History of Knox County, Ohio, its past and present, Part 38

Author: Hill, N. N. (Norman Newell), comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A.A. & Co., Mt. Vernon, Ohio
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Mt. Vernon, Ohio : A. A. Graham & Co.
Number of Pages: 1096

USA > Ohio > Knox County > History of Knox County, Ohio, its past and present > Part 38

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

The valuation of Knox county in 1826 was re- turned as follows:

Land, 301,695 acres, valued at $716,070

Town property . 81,362

Mercantile capital. 60,000

Houses. 26,340

Horses, 2,467 98,680

Cattle, 4,483. 35,864

Total. $1,018,316

The following from Mr. Norton's history is wor- thy of preservation as illustrative of the spirit of the times:

One of the "Phunny " characters in our county's history is our old friend Seeley Simpkins, who is now in his eighty-ninth year, and was born in West Jersey, the precise spot he doesn't know-nor is it material to the thread of this discourse. In 1804, when five years old, he was brought by his father from Morgantown, Virginia, and his recollection of Mount Vernon runs from the time Captain Walker lived in a little log hut close by the old sulphur spring. Seeley says that its water had a great medicine reputation with the Indians. He was a great favorite with the squaws and pappooses, by reason of his un- common musical talent. He could mimic any sound of varment or human, surpassed the lute of Orpheus, and outwhistled all creation. He furnished the music for early musters, and when it took four counties to make a regiment, he gave a challenge to out-whistle any man within them. He recollects with much pride the encomiums of Adjutant Stilley; who, he says, was

" the best judge of swill music then in the country." He fre- quented race tracks and drew crowds and supplied hoe-downs on demand. For a long time he labored under the disadvantage of making his pilgrimages on foot, but having the good luck to hear at preaching that "Balaam took his ass and saddled him," he concluded to take the next thing to it-his bull-and saddle and ride him. He was a nice little muscular brute, raised by him, and being gentle, was trained so that he travelled on See- ley's circuit. Often have we seen Seeley in all his glory ride to the mill with his grist, and while it was being ground he would take an airing around the town, whistling as he went. The races were usually in front of Norton's mill, on the flat, and there Seeley acquired "immortality and fame." On the occasion of a grand race, when the Critchfields, Sam Arbuckle, and the Creek nation were in town in their strength, a race was gotten up by Hugh Neal, John Gregg and John Kellifer, between Seeley's bull and Tom Irvine's horse. The stakes were up, judges took their stand, and expectation was soon gratified by the entrance of the steeds. At starting the little bull's tail received a sudden and severe twist, causing him to bellow lustily as Seeley with "vaulting ambition pricked the sides of his intent ;" and goaded to desperation, the bull pawed the earth and sped on with all his might, while the air was rent with the shouts and yells of the spectators, frightening him almost out of his skin. The horse, altogether unused to such noise and confusion, inclined to balk, shied to one side, and trembling from fear, could not be brought to the "outcome" in time, and the judges honestly pronounced in favor of Seeley's bull. Amid the applause of the large con- course, Seeley proudly mounted his charger, and as he stroked his neck, complacently took the wager and rode home a happier man than ever in his life before or since. The poet says:

" Honor and fame from no condition rise Act well your part-there all the honor lies."

Seeley has done this, and his name is inscribed on the page of his country's history, to be remembered long after those who have laughed at his career shall have been forgotten.

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HISTORY OF KNOX COUNTY.

CHAPTER XXII. PIONEER TIMES.

WHERE THE PIONEERS CAME FROM-THEIR CONDITION AND CHARACTER-WHAT THEY LIVED ON-THE "TRUCK PATCH" -- HOMINY BLOCKS-MILLS-COOKING -- CULTIVA- TION OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS-WILD TURKEYS-WHISKEY SUPERSTITIONS-DRESS OF THE MEN-THE FLAX WHEEL AND LOOM-MORE ABOUT CLOTHING-"KICKING .FROL- ICS"-DRESS OF THE WOMEN-WHITE KID SLIPPERS- DYEING-FOURTH OF JULY AND MILITIA MUSTERS -- CABINS AND THEIR CONSTRUCTION-FURNITURE OF THE CABINS-HOOSIER POEM-EARLY LAND LAWS-TOMA- HAWK RIGHTS-HUNTING-EARLY WEDDINGS-DANCING AND "HOUSE WARMING," SCHOOLING, SCHOOL TEACHERS, ETC .- SPELLING SCHOOLS-CONCLUSION.

So the sun climbs up, and on, and over, And the days go out and the tide comes in, And the pale moon rubs on the purple cover Till worn as thin and as bright as tin ; But the ways are dark and the days are dreary, And the dreams of youth are but dust in age,

And the heart gets harden'd and the hands grow weary Holding them up for their heritage. -Joaquin Miller.

PIONEER days for Knox county and the State of Ohio are gone forever; the wolf, bear, deer, Indian, and all associations and reminiscences of those "good old days" have long since faded from sight, if not from memory, and the pioneers, most of them, are gone, too-

"How few, all weak and withered of their force, Wait on the verge of dark eternity."

It remains to write their history, and the history of the times in which they lived, as of another race of beings; and, if possible, to impress the best of it upon the character of the present and future generations; for it is a history worthy of imitation and preservation. A study of the characteristics of the pioneer fathers and mothers is calculated to ennoble the mind and strengthen the hand for the battle of life.

It would require a volume to tell of their habits and customs; of their trapping and hunting; of their solitary lives in the great woods, surrounded by wild animals and wilder men; of their dress, manners, and peculiar ways; of their cabins and furniture; of the long winter evenings by the log- heap fire upon which -.

"We piled, with care, our nightly stack Of wood against the chimney-back --

The oaken log, green, huge, and thick, And on its top the stout back-stick ;

The knotty fore-stick laid apart, And filled between with curious art The ragged brush ; then hovering near We watch the first red blaze appear, Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam On whitewashed wall and sagging beam, Until the old rude-furnished room Burst flower-like into rosy bloom

It was a free, happy, independent life ; full of hard- ships, indeed, but sweetened with innocence and peace; with alternations of labor, pleasure and rest.

The pioneers of Knox were largely from New England, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, who sought to better their condition by making permanent homes in the wilderness west of the Ohio river. They came largely on foot over the Alleghany mountains, many of them having a single horse and wagon, or a two-horse wagon, in which their worldly possessions were carried, and in which the very old or very young, only, were allowed to ride. Many of them were poor, and, like Jack in the story, "came to seek their fortunes." A few came with ox teams; some with horses, two, three or four of them; some in two-wheeled carts, while others packed all their worldly possessions on a couple of old "critters." Instances are related of a bag on top, or snugged down in among the bundles, made somewhat after the fashion of a double knapsack, and a couple of babies poked their little bronzed faces out of the slits in this novel conveyance, and rode along like little "pos- sums."

From fifteen to fifty-five days were required in making the toilsome journey to the far West, by the first pioneers. Streams had to be forded frequently. It was not unusual for a team to give out on the way and cause a delay of a fortnight or a month to one of the families. The joy was very great when the team hove in sight and the family rejoined the party who had found "the end of the road," or stopped until the men looked for a suitable loca- cation.

When once settled and the cabin erected, it was not only a home and shelter for the pioneer and his family, but for every stranger who passed that way, "without money and without price." The latch string was always out, for these pioneers were great hearted people, and no man, be he white, black or red, was turned away empty. Their cab-

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ins, often not more than fifteen or twenty feet square, made of rough beech logs, with the bark still adhering to them, were frequently occupied by a dozen or even a score of people for a night, and no complaints made for want of room; genuine hospitality, always finds room enough and never apologizes for lack of more; and when breakfast time came there was no apology for the scarcity of knives, forks and spoons, for "fingers were made before any of these." The fare was homely, but generally abundant. What to eat, drink and wear were questions not, perhaps, difficult of solution in those days. The first was the easiest to solve. The deer, the bear, the wild turkey, the rabbit, the squirrel, all started up and said, or seemed to say, "eat me." These had been prepared for the red men of the forest, and were equally abundant for the pioneer. The forest was full of game, the streams full of fish, and wild fruits were abundant. To get bread required both patience and labor; the staff of life was one of the articles that must be earned "by the sweat of the brow;" it could not be gathered from the bushes, fished from the streams, or brought down with the rifle. Every backwoods- man once a year added to his clearing, at least, a "truck patch." This was the hope and stay of the family; the receptacle of corn, beans, melons, po- tatoes, squashes pumpkins, turnips, etc., each vari- ety more perfectly developed and delicious because it grew in virgin soil. The corn and beans planted in May brought roasting ears and succotash in Au- gust. Potatoes came with the corn, and the cellar, built in the side of a convenient hill, and filled with the contents of the truck patch, secured the family against want. When the corn grew too hard for roasting ears, and was yet too soft to grind in the mill, it was reduced to meal by a grater, and wheth- er stirred into mush or baked into johnnycake, it made, for people with keen appetites and good stomachs, excellent food. Place before one of those brawny backwoodsmen a square foot of johnnycake and a venison steak broiled on hick- ory coals, and no art of civilization could produce a more satisfactory meal.

Next to the grater comes the hominy block, an article in common use among the pioneers. It consisted simply of a block of wood-a section of a tree, perhaps-with a hole burned, or dug, into

it a foot deep, in which corn was pulverized with a pestle. Sometimes this block was inside the cabin, where it served as a seat for the bashful young buckskinned backwoodsman while "sparking" his girl; sometimes a convenient stump in front of the cabin door was prepared for, and made one of the best of hominy blocks. When pigs began to be raised, the natural relation between pork and beaten corn suggested the grand old idea of "hog and hominy."

Hominy blocks did not last long, for mills came quite early and superseded them, yet these mills were often so far apart that in stormy weather, or for want of transportation, the pioneer was com- pelled to resort to his hominy block, or go without bread. In winter, the mills were frozen up nearly all the time, and when a thaw came and the ice broke, if the mill was not swept away entirely by the floods, it was so thronged with pioneers, each with his sack of corn, that some of them were often compelled to camp out near the mill and wait several days for their turn. When the grist was ground, if they were so fortunate as to possess an ox, a horse, or mule, for the purpose of trans- portation, they were happy. It was not unusual to go from ten to twenty miles to mill, through the pathless, unbroken forest, and to be benighted on the journey, and chased, or treed by wolves. A majority of the pioneers, however, settled in the vicinity of a stream, upon which mills were rapidly erected. These mills were very primitive affairs- mere "corn crackers"-but they were an improve- ment on the hominy block. They merely ground the corn, the pioneer must do his own bolting. A wire sieve was then one of the most important articles of household furniture. It always hung in its place, on a wooden peg, just under the ladder that reached to the loft. The meal was sifted and the finest used for bread. How delicious was that "Indian pone," baked in a large deep skillet, which was placed upon coals raked from the fire-place to the hearth. Fresh coals were continually placed under it and upon the iron lid until the loaf, five or six inches thick, was done through. This was a different thing from johnnycake; it was better, and could not always be had, for to make it good, a little wheat flour was needed, and wheat flour was a precious thing in those very early days.

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HISTORY OF KNOX COUNTY.

A road cut through the forest to the mill, and a wagon for hauling the grist, were great advantages, the latter especially was often a seven days' wonder to the children of a neighborhood, and the happy owner of one often did, for years, the milling for a whole neighborhood. About once a month this good neighbor, who was in exceptionally good cir- cumstances, because able to own a wagon, would go about through the neighborhood, gather up the grists and take them to mill, often spending several days in the operation, and never think of charging for his time and trouble.

Cooking, in pioneer times, was an interesting operation.

The trammel and hooks were found among the well-to-do families, as time progressed. Previous to this, the lug-pole, across the inside of the chim- ney, about even with the chamber floor, answered for a trammel. A chain was suspended from it, and hooks were attached, and from this hung the mush-pot or tea-kettle. If a chain was not availa- ble, a wooden hook was in reach of the humblest and poorest. When a meal was not in preparation, and the hook was endangered by fire, it was shoved aside to one end of the lug-pole for safety. Iron ware was very scarce in those days. Instances are related where the one pot served at a meal to boil water for mint tea or crust coffee, to bake the bread, boil the potatoes, and fry the meat. By fine management this was accomplished. Frequently the kettle had no lid, and a flat stone, heated, and handled with the tongs, was used in stead of one, when a loaf or pone or pumpkin pie was baked. A shortcake could be baked by heating the kettle moderately, putting in the cake, and tipping it up sidewise before the glowing fire. Bannock, or board-cake was made by mixing the cornmeal up with warm watter, a pinch of salt and a trifle of lard, into a thick dough, spreading it on a clean, sweet-smelling clapboard, patting it with the cleanest of hands, and standing it slanting before the fire, propped into the right position by a flat-iron behind it. Baked hastily, this made a delicious cake, sweet and nutty and fresh, and the pretty stamp of the mother's dear, unselfish, loving fingers was plainly detected in the crisp crust.

The cultivation of domestic animals, both beasts and fowls, for the purposes of food, began early.

Cows for milk, butter, beef, and leather, and swine for pork, were bred, ear marked and turned into the woods to browse. "Root hog or die," was the law for man and-beast, but the woods were prolific and the hogs grew fat. The young pigs were ex- ceptionally a sweet morsel for the hear Bruin always singled out these young animals in prefer- ence to any other meat; but the pigs were often successfully defended by the older hogs, who, upon the least signs of distress from one of their num- ber, would go boldly to the rescue, and fiercely at- tack the foe, however formidable; often the pig was released and bruin, or the panther, compelled to ascend a tree for safety.

The boys often found wild turkeys' nests in the woods, and would bring home the eggs, and place them, to be hatched, under a trusty old hen, in an outside chimney corner, where they could assist the hen in defending the eggs and brood from the opossum or hawk. A flock of turkeys sometimes originated in this way, but more often, as tbey grew to maturity, they would fly away into the woods and never reappear. This grandest of birds is identical in civilized and savage life, and is the peculiar production of America. The wild ones were always a dark brown, like the leaves of their native woods, but when tamed, or "civilized," the diversity of color becomes endless.

When corn bread and milk were eaten for break- fast, hog and hominy for dinner and mush and milk for supper, there was little room for tea and coffee; and at a time when one bushel of wheat for a pound of coffee and four bushels for a pound of tea, were considered a fair exchange, but little of these very expensive articles was used.

Next to water, the drink of the pioneers was whiskey-copper-still rye whiskey. Everybody drank it. It was supposed to be indispensable to health, to strength and endurance during the labors of the day, and to sleep at night. It was supposed to be absolutely indispensable to warmth and animation in cold, chilly winter weather. It was .the sacrament of friendship and hospitality; it was in universal use; yet there was probably less drunk- enness in those days than at present. The whiskey was absolutely pure; it was not drugged, doctored and poisoned as it is to-day, and, although enough of it would bring drunkenness, it did not bring deliri-

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um-tremens, or leave the system prostrated, and the victim with a headache upon "sobering up." It was the first thing in demand as an article of com- merce. Stills for its manufacture sprang up every- where, all along the streams. Pioneers soon found a market at these stills for their corn, hence corn became the great crop, and whiskey the great article of commerce. It was the only thing that would bring money, and money they must have to pay taxes. Whiskey could be purchased for twelve or fifteen cents per gallon and paid for in corn, and the barrel of whiskey in the cellar, was as common as the barrel of cider was later. The whiskey that was not consumed at home was shipped on flat- boats or pirogues* on the Muskingum, Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans and sold for Spanish gold. The first rebellion against the Government of the United States, commonly called the whiskey insurrection, had its growth out of the hardships of the Scotch-Irish of western Pennsyl- vania, who in the mother country had learned to love whiskey and hate gaugers; and this popula- tion gave tone and character to the first settlers of eastern Ohio. There was this apology for the production of whiskey, that it was the only means of disposing of surplus crops, or bringing money into the country.

The hardy pioneers, after disposing of their cargo of whiskey in New Orleans, would often set out on foot for home, a distance of say fifteen hun- dred miles. Think of it, ye who ride in palace coaches at the rate of forty miles an hour while re- clining in cushioned seats, smoking your cigar, and reading in your morning paper the happenings of yesterday in Europe and America. While apolo- gizing somewhat for those whiskey days, it may be well to say that whiskey was not probably of any special benefit, was not to be compared to the pure water of their springs, and that too many of the pioneers drank too much of it, and that too often it made their eyes and noses red, their children ragged and their wives wretched, as it does to-day.

In every neighborhood there were a few families who had brought with them the superstitions of their forefathers, and the result was that some poor man or woman was reputed to be a witch. Not much proof was required. If a woman had very

black eyes, or stepped stealthily, or spoke in a low tone of voice, and the gossips said she was in league with the prince of the black art, it did not take long to fasten the reputation upon her, and the ignorant looked with awe and fear upon the poor hunted, watched creature. And so they greased their broom handles, and laid dead snakes head foremost in the paths, and hung horse-shoes over the cabin doors, and were careful to spit in the fire, and not look over their left shoulders when they passed the abode of the doomed one. But sometimes her wrath fell upon them, and the oxen would lie down in the furrow, and no power could move them, not even hot coals, nor boiling soap- suds, when poured upon them. One time, when the family of a poor man rose in the early morning, one of them lay still, and slept heavily and breathed noisily. On examination it was discov- ered that he had been witch-ridden; his sides were black and blue from the kicking heels that had urged him on to his best paces, and the corners of his mouth were torn from cruel bits guided by jerking hands. People who were objects of the witch's spite found a brood of downy young chicks in their chests, and piles of sprawling kittens un- der the half-bushel; and they overheard deep, cav- ernous voices, and fine piping ones, in conclave at midnight up in the air and the treetops, and under the dead leaves, and beside the chimney; and tracks, with a cloven foot among them, were dis- cernible. Think of the misery of a poor creature reputed to be a witch, met in her own lowly cabin by a weeping mother beseeching her to remove the spell of incantation that her sick child might re- cover! No denial of the absurd charge could avail her; no sympathy offered was accepted; and the foolish mother could do no more than return home, burn some woollen rags to impregnate the out-door air; stand the child on its head while she could count fifty backwards; grease its spine with the oil of some wild animal; cut the tip hairs off the tail of a black cat, and bind them on the fore- head of the persecuted one, while she repeated a certain sentence in the Lord's Prayer. Then, in her own language, "If the child died it died; and if it lived, it lived."

A superstitious old man was often found who could divine secrets, tell fortunes, foretell events,

* A canoe dug out of a log, or two canoes lashed together.

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find the places where money was buried, cure wens by words, blow the fire out of burns, mumble over felons and catarrhs, remove warts, and, with his mineral ball search out where stolen goods were hidden. The "mineral ball" to which the super- stitious ascribed such marvellous power, was no less than one of those hairy calculi found in the stom- achs of cattle, a ball formed compactly of the hair which collects on the tongue of the animal while licking itself. This man, one of the class whose taint infects every neighborhood, could not from any consideration be prevailed upon to leave a graveyard first of all. "Why, drat it!" he would say, "it's sure and sartin death; never knowed a fellow to leave the graveyard fust but what he'd be the next 'un planted there!" When an old neigh- bor of his died suddenly, this man said, with his thumbs hooked into his trousers' pockets restfully: "Why, drat him, he might a know'd more'n to leave the graveyard fust man! As soon as I seed him do it I says to myself, says I, "Dan, you're a goner ; you're done for; they'll tuck you under next time, an' nobody but your booby of a self to blame for it!"

On the frontier, and particularly among those who were much in the habit of hunting and going on scouts and campaigns, the dress of the men was partly Indian and partly that of civilized nations. The hunting shirt was universally worn. This was a kind of loose frock reaching half way down the thighs, with large sleeves, open at the front, and so large as to lap. over a foot or more when belted. The cape was large and sometimes fringed with a ravelled piece of cloth of a different color from that of the hunting shirt itself. The bosom of the hunting shirt served as a pocket to hold bread, cakes, jerk, tow for wiping the gun-barrel, or any other necessary article for the hunter or warrior. The belt, which was always tied behind, answered several purposes besides that of holding the dress together. In cold weather the mittens and some- times the bullet-bag occupied the front part of it. To the right side was suspended the tomahawk, and to the left the scalping-knife in its leathern sheath.

The hunting shirt was generally made of linsey, sometimes of coarse linen or deer skins. These last were very cold and uncomfortable in wet

weather. A pair of drawers, or breeches and leg- gins were the dress for the thighs, a pair of mocca- sins answered for the feet. These were made of dressed deer skin and were mostly of a single piece, with a gathering seam on the top of the foot and another from the bottom of the heel, without gath- ers, as high or a little higher than the ankle-joint. Flaps were left on each side to reach some distance up the legs. These were nicely adapted to the ankles and lower part of the leg by thongs of deer skin, so that no dust, gravel or snow could get within the moccasons. In cold weather the moccasons were stuffed with deer's hair or dry leaves to keep the feet warm ; but in wet weather, it was usually said that wearing them was "a decent way of going barefooted;" and such was the fact owing to the spongy texture of the leather of which they were made. Owing to this defective covering for the feet more than to any other cir- cumstance, the greater number of the hunters and warriors were often afflicted with rheumatism in their limbs. Of this disease they were all appre- hensive in cold and wet weather, and therefore al- ways slept with their feet to the fire to prevent or cure it as well as they could. This practice, unquestion- ably, had a very salutary effect, and prevented many of them from becoming confirmed cripples in early life.

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History of Knox County, Ohio, its past and present, Part 38

Author: Hill, N. N. (Norman Newell), comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A.A. & Co., Mt. Vernon, Ohio Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Mt. Vernon, Ohio : A. A. Graham & Co. Number of Pages: 1096

Author: Hill, N. N. (Norman Newell), comp; Graham, A. A. (Albert Adams), 1848-; Graham, A.A. & Co., Mt. Vernon, Ohio
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Mt. Vernon, Ohio : A. A. Graham & Co.
Number of Pages: 1096