USA > Ohio > Butler County > A history and biographical cyclopaedia of Butler County, Ohio, with illustrations and sketches of its representative men and pioneers. Vol. 1 > Part 66
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The uplands proper are remnants of the blue lime- stove plateau which once occupied all of southwestern Ohio, but so much of which has already been removed by aqueous and glacial denudation. They are almost universally covered with shallow deposits of drift, but over very large areas the character of the underlying rok shows through, giving its peculiar features to the topography, to the agricultural capacity, and to the water
supply of the districts occupied. These upland drift deposits are in considerable part derived from the waste of blue limestone land to the northward, so that a closer bond of connection exists between the soil and the under- lying rock than is usually found in drift-covered regions.
The lowest of the drift deposits, or that which rests directly upon the bedded rocks, is the bowlder clay. This formation is shown with great distinctness and in very numerous exposures in Butler County. Almost every stream in some portion of its course discloses it. A particular feature of the bowlder clay in Butler County is that of ancient vegetable growths, branches, trunks, and roots of trees in large quantities. Examples can be seen in following almost any stream to its source, but one or two points may be named which are specially noteworthy in this respect. Collins's Run, near Oxford, a small tributary of Four-Mile Creek, shows in its banks very numerous exposures of these pre-glacial and inter- glacial forest growths. The vegetation is imbedded in the clay very often, and part of it shows that it has been subjected to rough mechanical agencies. The frequent presence of leaves and roots in or upon the deposit serves to show, however, that the source of the vegetation was not very far removed. The north bank of Elk Creek, opposite the mill at Miltonville, also gives a fine exposure of the clay. At this point a peculiar modification of the bowlder clay is found that deserves particular mention. It is a clay distinctly green in color, and as shown by a single analysis or a specimen obtained at this point, is very rich in potash and soda. The analysis made by Professor Wormley is here subjoined :
Water combined, 4.50
Silicic acid,
55.10
Iron sesquioxide, 6.79
Alumina,
19.41
Carbonate of lime, 4.55
Magnesia, .
0.82
Potash and soda, 4.95
Silicate of lime, . 3.55
99.67
It will be seen that the elements above named, potash and soda, are abundant enough here to make the clay a fertilizer of considerable value. Vivianite, or phos- plate of iron, is of frequent, perhaps constant occurrence in it. Vegetable matter is also always present. This green clay has been more frequently met with in Warren and Butler Counties than elsewhere.
The vegetable matter that is intermingled with the bowlder clay is to be distinguished from that which is borne upon its surface. The presence of a buried soil of inter-glacial age has been noticed frequently in other counties. An interesting example is recorded by David Christy in his Letters on Geology, published in 1848. In the last letter-of the series, page 5, he says :.
" Beneath our diluvium are occasional beds of ' hard pan or very tough blue clay, with imbedded pebbles.' I had my attention called to this new and interesting
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HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY.
feature of our geology last Summer by Robert Beckett, Esq., eight miles cast of Oxford. He called upon me to examine the stump of a tree standing erect in this deposit at a point where a small stream is encroaching upon a bluff. The roots penetrated the hard pan in all directions. Twenty feet of diluvium overlies it. We dug out the stump and a part of the roots. Some years since Mr. Beckett, in digging a well twenty or thirty rods distant from this point, at a depth of ten feet in the diluvium, struck upon another small tree, standing erect, with the trunk and some of the branches almost entire. This tree continued down to a depth of thirty feet, where he found its roots, in the natural position of growth, penetrating the hard pan."
Mr. J. P. MaeLean has found, in the neighborhood of MeGonigle's and from there northward to Darrtown, trees buried at a depth of from thirty to fifty feet, and is of opinion that a forest is there covered by later deposits.
The yellow gravelly clay that makes the main element of the drift in all of this region is very abundant in this county. It is not formed from the weathering of the upper portions of the bowlder clay in place. The action of the atmosphere upon an exposed bed of blue clay changes its color and also its texture, it is true, but much more than this is required to account for the surface clays of Southern Obio. They have been worn away from their old places of deposit by water, and have been redeposited. The bowldier clay is always unstratified; the yellow clays are generally distinctly stratified. The uplands of the county, especially of its northern and central portions, are almost universally covered with de- posits of this kind. . There are no elevations in the county that escape the deposits of the modified drift.
The sand and gravel that make a third element in the drift of this region do not deserve a place by them- selves. They form a phase only of the second order of deposits, and must be referred not only to the same gen- eral line of agencies, but also approximately to the same time. As has just been stated, the highest elevations in the county give clear proof of having been involved in the submergence, by which alone these facts can be ex- plained. Bowlders are found at all elevations, and some of the largest size are found at the greatest altitude. One lying on the highest land of the west side of Ross Township measured one hundred and thirty feet above ground.
It is to be noticed that the bedded rock has been cut out to a greater depth than existing agencies ean account for throughout most of the area of the Miami Valley. The rocky floor is very seldom laid bare by the river, and is as seldom struck in any excavations or boring's that are made in the valley.
The valley is filled with immense accumulations of gravel and bowlders. These gravel bels undoubtedly overlie deposits of bowlder clay in many parts of the
valley. . Indeed, these deposits are occasionally, though rarely, struck in wells and similar excavations, and some- times they even approach very near the surface. The gravel is of various sorts and sizes, and indicates various degrees of strength in the currents that have transported it. Large quantities of sand are scattered through it. In composition it is principally limestone, thus agreeing with the pebbles and bowlders that fill the drift clays of the country; but unlike the true drift pebbles, it has lost the marks of the previous stage in its history, the shap- ing which it received under the glacial sheet. Its peh- bles no longer show the polish and striation due to this stage; but, on the other hand, bear unmistakable marks of having been fashioned in running water.
The gravel beds are in all cases covered with consid- erable deposits of loam and sand, which form the pres- ent sources of the valley. These deposits are arranged in three natural and well marked divisions, the first bottoms, the second bottoms, and the gravel terraces, sometimes called the third bottoms. Of this series, eon- trary to the general order in geology, the lowest member, the first bottoms, is the newest, and the highest member, the gravel terraces, is the oldest. In other words, the first and second bottoms do not extend beneath the gravel terraces, and consequently do not result from the denu- dation of portions of the valley. The gravel terraces are at least one hundred feet above low water of the river now. They are generally left in small and isolated fragments on the margins of the valleys, but sometimes they are found to hold considerable areas. In the vicin- ity of the village of Trenton they can be seen and stud- ied to considerable advantage, as also in the vicinity of Poast-town, ou the Banker and Lucas farms.
To follow their history we must go back to the Cham- plain epoch of geology-to the period of submergence that followed the glacial period. The level of this por- tion of the country was at that time four hundred feet lower than at present. Stratified deposits, on a large scale, of sand, gravel, and clay are found four hundred feet above the present drainage of the country. At the period of greatest submergence there could have been little or no current throughout the valley, but during the slow advancing movement of depression the valley was filled with immense accumulations of rearranged drift. We may suppose, then, that the gravel terraces are a part of the old floor of the valley, and that they once extended with a degree of uniformity throughout the wide basins in which we find the remnants of them to-day. As the continent emerged once more and slowly regained its present elevation, the river channels would be cut deeper and deeper into these deposits, the former surfaces of which would be left one hundred feet or more above the present river beds.
Little needs to be said in regard to their composition, as the name by which these deposits are known, the gravel terraces, indicates the main element in their mak-
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GEOLOGY.
281
ing up. Gravel, sand, and loam, variously intermingled, constitute the whole series. The sorting and arranging of materials could only have been accomplished in long extended portions of time. There are no indications of tumultuous deposition in any portion of the series. The soils formed from the weathering and decomposition of the surfaces of these beds are kind and productive.
The second bottoms, like the terraces, must be referred to causes and conditions not now existing in the valley. They lie above the reach of the highest floods, being thirty feet or more above low water in the main valley. They occupy broad areas, and constitute, by way of ex- cellence, the farming lands of the main valley. They consist of loams from two to six feet in thickness, over- lying gravel. They seem to owe their origin to an arrest of the upward movement of the continent, which con- tinued for a considerable period.
The first bottoms are the most recent of the series. They are, indeed, very closely connected with the present state of things. They occupy the deeper part of the valley, and are covered by all of the higher floods. To these floods they owe their origin in part, being made up of the sediments deposited from high water. An areua- ceous deposit filled with land shells- is a common and characteristic member of the formation. The shells must have mainly grown upon the regions where we now find them, and were buried by the deposits of annual floods. The clearing of the valleys and their drainage basin has introduced many elements of change, and the formation of these bottom lands may almost be said to have been interrupted. This sandy bed, to which reference has been made, is akin in composition and character to the loess of European geologists. An excellent example of the formation may be seen on the river banks within the limits of the village of Middletown. It is burned here into a cream-colored brick that answers well for a paving brick, and which is extensively used for this service.
Professor Wormley gives the following as the analysis of a specimen taken at this point:
Water combined,
5.20
Silicic acid, 42.30
Sesquioxide of iron, 3.48
Alumina, . 7.52
Carbonate of lime, 23.21
Silicate of lime, . .
5.09
Carbonate of magnesia, 13.09
99.39
As ean readily be judged from such a composition, soils of great fertility can not be formed from this de- posit, but there can be no doubt that it would serve an excellent purpose as a top dressing for uplands. It is, in reality, a shell mari, and would reward intelligent use very liberally. The thickness of this bed has not been found to exceed four feet in any exposures noted.
"joint clay" of the western valleys. Its composition is shown in the appended analysis made by Professor Wormley :
Water combined, . 4.20
Silicic acid, . . 70.10
Sesquioxide of iron, 5.30
Alumina, . . 13.90
Silicate of lime, 2.10
Magnesia, carbonate, 1.44
Potash and soda, . 3.20
100.24
This deposit can be also seen at the point named under the last head. It is, however, less widely distrib- uted through the valley.
Butler County, says Professor Orton, stands scarcely second in productive power to any equal area in the State. . No qualification certainly would be required it the valley of the Great Miami and that portion of the county lying east of the river were alone to be taken into account. This region might put in an unquestioned claim to be styled the garden of Ohio. It is made up of the broad and fertile intervales of the streamns that now traverse the valleys or of the still more desirable areas that were the valleys of an earlier epoch, but which are now deserted by streams, and which are evenly filled with the beds of the later drift, together with up- lands rising by gentle slopes to an altitude of four to five hundred feet above the river, and whose surfaces are hardly less productive than the areas first named.
The soil of all this district consists, in great measure, of decomposed limestone gravel, and exhibits every excel- lence of limestone land. A single area may be noted here as furnishing a unique line of facts in the native vegetation of the county. A chestnut grove is to be found in the southeast corner of Union Township, iu section fourteen. It is well known that the chestnut confines itself generally to the slate and sandstone soils of the county. Indeed, the boundary between the slates and the limestones in southwestern Ohio could be defined with satisfactory precision by noting the line where the chestnuts begin as one passes eastward. Isolated trees are known in the gravels and sands of limestone districts, it is true, but they are very rare. Dr. John A. Warder has called attention to one growing near Milford, in the Little Miami Valley, and another is known in Greene County, but in the area to which attention is now invited a forest growth in which the chestuut is a large element is found. The trees have attained a diameter of four feet in some instances, and in others stumps, long dead, are seen with large trees growing from them. The trees fruit well here aud reproduce themselves abundantly. Chestnuts (the fruit) were sold to the amount of forty dollars from a single farm a few years ago.
The soil does uot betray any peculiarities upon a su- perficial view, but the wells in the vicinity all show a great deposit of yellow sand beneath the surface. Many
There is often associated with the above named for- mation a sort of clay from two to four feet in thickness that agrees in physical characters very closely with the | fruitless attempts to secure wells in this neighborhood
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282
HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY.
are on record, the sand proving to be a quicksand, and caving in so rapidly as to prevent the sinking of the shaft to water. It has been thought that the sand would prove to be a molding sand, but no trials of it have been made. The bed of sand is anomalous, and it is interesting to note that the native forest growth which covers it is also exceptional. There are no peculiarities in the remaining drift soils of the county that require mention.
The poorest of them, like those covering the uplands of the northern' and western townships, if handled with skill and subjected to a rational system of agriculture, would take high rank when compared with even the strongest lands of the Atlantic border. Measured against the fruitful valleys and slopes just mentioned, and tilled under a system which even these noble tracts can not much longer endure, they seem somewhat stubborn and sterile.
There are no native soils on the uplands of the county, but the beds of drift grow thinner as we pass to the southward, and occasionally they disappear for limited areas from the slopes of the hills. The soil that is there formed from the waste of the shales and limestones of the Cincinnati series is of unusual excellence. The fa- mous blue grass land of Kentucky, it will be remem- bered, is derived from this same system.
The fact that the boundary of the drift is being rap- idly neared as we approach the southern line of the county explains certain points in the topography of the four southwestern townships. They are much rougher and more broken than the remaining arcas. This arises from the failure of the drift to cover the irregularities here as it has done elsewhere. There is certainly no reason to suppose that the contour of the rocky floor is more irregular in one district than in another. What Butler County owes to the drift can be seen by comparing Liberty and Union Townships of the southeastern corner with Reily and Morgan Townships of the south-west.
The views furnished by the uplands, especially as we approach the Great Miami Valley from either side, are many of them very wide and attractive. Several can be named that are not to be surpassed in quiet pastoral beauty by any thing within the limits of the State.
From Snively's Hill, near Jacksonburg, a wide and beautiful expanse of country is shown of the main val- ley on the east and sonth, and of the valley of Seven- Mile Creck on the west.
A still more commanding outlook is furnished on the
farm of Randolph Mecker, near Pisgah. It comprises nearly one-fourth part, and that the richest corner, of Butler County.
Such elements as these are not to be overlooked in making ont the catalogue of the attractions that a county possesses for human occupation.
The water supply of Batler County can not be said to be good. The geological formation from which the county is built is universally and necessarily poor in this respect. The rain-fall can not penetrate the fine grained clays of the Cincinnati series, and is consequently turned outwards in surface drainage. Wherever the rock is heavily covered with drift beds the supply is improved, both in quality and quantity; but in the thinly covered uplands reliance can not be safely placed on wells. There is no excuse, however, for a defective supply for either man or beast in a district which has so generous a rain- fall as Sonthern Ohio enjoys. It is only necessary to save the roof water in properly constructed and properly guarded cisterns.
The highest land in the county is not more than six hundred and fifty or six hundred and seventy feet above the Ohio River at Cincinnati. The highest land meas- ured is in the western portion of Madison Township, the ground now owned by Hampton H. Long. Another very high spot is two miles west of Jacksonburg, Wayne Township, on the farm of Colonel Phares. Its elevation. by barometer is six hundred and forty-two feet above the base above named. Locke gives the elevation of a point of cliff' limestone that barely enters the county on the north line of Milford Township as six hundred and one feet. Two miles due west of Oxford, on the Fair- field Turnpike, an elevation, determined by the level, occurs of six hundred and ten feet above the Ohio River at Cincinnati. The elevations of a few of the prominent points in the county are appended :
Miami Canal at Hamilton above low water at
Cincinnati, 169
Low water of the Miami at Hamilton, 131
Middletown, canal level, . . 211
Oxford, grade of railroad at depot, . 480
Oxford, highest ground within corporation, 532
Somerville, 334
Jacksonburg, 543
Phares's farm, two miles west of Jacksonburg, 642 Snively's Hill, one mile south of Jacksonburg, 563 Turnpike, two miles west of Oxford, 610
North-east corner of Oxford Township, on Darr-
town Pike (formerly Riley's tavern), 60₺
Miami River at Venice, . :50
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HAMILTON.
283
HAMILTON.
TOPOGRAPHY.
HAMILTON, the scat of justice for the county of Butler, is situated ou both banks of the Great Miami River, ahout thirty miles, by land, from its junetion with the Ohio River, and about fifty miles pursuing the meanders of the river.
The original Indian name of the Miami River was . Te-wighte-wa. It is so nanted on an old map of the country engraved in the year 1762, dedicated to General Amherst, then commander-in-chief of the British forces in North America. ' Te-wighte-wa was also the original name of the Miami tribe of Indians. On the first inter- course of the whites with them the old Indians of the Miami tribe called themselves by that name. According to some old books we find that the Miami River was sometimes known as Rocky River, or Stony River.
Hamilton is situated in 39º 26' north latitude, and 84° 31' west longitude from London, or 7º 29' west from the City of Washington. The upper plain, where the court house and principal improvements of the town are located, is about thirty-four feet above the surface of the water in the Miami River at its common stage. -The soil is alluvial, resting on a strata of gravel at least forty feet thick, that being the greatest depth to which the earth has been penetrated. Pure water is every- where to be obtained in abundance by digging to a level with the water in the river. The water in the wells rises and falls with the Miami, hence it is presumed that they are supplied by water filtering through the gravel from the river. The water obtained is clear and cool, but strongly impregnated with lime, so much so that tea-kettles aud other culinary vessels in which it is boiled soon acquire a coating of lime on the inside, which re- quires to be frequently removed. It is not known to contain any other foreign substance in any considerable quantity.
The alluvial plain on which the city of Hamilton is situated extends back about a mile and a half from the river to the base of the hills, which ultimately rise to about the height of two hundred and fifty to three hun- dred and fifty feet above the plain. The hills run in a smithwardly direction, then gradually incline to the south- enst, presenting a level plain or valley between them and the river at and below Hamilton.
The site where Hamilton now stands, previous to being occupied by General St. Clair's army, was mostly covered with a dense forest of timber, with thick underhrusl. About a mile to the south was a pond covering about one hundred acres of land, evidently the bed of the Miami River at no very remote period.
The tract of land lying between this pond and the river comprehended about six hundred acres, and was at that time a beautiful meadow covered with high grass. Above the fort, in what is now the upper part of the town, was also a beautiful prairie of forty or fifty acres.
In digging cellars in the northern part of the town of Hamilton, in the year 1855, two teeth of the inas- todon were found near each other embedded in the gravel, about five feet below the surface of the ground, bearing testimony that this huge animal at some former time dwelt in the forests in the vicinity. At the time of the first settlement of the country vast herds of deer and elk roamed through the woods, and numbers of other kinds of game were very abundant, and remained so for some time afterwards.
In the south part of the town, near the old burying ground on the corner of lot number forty-four, or on the west side of Third Street, and just north of the Junction Railway, was a mound of earth four feet high and thirty feet diameter. On removing it for the erection of a building, the bones of two human skeletons were found, with some flint arrow points and other stone implements. The hills in the neighborhood of Hamilton are composed of first a rich fertile mould, then loam, intermixed with loose stones, and underneath interstratifications of blue limestone and marl in places.
THE LAST COMMANDER OF THE FORT.
The latest commander of the fort was Major Jonathan Cass, who was born in the year 1753, about fifteen miles from Newburyport, New Hampshire. His ancestors were from Devonshire, England. His remote ancestors were of Norman birth. He was living in Exeter, New Hamp- shire, when the news reached there of the battle of Lex- ington. With some half dozen comrades he set off at once, musket in hand, to join the army, marching from his home to Cambridge. He was where the balls flew thickest at the battle of Banker Hill, and participated in the great battles of Trenton, Princeton, Germantown, Moumouth, and Saratoga, remaining in the army until the close of our great Revolutionary struggle. His ae- counts as brigade quartermaster were closed June 26, 1783, and a certificate was issued to him for the bal- ance due of £65. 108. 4d. Whether the government ever paid this certificate or not, is not now known. It is stated in Appleton's Cyclopedia, under article " Lewis Cass," that Major Cass retired to a four thousand acre traet of land in Muskingum County, Ohio, given to him hy the government for services in the Revolutionary army. This is a mistake. He never received an acre
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284
HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY.
of land for his services nor a dollar of pension money, although he died from injuries received while in the dis- charge of his duties in the public service. After the close of the war he resigned his commission and engaged successfully in the West India trade, living with his family at Exeter, New Hampshire. About the close of the year 1781 he married Miss Mary Gilman, daughter of Nicholas Gilman. Of this union, three sons and two daughters were born, all at Exeter. The oldest son was General Lewis Cass, and the youngest, Captain Charles Lee Cass, a brave officer of the "War of 1812," dis- tinguishing himself at the battle (sortie) of Fort Erie. All of the children became citizens of Ohio, the last sur- vivor (George W.) reaching the green old age of eighty- seven, in 1873.
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