History of Oneida County, New York, 1667-1878, Part 98

Author:
Publication date: 1878
Publisher: Philadelphia, Everts & Fariss
Number of Pages: 932


USA > New York > Oneida County > History of Oneida County, New York, 1667-1878 > Part 98


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"September 13 .- This morning we wrote home by a boat coming from the West loaded with hemp, raised at the south end of Cayuga Lake. What a glorious acquisition to agriculture and commerce do these fertile and extensive regions in the West present in anticipation ! And what a pity, since the partial hand of nature has nearly com- pleted the water communication from our utmost borders to the At- lantic Ocean, that art should not be made subservient to her to com- plete the great work !


"Immediately after breakfast we embarked, doubled a point of land, and entered the Oneida Lake with our sails filled to a light easterly brecze. The lake opened to our view, spreading before us like a sea. We glided smoothly over its surface, and were delighted with a charming day. On the south is the Oneida Reservation, at present inhabited by the Oneida nation of Indians. The country lies flat for eight or ten miles, and then swells into waving hills. On the north it is generally low, but heavily timbered.


" This lake is thirty miles long, and from five to eight broad. We are now sailing parallel with the Ontario Ocean, which I hope to see, and at least enjoy in delightful anticipation the prospect of a free and open water communication from thence to the Atlantic, via Albany and New York.


" In giving a stretch to the mind into futurity, I saw those fertile regions bounded west by the Mississippi, north by the great lakes, east by the Allegheny Mountains, and south by the placid Ohio, over- spread with millions of freemen; blessed with various climates, enjoy - ing every variety of soil, and commanding the boldest inland navi- gation on this globe; clouded with sails, directing their course toward canals, alive with boats passing and repassing, giving and receiving reciprocal benefits from this wonderful country, prolific in such great resources.


" In taking this bold flight in imagination, it was impossible to re- press a settled conviction that a great effort will be made to realize all my dreams.


"Near the west end of the lake are two small islands, on one of which resides a respectable Frenchman, who came from France a few years since, and has voluntarily sequestered himself from the world and taken up his solitary abode upon this island, with no society but his dogs, guns, and library, yet he appeared happy and content.


"This lake is extremely turbulent and dangerous, a small breeze producing a short, bobbing sea, in consequence of its shoal waters.


"The batcauxmen commonly hug the north shore as safest, as well as more direct from point to point. Ou that side these points project less into the lake than on the south shore. The wind soon rose to a brisk side gale, which occasioned such a dangerous agitation as obliged us to make a harbor at Twelve-Mile Point, near which we noticed two large bears walking along the shore in majestic confidence.


"We trolled with our lines and caught some bass. The day con- cluded with heavy rains and a violent squall. In spite of our tents we were much wet and half suffocated with smoke.


4


MORRIS W. MORRIS.


369


HISTORY OF ONEIDA COUNTY, NEW YORK.


" September 14 .- Early this morning we embarked and proceeded across the lake, rowing, with a light breeze in our favor. We passed tho Seven-Mile Islands (already mentioned) after stopping to break- fast on the north shore; soon after which the shores suddenly narrowed, and we found ourselves opposite Fort Brewerton, at the entrance of the Onondaga River, which is a very shallow stream.


" We landed at the old fort, where we found two families and a hand- some improvement. After refreshing ourselves under the first Chris- tian roof which had sheltered us in five days, we commenced deseend- ing the Onondaga River with an easy current. The river is generally about 300 feet wide. It is nineteen and three-quarters of a mile to Three-River Point. In its length there are three or four pretty long rapids ; but these obstructions can easily be removed, and a boat- channel formed.


"We observed in many places on this river small piles of stones, which, we were told, are thrown up by salmon, where they cast their spawn to protect them from other fish. These waters abound in cat- fish, salmon, bass, cel, and corporals, all very fine and fat. They are caught in eel-weirs, formed by the Indians thus : two walls of loose stones are thrown up, obliquely descending across the river to a point, where they are taken, at a small opening, in haskets or cel-pots. Salmon are caught at the Oswego Falls in the night, by spearing them as they vault up the falls, by the aid of torchlights."


On the 30th of September, 1799, Rome was visited by President Dwight, of Yale College, and in his " Book of Travels" he thus describes the place as it then appeared :


"Tho village of Rome is a very unpromising copy of the great exemplar from which it has derived its name. The land on which it is built is poor, and surrounded by alders or half-starved trees. The houses are about twenty in number, and decent in their appearance ; the whole aspect is uninviting. The proprietor of the ground, a gen- tleman of New York, believing, as proprictors usually do, that his lands will soon be very valuable, has taken effectual care to prevent them becoming so by distributing them into small house-lots, de- manding excessive rents, and adopting other unwise measures. The eanal, through which, when the outlets are open, runs a sprightly stream, adds not a little cheerfulness to the village. Nor is this the only benefit derived from it by the inhabitants. The base of their settlement is composed almost wholly of small round stones. The canal being dug to a depth considerably lower than their cellars, heretofore wet and troublesome, has effectually drained them. The water also, in the upper part of the wells, which was of a bad quality, has by the same means been drawn off; and the remainder, flowing from a deeper source, has become materially sweeter and better. We examined the locks of the canal, and were not a little surprised to see the bricks composing tho locks already beginning to moulder away, although the work had been finished little more than two years. I have seen no good bricks in this region. In fire-places they soon burn out ; whenever they are exposed to the weather they speedily dis- solve."


The brieks in the canal-locks were very large, but did not answer the purpose, and were soon after replaced by stone. The contractor for the building of the Rome court- house in 1806 used these bricks in its construction. When that building was destroyed by fire in 1844 they were again used in the walls of the house on the corner of George and Court Streets, since the property of F. HI. Thomas.


It is not possible at this day to determine the exact loea- tion of the houses of the persons who located near Fort Stanwix in 1760, but it is probable they were very near the fort, and on the opposite side of Dominick Street, in Rome. In a letter written to Colonel Gansevoort, in Sep- tember, 1778, by Major Cochran, then in temporary com- mand, he mentions the number of murders committed by prowling Indians, and states that a man going out in the field near the fort to catch a horse was tomahawked and sealped by Indians, " the latter being fired upon in return by the sentinel who was in the Brodock house."


After the destruction of Fort Stanwix, in 1781, the gar- rison was removed, and the settlers, being left without protection, and finding it unsafe to remain, also left the vicinity, and as far as can be learned there was not, in 1783, a single white settler in what is now the city of Rome.


In May, 1784, Jedediah Phelps, in company with James Dean, located on Wood Creek, not far from where the United States Arsenal was afterwards built, erected a log house and a shop, the latter used by Mr. Phelps as a place for carrying on his trade,-that of a silversmith and brass- founder. In the spring of 1785 their place was inundated by high water in Wood Creek, and Messrs. Dean and Phelps were obliged to live for three weeks in the garret of their log house, and cook their meals at the forge of the shop; the latter they reached in a canoe, to which they descended from the garret of the house by means of a lad- der. This year (1785) Mr. Dean settled in what is now the town of Westmoreland, and Mr. Phelps came to the fort. He built a house and a shop, and carried on his business for two years. The precise location of his old house and shop cannot now be aseertained. In 1797 he removed to a part of the Oneida Reservation, then recently purchased from the Indians. As early as 1806 he owned a large tract of land near Verona Village, and on one oeca- sion, when he and his son John were hunting wolves, they discovered iron ore at the roots of an upturned tree. This ore-bed was for a long time the source of supply for the Taberg furnace, and Mr. Phelps and his son, as discoverers, obtained a royalty on the ore, making a handsome fortune from the sale. In 1816, Mr. Phelps sold a half-interest in the ores on the farms in Verona to John W. Bloomfield, the first supervisor of the town of Camden. In 1819, Mr. Phelps removed to Barre, Genesee County (now Albion, Orleans County), and died near that place in 1849, aged nearly ninety-six years. When he first came to Fort Stan- wix there was one white man,-a Frenchman, living there with the Indians,-not an actual settler, so that Mr. Phelps was, so far as can be ascertained, the first white person who located in town subsequent to the Revolution.


A few other settlers came in 1785-86, and Judge Jones, in his " Annals of Oneida County," says that when his father eame to the county, in January, 1787, " there were three log houses at old Fort Schuyler, seven at Whites- boro', three at Oriskany, five at Fort Stanwix, and three in Westmoreland."


About 1795-96, when much alarm was felt in this re- gion regarding the hostile attitude of the Western Indians, a block-house was built in Fort Stanwix, octagonal in shape, and during the administration of President John Adams a company of regulars was stationed in it, com- manded by one Captain Cherry. This block-house stood very nearly in the centre of the fort.


The first settlements in Rome, outside of the vicinity of. Fort Stanwix, were at Ridge Mills, the Wright Settlement, and " Penny Street," in the northern and castern portions of its territory.


WRIGHT SETTLEMENT.


Early in 1789, Ebenezer Wright, Sr., emme to Fort Stanwix with his family of six children. Mr. Wright had


47


370


HISTORY OF ONEIDA COUNTY, NEW YORK.


served in the American army as a lieutenant during the Revolution. During the year 1789 the family remained at the fort, cultivating small pieces of ground and raising corn, potatoes, etc., for use the following winter. In the mean time Mr. Wright and his sons began a clearing on a tract of 196 aeres at the "Wright Settlement,"* and the same year built a log house on their farm, which was un- doubtedly the first one erected and occupied by a permanent settler (Phelps and others staying but a year or two on their places) after the Revolution. A house built subsequently, about 1796, by Mr. Wright, Sr., was long kept as a tavern, and in it was organized, in September, 1800, "The First Religious Society in Rome." The Wright family was among the most prominent of Rome's early settlers, and the " settlement" took its name from them as the pioneers of the locality.


A few years previous to the commencement of the present century the town of Stamford, in the southwest part of Vermont, sent a number of families to colonize the then western wilderness of New York. Among them were the Clark, Hinman, Matteson, Smith, and Selden families. Clark and Hinmant settled about 1796, near where the asylum now stands in Utica,-the Clarks on one side and the Hinmans on the other of the road to Whitesboro'; Silas Matteson, father of the late Simon Matteson, and grandfather of Hon. O. B. Matteson, located about the same year on what is now the County Poor Farm, in Rome; Esquire Smith settled the same year on the farm now owned by George Hammill; Thomas Selden, Jr. (grandfather of N. Hyde Leffingwell, of Rome), came to this locality in 1795, and settled on half of a 100-acre parcel which John Lansing, Jr., had leased to Jasper French. He purchased Mr. French's " betterments," ineluding a log house west of the highway, nearly opposite the present frame residence on the 50 acres. He took an assignment of the lease from Mr. French, covering the 50 acres, made all necessary arrangements, and returned to Vermont for his family, bringing them and his aged parents back with him in the winter of 1795-96. The roads were extremely bad, and a portion of the way lay through trackless snows. Mr. Sel- den, Sr. (also named Thomas), walked all the way, driving the cows and a yoke of oxen, and otherwise assisting. He was sixty-three years of age at the time. The females and children rode in the sleigh, driven by Thomas Selden, Jr. The elder Selden was a veteran of the Revolution, and had been a confidential scout for General Washington.


Thomas Selden, Jr., cleared up his lands, built a frame house about 1800, and, in company with Roswell Edgerton (a relative by marriage) and John Ely, carried on an ex- tensive business as contractors, in getting out timber, crect- ing buildings, etc. Among the buildings said to have been erected by them were the grist-mill of Colonel Samuel .Wardwell, at the Ridge, the Lynch (red) grist-mill, and the cotton- and woolen-factories in Factory Village (Rome). They also had the contraet for cutting the first road through the Rome swamp to the site of the Poor-House, and when the Erie Canal was constructed they had a contract at or


# This neighborhood was originally ealled "New Fairfield."


+ Mr. Hinman, the father of the late John E, Hinman, was sheriff of Oneida County in 1821 and 1822, and again from 1828 to 1832.


near Stony Creek, between that place and New London. They were somewhat crippled in resources by this latter contract, and their farms were only saved by their sons stepping in and helping them through.


Thomas Selden, Jr., served in the war of 1812, and was at Sacket's Harbor in the company of which Bill Watson, late of Watson's Hollow, in Rome, was lieutenant.


Mr. Ely, one of the firm of contractors, is supposed to have settled very early near the fort. IIe afterwards re- moved to a farm north of the Butts neighborhood, and later farther north.


Roswell Edgerton came to Rome from the same locality the Seldens emigrated from. His homestead was on the road leading from the Westernville road (near the present Williams Cheese-Factory) across to Delta, in the town of Lee.


Charles Leffingwell, the father of N. H. Leffingwell, came to Rome in 1802, and the father of Israel Denio in 1795. These families, in common with all others that season, suffered much during the " cold summer" (1816) from the loss of their crops, and the consequent dearth of edibles the following year. Wheat was scarce at three dollars per bushel, corn brought one dollar and a half per bushel, and other articles were worth fully double former prices.


In 1790, John Lansing, Jr., owner of large tracts of land in the northern part of Oneida County, leased to the following five persons 100 acres each, all the leases bearing date in June of that year, and the territory comprised in- cluding the Selden neighborhood :


To John Wright, son of Thomas Wright, one of Rome's earliest settlers, what is known as the " Gates place," 50 aeres, and that on the opposite side of the highway, known as the " Waters place," also 50 aeres ; to Moses Wright, brother of John, 100 aeres next north of the latter, lying on both sides of the highway; to Asa Knapp, the next 100 acres north ; to Elijah Weeks, 100 acres north of Knapp, mostly on the west side of the present highway, and run- ning down to the Mohawk ; to Jasper French, a surveyor, 100 aeres, mostly on the east side of the highway. The rent for these lots was 18 bushels of wheat for each 100 aeres, payable in Albany. The lot leased to Jasper French was the same on which Thomas Selden, Jr., located in 1795.


In 1790 leases had been granted in the neighborhood of the Wright Settlement to Seth Ranney, David I. Andrus, Nathaniel Gilbert, Rozel (or Roswell) Fellows, Ebenezer Wright, Jr., Willett Ranney, Jr., Benjamin Gilbert, John Wright, Moses Wright, Asa Knapp, Jasper French, Elijah Weeks, Elijah Root, Chester Gould, and Elisha Walsworth.


When Ebenezer Wright, Sr., came to Fort Stanwix, from Connecticut, in 1789, he was probably accompanied by his brother, Thomas Wright, Willet Ranney, Sr., and Bill Smith, all of whom located in the vicinity of the fort at first. David I. Andrus and Nathaniel Gilbert came either the same year or the next. In 1791 lands were leased in the Wright settlement to Dyer McCumber and Abner Pitcher. Other early settlers, all previous to 1800, were Colonel D. W. Knight, about 1790; Jesse Childs, about 1792; Joseph Otis, 1793; William West, 1793;


PHOTOS BY HOVEY & BRAINERD, ROME, N. Y.


L. ZENANA LEFFINGWELL.


N. Nya Staffing well


N. HYDE LEFFINGWELL.


The founder of the Leffingwell family in Oneida County was Charles, who was the son of Phineas, and was born in Norwich, Conn., March 6, 1780. In his youth he was an apprentice to the carpenter and joiner trade, which business he followed during his life. Arriving at the age of man- hood, the prospect of obtaining work in his native State not being encouraging, he decided to remove west. He located in Oneida County, March, 1802.


He was marricd, Feb. 28, 1808, to Electa, daughter of Thomas Selden, she being born in Stanford, Vt., July 29, 1787, and came to this county with her parents in 1795. Their family consisted of five children, none of whoni are living at the present time except the subject of this memoir. This aged couple lived together over sixty- two years. The latter part of their life was made pleasant and happy by the care and attention of their dutiful son. The honored head of the family, after arriving at a ripe old age, was called to his last resting-place July 11, 1870. His companion in life survived him only a little while, closing her eyes in peaceful repose March 6, 1871.


N. Hyde Leffingwell was born in the town of Western, Feb. 4, 1809. His father being in reduced circumstances, he only received a common-school education. In 1823 his father removed his family to the village of Rome, and young Hyde became a clerk in a general store kept by Brown & Hollister. He remained with that firm till 1827, when they dissolved. He then became a clerk in the


office of the collector of canal-toll, under Bela B. Hyde, who was a cousin of his father, and who also issued the first clearance and shipping bill on the Erie Canal. In 1835 he entered into partnership with Mr. Hyde in the storage business, which continued thirteen years, when Mr. Hyde retired. The business was continued by Mr. Leffing- well till 1851, when, on account of ill health, he gave up all active business.


He was united in marriage, Feb. 11, 1840, to L. Zenana, daughter of John and Harriet Humaston, she being born Feb. 10, 1819, ir the town of Vienna, Oneida County. They had three children, two of whom are now living: Z. Elizabeth, born Oct. 12, 1846 ; Charles M., Sept. 3, 1851.


The life of man is not only made of prosperities, but is forced to bear with many adversities, and none is so hard to overcome as the loss of a loving wife. Mrs. Leffingwell dicd April 5, 1867, not only mourned by husband and children, but by a large circle of sympathizing friends.


Politically he has always belonged to the Democratic party, has held a large number of town offices, being one of its present supervisors. He is also a director in the Fort Stanwix National, and trustee of the Rome Savings Bank.


What can be more pleasant for a man who has arrived at an advanced age, than to look back on the many pleasures and sorrows of life, and to think he has always been held in reverence and respect by friends and neighbors, and that his memory will be preserved for years to come ?


DANIEL M. CROWELL.


MRS. RUTH CROWELL.


PHOTOS. BY HOVEY & BRAINERD . ROME. N Y.


LITH . BY L. H EVERTS & CO., PHILA, P.


RESIDENCE OF D. M.CROWELL, ROME, ONEIDA CO., N.Y.


Photos. by Hovey & Brainerd.


ELIJAH CROWELL.


MRS. ELIZABETHI CROWELL.


DANIEL M. CROWELL


was born in Middletown, Middlesex Co., Conn., March 29, 1798, being the eldest son of Elijah and Elizabeth Crowell. In the spring of the following year his father removed to Steuben, Oneida Co., N. Y., where the subject of this sketeh passed his early life working on his father's farm and teaching sehool.


His father was a member of the militia of Oneida County, and that body of men being ealled into aetive serviee for the protection of Saeket's Harbor during the war of 1812, young Daniel, though but sixteen years of age, took his father's place in the ranks, and marehed with the rest of his comrades to proteet that point from British invasion. On the death of his grandfather his parents, in 1817, removed back to the old homestead in Conneetieut, taking their family with them. They both lived to be over ninety years of age, ending their days in that State. Dee. 6, 1821, he was married to Ruth, daughter of Samuel and Sarah Crowell, she being a native of Middletown, Middlesex Co., Conn., having been born April 2, 1797.


Not seeing mueh of a ehanee to prosper in his native land, Mr. Crowell decided to move west, and in the spring of the year following his marriage he loaded his household goods on an ox-eart, and in company with his wife they bid good-bye to old Connectieut, and started for Oneida County, which then was the western wilds of New York State. Traveling an average of twenty-five miles per day, their journey of two hundred miles was soon accomplished. They located in the town of Steuben, and their worldly goods at that time consisted of two yoke of eattle, an ox-eart, a brass kettle, bedstead, three ehairs, and a three-legged table, which were borrowed; also a eow.


But the Lord had blessed them with good constitutions, energy, and a disposition to accumulate ; and, with His aid, and their own individual exertions, they started on the roeky and rugged road which leads to sueeess. Mr. Crowell eon- tinued to be a resident of Steuben till 1840, when owing to ill health he removed in that year back to Conneetieut, where he remained until 1845, when he again returned, taking up his residenee in the town of Steuben until 1849, when he located in Rome, on the farm where he now resides, which he purchased of General Jessie and Colonel E. B. Armstrong.


Six children eame to bless his fireside and make home pleasant, one of whom, John G., lived to manhood, but he died in 1854 from the effects of an aeeidental injury ; his wife soon followed him, leaving au only son, Edgar W.


Thus left an orphan, Edgar was the pride and the comfort of this childless couple ; in him all their love was eentred, and in his sueeess in life they hoped to see their name live and be handed down to posterity. His grandfather wishing him to receive a college education, sent him to Hamilton College; while there he econtraeted the searlet fever, and died very suddenly in his twenty-first year.


Politieally he belongs to the Demoeratie party, casting his first vote for President of the United States for James Madison for his second term of office. Though he has been solieited a number of times to serve his eounty and town in various publie offiees, has always refused ; but during the time of his second residence in Connectieut he was elected to represent his native eounty in the State Legislature of that State, in 1843.


He is at present a member of the First Baptist Church of Rome, and has been a deaeon in ehurehes of that denom- ination for over forty years. He has always given largely of his means for the support of religion. His wife was also a member of the same ehureh. Dee. 6, 1871, there gathered at his family mansion friends from far and near to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of his marriage, and the following lines are appropriate to the oeeasion :


For fifty years we've journeyed on Together on life's way : Our loeks, onee fair to look upon, Are mingled now with gray.


We've shared each other's toil and eares ; A Father's love hath blessed ; And ere another fifty years We hope with Him to rest.


The last lines of the above verse have partially become a faet. Mrs. Crowell, the loving companion and helpmate of her husband for over fifty years, passed away from life Mareh 16, 1878, leaving sweet memories only to eheer his saddened heart, for as a wife she had been a treasure on earth. Mr. Crowell, though over fourseore years of age, enjoys good health, and is highly respected by those who know him ; and looking baek over the pleasures and perplexities of a life which is now drawing to a elose, he is to-day the only living representative of his family. Two generations have passed away before him, and still he is left, and still we hope he will be left to add year after year to his so far worthy and useful life.




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