USA > Ohio > Historical collections of Ohio in three volumes ; an encyclopedia of the state : with notes of a tour over it in 1886 contrasting the Ohio of 1846 with 1886-90, Vol. III > Part 7
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Population, 1880, 1,357. School census, 1888, 525; Celwin Fowler, school superintendent. Capital invested in manufacturing establishments, $43,000. Value of annual product, $48,300 .- Ohio Labor Statistics, 1888. Census, 1890, 1,470.
The site of New Lexington is pleasant. It is on a gentle elevation, just south of the " Pan Handle " Railroad. I entered it May 19, 1886. The best building in the place was the school-house, an imposing brick structure on a commanding site, the court-house then being unfinished. I noticed that north and east the country consisted mostly of gently rolling hills, on whose surface were broad fields luxuriant in growing wheat.
The one great absorbing point of interest connected with the place is that near here was born one of the world's great heroes, and in the cemetery here were laid his mortal remains, Sept. 9, 1884, and with great honors.
MACGAHAN, BULGARIA'S DELIVERER.
It is remarkable that a little interior county of Ohio should have produced two such extraordinary characters in the line of heroism as Philip Henry Sheridan and Januarius Aloysius MacGahan. Both were of Irish stock and both of Catli- olie birth and training.
MacGahan was born June 12, 1844, on the Logan Road, about three miles south of New Lexington, on what is known as Pigeon Roost Ridge. His father was James MacGahan, a native of County Derry, Ireland, and his mother, Esther Dempsey, of mixed Irish and German stock. They were married in St. Patrick's Church, in 1840, and settled on a little farm near by. When MacGahan was 6 years old his father died, leaving the widow in straitened circumstances. But she had a dower interest in the farm, and managed by struggling to get along with her little flock, in her little cabin nestled among the hills and almost surrounded by an unbroken forest.
MacGahan, as a boy in the district school, was far ahead in his studies, and he is spoken of as the mildest-mannered boy of the school and neighborhood-almost feminine and girlish in his ways and manners. He read all the books in the house and neighborhood, and when a boy of about 12 got hold of Dick's works-a great acquisition. Then, at night, he often wandered about, studying and locating and naming the stars, as described by Dick ; also, would frequently rise in the morning, before daybreak, to see and locate the stars and planets not visible in the early part of the night.
When about 14 years old he began working on farms in Hocking, Fairfield and Fayette counties, returning winters with the money he liad thus earned to Pigeon Roost to attend school. In 1861 he applied to teach the Pigeon Roost school, but was refused on the ground of youth and inexperience. He took this to heart and left Pigeon Roost as a home forever, and went to Huntington, In- diana.
There he got a school and taught with very great success two winters, aston- ishing his patrons by using the word and object methods. Then he sent for his mother and the rest of the family.
In the winter of 1863-64 he removed to St. Louis, where he remained four years, studying and writing for the press and finding employment as book-keeper in the house of John J. Daly & Co. While there, he met for the first time Gen.
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الصومعة القبة
MOSSENG. CO. MY
JANUARIUS ALOYSIUS MACGAHAN, Bulgaria's Deliverer.
MACGAHAN, the War Correspondent.
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GEN. JAMES M. COMLY, Journalist and Soldier.
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Sheridan, and gave a brilliant description to the Huntington Democrat of a grand ovation to that officer ; later he met Sheridan in Europe.
In December, 1868, he sailed for Europe, to study the languages-Latin, Ger- man and French-and with the ultimate design of returning to his native country and practising the law.
Just at the juncture when he had his trunk packed to return home, his funds being about exhausted, the Franco-Prussian war broke out, when he was engaged by the New York Herald to go with the French army as its war correspondent. He speedily procured a rough suit, rode hastily to the front, and soon after the wing of the army which he was with was driven back with considerable haste and dis- order. His graphic letter describing the re- treat immediately placed its author among the foremost war correspondents of the world. ITe then made a similar engagement with the London News. As a correspondent of these journals MacGahan was in all the wars of Europe for eight or ten years previous to his death. He was an unparalleled correspond- ent, for he seemed destitute of fear ; would ride into the midst of a battle with the com- manding officers that he might truthfully describe the thick of the fight-then, per- chance, at times sit down under the shade of a tree with bullets whistling all around, and coolly spread out a lunch and partake thereof, or make notes of tragic events as they were transpiring around him.
His experiences, in variety, during the few years of his foreign life, were not probably ever equalled by any journalist, and never did one accomplish so much, excepting Stan- ley. These ineluded his experience with the Commune in Paris, when he was arrested and condemned to death, and his life only saved through the influence of United States Minister Washburne; his travels through Enrope with Gen. Sherman and party in 1871-72; his long and lonesome journey across the Asiatic country to Khiva in the early part of 1873; his cruise on board of a war ship on the Mediterranean, and his acei- dental and unexpected visit with the same to Cuba, Key West, New York and else- where in the United States in the latter part of 1873; his ten months with Don Carlos' army in 1874; his capture by the Repub- licans, who took him for a Carlist, and he undoubtedly would have suffered death but for the intervention of a United States rep- resentative ; his voyage to the Arctic seas with the Pandora expedition in 1875 ; his experience with the Turkish army, and his memorable trip through Bulgaria in 1876 ; his visit to St. Petersburg and subsequent accompaniment of the Russian army to Bul- garia in 1877. where he was everywhere hailed as a liberator and deliverer ; for the gratefid people ran after him as he rode through the streets of the towns and villages of that country, kissing his boots, saddle, bridle, and even the little pet horse that he rode. Archibald Forbes, the great English writer and correspondent, who rode by his
side, says the grateful and affectionate demon- strations of the people of Bulgaria towards MacGahan, surpassed anything of the kind he ever saw or imagined.
Forbes, who loved him as a brother, in an article on MacGahan, pays this tribute to his great services :
" MacGahan's work in the exposures of the Turkish atrocities in Bulgaria, which he carried out so thoroughly and effectively in 1876, produced very remarkable results. Regarded simply on its literary merits, there is nothing I know of to excel it in vividness, in pathos, in a burning earnestness, in a glow of conviction that fires from the heart to the heart. His letters stirred Mr. Glad- stone into a convulsive paroxysm of burning revolt against the barbarities they described. They moved England to its very depths, and men travelling in railway carriages were to be noticed with flushed faces and moistened eyes as they read them. Lord Beaconsfield tried to whistle down the wind the awful sig- nificance of the disclosures made in those wonderful letters. The master of jeers jibed at, as 'coffee-house babble,' the revelations that were making the nations to throb with indignant passion.
"A British official, Mr. Walter Baring, was sent into Bulgaria on the track of the two Americans, MacGahan and Schuyler, with the intent to disparage their testimony by the results of cold official investigation. But lo ! Baring, official as he was, nevertheless was an honest man with eyes and a heart ; and he who had been sent out on the mission to eurse MacGahan, blessed him instead alto- gether, for he more than confirmed the latter's figures and pictures of murder, brutality and atrocity. It is not too much to say that this Ohio boy, who worked on a farm in his youth and picked up his education anyhow, changed the face of Eastern Europe. When he began to write of the Bulgarian atrocities, the Turk swayed direct rule to the bank of the Danube, and his suzerainty stretched to the Carpathi- ans. Now Roumania owns no more the su- zerainty, Servia is an independent kingdom, Bulgaria is tributary but in name, and Rou- melia is governed, not for the Turks, but for the Roumelians. All this reform is the direct and immediate outcome of the Russo-Turkish war.
"But what brought about the Russo- Turkish war ? What forced the Czar, reluc- tant as he was and inadequately prepared, to cross the Danube and wage with varying for- tune the war that brought his legions finally to the very gates of Stamboul? The pas- sionate, irresistible pressure of the Pan-Slav- ist section of his subjects, burning with un- governable fury against the ruthless Turk,
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because of his cruelties on those brother Slavs of Bulgaria and Roumelia ; and the man who told the world and those Russian Slavs of those horrors -- the man whoso voico rang out clear through the nations with its burden of wrongs and shame and deviltry, was no illustrious statesman, no famed lit- terateur, but just this young American from off the little farm in Perry county, Ohio."
MacGahan was preparing to attend and write up the International Congress at Ber- lin, when, declining to abandon a sick friend at Constantinople, he was himself attacked with the malignant fever that had prostrated his friend, and died after a few days' illness, June 9, 1878. Had he lived three days longer he would have exactly completed his 34th year.
MacGahan's meeting with the lady who subsequently became his wife, is full of ro- mance. He was travelling through the prov- inces of Russia, along with Gen. Sherman and party, when his horse stumbled and threw him, spraining his ankle so severely that he was taken to the nearest house, where he was compelled to remain quiet for several days. News of the accident, and the further fact that the sufferer was a young stranger, from a far-off country, brought many to see him ; among others a company of young girls of whom one was Miss Barbara D'Elaguine. MacGahan could not speak Russian at that time, and the lady could not speak English. Both could speak French, however, and that was the language of their courtship. There is one child of this marriage, a boy, born in Spain in 1874, during the Carlist war. The United States has been the home of widow and son for several years.
THE OBSEQUIES.
Thursday, September 12, 1884, was an ever-memorable day in New Lexington. It was the occasion of the funeral of MacGahan, who six years after his death was laid to rest in his native land. His remains at Constan- tinople were disinterred and brought by the United States steamer "Powhatan" in an outer casket to New York at the expense of the Press Club of that city, and were aceom- panied here from thence by his widow and child. They had previously lain in state in the City Hall, New York, and in the State Capitol, at Columbus.
Over 8,000 people were present, among them about sixty representatives of the press from various parts of the State. The streets and houses were decorated with evergreen arches and intermingled flags of black and white. One large streamer bore the inserip- tion : BULGARIA'S LIBERATOR ; and another, REST IN THY NATIVE LAND. The casket was taken into St. Rose's church. On it was a handsome plate, bearing the inscription :
J. A. MACGAHAN;
BORN, JUNE 12, 1844,
DIED, JUNE 9, 1878.
At the head of the casket was placed a large photograph of the dead journalist as he appeared in life, in citizen's dress, and at the foot was a full-length likeness of him in the costume of a war correspondent, as he roughed it with the boys or slept and dined in the tents of generals.
In the church was conducted the religious exercises, when Bishop Watterson preached .on the "Power and Responsibility of the Newspaper Press."
The following-named gentlemen acted as pall-bearers :
Gen. James M. Comly, Toledo Telegram ; . Senator John Evans, of Gallia county ; D. L. Bowersmith, of the O. S. Journal; S. J. Flickinger, Cincinnati Enquirer ; Senator John O'Neil, Zanesville ; Thomas Wetzler, Ohio Eagle; Lecky Harper, Mt. Vernon Banner ; Hon. W. E. Finck, Somerset ; Ed. L. Davenport, Logan Republican Gazette; Hon. J. L. Vance, Gallipolis Bulletin ; Dr. F. L. Flowers, Lancaster ; Jas. T. Irvine, Zanesville ; James W. Newman, Sceretary of State; L. C. Smith, Shawnee Banner ; Capt. Charles N. Allen, Columbus ; T. M. Gaumer, Zanesville Signal; C. E. Bone- brake, Springfield Globe.
About 11.30 the casket was brought out of the church and the procession began to form, under the direction of Hon. H. C. Greiner, assisted by several aids, in the fol- lowing order :
Platoon of G. A. R. men, with reversed swords ; Columbus Barracks Band ; G. A. R. Posts ; Military organizations ; Military Band ; Members of the Press ; Committees and Speakers ; Pall-bearers ; Hearse with guard of honor ; Relatives of deceased ; Citizens, etc.
The guard of honor was composed of a de- tachment of the New Lexington Guards.
After the usual religious rites at the grave, the people gathered about the stand which had been erected near by, to be used for the publie exercises. Hon. HI. C. Greiner took the chair and acted as President. The exercises consisted of :
Ist-Eulogy on Life and Character of J. A. MaeGahan, by E. S. Colborn.
2d-Poem, written for the occasion, by W. A. Taylor.
3d-An Address on the Office of the Newspaper Correspondent, by Silas H. Wright.
The New Lexington Tribune, from which the foregoing sketch is largely taken, thus aptly concludes :
The great event has come and gone and the mortal remains of the famous Ohio boy, who perished so honorably and bravely in a far distant country, now repose in his native land.
The Nation, the State and the people of this eounty have heartily united in paying a just tribute to a brilliant genius, to a patient, hard worker, to a brave, noble man, who lived and toiled for others more than himself; who freed a nation of people, who opened the way for the story of the Cross, and who,
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with his young wife and child awaiting his return in Russia, stopped amid malaria and malignant disease to lay down his life for a friend.
When qualities like these cense to attract the admiration and love of men and women, the world will scarcely be worth living in, and finis may be appropriately written upon its outer walls.
The Central Press Association of Ohio, after the funeral, organized to collect funds for the erection of a monument to the memory of their illustrious brother.
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GEN. JAMES M. COMLY, journalist, was descended from a family of Friends who came to Philadelphia with William Penn, in 1682. His grandfather James and great- uncle located, after the war of 1812, on the site of New Lexington, which the latter laid out. James was born there March 6, 1832. He went to Columbus to learn the trade of a printer, and was successively "devil," journeyman, foreman, local editor and finally, editor and proprietor of the Ohio State Journal. He was Colonel of the 23d Ohio, Hayes' regiment ; then General in the army, postmaster of Columbus, and was subse- quently appointed by President Hayes as Minister to the Sandwich Islands. He after- wards removed to Toledo and edited the Toledo Commercial, and died July 26, 1887, from wounds received in the late war, and which had made his later life one of great suffering, borne with noble fortitude.
General Comly had a high place among Ohio's gifted men. The Memorial volume published of his life and services bears this motto, which truthfully characterized him :
"Whose wit in the combat, as gentle as bright,
Ne'er carried a heart-stain awny. on its blade."
And his old commander, Rutherford B. Hayes, in the same memorial work, gives this testimony : "Knowing General Comly intimately more than twenty-five years, and specially having lived by his side day and night during almost the whole of the war, it would be strange indeed if I did not deem it a privilege and a labor of love to unite with his comrades in strewing flowers on the grave of one whose talents and achievements were so ample and admirable and whose life and character were rounded to a completeness rarely found among the best and most gifted of' men."
STEPHEN BENTON ELKINS, the eminent politician of the Republican party and rail- road magnate, was born in Thorn township, September 26, 1841 ; removed when very young to Missouri and eventually to New York City, JACOB STRAWN was one of the early settlers of the same township ; removed to Illinois, and at the time of his death became there the greatest cattle owner in the world. JOHN W. ILIFF, was born and brought up in Harrison township ; removed to Col- orado; received there the name of the "Cattle King," for he also, in turn, became the greatest cattle owner in the world. He died leaving an estate valued at two millions. WALTER C. HOOD, pronounced " a walking library and dictionary," was born at Somer- set, and died while honoring the position of State Librarian under Governor Allen.
OLIVER HAZARD PERRY, in whose honor this county was named, was of chiy- alrous stock, and the name fell to the right county, considering how she has responded by producing a Sheridan, a MacGahan and a Comly. His father, Capt. Christopher Raymond Perry, was a native of Newport, R. I., a gallant naval officer of the old Revolutionary War, and his mother, Sarah Alexander, was born of Scotch-Irish stock, in County Down, Ireland. She had five sons and three daughters. "To great strength of character Mrs. Perry added high intellectual power and rare social grace, training her children with extraordinary care to high ideals of life and duty. After the victory on Lake Erie, some far- mers in Rhode Island declared it was Mrs. Perry's Victory."
Her son Oliver was born at South Kings- ton, R. I., August 23, 1785. She carefully trained him to obedience and gifted him with the spirit of heroism by narrating to him the deeds of her military ancestors-the old Scotch Covenanters. His favorite books were the Bible. Plutarch's Lives, Shake- speare and Addison. Ile excelled in the study of navigation and mathematics ; at the age of 11 was confirmed a member of the Prot- estant Episcopal Church, and in 1799, at the age of 14, was commissioned midship- man ; in 1807 was a lieutenant in the Tri- politan war. When the war of 1812 broke out he had, in expectation of hostilities, been unwearied in the training of his crews and in
gunnery, and by assembling gunboats ocça- sionally, gained experience in the evolutions of a fleet, with which he practised also sham battles, dividing them into hostile squadrons. Within twenty-four hours after receipt of orders to go to Lake Erie and build a squad- ron, February 17, 1813, he had sent off a detachment of fifty men, and on the 22d following' started thither with his younger brother, Alexander. He was five weeks on the way, going mostly in sleighs through the wilderness to Erie, Pa. A few months later the squadron had been built, the battle fought, and the victory won.
At the time of the battle Perry was but 28 years of age. In June, 1819, he died of
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yellow fever, at the age of 33 years, in Port Spain, island of Trinidad, while in command of a squadron. A brother, Matthew Gal- braith, was also a very accomplished naval officer. He figured in the bombardment of Vera Cruz and commanded the famed expe- dition to Japan.
In 1806 the State of Ohio purchased W. H. Powell's famous painting of Perry's
Victory, and suspended it in the rotunda of the Capitol at Columbus. It represents Perry just as he has left the Lawrence for the Niagara, in a naval launch. The launch is in the foreground, while the vessels are shown around engaged in action. The chief merit of the painting lies in the lifelike . figures of Commodore Perry and his brave crew.
In this county are many ancient mounds of various dimensions, and four or five miles'in a northwesterly direction from Somerset is an ancient stone fort. Although irregular in shape it approaches a triangle. Near the centre is" a stone mound, about twelve feet high, and in the wall a smaller one. The fort encloses about forty acres. Just south of it is a square work, containing about half an acre.
SHAWNEE is eight miles south of New Lexington, on the Straitsville branch of the B. & O. R. R. It is one of the greatest coal-mining points in Ohio.
City officers, 1888 : E. W. Williams, Mayor ; D. C. Thomas, Clerk ; C. C. Marsh, Treasurer ; John Welch, Street Commissioner ; Thomas M. Jones, Mar- shal. Newspaper : Banner, Independent, A. Maynard, editor and publisher. Population, 1880, 2,770. School census, 1888, 1,094; C. Pierce, superintend- ent of schools.
NEW STRAITSVILLE is ten miles south of New Lexington, on the Straitsville Division of the C. H. V. & T. R. R. The largest veins of coal in the State are found here and the daily shipments are very large. It has seven churches.
City officers, 1888 : Henry Spurrier, Mayor; John E. Evans, Clerk ; J. L. West, Treasurer ; John Park, Street Commissioner ; Leonard Harbaugh, Marshal. Bank of Straitsville, H. H. Todd, president, C. B. Todd, cashier. Population, 1880, 2,872. School census, 1888, 1,152; C. L. Williams, superintendent of schools.
A recent visitor writes : " New Straitsville is in the heart of the richest coal- prodneing district west of Pennsylvania; it is only three miles over the high, steep hills to bustling Shawnee, with its mines and blast furnaces ; southward are Gore, Carbon Hill, and finally Nelsonville, all strong mining towns of the Hocking Valley. A good deal of life is underground. When a stranger comes to Straits- ville and beholds a few honses on half-a-dozen ridges and but two streets of con- sequence, he is scarcely ready to think that there is a population of nearly three thousand in the town, but if he went into many of the houses he would find them packed with people, and very often one roof shelters half-a-dozen families.
" Straitsville and Shawnee were desperate places during the great strikes that prevailed in Hoadly's administration. A good many deeds of violence were planned and executed in this neighborhood. At times human life was lightly valued, and yesterday a tree was pointed ont to me from the limbs of which a man was lynched for shooting an officer during stormy times.
." These are good, happy and busy days in the Hocking Valley. The mining region has not been so prosperous for half-a-dozen years. There is an abundance of work and a steady demand for more coal. The railroads are working their men night and day and still they can not hanl coal away from the mines rapidly enough to meet the current market demands."
CORNING is twelve miles southeast of New Lexington, on the T. & O. C. and K. & O. Railroads. The surrounding country is rich in coal and iron. It has four churches.
City officers, 1888 : G. W. Carroll, Mayor; Chas. W. Roof, Clerk ; Dessa Donnelly, Treasurer ; A. T. Winning, Marshal ; John Clifford, Street Commis- sioner. Newspaper : Times-Monitor, Independent, Times-Monitor Publishing Company, editors and publishers. Population, 1880, 2,500 (estimated).
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JUNCTION CITY is at the crossing of the B. & O. and C. & M. V. and T. & O. C. Railroads, five miles west of New Lexington. School census, 1888, 190.
RENDVILLE is on the T. & O. C. R. R., eleven miles from New Lexington. Population about 500. In 1887 Dr. I. S. Tuppins, born a slave and a graduate of Columbus Medical College, was elected Mayor. He is said to have been the first of his race elected to such a position in Ohio.
THORNVILLE is near the eastern end of the Licking Reservoir, on the line of the T. & O. R. R., and has a population of about 500.
THORNPORT is about two miles north of Thornville, on the B. & O. R. R. and on the Reservoir. In our old edition is stated :
"This portion of country was settled about 1810; land was then so cheap in the neighborhood that one Beesacker purchased twenty acres for an old, black mare ; luckily, in laying out the country, two important roads intersected his pur- chase. He immediately had it surveyed into town lots, naming it New Lebanon. An embryo town sprung into existence. This took place about 1815. It was afterwards changed to Thornville, from being in the township of Thorn."
PICKAWAY.
PICKAWAY COUNTY was formed January 12, 1810, from Ross, Fairfield and Franklin ; the name is a misspelling of Piqua, the name of a tribe of the Shawanese, for the significance of which see p. 517, Vol. II. The name was im- mediately derived from the plains in the county. The surface is level and the soil generally very fertile and productive in grain. In many places the eye will take in at a single glance five hundred acres of corn at one view. The country has the four varieties of woodland, barren, plain and prairie. The barrens were originally covered with shrub oak and were at first supposed to be valueless, but proved to be excellent for grass and oats. The original settlers were mainly from Pennsylvania and Virginia. The principal productions are corn, wheat, oats, grass, pork, wool and neat cattle.
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