Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 73

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 73

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Manufactures and Employees .- Cherry Valley Iron Company, pig, bar, and mnek-iron, 360 hands ; Grafton Iron Company, pig-iron, 70; Randall, Rankin & Co., flour and feed ; Leetonia Boiler-Works Company, boilers and bridges .- State Report. Population in 1880, 2,552. School census 1886, 948; G. W. Henry, superintendent.

COLUMBIANA, sixty miles from Pittsburg, on the P. Ft. W. & C. R. R. News- paper : Independent Register, Republican, John Flaugher, publisher. Churches : Reformed, Methodist Episcopal, Presbyterian, and Lutheran. Banks : J. Esterly . & Co., J. Esterly, manager ; Shilling & Co., S. S. Shilling, manager.

Principal Industries .- Enterprise Works, formerly Columbiana Pump Works; Eureka Flouring Mills; two bending works, planing-mill, and extensive buggy manufacturing. Census in 1880, 1,223. School census in 1886, 379; W. W. Weaver, superintendent.

SALINEVILLE, on Yellow creek and C. P. & W. R. R., sixty-three miles from Pittsburg. Newspaper : Ohio Advance, J. K. Smith, proprietor. Churches : Methodist, Presbyterian, Disciples, and Catholic. Bank : Cope & Thompson. Principal industries : manufacturing salt and coal-mining. Population in 1880, 2,302. School census in 1886, 974; William H. Hill, superintendent.

EAST PALESTINE, formerly called Mechanicsburg, was incorporated in 1875. Newspapers : Valley Echo, Independent, T. W. & R. M. Winter, publisher. Reveille, S. H. Maneval, publisher. Churches : 2 Presbyterian, 1 United Brethren, 1 Methodist. Bank : Chamberlain Bros. & Co. Principal industry : coal-mining.

466

COLUMBIANA COUNTY.

Population in 1880, 1,047. School census in 1886, 626 ; G. B. Galbreath, super- intendent.

WASHINGTONVILLE, on the boundary-line of Columbiana and Mahoning counties, and on the Niles and New Lisbon R. R., about one and a-half miles north of Leetoma. It elaims a population of about 1,600 people; the main occupation being coal-mining and coke-burning. The principal mines are operated by the Cherry Valley Company, of Leetonia. They also operate between twenty and thirty coke ovens.

COSHOCTON.

COSHOCTON COUNTY was organized April 1, 1811. The name is a Delaware word, and is derived from that of the Indian village Goschachgunk, which is represented on a map in Loskiel as having stood north of the mouth of the Tus- carawas river, in the fork formed by its junction with the Walhonding. The surface is mostly rolling ; in some parts hilly, with fine broad valleys along the Muskingum and its tributaries. The soil is varied, and abruptly so; here we see the rich alluvion almost overhung by a red-bush hill, while perhaps on the very next acclivity is seen the poplar and sugar tree, indicative of a fertile soil. With regard to sand and elay the changes are equally sudden. The hills abound in coal and iron ore, and salt wells have been sunk and salt manufactured. It was first settled by Virginians and Pennsylvanians. Area, 540 square miles. In 1885 acres cultivated were 90,218; in pasture, 150,500; woodland, 60,619; lying waste, 2,150; produced in wheat, 72,992 bushels; corn, 992,890; wool, 788,979 pounds ; coal, 52,934 tons. School census 1886, 8,770; teachers, 192. It has 42 miles of railroad.

TOWNSHIPS AND CENSUS.

1840. 838

1,246

Mill Creek,

907

626

Bedford,

1,141

921

Monroe,

557

1,003

Bethlehem,

827

836

Newcastle,

905

885

Clark,

703

1,041

Oxford,

760

1,201

Crawford,

1,134

1,431

Perry,

1,339

901

Franklin,

670

1,053

Pike,

1,115

720

Jackson,

1,896

1,969

Tiverton,

665

940

Jefferson,

771

1,143

Tuscarawas,

1,144

4,082

Keene,

1,043

839

Virginia,

1,005

1,180

Lafayette,

848

1,018

Washington,

1,029

729

Linton,

1,196

1,918

White Eyes,

997

960

1880.

TOWNSHIPS AND CENSUS.

1840.

1880.

Adams,

Population in 1820 was 7,086; 1840, 21,590; 1860, 25,032; 1880, 26,642, of whom 22,909 were Ohio-born.

One hundred and twenty years ago there were six or more Indian villages within the present limits of Coshocton county, all being Delaware towns except a Shawanese village on the Wakatomika, five miles from its junction with the Tuscarawas. The spot of their junction of these two branches of the Muskingum is at Coshocton, and is the locality, so famous in history, known as "The Forks

467

COSHOCTON COUNTY.

of the Muskingum ; " it is 115 miles from its mouth at Marietta. At the Forks was the principal village of the Turtle tribe of the Delawares, called Goschachgunk, the name now modernized into Coshocton. It occupied the site of the lower streets of. Coshocton, stretching along the river bank below the junction. As described by explorers at that day it was a very noticeable place. From two to fourscore of houses, built of logs and limbs and bark, were arranged in two parallel rows, making a regular street between. Prominent among these was the council-house, in which the braves of the different tribes assembled, smoked their pipes, and con- ducted their councils in dignity and with decorum. At one time, in 1778, it is said that 700 warriors assembled in the place. In 1781 Brodhead destroyed the village.

In 1776 the Moravian missionaries, Rev. David Zeisberger and John Hick- swelder, with eight families, numbering thirty-five persons, started a mission village two and a half miles below the Forks. They called it Lichtenau, that is, a " Pasture of Light"-a green pasture illuminated by the light of the Gospel. They selected this site in deferenee to the wishes of Netawatwees, a friendly Dela- ware chief, who with his family had become Christianized, and dwelt in Goschach- gunk. On the first Sunday after the spot had been prepared by felling trees, writes one, "The chief and his villagers came to Lichtenau in full force to attend religions services. On the river's bank, beneath the gemmed trees ready to burst into verdure, gathered the congregation of Christian and pagan worshippers. Zeizberger preached on the words, 'Thus is it written and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day ; and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.' Afterwards fires were lighted, around which the converts continued to instruct their brother Indians until the shades of evening fell." And this was doubtless the first sermon, either Protestant or Catholic, preached within the present limits of Coshocton county.

Great hopes were cherished of Lichtenau until 1779, when some hostile Wyan- dots and Mingo warriors having made it a rendezvous and starting-point for a new war-path to the white settlements it was abandoned, and thus was terminated the only Moravian mission ever established within the present limits of the county.

The large number of Indian towns along the Muskingum river and its branches made this region of great historic interest long before it was settled by the whites. In peace these towns were frequented by white hunters and traders ; in war large numbers of white captives were brought here from Virginia and Pennsylvania, some to remain and others en route to the Wyandot and Shawnee towns on the Sandusky, and when the Moravians came here the history of their operations in its results added a chapter of unique and tragic interest. The first white occupant known to the history of this territory was a woman-Mary Harris-the heroine of the "Legend of the Walhonding," in 1740. She had been captured when verging into womanhood, somewhere between 1730 and 1740, and adopted as a wife by an Indian chief, Eagle Feather. As early as 1750 she was living in a village near the junction of the Killbuck with the Walhonding, about seven miles northwest of " The Forks of the Muskingum." So prominent had she become, that the place was named "The White Woman's Town," and the Walhonding branch of the river thence to the Forks was called in honor of her " The White Woman's River."

In 1750 Capt. Christopher Gist, in the interest of the Ohio Land Company, of Virginia, established in 1748, was sent out to explore the country northwest of the Ohio. The object of this company was to secure permanent possession for the English of the interior of the continent. To accomplish this-" to secure Ohio for the English world "-Lawrence Washington, Augustus Washington, of Virginia, and their associates, proposed a colony beyond the Alleghenies.

In his journal Gist says that "he reached an Indian town near the junction of

408

COSHOCTON COUNTY.

the Tuscarawas and the White Woman which contained about 100 families, a portion in the French and a portion in the English interest." Here Gist met George Croghan, an English trader, who had his headquarters at this town, also Andrew Montour, a half-breed of the Sencca nation. He remained at this village from December 14, 1750, until January 15, 1751, one month and a day. Some white men lived here, two of whose names he gives, namely, Thomas Burney, a

Originally engraved for the Magazine of Western History.

THE FORKS OF THE MUSKINGUM.

[The view is up the valley, with its flowing waters and gracefully curving hills. On the right appears the village of Coshocton and the Tuscarawas, or Little Muskingum; in front, its junction with the Walhonding, or White Woman, and the delta between; on the left, the canal and bridge over the Walhonding leading into Roscoe. For soft, expansive beanty of scenery, united to memories of the tonching important events that here occurred when Ohio was all a wilderness, few spots are so inter- esting on the American continent.]

blacksmith, and Barney Curran. On Christmas day, by request, Gist conducted religions services, according to the Protestant Episcopal prayer-book, in the presence of some white men and a few Indians, who attended at the earnest solicitation of Burney and Curran. When Capt. Gist left he was accompanied by Croghan and Montour, and "went west," he says, " to the White Woman Creek, on which is a small town," where they found Mary Harris, and he gives briefly a few facts in her history ; they remained at her town one night only.

Again he notes in his journal : "Tuesday, January 15 .- We left Muskingum and went west five miles to the White Woman creek. This white woman was taken away from New England when she was not above ten years old by the French Indians. She is now upwards of fifty ; has an Indian hushand and several children. Her name is Mary Harris. She still remembers that they used to be very re- ligious in New England, and wonders how the white men can be so wicked as she has seen them in these woods,"

"Her husband, 'Eagle Feather,' brought home another white woman as a wife, whom Mary called the 'Newcomer.' Jealousies arose, and finally Eagle Feather was found with his head split open, and the tomahawk remaining in his skull; but the Newcomer had fled. She was overtaken and brought back, and was killed by the Indians Decem- her 26, 1761, while Gist was in the White Woman's town. The place where she was captured was afterwards called ' Newcomer's- town,' Tuscarawas county." The next white

COSHOCTON COUNTY. . 469

man to press the soil of Coshocton county probably was James Smith. He was a lad of eighteen years of age when, at the period of Braddock's defeat, he was taken prisoner

near Bedford, Pa., brought to the village of the Tullihas, on the Walhonding, and adopted into one of their tribes. His narrative is given elsewhere in this work.

COSHOCTON IN 1846 .- Coshocton, the county-seat, is finely situated on the Muskingum, at the junction of the Tuscarawas with the Walhonding river, eighty-

Drawn by Henry Howce in 1846,

PUBLIC SQUARE, COSHOCTON.

three miles northeast from Columbus and thirty from Zanesville. In times of high water steamboats occasionally run up to Coshocton. The ground on which it is built, for sitnation, could scarcely be improved, as it lies in four broad natural

Shepler & Sow., Photo., Coshocton, 1887.

PUBLIC SQUARE, COSHOCTON.

terraces, each elevated about nine feet above the other, the last of which is about 1,000 feet wide. The town is much scattered. About sixty rods back from the Muskingum is the public square, containing four acres, neatly fenced, planted with

470

COSHOCTON COUNTY.

young trees and covered with a green sward; on it stand the county buildings represented in the engraving. 'Coshocton was laid out in April, 1802, by Ebenezer Buckingham and John Matthews, under the name of Tuscarawa, and changed to its present appellation in 1811. The county was first settled only a few years prior to the formation of the town ; among the early settlers were Col. Charles Williams, William Morrison, Isaac Hoglin, George M'Culloch, Andrew Craig, and William Whitten. Coshocton contains 2 Presbyterian, 1 Methodist Episcopal, and 1 Protestant Methodist church, 6 mercantile stores, 2 newspaper printing-offices, 1 woollen factory, 1 flouring mill, and had, in 1840, 625 inhabitants .- Old Edition.

Coshocton is 68 miles east of Columbus and 115 miles from Cleveland, on the P. C. & St. L. and at the junction of Cleveland and Canton R. R., and june- tion of Tuscarawas and Walhonding rivers.

County officers in 1888 : Auditor, Joseph Burrell; Clerks, Samuel Gamble, Andrew J. Hill ; Commissioners, Vincent Ferguson, Samuel Neldon, Abner McCoy ; Prosecuting Attorney, Samuel H. Nichols; Probate Judges, Holder Blackman, Wm. R. Gault ; Recorder, Wm. H. Coe; Sheriff, James B. Manner ; Surveyor, Samuel M. Moore; Treasurers, William Walker, Geo. C. Rinner. Newspapers : Coshocton Democrat, Democrat, J. C. Fisher, editor ; Age, Republi- can, J. F. Meek, editor ; Standard, Democrat, Beach & McCabe, publishers ; Wochenblatt, German, Otto Cummerow, publisher. Churches : Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Episcopal, and Catholic. Banks : Commercial, Jackson Hay, president, Henry C. Herbig, cashier ; Farmers', J. P. Peck, president, Samuel Irvine, cashier.

Manufactures and Employees .- Buckeye Planing Mill, 5 hands; Houston & Hay & Sons, axles, springs, etc., 65; Wm. Ferrell, iron castings, 3; Tuscarawas Advertising Co., advertising novelties, 12; Coshocton City Mills, flour, etc., 6 ; J. F. Williams & Co., flour, etc., 11 .- State Report 1887.

Population in 1880, 3,044. School census in 1886, 1,053; J. M. Yarnall, superintendent.

"A short distance below Coshocton," says Dr. Hildreth, in Silliman's Journal, "on one of those elevated gravelly alluvions, so common on the rivers of the West, has been recently discovered a very singular ancient burying-ground. From some remains of wood still (1835) apparent in the earth around the bones, the bodies seem all to have been deposited in coffins; and what is still more curious is the fact that the bodies buried here were generelly not more than from three to four and a half feet in length. They are very numerous, and must have been tenants of a con- siderable city, or their numbers could not have been so great. A large number of graves have been opened, the inmates of which are all of this pigmy race. No metallic articles or utensils have yet been found to throw any light on the period or nation to which they belonged. Similar burying-grounds have been found in Tennessee, and near St. Louis, in Missouri."

We learned orally from another source that this burying-ground covered, in 1830, about ten acres. The graves were arranged in regular rows with avenues between, and the heads of all were placed to the west and the feet to the east.

In one of them was a skeleton with pieces of oak boards and iron wrought nails. The corpse had evidently been dismembered before burial, as the skull was found among the bones of the pelvis, and other bones were displaced. The skull itself was triangular in shape, much flattened at the sides and back, and in the posterior part having an orifice, evidently made by some weapon of war or bullet. In 1830 dwarf oaks of many years' growth were over several of the graves. The graveyard has since been plowed over. Nothing was known of its origin by the early settlers. Below the graveyard is a beautiful mound.

ROSCOE IN 1846 .- On the west bank of the Muskingum, opposite to and con- nected with Coshocton by two bridges, is Roscoe. This town was laid off in 1816 by James Calder, under the name of Caldersburg. An addition was subsequently

'471

COSHOCTON COUNTY.

laid off by Ransom & Swane, which being united with it the place was called Roscoe, from Wm. Roscoe, the English anthor. The Walhonding canal, which extends to the village of Rochester, a distance of twenty-five miles, unites with the Ohio canal at Roscoe. This town is at present a great wheat depot on the canal, and an important place of shipment and transshipment. Its capacities for a large manufacturing town are ample. "The canals bring together the whole water power of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding, the latter standing in the canal at this place, forty feet above the level of the Muskingnm, and the canal being compara- tively little used, the whole power of the stream, capable of performing almost any- thing desired, could be used for manufacturing purposes ; and sites for a whole manufacturing village could be purchased comparatively for a trifle." Roscoe contains 1 Methodist Episcopal church, 5 dry goods and 2 grocery stores, 2 for- warding houses, 1 fulling, 2 saw and 2 flouring mills, aud had, in 1840, 468 in- habitants .- Old Edition.

Roscoe is on the Walhonding branch of the Tuscarawas about a furlong above the junction of the two streams. From the hills baek of the town a fine prospect is presented up the valleys of the Tuscarawas and Walhonding, and down that of the Muskingum. The place in the decay of the canal business has not its old time relative importance. It has 1 Presbyterian and 1 Episcopal church, and the State report for 1887 gives the following industries and employees : Adams & Gleason, doors, sash, etc., 6 hands ; D. Rose & Co., furniture, 23; Empire Mills, flour, etc., 13; W. H. Wilson, blankets, flannels, etc., 5; J. F. Williams, flour, etc., 8.

Previous to the settlement of the country in the last half of the last century there were several military expeditions into this region. The first in importance and in order of time was that made by Col. Bouquet in October, 1764.

The following is extracted from a lecture delivered by Charles Whittlesey at Cleveland, December 17, 1846, and is especially valuable as a clear statement of the condition of affairs between the whites and the Indians at the period when the expedition was undertaken.

The Indians were very much displeased, when they saw the English taking possession of their country, for they preferred the Frenchmen, who had been their friends and traders more than one hundred years, and had married Indian women. A noted chief of the Ottawa tribe, known by the name of Pontiac, formed the resolution to destroy all the English frontier posts at one assault, in which he was encouraged by the French traders.

He succeeded in forming an alliance with the Ottawas, having 900 warriors ; the Poto- wotomies, with 350; Miamies of the lake, 350 ; Chippewas, 5,000 ; Wyandots, 300 ; Del- awares, 600; Shawnees, 500; Kickapoos, 300 ; Onatanons of the Wabash, 400, and the Pinankeshaws, 250; in all, able to muster 8,950 warriors. This may be called the "First Great Nort !. western Confederacy " against the whites. The second took place under Brandt, or Thayandanegea, during the revolution, and was continued by Little Tur- tle ; the third, under Tecumseh, in the last war. Pontiac's projects were brought to a focus in the fall of 1763, and the result was nearly equal to the design. The Indians col- lected at all the northwestern forts, under the pretence of trade and friendly intercourse ; and having killed all the English traders who were scattered through their villages, they made a simultaneous attack upon the forts, and were in a great measure successful.

The inhabitants of Pennsylvania and Vir- ginia were now subject to great alarm, and frequently robberies and murders were com- mitted upon them by the Indians, and prisoners were captured. Gen. Gage was at this time the commander-in-chief of the British forces in America, and his head- quarters were at Boston. He ordered an ex- pedition of 3,000 men for the relief of Detroit, to move early in the year 1764. It was di- rected to assemble at Fort Niagara, and pro- ceeded up Lake Erie in boats, commanded by Gen. Bradstreet. The other was the expedition I design principally to notice at this time. It was at first composed of the Forty-second and Seventy-seventh regiments, who had been at the siege of Havana, in Cuba, under the command of Col. Henry Bonquet. This force left Philadelphia, for the relief of Fort Pitt, in July, 1763, and after defeating the Indians at Bushy Run, in August, drove them across the Ohio. It wintered at Fort Pitt, where some of the houses, built by Col. Bouquet, may still be seen, his name cut in stone upon the wall.

Gen. Gage directed Col. Bouquet to or- ganize a corps of 1,500 men, and to enter the country of the Delawares and the Shawnees, at the same time that Gen. Bradstreet was engaged in chastising the Wyandots and Ot- tawas, of Lake Erie, who were still investing Detroit. As a part of Col. Bouquet's force was composed of militia from Pennsylvania

472

COSHOCTON COUNTY.

and Virginia, it was slow to assemble. On the 5th of August, the Pennsylvania quota rendezvoused at Carlisle, where 300 of them deserted. The Virginia quota arrived at Fort Pitt on the 17th of September, and uniting with the provincial militia, a part of the Forty-second and Sixtieth regiments, the army moved from Fort Pitt on the 3d of October. Gen. Bradstreet, having dispersed the Indian forces besieging Detroit, passed into the Wyandot country, by way of San- dusky bay. He ascended the bay and river, as far as it was navigable for boats, and there made a camp. A treaty of peace and friend- ship was signed by the chiefs and head men, who delivered but very few of their prisoners.

When Col. Bouquet was at Fort Loudon, in Pennsylvania, between Carlisle and Fort Pitt, urging forward the militia levies, he received a despatch from Gen. Bradstreet, notifying him of the peace effected at Sandusky. But the Ohio Indians, particularly the Shawnees of the Scioto river, and the Delawares of the Muskingum, still continued their robberies and murders along the frontier of Pennsylvania ; and so Col. Bouquet determined to proceed with his division, notwithstanding the peace of Gen. Bradstreet, which did not include the Shawnees and Delawares. In the march from Philadelphia to Fort Pitt, Col. Bouquet

had shown himself to be a man of decision, courage and military genius.

In the engagement at Bushy Run, he dis- played that caution in preparing for emer- gencies, that high personal influence over his troops, and a facility in changing his plans as circumstances changed during the battle, which mark the good commander and the cool-headed officer. He had been with Forbes and Washington, when Fort Pitt was taken from the French. The Indians who were assembled at Fort Pitt left the siege of that place and advanced to meet the force of Bouquet, intending to execute a surprise and destroy the whole command. These savages remembered how easily they had entrapped Gen. Braddock, a few years before, by the same movement, and had no doubt of success against Bouquet. But he moved always in a hollow square, with his provision train and his cattle in the centre, impressing his men with the idea that a fire might open upon them at any moment. When the important hour arrived, and they were saluted with the discharge of a thousand rifles, accompanied by the terrific yells of so many savage war- riors, arrayed in the livery of demons, the English and provincial troops behaved like veterans, whom nothing could shake. They achieved a complete victory, and drove the allied Indian force beyond the Ohio.

NARRATIVE OF BOUQUET'S EXPEDITION.

The original source of information concerning this expedition is the work of Dr. Wm. Smith, Provost of the College of Philadelphia, entitled "An Historical Account of the Expedition Against the Ohio Indians in the year 1764." W. F. Poole, LL. D., Librarian of the Newberry, Chicago, and a high authority on American history and its bibliography, writes us: The original edition was " printed at Philadelphia in 1765; reprinted at London in 1766 ; at Dublin, 1769 ; at Cincinnati, 1868 ; and at Amsterdam (in French) with biographical account of Col. Bouquet, in 1769."

The following narrative is from Graham's "History of Coshocton County," which is there rewritten from Smith in the light of modern geography which clearly indicates localities to the present time reader. The two engravings are copies of those designed by the celebrated painter, Benjamin West, for the London edition. The originals were engraved on copper, a better material than steel for artistic engraving. It is now out of use from its want of durability.

"The Indians, disheartened by their over- whelming defeat at Bushy Run, and despair- ing of success against Fort Pitt, now it was so heavily reinforced, retired sullenly to their homes beyond the Ohio, leaving the country between it and their settlements free from their ravages. Communication now being rendered safe, the fugitive settlers were able to return to their friends, or take possession again of their abandoned cabins. By com- paring notes they were soon able to make out an accurate list of those who were missing- either killed, or prisoners among the various tribes-when it was found to contain the names of more than 200 men, women, and children. Fathers mourned their daughters

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Historical collections of Ohio in two volumes, an encyclopedia of the state, Volume I, Part 73

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