USA > New York > Tioga County > Owego > Early Owego, N.Y.; some account of the early settlement of the village in Tioga County, N.Y., called Ah-wa-ga by the Indians, which name was corrupted by gradual evolution into Owago, Owego, Owegy and finally Owego > Part 2
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41
In 1785, the year after the corn planting expedition, James McMaster returned to Owego. It was in June of that year that four agents of the Massachusetts purchase, à body of .. 230,400 acres of land lying between the Owego creek and the Chenango river awarded to Massachusetts and since known as the Boston Purchase or Ten Townships, came here and found McMaster in possession. Mc-
IS
Master claimed ownership of what was subsequently known as the Me- Master half township, on which the village of Owego is now situated, by contract with the Indians, in which claim : he was sus- tained by Amos Draper; and their influence was such with the Indians that in order to conciliate chem and obtain possession the agents were compelled to satisfy Mc Master's claim by giving him eighteen square miles 'of land extending from the Susque- hanna river on the east side of the Owego creek eighteen miles north. and from the Owego creek on the - north side of the river eastward, a distance of six miles .. The particu- lars of this transaction are fully told in the "Susquehanna Valley" papers in the St. Nicholas maga zine, page 301.
James McMaster did not settle permanently here until 1788. Then he and his family settled in. a house which stood near where the main .. highway on the old. Indian trail ran along the river bank at . its intersection with the old Cayu- .. . ga bake trail which trail was iden- tical with the present McMaster street and extended down to the river. This house faced the river and stood near where Michael A. Lynch's ' house now stands. The house was afterward . occupied by" Dr. Samuel Tinkham and later by James Pumpelly.
The family of John . McQuigg.came the same year from Massachusetts.
The late Lyman C. Draper, of Madison, Wis., secretary of the Wisconsin state historical society,
79
purchased in 1876 of the heirs of the late judge Avery the manu- scripts containing interviews with early residents of southern New York relative to the Indian history. much of which was used in writing the Susquehanna Valley papers. In a letter to the editor of this paper written in October of the following year. Mr. Draper wrote that he had been for some time collecting ma- terial for a new life of Brant, the Indian chief, and that the Avery papers had been purchased . with others to aid him in that : purpose,
1 but that these papers did not con- tain much concerning Brant. but more of the local history of this region. After .Mr. Draper's death the papers . "became a part of the manuscript collection of the Wis- consin historical society. . The fol- lowing is a list of the more import- ant of them:
Mrs. Whitaker's account of her captivity among the Indians (1778.)
Dances and other . Ceremonies of the Iroquois: character of the hi- dians.
Mrs. Whitaker's reminiscenses of Brant and other chiefs.
Memoirs of Sebastian. Strope and his family.
Narrative of .Abel Hart.
Narrative of . Way-way : alias Betsy Douglas.
Statements of the following pio- neers (accounts of their own or their parents' adventures) : £ Jesse
McQuigg, John Gee, Mrs. Caty Harris, Lawrence . Merriman, Jona- than Terry, Elisha Forsyth.
Mrs. Caty Harris, mentioned in the last paragraph, was a daughter of James McMaster. The Avery in- terview with her was a very brief
201
one, and the following is a; verba- tion copy of it, as copied from the original in the Wisconsin historical society's collection :
Statement of Mrs. Caty Harris. June St .. , 1853.
Maiden name Caty " McMaster, daughter of JJas. (patentee.) Came to Owego when four or
five years old with my father's family:
Oldest brother Jas. Next Jeremiah.
David.
Oldest sister Jane . Sackett, wife of Caleb H. Sackett. Sister Elida MeMaster, dead.
Sister, Caty McMaster.
Sister, Ann Fish, dead.
Robert MeMaster . was a brother of old James and moved on at same time with Jas. He married a Bates, a sister .of Elisha Bates. Thos. . MeM., another brother,. came afterwards.
Electa Draper (now . Williams). first white . child born at Owego. Amos Draper's family first white family at Owego.
Recollects the Indians used to be there in bands; had wigwams near her , father's . house. They were peaceable and friendly as could be.
My mother, Rachel, died 30 years ago in Candor, my father died in Candor. They are buried on the farm now owned by Hiram Smith, not enclosed. . .
My father was a tall man, .not . foshy, large boned, about six feet high: : He paid the Indians for their land. He held the council with them near where his house was: (The particulars of this treaty have never transpired. C. P. A.)
I was born on the, Mohawk. . ] have had 7 children.
These are my grandchildren. (Pointing to two boys.)
My father built the house once occupied by Jas. Pumpelly.
The first house he built was near
1
1.
21
the river and pretty nearly back of the . Pumpelly . house.
I believe my father was in the army under . Genl. Clinton and came down the river. In that way I think he must have been ac- quainted with the valley of the river.
.At the time of this interview Mrs. Harris lived in the town of Cayu- ta, Schuyler county. It was from This interview that Judge . Avery. probably, obtained the misinforma- tion that MeMaster was in Clin-
ton's army. James McMaster's
wife's name was Rachel Their children were as follows:
James McMaster. Jr.
Jeremiah McMaster. He married Hannah Hill, a daughter of John fill one of the first settlers of the town of. Tioga. He died at Spen- cer. Ilis death followed the ampu. tation of his leg on account of a fever. sore. His daughter, Eliza MeMaster, married Leonard Jones, who came from . Peekskill, N. Y., with his father, John Jones, and settled . at Spencer between 1800 and 1805. John B. Jones, who lives in East Temple street, Owego, is a son of Leonard Jones.
David McMaster.
Jane Mc Master. Married . Col Caleb H. Sackett and lived at Candor. She died near Almond, Al- legany county.
Elida McMaster was unmarried. She died in 1843, aged 63 years. Her body was buried at West Can- dor ..
Catherine McMaster. Married James Harris, a blacksmith, . who was born in the north of Ireland .. They lived near VanEtten, . Che-
.
. mung county. Both were buried al Spencer. She was 80 years old at the time of her death.
Anu McMaster. Married a man named Fish. It is said that she died at the county poor house.
James MeMaster was a man of improvident habits, and although the owner, of property that with
judicious management would have
made him: immensely wealthy, it gradually passed from his hands and he died thirty years after his settlement: here in reduced cireuni- stances.
One day in 1818,, while living at Candor, where his daughter, Mrs. Sackett, lived, he borrowed a horse of a neighbor to ride to Spencer to visit one of his sons. He had gone but a short distance when the horse shied and he was thrown to the ground. breaking his rios. He was taken into Selah. Gridley's house. where he died a few days after- ward. His body was buried . on the Caleb . Sackett farm. . . The grave was plowed over many years ago. The farm , was subsequently out up into village lots and this grave was on the back part of the lot on. which Mrs. Alvah Fuller's house now stands.
COL. DAVID PIXLEY.
The first settler. of any . import- ance in the eastern : part of the" town of Tioga was Col. David Pix- ley, who, came from Stockbridge, Mass., in 1791. The same year Abner Turner came from Massachu- setts and settled at the confluence of the Owego and Catatonk creeks. Both Col. Pixley and, Mr. Turner had
.
23
been here previously on exploring tours.
Col. Pixley was born at Stock- bridge, Mass., March 2., 1741. His father, whose name was also David Pixley, was born at Westfield, Mass., . in 1814, and was a soldier in the ex- pedition against - Cape Breton in 1746. . He settled at Stockbridge be- fore 1749. Col. David Pisley fought in the Revolutionary war and had a fine military record. His record as obtained from Massachusetts ar- chives by one of his greatgrandsons, Josiah Collins Pumpelly, now living in New York city, is as follows:
He was a Arst. lieutenant, as by Lexington Alarm Call .. Rolls, April 19, 1775, in Capt. William Goodrich's company, Col. Patterson's regiment, from Stockbridge to Cambridge. Thirteen daysservice. Enlisted again May 5, 1775, for eight months' 'ser- vice from Stockbridge. Time of ser- vice three months, four days. Com- missioned May 27, 1775, captain. in Col. John Brown's regiment. En- listed June 30, 1777; discharged July 26, 1777. Twenty days' service in Northern Department.
In the lists of the officers and men of the regiments in the line in the United States service under Gen. Washington, as given in "New York in the Revolution," Lieutenant David Pixley's name appears (page 61) as in the corps of "Green Mountain. Boys.". The colonels were Ethan Allen and Seth Warner, and John Brown was major .. The editorial ex- planation heading this list says:
"These muster-rolls are recorded as "Major Brown's Detachment," and
24
that detachment is mentioned as in "Gen. Arnold's Regiment." (The only . mention of Gen. Arnold found in our records.) The fact that the "Green Mountain Boys" were . at Quebec in 1776; that this detach- ment was also at Quebec in 1776; that two of the officers on these rolls-Captain and Commissary Elijah Babcock and Captain Robert Coch- can-are identical in name and rank with those on a list handed to the Provincial Congress of New York by Ethan Allen and Seth Warner, on July 4, 1775, as officers for the Green Mountain Boys; and the fur- ther fact that none of the men are recorded in any other place, or with any other organization, all confirm the belief that the soldiers on . its rolls herewith were a part of that historic band."
The muster rollofthe menofLieut- tenant Pixley's company in the Mas- sachusetts archives at the State House in Boston contains the names of twenty Indians.
David Pixley was commissioned a colonel in the colonial army July 1, 1775. His commission bears the sig- nature of John Hancock, President. His regiment was in Gen. John Pat- terson's command at Bunker Hill, and he was under Gen .. Montgomery at the seige of Quebec.
There has been privately printed a circular giving the genealogy of Dr. Tinkham, Col. Pixley's son-in- law, and showing Dr. Tinkham's de- scent from Miles Standish, who came to America in the Mayflower in 1620. In this it is said that Lydia Patterson, Col. Pixley's sec- ond wife was a "daughter of Col. John Patterson, colonel of the in- . fantry regiment in which . David Pixley was , first lieutenant in the
. . 3 , 1
25
revolutionary army." This is an error .. She was a daughter of Joseph Patterson, who was born at Waterbury, Mass., in 1810 and died at Richmond in 1780.
Col. John Patterson (afterward
Gen. Patterson) was a man - of ability and prominence. He was born in 1844 at New Britain, Con., and was educated at Yale college. He taught school, studied law, and became a justice of the peace. m 1774 he removed to Lenox, Mass .. where he became a member of the .provincial congress. Just before the Revolution he raised a regiment among the neighbors of Berkshire county, and on the day before . the battle of Lexington and Concord he ordered his men to be ready to march at sunrise the next morning. He participated in the battle of Bunker Hill, holding the fortifica- tion's at Somerville, which protected the rear of the American forces,, and shared the hardships and adven- tures of the seige of Boston. In the ill-starred expedition toCanada under Montgomery and Arnold he lost the greater part of his men, and later with the remnant of his command he participated in the victories of Trenton and . Princeton, and as a brigadier-general in 1877 he had charge of Massachusetts troops in the campaign under Cen. Gates, which ended with the capture of the British army under Burgoyne. He was a member of
the , court-martial that tried and
condemned Major Andre. He .was afterward in command of West Point, and even after peace was de-
26
'clared he was retained there with his brigade and was not mustered out ' until December 8, 1783. In 1786 he assisted in the suppression of Shay's rebellion. In 1791 Gen. Patterson removed to Lisle, Broome county, N. Y., which was then a part of Tioga county. He was a member of assembly in 1792-3, men- ber of congress in 1803-5, member of the constitutional convention in 1801, and the first judge elected in Broome county in 1806, the year that county was set off from Tioga county, and he filled the office until his death in 1808 at Lisle. A mion- ument was afterward erected in his memory .on the town square at Lenox, Mass.
Josiah Collins Pumpelly says his. researches have convinced him that the company recruited by Patterson and Pixley did not reach Boston until a day or two after the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. If his conclusions are correct another idol would appear to have been irrepar- ably shattered.
.
.
Col. Pixley was one of the sixty original proprietors of the "Boston Purchase or Ten Townships." . He first came into this part of New York state as one of the commris- sioners appointed by the Boston company to treat with the Indians and obtain title to 230,400 acres .of land, between the Owego creek and the Chenango river for which the company had paid £1,500 to the state. The commissioners met the Indians two or three miles .above Binghamton in the winter of 1787-88 The particulars of this treaty with
27
the Indians may be found in Wil- kinson's "Annals of Binghamton" (page 39-40) and in Judge Avery's ' Susquehanna Valley" papers in the St. Nicholas Magazine, page 299.
By deed from . Archibald. Camp- bell, of the city of Albany, dated December 22, 1790, Col. Pixley ob . tained title to 3,000 acres of land in what was then known as "Campbell's Location" in the town of Tioga, bounded east by the Owego creek and south by the Susquehanna river ; "consideration five shillings and other good causes and consid- erations." . The amount originally paid for this property is said to have been fifty cents an acre.
Col. Pixley removed with his fam- ily from Stockbridge to Owego Feb. 6, 1791, and settled on his property. là May, 1791. he sold to Abner Tur- ner, who came here that year, 49% acres. on the west bank of the Owe- go creek where it meets the Cata: tonk creek. March 17, 1802, he sold 451 acres on the Owego creek, in- - cluding his own homestead, to Capt. Iliakim, Noah, and Asa Goodrich for $5,000. He then removed to Owe- go and lived in the old farm house which is still standing on the south side of Main street, west of and adjoining the " Owego academy grounds, and there he died in 1807. Ou the headstone of his grave' in the Presbyterian church yard in Temple street is the following inscription: .
"In memory of Col. David Pixley, who departed this life Aug. 25, 1807, in . the 67th year of his age. He was an officerofthe Revolution atthe seige of Quebec under Gen. Mont- gomery. He was the first settler
28
of Owego in .1790 and continued its father and friend until his death."
When Col. Pixley settled on the west side of the Owego creek that town was known as Owego, and the east side of the creek was known as Tioga .. The confusion arising from having the village of Owego in the town of Tioga on the east side of the creek was so annoying that in 1813 the names of the towns of Owe- „go and Tioga were exchanged, the one for the other, as they now ex- ist.
Col. Pixley was county treasurer of Tioga county from 1798 to. 1803, the only civil office he ever held here.
Col. Pixley's first wife was Lois Whittlesey, who was married to him December 8, 1763 .. His second wife was Lydia Patterson, daughter of James Patterson. She was born at Watertown, Mass., in 1745, and died in Owego .February 2, 1808. Mrs. Lydia Pixley was a woman of unostentatious piety and unbounded hospitality. While . living at Stock. bridge, Mass., her house was a home for strangers, especially for the . missionaries and ministers of that early day. After her death an extended sketch of her life and tri -. bute to her character was published in the Connecticut Evangelical Mag- azine for October, 1808, at page 336.
When Col. Pixley came to Owe- go from Massachusetts he brought his wife and three children, David, Amos, and. Mary.
David Pixley, Jr., was born at Stockbridge in 1764 and was the only son of Col. David Pixley by his
29
first wife. He married . Drusilla Bond: He was only 35 years old when he died in. the town of Tioga June 6, 1799. His body was the first one buried where the Tioga cemetery now is, which was then in the woods. His wife died June 1, 1322, aged 57 years, and her body is also buried there.
David Pixley, Jr., was a surveyor. Hé was one of the most influential of the proprietors of the "Boston Ten . Townships." His . children were Charles B.,- Jeremiah, -Mary Ann. David, and Jonathan. He lived on the west. side of the Owego creek, a little less than half a mile below Leach's mill.
Amos Pixiey died previous to the death of his father in 1807. leaving a wife and one son, Walter. Wal- tor died unmarried.
." Mary Pixley was married to Dr. Samuel Tinkham about the year 1793. Her second husband was James Pumpelly.
One of the sons of, David Pixley, Jr., Col. Charles B. Pixley, was born in 1792, the year after the ro- noval of his fatherto this county. He was at one time a hatter and kept a store in Lake street . where he sold musical instruments: sta- . tionery, etc. He lived in Bingham- · ton several years, where he mar- ried a sister of John A. Collier. He died Aug. 18, 1865, at the home of his sister, Mrs. Alanson Goodrich, in the town of Tioga.
Mary Ann Pixley, born in 1796, married Alanson Goodrich, son of Capt. Eliakim Goodrich, and died . April 22, 1875.
.
30
Jeremiah, Jonathan, and David Pixley all . removed to Oakland county, Mich. David Pixley's wife was Fidelia Jones, daughter of dea- con Solomon Jones.
At the time of Col. David Pix- ley's death he was the owner of nearly 9,400 acres of land all of which except 130 acres were situ- uated outside the village of Owego ..
CAPT. JOHN MC QUIGG.
The families of both James Mc- Master and Captain John MeQuigg settled at Owego the same year (1788), the year after Amos Draper, the . first' comer, settled here.
Captain John McQuigg was. of Scotch-Irish descent. The family seuled at . Derry, N. H., coming with the first Scotch people to New England. He was one of . eight brothers, all of whom fought in the Revolutionary . war. The father was a patriot, while the mother sympa- thized with the tories :. The conse- quence was that while. John and three of his brothers enlisted in the service with the revolutionists the other four brothers . fought . on the sideof Great Britain. John Mc. Quigg was captain of a company in a New Hampshire regiment. One brother died in the old . sugar house in New York, a prisoner of war.
Capt. John McQuigg came from Derry, N. H., with his family, then consisting of his wife and eight chil- dren, entering the Susquehanna val- ley by the way of Otsego lake and following the Indian trail to Owe- go. What impelled him to come with his large. family such a dis-
:
31
tance through an unsettled country into a wilderness no historian has explained.
He built a log house on the site of the Camp furnace, below Park street. It fronted on the river, as ' did also. Draper's and McMaster's houses, and the road ran along the old Indian trail between it and the stream. , Its description, as given to .Judge Avery by one of his sons, Capt. Jesse McQuigg, who was five years old whenthe family came here, will be given further on in these papers.
The: genealogical record of the McQuigg family was written by Miss Mary Hall, of Spencer, N. Y., and printed in the Spencer Needle of August 3, 1905.
John McQuigg's first wife was Mollie Gilmore: Their son was John M. McQuigg. His second wife was Sarah Coburn, of New Hampshire. Her children were as follows:
1. Mary McQuigg born 8 Feb., 1774. Married Abner Turner, of the town of Tioga.
2. Daniel MeQuigg born 23 Feb., 1.76.
2. Elizabeth . MeQuigg born 23 March, 1778. 'Married: Capt. Lemuel Brown, of Owego.
1. Robert. McQuigg born 9 'No- vember, 1780. Unmarried. Died in Owego .
5. Jesse MeQuigg born 24 May 1783.
6. Sarah McQuigg born 13. Aug., 1785. Married George Lord Talcott, of Owego.
7. . Patience McQuigg born March 27, 1787. Married first Richard Den- ton, of Danby, and second Peter Yaple.
8. David McQuigg born 27 Nov., 1791.
9. Rachael MeQuigg born 5. Jan.,
31
1793 .: Married Lieut .- Col. Win: Henry and lived at Mineral Point, Wis.
10. Jane MiQuigg born 15 Aug.,
. 1795. Married Comfort Weeks, o! Owego .. Removed . to Buffalo .and
.
thonce to Pittsfield. Ill. Comfort Weeks and his brother, Constant: N. Weeks, kept a shoe store in Owego. 11. Didama MeQuigg born 7 Oct., 1798. Matried William Watson . and lived at Pittsfield. III.
John McQuigg died in Owego in $1813, twenty-five years after his set- rlement here, and his body was one of the first ones interred in the old burying ground in Court street. His. wife, Sarah MeQuigg, died. Nov. 16, 1832, aged 85 years. Her body was buried in the Presbyterian burying ground in Temple street.
. When James Master, for a con- sideration of $10, gave a. deed of land for a public park on which the Tioga county court house now stands to the village of Owego (then known as Owego settlement) .dated Febru- ary 28, 1797, John . McQuigg was- named in the deed as one of the three trustees for the people. The other trustees . were . Capt. Luke Bates and Mason Wattles. Sept. 4, 1813, after the death of Bates and MeQuigg, a special election was held and. Eleazer Dana and John Hi, Avery were chosen their successors. John McQuigg's eldest son, John M. MeQuigg, was born Oct. 13, 1771, and he was seventeen years . old when the family .came here. Ile removed to Spencer about 1898, where he became a prominent man of the town. He died there Aug. 13, 1812. His wife was Lucy Lee, who after his death was married to Rev. Michael Burge, an itinerant Metho-
33
dist minister. ; John McQuigg, one of the sons of John M. McQuigg, represented Tioga county in the as- sembly in 1842, and died at Spon- cer 29 Nov., 1872.
Daniel and David McQuigg also removed to Spencer about . 1788. Daniel, married Charlotte Hobart, daughter of Edmund Hobart, of Con- necticut, one of the first settlers of. Spencer in 1795. He died there in 1823.
David McQuigg removed in June, 1804, from Spencer to Ithaca . and opened a store there. He dropped a portion of his name and was known the rest of his life as David. Quigg. His was the first store op- ened at Ithaca. He was successful in the mercantile business and con- tinued in it the rest of his life. David Quigg's: wife was; Harriet Pumpelly, a daughter of John Pum- pelly.
Capt. Jesse McQuigg fought in the war of. 1812. He was never married. He and his mother, with Lemuel Brown's . widow, lived in a house which was built in 1800 on the Abram Brown farm, north of Talcott street, which house was moved away about. sixty years ago and converted into a barn when Abram Brown's residence was built there. When Abram Brown's father, Capt. Lemuel Brown, 'the tanner, who married Capt. Mc- Quigg's sister, died Richard Brown and Capt. Jesse MeQuigg conducted the tannery business. Capt. Mc- Quigg died at the home of his nephew, Abram Brown.
-
34
One of the most . interesting . of the papers in. the Wisconsin state historical society's collection obtained by Lyman C. Draper from the heirs of Judge Avery is the statement made by Jesse MeQuigg to Judge Avery. Some of it Was published in the Susquehanna Vay- ley articles, but most of it has never been printed. The statement .. . is as follows:
STATEMENT OF JESSE MC QUIGG MADE APRIL 1, 1851.
F shall be 68 years old the 21th of May ensuing. I came to live at Owego in March, I think 1788.
My father, John MeQuigg, had been on the year before. in March and raised some corn and had . put up a house on the site of the build- ing now occupied by Henry W.Can> as a furnace. It was a log house with two square rooms, hewed logs, chinks filled in with bits of wood between the logs and mudded, a hole in each room in the place of window, no glass in them; we didn't indulge. in that luxury. Split pine logs, hewed off for a floor, a chimney back built of. stone with
a hole in the roof for the smoke to pass. out and with a stick chim- ney mudded from the roof up. . A. wood fastening to the door with the latch string hanging out as was always . the fashion. It fronted up- on the river. The highway ran be- tween it and the river; not much of, a road, only what nature made. My . father came, from the Merrimac, in the state of Massachusetts; came by the way of Otsego lake, down to where Unadilla and Bainbridge are now. Came with OX teams and sleds. There was still snow enough for slipping in that month ( March .. ) I presume we followed the Indian trail.
James. McMaster came on to live here' permanently the next . month
.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.