History of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio; their past and present, Part 43

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1592

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IIISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

enough, and "bushwhacking or poling along the shore by the bushes, and paddling the canoe in the intervals of deep water." By this method he usually made thirty miles a day.

These voyages, as late as 1793, were attended with considerable danger from the Indians, who, up to that time, were hostile and lurked along the shore for the pur- pose of surprising canoes and boats. Col. Ferguson informs us that he had repeat- edly to land and camp on the shore at night. A fire was built when the nights were so cold as to render it absolutely necessary for comfort and health. While thus camping it was not safe to remain more than a few minutes at a time by the fire, but after obtaining some warmth, to immediately retreat to the seclusion of a spot selected for sleeping in the bushes, at some distance from the fire. This was for the purpose of not being exposed to the view of savages who might be lurking in the thickets, and, on account of the light of the fire, be able to shoot with accurate aim.

Major Swan, one of the officers at Fort Washington, who had taken a small detacliment of troops from the fort to Pittsburgh, wrote back: "We arrived here after a passage of only forty-four days, in which we exhausted our provisions and groceries, and had to lay in fresh stock at Marietta."

In 1794, T. Greene, of Marietta, carried the mail between Pittsburgh and Cin- cinnati in a pirogue, or large canoe, propelled by poles and paddles. The post office had been established at the latter place in 1793, and all the mail matter at that time could be carried in a small hand-bag. Long intervals elapsed between the deliveries at each point.

Traders at old Fort Redstone, Pittsburgh and Wheeling furnished boats for emi- grants. They also furnished all necessary articles-provisions, furniture, cooking utensils, farming implements and boats at a moderate price. Each had a boat yard where the arks, keel or flat boats and barges were made. A boat of sufficient size for an average family, say thirty to forty feet long, cost $1 to $1. 25 per foot, so that a pretty respectable vessel, well-boarded up on the sides, and roofed to within six or eight feet of the bows, could be had for $35. This did not include the expense of a mooring cable, a pump and a fireplace, which cost, perhaps, $10 more. After these "family boats"' had been used to descend the river, they were frequently employed for transient purposes, and then broken up for their lumber. Besides these craft a number of keelboats plied on the Ohio and its tributaries, in use as common carriers of merchandise. Their principal cargo, by way of import or export, was flour, apples, whiskey, cider, peach and apple brandy, bar iron and castings, tin, copper- ware, glass, cabinet work, millstones, grindstones, nails, etc. Returning they brought cotton and tobacco from Kentucky, lead, fur and peltry. Messrs. Raum & Perry, Riddle and others of Cincinnati, who dealt in the New Orleans trade, brought cot- ton from Natchez, sugar, coffee, rice, hides, wines, rum and dry goods. The Navi- gator, for 1818, notes the great advantage it was to the commerce of Cincinnati, to have this line, slow as it was, and limited in its capacity.

First Packet Line. - The first regular and periodical line of packets between Pittsburgh and Cincinnati was formed January 11, 1794, by the establishment of four keelboats, of twenty tons each, as appears by an advertisement in the Centinel of the Northwest Territory. The advertisement,* which is quite a curiosity, is omitted on account of its great length. The proprietors of this new enterprise announced that each boat would make the voyage between Pittsburgh and Cincin- nati, " once in every four weeks." And, as an assurance of safety to passengers, they announced that " no danger need be apprehended from the enemy, as every person on board will be under cover made proof to rifle or musket balls, and there are convenient port holes for firing out. Each boat is armed with six pieces carry-

* The curious may see the advertisement in full in Cist's annual for 1859, p. 156. The Centinel was the first newspaper started in Cincinnati, November 9, 1793, by William Maxwell.

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ing a pound ball; also a good number of muskets, plenty of ammunition, and stoutly manned."

Such were the conditions and assurances, on the part of the proprietors of the " first line of packets," established on the Ohio river. We are nowhere informed of the success of the new enterprise, or the cost of passage between the two points, but as it was a step forward in river navigation in those days, it is reasonable to con- clude that, inasmuch as this was the most expeditious method of travel in those primitive days, they met with the encouragement which their enterprise deserved.

A notable event occurred at the hamlet of Cincinnati April 27, 1801, in the arrival of the brig "St. Clair," from above, commanded by Capt. Whipple, and bound on an ocean voyage. She was full-rigged and equipped, and loaded with produce for the West Indies, and was the first of the kind out of the Ohio. As she anchored off the port, says the Spy and Gazette, "the banks were crowded with people, all eager to view this pleasing presage of the future greatness of our infant country."

At this time boats reached Natchez in seventy-two days. On their arrival below, and the cargo discharged, they were usually broken up and the material sold. The crew then generally returned home on foot and horseback through the wilderness of the Southern States, and from three to four months were required to make the journey.

A herald of the coming good time of steam navigation was manifest in March, 1801, in a call for a meeting of citizens at "Yeatman's tavern, " to consider the mer- its " of a contrivance" for propelling boats against the current "by the power of steam or elastic vapor." This was fully ten years before the attention of Fulton and his associates was turned to the western waters as a hopeful field for the intro- duction of his invention. Somewhat later than 1801 Samuel Heighway and John Poole, proprietors of a "mechanical project constructed for the propelling of boats against the stream of rivers, tides and currents by the power of steam or elastic vapor," advertised for subscribers to their scheme of introducing it on the western waters, subscriptions " to become payable early on the [our] invention succeeding, and the boat performing a voyage from New Orleans to Cincinnati." As history is silent regarding their proposition it is inferred that nothing came of it.

Drake, in his description of Cincinnati in 1815, informs us that flat-bottomed and keel boats, and barges, were the vessels in which the commerce of Cincinnati had hitherto been carried. The first, he concluded, would long continue to be employed in the transportation of heavy articles down the river; but the latter, he thought, would probably be in a great measure superseded by steamboats, as two kinds were then coming into use on the western waters. This sentiment, although only uttered about seventy-eight years ago, sounds very strange to-day. In further discussing the probable change, Dr. Drake thought the "reduction of the voyage from New Orleans to Cincinnati from 130 days, is equivalent to an approximation of the two places, or to the annihilation of two-thirds of the distance."

But the era of steam was not yet, and the river navigation was still conducted by barge, keelboat, "broad horns," or "Kentucky boats," moved commonly by oars and poles, but also by sails when the wind was favorable. They carried from fifty to one hundred tons, and the charge for freightage from Cincinnati to New Orleans was $5 to $6 per hundred. In good-that was wet-seasons they could make as many as two round trips to New Orleans per year. Col. James Ferguson, it is recorded, made two trips a year from 1791 to 1794, while he was storekeeping in Cin- cinnati. The principal firms then engaged in the river traffic were Baum & Perry, and Riddle, Bechtle & Company. Their primitive business, indeed, was not destroyed by the river steamers until 1817, or six years after the first steam vessel passed down the Ohio.

Engraved by J.R.Rice & Sons, Philada.

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HISTORY OF CINCINNATI AND HAMILTON COUNTY.

FIRST STEAMBOAT.

The first successful operation by steam on the western waters was in 1811-12 by the steamboat " Orleans," of about two hundred tons, built by Fulton & Livingston at Pittsburgh. She descended to New Orleans during the memorable earthquake, and ran between New Orleans and Natchez until July 14, 1814 .* She was of three hundred tons burden, carried a low pressure engine, and cost about $38,000. She was finished and departed in October, reaching Cincinnati the day before Christ- mas, causing infinite surprise as well as joy. She was wrecked while lying at the wharf at Baton Rouge over night. The river was falling and the boat settled on a sharp stump which cut a hole through her bottom. The engine was taken out and, with a new boiler, placed in another boat, called the " New Orleans," in 1818.+

But the vision of Dr. Drake was not a prophetic one. The invention of Fulton was destined to cause a greater revolution in the transportation business than he anticipated. As shown, the first steamboat was built at Pittsburgh in 1811. The first constructed at Cincinnati was the " Vesta," which was launched in 1816. She was only 100 tons burden, and consequently was quite diminutive in size .. She wore out in 1821.

It was not, however, until 1817, that steamboat building was actively and exten- sively engaged in at Cincinnati. The second boat built here was called the "Comet." This was in 1817. She was 154 tons burden, a considerable increase over the " Vesta." She was lost in 1823. The "Comet " was built on a new plan. Her machinery was known as French's stern wheel vibrating cylinder plan.

The " Eagle," a small steamer of 70 tons, was also built at Cincinnati for James Berthoud & Son, of Shippingport, Ky., to run in the Louisville (afterward Natchez) trade. Then followed several other small boats. The first steamer owned entirely by Cincinnati capital was constructed in 1818-the "Experiment," a forty-ton craft. "Thus," says Cist, "it seems that thirty-two boats had to be built before we could furnish capital and enterprise to own one."

As Dr. Drake records in his " Picture of Cincinnati in 1815," navigation was still conducted by flat and keel boats and barges only, though two kinds of steamers were beginning to ply on the Ohio. One hundred days were still necessary for the New Orleans round trip, which it was expected steam would reduce to thirty. Cin- cinnati had been made a port of entry in 1808, but no vessel was cleared here until 1815 on account of the cessation of ship building on the Ohio.

Flour was now the chief article of export from the Miami country, several thou- sand barrels being sent thence annually to New Orleans. A good business had also been begun in the exportations of pork, bacon, lard, whiskey, etc. At this time more than seventy shops in "the village " were now keeping imported goods for sale, about sixty of which were selling dry goods, hardware, glass and queensware. Castings were already made in Ohio, at Zanesville and Brush Creek, and were brought thence to Cincinnati. Pennsylvania and Virginia furnished bar, rolled and cast iron, and various manufactures in iron, besides millstones, coal, salt, and so forth.

New Orleans was then, and Dr. Drake thought must continue to be, the great emporium of the southwestern country, and even in 1815 many articles of import from the East could be obtained more cheaply from that city than by Pittsburgh. This was not to be wondered at. The only means of transportation from Philadel- phia to Pittsburgh was by pack horses and wagons; from New Orleans the goods came direct by water at a less cost.

The "ingress of foreign merchandise through other channels," remarks an early writer, " was already anticipated." The general government was expected to com-

* Western Annals, Vol. I, p. 68.

t Ford, Vol. II, p. 64.

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plete a National road from the Potomac to the Ohio, which would greatly reduce the expenses of transportation by reducing the time en route.

The imports this year at Cincinnati, from places east and south, amounted to $534,680. In 1816 they had reached $691,075; in 1817, $1,442, 266, and in 1818, $1,619,030. During the two years following the last war with England, there was a great increase in the importation of foreign goods, with a consequent depression of prices.

In 1817 the commercial aspects of Cincinnati were noted in an interesting way by the traveler Burnet. He says in his book:

"Numbers of arks, with emigrants and their families bound to various parts of the western country, are generally near the landing. Whilst we were here I counted the different craft which then lay in the river; and as it may convey some informa- tion, I shall state their number-seven Kentucky boats similar to ours with coal, iron and dry goods, from Pittsburgh; four barges or keelboats-one was at least 150 tons, and had two masts. These boats trade up and down the river, exchanging and freighting goods from and to New Orleans, Pittsburgh and other places; four large flatboats or scows with stone for building; salt from the Kanawha; six arks laden with emigrants and their furniture. Emigrants descending the Ohio mostly call at Cincinnati to purchase provisions and collect information. These arks are similar to the Kentucky boats, only smaller. They can only descend the river."

During the season of 1818-19 the amount of flour inspected at Cincinnati for export reached 130,000 barrels. It was estimated that at least 50,000 tons of prod- uce went abroad that year out of the city and the two Miami rivers. The imports that year were only about half a million. The balance of trade had been against Cincinnati, and the local merchants were uncommonly prudent and cautions about their imports. The exports, however, from October, 1818, to March, 1819, amounted to $1,334,085 of flour alone, pork 10,000 barrels, worth $150,000. To the Indiana, Illinois and Missouri territories, alone, the value of the exports amounted to $300, - 000 for that time.

To show the steady growth of commerce it may be mentioned that the imports for 1826 amounted to $2,528,590, and the exports reached $1,063, 560. The differ- ence in trade is explained on the ground that the country was new and the products fell short of supplying the home demand. For 1832 the commerce of Cincinnati was estimated at four million dollars; for 1835 at something more than six million dollars. The steamer arrivals this year numbered 2,237, and among the imports were 90,000 barrels of flour and 55,000 of whiskey.

STEAMBOAT BUILDING.

Steamboat building, when it was fairly started, soon began to look up briskly. Navigation changed rapidly from the keelboat to the steamboat. The first steam vessel, as already stated, was the "Vesta," built in 1816. During the next year steamboat building began to be active, and was most successfully prosecuted. Ves- sels were built at Cincinnati and elsewhere on the Ohio more cheaply than in any eastern city, and the preference was given to Cincinnati. Of all that were built on the entire western waters in the two seasons between 1817 and 1819, nearly one- fourth was launched here. A large number was also built here in the years 1824-26; in fact, it is considered doubtful whether more were constructed during that time in any city in the world. The woodwork especially was superior. Black locust, which was not found even at Pittsburgh, was considerably used for boats, and vessels thus made were more desirable than those constructed at the east from Jersey oak. Upon these waters there had been 233 steamboats by 1826. Ninety had been lost or · destroyed, and there were 143 remaining, of about 24,000 aggregate tonnage. One was built in 1811, and another in 1814; two in 1815; three in 1816; and in the years following successively, 7, 25, 34, 10, 5, 13, 15, 16, 27 and 56. Of these 48

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were built at Cincinnati, which had half a million dollars invested in the river business. By this time the primitive craft had been almost wholly superseded by the steamers, some of which were so adapted to the river as to run through the very driest season. Thenceforth steamer building was to be exceedingly prominent among the industries of the Queen City. The number built, however, has varied greatly from year to year. Marine reports show that in 1833, for example, only eight steamers were launched from the Cincinnati shipyards, with a total tonnage of about 1,730.

In 1840 thirty-three steamboats, representing a carrying capacity of 5,361 tons, were built at Cincinnati at an aggregate cost of $592, 500. The "Joan of Arc" was the largest and finest. She carried 343 tons, and cost $32,000. The "Ben Frank- lin," another popular boat of a later date, carried 312 tons, and cost $40,000. The passenger traffic up and down the river afforded an important item of revenue in those days. Older readers will recall the scenes of excitement attendant on the arrival at the wharf of these "magnificent floating palaces," as they were called, and the pride with which they were regarded by their owners and the people. A trip on one of them was regarded as a peculiar privilege, and marked an epoch in the life of the traveler.

By the census of 1840 it appears that the capital invested in Cincinnati houses in foreign trade and in the commission business was $5,200,000; capital employed in the retail dry-goods business, and other branches of trade, $12,877,000. There were twenty-three lumber yards, employing seventy-three hands. The capital invested amounted to $133,000, and the sales reached $342,500. The total manu- factures for that year showed 10,667 hands employed, and the value of products $17,432,670 .* The capital invested in manufactures is given by the authority at $14,541,842.

So rapid, however, was the development of commerce, that in January, 1841, there were eighty-eight steamboats belonging to the district of Cincinnati. These boats plied between Pittsburgh, St. Louis and New Orleans, and did a large trans- portation business in freight and the carrying of passengers.

In 1841-42 the value of imports to Cincinnati was $41,236, 199; of exports, $33,234,898. In 1857 the value of imports had reached $74, 348, 758, and of exports $47,497,095. Cincinnati suffered less by the monetary panic of 1857 than any city of importance in the country. The coal consumed in 1841 amounted to 1,900, 050 bushels; in 1851 it had risen to 7,785, 000 bushels.

The number of vessels, barges, and steam ferryboats, built at Cincinnati between 1853 and 1879, inclusive, is strikingly exhibited in the following statement, which gives the number of boats built each year: 1853, 33 boats; 1857, 34; 1858, 14; 1859, 11; 1860, 28; 1861, 11: 1862, 4; 1863, 43; 1864, 62; 1865, 44; 1866, 33; 1867, 18; 1868, 11; 1869, 11; 1870, 52; 1871, 44; 1872, 52; 1873, 48; 1874, 29; 1875, 16; 1876, 19; 1877, 21; 1878, 30; 1879, 24.

The aggregate tonnage ranged from 1, 745 in 1862, to 20,838 in 1870. The first year of the war, it will be observed, caused a great depression in the business. But in 1863 and 1864 the great demand for boats caused unusual activity. After peace was made there was a decline, but it revived in 1870. The range of boats plying to and from the city was 225 in 1862, to 446 in 1865.

The eleventh annual report of the Cincinnati Board of Trade says of the boat building of 1880-81, that " a good number of boats were built during the past year -the number of all crafts being 20, with a tonnage of 6,683, against 24 the pre- ceding year, and tonnage 10,641. A heavy increase of tonnage was expected, but not in the number of boats. This was expected to be in stern-wheel boats for mak- ing short trips. Many of these had reached a carrying capacity of 3,000 tons."

* Cist, 1859, p. 345.

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For the commercial year ending August 31, 1880, the Chamber of Commerce reported that "the arrivals for the year aggregated 3,163 boats, compared with 2,725 in the year immediately preceding, and the departures 3,167, in comparison with 2,730. The whole number of steamboats and barges which plied between Cincin- nati and other ports in the past year was 322, with an aggregate tonnage of 83,569."

SEAGOING VESSELS.

Very early in the century the construction of sailing vessels, for river and ocean navigation, began on the upper Ohio. Among the sailing vessels built at Marietta between the years 1801 and 1805, was a beautiful little 70-ton schooner called the "Nonpareil," constructed by Capt. Jonathan Devoll, one of the earliest shipwrights on the Ohio, for himself and sons, and Richard Greene. In the spring of 1805 she was finished and loaded for a voyage down the Ohio and Mississippi, and Gen. Mans- field took passage on her with his family. The little craft left Marietta April 21st. The distance to Cincinnati, 160 miles, she made after a voyage of seventeen days, being kept back by adverse winds and a low stage of water. Cincinnati then had a population of 950. Capt. Devoll also made the boats which brought the first set- tlers to Marietta for the Ohio Company.

In 1844 a bark was built at Marietta of 350 tons burden, and named the "Mus- kingum," which loaded at Cincinnati for Liverpool. She reached her destination safely in January, 1845, and the Liverpool Times noted her arrival in flattering terms, and said that by her it received a file of Cincinnati papers. She was the first vessel that ever cleared here for Europe. The voyage was regarded as a very remarkable one.

Other seagoing vessels were fitted out here at various points on the Ohio. John Swasey & Company, of Cincinnati, built three vessels, before 1850, of 200 to 350 tons-one full-rigged brig, the "Louisa," and two barks, named, respectively, the "John Swasey" and the "Salem." They were towed to New Orleans, and pre- pared for sea. One made a six months' trading trip to the west coast of Africa. She proved to be a good sailer. The "Minnesota," a ship of 850 tons, was built here about the same time by another firm, for a New Orleans owner.

THE CANAL SYSTEM.

The canal system of Cincinnati, which also became an important factor in the transportation business and the development of the city, was commenced in 1824, but was not fully completed until 1842. The Miami canal commences at Cincin- nati, and follows the Great Miami valley until it passes the summit at St. Mary's and enters the Maumee valley, terminating at Toledo. In 1826 it was fairly under contract, and thirty-one miles, from Main street to the dam at Middletown, were nearly finished. In 1828 it was completed to the mouth of Mad river, a distance of 67 miles. In 1841 it was in operation to Pequa, and the extension was com- pleted eighty miles beyond Dayton. For two years it had paid more than the annual interest upon the debt incurred in its construction, which was considered " the best evidence of its utility."

The amount of tolls for 1850 collected on the canal was $315, 103.60. During this year there arrived at Cincinnati 117,655 tons of merchandise, and there were cleared during the same period 42, 784 tons. The total amount of tolls collected from 1828 to 1840 was $637,837.10.

The Wabash canal, which is wholly in Indiana, joins the Miami at the junction in the Miami valley, and therefore becomes a contributor to the commerce of Cincinnati.

The growth of the commerce of Cincinnati has been rapid. In 1869 the river trade was $169,500,000, against $150,000,000 of imports and exports for Pitts-

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burgh, $115,000,000 for Louisville, $30,000,000 for Wheeling, and $40,000,000 for Paducah. This year crackers were exported to China and candies to Greece.

The local commerce for 1873-about $540,000, 000-was nearly half of the com- merce of the United States. The law of Congress passed July 14, 1870, allowing direct importation of goods from abroad to Cincinnati greatly facilitated foreign transactions. The total of direct importations entered at the port of Cincinnati in the fiscal year of 1877-78 was $632,528 ; for 1878-79 it was $896,549 ; for 1879- 80, $998,372, showing an increase of $101,831, or nearly 12 per cent. in favor of the last.

From an elaborate table prepared by the Merchants Exchange it appears that from 1856 to 1880, inclusive, there were received at Cincinnati 38,662,428 bushels of wheat, and 15,468,911 barrels of flour. For the same period the receipts of corn amounted to 58, 311, 493 bushels.

TRADE OF 1892.

But it is from the carefully prepared and elaborate reports of the. Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce and Merchants Exchange, that we are enabled to get the best insight of the trade and commerce of the Queen City and the wonderful prog- ress it has made in a little over fifty years. This powerful association of merchants was organized October 15, 1839, and has therefore been in existence about fifty-four years. The forty-fourth annual report shows that at the beginning of 1893 there were about 2,200 members. The organization represents the concentrated activity of the leading business men of the city in every department of trade and com- merce, and the influence it exerts in the advancement and material wealth is far- reaching and invaluable. The following extract from the report for the commercial year ending August 31, 1892, will give the reader a comprehensive idea of the busi- ness situation of Cincinnati :

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History of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio; their past and present, Part 43

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati Publication date: 1894 Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson Number of Pages: 1592

Author: Nelson, S.B., Cincinnati
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Cincinnati : S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1592