USA > Ohio > Historical collections of Ohio, containing a collection of the most interesting facts, traditions, biographical sketches, anecdotes, etc., relating to its general and local history : with descriptions of its counties, principal towns, and villages > Part 7
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On Wednesday, October 24th, 1801, a church was constituted at Austinburg with sixteen members. This was the first church on the Western Reserve, and was founded by the Rev. Joseph Badger, the first missionary on the Reserve, a sketch of whom is in another part of this volume. It is a fact worthy of note, that in 1802, Mr.
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ASHTABULA COUNTY.
Badger moved his family from Buffalo to this town, in the first wag- on that ever came from that place to the Reserve. In 1803, Aus- tinburg, Morgan and Harpersfield experienced a revival of religion by which about 35 from those places united with the church at Aus- tinburg. This revival was attended with the phenomena of." bodily exercises," then common in the west. They have been classified by a clerical writer as Ist, the Falling exercise ; 2d, the Jerking exercise ; 3d, the Rolling exercise ; 4th, the Running exercise ; 5th, the Dan- cing exercise ; 6th, the Barking exercise ; 7th, Visions and Trances. We make room for an extract from his account of the 2d of the series, which sufficiently characterises the remainder.
It was familiarly called The Jerks, and the first recorded instance of its occurrence was at a sacrament in East Tennessee, when several hundred of both sexes were seized with this strange and involuntary contortion. The subject was instantaneously seized with spasms or convulsions in every muscle, nerve and tendon. His head was thrown or jerked from side to side with such rapidity that it was impossible to distinguish his visage, and the most lively fears were awakened lest he should dislocate his neck or dash out his brains. Ifis body partook of the same impulse and was hurried on by like jerks over every obstacle, fallen trunks of trees, or in a church, over pews and benches, apparently to the most im- minent danger of being bruised and mangled. It was useless to attempt to hold or restrain him, and the paroxysm was permitted gradually to exhaust itself. An additional motive for leaving him to himself was the superstitious notion that all attempt at restraint was resisting the spirit of God.
The first form in which these spasmodic contortions made their appearance was that of a simple jerking of the arms from the elbows downwards. The jerk was very quick and sudden, and followed with short intervals. This was the simplest and most common form, but the convulsive motion was not confined to the arms ; it extended in many instances to other parts of the body. When the joint of the neck was affected, the head was thrown backward and forward with a celerity frightful to behold, and which was impossible to be imitated by persons who were not under the same stimulus. The bosom heaved, the coun- tenance was disgustingly distorted, and the spectators were alarmed lest the neck should be broken. When the hair was long, it was shaken with such quickness, backward and forward, as to crack and snap like the lash of a whip. Sometimes the muscles of the back were affected, and the patient was thrown down on the ground, when his contortions for some time resembled those of a live fish cast from its native element on the land.
The most graphic description we have is from one who was not only an eye witness, but an apologist. He says, " Nothing in nature could better represent this strange and unac- countable operation, than for one to goad another, alternately on every side, with a piece of red hot iron. The exercise commonly began in the head, which would fly backward and forward, and from side to side, with a quick jolt, which the person would naturally labor to suppress, but in vain ; and the more any one labored to stay himself and be sober, the more he staggered, and the more his twitches increased. He must necessarily go as he was in- clined, whether with a violent dash on the ground, and bounce from place to place like a foot-ball, or hop round, with head, limbs and trunk twitching, and jolting in every direction, as if they must inevitably fly asunder. And how such could escape without injury, was no small wonder among spectators. By this strange operation the human frame was commonly so transformed and disfigured, as to lose every trace of its natural appearance. Sometimes the head would be twitched right and left, to a half round, with such velocity, that no: a feature could be discovered, but the face appeared as much behind as before ; and in the quick progressive jerk, it would seem as if the person was transmuted into some other species of creature. Head dresses were of little account among the female jerkers. Even handkerchiefs bound tight round the head would be flirted off almost with the first twitch, and the hair put into the utmost confusion ; this was a very great inconvenience, to redress which the generality were shorn, though directly contrary to their confession of faith. Such as were seized with the jerks, were wrested at once, not only from under their own government, but that of every one else, so that it was dangerous to attempt confining them or touching them in any manner, to whatever danger they were exposed, yet few were hurt, except it were such as rebelled against the operation, through wilful and deliberate enmity, and refused to comply with the injunctions which it came to enforce."
From the universal testimony of those who have described these spasms, they appear to
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ASHTABULA COUNTY.
have been wholly involuntary. This remark is applicable also to all the other bodily exer- cises. What demonstrates satisfactorily their involuntary nature is, not only that, as above stated, the twitches prevailed in spite of resistance, and even more for attempts to suppress them ; but that wicked men would be seized with them while sedulously guarding against an attack, and cursing every jerk when made. Travellers on their journey, and laborers at their daily work, were also liable to them.
We conclude our sketch of the county with some amusing inci- dents, related in the Mss. of the Society ; although trivial in them- selves, they are important in illustration.
There is a stream in Geneva, called " Morse's Slough," and it took its cognomen in this wise. For a time after the Spencers, Austin, Hale, and Morse commenced operations on the lake shore, in the NE. corner of Geneva, they plied their labors there only a week at the time, or as long as a back load of provisions, that each carried, might happen to last. Whatever time of the week they went out, those having families returned on Saturday night to the settlements, and those without, returned whenever out of provisions. The main portion of provisions by them thus transported, consisted of Indian or corn bread : and whoever has been used to the labors of the woods, swinging the axe, for instance, from sun to sun, and limited to that kind of diet almost solely, will know that it requires a johnny-cake of no slight dimensions and weight to last an axeman a whole week. It must, in short, be a mammoth of its species! Such a loaf, baked in a huge Dutch oven, was snugly and firmly pinioned to the back of James M. Morse, as he, with others, wended his way to the lake shore, intent upon the labors of the week.
The stream was then nameless, but nevertheless had to be crossed, and Morse must cross it to reach the scene of his labors. Although a light man, he had become ponderous by the addition of this tremendous johnny-cake. The ice lay upon the streams, and men passed and re-passed unloaded without harm. Not so those borne down with such incumbrance as distinguished the back of Morse, who was foremost among the gang of pioneers, all marching in Indian file and similarly encumbered. They came to the stream. Morse rushed upon the ice-it trembled-cracked-broke-and in a moment he was initiated into the mysteries beneath, with the johnny-cake holding him firmly to the bottom.
The water and mud, though deep, were not over his head. The company, by aid of poles, approached him, removed the Gloucester hump of deformity from his shoulders, re- lieved him from his uncouth and unenvied attitude, and while he stood dripping and quiv- ering on the margin of the turbid element-amid a shout of laughter they named this stream " Morse's Slough."
A young man by the name of Elijah Thompson, of Geneva, was out hunting in the forest with his favorite dog. While thus engaged, his dog left him as if he scented game, and soon was engaged with a pack of seven wolves. Young Thompson, more anxious for the dog than his own safety, rushed to the rescue, firing his rifle as he approached, and then clubbing it, made a fierce onset upon the enemy. His dog, being badly wounded and nearly exhausted, could give him no assistance, and the contest seemed doubtful. The wolves fought with desperation ; but the young man laid about him with so much energy and agility, that his blows told well, and he soon had the satisfaction of seeing wolf after wolf skulk away under the blows which he dealt them, until he remained master of the field, when, with the remains of his rifle-the barrel-on his shoulder, and his bleeding and helpless dog under his arm, he left the scene panting and weary, though not materially injured in the conflict.
Mrs. John Austin, of the same township, hearing, on one occasion, a bear among her hogs, determined to defeat his purpose. First hurrying her little children up a ladder into her chamber, for safety, in case she was overcome by the animal, she seized a rifle, and rushing to the spot saw the bear only a few rods distant, carrying off a hog into the woods, while the prisoner sent forth deafening squeals, accompanied by the rest of the sty in full chorus. Nothing daunted, she rushed forward to the scene with her rifle ready cocked, on which the monster let go his prize, raised himself upon his haunches and faced her. Dropping upon her knees to obtain a steady aim, and resting her rifle on the fence, within six feet of the bear, the intrepid female pulled the trigger. Perhaps fortunately for her, the rifle missed fire. Again and again she snapped her piece, but with the same result. The bear, after keeping his position some time, dropped down on all fours, and leaving the hogs behind, retreated to the forest and resigned the field to the woman.
The early settlers experienced great difficulty in preserving their swine from the ravages of wild beasts. Messrs. Morgan and Murrain, who, with their wives, dweit in the same cabin, had with difficulty procured a sow which, with her progeny, occupied a strong pen
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ATHENS COUNTY.
contiguous to the dwelling. During a dark night, their husbands being necessarily absent, the repose of the ladies was disturbed by a very shrill serenade from the pen : arousing from their slumbers, they discovered a large bear making an assault upon the swine. They attempted, by loud screams and throwing fire brands, to terrify the animal ; but not suc- ceeding, they took an unloaded rifle, and having heard their husbands say that it required just two fingers of powder, they poured liberally into the muzzle, one of them in the mean- while measuring lengthwise of her fingers, until the full amount was obtained, then driving in a ball they sallied out to the attack. One lady held the light, while the other fired the gun. Such another report, from a tube of equal capacity, is seldom heard. The ladies both fell prostrate and insensible, and the gun flew into the bushes. The bear was doubt- less alarmed, but not materially injured.
On the night of the 11th of August, 1812, the people of Conneaut were alarmed by a false report that the British were landing from some of their vessels. A sentinel, placed on the shore, descrying boats approaching, mistook them for the enemy. In his panic he threw away his musket, mounted his horse, and dashing through the settlement, cried with a stentorian voice, " turn out ! turn out ! save your lives, the British and Indians are landing, and will be on you in fifteen minutes !" The people, aroused from their beds, fled in the utmost terror to various places of covert in the forest. Those of East Conneaut had sheltered themselves in a dense grove, which being near the high road, it was deemed that the most perfect silence should be maintained. By that soothing attention mothers know how to bestow, the cries of the children were measurably stilled ; but one little dog, from among his companions, kept up a continual unmitigated yelping. Various means having in vain been employed to still him, until the patience of the ladies was exhausted, it was nnanimously resolved, that that particular dog should die, and he was therefore sentenced to be hanged, without benefit of clergy. With the elastics supplied by the ladies, for a halter, and a young sapling for a gallows, the young dog passed from the shores of time to yelp no more.
Rock Creek, 8 miles s. of Jefferson, contains 2 churches, 2 stores, 1 saw, 1 grist, 1 oil mill, 2 tanneries, and about 60 dwellings. It is on a creek of the same name, which furnishes considerable water. Eagleville is a somewhat smaller manufacturing village, 4 miles sw. of Jefferson, on Mill creek, a good mill stream. Windsor, 20 miles sw. of Jefferson, contains about 40 dwellings. There are other small villages in the county, generally bearing the names of the townships in which they are situated.
ATHENS.
ATHENS was formed from Washington, March 1, 1805, and derived its name from Athens, its seat of justice. The surface is broken and hilly, with intervals of rich bottom lands. The hilly lands are covered with a fertile soil, and a heavy growth of trees. The prin- cipal crops are wheat, corn, oats and tobacco. Excellent coal abounds, iron ore is found in many places, and quantities of salt are made. The Hocking canal commences at Carrol, on the Ohio canal, in Fairfield county, and follows the river valley to Athens, a distance of 56 miles. The business, now small, is rapidly increasing. The coal trade of this valley is destined to be very great, ere many years. Below are the names of its townships, in 1840, with their population · at that time.
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ATHENS COUNTY.
Alexander,
1450
Carthage,
737
Trimble,
762
Ames,
1431
Dover,
1297
Troy,
1056
Athens,
1593
Elk,
1261
Vinton,
227
Bern,
381
Lee,
848
Ward,
345
Brown,
257
Lodi,
754
Waterloo, 741
Canaan,
800
Rome,
866
York,
1601
Population of Athens county, in 1820, was 6,342 ; in 1830, 9,778, and in 1840, 19,108, or 30 inhabitants to a square mile.
In Evan's map of the middle British colonies, published in 1755, there is placed on the left bank of the Hocking, somewhere in this region, a town, station or fort, named " French Margarets." Proba- bly Margarets creek, in this county, was named from it. In the county above, (Hocking,) have been found the remains of an old press, for packing furs and peltries, which are yet visible, and attest that French cupidity and enterprise had introduced an extensive trade among the Indians.
Lord Dunmore, in his famous expedition against the Indian towns upon the Scioto, in the autumn of 1774 -- just prior to the commence- ment of the revolutionary war, descended the Ohio, and landed at the mouth of the Great Hockhocking, in this county. He was there during the bloody battle of Point Pleasant-on an air line 28 miles distant-between General Lewis and the Indians. At this place he established a depot and erected some defences, called Fort Gower, in honor of Earl Gower. From that point he marched up the valley of the river, encamping, tradition says, a night successively at Fed- eral creek, Sunday creek, and at the falls of the Hocking. From the last, he proceeded to the Scioto, where the detachment under General Lewis joined him, and the war was brought to a close by a treaty or truce with the hostile tribes. Dunmore, on his return, stopped at Fort Gower, where the officers passed a series of resolu- tions, for which, see Pickaway county, with other details of this expedition.
Colonel Robert Paterson, one of the original proprietors of Cin- cinnati, with a party of Kentuckians, was attacked, near the mouth of the Hocking, by the Indians, two years after the erection of Fort Gower. The circumstances are given under the head of Mont- gomery county.
Athens, the county seat, is situated on a commanding site on the Hockhocking river, 72 miles sE. of Columbus. It contains 1 Pres- byterian, 1 Cumberland Presbyterian, and a Methodist church, a classical academy, 11 mercantile stores, and by the census of 1840, had 710 inhabitants. It was made the county seat in March, 1805. The Ohio University, the oldest college in Ohio, is situated here, but has temporarily suspended its operations, for the purpose of recovering from pecuniary embarrassment. It was first chartered by the territorial government, and afterwards, in 1804, by the state legislature. It was early endowed by Congress with the two town- ships of Athens and Alexander, containing 46,000 acres of land, which, with the connecting resources, yield an annual income of
7
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ATHENS COUNTY.
about $5000. The buildings are substantial and neat, and stand in a pleasant green. This institution has exerted a most beneficial influ- ence upon the morals and intelligence of this region. Among its graduates are many who do it honor, and it will, doubtless, when
Ohio University, at Athens.
again in successful operation-as it soon will be-continue its good work.
This county was settled shortly after Wayne's victory. The following named persons are recollected as settling in Athens and vicinity, two or three years subsequent to that event, viz : Solomon Tuttle, Christopher Stevens, Jonathan Watkins, Alvan and Silas Bingham, Henry and David Bartlett, John Chandler, and John and Moses Hewit. On Federal creek, also, were Nathan Woodbury, George Ewing-father of Hon. Thomas Ewing-Ephraim Cutler and Benjamin Brown. The first mill was erected about 1800, on Margarets creek, prior to which some of the settlers were accus- tomed to make tedious voyages, in canoes, down the Hocking, up the Ohio, and 4 miles up the Muskingum, above Marietta, to get their corn ground, while others, comprising a majority, depended upon hand mills and hommony blocks.
The annexed vivid sketch of the captivity and escape of Moses Hewit (one of the earliest settlers in this county) from the Indians, is from the history of the Bellville settlement, written by Dr. S. P. Hildreth, and published in the Hesperian, edited by William D. Gallagher.
Moses Hewit was a native of New England, the land of active and enterprising men, and born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in the year 1767. He removed to the waters of the Ohio, in 1790, in company with his uncle, Captain John Hewit, soon after the settle- ment of the Ohio Company ; at the breaking out of the Indian war, he resided on the island now known by the name of " Blennerhasset," in the block house of Captain James, where he married a cousin, the daughter of Captain Hewit. After his marriage, he lived a short time at the mouth of the Little Kenawha, but as the Indians became dangerous, he joined the company of settlers at " Neil's station," a short distance above, on the same
·
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ATHENS COUNTY.
stream. At this period, all the settlements on both banks of the Ohio were broken up, and the inhabitants retired to their garrisons for mutual defence.
The garrison at the middle settlement, in Belprie, was called " Farmer's Castle," and was a strong stockaded defence, with comfortable dwelling houses erected along the margin of the stout palisades which surrounded it. It stood near the bank of the Ohio river, on the waters of which nearly all the intercourse between the stations was conducted in light canoes. At this garrison, Mr. Hewit was a frequent visitor, but not an inmate. Some of the more fearless inhabitants, on the left bank, still continued to live in their own dwellings, considering themselves in a manner protected by the Ohio river, and by the vigilance of the " spies," who daily scoured the adjacent forests. Mr. Hewit was, at this time, in the prime of life and manhood ; possessed of a vigorous frame, nearly six feet high, with limbs of the finest mould, not surpassed by the Belvidere Apollo, for manly beauty. The hands and feet were small in proportion to the muscles of the arms and legs. Of their strength, some estimate may be formed, when it is stated that he could, with a single hand, lift with ease a large blacksmith's anvil, by grasping the tapering horn which projects from its side. To this great muscular strength was added a quickness of motion, which gave to the dash of his fist the rapidity of thought, as it was driven into the face or breast of his adversary. The eye was coal black, small and sunken, but when excited or enraged, flashed fire like that of the tiger. The face and head were well developed, with such powerful masseter and temporal muscles, that the fingers of the strongest man, when once confined between his teeth, could no more be withdrawn than from the jaws of a vice.
With such physical powers, united to an unrefined and rather irritable mind, who shall wonder at his propensity for, and delight in, personal combat ; especially when placed in the midst of rude and unlettered companions, where courage and bodily strength were held in unlimited estimation. Accordingly, we find him engaged in numberless personal con- tests, in which he almost universally came off victorious. One instance of his activity and reckless daring took place at Marietta, about the year 1796. In some quarrel at a tavern, the vigor of his arm was laid so heavily upon one of his opponents, that serious apprehen- sions were felt for his life. Complaint was made to the magistrate, and a warrant issued for his apprehension. Of this he had timely notice, and not relishing the inside of a jail at that inclement season of the year, it being in February, he started for the river, intending to cross into Virginia, out of the jurisdiction of the constable. It so happened that the rains on the head waters had raised the river to half bank, and broken up the ice, which completely covered the stream with fragments of all dimensions, so closely arranged that no canoe could be forced through them. Although late in the night, there was yet the light of the moon, and rushing down the bank, with the constable and a numerous posse at his back, he leaped fearlessly on to the floating ice, and springing from fragment to fragment, with the activity of a fox, he reached the opposite shore in safety, about half a mile below the point where he commenced this perilous adventure. The constable, seeing the object of his pursuit afloat on the ice, came to a halt, concluding that, although he had escaped from the penalty of the law, he could not avoid the fate which awaited him, and that he would certainly be drowned before he could gain the shore. But, as fortune is said to favor the brave, he escaped without harm, and his life was preserved for wise and provi- dential purposes.
Sometime in the month of May, 1792, while living at Neil's station, on the Little Ken- awha, Mr. Hewit rose early in the morning and went out about a mile from the garrison in search of a stray horse, little expecting any Indians to be near, having heard of none in that vicinity for some time. He was sauntering along at his ease, in an obscure cattle path, thinking more of his stray animal than of danger, when all at once three Indians sprang from behind two large trees, that stood one on each side of the track, where they had been watching his approach. So sudden was the onset, and so completely was he in their grasp, that resistance was vain, and would probably have been the cause of his death. He therefore quietly surrendered, thinking that in a few days he should find some way of escape. For himself, he felt but little uneasiness; his great concern was for his wife and child, from whom, with the yearnings of a father's heart, he was thus forcibly separated, and whom he might never see again.
In their progress to the towns on the Sandusky plains, the Indians treated their prisoner, Hewit, with as little harshness as could be expected. He was always confined at night by fastening his wrists and ancles to saplings, as he lay extended upon his back upon the ground, with an Indian on each side. By day his limbs were free, but always marching with one Indian before, and two behind him. As they approached the prairies, frequent halts were made to search for honey, the wild bee being found in every hollow tree, and often in the ground beneath decayed roots, in astonishing numbers. This afforded them
52
ATHENS COUNTY.
many luscious repasts, of which the prisoner was allowed to partake. The naturalization of the honey bee to the forests of North America, since its colonization by the whites, is, in fact, the only real addition to its comforts that the red man has ever received from the destroyer of his race ; and this industrious insect, so fond of the society of man, seems also destined to destruction by the bee-moth, and like the buffalo and the deer, will soon vanish from the woods and prairies of the West.
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