USA > Maryland > Washington County > Hagerstown > A history of Washington County, Maryland from the earliest settlements to the present time, including a history of Hagerstown > Part 18
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Hancocktown were the stores of Samuel McFerran and Joseph and Henry Protzman.
The people who came to town to deal at the stores had no lack of accommodation, for the taverns were very numerous. In 1991, Peter Shaffner took Beltzhoover's tavern and changed its name to the "Sign of the General Washington." Beltzhoover then lived in a large brick house next door to his tavern, probably the old Dorsey house. He afterward resumed the tavern keeping busi- ness in 1793. John Ragan kept the "Indian King tavern" in the Main street leading from the Court House to the Western country. Ile was succeeded in 1791 by Thomas Crab. From the Indian King, ('rab took Adam Ott's tavern at the sign of the "Shipp." This house stood where the Hoover House later stood. Crab was succeeded at the Indian King by Mr. Peck. In connection with the Hotel Peck had a summer garden where he served tea, . coffee and syllabub. In 1799 Peck went to Bal- timore and took the Columbia Inn. Wil- liam Mackey kept the "Indian Queen" on North Potomac street; James Downey kept the "American Arins" on the Main street leading to the Western country, and Capp's tavern. On the public square, fronting the Court House, stood the Fountain Inn, kept in 1797 by Jonathan Hager. This was a favorite place for Independ- ence day celebrations. This Jonathan Hager set- tled in the valley not many years after his namesake the founder of the town, with whom, as far as I am able to discover, he was not related. He was a man of excellent character and a pop- ular and good citizen. For some years he kept a tavern in Chambersburg but returned to Hagers- town about 1796. He was a soldier in the Revo- olutionary Army and it is stated in his obituary that "he lived in Hagerstown when the ground on which it stands was a howling wilderness." If this be true, he must have come here at an early age for he was only nine years old when the town was laid out, having been born in 1752. He died February 16, 1823.
In Williamsport, there was the tavern at the Sign of General Washington, opened by George Bishop in October 1793; and in Haneocktown the tavern was at the sign of the "Ship." Previously to 1792 it was kept by John Donavan. In that year it was taken by Caspar Shaffner.
The newspaper gives but little insight into the political affairs of the time, but that little furnishes a eurious eontrast to the customs of the
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present time. In a communication addressed to the printer in October, 1790, an unsueeessful eandi- date at an election which had just taken place complained bitterly because he had "observed at almost every door in Elizabeth Town a printed piece of yours entitled 'Result of the Election.' It was so new and extraordinary that I wish the same error never to be committed by a printer whom I respect and have from his first eoming here en- deavored to support. The errors are, first, insert- ing the number of votes the gentleman eleeted had, and second, mentioning a gentleman who was not elected." For this gross breach of propriety the printer made a suitable apology. All that was said about the election was in the extra for the regular issue contains but little mention of it. This Congressional District was composed of Alle- gany, Washington and a portion of Frederiek counties. Col. Thomas Sprigg was the first rep- resentative in Congress. The candidates were selected by commissioners from the different eoun- ties who were appointed "to confer and secure a respeetable representation in Congress at the ensu- ing election."
In the spring of 1791, a movement began which has continued until the present day-the emigration of people from the County to the West, which has peopled many important seetions of country with Washington County folk. There is a Maryland settlement in Northern Illinois, with Polo for its eentre, which is almost entirely peopled from our County. In 1791, and pre- viously, Kentucky was the western frontier and its rich soil and excellent climate had just begun to attract immigration. A wilderness intervened, which had to be traversed at a great cost of labor and patience; but the tide of emigration was strong for many years. A Frenehman, M. Lacas- sagne, and others who owned great tracts of land in the new territory, had agents in Hagerstown and neighboring towns for the sale of their lands and the promotion of emigration to the banks of the Ohio. In this county Lacassagne's agents were James Chapline, of Sharpsburg; Col. Thomas Sprigg, Col. John Barnes, Nathaniel Morgan and Dr. Henry Schnebley, leading and influential cit- izens of the County. The Orndorff family from Mt. Pleasant, near Sharpsburg, emigrated to Kon- tucky at an early period. Among them was Christopher Orndorff, who settled in Logan County where his wife, Mary, died in 1823. Col. Hynes a rich farmer near Hancocktown, went in 1792.
In March, 1791, a party of fifty, left Funkstown and journeyed through the wilderness to the new land. They took with them the baggage of "that good old man" Jacob Funk, the founder of the town of Jerusalem or Funkstown, who followed in a few days, probably overtaking the party on the way. Frederick Rohrer left the County in 1793 for a "distant part," probably Kentucky, and left a large number of town lots and other proper- ty in the hands of Baltzer Goll, Luke Tiernan and Jacob Rohrer for sale. Among the first emigrants to leave for the wilds of Kentucky was Captain John Reynolds, an officer of the Revolutionary Army. He sold his property in Washington County, took leave of his aged parents and friends and set off in the latter part of 1778 for the West, traversing a wilderness almost from the time of leaving home. He was accompanied by his wife and seven eliildren, a Mrs. Harden and her two children, Mrs. Malotte and five ehildren, Capt. Daniel Stull, Robert Dewler, Ralph Naylor, a white servant, and a colored girl belonging to Mrs. Reynolds. The party spent the winter near the banks of the Ohio not far from Pittsburg and in March 1779, they embarked in two boats to reach their destination lower down the river. One boat contained Captain Reynolds and all the per- sons above named. The other boat contained Reynolds' cattle and horses and was in charge of men employed by him.
The boats had come to Long Reach about fifty miles below Wheeling. Here the children became tired, and the party landed ; but traees of a recent Indian encampment were discovered and they im- mediately re-embarked and pushed out into the stream. The eurrent carried the boats near. the northern shore, and as they approached a point of land a volley of rifle bullets was poured upon the boat in which were Captain Reynolds and his family. The Captain was asleep with his head in his wife's lap. The man who was stear- ing was killed. Reynolds grasped his rifle and arose to his feet but as he did so, a bullet erashed through his brain and he died instantly. The horrified woman was induced to lie down but not until a bullet had gone through her bonnet. The fire was returned, and one Indian was killed, but the boat drew nearer and nearer to the shore and a number of Indians swam out and took possession of it. Three of the occupants of the boat were killed and the remaining nineteen were carried into captivity. The cargo of the boat was an im-
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mense prize for the savages and consisted largely of dry goods and other merchandise in which Rey- nolds had invested his whole fortune.
The narrative of the adventures of these un- fortunate people is thrilling in its details and heartrending. They were tortured and persecuted and suffered from weariness and hunger. Mrs. Reynolds saw her little girls fall by the way from weakness and want of food and was in constant terror lest they should be unable to rise again, in which case she knew they would be tomahawked. 'They were compelled to run the gauntlet several times for the amusement of the party. "Į'his pastime consisted in compelling the prisoners to run through an avenue of Indians, who rained cruel blows upon them as they passed. Capt. Reynold's son, John, one day disappeared from the party, and the mother was convinced that he had been killed. But she afterwards recovered him as we shall see. He finally returned to Hagerstown, where he lived many years as a respected and hon- ored citizen, Major John Reynolds. He died about the year 1830.
Soon after this two of the children, Elizabeth and a little son, William, then in his third year, were torn from the arms of the mother, who, with some of her other children, was carried by a war party to Fort Detroit. The little boy and girl were taken to one of the Delaware towns on the Scioto. William was kept by the chief, who was called Peter, as his property. Peter gave Eliz- abeth to his wife's sister. At this settlement was also Peter Malott and several white women, whose business it was to work corn and do all the domes- tic work. Elizabeth was near enough to her little brother to see him occasionally. She was fortu- nate enough to seeure the good will of the squaw who had possession of her, and received humane treatment. The party had now and then to en- dure famine, when the corn erop had been exhaust- ed, and the chase had been unsuccessful. It hap- pened that a party returning from the war path brought a captive white woman from Kentucky through the Scioto village. This woman had an opportunity to speak with Elizabeth and learn her history. The little girl begged her, if she ever escaped from the Indians to send word of her place of captivity to her uncles, Joseph Reynolds and Robert Smith, of Washington County, Mary- land. She also sent a message to her father who she seems to have thought might still be alive. In the meantime the devoted mother was at De-
troit, planning and working for the rescue of her children, who were scattered abroad throughout the wilderness. To gather these again to her arms was a task which might well have appeared hope- less to the most sanguine, and appalling to the bravest heart. But the brave woman never de- spaired. She had arrived at Detroit, forlorn and in a deplorable condition of weariness and suffer- ing. IIer captors had deprived her of nearly all of her clothing and she had but little to wear except a ragged blanket. Some ladies offered to take her little girls as nurses for their children, but she refused to let then go, and the next day they sent her a supply of suitable clothing. Fromn this time onward she made some money by sewing, and received regular rations from the British gov- ernment for herself and her children, as prisoners of war. Whilst in Detroit, a Captain Reynolds of the British Army, hearing her name, and that she was from Maryland, obtained an introduction to her. He told her he was from Maryland, which he had left when the war broke out, to join his Majesty's service, and that he wished- to find whether he could trace any relationship with her husband. Mrs. Rynolds told him she had no de- sire to make the inquiry as she did not wish her children to claim kin with a Tory.
Mrs. Reynolds soon prevailed upon the British commander to send parties in search of her other ehildren. These messengers went out provided with a great quantity of rum, found them all and induced their possessors to bring them to Detroit, and claim the twenty pounds reward which was given for each prisoner or scalp brought in by the Indians. In this way all were recovered except Joseph, the eldest, who had been adopted by a chief near Detroit, and was designed to succeed him in command of the tribe. Him the mother succeeded in abducting while the warriors were all absent from the wigwam. The boy was secreted until her departure. The Indians made desperate endeavors to recover him, and to kidnap the other children. John had been purchased on the Upper Sandusky by a Mr. Robinson, who, after learning who he was, brought him to Detroit and delivered him to his mother from whom he had been sepa- rated since early in their captivity. The party which had brought Elizabeth to Detroit had left little William in the Delaware settlement. It was in October that Elizabeth left him and the mother was almost distraeted with grief at not getting him back. One day about the middle of Decem-
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ber, as Elizabeth went past the Council house door for water, an officer called to her to come and see her little brother. She ran eagerly forward and there saw the little fellow. The officer restrained her from speaking to him to see whether he would know her. He looked up and saw her and said, "It is my Betsy." She ran for her mother who was electrified with joy. The little boy, after some difficulty, recognized her also. The eom- mandant redeemed him and restored him to his mother. It may well be supposed that the meet- ing of the mother with her little ones as they were restored to her was pathetie to the highest degree.
The kind commandant soon put the whole party on a vessel and sent them to Montreal. In that city Mrs. Reynolds met an American prisoner whom she knew and she set to work to get him a compass and a tinder box to assist him in eseaping. He had already made an attempt. but for laek of a compass had got lost in the woods and been re- captured by the Indians. As he was about making the second attempt, the news of peace arrived. Mrs. Reynolds. her children and nineteen other prisoners were landed in the United States, and conveyed to New York. Here they met General Washington who gave them a pass. They set sail for Philadelphia. There this remarkable woman hired a wagon and drove baek to her old home in Washington County. As the party, all of whom were supposed by their friends to be yet in eaptivity with the Indians, approached the house of Captain Reynolds' father, one of the boys ran ahead. As he went into the house he was asked whose little boy he was and replied : "Captain
John Reynolds." The astonished old man looked down the road and there saw his dead son's entire family approaching. The heroie woman had brought her whole pack baek, safe and sound, with- out the loss of a single member. Major John Reynolds, one of the boys as has been already said, became a respected citizen of Hagerstown, living here many years. Another son, Joseph, married Betsy the daughter of Capt. William Heyser in 1793. William left the county and went to Balti- more to live in 1294. Little Elizabeth married a man named Wolfkill and went to live in Urbana, Ohio. Mr. Joseph Reynolds who recently lived in Hagerstown and who was a son of Captain John Reynolds' eousin, met this lady in Urbana when she was eighty years of age. She told him this whole narrative of her adventures among the In- dian>. ('aptain John Reynolds' brother devoid his life to the work of revenge and became a celebrated Indian fighter. I-aae Reynolds, the father of the late Joseph Reynolds, lived on the farm more recently owned by Mr. Wm. Roulette near Sharpsburg. Thence he removed to Balti- more. William Reynolds, the oldest of the ehild- ren who were taken into eaptivity, beeame a wealthy farmer in Washington County. He lived on a fine farm near Mt. Aetna Furnace and died there October 7, 1823. Before his death he had lost his property by going seeurity .*
The most important of all the immigrants froin the County up to the end of the century was Col. Thomas Hart, who left for Lexington, Ken- tuckv, on Wednesday, May 27. 1194, aecompanied by his family. Col. Hart had seven children only two of whom were living when their mother, Mrs.
*The narrative of the adventure of one of the early emigrants from Washington County to the Val- ley of the Ohio, a brave woman, will give an insight into the life of those hardy pioneers who won the West.
"Among the first adventurers who settled on the river in the vicinity of Wheeling, was a family by the name of Tomlinson. Joseph and Samuel were then in the prime of life, when, in the year 1771, they commenced clearing Grave Creek. The cabin of Joseph was built on the elevated second bottom, about two hundred yards from the great mound which stood on his possessions. A large spring of clear cold water burst out at the foot of the slope, forty or fifty yards from the house, and ran along the first bottom a few rods, discharging its current into Little Grave Creek. Subsequently several famil- ies joined them, and by the time the Indian war broke out in 1774, they were able to build and man a stout block-house, surrounded by pallisades, which
they defended in such a manner as to maintain their rost during that season of war and bloodshed. Peace was made with the savages by Gov. Dunmore, in the fall of that year.
Mr. Tomlinson's clearing was now so large that he thought he could support a wife. A young woman named Elizabeth Hartness, whose mother lived about fifteen miles from Hagerstown, in Maryland, had made a conquest of his heart some years before, while seeking protection within the walls of Swear- ingen's fort, with her widowed mother and sisters, from an inroad of the Indians. Joseph was at the time employed as a ranger, for the settlement around the fort, and thus became acquainted with Elizabeth when quite a small .girl. She was now eighteen years old. He made a journey across the mountains in January, 1775, and they were married within the walls of the fort.
Mounted on horses, they commenced their jour- ney to her new home the last of January, and reach-
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OF WASHINGTON COUNTY, MARYLAND.
Susanna Hart, died, August 26, 1832, at the ad- vanced age of eighty-six years. One daughter, Eliza Hart, married Dr. Richard Pindle, a promi- nent physician of Washington County, one who had an honorable record in the Revolutionary Army. Dr. Pindell was a partner of Dr. Frederick Dorsey in 1803. His office was near the Square. In 1791 he lived about three miles from Hagerstown. He was the first Master of Mt. Moriah Lodge of Masons, which was organized in 1802, and was elected Grand Master in 1806, About 1814 he moved to Kentucky and praetieed medicine in Lex- ington. He was for many years the family phy- sician of his distinguished brother-in-law Clay. Mrs. Pindell died in August 1793. Another daughter, Sukey Hart, married Samuel Price, a member of the bar of Hagerstown in June 1794. After reaching Kentucky a third daughter married Henry Clay and a fourth married James Brown, subsequently minister of the United States to France. One son, the gallant Capt. Hart, distin- guished himself in the Indian war and fell in the massacre on the Raisin River in the war of 1812. Col. Hart was for many years one of the most conspicuous and useful citizens of Washington County. He lived a number of years on his farm on Long Mcadows, afterwards the Richard
Ragan farm, and more recently owned by George W. Harris and Wm. Young. Upon this farm Mrs. Clay was born. She frequently passed through Hagerstown in after years in company with her distinguished husband, and was here for a night with her grand-daughter in 1832 a few weeks be- fore Mr. Clay was nominated for President of the United States by the National Republican conven- tion at Baltimore. Upon that occasion they speut the night at the Globe Tavern. Col. Hart's resi- dence in Hagerstown when he came here to live was in the building subsequently McIllenny's Tavern. He was for many years a partner of Nathaniel Rochester and the senior member of the . firm. Shortly before he left, these two had dis- solved partnership and Col. Hart continued in the mercantile business in the firm of Thomas Hart & Sons. This is the commentary of the Washington Spy upon Col. Hart's departure. "He was an old and very respectable citizen, a peculiar ornament to society, a great admirer of order, a warm friend to the rights of man. It eannot therefore be wondered at that it is with regret we part from him and his admirable family."
Lucretia IIart, who was for more than half a century the wife of Henry Clay, was born at the farm at Long Meadows near Hagerstown in
ed his little log cabin on the 5th of February. After the planting of his cornfield in the spring, they again mounted their horses and made another jour- ney to the vicinity of Hagerstown for the purpose of bringing out her mother and her oldest sister, Molly Hartness. The old lady was a native of Ire- land, and came to America when a child. Her family name was Scott. Her other two daughters were mar- ried, and an only son had been killed by the Indians the year before while out on a trading expedition among the savages on the waters of Big Hocking, so that her mother and Molly were quite alone. Elizabeth was the youngest child of her parent, now in her sixty-second year.
Pack-horses were procured, and as much of their household goods as they could bring in this way were packed over the mountains, by roads which at this day would be called impassable. "Where there is a will there is a way;" and many things then accom- plished by the pioneers, would now be thought actu- ally impossible. The old lady was a very small woman, but animated with a resolute, adventurous spirit, she bore the journey without complaining.
They reached their wilderness home in June, the year the war of the Revolution commenced. Here they lived with constant watchfulness, on ac- count of Indians, until August, 1777, when their depredations became very troublesome, and word was brought by the rangers and traders that a large
body of Indians were on their way to destroy the settlements at Grave Creek and Wheeling. A council of the inhabitants was called, when it was decided to abandon the settlement and retire with their fam- ilies, some to Wheeling Fort, and others to the station on Monongahela, near Redstone Old Fort. Packing up their household goods, with their only child, they placed them on horseback, and driving their cattle before them, bid a sad farewell to their pleasant home. They left seventeen acres of corn, all in the roasting ear, a quantity of flax, some of it dressed ready for spinning, with their hogs and fowls to the merciless power of their enemies.
The females of that day were celebrated for their skill in spinning and weaving, all their apparel being fabricated with their own hands, from mate- rials grown on their own lands. Flax and hemp af- forded a large portion of the raw articles; some had a few sheep, but they were scarce.
In a few hours after their departure, the fort and dwelling houses were burnt to ashes, and their corn-fields and hogs destroyed. As they passed through Wheeling, Samuel, who was a single man, thought it to be his duty to remain and assist in defending the place against the coming attack. He did so, and on the morning of the assault, the 27th, while out reconnoitering their approach, with one Greathouse, fell into an ambuscade and was killed. Joseph, with his family, and that of Isaac Williams, his brother-in-law, proceeded on to the vicinity of
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1781. While she was a child of 13 her father, Col. Hart, emigrated to Lexington, in ken- tucky, which was then a village containing a few log huts. In 1797, when she was sixteen years of age, there were but fifty families residing in Lexington ; and of all that beautiful and fertile country surrounding the town, but a small part was yet in cultivation. The primeval forests could be seen in every direction ; panthers, bears, wolves, wild turkeys and decr were frequently shot within half a mile of the rude court house. It was at this frontier town, peopled, however by polite fam- ilies from Marylaud and Virginia, that Lucretia Hart passed the years of her youth and early womanhood.
It could not be expected that amid such scenes she would acquire the arts of the drawing-room, or much of the knowledge which is stored in books, she did acquire however, an abundance of such knowledge and skill as her situation required. Few women have ever understood better the man- agement of a plantation than Lucrctia Hart.
The country was rapidly filling up. In No- vember 1197. among the emigrants who arrived from Virginia, was Henry Clay, then about twenty- one years of age, and one of the most brilliant young men of his native State. The son of a Bap-
tist preacher, he had in his boyhood found employ- ment in Richmond, where, attracting the notice of an eminent judge, he had received assistance from him in studying the law. Although much courted in the polite society of Richmond, and though his talents were cininent and acknowledged, there were too many old lawyers in the place to admit of the speedy rise of the young man, who had nothing but his talents to recommend him. So, on getting his license to practice, Henry Clay emigrated to the new State of Kentucky, and hung out his tin sign at Lexington. He was so poor that he had not the means of paying his weekly board; and he used in after years to say that he thought he should be perfectly comfort- able if he could make a hundred pounds a year.
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