A Centennial Memorial History of Allegany county, New York, Part 2

Author: Minard, John Stearns, 1834-1920; Merrill, Georgia Drew
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Alfred, N.Y., W. A. Fergusson & co.
Number of Pages: 1102

USA > New York > Allegany County > A Centennial Memorial History of Allegany county, New York > Part 2

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Portrait 729

Hon. Abijah Joslyn Wellman,

Portrait

731

Stephen Welcome Cole

Portrait

732

Herman Rice,

Biography

733

Herman Rice,

Portrait

734

William H. Pitt, A. M., M. D., Ph. D.,

735

William P. Brooks,

736

Samuel A. Farman,

766

A. W. Henry,

768

Mills Family,

770

George Minard,

771

John S. Minard,

772

Charles Ricker,

774

Mahlon L. Ross,

774

P. C. Soule, M. D.,

776

Stephen H. Draper,

779

Charles J. Elmer,

805

J. B. Gordon, .

806

R. B. Laning, Esq.,

808

O. T. Stacy, M. D.,

809

George H. Eldridge,

842

William J. Glenn,

843

David Kirkpatrick,

845

Col. Samuel H. Morgan,

847

Henry and William P. Stevens,

849

Hon. Addison S. Thompson,

850

Hon. Calvin T. Chamberlain,

851 852

Deacon Isaiah Jordan,

861

LaFrone Merriman,

863

Alvan Richardson,

866

Hon. H. H. Wakely,

877

The Childs Family,

891

William Cranston,

900

Richard L. Andrus,

924

The Cowles Family,

925

Nelson Hoyt,

928

The Meads,

929

Stephen W. Thomas,

930

Hon. Martin Butts,

938

The Congdon Family,

939

William Henry Bartholomew,

Where the dark green pines and hemlocks grow, Where the fountains of light from rock sources flow, Where the Red Man's foot had scarce ceased to roam, Our fathers established their pioneer home. "Tis the "top of the world," 'tis the land where we see The waters flow all ways to get to the sea; To the north, to the south, to the east, to the west, The crystal streams spring to the broad ocean's breast. -W. A. Fergusson.

ALLEGANY AND ITS PEOPLE.

A CENTENNIAL MEMORIAL HISTORY.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY GLIMPSES OF OUR TERRITORY.

" Realm of the Senecas ! No more In shadow lies the pleasant vale; Gone are the chiefs who ruled of yore, Like chaff before the rushing gale. * * *

And hut and hall of council now Are changed to ashes cold."

IT may be well. perhaps, before entering upon the subject proper of the history of Allegany county, to consider briefly the scene of the ad- ventures. exploits, hardships and privations, which will necessarily. to some extent at least, be recounted in succeeding chapters.

The territory included within the present limits of the county of Alle- gany, up to the very dawn of the nineteenth century, with some few exceptions of "open flats " along the winding course of the Genesee river, the Casconchagon of the early French Jesuit explorers. Shining-clear- opening .- Pleasant-open-valley. Clear-valley, or Beautiful-valley. as its name, somewhat differently rendered in the elastic Seneca language. implies, was covered with a prodigious growth of timber of various kinds, the stately pine largely predominating, yet liberally interspersed with hemlock. oak, ash, elm. chestnut, cucumber and hickory. On the river flats, also on the bottom lands along some of its larger tributaries. sometimes quite close to the banks, were the beautiful butternuts, which annually shed their fruitage of toothsome nuts. Huge buttonwoods and large cottonwoods and poplars, were also found in abundance along the river; wild plum trees were also frequent, and graceful elms of mammoth proportions, with such a multi- plicity of branches as sometimes to defy successfully any attempt to count them, at intervals were found; while the trees which fringed the river bank were for most of the way serving the purpose of trellises for the thousands

HISTORY OF ALLEGANY COUNTY, N. Y.

of vines which attained a marvelous growth, and climbed in some instances to their very tops profusely laden with grapes; the beautiful bitter-sweet and ivy also contributed to the variety.

The open flats were covered with a luxuriant growth of grass, reported by some enraptured explorers as attaining a prodigious growth and heigth, "tall enough," it was claimed, " to easily obscure and hide from observation, not only the horse, but his rider." In places this grass was burned off, ex- posing a soil, which, subjected to the manipulations of the rude husbandry of Indian women, laughed with a bountiful harvest of corn, beans, squashes and gourds, when only slightly tickled with their primitive farming im- plements. Fish of various kinds swarmed the waters, as yet suffering no hindrance from dams nor polluted with sawdust, and speckled beauties abounded in such profusion as would to day tempt from long distances the enthusiastic disciples of Izaak Walton. Not a tree had fallen a victim to, or even showed the scar of the white man's axe.

It was in very deed a virgin wilderness, peopled with a considerable population of bears, wolves, elk. deer, raccoons, otters, panthers and other beasts of prey. This territory was sparsely peopled with a tribe of Seneca Indians, who lived in small villages along the river, and at different times camped out upon the highlands for purposes of hunting, or catching pigeons wherever they might chance to roost and build their nests. A dark and dreary though betimes a beautiful and enchanting forest solitude it must have been, its awful and oppressive stillness broken only by the laughing streams bounding over the pebbly bottoms, the frightful screams of some wild beast of prey, or made to echo the war-whoop of the Senecas, or the wild songs they sang when celebrating their feasts and dances. It was and had been for ages the terrestrial paradise of the Senecas.

This was substantially the condition of things as they existed 100 years ago in the territory now covered by the county of Allegany, and the atten- tion of the reader is called to this uninviting scene, and it is hoped he may be sufficiently interested to follow carefully the process of evolution which has resulted in the Allegany of to day, presenting to the eye almost every variety of scenery; beautiful fields, and lofty wood-crowned summits, wind- ing streams and lovely valleys, rock-bound gorges and extended plains, dotted with quiet hamlets and thriving villages, in one instance almost ap- proaching city-like proportions, and peopled with a class of citizens drawn from many nationalities, but intelligent, patriotic, industrious, contented and happy.

EARLY EXPLORATIONS, ETC.

CHAPTER II.

EARLY EXPLORATIONS, ETC.

" The distant top of the wooded hight Was edged with a rim of tender light, And thicket, fountain, rock and tree, From cloudless sun a radiance drank, While washed the rapid Genesee.

* *

* * * * *

The shambling elk shrill whistle gave, While breaking through the thicket green To plunge his muzzle in the wave."

A LTHOUGH the first white person whose foot pressed the soil of Allegany, whose name can be given with any degree of certainty, was the captive, Mary Jemison, the De-he-wa-mis of the Senecas, so generally referred to as the "White woman of the Genesee." As with her Indian captors she made her advent into the "Genesee country," about 1759. when the party halted for a day and a night at the upper Caneadea village (Gah-yah-o-de-o of the ancient Senecas), which was in the present town of Caneadea. on their way to Gardeau, it is nevertheless reasonably removed from the field of conject- ure that possibly La Salle, and perhaps some others of the early French Jesuits or their subalterns. had already a full half-century before passed over this route of travel, which afterward for a time served as the pathway from the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico.

Remembering and ever keeping in mind this fact that in all the earlier explorations of our country, the natural water-ways were the medium through which the remote recesses of the vast forest solitudes were reached. and. glancing occasionally as you read at a map of Western New York, care- fully scan what follows.

In his admirable address before the Livingston County Historical Society at Nunda in January, 1886. the late lamented Geo. H. Harris. Esq., of Rochester, asserted that "The great water route from the St. Lawrence to the south, sought by La Salle and other explorers. was by way of Lake Ontario, Irondequoit bay, and the Genesee river to Belvidere, the Oil and Ischua creeks to Olean, then down the Allegany, Ohio and Mississippi rivers to the Gulf of Mexico. There were variations in this route between the Genesee and Ohio rivers, the discovery of which caused a vast expense of time, money and human blood. During the French dominion in Canada their voyageurs were frequently upon the Genesee and its connecting trails. The first description of the river ever published was that of the good Father Charlevoix, who passed along the south shore of Lake Ontario, in 1721. Writing from Fort Niagara, he says 'There is a little river, which I would have visited if I had sooner been informed of its singularity. and of what I

HISTORY OF ALLEGANY COUNTY, N. Y.

have now learnt on my arrival. They call it Casconchiagon. It is very nar- row, and of but little depth at its entrance into the lake (Ontario). A little higher it is 140 yards wide, and they say it is deep enough for the largest vessels.' Two leagues (six miles) from its mouth, we are stopped by a fall which appears to be 60 feet high, and 140 yards wide. A musket shot higher, we find a second, of the same width, but not so high by two-thirds. Half-a- league farther, a third fall 100 feet high good measure, and 200 yards wide; after this, we meet several torrents, and having sailed 50 leagues farther, we perceive a fourth fall every way equal to the third. The course of the river is 100 leagues, and when we have gone up it about 60 leagues. we have but ten to go by land, taking to the right to arrive at the Ohio, called La Belle Riviere. The place where we meet with it is called Ganos, where an officer worthy of credit, and the same from whom I learnt what I have just now mentioned, assured me that he had seen a fountain, the water of which is like oil and the taste like iron. He said that a little farther on, there is another fountain exactly like it. and the savages make use of its waters to appease all manner of pains."

The officer to whom Charlevoix alluded was Joncaire, a Frenchman, who had been adopted by the Indians, and lived for some years at Lewiston, on the Niagara river. He was on the best of terms with the Indians, had two half-breed sons, Clanzonne and Chabert. The elder Joncaire made a number of journeys up the Genesee river, to Belvidere, over the divide to Oil creek. and so on, down the Allegany and Ohio rivers. One or both of the sons also made the same journeys. On these journeys they were sometimes provided by the French government with a number of lead plates, about eleven inches long, seven and one-half wide, and one-eighth of an inch in thickness. with inscriptions thereon. leaving blanks to be filled out with date and place of using them. They were to be buried at certain well defined places, like the confluence of important streams, or where some strongly marked geograph- ical feature existed. It was one of a class of ceremonies, which was con- sidered of importance in " taking possession " of the country in the name, and by the authority of the French sovereign. On one of these trips a plate, designed for such a purpose, was stolen from Joncaire while going through the Seneca country, and on the 29th of January, 1751, Gov. Clinton, into whose possession it is presumed to have fallen, sent a copy of the inscription to Gov. Hamilton of Pennsylvania.

The inscription as translated is:

"In the year 1749, of the reign of Louis the 15th, King of France. we Celoron, commander of a detachment sent by Monsieur the Marquis de-la- Galissoniere, Governor General of New France, to re-establish tranquility in some Indian villages of these cantons, have buried this Plate of Lead, at the confluence of the Ohio and the Chautauqua, this 29th day of July, near the river Ohio, otherwise Belle Riviere, as a monument of the renewal of the pos- session we have taken of the said river Ohio, and of all those which empty into it, and of all the lands on both sides, as far as the sources of said rivers,

EARLY EXPLORATIONS, ETC.

as enjoyed or ought to have been enjoyed. by the Kings of France preceding, and as they have there maintained themselves, by arms and by treaties, especially those of Ryswick. Utrecht and Aix la Chapelle." :

"This was the first reliable account of the Genesee given by the old writers. and errs only in the exaggerated distances. The fountains men- tioned were a petroleum oil spring near Cuba, N. Y., and another in Venango county, Pa. The wonder expressed by Charlevoix, over 170 years ago, is still felt by all who have a personal knowledge of the Genesee river. From its source in Pennsylvania to its entrance into Lake Ontario, its course is through some of the most magnificent scenery, and is marked with wondrous changes wrought by the hand of nature."

The third fall mentioned in this description, is the one at Rochester, and the fourth at Portage. which should have been given as three. The exag- gerated distances given are not to be wondered at, as the river was very tortuous, and its course lying for the most part through such an entirely primitive wilderness, the way must necessarily have seemed much longer than it really was. and it was really much longer to travel with boats then than it is at the present time.

It would of course be a satisfaction to know more of the officer of whom Charlevoix speaks and how he pursued his journey, and how many men accompanied him, their names, etc .; but as that is impossible, and from the fact of the Genesee river being the principal stream of the county, traversing its whole length from south to north. thus furnishing its most prominent and distinguishing geographical feature, the reader will, it is trusted, agree with the writer in considering the foregoing account, even though meagre, as appropriate in this connection. I will close this chapter by introducing an extract from an address which the writer delivered before the Allegany County Historical Society, January 8, 1890. This expedition of Charlevoix's lieutenants had been briefly alluded to. "I"fancy that if our honored friend Major Richard Church. who is detained at home by illness this evening, would only provide himself with a sort of reversed horoscope of reasonably strong power, adjust its focus for about 1720, and train it so as to sweep for some distance the banks of the river along about opposite his beautiful homestead, he would be able to descry, through the intervening mists and shadows of the ages. the well defined outlines of the particular officer spoken of by Charlevoix, accompanied by a few privates and an Indian guide or two, as they pulled and poled their bateaux up the shallow waters, unloaded their store of trinkets, camp utensils and accoutrements, and prepared for the portage to Oil creek ! There is no reasonable doubt of it."

HISTORY OF ALLEGANY COUNTY, N. Y.

CHAPTER III.

OUR PREDECESSORS-THE SIX NATIONS.

" The red man boasts no herald-roll, But views with equal pride of soul The painted symbol on his skin, Allies to memory of sires Famed for their prowess, while within His bosom wakes heroic fires."

W HEN the white man first entered this beautiful Seneca country, he found numerous deeply-trodden paths threading the forest in different directions. They led from one Indian village to another, and occasionally branched off to their favorite hunting and fishing grounds, and here and there marked their intercourse with neighboring aboriginal tribes. These were the " trails," and were the routes pursued by the French missionaries and traders and by the Dutch and English in their intercourse with the In- dians. They afterwards served to guide our early pioneers through the forest, enabling them to appreciate the value and beauty of the country.

One of these trails, the one with which we are just now more interested than any other, passed from Mt. Morris up the river to Gardeau and Canea- dea, and still on to the Allegany river at Olean, leaving the valley of the Genesee in the neighborhood of the Church manor-house at Belvidere and following the valley of Van Campen's creek to some point near Friendship village, from thence taking a feasible route to the oil spring in Cuba, and following the course of the water to the Allegany at Cornplanter's town later Olean Point, afterward for a short time Hamilton and now plain Olean. An- other branch of this important trail led from Belvidere up the river, fol- lowing its course, in a good part of the way being identical, with our present "river road," and passing on to Pennsylvania. From the upper Caneadea village, located on the east side of the Genesee river in the town of Canea- dea, nearly opposite the village of Houghton, a lateral trail branched off to the west, following up the ravine just north of Houghton Seminary, thence striking almost exactly the line of the road to Rushford as at present located, and bearing from thence northwesterly through Centerville, Freedom and on to Buffalo. This was an important trail, and was much used during the French and Indian wars and in the Revolutionary times, communicating as it did so directly with the lake frontier.

From the Caneadea village another trail passed easterly through Allen and Birdsall to the Canisteo river near Arkport, and was known by the early white explorers as the "Canisteo path." This was also a very important trail. It was over this trail that the hordes of savages, led by. Mohawk, Shongo, and Hudson, passed when they set out upon their expedition against

OUR PREDECESSORS-THE SIX NATIONS.

Wyoming in 1778. Many a war party has passed along this aboriginal high- way of travel.

These trails were in fact the "highways " of a once powerful nation of American Indians, the Senecas, one of the original Five Nations, the Iro- «quois, and. later. after the adoption of the Tuscaroras, of the confederacy of Six Nations, our immediate predecessors in the occupation of this section of our country. The Iroquois have been called the " Romans of the new world." Their federal system of government, although a pure oligarchy, sedulously, and with great ingenuity, guarded against centralization and the aggression of power, always recognizing the principles of local self-govern- ment. in the admistration of which their women were allowed a potential voice and influence, and their rights were sacredly guarded and plainly de- fined. It has been claimed that the ultimate object of their federal policy was nothing less than a peaceful union of all the tribes of the continent, and is perhaps without a parallel in affording to its people more than 300 years of uninterrupted domestic unity and peace.

Agriculture had to some extent begun to modify the life of the aborigi- nal hunters of New York when, in 1687, the Marquis De Nonville invaded the lower Genesee country. In his report to his government he claimed to have destroyed " more than a million bushels of corn." Said the late David Gray, of Buffalo, in a paper on "The last Indian Council of the Genesee," published in Scribner's Magazine, "In the midst of their fields they built their villages, some of which contained more than a hundred houses. Three sis- ter divinities of their religion were the spirit of the maize, the bean and the squash. A fancy superior to that of the average of savage peoples stamped their unwritten legends and mythology. They had even a rude astronomy, and mapped the heavens, giving names to the principal constellations. Among them the art of eloquence was cultivated as assiduously as that of arms. Their parliament was an indigenous growth in the depths of the New York forests." Of the annual councils of the sachems Gov. De Witt Clinton wrote that "in eloquence, in dignity and in all the characteristics of per- sonal policy, they surpassed an assemblage of feudal barons, and were per- haps not far inferior to the great Amphictyonic council of Greece."

HISTORY OF ALLEGANY COUNTY, N. Y.

CHAPTER IV.

THE SENECAS-THEIR ORIGIN, ETC.

Lo ! the poor Indian, whose untutored mind

Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind ;

His soul proud science never taught to stray

Far as the solar walk or milky way ;

Yet simple nature to his hope has given,

Behind the cloud-topt hill a humbler heaven ;

Some safer world in depth of woods embraced,

Some happier island in the watery waste,

Where slaves once more their native land behold,

No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold ;

To be content 's his natural desire ;

He asks no angels' wings, no seraph's fire,

But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, His faithful dog shall bear him company. -- Pope.

Tis . written in the life of Mary Jemison "Perhaps no people were more exact observers of religious duties than the Indians among the Senecas who were denominated 'pagans,' in contradistinction to those who, from hav- ing renounced their former superstitious notions, have obtained the name of Christians. They believed in a Great Good Spirit, whom they called in the Seneca language, Ha-wen-ne-yu, as the creator of the world and of every good thing; that he made man and all inoffensive animals; that he supplied them with the comforts of life, and that he was particularly partial to the Indians, who, they said. were his particular people. They also believed that he was pleased in giving them (the Indians) good gifts, and that he was highly gratified with their good conduct; that he abhorred their vices, and that he was willing to punish them for their bad conduct, not only in this world, but in a future state of existence. His residence. they supposed, lay at a great distance from them in a country that was perfectly pleasant; where plenty abounded even to profusion; that the soil was completely fer- tile, and the seasons so mild that the corn never failed to be good; that the deer, elk, buffalo, turkey and other useful animals were numerous, and that the forests were well calculated to facilitate their hunting them with success; that the streams were pure and abounded with fish, and that nothing was wanted to render fruition complete. Over this territory they believed Ha- wen-ne-yu presided as an all-powerful king, and that without counsel he ad- mitted to his pleasure all whom he considered worthy of enjoying so great a state of blessedness. * * * According to the Indian mode of burial, the deceased is laid out in his best clothing, and put in a coffin of boards or bark. and with him is deposited in every instance, a small cup and a cake. Gen- erally two or three candles are put into the coffin, and in a few instances, at the burial of a great man. all the implements of war are buried by the side

THE SENECAS -- THEIR ORIGIN. ETC.

of the body. The coffin is then closed and carried to the grave. On its be- ing let down. the person who takes the lead in the solemn transaction, or a chief, addresses the dead in a short speech in which he charges him not to be troubled about himself in his new situation nor on his journey, and not to trouble his friends, wife or children whom he has left; tells him that if he meets with strangers on the way. he must inform them what tribe he belongs to, who his relatives are, the situation in which he left them. and that hav- ing done this he must keep on till he arrives at the good fields in the country of Ha-wen-ne-yu; that when he arrives there he will see all his ancestors and personal friends that have gone before him, who, together with all the chiefs of celebrity, will receive him joyfully, and furnish him with every article of perpetual happiness. The grave is now filled and left till evening. when some of the nearest relatives of the dead build a fire at the head of it. near which they sit till morning. In this way they continue nine successive nights, when. believing that their departed friend has arrived at the end of his journey, they discontinue their attention. During this time the relatives of the deceased are not allowed to dance. 1

The tradition of the Senecas in regard to their origin is that they broke out of the earth from a large mountain at the head of Canandaigua lake. which they still venerate as the place of their birth. Thence they derive their name, Ge-nun-de-wah, or . Great Hill,' and were called . Great Hill Peo- ple,' which is the true definition of the word Seneca. The great hill at the head of Canandaigua lake. from whence they sprung, is called Ge-nun-de- wah and has for a long time past been the place where the Indians of that nation have met in council, to hold great talks, and to offer up prayers to the Great Spirit, on account of its having been their birth-place; and also in consequence of the destruction of a serpent at that place in ancient times. in a most miraculous manner, which threatened the destruction of the whole of the Senecas, and barely spared enough to commence replenishing the earth. The Indians say that the foot of the big hill near the head of Canan- daigua lake was surrounded by a monstrous serpent, whose head and tail came together at the gate. A long time it lay there confounding the people with its breath. At length they attempted to make their escape, some with their hominy blocks, and others with different implements of household furniture, and in marching out of the foot walked down the throat of the serpent. Two orphan children, who had escaped this general destruction by being left on the side of the foot, were informed by an oracle of the means by which they could get rid of their formidable enemy, which was to take a small bow and a poisoned arrow, made of a kind of willow, and with that shoot the serpent under its scales. This they did and the arrow proved effectual, for, on its penetrating the skin, the serpent became sick, and ex- tending itself, rolled down the hill, destroying all the timber that was in its way, and disgorging itself. At every motion a human head was discharged and rolled down the hill into the lake, where they lie at this day in a petrified state having the hardness and appearance of stones. and the pagan Indians

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A Centennial Memorial History of Allegany county, New York, Part 2

Author: Minard, John Stearns, 1834-1920; Merrill, Georgia Drew Publication date: 1896 Publisher: Alfred, N.Y., W. A. Fergusson & co. Number of Pages: 1102

Author: Minard, John Stearns, 1834-1920; Merrill, Georgia Drew
Publication date: 1896
Publisher: Alfred, N.Y., W. A. Fergusson & co.
Number of Pages: 1102