USA > Ohio > Brown County > History of Clermont and Brown Counties, Ohio, from the earliest historical times down to the present, V. 1 > Part 20
USA > Ohio > Clermont County > History of Clermont and Brown Counties, Ohio, from the earliest historical times down to the present, V. 1 > Part 20
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It was a day of rude energy and of uncompromising, per- sonal independence. When Donnell's Trace was laid by the upper ford, James Kain quickly perceived that the travel would be turned away from his cabins too big to move and too good to leave. Whereupon, he gathered his stalwart sons and graded an angling cut through the steep bank, that stood thirty feet high between his place and the lower ford twenty rods farther east. By this heroic treatment of the vital ques- tion, he forever cut off the fraction from Donnell's measured distance of "601/2 miles to Chillycothia." That half mile saved brought every coming or going traveller directly to Kain's door and added much to his prosperity. "The Dug-Way" also changed the expected growth of the town from the center at Main and Broadway, where the Public Square cornered and where Justice was to have her seat. Before the opening of the
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country farther from the Ohio permitted the migration to flow farther north, the vans of a countless posterity went west- ward by that way to the Round Bottom Road or over the Deerfield or Lebanon Road to scatter along the Miamis and make that region for many years the wealthiest per capita district in the United States. After the tide of immigration ebbed and went to swell other vacant currents, the parents of the posterity in Brown County that rejoices in the conveni- ence of the Norfolk and Western Railroad came or went, as business required or pleasure pointed, through the ford by the "Dug-Way," all heedless of the impulsive decision that had lengthened life by shortening the path that was to wait forty years for a bridge.
And yet there was good after that. Any who hesitate to act when a public benefit involves a sacrifice of personal ease may learn a lesson from this long gone, but long continuing incident. Sixty-five years after the resolute Kains saw their way and made it with thanks to none, when the tools were rust and the diggers dust, in the drouthy July of 1863, a fam- ous army and its capturing foe came by in headlong flight and equally swift pursuit. Many, very many Confederate troopers seeing the fine pond below rode down the Dug-Way and laved the thirst of the horses whose solid march of ninety- five miles rested that night on the slopes around. The burning of the bridge the next morning by Morgan's men was a bless- ing to their foe; for, each and every one of the nearly ten thousand pursuing horses during the day was obliged to go down the Dug-Way and wade the broad ford and be refreshed with a drink. After that, as was told in letters, little water could be had from the wells and cisterns depleted by the raid- ers, until Brush Creek in Adams county was crossed quite forty miles ahead. If the shades of the Kains could have looked upon the scenes of earthly effort, as some have taught, the relief to the dumb at that strenuous time alone would have been sufficient reward for the labor that made mercy easy. This may seem slight to the slighting, but some will under- stand, and for such much should be rendered.
Kain had other prospective troubles not so easily prevented. On June 7, 1799, Benjamin Wood wrote to Lytle: "There is no truth in the story that the savages are hostile. They are
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all friendly. I would like to have your permission to open a tavern here." In that season alarming rumors of Indian hos- tilities caused many out settlers for the Miamis to turn back toward the forts.
CHAPTER X.
COMING OF THE PIONEERS-CONTINUED.
Settlement Eastward from the Miami-A Methodist Class Formed at McCormick's-The Immigration of 1798 More Than Doubled the Homes-Another Methodist Class Formed-An Official List of Settlers on Eagle and Straight Creeks-Jacob Ulrey and Captain W. H. Ulrey-Philip Gatch-The First Methodist Church North of the Ohio- Francis McCormick-Daniel Feagins-Round Bottom- More Roads-Warren Malott-John Metcalf-James Poage -John Boude-Benjamin Gardner-Joseph Dugan-Major Shaylor-Robert Christie-Leonard Raper-John Naylor- Joshua Lambert-The Lost Child.
After much reflection through the winter of 1797-8, for he was that kind of a man, Jacob Moyer saw a larger life in the woods where Goshen was to be, than was apparent in Wald- schmidt's mill that was contemporary with Taylor and Lytle's enterprise on the Middle East Fork. So he went eight miles eastward on the Upper O'Bannon and started the oldest home in Goshen township, which was also the first clearing between the Big Field at Williamsburg and Deerfield on the Miami, where a cabin or two dated from 1796. As the German ac- cent wore smoother, the younger Moyers first dropped the rounding sound, and then the letter "o" from their name, which is now written, Myers, whose number is many and worthy. Philip Smyzor came out from the river into Miami township, where he left not less than eight sons and four daughters whose progeny may be found in many states. Abraham Miller became a neighbor of the Simontons, where Loveland was to flourish. Andrew Apple settled in what was to be known for many years as Olive Branch, and made a much nearer neighbor for Ezekiel Dimmitt on that side. Joseph Avey and Jacob Teal made the first settlement on the lower East Fork. This was the "Mr. Teal" mentioned by the Rev. James Smith in his journal as having shared his trip in
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October, 1797. when they crossed from Augusta, on "Tuesday, 3rd." That evening they arrived at "Denham's-town," where they found that old man possessing "both grace and talents with a spirit greatly opposed to slavery." Two weeks after this "Brother McCormick, Brother Howard, Mr. Sewell and myself started for the Scioto," from McCormick's house. Their road was up the East Fork about twelve miles, where they camped out, reaching Williamsburg on Tuesday, the 17th, where they found "eight or nine families."
After migrating from the battle ground of Antietam, where his first child was born in 1762, to North Carolina, and then to Kentucky, John Hill, the elder, finally settled near Love- land in 1798, with several of six sons and two daughters, of whom some were already married. On January 27, 1799, Sam- uel Hill, not yet twenty years old, was married to Mrs. Francis McCormick's sister, Jane Easton, then not quite sixteen, but an earnest member of McCormick's class, where the courtship began. For, the Hills were zealous Methodists, and made haste to join the class eight miles to the south, where Joseph Hill and his wife Rose, and Philip Hill and his wife Elizabeth, met Ezekiel and Phoebe Dimmitt, with the Gest brothers, who came from ten miles still farther to the southeast. The Hills had the company of John Ramsey and his wife for six miles, and, on the way, they found another faithful brother, William Salter, who lived but two miles from the meeting house which was McCormick's Cabin. The Dimmitts after the second year had the company of Jacob Teal and his wife and of Joseph Avey and his wife, who lived four or five miles out on their path, over which Barbara Malott came a year later, when the Garlands settled out toward the Mitchells, who, for a year before had come in alone from four miles to the north- east. Asel Hitchcock and his wife, Jane, were also members of that class but nothing else is known of them. Jeremiah Hall came with Mr. Johnson and his wife from about Mt. Carmel. Part of John Hill's family moved to Warren County, and the older sons came on from Kentucky to Ohio, where John, Jr., Jacob, Thomas and Samuel settled in Stonelick township. There the family has become almost as numerous as the hills that enclose that picturesque stream, and, where- ever found, they keep the faith of their fathers, and remain staunch members of the Methodist Church.
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The first cabin in Stonelick township was raised in 1798 by Henry Allison, a brother of Surgeon General Allison, who held his high rank in the armies of Harmar, St. Clair and Wayne. After a year or so, General Allison used the place as a country home until his death on March 22, 1816.
Three brothers, Robert, Hughey, and Andrew Dicky, and their brother-in-law, William Hunter, spent . the winter of 1798-9 in Williamsburg, after which they made the first settle- ment in Jackson township of Clermont County. Robert did duty in the Revolution for which he drew a pension. Daniel Kidd also lived a part of the year in Williamsburg before set- tling in Batavia township.
Hugh McLain, a Scotch Irishman, married Mary Allison in Pennsylvania, and came to Columbia early in 1796, and from there to Williamsburg in 1798, to live with his only child, Archibald McLain, Jr., married to Mary, a daughter of Wil- liam Shaw. The children of Archibald, Jr., intermarried with others in Brown and Clermont until the relationship is puz- zling. The complications are obscured by a variation in spelling as shown by the name of the late well known Homer McLean, who followed the spelling of the Clermont branch. The families of Foote and Tweed came in 1798 to the future Ripley, whence several came to Williamsburg to figure as early editors and lawyers who enlarged the local history.
In 1798 Jacob Waterfield, then eighteen years old, came with his widowed mother to the neighborhood that was to be known as Felicity, and there founded one of the substantial families of that vicinity. 'About the same time, Franklin town- ship in Clermont gained three more notable names-Utter, Prather and Sargent. Joseph Utter came west by Braddock's Road to Fort Redstone, where, on October 3, 1791, his noted son, Colonel Douty Utter, was born. In their family was an orphan child, Adam Reed, who founded a large family.
The number is large who are or should be proud to trace their lineage to John G., and Erasmus Prather, who came from Maryland, where James and Philena Pigman Sargent lived, and proved their sense of right by emancipating their slaves, for whom they made all possible provision, and then, with his brothers, James and Elijah, sought a free land in which to rear their children. Those sons and daughters inter-
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married with the Prathers, Fees, Frambes, Parrish and others, who formed a practical emancipation society a dozen miles to the south of Denhamstown. After the occasion demanded, another station was formed farther north at Williamsburg in the movement described as the "Irrepressible Conflict." As soon as the wilderness to the north was broken, these three points running straight through Denhamstown to the polar star became one of the earliest of the main lines of the Under- ground Railroad. James Sargent was an original Methodist, and, generally speaking, so were the people who came with or gathered about him.
While the most desirable tracts had been surveyed with much energy, the owners of the lands were generally distant and disposed to wait for higher prices for what had cost little but the courage to prove their claims. With no, or at least little, agency by or near to forward sales, the settlements on the Brown County side in 1797 and '98 were few. Lewis township received the familes of Charles Baum, Peter Emery and Conrad Metzgar, whose numerous posterity is to be found in both counties and far abroad. When their Pietistic ideas were not antagonized they ceased to be noticeable, and now there is no trace of the ancient austerity. After three years of scattered life that started from Maryland and stopped awhile at Manchester, and then by the Mouth of Bullskin, George Richardson came with wife and five children. His son Lemuel in 1803 married Nancy, a daughter of the most ancient hunter, Alexander Hamilton. After bearing nine children, Nancy died, and Lemuel married Mary Lapole, who had seven children and died. Lemuel then married Elizabeth Shaw, who bore eight children. making twenty-four for one father.
After bringing the products of his farm and distillery in Western Pennsylvania for several years to appease the hunger and allay the thirst of Cincinnati, Walter Wall in 1798 de- scended the Ohio with his family, farming implements, house- hold utensils and domestic animals, to the mouth of Straight Creek in a flat boat, which he broke up and took out into the woods primeval of Pleasant township for a shelter until cabins could be raised and fitted from the boat boards with more than common convenience. A study of such incidents will increase intelligent admiration for the vanguards of our
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refinement. Jacob and Thomas Berry from Pennsylvania made their way about the same time into Pleasant township from the White Oak side. Among those who ventured with Massie to build the Station at Manchester was Benjamin Beaseley. Passing through exploits as thrilling as Highland romance if told with a wizard pen, he came at last to settle for life in Huntington township back of Aberdeen, where he practiced surveying, mostly in Adams County, and gained a handsome estate. There are conflicting accounts of Lewis Shick, whose daughter was the wife of Jacob Berry-one ac- count assigns his coming to 1798 and others five years later. The question like some others depending upon tradition is settled by an official document. A petition presented to Gover- nor St. Clair, January 10, 1799. probably includes most of the male inhabitants on the waters of Eagle and Straight Creek, about the close of 1798. The paper presents names of which. nothing is known, which is to be expected where restless change was the rule and long residence the exception. Again, some may find a desired hint in the list :
Matthew Davidson, Thomas McConnell, Joseph Lacock, Isaac Ellis. William McKinney. William Forbes, George Mc- Kinney, Jacob Miller, John Caryon, William Lewis, Fergus McClain, Richard Robison, Henry Rogers, Thomas Ack, Val- entine McDaniel. Uriah Springer. Forgy McClure, John Henry, John Redmon, Joseph Jacobs, William Lewcas, John Mef- ford, William Woodruff, George J. Jennings, Ichabod Tweed, Amos Ellis. James Henry, William Moore, Isaac Prickett, Tom Rogers, William Long, Joseph Moore, Benjamin Evans, Jacob Nagle, Lewis Shick, John Phillips. James Prickett, James Young. Abel Martin, N. McDaniel, Thomas Dougherty, Tom Ash, Samuel Tweed. Jacob Miller. Walter Wall.
As yet in all the region between the fringe of cabins along the river and the clapboard roofs of Williamsburg and Bethel, from Dimmitt's by Batavia to Manning's Station on Indian Creek, there was not a tree amiss from Nature's scheme. The first to plunge to the center of this savage seclusion was Jacob Ulrey, who, on March II, 1798, camped near Bantam, on the stream that bears his name and forthwith began what was for some time the most isolated home in the Clermont side. Sixty-two years and more later, the college room-mate and
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friend of the writer was this mighty hunter's gifted grand- son, Captain William H. Ulrey, of the Fifth and then of the Second Ohio Cavalry. It is well to take satisfaction in an honorable forefather. It is equally honorable for the ancestor that has such a descendant as Captain Ulrey, who was as true . as he was handsome, and as gentle as he was brave. Jacob Ulrey in doing the best that came his chance, lived a useful life that has been well recorded by another hand. But if there were no other merit, his memory deserves mention for found- ing the family that gave this lovable youth to perish for the Union. His service in the Fifth Ohio Cavalry was the battle roll of that regiment until the commission of Captain in the Second Ohio Cavalry was literally handed him in line of battle, under fire, at Hatchie River. Then, from October 1, 1862, he was in the van of the ten months' pursuit that captured General John Morgan's command-a campaign that stirs the pride of the North and South alike. Then, after a year under the bril- liant Custer in Sheridan's famous victories, it was his lot, in Wilson's wild raid around Richmond to command the batta- lion that covered the escape of that imperilled army, at Stoney Creek, on June 29, when he fell from the saddle with his right side and arm mangled by a shell, and was captured to die in a prison hospital, July 29, 1864, while not yet twenty- two years old. In searching for chivalry, no one in personal memory so meets the requirements as Captain Ulrey. A duti- ful son, a kind brother, a sincere friend, a diligent student. a cheerful companion, he was a Christian without cant, a gentle- man without guile, and wise beyond his years. No officer was more loved or better obeyed by his men, and no person was more lamented by those who knew his worth.
Adam and Mary Hatton Simmons with four sons and six daughters were a most valuable addition to the settlement about Bullskin. The family were ardent Methodists, with whom the neighbors formed a class, of which Adam was the leader, about a year later than McCormick's at Milford. Samuel Jackson helped to extend the clearings of Washington town- ship, in Clermont. He also did the first tanning in all the region, unless we except the dressing of deer and other skins or furs. That art was generally known and practiced, as such clothing was commonly worn.
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While James Sargent and Adam Simmons with their fam- ilies and friends were dutiful in their class and domestic devo- tions in accordance with the discipline of their profession, a man of importance to Methodism and consequence to the pub- lic was riding westward with the men of his company, along the new cut traces of Zane and Donnells. The women and children floated down the river with their luggage, and his coming over this new path is the first of which there is a record.
A devout mind in considering this incident would delight to believe that a gracious Providence was directing the prep- aration of material and spiritual paths, so that both should be united for mortal good and divine design. The name of America first appeared in John Wesley's list of appointments for the year 1770. In 1771, the name appears for the second time in a list of returns to him, reporting three hundred and sixteen members of the new society. In answer to their cry for a spiritual guide. he sent unto these distant brethren his young and well beloved disciple, Francis Asbury, who at once became the gigantic apostle of the new creed of methodical piety in the New World.
The second American upon whom this great, first Bishop laid his consecrating hands and ordaining command was Philip Gatch, who entered upon his Master's work in 1773, when but twenty-two years old. From an earthly view this work was a cruel service, for he angered the people whom he urged to sweeter faith and purer living, so that they fell upon him with savage blows and reviling words, and mockingly clad him with a robe of tar, and beat him upon the face with their paddles, which so injured his eyes that he had to cease from riding abroad, and was obliged to confine his minis- trations to such as came to his door asking for the words that would heal their spirit.
Among his converts was Elizabeth Smith who owned nine slaves. After their marriage, this conscientious couple freed their slaves, and then freed themselves by seeking a land of free thought and free action. In the fall of 1798, the whole household and their friends to the number of thirty-six souls, came to Wheeling, where the weaker took boats and the stronger took horses. The Rev. James Smith, the patriarch's
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brother-in-law, who had spied the land the year before, com- ing and going through Kentucky, came with them over the shorter Trace, and, when they reached Williamsburg, he led them to the crest of Backbone Ridge whence they gazed down the valley of the East Fork. Though bereft of virgin verdure, travelled artists are delighted with the scene which a kind for- tune has withheld from speculative promoters, until it can be occupied by scientific homes, untrammelled by antiquated inconvenience. Through this valley, "fair as a garden of the Lord," and soon to be a most charming suburb of the Queenly City, they went on toward the end of the Delectable Hills, and tarried some weeks at Newtown, until Gatch could bar- gain for the fine tract at the fork of the Little Miami, where the Mound Builders had flourished and perished ages before.
Amid all that abounding beauty and promise of plenty, Gatch made a generous home near to Francis McCormick. Of his companions in the journey west, Ambrose Ransom settled to the westward; his son-in-law, James Garland, with his brother, Peregrine Garland, went next to the north, and John Pollock to the southwest which was accomplished in the winter and spring of 1799.
In the meantime. Francis McCormick had labored zealously to obtain full ecclesiastical recognition of his little society according to the regulations prescribed by Wesley and prac- ticed by his followers. In pursuance of this sacred purpose, he made several trips to Kentucky, where he had spent some months before settling on the Miami in 1796; but owing to the overcrowded work of that immense and scantily supplied circuit, no one of greater authority than his own could be spared to institute his church. It was through McCormick's personal persuasion that the pious young Ezekiel Dimmitt was induced to come to Batavia and prepare the wilderness for the coming of the Lord. And it was McCormick's zeal that won James Smith to persuade Gatch to leave Virginia. At last there came a time when his prayers were answered by Rev. John Kobler. the presidng elder of all Methodists who lived in Kentucky and Tennessee.
The annals of his church tell that, "He was a man of saint- like spirit, dignified and ministerial bearing, untiring labors in preaching, praying, and visiting the sick; preaching ability
4
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above mediocrity, tall, slender, with an energy of soul that far surpassed that of his body." His own journal tells that, "I crossed the Ohio at a little village called Columbia, and fell upon my knees upon the shore and prayed for divine blessing upon my mission." No other prayer of the kind has been more fully granted. "That evening," he continues, "I reached the house of Francis McCormick, ten or twelve miles away on the Miami River. On Thursday, August 2, 1798, I preached at his house to a tolerable congregation on Acts XVI, 9: 'And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; there stood a man of Macedonia and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia and help us.' It was a time of rejoicing from the presence of the Lord, who gave testimony to the word of His grace. The little band was much rejoiced at my arrival among them, together with the prospect of having circuit preaching and all the privileges and ordinances of our Church."
Such is the brief but circumstantial account of the institu- tion of the tremendous moral force of Methodism in a vast territory where its votaries are numbered by multiplied mil- lions, and its influence only bounded by eternity.
Francis McCormick, "the man of Macedonia." was large of form, mighty of muscle, and strong and sweet of voice, so that people heard his song with rapture and left their scorn of Methodism unspoken in his presence. His humble cabin has long since vanished and its location is not certain. But as the importance of marking notable scenes comes to be better understood, it should be a proud occasion for those who love the Methodist faith to gather 'round and raise a memorial inscribed to this effect:
HERE STOOD THE CABIN OF FRANCIS McCORMICK, WHERE AND BY WHOM, A. D. 1796, THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH WAS FIRST PLANTED IN THE GREAT NORTHWEST OF AMERICA.
McCormick's joy at the coming of Gatch and his companions was unbounded, for he knew that the small. weak eyed man
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was a spiritual giant. The settlement now held three duly licensed preachers, who went proclaiming the Gospel in all directions, not only on the Sabbath, but all other days, often holding two days' meetings, and keeping up quarterly meet- ings held in different places, but mostly at McCormick's Set- tlement, as Milford was then called, to which even women would come walking twenty and thirty miles. Late in 1799 Miami Circuit was constituted, and "Ezekiel Dimmitt's House," sixteen feet square, was made one of the "preaching places." That was six years before the Methodists had a preaching place in Cincinnati. In the mean while, the "Gatch House" was the regular and accepted place for the Bishops, Asbury, Whatcoat and McKendree. Thus early was the moral machinery put in action by McCormick and Gatch, who were yoke-fellows to the end. We will see more of Gatch as a citizen.
Ludwig Freiberger was one of the oldest of the Pietists at Waldschmidt's Mill. having one daughter married to Jacob Moyer or Myers already located on the Upper O'Bannon, and another to Jacob Stroup; but in order that they should have lands that he could not expect long to enjoy, he started out in 1799 to clear a farm on the site of Goshen. Perhaps, unfa- miliar with English writing, he never knew how much his name was changed and abused in the translation that followed the sound and lost the noble meaning of Free-hill-man, and instead became the unmeaning Lewis Frybarger. Jacob Stroup settled two miles away, in the same township, and raised three sons and thirteen daughters who each so far as traced, founded other farms and families. Soon after Daniel Morgan came to the neighborhood and after making a clear- ing also made leather in the second tanning place noted in Old Clermont not yet known by that name.
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