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Early State and Local History
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1. Ohio - 2.
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Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from Microsoft Corporation
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Early State and Loral History
Prepared and Published
by the
Dolly Todd Madison Chapter
Daughters of the American Revolution
HTERS
DAUGA
OF T
· AMERICA
THE . NOILAT
RICAN REVOLUT
Tittin, Chia 1915
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LILLARY 382574B ABTOR, LUNDY AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS . 1946 L
SPAHR & GLENN, PRINTERS COLUMBUS, OHIO
Mrefare
T has been the aim of the Dolly Todd Madison Chapter, in the preparation of this volume, to accomplish something that not only would be of interest to the present, but a heritage to the future. Realizing that much of our early local history had not been written and that the few remaining pioneers of our community who had helped to make that history were rapidly passing, the Programme Committee for the year 1912-1913 concluded that the most useful and inter- esting work immediately before the Chapter was that of gathering together and preserving in permanent form, our early unwritten local history. Too long delayed, the task assumed, although pleasant, was not an easy one. To best accomplish it, different subjects covering the historic field, were assigned to the different members chosen for the work. The part the Red Man played in our local history was made the subject of a separate paper.
Other papers review the early history and progress of our State, and the important part it has played in the history and development of our Nation.
And since this volume has been prepared by a Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, it seems appropriate to include within it, not only the military services rendered our Nation by the Revolutionary ancestors of our Members, but also, in so far as possible, their authentic and traditional family history; and likewise, the lineage of our Members descended from such ancestors.
In thus preserving much of our local history for posterity, we cherish only the hope of a grateful appreciation; and we dedicate this volume to the Memory of our Pioneer Men and Women.
MRS. JOHN L. LOTT.
Tiffin, Ohio, May 1, 1915.
Regent.
"A written memorial of the past and a record of the present, are works which civilization demands."
CONTENTS.
Page
Early Ohio History
1
What Ohio Has Contributed to the Nation
14
The War Governors of Ohio
23
The Passing of the Red Man
30
Our Pioneer Men and Women 44
Our Historic Sites and Buildings
62
Reminiscences of Pioneer Days
99
Our Own Sandusky
166
History of Our Chapter
174
Military Services of Revolutionary Ancestors .
177
Lineage of Chapter Members
248
Honor Roll:
Massachusetts 188
Connecticut
199
Rhode Island . 201
New Hampshire 205 211
New York
220
Pennsylvania .
241
Maryland .
246
General Honor Roll
247
Chapter Members
271
In Memoriam
274
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Portrait of Josiah Hedges
Frontispiece Facing Page 65
Fort Ball, 1813
The Bowe Tavern
71
First Brick Building
73
First Court House
75
First Protestant Church .
79
New Jersey
Early Chin History 1803 -- 1861
By MRS. JAMES R. HOPLEY, Bucyrus, Ohio.
HE early history of Ohio carries us into foreign courts, out upon the high seas; into the heart of the most ancient civilization of this continent; it carries us into primeval forests and out upon the great inland lakes of the world. It is written in water, in blood, in fire and in the imperishable iron and granite of some of the completest and most wonderful char- acters of the world's history. Upon its soil occurred the first Declaration of Independence, and it was the battle ground at one and the same time of three nations. In Ohio the concluding battle of the Revolution was fought. The greatest general of his time was born in Ohio. The greatest American woman novelist of her time was born in Ohio, and the greatest living woman lyric singer is an Ohioan. Upon Ohio's soil culminated one of the great personal tragedies of history-the defeat of St. Clair, the Territorial governor, who, the hero of many wars, the presiding officer of the Continental Congress when the Ordinance of 1787 was framed, the man whose fortune clothed and fed Washing- ton's forces at Valley Forge, was, in his old age and broken by defeat, banished to his former home in Pennsylvania, home, alas, no more. The government never repaid him, and he died by falling from the cart in which he drove from door to door, selling the produce of his own small garden. In a country graveyard at Greensburg, his resting place is marked with a humble sandstone, on which is inscribed "The earthly remains of General Arthur St. Clair are deposited beneath this humble monument, erected to supply the place of a nobler one due from his country." The long military service of General St. Clair had unfitted him for dealing with a representative body and that he was arbitrary in the discharge of his duties is true.
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Early Ohio History
So the veteran of three wars was retired, after fourteen years service as Territorial governor, and the machinery of state, placed in the hands of the Secretary, Charles Willing Byrd, who enjoyed the approval of Jefferson, then President, and of the liberty-loving Ohioans led by that superb and well-balanced patriot, Edward Tiffin.
We are to consider here the period beginning with Statehood, 1803, to the period which ushered in the Civil War, 1861.
By virtue of the enabling Act of Congress, passed in 1802, thirty-five members, representing the nine counties, Trumbull, Jefferson, Belmont, Washington, Fairfield, Ross, Adams, Cler- mont and Hamilton, who were elected in October (this very month 109 years ago) met in Chillicothe in November and framed the Constitution for the State to be. This Constitu- tion was then and there approved and adopted by the vote of twenty-seven men, and was not submitted to the people at all. In this the new state was like New York, Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Georgia, Maryland, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Tenn- essee, and Vermont, in all, twenty other States. These con- ventions, like that of Ohio, regarded themselves as the sovereign source of power, and so far as this feature of the first Consti- tutional Convention is concerned, it was not extraordinary nor without dignified precedent, but it forms an amusing episode, since St. Clair was dethroned and banished in order that the People might rule. The date on which Ohio became a Com- monwealth of the United States, has been greatly discussed, but is now conceded to be a settled question. Ohio became a sovereign State and entered the Union of States, March Ist, 1803. We believe that Ohio completed and that the Senate and House and the President himself, understood Ohio to have completed, the civil organization on March 1st, 1803, for on that date President Jefferson sent to the Senate for confirmation as district judge for the State of Ohio, the name of Charles W. Byrd, and the names of Michael Baldwin and David Zeigler, as United States District Attorney and United States Marshal. It is seen that the Federal district of Ohio was organized on the same day Ohio emerged from her Territorial condition into
3
Early Ohio History
that of Statehood. This is the earliest date on which Ohio can be called a State, for the law-making power is the primal representative of the sovereignty of the State, and by the ex- press provision of the Constitution this was the date on which the first General Assembly met, the State government was organized, the Territorial government terminated, and Ohio became a Commonwealth and a member of the Union.
In the history of the Seal of Ohio there is much to surprise and perhaps to amuse us, as the changes in its form have been so many, and have been made often-times without authority of law. This seal was to be kept by the Governor and used by him officially. The design was designated March 25, 1803, after this manner, by the Legislature: "The Great Seal of Ohio shall be two inches in diameter. On the right side near the bottom shall be drawn a sheaf of wheat and a bundle of seven- teen arrows, both erect. In the background and rising above shall appear a mountain, over which the Sun is rising; all to be surrounded by these words-'The Great Seal of the State of Ohio.""' On February 19, 1805, the seal was changed, and again, January 1, 1831; then reverted to the first design, March 10, 1851; then changed anew April 6, 1866, the work being done by Tiffany. By a law enacted May 9, 1868, the original seal was restored, except, for a mountain, was sub- stituted, "a range of mountains." As is well known, the mountain pictured in our seal was inspired by the beautiful hill, Mount Logan, at Chillicothe, which looked down upon the first Constitutional Convention. Thus Ohio was equipped and sealed for her labors. She was the first born of the Ordi- nance of 1787, the fourth to be added to the Original Thirteen.
The first Ohio legislature met at Chillicothe, as we have said, on March 1, 1803, the members of the House of Repre- sentatives, thirty in number, and of the Senate, fifteen in num- ber, having been chosen at an election held the preceding Jan- uary. The Governor, the members of the General Assembly, the sheriffs and coroners, were the only part of the State govern- ment chosen by election. The other State executive officers were selected by the legislature, including Secretary of State, Auditor of Accounts, and State Treasurer. It was also left to that body to designate the judicial districts and to select the
4
Early Ohio History
chief military officers, and judges of the Supreme Court and Courts of Common Pleas. Ross county had the honor of furnishing the first Governor of the State, Edward Tiffin, who was re-elected in 1805, serving two terms. The name Governor has been pronounced a misnomer during the life of the first Constitution, as the powers of the chief executive were much restricted, and a bare majority in the legislature was sufficient to enact legislation, regardless of opposition.
Ohio was not conspicuous in Congress during the early period of Statehood. Her first member and her only one for the period from 1803 to 1812, was Jeremiah Morrow. Morrow was a Jeffersonian Democrat. He was returned to Congress twice in after years, in 1830 and 1840.
In 1804, the purchase, from the Indians, of all the Western Reserve, west of the Cuyahoga, together with the lands south of Wayne's Treaty line, was accomplished. This territory in- cluded the Fire lands, or Sufferer's lands, consisting of a half million acres, which Connecticut gave to those who had lost their property by the torch in the War of the Revolution. The Fire lands included the present counties of Huron and Erie, and a part of the eastern portion of Ottawa county.
In this year, Ohio University was opened at Athens. It is one of the four Universities, to the support of which, the State contributes by general taxation, the others being Miami, at Oxford, Ohio State, at Columbus, and Wilberforce, for col- ored youth, near Xenia. Ohio and Miami were the first schools to be favored with land grants from Congress, for institutions of learning. Miami was incorporated in 1809, but was not in operation until 1824. Neither Ohio State, nor Miami, were aided by the State, until 1881, when both began to receive small annual appropriations.
The year 1807 saw the beginning of a long contest between the legislative and judicial branches of State government. The cause was an act passed in December 1805, one section of which deprived litigants of the right to trial by jury, in actions brought before justices, where the amount was more than twenty and less than fifty dollars. A constitutional principle was involved and when Judge Calvin Pease, resident judge of the Common Pleas Court in Belmont and Jefferson counties ruled the act
5.
Early Ohio History
unconstitutional, he established a precedent followed ever since by National and State Supreme Courts. There had been a gen- eral impression that a legislative act took precedence over a judicial decree, and discussion was wide-spread. On January 3, 1808, a special committee of the House reported a Reso- lution to the effect that the Judges of the State were not auth- orized by the Constitution to set aside an Act of the Legislature by declaring it unconstitutional and void. The House in De- cember impeached Judges Pease and Tod, (Supreme Court Judges Huntington and Tod, having affirmed Judge Pease's ruling). The Senate sat as a Court of Impeachment from De- cember 1808 to February 1809, acquitting both judges. A similar problem before the Supreme Court of the United States was not ruled on until after January 1808, so the State judges made their decision without aid or precedent from the highest court. The "sweeping resolutions" adopted by the House in 1809 and 1810 were the result of this controversy, the supporters of the impeachment proceedings being strong enough to force the resolutions through. It vacated the offices of all the then judges of the Supreme Court, all resident judges of Common Pleas circuits, the offices of Secretary of State, Auditor, and Treasurer, and provided for the election of justices in every township. The action of the people of the State in electing the impeached judges to high office, including returning them to the bench, is construed to mean that the people at large recognized the soundness of the judicial rulings, and since that time, the right of the highest court in the State to declare an act unconstitutional, has been recognized.
Chillicothe remained the capital of Ohio until 1810, when by legislative act the capital was transferred to Zanesville, necessary buildings being furnished there, free of expense to the State. Zanesville enjoyed this distinction but two years, as Chillicothe again secured it for the four years prior to 1816, when Columbus became the seat of government. Owners of land "on the east side of the Scioto opposite the town of Franklinton, donated to the Commonwealth, ten acres for a State House, twenty acres for a penitentiary, contracting to erect thereon suitable buildings."
6
Early Ohio History
Among the acts passed by the first legislature affecting a part of the population, were the black laws, dating back to 1804. They required black and mulatto persons to furnish legal proof of their freedom and to give bond against becoming public charges. They could not testify in any case in which one of the parties to the dispute was white, and they were not permitted to maintain an action at law against a white person. From 1809, on, numerous memorials protesting against these laws were sent to the legislature, but they were not repealed until 1849.
The first steamboat on the Ohio River was built and launched at Pittsburgh, in 1811; the steamer was the New Orleans. This was rapidly followed by others, and merchan- dise, passengers, and mails were carried with dispatch. Pre- vious to this time, packet boats were polled up the river, making the round trip from Cincinnati to Pittsburgh in a month. Seven years later, steam navigation was inaugurated on Lake Erie, when the steamer "Walk-in-the-Water," named after an Indian chief of the region, made her first trip in August, 1813.
In the eight years from 1804 to 1812, twenty-two new counties were organized. They were: Muskingum, 1804; Athens, Champaign, Geauga, and Highland, 1805; Ashtabula, Cuyahoga, Portage, and Miami, 1807; Delaware, Knox, Licking, Preble, Stark, and Tuscarawas, in 1808; Darke, 1809; Clinton, Fayette, Guernsey, Madison, and Pickaway, in 1810; and Coshocton, in 1811.
In 1811 Tecumseh's federation of Indian tribes was formed to drive white settlers out of Ohio. Tecumseh, who has been pronounced the greatest warrior, excepting Grant and Sherman, born within the borders of Ohio, recognized as an orator and a man of great intelligence and ability, is said to have been born about 1769, at the Shawnee village of Piqua, five miles west of Springfield. He traveled thousands of miles on foot, persuading other tribes in the south and west to join him. He believed that the Indian tribes who had sold the Western Reserve to the settlers, had no right to barter away their herit- age, which he claimed was held in trust by them, for the whole native American race. The federated tribes were met at
7
Early Ohio History
Tippecanoe River by a force of white men under command of William Henry Harrison. The battle was fought while Tecum- seh was absent, and the Indians were defeated. Tecumseh then allied himself with the British, and at the time of his death, in the Battle of the Thames, was holding a brigadier general's commission in the British army.
The War of 1812 brought the only naval battle ever fought, within the confines of Ohio. This is one of the most celebrated and decisive naval battles of history. Perry's victory near Put-in-Bay, September 10, 1813, is to be fitly commemorated on its centennial anniversary next year. There were many Ohio men on Perry's ships and his little fleet was used to carry Harrison's soldiers on toward Malden and the Thames. Ohio, thinly settled as it was, promptly furnished three regiments when the call for troops came at the outbreak of the struggle. These regiments hewed their way through the forests and wild regions, from Urbana to the Lakes, only to fall into the hands of the British as prisoners, when Hull surrendered at Detroit.
Kentucky's promptness in sending three regiments of volunteers to Ohio gave this State protection for its borders. Harrison, the hero of Tippecanoe, was then placed in command of the western army and the valiant service of his troops at Malden and the Battle of the Thames, October 5th, 1813, effectually put an end to the war in that quarter.
The War of 1812 has sometimes been called the second War of Independence, but it was rather a contest for territory. The people of Ohio certainly felt less interest in the impress- ment of our seamen by the British, though great indignation was aroused by this unjustifiable and cowardly practice. The promptness with which three regiments were raised in our thinly populated State shows that the men of that period were in- fluenced both by sentiment and tangible interest in their possessions. The surrender of Detroit is called, by General Anderson, the most humiliating chapter in our national history. Hull, the commander, was recommended for clemency on ac- count of his age, yet, he points out, that Hull was the same age as Major Robert Anderson when he defended Fort Sumpter; just the age of Admiral Dewey when he sank the Spanish fleet
8
Early Ohio History
at Manila Bay; and was a year younger than General Scott when he took the City of Mexico.
Ohio in the War of 1812, numbered, probably, fourteen thousand. General Harrison, who had been made commander, resented the criticism of Secretary of War Armstrong, and after the Battle of the Thames, resigned. General McArthur was placed in command and called upon Ohio for five hundred mounted volunteers. With these, and two hundred from Ken- tucky, and seventy friendly Indians, he dispersed the Indians threatening Detroit, and later, twenty-five miles from the head of Lake Ontario, at Malcolm's Mills, November 5, 1814, engaged in battle with the Canadian militia, taking two hundred prisoners. This was the only command in the war that penetrated two hundred and twenty-five miles into the ene- my's country.
The attack on Fort Stephenson, now Fremont, during the summer of 1813, was notable for the heroic defense of the gar- rison under command of Major George Croghan. The garrison of one hundred and sixty men, with one field piece, repulsed Procter's five hundred Canadians, with a siege train and eight hundred Indians. While not the most desperate defense in military annals, it was a remarkably stubborn and effective one, and the result was extremely important.
The National Road, begun in 1808, was completed in 1812. It ran from Cumberland, Maryland, through this State, and through Pennsylvania, Virginia, Indiana, and into Illinois. States along the line of the road were given an outlet to the Atlantic, and settlers bound westward, found it "a great aid, to rapid and comfortable travel." The cost was seven million dollars. In 1834 Congress began to surrender parts of it to the States, and by 1856 it was owned entirely by them. Ohio received her section, over two hundred miles, in 1853.
In 1817, as the final result of the contest of 1812, so far as the Indians were concerned, the National government purchased from them, their title to all that part of the State north of the Ohio River and west of the Fire lands, except a few tracts re- tained by the tribes. The Wyandots, Senecas, Delawares, Pottowatomies, Ottawas, Shawnees, and Chippewas, were paid sums, varying, from four thousand dollars in perpetuity,
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Early Ohio History
to the Wyandots, to a single payment of five hundred dollars, to a Delaware. The tracts reserved were subsequently traded by the Indians for lands west of the Mississippi River, but it was not until 1841 that the last of the Ohio Indians, the Wyan- dots, left the State for their new reservations.
With the close of the War of 1812, so glorious to us in achievements on land and sea, Ohio was at peace with the Indians, and enjoyed thirty-one years uninterrupted by war. These years were crowded with remarkable developments, industrially, in science, government, education, literature, art and invention. Then came the war with the sister republic of Mexico, 1846-1848, in which Ohio did not sympathize greatly. Texas had been annexed December 29, 1846, as a State of the Union. April 24, 1846, General Zachary Taylor, then maneuvering U. S. troops on the left bank of the Rio Grande, in what was claimed to be United States territory, was attacked by the Mexican general, Arista. It is usual to say that this war was begun by this hostile act. Ohio, though unfavorable to this contest, furnished her quota for army and navy, about one-eighth of the entire forces. The result was the acquisition of California, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and part of Colorado. The war closed with the treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo. Scott and Taylor were the heroes of this conflict, by which was acquired one hundred thousand more square miles than the area of the Original Thirteen States, and was followed by the Gadsden purchase, 1853, of Louisiana.
In January, 1822, the legislature appointed a canal com- mission, which later reported favorably on the project of con- necting Lake Erie and the Ohio River, by canals. February 4, 1825, a board of canal commissioners was appointed and authority given to proceed with construction. Excavation was begun in 1826 and the system completed in 1842. The Ohio and Erie canal, connecting Cleveland and Portsmouth, is three hundred and nine miles in length. The Miami and Erie, from Toledo to Cincinnati, two hundred and fifty miles; the total cost of construction being over fourteen million dollars. The building of the canals attracted capital and popu- lation, and was of great benefit to the regions traversed, re- sulting in the rapid upbuilding of the towns along the route.
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Early Ohio History
But the first of the canals was scarcely completed when rail- road building began in Ohio, and the canal system was not extended beyond the original plan.
In 1787, in addition to the act setting aside every sixteenth section of each township for school purposes, it was also ordered that two entire townships be given perpetually for a seminary of learning under the care of the legislature of the State. In 1825 the legislature passed a law, imposing a general tax for the support of public schools and providing for their establish- ment in every township. Four years later the tax was in- creased to one and one-half mills. Up to 1825 the schools were under no State supervision, and there was no attempt to follow a system. Twelve years later, in 1837, the office of State Superintendent of Common Schools was created and maintained for three years. In 1843 it was revived and the title changed to the State Commissioner of Common Schools. Since then the State has continued to exercise supervision over the public schools. In 1849, boards of education were em- powered to establish high schools and schools of lower grade, and by 1850 there were graded schools in over sixty cities.
The Constitution of 1851 pledged the people of Ohio to preserve undiminished, all funds arising from donations made to the Commonwealth, for education. The legislature was empowered to increase these funds for the benefit of a common school system. In 1853, a general school law was enacted putting township schools under limited supervision of boards of education in the townships, providing for the organization of separate school districts in cities and villages of over three hundred inhabitants, giving boards of education power to erect school houses and to fix the rate of taxes for school pur- poses. The funds arising from the sale of school lands in the State, were and are still preserved in a huge trust fund, on which six per cent interest is paid annually, and divided among the districts from which the money was originally derived. This is known as the irreducible State debt.
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