Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 117

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio
Number of Pages: 1006

USA > Ohio > Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I > Part 117

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At a banquet given in Cambridge on the retirement of Jonathan Rose as County Com- missioner and the incoming of Peter Lochary. it was proposed to hold annual reunions of those born or bred in Pennyroyaldom, and the proposition acted upon. The first was held, August, 1880, at Gardiner's Grove in Oxford township, and the records of that and succeeding meetings have been preserved by Mr. John Kirkpatrick in pamphlet form from which we quote.

Rev. John Ables, of Jackson township, and his brother Bethuel (since deceased), the oldest living people born in Oxford township, were present at the first reunion, and from the speech of Bethuel (the first white child born in Oxford township), we extract the following :

"I was born in 1806, within a mile of this spot, amongst the wolves, Indians and snakes. My father died when I was six years old, and left me the oldest of the family upon my mother's hands. John, who has just spoken, was the next eldest. One night he and I, as the wolves were troublesome, penned the sheep right up against the cabin. In the night the wolves came and howled and pushed around the house. The sheep were killed and wounded. It made our little hearts quake at the danger. Once I went for my uncle, Reuben Borton, through a wheat patch for water. I was terribly afraid of snakes. I stepped in my bare feet on two copperheads while going, and also on an old hoop which flew up and struck me. I jumped so high each time that I brought no water back. My uncle found and killed the snakes.

"There were no near neighbors ; for miles around there was nothing but paths. One day I was riding on an errand through the woods on 'Kate,' and suddenly a man's hand came from behind a tree on my thigh. I told of it and was informed that it was a robber looking for land buyers who had money. I escaped because I was a boy. In

a few days we heard of a murder on the Maginnis farm. The hand of Providence was around us or we could not have lived. We suffered. I was out after the cows one day, and in crossing a creek walked on a log out into the stream and jumped to get over. I lit in the mud and went down and down, and could not get out: the more I stepped the more I became fastened. Some chips floated near me and little by little I was enabled to reach a slim branch above me.

"I learned the blacksmith business. I made the tools to clear this country. I made the hoes, the axes and the mattocks for the settlers. I was here when there were not thirty people in the township. I know all of Pennyroyal, and how to make the oil, too. In the early days we boiled it in kettles, now a four-horse load is needed to fill a ' gum.' It was hard work to gather pennyroyal. It grows by ' grasshopper springs.' The springs near it are generally filled with grasshoppers, and the fields with weeds, etc."

From the address of Geo. Plattenburg (since deceased) we give :

"In 1805 my father and family moved out. We did not have a load of furniture, and put some salt in the bottom of the wagon and sold it at Washington, Pa., for $6 a sack or $30 a barrel. It took one-and-a-half bushels of wheat to buy a pound of coffee then. Flour sold at New Orleans for $1.50 a barrel. It was plenty and money scarce. I made a coat for a man that cost him twenty- seven barrels of flour, or one hundred and thirty-five bushels of wheat. Timber sold at $12 a thousand feet, and whiskey at fifteen cents a gallon, but where were the fifteen cents ?"

From William Morton's remarks we quote :

"There were not more than fifteen persons in the township when we came to the goodly land of Ohio, in 1814 and 1815. The early settlers who followed were from New Jersey,

734

GUERNSEY COUNTY.

New York, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsyl- vania and Virginia. I was then ten years old. The boys had to hunt the cows from ridge to ridge through the wood sometimes for half a day, and then come home without them. They braved dangers, too. The hogs in the woods, wild as they were, were more danger- ous than the bears. When cow-hunting the dogs would scare up the hogs, the hogs would charge, in battle array, upon the dogs, who would fall back upon the boys and they would have to stand the battle from great fallen trees or from the saplings. One day when my brothers and myself were out, we heard on a ridge above us howlings like those of a wolf. We howled similarly in return, and the dogs joined us in the howling. A boy on the ridge took to flight, thinking a pack of wolves was in reality near. This was the fun of those times."

Hon. Joseph Ferrell said that when Oxford township was organized there were not enough men in it to fill the offices. It was soon set- tled by soldiers from the war of 1812, two of whom, William Bernard and William Rich- ards, were still living. The Second Regiment of Ohio in the war of 1812 was made up in this region ; the Second Regiment in the war of 1846 was filled from here, and the Second Regiment in the last war had many from this neighborhood.

From Hon. Newell Kennon's reminiscences of Fairview we extract :

"About 1818, in the woods south of Fair- view, was seen by all the passers-by a speak- er's stand with benches in front sufficient to seat a large audience. This place was occu- pied for preaching by the Reformed Associate Presbyterian Church for five or six years by the Rev. Samuel Findley, their chosen pas- tor. In fair weather very large and appreci- ative audiences would assemble to hear the teachings of the learned doctor. The church increased rapidly, large numbers of families settling in the neighborhood who were mem- bers of that persuasion, besides others joining who had never been members of any church. They then built what was called a large and comfortable stone church. The chief archi- tect was a sort of stone mason-but not a Free Mason, or he would have used the plumb, square and level more than he did, thus pre- venting the intolerant law of gravitation from pushing it down in the process of time. It was strange that the architect, who had the entire control of the building, would have a jug of whiskey placed in the corner-stone as a memento. When the workmen took down the building, the jug and the whiskey were found in a high state of preservation ; they drank the whiskey and I don't know what became of the jug."

In the early settlement of the West the borders were infested by desperadoes flying from justice, suspected or convicted felons escaped from the grasp of law, who sought safety in the depths of the wilderness. The counterfeiter and robber found there a secure retreat and a new theatre for crime.

During the early settlement of the wild hill country of Southeastern Ohio the scattered, struggling, honest pioneers suffered much from the depredations of this class who found hiding-places among the caves and rocks and thick tangled under- growth of the ravines. Much loss was inflicted by horse-thieves and counterfeit- ing of coin was carried on at times quite extensively. In some instances the early settlers executed summary justice upon the depredators and hung or shot them without ceremony. The outside public learned not of these events, as they took place before the advent of newspapers and communication with the older settled communities infrequent ; we now learn of them mainly by tradition.

For several years prior to 1834 a large number of horses had been stolen from Guernsey and the surrounding counties, and so completely were all traces of the thieves covered up that the settlers were forced to the conclusion that an organized band of horse thieves must have been formed in their midst. From the scant evi- dence at hand, it appeared that these maranders had a line of communication from the Muskingum Valley to Lake Erie. So that horses stolen in Guernsey county would be passed along the line and disposed of at a point far distant from the place of theft. All efforts toward the discovery of the thieves were without avail, until finally suspicion fastened upon one Walter G. Perry, who resided some five miles east of Cumberland, in Guernsey county, near what is now called Blue Bell.

On the night of October 15, 1833, a horse had been stolen from Wm. Knap- penburger, of Tuscarawas county, who offered a reward for the capture of the thief, and described him as " a short stout-made man, with black piercing eyes and of a rather quiet disposition." Perry answered to this description and measures were taken for his arrest, but he could not be fonnd.

At this time a school-teacher in the McElroy district, named Adonijalı Parrish, was boarding with Anthony Jones, and during the night, January 5, 1834, he

735

GUERNSEY COUNTI.

heard some one cautiously admitted to the Jones dwelling; his suspicions were aroused and still further excited when, toward morning, he heard the stealthy departure of the person admitted during the night. By questioning the young son of Jones, Parrish learned that the cautions guest of the night was "uncle Perry." Instead of attending to his school that day he hastened to an adjoining district, now called Harmony, and securing the assistance of Robert Marshall, Thomas Rannels, James C. Bay, E. Burt and Robert Kells, started in pursuit of Perry. Armed with rifles, they proceeded to the dwelling of Jones and from there

L. M. Rodecker, Photo., Cumberland.

PERRY'S DEN.

took up the trail, which was easily followed, owing to a light snow having fallen during the night. After following it for some distance, they perceived that an effort had been made to cover the tracks and baffle pursuit.

About a mile and a half from Jones's the trail led into a deep ravine, on either side of which were high projecting rocks and deep, dark recesses, causing the pur- suers some trepidation through fear that Perry might have accomplices hid among the rocks and caverns of the ravine, and that they might fall victims to an am- bushed enemy. They moved cautiously forward, speaking only in whispers, every faculty on the alert. Suddenly one of the party called out, "There he is, by the rocks." Seeing that he was discovered, Perry assumed a defiant attitude, and pis- tol in hand, eried out with an oath that he would shoot the first one who came near. His pursuers having satisfied themselves that he was alone, began closing in on him, when he started to run. Marshall and Rannels threw up their rifles, firing simultaneously, and Perry fell, wounded in the right leg. His captors car- ried him to the cabin of Clark Williams, where his wound was dressed, and on the evening of the same day he was taken to Cambridge.

Perry was tried and convicted at the April term of court in Tuscarawas county, and on the 19th of April was sentenced to five years' imprisonment in the peni- tentiary. His wound refused to heal and near the end of the first year's impris- onment he was pardoned by the governor and set at liberty. He returned to his family, who still resided in Guernsey county, but, after a short time, they all left and were heard of no more. Perry had preserved the rifle-ball which had shat- tered his leg, swearing he would be glad to " plant it in each of his captors."

After Perry's departure evidences came to light of his having been connected with a gang of counterfeiters. For several months preceding his arrest, numerous

736

GUERNSEY COUNTY.

spurious notes and coins were put in circulation, and Perry on one occasion had remarked to Martin Robbins that he had a lot of coins that would "go just as well as any." About two hundred yards east of his dwelling, in a ravine, was dis- covered a slot cut in a tree, and near it a long lever, which was used to make im- prints of coins in short blocks of seasoned wood ; from these primitive molds casts were made in the same manner that the early pioneers cast their rifle-balls.

These discoveries furnished an explanation of the stealthy visits of strangers to the cabin of Perry during all hours of the night. In 1883, in a field near this spot, Newton Hickle plowed up some 130 or more counterfeit coins, evidently made in this manner.

The place of his capture has ever since been called Perry's Den, and is a resort for picnic parties and lovers of the romantic in nature. It is in Spencer township, three miles east of Cumberland, in a deep glen in the highlands, dividing the waters of Wills and Duck creeks.

In its native wildness it afforded remarkable facilities for secreting stolen prop- erty. Its distance from roads and the difficulties of access, together with the dense underbrush and its peculiar openings in the rocks, made its discovery extremely unlikely.

Two waterfalls of from twenty to thirty feet descent and about one hundred yards apart add to the romantic beauty of the glen. Horse Shoe Falls, with its ledge of rock projecting out over the depths below, forms a cavern in which twenty horses could be stabled at one time, undiscoverable except by the closest inspection, and early settlers say that unmistakable evidences that it had been- put to such uses were plainly discernible. The second waterfall is a gem of beauty ; in summer it is bordered with ferns and flowers, intermingled with laurels and evergreens, and in winter, stately columns of glittering ice and fantastic shapes and forms of fila- gree and frosted work arrest and please the eye.

THE GUERNSEY COUNTY METEOR.

On the 1st of May, 1860, about half an hour after noon, an aerolite exploded over the western border of this county a little east of the village of New Concord. As it approached the earth its brilliance was almost equal to the sun. A great number of distinct detonations were heard like the firing of cannon, after which the sounds became blended together and were compared to the roar of. a railway train. This meteor was one of the most remarkable on record from the large quantity of stones which fell to the earth. Prof. Elias Loomis, of Yale College, in Harper's Magazine for June, 1868, in an article entitled "Shooting Stars, De- tonating Meteors and Aerolites," thus gives the main items connected with this very notable aerolite.

"Several stones were seen to fall to the ground and they penetrated the earth from two to three feet. The largest weighed 103 pounds, and is preserved in the cabinet of Marietta College. Another was found which weighed fifty-three pounds, a third fifty-one pounds, a fourth was estimated to weigh forty to fifty pounds and a fifth weighed thirty-six pounds. A small one, weighing fifteen pounds, is preserved in the cabinet of Yale College. . About thirty stones were found, and the entire weight of all the fragments was estimated at 700 pounds.

"All these stones have the same general ap- pearance. They are irregular blocks, and are covered with a very thin black crust, which looks as if it had been fused. Their

specific gravity was 3.54, and their composi- tion very similar to that of the Weston me- teor. This meteor fell in the southwestern part of Connecticut on the morning of Decem- ber 14, 1807, and was nearly one-half silex, about one-third oxide of iron, and one-eighth magnesia, with a little nickel and sulphur.

Owing to the cloudy state of the atmos- phere, the time was unfavorable for accurate observation of the meteor's position in the heavens. It has been computed, however, that the meteor moved toward the northwest, that its path was nearly horizontal, and ele- vated about forty miles above the earth's surface. . The velocity of the Weston meteor relative to the earth was abont fifteen miles per second. . . . There are eighteen

737

GUERNSEY COUNTY.

well-authenticated cases in which aerolites have fallen in the United States during the last sixty years and their aggregate weight is 1,250 pounds.

" While aerolites contain no elements but such as are found in terrestrial minerals, their appearance is quite peculiar, and the grouping of the elements, that is, the compound formed by them, is so peculiar as to enable us by chemical analysis to dis- tinguish an aerolite from any terrestrial sub- stance.

"All aerolites without exception contain a substance called Schreibersite, though often in very small quantities. This substance is a compound of iron, nickel and phosphorus, and has never been found except in aero- lites."

Another writer upon meteors says :

"Records of the fall of aerolites is as old as history. One is recorded by Pliny, 467 B. c., which was the size of a wagon. Kep- ler affirmed his belief that there were more

comets and smaller bodies flying through space in number than fish in the ocean.

" In regard to the chemical composition of these stones it must be observed that in pass- ing through our atmosphere they undergo some change, as they always take fire in the upper regions by friction against our atmos- phere, and arrive at the ground hot, some- times making a deep hole. Combustible substances in their composition, and perhaps an atmosphere of combustible gases surround- ing them, combined with the immense velocity with which they enter our atmos- phere, cause, on the sudden diminution of that motion, a most intense rise in tempera ture, ignition, and very often one or more violent explosions. It is not surprising that they all present the appearance of having been subject to great heat. Chemists have proved that aerolites are not of volcanic origin, and astronomers that their velocity is far too great to be accounted for by terres- trial attraction."

CUMBERLAND, about seventy miles east of Columbus, at the junction of B. Z. & C. and C. W. & N. Y. railroads, is surrounded by a fine farming country. Newspaper : News, Independent, W. A. Reedle, editor and publisher. Churches : 1 Methodist Episcopal, 1 Cumberland Presbyterian and 1 Presbyterian. Popu- lation in 1880, 519. School census in 1886, 200; A. R. McCulloch, superintend- ent.

QUAKER CITY, about ninety miles east of Columbus, on the O. C. R. R., is in the midst of a fine agricultural and stock-raising district. Newspaper : Indepen- dent, Independent, J. W. & A. B. Hill. Churches : 1 Disciples, 1 Methodist Episcopal and 1 Friends.

Manufactures and Employees .- Manufacturing builders' materials ; sheep- shearers' benches ; 1 foundry and machine shop; cigar factories; Quaker City Window Glass Co., employing 70 hands ; 2 good gas wells; coal mining, etc. Bank : Quaker City National, John R. Hall, president, I. P. Steele, cashier. Population in 1880, 594.

BYESVILLE, five miles south of Cumberland, on the C. & M. R. R. News- paper : Transcript, Independent, V. D. Browne, editor and proprietor. Popula- tion in 1880, 210. The following are names of villages, with their population in 1880 : SENECAVILLE, 402 ; SALESVILLE, 266 ; FAIRVIEW, 152.

(By courtesy of Publishers of the New England Magazino.)

THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE.

739

HAMILTON COUNTY.

HAMILTON.

HAMILTON was the second county established in the Northwestern Territory. It was formed January 2, 1790, by proclamation of Governor St. Clair, and named from Gen. Alexander Hamilton. Its original boundaries were thus defined : "Beginning on the Ohio river, at the confluence of the Little Miami, and down the said Ohio to the mouth of the Big Miami ; and up said Miami to the standing stone forks or branch of said river, and thence with a line to be drawn due east to the Little Miami, and down said Little Miami river to the place of beginning." The surface is generally rolling ; soil on the uplands clay, and in the valleys deep alluvion, with a substratum of sand. Its agriculture includes a great variety of fruits and vegetables for the Cincinnati market.

Area about 400 square miles. In 1887 the acres cultivated were 68,458; in pasture, 19,468 ; woodland, 10,774; lying waste, 5,619; produced in wheat, 163,251 bushels; rye, 34,390 ; buckwheat, 110; oats, 116,500; barley, 34,390 ; corn, 468,501 ; broom corn, 2,345 pounds brush ; meadow hay, 16,573 tons ; clover hay, 3,915; potatoes, 190,398 bushels ; tobacco, 25,460 pounds ; butter, 648,910; cheese, 9,950; sorghum, 15 gallons; maple syrup, 454; honey, 7,413 pounds; eggs, 327,650 dozen; grapes, 235,235 pounds; wine, 3,091 gallons ; sweet potatoes, 11,314 bushels; apples, 1,910 ; peaches, 2,327 ; pears, 1,195 ; wool, 9,405 pounds ; milch cows owned, 9,714; milk, 3,779,048 gallons. School census, 1888, 99,049 ; teachers, 1,031; miles of railroad track, 545.

TOWNSHIPS AND CENSUS.

1840.

1880.

TOWNSHIPS AND CENSUS. 1840.

1880.

Anderson,

2,311

4,154

Miami,

2,189

2,317

Colerain,

2,272

3,722

Mill Creek,

6,249

11,286

Columbia,

3,022

5,306

Spencer,

996

Crosby,

1,875

1,043

Springfield,

3,092

7,975

Cincinnati (city),

46,382

255,139

Storrs,

· 740

Delhi,

1,466

4,738

Sycamore,

3,207

6,369

Fulton,

1,505

Symmes,

1,033

1,626

Green,

2,939

4,851

Whitewater,

1,883

1,575

Harrison,

2,277

Population of Hamilton, in 1820, was 31,764; 1830, 52,380; 1840, 80,165 ; 1860, 216,410 ; 1880, 313,374; of whom 191,509 were born in Ohio; 10,586, Kentucky ; 6,468, Indiana ; 4,362, New York ; 4,185, Pennsylvania; 2,361, Virginia ; 53,252, German Empire; 16,991, Ireland; 4,099, England and Wales ; 1,787, Franee; 1,308, British America ; 796, Scotland. Census, 1890, 374,573.

Before the war much attention was given to the cultivation of vineyards upon the hillsides of the Ohio for the manufacture of wine, and it promised to be a great business when the change in climate resulted disastrously.

740

HAMILTON COUNTY.

ANTIQUITIES.

THE GREAT DAM AT CINCINNATI IN THE ICE AGE.

The country in the vicinity of Cincinnati owes its unsurpassed beauty to the operations of Nature during the glacial era. It was the ice movements that gave it those fine terraces along the valleys and graceful contours of formation on the summits of the hills that were so attractive to the pioneers. Here it was that the great ice movement from the north ended. As has been remarked, "those were the days of the beautiful lake rather than the beautiful river."

No single cause has done more to diversify the surface of the country, to add to the attractiveness of the scenery and to furnish the key by which the condition of the Ice Age can be reproduced to the mind's eye than glacial dams. To them we owe the present existence of nearly all the waterfalls in North America, as well as nearly all the lakes.

A glacial dam across the Ohio river is supposed to have existed at the site of Cincinnati during the Ice Age, and the evidence supporting the theory is so full and conclusive that its existence can almost be assumed as an absolute certainty.

The evidences of the former existence of this dam and the lake caused thereby were first discovered and the attention of the scientific world attracted thereto, in the summer of 1882, by Prof. G. Frederick Wright, of Oberlin, whose valuable researches on glacial phenomena have given him a world-wide reputation. The facts here given are extracted from Prof. Wright's recently published volume, " The Ice Age in North America," a work scientific, but plain to the commonest understanding, intensely interesting and an inestimably valuable contribution to the sum of human knowledge.

"The ice came down through the trough of the Ohio, and meeting with an obstruction, crossed it so as to completely choke the chan- nel, and form a glacial dam high enough to raise the level of the water five hundred and fifty feet-this being the height of the water shed to the south. The consequences follow- ing are interesting to trace.

'The bottom of the Ohio river at Cincin- nati is 447 feet above the sea-level. A dam of 553 feet would raise the water in its rear to a height of 1,000 feet above the tide. This would produce a long narrow lake, of the width of the eroded trough of the Ohio, submerge the site of Pittsburg to a depth of 300 feet, and make slack-water up the Monon- gahela nearly to Grafton, W. Va., and up the Allegheny as far as Oil City. All the tributaries of the Ohio would likewise be filled to this level with the back-water. The length of this slack-water lake in the main valley, to its termination up either the Alle- gheny or the Monongahela, was not far from one thousand miles. The conditions were also peculiar in this, that all the northern tributaries head within the southern margin of the ice-front, which lay at varying dis- tances to the north. Down these northern tributaries there must have poured during the summer months immense torrents of water to strand bowlder-laden icebergs on the summits of such high hills as were lower than the level of the dam."

Prof. E. W. Claypole, in an article read before the Geological Society of Edinburgh, and published in their "Transactions," has given a very vivid description of the scenes connected with the final breaking away of

the ice-barrier at Cincinnati. He estimates that the body of water held in check by this dam occupied 20,000 square miles, and that during the summer months, when the ice was most rapidly melting away, it was supplied with water at a rate that would be equivalent to a rainfall of 160 feet in a year. This con- clusion he arrives at by estimating that ten feet of ice would annually melt from the por- tion of the State which was glaciated, and which is about twice the extent of the un- glaciated portion. Ten feet over the glaciated portion is equal to twenty feet of water over the unglaciated. To this must be added an equal amount from the area farther back whose drainage was then into the upper Ohio. This makes forty feet per year of water so contributed to this lake-hasin. Furthermore, this supply would all be fur- nished in the six months of warm weather, and to a large degree in the daytime, which gives the rate above mentioned.

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Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 117

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893 Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio Number of Pages: 1006

Author: Howe, Henry, 1816-1893
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Cincinnati : Published by the state of Ohio
Number of Pages: 1006