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IN OLD OTSEGO
by
Roy L. Butterfield
1959
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019
https://archive.org/details/inoldotsegonewyo00butt
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 06843 1987
GC 974.701 OT8BU
IN OLD OTSEGO
A NEW YORK COUNTY VIEWS ITS PAST by
Roy L. Butterfield OTSEGO COUNTY HISTORIAN
with
A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF COUNTY REFERENCES
1959
This Printing Authorized by Otsego County Board of Supervisors, 1959
Printed by The Freeman's Journal Co Cooperstown, N. Y. 1959
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE
V
INTRODUCTION vi
THE GENESIS OF OTSEGO COUNTY 1
OTSEGO'S EARLY POPULATION 5
GEORGE CROGHAN AND OTSEGO COUNTY
8
WILLIAM COOPER, COLONIZER
12
DOCUMENT-JACOB MORRIS 15
DR. NATHANIEL GOTT 17
A TRANSPORTATION STORY
20
IMPROVING THE MIND 24
OTSEGO IN OHIO
27
NOTABLE NATIVE SONS 30
OTSEGO WRITERS
34
GOLD RUSH DAYS 37
RICHFIELD'S MINERAL SPRINGS 42
OTSEGO MISCELLANY 45
ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO IN 1859 51
BIBLIOGRAPHY
55
iii
PREFACE
T HE MEMBERS of the Otsego County Committee on Historic Observances take pleasure in publishing in book form the interesting series of articles prepared by County Historian, Mr. Roy L. Butterfield, on the early history of our County. This series of articles was published weekly in all of the newspapers of the County during the summer and fall months of this year. 1959 was designated by the Legislature as "New York's Year of History."
The Committee members were of the opinion that Mr. Butter- field's articles contain very important Otsego County Historical material that should be preserved for posterity, put together in permanent book form and copies placed in all of the libraries, the schools and other institutions of the County. Hence, they requested of the members of the Otsego County Board of Supervisors an appro- priation for this purpose. The request was granted and sincere thanks and gratitude are hereby expressed to this honorable body.
Generous thanks and congratulations are also extended to Mr. Butterfield for his scholarly and painstaking study and research that made possible the rich material presented in this volume.
H. Claude Hardy, Chairman Mrs. Port Ferris, Vice Chairman Robert A. Harlem, Secretary Otsego County Committee on Historic Observances.
Cooperstown, New York December 29, 1959
V
.
INTRODUCTION
T HE DESIGNATION of 1959 as New York's Year of History, with every community in the state urged to aid in its observance, afforded a favorable opportunity to bring to attention items of importance in the history of Otsego County. Accordingly, the material presented here was prepared and is offered as a part of this county's participation in the whole project.
The fifteen chapters do not lend themselves to arrangement in a chronological sequence. Topics were selected primarily because at hand was information upon them which previously had been men- tioned little, if at all, in works devoted to the local scene. As an example, small comment has heretofore been made in print on the enviable place held by this county in the literary field, and so with many of the other subjects.
As they stand, these articles have necessarily been greatly con- densed. Each could readily fill much more space. Also other topics of likely appeal to current readers and of value in future research could well have had a place, but this volume can be only a sampling of the extensive and interesting history of the area.
These contributions may be helpful to teachers and pupils in our schools and to others who have need or desire to pursue our local history. I hope this number is legion. A further hope is that in the following pages can be found cause for satisfaction-and even pride- in the record of Otsego County.
Hartwick, N. Y. December 29, 1959
Roy L. Butterfield Otsego County Historian
vi
THE GENESIS OF OTSEGO COUNTY
WHEN white men first came into the Otsego region the territory now covered by the county belonged to the Mohawk Indians. It was not included under the charter given by King James II of England to the Duke of York in 1664, as that instrument reads, "all the land from the west side of Connectecutte River to the East side of the De la Ware Bay," even if these may be construed to have reached to the utmost heads of those waters. Any British claim there was still shadowy when the Province of New York was divided into counties in 1683, Albany to include all the province north of Dutchess and Ulster Coun- ties. The next year Onondaga and Cayuga sachems stated "That they have put themselves and their lands under the Protection of the King, and have given the Susquehanna River to the Government of New York of which they desire it may be a Branch, and under which they will shelter themselves from the French." This would properly per- tain to regions farther south and west than Otsego, as the real Indian owners there are not mentioned. However, as early as 1704 the Mohawks began to convey their lands to white men and in 1736 this trend first affected present Otsego County. By 1761 150,000 acres there had been thus transferred and a small settlement had been in existence at Cherry Valley for two decades. With the session of Canada to England in 1763, every one in New York was safe from the French. The frontier line could soon move to the "Line of Property," set at the Ft. Stanwix treaty in 1768 to separate the areas of white and Indian occupation. This line, so far as it need be traced here, ran from the confluence of the Canada and Wood Creeks (somewhat west of the City of Rome) to the source of the west branch of the Unadilla River, the whole length of that stream, then overland to the north-east cor- ner of Pennsylvania. Almost at once thereafter the remaining Otsego lands were almost entirely taken up and settlements were begun on them in a dozen or more places. Local government facilities nearer at hand than Albany were now needed.
On March 12, 1772 Tryon County was erected, named for the colonial governor at the time and taking from Albany all its territory west of a point on the Mohawk River which is now the south-east
2
corner of Montgomery County. This action was followed twelve days later by a division of the new county into districts, a district corre- sponding to a present town. The two westernmost districts abutted on the Line of Property and were separated by the Mohawk River. By some mischance, the two names chosen, Kingsland and German Flats, were interchanged in the statute. This was corrected the next year. German Flats was the district on the south bank. The name derived from the Palatines who had been encouraged to settle there much earlier as a buffer against the French. The eastern boundary was a north-south line drawn through Little Falls, thus almost touching Hyde Bay on Otsego Lake, Southward the district extended, as then hazily expressed, "to the limits of this colony" and so included the larger part of present Otsego County. Canajoharie was the district formed at the same time at the east and in this lay the rest. An act of 1774 placed the land south of the west branch of the Delaware River in Ulster County and so gave German Flats and Canajoharie definite south bounds.
Old England District
The colonial legislature met on April 3, 1775. The final measure receiving approval that day was the creation in Tryon County of Old England District, taken from German Flats. This was destined to be the last act ever to take effect in New York under British rule. The Colonial Assembly never met again. Sixteen days later, April 19, 1775, came the battles of Lexington and Concord. In May a Provincial Congress took over the functions of government for the revolution- aries. In the first state constitution, promulgated in 1777, April 19, 1775, was pronounced the date after which the acts of the English King and his representatives became void.
The boundaries of Old England District began at the head waters of Otsego Lake, ran westward along the north line of the Otsego Patent, continued to the Unadilla so as to include the Edmeston Pa- tents, south along the river to its mouth and one mile farther, then northeast and north along the line of the Wallace Patent to the Sus- quehanna, north on that river and Otsego Lake to the place of begin- ning. At the time a part of present Otsego County was left in German Flats.
3
Soon after the Revolution was won more changes were made. Governor Tryon had led hostile forces against the patriots' towns and homes. It was intolerable that his name should continue to designate a New York County. In 1784, Tryon County was more acceptably re- named Montgomery in honor of a lamented American general who had fallen at Quebec in 1777. Now the local population began greatly to increase. In 1787 the Township of Harpersfield was formed with its southern boundary on the west branch of the Delaware and its north- ern on the Charlotte and Susquehanna Rivers, thus reducing Cana- joharie and Old England Districts. In 1788, the legislature redefined the subdivisions and established several new ones, but now the term "towns" was adopted. As obnoxious a reminder as Tryon, Old Eng- land District became Otsego Town. Its area was also enlarged by tak- ing from German Flats more land to the north to about the present county boundary.
Otsego County
Otsego County was erected February 16, 1791. In its first form it was much larger than it is now, including a very large part of Dela- ware and almost the western half of Schoharie. There were three towns, Otsego and Harpersfield, as already described, and Cherry Valley, newly taken from Canajoharie. The next year another one was authorized, Dorlach, this being taken from Cherry Valley. Dorlach became part of Schoharie when that county was erected in 1795 and renamed Sharon, but the Sharon of that day included Seward and much more of Schoharie County. Similarly the original Town of Harpersfield was divided by the formation of Franklin in 1792 and Kortwright in 1793. In 1797 these three last named towns became parts of new Delaware County. A considerable slice north of the Char- lotte River was taken away in 1816 to help form Davenport, Delaware County, another in 1817 as part of new Winfield, Herkimer County, but in 1822 Otsego received back some of the Wallace Patent south of the Susquehanna, thus restoring part of the southern boundary of Old England.
The proceedings here recounted have given Otsego County its extent and outline. Within there have also been alterations, the
4
latest in 1854. Original Otsego Town has been carved into sixteen, the remainder of original Cherry Valley into eight, resulting in the 24 towns now existing. As a final look at what has been, a spectator at a meeting of the Otsego Board of Supervisors in 1794 would have seen nine members of that body. Only five of these would have been residents within the present limits of the county and each of these would have been representing an area much larger than does any such officer today.
OTSEGO'S EARLY POPULATION
THE first white settlement in present Otsego County was at Cherry Valley in 1740. It continued as the only one, and a small one at that, for a quarter-century. Thereafter in colonial times came two periods of expansion. The result of the Seven Years' War, end- ing in 1763, brought release from French aggressions and families moved west to the line of Otsego Lake and the Susquehanna River. The King's Proclamation Line of that date was adjusted to the satis- faction of the Iroquois in 1768 and another wave of settlers flowed on to the Unadilla. These pre-Revolutionary pioneers were of various stocks, including a few Palatine Germans from the Mohawk Valley, a greater number of Dutch from the same source, many Scotch, Irish and Scotch-Irish (Ulstermen), some of whom had stopped for a time at more eastern locations, an occasional Jerseyite, lured here by specu- lators from the Philadelphia area who had secured land grants in Ot- sego. Toward the western border were considerable numbers of recent- ly arrived native Englishmen. In marked contrast to later periods, very few were New Englanders.
What the population may have been at the outbreak of hostilities with the mother country is difficult to determine. It was close to 300 at Cherry Valley. The names of about 60 families then residing out- side that settlement have been found. Others are alluded to, but with insufficient identification. Certainly 900 persons then living within the limits of the county is not an excessive estimate. When the Revo- lution began, each man had to make the hard choice where to cast his lot. Naturally they divided, but with by far the greater proportion on the patriots' side. The result was civil war with the homesteads as the battle ground. The loyalists were ousted. Some of them actively joined the British and became informants, spies and warriors against their old neighbors. Some declared their neutrality and had to walk a circumspect path. Before the fighting ceased all the settlements had been destroyed and all the residents, who had not been massacred or taken up arms, had fled. The population fell to zero.
With the ensuing peace, the former residents returned, but not alone. Hordes of New Englanders followed and soon became the
6
predominant element. A few came also from Pennsylvania and New Jersey, but many of these had a New England ancestry. More Palatines and Dutch arrived (Van is a frequently encountered surname prefix now) . European immigration to America had ceased with the war years, did not resume until much later. The numbers belonged to the Yankees. Their distinctive character and customs became stamped on the county, where they remain today, together with thousands of their descendants.
In the 1780's the "Otsego Country" was the Far West and an eagerly sought goal. The great land patents, most of whose acres had stood as idle land since their acquisition fifteen, twenty or more years before, were now cut into farm-sized lots and soon rented or sold. Again, it is not possible to state precisely the population at the first Federal census in 1790. The county was erected the next year and until then the eastern third lay in the large town of Canajoharie, which then extended to the Mohawk Valley. A fairly reliable estimate can be made from the known population of the other two-thirds and the exact figures from later censuses. The rate of increase thus deter- mined can be projected backward with the following result:
Population of Otsego County
1790
2,420, est .*
1800
21,636
1810
38,802
1820
44,856
1830
51,372
-
Here is shown an astounding rate of increase, but this was to be duplicated in many localities as the Western movement rolled on. Otsego was the first New York County to experience it, also the first to feel the effects of its resistless onward flow. The 1830 total was Otsego's high point. The figure then has been sometimes approximat- ed, but never quite equalled. The reasons are many and clear, but the one pertinent to this article is that Americans have always been on the
* Tables in the published state census reports for 1855 and 1865 give 1,702 as the population of Otsego in 1790. There was then no such county, but this was the correct figure then for Otsego Town. The 1875 report makes no such statement.
7
move. In the nothern United States until 1790 they were dammed up at the Line of Property along which lies Otsego's western boundary and the region became actually overpopulated for an agricultural area. With that obstacle removed, local families joined in the general west- ern hegira. As Otsego men moved out, their places were often taken by more New Englanders, but the outflow exceeded the intake. As it was reported in 1789 that multitudes were flocking to Cooperstown at the rate of thirty a day, so one may read that in the spring of 1857, 300 local persons were going west, many to Victoria, Illinois. Such cycles were repeated again and again in the century following the Revolution.
GEORGE CROGHAN AND OTSEGO COUNTY
COLONEL GEORGE CROGHAN (pronounced Crawn) was an Irish Episcopalian who came to Pennsylvania in 1741, engaging successfully in the Indian trade in the western part of that state and along the Ohio River until that business was disrupted by French disturbances. After 1754, his activities were mostly those of a military officer, an official Indian agent and a promoter of westward expansion. He is of interest to Otsego because for a brief period he owned more of its acres than any other person ever did, not forgetting the George Clarkes or Wil- liam Cooper, and because of the wide attention he directed to the area.
In his way with the Indians, Croghan much resembled his friend Sir William Johnson of New York State, in that he treated them fairly himself, defended them from unfair practices on the part of other whites, learned their tongues, mingled in their social life and took an Indian wife. In 1756, he became chief deputy to Johnson, Sole Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the colonies north of Vir- ginia from 1755 to 1774. Croghan's special field was the region with which he was already familiar, but he was often on duty among the New York Iroquois and the Otsego country became known and attractive to him. For his valuable services in the French and Indian War, he was among the officers named to receive a bounty gift from the King's own New York lands and one of four slated for 10,000 acres. He felt entitled to twice that amount. He knew of an 18,000 acre Otsego tract, applied for it and, after some haggling, received it. He called this Belvedere Township. It lies mostly in the present Town of Roseboom.
For himself and friends he further negotiated four Indian deeds, a necessary preliminary to a patent. The lands concerned are in the western and southern parts of Otsego County and aggregated 350,000 acres. All this was granted in the years 1769 and 1770 under seven royal instruments as the Upton, Morris, Otego, Butler, McKee, Skinner and Otsego Patents. In the two first mentioned Croghan had no financial interest, but he had included the lands desired by Clot- worthy Upton and Staats Long Morris in his dealings with the
9
Indians for the Butler parcel. Both were men of prestige and Croghan was glad to accommodate them. He conveyed his rights under the Indian deed to the large Otego tract to Sir William Franklin, son of Benjamin and colonial governor of New Jersey. The patent was ob- tained for several persons interested in Croghan's doings, Franklin retaining an interest. Among them were William Trent, Croghan's brother-in-law and partner, Samuel and Thomas Wharton, Quaker Philadelphia merchants, Richard Smith and Richard Wells, members of the Burlington Company, a group of Burlington, New Jersey Quaker capitalists. This was mainly an adjustment of accounts. Frank- lin was one of those who furnished money for Croghan's enterprises and obtained much on his own credit from the Burlington Company.
The 227,000 acres which comprised the other four patents all came to Croghan. John Butler was a neighbor and intimate of John- son and a brother officer of Croghan's in the French War. Alexander McKee was his right hand man while in the Indian trade and his suc- cessor as Deputy Superintendent. Stephen Skinner was Treasurer of the Province of New Jersey, serving under Franklin. All these were obliging their friend. Croghan applied for the 100,000 acre Otsego Patent in his own name. With Belvedere and with the more than ample highway allowances, Croghan's Otsego possessions now ex- ceeded a quarter million acres.
At one time he hoped to make his permanent home at the foot of Otsego Lake. He was there in the fall of 1768, during much of the next year and well into 1770, making extensive plans for the settle- ment of the whole region. His son-in-law, Augustine Prevost, came on to occupy 6,061 acres at the tip of the Otsego Patent. The young Joseph Brant, protegee of Johnson, later the husband of Croghan's half-breed Mohawk daughter and the celebrated Iroquois chieftain, was there as guide. Financial embarrassments shortly forced Croghan to part with most of his Otsego properties and to abandon the settle- ment there. These had been but a fraction of his whole vision of the important part he could play in the rapid extension of the American frontier even to the Mississippi. An example was the proposed four- teenth colony of Vandalia, to be located where West Virginia is now, but larger. Croghan, Trent, Johnson, Benjamin and William Frank- lin, Charles, Joseph, Samuel and Thomas Wharton were among the
10
men who applied jointly for 2,400,000 acres in Vandalia. The pros- pects appeared bright for several years but vanished with Virginian opposition and the ensuing Revolution. With such outcomes, Cro- ghan's land empire collapsed. He had pyramided his speculations, encumbering each new acquisition to secure another, borrowing at high interest and for short terms. He continued vainly to attempt to recoup his fortune along the same line but died a poor man in 1782, one of very many who opened American frontiers with no lasting profit to themselves.
A report on the disposal of Croghan's Otsego lands would be too long to be given here, but some evidence of his impact on the region will be presented. Readers will note that many persons heretofore or hereafter mentioned were from the Philadelphia area. Croghan was the first of these to recognize the local opportunity and his pioneering brought the rest. His own attempted settlement was the first within the lands where he had extinguished the Indian title, but others were made forthwith. Among them were ones by John Tunnicliff in "The Twelve Thousand" (a part of the Otsego Patent), by the Garretts and other Englishmen down the Butternuts Creek, by Richard Smith and his followers at Laurens in the Otsego Patent. (Richard R. Smith, son of Richard, was the first sheriff of Otsego County.)
In atlases will be found the name "Graftsburgh" applied to lands on the Unadilla. It should be "Gratzborough," a tract of 9,050 acres deeded to Bernard Gratz, Croghan's steadfast friend and an executor, for services rendered when Croghan was in utmost need of funds. It was familiarly known as the "Jew's Patent." Hillington is a name still current in Morris. It derives from Henry Hill, a member of the Bur- lington Company, who received 18,000 acres in the Butler Patent in partial satisfaction of a Croghan debt. There are two Wharton Creeks in Otsego, one flowing into the Unadilla, the other a tributary of the Otego Creek. The first is named for Joseph Wharton, another Croghan creditor, who accepted 15,000 acres there, the second perpetuates in the Otego Patent the name of Samuel Wharton. Burlington as the name of an Otsego Town now needs no explanation, neither does the existence of Quaker churches in the southern and western parts of the county, as in Burlington, Laurens, Milford, Morris and New Lisbon a century or more ago.
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In that part of Delaware County which was once in Otsego, are the towns of Franklin and Meredith. They are named for Sir William Franklin and Reese Meredith, merchant of Philadelphia, to whom with three Whartons and others, was patented the "township" of Franklin. Augustine Prevost and his relatives came to have an interest in the McKee Patent. He was related to Aaron Burr, who thus became an attorney for the Croghan Estate, to visit the region often and to enter a ward at Hartwick Seminary. The instances cited all stem directly from Croghan's activities in Otsego. There are many more, and perhaps most important is the fact that William Cooper made his first independent assay in land development on the very spot where George Croghan had made the same kind of effort fifteen years earlier, but with a far different result. In proper keeping, Cooper was born near Philadelphia, was of a Quaker family and came to Otsego from Burlington, New Jersey.
Readers who wish to learn more about this interesting man are referred to Albert T. Volwiler's George Croghan and the Westward Movement and a new book scheduled to appear in May of this year, Nicholas B. Wainwright's George Croghan, Wilderness Diplomat.
WILLIAM COOPER, COLONIZER
THE place which William Cooper holds in the history of Otsego County stems directly from the remarkable success of his large land operations. A brief outline of his policies and the nature, extent and locations of these undertakings will be attempted here.
Cooper was not a landlord in the sense that were the George Clarkes, of Hyde Bay, or Goldsbrow Banyar, of Albany, both of whom owned much land here and elsewhere but always leased it, thus retaining a hold on the title. Neither was Cooper a land speculator of the type of Robert Morris or Alexander Macomb who acquired vast New York holdings, looking for quick profits but with no thought of the men who would actually till the ground. Cooper was a colon- izer. Wild lands were a challenge-almost an affront-to him. He was eager to see them immediately cut into farms, sold and occupied as such, with all the adjuncts of civilization soon replacing a recent wilderness. Accordingly he always so proceeded.
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