USA > Ohio > Greene County > History of Greene County, Ohio: its people, industries and institutions, Volume I > Part 9
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toward the Little Miami and the gorge through which it flows. As the ap- proaching redskins were almost upon him, the fugitive suddenly veered to the left and quickened his pace. The change in his course did not give him the desired advantage, for he found that he had miscalculated his pursuers' speed and endurance and now feared that he would soon be overtaken. Straining every nerve and summoning all of his energy, he veered still farther to the left when the roaring of the falls reached his ears. As his present course would take him to the falls where he would have the opportunity to elude his pursuers, the Shawnees sent their fleetest runners to head him off ; hence he changed his course again and ran straight forward toward an ash tree which stood near the edge of the cliff a short distance below the falls and which he had marked several years before with his hatchet. Again the hunter looked back over his shoulder to measure his progress and to his alarm found that the Indians were almost upon him. The leader of his pur- suers was Little Fox, a Shawnee chief, of no mean distinction, and Darnell decided that that savage was the most vulnerable point at which to strike his enemies. Before he left Oldtown he had stolen a rifle and hunting accouter- ments from his captors and now he examined the priming of his rifle which he found in perfect condition. To the surprise of the savages he suddenly paused in his career near a tree which stood on the road now leading from Clifton to Yellow Springs, boldly faced his pursuers and threw his rifle to his shoulder. Little Fox immediately saw the intention of his quarry, who had the weapon directed at his breast, and tried to shelter himself behind a tree; but he was too late, for when the rifle cracked the Shawnees had lost another valuable chief. Darnell did not pause to reload, for the remaining five darted forward with hideous yells to avenge the fall of their chieftain.
THE LEAP ACROSS THE GORGE.
Directly before Darnell lay the gorge which, from bank to bank, was fully thirty feet in width. Cedars and bushes grew thickly along the edge of the precipice and far below rolled the Little Miami, white with the foam from the falls above. The hunter was not ignorant of all these facts, for he had visited it before. He knew the foolhardiness of the attempt to leap the gorge and that almost certain death awaited him on the ugly stones in the bottom of the precipice through which the river tumbled, but such thoughts did not arrest his progress. He was determined to leap the gorge, and if death came to him in the attempt it would come more easily and quickly on the rough stones in the river bed than at the stake back in old Chillicothe. After he had passed the ash tree, he summoned every ounce of his strength and strained every nerve to the utmost for the leap, and a moment later he had sprung from the cliff. To the amazement of the Shawnees who had
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reached the cliff and were gazing with wonder at the daring attempt of the white man, Darnell cleared the chasm and grasped a bush on the opposite side of the gorge. With great exertion he drew himself up to solid ground and sprang forward again; however, there was no further need for precipi- tate flight, for the pursuit was ended. As his form disappeared among the trees, one of the wondering redskins must have given voice to some such ex- pression : "He is more than a paleface. He is under the protection of the Great Spirit, for neither paleface nor Indian could ever have leaped across the Chekemeameesepe. Let us no longer pursue a spirit. We shall never look upon his like again this side of the Dark River and the Happy Hunt- ing Grounds." In silence the baffled savages retraced their steps to Oldtown where they related the story of the daring man's leap to their wondering people. The white prisoners could scarcely believe it, but they afterwards heard the story from the lips of Darnell himself.
THE STORY OF JENNIE COWAN.
One of the most tragic and pathetic stories of the days of the Indian occupancy of this region and of the time when the Shawnee village at Old- town was in its ascendancy had to do with the remarkable adventure which befell Mrs. Jennie Cowan, a great-grandaunt of the venerable pastor emeri- tus of the Second United Presbyterian church at Xenia, the Rev. James Gillespy Carson. During the middle eighties of the eighteenth century Jennie Cowan, with her husband and young daughter, was living with her family in the settlement surrounding the pioneer fort in what is now Blunt county, Tennessee. One day when the men of the settlement were outside the blockhouse engaged in the tending of their crops, a band of the Shawnees which had gone down into the Tennessee country from their headquarters at Oldtown descended upon the settlement, killed and scalped the men and took some of the women prisoners, among the latter of whom was Mrs. Cowan. This unhappy woman, mercilessly bereaved of her husband and cruelly torn from the side of her daughter and the companionship of her associates at the settlement, was taken by her savage captors to the headquarters of the tribe at Oldtown, a long and arduous journey across the great Kentucky country and up into the valley of the Miamis. The Indians, with savage venom, thinking to add to the trials and miseries of their unhappy captive, compelled the poor woman to carry with her the scalp of her slain husband. This, how- ever, instead of being added punishment, as her captors had designed, was but a gruesome task willingly borne by the bereaved woman, who gladly bore the scalp of her husband in the bosom of her dress rather than to see it in the desecrating hands of her blood-thirsty captors. Upon the arrival of the marauding band at the Shawnee village (Oldtown) Jennie Cowan was given
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over to the charge of an old squaw and was compelled to serve the latter as a slave during the period of her captivity, subjected to cruel treatment and under the necessity of performing the drudgery of her savage mistress's primitive abode. Among the tasks required of her was that of drawing and boiling the sugar water during the early days of the spring. As Doctor Cowan recalls the story, which was related to him in his childhood by his mother, who had it from her grandaunt, during one of these seasons of sugar-boiling the unhappy captive fell asleep after three days and nights of ceaseless vigil over the kettles of sugar water and thus permitted the fires to die out and the sugar water to get out of "boil." She awakened just in time in the gray dawn of the morning to relight the fires and renew the boiling process before her savage taskmistress appeared on the scene.
For seven years Jennie Cowan was held in captivity at the Shawnee village. During the latter period of this captivity one of the Shawnee braves from the nearby Mad river station of the tribe declared his admiration for the white captive and made her an offer of marriage, which, of course, was declined. The captive's taskmistress insisted upon her acceptance of the proffer of marriage and threatened dire consequences in case of further declination of the "honor," but the chivalrous brave, gracefully acknowledg- ing the right of the captive to her own choice in the matter, withdrew his suit and in order to appease the wrath of the squaw who held the white woman's temporary destiny in her hand, declared that he did not want the fair captive and would not have her. His open admiration, however, did not abate and presently found tangible expression in an offer to the captive of a means of effecting her escape from the village. He arranged for the holding of a shooting match at his station on the Mad river and appointed a comrade and a young Indian woman there to meet the captive secretly and see that she had safe conduct to Ft. Detroit. And thus Jennie Cowan, after seven years of captivity, was enabled to make her way from Oldtown. The released captive and her escort crossed Lake Erie on the ice, for the escape was effected in midwinter, and were nearing the fort at Detroit when the Indian who was guiding Mrs. Cowan was attracted by the possibility of getting some whisky at a sutler's camp not far from the fort and entered the place. There his captive was recognized by another Indian, who seized her and an- nounced his intention to return her to the station at Oldtown. Her guide, however, was able to secure the assistance of a friendly Indian and prevented the execution of the threat which would have returned the white woman to a captivity than which death would have been more welcome. She presently was safely conducted to Ft. Detroit, where she was given tender and kindly care and was after a while escorted to Ft. Pitt and thence down the river to Maysville, from which point she was able to make her way to her former
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home in Tennessee, where she was received with open arms and many mani- festations of rejoicing on the part of the settlement, which had long counted her as dead.
Not long after her return to her old home Mrs. Cowan was married to one of the settlers in the community. Two years later a marauding band of Cherokees from the Georgia country invaded Tennessee and the much-tried woman again was taken captive, her daughter this time being taken captive with her. For two years the women were held in captivity by the Cherokees. A company of young men in the Blunt settlement then was organized to pro- ceed against the Cherokees for the purpose of rescuing the captives. This company succeeded in compelling the surrender of a band of Cherokees and with the captives thus secured was enabled to effect an exchange of prisoners and the unhappy white woman and her daughter, the former of whom had been compelled to spend nine years of her life in durance among the red- skins, were again restored to home and civilization.
CHAPTER V.
COUNTY ORGANIZATION.
Just twenty-three days after Ohio became a member of the Union, Greene county was erected into one of the civil divisions of the state, March 24, 1803, by an act of the General Assembly. This section was not the only one favored with the privilege of forming its local government, for three other counties were erected by the same act, Warren, Butler and Montgom- ery counties. The first was named after Gen. Joseph Warren, the hero of Bunker Hill; the second for Gen. Richard Butler, a distinguished officer of the Revolution, who fell in St. Clair's disastrous defeat; the third for Gen. Richard Montgomery who fell at Quebec in the American attack on Canada during the Revolution, and Greene county was given its name in honor of the brilliant American general who led Cornwallis into the trap at Yorktown, Gen. Nathaniel Greene. Since these counties were composed of territory taken mainly from Ross and Hamilton counties, the Legislature out of jus- tice to the parent civil divisions, reserved to these two counties the right to make distress for all dues and officers' fees which were yet unpaid by the inhabitants of the newly established counties.
Although the act creating these new counties was passed on March 24, it was not in force until after May 1, 1803, which date is really the birth- day of Greene, Montgomery, Warren and Butler counties. Since the coun- try was wild and undeveloped, no preparation had been made for the imme- diate establishment of a permanent seat of justice in each of the new coun- ties, and section six of the act provided temporary places where the county business could be transacted and the courts held. This temporary county seat in Warren county was the house of Ephriam Hathaway on Turtle creek; in Butler county, the house of John Torrence in Hamilton; in Montgomery county, the house of George Newcome in Dayton, and in Greene county, the house of Owen Davis, the miller, on Beaver creek; however, this latter house was then occupied by Davis' tenant, Peter Borders. It is quite probable that the reason for choosing the house of Owen Davis for the temporary seat of justice for Greene county was that this cabin was located on the Pinkney road, the only road which extended southward to Cincinnati at that time.
BOUNDARIES.
The first limits of Greene county were much more extensive than they are today as may be seen by the wording of section four of the act which
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created the four counties. There is, however, so much geographical ambig- uity in the section describing the original boundaries of the county that it is well nigh impossible to determine with any degree of certainty the limits of the county as set forth by the section. The difficulty in defining these orig- inal limits arises from the fact that the framers of the section described the bounds not by township, range and section lines, neither by natural features, but their delineation depended entirely upon the counties previously estab- lished, Ross and Hamilton :
Sec. 4. All that part of the counties of Hamilton and Ross included in the following boundaries, viz .: beginning at the southeast corner of the county of Montgomery, running thence east to the Ross county line, and the same course continued eight miles into the said county of Ross; thence north to the state line; thence westwardly with the same to the east line of Montgomery county (Montgomery county also extending by the act to the northern limits of the state) ; thence bounded by the said line of Montgomery to the be- ginning, shall compose a fourth new county called and known by the name of Greene.
It would take an expert cartographer to delineate on the map of the state the limits of Greene county as they were described above. In the first place, it is necessary to determine the limits of Montgomery county which was erected at the same time as was Greene; in the second place, the limits of Ross county, whose extent at that time was very vague, would have to be determined. In fact the only definite line of the county at that time was its northern boundary, the state line, but the eastern and western limits of this north line of the county were not determined by this act. Moreover, while the section specifically states that the northern boundary of the county of Greene was the state line, it follows that the framers of the section did not take into consideration the Greenville Treaty line of 1795, for the Legisla- ture as a matter of fact had no right to organize counties out of territory to which the Indians had not then relinquished their title. It follows then that the limits of Greene county in 1803 could not have extended farther north than this Greenville Treaty line of 1795.
SCATTERED SETTLERS GIVEN PROTECTION.
The Greenville Treaty line began at the mouth of the Cuyahoga river ; thence up that river to the portage; thence across the portage and down the Tuscarawas branch of the Muskingum to the crossing place above Ft. Laurens; thence in a westerly direction to that branch of the Great Miami at or near which stood Loramie's store; thence northwest to Ft. Recovery; thence in a southerly direction to the mouth of the Kentucky river. The addition of all this extensive tract north of the treaty line to the Greene county of 1803 was the origination of a policy on the part of the Legislature to add to each regularly organized county of the northern tier certain por- tions of Indian or unorganized territory, which was to be under the civil
(7)
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and criminal jurisdiction of the newly organized county. This was done to give the scattered settlers in that portion protection. There was little or no effort on the part of the early Greene county government to organize this great expanse of territory. All that was done was the erection on May 10, 1803, of Mad River township, which embraced this extensive section. This township was wild and unsettled as was shown by the petition of James McPherson for a tavern, twenty miles north of Springfield, in 1804. Obviously, most of the civil business transacted by the county government with this great township was confined to its extreme southern portion.
Even the origin of the territory which composed Greene county as it was originally is vague in one respect. According to the section of the act which created this county, it was composed of not only a part of Ross and Hamilton and Wayne counties, but it also had within its bounds a strip of territory which was included in neither of the before-mentioned counties. Generally that strip of land is regarded as having been a part of Hamilton county.
QUESTION OF BOUNDARIES A SECONDARY ONE.
Immediately after the organization and establishment of the county, the officers were so busy in starting the machinery of government that the ques- tion of boundaries was a secondary one. Townships were organized; the county seat of justice had to be located, the lots sold, and the court house begun. Gradually the question of boundaries between this and adjoining counties arose, especially after the organization of Champaign county in 1805 from parts of Greene and Franklin counties. It was not, however, until 1810 that serious effort was made to delineate the bounds of the county. On January I, of that year, the board of commissioners made the following order :
Ordered that the surveyor of this county proceed to ascertain part of the north and all of the east boundary of the county by surveying as follows, viz .: Beginning where the old Ross county line crosses the line between the eighth and ninth ranges, which is con- sidered the county line between Champaign and this county; thence east eight miles; thence south twenty-one miles, adjoining Franklin and Highland, or so far south as that the south boundary line of this county will intersect the same; and that notice be given the board of Commissioners of Champaign, Franklin and Highland counties, that the surveyor of this county will proceed to survey accordingly on the third Monday of March, next, and con- tinue from day to day until the samc is completed, and that said surveyor take to his assistance two chain carriers and one marker, to mark with three chops, fore and aft.
(Signed) JOSIAH GROVER, CLK. G. C.
Evidently the task of surveying these two boundaries in the county was no small one, for it was not until the April following that Samuel Kyle made his report to the commissioners in detail, as follows :
Samuel Kyle, Esq., Surveyor of Greene county, being appointed to survey a part of the north and all of the east boundary of the county aforesaid, made his return in the follow- ing words, to wit: Beginning at a stake where the old Ross county line crosses the line
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between the eighth and ninth ranges; thence east (crossing the north fork of the Little Miami at 2 miles, 148 poles, the Springfield road at 7 miles, 22 poles, a branch of the east fork, 8 miles and 208 poles) ; thence nine miles, 24 poles to a black oak, white oak and hickory on the line between the eighth and ninth ranges. I then proceeded to ascertain the east boundary. Beginning at a stake eight miles cast of the old Ross county line, sup- posed to be at or near the place where the S. E. corner of the county will be established ; running thence north (crossing the Chillicothe road at 3 miles and a half, the south fork of Massies creek at 12 miles and 20 poles, the United States road at 13 miles, the old Chilli- cothe road at 15 miles and 40 poles, the east fork of Massies creek at 15 miles and 100 poles, the east fork of the Little Miami at 17 miles and 208 poles, and a branch of said fork at 19 miles and 8 poles), 20 miles and 271 poles to the black oak and hickory at the northeast corner of said county.
(Signed) SAMUEL KYLE, S. G. C.
Ordered that the said lines be established agreeably to the survey aforesaid.
FURTHER BOUNDARY LIMITATIONS.
This east line of Greene county has not been changed since it was deter- mined in 1810, but there is considerable dispute about its actual whereabouts today, since the survey can not be determined by section, township and range lines, as this part of the county lies in the old military survey. This old Ross county line was located one and one-third miles west of the Painters- ville and Port William road, as now located, or eight miles west of the pres- ent southeast corner of Greene county. From this point the Ross county line extended north, passing approximately one-half east of Paintersville, New Jasper and Cedarville. Thus Greene county extended eight miles on its eastern side into old Ross county.
The west line of Greene county as established in 1803 has remained unchanged. The task here was easier because that part of the county lies in the Congressional survey. The line between this county and Montgomery begins at the southeast corner of the latter county, in the line of Warren county, and in the east line of section 16, township 3, range 5, seventy and thirty-two hundredths rods south of the southwest corner of section 10, township 3. From thence the line extends northward with the sectional line to the northwest corner of section 9, township 2, range 8. At this point the line extends two miles to the southwest corner of section 34, in the line of townships 3 and 4. Here the line turns northward following the west line of section 34 until it reaches the northwest corner of the county at the north- west corner of this section, which is situated a short distance northwest of Osborn.
The south line of Greene county was surveyed following an order of the commissioners, March 6, 1810. The order is as follows :
The commissioners of Greene county being informed that the commissioners of War- ren county having agreed to run a line between Warren and Greene counties, beginning at the Little Miami river at the middle of the fifth range, thence east to the old Ross county line, and the same course continued eight miles; ordered that the surveyor of Greene county do meet the surveyor of Warren county on the 2nd Monday of April, next, at the
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place of beginning and proceed to run said line and take to his assistance one marker and . two chain carriers, and to have the line marked three notches fore and aft.
(Signed) JOSIAH GROVER, CLK.
The point where the county has experienced the greatest difficulty in determining its boundary has been on its northern side. For only two years did its extent comprise the large tract as set forth in the section of the act which organized the county, for in 1805 Champaign county was organized. By the order of the commissioners of January 1, 1810, the line was, as has been shown before, partly determined by Samuel Kyle. The line then passed a short distance south of Springfield, on the line of the eighth and ninth ranges. It extended east and west two miles north of Osborn, four miles north of Yellow Springs, about four and three-fourths miles north of the bank of the Little Miami and the present corner of Greene and Clark counties at Clifton, and five and one-half miles north of the present southeast corner of Clark county.
After the organization of Clark county in 1817, which was erected out of parts of Greene, Madison and Champaign counties, the line was changed again. On June 15, 1818, the commissioners of Greene county ordered : "That Moses Collier, Surveyor of Greene County, do meat with the surveyor of Clark County on the 18th of this inst., and proceed to run the lines be- tween the respective Countys, aforesaid, commencing on the East line of the County of Greene, five miles and a half South of the North boundary of the Eighth Range and continue until the line is ascertained between the aforesaid Countys of Greene and Clark, and make returns of the same as the law directs." Collier and the surveyor of Clark county finally deter- mined the line which began on the east line of Greene county about three miles south of Charleston, from whence it extended west to a point one and one-half miles west of Selma. The line then ran northward one-half mile to a point northeast of N. E. Holloway's house, from which place it ex- tended westward to the line between townships four and five in the eighth range, near Clifton. The line then followed the township line northward to the line between sections three and four; thence the line followed the sec- tional line to the line of the third township, northwest of Yellow Springs. From this point the line followed this township line to the sectional line be- tween the fourth and fifth tier of sections in the third range, and with this sectional line it extended to the east line of Montgomery county, joining it near Osborn.
INFLUENCE OF GEN. BENJAMIN WHITEMAN.
After the line between Greene and Clark counties was surveyed and established there was one loyal and influential resident of Greene county who was not at all satisfied with the arrangement. This was Gen. Benjamin
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Whiteman. That part of the boundary line described as the third above, ex- tending west to the line between the townships four and five in the eighth range, ran somewhat to the south of General Whiteman's dwelling, which was situated on the north side of the Little Miami a short distance east of the present village of Clifton, thus making the General a resident of Clark county. He was at that time, and had been since its organization, a prom- inent man in Greene county, as he had served as one of the first three asso- ciate judges of the first court of common pleas that had established the gov- ernment of the county and had laid it off into townships. Since he was identified with the public interests of the county, he desired to remain a resident of it. Accordingly he used his influence in the halls of the Legis- lature which passed a bill on January 25, 1819, so changing the boundary line between Greene and Clark counties that it ran north of the General's dwelling thus causing him to remain a resident of this county. This line is described as follows: "From the line running north one-half miles, thence such a course (west by north) as will strike the line between townships four and five, on the north side of the Little Miami river, in the eighth range." In accordance with this act of the General Assembly, the commissioners of Greene county ordered on July 5, 1819, that "the surveyor of Greene County, in conjunction with the surveyor of Clark County, do ascertain and survey the line between the said Counties of Greene and. Clark agreeably to the act of the last session of the Assembly for that purpose made and provided and that the Commissioners of the said County of Clark have notice of the inten- tion of the Commissioners of Greene County of having the said line run ac- cording to Law, to begin on the 16th day of August, next, and that each of the said Surveyors do forthwith make return of such security to the Clerk of his respective County according to law."
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