in township 4, range 1, and sections 8, 9 and 10 were entered on April 22, 1801. Section 9 lies partly in Ohio county, section 10, all in Ohio county, all three sections lying about the mouth of Laughery creek. These sections were entered by Daniel Conner, but were transferred on December 2, 1806, to Oliver Ormsby. Section 21 and fractional sections 22 and 23 were entered on April 27, 1801, by Charles Wilkins. These sections lie across the mouth of Tanner's creek. Fractional sections 27, 28 and 29 were entered by James Conn on December 19, 1801. These sections are adjacent to Aurora and just south of the sections entered by Wilkins. On August 22, 1801, Cave Johnson entered a portion of section 13, township 7, range I. On December 8, 1801, William Allensworth and William Ramsy entered the balance of the section. This is the section on which the town of West Harrison now stands. On August 13, 1801, John Brown entered another piece of ground in section 9, township 7, range I, and on September 16, 1801, Bayliss Ashby entered part of section 14, same township. These sections lie along the Whitewater near the mouth of Logan creek.

MANY LOSE HOMESTEADS.

The above entries comprise all the land entered during the balance of the year following the opening of the Cincinnati land office. It is probable that

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many of the settlers who had selected lands were as yet unable to gather to- gether sufficient money to make the payments required. Some of these who entered lands during 1801 were not bona fide settlers and it was, after all, only the few that had the cash to spare when the government was ready to put the land on the market. The lands at that time were being offered by the government in section or half sections and the cost was two dollars per acre, part cash, the deferred payments bearing interest. The land was two high for its earning value at that time, and many who made a first payment found themselves unable to make the deferred payments and were either forced to sell at the best market price they could obtain or dispose of it to some other settler. Then, too, the government wanted to dispose of the land in tracts that were too large to meet the purses of many of the settlers. It was seldom that a settler desiring to better himself by coming to these western forests was possessed of any great amount of cash. Later on the government made it possible for entries to be made in quarter sections and even less, in order to meet the requirements of the times.

In 1802 the number taking up land was even less than in the former year. Section 3 of township 5, range I, lying about Homestead, was entered by Barnett Hulick during that year. Section 12, just north of West Harrison, in township 7, range I, was entered, a portion of it, on June 5, 1802, by William Majors. These seem to have been all the land entries made during that year. The troubles with the Spanish at the mouth of the Mississippi may have deterred settlers from taking up land. In 1803 the conditions had changed very little. While events of vast importance to the settlers in the Ohio valley were coming to pass elsewhere, yet the means of communication were so slow that it is possible no word drifted into the valley concerning the purchase of the Louisiana Territory until the next spring. Section 26, town- ship 5, range 2, lying close to Wilmington, was entered by Jeremiah Hunt. Part of section II, in township 4, range 2, was entered that year by Henry Cloud, and part of section 4, township 7, range I, on the west side of the Whitewater, in Logan township, was entered by James Adair. Section 10, just south and east of section 4, same township, was entered in the same year by John Hackleman, in part. In 1804, conditions were growing better and the land entries increased. A part of section 35, township 5, range I. was entered by Thomas Miller during 1804. Fractional section 4, in town- ship 4, range 2, was sold to Daniel Conner. Fractional sections 32 and 33, township 5, range I, were sold to Charles Vattier, of Cincinnati, on September 18, 1804. The fractional section purchased by Conner is more recently the

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W. S. Holman estate, and the Vattier lands comprise part of the ground on which the city of Aurora now stands. Noble Butler entered a portion of section II, in township 6, range I, which was the section on which the camp meetings were held some forty or fifty years ago. A portion of section 13, just southeast of section 11, was entered by Thomas Miller the same year. Part of section 14, in the same township, was entered by Robert McConnell the same year. Charles Dawson entered all of section 24 and part of section 23, in the same township, in 1804, and Jacob Blasdel entered a portion of sec- tion 29 and, together with Archibald Stark, all of section 28, in the same township. This is the land on which the town site of Cambridge was after- wards laid out and the lands of Ferris J. Nowlin, who is a lineal descendant of Jacob Blasdel, is a part of this entry. Township 6, range I, is mostly in Miller township. In township 7, range I, Alexander Dearmand entered a portion of section 12, just north of West Harrison, and James McCoy entered a portion of section 14 in Logan township.

During the year 1805 there seems to have been a comparative lull, even in the slow-going entries of land. Adam Flake, one of the first, if not the very first, to settle in the county, entered a portion of section 35, township 5, range 2, on South Hogan creek, and Michael Henich entered a portion of section II, in township 4, range 2, just one mile south of Adam Flake's entry. In Harrison township, a portion of section 25 was entered by John Allen.

HARDSHIPS OF THE PIONEERS.

The "winning of the West" was a slow process and in it there was much more to do than to war with the Indians. History deals largely with the In- dian wars, but says very little concerning the economic side of the matter. Historians write books to sell and the prosy details of chopping down big trees, burning the logs and clearing away the underbrush does not make as good reading to the average American as the exciting details of bloody war- fare. Four years after the land office had been opened at Cincinnati, only thirty-three land entries had been made in the county. Dearborn county, when first settled, was covered thickly with forest trees. Large walnut, ash, elm, hickory, sugar and other trees were thickly interwoven with buckeye, haw, box elder, ironwood, cottonwood and water maple, and the underbrush in places was even more troublesome to clear for the coming of the plow than were the larger varieties. Cutting down the trees, burning the logs, and mak- ing a clearing even large enough to enable the settler to raise sufficient corn for his family was no small task. The Indian, according to the treaty, was

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supposed to keep off government ground, yet his treacherous character was well known, and he was uncomfortably in evidence at the cabin of the pio- neer, demanding food and drink. Wild beasts were common: The bear, deer and occasionally an elk were common. Panthers, lynx and other smaller and less dangerous animals were to be met, and serpents of most every conceiv- able kind were common. In the bottoms the water was not good, the settler not digging deep enough to get the flow from deep springs, and the mos- quitoes inoculated the people with malaria until chills and intermittent" fevers were the common diseases of the times. On the higher lands it was more healthful and malaria was scarcely ever found. The first settler would first clear away the trees from about his buildings, then cut off a small patch so that he could raise some corn and garden vegetables. Then, perhaps, if he were able, about the middle of August he would deaden another patch so that the next spring he could burn the logs. Sometimes trees would be burned into two or three parts, thus saving the labor with the axe. This was called "niggering" a log off and was a common way of labor saving. Log-rollings were a common social event. A clearing would be made and the logs pre- pared to pile when the neighbors would be gathered together, men, women and children, for the rolling. Handspikes were made out of tough wood and, if a yoke of oxen belonged in the neighborhood, these patient animals were brought into requisition. Athletics were in vogue in those days, even more than today. But the champion was the man who could outlift his fellows. After the logs had been piled ready for the bonfire, some kind of entertain- ment was given, generally winding up with a dance. In this way a field was cleared for the spring planting. In the fall the corn was generally pulled or jerked off the stalk and thrown in a pile in a shed or barn; then some night the neighbors would be called in to "shuck" it out. The occasion was made merry by songs, and the young folks would be busy, as young people always are, getting acquainted and courting. It is said that one of the rules of the "shucking bee" was that every red ear shucked by the young men entitled them to choose from the young maidens present one whom he might kiss. It is very probable, at any rate, that the people of those days enjoyed them- selves in a special way fully as much as those who now possess the most ele- gant parlors and move in the most highly-cultivated society.

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History of Dearborn County, Indiana : her people, industries and institutions, Part 10

Author: Archibald Shaw Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Number of Pages: 1123

Author: Archibald Shaw
Publication date: 1915
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1123