A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record, Part 112

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans
Number of Pages: 1612

USA > Ohio > Scioto County > A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record > Part 112

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HISTORY OF SCIOTO COUNTY.

the Revolutionary army, being an officer of the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment, commanded by Col. Thomas Nixon.

Amos Wheeler served in the Revolution (see Revolutionary sol- diers) and was an eye witness of the execution of Major Andre, the famous British spy, at Tappan, N. Y., October 2, 1780, being one of the horse guard at the time.

After the Revolution, he moved to Bethlehem township, Graf- ton, County, New Hampshire, and married Elizabeth Snow at Bath, N. Y., October 11, 1788. His wife was the daughter of a sea cap- tain, who spent a great many years on the ocean, and who wrote a book on the Millennium. Amos Wheeler believed with the Declara- tion of Independence, that all men should be treated alike, and tried to be sociable and friendly with the poorest and most ignorant as well as with the wealthy and educated. He was major in the militia, and a Presbyterian. His wife was a Free Will Baptist, aristocratic, choosing her associates among the wealthy and refined, but always treating the "back woods" people kindly. Although they differed in religion and politics, there never was any quarreling between them.

The family relations were unusually congenial because the chil -- dren were carefully taught to respect each other's rights and feelings. So peace and kindness reigned in spite of all irreconcilable opinions.

In 1808. Amos Wheeler together with his family, which then consisted of his wife, two sons, and three daughters, moved from New Hampshire, and settled in the town of Wheelersburg, Scioto County, Ohio. Amos was accompanied to Ohio by his father Nathan Wheeler, an old man who loved to tell war stories, and to sing war songs to the boys. He died in 1812 lacking but two weeks of being 90 years old. During the war of 1812, Amos Wheeler offered his services to his country, and it is believed took part in the expedition against the British and Indians at Vincennes, Ind.

July 17, 1818, while yet a resident of Scioto County he applied for a pension, which was granted and continued until his death. About 1822, he sold his place at Wheelersburg to the Rev. Dan Young who also was from New Hampshire, and moved to Marion County, Ohio. Amos was tall and fair with curling hair, and grew bald as he grew older. He died March 27, 1827, aged 66 years and 6 months, and was buried at Marion, Ohio.

His wife, Elizabeth, who was born on December 16, 1771. was small and her eyes and hair were very black. She was a very hand- some woman and used to in the earliest days, wear high-heeled shoes, and hoops so large that she had to tilt them to pass through a door. To the very last she used her face powder, and was fond of fine caps, and was dainty and precise in her dress and manners. She had something of a military spirit, for she walked with much spirit and precision in all her movements, something like a trained soldier, even to the last years of her life. She was so well acquainted with the

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Scriptures,-book, chapter and verse .- that her son-in-law, a min- ister, when hurried, consulted her rather than turn to the concordance. She was very helpful to him in his ministry, which was a widely suc- cessful one. She was in her 73rd year when she died. Elizabeth Wheeler, drew a pension as widow of a Revolutionary soldier, until the time of her death which occurred in June, 1843 at East Liberty, Ohio, where she made her home during the latter part of her life with her eldest daughter, Elizabeth, then the wife of Rev. David Dudley.

Amos and Elizabeth Wheeler were the parents of six children, three sons and three daughters. The five eldest children were born in New Hampshire, and the youngest Horatio Nelson was born at Wheelersburg, Ohio, August 4, 181I.

It might perhaps be interesting to note in this connection that a number of the grandsons of Major Wheeler took part in the Civil War, among them being Lieut. Edward D. Wheeler who graduated from West Point on June 13, 1864, served during the siege of Peters- burg, Va., and was at the action of Laurel Hill and was Asst. Adj. General of the 25th Army Corps when Grant entered Richmond, and who served for many years in the regular army. Lieut. Amos Wheeler, a man in every way worthy of his namesake, took part in many hard fought battles, and accompanied Sherman to the sea. David Thompson, son of Mahala (Wheeler) Thompson, second daughter of Major Amos Wheeler, entered the army as a Second Lieutenant, in the 82nd Ohio, and was rapidly promoted to Colonel. He was wounded at the battle of Dallas, Ga., and again at Averys- boro, N. C., for his services in which he was brevetted, Brigadier General, to date, from March 13, 1865. For his bravery at the bat- tle of Gettysburg he was presented with a magnificent sword by the privates, and non-commissioned officers of the 82nd Ohio regiment.

Ruluff Whitney

was born in Salisbury, Conn., June 25, 1777. His father was Chris- topher Whitney and his mother, Mary Ticknor of Sharon, Conn. His great-great-grandfather. John Whitney, of Watertown. Mass., located there from London, England, in June, 1835, coming on the ship "Elizabeth and Anne." He was soon admitted as a freeman and for twenty years was selectman, constable and town clerk. The founder of the family in England was Turstin the Fleming, or Turs- tin De Wigmore, or Sea Rover, whose distinction between mcum and tuum were of the vaguest character and who with other gentle- men (?) of his kind followed in the wake of William, the Conqueror, from Normandy and England, for anything which might turn up.

Christopher Whitney was a Revolutionary soldier. In 1790, he went to the western part of New York, to take up land as a reward for his military services in the Revolution.

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HISTORY OF SCIOTO COUNTY.

1800, Ruluff Whitney married Susan Glenny of Virgil, New York. In 1806, he was a Justice of the Peace of his township. He lived at Dryden Corners, Cayuga County, New York, until 1816. There was a frost every month that year and he determined to go further south. He started with his family for New Orleans. They went in wagons to Pittsburg, Pa. The party was composed of him- self, wife and eight children. At Pittsburg he invested most of his money in goods for trading down the river. These goods were lost in a storm in the river. The family stopped at Pomeroy, Ohio, and Mr. Whitney bought coal land. After remaining here a year or so, he loaded a boat with coal and started with his family to New Or- leans, but went to St. Louis. He left his family at St. Louis and took up a claim and built a cabin in Illinois. Coming back to St. Louis to renew his journey to New Orleans, some of his children had been attacked with yellow fever but recovered.

This induced him to give up the voyage to New Orleans and as soon as his children recovered, he took his family on a steamboat to go up the Ohio and return to his old home in New York.

On the boat going up the Ohio, he fell in with a citizen of Ports- mouth, who persuaded him that one of the poles of the earth came out there. He was so charmed with what he had heard of Ports- mouth that he determined to stop there and did so in January, 1821. He never left the town and is buried in its cemetery. In 1825, he was Coroner of the County. In 1829. he bought the lot known as the Whitney corner where the Washington hotel now stands. He built a part of the building first placed on the lot and moved another part. from Jefferson street. He gave $111.82 for the north one-half of inlot No. 2, 66x821/2 feet on the northwest corner of Second and Market streets and bought of Hugh Cook. He gave Mercy Cook, the wife, $5.00 extra to release her dower.

He got coal off his lands in Meigs County, Ohio, and sold it in Portsmouth. The coal first burned in the court house at Ports- mouth, was sold to the County. December 6, 1831, at 1612 bushels for fifty cents. Our pioneers were desperately reckless about spelling and in entering the transactions on the Commissioners' Journal. they spelled coal, "cole." Moses Gregory, then Auditor, will have to stand responsible for this error as he was Auditor at that time. Mr. Whitney had a coal yard on Jefferson street north of Second and later on his lots opposite the court house on Sixth street.

In 1837, he burned and furnished the brick for the present court house. He first used the entire Whitney corner building for a resi- dence. Then he kept a grocery there. In 1837, he went into the pork packing business and built the brick house on Market street so long used by Maxwell as a feed-store.

In 1833. he was a Health Officer of Portsmouth ; was re-elected in 1834, but declined to serve. In 1836, he was appointed and serv-

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ed as Health Officer. In 1836, he was elected clerk of the market at $15.00 per year. He declined to accept the office, at that compensa- tion, and Thomas Ferrin was elected at $30.00 per year and accepted.

Ruluff Whitney was a large, portly man, lacking one-fourth of an inch of six feet, with florid complexion, light hair and blue eyes. His wife was under size, plump and with very black eyes and hair. After he had bought the Whitney lots on Sixth street near the court house, he tried to have the street laid out east, in a straight line until it struck Lawson's Run, but the men in Portsmouth who made it their business to block streets, and in each generation got in their work, said he was entirely selfish in the matter and his plan was defeated. His wife was a Presbyterian all her life. He attended that church with her, but later he attended All Saints church. He died at his residence on the Whitney corner August 8, 1846. His wife died a year previous. A few years before their death they together made a long visit to their friends and old home in New York. They are buried in the old Funk graveyard in Kinney's Lane. Their chil- dren were eight in number. John resided on the corner of Sixth and Court streets. He was married twice and had two sons, John Nesbit and James Glenny; Mary Ticknor, a daughter, married Hannibal H. Hamlin and resided in Cincinnati. She had five children who at- tained maturity: Ruluff Whitney, Jr., a son, died in Portsmouth in 1824: Susan Whitney, a daughter married Elisha G. Stone and lived in Cincinnati ; she had five children to attain maturity. Sarah Whitney, a daughter married Andrew Rowan Harden and resided in Cincinnati ; she had five children to attain maturity. William Glen- ny Whitney, a son, resided in Portsmouth all his life, and has a sketch below. Minerva Whitney married Abjah Curtis of Connecti- cut and was childless. Olive Whitney married Col. Allen Campbell McArthur of Chillicothe, Ohio. They had five children.

Ruluff Whitney, our subject, has sixty-eight grand-children and eighty-seven great-grandchildren, all of whose names and addresses are known to Miss Belle Whitney of Portsmouth, Ohio.

William Glenny Whitney

was born April II, 1811, at Dryden's Four Corners, Cayuga County, New York. It is now in Tompkins County. He was the third and youngest son of Ruluff Whitney and Susannah Glenny. His mother was the daughter of John and Nancy Nesbit Glenny of Virgil, New York. The Glennys emigrated from Newry, County Down, Ire- land, in 1795. Ruluff Whitney was a descendant of John and Eleanor Whitney, who emigrated from England, and settled at Wat- ertown, Mass., in 1635.

Mr. Whitney resided with his parents as long as they lived. Un- til he was about six years of age, they lived in Dryden and vicinity. In the year 1817, they went to Pomeroy, Ohio, where they resided

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HISTORY OF SCIOTO COUNTY.

until 1820. In 1821 they settled in the town of Portsmouth. Our subject attended school three months in the winter in town. The teacher was paid by the parents of the pupils. One of his teachers was in the habit of taking a long nap in the afternoons and it was a favorite amusement for the boys to try which could approach close enough to shake a fist under his nose and regain his seat without arousing him. We are not informed who that teacher was, but it may have been William Jones. However, William G. Whitney was disposed to learn and kept his books and slate for study and studied at every opportunity. He was quite a reader of the English classics.

In 1830, he and his brother, John, bought out the father's busi- ness and conducted it under the name of J. & W. G. Whitney. They engaged in forwarding freight on the canal and were part owners of the steamboat "Olive," plying between Cincinnati and Portsmouth. William G. was the Captain.

On January 22, 1831, our subject was commissioned Ensign of the First Regiment, Second Division, Second Brigade State Militia. He was qualified July 11, before Silas Cole, Adjutant. He was call- ed Captain because he became Captain of a militia company in Ports- mouth.

Mr. Whitney was twice married. His first wife was Miss Mel- vina Fleming, whose parents came from Pennsylvania. There were four children of this marriage: Ruluff, who lives at 419 Arch street, Cincinnati, Ohio; Susan, wife of John S. Womble, of Oviedo, Orange County, Florida ; William Fleming and James, an infant who was killed by a fall when he was two days old, the mother fol- lowing four days after, April 29, 1847.

In 1837, 1838 and 1840, Win. G. Whitney was overseer of the poor of Wayne Township. From 1840 to 1844, he was town street commissioner of Portsmouth. In 1842, he succeeded Jacob Offnere as town Treasurer and was elected annually until 1845 when he was succeeded by John Waller. He was a communicant of All Saints church and from 1847 to 1851, he was a vestryman. In 1850, he was on the building committee.

In 1850, Mr. Whitney was married to Miss Elcy F. M. Voor- hees, daughter of Isaac Voorhees and his wife, Isabella McCormack. Mr. Voorhees came to Ohio from Brownsville, New Jersey, a son of Jacob Van Voorhees and his wife, Hannah Sickles. Jacob Voor- hees, his father, was a Revolutionary soldier, and descended from a Stephen Coerte Van Voor Hees, who emigrated from the province of Drenthe, Holland, April 1660, on the ship "Bontekoe," meaning "spotted cow," and settled at Flatland, Long Island. The children of our subject's marriage were: Isabella Olive, Mary Jane, married Charles Edwin Jewell, died at Toronto, Canada, June 14, 1889, leav- ing three children ; Elsie G., Martha W., who died in infancy, and Teresa, who married Allen Campbell McArthur, of Circleville, Ohio.

WILLIAM VEACH. [Page 853.]

SIMEON WOOD. [Page 875.]

LORENZO DOW MCKINNEY. [Page 787.]

AARON NOEL. [Page 794.]

PIONEERS OF SCIOTO COUNTY.

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In 1851, the partnership with his brother John was dissolved John W. took the Sixth street property, and William G. took the Second and Market street corner. Later, he took into partnership his wife's brother-in-law, James D. McLean. In 1859, the firm abandoned the grocery business and confined themselves to commis- sion and to transporting freight on the canal. The business of freight- ing on the canal was very lucrative during the Civil War. Mr. Whitney's business required him to spend much of his time traveling the country between Portsmouth and Columbus, which he did in a buggy built by John L. Ward. It is said he brought the first locomo- tive for the Hamden Branch of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad by canal.

In 1870, James D. McLean, Mr. Whitney's partner, retired from the business and it was conducted by him alone. He was a town guard in Portsmouth in 1875.

Mr. Whitney was a Whig and later a Republican in his politi- cal views. However, he had a strong dislike to party slavery. While at least after middle age, not an active politician, he always informed himself of the party candidates and never hesitated to scratch from his ticket, the man whom he knew to be unfit for office. Mr. Whit- ney was essentially a refined man, disliking roughness and coarseness in reading or companionship. While alive to business opportunities, he had no taste for going beyond in a bargain or shoving another man aside. He never used tobacco in any form. He died February 9, 1889, and is interred in Greenlawn cemetery.

Joseph Williamson

came to Ohio from New Jersey and located on government land, on the site of the town of Alexandria. He had a family of nine children : Frank, William, Joseph, Peter, James, Thomas, Margaret, Anna and Sarah. He died in 1812. His wife, Martha (Fort) Williamson died in 1834. Both are buried in Washington township. His son, Joseph was the father of George Williamson of Dry Run, who has a sketch and picture herein.

Alden Washington Williamson

was born February 7, 1819 in Flat Woods, West Virginia, near Louisa, Kentucky. He was the son of Hiram and Mary (Swearin- gen ) Williamson. His father died when he was only fifteen and left several children, of whom he was the eldest. His first employment away from home was on the steamboat "Transit" as a deck hand at $15.00 per month. She was a side-wheeler built by Samuel J. Hus- ton and owned by Captain James W. Davis and Luke P. N. Smith. She ran from Portsmouth to Cincinnati and made two trips a week. -

She was 100 tons burden. He worked on her until he was made mate at eighteen and then went on the "Ashland," a stern-wheel

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steamboat owned by the same parties. She ran from Portsmouth to Cincinnati. Captain Tinker was the master. Our subject was mate for ten years on these two boats or until 1847. After the "Ashland" was built, the pilot, steward, engineer and mate all got $1.00 per day. They served some time at this rate and then all who had been receiving $1.00 per day were raised to $40.00 a month, except our subject. He determined not to stand it and left the boat at Cincinnati. All of the crew wanted him to remain but he refused and returned to Ports- mouth on a Pittsburg boat. In the six weeks following his leaving the "Ashland" it had five mates successively. They lost money, and Captain Davis offered Williamson $75.00 per month to go back on the boat, but he declined. They had paid $60.00 for a mate after he left.

December 22, 1841. he was married to Sarah Ann Gharky, daughter of David Gharky. After he left the "Ashland," he engag- ed in building flat boats for David Gharky and saved $300 from his labors. He bought a canal boat and four horses for $600 paying $300 down and the remainder at $50 per month. He ran the canal boat for ten years and regards this as the pleasantest part of his life. He carried passengers and furnished meals and carried all freight which offered. The rates of fare were $3.00 to Columbus, $1.00 to Waverly and $1.50 to Chillicothe, including meals and lodging and the boats crew and passengers lived on the fat of the land. He ran to Columbus and return and made one trip a week. The boat carried a double crew and ran the whole 24 hours. He cleared $7,500 in four and one-half years. For eight years he used horses, but the last two years he was on the canal, he ran a propeller. He bought it for $2,500 and sold it to a southern man for $5,000.

He went to St. Joseph Missouri, for eighteen months, and there ran a ferry boat which he had purchased at Portsmouth and taken out with him. The boat was a steamboat named "General Gaines " He and his partner, a Mr. Knight, cleared $600 in 46 days by ferrying emigrants on their way to California. He traded the boat for 160 acres of land two miles back of St. Joseph. He gave $10 per acre for this land, held it three years and sold it for $25 per acre. The Captain thinks it was the mistake of his life in not holding on to this land, as it is now in the center of the city of St. Joseph, a city in 1870, of over 52,000 people. The Captain was like everyone else who has ever lived in Portsmouth, he had a longing to come back, and he did come back. He built two steamboats: the "Cotton Val- ley" and the "Bedford." He sold the "Cotton Valley" and sunk the "Bedford" at Tower Island, ninety miles below St. Louis. He got $670 out of the wreck of the "Bedford" and bought the "Fash- ion" and paid $1,200 for her. He ran her from Portsmouth to Rome. The "Fashion" was sadly out of repair and after repairing her a number of times, he rebuilt her and changed her name to the

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"Reliance." He sold her for $2,250, paid his debts and had $200 left.

He and Captain Pres Lodwick bought the propeller, "W. F. Gaylord," and on Nov. 16, 1881, she was run down by the towboat "D. T. Lane," and sunk at Ashland, Ky. All the crew were sav- ed except the cook, Elizabeth Meade. The "Gaylord" was going to land and the "Lane" had a fleet of empties. Captan John N. Lod- wick was aboard the "Gaylord" as a guest and was in bed when the crash came. He secured two wooden life preservers and the boat sank under him. He floated down the river, and was rescued by the "Nellie Brown" after he had been in the water about thirty minutes. Captain John N. Lodwick had been blown up four times, sunk three times and run over by a railroad train once.

Captain Williamson is one of the best illustrations of "pluck" who ever lived in Portsmouth or anywhere else. He has made .and lost fortunes. He has all the bad luck any one possibly could have. He is badly crippled up and has to go abroad with a crutch under each arm, but nevertheless, he goes about and attends to any business he can do just as though he were young. He goes to church every Sunday, and attends to every duty and obligation just as though he had a grant of life for 100 years to come. Whenever Captain has been called on to go through a season of adversity, like Mark Tap- ley, he always "comes out strong." He is never dismayed, never overcome. If the British gave him the task of subduing the Boers in South Africa, he would undertake it and do it, too, if he lived long enough, even if he had to go about on trestle work like he does now. He has clung to the Ohio river and is known by everyone on its banks from Portsmouth to Cincinnati, and they are all his friends. If he were in that trade again, he could carry every pound of freight which could be loaded on his boat.

John Williams,

better known as "Rocky" Williams was born in Scioto County near Rarden, September 25, 1830. His father was Matthew Williams, an early settler, and his mother's maiden name was Elizabeth Jones. The only education he had was that of the common schools of the vicinity. He was a tall, slender built man, with very black hair, and was the most popular man who ever lived in Brush Creek Township. For sixteen consecutive years, he was Assessor of his township, and was also township Treasurer for two or three terms. In his politi- cal views, he was a Democrat. His occupation was a farmer, but at the same time his energy was such that he engaged in buying and selling lumber.

He married Saloma Ann Hibbs, daughter of Samuel Hibbs, in 1862. Mr. Hibbs' mother's maiden name was Sarah Catherine Ten- er. Three children were born to them: Eliza, the oldest, was mar-

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ried to John Newman, of Rarden, September 29, 1888, and is the mother of four sons : Charles was born September 8, 1875. He is the agent of the N. & W. Railroad at Mineral Springs, and Della Pearl, who died July 29, 1891. He was one of the best business men in his township. There was no new enterprise project in his commun- ity in his period of business activity which covered all his life from the age of twenty, in which he did not have a part. He promoted all public enterprises. He was a man of very firm purposes and good judgment. He had most excellent qualities of mind and heart, and when he died he was more generally missed by the community than any man who ever lived in it before, or in his time.

John Asher Winkler

was born November 5, 1820, at Harrisonville. Scioto County, Ohio. and is of German, French and English descent. He is the son of Asher Winkler and Rebecca Rockwell, his wife. His great-grand- father Winkler, whose father went to England from Germany emni- grated thence to Maryland. His father with his parents moved to New York and settled near Elmira. Here his father married Rebecca Rockwell, who was of French and English descent. She was a daughter of Job Rockwell, a Revolutionary soldier. Mr. Winkler's uncles, . James and John W., fought in the war of 1812. On July 5, 1816, his parents landed in Ohio, having floated from the source of the Alleghany to just below Wheelersburg.

The country at that time was practically a wilderness. They purchased the land on which Harrisonville was afterwards built. Here they lived for several years, but the land not being very pro- ductive, they sold it and bought another farm near Lucasville which proved to be as poor as the other. They lived here two years and then sold again this land, purchasing land back of Wheelersburg. But on account of the unhealthfulness of the country, they were not satisfied and determined to try it further west. Having some friends near Piqua, Ohio, they sold out and gathered together their household effects and set out thither.

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A history of Scioto County, Ohio, together with a pioneer record, Part 112

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913 Publication date: 1903 Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans Number of Pages: 1612

Author: Evans, Nelson W. (Nelson Wiley), 1842-1913
Publication date: 1903
Publisher: Portsmouth, O. N. W. Evans
Number of Pages: 1612