History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley, Part 119

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 728

USA > Ohio > Jefferson County > History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley > Part 119
USA > Ohio > Belmont County > History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley > Part 119

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).

"On the balance of these rocks are sculptured nine human footprints, varying from five and a half to fourteen and a half inches in length, and indented in rocks in divers depths, cloven footprints, the impression of shell fish, serpents, earth worms and numerous bird tracks.

"Two of the human footprints are anomalous; one is seven inches long, two and one-fourth inches across the heel, and im- pressed in the rock one-fourth of an inch. The four small toes go out straight with the body of the foot, while the great toe shoots out at right angles with it, at the right side from the point where the small toes are attached to the foot. From the point of the great toe to the opposite side of the little toe, is tive and a half inches.

"The other queer footprint is nine and three-fourths inches long, three inches across the heel; the toes attached to the body of the foot just as the one described, but the great toe goes out on the left side of the foot. From the point of the great toe to the opposite side of the little toe, is six and three-fourth inches.

"Of bird tracks, I counted thirty-five on the two large rocks of which I have been speaking, and twenty-five on smaller frag- ments which lay carved about them. I only found six in regu- lar snccession, as if intended to represent the tread of the same bird. They were four inches in length from the point of the heel to the tip of the fore toe, and four inches wide, but the steps were less than five inches.

"The remainder of the bird tracks were scattered in all direc- tions over the surface of the rocks and no two of them of the same size. The depth of impressions of the varions tracks varied from three-fourths of an inch to a mere scale barely discernable. The smallest human footprints were five and a balf inches long, were the deepest, being a shade over three-fourths of an inch, while the largest, fourteen and a half inches long, were scarcely per- ceptible."

From the multitude of facts furnished by these and other relics of the monnd builders, the author is led to the following conclusions concerning them :

That they cultivated the terms of peace, never engaging in war save for self defence; that they were highly civilized, tak- ing a different line of development from all other races of men, existing or extinct ; that they were advanced in some of the arts, but pursued agriculture and herding as their chief occupations, on account of their high moral tendencies; that they were ex- ceedingly religions and worshipped the sun as their principal Deity.

Nowhere among the work of their hands remaining for onr examination have implements of war been found justly referra- ble to them. What are called " forts," never have a stragetical location and are never built on such principles as justity the opinion that they were such.

The fort and mound on the Nuzum tarm and the two little monnds on the site of the old brick meeting house, are, in the author's opinion, parts of the devotional structures and ap- pliances. The two former were their temples of worship and the latter a monument of the sacrificial ceremonies.

MOUNDS AND FORTS.

A few miles west of Barnesville, but within the township of Warren, are two ancient works erroneously denominated "lu- dian Forts." One of them is located on the Jesse Jarvis, and the other on the James Nuzum lands, Over fifty years ago the anthor of this article made a careful examination of the one last mentioned, and we will have to submit the result to our read- ers as he then sketched it.

*This attitude is perhaps about thirteen hundred feet.

3.42

HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES.

" In the year 1828, at the invitation of some friends, I visited the old Indian Fort, located on the farm of Richard Hare, abont two miles west of Barnesville. I found this ancient monument of a departed race, beautifully situated on the broad top of a ridge gently inclined from the northwest to the southeast. The embankment was at no point less than five feet in height, and the southeastern portion had an average elevation of a little less than ten feet, and the uniform width a trifle over fifteen feet. Judging by the eve I had concluded the fort to be a perfect cir- cle, but when I applied the line to its measurement, I was as- tonished to find how much I had been deceived.

"By measurement I found the circuit to be eliptical with the greater focus at the southeast end of the elipsis, and also that the shape of the embankment was hexagonal, instead of cycloidal, with each segment of uniform length, and but a slight deviation in curvature. The longest diameter, that from northwest to southeast, was four hundred and fifty feet, and the cross diame- ter was four hundred and twenty feet. The diameter of the ends, taking a given distance within from the embankment, was: the longer two hundred and twenty-five feet, and the shorter one hundred and fifty feet. The total length of the ein- bankment was four hundred and forty yards.

"Breaking through the embankment on the southeast side, at each end of the most easterly segment, were two depressions twenty feet wide measuring across the summit. These depres- sions I concluded from the appearance of themselves and sur- roundings, were gateways. The embankment and the interior of the circle were covered by large fresh trees, Sugar-trees stood on the embankment three feet in diameter, and on the southwest limb of the enclosure was a great poplar, sixteen feet and five inches in girth, towering eighty to one hundred feet above its comrades."

Directly east of Mr. Nuzum's residence is one of the largest if not the largest mound ever yet discovered. This mound is over ninety feet in height, and its circumference at the base about eighteen hundred feet, tapering in elegant proportions to the summit. Out from each side of the mound projects a tremen- dous embankment, declining with gradnal slope to the general level of the ridge on which it stands. This mound and embank- ment, equal in their stupendous proportions, according to many antiquarians and archeologists, any work of ancient or modern times.

A little north of northwest, and abont a mile and a half from the fort, on the Nuzum farm, there is another on the lands of Daniel Chaney, which encloses several acres of land.

West of southwest of this last fort, and on the farm of Jesse Jarvis, there is another, which encloses about six acres of land. The entire summit of the bill level is surrounded by the em- bankment, which is very irregular in height and course. Sev- eral human skeletons were ploughed up in early times on the inside of this fort.

Almost due south of this, and two and a half miles distant, and within five rods of the county line, on the farm of Robert Y. Price, are the "track-rocks."

On the lands of Thomas Colpitt, three-fourths of a mile, south - west of Barnesville, there is a very beautiful mound. Its height is abont fifteen feet, and diameter, at the base, forty feet. This mound is almost a perfect cone. It stands upon the lowest point, at the feet of the surrounding hills that rise two hundred to three hundred feet above its top.

FRIENDS' STILLWATER MEETING.HOUSE.

BY JONATHAN SCHOFIELD,

About one-half of the eastern part of Warren township was originally settled almost exclusively by Friends, commonly called Quakers,

They came chiefly from the southern states, many of the pioneers being the heads of young and growing families, were stimulated to the movement by a desire to remove without the blighting influence of human slavery, against which their reli- gious principles required them to bear a consistent testimony, and being unwilling that their children should grow up in the midst of its corrupting influences, they left, in many instances good lands in a genial clime, to set themselves down to a life of privations and hardships incident to pioneer life in the forest north of the Ohio river.

Robert Plummer and family were probably the first Friends who settled here, about the year 1801. They came from Fred- erick county, Maryland; and family tradition tells us that five days' time was necessarily occupied by them in making their way through from the open road where Morristown now is to this neighborhood. There was no road, and a way had to be made as they progressed.

From the lips of Robert Hodgin, now of Barnesville, seventy- four years of age, we get the following tradition : That his father and William Patten, in company, left their homes in Georgia and came prospecting in 1802; that they crossed the Ohio river at Cincinnati and looked over the Miami country, but did not like it, thinking it would be sickly. They therefore came on to Belmont and Jefferson counties, and determined this to be the locality for their future homes; therefore they made arrange- ments with Jonathan Taylor, a Friend, of Mt. Pleasant town- ship, Jefferson county, to seenre them a section of land from the government, as no less than a section was then subject to entry, and they returned home to make preparation for moving the next season. They had to swim their horses through all the unfordable streams this side of Cincinnati.

The next season (in 1803) came the Hodgins' that is, Robert's father, William and his brother Stephen, the Pattens, the Todds and Bailey Hays, with their families. (The Hayses were not Friends, and Deborah Stubbs, a young woman, emigrated, and Joseph Stubbs, Deborah's father, came along prospecting). Their route lay through Virginia, and their vehicles of conveyance were the well-known southern one-horse carts. They camped of nights on their journey.

Within the next five years, from 1803 to 1808, they came in companies-the Williams', part of the Millhouses Childrees, Sid- wells, Thomases and Vernons, from Georgia ; the Starbucks, but recently from Nantucket; the Pattersons, Bundys, Stan- tons, Edgertons, Dondnas, Boswells, Coxes, Brocks, Outlands, Halls, Colliers, Middletons and Hansons, from North Carolina ; the Baileys, Davies, some of the Vernons, and Hickses, from Southeastern Virginia, and the Clendennens, Strahls, Smiths and Whites, from Pennsylvania. The exact dates of the arrival of the various families before 1808 is difficult now to ascertain.

For after additions we extract from the minutes of the Still- water monthly meeting: In Fifth Month, 1808, certificates of membership were received for William Patterson and wife Eliz- abeth, the latter a minister in unity, with their five minor chil- dren, from Short creek. In the Sixth Montb, from same meet- ing, Joseph Patterson, Sr., wife and three children, Mary Edger- ton, Elizabeth and Jemima Patterson. Seventh Month, Stephen Bailey, from Dinwiddie county, Virginia, and Mary Hicks with five sons and a daughter from Sussex county, Virginia. Eighth Month, Richard Kerney, eastern Pennsylvania. Tenth and Eleventh Months, from Short creek, Benjamin Patterson, Jr., Joel Patterson and John Patterson. Twelfth Month, John Beck, wife and seven children, from Gleason county, Va., and in the First Month of 1809, Hannah and Ann Rogers, from Cecil county, Md. Also in 1809, John Purvis and Hezekiah Starbuck, from North Carolina, James Brock and wife, Peter Sears aud Benjamin Watkins, from Dinwiddie county, Va .; William Block- som, wife and six children, from Plainfield monthly meeting; Henry Barnes, from Concord, and Jacob Parker and wife, Benajah Parker and George Parker, from Short creek.

In 1810, Sarah Williams, with five sons and three daughters, and Henry Ballenger, from Pipe creek monthly meeting; Philip Strahl, wife, five sons and three daughters, Rachel Pickering and Ann Edgerton, from Short creek; Titus Shotwell. wife, three sons and two danghters, Ann Taylor, Joel Gilbert and wife, Abel Gilbert, wife and two daughters, and Sarah Cox, from Plainfield; Jeremiah Cook, wife and two daughters, William Satterthwaite, Jacob Pickering, from Concord.

In 1811, Anderson and Thomas Arnold, Joel Judkins, wife and daughter, Carolns Judkins, wife, five sons and one daughter, Edward Thornboro, Jacob Crew, wife, three sons and one daughter, Isaac Crew, wife and daughter, from North Carolina ; Hngh Wilson, Richard Fawcett and daughter, John Gilbert, wife, one son and two daughters, from Plainfield; Thos. Web- ster, from Little Britain, Pa .; Mary Taylor, from Exeter, Pa .; Sammel Yocum, wife, one daughter and six sons, from Short creek monthly meeting; Jesse Bailey, wife, two sons and four daughters, Reuben Watkins, wife and five sons, Sarah Bailey, one son and two daughters, from Dinwiddie county, Va .; Joseph Garretson, wife, two sons and one daughter, from Concord.

1812. From Short creek, Simeon Taylor, wife and daughter, Henry Stanton, wife and two sons, Eaton Hays, Robet Burnett, wife, three sons and three daughters. From Plainfield, Joseph

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HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES

Nicholson's minor daughter and two sons, Elizabeth Nicholson and five minor children, Josiah and Alice Rogers, two sons and three daughters, Matthew 'Wood, one danghter and two sons, Isaac Wood and Abraham Wood. From Chester county, Pa., Josiah Pennington. Samnel Berry, wife and two daughters, from Concord, Ohio; and Renben Edgerton, from Deer creek monthly meeting.

1813. Joseph Albertson, wife and daughter, from Plymouth (now Smithfield, Ohio) ; Sally Morris, from Salem, Ohio; Jon- athan Fawcett, William Webster, from Plainfield; Joshna Scott, four sons and three daughters, from Short Creek ; Stephen Bur- net, from Redstone ; Zachariah Bailey, Dinwiddie connty, Vir- ginia; Achsa Patterson, from Northampton county, North Car- olina ; Rebecca Vore, from Exeter, Pa.

1814. James Barnes, from Plainfield. This James Barnes must have been the founder of Barnesville, as he was a Friend, and no earlier certificate for one of that name appears on the records of this meeting. Jacob Patterson, from Darby creek ; Zadoc Boswell, from Symonds creek, North Carolina ; Abisha Thomas, from Plainfield; Anna Webster, Edward Hattou, from Centre, Pa. ; Hannah Miles, Jr., Thomas Smith, wife and four sons, from Hopewell, Virginia; Susanna Plummer, four sons and two daughters, from Pipe creek; Wm. Morris, wife, five sons and four daughters, from Salem,

1815. Nellie Frazier, her son and two daughters, William Frazier, from Concord ; Mary Patterson, from Short creek ; Joseph Bishop, from Concord; Thomas Osborn, wife and son, from Surry county, North Carolina; Samnel Sharpless, from Concord; Hugh Judge and wife, Susannah, Rebecca G. Judge and Phoebe Judge, from Indian Spring, Maryland; Mary Sat- terthwaite, from Chesterfield, New Jersey ; Ann Peebles, from North Carolina; Daniel Wilson, from Concord, Pa. ; Joseph Edgerton, wife, four daughters and one son, from North Caro- lina ; Robert Miller, from Plainfield.

1816. John Webster, wife and son, from Plainfield ; Samuel Embre, wife, six sons and a daughter and Lydia Embre, from Short creek ; Joseph Jones and Mary, his wife, Aaron Morris, George Parker, wife and son, from Columbiana county, Ohio ; Jonathan Bogue, wife and two daughters, Caleb Engle, one son and five daughters, from Plainfield; Issacher Scholfield, wife, two sons and two daughters, from Indian Spring, Maryland; (these moved from Washington City;) Andrew Sholfield, a minor, from Indian Spring, Maryland; Hiram Baily, from Centre, Ohio; Hannah Stanton and two daughters, Mary Wil- Non, from Concord; Israel Briggs, wife and two daughters, from Salem; Hannah Romine, from Hopewell, Virginia; Isaac Brown, from Maryland; Enoch Harlon, Hannah, his wife, six sons and a daughter, Harriet Harlan, from Chester county, Pa.

1817. Job Newby, from Short creek; Win. Mott, Marlboro and William Massey, from Goshen, Pa. ; Jordon Newsome, Pru- dence Newsome, from North Carolina; Robert Hodgin, wife and seven children, from Mill creek; William Dewees, wife and three children, Ciduey Hoops, from Pennsylvania; Borden Stanton, wife and four children, from Concord; William Harry, from Kennet, Pa. ; Susannah Jolly and daughter, from Plymouth, Daniel Strahl, Mordecai Yarnall, wife and two daughters, from Short creek ; Mary Morris and Nathan Mor- ris, from Salem ; Rebecca Fisher, from Plainfield.

These people were generally poor or in moderate circum- stances, and for the most part ocenpied the land only in small tracts, so that the population was reasonably dense for a conu- try district at au early day. They were industrious, frugal, upright, necessarily; with their religions principles, moral to the highest degree; and, on the subject of temperance, absti- nence from the use of spiritous liquors, or the manufacture or sale thereof, or even the sale of grain knowingly for distillation, They were the pioneers-the beacou light of the age. To sus- tain this assertion, copions extracts from the records of Still- water monthly meetings will hereafter be inserted as legitimate inatter of history. They systematically extended care as to the encouragement of schools for the education of their youth, and to assist pecuniarily those of their members in defraying the expenses thereof who were unable of their own means to pay the expense of their children's tuition,

Their first meeting-house, according to the statement of the oldest citizen, Hosca Doudna, was a single "log pen," "scutched down," sitnate ou a ten acre lot obtained of Richard Croy, in the northeast corner of the southwest quarter of section num- ber 9, inside of and near the northeast corner of the present graveyard. Whether the land was bought before this first meet- ing-house was built cannot probably be nscertained, but the right of occupancy was manifestly secured in some way, and

said ten-acre lot was, subsequently, if not previously, paid for, and a deed executed by Richard and Ann Croy, Fourth month, 1st, 1813, to William Hodgin, Joseph Middleton, Herman Davis, Richard Edgerton and Joseph Cox, trustees, for the use and be- hoof of Stillwater monthly meeting, $40 being the considera- tion paid. The first meeting-house must have been built in 1803 or 1804, as Robert Plummer's family is the only one we have any account of having come before 1803, when William Hodgin and his fellow emigrants arrived, and the preparative meeting being established in the spring of 1805, (according to Hosea Doundna's account) when another room was added to the building to accommodate it. Nearly all Friend's meeting-houses are constructed of two contiguous rooms (one for each sex) so arranged as to open into one for public meetings, and to be sep- arated by closing shutters between them for the transaction of disciplinary proceedings,

This house seems to have been made to subserve their wants for both meeting and school house for a number of years.

The following minutes, taken from the records of the month- ly meeting, indicates the first movement to provide a better one, viz :

Third Month, 26th, 1811 .- " The subject of building a new meeting house coming under consideration, the meeting appoints Joseph Middleton, Camm Thomas, Isaac Clendeunon, William Hodgin, George Starbuck. John Middleton, Jesse White, David Smith, Joseph Cox and William Bundy to take the case under their care and make an estimate of the expense of a house 60x30 feet in base, and to carry the same into execution as soon as con- convenient." Nothing more appears on the records in reference to the subject until the Seventh Month, 1815, when a committee was appointed to make an estimate of the amount necessary to be raised to finish the new house, and in the Ninth Month said committee reported: " They had attended to their appointment and thought $300 would be needed, which they had apportioned on the members, and produced the list, which was satisfactory," and a committee was appointed to receive it from the members and pay it to William Hodgin.

A year later Issachar Scholfield, who had been appointed to collect money to be applied to building the yearly meeting honse, reported a surplus received, which he was directed to pay to- wards finishing the new house.

H. Doudna thinks the brick were made for this building in 1811, and it was put up in 1812. If this was the case the finish- ing was very tedions, This house was lengthened about 1823 or 1824, to accommodate the quarterly meeting. Thus enlarged it was about 38x97 feet, twelve-feet story, and stood, serving the meeting well, until the year 1878, when it was demolished and the present plain, substantial brick structure was built by the year- ly meeting on the same site. It is 60x100 feet, twenty-nine feet high to the square and roofed with slate, and makes a respecta ble appearance. It cost $9,000. There are two large committee rooms in the northeast and southeast, or front corners, with the space between them partitioned off from the main room by a movable partition, for the accommodation of Stillwater particu lar meetings, above all of which (a space twenty-four feet wide, the length of the building) are gallery seats. In time of yearly meeting the portable partition is taken down, throwing the whole floor area, (except the committee rooms) with gallery, into one room for the public meetings.

The women occupy the south end of the building and the men the northern, and by lowering from the garret a pannel work board partition, the two are separated for the transaction of their disciplinary proceedings.

It would seem not inappropriate here to introduce a sketch of the religious belief of this peculiar people.

The doctrines of the society may be briefly stated as follows: They believe in one only wise, ouruipotent and everlasting God, the creator and upholder of all things, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, the mediator between God and man, and in the Holy Spirit, which precedeth from the Father and Son, one God, blessed forever. They believe in the divini. ty and manhood of the Lord Jeans: and that His saeritice of Himself upon the Cross was a propitiation and atonement for the sins of the whole world. The Friends believe also in the Holy Spirit, a manifestation of which they believe is given to every man, that it convicts for sin, and as obeyed gives power to the soul to overcome and forsake it, opens to the mind the mysteries of salvation, enables it savingly to understand the truth recorded in the holy Scriptures, and gives it the living, practical and heartfelt experience of those things which pertain to its everlasting welfare. The society of Friends have always believed that the holy Scriptures were written by divine in

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HISTORY OF BELMONT AND JEFFERSON COUNTIES.

spiration, and contain all the fundamental doctrines and princi- ples relating to eternal life and salvation.

They believe that the gospel baptism is that of the Holy Spirit, and that the true communion of the body and blood of one bord Jesus Christ is inward and spiritual.

Believing that man can do nothing that tends to the glory of God or his own salvation without the immediate assistance of the spirit of Christ, it is the practice of the society to sit down in solemn silence to worship God, unless some feel drawn by the influence of the spirit to engage in the ministry of the gospel or in vocal prayer.

They believe the qualification for the ministry is the special gitt of Christ Jesus npon both men and women, and to be exer- cised only as he qualifies immediately for the service. Their ministers preach treely without any compensation from their hearers.

The society believes war is wholly at variance with the gos- pel, and therefore cannot take part in any warlike measures. They also believe all oaths forbidden by Christ. It also forbids its members to go to law with each other, and enjoins npon its members a simple mode of living, moderation in pursuit of busi- ness, and that they discountenance lotteries, music, dancing, stage plays, horse races and all other vain and unprofitable amusements, as well as changeable fashions, in dress, language, or the furniture af their houses.

The practice of uncovering the head, as a mark of respect, or using the complimentary expressions in common nse, such as " Mr.", " your humble servant," or other flattering titles, the Friends have always felt bound to refrain from, believing they had their origin in the pride and vanity of the human heart, which as also the use of the names of the days of the week and month, derived from heathen gods, and have called them by their proper numerical names.

The Discipline of the society embraces four grades of meet- ings counected with and dependent upon each other. First, the preparative meetings receive and prepare the business for the monthly meetings, which are composed of one or more pre- parative meetings and rank next in order above them. In the monthly meetings the executive department of the discipline is chiefly lodged. The third grade includes quarterly meetings, which consist of several monthly meetings, and exercise. a super- visory care over them, examine into their condition, and advise or assist them as occasion may require; and, lastly, the yearly meeting, which includes the whole within a given district, pos- sesses exclusively the legislative power, and annually investi- gates the state of the whole body, which is bronght before it, by answers to queries addressed to subordinate meetings.

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History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties, Ohio, and incidentially historical collection pertaining to border warfare and the early settlement of the adjacent portion of the Ohio Valley, Part 119

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 728

Author: Caldwell, J. A. (John Alexander) 1n; Newton, J. H., ed; Ohio Genealogical Society. 1n
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Wheeling, W. Va. : Historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 728