Centennial History of Butler County, Ohio, Part 3

Author: Bert S. Bartlow, W. H. Todhunter, Stephen D. Cone, Joseph J. Pater, Frederick Schneider, and others
Publication date: 1905
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1149

USA > Ohio > Butler County > Centennial History of Butler County, Ohio > Part 3

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).

The smallest tax on the duplicate is as-

sessed against John Reily, who was no land- grabber, but held a few lots in Hamilton, Williamsburg, Cincinnati and Deerfield. His lots in Hamilton embraced one acre of ground, and is the property formerly occu- pied in part by Colonel Campbell as a resi- dence, and the entire tax on all of Mr. Reily's property for 1805 was two cents and seven mills. The largest resident taxpayer was Celadon Symmes, $21.67.9; after him, Joel Williams, $18.64, then Samuel Dick $18.07 on 3,703 acres in what is now Ross; next, John N. Cummins, $15.81.

TOPOGRAPHY OF BUTLER COUNTY.

BY S. S. DARLING.

Originally Butler county contained four hundred and eighty square miles. After its line was straightened on the south between Butler and Hamilton counties, and a strip taken from the northern part and added to Warren county, reduced its size to a consid- erable extent. At the present time it em- braces a territory twenty-five miles east and west, by nineteen miles north and south, its average limits being not far from twenty- four and one-half miles by eighteen. This land lies in the valley formed by the diver- gence of .the Great and Little Miami rivers. It presents many interesting topographical features. There was at some time in the un- recorded past a terrific struggle of natural forces in this valley. During the period of glacial action, the ice mountains wound their slow course, and cut a path on their way to the seat. The evidences of this are abund- ant, and are to be seen in the outcroppings on the banks of the numerous streams which find their outlet in the Great Miami river.

The average breadth of this valley is

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twelve miles. The eastern divide skirts the · borders of Warren and Hamilton counties; the western divide runs nearly parallel with the eastern, beginning with the high lands of Montgomery county, and attaining its greatest elevation toward the north. The boundaries of this valley are sharply defined, and can be easily traced by the unassisted eye. This fact will recur to any one, who, from the crest along which the Big Four Railroad passes, has cast a glance westwardly, or who, from the height between Millville and Darrtown, has looked eastward to the ridge which separates the Ohio and Little Miami rivers from the Great Miami valley. A view from either of these vantage points is one of surpassing loveliness. In spring the verdure is refresh- ing in its tints, the slopes have enough of forest to relieve the monotony of a dead landscape. while the fields of starting grain, to use a rounded period of Edward Everett. "appear as if nature had spread a carpet fit to be pressed by the footsteps of her de- scending God." If one seeks natural beau- ties he has not far to go, and yet it is prob- ably true that most people have given scarcely a thought to the riches of beauty so lavishly spread around them. If one will take his stand on a summer evening on the hills southeast of Hamilton, looking over the valley toward Port Union, and survey its fields of ripening grain, he will see a picture such as no artist could transfer to canvas. On the road between Hamilton and Middle- town, on the east side of the Miami river, there are several points of observation from which the prospect is equally beautiful. Among these may be mentioned the views near the residences of the late Philip Hughes and Peter Shafor, looking west-

ward, or from Kennedy's farm, about two miles from Hamilton, on the west side of the river. The traveler by the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Indianapolis Railroad to Ox- ford, if observant, will, just before arriving at McGonigle's Station, catch a swift glimpse of the peaceful vale in which Mill- ville rests like a gem in a setting of rare excellence.

From the heights around Oxford the forest and the cleared upland rise and swell or fall away in graceful undulations that fill the eye and the heart with a sense of grace- ful beauty and perpetual delight. If the old saying be true, that "an undevout astrono- mer is mad," then it will be equally true to assert that he who has lived among such beauties and has been unobservant. is un- worthy the gifts so freely spread before him. If the reader will consult the map of Butler county he will see that the Miami river be- gins its course in the extreme northeastern border. and thence cuts diagonally through, leaving the county at its southwestern bor- der. As the crow flies this distance is thirty miles, but in the meanderings of the river it is probably forty-five to fifty miles. A glance at the general lay of the land within this valley shows it to be in harmony with. the general pitch of the surface south of the great divide which separates the waters that flow into the lakes, and thence to the north Atlantic ocean, from those waters which seek the warmer clime of the south, and thence flow northward through that greatest of all rivers, the Gulf stream, to again meet after a long separation .. The observer will also note that the courses of all streams flowing into the Great Miami is from northwest to southeast on the westward side of the river. This direction is likewise in conformity with

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the slope of the country, but on the east side of the river we find an anomalous hydro- graphic condition. While on the westward side Cotton Run, Seven-Mile, Four-Mile, Indian creek, and other tributaries of the Miami flow in a natural course, the largest tributary on the eastward side within Butler county, in defiance of all natural laws, ap- pears to run up hill. Gregory's creek has its sources in the lands of Union township. and thence flows northwestwardly and emp- ties into the Miami near Lesourdsville. So also Pleasant run, which has its source be- yond the borders of Hamilton county, makes what is apparently an up-hill detour, and finds its way into the Miami at a point nearly abreast at Symmes Corner. One who never followed the course of these two streams, save on the map, would be at a loss to ac- count for this strange contravention of phys- ical laws, but a following of the streams themselves affords an explanation of the seeming contradiction. Gregory's creek and Pleasant run both pass through gorges and ruts scooped out for them by glaciers that must have separated from the main ice mountain as it moved down the valley. These smaller glaciers being less powerful than the parent glacier were compelled to yield obedience to the character of the land over which they passed, while the larger glacier. by its great weight, was able to carve its way in the general direction which is shown on the westward side of the river. On the eastward side the adventurers cast adrift were compelled by their weakness to pick out the softest and easiest road in their journey to the Ohio valley.

The reasonableness of this theory could be abundantly demonstrated did space per- mit, but it is merely alluded to here for the

purpose of drawing the attention to a phys- ical curiosity which has few parallels.

Within the memory of people living, there have been great changes in both the climatology and the physical features of the county. In the course of the river there have been changes within the recollection of people who belong to the present generation. The Miami and Erie canal was begun in 1825. and so late as 1845 Hamilton shippers to Cincinnati by canal relate that it was no uncommon thing for the horses to flounder from the towpath breast deep into a lake which covered most of the ground which lies east of the old Chase farm, now owned by Dr. Thad. Reamy, near Jones's Station. Drainage, both natural and artificial, has re- claimed all this waste land and made it as valuable a tract as there is in the county. With regard to the river, the number of its tributaries, and the immense rain-fall at its sources, make it a stream remarkable for the suddenness of its floods, its volume of water, and the uncertainty of its changes in course. The cut-off above Hamilton, which took place in 1805, and the flood of 1866, which swept away the old Hamilton bridge, and that of 1898, which destroyed the Columbian bridge, are in vivid recollection. Those floods carried several thousand acres of valu- able land from its owners, and in some in- stances worked almost financial ruin. This was notably the case at the bend of the river, where the Alston farm is situated. also below Middletown on the Dr. J. L. Thornton farm. It is doubtful, however, from the testimony of old residents, whether the floods of the present generation equal in volume or in de- structiveness those which were common at the beginning of the present century. It is certain that they are not so regular in their

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return, and can not be so surely counted upon.

Hamilton between the years 1810 and 1825 did a large trade with New Orleans and with the Indian Territory. That trade was carried on by flatboats, some of which were built on the banks of Four-Mile creek, near Oxford, and were there loaded with provis- ions suitable for the southern markets, and the flood never failed to come and bear them along their way.

There is not such certainty in the returns of these freshets now, and it would be im- possible to establish a trade on the chance of such conditions as made those ventures at that time perfectly sound from a business point of view. It would appear as if rain- falls and snow-falls were greater in those earlier days than now. Whether this change is due to the denudation of the valley by cut- ting off the timber, it would, perhaps, not be profitable to take time in inquiry. It is prob- able, however, that as the land became clearer and broken up in settlement that the rain and snow falls are now absorbed, where for- merly they ran to the river, and that thus, instead of the annual average of rain being less than it once was, we are misled by its effect, being less apparent in great floods. It is the opinion of at least two engineers, who have had great experience in the meas- urement of water volumes, that the flood of 1866 was probably not exceeded in quan- tity of water by any that preceded it within the written history of the valley.

With regard to the soil Butler county compares favorably with the average of the state. It shows but a small proportion of what is called poor or waste land. In this class but 10,468 acres are returned to the secretary of state, leaving 189,539 acres as

either wood or pasture land, or as susceptible of tillage. This is the report as given by the Ohio agricultural board in 1900. There is wide diversity in the fruitfulness of dif- ferent portions of the county. It embraces as rich land as there is in the state, and some exceedingly poor. It has been found by ex- periment, however, that the lands which are considered poor possess hidden elements of strength. and some as good farms as there are in the county were originally purchased at cheap figures, in view of their poverty of production. Intelligent tillage has shown that this seeming poverty was easy of rem- edy, that there was inherent virtue in the soil, which needed only waking to activity by simple artificial means. The average composition of the upland soil is a sandy loam. In the highest uplands this changes to a clay. In the bottom where the Miami river has made its deposits the character of the soil changes to a deep black-what are termed the bottom lands of the Miami val- ley.

. It may be questioned, however. whether the term bottom land is rightly applied, since the fertility of the uplands for certain crops fully equals that of the low land. Bottom lands are peculiarly adapted to corn. the up- land to wheat and harley. No county in the state is traversed by more small streams. The bridges under county supervision num- ber more than one thousand, and the loss on bridges by flood in 1898 was more than one hundred thousand dollars. This is men- tioned in connection with what has already been said about the Miami river and its trib- utaries. to impress upon the reader the sig- nificance of a natural system of irrigation and drainage. The uplands abound in springs. and in seasons of drought give out

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the hoard of water they store during seasons From these two sources, widely apart as of plentitude. In seasons of extreme rain- they are, spring the sources of Butler coun- ty's wealth. fall the inclination of the land toward the river readily conveys away the hurtful sur- It would be hard between the Lakes and the Gulf, or between Portland, Maine, and the Rocky Mountains, to find the same num- ber of acres better adapted to general pur- poses of cultivation. It would appear as if all the elements, both in soil and in climate, had combined in the Miami valley to make the labor of the farmer successful. On ev- ery side come fructifying rills, the snows of winter cover the sleeping grain, the warm breath of spring breathes nowhere more gently, and above are no more benignant summer skies. plus. It has been found necessary in but few portions of the county to resort to artificial draining-nature has so well provided for the wants of the husbandman. There is no doubt that if artificial means were used the productiveness of the county could be largely increased, for wherever drainage experi- ments have been tried the results have been exceedingly satisfactory. A good illustra- tion of this natural drainage can be seen along the bank of the canal, just north of Hamilton, or on the rocky road between Heno and Miltonville. Where the rock crops up from the cutting it will be found that there is a sufficient depth of soil GEOLOGY OF BUTLER COUNTY. from deposits of verdure to insure richness and stability, while the underlying rock pre- vents too great evaporation in drought, and at the same time acts as an underground roof to turn excessive water into the Miami river. We have tried in this way to briefly explain the most striking feature that per- tains to the general outlet of the county.

A wrong impression is abroad with re- spect to the fertility of the Miami valley. We have endeavored to show that the up- lands are good for wheat and for barley, while the low lands are good for corn. The exceeding richness of production is, there- fore, not due to natural fertility of soil so much as it is due to a plan which in nature appears to have been provided for the con- tinual renewal of the land. In the bottoms this renewal of land comes from the annual overflows of the river. In the uplands it comes from the absorption by the soil of nitrogenous elements from the atmosphere.

The Great Miami at some former period diverged from its present route and bent to the east. The larger and more plainly marked of these channels is that which di- vides just below Hamilton, and follows the line of the present Mill creek through Fair- field and Union townships. This valley is in the neighborhood of a mile wide, and the gravel and bowlders show plainly where its waters once flowed. The other channel of the Miami began in Lemon township, and followed Dick's creek through this and Warren county until it finally debouched in the Little Miami. The canal follows the valley first mentioned, while the Lebanon canal once followed the other. It is prob- able that these depressions, as well as those of the various creeks, owe much to glacial action.

In the first map of this region in Eng- land. the Miami is indicated as Stony or Rocky river. Its bed in many places shows

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the rock foundation, and so do those of and covers a section or two of the county. Seven-Mile creek and its affluents. But Both the Clinton and Niagara formations Twin creek and Indian creek have the evi- are shown here, but the area is so small, and is known to so few residents of the county, comparatively, that it may be dis- missed from further consideration. dences of greater antiquity, as their beds are entirely alluvial, so far as is visible to the eve, and the rock is buried beneath. In each valley there is a little extent of level ground, varying from a few yards to up- wards of three miles wide in the Miami at Hickory Bottom, in the south part of Madi- son township and north part of St. Clair. These bottoms are known as prairies, and were partly without wood at the beginning of the settlements, and where free were cov- ered each year with an excellent growth of grass. These low-lying alluvial districts cover an arca of not less than eighty square miles, or between one-fifth and one-sixth of the total surface.

The Butler county scale begins at about two hundred feet above the base of the sys- tem. and extends to the summit of the series. In Cincinnati this system is about eight hun- dred feet in thickness, making the Lebanon beds about three hundred, the Cincinnati di- vision proper four hundred and twenty-five, and the Point Pleasant beds fifty feet. Thus in this county it gives about six hundred feet of bedded rocks. There are few points of interest in the formation at large that are not found in Butler county, and on the other hand there are few peculiarities of stratifica- tion or fossil contents that deserve special mention as differing from other portions of the Cincinnati group.

This county is one of blue limestone. Most of this is not of a high character for the quarry ; but there are several beds that make excellent building stone. Orton's ge- ological survey, which we shall follow in this description, says one of the best sections in the county can be found at or near Ham- ilton. In the quarries just west of the river, the section can be begun at a horizon about two hundred and seventy-five feet above low water at Cincinnati, and it can be followed in frequent outcrops to the summit of Heitz- man's hill, on the Millville pike, where many of the characteristic fossils of the Lebanon division are found.

The streams in the vicinity of Oxford, Four-Mile, and its tributaries, furnish very prolific although not very extended expos- ures. The horizon is quite definitely fixed .by the presence of Orthis Retrorsa (Salter) ; Orthis Carleyi ( Hall). This shell is found on the banks of Four-Mile very near to the wa- ter's edge, directly east of the village of Ox- ford. The vertical range of this fossil is very limited, while its horizontal range is wide, so that it serves an excellent purpose as a landmark on the system. Its latitude is a horizon about four hundred and seventy- five feet above low water at Cincinnati, or about three hundred and forty-five above low water in Hamilton.

The bedded -rocks of Butler county be- long, with the exception of the very limited area of one or two square miles, to the Lower Silurian or Cincinnati group of Ohio. The exception named is found in the northeastern The Oxford sections are of interest from the fact that they yielded thirty-five years corner of Oxford township, where a spur of the cliff limestone crosses the county line, ago many of the type fossils of the forma-

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tion. The early geological work of David Christy, Esq., was done in this field, and through him collections of the fossils found here were distributed among eastern and foreign geologists. The name of Oxford is, accordingly, very widely known as one of the typical localities of the blue limestone or Cincinnati group of southern Ohio. The original cabinet of Mr. Christy is now in . possession of the Miami University. It con- tains a number of interesting fossils.

Wayne and Madison townships, and es- pecially the latter, furnish unsurpassed ex- posures of the Lebanon beds on the banks of the smaller streams that drain their high- lands. Kemp's run, near Middletown Sta- tion, furnishes excellent ground for the col- lector, as do several branches that flow from Loy's hill to Twin creek, on the north line of the county.

The lowest ground in the county is to be found on its southern boundary in the Miami valley. Its approximate elevation above the level of low water in Cincinnati is fifty feet. The alluvial division represents the valleys of both ancient and modern- the eroded regions from which the rocks have been carried away to a depth at least below existing drainage courses. These areas could be appropriately described as the portions of the county that have an eleva- tion of not more than two hundred and fifty feet above the Ohio river. The uplands em- brace the lands above this level. A large proportion of them. however, lie at an eleva- tion between four and six hundred feet above the Ohio. This division of the surface of the county is much less definite on the east side of the river than it is on the west, for the reason that the drift deposits are heavier in the first-named district. In other words,

the lines of the valleys are here harder to be traced. There are areas of unmistakable up- lands, but they are connected with the val- leys by slopes of considerable extent, which completely obscure the true outlines of the rocky floor.

The uplands proper are remnants of the blue limestone 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 rock shows through, giv- ing its peculiar features to the topography. to the agricultural capacity, and to the water supply of the districts occupied. These up- land 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 underlying 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. Al- most 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. Ex- amples can be seen in following almost any stream to its source, but one or two points may be named which are specially note- worthy in this respect. Collins's run, near Oxford, a small tributary of Four-Mile creek, shows in its banks very numerous ex- posures of these pre-glacial and inter-glacial forest growths. The vegetation is imbedded

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in the clay very often, and part of it shows that if has been subjected to rough mechan- ical 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 modifica- tion of the bowlder clay is found that de- serves particular mention. It is a clay dis- tinctly green in color, and as shown by a single analysis or a specimen obtained at this point, is very rich in potash and soda. 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 re- corded 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.'" -

The yellow gravelly clay that makes the main element of the drift in all of this re- gion is very abundant in this county. It is not formed from the weathering of the up- per portions of the bowlder clay in place. The action of the atmosphere upon an ex- posed 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 sur- face clays in southern Ohio. They have been worn away from their old places of de- posit by water, and have been redeposited.

The bowlder clay is always unstratified; the yellow clays are generally distinctly strati- fied. The uplands of the county, especially of its northern and central portions, are al- most universally covered with deposits of this kind. There are no elevations in the county that escape the deposits of the modi- fied drift.

The sand and gravel that make a third element in the drift of this region do not de- serve a place by themselves. They form a phase only of the second order of deposits, and must be referred not only to the same general line of agencies, but also approxi- mately 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 explained. Bowlders are found at all elevations, and some of the largest size are found at the greatest altitude. One ly- ing on the highest land of the west side of Ross township measured one hundred and thirty feet above ground.

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Centennial History of Butler County, Ohio, Part 3

Author: Bert S. Bartlow, W. H. Todhunter, Stephen D. Cone, Joseph J. Pater, Frederick Schneider, and others Publication date: 1905 Publisher: Number of Pages: 1149

Author: Bert S. Bartlow, W. H. Todhunter, Stephen D. Cone, Joseph J. Pater, Frederick Schneider, and others
Publication date: 1905
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 1149