USA > Ohio > A history of the state of Ohio, natural and civil > Part 20
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From the date of this letter, major Trimble, lieutenants Cass, John M'Elvain, and ensign Cisna were brevetted.
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General Gaines was himself severely wounded soon af- terwards, which caused this oversight in his report to the se- cretary of war. He did them full justice afterwards, and their country fully appreciated their good conduct in the battle.
Colonel John M'Elvain, is now in private life, and resides at Columbus. Captain Charles L. Cass is also in private life, and resides on his farm, not far above Zanesville, on the Mus- kingum river.
Our officers and soldiers were in all the battles, on the Niagara river, in 1814, and in every instance, they behaved well. Not a few of them, were killed in battle, or returned home badly wounded, and died in Ohio. They have mostly now descended down to the grave. They bled for their coun- try, and are entitled to our esteem and veneration. Ohio will forever cherish the remembrance of their feats in arms, as be- longing to our history. These patriots live in their example, to lead others to success and victory. Their deeds will be han- ded down to posterity, in the poet's song, on the historian's page, and the painter's canvas. Trimble and Cisna are long since dead. The former was a United States senator, from Ohio, when he died. Captain Cisna died at Piketon, where his family now dwell.
We cannot dismiss our picture of the late war in Ohio, with- out saying a few words respecting our principal figure on the canvas. We ask our reader's attention to them.
GENERAL WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON every where appears on the whole field of his operations. The commissary's and quar- ter master's departments, the recruiting service, all, all the ma- chinery of war, is moved by him. His zeal, prudence, sleep- less activity, untiring energy and heroic daring over- came all difficulties and surmounted all obstacles. To look back upon the amount of labor of all sorts, performed by him, in that portion of his life, astonishes us. Few men could have carried on the correspondence, which he was compelled to do, in the same period of time. He wrote constantly to govern- ors of states, officers of the army, and the secretary of war. He traversed all the swamps of the northwest, constantly, al-
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most. He visited the principal depots of provisions, and of troops, in Ohio. He traveled between the distant points, which he often visited, but when he went, he traveled night and day. Sometimes going on foot, leading his horse, and jumping from bog to bog, he made his way through the wil- derness of swamps. While on tiresome, rapid, and long marches, with his troops, in the wilderness, his cheerfulness and buoyancy of spirits, cheered all hearts. A cheerful re- mark from any soldier, in such cases, produced a hearty laugh from his general, who reechoed the remark, with applause. Marching through the mud, the soldiers often sung some rude song of their own manufacture, the General sometimes joined in the chorus, and drove off all the gloom which hovered around them. No commander was ever more beloved, or better obey- ed. Though his orders were given more like requests, some- times, than absolute commands, yet they were always obeyed instantly and implicitly, by all under his command. His care of his troops more resembled that of father, than a military commander. No father was ever kinder in his manner of con- veying his advice, his reproofs or applauses. We do not know of even one soldier's being executed, in his army. In the coun- ty where this was written, a private soldier was arrested for desertion, and found at home, here, while the army was marching towards the frontier, and this was the third offense of the same kind. The detachment halted, the soldier was brought forward to his company, and the general informed of all the circumstances, and asked, if the soldier should be pun- ished? The general came near, looked carefully at the man, and said, " no, he regrets what he has done, I will forgive him, for he will never be guilty again." Joining his company, this soldier, Morris was finally killed, charging the enemy at Fort Erie, in August 1814.
General Harrison's education is good. He graduated at William and Mary college, in Virginia, after which he studi- ed medicine, in Philadelphia. These early advantages were not lost on him. He is a beautiful writer, and a most elo- quent orator. His despatches, general orders and addresses
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were always extremely well written. On any sudden and great emergency, such as the sudden appearance of Proctor and his red allies, at Camp Meigs, in April, 1813, Harrison's short address to his troops, produced a most powerful effect, when he pointed to Wayne's battle ground directly across the Maumee, reminding them of what valor and patriotism had done there, in 1794.
His knowledge of medicine, was of great importance to him, of which he availed himself, in his intercourse with his troops. Their health always had his strict attention. Their food, clothing, care of themselves, and every little circumstance, connected with their personal welfare, were always objects of importance, in the estimation of their commander-in-chief.
He enjoyed one great advantage, in being well known to the entire people, in the country where he commanded. They all knew him, and confided in him as their friend, and as their defender. Farmers parted with their property, at his demand, and even gave it freely, when he called for it.
Though a military man, from the time he was twenty-one or two years old, yet, he ever advocated the subordination of the military to the civil powers. His attachment to our con- stitution and the republican system is unbounded. This he has shown in all the stations which he has held, whether dele- gate or member of congress from Ohio, governor of Indiana, or minister to Colombia. At the head of our armies he was defending this form of government and the liberties of his country.
A man of the common size, erect, as in youth, and though, sixty-four years old, yet active, quick to move and to think, and ready to meet any emergency, as at thirty years of age. He enjoys perfect health of body and mind. His temper was always mild, even, and entirely under his control. He was never seen to be in anger. His disinterestedness is clearly proven by his comparative poverty. In his dress, and in all his expenses he is plain and economical; but not parisimonious. Although he has held many offices, out of which a modern
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patriot would make millions, general Harrison has never laid up, even one dollar. He owns the farm, which his father-in- law, judge Symmes, gave him at the North Bend, but that is all he owns.
His benevolence is bounded only by his means; and, could he have his wishes gratified, every human being would be vir- tuous, good and perfectly happy.
4
The war may be said to have ended in Ohio, on the 5th day of October, 1813, and all that was done afterwards, was merely guarding this frontier, by general Duncan McArthur, who was appointed a brigadier general, in the regular United States army, and took the command here. Governor Meigs, had been appointed Postmaster general, and settled in Washington city. Harrison resigned his commission, and was elected to congress, by the Cincinnati district. McArthur, made an ex- pedition into Upper Canada, in the summer and autumn of 1814, disarmed the militia,and destroyed some public property there. The peace was declared in the spring of 1815, and, all has been peace, ever since, in Ohio. And so may it for- ever remain, in peace and prosperity. The immediate effects of this war, on Ohio, are summed up, in a few sentences.
The war brought many people, into the state, who finally set- tled down in it, and thus added to our numbers. The soldiers. who traversed the country, and were finally discharged, at Chillicothe, in the spring of 1815, continued in the country. The embargo, and the war, drove many families from the At- lantic frontier to Ohio. Large sums of money were disbursed here, and all sorts of provisions and even labor commanded high prices. Farmers entered many tracts of land, and paid the first payment, on them. The conclusion of the Indian war, in 1795, left among us, the remains of Wayne's army: so the war of 1812, added to our numbers in the same manner. Those who traversed so fine a country, saw it, were pleased with it, and tarried in it. But, as the last war, brought more men and more money to support the war, into the country, than the first war did, so the last event, effected more, for this
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state than the former one had done. At the conclusion of Wayne's war, we had scarcely five thousand inhabitants, per- haps, not even that number. At the conclusion of the war of 1812, our numbers were probably three hundred thousand. The population increased, after this war, not rapidly, yet stea- dily, for two or three years, until, by a succession of unto- ward events, the state became stationary, for several years. But we will reserve our remarks on that portion of our civil history, for a separate article.
As a national affair, the war, which we have been consider- ing, so far as Ohio was concerned in carrying it on, was con- ducted as well as could have been expected. Her citizens had no sailors impressed on the high seas, nor any ships or goods seized there, by England, yet our people never murmur- ed that it was an eastern war, and ought to be borne by eastern men. Our citizens never objected to crossing an im- maginary line, under any poor, frivolous excuse, but on the contrary, they complained that they were not led into the heart of the enemy's country instantly, and allowed to end the war on this frontier, at once and forever. Our citizen soldiers, patiently underwent all the hardships of warfare, without a complaint, and they cheerfully obeyed their officers, who were elected by themselves. The officers treated them as their neighbors and friends, even standing guard while their soldiers slept. Western members of congress served as privates in western campaigns. McArthur, Cass, and all the officers stood as sentinels, often, as if they had been privates. Desertions were rare, and not a volunteer was punished with death, for any crime, nor ever deserved it. There was no party opposed to the war, in Kentucky, Ohio, or Indiana. So far as these states are concerned, now, they are as true and faithful citizens to the nation as can be desired. We have stated facts within our own entire recollection, and cannot be wrong. Impartial truth is all we aim at in our relation of events.
By the war of 1812, the nation might have been indirectly benefited, by gaining some little notice abroad. It might have
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roused up the nation from a sort of torpor of the body politic, but impressment was left where we found it, unprovided for by treaty stipulations.
It is quite possible the governments of both countries got heartily sick of the war, and so made peace. On the part of Great Britain, it was certainly a poor, and very small busi- ness, and if continued, would have issued eventually greatly to her injury. England can never have any interest in quar- reling with us whose trade is all she needs, and which war interrupts and if persisted in, and continued very long, would finally destroy. War long continued with England would make us a manufacturing nation, and independent of England .. We have no interest in quarrelling with our old stepmother, whose language we speak, and whose institutions we have copied, and bid fair to extend and perpetuate over all North America.
To all human appearance, this nation is eventually destin- ed to be the most powerful one that now is, ever was, or ever will be on the globe. At our present rate of national increase, in numbers, wealth and power, in one century to come, this nation will consist of more than one hundred millions of peo- ple, who will occupy the surface of all North America; whose commerce will encircle the globe, and whose power will be felt on every sea, and in every country of the whole earth. May her mercy and benevolence be coextensive with her power; protecting the weak, warring only on the unjust, and enlight- ning the ignorant. May she carry all the useful arts to every ยท portion of mankind, and spread the benign principles of the gospel in all lands. Thus our nation may, if she will, become, a blessing to all mankind.
GENERAL EVENTS.
PERIOD FIFTH.
THIS PERIOD COMPRISES THE HISTORY OF OHIO FROM 1815 TO 1825.
DURING the period of which we are about to treat, there was a stagnation of business of all sorts. To relieve the pressure in the midst of it, congress reduced the price of their lands in the west, from two dollars to one dollar and twenty-five cents an acre. This reduction was extremely injurious to land own- ers, many of whom held large tracts, on which they had long paid taxes, until the taxes themselves, amounted to more than the lands were worth. The productions of the lands, meat and bread, no longer found a market near the place of their production. A want of good roads, either by land or water, on which our home productions could be transported, added to our far inland situation, operated severely on industry of all sorts, and palsied every manly effort, either of body or of mind, in Ohio. This stagnation of business, and this torpor of the body politic were increased, and greatly aggravated by the failure of a great number of little country banks. These had sprung up like mushrooms, in a night, during the war, when every article, which the farmer could spare, sold readily for cash at a high price. The eastern merchants, to whom we were greatly indebted, refused our western bank paper, ex- cept at a ruinous discount, in payment either of old debts or for goods. Our specie had been transported on pack horses over the Alleghanies. The vaults of our banks were emptied of their silver and gold, and all our banks either stopped **
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payment, or ceased to do business. The farmer was discour- aged from raising much more, than what he really needed for his own immediate use; the trader feared to take bank paper, that might be of no value, before he could use it; and his old customers could no longer purchase any goods except mere necessaries of life. The people living in the towns, became idle, lazy, and of course, dissipated. Amidst this gloom, the national government brought suits in court on all the bonds due to them, for the internal duties on distilleries, &c., &c., and against the collectors of the revenue. United States lands had been sold to settlers on a credit, and these were forfeited for non-payment.
Universal ruin stared all in the face, and it seemed for awhile, as if the people of the west would retrograde into a state of barbarism.
Congress had chartered a national bank, but although this measure operated for a moment, auspiciously by throwing in- to circulation a sound currency, yet inasmuch as the balance of trade was greatly against the west, we received no lasting benefit from it.
Three-fourths of the state, all south of the summit which separates the waters of the Mississippi from those of the St. Lawrence, carried their produce to New Orleans for sale. This trade was very little better than no trade, only as it ter .- ded to keep men out of absolute idleness. The arks, or as they were called "New Orleans boats," cost about two hun- dred dollars each, where they were built, and as they were of little value at New Orleans, and could not be used by their owners, only for descending the river, the entire cost of the boats was lost. The hands employed in this long, tedious and expensive voyage, provided they escaped death by the yellow fever, or by some robber, were compelled to return home by land through the Indian country. In the interior where thesc boats were built along the Ohio, and its branches, after build- ing the boats and loading them with flour, pork, lard, whisky, cider, apples, fowls, &c., the freshet must come before they could depart on their perilous voyage. And it might hap-
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pen, and often did happen, that all the streams in the state of Ohio were up, at nearly the same time. The flood came, and with it departed such an amount of produce, that the market was glutted. The best flour has been sold for three dollars a barrel, and pork for four or five dollars a barrel, in New Or- leans, which amounted to a total loss of the cargo. Or the boat sunk on its voyage, and not merely were the boat and cargo lost, but every man on board it perished. If those who' left their property for sale in New Orleans, lost only all they thus stored in the agent's warehouse, and were not called on for a considerable amount, as the difference of value between the expenses of selling and what the sale produced to the own- er he was truly fortunate, in those times. Or if a man, who had purchased and paid for twenty thousand dollars' worth of produce in Ohio, and had succeeded in making what was then considered a good sale of his property, in New Orleans-we say if such a man should have been taken sick at an inn, where he lodged, (and he was sure to be, if he put up at one of them) and should die there, among strangers, with his twenty- five thousand dollars, about his person, not a dollar was ever returned to his family, but in its stead a bill of several hun- i dred dollars for funeral expenses, was forwarded to his widow, parents, relatives or friends, who generally paid the host all he demanded. Numerous cases of this sort, fell out within our entire recollection of them, and all their attendant cir- cumstances.
Although taxes were levied on lands, for the support of the state government yet they were but poorly paid. And the sales, for taxes were so loosely, carelessly made, by the col- lectors, that a tax title to land was good for nothing. The more of them one had, the poorer he would be, in the same proportion.
At an early date of the state government, all the lands in the state, which had been sold by the United States over five years were divided, into three rates, first, second and third rates, and taxed accordingly, without any reference to their real value. Bottom lands, along the streams, and rich prairie
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lands, were first rate, and paid the highest tax. These lands might be worth very little from many circumstances, such as their liability to be overflowed by freshets, and they might be distant from any town, &c., so that even third rate lands might be by far, more valuable than the first rate lands. For mere cultivation, the second rate lands, lying generally on what was denominated second bottoms, were better adapted to produce grain, than those of the first class. Besides, the county officers did pretty much as they pleased in their re- turns, and first rate lands in one county might be estimated as second, or even third rate lands, in a county adjoining. This system of taxation was very erroneous, and unequal in its op- eration, doing great injustice, and productive of discontent among the land owners.
It is easily seen that a system of taxation so loosely framed, and so unjustly too, could not be very well enforced. The money raised by it so far as the members of the general assem- bly were to be paid out of it, was grudged by the tax payers. Not a few of these givers of law, were extremely illiterate; so much so, that some of them could neither write nor read their own names.
The poorer sort of people were mere squatters on the pub- lic lands, or tenants on the lands of the more wealthy land owners. These men were all voters, and they not unfre- quently obtained seats in the legislature. They paid no tax- es themselves, but they levied heavy burdens on others. We need not wonder that taxes so levied and in part (and no small part either) for such a purpose, were badly paid.
From these causes, and those causes heretofore enumerated, the state treasury at length became totally exhausted. All the salaries of the state officers, were in arrear, and all these officers, and even the members of the general assembly were paid in audited bills on the treasury. Governor Brown, though faithfully exerting every power he had, actually failed to bor- row twenty thousand dollars on the credit of the now great, populous and wealthy state of Ohio. Yes, reader, such was the fact, only a very few short years since. Several unskill-
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ful, or possibly fraudulent attempts, had been made previous, to these times, to raise a revenue by incorporating no small number of banks. These had failed, as every man of sense knew they must fail-and as they always will fail to produce much revenue to the state treasury, under any circumstances.
And at the period of our lowest depression, as to credit, no money scarcely of any sort, had a circulation among us.
Pork sold for one dollar per hundred pounds, Indian corn for twelve and a half cents a bushel, wheat for twenty-five cents, and every other article of produce was equally cheap where they were produced. And there was not a demand even at these prices, for all the farmer could easily spare.
These times, we can all remember, and, as matters of mere historical fact, we can now look back upon them, with pride and exultation, while we look around us, on the contrast, every where seen, felt and fully realized. Amidst all these gloomy circumstances, there were a few men, in the state, who looked through them, towards better days. The first impulse, which roused into activity, the sleeping energies of the Wes- tern people, was Fulton's steam boat. The first one, built on the western waters, was constructed by Robert Fulton, at Pitts- burgh, and departed from that place, in December 1812, and arrived at New Orleans, on the 24th of the same month. It was called the ORLEANS. The second was called the COMET, built by Samuel Smith, and went to Louisville, in the summer of 1813. Third, The Vesuvius, was built by Fulton, and de- scended to New Orleans, in the spring of 1814. Fourth, The Enterprise, built at Brownsville, Pennsylvania, was owned and constructed by Daniel French, on his patent. This boat made two voyages to Louisville, in the summer of 1814, under the command of captain Israel Gregg. Fifth, The Aetna was built at Pittsburgh, 1815, by Fulton and company. This busi- ness of building steam boats, increased annually, until in 1819, forty one steamers, had been constructed on the western waters. The improvements in every part of the machinery, by this time, had so far succeeded, and those who managed them, had, by
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actual experience, so far perfected themselves, in their business that the public attention had been turned towards steam boat navigation.
A new era, may be said to have commenced, which, in its beneficial effects, has produced a great deal of real good, to all the western people. There are now, four hundred steam- ers navigating our western rivers !!
The inventor of the steam boat, was ROBERT FULTON, a native of Pennsylvania. By occupation, he was orginally, a portrait painter. He inherited nothing from his parents except his genius, but, he was so fortunate, as to marry into a distin- guished family, in the state of New York. That family, was not only wealthy, but talented and influential; it was the LIv- INGSTON family. Although, the power and uses of steam, had long been known, to a great degree, in Europe; and al- though, Bolton, Watt and Arkwright had successfully applied it, to a great many useful purposes, yet, until Robert Fulton, brought this power into useful operation, in propelling vessels, nothing practical was effected by it, in navigation. Fulton expended a fortune, on his invention, and died not worth a dol- lar, leaving behind him, a family of orphans. He even lost his life, in trying an experiment, on a vessel of war, which con- gress had employed him to construct. His fate, and his ser- vices as well as Clinton's, under any modern European gov- ernment, would have entitled their heirs to a competency, dur- ing their lives, in consideration of the services of their fathers, to the country, which had been so signally benefited by their labors. What has the republic done for Fulton's and Clinton's heirs? Nothing, absolutely nothing.
To the western states, whose lakes and rivers, are unrival- ed, in the whole world, for their length, size, and usefulness, aided by this invention; the steam boat is an inestimable bless- ing. It diminishes space and time. And a voyage may now be made, in two weeks, from New Orleans, to Cincinnati or St. Louis, which would before the steamer was in use, have taken three months to perform. And four hundred tons may be trans ported in one vessel, now, whereas thirty tons, was all that a
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common keel boat, could carry upwards, in its long, tedious and dangerous voyage.
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