USA > New York > Lewis County > History of Lewis County, New York; with...biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 19
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 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88
At a meeting at the Court House, De- cember 24, 1825, the committee prepared a petition to the Legislature, and reported the following estimates of business :-
Denmark 1,272 tons; mean distance 60 miles.
Lowville 1, 310 tons, viz : grain and flour 550; ashes 130; butter and cheese 10; sundries 620. Distance 60 miles at 1 1-2 cents per mile.
Martinsburgh 1,280 tons. Turin 600 tons. Leyden, Watson, Pinckney and Har- risburgh, 1,200 tons. Total 5,662 tons, amounting to $5,435.80. From Jefferson county the estimate claimed 10,680 tons at $10,146; from St. Lawrence 13,000 tons at $23,400, and from Herkimer and Oneida 4,620 tons at $1,386, making with the extra transportation added to the Erie Canal a revenue of $69,145.88 .*
The county papers of northern New York at this period teemed with articles favoring the measure, and a series of sta- tistical essays in the Black River Gazette, signed Jonathan, had a beneficial influence upon public opinion.
The Canal Commissioners reported March 6, 1826, upon the Herkimer, Rome and Camden routes. The first had a rise and fall of 1,831 feet, and was deemed inexpedient. The second had 1,587 feet lockage, and would cost to Ogdensburgh $931,014, and the third with 635 feet lockages, would cost $855,630. No result followed, and on the 2d of January, 1827, a canal meeting held at the Court House, renewed their memorial, and petitioned Congress to procure the right of navi- gating the St. Lawrence to the ocean. A meeting at Carthage October 23, 1827, prepared the way for a general conven- tion at the Court House in Martinsburgh on the 4th of December, at which dele- gates attended from all the towns inter- ested in the work. Spirited addresses were delivered, and a resolution was passed for the incorporation of a com- pany to construct a canal.
* A general committee of correspondence was chosen at this meeting, consisting of Russell Parish, Isaac W. Bostwick, Ela Collins, Chas. Dayan and Jas. McVickar.
129
CANAL PROJECTS.
The address of the Rev. Isaac Clinton of Lowville upon this occasion, affords data in the highest degree valuable as showing existing resources at that period. It was therein stated that five towns in Lewis county made annually 100 tons of potash each; * and three otherst about fifty tons each. About 2,500 barrels of pork, and 60,000 bushels of wheat, were supposed to pass through and from the county to the canal. About 1,500 head of cattle were driven from the county and five times as many from Jefferson and St. Lawrence. The county exported 50 tons of butter and cheese, 20 tons of grass-seed, 14 tons of wool, 12 tons of oil of mint,; and 325 tons or 650 hogsheads of whiskey. It received an- nually 400 tons of merchandise, 50 tons of bar iron and steel, 40 tons of gypsum, 15 tons of dye-stuffs and 20 tons of hides. This increase from the county and be- yond had been during twelve years, at the rate of 300 hundred tons annually. This address closed with a direct appeal to the enterprise of our citizens. It was as follows :-
" Perhaps sir, it may be said that the remarks are plausible, but the undertak- ing is great and we can do without it. So we might do without many other things. A farmer on a very small scale might do without a scythe and cut his grass with a jack-knife. What are canals and what are railroads but great labor saving machines ? What a grass scythe is to a jack-knife, so is a canal to a com- mon team. Will it be said, sir, that the undertaking is really too great - we can not accomplish it? Let no such thought lodge in any man's bosom. Say we can accomplish it, we must and we will have a canal. What if the patriots of the Revolution had said -' slavery is truly detestable and liberty is equally desir- able, but what are we? We have no army, no treasury, no revenue, no maga- zines of arms, and such is the mighty
power and prowess of Great Britain that we cannot withstand them!' What, I say! then, we and our children would have been slaves forever. But they said, we can withstand them, and they did withstand them, and with their blood and treasure and indescribable hardships and privations, procured the benefits and blessings we now enjoy. Let us not say 'we can't.' This expression has been the ruin of thousands, has prevented many a glorious enterprise,-has kept many a family poor and in the back- ground. This was the imbecile lan- guage of our committee, last winter ! Let us then say we can and we will have a canal. Many farmers may turn out if need require, with their teams and work out shares. It would be better to do this than be forever wearing out their teams in carrying their produce to market and paying toll at turnpike gates. The enter- prise is only worthy of the industrious and spirited citizens inhabiting this sec- tion of the State. And from the previous estimates I am confident the stock must be good, and after the canal is made and proved, will sell at any time for ready cash."
A writer in the Black River Gazette, under the signature of Asdrubal, at this period also urges the measure proposed at this convention.
The application in the hands of Mr. Dayan, then in the Senate, and General George D. Ruggles, in Assembly, pro- cured an Act, passed March 20, 1828, in- corporating the Black River Canal Com- pany. A subscription of $100,000 by the State, was proposed by Mr. Dayan, who was supported by Senators Hart, Water- man and Wilkins, and opposed by Jor- dan and Carroll. It was finally stricken out in the Senate.
The act incorporated George Bray- ton, Isaac Clinton, Levi Adams, Peter Schuyler, James McVickar, James T. Watson, Seth B. Roberts and Vincent LeRay de Chaumont, and their associ- ates, with $400,000 capital and the usual powers of stock companies. The canal was to be finished within three years,
* These must have been Leyden, Turin, Martins- burgh, Lowville and Denmark.
t Watson, Harrisburgh and Pinckney.
# Chiefly from Lowville.
130
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
and the franchise included the naviga- tion of the river to Carthage. The Com- missioners above named employed Al- fred Cruger* to survey and estimate a route, and his railroad report,rendered in September of that year, mostly advised railroad inclined planes as extensively em- ployed in Pennsylvania, instead of locks, and placed the total cost of 44.86 miles at $433,571.25. The structures were to include 9 culverts, 8 dams, 7 waste weirs, 52 bridges, 1,015 feet rise by planes, and 75 feet by locks. He proposed to im- prove the river by wing dams, where obstructed by sand-bars, eight of which might be built for $4,168. Subscription books were opened at the office of W. Gracie, New York, December 15, 1828, but the stock was not taken, and a meet- ing at Lowville, represented from many towns, January 24, 1829, discussed a plan of local taxation, but finally abandoned it, and agreed upon a memorial, urging its adoption as a State work.
A concurrent resolution, introduced by Mr. Ruggles, was passed April 7, 1829, ordering a new survey in case that made by Cruger was not found reliable, and the Canal Commissioners were di- rected to report the result to the next Legislature. Canal meetings were held at Lowville, June 4th, and at Turin, Octo- ber 17, 1829, and an effort was made to procure a nomination of a person pledged to the canal alone, irrespective of party, but did not meet with favor. On the 12th of January, 1830, a conven- tion of delegates from Lewis, Jefferson and Oneida, met at Lowville, to memor- ialize the Legislature; town committees were appointed, and again November 22d of that year, for a similar purpose.
On the 6th of April, 1830, the Canal Commissioners were by law directed to cause a survey of the proposed canal, and Holmes Hutchinson employed
under this act, reported his labors the 6th of March following .* His estimate, based upon a canal twenty feet wide at the bottom, four feet deep, and the locks ten by seventy feet, capable of passing boats of twenty-five tons, placed the total cost of the canal and feeder at $602,544. The charter of the first com- pany having expired by its own limita- tion, a new one of the same name was char- tered April 17, 1843, with $900,000 capi- tal, and power to construct a canal from Rome or Herkimer to the Black river, and thence to Ogdensburgh, Cape Vin- cent, or Sackett's Harbor. The work was divided into six sections, of which one must be finished in three and the whole in ten years. Nothing was done under this act.
In 1834, Francis Seger in the Senate, and George D. Ruggles in the Assem- bly, procured an act (April 22d) provid- ing for an accurate survey of a canal from the Erie canal to the Black river below the falls, and thence to Carthage. The surveys of Cruger and Hutchinson were to be adopted in whole or in part, at the discretion of the Commissioners, and the result was to be reported at the next session. Mr. Timothy B. Jervis was employed upon this duty, and his survey, based upon a canal twenty-six feet wide at the bottom, banks seven feet high, water four feet deep, locks and two inclined planes, computed the cost at $907,802.72, with composite locks, and $1,019,226.72 with stone locks.t
A report from the Canal Board, in 1835, stated that the actual cost of freight by railroad was three and one- half cents a mile per ton, as shown by the Mokawk & Hudson Railroad .; This is believed to have influenced favor- able action upon the Black River canal, although manifestly unfair as regarded railroads, because based upon the ex-
* Mr. Cruger died at Mantanzas, Cuba, in 1845, while engaged in a railroad survey.
* Assembly Documents, No. 229, 1831.
+ Assembly Documents, Nos. 55, 150, 1835.
# Between Albany and Schenectady.
131
THE BLACK RIVER CANAL.
perience of a road only sixteen miles long, having two heavy inclined planes, and using locomotive and stationary steam power as well as horses.
The construction of the Black River canal was authorized by an act of April 19, 1836, which provided for a navigable feeder from Black river to Boonville, and a canal from thence to Rome and to the High Falls, and the improvement of the river to Carthage for steamboats drawing four feet of water. The details of construction and expense were left discretionary with the Canal Commissioners, who were to re- ceive from the Canal Fund such sums as the Canal Board might estimate and certify would be the probable expense, with such additional sums over and above the foregoing, borrowed on the credit of the State, and not to exceed $800,000. The surplus waters of Black river, not needed for the canal, were to be passed around the locks by sluices or turned into Lansing's kill or the Mohawk river.
This act was largely due to the exer- tions of Francis Seger of the Senate, and Charles Dayan of the Assembly, whose active labors for the promotion of this measure deserve honorable recognition in this connection .* Eleven years had passed since this work was first urged
upon public notice by the Governor, and the youth who listened with enthusiasm to the glowing prospect of coming bene- fits from the completed canal, had ripened into manhood before the first positive step was taken towards its real- ization. Still they were destined to grow old in the anticipation, and while those who had fondly cherished and aided the successive stages of effort, became sil- vered with age; full many closed their eyes in death, before it became a practi- cal reality ! Stow, Clinton, Watson, the elder Le Ray, Lyon, W. Martin, Adams, J. Mc Vickar, Collins, Parish, Rockwell, Bancroft, J. H. Leonard, N. Merriam, H. G. Hough, B. Yale, S. Allen, and many others who had served on committees, and contributed time and money to the promotion of this improvement, died be- fore it was so far completed as to admit boats into the river.
Surveys were placed in charge of Por- teus R. Root, and in September, 1836, Daniel C. Jenne, resident engineer, be- gan further examinations which were continued through the fall and the spring following.
The first contract for construction was made November 11, 1837, including 14 miles from Rome, and work was at once begun. On the 26th of May following, the work was let to Boonville, including the feeder, and Sept. 7, 1838, eight miles north of that place. Work was begun and vigorously prosecuted until, under an act of March 29, 1842, entitled “ An act to provide for paying the debt and preserving the credit of the State," more familiarly known as the tax and stop law, work was suspended. The original esti- mate upon which work had been begun was $1,068,437.20. The third division, extending from Boonville to the river, a distance of ten miles, contained 38 locks of which 24 were nearly finished, the gates and dock timbers excepted. The other 14 locks had not been contract-
* Francis Seger removed from Albany county to this county in 1826. He studied law with Marcus T. Rey- nolds, and was admitted to the Bar in 1823, having taught school at various times to aid in acquiring an education. He was several years deputy clerk, and from 1828 to 1833, inclusive, Clerk of Assembly, but yielded this position at the urgent solicitation of friends of the Black River canal, for a place in the Senate, where he remained four years. He was appointed a Master in Chancery, and in April, 1843, under Bouck's administration, became First Judge of Lewis county. He continued to officiate until 1856, having been elected Judge and Surrogate, at the first Judicial election in June, 1847, and again in 1851. In 1846, he was elected one of the secretaries of the Constitutional Convention. His highest ambition ever seems to have been the faithful discharge of official trusts, with an ability and simplicity worthy of imitation. While holding the office of Coun- ty Judge, Mr. Seger lived in Martinsburgh, but his prin- cipal home was in the present town of Lyonsdale. east of the river, and within view of the High Falls. He died there, in 1872.
132
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
ed. It was estimated that $276,000 would finish this division, and $809,000 the whole work .* There had been expended ac- cording to the report of 1842, $1,550,- 097.67. The sum of $55,222.78 was paid for extra allowances, and for suspension of contracts on the part of the State, and much loss was occasioned by the decay of wooden structures, washing away of banks, filling in of excavations, and other damages to which half finished works of this class are liable.
In the Constitutional Convention of 1846, Lewis county was represented by Russell Parish, an ardent friend and able advocate of the Black River canal. In a speech of Sept. 15th, he urged the com- pletion of this work with great zeal, and the clause in the Constitution (Art. vii. Sec. 3), providing for the completion of this canal among other public works, is without doubt to be attributed in quite a degree to him.t
An act passed May 12, 1847, appropri- ated $100,000 to this canal. Work was soon after resumed on the feeder, and the next year on the canal south of Boon- ville, many old contracts were resumed, new portions were let, and in the fall of 1848, the feeder was finished so far as to admit water on the 18th of October. The first boat passed up the feeder to the river, Dec. 13, 1848. The canal from Boonville to Port Leyden was put under contract in 1849, and the feeder was brought fully and successfully into op- eration in May or June of that year.
The first boat from Rome came up May 10, 1850, and water was let in down to Port Leyden, Oct. 27, 1850, and it was
brought into use in the spring of 1851. The part north of Port Leyden was put under contract in 1850, to be done July I, 1854, and one mile brought into use in 1852. A dam four feet high was built in 1854, just above the High Falls at a cost of $5,000, affording two and a half miles of navigation on Black and Moose rivers. The canal passes 45 chains in the river above this dam.
The improvement was finally com- pleted, by the construction of two dams in the river below the High Falls, for use in low stages of the water .*
The canal was finally brought into the river, November 13, 1855, by the com- pletion of 2.7 miles of canal, compris- ing 13 locks north of Port Leyden. The canal is 35.62 miles in length. The feeder is 10.29 miles, and the slack water above the dam 2 miles further ; a feeder at Delta, 1.38 miles, and the river below the falls 42.5 miles, making in all about 95 miles of navigation, including 5 miles on Beaver river, on the bank of which there is at present a towing path. The canal rises 693 feet by 70 locks, from the Erie canal at Rome, to the sum- mit at Boonville. It descends north- ward, 387 feet, by 39 locks to the river below the High Falls, a distance of 10.3 miles.
The canal has 6 aqueducts, 12 waste- weirs, 18 culverts, 36 road bridges, 40 farm bridges, 3 tow bridges and 2 dams. Its net cost of construction and working up to September 30, 1857, was. $4,050,406.70. It had not then paid its expenses for repairs in any one year.t
The experience of 1849, (a very dry season,) demonstrated the necessity of reservoirs on the head waters of Black river, to 'supply the Rome level on the
* Other estimates placed this amount less. A special report by acting Commissioner Enos, dated Feb. 23, 1843 (Senate Doc., 49), estimated the cost of completion, with stone locks, at $639,000.01, and with composite locks, at $436,740.96.
t The vote in February, 1854, on amending the State Constitution in relation to the canals, was in this county cast in favor of the change in every town except Mon- tagne, West Turin, Turin, Osceola, Lewis Leyden, and Pinckney, amounting to 1,572 for and 907 against the measure.
* The estimated cost of completion in 1851, was $397, 761.96. including the River Improvement. In 1853 the estimated cost of finishing was $155,400, or accord- ing to the plan of 1851, $248,784.
t Senate Doc. 129. 1858. The deficiency alluded to, is not limited to this canal, and might be said with ref- erence to others.
133
BLACK RIVER CANAL.
Erie canal. Of these, three, known as the Woodhull, North Branch and South Branch reservoirs, having together an area of 2,177 acres, and a capacity of 1,822,002,480 cubic feet have been built. The lakes on Moose river appear capable of improvement as reservoirs, to an ex- tent sufficient to meet all probable de- mands for river navigation or hydraulic power below, and have recently been used for this purpose .*
The improvement of the river chan- nel was, for some years, made a subject of vacillating project, and barren ex- penditure, which reflected little credit upon the State authorities charged with this duty, and although large sums were applied to this object, we had compara- tively little benefit to show beyond the dam at Carthage,t three substantial bridges, and a few landing places partly built at town or individual cost.
In the summer of 1849 two boats were built for clearing the river, one at the falls and the other at Illingworth's in New Bremen. In 1851 a plan was adopted for constructing jetty dams and piers, for confining the current and thus deepening the channel. The estimated cost of this work, including the dam at Carthage, two bridges and the reservoirs was $153,200. On the 18th of October, 1853, after large expenditures, this plan was abandoned, and that of two dams with locks were substituted, under the advice of John C. Mather, then Canal Commissioner. This scheme was su-
*By an act passed May 21, 1881, the sum of $6,000 was appropriated for the purpose of constructing reser- voirs upon the upper waters of Independence creck and Beaver river, for the maintenance of hydraulic power upon the river below, and as a compensation for the waters diverted into the Erie canal, by the Boon- ville feeder, from the upper tributaries of the Black river, the Superintendent of Public Works was author- ized to take lands needed for overflow, in the mode usually practiced in public improvements.
t The dam at Carthage was built in 1854, at a cost of $7,500. One of the bridges above alluded to is at that village.
¿ A dam near Lowville was to cost $29,700, and one at Otter creek $35,000, two bridges $6,000, dredging $6,000, and reservoirs $39,600.
perceded in 1854, by the Canal Commis- sioners, on the ground of fraudulent con- tracts, and that of 1851 readopted De- cember 19th of that year, at an estimated cost of $161,000 for completion. Other heavy expenditures were incurred, when on the 3d of September, 1857, this plan was again abandoned, and the engineer was directed to furnish plans for a dam and lock just above the mouth of Otter creek. There had then been spent on the piers, $88,320. A dam and lock were constructed at the mouth of Otter creek in 1850-'60, and another at a point some three miles east of the Beach Bridge (in a direct line) in 1865-'66. These locks have chambers 160 by 34 feet, with lifts of four feet. In high water steamers go up and down over the dams adjacent. It will be noticed that the idea of im- provement of the river has been a sub- ject of progressive growth. In 1828, Cruger estimated its cost at $4,168. In 1830, Hutchinson found it would be $12,- 000. In 1834, Jervis estimated it at $20,- 840. Its ultimate cost is to be revealed by time and our Canal Engineers.
The Black river was declared a pub- lic highway by an act of March 16, 1821, from the High falls to Carthage, and on the 24th of June, 1853, from the falls up to the Moose River tract. The latter act applied $5,000 to the improvement of the channel for floating logs, required booms and dams to be constructed with reference to passing timbers, and at- tached penalties for obstructing the channel. The commissioners for apply- ing this sum were Alfred N. Hough, Gardner Hinkley, and Anson Blake, Jr.
THE BUSINESS OF THE BLACK RIVER CANAL.
In the winter of 1875-'76, at a time when an amendment to the State Con- stitution was under discussion, allowing the Legislature to sell or abandon the
134
HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.
lateral canals, a public meeting was held at Lowville, and a committee was ap- pointed to collect data tending to show the importance of the Black River canal, on account of the business done upon it, and upon the river, as well as its necessity as a feeder to the Erie canal. As these facts have a certain his- torical interest, and were derived from official sources, we deem it proper to introduce them in this connection. The statement was prepared at the request of the committee, by the author of this volume :-
This canal represents a navigation of 90.3 miles, of which 35 1-3 miles are the canal proper, including the feeder from the summit level at Boonville to the Black River dam-12.09 miles are the waters of the pond of this dam,-1.38 miles are in the Delta feeder, and 42.5 miles the natural navigation of the Black river, ending at Carthage, in Jefferson county.
As is well known, this canal was be- gun at about the same time as the en- largement of the Erie canal, and that a prominent reason for its construction was the necessity of bringing an abundant supply of water for the "Long Level " of that canal, which could not be had from any other source. As this was a summit level, the drain from each end was heavy and constant, and it is well known that without this supply, naviga- tion could not now be maintained in the Erie canal, in ordinary seasons, while in those unusually dry, it demands the ut- most capacity of this important feeder, and its reservoirs, which are capable of delivering about 12,000 cubic feet of water per minute.
It may be readily shown that the Black River canal might have been sup- plied with water sufficient for its own navigation, from the streams along its course, without the costly structures on the Black river and its upper waters for storing the vast amount of water de- manded by the Erie canal, in very dry seasons, and common justice would charge the expenses of construction, maintenance and damages of these agen- cies of the supply to the Erie canal, rath-
er than to the Black River canal. In fact, they must be maintained, so long as the enlarged Erie canal is a thoroughfare of the commerce of the State, and of the Great West, at a cost of about $11,600 per annum, even were the waters allowed to find their way down to Rome feeder, by the natural channels, from Boonville summit.
In the projection of a new public work by the State, the probabilities of costs and profits would probably come into the estimate, and a decision might depend upon the result of the calcula- tion. But in the case of a work finished and paid for, the question of cost has nothing to do with the future. This de- pends altogether upon the fact as to whether the maintenance will be greater or less than the benefits derived from it. We may remark that a large proportion of the cost of the canals is for perma- nent construction, in excavation and ma- sonry. While some canals have been built with wooden locks, this has its locks of stone, requiring but a small ex- pense for maintenance, as compared with first cost. In fact, future expenses will be chiefly those for timber structures in the lock-gates and bridges. The latter would require maintenance in any event, now the canal is finished either at the cost of the State or of the towns, so long as highways are travelled, or to the end of time.
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.