USA > New York > Oneida County > Steuben > A narrative history of Remsen, New York, including parts of the adjoining townships of Steuben and Trenton, 1789-1898 > Part 5
USA > New York > Oneida County > Remsen > A narrative history of Remsen, New York, including parts of the adjoining townships of Steuben and Trenton, 1789-1898 > Part 5
USA > New York > Oneida County > Trenton > A narrative history of Remsen, New York, including parts of the adjoining townships of Steuben and Trenton, 1789-1898 > Part 5
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A stone mason of the vicinity secured work at South Trenton, living for the time in the family where he was employed. One evening it was announced that, as some of the men of the household wished to get an early start the following morning to carry the season's yield of wool to a carding mill several miles distant, all hands would be required to seek their beds early, as they would be called for breakfast long before daylight. Thus,
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shortly after candle-light all retired, and were soon asleep. In due course they were summoned by the housewife, and found the morning meal ready spread. While they were eating, a wind arose, changing to tur- bulence what had been a calm and peaceful night. Be- fore the breakfast was over, some of the company began to speculate as to what the precise hour might be; one remarked that he had not heard the roosters crow, while others went out to survey the sky in an effort to settle the question by reference to the position of the "great dipper." Finally, however, they unitedly de- termined that it was too early to start to mill, so they made themselves comfortable, some retiring to their rooms and to bed. The latter enjoyed a long and re- freshing rest before they arose again at day-break. In the course of the day a neighbor who was fortunate enough to own a clock, chancing to call, was asked at what time during the night the wind had begun to blow, and replied, "at eleven o'clock."
Sometimes families would arrive at church an hour or more before time for service; and a number of authen- ticated instances are related of their arriving after the benediction had been pronounced and the congregation were leaving.
In later years "Down East Yankees," as they were called, occasionally came through peddling clocks. These time-pieces were simply the uncovered works to hang upon the wall, the weights and pendulum all in evidence; for cases to these "grand-father's clocks" were too cumbersome to transport from so far-away a country as Connecticut. A crafty ruse of the wily ped- dler was to obtain permission to hang a clock in the house for two or three weeks, or until his return trip, stating in explanation that the roads were rough and his wagon heavily loaded. The generous-hearted set-
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tler seldom refused to grant so simple a request; and the clock would be installed accordingly, the pendulum adjusted, weights attached, the mechanism wound and set in motion, and instructions given to keep it running until the owner's return. However, when he called on his homeward trip, it almost invariably was found that the simple little contrivance had so ingratiated itself into the affectionate favor of the household, that it was unanimously decided that they could not endure the thought of letting it go out of the family.
There still are found here clocks made by Hoadley, by Hopkins, and by Whiting, now from a hundred to a hundred and fifty years old, their mechanism construct- ed entirely of wood; and then, too, there are found those that were brought to this country by some of the Welsh settlers, in which the works are of brass, bearing the imprint of some English or Welsh manufacturer. And they are serving the present generation as faithfully as they did the sire and grandsire, measuring time and hourly proclaiming its flight.
Household articles now so common as to be consid- ered absolutely essential to comfort, were then either entirely lacking or regarded as exceptional luxuries. Even the ordinary pin, so plentiful in these days of mi- crobe avoidance that some there are who disdain to use the same one a second time, were then often wanting in the family. Pins were then made with the heads form- ed of separate pieces of metal, or twisted wire, which often became detached from the body as completely as did the heads of some ambitious monarchs of former times; and the few pins that a fortunate household pos- sessed would be hoarded and kept in use so long that it became an exception to find one that had not lost its head. Two good sewing needles and a darning needle were considered ample provision for a family, to which
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of course must be added the ever-present knitting need- les. A large-sized pin used for fastening wraps and shawls has been known to serve the members of more than one generation.
There were no baby carriages, and, owing to the scar- city of sawed lumber, even the cradle was often want- ing. The grandfathers and grandmothers of some of the most prosperous families of the present generation were lullabied to their infant slumbers while cradled in a sap-trough.
There were times when an ingredient so necessary to the art of cooking as common baking-soda could not be obtained, or if obtainable the needful shillings or pence . wherewith to pay for it were lacking; so to meet the con- tingency the resourceful housewife would burn a quan- tity of corn-cobs on the hearthstone, and carefully col- lecting the white portion of their ashes use them as a substitute for soda.
Compensations there were, which in a measure atoned for the privations, inconveniences, and hard labor en- dured; for there was contentment and happiness withal, and charity and good-will generally prevailed. As Mr. Simeon Fuller expresses in a letter of reminiscences to the writer: "The first settlers were helpful and obliging to one another. If any of them through sickness or any other bad luck were unable to get in his crops, a bee was made and he was helped out. And if a new settler came and was in destitute circumstances, they divided with him until he could help himself. If a bear or a deer were killed, a feast was made and the neighbors without dis- tinction were called in to share it. Despite all their privations and hardships, they, without exception, would declare these the happiest days of their lives."
· Social pleasures were not entirely wanting, though opportunities in this respect were exceedingly limited,
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being restricted principally to mutual visiting; and as all endured hardships in common, on the principle that "one touch of nature makes the whole world kin," no social distinctions save honesty and respectability were recognized. Trivial distinctions there were, of course, for some had received certain advantages in their for- mer homes that others in the new settlements had never been privileged to enjoy; but on the whole they met so- cially on common ground as equals. The young people for miles around gatherd at "corn-huskings," or "par- ing-bees," or at "sugarings-off," where in the latter the final touches in the maple sugar camps furnished a lux- ury that "kings and potentates" might long for. Then, too, the more mature matrons would meet at "quilt- ings," or afternoon teas, where, if they did not sew for the hostess, they brought their own sewing or knitting, for their hands were never idle. And where there was ordinarily so little to divert the even tenor of their minds, and these occasions for meeting socially so rare, naturally the neighborhood news and gossip must needs be recounted, and family trials and afflictions described, through lack of more important topics. One dame might regale the company with the symptoms of her daughter who had "the janders," while another would have the assembly conjecturing as to who could be the guilty one who got up before sunrise and plucked Mrs. - 's geese.
The less seriously inclined sometimes found pleasura- ble diversion upon the floor of Oliver Smith's ball-room, tripping "the light fantastic" to the strains of "Uncle Tom" Nichols' violin. These dancing-parties were held during the afternoon and early evening, owing perhaps to the long distance some of the guests were obliged to come. The dance began soon after the arrival of the guests, in mid-afternoon of the short winter day, and continued until six o'clock, when there was an inter-
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mission while supper was served. Then after supper dancing was resumed, but by ten o'clock all was over. The guests, wrapped in warm skins or heavy home-made blankets, seated in large farm sleighs generously pro- vided with straw, returned to their homes; their lives to be cheered long after by the memory of these few hours of mirth and gayety, snatched from an existence in the main all too joyless and solitary.
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Regarding the question of agriculture, it soon became manifest to the early settlers that the soil of these hill townships was not adapted to grain, and little attempt was made to raise any except the coarser varieties, or at least only in such quantity as was needful for home con- sumption. Many acres were devoted to the cultivation of flax. It was a crop that was known to impoverish the soil more rapidly than any other, yet it yielded well, · and was a product indispensable to the early inhabitant. Eventually, attention was turned to grazing and dairy- ing, and the farms speedily became well stocked with cattle and sheep. But in this enterprise, however, no regard was paid to selection or breeding, for any distinc- · tion of "caste" or quality-in these parts, at least-was not recognized or understood; broad-horn or short-horn, long pedigree or no pedigree, it mattered not, for a cow was a cow, a sheep a sheep, and a hog most indisputably a hog then as now, here as elsewhere, and valued accord- ing to the amount of fat that could be forced upon him. Each farm acquired its herd, heterogeneous though it were, and butter-making became the principal industry. Cheese was made to some extent by owners of large dairies, say of sixty or a hundred cows; still, butter was by far the larger product, and its quality became an im- portant factor in establishing the reputation of "Oneida county butter" in the New York market, where it is noted for its superior excellence to-day.
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For many years the price of butter seldom exceeded ten cents or a shilling a pound, and often sold as low as sixpence. The entire season's proceeds of a good- sized dairy are known to have been less than forty dollars. Buyers about here were numerous, and to these "butter merchants," as they were termed, often was entrusted on consignment the entire product of the dairy to take to New York in the fall; and then the farmer for months patiently awaited his return, when he was finally obliged to accept such amount as the merchant claimed he was able to market for, less the inevitable commission for selling. With the liv- ing expenses of his family for a year or more charged against him at the store, and perhaps a payment due on his farm, should the farmer demur in disappoint- ment and dissatisfaction, the tender-hearted merchant would relate with tear-dimmed eye and choking voice that tubs of butter were piled on the wharves in New York as high as the buildings; and how he had labored to have theirs in particular taken off his hands, thus spending the whole winter in the city trying to sell the output consigned to him. Then, to propitiate in a measure the natural disappointment, the mer- chant would reach down into the depths of a capacious coat-tail pocket and draw therefrom a new bandana handkerchief, or perhaps a fancy snuff-box, as a present to the woman of the house-possibly her sole recompense for days of patient labor in the dairy- while she must now, with other members of the family, forego the few coveted and needful things they had expected to be able to possess when the "butter money came in."
The local merchants also were large buyers and shippers of butter. The farmer would trade with a merchant, buying practically all his store supplies
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from him on credit, and in the fall turn his butter over to be sold at the best price obtainable, from which sum to deduct his account and pay to him the balance; or perchance, as often happened, his indebtedness would amount to more than the proceeds from the sale of the butter, so that several years would some- times elapse before the account could be balanced.
And yet, most families were to an extent independent of the tradesman or merchant. Their own cattle, sheep, swine and poultry provided the necessary meats; the maple trees their sugar and syrup; and the busy bees a store of honey. Nevertheless, there were some necessaries that the farm could not supply, and among these may be mentioned salt and sole-leather. · Trips were made to Salt Point-afterward Salina, now a part of Syracuse-usually in winter, crossing Oneida Lake on the ice, the sleighs loaded with pro- duce to be exchanged for salt, on a basis of three dol- lars a barrel. It was essential that two or more ac- company each load on these occasions, in order that one might guard the sleigh while the other bargained for salt; for some of the "salt boilers" were somewhat covetous of other people's goods.
Sole-leather, when bought outright, cost three shillings a pound; though hides, as we have elsewhere shown, were often tanned on shares, by the slow and only process known at that period. From the time the raw hide was first taken in hand until the leather was fully dried, not less than a year was consumed in producing the best quality of sole-leather.
Our forefathers were constitutionally slow to accept innovations. Any tool, implement, or household utensil invented or improved for the purpose of lessen- ing toil, or easing the exertion of farm and domestic labor, was not received with general favor when first
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introduced. Wedded to the old ways, which they considered best, they were loth to adopt new or un- tried methods, nothwithstanding they might bear promise of lightening their tasks, saving time, and rendering their homes more comfortable. Even stoves were not introduced into the households here previous to 1835, for many believed their use detrimental to health and would not allow them in their homes. The first grain-cradle brought to this section was owned by Joseph Halstead, a kindly, generous-hearted man who, after cutting his own grain, would often urge the loan of the cradle upon his neighbors when he saw them in their fields harvesting with that an- cient and back-breaking implement of husbandry, the sickle; but some declined his offer, believing that this new device tended to wastefulness, since it did not cut the straw so closely to the earth as did the sickle. When Sylvester Burchard began to make cast-iron plows, there were farmers who hesitated to use them through fear that the iron would "poison their land." They declared that the dust worn from the iron would pollute the soil, and crop failures where all-cast plows had been used were attributed to this cause. When wash-boards came into use in this locality, there were women who would not use them because they thought they would wear out the clothes more rapidly than did the old method of soaping a garment, then with the hands rubbing one part against another in the water, until the entire fabric was gone over and all dirt and stains removed. The use of a mop was considered a most slovenly way of cleaning a floor, and those who resorted to its use were thought to be unduly averse to work, or over regardful of their hands, their knees and their backs.
And this work it may be observed, was not thought
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beneath the dignity of the matron and daughters of the family to perform. There were few "servants," nor were there class distinctions founded on the char- acter of the work one was called upon to do; for all honest labor faithfully done was considered commenda- ble. The virtue of industry was taught betimes to the children of the household, and they were warned to shun idleness as a degrading vice. The young girls of the family were early taught to spin, even before their stature would permit their hands to reach the spinning-wheel "head." To make the task pos- sible for these, a plank would be laid beside the wheel, with one end elevated by a block of wood of sufficient height to permit the youthful spinner to reach the spindle; and here for hours, with forward and back- ward step, she would walk the plank, spinning her "stint" of knots. The boy had his "chores" to do, which must be attended to regularly and systematic- ally, thus establishing in his character the foundation of invaluable qualities. When not needed at home, it was customary for the farmers' daughters to assist in the household work of other families, they taking for the time being the position of membership in such family.
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CHAPTER IV
LAND GRANTS AND TITLES
Concerning the subject of land grants, it should be borne in mind that when recorded history first sheds a ray of light on the subject, this region was a part of a large and indefinite territory now comprised in several states of our Union, which constituted the do- main of the Five Nations. The counselors of these warriors met for conference at Genesee, at Oneida, and at Onondaga. Their council-fires gleamed with- in sight from the summit of Starr's Hill, which also overlooks a portion of Oneida Lake, one of their fav- orite fishing resorts. Their armies marched from the Mohawk to the Miami, and there was none to dis- pute their supremacy over the vast stretches of mag- nificent forests where their arms had made them masters.
Forty-two years after the discovery of America by Columbus, Jaques Cartier landed at Hockalega, now Montreal, where on the banks of the St. Lawrence he erected the cross and planted the French flag. Ignoring the Papal Bull of Pope Alexander VI, he proclaimed in the names of Jesus and Mary and of Francis I of France, that he took possession of "That river and all the lands adjoining it, and its tributaries near and remote." The same claim and right was re-asserted by Champlain, at the founding of Quebec, in 1608. The English, under Gosnold, had entered Chesapeake Bay in 1607, and the Dutch, in the person of Henry Hudson, entered the river that bears his
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name in 1609, each claiming the adjacent territory for their respective monarchs.
Now Remsen is located on the dividing ridge or summit which separates the waters that flow to Lake Ontario from those that find their way to the Hudson, its streams being thus tributary to both the St. Law- rence and Hudson rivers. West Canada creek, the largest tributary of the Mohawk, forms a portion of the eastern boundary of the township, and Black river, forming the northern boundary, empties into Lake Ontario, its waters thence flowing through the St. Lawrence to the gulf. A portion of the waters fo the township of Steuben, as originally formed, find their way to Chenango river, thence through the Susquehanna to Chesapeake Bay. So it may be said that Remsen and its environs were once claimed, through alleged right of discovery, by three monarchies of the old world.
From the arrival of Champlain upon the St. Lawrence until after the conquest and treaty of 1762, a large portion of our state was within the definite bounds of French Canada, or in a more extended geographical designation, New France. However, long before the conquest and fall of New France, both the English provinces of Massachusetts and New York passively claimed title, under conflicting charters. Those upon which Massachusetts based her claim were granted by King James I, of England, in 1620, and by Charles I, in 1628. These embraced all the territory between the forty-second and forty-fourth degrees north lati- tude, extending from the Atlantic ocean on the east to the Pacific ocean on the west. This vast grant was called New England. The Province of New York · was claimed under a charter from Charles II to the Duke of York and Albany, whereby was granted all
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the lands extending from a line twenty miles easterly of Hudson river, northerly to Canada, southerly to Delaware Bay, and westerly to the Pacific. Thus, after the conquest of New France, the domain of Rem- sen and vicinity was definitely owned by the British.
We have no knowledge that it was ever even tran- siently occupied by any white being until several years after the revolution. And yet, while these hills and valleys were still wrapped in the embrace of primeval solitude, war was waged on every side. Years before its first permanent white settler appeared, the distant murmur of the guns at Fort Williams- afterward Fort Stanwix, now Rome-awoke the echo of these hills. French and English troops, richly caparisoned, Indian warriors in paint and plumage, traversed the lakes and streams in their batteaus, or marched along the trails of the Red Men from the Mohawk to Onondaga, to Oswego, and Frontenac, touching our very borders,* Later, the great polit- ical tempests of revolutionary times roared and thundered within hearing distance, and the drums and bugles of war sounded on every side. Cannonading at Schuyler, at Oriskany, and at Stanwix startled the wilderness. There were treaties, alliances, plots and conventions within a day's journey of Remsen, while we are left but a single skirmish amidst these stirring scenes to refresh our "parching chronicles;" for the utmost that can be said for Remsen in setting up a claim to revolutionary distinction is that on its eastern
* On November 12, 1757, an expedition under the command of M. de Belletre, composed of about three hundred marines, Cana- dians and Indians, which had traversed the wilderness by way of Black river, attacked and destroyed the Palatine settlements on the north side of the Mohawk river, at or near the present village of Herkimer. Unquestionably, this expedition passed through Steuben, and probably put through the military road, traces of which, Mr. Simon Fuller tells us, were found by the first settlers in the township.
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border the tory captain, Walter Butler, met the retri- bution his crimes deserved.
Albany county was the first civil division of the commonwealth to which Remsen was subject. On March 12, 1772, Tryon county was set off from Albany county, the name being changed six years later to Montgomery county. On March 8, 1778, the town- ship of Whitestown was formed from that of German Flats, and was bounded east by a line crossing the Mohawk river at Utica, opposite the present site of Bagg's Hotel, running thence north to Canada, and south to the Pennsylvania state line. Although Whitestown as then formed included the entire portion of the state west of that line, the new township con- tained less than two hundred inhabitants. Thirty- two years later, however, or in 1810, it had 380,319, about 20,000 more than the whole population of Con- necticut, Mr. White's native state.
This new township included all the present terri- tory of Steuben, and the western half of Trenton; but Remsen as subsequently formed, was too far east to be included. When Oneida county was erected, the old Whitestown line was thrown eastward to the county's present boundary, and thus it was that Rem- sen's territory was set off from Norway, Herkimer county, in 1798. Its area embraced portions of land gaining title from several old patents, namely: Adgate's Eastern Tract; Woodhull's Patent, a tract about eight miles square; Remsenburgh Patent; and small portions of Service's Patent and the Steuben Grant. Woodhull's was situated north of Remsenburgh Patent and the Black river, and Adgate's was north of Wood- hull's. The township of Forestport, which was orig- inally a part of Remsen, is comprised wholly of por- tions of these two patents.
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The original patentee of Adgate's tract was Matthew Adgate, who in 1798 was vested with title to 43,907 acres.
The Remsenburgh Patent, consisting of 48,000 acres, was partly in Oneida county and partly in Herkimer county, and was granted December 28, 1787, to Henry Remsen, J. G. Klock, George Klock, John Van Sice and Dirck Van Ingen. They had presented a petition to the legislature, stating that lands had been conveyed to them by deed, dated May 28, 1766, and recorded in the office of the Secretary of State. An act was passed May 5, 1786, authorizing the issue of "A patent of any un- granted or unlocated lands, in one parcel, if such a large parcel can be located." So the patent was issued ac- cordingly.
The greater part of Service's Patent was comprised within the township of Trenton. It was granted in 1768, by Sir Henry Moore, governor of the Colony of New York, ostensibly to "Peter Service and twenty- four others, tenants," but in reality for the benefit of Sir William Johnson.
Early in the eighteenth century a considerable part of the cultivated land in the Province of New York, and much that was yet uncultivated, was divided into large manorial possessions, obtained from the government by men of superior sagacity and influence. Many of these manorial grants were primarily made to obscure indi- viduals, and by them transferred to some government favorite or officer of rank. This procedure was for the purpose of evading the "Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations," a board constituted of fifteen mem- bers and their successors appointed by King William, in 1689, and continued in force until the close of the American revolution.
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