History of Crawford County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 11

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850-
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1302

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Article VII .- And the said chiefs, or their suc- cessors may, at any time they may think proper, convey to either of the persons mentioned in said schedule, or his heirs, the quantity thereby secured to him, or may refuse to do so. But the use of the said land shall be in the said person; and after the share of any person is conveyed by the chiefs to him, he may convey the same to any person what- ever. And any one entitled by the said schedule to a portion of the said land, may, at any time, convey the same to any person, by obtaining the approba- tion of the president of the United States, or of the person appointed by him to give such approbation. And the agent of the United States shall make an equitable partition of the said shares when conveyed.

Article VIII .- At the special request of the said Indians the United States agree to grant by patent, in fee simple, to the persons hereinafter mentioned, all of whom are connected with the said Indians, by blood or adoption, the tracts of land herein de- scribed:

To Elizabeth Whitacre, who was taken prisoner by the Wyandots, and has since lived among them, 1280 acres of land. (This land was near Fremont, Sandusky county.)

To Robert Armstrong, who was taken prisoner by the Indians, and has ever since lived among them,

tAbout one mile east of Cardington, Morrow county.

#Northern boundary Tuscarawas county.

|Western part Shelby county.

*Maumee River.

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

and has married a Wyandot woman, 640 acres. (This land is now a part of Tiffin.)

To the children of the late William McCollock, who was killed in August, 1812, near Maugaugon, and who are quarter-blood Wyandot Indians, 640 acres. (This land is now a part of Tiffin.)

To John Vanmeter, who was taken prisoner by the Wyandots, and who has since lived among them, and has married a Seneca woman, and to his wife's three brothers, Senecas, 1,000 acres. (This land was on the Honey Creek, Seneca county.)

To Sarah Williams, Joseph Williams and Rachel Nugent, late Rachel Williams, the said Sarah having been taken prisoner by the Indians, and has ever since lived among them, and being the widow, and the said Joseph and Rachel being the children, of the late Isaac Williams, a half-blood Wyandot, 160 acres. (This land was on the Sandusky, below Fre- mont.)

To Catharine Walker, a Wyandot woman, ind to John R. Walker, her son, who was wounded in the service of the United States, at the battle of Mau- gaugon, in 1812, 640 acres of land each. (This land "was on the Honey Creek, near Tiffin.)

To William Spicer, who was taken prisoner by the Indians, and has ever since lived among tl. em, and has married a Seneca woman, 640 acres of the east bank of the Sandusky.

To Horonu, or the "Cherokee Boy," a Wyandot chief, 640 acres. (This land was where the Tym- ochtee empties into the Sandusky.)

Article XV .- The tracts of land being granted to the chiefs, for the use of the Wyandot, Shawanese, Seneca and Delaware Indians, and the reserve for the Ottawa Indians, shall not be liable to taxes of any kind so long as such land continues the property of said Indians.

Article XIX .- The United States agree to grant by patent, in fee simple, to Zeeshawan, or John Armstrong, and to Sanondoyourayquaw, or Silas Armstrong, chiefs of the Delaware Indians, living on the Sandusky waters, and their successors in office, chiefs of the said tribe, a tract of land to contain nine square miles, to join the tract granted to the Wyandots of twelve miles square, and to include Capt. Pipe's village .*

The reservation of twelve miles square was all in what was originally Crawford county. Its eastern boundary was about three-quarters of a mile west of the present western boundary of the county.

By this treaty the United States were to pay the Wyandots a perpetual annuity of $4,000; the Senecas, $500; the Shawanese, $2,000 an- nually for fifteen years; the Chippewas $1,000 annually for fifteen years ; the Delawares, $500, but no annuity. The Government also agreed to pay for property and other losses sustained by the Indians during the war of 1812-15: to the Wyandots, $4,319.39; Senecas, $3,989.24; Delawares, $3,956.50; Shawanese, $420; and

*This village was the present village of Little Sandusky, in southern Wyandot, a part of Crawford from 1820 to 1845.)

to the Senecas an additional sum of $219; to Indians at Lewis' and Scoutash's towns, $1,- 227.50; to the representatives of Hembis, $348.50. The Shawanese were also to receive $2,500 under the treaty of Fort Industry in 1805. The United States were also to erect a saw and grist mill for the Wyandots, and to provide and maintain two blacksmith shops, one for the Wyandots and Senecas, and the other for the Indians at Hog Creek.t The value of improvements abandoned by the tribes when they left their land was to be paid for. The land bought by the United States of the Indians was a tract as large as about one- third of the State of Ohio. It proved to be an excellent and profitable bargain-for the United States. They secured something over ten million acres, which they soon placed on the market at $1.25 per acre and upward.

The reservation of twelve miles square was all in what is now Wyandot county. But a supplemental treaty was made to this original treaty on Sept. 17, 1818, between Lewis Cass and Duncan McArthur, the Commissioners for the United States, and the sachems, chiefs and warriors of the Wyandot, Seneca, Shawanese and Ottawa tribes.

When the original treaty was made in 1817, the Wyandots positively refused to sell their land. Most of the other Indian nations were willing to sell, and promptly set up a claim of ownership to much of the land which belonged to the Wyandots, and agreed to sell the land to the Commissioners. The Wyandots denied these ownerships and called attention to the fact that at all previous treaties these same tribes were at the front with their fraudulent claims, when in reality nearly all the land they had they only occupied through the courtesy of the Wyandots, who were the sole and only owners of the land. The Commissioners preferred buying of the Wy- andots, but as they absolutely refused to sell, the Commissioners decided to buy it of the other tribes. It was in vain that Between-the- Logs, the orator of the Wyandots, protested on behalf of his tribe, calling attention to the fact that when their American father was at war with their enemies, the English, the great American chief made his home on the land of

tHardin County.

FOUNTAIN IN COURT YARD, BUCYRUS, O.

BUCYRUS CITY HOSPITAL, BUCYRUS, O.

Cof

CRAWFORD COUNTY HOSPITAL, BUCYRUS, O.

CRAWFORD COUNTY INFIRMARY

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

the Wyandots during that war; that the Wyan- dots were the only tribe that remained loyal to their American father, and in the latter part of that war it was Wyandot braves who fought side by side with their American friends, and at the request of the American father delivered all their prisoners to the great general un- harmed. The land had to be had, so the elo- quence of Between-the-Logs was useless, and finding their land would certainly be taken, the Wyandots made the best of a bad bargain by signing the treaty, and so came in for a share of the payments.

That winter Between-the-Logs and several other chiefs and warriors of the Wyandot, Seneca and Delaware tribes, took "the long trail" east, and one morning presented them- selves before the Secretary of war at Washing- ton. The Secretary was very much surprised at their call, and his first words were a mild rebuke that they had come to Washington without his first having received word from the Commissioners of their intended visit. Between-the-Logs tersely replied: "We got up and came of ourselves. We believed the great road was free to us."

They explained why they had felt com- pelled to sign the treaty as the only way of protecting a part of their rights; that the Com- missioners had not treated them fairly, and without their knowledge they had come to the "Great Father" for justice. The Secretary looked the matter up and took them before the "Great Father," President Monroe, who lis- tened patiently to Between-the-Log's eloquent plea for justice for his people. It was found a wrong had been done the Wyandots, so in- structions were sent to the Commissioners to rectify this wrong, and the supplemental treaty was made at St. Mary's, on Sept. 17, 1818. Article two of the supplemental treaty says :

"It is also agreed there shall be reserved for the use of the Wyandots, in addition to the reservation before made, fifty-five thousand six hundred and eighty acres of land to be laid off in two tracts, the first to adjoin the south line of the section of 640 acres of land heretofore reserved for the Wyandot chief, "Cherokee Boy," and to extend south to the north line of the reserve of twelve miles square at Upper Sandusky, and the other to join the east line of the reserve of twelve miles square at Upper San- dusky, and to extend east for quantity."

They were also to receive sixteen thousand acres of land, commencing a mile north of the

present town of Carey and extending into Seneca county, a tract five miles square; also 160 acres in Sandusky county. The Wyandots were also to receive an additional annuity of $500; the Shawanese $1,000; the Senecas $500, and the Ottawas $1,500.

Of the 55,680 acres, 2,240 was in the grant south of that given to Cherokee Boy. The balance was attached to the twelve mile square reservation on the east. This tract entered the present Crawford county just north of the half section line of section 35 in Dallas town- ship, continued east through sections 31 and 32 in Bucyrus township and nearly to the centre of section 33 (the south line was a little over half a mile north of the southern boundary of Bucyrus township) ; it then went north twelve miles through sections 28, 21, 16, 9 and 4 Bucyrus township, a trifle over two miles west of the present western line of the city of Bucyrus; through sections 33, 28, 21, 16, 9 and 4 Holmes township, three quarters of a mile west of Brokensword; continued north a trifle over three quarters of a mile in section 33 Lykins; then west through sections 32 and 31 Lykins and 36 and 35 Texas, about three quarters of a mile south of Benton. This reserved to the Indians about the western two and a half miles of Bucyrus and Holmes, the northern two miles of western Dallas, the southern half mile of Lykins and Texas, and all of Tod, barring it to settlement, except that with the consent of the Government the In- dians could sell the land.

The treaty of September, 1817, with the supplementary treaty of a year later opened to settlement all of northwestern Ohio, except that reserved to the Indians, about 225 square miles. In 1819 it was surveyed by Sylvester Bourne and Samuel Holmes. The new terri- tory was known as the New Purchase, and al- though there was still plenty of land unoc- cupied that had been purchased from the In- dians in 1805, yet the fact of new land being thrown on the market gave it to the settlers a sort of superior value and a feeling that it was a choicer article. Even before the surveyors had completed their work sufficient to place the land on the market at the land offices, set- tlers were in the New Purchase looking up land.

The first settler to enter the New Purchase

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

was Samuel Norton. With him were his wife and six children; his brother-in-law Albigence Bucklin, with a wife, six children and an adopted daughter; and Seth Holmes, their driver and guide. These first pioneers drove through from their home in Eastern Pennsyl- vania, a distance of about 600 miles, in a large schooner wagon, and arrived in October, 1819, the Nortons locating their home on the banks of the Sandusky, west of the present Sandusky avenue bridge at Bucyrus, land now owned by Christian Shonert; Bucklin and family were also on the banks of the Sandusky between the brewery and the T. & O. C. road. (Up to half a century ago the main channel of the river was at the foot of the bluff back of the brew- ery.) Seth Holmes made his first headquar- ters in an abandoned cabin that was standing where is now the court house yard. A family by the name of Sears were the next arrivals, locating just west of Oakwood cemetery; they remained only a short time and removed to parts unknown. Daniel McMichael came in 1819, and stopped for a time in the eastern part of the county (what is now Polk town- ship), near where Norton and Bucklin also left their families until they could find land that suited them. After Norton had selected his land, McMichael came to the same section and entered land just north of the river; also land in the southwest corner of Liberty township, where he built a mill. In the Spring of 1820 David Beadle came with two sons, Michel and David, and a son-in-law John Ensley, who mar- ried Ann Beadle. Michel was married, and had 80 acres on West Mansfield street, just west of Norton, and south of this his father had 80 acres, his son David, a young man of 18, making his home with him.

In 1820 Ralph Bacon settled on the east half of the south east quarter of section 25 in Liberty township. With him and his family came Auer Umberfield as a teamster.

In 1819 John Kent settled in Whetstone township, and in 1820 he was followed by Joseph S. Young, Noble Mckinstry, Martin Shaffner and a man named Willowby.

In Dallas township in 1820 were George Walton, G. H. Busby, Matthew Mitchell and Samuel Line.

In Chatfield township in 1820, Jacob Whet- stone had erected a cabin and cleared some

land. His occupation was that of a hunter; he wandered all over that section and never settled permanently in any one location.

As early as 1820 no pioneer had settled in Cranberry, Lykins, Holmes, Texas or Tod.

In 1820 there were about sixty known fam- ilies in Crawford county, and counting all the members of those families there must have been between five and six hundred people in what is now Crawford. Heading the list was Disberry Johnson of Polk with a wife and 17 children, while on the section adjoining was Samuel Brown with a wife and several chil- dren, so that in 1820 the metropolis of Craw- ford county was in western Polk. Christian Snyder was in Jefferson township with a wife and eleven children, and in the same township was Westall Ridgley and Jacob Fisher each with a wife and eight children. In Bucyrus was Samuel Norton with a wife and six chil- dren, and Albigence Bucklin with a wife and seven children, one an adopted daughter. The "metropolis" (the largest population in one section), only remained in western Polk for about a year when the settlement of Bucyrus transferred it to that place, where it remained until the census of 1870 transferred it to Galion, where it remained for forty years until the census of 1910 again transferred it to Bucyrus.

The early pioneers came from New Eng- land and Pennsylvania and New York with a few from Virginia. They came in wagons drawn by one horse or a yoke of oxen, some- times a two horse wagon, always weeks on the trip and sometimes months, and with the ex- ception of a very few all took up their claims in the forest where the land had to be first cleared to give them the ground for the raising of their crops.

Having selected his land the first work of the pioneer was the erection of some shelter for the protection of himself and family. Sometimes the pioneer left his family with friends or relatives in one of the eastern coun- ties, and came on foot with his axe and rifle, erected his little cabin, and returned for his family. The cabins were all of logs, the "lean-to" the most primitive, which was simply a three-sided shelter, built of saplings, and very small logs, sloping to the ground at the rear, with only the two sides and the slop-

AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS

ing roof, the front being hung with skins as a they were lifted into place. The building of protection from the wind and rain. These cabins were similar to the hunters' "camps," and in only a very few cases did the early pio- neers of Crawford start with so crude a shel- ter.

The early pioneers brought very little with them except large families; some had practic- ally nothing; others had a few chickens, a few hogs, sometimes a cow, and some no more stock than the horse or the yoke of oxen that had brought them on their long and toilsome jour- ney in the one wagon. Some came on foot, carrying their little all on their backs.

With the first pioneers in the different sec- tions it was impossible to build a cabin of very large logs. The first arrival selected his site, cut down the smaller trees, and from these made the logs which he could handle alone, and with these logs he built his home, chinked up the cracks with mud, covered it with sap- lings and brush, and had a place to live. As neighbors came within a radius of several miles the pioneer had an easier task. He selected his site on some dry ground, near a stream or spring that would furnish him with water, a site where most of the trees were of the uni- form thickness for the logs he desired; these trees he felled himself, cut them into logs of the proper length, beveling the ends so they might fit as closely together as possible. Everything being in readiness the neighbors came, and the cabin was erected by strong and willing hands, the pioneer adding the roof, and also the door and perhaps a window at his leis- ure. The general size of these earlier cabins was 14 to 16 feet long, with a heighth of six to eight feet. The ground logs were first placed in position, and on these the additional logs were piled, the beveling and notching of the logs holding them in place at the corners. As the cabin increased in height, these logs, a foot in diameter, had to be lifted into position, which was done by the strong arms of the men, some with hand spikes and skid-poles, and when it came to the gable logs at the ends, each shorter than the one below it, they had to be held in place until the ridge pole and cross pieces were in position. In the erection of the cabin the responsible positions were the cor- ner-men, men with a clear head and a quick eye, expert with the axe, who notched the logs as

these cabins was not without danger, for some- times, fortunately seldom, a heavy log slipped from the hand-spikes or the skid-poles, while strong arms beneath were shoving it into posi- tion, and an accident occurred, a broken arm or leg of some one caught beneath the heavy log. Sometimes a life lost. Leveridge was killed at a cabin raising where the city of Galion now stands, and a year or two later, in 1822, Heman Rowse was crushed to death by a falling log at a cabin raising a mile south of Bucyrus.

The cabin erected, the pioneer put on his own roof, made of clap-boards, cut as thin as he could make them with an axe or an adze, and over the cracks a second layer. He chinked and daubed the sides, filling in the cracks between the logs with moss and sticks, plastering it with mud, both inside and out- side the cabin. This daubing had to be re- newed nearly every year, as the rain softened the mud and washed it away. The chimney was built on the outside, at one end of the cabin. The base of the chimney was gen- erally of irregular stones, plastered with mud, while the upper portion was sticks laid rail- pen or corn-cob fashion and plastered with mud. Sometimes where stone was scarce, the entire chimney was of sticks plastered with mud. The fire-place was sometimes so large that logs six to seven feet in length could be burned in it, the "back log" being so heavy it had to be towed or snaked into the cabin by a horse, and it took strong arms to roll it into position, where it would burn for a week. There was an advantage to the pioneer to keep a roaring fire, as all the wood he burned meant so much more of his land cleared.

The door was a crude structure, the logs being cut away in the front of the house, and the door made of lumber roughly split from the logs with bars across to hold it together, and hung with wooden or leather hinges. A wooden bolt was inside the cabin, which fitted into a groove, and this bolt could be raised from the outside by means of a latch-string of deer hide, which ran through a little hole above the bolt, and hung outside, hence the ex- pression, "the latch string is always out." All that was necessary to lock up the house was to draw the string inside, but this was seldom

HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY

done even at night. After his cabin was erected the pioneer took his time to building his door, and until this was done, the opening was covered with skins to keep out the wind and rain, and a large fire kept burning on the outside at night to keep away the wild animals that were prowling through the forest. If a window was added a small section of the logs was cut away, the same as for the door, and the opening was covered with greased paper or the thin skin of some animal, glass was too ex- pensive, besides there was none to be had in the early days in the wilderness.

In fact nearly every one of the earlier cabins was completed and occupied for years with not a nail or a screw or a piece of metal used in its construction; everything of wood and leather, and that leather the skin of some animal of the forest.

Some cabins had the bare ground for a floor ; others had a puncheon floor, boards split from logs and smoothed as well as the work could be done with an axe. If a small article slipped through the cracks all that was necessary was to raise one of the puncheons and recover the missing article. If the cabin was of sufficient height, it boasted of a loft, puncheon boards being laid across where the slope of the roof commenced. This made a sleeping place for the children, and was reached by climbing up a ladder and through a hole cut in the boards. This was also the guest chamber, the visitor mounting the ladder to his sleeping apartment and crawling on hands and knees to his bed, which consisted of a tick stuffed with dried leaves, with plenty of skins and furs. Here he could listen to the pleasant patter of the rain on the clapboard roof, sleep soundly, and in the morning at the rear of the cabin find a wooden washbowl, get his own water from the spring or well, and prepare himself for the wholesome breakfast.

Some of the early pioneers brought small articles of furniture with them, but in most cases much of it was made by hand after their arrival. The table was a wide board, carved with an axe and supported by legs cut from small saplings; the bed was made the same way, and the primitive cupboard with its few rough shelves was handmade. On these shelves were the dishes; the one or two cook- ing utensils of iron or pewter ; the few dishes

brought from the old home, and the others of wood, made in the evening from the buckeye; plates and saucers and basins of wood. Oc- casionally there were knives and forks, but not enough to go around, and wooden ones took their place, the hunting-knife of the pioneer being the carving knife for the meal.

Game was abundant, and without leaving his little clearing the early pioneer could easily secure an abundant supply of meat; deer and turkey were plentiful; so were the smaller game, rabbit and squirrel, but powder and ball were too expensive to waste in killing these, except in case of absolute necessity. Bread was the scarce article and at times had to be used sparingly. After his first crop the pio- neer diet was game, potatoes and cornbread, with cranberries, honey and dried apples as the luxuries. On important occasions they in- dulged in wheat bread, and even served tea. There were no stoves, and the cooking was done in the large fire-place, the kettles or pots hung on an iron or wooden crane suspended over the fire. The frying pan had a long wooden handle, and was used for cooking both the meat and the corn cakes, either held over the fire or placed on a bed of burning coals drawn out over the hearth.

Bread was baked in a covered "bake ket- tle," and under and over it was a bed of burn- ing coals constantly renewed. Later, many pioneers had a bake oven built of stones and mud near the cabin. Sometimes the bread was baked in the hot ashes underneath the fire, or on a board tipped up in front of the fire. It was in this manner the true "hoe cake" was baked, the broad hoe being used for the pur- pose, which gave it its name; also called "johnny-cake," a corruption of journey cake, bread in convenient shape for taking on a journey. Corn was the staple article of diet. and was cooked in several ways: it was made into hominy or boiled into mush; cooked in a covered oven as corn pone; cooked in front of the fire as johnny-cake, or cooked in round balls as corn dodgers. Like the old New Eng- land woman who never baked anything but ap- ple pies, she always responded to inquiries as to what kind of pies she had, that she had three kinds: "open-faced, kivered, and criss- crossed." The pioneers had the same variety in their corn-bread; and it was a variety, as

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History of Crawford County, Ohio, and representative citizens, Part 11

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850- Publication date: 1912 Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1302

Author: Hopley, John E. (John Edward), 1850-
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago,Ill., Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1302