USA > New York > Chautauqua County > Ellicott > The early history of the town of Ellicott, Chautauqua County, N.Y. > Part 15
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tons, one eight feet high, having on a necklace consist- ing of 1,500 pieces of mica the size of a dime. The smaller skeleton had a necklace of 600 beads, the same shape only thicker, probably made either of deer antlers or bone. I have a few of each of these beads. There was also a small Indian god of polished black stone. It was in a sitting posture, was about ten inches high with three rows of hieroglyphics on the back. In this I was much interested. It was stolen the next year, and, although the state offered a large reward, it has never been recovered. The archway gradually rotted away after the death of Mr. Tomlin- son, and a part of the earth fell in, carrying the stair- case with it; but recently the mound has been pur- . chased by an enterprising man who has built a fence around it twelve feet high with a view to making his investment pay. Just below, near the mouth of Big Grave creek, is evidently an Indian burying ground, for as the bank washes away the bones protrude. and many a relic in the form of arrowhead and battle axe have I in my possession that I found there.
We landed at Captine, Sunfish, Marietta and Parkersburg; a, mile and a half below the latter place is Blennerhassett island where we took the skiff and went ashore. The outlines of the residence were still apparent situated on the upper end of the island which is high, very beautiful and is never inundated. Par-
tially around the front the foundation was built of brick which had been "packed" on horseback across the mountains from Philadelphia early in this cen- tury. I brought away two of the bricks which I still have. The celebrated well is eighty feet deep, five feet across, the wall of cut rock laid up in eight seg- ments. The water is drawn up in a large bucket by a
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windlass. I took a refreshing draught, and have stop- ped there many times since to enjoy a cooling drink from the old Blennerhassett well.
On Belpre plains at Cedarville, directly opposite the above interesting island is an ancient cemetery formerly used by the pioneer. In one corner of it, fac- ing the river, were five graves of a mother and child- ren who were murdered by the Indians near the close of the last century. A cedar headboard marked the spot, giving an account of the murder and the ages of the children; the letters being painted black, were pro- tected from the weather by the paint, while the plank had worn with the corrosion of time, leaving the let- ters slightly projecting. Until recently it has been standing, but now nothing remains of it, as the bank has gradually washed away and carried the graves and monuments with it.
I next stopped at Point Pleasant which at an early day was an Indian settlement, but the savages were driven away by the English who took possession of the place. Near there occurred one of the hardest battles ever fought with Indians, lasting from early dawn till sunset, when the savages were flanked and had to retreat. The intrepid Col. Lewis was killed here, and was buried on the shore where the Big Kan- awha intersects the Ohio. He had rested undisturbed until the centennial anniversary of the battle when his remains were taken up with appropriate ceremonies to be placed in a monument. For a century he had slumbered on with no requiem but the ripple of the beautiful Ohio and the Kanawha, and nothing to mark his resting place but the tall sycamore tree beside which he was buried.
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The next stopping place was Pomeroy, a town ex- tending several miles along the river and as far back as you can see. Fifteen miles below Gallipolis was a colony of Germans. Capt. Barrows sold them a lot of sash and I all the furniture I had in stock, besides a few pails.
At Portsmouth I sold all of my snaths and a part of the pails; I sold the last at .Manchester.
At New Richmond a man offered me twenty-five dollars for the boat, which had been invoiced at $50 ; but after advising with Deacon Barrows I accepted his offer, transferring the remainder of my stock to his boat, and bade farewell to the old boat on which I had done so much hard work coming down the Allegheny. I am sure the man got cheated, and have felt a little guilty ever since. It was sixty feet long, built mostly . of hemlock, sided with no view to breaking joints, a ridgepole in the middle made of two basswood poles with the bark peeled off, studs on each of the girts, which were eight feet apart, a two-ply roof put on with carlings, the floor of horse boards. Just at the right of the stud that held up the ridge pole was a board chim- ney-box of earth with a few bricks for a fireplace and a lug pole across, on which to swing our kettle. The above is a sketch of the boat on which the writer spent three months, but did not get enough out of the ven- ture into $200 to pay the claim. At Cincinnati, after completing the sale of the goods, I took the first boat back to Pittsburg, first coach to Erie and stage to Jamestown, where I landed July 3, and thus ended a voyage which occurred forty-three years ago, and was not altogether void of interest as being the germ of a business extending through as many years, and find-
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ing a market for a vast amount of Jamestown's pro- ducts.
In the spring of 1844 I came to the conclusion that with a good boat and judiciously assorted cargo, the river business might be made to pay, and decided to continue the occupation. I procured material of good quality to put up an eighty-foot boat, and com- menced work on the first of April. With several hands I soon had the bottom on the pail factory stocks, planked, caulked, and turned in. I took on board the lumber with which to finish, and the oars ready to run the boat myself to Wilson's landing, as Jacob Rice, Guinea Carpenter and the other good pilots were away. This was always the time that the boys most enjoyed, when as many as the bottom would conveniently carry were allowed to take passage as far as Tiffany's. From there they would walk home. At Wilson's with plenty of help, we soon had the best finished boat ever built in Jamestown up to that time. There was a three-ply roof, two ridge poles, a cabin in the stern with cook stove, bedsteads, chairs, and all else needed for our comfort. For cargo I put in an assortment of agricul- tural implements, tubs, buckets and a lot of half-bushel measures, besides seventy-five dozens of cast steel hoes, crowding the boat full and investing about two thousand dollars in it. With two good hands I started from Myers's the 15th of April, doing my own piloting and safely passing the Conewango rapids to Warren, Tidioute, White Oak, Mahoning and other bad places to Pittsburg. I stopped at all the towns on the Ohio river above Cincinnati, selling goods at satisfactory prices, showing the people that all Yankees were not necessarily dishonest. We were absent three months, and at Cincinnati sold the boat for two hundred dol-
.
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lars to Capt. Cowing formerly of Dexterville, he having an order to procure a good boat for a friend down the river. In the venture I cleared seven hundred dollars, returning home in better spirits than on my return the previous year.
The next year I built a third boat and ran it down to Fentonville below State Line bridge, in order to go below all the low bridges and at the same time get an early start during the spring freshets ; having my lad- ing, which consisted in part of snaths, rakes, cradles, tubs and buckets, drawn from this village and put into the boat there. In the meantime Joseph Waite, Esq., who owned a hay farm on the Stillwater, got S. B. Winsor to build two boat bottoms at Myers's, which he ran to State Line to finish and load, He completed the boats and then put in twenty-five tons of pressed hay with- out first caulking the gunwale seams, although I ad- vised him several times, offering to assist him. His reply was that he had run his hay boat the previous year without caulking, and that he would again. The water falling, the boat careened over and sank, the water running in and ruining his hay. He said he did not care so much for the hay, as he had any quantity of that, but that he had been to much expense to have it pressed and hauled. With his team he drew out the bundles, raised, caulked and reloaded the boat. I had previously told him that his boat was too high to pass under the bridges, which he would not believe, but after we had both run our boats to Pine Grove, he fin- ally concluded to follow my advice by taking a board the height of his boat and going on a raft through to Warren, measuring the heighth of the bridges as he passed under. He found that the boat was entirely too high, and employed all the men he could procure who
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could wield a hand saw, to assist him in lowering the boat three feet, that he might be able to clear the bridges. He landed at Warren just above my boat at dusk, and proposed that we should couple together and he with his crew board on my boat, as he had made no provision for a cabin. I made ready to couple, and Hans Waite with B. B. Mason went on shore to take the line to a post lower down, while the writer climbed to the roof of the hay boat to help drop it down. Through their inexperience they failed to get a turn on the post, and away went the hay boat with only one oar shipped and a big river to contend with. I hastily shipped an oar which ordinarily takes two men to lift, and in the dark landed just above Mead's island, on the left, having then to walk about four miles through the mud, brush and pitchy darkness up to Warren, which place I reached after ten o'clock, and not in a very good humor. I was met by the old judge with the inquiry as to how the hay market was in Pitts- burg. Upon which his son Hans gravely told his father that it was the last time he should ever show the light of his countenance on a hay boat. I finally agreed to help them through to Pittsburg by allowing them to couple their boat to mine. The judge sold his boat to good advantage, returned his borrowed money, paid his expenses by the way, and started for home, but fully determined never again to try hay boating.
I painted my boat a light chrome yellow above the gunwale plank, trimmed with white ; the gunwale and plank were red. We had five windows on a side, with the name I had selected, "YANKEE NOTION " painted black in block letters between the windows, which were twenty inches deep, making the letter the same length ; which being on a light background, read
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well in the distance. In the above you have a sketch of my boats as they appeared from 1845 to 1861, when the rebels came down on me and the name, as they could not tolerate the "Yankee," and threatened to burn the boats if the name was not changed. I ran it through that year without changing, notwithstanding the threatening looks, but the next year adopted the name " N. Brown," abandoning the venerated name under which I had run scores of boats, which were scattered all the way down the lower Ohio, Mississippi and the intersecting bayous. They had become ex- ceedingly popular with store boatmen in the south.
They felt if they had a boat with " Yankee Notion" on the side, endorsed " N. Brown, Jamestown, N. Y.," with stencil plate on the front end of the boat under the roof, (which they always looked for in buying a boat) they had a craft that would stand all the waves old Boreas could scare up along the Mississippi, having been truly tested in passing over the Conewango dams; word often being sent to that effect and orders for our boats.
Before the war, about all the business along the shores was done by what were then called storeboats. Ours were just right and adapted to that kind of busi- ness. Merchants would come up to Louisville and Cincinnati, buy the craft, fit it with shelving, counters, and all other appurtenances, investing from ten to fifteen thousand dollars in assorted goods. We regret to say that after our boats were sold a few of them may have taken some barrels of whiskey on board. At the plantations they were obliged to get a permit from the owner or overseer to sell goods to their darkies, but some would not allow them to sell their slaves whis- key; others would not give the privilege Saturday
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night; alleging that if drunk all day Sunday they would not be worth much on Monday. The boat was always anchored out at the stern so that the darkies could only go aboard at the bow, and care was taken that only a few should go on at a time; when they would part with all the money they had, and all the cotton and sugar they could steal. Some storeboat men would anchor, out from the shore, using a skiff to bring customers on board, as the merchants had the opinion that few of them could be trusted. As these storeboat men bought cheap goods and sold them at fabulous prices it is no wonder that they got rich.
I once ran down to Louisville and landed just be_ low some coal boats, where the owner of the boats had several slaves shoveling coal. One of them did not work fast enough to satisfy his owner who cursed him furiously, and then picking up a heavy strap or tug, beat him over the head unmercifully. The slave ex- claimed, "You have beaten me for the last time," and preferring drowning to his severe treatment, jumped into the river where it was fifteen feet deep. He sunk, and then rose near the end of the boat, where the slave holder caught him by the wool and with the help of the other slaves, pulled him out, when he applied the strap with more severity than at first. One negro on each side then took him up to Walker's slave pen where he was told that he would be sold immediately and would be sent farther south as soon as able.
It did not take me long to sell my boat, as three customers wanted it. I put it up at auction, starting at three hundred and running it up to four hundred and fifty dollars. I took the Pittsburgh packet Farmer and ran through to Cincinnati, reaching there the 5th of July. On board were a number of emigrant deck
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passengers who were just recovering from the cholera and were put off here. As the boat had to lay by till evening I strolled about the city, In passing through the deserted streets nearly all the vehicles I saw mov- ing were hearses, as the cholera was raging and one hundred and fifty dead were reported that day. Leav- ing Cincinnati that evening I was much interested in a fellow passenger, a Mr. Lavaty of Allegheny City, with whom I became acquainted. Above Pomeroy I noticed his not being present at the breakfast table. I sent the clerk to inquire and found that he was in the last stages of cholera. . He gave his personal effects to the clerk to be forwarded to his friends, and died be- low Marietta. Ile was rolled up in the sheets in which he died, placed in a rough box, and in the evening the steamer landed on an island just below Newport, Ohio, where a grave was hastily dug, and by the weird light of the torches he was buried by the ne- gro deck hands, a feeling of gloom and sadness over- spreading the entire boat. I reached Pittsburg with- out further incident, and Jamestown with thankful- ness that I could once more breathe the pure Chautau- qua air.
REMINISCENCE OF FOURTH STREET.
In writing up the streets the historian has omitted our beautiful roadway, which in 1834 was almost path- less from Main over to Second street. Dr. Foote, the proprietor of the east end of the village, objected to a road being cut through, on the plea that, in part, it would spoil his farm ; and in order, as he thought, to block the game, he, "Sine Jones like," moved a house across the track just in front of where the Central school building now stands, causing quite a sensation in our quiet village. It stood there a week or ten days, during
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which time it was an object of much interest, many parties visiting it, not with a view of renting, but to examine its stability. Finally, on Saturday night there was a furious cyclone, not unlike but perhaps not quite so intense as the one which struck the land office in Mayville in 1836. However, the house went down under the pressure of a score or more of stalwart arms, a shower of axes, hand saws, crowbars, etc., and it fell with a crash, the participants not tarrying long, thinking that some one watching might put in an ap- pearance and perhaps scold a little. I went up the
next day to view the remains. The demolition was complete ; not a timber lay upon another. A second building could not be moved there on Sunday. Early Monday morning the commissioners were on hand, and as a result we have our beautiful Fourth, not quite as wide through what was once the old Doctor's land as it should be, but the gem street of the city notwith- standing.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE HOTEL PRECEDES CIVILIZATION-THE EARLY HO- TELS IN JAMESTOWN-THE FENTON OR DISHER HOUSE-AN EARLY VIEW FROM THE VERANDAH -BROWN'S FACTORY RACE FORGERY-BALLARD'S TAVERN-ELISHA ALLEN'S TAVERN AND THE BLIND HORSE BALL-ELISHA ALLEN AND HIS CLERK- ALLEN RENTS HIS TAVERN TO SOLOMON JONES AND MOVES INTO THE CASS HOUSE-LAYING OUT THE JUSTICE-A NOTED DEER LICK-HALL BUYS THE KIDDER FRAME, FINISHIES IT AND MAKES THE JONES' TAVERN, AFTERWARDS KNOWN AS SHAW'S HOTEL-FIRES ON MAIN STREET-ALLEN HOUSE -STABBING OF NAT SMITH -- BALES FAT PINE -- VAN VELSOR'S TRIANGLE-ELLICK JONES-RUFUS PIER -WILLARD RICE-MR. AND MRS. ALONZO KENT- DISTILLERIES.
May it not be truly said that the appearance of the hotel in a country marks its first step forward in civ- ilization, enlightenment and education; its commence- ment in arts and sciences, its first introduction to litera- ture. And as these increase in any country, in size, in beauty and in accommodations, do the arts of civi- lized life increase, and education spreads her wings.
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TIIE TOWN OF ELLICOTT.
We frequently hear it remarked that Christianity is the great forerunner of civilization-less often that civilization precedes Christianity; and furthermore that these must gain a foothold before history, science and literature can flourish within the confines of any nation. It has appeared to us that all important things inthis world originated in small beginnings, and not the smaller in the more important. As the world has advanced from its tribal condition into that of states and nations, do we not notice that the laws of hospitality must be observed before civilization com- mences. That the wanderer instead of having his throat operated upon by the sharpish, ragged edge of a flint, or his brains knocked out with a hammer of stone, must be kindly treated, entertained, fed, clothed, and sent on his way rejoicing. When the savage be- gins to entertain better motives, when his first rude ideas of law and order and community of interests have dawned on his mind, and he can view the stranger he chances to meet as nota altogether an enemy, he erects caravansaries or places in which the wanderer or tray-
eler and his beast may be partially protected, if not fed. This advancement marks the semi-barbarous condition of man, he has rulers and is subject to rude laws, cultivates rude arts and makes manifest that the first seeds of education are springing into life and will ere long bear fruit. But it is not un- til his savage and barbarous nature has been so far wrought upon and modified by the enlightenment around him, that he sees the advantage that may accrue to himself, by permitting his more civilized neighbor to travel unmolested and safely through his country, and has provided convenient places for his safety and entertainment, that he commences to reap
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the true advantage of his presence. This is well ex- emplified by the present condition of north-eastern Russia and the steppes of Siberia. Houses for the en- tertainment of travelers, hostelries are erected in which the traveler may be comfortably housed and fed, and government provides a rude but safe and never-failing means of transporting him from place to place. As soon as this stage of advancement is reached, and not until then, the advancement in civilization, in the arts and sciences, of education, and the refinements of life, commences and advances with rapidity. Thus it ap- pears that the hotel is the avant courier of civilization and of Christianity, of education and learning.
EARLY HOTELS IN JAMESTOWN.
Previous to the fall of 1814 traveling in the south part of the county was confined almost exclusively to those who were viewing the country in quest of loca- tions for their future homes. At the rapids, these were mostly accommodated at the Blowers house.
JACOB FENTON with his family, settled at the Rap- ids in the spring of 1814. Mr. Fenton was a native of Connecticut, a potter by trade, and a Revolutionary soldier. During the summer of that year, with the assistance of Judge Prendergast, he erected-for those days-a large, two-storied house to be used as a tav- ern. It was located in the center of the half block on the east side of Main street, between First and Second, and opposite to the Blowers house. The location was a side hill and the house on the steepest part of it. The front of the building was to the south towards the outlet, and had a wide, two-storied verandah running its entire southern frontage .* The hill was so steep,
* The front of this building was about 50 feet north of First street, and the west end 25 feet east of Main street.
ยท
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that on the north side of the building the second story was on a level with the ground, The house was com- modious, containing two large rooms on the lower floor with a wide hallway, and stairs leading to the second floor between; and a deep cellar excavated into the hill and under a lean-to behind and to the north. which usually was well stored with whiskey, venison, a few potatoes, etc. There were three large rooms and as many good-sized bed rooms on the second floor, and an attic divided into two rooms with sleeping accom- modations for as many as might apply. On the north- east corner of the lot adjoining Potter's alley and Sec- ond street was a 40x50 foot barn which it was almost impossible to reach on account of "The Quick Sand hole," which occupied Second street east from Main to Potter's alley ; it was long and wide, and good judges of mud holes estimated its depth to be greater than its length and breadth combined. Fenton's tavern was not only the drinking, but the business center of the hamlet of the rapids.
Will the present inhabitant of Jamestown in im- agination stand with us, in the open verandah of the Fenton house and view its surroundings as they were within our remembrance. To the south, no building whatever; a patch of cleared land on the opposite side of the outlet, (Prendergast's meadow;) beyond a dense forest. Between the house and the race are perhaps two or three hundred saw logs, sitting on which are a dozen or more of squaws and lazy Indians; their wig- wams are on the sidehill and lowland, a little to the right you can see the smoke curling up in blue streaks among the trees and bushes. (Lucius B. Warner's grounds and fine residence occupy that location now.) You go and talk with that old Indian down there on
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the logs and he will tell you that "the smoke of his father's wigwam went up among the trees on that hill- side a hundred years ago or more, and that that side hill is filled with the bones of many warriors who start- ed for the happy hunting grounds from beside the runaway waters of Jadaqueh." At an early day that locality was known as the "Indian burying ground." Down there to the southwest on the other side of the race is the saw mill, and that building in front (to the north) is the grist mill. The low building on the west side of Main street and below First street is the "mill shed," just above and across First street is Prender- gast's store, immediately opposite and across Main street to the west is Dr. Hazeltine's house, and above it on the corner is Elisha Allen's tavern, by far the handsomest building in town, which until a short time ago was called the Cass tavern; and that building above, of which you can merely see the highest part of the roof and the chimney is Judge Prendergast's house; all beyond is dense forest. Now, look towards the east. That big building down there where Gran- din's mill now stands is the "cotton factory" and the one beyond is Daniel Hazeltine's woolen factory and just across the alley between us and the cotton factory is Blower's slab shanty. The Judge has cut the pine trees along the side hill below Second street, to his east line and the woods you see over there belong to Dr. Foote. We are standing in the long two-storied verendah of Jacob Fenton's tavern which is on the south side of the house, if we were on the north side of the house we would see the big barn already mentioned, Tiffany's store on the corner of Main and Second, and Abner Hazeltine's house on Pine street, just back of the Bush block, where the big brick barn now stands
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