USA > Ohio > Highland County > A history of the early settlement of Highland County, Ohio > Part 8
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38
After proceeding several days ,cau- tiously, the company struck Paint Creek near the falls. Here they found fresh Indian signs, and had not traveled far before they heard the bells on their A council was now held. of men to the spot of St. Clair's defeat. Some of the most experienced thought They arrived on the ground on Christ- it was too late to retreat, and advised as mas day, and pitched their tents on the the best course to take the enemy by battle field, and when the men went to surprise. The Indians, it appeared, were encamped on Paint Creek, precise- crossing. The party came on them by lie down at night in their tents they had to scrape the bones together and carry ly at what is now called the Reeves' them out before they could make their beds. The next day holes were dug and surprise, and the battle was soon decid- the bones remaining above ground were ed in favor of the whites. The Indians buried; six hundred skulls being found fled across the creek, leaving all behind among them. The flesh was entirely off them but their guns. Several of them the bones, but in many cases the sinews were killed and wounded. One white yet held them together. After this man, named Joshua Robinson, was shot
1
20
A HISTORY OF HIGHLAND COUNTY, OIIIO.
through the body. These Indians were in motion for Kentucky. He was pleas- Shawnees, and would not go into the ed with the accounts he heard of that treaty with Wayne. They had been on country, and determined to make it his the war path, and had one prisoner with future home. The next spring, he ac- them, who made his escape to the cordingly set out in company with one whites, when the attack was made. As of his brothers for the cane country. soon as the company could gather upall They traveled by the river from Red- the Indian horses, skins and other plunder, they placed poor Robinson on
stone to Limestone, now Maysville, and thence to Lexington. Some five miles a hastily constructed litter, and com- south of that place, they camped in menced a rapid retreat. Robinson died the woods near a locality known as of his wound shortly after they started, Walnut Hills. At this place they made and some of the men were detached to a crop of corn. During the summer. William Rogers, having found the
perform the last rites of burial, while the others continued their hurried country fully equal to his anticipations, march. This duty was soon performed, returned to Virginia for the family,
as well as the circumstances would and sometime in November, 1785, all admit. Robinson was a Pennsylvanian, landed safe at their new home, much
and had merely came west on a visit, being a brother-in-law to Judge Rich- ard Evans, one of the early settlers of this county. Night overtook the re- treating party in the hills some miles south of the present town of Bainbridge, and as they expected to be pursued by the Indians, they made preparations for a night attack on their encampment.
spring, when an alarm of Indians was lived in peace and quiet till the next
spread among them, which aroused the war spirits of the old patriots, and an expedition was soon set on foot to pur- sue the savage invaders, and if possible,
erty. This expedition was commanded retake the horses and other stolen prop-
Sentinels were posted, and the utmost by either Clark or Logan, both celebrat- care and caution observed in the ar- ed as leaders of the Kentucky Indian rangements for defense. At about, an fighters. They crossed the Ohio, at or hour before day the next morning, one near the falls, and pursued the enemy of the sentinels observed an Indian into the Wabash Valley, but were
slowly creeping up on him. He waited
unable to overtake them.
William
till he came sufficiently close, when he Rogers was in this expedition. Shortly fired. The Indian fell, but rose again after this, he moved to Bourbon coun-
and made off. The attack was then ty, and resided there till the adoption of made with vigor on the camp from one the State Constitution in 1792, and find- quarter. The whites resisted with their ing that Kentucky had been made a accustomed courage and skill. After slave State, he determined to leave that
an hour's contest the Indians retreated. beautiful country as soon as the North-
Several horses were killed, and one western Territory was open for settle-
man, a Mr. Gelfillen, shot through the ment. Accordingly, in 1799, accompan- thigli. The loss of the Indians was ied by two of his sons, John and never ascertained. This was the last Thomas, he set out for the Scioto coun- Indian fight on the waters of the Scioto. try, and on arriving, they commenced
William Rogers, above named, was a a settlement on the North fork of Paint, Pennsylvanian by birth, but emigrated at the point where the turnpike road
with his father, Hamilton Rogers and now crosses it, which was the first im- family, to Loudon county, Virginia, provement made on that branch of about the year 1770, when, a few years
Paint, and their cabin was the only one afterwards, he married and settled between that place and Chillicothe, ex- down on what was called a life lease on cept Gen. McArthur's near the town. the waters of Goose Creek. But short- Of Robert Finley, another one of that ly after he commenced operations on party, who afterwards became a citi-
his new farm, he found himself sur- zen of Highland county, little need be rounded by slaveholders. At length he said, as his history is certainly familiar became so much annoyed by witnessing to all. He was of the genuine pioneer the practical operations of the system, stock, born in Pennsylvania, and edu- that he determined to seek some conn- cated at Princeton College, New Jersey. try where it did not exist. According- he early became a licensed clergyman ly, in the year 1783, or '81, he made a of the Presbyterian Church, at which tour over the mountains, as it was term- time there were pressing calls for min- ed in those times, with a view to find a isterial labor in the now settlements of home. When he arrived at the settle- the Carolinas and Georgia, to which ment of Redstone, now Brownsville, Finley yielded, and went as a mission- Pennsylvania, he found the country all ary to North Carolina, where he labor-
delighted with the country. Here they
30^
A HISTORY OF HIGHLAND COUNTY, OHIO.
ed for three years. Here he made the 1758 with his family, and landed safe at acquaintance of Boone. From this ac- Limestone, and took up his residence quaintance grew a strong desire to shortly after in Washington, Mason visit Kentucky, which he gratified in county, Kentucky. In the winter of the spring of 1751. But this was mere- 1789, he purchased land in the vicinity ly an exploring expedition. He was de- of Stockton's Station, near the present lighted with the country, but on his re- town of Flemingsburg, and built a turn. found it inconvenient to remove cabin in which he took up his abode. his family at that time to the West. This was the frontier house of the set- tlement, there being none between it was otherwise prepared for defense. Here he was in constant danger from incursions of the Indians. He, however, managed to preacli to two congrega-
He, however, left Carolina and took up his residence in Virginia, where he con- and the Ohio. It had port holes and tinued his labors as a minister. Not satisfied yet, and still yearning for Ken- tucky, he, in the course of the next two years, crossed the mountains to the Red- gregation and preached with great gave instructions in the language. In
stone region, where he gathered a con- tions, and opened a school in which he success. Here he labored for two years, the fall of 1796 Mr. Finley emancipated but still discontented and anxious to all his slaves, and removed to the make his home in the land of promise Scioto country to aid in building up -Kentucky-he set out in the fall of the infant settlement of Chillicothe.
CHAPTER VIII.
HABITS AND CUSTOMS OF THE PIONEERS, AND THE HARDSHIPS AND PRIVA- TIONS THEY ENDURED-THE SETTLEMENT AT CHILLICOTHE, AND THE MEANS EMPLOYED TO STIMULATE ITS RAPID GROWTHI AS A TOWN-THE TREATY OF GREENVILLE, BY WHICH PERMANENT PEACE WAS SECURED TO THE NORTHWESTERN TERRITORY.
JAVING passed in review the heroic designation of the class, and includes days of the West, a contemplative all, whether remembered or forgotten, pause on the verge of the new era who formed the vanguard and carried which followed may not be entirely forward the column of civilization into without interest or advantage. The the wilderness of the north-west.
people of this day in Ohio can not do The era of the moccasin, the buckskin too much honor to the men who opened hunting shirt, breeches and leggins; the way to the settlements which are of the fox skin cap, the rifle and scalp- now matured into homes of comfort, ing knife, the night repose under a tree, log, or the more luxurious bark camp, and the encounters with the bear, panther, or Indian, is now dim in the distance, and the people of. this day. who can so far forget themselves and their immediate surroundings as to pause to contemplate those rough and uncouth looking men, and the wild and fearful scenes in which they so nobly acted, can not, without an effort, realize the truth, that these same savage, un- courtly accoutered woodsmen were the fathers of this portion of the great West, and the progenitors of many of its refined and luxurious inhabitants.
elegance and beauty, and although many of them sleep in forgotten graves, and their very names have no place of record save the hearts of a very small number-relics, as it were of the past more than denizens of the present- who are just themselves tottering into the tomb, yet each son and daughter of this soil, o'er which they so often pur- sued the Indians, or were in turn pursued by them, or trailed the weary limits of the hunter, the surveyor or the explorer, and in whose forests of unbroken gloom and wildness they so often, amid storms, danger and death, encamped to snatch a few hours neces- Many of the Western Pioneers, says sary repose, ought to reverence the one who was himself of them, were very name of PIONEER. That is the warriors by profession and courted dan-
31
A HISTORY OF HIGHLAND COUNTY, OHIO.
ger for danger's sake, who on account hunter or herdsman condition of society of their daring intrepidity were wel- can enjoy. They had no civil officers to settle their difficulties with each other, come guests wherever they went. Others there were, whose views were nor priests to direct their morals, yet more enlarged, and who with equal courage put danger at defiance, keeping
crime among them was of very rare occurrence. Should any one who a steady eye to push forward the bounds chanced to be amongst them prove of civilization in the vast wilds of the troublesome and disturb the harmony West. Such were the leaders of the of the community, his expulsion forth-
hardy woodsmen who were engaged in
making new settlements on the borders be to him if he again attempted to in-
of the river Ohio and its tributary streams. Some one of these master spirits led the way in each settlement that was made, in spite of the Indians, whose restless and continued incursions caused every cabin to be raised at the risk of life, and every settlement to be made under the most trying and peril- ous circumstances. The rapidity of the advancement of art and improvements seems so great at this day that the few weather-beaten pioneers who yet linger amongst us can not but look around them with surprise and wonder. In the lapse of a few years-an apparently very brief space of time-they behold the country that they knew far better in its forest state than now, all check- ered over with farms, villages and cities, and instead of the humble log cabin, so dear to the memory, splendid mansions, the abodes of ease and ele- gance, greet the eye. Roads and canals, where first was the Indian's trail, and the palace steamboat, instead of the frail emigrant boat, or the dreaded canoe of the red man.
The toils, hardships and dangers of the pioneer were not, however, unbroken by pleasures none the less keenly relished for springing in the wilderness. The soil adjoining cabin stations on the banks of The consequence was that much of the the Ohio was easily cultivated, and very inate nobleness of heart was developed in them, while all the baser elements were left dormant. With the people of this enlightened and property loving day the reverse is doubtless true to a great extent, and it is painful to record the fact that intense selfishness hus lit- erally dried up the modicum of the milk of human kindness compassionate. ly allotted to frail humanity. Bravery and endurance were the leading char- acteristics of the early pioneers, and to exhibit these in an eminent degree, was to be distinguished and respected. The possession of wealth, or even property, was not then, as now, evidence of high moral and intellectual capacity, and and favor of society. It has been said productive, readily supplying their few wants in the way of bread, and the woods abounded in almost every variety of game. Deer, elk, bear, buffalo and turkeys were abundant, while the river furnished a variety of excellent fish. Luxuries, says McDonald, were entirely unknown, except old Monongahela double distilled, which was in great de- mand in those days, and freely used when it could be obtained. Coffee and tea were rare articles not inuch prized or sought after. The inhabitants were generally as playful as kittens, and as happy in their way as their hearts could desire. The men spent most of their time, when not on the war path, in therefore a sure passport to the confidence hunting and fishing, and almost every evening the boys and girls footed mer- that there is a nobility above birth, and rily to the tune of the fiddle. Thus was riches above wealth, and of men, this their time spent in that happy state of the bravest is ever the noblest. This indolence and ease, which none but the principle seems to have been adopted
with would be the consequence, and woe trude himself upon them.
The manner of these pioneers among themselves was affectionate and familiar. They addressed each other by their christian names only, which custoni ap- peared to them the most friendly and sociable mode of intercourse. To one of these old men who looks back on those days it must scem as if money making and the selfishness incident to it had frozen up all the avenues to the heart- that the frank and social intercourse which was then the sunshine of society is gone, and the cold, calculating spirit of accumulation has succeeded. But while they can not but feel the change, and occasionally cast a regretful thought back through the accumulated space of sixty years and upwards, they are con- scious that they were but acting the part assigned them, in which the modern art of money getting formned no ingredient. Their mission was simply to prepare the way, while that of their more fortunate successors is to cultivate, embellish and enjoy the heritage. If in this they have grown selfish, arrogant and forgetful, it is but natural, for all their efforts neces- sarily center in self. Not so with the rough old pioneers, who were, though often unconsciously, laboring for others.
32
A HISTORY OF HIGHLAND COUNTY, OHIO.
by society in the early pioneer days, and Indians, then their immediate neighbors. if it be correct, the nobility of the They seemed disposed to preserve in- frontier ' nen remains unrivaled. But violate the conditions of the treaty of that there is a riches above wealth, was peace, and mixed with the settlers in evidenced by the lives of these men, as the most friendly manner. history and tradition has transmitted
While these things were transpiring at. them There were none of the vexations the settlement, Gen. Massie, McArthur and others were engaged in laying out the present city of Chillicothe, on the banks of the Scioto, which thenceforth became the nucleus of the settlement.
and heart-burnings generated by rival grades or casts in their small communi- ties. Enterprise and courage to carry it forward gave to each one the knowledge of his own capacity, while sincere friend- After the necessary steps had been taken to run off the lots, streets and alleys of the town by blazing and mark- ing the trees of the thick woods, the proprietor, Gen. Massie, held a consulta- tion with his friends as to the name of the town, and finally adopted the Indian name, Chillicothe, which means in their tongue simply "town." One hundred out- lots were chosen by lot by the first hun- dred settlers, as a donation from the pro- prietor. A number of in-lots and out-lots were also sold to other persons desiring to settle in the town. The first choice of in-lots was sold for ten dollars each. ship and entire confidence in times of danger cemented them together as a band of true and generous brothers. Their hearts were buoyant with health and hope, and when danger was not im- mediate they were doubtless the happi- est, and as a consequence, the richest of the children of earth. But the result of their simple, though heroic lives, has secured untold blessings to their chil- dren and successors, therefore let all honor be awarded to the noble old pioneers. An eloquent American writer on this subject says: "Is the memory of our forefathers unworthy of historic The town increased rapidly, and before or sepulchral commemoration ? No the commencement of the winter of that people on earth, in similar circumstances, year it had in it several stores, taverns ever acted more nobly or more bravely and mechanic shops. The adjacent rich than they did. No people of any coun-
lowlands were laid off in small lots of try or age made greater sacrifices for the one and two hundred acres, and sold benefit of their posterity than those which were made by the first settlers of the western regions. What people ever left such noble legacies to posterity as those transmitted by our forefathers to their descendants ?"" either for cash or on credit, at from one to two dollars per acre. The consequence was that the settlement grew with great rapidity, its fertility and beauty having been heralded years before through the older settlements of Kentucky, Western Pennsylvania and Virginia. A descrip- tion of these bottoms, to be faithful,
At the first dawn of peace, undeterred by the failure of the expedition named in a former chapter, another party was would be next to impossible, as they ap- formed at Manchester destined for the peared to the wondering gaze of the Scioto country, a part of whom went by newly arrived emigrant in their native water up the Ohio and Scioto rivers, dress. The soil itself was not excelled and the remainder by land. The point for richness by any in the world. The agreed upon for meeting was at the lofty sugartree spreading its beautiful mouth of Paint, at a place afterwards branches, the graceful elm, black walnut, known as "Station Prairie." The party who went by water took, besides a few of the necessaries of life, farming utensils, and other articles needed in plum, the grape vine and the blackberry, commencing a permanent settlement.
oak, hickory, cherry and hackberry, the spicewood and sassafras, with their fragrance, and the pawpaw and the wild with their luscious fruit. Beneath all of On the first day of April, 1796, they which, the wild rye, green and luxuriant landed their goods, and commenced the as a wheat field in May, mixed with the erection of their cabins and preparations prairie and buffalo clover-all combined for planting corn. Three hundred acres to form a scene of enchanting grandeur. of the rich prairie were soon turned up The clear and beautiful rivulet, says J. by the plows, and for the first time in B. Finley, creeping through the grass, that region was heard the cheerful sounds and softly rippling over pebbly bottoms, of the plowman's voice.
the gentle zephyrs freighted with
That season was one of prosperity to nature's incense, pure and sweet, regal- the settlers, and although they occasion- ed our senses and filled us with delight. ally suffered from want of the necessaries All nature had a voice which spoke most of life, yet they were soon relieved by impressively to the soul, and while all the luxuriant crops of their plantation. the senses were pervaded with an un- No disturbance occurred with the utterable delight, the solemn stillness
33
A HISTORY OF HIGHLAND COUNTY, OHIO.
seemed to say, God reigns here.
land owners and speculators.
The treaty of Greenville having fixed the boundaries to the Indian Territory and secured peace on a permanent basis, and thus removed the barriers which On the 15th day of August, 1796, Gov. St. Clair, by proclamation, established Wayne county, which included within its territorial boundaries all the north- had so long been insurmountable, the western part of Ohio, a large tract of tide of emigration to Southern Ohio the north-eastern part of Indiana, a comninenced flowing in a strong and considerable part of Illinois and Wis- consin, and the whole of the present State of Michigan. This was the third county in the North-western Territory, and was named for Gen. Anthony Wayne, who was born in Chester coun- steady stream. Most of the necessary steps to a general settlement throughout the Military District had already been taken. The country had been thorough- ly explored, and much of it surveyed. Landing points on the river, such as ty, Pennsylvania, January Ist, 1715. Marietta, Gallipolis, Manchester and He early became a surveyor and Cincinnati furnished new-comers arest- engineer, and having enlisted in the ing place till they could look around for a new home, in anticipation of which
army of the Revolution in 1775, was made a Brigadier General two
they had severed the ties which bad years afterwards, in which capacity he bound them to the old. All, therefore, continued to serve during the war. seemed to be in complete readiness and Ile particularly distinguished himself anxiously awaiting the era, which was at the battles of Brandywine, German- ushered in by Wayne's brilliant and town and Monmouth, and his attack conclusive victory at the battle of the upon Stony Point in July, 1779, an al- Fallen Timbers, and inaugurated short- most inaccessible height, defended by ly after by the treaty at Greenville.
six hundred men and a strong battery of artillery, was perhaps the most
The settlement at Marietta rapidly extended itself up the valley of the brilliant exploit of the war. At mid- Muskingum, and that at Gallipolis north night he led his troops with unloaded into the adjacent country as far as the muskets, flints out and fixed bayonets, present town of Lancaster, which was and without firing a single gun, carried then the principal town of the Wyandott the Fort by storin, taking five hundred Nation. Zane's Trace from Wheeling and sixty-three prisoners. In the at- to Limestone, made in the fall of 1796, tack he was struck by a musket ball in passing through the point now occupied the head, which was, at that moment, by Chillicothe, guided many to that supposed to be a mortal wound, but he place the following spring and summer, called to his aids to carry him forward while the navigation of the Sciotoriver, that he might die in the Fort his party being now free from the vigilant eye were so heroically storming.
and hostile rifle of the savage, offered
The crowning acts of his life were his another convenient opening to the in- victory over the Indians on the Mau- terior. The route from Kentucky mee, and the treaty with the savage through Manchester was also known, tribes which followed. His life of peril and glory was terminated in 1796, in a cabin at Presque Isle-now Erie, Pa.,-then in the wilderness. His body was there buried, at his own request, under the flag staff of the Fort on the shore of Lake Erie. In 1509 his son re- moved his remains to Delaware county,
so that apart from the fatigues incident to a tedious journey through the wilder- ness, no obstacles appeared between the Revolutionary soldier of the Virginia Continental Line and the dearly earned reward of his services. Chillicothe be- came at once the centre of attraction, and the headquarters of the emigrants, Pennsylvania.
CHAPTER IX.
ORGANIZATION OF ADAMS AND ROSS COUNTIES-FIRST SETTLEMENT WITHIN THE LIMITS OF HIGHLAND AT SINKING SPRING -- JOIN WILCOXON, THE PIONEER HOUSEHOLDER-EARLY LIQUOR LEGISLATION IN THE TERRITORY --- APPOINTMENT OF JUSTICES OF THE PEACE, AND THEIR PECULIAR IDEAS OF THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE-CAUSES WHICH RETARDED THE GROWTH OF THE CHILLICOTHE COMMUNITY, AND LED TO THE SETTLE- MENT OF HIGHLAND.
N July, 1797, Adams county was es- vast and pathless Northwestern Territo- tablished by proclamation of Gov. St. ry, determined to establish himself and Clair. It comprehended a large tract family in the midst of its best hunting grounds, regardless of the prior claim of the Indians. With his worldly wealth, wife and child stowed upon the back of a strong horse, and himself and dog on foot in advance, he struck out in the di- of country lying on both sides of the Scioto river and extending north-west to Wayne. This county was named for old John Adams, and embraced within its boundaries most, if not all, of what is now Highland. It was the rection of the even then famous rich fourth county organized in the Terri- lands of the Scioto and Main Paint tory. The first court in this county country. He traversed the hills for sev- eral days, camping out at night and fre- quently remaining four or five days at a place to hunt and rest his wife and horse. The weather continued delight- ful, it being the latter part of April, and Nature in the first dawn of vernal beauty log Court House and jail erected. The presented for several days a peculiar Manchester people were greatly oppos- charm to the eyes of the lonely emi- was held at Manchester. Commission- ers, appointed by the acting Governor, soon afterwards located the county seat a few miles above the mouth of Brush- creek, at Adamsville, to which place the seat of justice was removed, and a ed to this location of the county seat, grants. The long days of bright, warm and kept up a warm contest until its of West Union in 1804 as the seat of sun, succeeding the cold winds and rains permanent settlement by the location of the early part of the month, had al- ready covered the sunny banks and hill justice of the county. The chief part sides with early plants and flowers. Al- of the present county of Highland, em- ready the elm, sugartree and buckeye braced originally within Adams, was had shown their green leaves, and the appropriated the next year by the early wild grass not only supplied abun- erection of Ross county. This county dant pasture, but covered and adorned was established by proclamation of the surface. The nights, too, were more Gov. St. Clair on the 20th of August, charming, if possible, than the days in 1798. The original lines of which coun- ty were quite extensive, embracing those grand old woods. The very still- ness was sublime, and the mild rays of much of the present territory of the the moon, penetrating the forest and adjoining counties. Chillicothe be- came at once the seat of justice.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.