History of Hamilton County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 66

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp; Williams, L.A. & co., Cleveland, O., pub
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio, L. A. Williams
Number of Pages: 590

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HISTORY OF HAMILTON COUNTY, OHIO.

larger than the original building, was early made, and finally the additions and reconstruction made by the son, which have converted it into the spacious and handsome mansion it now is. Mr. Armstrong is a inan of inde- pendent political views, voting for the most part with the Democracy ; but is by no means a professional politician or office-seeker, and has filled no public office except that of school director, which he held sixteen or seven- teen years, when he declined the reelection that was again offered him. He never belonged to a society of any kind except the Patrons of Husbandry, the Newtown grange of which is still maintained. His grandparents were members of the Methodist church, but all their sons accepted the Universalist creed. Mr. T. M. Armstrong, of the third generation, has never been united with

any church. Through all his active life, now verging towards three-score and ten, he has enjoyed excellent health of mind and body, and still attends to his domestic and agricultural affairs with the old-time mental and physical vigor.

Mr. Armstrong was married January 24, 1850, to Ju- lia A. Debolt, daughter of Henry Debolt, a farmer living near Newtown. By this marriage he had two children- Thomas H. and Dora. He lost his wife by death in De- cember, 1857, and was again married in September, 186r, to Miss Sarah J. Thompson, also of Newtown, by whom he has two children-Eugene M. and Ivy. All the children are living except Thomas, who died after he had grown to manhood.

COLERAIN.

GEOGRAPHY.

Colerain is bounded on the west by the Great Miami river ; on the north by that stream and Butler county ; on the east by Springfield township; and on the south by Green and Miami townships. Its eastern boundary is the range line; the range line next to the westward cuts across about four and a half miles of the township, until it intersects the Great Miami near New Baltimore, be- tween sections four and thirty-four. The north line of this township, between the river and the northwest cor- ner of Springfield township, is much more regular and more nearly on a right line east and west than the devi- ous boundary of Springfield on the north. It is about two-fifths of a mile north of the dividing line between Crosby and Harrison townships and Butler county, the "jag" occurring at the Great Miami.

The lands of Colerain lie in three entire ranges- those numbered one and two in township one, and range number one in township two. It hence results that there are in its territory three sections numbered one, being one in each corner of the township except the northwest; and two each numbered two, three, four, seven, thirteen, and nineteen; besides fractional sections numbered eight, nine, ten, and twenty-five, duplicates of entire sections similarly numbered. There are thirty-five whole and eleven fractional sections in the township. The section lines are much more nearly straight in this township than in Springfield and Sycamore, but they more remarkably diverge in many cases from the true direction. The vicious system, or careless want of system of Judge Symmes' surveys, is nowhere in the Purchase more glar- ingly exhibited than here. Some of the sections, as those numbered from twenty to the north line of the county, are by the divergence of their lines on the east and west approached closely to thrice the dimensions of those next them on the west. The township is seven sections, or about as many miles, in length from north to south, and nearly eight miles in its greatest breadth, from the westernmost point of the fractional section nine, near- ly opposite the terminus at the river of the south line of Crosby township, across to a point in the eastern line of Colerain opposite the north part of Mount Pleasant vil- lage, in Springfield township. Its breadth at the northern boundary is four miles, at the southern seven; its aver- age width about six.

The surface of the township, near the Great Miami, which washes its western and northern fronts for about twelve miles, partakes in part of the general character of the Miami valleys near the rivers. It is broad, flat, and fertile, except where the hills impinge. closely upon the

river bank, as they do for some miles. Back of this belt of lower country is the highland, or the ancient plateau, which extends upon a general level, to the eastern and southern boundaries, near which it overlooks the valleys of Mill creek and the West fork. It is deeply cut through, in the southernmost part of the township, by the course of Taylor's creek, whose headwaters take their rise to- ward the southwest corner, in sections thirteen and four- teen, and, after uniting their streams in section nineteen, dip down over a mile to the southward in Green town- ship, near the northwest corner of which the stream emerges again in Colerain, and flows in an exceedingly tortuous course toward every point of the compass for about two miles, until it reaches the Great Miami exactly at the southwest corner of Colerain. Another stream of modest size, the Blue Rock creek, cuts nearly across the township on a general east and west line about three miles north of the southern line; another, with numer- ous branches, flows through the northern part of the township until it makes its exit into Butler county, a lit- tle over a mile east of the Great Miami; and several other and more petty brooks, tributaries of the Great Mi- ami on the west or the West fork of Mill creek on the east, aid to diversify the topography and water the fertile lands of Colerain.

The township is pretty well provided with wagon-roads ; but the great highway through it is the famous Colerain pike, which intersects it almost in a diagonal from Mount Airy, first beyond the southeast corner of the township, to a point upon the river-road in the direction of Venice, Butler county, very near the northwest corner. It is described in King's Pocket-book of Cincinnati, as "a continuation of Central avenue. At the junction of Central avenue with Denman street, the site of the old Brighton house, it takes a northerly direction, passing through Camp Washington by the workhouse and the house of refuge, through Cumminsville (by the Wesleyan cemetery) and Mount Airy, on to Colerain township, from which it received its name. Continuing, it passes through Venice and Oxford, in Butler county, where it is known as the Cincinnati pike. The road is well macad- amized." After leaving Mount Airy at a mile's distance, it passes the village of Groesbeck, in Colerain township; a little more than two miles further it passes through Bevis, and at about three miles' distance the old village site of Georgetown. All the villages of the township, except Pleasant Run, a hamlet in the northwest corner, are situated upon this fine road.

Although Colerain is one of the largest townships in the county, the peculiarity of its topography and of its

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HISTORY OF HAMILTON COUNTY, OHIO.

situation, with reference to Cincinnati, the inevitable and only railway centre in the county, have hitherto pre- vented the laying of iron road on its soil. Two railway lines have been projected to intersect it, however, one, the Cincinnati & Venice railroad, to enter the township at the wagon-bridge near Venice, thence southeastward and southward with a general parallelism to the Colerain pike, until it leaves the township, near St. Jacobs, in Green township, and passes nearly due south by Weisen- burgh, to a junction with the Cincinnati & Westwood narrow-guage, a little south of Cheviot. Its entire course through Colerain, if built upon this line, will be a little more than seven miles. Another route, known as the Liberty, Connersville & Richmond railroad, is planned to enter the county in Crosby township, three miles west of the Great Miami, which it will cross at New Baltimore and run southward and eastward about three and one-half miles in Colerain to a junction with the Cincinnati & Venice road, near Bevis. The prospects of these schemes are not just now very hopeful. Other lines have at times been in discussion, and not many ycars are likely to pass before the township is supplied with railway facilities.

ANCIENT WORKS.

Some of the finest remains of the Mound Builders, although not very numerous, are to be found in this town- ship. Upon the height known as Bowling Green, near the Great Miami river, about a mile above New Balti- more, is a well-defined mound, of somewhat extensive base, and several feet in height. It was probably used as a mound of observation.

In the forest one mile west of Bevis and about the same distance south of Dry Ridge Catholic church, is an interesting ancient enclosure. It is an exact circle, of about fifty feet in diameter, and its parapets at present with an average height of two feet. The site it occupies is elevated, overlooking a wide tract of country. Its sym- metry has been considerably marred by the running of fences and other modern improvements across it, but its form is still clearly outlined.

The principal ancient remain in Colerain township, and one of the most interesting in Hamilton county, is situated near the singular and abrupt bend of the Great Miami, which begins about two miles southwest of the county line, on the Colerain side. This bend, which was until recently the main channel of the river, is now being gradually deserted by it, the waters having made their way by a shorter cut across a part of the bend, thus forming an island containing sixty to seventy acres, belonging to this township. About ninety-five acres are enclosed by the famous "Colerain work"-a fortifi- cation or sacred enclosure, the parapet of which is still pretty well preserved, and in places is eight to ten feet high. It is at the angle of the river, below a hill some two hundred and eighty feet in height, upon which is a mound of observation ten feet high, commanding a broad and far-reaching view of the valley and surrounding country. It is now fitly occupied in part by a cemetery.

In the same remarkable neighborhood, not far from

this old work, stood the not less famous modern fortifi- cation known in the history of the Miami country as

DUNLAP'S STATION.

The first settler in the tract now covered by Colerain township was undoubtedly John Dunlap, an Irishman from Colerain, in the north of Ireland. In 1790 he made his way up the valley of the Great Miami to this notable bend, about seventeen miles from the Cincinnati of that day, where he determined to found a colony, and laid out a village, which he named from his native place in the old country, and which, though it presently became extinct, perpetuated its musical name in the designation of the township. A few settlers joined him here; and they promptly built a fort or station at the spot selected. It consisted simply of their little cabins clustered together upon a space of about an acre, built to face each other and, with a singular want of forethought, their roofs so placed as to slope outward, and the eaves so low that it is said the dogs were accustomed to jump from the stumps without to the top of them, and so get into the enclosure .* This was constructed of a stockade of rather weak pickets, made of small timber or logs split in half and thrust into the ground, above which they stood only about eight feet high. Small block-houses were built at the corners of the square formed by the stockade. Within this dwelt about thirty persons -- men, women, and children-including only eight or ten capable of bearing arms. Upon the erection of the station, how- ever, and application duly made at Fort Washington for a garrison, Lieutenant Kingsbury was sent with thirteen soldiers to strengthen the defenders. When the terrible occasion came, too, as we shall presently see, the heroic women of the little fort proved capable of rendering in- valuable aid toward its salvation from capture by the mer- ciless savage foe.

Dunlap's station is principally memorable as the scene of the fiercest and longest sustained Indian attack re- corded in the annals of Hamilton county. For several days in early January, 1791, the savages had been lurk- ing in the vicinity in considerable force. On the eighth they made the fatal attack upon Wallace, Sloan, Hunt and Cunningham, as is related in our chapter upon "The Miamese and the Indians." Sloan who escaped wounded, and Wallace who escaped unhurt, took refuge in the station, and the next day (Sunday) the latter guided a party to the scene of the disaster, where they found the body of the unfortunate Cunningham, tomahawked and scalped. They buried it on the spot, and returned with- out molestation. Hunt made his appearance before the station the succeeding day, but as a hapless prisoner in the hands of his torturers and murderers. The story of the siege is admirably narrated in Volume I. of Mc- Bride's Pioneer Biography, receiving many of its touches and details, we suspect, from the hand of the accom- plished editor of that work, Mr. Robert Clarke, of Cin-

* One of these cabins is said to be that still standing on the river road near the Colerain end of the bridge over which runs the highway to Venice, removed thither from the old site; and bullets are said to have been cut from its logs. If so, this is probably the only remaining relic of the fortified stations of Hamilton county.

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HISTORY OF HAMILTON COUNTY, OHIO.

cinnati. At the risk of some repetition-the facts hav- ing been given in brief in the first division of this work -we quote the main portions of the narrative here:

Before sunrise on the morning of the tenth of January, just as the women were milking the cows in the fort, the Indians made their appear- ance before it, and fired a volley, wounding a soldier named McVicker. Every man in the fort was immediately posted to the best advantage by the commander, and the fire returned. A parley was then held at the request of the Indians, and Abner Hunt, whom they had taken prisoner as before mentioned, was brought forward securely bound, with his arms pinioned behind him, by an Indian, or, as some say, the notorious Simon Girty, the leader of the party, holding him by the rope. Mounting him on a stump within speaking distance of the garri- son, he was compelled to demand and urge the surrender of the place, which, in the hope of saving his own life, he did in the most pressing terms, promising that if it were done, life and property would be held sacred. Not a single individual in the fort, however, would agree to a surrender. Lieutenant Kingsbury took an elevated position where he could overlook the pickets, and promptly rejected all their propositions, telling them that he had dispatched a messenger to Judge Symmes, who would soon be up to their relief, with the whole settlement on the Ohio. He failed, however, to impose on them. They replied that it was a lie, as they knew Judge Symmes was then in New Jersey, and informed him that they had five hundred warriors, and would soon be joined by three hundred more, and that, if an immediate surrender was not made, they would all be massacred, and the station burned. Lieu- tenant Kingsbury replied that he would not surrender if he were sur- rounded by ten thousand devils, and immediately leaped from his posi- tion into the fort. The Indians fired at him, and a ball struck off the white plume he wore in his hat. The prisoner Hunt was cruelly tortured and killed within sight of the garrison.

The station was completely invested by the Indians and the attack was most violent. They commenced like men certain of victory and for some time the garrison was in great danger. The Indians fired, as usual, from behind stumps, trees and logs, and set fire to a quantity of brushwood that had been collected by the settlers, and then, rushing in with burning brands, attempted to fire the cabins and pickets. The vigilance and close firing of the besieged, however, prevented the ac_ complishment of this object. One Indian was killed just as he reached the buildings. In the night they threw blazing arrows from their bows against the stockade and upon the roofs of the buildings, with the inten- tion of firing them ; but in this they were also unsuccessful. The garrison well knowing that their lives depended upon it, met them at every point. The attack was continued without intermission during the whole of the day and the succeeding night, and until nine o'clock in the morning of the IIth, when the Indians, despairing of success, and, perhaps, appre- hensive of the arrival of reinforcements from Cincinnati, raised the siege and retreated in two parties, one to the right and the other to the left, as was afterward discovered by their tracks.

The whoie strength of the garrison was eighteen soldiers and eight or ten of the settlers capable of bearing arms. The entire number in the fort, including women and children, not counting the soldiers, did not exceed thirty souls. The Indians were estimated by those in the fort at from three to five hundred, led by the infamous renegade, Simon Girty, as was ascertained seven years after, on the return of a white man, who had been taken prisoner near the station a few days before the attack.

The little garrison, although but a handful compared with the host by which they were assailed, displayed great bravery, in some instances amounting to rashness. During the incessant fire from both sides they frequently, for a moment, exposed their persons above the tops of the pickets, mocking the savages and daring them to come on. Women, as well as men, nsed every expedient in their power to provoke and in- vite the enemy. They exhibited the caps of the soldiers above the pickets as marks to be shot at. According to their own accounts they conducted themselves with great folly as well as bravery, though their apparent confidence may have induced the Indians to raise the siege the sooner. When the garrison was in danger of falling short of bul- lets, the women melted down all their pewter plates and spoons to keep up the supply.

The garrison, though in imminent danger, sustained but little injury. On the first fire the Indians shot into a building called the mill, where the hand-mill was kept for grinding the corn of the neighboring settlers and the garrisen. It stood on a line with and near the block-house, and, being neither chinked nor daubed, the Indians shot between the logs, by which means they killed one man and wounded another. The body

of Abner Hunt, who had been taken prisoner by the Indians a few days previous, was found near the fort, shockingly mangled and stripped naked, his head scalped, his brains beaten out, and two war clubs laid across his breast.

ANOTHER STATION,

founded by John Campbell, probably during the summer or fall of 1793, is said by Mr. Olden, in his Historical Sketches and Early Reminiscences, to have been estab- lished seven or eight miles southeast of Dunlap's, on the east bank of the Great Miami, opposite the present vil- lage of Miamitown. Little seems to be known concern- ing it. Mr. Olden says :

The settlers around the station were few in number; no preparations for defense were made; and, having been established late in the period of Indian hostilities, no depredations were committed in the neighbor- hood, consequently no important historical events are attached to it.

ORGANIZATION.

Colerain is one of the oldest townships. It is the creation of the court of general quarter sessions of the peace of 1794, when its boundaries were defined as fol- lows :

Beginning at the southwest corner of the fractional township on the Big Miami, in the second entire range, thence up the Miami to the north line of said fractional township, according to Symmes' plat; thence east to the meridian on the west side of the college township; thence south to the southern boundary of said fractional township; thence west to the place of beginning.

This extensive boundary brought in a tract of five sec- tions breadth in what is now Butler county, additional to the present limits of the township in that direction.

The cattle brand of the township was ordered to be the letter G.

In 1803 the boundaries of Colerain were so defined as to include townships one and two, in the first entire range, and the western tier in township three, same range, and sections eighteen, twelve and six, in township two, and section thirty-six in township three, second fractional range, and so much of the second entire range as lies north of and adjoining the said township of Colerain. This definition of boundaries gave the township all its present territory, together with the western tier of sec- tions in the present Springfield, the three easternmost sections in the north tier of Green, and the northwestern- most section in Mill Creek. The provision for taking in a part of the second entire range gave the township only its present short line of sections on the north, as Butler county had just been erected, and the remainder of the range lies within its borders. The total area of Colerain is now twenty-six thousand seven hundred and forty- eight acres.

By the order of 1803 the voters of Colerain were directed to meet at the dwelling of John Haryman and choose two justices of the peace.

The following named were the first officers of the township (1794):

John Dunlap, clerk; Samuel Campbell, constable; John Shaw, overseer of the poor; Isaac Gibson, Samuel Cresswell, John Davis, viewers of enclosures and apprais- ers of damages.

In 1809 Judah Willey was appointed by the governor of the State a justice of the peace for Colerain township, "to continue in office for three years from the third day

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HISTORY OF HAMILTON COUNTY, OHIO.

of April, instant." The following named citizens of Colerain are also known to have served the township as justices:

1819, Isaac Sparks, John Runyan, James Carnahan, Joseph Cilley; 1825, William H. Moore, Jonathan Cilley, Stewart McGill; 1829, Stewart McGill, Noah Runyan; 1865, John L. Haukins, George T. Marsh, George W. Haisch; 1866, the same, with Martin Barns, jr .; 1867-8, same as 1866, except Haukins; 1869-70, Barns, Marsh, J. H. Wyckoff; 1871, Barns, Wyckoff, Thomas P. Mc- Henry; 1872-3, McHenry, Wyckoff, John Leibrook; 1874, Leibrook, Wyckoff, Joseph Jones; 1875-6, Wyck- off, Jones, Barns; 1877, Wyckoff, Barns, William Arnold; 1878-9, Arnold, Wyckoff, John Hamaker; 1880, Arnold, Wyckoff.

SETTLEMENTS.

Among the early settlers in Colerain township, besides Dunlap, Campbell, and others already named, were the Brown, Halstead, Huston, and other old families, some of which will be found noticed in the brief narratives be- low.

In 1796 the Hughes family, the head of which was then Ezekiel Hughes, and which was afterwards promi- nent among the pioneers of Whitewater township, settled upon a tract in the valley of the Blue Rock creek, nearly opposite New Baltimore, awaiting the time when the Congress lands west of the river should be open to set- tlement. With them was Edward Bebb, father of Gov- ernor William Bebb. Some interesting notes of their residence here will be found in the history of Whitewater township.

Hon. Nehemiah Wade was born in Cincinnati, August 18, 1793, and died near Venice, Butler county, July 24, 1879. He was the son of David E. Wade, an old pioneer of Hamilton county, and was married to Miss Wallace, of Cincinnati. Four sons and a daughter were the fruit of this union. His second wife was Mrs. Jane Dick, daugh- ter of Isaac Anderson, and widow of George Dick. To them was born one danghter, Sarah, who was the wife of Rev. McMillan. Mr. Wade was a teller in one of the Cincinnati banks when only seventeen years of age. In 1818 he was elected justice of the peace of Ross township, and continued in office for six years; in 1841 was elected by the State legislature an associate judge of the court of common pleas for Butler county, and was re- elected in 1847, serving in that office for twelve years.

The Oxford Female college received a donation from him of ten thousand dollars. He united with the Pres- byterian church of Bethel in 1818, and in 1828, with a few others, joined in organizing the Presbyterian church of Venice, and was a ruling elder of this church until his death.

John Huston was born in Ulster, Ireland, and is the great-great-grandfather of the Hustons whose sketches are annexed below. He came to America in an early day, and served in the battle of Brandywine, under Washing- ton, as a captain of a company. He was long lived, and possessed a sturdy character, which traits seem to have been transmitted to his numerous descendants, as an in- heritance. He was buried in Lancaster county, Pennsyl-

vania. Three of his sons, Paul, Samuel and David, emigra- ted to Colerain township in 1795, David settling finally in Greene county, where he was for twenty-one years an as- sociate judge and sent twice to the State legislature. His numerous descendants are in Butler county and around Dayton, Ohio.

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History of Hamilton County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches, Part 66

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp; Williams, L.A. & co., Cleveland, O., pub Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio, L. A. Williams Number of Pages: 590

Author: Ford, Henry A., comp; Ford, Kate B., joint comp; Williams, L.A. & co., Cleveland, O., pub
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio, L. A. Williams
Number of Pages: 590