USA > Ohio > Montgomery County > Dayton > Early Dayton; with important facts and incidents from the founding of the city of Dayton, Ohio, to the hundredth anniversary, 1796-1896, > Part 5
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Red Banks was on the border of Tennessee and Kentucky, and, as it was unknown as yet to which the place belonged, it was a lawless region and a refuge for thieves and rogues of all kinds who had "been able to effect their escape from justice in the neighboring States." At Red Banks our travelers saw a fellow named Kuykendall, who "always carried in his waistcoat pockets 'devil's claws,' or rather weapons that he could slip his fingers in, and with which he could take off the whole side of a man's face at one claw." Kuykendall had just been married and a wedding ball was in progress when Van Cleve arrived, at the close of which festivities the bridegroom was murdered by some of the guests.
On July II the travelers reached Green River. They each made a raft with an armful of wood and a grapevine to carry their gun and clothes "and then taking the vines in their mouth swam the river, dragging their rafts after them." During the four succeeding days they passed through an uninhabited wilder-
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ness. July 26 they arrived at Cincinnati. Spies employed by Wayne's army had just come in for ammunition and were going to return on foot. They invited Van Cleve to join them, and he regretted that his feet and clothes were both almost worn out, and as he was unable to stand the journey he was obliged to decline the offer.
On the 28th of July he was employed by the contractors to drive a drove of cattle to Fort Greenville. Nearly the whole of August he was very ill at Cincinnati. On his recovery, after paying doctor's and board bills and for some clothes, he had but a dollar left. Accordingly, though so weak that he could hardly walk, he engaged with the contractors to drive cattle to the army then at Fort Wayne, and was occupied with this business till Decem- ber. In January, 1795, he entered into partnership at Cincinnati with his brother-in-law, Jerome Holt, and Captain John Schooley. They farmed and also hauled quartermaster's supplies to Fort Washington and the outposts in their six-horse wagon. Van Cleve "worked hard, lived poor, and was very economical, and had about as much when he quit as when he began."
In the fall of 1795 he accompanied Captain Dunlap to make the survey of the land purchased for the Dayton settlement. Surveyors endured much hardship. A hunter and a spy always accompanied surveying parties, for they were obliged to supply themselves with food from the woods, and to be on the watch against attacks from wandering bands of Indians. On the 26th of September Van Cleve records that their horse was missing, though he had been well secured when they camped for the night. Indians had probably stolen him. They hunted for him all day, but did not find him ; and were thenceforth obliged to carry the baggage themselves, though traveling on foot. When they arrived at the mouth of Mad River, the site of Dayton, they found six Wyandot Indians camped there. At first both the white and the red men were a little alarmed; but they talked together, and dicussed mutual grievances. Van Cleve's father had been killed by Indians, and the Wyandots had suffered in like manner from the white man. They admitted that both sides had reason for complaint, and that both were to blame, and they soon became friends and exchanged presents. "They gave us," Van Cleve says, "some venison jerk, and we in return gave them a little flour, salt, tobacco, and other small articles. At the request of one of them, I exchanged knives, giving him
1
From & water-color portrait in possession of Mrs. Thomas Dover. Copyright, 1895, by W. J. Shuey. BENJAMIN VAN CLEVE.
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a very large one, scabbard, and belt that I carried for several years, for his, which was not so valuable, with a worsted belt and a deerskin to boot."
The Ist of October their hunter and another man were sent forward to hunt and cook, and when, after a day of fasting and hard work, the surveyors reached camp they found that some- Indians had robbed their men of most of the provisions, and "menaced their lives." On another occasion the surveyors fasted thirty-four hours, laboring and traveling most of the time, and the Memoranda describes the gusto with which they ate the big pot of mush and milk which was all they had for supper when at last they reached a cabin. "October 3," Van Cleve writes, "it rained very hard, and the surveyor got his papers all wet and was about stopping. We had about a pound of meat, and, though we had nearly done our business, were thinking of setting off for home. I undertook to keep the field- notes, and hit on the expedient of taking them down on tablets of wood with the point of my knife, so I could understand theni and take them off again on paper." They returned to Cincinnati on the 4th of October.
On the Ist of November Van Cleve went again to Mad River. A lottery was held, and he drew lots in and near Dayton for hin- self and others, and "engaged to become a settler in the spring." This winter, when not surveying, Benjamin Van Cleve wrote in the recorder's office at Cincinnati. In March, 1796, as already related, he accompanied his mother and several others to Dayton. In his diary he made this simple and characteristic record of their arrival at their new home : "April 1, 1796. Landed at Dayton, after a passage of ten days, William Gahagan and myself having come with Thompson's and McClure's families in a large pirogue."
Van Cleve raised a very good crop of corn at Dayton this year, but most of it was destroyed. He sold his possessions in Cincinnati, but "sunk the price of his lots." He gave eighty dollars for a yoke of oxen and one of them was shot, and twenty dollars for a cow and it died ; so that at the close of 1796 he was about forty dollars in debt. The next year his farming was also unsuccessful, and he lost $16.17 and gained nothing. In the fall of 1796 he accompanied Israel Ludlow and W. C. Schenck to survey the United States military lands between the Scioto and Muskingum rivers. "We had deep snow," he says, "covered 4
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with crust. The weather was cold and still, so that we could kill but little game, and we were twenty-nine days without bread, and nearly all that time without salt, and sometimes very little to eat. We were five days-seven in company-on four meals, and they, except the last, scanty. They consisted of a turkey, two young raccoons, and the last day some rabbits and venison, which we got from some Indians." In February, 1798, he began the study of surveying in Cincinnati, boarding at Captain Benham's. He was promised a district in the United States lands by Israel Ludlow, who had the power of filling blank commissions from the Surveyor-General, but who, as on the former occasion, never fulfilled his promise. After completing his studies, he "assisted Avery in his tavern during the sitting of court, and for some time afterwards posted books for several persons, and wrote for a short time in the quartermaster's department at Fort Wash- ington." He had been waiting in Cincinnati all summer, hoping to be employed as a surveyor, and was now again put off. He therefore returned to Dayton. On his arrival, having nothing else to do, he dug a sawmill pit for D. C. Cooper, proprietor of the town. From working in so damp and chilly a place he caught a violent cold, and had rheumatism and fever, succeeded by pleurisy. He had been forced to sell his preemption rights and outlots in Dayton, but in 1799 rented some ground and raised an excellent crop of corn.
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CHAPTER III
PIONEER LIFE
Two HOUSES on Main Street in 1799-Small Size of Cabins-Description by W. C. Howells of a Home of the Period-Newcom's Tavern, First House in Dayton, Chinked with Mortar-Corner Monument Avenue and Main Street the Business Center of Dayton -First White Child Born in Dayton - Biography of Colonel Newcom- Wearisome Journey Through the Woods to Dayton -- Camping at Night-Newcom's Tavern Described - Relics -Old Clock and Brass Candlestick -First County Court Held at Tavern-Money Scarce-Convicted Persons Fined a Deerskin or a Bushel of Corn-Sen- tenced to Thirty-Nine Lashes on Bare Back -Sheriff Newcom's Primitive Prison a Corn-Crib and a Dry Well-Anecdotes of Visits of Troublesome Indians to the Tavern -Colonel Newcom Introduces Apples-First Wed- ding in Dayton -Benjamin Van Cleve's Characteristic Account of the Event-Mr. Van Cleve's Hospitality to Strangers -Usefulness to the New Town -W. C. Howells's Description of Social Life in Pioneer Times-Fire- Hunting on the Miami- Women Helped Their Husbands in the Fields- Dependent on the Husband's and Father's Gun for Meals-Pelts and Bears' Oil Articles of Merchandise-Skins Used for Clothes, Moccasins, Rugs, and Coverlets-Business Conducted by Barter-Ginseng, Peltries, Beeswax, etc., Used as Money-Cut-Money or Sharp Shins-Charges Made in Pounds, Shillings, and Pence-Wild Animals-First Mill, a Corn- Cracker, Built by D. C. Cooper-Log Meeting-House Built-Dayton First Governed Wholly by County Commissioners and Township Assessors- D. C. Cooper Justice of the Peace-Early Marriages-Petition Presented to Congress by Settlers-The Town Nearly Dies Out-D. C. Cooper, Titular Proprietor, Resuscitates It-Town Plats- Basis of Titles-Ohio a State- Montgomery Separated from Hamilton County -Population Increases -First Election-First County Court-Mr. Cooper Builds Saw- and Grist- Mills-Levees-New Graveyard-Log-Cabin Meeting-House Sold-New First Presbyterian Church -Mr. Cooper's Death - First Jail.
THE only buildings in 1799 on Main Street within view of the blockhouse on the site of the Soldiers' Monument were New- com's log tavern, two stories in height, and containing four rooms, built in the winter of 1798-1799, and George Westfall's cabin of one room and a loft, on the southeast corner of the alley between First Street and Monument Avenue. One won- ders how a family of five or six could live in a diminutive house like the latter. W. C. Howells, father of the novelist, in his "Recollections of Ohio," published in the spring of 1895, de-
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scribes such a cabin, into which two families, one of them his father's, -cultivated, refined people,- were crowded for four days and nights, and which was the home of the Howells family, nuin- bering nine, for several months. This log cabin was eighteen by twenty feet in size, and with a loft overhead, in the highest part of which you could make a bed on the floor. The cabin con- tained fourteen persons during the crowded period mentioned - eight grown people and six children. Mr. Howells says: "As I write this in a house where there would be a room for each, I do not myself see how it was managed. But that was fifty years ago, and people put up with worse things. The fact is, there was no alternative, and when it is that or nothing we can do many odd things." In those days people rolled up in a bear- skin or blanket and slept on the puncheon floor or out-of-doors in summer on the grass.
It is difficult for people with modern ideas of space and privacy to comprehend how a small house like Newconi's Tavern could have afforded accommodations for travelers, for a store, church, court-house, and jail. But Mr. Howells throws some light on this question also. Describing a journey in a wagon, he says : "We stopped at night at a tavern, as was the custom, only hiring the use of one room on the first floor, known as the movers' room, and the privilege of the fire to make tea or coffee, or fry bacon. It was very much like caniping out, save that we were housed at soldiers' quarters." The movers' room of a tavern was also, no doubt, often used for meetings of the court or of the church. Mr. Howells says that cabins sometimes contained a four-light window, with greased paper for glass, but it was very common for log cabins to have no windows whatever. In ex- tremely cold weather the door would be closed, and likewise at night, but mostly, by keeping a good fire, the door could be left open for light and ventilation ; and the chimneys were so wide and so low, very often not as high as the one-story house, that they afforded as much light as a small window. These chimneys were always outside the house at one end. The manner of build- ing them was to cut through the logs at the gable-end a space of six or eight feet wide and five or six feet high, and logs were built to this opening like a bay-window; this recess was then lined with a rough stone wall up as high as this opening ; from that point a smoke-stack was built of small sticks split out of straight wood, and laid cob-house fashion to the height desired,
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and then plastered inside and out with clay, held together by straw.
In 1799 lime was made in Dayton for the first time, from stones gathered from the bed of the river and piled on a huge log fire, which took the place of a kiln. Newcom's Tavern was the first house chinked and plastered with lime mortar instead of clay .- "A wondering country boy, on his return from the village, reported to his astonished family that Colonel Newcom was plastering his house with flour."
The southwest corner of Monument Avenue and Main Street was the business center of Dayton Township for five or six years. If a crowd was possible in such a hamlet, it assenibled there when court was in session, as in 1803, or when there was a meeting to organize for defense against the Indians, or to attend to religious or political affairs. All travelers on horse- back, on foot, or in wagons, prospectors hunting for land, emi- grants, farmers and their wives in town for the day, stopped at Newcom's Tavern to eat or sleep, shop, attend to law business, get a drink of water from the only well in the township or a glass of something stronger, or to rest and gossip around the roaring log fire, where the villagers loved to gather. April 14, 1800, Jane Newcom, the first child born in Dayton, was born at her father's tavern. She married Nathaniel Wilson. Mrs. Josiah Gebhart, daughter of Mrs. Wilson and granddaughter of Colonel Newcom, has portraits of both these pioneers in her possession.
The interest that is felt in the preservation of Newcom's Tavern renders the career of the builder of that historic house, a man who "enjoyed the respect of the whole community," of import- ance. Colonel George Newcom was born in Ireland and brought to this country by his parents in 1775. The Newcoms settled first in Delaware, removing afterwards to the neighborhood of Middletown, Pennsylvania. George Newcom married Mary Hen- derson, of Washington County, Pennsylvania. They had three children, one of whom died before they came to Dayton. The second child, John W., had several children, all of whoni died young, except Martha A., who married Jolin E. Greer, of Day- ton. The third child, Jane, as already stated, married Nathaniel Wilson, and four of her nine children lived to be well known in Dayton-Clinton, Mrs. Mary J. Hunt, Mrs. Elizabethı Bowen, and Mrs. Josiah Gebhart.
In March, 1796, George Newcom and his wife left Cincinnati
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(where they had arrived about 1794) for the site of Dayton. Three other families and five unmarried men were of the party. It took them two weeks to make the trip of sixty niiles over the almost unbroken roads, and very wearisome and uncomfortable was the journey. The weather was damp and cold, rainy, and spitting snow. Camping at night in the wet woods was a trying experi- ence, though hatchet and ax furnished fuel for a blazing fire, kindled by rubbing together pieces of punk or rotten wood, and their rifles supplied them with food from the surrounding forest. Beds were made by spreading blankets over brush. In the early morning mothers and children arose, shivering and unrefreshed ; breakfast was prepared, horses fed and packed by men cold, tired, and discouraged, and another day's journey begun.
The road from Cincinnati to Hamilton had been used so much by United States troops that it was tolerably good, but the rough, narrow road from Hamilton to Dayton was often almost impassable for heavily laden horses. Even the women seem to have walked most of the way. The men drove the cattle and led the packhorses. In creels, suspended from either side of the pack-saddles, were carried bedding, clothing, cook- ing utensils, tableware, provisions, tools, implements, and children too small to walk, their heads only appearing above. When the party came to small streams, they felled trees and made foot-bridges. It was necessary to build rafts to carry men, women, children, and freight across large creeks, and horses and cattle swam over. Driving the cattle, which would stray from the road and occasion delay till they were found, was troublesome and provoking business. Finally, the party reached the mouth of Mad River, and found friends awaiting them, the other two. companies of settlers having arrived a few days sooner.
Colonel Newcom built a cabin of one room and a loft on the southwest corner of Main Street and Monument Avenue as soon as he arrived, which in the winter of 1798-1799 gave place to the tavern of two stories and four rooms. This latter house is usually described as tavern, store, court-house, and jail, though the jail, in two separate "apartments," was really in the back yard, where was also a log barn. When large parties stopped at Newconi's Tavern, probably they occupied a movers' room and looked after themselves. But when one or two travelers alighted with their saddle-bags, they were no doubt made literal guests and taken into the family as if they were friends or relations. It
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was a typical frontier tavern, the host and hostess, as was the universal custom in private houses, assisting in doing the work of the tavern, and often even the stable, with their own hands. On the kitchen mantel of the tavern stood tall brass candlesticks, one of which is now in the possession of Mrs. Josiah Gebhart. In a corner ticked the large, old-fashioned clock, six feet or more in height. It is now in the possession of Mr. Charles W. Geb- hart, wound regularly with the key that Colonel Newcom used, and keeping as excellent time as it did a hundred years ago. In the kitclien also stood a dresser laden with pewter dishes, which shone like silver.
The first county court was opened in an upper room in New- coni's Tavern July 27, 1803, by Hon. Francis Dunlevy, presiding judge of the first judicial district. Benjamin Van Cleve was clerk pro tem .; Daniel Symmes, of Cincinnati, prosecutor pro tem .; George Newcom, sheriff; and James Miller, coroner. The law fixing the county-seat at Dayton, which went into force in May, 1803, also directed that the court should assemble "at the house of George Newcom, in the town of Dayton." As there was no business to transact, court adjourned on the evening of the day it assembled. Nearly all the men in Montgomery County flocked to Newcom's on July 27. The opening of court was the occasion of universal excitement and amusement in that stag- nant, back-country region. The judges and lawyers slept the night of the 27th in one room at the tavern, and left early the next morning on horseback to open court at Xenia. The second session of court-November 22, 1803-was held under the trees back of Newcom's Tavern, aad the aid of the sheriff was required to disperse the curious crowd which was listening, not only to the testimony of witnesses, but to the presumably secret discus- sions of the jury. Seven cases were tried, and court adjourned next day.
As money was scarce, persons convicted by the court were fined a certain number of deer or other skins, or an amount of corn or pork. Small offenses were often punished by from one to thirty- nine lashes on the bare back, well laid on, the sentence being executed by Sheriff Newcom as soon as pronounced. There was no regular jail, and Colonel Newcom confined white prisoners in a dry well on his lot. "The pit was dry and there was no water in it," as Curwen, the witty first historian of Dayton says, "and following the example of Old Testament jailers, he let down
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those who broke the peace of the State, and there they remained till brought up for trial." When drunken and troublesome Indians were placed in his keeping, he bound them and confined them in his corn-crib.
Visits of Indians. were a great nuisance to pioneers, whether they were friendly or the reverse. They were in the habit of calling white people by their Christian names, and would stand outside the Newcom house, carefully closed against them, shout- ing "Polly, Polly," and if Mrs. Newcom persisted in refusing to admit them, would fill their hands with corn from the crib and throw it through the chinks between the logs of the cabin, which were not always well filled with plaster. One day Colonel Newcom came home and found his wife at the wash-tub and an Indian bespattered with blood bending over her with a tomna- hawk. The Colonel demanded what this meant, and the Indian replied that "Polly" was washing his shirt. He had compelled Mrs. Newcom to get a tub of water and wash the shirt, which was soaked with blood, whether of man or wild beast Mrs. New- com did not learn. Colonel Newcom sprung upon the Indian, gave him a severe beating, bound him with strong rope, and threw him into the corn-crib. In a short time the Indian was discovered running towards Mad River, and was never seen nor heard of again. How he managed to untie the rope and escape is an unsolved mystery.
Once, when Mrs. Newcom was ill, a crowd of excited Indians burst into the room where she lay and ordered Colonel Newcom to get them a rope, as they wished to bind one of their number who had offended them. Mrs. Newcom was afraid to be left alone with the Indians, and sat up and begged her husband not to get the rope. Thereupon one of the Indians pushed her back with great violence on the bed. Terrified at the threatening manner of the angry ruffians, she caught up her baby, Jane, and fled into the hazel bushes as far from the house as she was able to go, not returning till Colonel Newcom had got rid of the intruders.
Colonel Newcom introduced apples into Dayton. Previously the settlers had no fruit but the wild growth of the woods and prairies. He brought a number of apples from Cincinnati, called the citizens together, and gave different varieties of the fruit to whoever desired to plant the seed. He planted seed on his farm, now the home of Mr. P. E. Gilbert, on Huffman Avenue,
From a daguerreotype in possession of Mrs. Josiah Gebhart. COLONEL GEORGE NEWCOM.
NEWCOM'S TAVERN IN 1799.
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setting out the tiny trees in an orchard when they were only a few inches high. This orchard was cut down a year ago.
Colonel Newcom was the first sheriff of Montgomery County, and held other offices. He was a member of the Ohio Legislature for twenty-three consecutive years-first as a senator and after- wards as a member of the lower house. When the Legislature spent time uselessly on business of little importance, he would berate his fellow members for wasting the people's money by long sessions when all important affairs could have been crowded into a short period. He served as a soldier in Wayne's campaign against the Indians in 1794, and also in the War of 1812. April 3, 1834, his first wife died. He married Elizabeth Bowen, June 22, 1836. She died October 29, 1850. Colonel Newcom lived to be eighty-two, and died February 25, 1853.
August 28, 1800, is noted as the date of the first wedding in Dayton. On that day Benjamin Van Cleve was married to Mary Whitten at her father's house on his farm a short distance from town. Mr. Van Cleve makes this characteristic record of the event in his diary: "This year I raised a crop of corn and determined on settling myself, and having a home; I accordingly, on the 28th of August, married Mary Whitten, daughter of John Whitten, near Dayton. She was young, lively, and ingenuous. My property was a horse creature, and a few farming utensils, and her father gave her a few household or kitchen utensils, so that we could make shift to cook our provisions ; a bed, a cow and heifer, an ewe and two lambs, a sow and pigs, and a saddle and spinning-wheel. I had corn and vegetables growing, so that if we were not rich we had sufficient for our immediate wants, and we were contented and happy." Mr. Van Cleve's marriage was a benefit to the community, for it enabled him to exercise that open-handed hospitality to strangers which was a trait of the public-spirited pioneers. The writer of an obituary notice of him published in the Dayton Watchman, in 1821, says: "He has been a leading character in this county, and has taken an active part in promoting its interests. By using system in his business, he found leisure from his duties as clerk of the court, postmaster, and his private affairs, to do much for the public good ; and the strangers that passed through town found in Mr. Van Cleve one who was able and took pleasure in giving them information."
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