History of Lewis County, New York; with...biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 4

Author: Hough, Franklin Benjamin, 1822-1885
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Syracuse, New York : Mason
Number of Pages: 712

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HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.

ceded to the State all their lands, except- ing certain reservations, among which was a tract one-half mile wide on each side of Fish creek, from its source to its mouth, which, according to Cockburn, the surveyor, was retained on account of the importance of the "salmon fish- eries."

On the 22d of June, 1791 Alexander Macomb submitted an application* for the purchase of all the lands within cer- tain specified boundaries, including the tract since known as Macomb's Purchase, excepting certain islands in the St. Law- rence, the ownership of which had not yet been settled by surveys under the treaty between England and the United States. One-sixth part of the purchase money was to be paid at the end of one year, and the residue in five equal annual installments, without interest. The first payment was to be secured by bond, to the satisfaction of the Com- missioners, and if paid within time, a patent was to be issued for a sixth part, and new bonds for the next sixth were to be issued. If at any time the purchaser chose to anticipate the payments, a deduction of six per cent. per annum was allowed. The price offered was eight pence per acre, de- ducting five per cent. for roads, and all lakes of more than one thousand acres in area. The proposition was accepted, and the lands were ordered to be sur- veyed out at the expense of Macomb,t under the direction of the Surveyor General.

The sale of such enormous tracts of and at a merely nominal price, attracted

* Given in full in the History of St. Lawrence and Franklin counties, page 253.

t Alexander Macomb was a son of John Macomb, and emigrated from Ireland in 1742. Heresided many years in New York, and held a colonial office, and in 1787-'88, '91, he was in Assembly. During several years he resided in Detroit as a fur trader, and in passing to and from Montreal, had become acquainted with the value of the lands of northern New York. He furn- ished five sons to the army in 1812, one of whom was the illustrious General Macomb of I'lattsburgh memory.

public notice throughout the State, and the occasion was not lost by the opo- nents of the State administration to charge the Land Commissioners with the basest motives of personal gain, and even with treason itself, On the 20th of April, 1792, Dr, Josiah Pomeroy of Kin- derhook, made oath to his belief from hearsay, that a company, planned by William Smith, Sir John Johnson and others, chiefly tories living in Canada, had been formed under the auspices of Lord Dorchester [Sir Gny Carleton] as early as 1789, to purchase an extensive tract of land upon the St. Lawrence, with the ultimate design of annexing it to Canada, and that Gov. George Clin- ton was privy to their scheme, and inter- ested in the result .* To this absurd charge the Governor's friends opposed a letter of Gen. Schuyler, and the affi- davits of Macomb and McCormick, fully denying any direct or indirect interest of the Governor in the purchase. In the Assembly a series of violent resolutions was offered by Colonel Talbot of Montgomery, evidently designed as the basis of an impeachment, but, after a most searching investigation, that body cleared the Commissioners of

* Handbills, 1775 to 1802, p. 41, 43. Library of Albany Institute.

Since our first edition was printed an opportunity has been had for examining original historical materials at the seat of the Canadian Dominion Government at Ottawa, which at least tend to illustrate the feeling that prevailed among those who then had the direction of affairs in Canada, as to the boundary that should be agreed upon between the two countries. Sir John Simcoe, Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada, was particularly grasping in his ambition. He wanted first the dividing lands between the waters of the St. Law- rence and the Mohawk, as the line, so as to secure the lands on both sides of the former. He then proposed the Oswego River, -next the Genessee, and finally with great reluctance consented to the Niagara as a western boundary. Not getting this, he was anxious that the waters flowing into Lake Erie, near Erie,- next the Cuyahoga, -the Miami of the Lakes, and so on, disputing every step till the last. We regard it as not improbable that there may have been Canadians, who anxiously looked forward to the annexa- tion of some part of Northern and Western New York to their territory, although there is no evidence that to our knowledge could be construed in support of the theory charged by Dr. Pomeroy, as to the complicity of Governor Clinton in any such measure.

FIRST LARGE LAND SALES.

blame, and commended their course .* Aaron Burr, then Attorney General, was absent at the time of the sale, and escaped censure at the time, but in his after career he was directly charged with basely selling his influence to obtain the grant. The clamor against the Governor was raised for political effect, and had its influence on the next election.

From letters of these negotiators it appears that the immense purchase was the fruit of years of preliminary man- agement, and allusions to some great operation as early as 1786, have refer- ence, no doubt, to these events, which appear to have originated with Con- stable. With a keen eye to the public interests, the very parties who had secured this tract, influenced the pas- sage of a law in 1794, fixing the mini- mum price of the remaining 2,000,000 acres of the public lands at six shillings per acre, thereby giving this value to their own. The unsettled state of the frontiers, and the refusal of the British to surrender the posts, had a serious influence upon the first attempt at set- tlement. The surveyors were turned back at Oswego from proceeding further, and the Indians at St. Regis drove off the first intruders. In a speech to the Indians in 1794, Lord Dorchester said, that there was a prospect of war impend- ing, and that the warrior's sword must mark the boundaries of the country. In the war of 1812-'15 it was again pro- posed to render the highlands south of the St. Lawrence the national boundary, and some such hope may have led to these embarrassing interruptions in the surveys.

Alexander Macomb, Daniel McCor- mick and William Constable were equally interested in the original contract, but Macomb became soon involved in an

immense speculation styled the " Million Bank," in which Isaac Whippo, William Duer, Walter Livingston and others were concerned, and a great number of men were pecuniary losers; Macomb was lodged in jail April 17, 1792, and even there owed his life to the strength of his prison walls.

On the 19th of April, 1792, Robert Benson, City Clerk, advertised the pub- lic, that as a number of persons as well men as boys and negroes, having assem- bled in front of the jail the evening before, broken the lamps and behaved disorder- ly, the Mayor would take measures to prevent the like for the future. Children and apprentices were to be kept within doors. The disorders here noticed were excited by the failure of Macomb and others, and his failure interrupted a negotiation with the Holland Land Com- pany, who had an interest in lands just south of the purchase, now in Oneida county, and who afterwards bought in western New York .*

The Fish Creek Reservation was not regarded in this sale, probably because it was supposed not to extend up into the tract. In the course of the survey this became a subject of anxiety, and while some considered that the reserva- tion would extend up only so far as the salmon went, others would limit to the union of the principal branches, and others only by the sources of its main tributaries. The proposition was made in 1794, to meet the Oneidas, and request a person to be sent to fix the uppermost limit of the creek, and see the half-mile run out on each side of it. Upon examin- ing the patent it was found that the State had undertaken to sell the reservation, and must settle whatever damages might result to the Indians. In a treaty

* Assembly Journals. Hammond's Political History of New York, Vol. I, p. 58. Parton's Life of Burr, p. 176.

* A card published in April, 1792, alludes to great dis- orders among the bulls and bears, about the coffee house and at the Corners. A great pecuniary panic followed, and Richard Platt, Gardner and Rodman, Leonard Bleecker, and others were broken by the transaction.

HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.

held September 15, 1795, the latter en- gaged to sell all north of a certain creek falling into Fish creek, on Scriba's pur- chase, for an annuity of $3 per hundred acres, to be ascertained by survey. On the 5th of March, 1802, a provisional agreement of sale of this and other parts of reservations was made, and on the 4th of June of that year it was confirmed in the presence of John Taylor, United States Commissioner, thus forever can- celing the native title to the lands of Lewis county .*

Macomb's purchase embraced 3,816,- 960 acres, from which deducting five per cent. there remained 3,670,715 acres. On the 10th of January, 1792, the first pay- ments having been made, a patent for 1,920,000 acres was issued to Macomb, embracing the whole purchase, excepting what lies in St. Lawrence and Franklin counties. The conveyance was that of a full and unqualified freehold, with no reservation but those of gold and silver mines, and no condition but the settle- ment of one family to every square mile within seven years. The purchase was subdivided into six great tracts, of which I lies in Franklin, II and III in St. Law- rence and IV. includes 450,950 acres, or all of Jefferson and Lewis counties north of a line near the 44th degree of north latitude. The division line between V and VI was never run, and they have never been recognized in land sales, being indefinitely regarded as including the remainder of the tract. In an early map, a line drawn from near the S. W. corner of the purchase, about N. 16º E. and crossing the Black river at the northern bend, east of the Watson bridge, is theo-

retically given as the line between Nos. V and VI. Macomb conveyed to Will- iam Constable of New York, June 6, 1792, Great Tracts IV, V and VI, for £50,000,*[$125,000,]and this conveyance was renewed by Macomb and wife, Octo- ber 3d of that year. Constable conveyed, Dec. 17-18, 1792, to Colonel Samuel Ward 1,281,880 acres, embracing tracts V and VI, (excepting 25,000 which had been con- tracted to Patrick Colquhoun and conveyed to William Inman, for £100,- 000.1) On the 27th of February following, Ward and wife re-conveyed these lands to Constable, excepting 685,000 acres, which he had sold. # This sale to Ward is understood to have been a trust conveyance, and the sales made by Ward, to be hereafter specified, were virtually sales by Constable. We now arrive at a point in the chain of title from whence several lines diverge, and to con- vey a clear idea of each, they will be traced separately down to the sales of single towns. Such changes as occurred within the limits of the towns, will be no- ticed in connection with their history.

Lewis county comprises two whole and parts of seven other great tracts which have been known in land sales by distinct names. To the townships west of Black river, separate names were ap- plied by Simeon DeWitt, Surveyor- General, in his State maps published in

* Deeds, Sec. office, xxiv, 300.

+ Deeds, Sec. office, xxxix, 6.

# Deeds, Sec. office, xxv, 208. In this conveyance it is understood that William Constable, Colonel William Stephens Smith, and Samuel Ward, were equally interest- ed. A balance sheet of the accounts of these three propri- etors, brought down to July 1, 1796, shows an amount of £69,092.2.0, cost and expenses, and £50,475.10.9 profits, leaving to each one a share of $74,778.57. The current of this affair did not always run smooth, and in a letter to Macomb, dated October 29, 1794, Constable complained that Smith had never disbursed a sixpence, and was profiting by the labors of others, while Ward was bound for the bills. Smith died at Lebanon, Mad- ison county, N. Y., June 10, 1816. He was a member of the 13th and 14th Congresses, and a son-in-law of President John Adams. He was secretary to Mr. Adams when in England, and was a brother of Justin B. Smith, who held the Hornby title to lands in south- western New York, for sometime.

* In the celebrated "Livingston Lease " made with the Oneidas and other Indians, Jan. 8, 1788, for 999 years, and which was declared void, the Oneidas re- ceived a strip of land a mile wide on Fish Creek, from one end to the other. This only affords another proof of the great importance which they attached to the privilege, and perhaps indicates the considerable benefit they derived from its fisheries in the primitive condition of the streams.

THE BLACK RIVER TRACT.

1802 and 1804. These tracts, with the numbers and original names, were as follows :-

THE GREAT TRACTS OF LAND EM- BRACED IN LEWIS COUNTY.

BLACK RIVER TRACT (in part), includ- ing

Township 5, Mantua, now Denmark. Township 9, Handel, now Pinckney.

Township 10, Platina, now Harris- burgh.

Township 11, Lowville, now Lowville. The remainder in Jefferson county, south of Black river.

BOYLSTON TRACT (in part), including Township 3, Shakespere, now the largest part of Montague.

Township 4, Cornelia, now Martins- burgh, (west part).

Township 5, Porcia, now Martins- burgh, (the triangle).

Township 8, Hybla, now Osceola.

Township 9, Penelope, now High Mar- ket.

Township 13, Rurabella, now Osceola. The remainder in Jefferson and Os- wego counties.

CONSTABLE'S FOUR TOWNS, including Township I, Xenophon, now Lewis.

Township 2, Flora, now Lewis, High Market and West Turin.

Township 3, Lucretia, now High Mar- ket, Turin and Martinsburgh.

Township 4, Pomona, now West Turin and Turin.

INMAN'S TRIANGLE, including Leyden and a part of Lewis.

BRANTINGHAM TRACT, in Greig.

BROWN'S TRACT, (in part). The west- ern border of four townships extending into the eastern part of the county, viz : Part of Township I, Industry, now in Greig and Lyonsdale and part of Herkimer county.

Part of Township 2, Enterprise, now in Greig and Herkimer county.

Part of Township 3, Perseverance, now in Watson and Herkimer county.

Part of Township 4, Unanimity, now in Watson and Herkimer county. The remainder in Herkimer and Ham- ilton counties.

WATSON'S TRACT, including part of Watson. The remainder in' Herkimer county.

CASTORLAND, including parts of Greig and Watson, the whole of New Bremen and Croghan, and in Jefferson county the parts adjoining Black river. on the north side.

GREAT TRACT NUMBER FOUR, or the Antwerp Company's purchase, including Diana and a large tract in Jefferson, and a corner in Herkimer counties.

THE BLACK RIVER TRACT.

Samuel Ward and wife, on the 12th of December, 1792, conveyed to Thomas Boylston of Boston,* for £20,000, all of Macomb's purchase south and west of Black river, excepting Inman's triangle. The only knowledge then had of the course of the river was derived from Sauthier's map, a copy of which, correct- ed at the office of the Surveyor-General, from the latest data in his possession, was used in these early sales. Black river was entirely omitted on the printed map, and when thus laid out upon vague information, was represented as flowing in a nearly direct line from the High Falls to the lake. The lands south of the river were sold for 400,000 acres, but upon survey they measured 817,155 acres. To rectify this enormous error, is said to have cost Constable £60,000 Sterling. On the 21st of May, 1794, Boylston gave a deed of trust of the land since known as the Black River Tract,

* Boylston proved to be a partner of Lane, Son and Frazer of London, who soon failed for a large amount, and the title was subsequently conveyed by their assign- ees. Boylston was related to the wife of Colonel Wm. S. Smith, who is mentioned in connection with Samuel Ward's operations.

HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.

to George Lee, George Irving, and Thomas Latham, assignees of the firm of Lane, Son and Frazer of London, and they in turn conveyed to John Johnson Phyn of that place," June 2, 1794, with whom by sundry assurances in law the title became vested in fee simple, with all the rights and appurtenances pertaining thereto.t Phyn appointed Constable his attorney to sell any or all lands, April 10, 1795,¿ and the latter sold, on the 15th of July following, to Nicholas Low, Will- iam Henderson, Richard Harrison and Josiah Ogden Hoffman, all of New York city, the land between the Black river and a line running in a course S. 81º E. 3100 chains, from the mouth of Sandy creek to the river.

In a letter from Wm. Henderson to Constable, dated February 6, 1795, the writer stated a difficulty in the lodging of American stocks as security instead of personal responsibility. All the ad- vantage he expected was to be derived from the credit allowed, and to buy stock and pledge it would cost more than to advance the money and make full pay- ment at once. Constable was offered an interest in the tract if he preferred to become an associate. Mr. Henderson added: "The room for speedy profit on waste lands in general above a dollar an acre, I do not, for my part, think very great; indeed the sudden rise which they have taken may be consid- ered in a great degree artificial. You will say, perhaps, 'Why then do you purchase?' I reply, because they have been an article in which there is great speculation, and therefore may answer to sell again."

The proposition of Hamilton for bring-

ing the western territory into market at a cheap rate, was looked upon as an alarming indication of ruin by those making this investment.

To give a better idea of these specula- tions in northern lands, we will quote from a letter written late in 1798, by one of the parties concerned, to his agent in London. After stating that the capital invested might be unproductive a few years, but would certainly return several hundred per cent. in the end, he says that in 1786, he received 3,000 acres in Bayard's patent, on the Mohawk, valued at four shillings the acre, which in 1796 he brought into market and sold at twenty shillings. He then mentions the purchase of the Boylston tract in 1794, estimated at 400,000 acres, at two shil- lings, and adds :-

"On my arrival here in 1795, I had it surveyed and explored, when it appear- ing that from the course of the river by which it was bounded, it comprehended double the quantity, or upwards of 800,- 000 acres, the purchase being so much larger than I had contemplated, I was under the necessity of proceeding imme- diately to sell a part of the tract. This I found no difficulty in doing, as the land was found to be uncommonly good. Messrs. Nicholas Low and his associates purchased 300,000 acres at 8s., or 4s. 6d. sterling, one-fourth of the money payable down, the balance in five annual install- ments, with interest, the whole of the land remaining security on mortgage. In 1796, I had the whole of the remaining 500,000 acres laid out in townships of 25 to 30,000 acres, and sold in that and the succeeding year about 100,000 acres from 6s. 9d. to gs. sterling, receiving { the money down, and taking mortgage to se- cure the balance in five annual payments with interest at 7 per cent. as is custom- ary. I interested a Mr. Shaler in one-half of two townships, on condition of his settling on the tract, and selling the lands out in small farms of about 200 acres, he to be charged gs. per acre for his part, and to have half the profit on the sales. He accordingly went out and had the lands surveyed, made a road from

* James Phyn married a sister of Constable, and traded at Schenectady with John Duncan before the Revolution. John Johnson Phyn, his son, was an unmarried man. We find a memorandum stating that Phyn, Ellis and Englis were London furriers, and con- cerned in the Canada trade.

{ Deeds, Sec. office. xxiv, 34.

¿ Deeds, Sec. office, xxxix, 64.

THE BOYLSTON TRACT.

Fort Stanwix into the midst of it,

and built a saw mill and a grist- mill. His accounts last rendered show the disposal of about 10,000 acres for nearly $40,000, of which he has paid me all the money received, being $10,000, and has made an account of expenses for roads, buildings, &c., of about $4,000. He sells alternate lots at $4 the acre, the settlement. of which will immediately give an additional value to the interme- diate ones, which we mean to reserve."

A deficiency of 24,624 acres being found on the survey of the Boylston tract, this was supplied from township 2 [Worth], in Jefferson county. On the 15th of April, 1796, Phyn confirmed this sale .* One quarter of the purchase was paid down, and the balance secured by mortgage, which was paid and canceled June 16, 1804. It had been assigned to the Bank of New York with other ac- counts of Constable.

The Black River tract was divided by ballot between the owners, on the 11th of August, 1796. Low drew 2, 7, and II, or Watertown, Adams and Lowville, and 1,578 acres of the surplus tract ; Henderson took 3, 6, and 9, or Rutland, Henderson and Pinckney, and 649 acres of the surplus ; and Harrison and Hoff- man together, 1, 4, 5, 8, and I0, or Houndsfield, Champion, Denmark, Rod- man, and Harrisburgh, and 1,283 acres of the surplus. As their guide, in mak- ing this division, Mr. Benjamin Wright,t

* Deeds, Sec. office, xxxvii, 214.

+ As this name occurs throughout the records of survey of most of the towns west of the river, a desire has been expressed to know something of his history, although he never made the county a place of permanent residence, and may have been personally known to but few who settled upon the farms that he surveyed.

Mr. Wright was born in Wethersfield, Conn., Oct. 10, 1770. In his early life he took a great interest in his studies, and especially in surveying, taking appar- ently as his model the example of Washington when a boy. Becoming skilled as a surveyor, he in 1789 drifted into the State of New York with the tide of settlement, and settled in a part of Rome still called "Wright's Settlement," to which place his father and family had previously removed. He was not long in finding ample employment, and from 1792 to 1796, he ran ont half a million of acres of land into farms. Returning in 1798 . to the home of his youth, he married the daughter of Rev. Simon Waterman at Plymouth, Ct., and resumed

who surveyed the outlines of the towns in April and May, 1796, reported with a minute description of soil, timber, and natural advantages, the following gener- al summary of his views with regard to their relative value :-

" Numbers 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, have very little to choose in point of quality. 6 is best situated, but 7 is a most excellent town. 5 would be called best by New Eng- land people on account of the luxuriancy of its soil on Deer creek. 2 is an ex- ceeding good town, but is not so good as 7. 8 and 9 are very good towns. 10, the north part, is exceeding good. II, the west part, is excellent. 7 has the preference of the whole for qual- ity and situation together, and 6 for situation only. I is well situated, but I fear has not good mill sites on it. 8 has excellent mill sites, and 9 also, but are some broken. 10 is bad on the south line,and 9 also, being cold and hemlocky."

The prejudice against hemlock timber is historically connected with the titles, and had an influence upon opinion as to the value of lands, which experience has not sustained. The indifferent quality of these lands when first brought under cultivation, is found due to the large amount of tanin in the leaves, and as this disappears the capacity of the soil in- creases until it may equal the best, other circumstances being equal.

BOYLSTON'S TRACT AND CONSTABLE'S FOUR TOWNS.

On the 10th of April, 1795, Phyn re- conveyed to Constable 104,997 acres for £10,000, which tract was subdivided into

his employment, which turned from land surveys to en- gineering, as projects of inland navigation came up.

In the surveys of the Erie Canal he was associated with James Geddes, and a large share of credit is due to him, in the engineering of that great work. He was afterwards employed in canal surveys in many other States, being in fact, the highest authority that could be found upon the subject. The Harlem R. R., the N. Y & Erie R. R., the Tioga R. R., the Chicago and Illinois River Canal, were partly built under his advice. In 1835 he was employed upon a railroad in Cuba. He died in New York, where he had resided many years, August 24, 1842. Through life he sustained a high reputation for zcal, industry, probity, and faithful devo- tion to the interests he had in charge.

HISTORY OF LEWIS COUNTY.

four towns adjacent to Inman's Triangle, and almost reaching the south-east cor- ner of the Eleven Towns of the Black River tract .*

On the Ist of April, 1796, Phyn recon- veyed to Constable 406,000 acres for $400, this being the residue of the Boylston tract. This land was subdivided into thirteen towns, which in common lan- guage have been denominated the " Boylston Tract," although strictly speaking, that tract included everything between the Black river, the Lake, and Inman's Triangle, amounting to 817,155 acres. The separate numbering of the townships surveyed out from the lands released in 1795 and 1796, has resulted in some confusion as, from I to 4, the num- bers are duplicated. The outlines of these towns were mostly surveyed by Wm. Cockburn, & Son of Poughkeepsie.

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History of Lewis County, New York; with...biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 4

Author: Hough, Franklin Benjamin, 1822-1885 Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Syracuse, New York : Mason Number of Pages: 712

Author: Hough, Franklin Benjamin, 1822-1885
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Syracuse, New York : Mason
Number of Pages: 712