USA > Michigan > Oakland County > History of Oakland County, Michigan, a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests, Volume I > Part 7
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57
"The legend which I have attempted to verify is founded upon an incident occurring at Orchard lake long before the coming of the white man and while the grand farms now lying around it were merely a vast oak opening. its sole occupant the Indian and the wild beast. Very near the center of this Orchard lake is a large island, wooded to its very shore. On it are a few apple trees, old and gnarled, remnants of an orchard planted so long ago that the Indians even have no data concerning it. Its name, Me-nah-sa-gor-ning, meaning "apple place," still lives in tradi- tion.
"On this island the Algonquin chief, Pontiac, had his lodge after his repulse at the siege of Detroit. On the high bank of this lake, oppo-
22
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
site the island, is still to be seen the ancient burial ground of the Sacs, Hurons and Wyandots.
"Tradition says that back beyond the memory of the tribe a young chief sickened and suddenly died. The maiden to whom he was be- trothed became insane, and whenever she could escape from her guard- ians they would take the body of the chief from its resting place in the old ground across the lake and carry it back to the place where his lodge formerly stood.
"At last, weary of guarding her, with the advice of their medicine man the tribe killed her, upon her refusal to marry. This crime, so di- rectly opposed to all former Indian custom, so offended the Great Spirit that he avowed his intention of totally destroying the tribe, and to give the maiden, 'as long as water flowed,' complete control over it. She alone
APPLE ISLAND ORCHARD LAKE
has power to assume her form at any time. She can compel the attend- ance of the tribe at any time by the beating of the Indian drum. At this sound they must gather and wait where an old canoe has been gradually covered by the drifting sands. Upon the signal of her coming with her dead the warriors must meet her on the shore, bear the chief on his bier and lay him down by the ashes of his council fire and, waiting beside him until she can caress him, bear him back to his resting place. All, how- ever, must be done between sunset and sunrise-a foggy night being always chosen to elude observation."
PRIMITIVE TILLAGE AND INDUSTRIES
One of the most complete sketches of aboriginal history as it relates to Oakland county has been written by (). Poppleton, formerly president of the Oakland County Pioneer Society. It is mainly contained in his address delivered before that body in June, 1884. The portions applic- able to the subject now being considered are as follows :
23
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
"Oakland county is not barren of traditional or legendary events of deep interest to the historian, and to her people. When the Jesuit fathers and French fur traders first visited this region. of the country, and fol- lowing them the very early pioneers, they found many evidences of a prior occupation by a semi-civilization, in the tillage of the soil by un- known and extinct agriculturists of a very remote period. Many rude agricultural implements have been found in the clearing and tillage of the land and by excavations; thus demonstrating theoretically that the country had been previously occupied by a people who were well versed in the knowledge of practical agriculture, and who subsisted by cultivat- ing the soil, by mining, in pursuit of game of the forests, and the fish of the lakes and rivers.
"The very early surveyors in pursuit of their calling, and the pioneer in exploring this region for a favorable location for his homestead, found large areas which, evidently, had been tilled in hoed crops, judging from the regular and well defined rows of hills for corn and vegetables, upon which were then growing the largest oaks and other trees of the forests. By an actual computation of the yearly growth of these trees, the occupa- tion of this region by those people must have been centuries before the discovery of this continent.
"The traditions were that corn, beans and other grains and vegetables were raised upon these aboriginal fields; that they had sustained a numerous population, who were proficient in the arts of rude manufact- uring of cloths, pottery and copper utensils, silver and copper ornaments. stone axes, hammers, mortars and pestles, flint arrow heads, graining and skinning knives, many of which have been found during the early ex- plorations of the missionaries and traders and since by the first settle- ments of the pioneers of the county.
"At what period those people occupied the county is difficult even to approximate a date. Yet from the modified barbarism which is indi- cated by works left by a pre-historic race, there can be no other conclu- sion than that this county has been occupied by a race long since extinct, who were undoubtedly connected with the early civilization of Europe.
CONTACT WITH KNOWN TRIBES
"In the early explorations of the Great Lakes by the French, com- mencing in 1534-5, they found the descendants of the Algonquin tribes of Indians occupying the country to the north and west of Detroit, with whom they held social and commercial intercourse, yet but little of the French and early Indian history has been preserved. It is known that the fur traders made their annual visits to this region, through the rivers Huron, Rouge. Raisin and Clinton, for the purpose of bartering with the Indians for furs and skins.
"But little has been preserved of the Indian history, or of the French nomadic occupation. One Michean, a French and Indian trader, who died about the time of the first settlement of Wayne, Oakland and Mac- omb counties, at the advanced age of one hundred and fifteen or one hun- dred and sixteen years, relates that one of the traditions of the tribes was that a sanguinary conflict occurred between the Foxes and Chippewas,
24
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
upon the plains north and west, adjoining what is now the village of Bir- mingham, and known as the Willits, Doctor Swan and Captain Blake farms, on sections 24 and 25.
SCARS OF BATTLE
"The village of the Chippewas was situated near the present site of the cemetery and formed a nucleus from which they sallied forth upon their hunting, fishing and warlike expeditions and forays, returning with varied success and bringing game, furs and the scalps of their hated foe, the Foxes. Between these powerful tribes there had existed a deadly feud for many years, until it culminated in an attack by the Foxes upon the Chippewas, at their village. How many braves were engaged in the con- flict, tradition has failed to hand down to us. That there were many on each side is evident from the number of dead redskins said to have been found in the trail of the retreating tribes and on the battlefield. The Chip- pewas were defeated after a desperate struggle in defending their chil- dren, squaws and camp fires, and their village burned. They retreated along the trails towards what is now Detroit, closely pursued by their foes. leaving about seven hundred dead bodies along the course of their retreat ; and on the field of battle the dead were too numerous to be counted. The pride and prowess of this once powerful tribe was crushed and humili- ated, and thereafter they declined in influence and numbers.
"There is one other notable Indian tradition, of an event which occurred in the county-that of a hostile meeting between the great chief Pontiac and another tribe, in the vicinity of a large, while oak tree, in the township of Royal Oak, on section 16, from which the township derives its name ; located near the junction of the Crook's, Niles and Paint Creek roads. At the time I first saw it, in 1825, it still bore the scars made by the tomahawks, arrows and bullets. But at what date this happened, or what tribe was opposed to Pontiac and his followers, I have never been able to learn, not even through traditional history."
C. Z. HORTON'S CONTRIBUTIONS
C. Z. Horton has also made valuable contributions to the Indian pic- tures of Oakland county, some of which are given. They were originally published in the Rochester Era. As to evidences of former tillage, either by Indians or a more primitive race, he says : "In this connection I would state that the appearance of the woodlands when I first came here ( to Rochester ), especially south of the Clinton river, looked like an old corn field, or like hills where corn had grown, the rows running a little west of north and east of south, about four feet apart each way; besides all the stones had been piled up, as but few scattering ones could be seen and many of them were deeply imbedded in the earth."
INDIAN CAMPING GROUND AND CEMETERY
"Near the dwelling of Mr. Edwin T. Wilcox, on the Paint Creek road, some two miles south of Rochester," he continues, "there were deep in-
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
dentations in the ground, and from ten to twelve feet across, some of them two or more feet deep. They followed the line of the ridge, were from four to six feet apart-perhaps 100 of them-and were parallel, showing the appearance of a winter camping-ground where the earth had been thrown up around their wigwams, as it was afterwards dis- covered. in digging in them, they contained the debris of ashes and char- coal. On the lot owned by Mr. Simeon P. Hartwell, the same broken surface appeared, also the corn hills. On the Chipman farm, now occupied by Mr. Weaver, some eighty or one hundred rods east and north, the same indications were observable, also an old burial ground. These signs I never observed north of the river.
QUEER CUSTOMS
"It was a custom with the Indians that when their young arrived at a proper age they were enclosed in a wigwam and had to remain thus in se- clusion by themselves a number of days, or until they would dream of some animal, bird, or reptile, and be able to number and tell of it in the morning. Whatever the dream might be that would be an object of wor- ship through life-such as a bear, a deer, a fox, an eagle, hawk, or smaller animals and birds, and even snakes and lizards. I have often seen trees in the woods, in this vicinity, with rude representations of this kind worked on them, which was their habit of doing. I saw two boys in their wigwams undergoing this ordeal-singing during the day and silent at night. This happened in front of Mr. William Burbank's residence in the summer of 1825, where Mr. Conrad Taylor now resides. I asked Mrs. Burbank what was the object of the Indians to be thus engaged on a sultry day? She said it was one of their religious ceremonies. I have since learned that such was the case.
"Here is another circumstance, or rather a ceremony of the Indians I have heard narrated by the old settlers, which will be of interest to all those living in this vicinity, which took place in 1824. It is this: south of the Barnes Brothers' paper mill, near the hill, on the land occupied by Mr. Ezekiel Dewey, the Indians cleared off all the flat, built a large log- heap, and set it on fire : in building the heap they left an opening in the centre. They then brought forth two white dogs which they had fantas- tically decorated with red flannel around their necks, tied in their ears and around their legs and tails; and when the pile had fairly become ignited all through, they threw their canine victims into the aperture left in the middle of the blazing pile. They then commenced their songs and dances, which they kept up all night-as the old saying is, they made the welken ring.'
THE PASSING OF WE-SE-GAHI
We-se-gah was probably one of the most turbulent of the Indians in this section. He was large and muscular, and when in liquor was ready for fight. Most of the settlers were afraid of him. Of his quarrelsome and pugilistic propensity none perhaps were better acquainted than Alex- ander and Benjamin Graham. They both had, several times, quarreled
26
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
with him. We-se-gah at one time drew a tomahawk on Benjamin while he was at work on his shoe-bench, for which Benjamin gave him a very sound thrashing, and at another time he attacked Alexander. After a long tussle, of nearly an hour's duration, Alexander finally overpowered him. We-se-gah, drawing his blanket over his face, then sat down and waited for Graham to dispatch him according to Indian law-by burying a toma- hawk in his head. Graham raised the blanket and said to him: "Go! Never come back. If you do, I will kill you !" We-se-gah went, and was never seen in this section afterward."
CHAPTER IV FIRST SETTLERS AND LAND OWNERS
GREAT SET-BACK TO SETTLEMENT-OAKLAND COUNTY'S FIRST SETTLERS -THE MACK COLONY OF PONTIAC-"UNCLE BEN" WOODWORTH- -FIRST SURVEYS-LOCATIONS UNDER THE "TWO DOLLAR" ACT- THIE "TEN SHILLING" ACT- GREAT EVENT FOR THIE PIONEER LAND OWNER-TOWN OF PONTIAC SETTLED-ORION AND OXFORD ROYAL OAK AND TROY-AVON AND WHITE LAKE-SPRINGFIELD AND GROVE- LAND-FARMINGTON AND WEST BLOOMFIELD-WATERFORD AND IN- DEPENDENCE-BRANDON, SOUTIIFIELD AND BLOOMFIELD.
Any general history will inform the reader as to the nature of the civil or judicial jurisdiction which was theoretically exercised over the territory now recognized as Oakland county, but humanly speaking we have no vital interest in the subject until men, women and children com- menced to appear and form households in the new country. This hap- pened about two years after the state surveys commenced in southern Michigan, the pioneers in the Oakland county movement being James Graham, his son Alexander, Christopher Hartsough and John Hersey. They located in the township now known as Avon on the 17th day of March, 1817, and brought their families with them.
GREAT SET-BACK TO SETTLEMENT
It took so many years to counteract the report made by the surveyor general in relation to the military, or southern Michigan lands, that a somewhat extended review of the attending circumstances seems germane to the subject. On the 6th of May, 1812, congress passed an act requir- ing that two million acres of land should be surveyed in the then territory of Louisiana ; a like quantity in the territory of Illinois, as well as in the territory of Michigan-in all, six million acres, to be set apart for the soldiers of America in the war of 1812. The lands were surveyed and appropriated, under this law, in Louisiana and Illinois, but the surveyors reported that there were no lands fit for cultivation. The prin- cipal meridian and the base line for the Michigan surveys were estab- lished in 1815.
The surveyor general's report which so long retarded immigration to southern Michigan and Oakland county was as follows: "The country on the Indian boundary line from the mouth of the Great Auglaize river
27
IHISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
and running thence for about fifty miles is (with some few exceptions ) low, wet land, with a very thick growth of underbrush, intermixed with very bad marshes, but generally very heavily timbered with beech, cotton- wood. oak, etc. : thence continuing north and extending from the Indian boundary eastward, the number and extent of the swamps increase, with the addition of numbers of lakes, from twenty chains to two and three miles across.
"Many of the lakes have extensive marshes adjoining their marshes. sometimes thickly covered with a species of pine called tamarack, and other places covered with a coarse, high grass, and uniformly covered from six inches to three feet (and more at times) with water. The mar- gins of these lakes are not the only places where swamps are found, for they are interspersed throughout the whole country, and filled with water. as above stated, and varying in extent.
"The intermediate space between these swamps and lakes-which is probably near one-half the country-is, with very few exceptions, a poor, barren, sandy land, on which scarcely any vegetation grows, except very small, scrubby oaks. In many places that part which may be called dry land is composed of little, short sand-hills, forming a kind of deep basins, the bottom of many of which are composed of marsh similar to the above described. The streams are generally narrow and very deep compared with their width, the shores and bottoms of which are ( with very few exceptions) swampy beyond description; and it is with the utmost difficulty that a place can be found over which horses can be con- veyed in safety.
"A circumstance peculiar to that country is exhibited in many of the marshes, by their being thinly covered with a sward of grass, by walk- ing on which evinces the existence of water, or a very thin mud immedi- ately under the covering which sinks from six to eighteen inches under the pressure of the foot at every step, and at the same time rises before and behind the person passing over it. The margins of many of the lakes and streams are in a similar situation, and in many places are liter- ally afloat. On approaching the eastern part of the Military lands towards the private claims on the straits and lake, the country does not contain so many swamps and lakes, but the extreme sterility and barrenness of the soil continues the same.
"Taking the country altogether so far as it has been explored, and to all appearances, together with information received concerning the bal- ance, is so bad there would not be more than one acre out of a hundred. if there would be one out of a thousand, that would in any case admit of cultivation.'
The effect of this report upon congress was that so much of the act of 1812 as related to Michigan was repealed by an act of April 29, 1816. which also located 1.500,000 acres of additional land in Illinois and 500,- 000 acres in Missouri, in lien of the original 2,000,000 allotted to Michi- gan. It was not until 1817 and 1818 that a few venturesome pioneers braved the dangers of the terrible morasses depicted in the report of the surveyor general, and demonstrated how flimsy was the basis for its mis- leading statements. The visits of Major Oliver Williams and his com- panions, in the fall of 1818, marked the great turning point of public
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
opinion for the better ; it proved beyond question that there was a fertile and beautiful country in the interior, when once the immigrant had pene- trated through the marshy belt which girdied Detroit.
OAKLAND COUNTY'S FIRST SETTLERS
Something about these men who thus sowed the seeds of civilization in Oakland county is given by Hon. T. J. Drake in one of his many historical addresses, to which all writers of the early times are so much indebted. His words are: "In early life old Mr. Graham (James). resided near Tioga Point, on the Chemung branch of the Susquehanna river, in Pennsylvania. About sixty years since, he moved to Oxford, in Upper Canada, in 1816 to Mt. Clemens, and on the 17th day of March, 1817, came into Oakland county to locate on a farm now occupied by Dr. William Thompson,, lying on the north bank of the Clinton river. B. Graham, a young son of Mr. James Graham, was employed as one of the hands under Colonel Wampler, in surveying that town in 1816.
John Hersey was the first man that entered lands in the county of Oakland on the 29th of October, 1818. He entered a part of section 10, in this town, on the waters of Paint creek and erected a saw mill, the first in the county. He placed in it a run of stone which were manu- factured in the county by a mechanic by the name of Wood, and made the first flour manufactured in Oakland. By his exertions the incon- veniences and hardships attendant on a new settlement were greatly re- lieved and immigration largely induced. The name of John Hersey, whose long life was marked by signal industry and integrity, should be engraven on the memory of every citizen of Oakland. Pioneers of Oak- land! Long may his memory be cherished.'
Mr. O. Poppleton's account in an address before the County Pioneer Society : "It has now been sixty-seven years since the first permanent settlers located in the county of Oakland. The first were John Hersey, James and Alexander Graham and Christopher Hartsough in the town- ship of Avon, with their families, on March 17, 1817, who spent their first night on the plat of ground between the junction of Paint creek and Clinton river. These families came by way of Mt. Clemens, following the course of the Clinton river, there being an impenetrable swamp be- tween Detroit and their new home-so reported by the commission sent out by the surveyor general. The report demonstrates how little was known of the interior of the territory and county at that time. Sixty years ago Moses Allen entered the first lands in the county at the United States land office at Detroit on October 24, 1818, being the southwest quarter of section 32 in Orion."
THIE MACK COLONY OF PONTIAC
In 1818, the year after the Grahams settled in Avon township, Colonel Stephen Mack, agent of the Pontiac Land Company, located a small colony on the site of the future county seat. Accompanying him were Orison Allen, William Lester and Major J. J. Todd, with their families, and they were not "planted" until in the fall of that year.
30
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
The same autumn and winter, settlements were commenced at Bir- mingham, Royal Oak, and other places above the Detroit and Saginaw trail, and in March, 1819, Major Oliver Williams and his brother-in-law Alpheus Williams, settled in Waterford township. Captain Archibald Phillips also settled in Waterford very early. Among the first to enter land in Troy were Messrs Castle, Hunter, Hamilton and Fairbanks, in February, 1819.
"UNCLE BEN" WOODWORTH
In town 4, north of range II east, now called Oakland, the first pur- chase was made by Benjamin Woodworth and William Russell, on the 16th of March, 1819. They entered a part of section 33. The history of father Russell, as he was familiarly called, is truth itself, candid and unassuming. He was an example of sociality and benevolence, upright and just in all his ways. Benjamin Woodworth, "Uncle Ben." as he was . known by all who ever stopped at the "Steamboat Hotel" in Detroit, had a heart full of kindness and a hand ever ready to help the distressed. Ile was the constant friend of Oakland county, and he never forgot or for- sook her early inhabitants. In 1824, James Coleman and James Hazard purchased : in 1825, Benedict Baldwin, Ilorace Lathrop, James D. Gal- loway, J. B. Galloway. J. Dewey, Samuel Hilton, Ezra Newman, David Hammond and Needham Hemmingway, became purchasers and were among the early settlers.
FIRST SURVEYS
Most of the earliest explorers of Oakland county came in by way of Mount Clemens and the Clinton river. the year 1819 being one of the busiest of the very early period. The pioneers followed close on the heels of the government surveyors. Among the latter who saw the country in the pioneer times of which we write were Colonel Joseph Wampler and Captain Henry Parke, and to the latter the author is indebted for an interesting picture which will be presented later.
Virtually, the dates of land entries fix the dates of settlement, as most of those who entered land did so for the purpose of founding homes and not to hold it for "speculation." Mr. (). Poppleton has made the most complete synopsis of those who located the first lands in the different townships, and his list is often published without giving him due credit. It was first given in his address before the Oakland County Pioneer Soci- ety February 20, 1889.
From the date of Pontiac's abandoning the siege of Detroit, in 1764. to the time of ordering the survey of the county by the surveyor general, in 1815, 1 find in my researches but little authoritative historical interest," he says. "But in my investigations of the early surveys in the state and county I find it replete with interest. From the old records I learn that the first surveys in the territory of which we find any public record were made by Aaron Greely of 'Private Land Claims' on St. Clair, Detroit and Rouge rivers in the winter of 1809 and from July to November, 1810.
The first surveys upon the meridian line were made by Benjamin Hough in the fall of 1815, from the north line of town 3 west, in Jack-
31
HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY
son county, south to the Ohio state line. The first surveys on the base line were east of town 5 east, in Livington county, to Lake St. Clair, by Alexander Holmes, in 1815.
The earliest subdivisions of townships are given in the order as sur- veyed, viz .: In March, 1817, town I north, range 10 east, Southfield; in April, 1818, towns 1 and 2 north, range II east, Royal Oak and Troy, by Joseph Wampler ; in May, 1817, town I north, range 9 east, Farming- ton, by Samuel Carpenter.
LOCATIONS UNDER THE "TWO DOLLAR" ACT
Entries under the "credit" system or the "two dollar act" were inade in the townships of the county as follows: Waterford, Independence, Southfield, Bloomfield, Pontiac, Orion, Troy, Avon, Oakland and Royal Oak, commencing October 24, 1818, by Moses Allen in Orion, of the southwest quarter, section 32, the first location of land in the county.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.