History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 58

Author: Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co.
Number of Pages: 716

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In the spring of 1798 Nathaniel Doan, the black- smith, moved to Cleveland with his family and built a blacksmith shop on the south side of Superior street, a little west of the present end of Bank street, doubt- less on the lot given him by the company. Ile at first occupied as a residence the cabin built by Job P. Stiles, who about this time moved out on the ridge near Kingsbury's. Elijah Gun also moved to the ridge south of Kingsbury's, and Rudolphus Edwards. of Chenango county, New York, settled farther north near the present intersection of Woodland avenue and Woodland Hills avenue. In the city proper, Doan's, Carter's and lawley's were the only families, but .Jo- seph Landon, who had returned from the East, and Stephen Gilbert were there, and cleared some ground which they sowed to wheat. Mr. Carter also planted two acres of corn on Water street, near the lake.

Nearly every man, woman and child in the settle- ment was sick with the fever and ague. There were not enough well persons to take care of the sick, much less to provide food and the other necessaries of hfe. In the intervals of the chills Carter and his hounds often secured a deer, which was liberally divided among his less expert neighbors. Nathaniel Doan's family of nine members were all sick at once. The only one who was able to do anything was his nephew Setb, an active boy of thirteen. Although he had the shakes every day himself, the boy not only managed to collect wood and bring water, but fre- quently made a trip to Kingsbury's to obtain corn.

That industrious pioneer, as well as his neighbors. Gun and Stiles, had found health in their homes on the ridge, and had raised good crops of corn on the newly-cleared land. Kingsbury, energetic and invent- ive, determined to have something better than a stump mortar to grind his food. He accordingly obtained two large stones from the banks of Kingsbury run, shaped them into the semblance of mill-stones, placed

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THE CITY OF CLEVELAND.

one on the ground and the other above it, fastened a handle to the upper one, and by working the latter back and forth produced flour and meal, not indeed of the finest, yet superior to any but the imported article.

There was not only no physician but no quinine, the great specific for ague, and the settlers got along as best they could with decoctions of dogwood bark. As the cold weather approached the chills disappeared, but the settlers had had a fearful lesson, which new- comers were quick to learn from them, and which long retarded the progress of Cleveland.

Near the middle of November four of the men, still weak from the effects of the agne, started in a boat for Walnut Creek, Pennsylvania, to obtain flour. Between Euclid creek and Chagrin river their boat was wrecked, and they returned by land empty- handed. So throughout the winter all the people, both in the city and on the ridge, depended on Kings- bury's hand-mill for their breadstuff, which was coarse enough to have suited the palate of the re- nowned Graham himself.

In the spring of 1799 Mr. Doan, entirely satisfied with his city experience, abandoned the lot given him by the company, and moved four miles east to a point where the ridge road from Kingsbury's struek the "('entral highway," where he established his home and his shop. The locality was long known as "Doan's Corners," and afterwards as East Cleveland, but for twelve years has been a portion of the city.

Mr. Hawley also Jeft the apparently doomed place at the month of the Cuyahoga, and located in the Kingsbury neighborhood. Carter's and Spafford's were the only families left. They had begun to feel ac- climated, and determined to stay at all hazards. They kept a kind of a tavern, and Mr. Carter also traded some with the Indians, as indeed almost every one did who could obtain some salt and whisky as capital, these being considered the two great necessities of life. Money was scarce beyond the imagination of the present day; furs were almost legal tender, and were frequently used to pay debts and "make change," even by the whites,

Superior lane was at this time a high, sharp ridge impassable in ascent or descent. The travel up and down the hill was obliquely along Union street-now Spring street. The first named roadway, however, began to be worked about this time.

In this year two newcomers, Wheeler W. Williams and Major Wyatt built the first grist mill on the Re- serve at the falls of Mill creek, at what was long known as Newburg, but is now the eighteenth ward of the city. The irons were furnished by the land company. The task was a very serions one and was not completed till fall, when David Bryant and his son Gilman, who had been quarrying grindstones near Vermillion river, went to the Newburg settle- ment and made a pair of mill-stones. They were ob- tained and made abont half a mile north of the mill, which was near the main fall. The water was con-

veyed down the hill to the wheel at an angle of forty- five degrees.

When the mill was all completed and ready for grinding, invitations were sent out to all the people round abont for a grand celebration. The number was not large; no one lived west of the Cuyahoga, nor up the valley of that river, above the mill. With- in the limits of the present city there were as near as can be ascertained ten families-Carter's, Spafford's, Doan's, Edwards', Kingsbury's, Gun's, Stiles', Haw- ley's, Hamilton's and Williams'-(all but the two first on the outer borders) and a few single men. There was, however, a small settlement in Enclid, whose members doubtless helped to swell the number, and it is quite probable that there was a delegation from the more populous region east of the Chagrin; for a dis- tance of fifteen or twenty miles was little regarded by the sturdy pioneer, and this was the first gristmill on the Western Reserve.

The Indians were frequently to be seen in all parts of the city and the surrounding country, but they seem to have been very friendly and never to have had any serions difficulty with the whites. There was an old camp, where they often met, near Mr. Kingsbury's residence, and about where he afterwards built his frame-house, now occupied by his son, James Kings- bury.

One day a young squaw came running into the house, declaring that one of the Indians had badly hurt his squaw; "-most kill her." Mr. K. hurried out and found the camp in great commotion, the in- jured woman leaning against a tree apparently faint- ing, and the Indian standing sullen and defiant in front of her. The white man began to seold him for hurting the woman. IIe defended himself zealonsly in the Indian tongne, with occasional words of broken English, asserting that she was "heap bad squaw," and gestienlating with great energy to make up for his laek of language.

In the course of his motioning he brought his hand quite close to the squaw's face. She suddenly came out of her faint and seized one of his fingers between her teeth. Hle yelled with pain but she clung with all her might, and the white peace-maker was obliged to choke her pretty smartly to make her let go,

Game was abundant everywhere. There were two deer-licks (places where slightly salt water oozed from the ground) about a quarter of a mile from William Kingsbury's house. Ilere the deer frequently came to enjoy the luxury, and patient watching would almost always reward the hunter with a fat buck or a timid doe. In time, however, the frequently falling of the death-bolt at that particular place warned away the survivors from the dangerous locality.

Bears were less frequent, but were sometimes seen. Wolves, too, occasionally made their appearance. Mr. Kingsbury brought a sow and a number of pigs from Pennsylvania, which he carefully penned up at night, but allowed to run loose among the plentiful acorns and nuts during the day. One day, while he was

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THIE VILLAGE FROM 1800 TO 1815.

absent, the family heard a noise near the house, and looking out saw the old sow in a state of great excite- ment, alternately pushing her young toward the house, and turning to grunt at two gannt gray wolves. which were slowly following her, apparently hesi- tating about attacking an antagonist of a species they had never before seen. An outery from the family quickly drove them away, but as there was no one to handle the old " queen's arm" which Mr. Kings- bury's brother had borne at the battle of Bennington, they escaped unharmed.

Among the illustrations of early frontier life, we will advert to one more occurring in the neighbor- hood on the ridge. On Christmas day, 1799, Mr. Kingsbury's oldest daughter Abigail, seven years old, with her two younger brothers Amos and Almon, to- gether with Fanny Ilawley (now Mrs. Miles), nearly eight, and her younger brother, all went to visit the children of Job Stiles, who lived about a quarter of a mile farther south. There was a woods-road, con- siderably traveled, along the ridge, and no one sup- posed there was any danger.

Unfortunately they stayed late, and it was begin- ning to be dusk when they started home. They soon lost their way, and began wandering back and forth in the strange way in which many older persons do when once they lose their latitude in the woods. Many times they must have come near the residences of one or the other family, but somehow never saw the light of either. The smallest children soon be- came very weary. Fanny carried her brother and Abigail picked up her youngest brother Almon. The venerable Mrs. Miles related to us how she and Abi- gail-themselves the merest children-staggered to and fro under their burdens in the darkness and the growing cold, while Amos Kingsbury, only five years old, appeared to be perfectly frantic at the terrible prospect. At length the two girls gave up in despair. They laid the two youngest boys down to- gether, spread Abigail's broadcloth cloak over them, beneath which they soon went to sleep-and then waited, not knowing whether they were to be devoured by wolves or frozen by the cold.

Meanwhile their families had discovered that the children were lost, and all the three or four men of the neighborhood were out in search of them. Luckily too, Fanny's uncle, Lorenzo Carter, had been out on a hunt, and stopped at her father's with his rifle and hound. He, of course, joined in the search. In the road the children's tracks were not distinguish- able, and even in the woods they had crossed each other so often that the hound could hardly follow them. After ranging to and fro a long time, however, he at length struck a distinct trail, which he and his master quickly followed. Ere long the dog reached the hollow where the children were. Little Amos saw him, and screamed to his sister Abigail: " Nab- by. Nabby, here's a wolf !"

The girls, however, saw that it was a dog, and a moment after Carter came in sight, crying out to

them not to be scared. He fired his rifle, the universal signal of success in such cases, and the searchers quickly assembled. The overjoyed fathers and friends caught up the babes in the woods, and soon bore them to their frightened mothers, when they were put to bed with a better chance of a sound sleep than that offered by a Christmas night in the forest, with the wolves as possible performers in the play.

Nothwithstanding the season, however, it does not seem to have been very cold, and in fact all the old accounts speak of the remarkable mildness of the winters during the last two or three years of the eighteenth century.

CHAPTER XLV. THE VILLAGE FROM 1800 TO 1815

Population In 1800-('ivil Organizations-City Lots too High-Good Crops-The First Distillery -An Indian Play-ground-A White Dog Feast-Samuel Huntington-Spafford's Map-Changes of Streets-The First School-A Lawyer Among Wolves - First Hotel Keepers-Hunt- ington's Advanceement First Framed House Is Destruction-One Family a Year-Price of Freight -First Militia Company Purchase of the West Side from the Indians-The First Post Office-Newburg Fam- ilies Samuel Dodge -- The Two Omies -- Young Omie's Violence Carter threatens to Hang Ilim-The Story of ""Ben " - A Curious Ending John Walworth-The First Collector A Framed House on the Ridge

A New Religion- Hard ('nstomers in Cleveland Slaughtering Hogs on Sunday A Would-be Runaway-Forcing a Man back to take his Pay-Another Major- A Cleveland Governor and Senator-Fanny Ilawley's Adventure with an Indian-His Freaks at Hawley's House- The Last Division of Reserve Lands Cleveland made the County-Seat - Ellas Cozad Samuel and Matthew Williamson-Levi Johnson-The Residents of 1810 -The Two Stores -The First Court of Record-An- other Warehouse-George Wallace - The First Execution The War of 1812-Residents at the Beginning of the War Location of Houses- The Farming Lands A Few Incidents of the War-Taking Potatoes to Perry The First Briek I uilding-A Schooner built in the Woods- The Village incorporated Close of the War.

1x 1800 the population of the tract laid out as a city still consisted only of the families of Carter, Spafford and Clark, Stephen Gilbert and perhaps Joseph Landon; making a total of about twenty per- sons. In the whole territory now included in the city, however, there must have been between sisty and seventy persons.

In July Cleveland became a part of the county of Trumbull, which embraced the whole Western Re- serve. James Kingsbury was appointed one of the first justices of the peace " of the quorum," thereby becoming a member of the court of quarter sessions of the new connty; and Amos Spatford was appointed one of the first justices not " of the quorom."

At the first court of quarter sessions, held at War- ren on the fourth Monday of August, 1800, the civil township of Cleveland was organized, together with seven others, in the new county. It embraced not only the survey township of that name but all of the present Cuyahoga county east of the river, three townships of Geanga county, and nominally the whole Reserve west of the Cuyahoga, though this tract was still in possession of the Indians. Lorenzo Carter and Stephen Gilbert were at the same time

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appointed the first constables, to preserve the peace in this immense territory.

Mr. Turhand Kirtland, the agent of the land com- pany, who visited Cleveland this year, stated that Carter, Spafford and Clark were very much dissatis- fied with the price of city lots, (twenty-five dollars per acre), and determined not to remain. It seems they had not up to this time purchased any land, ex- cept perhaps a lot apiece. They had been encouraged by members of the company to expect lots at ten or twelve dollars per acre, and they all declared they would leave the place rather than pay the price de- manded. Mr. Kirtland persuaded them to wait until he could consult the directors, and earnestly urged that the price should be lowered. As those persons all remained, and as emigration continued very light for a long time, it is presumed that their wishes were acceded to.

Mr. Kirtland also mentioned the extreme searcity of money, and said inhabitants were very desirous that the company should receive cattle, provisions, etc., in payment for their land. This course, how- over, was not followed, so far as the traets owned by the company at large was concerned, though it may have been by individual owners of the divided lands. Mr. Kirtland also reported the erops as good and the settlers healthy. The latter expression doubtless ap- plied principally to those in the country, for the vicinity of the month of the Cuyahoga was long cele- brated as the favorite residence of King Agne. Prob- ably, however, the few families who were there in 1800 had had nearly all the shakes shaken out of them, or in other words had become partially acclimated to the surrounding miasma.

In the fall of 1800, David Bryant and his son Gil- man, brought a still from Virginia, built a distillery twenty feet by twenty-six, out of hewed logs, on the river flat, near the foot of Superior lane, brought water from a side-hill spring in a trough into the upper story, and began the manufacture of whisky. This was, at that time, as respectable a business as any in the country, and the opening of a distillery was hailed with joy by the inhabitants of the vicinity, not only because it promised a cheap supply of their favorite beverage, but because their wheat, when turned into whisky, could be sent to market without costing all it would bring for transportation.

The Indians now erossed oftener than ever from their own land on the west side, to the place where whisky was not only sold but made. They had a kind of ferry, opposite the foot of St. Clair street, where they always kept canoes in which to pass over the river. Their well-worn trail from the eastward there crossed the Cuyahoga, ran across the marshy ground, past the old log storehouse, which, as before stated, stood near the corner of Main and Center streets, and thence to a small opening in the woods, near the present crossing of Detroit and Pearl streets. There the Indians were ascustomed to assemble, play their games, hold councils, etc.

There, were often heard the sounds of glee from squaws, children and the old men as the young war- riors engaged in athletic games, or tossed the ball to and fro with a skill hardly surpassed by the pitchers, catchers and left fielders of the present day. There, too, the woods re-echoed with the sonorous speeches of their orators, as they recounted the great deeds of their fathers, ere the white man had come to grasp their fair domain, and occasional shouts of applause from the excited auditors reached the ears of the few settlers across the river. It is admitted, however, by all the early emigrants that the Indians were nni- formly peaceable, and even friendly, in their inter- course with the whites.

As was stated in the general history, they were ac- enstomed to come to the month of the Cuyahoga in the fall, hanl their canoes ashore, scatter out up the river in small parties, hunt and trap during the winter, return in the spring, and go thenee to their cornfields on the Sandusky and Manmee. There were usually a few, however, around the month of the river at all seasons of the year. At these fall and spring reunions, especially the latter, feasting and drunkenness were the order of the day.

Gilman Bryant described one of the feasts to which he was hospitably invited. The piece de resistance was a white dog. (We don't generally varnish our writing with seraps of French, but in this case the Galhe expression is too appropriate to be omitted.) All Indians, so far as we know, consider that there is something peculiarly sacred about a white dog. Among the Six Nations one or more are every year strangled and burned entire as a sacrifice. In the present instance, however, Chippewas and Ottawas managed to unite religion and high living.

Having killed the dog, they singed part of the hair off, chopped him up and made a large kettle of soup. They placed a large wooden bowlful of it on a scaffold as a sacrifice to their "Manitou," or Great Spirit; the rest they appropriated to worldly uses. When making the sacrifice they prayed to Manitou for a safe voyage on the lake, good crops of corn when they arrived at home, and other similar blessings. As they began eating themselves they offered young Bryant a dish of soup with a fore paw in it, with some of the hair still between the toes. He declined the proffered morsel, whereupon they disposed of it themselves, saying that a good soldier could easily eat that.

During the winter of 1800 and 1801, young Bryant and his father cleared five acres on the bank of the river just above the town-plat. In the spring of 1801, Timothy Doan, a brother of Nathaniel, came to Cleve- land, but removed to Euclid in the autumn.

A somewhat distinguished arrival of this season was Samuel Huntington, a lawyer about thirty-five years old, nephew of the governor of Connecticut of that name, who, after traveling though a large part of Ohio, had determined to make his future residence at Cleveland. Hle built a large, hewed log-house, the

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THE VILLAGE FROM 1800 TO 1815.

most aristocratie residence in the place, on the south side of Superior street near the top of the bluff, and to this in the fall he moved his family. He also, during the same season, caused the erection of the first frame building in the city-a barn built by Mr. Samuel Dodge. Elisha Norton, a trader, made his home in Cleveland with his family this year.

In this year Mr. Spafford made another map of the eity, about the same as the one formerly made by Pease, with two or three exceptions. Ohio street 18 shown as occupying the old line of Miami street from Huron street southward, and then turning at a right angle into the present Ohio. This was probably an inadvertence on the part of Mr. Spalford. The short street, at first called Federal street, cast of Erie, was shown on this map, but no name was given it, and. in fact, the name of Federal has never been known since. Probably the rapidly rising fortunes of the Democratic party in Ohio made the name of "Federal" given by the magnates of Connecticut too unpopular for continuance. Superior lane was also shown on the new map and Maiden lane omitted; the latter evidently by direction, as it has never been replaced.

In 1802, the first school was kept on the city plat in Carter's house by Anna Spafford. There could hardly have been over a dozen scholars. If the younger ones strayed far on their schoolward or home- ward route they were in danger of meeting the fate of Elisha's scorners. Alonzo Carter, eldest son of Lorenzo, notes in his published reminiscences that a man killed a bear that year with a hoe, on Water street, near the light-house.

The same season, as the future Governor Hunting- ton was floundering one evening on horseback along the swampy road from Painesville, a pack of wolves came out of the forest near the present corner of Enelid and Willson avenues, and attempted to seize him. He had no weapon but an umbrella. llis frightened horse did its best to escape, but the mud was so deep that the wolves had decidedly the advan- tage. Iluntington beat them back as well as he could with his umbrella, the horse made renewed efforts, a little firmer ground was reached, a rousing gallop left the assailants behind, and steed and rider, cov- ered with mud, quickly dashed in among the cabins of the city.

Carter and Spafford had both been entertaining strangers ever since their arrival, but at the court of quarter sessions, held in August, 1802, they both ap- plied for and received regular licenses as hotel keep- ers. It did not require much to " keep a hotel " in those days. Almost everybody had plenty of bread and meat, and if a man had an extra bed or two and could procure a barrel of whisky, he was apt to put up a sign and announce himself as a tavern-keeper.

In the ensuing winter Ohio was admitted as a State into the Union, and Mr. Huntington was elected one of the new Ilouse of Representatives. On his arri- val at Chillicothe, the capital, he was elected the speaker of the House, and scarcely had he taken this

position when, in 1803. he was appointed one of the judges of the Supreme Court of the State. He still retained his residence at Cleveland, making long jour- neys on horseback through the forest from his log house on the Cuyahoga to take his seat on the Su- preme Beneh.

That year the first frame house was creeted in the city. nearly seven years after the first settlement, the builder being the indefatigable Carter. It was situ- ated near the foot of Superior street. Unfortunately, just as the house was finished and the family could move in, the shavings caught fire and the building was totally consumed. Mr. C. built again the same year, but was obliged to contine himself to a hewed log house, and it was seven or eight years more- near fifteen years from the survey and settlement- before Cleveland conld boast of a single frame resi- denec.

About one family a year seems to have been the in- crease of Cleveland for several years at this period. In 1804. Oliver Culver, one of the party who surveyed the Western Reserve, brought out some goods (salt, calieo, liquor and tobacco, ) to trade with the Indians but after one season's experience returned east and did not repeat the experiment. The freight from Black Rock-now a part of Buffalo, was three dollars per barret.

Another event of the year was the organization of the first militia company in the vicinity. The district appears to have embraced the whole civil township of Cleveland, containing several hundred square miles, but the officers, Captain Lorenzo Carter, Lieutenant Nathaniel Doan, and Ensign Samuel Jones all resided within the present limits of the city. The same sea- son Captain Carter was chosen major of the " second battalion, first regiment, second brigade and fourth division of the Ohio;" Doan and Jones being respect- ively promoted to captain and lieutenant.

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History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 58

Author: Johnson, Crisfield Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co. Number of Pages: 716

Author: Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.B. Lippincott & Co.
Number of Pages: 716