USA > New York > Ontario County > A history of Ontario County, New York and its people, Volume I > Part 13
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The campaign was an exciting one from beginning to end. The Southern Democrats, enraged and alarmed by the growing anti-slavery feeling at the North, withdrew from the National con- vention of their party when they found themselves unable to con- trol its action. Two Presidential tickets resulted, one representing the Northern Democracy and headed by Stephen A. Douglas and Herschel V. Johnson; the other representing the Southern wing of the party and headed by John C. Breckenridge and Joseph Lane. A fourth organization, styling itself the Constitutional- Union party, and assuming to represent the old Whigs and Amer- icans, nominated John Bell for President and Edward Everett for Vice President.
The most noteworthy demonstration of the campaign in
139
THE LINCOLN - HAMLIN CAMPAIGN.
Ontario county was that held at Canandaigua, on the afternoon of Tuesday, October 23, when United States Senator Doolittle, of Wisconsin, made the principal speech in Bemis hall, in which were crowded, it was reported, over one thousand people. James C. Smith, Esq., presided, and Albert Lester. Jedediah Dewey and R. C. Stiles were named as vice presidents. Cooke's glee club led in singing campaign songs. So many people were unable to gain admittance to the hall that an overflow meeting was organized on the square in front of the court house, Hon. Henry W. Taylor acting as its chairman and Har- vey Stone, Marshall McLouth and Andrew J. Hanna as vice presidents. A handsome banner was then presented to the Wide- awakes of Canandaigua by Judge Taylor, speaking in behalf of the ladies, and Elisha W. Gardner, Jr., made the speech of accept- ance. Following this ceremony, Judge Jessup, of Pennsylvania, was introduced and spoke until a rain storm compelled the adjournment of the meeting.
EDWIN HICKS.
In the evening the Wide- Edwin Hicks, one of the delegates elected at the first Republican caucus in Canandaigua, September 17th, 1855. Had been a resident of the village since January preceding; was Vice President of the first Republican club organized here. Born in Bristol, February 14, 1830. District Attorney of the county, 1857, 1864-75 ; the Ontario-Seneca- Yates mem- ber of the State Senate in 1876-7; United States Referee in Bankruptcy from 1898 to date of his death, November 30, 1902. This portrait is from a photograph made about 1865. awakes of the several towns pa- raded the streets under the direc- tion of Marshal Hildreth and his aids. Among the displays made by the paraders was a log cabin on wheels, drawn by four horses, decorated with emblems of frontier life and the inscription "Uncle Abe at Home," and escorted by companies of Wideawakes from Rushville and Gorham.
The local speakers of the campaign included James C. Smith, Elbridge G. Lapham, Edwin Hicks, Elisha W. Gardner, Emory B. Pottle, William H. Smith, and William H. Lamport. The latter had been affiliated with the American party and in 1856 its unsuc- cessful candidate for the State Senate.
At the election held on the memorable 6th of November, 1860.
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
the Lincoln ticket carried every free State, with the exception of New Jersey, where there was a fusion of the opposition forces, and as a consquence it secured only four of the seven electoral votes, the other three going to the Douglas ticket, which obtained beside these only the nine votes of Missouri. Mr. Breckenridge carried the Southern States with the exception of Kentucky, Tennessee. and Virginia, which went to Mr. Bell.
Ontario county, doubling her majority for Fremont four years before, gave Lincoln 2,100 plurality. Mr. Chamberlain was elected member of Congress in the Ontario-Yates-Seneca district by 3,800 majority, and the entire Republican ticket for county offices was elected. In the National contest, party lines had been forgotten and the people of the county had rallied magnificently to the sup- port of the cause of union and freedom.
The news of the election of Lincoln was received in Ontario county with rejoicing, but the demonstrations were of a compara- tively moderate character, owing to the feeling of apprehension as to the future. During the campaign the expressions of Southern newspapers and orators had plainly indicated that in the event of the election of the Republican ticket the Southern States would attempt to secede from the Union, and if this threat was carried out the people realized it would mean nothing less than war. As a consequence the election was followed by an expectant hush, which was first disturbed by the withdrawal of Southern members from Congress and by the action of Southern legislatures in assum- ing to withdraw their States from the Union, and which was finally broken by the attack upon Fort Sumter.
Stephen A. Douglas, though winning only twelve electoral votes, had received a splendid endorsement, his popular vote exceeding that given Breckenridge by 50 per cent. and falling less than 500,000 below Lincoln. His vote in Ontario county was 3,634 as compared to Lincoln's 5,764. That he did not receive a larger vote or carry the county shows how thoroughly public senti- ment had been aroused over the question of slavery and how con- vincingly the arguments of Lincoln had appealed to loyal citizens. Mr. Douglas was personally known to many of the people of the county. He had been a student at the Canandaigua academy from 1831 to 1833, spending his spare time in the law office of Walter Hubbell, Esq., and absorbing there and in the court room where practiced such lawyers as John C. Spencer, Jared Wilson, Dudley
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THE LINCOLN - HAMLIN CAMPAIGN.
Marvin, and Mark H. Sibley, much of the knowledge of the law and of public affairs that later made him an eminent lawyer and a great politician. His mother lived at Clifton Springs with her sec- ond husband, Gahasa Granger, and there, in the campaign of 1860, on September 15, he addressed one of the largest public meetings ever assembled in the county. Newspapers of the time reported that there were at least six thousand people present.
But while the Ontario county voters had followed Mr. Doug- las's career with much interest and admired his brilliancy of intel- lect and his great ability as a public speaker, they were not misled by his specious arguments in support of "Popular Sovereignty." That the "Little Giant," as he was affectionately called, declined to follow the reactionary elements of his party in their efforts to embarrass the new administration, and generously gave his allegiance to his successful rival, Mr. Lincoln, in furtherance of the latter's determination to save the Union, confirmed their faith in his statesmanship and his patriotism.
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
XV
OLD ONTARIO IN WAR TIME.
Twice Invaded by Armies of Civilized Powers, First by DeNonville, then by General Sullivan and His Continentals-The Simcoe Scare-Ontario Militia in the War of 1812-The Whole County in a Tumult-Relief for the Refugees-The Troublous Days of 1861-5.
Wartime, as the word is commonly understood, means the days of '61-'65. But Ontario county has been through other war times than that. Twice within the period of written history was the terri- tory now embraced within its boundaries invaded by armies of civilized powers.
First came the invasion by the French General De Nonville, in 1687, undertaken to punish the Iroquois for their incursions into New France. Landing his force of two thousand men at Irondequoit bay, he penetrated the forest as far as Victor, and there fought a bloody battle with the red possessors of the soil, destroyed great stores of their grain, and marched back again to his ships, all within a few days.
The territory referred to again echoed to the tramp of hostile forces in 1779, when the army led by General Sullivan, and commis- sioned by General Washington to break the strength of the Iroquois confederacy, then the cruel ally of King George, marched around the foot of Seneca lake, and proceeding westward visited and destroyed the Seneca villages of Kanadesaga, Canandaigua, and Honeoye. No battles were fought in the territory on this or on the returning march, but the horrors of war are not confined to battles. In the burning of well-built homes, in the cutting down of orchards, in the destruction of great fields of maize and vegetables, the cruel though necessary object of the invasion was attained, and no more did forces of red men issue from the lake-studded forests of Western
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OLD ONTARIO IN WAR TIME.
New York to harry and massacre the patriot settlements on the frontier.
These were the only occasions when the territory now embraced in the county was actually the scene of warlike demonstrations, and both were previous to the time of white settlement, but the county since its organization, which was cotemporaneous with the adoption of the Federal constitution in 1789, has not been entirely free from the alarm of war.
SULLIVAN MEMORIAL.
Erected by Dr. Dwight R. Burrell, at corner of Bristol and Thad Chapin streets, Canandaigua, in memory of General John C. Sullivan and the Continental army, who passed near the spot, September 11 and 18, 1779.
In August, 1794, Governor Simcoe, of Canada, in an interview with Captain Charles Williamson, the great promoter of enterprise and settlement in Western New York in those early days, gave formal notice, in the presence of Thomas Morris and Nathaniel Gorham, Jr., the representatives of the pioneer settlement at Can- andaigua, that the white settlers must move out of the Indian territory in Western New York. The country had been excited for months previous on account of the acts of British officers and agents and with the alarming conduct of the latter's former allies, the
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
Indians. President Washington protested through Minister John Jay against this "irregular and high handed proceeding," charging that the agents of the Crown kept "in irritation the tribes that are hostile to us, and are instigating those who know little of us, or we of them, to unite in the war against us, and whilst it is an undeniable fact that they are furnishing the whole with arms, ammunition, clothing and even provisions to carry on the war. I might go farther, and, if they are not much belied, add, men also in disguise."
War seemed to be at the very gates of the young county. General Knox, Secretary of War, issued an order in favor of the Governor of New York for 1,000 muskets, cartridge boxes, and bayonets. The Legislature, in appropriating money for fortifica- tions at New York city, made provision also to the amount of 12,000 pounds for the building and equipping of one or more floating batteries, or other vessels of force, for the security of the western and northern frontiers of the State. Governor George Clinton, as early as May 29, ordered that "one thousand weight of powder and a proportionate quantity of lead" be deposited at "Canadaqua" in Ontario county, also the same for Onondaga county, the militia of which counties, he stated, had been represented to him as destitute of ammunition. Lieutenant-Colonel Othniel Taylor was directed to take charge of the supply for Ontario county. Active prepara- tions were made for the erection of palisades and block houses at Bath, Geneva, and Canandaigua, at the head of Canandaigua lake, and at Mud Creek, as witness the following proposals :
Mr. Johnson-I will contract to get five Hundred Stickes of Palesades 13 feet Long and one foot Square and Deliver them on the Hill at Geneva for Six pence per foot as Witness My hand.
Geneva, July 11th, 1794.
DEODAT ALLEN.
Gentlemen-We will engage to git one Thouthan Stickes of Palleasadeas Thirteen feet Long and one feet Square and Deliver them on the Hill at Geneva for Six pence per feet and Will ask no pay till one half of the timber Is delivered on the Spot as witness our hands.
Geneva, July 12th, 1794.
DEODAT ALLEN, PETER BORTLE, JRS.
The Charles Williamson, Thomas Morris, Esquires.
Gentlemen-We shall contract with you according to your Advertisement for One Thousand Pallisades Thirteen futt in length one futt square at Sixpence Pr futt to be delivered upon the hill at Geneva. To bear inspection By two men which you shall chuse yourselves.
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OLD ONTARIO IN WAR TIME.
If your Honnors thinks that we are capable of Serving you we will from time to time have acation to draw upon you for a Little Cash as the wak is done. With Esteem we are your Hu'ble Serv't.
LUTHER SANFORD, ALEXANDER BIRNEY.
Geneva, 15 July, 1794.
But so far as known the block houses were never built. The lesson which General Wayne administered to the Western Indians made the Senecas quite amenable to proposals for peace, and at the conclusion of the Pickering coun- cil, November 11, 1794, which during the six weeks of its pro- longed deliberations must have given Canandaigua the appear- ance of a war-time camp, they con- cluded a treaty which was never broken, and the county after- wards remained secure from fear of invasion by the Indians. The Simcoe scare had happily blown over, but while it lasted the pio- neers endured real and constant alarm of war.
In the war time of 1812, that alarm took yet more tangible shape. Most of the leading citi- zens, at the county seat at least, JAMES WADSWORTH. James Wadsworth, nephew of Major General Jeremiah Wadsworth of the Continental army, was born in Durham, Connecticut, April 20, 1768; settled at Geneseo, then called Big Tree, in 1790, as the manager of a large tract of land owned by his uncle; the an- cestor of all the Wadsworths now living in the Genesee valley; died at Geneseo in 1844. were Federalists and being such were probably not over enthusi- astic supporters of the war, but having frankly expressed their sentiments by the adoption of resolutions (September 10, 1812), they gave no further public signs of opposition. Canandaigua had been made a depository for military supplies, including arms and ammunition, the year before the outbreak of the war ; an arsenal had been built on an eminence on the western boundaries of the village, and it is safe to assume that the annual muster of the militia in that year had particular interest.
The forts at Niagara and Oswego remained in the hands of
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
the English from the close of the Revolution to 1796, and were naturally the center of much anxious thought to the people of Western New York, and made Ontario county not only the scene of much military activity on the part of its own citizens, but a high- way for troops marching from the east to the front. At the out- break of hostilities, one of its own honored citizens, General Amos Hall, of Bloomfield, was for a short time in command of the forces on the frontier, as major-general of this division of the State militia, and not a few of its yeomanry, as the old cemeteries of the county testify, saw active service in the succeeding campaign.
General Hall, in 1813, as the result of the review of his force at Buffalo, reported that it included one hundred and twenty-nine mounted volunteers from Ontario county, under command of Colonel Seymour Boughton ; also four hundred and thirty-three Ontario county volunteers commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Blakesle. The county then included the territory now embraced in Ontario, Livingston, Monroe, Yates and part of Wayne.
The Federalists were right in one respect, the country was totally unprepared for war, and on the Niagara frontier as else- where blunder succeeded blunder. The militia, at the battle of Black Rock, although unfitted and untrained for the realities of war, acquitted themselves creditably, until, forced to retreat before the veteran Royal Scots, a cry of "Indians are coming!" filled them with terror and they fled in confusion. As a result, Buffalo village was burned and its inhabitants and those of the region about sought safety in flight to the villages at the east .. Forty of Colonel Blakesle's regiment were captured, a number of the Ontario volun- teers were killed or wounded, and the whole county was thrown into a tumult. Moreover, the refugees were suffering for want of food and clothing, and it was incumbent upon the people to relieve their necessities. They did so promptly and generously. The citizens of Canandaigua appointed a relief committee, through whose efforts a considerable fund was raised, and with aid voted by the Legislature the needs of the refugees were relieved during the anxious winter of 1813-1814. One of the appeals issued read as follows :
Canandaigua, January 8, 1814.
Gentlemen-Niagara County and that part of Genesee which lies west of Batavia, are completely depopulated. All the settlements in a section forty
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OLD ONTARIO IN WAR TIME.
miles square, and which contained more than twelve thousand souls, are effect- ually broken up. These facts you are undoubtedly acquainted with; but the distresses they have produced none but an eye witness can thoroughly appre- ciate. Our roads are filled with people, many of whom have been reduced from a state of competency and good prospects to the last degree of want and sorrow. So sudden was the blow by which they have been crushed that no provision could be made either to elude or meet it. The fugitives from Niagara county especially were dispersed under circumstances of so much terror that in some cases mothers find themselves wandering with strange children, and children are seen accompanied by such as have no other sympathies with them than those of common sufferings. Of the families thus separated, all the members can never again meet in this life; for the same violence which has made them beggars has forever deprived them of their heads, and others of their branches. Afflictions of the mind, so deep as has been allotted to these unhappy people, we cannot cure. They can probably be subdued only by His power who can wipe away all tears. But shall we not endeavor to assuage them? To their bodily wants we can certainly administer. The inhabitants of this village have made large contributions for their relief, in provisions, clothing and money, and we have been appointed, among other things, to solicit further relief for them from our wealthy and liberal-minded fellow-citizens. In pursuance of this appointment we may ask you, gentlemen, to interest yourselves particularly in their behalf. We believe that no occasion has ever occurred in our country which presented stronger claims upon individual benevolence, and we humbly trust that whoever is willing to answer these claims will always entitle himself to the precious reward of active charity. We are, gentlemen, with great respect.
WILLIAM SHEPARD,
MOSES ATWATER,
MYRON HOLLEY,
THADDEUS CHAPIN, N. GORHAM,
THOMAS BEALS,
PHINEAS P. BATES, Committee of Safety and Relief at Canandaigua.
In the more skillfully managed and more successful campaign of the succeeding summer, the Ontario county militia found them- selves members of the brigade of volunteers under General Peter B. Porter (a few years before a resident of Canandaigua), cooper- ating with the regulars under General Winfield Scott, and had part in retrieving the blunders of the earlier campaign, participating in the capture of Fort Erie, the battles of Chippewa and Lundy's Lane, and the defense of Fort Erie. General Porter was accorded unstinted credit for the persuasiveness of his eloquence in enlisting recruits, and for his gallantry and skill in leading them against the foe. The Governor made him a major general, Congress voted him a gold medal, and Canandaigua, according to the good old fash- ioned custom, gave him a banquet. With the raising of the siege of Fort Erie, September 17, 1814, the campaign on the New York
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
frontier was ended, and soon after the great victory at New Orleans finally closed the episode.
But enough of these old time soldiers:
"Their swords are rust, Their bodies dust; Their souls are with the saints, we trust."
Although twice have armies of civilized States invaded the terri- tory now embraced in the county of Ontario and swept its peaceful vales with war's besom, and although twice since the county has been recognized as a civil division of the State of New York have defenses been erected here and arms and ammunition assembled with which to repel the attack of hostile forces, neither the deeds of the French Cavaliers under De Nonville, nor those of the Ragged Continentals under Sullivan, constitute more than interesting catch words for study of aboriginal and colonial history. And Simcoe's scare was soon over, and the scars of 1812 were long ago obliterated.
When we of the Twentieth century picture Ontario county in war time our thoughts inevitably turn to the troublous days of 1861-65. Their poignant memories survive. Reminders of the pas- sions of those days, the joys, the griefs, are in every home. Here a picture on the wall or in an old album, there a sword or a musket, recalls deeds of sacrifice and valor in which children and grand- children take sacred pride. On Memorial day, empty sleeves, or G. A. R. buttons, growing rapidly fewer now, tell us that some of those who had a part in the mighty struggle are still with us.
149
THE COUNTY IN THE CIVIL WAR.
XVI
THE COUNTY IN THE CIVIL WAR.
A Patriotic Pulpit-Citizens Make Large Financial Contributions in Support of the Union Cause-Recruiting the Armies- Canandaigua Academy's Part-Treasonable Utterances-The Ontario Volunteers and Their Gallant Record-The County Represented in Twenty-nine Different Regiments.
Most of the local pulpits eloquently supported the cause of Freedom in the years immediately preceding the war, and when they did not or were suspected of pro-slavery sympathy, the congrega- tions dwindled. As during the war of 1812, Sheriff Phineas Bates had severed his connection with the Congregational church in Canan- daigua because of the sentiments expressed by its Federalist minister, and took sittings in St. John's where at least the rector was required to pray for the President of the United States and all associated with him in authority, so as civil war was threatened men of the intenser character transferred their church connection to the Congregational fold, where the scholarly and eloquent Dr. Oliver E. Daggett let no Sunday pass without enforcing a lesson of patriotism, or to the Methodist Episcopal fold, where Rev. K. P. Jervis was thundering forth such anathemas against the South and those who upheld in any way its peculiar institution as to bring down upon his head the sharp criticism of one of the conservative papers of the village. Whereupon, the editor of a rival sheet, coming to the preacher's defense with more vigor and passion than discre- tion, involved himself in a prosecution for libel.
The people of Ontario county had not realized any more clearly than those elsewhere in the North that the inauguration as President of the rail splitter of Illinois would be followed by actual war, but they met the crisis firmly. They retreated not one whit from the position they had taken months before in opposition to the designs of the slave power. Their stations on the Underground Railroad, never closed to the ebony-hued travelers who trudged in
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HISTORY OF ONTARIO COUNTY.
increasing numbers to freedom in the North, attempted little of concealment now. They assembled in many so-called relief meet- ings, and there expressed sympathy with their brothers in bleeding Kansas and adopted plans looking to the practical support of the cause for which they prayed and labored.
But they felt that the South would stop at actual rebellion, or at least delay the irrevocable step for yet other months. Perhaps they thought that the peace convention called to meet in Wash- ington in February, 1861, would solve the problem. Two of their most prominent citizens, the Hon. Francis Granger, a man then of National reputation, and the recognized leader among the Silver Grays or Anti-Slavery Whigs, and James C. Smith, in the prime of his young manhood and a leader in the six-year-old Republican party, had been chosen by the Legislature to represent the State in that body, but the peace convention came to naught.
Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated President of the United States, and then in the fast-turning kaleidoscope of time came that never-to-be-forgotten 12th of April, 1861, when Sumter was fired upon. The shot was heard in Ontario county, as it was in every loyal community of the North, with mingled feelings of surprise and dismay, but not of fear. The call of President Lincoln for 75,000 volunteers to aid in suppressing the rebellion met its prompt response here, as is evidenced by the following notice published in the local papers :
Our Country Now and Ever.
The citizens of Canandaigua and vicinity are requested to meet at the Town House in Canandaigua, Saturday afternoon, April 20th, at 2 p. m., to adopt such measures as shall be necessary to unite with our fellow countrymen to sustain the government of the United States, defend our country and protect the honor of our national flag.
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