History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 9

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

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On the 29th of the same month the stockholders were again convoked by the directors to receive the report of the committee on partition, consisting of Pease, Spafford, Warren and Holbrook. Six town- ships were to be sold for the general benefit: two of them being Euclid and Cleveland (then inelnding Newburg) and four being outside of Cuyahoga county. Four other townships (Warrensville, Bedford and two outside the county) were drawn in four hundred parcels, one to each share. All the rest of the Re- serve east of the Cuyahoga was drawn in ninety- three parcels; each consisting of a township or more.

These, as before arranged, were received by the pro- prietors, who clubbed together in groups for the pur- pose; each group dividing its portion among its mem - bers as they could agree. This ended the direct connection of Mr. Pease with the Connecticut Land Company. He was afterwards employed by the " Hol- land Company " in surveying its land, which com- prised six or eight of the westernmost counties of New York. When his brother-in-law, Gideon Gran- ger, became postmaster-general of the United States in 1801, Mr. Pease was made assistant postmaster- general. While holding that position he was employed by the government to relocate the south line of the Western Reserve, in 1806.

The stockholders were still in trouble because Con- gress had failed to take any special action regarding their territory, and again petitioned the legislature of Connecticut to afford them relief, but that body wisely decided to make no movement which might bring it into collision with the national authorities. The company also voted to give two hundred dollars, or loan five hundred, to any one who would put up a gristmill near the Cuyahoga, and likewise to others, to do the same in other localities. Two more assess- ments were levied, of ten dollars per share each.

In the spring of 1798 a party of eighteen came out to the Reserve and built a road from Cleveland to the Pennsylvania line, near the lake shore, which occu- pied them the greater part of the season. The same year Doan, (who had returned from the East to settle, ) Edwards, Stiles and Gun followed the example of Kingsbury and located themselves four or five miles each from the month of the Cuyahoga. Doan made his home at the point long known as Doan's Corners, and the others along the ridge south from that point. The object of all of them was to escape the ague, then so terribly prevalent in the "city," and to a great extent they succeeded. Their removal left the "city" to the occupancy of Mr. Carter, Mr. Amos Spatford, ( who came there the same year) and their families, and to Joseph Landon and Stephen Gilbert who cleared land and sowed some wheat. The early accounts speak frequently of the generous assistance afforded by Mr. Carter and his wife to the fever-smitten inhabitants. He seems to have escaped sickness to a considerable extent, and his expertness with his rifle enabled him to make frequent and most welcome presents of game to his afflicted neighbors. Deer were plenty, and could be seen forty, fifty or even sixty rods away, owing to the fact that there was very little underbrush in any part of the county. Mr. Carter also brought goods that year to trade with the Indians; thus be- coming the first merchant in the county after the settlement by the whites. The same year Mr. John Morse and others made a settlement in Enclid.

As illustrative of the hardships undergone by the early settler, it may be mentioned that Nathaniel Doan and his whole family, numbering nine persons, were sick during a considerable part of the season. The only one able to do anything was his nephew,

THE PERIOD FROM 1798 TO 1800.

Seth Doan, a boy of thirteen, and he had the inevita- ble shakes. For two months Seth went to Mr. Kingsbury's and got corn, which he then crushed in Mr. Kingsbury's hand-mill and took home to the family. When he was unable to go they had no vegetable food but turnips, though Carter and his hounds kept them pretty well supplied with venison.

The mill spoken of, at least the first one built by Mr. Kingsbury, was of the form which was common in all the new country during the first years of settle- ment. An oak stump was hollowed out so that it would hold about half a bushel of corn. Above it a heavy wooden pestle was suspended to a " spring- pole," the large end of which was fastened to a neigh- boring tree. A convenient quantity of corn being poured into the hollow, the pestle was seized with both hands and brought down upon it. Then the spring-pole drew it up a foot or two above the corn. when it was again brought down, and thus the work continued until the corn was reduced to a quantity of very coarse meal. These machines were commonly called " plumping-mills," and probably each of the first-settled townships in the county had one or more of those rude but convenient articles. For three or four years there was no water-mill nearer than Penn- sylvania.

Mr. Kingsbury, however, being a particularly en- terprising pioneer, soon constructed something more effective than his plumping-mill, though still unable to compass a regular gristmill. Getting a couple of large stones in the vicinity, he shaped them into some similitude to mill-stones and fastened the lower firmly in position. To the upper one he affixed a long lever, by which it could be rotated back and forth, and with this simple machinery he and his neighbors were able to grind their corn finer and more rapidly than with the discarded plumping-mill.

The doctor who attended the surveyors having re- turned with them, there was no physician in all this part of the Reserve. It fact it was twelve years more before one located in Cuyahoga county. The people had to do their own doctoring and provide their own medicine. Instead of calomel they used an infusion of butternnt bark; instead of quinine, a de- coction of dogwood and cherry. These were crude remedies, yet, notwithstanding the extreme sickliness of the locality, which is admitted by all the early set- tlers, it does not appear that the mortality was much larger than in sections where there was an ample sup- ply of physicians. Doubtless, however, a good phy- sician would have stopped the prevalent fevers more quickly than they " wore themselves out," and would thus have prevented much suffering.

The last three years of the eighteenth century were remarkable in this locality for the early appearance of warm weather. Pinks and other flowers bloomed in February each year, and peach trees were in full blossom in March.

All along during the early years of settlement the Chippewas, Ollawas and other western Indians, to

the number of several hundred, were in the habit of coming every autumn from their summer homes on the Sandusky and Maumee, where they raised their corn, and assembling at the mouth of the Cuyahoga. There they piled their canoes, and then scattered out into the interior to spend the winter in hunting and trapping. Having acquired an ample supply of meat for summer use, and a quantity of valuable furs, they would return in the spring to the point where they had left their canoes.

llere they would sell their furs, and before return- ing home would indulge in a grand, annual drunk. For this festive occasion they prepared, with praise- worthy caution, by giving their tomahawks, knives, rifles and all other weapons to the squaws. These articles the latter would hide in some secluded place, carefully concealed from the warriors. Sometimes an ample allowance of whisky would be purchased " in bulk " of the nearest trader, with which the Indians would retire to some forest nook and there celebrate their frantic orgies. Sometimes they bought it by the drink: increasing the amount and the frequency as the hours progressed.

Whichever way was adopted a terrific scene was the result. The warriors, as the whisky mounted to their brains, threw off all the usual stolidity of their demeanor: told with braggart shouts of the wars in which they had been engaged and the number of sealps they had taken; tore off even the seanty gar- ment they generally wore; rent the air with blood- curdling yells, and often fought among themselves with nature's weapons or such clubs and stones as they could pick up. At such times they frequently sought zealously for the knives and rifles of which they had previously dispossessed themselves, but the squaws generally performed their duty as enstodians with great, fidelity, and a severe pounding was the most serious injury the irate warriors received at each other's hiatuls.

Nor were the sqnaws entirely deprived of their share of amusement. After their lords had awakened from the sleep which followed their debauch, and bad received back their weapons, the gentler sex were al- lowed (provided there was any whisky left or any fur to buy it with ) to indulge in a lively drunk of their own. Their demonstrations were almost as frantic. but not usually as pugnaejous, as those of the warriors.

After all had satiated themselves with pleasure- according to their ideas -- they launched their canoes, loaded in their dried deer meat and bear meat, and those skins which, being unsalable to the whites, they destined for the furnishing of their lodges, and paddled swiftly away to their fertile cornfields at the head of the lake.

In the spring of 1799, the Indians obtained the whisky for their annual celebration from Mr. Car- ter. After using up their first supply they sent him furs and obtained more, and this was often repeated. Doubtless thinking that the less liquor they drank the better off they would be, the worthy trader, as

GENERAL HISTORY OF CUYAHOGA COUNTY.

the tradition goes, diluted the whisky with larger and larger quantities of water, as his customers became more and more intoxicated. The result was that they became sober long before they expected, and knew that a fraud had been perpetrated. Nine of them came to Carter's cabin in a great rage; swearing vengeance because they had been cheated out of a part of their drunk. Luckily all their arms were still in the possession of the squaws. They quickly burst open the cabin door, but the burly trader, standing behind it, knocked down three or four of them as they entered, sprang over their prostrate forms, rushed upon those outside, and drove them, unaccustomed to tist-tights, in tumultuous disorder to their canoes. Ere he returned to the cabin, his other foes gathered themselves up and slipped quietly away.

For a while Carter was somewhat anxious lest they should all return with their weapons, but instead of that, after a considerable time had passed, a deputa- tion of squaws appeared and professed themselves desirous to make peace. The trader readily assented, walked over alone to the camp of his enemies, and easily succeeded in pacifying them. Whether he was able to convince them that it was a highly moral transaction to water an Indian's whisky when he was getting too drunk, and then knock him down for resenting it, history saith not, but there is no doubt that he exercised an immense influence over the Indians, and could take liberties with them which no one else could. llis bold, rough-and-ready ways, his great physical strength, and his expertness as a marksman and hunter, far superior to their own, were all attributes which naturally gained the intense admiration of the rude, untutored children of the forest. Some of them declared he was a magician, and could kill an animal with his rifle without breaking its hide.

On their way to and from their summer residence, the Indians usually stopped at Rocky river to fish, and this was also a favorite resort of the whites. The former generally fished at night in their canoes, with torchlight and spears; the whites used these means, but also frequently resorted to the hook and line, and sometimes managed to construct a small seine.

In the spring, summer and fall of 1799, W. W. Williams and Major Wyatt built the first gristmill in the present county of Cuyahoga. It was located at the falls of Mill creek, in what was long known as the village of Newburg, but is now a part of the city of Cleveland. The Land Company gave the proprie- tors a hundred aeres of land and all the irons for their mill, in consideration of their putting it np. The irons were the most important part of the struct- ure, as it was absolutely necessary to bring them from the East, while all the rest of the appliances could be procured in the vicinity.

The water was conveyed in a trough dug out of logs to an undershot wheel, "twelve feet over." which had but one set of arms, with brackets fifteen inches long, running inside the trough. David and

Gilman Bryant, who were still engaged in their grind- stone trade from Vermillion river, made the mill- stones ont of material obtained by the side of the creek, half a mile below the mill.

By this time it had become evident that almost all the surveyors had given up their idea of settling in Euclid, and about all that remains in evidence of their design is the name of the great mathematician, applied by them to their favorite township. Other settlers, however, came into that township and Cleve- land, of whom more particular mention will be made in the township histories.

The next year, 1800, Williams and Wyatt built a sawmill, near their gristmill, on Mill creek; the former, like the latter, being the first institution of its kind in the county. As in the case of the first mull, too, the irons for the sawmill were presented by the company.

This year was also distinguished by the establish- ment of the first school in the county. It was kept by Miss Sarah Doan in the Kingsbury neighborhood, which, as before stated, was long a part of Newburg, but has now been absorbed in the omnivorous city.

Some important movements were made regarding the fee-simple and the political jurisdiction of the Western Reserve. The United States at length for- mally conveyed all its title to the soil of that terri- tory to the State of Connecticut (by which State it had been legally vested in the members of the Land Company and in the "Fire Lands" proprietors), while on the other hand the State formally released to the United States all its claims to the political jurisdic- tion of the territory in question.

On the 10th of July, 1800, the legislature of Ohio formed a new county out of parts of Jefferson and Wayne, comprising all of the Western Reserve, in- cluding the " Fire Lands" and the neighboring is- lands in the lake. To this county was given the name of " Trumbull," in honor of Jonathan Trum- bull, then governor of the State of Connecticut, and a son of the celebrated Revolutionary governor of the same name, who was the original " Brother Jonathan." The county-seat was located at Warren; the most of the settlers, who were very few, being in the south- eastern corner of the Reserve.

On the 2end of September, 1800, Gov. St. Clair issued his proclamation, directed to David Abbott, who had been appointed sheriff of Trumbull county, and who lived near the mouth of Chagrin river in the present county of Lake, requiring him to hold an election at Warren on the second Tuesday of October, for the purpose of choosing a representative in the Territorial legislature. The election was duly held . at the time and place specified, when only forty-two votes were cast for the whole county of Trumbull; that is to say in the whole Western Reserve. As it was about sixty miles from the county-seat to Cleve- land and the same distance to Conneant, it is quite probable that some of the voters stayed at home. Edward Paine, whom we have mentioned as living

THE PERIOD FROM 1801 TO 1806.

with the Stiles family during the first winter that Cleveland was occupied by white people, received thirty-eight of the forty-two votes, and was declared duly elected. This was the first election in which the settlers on the Reserve had taken part, and they were highly pleased to find themselves ouce more perform- ing the accustomed duties of citizens.

Meanwhile, however, the first court of quarter ses- sions had been held at Warren, on the fourth Monday of August, 1800, by the judge of probate and the " justices of quornm " of the new county. The for- mer was John Leavitt. The latter were John Young, Turhand Kirtland, Camden Cleaveland, Eliphalet Austin and James Kingsbury; the last named being the only member from the present county of Cuya- hoga. The first justice of the peace not "of quo- rum," from this county, was Amos Spafford. The court appointed a commission consisting of Amos Spatford, David Hudson, Simeon Perkins, John MI- nor, A. Wheeler, Edward Paine and Benjamin David- son, to report a proper division of Trumbull county into townships with convenient boundaries.

On their report the county was organized in eight townships, of which Cleveland was the westernmost. It. comprised all of Cuyahoga county, together with the townships of Chester, Russell and Bainbridge in Geauga county. It also embraced the whole Indian country to the western boundary of the Reserve, (in- cluding the Fire Lands, ) which was also the western boundary of the county. Its jurisdiction over the tract. west of the Cuyahoga was, however, merely nominal; as there were no white men there to govern, and no one in those days thought of subjecting the Indians on their own ground to civil law. Thus the township of Cleveland had an area of about two thou- sand three hundred and forty square miles; of which, however, only about two hundred and sixty square miles were open to ocenpation by the whites. The next township east of Cleveland was Painesville.

The distinction between survey townships and civil townships should always be borne in mind by those studying the early history of this section. Thus. while the civil township of Cleveland embraced the immense territory above described, the survey town- ship of the same name comprised only a small district. about five miles by eight, ont of which were after- wards formed the civil townships of Cleveland and Newburg.

After the county had been thus divided into town- ships, the court appointed constables for them; those for Cleveland being Stephen Gilbert and Lorenzo Carter.

In this year Turhand Kirtland, writing to General Cleaveland from the town which bore the name of the latter, declared that the prices of land were 100 high; objecting especially to the demand of twenty- five dollars per acre for city lots. He stated that. the erops were extremely good, the settlers healthy and in good spirits, and their numbers increasing as rapidly as could be expected. There was a universal

scarcity of cash, however, which of course made pay- ments difficult. The settlers were anxious that the company should build a store, and take grain and other produce in payment for their land. This, how- ever, was not done.

CHAPTER IN.

THE PERIOD FROM 1801 TO 1806

Samuel Huntington- No Laws -Grand Fourth of July Celebration- Gilman Bryant and his Lady -The Ball- \ Traveling Minister-First Town Meeting-First Township Officers-Mr. Huntington made Jus- tier of the Quorum-His Polities-Attempt to sell Six Townships- Failure, and the Cause- The Townships divided-Huntington a Judge of the Supreme Court -First Indietment-The First Murder-"Me no Traid " A Treacherous Blow - Thre .ts of Revenge - A Compromise Two Gallous of Consolation- Organization of Militia-Carter elected Captam A Useless Protest-The Captain promoted to Major-The Sloop Cuyahoga Packet - Purchase of the Land West of the Cuyahoga -Proposed Conneil at Cleveland Indians stay Away Council at San- dusky Terms of the Treaty Silver in Payment First Post-Office - Collection District of Erie Settlement of Mayfield Another Miitia Election List of Voters -Formation of Geauga County Survey of West.Side Lands The Perils of the Lake-A Terrible Scene-Resene of "Ben "-Loss of the Schooner " Washington "

EARLY in the spring of 1801. Samuel Huntington. of Connectient (a nephew of the governor of that State of the same name), who had been examining the lands on the Reserve during the previous summer, and had at the same time obtained admission to the bar of the State, came to Cleveland and selected that point as his future home. He immediately employed workmen to build him a large. hewed-log house, which, notwithstanding its humble materials, ap- peared quite aristocratie in comparison with the cabins of the other settlers. He also employed Mr. Samuel Dodge to build him a framed barn: this being the first framed editice in the county. The boards were of course obtamed From Williams and Wyatt's mill at Newburg.

Mr. Huntington was the first lawyer in the county. He did not, however, obtain any considerable prae- tice: for the immigrants from the land of steady habits were not litigions, and were too few in number to make much business for an attorney. Huntington was evidently ahead of his time, as were many others, in expecting that Cleveland would soon be a large town. In fact no one could have appeared more in- congruons among the rude settlers, the red Indians, the log cabins and the frowning forests of this ex- treme frontier than the slight, dapper counselor, thirty-live years old, about five feet eight inches tall, highly educated, and having acquired in European travel not only a knowledge of the French language but a demonstrative affability of manner, described by Americans by the general title of " Frenchy." Yet so impartially were his bows and smiles distributed to all around, and so shrewd was his political man- agement, that important public trusts were soon con- tided to him, and he rose in no long time to the highest honors of the State. His first advancement was an appointment as lieutenant-colonel of the Trumbull-county militia regiment.

GENERAL HISTORY OF CUYAHOGA COUNTY.

Down to this time there had been no laws of any kind in the vicinity. There were no officials to enforce them, and in fact it had previously been some what doubt- I'ul whether the laws of the Northwestern Territory applied to the Connectient Reserve. For a wonder, there had been no cases of lynch-law, and there had been but a single instance of what might be called club-law -the row between Carter and the Indians.

It might appear that there was now a prospect of more lively times, for in this year the first distillery in the present county was erected at Cleveland by David Bryant. This, however, was entirely a matter- of-course proceeding; a distillery being invariably one of the first institutions of a new settlement, and being generally erected by one of the most respecta- ble and responsible men in it.

All the old chronicles speak enthusiastically of the grand celebration and ball in honor of the Fourth of July, in 1801. The writer was at first in doubt whether this should be included in the general history of the county or be relegated to the more restricted details of Cleveland local aunals. But after duly considering that it was the first Fourth-of-July cele- bration in the county, (at least the first that has found its way into history, ) and was likewise the first ball in the county, and was probably attended by almost all the citizens of the county, he has coneluded to assign it a place among the county annals.

Of the patriotic observanees during the day no ac- count has been preserved, but the grand ball has been described in glowing terms. Gilman Bryant, one of the participants, has narrated, in a letter published by Colonel Whittlesey, the appearance and mode of travel of himself and his lady, in terms doubtless applicable with some modifications to many others of the guests. The youthful knight, only seventeen years old, waited on " Miss Doan, who had just arrived at Doan's Cor- ners four miles east of Cleaveland," and who was probably the daughter of Timothy Doan, who came thither that year but afterwards removed to Euclid. The lady was but fourteen years oldl.

The cavalier attired himself gorgeously, in what he assures us was the prevailing mode; wearing a suit of gingham, a good, wool hat and a pair of substantial, brogan shoes. His long hair was bound behind in a qneue about as long and as thick as an ordinary corn- cob, tied round with a yard and a half of black ribbon, below which the hair extended in a small tuft. Those were the days of powdered wigs among the gentry. and the youth came as near the genteel standard as he could by annointing his hair with tallow, and then sitting on it as much flour as he could make stick. Thus arrayed, he mounted a horse and rode ont to his lady's mansion of logs. She climbed upon a stump, and he rode up beside it: she kirtled her calico dress about her waist to keep it clean, spread her under. petticoat on the horse's back, mounted, and clasped her cavalier about the waist to steady herself, and away they went in splendid style to the double log-

house of Mr. Carter, on the brow of the hill at the west end of Superior street.

Thither, too, came the whole elite of the Cuyahoga eonnty which was to be. Wagons rolled in from the Jake-washed shores of Euclid ; horsemen with dames behind them rode down from the mills of Mill creek, and young farmers came in high glee with their girls from the Kingsbury ridge, which had attracted so many settlers on account of its healthy location. No less than twenty gentlemen and fifteen ladies graced the festive occasion. John Wood. Benjamin Wood and R. H. Bliun were the managers ; Samuel Jones, afterwards quite noted as Major Jones, was the chief violinist and floor-manager. His ringing tones called off the figures in " Fisher's Hornpipe," " Hi, Betty Martin " and the ". Virginia Reel," and cavaliers and dames, old and young, married and single, responded with a vigor which marked the rude floor with the dent of many a heavy brogan, while the rough ceiling was almost reached by the heads of some of the taller dancers. If their spirits flagged they were speedily renovated with a beverage concocted of whisky, water and maple sugar, and the 5th of July was well under way ere the jovial revelers returned to their homes by means of the same primitive conveyances which had borne them to the scene of festivity.

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History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Part 9

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