USA > New York > Franklin County > Historical sketches of Franklin county and its several towns > Part 33
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Though until a recent period without a house built expressly for purposes of worship, Duane had religious services from earliest times. It has already been seen how these were arranged and conducted under the distinctively Duane influence, with occasional visitations by Episcopalian deacons or clergy, with regular lay readings by Major Duane himself, and with Congregational worship under home leadership.
309
DUANE
Only a few years later the indefatigable Methodist Episcopal circuit riders, or pastors from adjacent towns, carried their ministrations here, even if somewhat irregularly, and, with a persistence not manifested by any other denomination, held to the field until it became their own exclusively. Duane was between two Methodist charges or stations. Saranac mission in the Troy conference, and Malone in the Black river (now Northern New York) conference; and it was visited sometimes by the preacher of one and sometimes by that of the other, besides being served from time to time by local preachers residing within its own territory. Such services were held generally in the " pretty little school house looking so much like a church " that was built by Major Duane. In 1836 Rev. Jehiel Austin, appointed to Saranac mission, and who made Merrillsville his home, extended his work to Duane, and formed a class there. Several families united with the Methodist Epis- copal Church at about this time, and the work prospered for about two years, when business disturbances and reverses occasioned a number of removals from the town, and the work languished. But John Adams, a local preacher or exhorter, who lived on the place afterward owned by William Steenberge, officiated at services from time to time between 1839 and 1844, and in the latter year a Mr. Parish, then stationed at Merrillsville, preached in Duane also. It was in 1849 that Methodism was permanently organized in Duane, Rev. Ebenezer Arnold, stationed at Malone, forming a class there, and having a regular week-day appoint- ment in the town, the meetings being held at the residence of Hiram Ayers, who was the class leader. The other members were Mrs. Bigelow Ayers, Thurza Ayers, Joseph Sheffield, Sr., and wife, William Ester- brooks and a Mr. Robbins. A Sunday school also was formed during the period with Thurza Ayers as superintendent. In the same year Rev. Alonzo Wells, then of Bangor, supplied the appointments both at Duane and Chasm Falls, the work at these points having been linked together almost from earliest times. In 1850, through the efforts of Rev. Mr. Arnold and Presiding Elder Isaac L. Hunt, South Malone and Duane were set apart from the Malone circuit, attached to the Chateaugay cir- cuit, and called the Duane mission. Rev. B. F. Brown became pastor and Rev. Mr. Wells junior pastor - this arrangement continuing until 1852, except that Rev. William Chase succeeded Mr. Wells. In 1852 the connection between these missions and Chateaugay was severed, and they were united with Dickinson, under the ministration of Rev. Allen Miller. In 1854 Rev. Chas. M. Bowen became pastor, and in 1853-9 the charge was supplied by Rev. Mr. Bowen, Rev. Mr. Northrup, Rev. Samuel Salis- bury, and Rev. Mr. Castle. The list of succeeding pastors appears in
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HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
the appendix. The church edifice was erected in 1884 during the pas- torate of Rev. J. R. Kay, and in this same period the name of the charge was changed to Chasm Falls. Within the past few years a marked revival of interest and increase in membership have been witnessed.
Duane is as distinctively a rural town as can be found in the State. It has no manufactories, no railway, and practically no business aside from that of its summer hotels and one or two saw mills. It has one post-office, one telephone and one telegraph office. In 1847 and again in 1858 it sought to have the south half of township Number Nine taken from Malone and joined to itself, but failed.
Though he was not a resident of the town, Thomas Meacham hunted and fished there so much that he deserves mention here. Meacham Lake was named by him, and his obituary stated that during his life he had killed 77 panther, 214 wolves, 210 bears and 2,550 deer. He died at Hopkinton in May, 1849.
CHAPTER XV FORT COVINGTON
Fort Covington was erected as a town from Constable February 28, 1817, and included what is now Bombay. The mile square comprising the village of the same name and something over seven thousand acres contiguous on the west had been a part of the St. Regis Indian reserva- tion, but were ceded to the State, a part in 1816, and the remainder two years later. The consideration paid to the Indians therefor was an annuity of fifteen hundred dollars forever - equivalent to twenty-five thousand dollars capitalized at six per cent. After this cession most of the tract was patented by the State to settlers who had previously held the lands under leases from the Indians at a rental of ten cents per acre per year, though two parcels were reserved by the State for military purposes. One of these, bordering on the right bank of the Salmon river, contains about forty-six acres exclusive of the highway, and was leased by the State in 1845 to John Moore at a rental of twelve dollars per year, subject to surrender of the premises whenever the State should require. Moore subsequently assigned the lease, and the plot has since been occupied under similar assignments by a number of parties. It is at present in the possession of F. J. Dimond, William G. Kelsey, the Alex. Smallman estate, the Salmon River Yacht Club, and others. The like reservation on the left bank of the river is under lease to Mrs. Albert Nevin, and comprises about fourteen acres. The rental for this parcel is five or six dollars. Both leases being terminable at any time at the pleasure of the State, the lessees naturally do not care to undertake costly improvements, and it would seem as if it were for the best interest alike of the State and of Fort Covington that the policy of holding the lands for possible fortification and military occu- pation be abandoned, and the plots sold outright to the highest bidder, for there is not the slightest likelihood that either of them will ever be fortified or be used for military purposes. For a time following the act of reservation it was proposed now and again to ereet defensive works there, but the proposition never went further.
Fort Covington is the oldest town in the county in point of settle- ment by the whites with the exception of Burke and Chateaugay, and
[311]
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HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
if we count William Gray a white it antedates even these. Gray was a revolutionary soldier at the age of seventeen years, his home having been in Washington county, and was captured by the British near Whitehall. Held as a prisoner at Quebec until the close of the war, he located at Caughnawaga, and then at St. Regis. In everything but birth he was more Indian than white. In 1793 the St. Regis chiefs leased to him lands now comprising the village of Fort Covington, known as the mile square, for two hundred dollars annual rental and the promise of the erection of mills there. Three years later this lease was assigned by Gray to Thomas Araquente, a St. Regis chief, and car- ried with it a saw mill which had been built in the meantime. Toward the close of the year 1798 Araquente transferred his holdings to James Robertson of Montreal for two thousand four hundred dollars and an agreement on Robertson's part to continue payment to the Indians of the stipulated rental. Robertson's lease was for a term of nine hun- dred and eighty years. Araquente even assumed to include in the transfer, besides the mill and mile square, the lands on both sides of the Salmon river to its source, but no attempt appears ever to have been made to enforce possession or title under this latter conveyance. Three brothers of James Robertson also became interested in his investment. They erected a grist mill in 1804, which was swept off by a flood in 1805, and was immediately rebuilt - the cost of the two structures and equipment, according to Dr. Hough, having been about seven thousand dollars. Robert Buchanan was the builder for the Robertsons, and afterward leased and operated the mill for a good many years. He died at Fort Covington or Dundee in 1829, and his brother Duncan in 1825.
The town includes only a part of township number two and the ceded Indian lands, making an aggregate assessed acreage of 22,565. It is one of the smallest towns in the county, while in valuation it ranks seventh. Ninety years ago its valuation was the same as Bangor's, and but little less than that of Chateaugay. Malone's was eighty thousand dollars larger, and is now the greater by two millions and a half. In the intervening period Bangor's assessment has been multiplied by five, Chateaugay's by six, and Malone's by fifteen, while Fort Covington's has increased only about fourfold. True, Fort Cov- ington has since been partitioned to make Bombay, but in the same period Bangor has lost Brandon, a part of Harrietstown, and Santa Clara; Chateaugay has been shorn of Bellmont, Burke and Franklin; and Malone has had taken from it Duane, Brighton and the richest part of Harrietstown.
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FORT COVINGTON
Fort Covington is well watered. The Salmon river flows northwest- wardły through the northern and eastern part of the town; the east branch of Deer river traverses almost the entire length of the town on the east : the west branch of the same stream crosses the entire south part, whence it bends into Bombay for a short distance, and then, swinging easterly, again enters Fort Covington, approximately paral- leling the east branch, which it joins just above the point of confluence with the Salmon; the Little Salmon flows through the eastern part of the Indian cession, and Pike creek through the western section. The latter empties into the Salmon below the Canadian border, and the Little Salmon about half a mile south of the border. Cushman brook flows for about three miles through the eastern part of the town, empty- ing into the Salmon a mile above the mouth of Deer river.
Fort Covington has of course its ridges and valleys, though not so markedly as most of the towns to the south, a considerable section being as nearly level as any equal body of lands in the north country. Its soil is largely clay except in the south portion, and as a whole is well adapted to profitable agriculture. Originally it was of course densely wooded, and with a larger growth of hard timber than char- acterized Constable and Westville. It is one of the few localities in the county where oak flourished, a tree that is seldom known on light or grav- elly ground. Even now thirty to forty thousand feet of oak are sawed there annually. There was also in some parts of the town a good stand of pine. Most of the latter went down the river in rafts of lumber and ship masts to Montreal or Quebec, as also did the cut from Westville and even from as far to the south as Malone. Pine lumber sold in those days at five dollars a thousand for common, and at eight dollars for clear. A number of the finest farms in the county are in Fort Coving- ton, and a particularly large proportion of its farmers have ranked high in intelligence, in character and in the degree of success that they have attained in their calling, and have been regarded locally as authority in methods and as examples to be emulated. Even as long ago as 1820 farmers of the town succeeded in winning a noticeable part of the premiums given by our first county agricultural society at its first fair for cattle and farm products.
Since there are no town records of date earlier than 1817, nor church records until still later, the story of settlement and progress prior to the war of 1812 is now practically impossible of definite ascertainment, the more so because, early occupancy having been in general under leaseholds from the Indians, deed records are also lacking. The part
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HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
of the town which is now the village was known until 1817, and even later, as French Mills, though why so called it is difficult to under- stand except upon the theory that a considerable percentage of the early inhabitants were French, for the mills were the enterprise of Englishmen and Scotchmen.
The name which was assumed upon the erection of the town was taken in honor of General Leonard Covington, who was mortally wounded at the battle of Chrystler's Farm in 1813, and died on a boat en route to French Mills. His funeral was held from the house, then a hotel, that is now occupied by Frank J. Bucklin, at the west end of the lower bridge, and interment was near the residence of the late T. T. Kimball, on what has since been known as Covington Hill, not far from the block-house. The remains were removed to Sacketts Harbor in 1821. The town would have been called simply Covington except that a town so named had already been erected in the western part of the State; and hence "Fort " was prefixed.
When the first settlers other than those connected with the mills came, and who they were, is not known with certainty. Dr. Hough's history names Samuel Fletcher, Aaron McLean, Ambrose Cushman, John Hunsden, David Lynch and Robert, Walter and Duncan Buchanan as having located in 1800 or soon thereafter; but the records in the county clerk's office do not show any of these except Robert Buchanan as having had title to real estate in the township at anything like the date stated, though it is known from State records that Mr. Hunsden was there in 1803 as clerk of the Indians. He was a physician, and, according to the Franklin Telegraph, died there in 1820. He had been a revolutionary soldier, was familiarly known as " captain," and in announcing his death the Telegraph said that he " had long been a useful and respected inhabitant." He was at one time deputy collector of customs. His daughter was the first wife of General S. C. F. Thorn- dike of Malone. A map in the Secretary of State's office, made in 1818, indicates that he was then the owner of about eight hundred acres of land along the Little Salmon river and west of it. By an act of the Legislature, passed in 1819, he was to be allowed twelve hundred dollars on any purchases of lands that he might make, as compensation for his services in inducing the Indians to consent to the cessions of 1816 and 1818.
It is also known that at least one of the Robertsons was there as early as 1798; but in apparent discredit of Dr. Hough's statement of early residents is this record in the diary of James Constable, who
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FORT COVINGTON
visited the place in August, 1805: "Came to the French mills on the north side of Salmon river, being an old saw mill, and now not at work. There is a very large grist mill completing on the other side, the property of a Mr. Robertson of Montreal, which is the old mill with additions. Mr. Buchanan, the superintendent, went through it with ns. In April, last, the dam was undermined, gave way, and overset the then mill, the waters carrying the millstone a great distance. * * *
The mill is constructed for four run of stones, and the work appears to be good. The expense must be considerable, and the iron work is got at Judge Bailey's, twenty-five miles distant. There is no village here, and no people but those belonging to or working at the mills." (The reference to Judge Bailey is important, as establishing that in 1805 there were iron works at Chateaugay.) But as impeaching Mr. Con- stable in part, and to some extent suggesting that there were more people at French Mills, or at least in the township, at the date in question than he or even Dr. Hough indicates, I give the following transcript from the assessment roll for 1806 of the town of Malone, of which Fort Covington was then a part :
Personalty.
Realty.
Robert Buchanan
$75
$250
Seth Blanchard.
100
175
Walter Blanchard
250
David and Luther Danforth.
. . .
220
Sullivan Ellsworth
.
200
Thomas Fletcher.
15
312
Buel Hitchcock
25
. . .
David Lynch
45
57
Arthur McMillan
30
.. .
David McMillan
63
Daniel McLean
.. .
221
Ezekiel Paine
.. .
100
...
. .
320
Silas Cushman
. . .
Samuel Fletcher
.
These all seem to be, and most of them certainly are, Fort Covington names, though two or three of them may belong to Westville. Unfor- tunately the assessment roll from which they are copied does not carry any township or lot descriptions. However, an old map on file in the county clerk's office locates Mr. Blanchard three or four miles south of the village, and his will as recorded in the surrogate's office in 1832 refers to Seth W. B. Wilson as his grandson, and makes provision for his education, though I am informed by a surviving member of the family that there was no blood relationship between the two. Mr. Blanchard was in 1817 one of the associate judges of the court of common pleas, and at the first town meeting was elected a commissioner
Henry Briggs.
400
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HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
of common schools. He was, too, one of the first men to hold the office of deputy collector of customs at French Mills. He had a son, Steven, who was the father of Justus and Seth. The latter was decidedly a "character," effervescing good nature, fond of companionship, and dearly loving a joke. His conversation was picturesque in the extreme, abounding in wit and quaint expressions, some of which are still quoted frequently in the town. By occupation he was a wheelwright, and he lost an arm by reason of its having been so badly mangled by a saw as to necessitate amputation.
The map referred to puts Silas Cushman just over the town line in Westville, but shows Ambrose abutting on the river, south and east of the village. The latter was a soldier in the war of 1812.
Samuel Fletcher is marked as owning the lot next west of Ambrose Cushman. At a later date he was a merchant at West Constable or Westville Corners, and eventually removed to St. Lawrence county. He was an uncle of Calvin T. Fletcher of Helena, who at one time practiced law in Malone, and the great uncle of the late Ernest T. Fletcher of Malone. Thomas Fletcher is thought by Stiles Stevens, his grandnephew, and exceptionally well informed on points of early local history, to have been the man who was shot by the British when they raided the town in 1812, though Mr. Briggs remembered the name as Frazer. Mr. Stevens is probably correct.
David and Luther Danforth are on the map at the southeast corner of the mile square, at the upper falls, where, in company with Guy Meigs, they had a gang saw mill, which after Mr. Meigs had withdrawn from the partnership they continued to operate until the timber supply had been practically exhausted. They also had a carding and fulling and woolen mill, which latter they leased in 1836 to Luther Starks and Sidney Briggs -Starks subsequently assigning his interest to Daniel Russell and D. S. McMillan. The place is the same that was until recently occupied by Thomas Davidson, deceased, with a carding mill, and it is worthy of note that, whereas in early times nearly every com- imunity had such a mill, Mr. Davidson's was in 1917 the only one in the entire county. It still contained the machinery for the manufacture of cloth. The exact date of the erection of the woolen mill here is unknown, but it was probably between 1830 and 1835,* and was the second mill of the kind in the county. In a letter written by John H. Hatton. and published in 1903, it is stated that Luther Danforth had three sons, a son-in-law (Thomas Richey) and a grandson who were
* Mr. Davidson died in the autumn of 1917, and the mill was then razed.
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FORT COVINGTON
Methodist ministers. Allen Danforth, presumedly a son of David or Luther, served as fifer in Captain Tilden's company in the war of 1812.
Sullivan Ellsworth was doubtless a brother of Orange and an uncle of Chandler, as a biographical sketch of the latter lists a Sullivan as one of the brothers of Orange. The map gives him a number of farms in the central and southern parts of the town. Orange Ellsworth must have arrived earlier than 1808, as Chandler was born in the town in that year. His farm adjoined the home place of Sullivan. Alpheus Ellsworth, a brother of Orange, probably came at about the same time with the latter. Certainly he was there in 1814, as in that year he joined with Orange in taking title to lands which were already in their possession, probably under contract.
David McMillan was the father of Mrs. Ebenezer Stevens, who was the first white child born in the town, and also of David Stiles, who gave the Lawrence, Webster Co. woolen mills in Malone so fine a reputation for honest and durable, even if coarse, products, and who, removing to Wisconsin at about the close of the Civil War, amassed a fortune in lumbering, and died there in 1883. A son, B. Frank, is an almost annual visitor to old friends in Malone and Fort Covington, and is prosperous. Arthur McMillan, a brother of the elder David, was a member of Captain Tilden's command at French Mills in the war of 1812.
Buel H. Hitchcock came in 1802 from Vermont with Albon and Alrie Man of Westville. He was a physician, and Aretus M., Myron H. and Alric (all of whom became prominent in the business life of Fort Covington twenty years later or more) were his sons. Alric removed to Cornwall, Ont. There is still standing, though built over, a frame-dwelling house that is known as the " Hitchcock house." In a paper prepared some years ago by Jolm A. Quaw it is said that this building was in existence when James Campbell came in 1808, and that it is believed to be the oldest frame structure in the county. It is now at the south foot of Water street, on the bank of the river, and it probably was the home of Dr. Hitchcock. Formerly it stood on the lot now occupied by the residence of James MaeArtney, some twenty rods north of its present location. It was from this house, as told by Christopher Briggs and Stiles Stevens, that a man stepped out with a gun when the British entered the town in 1812. Partieulars regarding the affair are not altogether agreed, except as to the fact that the British fired upon him and either wounded or killed him.
Henry Briggs was in trade at French Mills during the war of 1812,
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HISTORY OF FRANKLIN COUNTY
but afterward returned to Washington county for a time. He came to Fort Covington again in 1820, accompanied by his family. Several sons of a brother came later, and became well known and substantial men in the northern part of the county. Henry was the father of Christopher, who was elected county superintendent of the poor in 1864, lived in Malone for many years, and committed suicide in 1890 by stabbing himself in the abdomen. The Briggs family was a large one, but I think that the last member of it lately living in this section and bearing the name was Levi, a son of Christopher, who made his home with his son-in-law, Guy Man, in Westville.
Concerning Ezekiel Paine or Payne I am able to learn but little. He was town clerk of Constable, of which Fort Covington was then a part, in 1808, a coroner the same year, one of the incorporators in 1815 of a literary society known as the French Mills Miscellaneous Library, and upon the organization of Fort Covington as a town in 1817 was elected one of the inspectors of schools. Samuel H. Payne was an ensign in the State militia in 1818, a captain in 1822, and deputy customs officer in 1838, at which time he evinced such interest and sympathy, if not open activity, in the Papineau cause or Canadian rebellion that he was removed from office. The neutrality law then made it the duty of customs officers, among others, to aid in enforcing that statute, and in particular to seize any arms or munitions or sup- plies that were intended for use of insurrectionists against a foreign government, so that Mr. Payne was adjudged by the administration to have doubly offended, in that, besides having individually violated the neutrality law, he had been also negligent and disregardful of the obligations of his office for enforcement of it. At that time probably nine-tenths of the people in Fort Covington were pronounced partisans of the rebels. Whether any of them actually went into Canada, as many did at Ogdensburg, to help the rebels fight their battles, I am not advised; but fifty or more of the most prominent men in the place organized an association to give them aid and comfort by subscription of funds and by procuring guns for them. The next year Mr. Payne was nominated by his party for the Assembly as a vindication, but was defeated by John S. Eldredge of Hogansburgh. In 1838 two militia companies in Franklin county were called out for service on the border for enforcement of the neutrality law, and at least one of the two was stationed at Fort Covington, under the command of a Captain Mont- gomery. The troop used the building now known as the Spencer or American House for a barracks, and cells of oak plank were built in
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