History of Coshocton County, Ohio, its past and present, 1740-1881, Part 46

Author: Hill, Norman Newell, jr., [from old catalog] comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A. A., & co., Newark, O., pub. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Newark, Ohio, A. A. Graham & co.
Number of Pages: 854

USA > Ohio > Coshocton County > History of Coshocton County, Ohio, its past and present, 1740-1881 > Part 46

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His operations in the Muskingum valley were quite extensive, and continued a number of years even after he had penetrated further west. It was his highway of travel to and from the Penn- sylvania cider-presses, and while he continually extended his nurseries further westward, he yet kept up those he had established in this valley, and visited them frequently on his journeys back and forth. The spot occupied by one of his nur- series is pointed out in New Castle township, and an immense apple tree of his planting is referred to in the history of that township.

During the war of 1812, Johnny was very active in warning the settlers of danger, and considered himself a kind of scout and general guardian of the frontier. He never shrank from danger or hardship when he thought the lives of the settlers

were in danger. He happened to be in Mansfield, Richland county, when Jones was killed, and immediately volunteered to go to Fredericktown and Mount Vernon for help, as it was supposed a large body of Indians were lurking around the block-house, and about to make an attack upon it; and that they had probably committed other murders in the neighborhood. An early settler says, regarding this trip of John Chapman's, which was made in the night :

Although I was but a child, I can remember as if it were but yesterday, the warning cry of Johnny Appleseed, as he stood before my father's log cabin door on that night. I remember the precise language, the clear, loud voice, the delib- erate exclamations, and the fearful thrill it awoke in my bosom. "Fly! fly! for your lives! the Indians are murdering and scalping at Mansfield!" These were his words. My father sprang to the door, but the messenger was gone, and midnight silence reigned without.

Johnny Appleseed created some consternation among the settlers on this trip, by his peculiar manner of announcing his business. He was barefooted and bareheaded, and ran all the way, stopping at every cabin as he passed, giving a warning cry similar to the above. It must be remembered that after Hull's surrender the pio- neers were fearful of an Indian raid, and went to bed every night with the thought that they might lose their scalps before morning; thus their imaginations were already highly excited, and Johnny's hurried rap at the cabin door and his fearful midnight cry merely confirmed their ex- pectations and created a panic. Many ludicrous things happened in consequence. Families left their cabins and flew to the block-houses for safety.

Mr. Coffinberry says :

John Chapman was a regularly constituted minister of the Church of the New Jerusalem, according to the revelations of Emanuel Sweden- borg. He was also constituted a missionary of that faith under the authority of the regular asso- ciation in the city of Boston. The writer has seen and examined his credentials as to the latter of these.

He always carried in his pocket, books and tracts relating to his religion, and took great de- light in reading them to others and scattering them about. When he did not have enough with

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him to go around, he would take the books apart and distribute them in picees.

Johnny was very closely identified with the early history of Mount Vernon, as the following document, which appears on the records in the Recorder's oflice of that county, will show :

John Chapman,

Know all men by these

Jesse B. Thomas. ) to presents, that I, John Chap- man (by occupation a gath- erer and planter of apple seeds), residing in Rich- land county, for the sum of thirty dollars, honest money, do hereby grant to said Jesse B. Thomas, late Senator from Illinois, his heirs and assigns forever, lot No. 145, in the corporation limits of the village of Mount Vernon, State of Ohio.

The deed was given in 1828. The lot is proba- bly the one upon which now stands the Philo house, on Main street, and is a valuable one. It is pleasant to know that Johnny once had a spot of ground he could call his own.

This was not, however, the extent of his posses- sions in Mount Vernon. The last time he is re- membered to have been in this neighborhood, he pointed out to Joseph Mahaffey two lots of land at the lower end of Main street, west side, about where Morey's soap factory once stood, saying that he owned them and would some day come back to them. Steven's warehouse, formerly the Mount Vernon woollen mills, erected by N. N. Hill, now stands upon a portion of the ground.

Besides the cultivation of apple trees John Chapman was extensively engaged in scattering the seeds of many wild vegetables, which he sup- posed possessed medicinal qualities, such as dog- fennel, pennyroyal, may-apple, hoarhound, cat- nip, wintergreen, etc. His object was to equalize the distribution so that every locality would have a variety. His operations in Indiana began in 1836, and was continued for ten years or more. In the spring of 18.47, being within fifteen miles of one of his nurseries on the St. Joseph river, word was brought to him that eattle had broken into his nursery and were destroying his trees, and he started immediately for the place. When he arrived he was very much fatigued; being quite advanced in years, the journey performed without intermission, exhausted his strength. He lay down that night never to rise again. A fever settled upon him and in a day or two after

taking sick he passed away. "We buried him," says Mr. Worth, " in David Archer's graveyard, two and a half miles north of Fort Wayne."

CHAPTER XXVII.

PIONEER TIMES.

Where the Pioneers Came From-Their Condition and Char- acter-What They Lived On-The " Truck Patch"-Hominy Blocks-Mills-Cooking-Cultivation of Domestic Animals -Wild Turkeys-Whisky-Superstitions-Dress of the Men- The Flax Wheel and Loom-More About Clothing-" Kick- ing Frolies"-Dress of the Women-White Kid Slippers- Dyeing-Fourth of July and Militia Musters-Cabins and Their Construction-Furniture of the Cabins-Hoosier Poem -- Early Land Laws-Tomahawk Rights-Hunting- Early Weddings-Dancing and " House Warming, " School- ing, School Teachers, etc .- Spelling Schools-Conclusion.

PIONEER days for Coshocton county and the State of Ohio are gone forever; the wolf, bear, deer, Indian, and all associations and rem- iniscences of those "good old days" have long since faded from sight, if not from memory, and the pioneers, most of them, are gone, too-

"How few, all weak and withered of their force, Wait on the verge of dark .eternity."

It remains to write their history, and the history of the times in which they lived, as of another race of beings; and, if possible, to impress the best of it upon the character of the present and future generations; for it is a history worthy of imitation and preservation. A study of the char- aeteristics of the pioneer fathers and mothers is calculated to ennoble the mind and strengthen the hand for the battle of life.

It would require a volume to tell of their habits and customs; of their trapping and hunting ; of their solitary lives in the great woods, surrounded by wild animals and wilder men ; of their dress, manners, and peculiar ways; of their cabins and furniture : of the long winter evenings by the log- heap fire upon which-

" We piled, with eure, our nightly stack Of wood against the chimney-back- The onken log, green, huge, and thick,

" And on its top the stout back-stick ; The knotty fore-stick Inid apart. And filled between with curious art The ragged brush ; then hovering near We watch the first red blaze appear, Heard the sharp crackle, caught the glenm On Whitewashed wall and sagging beam, Until the old rude-furnished room Burst flower- like into rosy bloom."

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HISTORY OF COSHOCTON COUNTY.

It was a free, happy, independent life; full of hardships, indeed, but sweetened with innocence and peace; with alternations of labor, pleasure and rest.

The pioneers of Coshocton were largely from New England, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Mary- land, who sought to better their condition by making permanent homes in the wilderness west of the Ohio river. They came largely on foot over the Allegheny mountains, many of them having a single horse and wagon, or a two-horse wagon, in which their worldly possessions were carried, and in which the very old or very young, only, were allowed to ride. Many of them were poor, and, like Jack in the story, " came to seek their fortunes." A few came with ox teams; some with horses, two, three or four of them ; some in two-wheeled carts, while others packed all their worldly possessions on a couple of old " critters." Instances are related of a bag on top, or snugged down in among the bundles, made somewhat after the fashion of a double knapsack, and a couple of babies poked their little bronzed faces out of the slits in this novel conveyance, and rode along like little " possums."

From fifteen to fifty-five days were required in making the toilsome journey to the far West, by the first pioneers. Streams had to be forded fre- quently. It was not unusual for a team to give out on the way and cause a delay of a fortnight or a month to one of the families. The joy was very great when the team hove in sight and the family rejoined the party who had found " the end of the road," or stopped until the men looked for a suitable location.

When once settled and the cabin erected, it was not only a home and shelter for the pioneer and his family, but for every stranger who passed that way, " without money and without price." The latch string was always out, for these pio- neers were great hearted people, and no man, be he white, black or red, was turned away empty. Their cabins, often not more than fifteen or twenty feet square, made of rough beech logs, with the bark still adhering to them, were fre- quently occupied by a dozen, or even a score, of people for the night, and no complaints made for want of room; genuine hospitality always finds room enough, and never apologizes for lack of

more; and when breakfast time came, there was no apology for the scarcity of knives, forks and spoons, for " fingers were made before any of these." The fare was homely, but gener- ally abundant. What to eat, drink and wear, were questions not, perhaps, difficult of solution in those days. The first was the easiest to solve. The deer, the bear, the wild turkey, the rabbit, the squirrel, all started up and said, or seemed to say, "eat me." These had been prepared for the red men of the forest, and were equally abundant for the pioneer. The forest was full of game, the streams full of fish, and wild fruits were abundant. To get bread required both patience and labor; the staff of life was one of the articles that must be earned " by the sweat of the brow ; " it could not be gathered from the bushes, fished from the streams, or brought down with the rifle. Every backwoodsman once a year added to his clearing, at least, a " truck patch." This was the hope and stay of the family; the recep- taele of corn, beans, melons, potatoes, squashes, pumpkins, turnips, etc., each variety more per- fectly developed and delicious, because it grew in virgin soil. The corn and beans planted in May brought roasting ears and succotash in August. Potatoes came with corn, and the cellar, built in the side of a convenient hill, and filled with the contents of the truck patch, secured the family against want. When the corn grew too hard for roasting ears, and was yet too soft to grind in the mill, it was reduced to meal by a grater, and whether stirred into mush or baked into johnnycake, it made, for people with keen appetites and good stomachs, excellent food. Place before one of those brawny backwoodsmen a square foot of johnnycake and a venison steak broiled on hickory coals, and no art of civiliza- tion could produce a more saisfactory meal.

Next to the grater comes the hominy block, an article in common use among the pioneers. It consisted simply of a block of wood-a section of a tree, perhaps-with a hole burned, or dug, into it a foot deep, in which corn was pulverized with a pestle. Sometimes this block was inside the cabin, where it served as a seat for the bashful young buckskinned backwoodsman while " spark- ing " his girl; sometimes a convenient stump in front of the cabin door was prepared for, and

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made one of the best of hominy blocks. When pigs began to be raised, the natural relation be- tween pork and beaten corn suggested the grand old idea of "hog and hominy."

Hominy blocks did not last long, for mills came quite early and superseded them, yet these mills were often so far apart that in stormy weather, or for want of transportation, the pioneer was com- pelled to resort to his hominy block, or go without bread. In winter, the mills were frozen up near- ly all the time, and when a thaw came and the ice broke, if the mill was not swept away entirely by the floods, it was so thronged with pioneers, each with his saek of corn, that some of them were often compelled to camp out near the mill and wait several days for their turn. When the grist was ground, if they were so fortunate as to possess an ox, a horse, or mule, for the purpose of trans- portation, they were happy. It was not unusual to go from ten to twenty miles to mill, through the pathless, unbroken forest, and to be benighted on the journey, and chased, or treed by wolves. A majority of the pioneers, however, settled in the vicinity of a stream, upon which mills were rap- idly erected. These mills were very primitive affairs-mere "eorn crackers "-but they were an improvement on the hominy block. They mere- ly ground the corn, the pioneer must do his own bolting. A wire sieve was then one of the most important articles of household furniture. It always hung in its place, on a wooden peg, just under the ladder that reached to the loft. The meal was sifted and the finest used for bread. How delicious was that " Indian pone," baked in a large deep skillet, which was placed upon coals raked from the fire-place to the hearth. Fresh coals were continually placed under it and upon the iron lid until the loaf, five or six inenes thick, was done through. This was a different thing from johnnycake; it was better, and could not always be had, for to make it good, a little wheat flour was needed, and wheat flour was a precious thing in those very early days.

A road eut through the forest to the mill, and a wagon for hauling the grist, were great advan- tages, the latter especially was often a seven days' wonder to the children of a neighborhood, and the happy owner of one often did, for years, the milling for a whole neighborhood. About onee

a month this good neighbor, who was in excep- tionally good circumstances, because able to own a wagon, would go about through the neighbor- hood, gather up the grists and take them to mill, often spending several days in the operation, and never thinking of charging for his time and trouble.

Cooking, in pioneer times, was an interesting operation.

The trammel and hooks were found among the well-to-do families, as time progressed. Previous to this, the lug-pole, across the inside of the chim- ney, about even with the chamber floor, answered for a trammel. A chain was suspended from it, and hooks were attached, and from this hung the mush-pot or tea-kettle. If a chain was not availa- ble, a wooden hook was in reach of the humblest and poorest. When a meal was not in preparation, and the hook was endangered by fire, it was shoved aside to one end of the lug-pole for safety. Iron ware was very scarce in those days. In- stances are related where the one pot served at a meal to boil water for mint tea or crust coffee, to bake the bread, boil the potatoes, and fry the meat. By fine management this was accom- plished. Frequently the kettle had no lid, and a flat stone, heated, and handled with the tongs, was used instead of one, when a loaf or pone or pumpkin pie was baked. A shortcake could be baked by heating the kettle moderately, putting in the cake, and tipping it up sidewise before the glowing fire. Bannock, or boardcake, was made by mixing the corn-meal up with warm water, a pinch of salt and a trifle of lard, into a thick dough, spreading it on a clean, sweet-smelling elapboard, patting it with the cleanest of hands, and standing it slanting before the fire, propped into the right position by a flat-iron behind it. Baked hastily, this made a delicious cake, sweet and nutty and fresh, and the pretty stamp of the mother's dear, unselfish, loving fingers was plainly detected in the crisp crust.

The cultivation of domestic animals, both beasts and fowls, for the purpose of food, began early. Cows for milk, butter, beef, and leather, and swine for pork, were bred, car marked and turned into the woods to browse. "Root hog or die," was the law for man and beast, but the woods were prolific and the hogs grew fat. The

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HISTORY OF COSHOCTON COUNTY.

young pigs were exceptionally a sweet morsel for the bear. Bruin always singled out these young animals in preference to any other meat; but the pigs were often successfully defended by the older hogs, who, upon the least signs of distress from one of their number, would go boldly to the res- cue, and fiercely attack the foe, however formida- ble; often the pig was released and bruin, or the panther, compelled to ascend a tree for safety.

The boys often found wild turkeys' nests in the woods, and would bring home the eggs, and place them, to be hatched, under a trusty old hen, in an outside chimney corner, where they could assist the hen in defending the eggs and brood from the opossum or hawk. A flock of turkeys some- times originated in this way, but more often, as they grew to maturity, they would fly away into the woods and never reappear. This grandest of birds is identical in civilized and savage life, and is the peculiar production of America. The wild ones were always a dark brown, like the leaves of their native woods. but when tamed, or "civil. ized," the diversity of color becomes endless.

When cornbread and milk were eaten for break- fast, hog and hominy for dinner and mush and milk for supper, there was little roomfor tea and coffee; and at a time when one bushel of wheat for a pound of coffee and four bushels for a pound of tea, where considered a fair exchange, but lit- tle of these very expensive articles was used.

these stills for their corn, hence corn became the great erop, and whisky the great article of com- merce. It was the only thing that would bring money, and money they must have to pay taxes. Whisky could be purchased for twelve or fifteen cents per gallon and paid for in corn, and the barrel of whisky in the cellar, was as com- mon as the barrel of cider was later. The whisky that was not consumed at home was shipped on flat-boats or pirogues on the Musk- ingum, Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Or- leans and sold for Spanish gold. One of the first rebellions against the Government of the United States, commonly called the whisky insurrection, had its growth out of the hardships of the Scotch- Irish of Western Pennsylvania, whoin the mother country had learned to love whisky and hate gangers; and this population gave tone and char- acter to the first settlers of Eastern Ohio. There was this apology for the production of whisky that it was the only means of disposing of surplus crops, or bringing money into the country.

The hardy pioneers, after disposing of their cargo of whisky in New Orleans, would often set out on foot for home, a distance of say fifteen hundred miles. Think of it, ye who ride in pal- ace coaches at the rate of forty miles an hour while reclining in cushioned seats, smoking your cigar, and reading in your morning paper of the happenings of yesterday in Europe and America. While apologizing somewhat for those whisky days, it may be well to say that whisky was not probably of any special benefit, was not to be compared to the pure water of their springs, and that too many of the pioneers drank too much of it, and that too often it made their eyes and noses red, their children ragged and their wives wretched, as it does to-day.

Next to water, the drink of the pioneers was whisky-copper-still rye whisky. Everybody drank it. It was supposed to be indispensable to health, to strength and endurance during the la- bors of the day, and to sleep at night. It was sup- posed to be absolutely indispensable to warmth and animation in cold, chilly winter weather. It was the sacrament of friendship and hospitality; it was in universal use; yet there was probably In every neighborhood there were a few fami- lies who had brought with them the superstitions of their forefathers, and the result was that some poor man or woman was reputed to be a witch. Not much proof was required. If a woman had very black eyes, or stepped stealthily, or spoke in a low tone of voice, and the gossips said she was in league with the prince of the black art, it did not take long to fasten the reputation upon her, and the ignorant looked with awe and fear upon less drunkenness in those days than at present. The whisky was absolutely pure; it was not drugged, doctored and poisoned as it is to-day, and, although enough of it would bring drunken- ness, it did not bring delirium tremens, or leave the system prostrated, and the victim with a head- ache upon " sobering up " It was the first thing in demand as an article of commerce. Stills for its manufacture sprang up everywhere, all along the streams. Pioneers soon found a market at | the poor hunted, watched creature. And so they

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greased their broom handles, and laid dead snakes head foremost in the paths, and hung horseshoes ever the cabin doors, and were careful to spit in the fire, and not to look over their left shoulders when they passed the abode of the doomed one. But sometimes her wrath fell upon them, and the oxen would lie down in the furrow, and no power could move them, not even hot coals, nor boiling soapsuds when poured upon them. One time, when the family of a poor man rose early in the morning, one of the oxen lay still and slept heav- ily and breathed noisily. On examination it was discovered that he had been witch-ridden; his sides were black and blue from the kicking heels that had urged him on to his best paces, and the corners of his mouth were torn from cruel bits guided by jerking hands. People who were ob- jects of the witch's spite found a brood of downy young chicks in their chests, and piles of sprawl- ing kittens under the half bushel; and they over- heard deep, cavernous voices, and fine piping ones, in conclave at midnight up in the air and the tree-tops, and under the dead leaves and be- side the chimney ; and tracks, with a eloven foot among them, were discernible. Think of the misery of a poor creature reputed to be a witeli, met in her own lowly cabin by a weeping mother beseeching her to remove the spell of incantation that her sick child might recover! No denial of the absurd charge could avail her ; no sympathy offered was accepted; and the foolish mother could do no more than return home, burn some woolen rags to impregnate the out-door air, stand the child on its head while she could count fifty backwards, grease its spine with the oil of some wild animal, cut the tip hairs off' the tail of a black cat and bind them on the forehead of the perse- cuted one, while she repeated a certain sentence in the Lord's Prayer. Then, in her own lan- guage, " If the child died, why, it jes' died; and if it lived, it lived."

A superstitious old man was often found who could divine secrets, tell fortunes, fortell events, find the places where money was buried, cure wens by words, blow the fire out of burns, mum- ble over felons and catarrhs, romove warts, and, with his mineral ball search out where stolen goods were hidden. The "mineral ball " to which the superstitious ascribed such marvelous power,

was no less than one of those hairy calculi found in the stomachs of cattle, a ball formed com- pactly of the hair which collects on the tongue of the animal while licking itself. This man, one of the class whose ,taint infects every neigh- borhood, could not from any consideration be prevailed upon to leave a graveyard first of all, " Why, drat it!" he would say, " it's sure and sar- tin death; never knowed a fellow to leave the graveyard fust, but what he'd be the next 'un planted there!" When an old neighbor of his died suddenly, this man said, with his thumbs hooked in his trousers' pockets restfully : " Why, drat him, he might a know'd more'n to leave the graveyard fust man! . As soon as I seed him do it, I says to myself, says I, 'Dan you're a goner ; you're done for ; they'll tuck you unter next time, an' nobody but your booby of a self to blame for it!'"

On the frontier, and particularly among those who were much in the habit of hunting and go- ing on scouts and campaigns, the dress of the men was partly Indian and partly that of civil- ized nations, The hunting shirt was universally worn. This was a kind of a loose frock reaching half way down the thighs, with large sleeves, open at the front, and so large as to lap over a foot or more when belted. The cape was large and sometimes fringed with a raveled piece of cloth of a different color from that of the hunting shirt itself. The bosom of the hunting shirt served as a pocket to hold bread, cakes, jerk, tow for wip- ing the gun-barrel, or any other necessary article for the hunter or warrior. The belt, which was always tied behind, answered several purposes besides that of holding the dress together. In cold weather the mittens and sometimes the bul- let-bag occupied the front part of it. To the right side was suspended the tomahawk, and to the left the scalping-knife in its lenthern sheath.

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History of Coshocton County, Ohio, its past and present, 1740-1881, Part 46

Author: Hill, Norman Newell, jr., [from old catalog] comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A. A., & co., Newark, O., pub. [from old catalog] Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Newark, Ohio, A. A. Graham & co. Number of Pages: 854

Author: Hill, Norman Newell, jr., [from old catalog] comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A. A., & co., Newark, O., pub. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Newark, Ohio, A. A. Graham & co.
Number of Pages: 854