USA > New York > Erie County > Centennial history of Erie County, New York : being its annals from the earliest recorded events to the hundredth year of American independence > Part 16
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Going westward we find the Boston people at length rejoicing in a grist-mill, erected this year by Joseph Yaw. According to Gen. Warren's recollection, Mr. Yaw was elected supervisor of Willink in both 1808 and 1809. The Willink records were burned with those of Aurora in 1831, so it is not certain.
The first settlement in the present town of Eden was made
176
AURORA, CLARENCE, ETC.
this year. Elisha Welch and Deacon Samuel Tubbs located at what is now known as Eden Valley, but which for a long time bore the less romantic appellation of Tubbs' Hollow.
In this year, too, Aaron Salisbury and William Cash made the first permanent settlement in the present town of Evans, west of Harvey's tavern at the mouth of the Eighteen-Mile. Salis- bury was a young, unmarried man. Cash had several sons, since well known in the town. His brother David Cash, Nathaniel Leigh, Jolın Barker, Anderson Tyler, Seth and Martin Sprague and others came not long after, and all settled near the lake shore, where the only road ran.
Besides Samuel Calkins, David Rowley and others, Timothy and Oren Treat settled in Aurora in 1809. Oren Treat, then nearly twenty-two years old, located himself on a farm a little east of Griffin's Mills, where he has ever since resided. It is only this year that he has given up its active superintendenc e, though almost eighty-nine years of age. He informs me that Humphrey Smith built a grist-mill at what is now called Griffin's Mills in 1809, though it was not finished till the next year. Like most of the pioneer mills, it was of a very primitive con- struction, the bolt being at first turned by hand.
In Wales there was a considerable increase of the population ; Peleg Havens, Welcome Moore and Isaac Reed being among the new comers.
There was a large immigration into the north part of the county this year. Isaac Denio, John Millerman and Benjamin Ballou were among those who settled in the present town of Newstead. Archibald S. Clarke was again elected to the as- sembly.
Most of those who came into Clarence still located then- selves in the southern part of the township, but Matthias Van- tine moved into the wilderness four miles north of Harris Hill. His son, David Vantine, then a youth of fifteen, now a sturdy old man of eighty-two, says there was not a family north of the limestone ledge when his father settled there. A little further north was what was then called the Tonawanda swamp.
A young man of twenty-one, since well known as Colonel Bea- man, located three miles north of Clarence Hollow that same summer. For sixty-seven years he has remained on the same
177
GLEZEN FILLMORE.
farm. When I conversed with him in 1875, he said that at the time he came there was not a house on the north, through to the vicinity of Lockport.
Another of the new comers into Clarence was destined to wield a strong influence throughout not only Erie county but Western New York. I refer to the Rev. Glezen Fillmore. He was then a bright, pleasant, yet carnest youth of nineteen, with the well-known, strong, Fillmore features, and stalwart Fillmore frame.
Having been licensed in March, 1809, as a Methodist ex- horter, the youthful champion of the cross immediately set forth from his home in Oncida county, on foot, with knapsack on his back, traveling two hundred miles through the snow and mud of carly spring, to begin his labors in the wilderness of the Hol- land Purchase.
Arriving in the neighborhood where his uncle Calvin resided, he at once went to work. His first preaching was at the house of David Hamlin. A man named Maltby and his wife werc the only listeners except Hamlin's family, but the young ex- horter bravely went through with the entire services, including class-meeting. It is to be presumed that he felt rewarded when, in after years, he learned that four of Maltby's sons had become Methodist ministers.
Young Fillmore procured land, and throughout his life made his home, at Clarence Hollow, though spending many years at a distance, on whatever service might be allotted to him. In the fall of 1809 he returned to Oneida county, married Miss Lavina Atwell, and brought her back to his frontier home.
Mrs. Fillmore, in later years widely known as " Aunt Vina," shared her husband's toils, and when I saw her a year since, at the age of eighty-ciglit, her form was still unbent and her eye undimmed, and she would easily have passed for seventy. She stated that there was already a Methodist society at Clarence Hollow when she came, probably organized the summer before.
Samuel Hill, Jr., was elected supervisor of Clarence for the year 1809. As near as I can learn it was in that year, though possibly a little later, that Otis R. Ingalls opened the first store in the present town of Clarence, at Ransomville, now Clarence Hollow.
178
ORIGIN OF "BLACK ROCK."
Meanwhile the little village at the mouth of Buffalo creek kept creeping along toward its destined greatness. Fortunately we have the means of ascertaining its exact position in 1809.
In October, Erastus Granger, who had lately been appointed collector of customs for the new district of Buffalo Creek, wrote to the Secretary of the Treasury, protesting against the proposed removal of the custom-house to Black Rock. Comparing the grandeur of Buffalo with the insignificance of Black Rock, he declared that the former had a population of no less than forty- three families, besides unmarried men engaged in business, and that the court-house and jail were "nearly completed."
The same letter contributes largely to settle a question which has been raised as to the origin of the name "Black Rock." It is generally attributed to a large, flat, dark-colored rock lying at the base of the bluff, where the boats used to land. Some have supposed, however, that it was derived from Bird Island, which was also a dark rock situated a short distance out in the river, and much farther up. A remark made by President Dwight of Yale College, in his journal of travels in this vicinity, in 1804, shows that he then supposed Bird Island to be the original " Black Rock."
But Judge Granger had resided at Buffalo ever since 1803. and he had evidently no such idea. In the letter just men- tioned, he says that Porter, Barton & Co. have built a store "on the Rock," and adds that besides Frederick Miller's temporary house under the bank, where a ferry-house and tavern are kept, one white family and two black families comprise the popula- tion. He goes on to say that lake vessels lie at the head of the rapids "a little below a reef called Bird Island, one mile from Black Rock and one and three fourths miles from Buffalo." It is quite plain that Judge G. looked on the original Rock as being at the foot of the rapids, and the ideas of a per- manent resident since 1803 are certainly entitled to far more weight than those of a mere traveler. Some other circum- stances have been adduced in favor of Bird Island as the origi- nal Black Rock, but they are, I think, decidedly overbalanced by the testimony in favor of the "rock " on shore.
For the time being the port of entry remained at Buffalo.
In his letter, Mr. Granger stated that a motion looking toward
179
"THE HORN BREEZE."
removal had been made in Congress by Peter B. Porter. This gentleman had been elected to Congress the year before, from the westernmost district of New York, and was as yet a resident of Canandaigua. His elder brother, Augustus Porter, the new first-judge of Niagara county, Benjamin Barton, Jr., and himself, had formed a partnership under the name of Porter, Barton & Co., and were the principal forwarders of eastern goods to the West. Their route was by way of Oneida lake, Oswego and Ontario, to Lewiston ; thence by land-carriage around the Falls and by vessel up Lake Erie. Of the few sail-vessels then run- ning on Lake Erie, owned on the American side, probably more than half were owned by Porter, Barton & Co.
Their ships had the same difficulty in ascending the rapids that had beset the Griffin a hundred and thirty years before. To overcome it they provided a number of yoke of oxen to drag vessels up the rapids. The sailors dubbed these auxilia- ries the "Horn Breeze.".
Porter, Barton & Co., joined with others, had also bought a tract of eight hundred acres, extending from Scajaquada creek south to near Breckenridge street. South of that was a lot of a hundred acres given by the State for a ferry, and still farther on was South Black Rock, where the State authorities intended to lay out a village extending to the "mile line" on the west side of Buffalo.
As to Buffalo creek, all agree that it was worthless for a har- bor, on account of the bar at the mouth. All sail vessels stopped at Black Rock, and only a few open boats came into the creek.
It was in 1809 that the authorities, who must have been the highway commissioners of Clarence, straightened the main avenue of Buffalo, cutting off Ellicott's "bay window" in front of outer lot 104. The great power that he exercised throughout the Holland Purchase makes it seem strange that they should have done so, but the facts are not disputed. Professor Evans says that he had begun to gather material for a grand mansion in the semi-circle, and that when the street was straightened he gave up the idea, and afterwards lost much of his interest in Buffalo. The stones he had gathered were used to help build the jail. Lot 104 was never subdivided or sold until after his
180
THE FIRST CHURCH IN BUFFALO.
death. About the time of the straightening, too, the names of "Willink avenue" and " Van Staphorst avenue " seem to have been thrown aside by general consent, and the whole was called Main street. The original names, however, of the other streets and avenues were retained for many years afterwards.
It was not till the last of 18og that a church was formed in Buffalo. Mrs. Fox agrees with Mrs. Mather, mentioned by Turner, that the first meetings were held in the court-house. It was formed by a union of Congregationalists and Presbyterians, under the direction of Rev. Thaddeus Osgood. Amos Callen- der, who came shortly after, became a leading member of the church. One account makes the organization still later, but I think the above is correct. There was still no minister except an occasional missionary.
Among the new comers was another of the "big men " who by strength of brain and will, and almost of arm, fairly lifted Buf- falo over the shoals of adverse fortune. Tall, broad-shouldered, fair-faced and stout-hearted, young Dr. Ebenezer Johnson en- tered on the practice of his profession with unbounded zeal and energy in the fall of 1809, and for nearly thirty years scarcely any man exercised a stronger influence in the village and city of his adoption. Another arrival was that of Oliver Forward, a brother-in-law of Judge Granger, who became deputy collector of customs and assistant postmaster, and who long exercised a powerful influence in Buffalo.
181
TOWN OF "BUFFALOE."
CHAPTER XXII.
JUST BEFORE THE WAR.
Town of " Buffaloe."-New Militia Regiments. - Buffalo Business. - Peter B. Porter -Tonawan la. - Store at Williamsville. - Clarence. - Settlement of Alden. - James Wood .- A Wolfish Salute .- An Aged Couple .- Colden .- Richard Buffum .- Springville .- Tucker's Table .- A Crowded Cabin. - Turner Aldrich .- The " Hill Difficulty."-Sardinia .- A Resolute Woman .- Boston and Eden. - Unlucky Sheep .- Evans .- Bears and Hedgehogs .- A Store too soon .- Crossing the Reservation .- A Mill-race as a Fish Trap. - Buffalo Firms .- Hf. B. Potter .- The Buffalo Gazette .- Feminine Names .- Old-Time Books .- An Erudite Captain. - " Buffalo-e."-The Unborn Reporter .- In- flation of the Marriage List .- Divers Advertisements. - "A Delinquent and a Villain."-Morals and Lotterie -.- The Two Chapina. - A Medical Melee. -A Federal Committee .- Division of Willink .- Hamburg. Eden and Con- cord .- Approach of War .- Militia Officers .- An Indian Council .- A Vessel Captured. - The War Begun.
This chapter relates principally to the years 1810 and 1811, but will be extended to the beginning of the war, in June, 1812.
In the first-named year the United States census was taken, and the population of Niagara county was found to be 6,132. Of these just about two thirds were in the present county of Erie.
In that year, too, the name "Buffalo," or "Buffaloc," was first legally applied to a definite tract of territory. On the 10th day of February, a law was passed erecting the town of "Buffaloe," comprising all that part of Clarence west of the West Transit. In other words, it comprised the present city of Buffalo, the towns of Grand Island, Tonawanda, Amherst and Cheektowaga, and the north part of West Seneca ; being about eighteen miles long north and south, and from eight to sixteen miles wide east and west. Another event considered of much importance in those days was the formation of new militia regiments. The men subject to military duty in Buffalo and Clarence were con- stituted a regiment, under Lieut. Col. Asa Chapman, then living near Buffalo. Samuel Hill, Jr., of Newstead, was one of his majors. The men of Willink formed another regiment, and
182
PETER B. PORTER.
young Major Warren was promoted to lieutenant-colonel com- manding. His majors were William C. Dudley, of Evans, and Benjamin Whaley, who was or had been a resident of Boston. There was also a regiment in Cambria, and one in Chautauqua county, and the whole was under the command of Brigadier- General Timothy S. Hopkins.
The mercantile business of Buffalo began to increase. Juba Storrs, having abandoned the law, formed a partnership with Benjamin Caryl and Samuel Pratt, Jr., under the firm name of Juba Storrs & Co., which took high rank in the little commer- cial world of Buffalo. In isto, the junior member, Mr. Pratt, was appointed sheriff, and Mr. Storrs himself, county clerk. Eli Hart and Isaac Davis also erected and opened stores about that time.
Another new settler, afterwards quite noted, was Ralph l'omeroy, who began the erection of a hotel on the northeast corner of Main and Seneca streets. Asa Coltrin, a physician. and John Mullett, a tailor, came about the same time.
Dr. Daniel Chapin, who was there then, and perhaps came earlier, was a physician of some note, and was the principal rival of his namesake, Dr. Cyrenius Chapin. The two were usually at bitter feud.
The most influential new comer in the county, however, was Peter B. Porter, who, after being reelected to Congress in the spring of isto, removed from Canandaigua to Black Rock. He was then thirty-seven years old, unmarried, a handsome, portly gentleman of the old school, of smooth address, fluent speech. and dignified demeanor.
At Canandaigua he had practiced at the bar, but after his re- moval he devoted himself to his commercial fortunes as a mem- ber of the firm of Porter, Barton & Co., save when attending to his political duties. Mr. Porter was the first citizen of Eric county who exercised a wide political influence.
A few lots were sold at Black Rock in 1810, and one or two small stores put up, but there were still very few residents.
The same year the Holland Company (that is, the several in- dividuals commonly so-called) sold their preemption right in all the Indian reservations on the Purchase to David A. Ogden. He was acting in behalf of other parties, joined with himself, in
183
THE NORTH TOWNS.
the speculation, and the owners were generally called the Ogden Company. The whole amount of territory was about 196,000 acres, and the purchase price $98,000. That is to say, Ogden and his friends gave fifty cents an acre for the sole right of buy- ing out the Indians whenever they should wish to sell.
There was still very little improvement in the north part of Tonawanda. Robert Simpson settled about a mile from Tona- wanda village. His son, John Simpson, then a boy, says that Garret Van Slyke was then keeping tavern on the north side of the creek, but on this side there was nothing but forest. A guard-house was built on this side on the approach of war. Henry Anguish lived a mile up the river. The only road to Buffalo was along the beach. Another one had been under- brushed out but was not used.
It was about 1810 that Isaac F. Bowman opened a little store at Williamsville, the first in the present town of Amherst, and probably the third in the county, out of Buffalo. The same year Benjamin Bowman bought the saw-mill on Eleven-Mile creek, four miles above Williamsville, (in the northwest corner of Lancaster,) and soon after built another, and the place has ever since retained the name of Bowman's Mills, or Bow- mansville.
The lowlands of township 13, range 7, being the north part of Amherst, had not even had a purchaser until 1810, when Adam Vollmer bought two lots at $3.00 per acre.
The same was the case in township 13, range 6, forming the north part of Clarence, where John Stranahan purchased at $2.75.
At the town-meeting this year Samuel Hill, Jr., was re- elected supervisor of Clarence, which by the erection of "Buf- faloe" had been reduced to a territory only eighteen miles long and twelve miles wide. It was also voted "that every path- master's yard should be a lawful pound," and that a bounty of $5.00 each should again be offered for wolves and panthers.
Elder John Le Suer and Elder Salmon Bell were both minis- ters resident in the old town of Clarence before the war, the former being quite noted throughout the northern part of the county.
Moses Fenno, who moved into the present town of AAlden in
184
A WOLFISH SALUTE.
the spring of 1810, is usually considered there as the first settler of that town, though Zophar Beach, Samuel Huntington and James C. Rowan had previously purchased land on its western edge, and it is quite likely some of them had settled there.
It is certain, however, that Fenno was the beginner of im- provement in the vicinity of Alden village, and raised the first crops there, in the year mentioned. The same year came Joseph Freeman, afterwards known as Judge Freeman, William Snow and Arunah llibbard.
It was in 1801 that the present town of Wales attained to the dignity of a framed house. It was built by Jacob Turner, and his daughter, Mrs. Judge Paine, informs me that it is still stand- ing upon the farm of Isaac W. Gail, Esq.
One of the new settlers in Wales in 1810 was James Wood, then a youth of twenty, who, after a long and most active career, passed away a few months since. He informed me last year that when, in 1810, he began making a clearing on the flats just below the village of "Wood's Hollow," which derived its name from him, there was not a house south of him in the town- ship. . There was no road, but on the west side of the creek was a well-beaten Indian trail.
In fact the wolves were about his only neighbors, and much closer than he liked. Having brought a heifer and five or six sheep from Aurora, the young pioneer secured them in a pen, close to his cabin. Hearing the wolves howl at night, he went out, when he found them closing in all around him, and could hear their jaws go "snap, snap," in the darkness of the forest. Calling his dog to his aid, he managed to beat a retreat to his cabin, but he always vividly remembered the snapping of the wolves' jaws around him. Fortunately they were unable to get into the sheep-pen.
Emigration was brisk all through the county, and log houses were continually rising by the wayside, but incidents of special interest were less common in the older settlements than among the first emigrants. Among the new comers in Aurora this year were Jonathan Bowen, Asa Palmer and Rowland Letson. The first church was organized in town by the Baptists. It had sixteen members.
In East Hamburg, besides Stephen Kester, Elisha Clark and
LAKE SHORE RELICS. 185
others, William Austin, then a young man of twenty-four, set- tled with his wife in the Smith (or Newton) neighborhood, and both are still living in the town. This is the only instance that I remember of a man and woman married before the war of 1812 both of whom still survive, though there may be others.
Mr. Austin remembers that there was a town-meeting at John Green's tavern, (afterwards kept by George B. Green,) when he first came, on the subject of dividing the town of Willink, and that some of the voters said they came thirty miles to attend it.
By this time (1811) the locality of East Hamburg village be- gan to be known as "Potter's Corners," from two or three prom- inent men of that name who had settled there.
By this time, too, that energetic mill-builder under difficulties, Daniel Smith, had, in company with his brother Richard, got him up a regular grist-mill, near where Long's mill now stands, at Hamburg village, which then began to be known by the name of Smith's Mills. Among the settlers in the vicinity was Moses Dart, a still surviving citizen.
About this time, perhaps earlier, the Messrs. Ingersoll lo -. cated on the lake shore, in Hamburg, just below the mouth of the Eighteen-Mile. Shortly after their arrival they discovered on the summit of the high bank seven or eight hundred pounds of wrought iron, apparently taken off from a vessel. It was much caten with rust, and there were trees growing from it ten to twelve inches in diameter.
A few years before, as related by David Eddy, a fine anchor had been found imbedded in sand on the Hamburg lake shore. Ten or twelve years later two cannon were discovered on the beach near where the iron was found. The late James W. Peters, of East Evans, in a communication to the Buffalo Com- mercial Advertiser, reproduced in Turner's "Holland Purchase," stated that he saw them immediately after their discovery, and cleaned away enough of the rust to lay bare a number of letters on the breech of one of them. He stated that the word or words thus exposed were declared to be French ; he did not say by whom, nor what they were.
From these data, Turner and others have inferred that the Griffin was wrecked at the mouth of Eighteen-Mile creek; that such of the crew as escaped intrenched themselves there to resist
13
186
SETTLEMENT OF COLDEN.
the Indians, but were finally overpowered and slain. It is much more probable, however, that the Griffin sank amid the storms of the upper lakes, especially as La Salle and his three companions came back on foot not far from Lake Erie, doubtless making constant inquiries of the Indians as to any wrecked vessel.
Mr. O. H. Marshall is very decidedly of the opinion that the evidences of shipwreck found on the lake shore were due to the loss of the Beaver, which occurred near that locality about 1765, and furnished an essay supporting this view to the Buffalo His- torical Society, which has unfortunately been lost. The size of the trees growing over the irons confirms Mr. Marshall's theory, which is in all probability correct. It is not seriously invalidated by the French words (if they were French,) on the cannon, as many English mottoes (such as " Dicu et mon droit," " Honi soit qui mal y pense," etc.,) are of French origin.
Dr. John March and Silas Este settled near Eden Valley in ISio, and Morris March, son of the former, informs me that there were just four families in town when they came. When the two families came, in March, they had to draw their wagons by hand on the icc across the Eighteen-Mile at Water Valley, where a saw-mill was about to be erected.
Up to this time no settlement had been made in the present town of Colden, but in ISIO Richard Buffum became its pioneer. He was a Rhode Islander of some property, and being desirous of emigrating westward he was requested by a number of his neighbors to go into an entirely new district and purchase a place where he could build mills, when they would settle around him.
Accordingly he came to the Holland Purchase, and located on the site of Colden village. His son, Thomas Buffum, then seven years old, informs me that his father cut his own road six or eight miles, and then built him a log house forty feet long ! This is the largest log dwelling of which I have heard in all my researches, and is entitled to special mention. The same fall he put up a saw-mill. Various causes prevented the coming of the neighbors he had calculated on, and for a good while Mr. Buf- fum was very much isolated. The first year no one came ex- cept men whom he had hired. As, however, he had eleven children, he was probably not very lonesome.
187
TUCKER'S TABLE.
There was considerable emigration into Concord in 1810. One of the first comers was William Smith, whose son, Calvin C., then seven years old, names (besides Albro, Cochran and Russell) Jedediah Cleveland, Elijah Dunham, Mr. Person and Jacob Drake as residents when he came. Rufus Eaton, long an influential citizen, came that summer, and Jonathan Townsend purchased, and probably settled, in the locality which has since been known as Townsend Hill. Josiah Fay, Benjamin C. Fos- ter, Seneca Baker, Philip Van Horn, Luther Curtis and others came about the same time into various parts of Concord.
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