History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 27

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THE FIRST JAIL

was erected about 1832, by Elisha W. Howland, under contract with the county commissioners. The walls, and ceilings, and floor of this building were composed of hewn timbers eighteen inches square, laid one upon another and bolted through with iron bolts. The windows were secured by iron grating of perpendicular bars one inch square, about three inches apart, and passing through horizontal flat bars about one inch thick, and with a space between them of about three inches. All these bars were deeply inserted into the timbers at the sides, and above and

below the open space cut for the windows. This jail was completed about the year 1832. The courthouse was completed earlier, probably about 1826.

THESE BUILDINGS

were used for their respective purposes the one for the administration of justice and the county offices, the other for the confinement of criminals, until the year 1843, when another and better courthouse and a better jail were built by the county.

In the old jail above described, Sperry was incarcerated for the murder of his wife; in this old courthouse he was tried, condemned, and sentenced to be hung.

The same jail confined Thompson for the murder of a young lady at Bellevue.

In this old jail Sperry committed suicide, in the presence of Thompson, to escape the gallows.

The walls of this old courthouse echoed the arguments of attorneys Hiram R. Pettibone, Peter Yates, Asa Calkins, Nathaniel B. Eddy, Homer Everett, L. B. Otis, C. L. Boalt, E. B. Sadler, Brice J. Bartlett, W. W. Culver, and fairly shook with the crashing voice of Cooper K. Watson, in his prime, when he prosecuted Sperry with wonderful powers of eloquence and logic.

These buildings served their purposes well, until the increasing population and legal business of the county required more room and structures more secure from de- struction by fire.

Soon after the erection of the brick courthouse the lots on which the old courthouse and jail were situated were sold by the commissioners.

The deed conveys the lots numbers one hundred and three and one hundred and four to John Karshner for the sum of eight hundred and ten dollars, and bears date January 13, 1845, and the county commissioners who executed the conveyance

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were: Paul Tew, John S. Gardner, and James Rose.

On the 14th day of March, A. D. 1845, John Karshner conveyed the same lots, for the same amount of consideration, to Daniel Schock, David Deal; John Stahl, John Heberling, and Frederick Grund, as trustees f "The United German Evangelical

Lutheran, and German Evangelical Reformed St. John's Church, of Fremont." Rev. Henry Lang, pastor of the church, took possession of the buildings soon after the sale. The jail was used for a stable, the court room was converted into a place of worship, while the room below served as a residence for the worthy pastor and his family many years. The two societies separated, and the property is now owned exclusively by the Lutheran Church of Fremont, and the whole building is used as a parsonage of the church.

The jail was taken down several years ago, but the old first frame courthouse is still standing, with all its timbers strong and sound.

THOUGHTS ABOUT THE OLD COURTHOUSE.

On the judge's seat in this old courthouse sat John C. Wright, and as one of the judges of the Supreme Court of the State under the old constitution, heard and determined causes with wonderful promptness and marked ability. It was here that Judge Wright heard a divorce case, the cause alleged being cruel treatment of the wife by the husband. The testimony showed a chronic habit of indulging bad temper by both parties, but the wife, who sought the divorce, was the greater and more talented scold of the two. Judge Wright patiently heard the evidence and arguments in the case. As soon as the arguments were closed, the judge, in his sharp, ringing voice began, and said: "This is a petition for divorce, on the ground of extreme cruelty. The

proof shows that the parties have been about equally cruel toward each other, and taking the evidence all into consideration, the Court is satisfied that in this case two people have been joined in the holy bonds of wedlock who are possessed of very unhappy tempers, but if bad temper should be held to be sufficient cause for divorce, we fear that few matrimonial contracts in Ohio would stand the test. The divorce is therefore refused." More such decisions are needed to preserve the sanctity of the marriage relation in more recent times.

In this old courthouse Judge Ebenezer Lane sat and announced decisions as learned and sound as any since his day. In the old court room Brice J. Bartlett, Nathaniel B. Eddy, Lucius B. Otis, and Homer Everett first appeared in the practice of the law. The old house has served for a time as the temple of justice, then as a temple for illustrating God's mercy to man, and finally as the abode of a pious, peaceful, and happy family.

THE SECOND COURTHOUSE AND JAIL.

The county, in 1840, had so increased in inhabitants and business that the old courthouse, twenty-four by thirty-six feet in dimensions, no longer afforded room for the proper and convenient transaction of the public business, nor a safe repository for the public records. Hence public opinion urged the county commissioners to

the construction of a safer

and more commodious building. It appears by the journal of the county commissioners, that the public desire put them in motion towards this object in March or April, 1840. The first recorded action of the commissioners is found in their journal under date of April 3, 1840, when they met at the auditor's office with Nathaniel B. Eddy, then county auditor. They met, as the journal entry shows, and not having completed their view and location of a

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site for the courthouse, adjourned until the next morning. The next journal entry shows that on the 4th of April, 1840, the commissioners met pursuant to adjournment, and having completed the survey and location of a site for a courthouse, adjourned without delay. The commissioners then were: Paul Tew, of Townsend township; Jonas Smith, of Ballville township; and John Bell, of Sandusky township.

The commissioners, at their meeting under date of June 2, 1840, after having published for proposals, met, and opened and examined offers filed, and after having them under advisement accepted the pro- posal of Isaac Knapp, to build the courthouse and jail, for the sum of fourteen thousand five hundred and fifty dollars.

On the 4th day of June, 1840, the county commissioners ordered a levy on all taxable property of the county, of one mill and a half on the dollar valuation, for courthouse and jail purposes, to be held exclusively for those purposes and no other.

PLAN OF THE HOUSE.

The contract between the commissioners and Mr. Knapp, and the plans and specifications of the building, were not made matter of record, and cannot now be found, but the following items respecting the materials, form, and dimensions of the building as erected by Mr. Knapp, are gathered from those who are familiar with the courthouse before any alteration was made.

The length of the building east and west, was fully sixty-seven feet; the breadth north and south, was fully forty-five feet.

The basement was the jail, built of large blocks of cut limestone, with a wide hall along the north basement wall, and the south side partitioned by thick walls of cut limestone into cells for prisoners. These walls were all of unusual thickness,

and the cells closed by doors made of strong iron bars. The floor of the jail was of very heavy limestone flagging, and the ceiling of the same material. Both floors, that is, first and second floors above the jail, were of sandstone flagging laid in mortar, on heavy timbers placed near together.

The height of the wall from the eaves trough to the ground was forty-five feet; the roof, what mechanics denominate quarter- pitch, covered with pine shingles, with belfry a little east of the centre. The style was plain Grecian, with a porch on the front, or eastern gable end, supported by four fluted columns of woodwork, about eight feet deep, floored with dressed limestone flagging. A flight of steps, extending north and south, and in front centre about thirty feet, led from the pavement to the porch, which was elevated about four feet above the sidewalk.

The exact time when the building was completed, or when it was first used, is now, after the lapse of forty years, rather difficult to find. But certain facts of record serve to show a near approximation to the time the building was completed, so far as Mr. Knapp's contract had to do with it. For instance, at a meeting of the commissioners, under date of December 5, 1843, they ordered, as appears by their journal, that as soon as the new courthouse should be finished, the auditor should let, to the lowest bidder, a contract for finishing and furnishing the inside of the clerk's office, according to plans and specifications furnished by the clerk. This entry indicates very clearly that the courthouse was not completed at the date of the order, December 5, 1843. But under date of August 1, 1844, we find an entry in the commissioners' journal, reciting that a large number of taxpayers, being convinced that Isaac Knapp had lost largely in building the courthouse and

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jail for the county, asked the commissioners to make him an extra allowance, to cover his losses, and they then ordered an allowance of two thousand dollars, to be paid out of the county treasury. This indicates that the job had been completed before the time this' extra allowance had been made, and leads to the conclusion that the spring term of the court of common pleas, of the year 1844, was held in the new courthouse.

The building was intended to be safe against fire, but the stone floors were found to be objectionable, especially for the court room, on account of the noise produced by walking on the stone flagging. The stone floor in the court room, after a few years use was removed, and a wooden floor, with manila carpet, put down, which was a great improvement. Soon after, the stone floors in the offices were removed, for reasons of health, and wood floors substituted for them, but the stone floor in the hall is yet kept in use as it was originally laid. The jail, made with so much care and cost, was, in a few years, found to be so damp and unhealthy that it was repeatedly reported by the grand jury to be a nuisance, and finally the com- missioners built a jail on the rear of the courthouse lot, above ground, with means of ventilation, which is now occupied for the purpose.

COURTHOUSE ENLARGED.

On the 10th of September, 1870, the court room was again found too small for the convenient transaction of business, and the commissioners on that date contracted with D. L. June & Son to extend the building westward a distance of forty feet, with dimensions of width and height, and style of work, to correspond with the main building. The June contract was only for the mason work, and the agreed price was eight thousand nine hundred dollars.

After D. L. June & Son had finished the extension of the courthouse, the com- missioners contracted with Jacob Myers for doing the joiner work of the enlarged court room, who completed the work in the fall of 1871, at a cost of about one thousand five hundred dollars. The court room was completed and occupied by the court in the fall of 1871. Hitherto the court room and offices had been warmed by stoves in each of the separate rooms and apartments. About this time two important ideas came over the county authorities in the way of progressive means of economy and safety. One was the heating of the courthouse by steam, and the other that of providing fireproof and burglarproof vaults for the preservation of the county records in the offices of the clerk, auditor, recorder, and probate judge; also a capacious time-lock burglarproof safe for the county treasury.

STEAM HEATING APPARATUS.

On the 6th of September, 1871, the commissioners contracted with Sales A. June, of Fremont, to put into the court house a boiler and furnace in the basement, with a tank and heater sufficient to furnish steam to warm the courthouse; and with Davis & Shaw, of Toledo, to furnish pipe and coils sufficient to warm the halls, offices, and the court room in the house. They contracted to pay Sales A. June, for his work, the sum of six hundred dollars. The amount to be paid Davis & Shaw, for their work and materials, was two thousand seven hundred dollars. The steam heating apparatus was completed and used for the purpose of warming early in the winter of 1871-72, and has ever since worked satisfactorily, and is likely to be long continued in use.

From the completion of the courthouse to the year 1880, the county clerk's office had been kept on the first or lower floor of the courthouse, in the northeast room.

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This arrangement was inconvenient, especially during sessions of the court, for to get access to the files and records of the office the clerk must leave the court room and descend the stone stairway. After the election of the present efficient and experienced clerk, Basil Meek, he suggested an improved arrangement of the clerk's office, by removing it up stairs on the same floor as the court room, and adjoining it in the rear. This was done in 1880; and now the attorneys and all concerned feel gratified with the improvement. A new fireproof vault was constructed up stairs in the new office, for the preservation of the court records, and there is now a sense of convenience and safety in the well-arranged clerk's office.

We have thus traced the building of the second courthouse in the county to its present condition; and if the reader shall be impressed that the account is tedious in unimportant and uninteresting details, we suggest that as time passes, and when the county in its multiplied wealth and population shall, in the progress of events, build a more commodious and elegant structure in which to transact the business of an advanced generation, the particulars we have given will become more and more curious and interesting.

The difference in cost, convenience, safety, and elegance, between the first simple framed courthouse, we have described, and this second one we have given an account of will not be a tithe of the difference between the present building and the next one the people will erect for the same purposes.

THE COUNTY INFIRMARY.

Order is heaven's first law, and this confess'd, Some must be richer, greater than the rest.

Pope's Essay on Man.

The Lord said when on earth in the flesh, For the poor always you have with you.

In these utterances we see that the poet

philosopher simply and beautifully amplifies what the Divine Master of humanity had tersely uttered centuries before the poet lived. The utterances are both true, and both enunciate, not only what was and still is true, but what is always to be true. The word poor is applied to many objects, as our language is now framed, but no doubt in the quotations above given the word was used to signify persons who were destitute of money and property, and needed the assistance of others to obtain the proper means of subsistence, and would seem to embrace all who are found in that condition, whether by loss or lack of property, or by the mental or physical inability to acquire their own proper subsistence. When we consider the number of imbecile, and deaf and dumb, and blind from birth, born into this breathing world, how many men and women, once able to do their full share of productive labor, are disabled by the lapse of time, and decay of their powers. When we observe how many who are well endowed with will, and brain, and muscle, and who have worked well to maintain, improve, and ornament the great fabric of civilized society, are by fire and flood, cyclone and earthquake, and war, and all the minor accidents to which property, and life, and limb, and reason are subject, on sea and on land, society may well settle down to the conclusion that "the poor will be always with us," and that Christ in this, as on all other subjects he spoke of, uttered a truth which will not fail. The same Christ who uttered the truth referred to, also taught the universal brotherhood of man, with the sublime doctrine of love toward all. Under the influence of such teachings, the human heart individually, as well as in the aggregate of communities and States, has been moved up higher in the scale of charity and good will towards men, Marked and wonderful as the present

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age is, by its unparalleled progress in science, in explorations, in inventions for travel and transportation, and in the march of thought, the organized charities for the relief, maintenance, and comfort of the unfortunate, form the grandest, and at the same time the most beautiful work and proof of our progressive civilization. When one looks at the grand edifices raised by the people of the State, and given as homes for the deaf and dumb, and blind, and those who by birth or accident are deprived of reason, and the like, in the counties, for the poor and infirm, and considers the tender care bestowed upon them, all by kindhearted and Christian men and women, the contemplation fairly forces out the exclamation: "Surely the spirit of Christ is abroad in the earth."

SKETCH OF THE POOR LAWS OF OHIO.

The early settlers of the State were of that class of people, few of whom needed more than temporary relief, which the generous heart of the pioneer promptly furnished, without resort to legal methods. In those communities so thinly populated that the face of a man or woman is of itself a matter of cheer and pleasure whenever met, neighborly kindness rendered poor laws unnecessary. But as the population increased and inhabitants began to crowd and cross each other in interest and design, that, free heartedness which prevailed among old pioneers subsided, or took another form of manifestation.

On the 5th of March, 1831, the General Assembly passed a law providing for the organization of townships, and for the election of officers thereof. Among the township officers, this law required the election annually of two overseers of the poor. In another act, passed March 14, 1831, and which took effect June 1, 1831, it was provided that when the overseers of the poor of any township in any county

not having a poorhouse, should be satisfied that any person having a legal settlement (a residence of one year) in such township, was suffering and ought to be relieved at the expense of such township, they might afford such relief at the expense of the township as in their opinion the necessities of such person might require; and if more than temporary relief was required, then the overseers of the poor should give seven days notice, by written or printed notices, posted up in at least three public places in the township, of the time and place at which they would attend and receive proposals for the maintenance of such pauper. The contract for maintenance was by the law limited to one year. This provision, therefore, required an annual advertising and contracting for the support of each unfortunate. Whatever service the pauper could reasonably perform was done for the benefit of the person supporting him or her.

BLACK AND MULATTO PERSONS EXCEPTED,

In the act of March 14, 1831, the second section reads as follows:

SEC. 2. That nothing in this act shall be so construed as to enable any black or mulatto person to gain a legal settlement in this State.

We mention this provision of the statute in a total absence of all admiration or approval of it, but for the purpose of exhibiting a fact in history and preserving it as a point from which the progress of civilization and humanity may be measured. Fifty years ago the people of Ohio drew the color line, and excluded the man "with skins not colored like their own," from the pale of public charity, and turned him out to die like a dog in a fence-corner, or beg his bread from the hand of some individual whose heart had been touched by the spirit of Christ, or by the natural impulse of pity. While we remember that the white people of Ohio, by solemn legislative enactment, denied

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and withheld a crust of bread from a starving man on account of his color, in 1831, let the people of Ohio be moderate in their condemnation of other people who resist being governed and ruled by the same race of people in 1877. Until the angel of mercy has blotted our statute with his tears, as he is said to have blotted out Uncle Toby's oath, let us have charity for a more justifiable sin. But God's great work is going forward apace.

John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave, But his soul is marching on.

On the 8th of March, 1831, an act was passed, authorizing the county commissioners to purchase sites and erect a county poorhouse in their respective counties, and to levy and collect taxes to pay for and maintain the same; but this did not supersede the poor laws requiring townships to support the poor, nor was the law to erect poorhouses compulsory on the commissioners.

An act passed February 8, 1845, abolished the office of overseers of the poor, and imposed their duties on the township trustees. Under these statutes the townships of Sandusky county gave relief to the poor as from time to time they were required by circumstances, until the time when the commissioners resolved to

BUILD A POORHOUSE.

After considering the subject quite earnestly for some time, and calculating the cost of keeping the unfortunates by the township, and looking to the future increase of that class of persons as the population of the county should increase, the commissioners arrived at the conclusion that, all things considered, the establishment of a county poorhouse, with a farm connected with it, would be for the interest of the people, as well as the comfort of those whose condition or misfortunes in life demanded help. Accordingly,

on the 9th day of June, 1848, the county commissioners, namely, John S. Gardner, Hiram Hurd, and Eleazer Baldwin, ordered that there be levied on the taxable property of the county, to be collected by taxation on the duplicate, the sum of one thousand five hundred dollars, for purchasing a site and erecting a poorhouse. At this time Homer Everett was county auditor, and his advice and influence with the commissioners were earnestly used in favor of the measure, and there was no dissenting voice on the board. The tax was placed upon the duplicate, as directed, and so far collected in the fall of 1848 that on the 16th day of January, 1849, the commissioners purchased of John P. Haynes, and partly paid for, the southwest quarter of section number twenty-five in township five, range fifteen, containing one hundred and sixty acres, and also the southwest quarter of the northwest quarter of the same section, containing forty acres, making together a tract of two hundred acres of land, for the agreed price of three thousand dollars. The object in purchasing this tract of land, which is situated about one-half mile east on a direct line outside of the city limits, was that those inmates of the institution who were able might till the land and thus contribute to their own support, according to their ability. The buildings on this land were fitted up and converted into a poorhouse. From time to time the buildings were improved, as was also the farm.

Experiment and observation developed the fact that there were instances of not uncommon occurrence, where men who had some property were without friends who would minister to them, and supply their wants, and that public relief ought to be afforded to such, as well as to those who were destitute of property. Hence, an attempt to soothe the feelings of those who might be compelled to accept relief, by changing the name of the institution.

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The dreaded poorhouse was abolished by an act of the General Assembly, passed March 23, 1850, and thenceforth the name of "county infirmary" was substituted. There probably were some good reasons for this change of name, but black is black whatever name be given to it, even should the General Assembly pass an act that it shall henceforth be called white. The rose would smell as sweet by any other name and the odor of the skunk would be as strong.

Still, it should be considered that in the early history of the country, in some of the States, the inmates of the poorhouse were by law deprived of some of the civil rights enjoyed by other inhabitants of the town, or county, hence the charge of having been in the poorhouse carried with it, in a popular sense, a charge of degradation and disgrace. The change of name was, therefore, not only polite, but proper, for it cannot be truly said now that there is a man, woman, or child, kept in a poorhouse in Ohio, although many are relieved and maintained in our county infirmaries. It should be recorded that the State never, by law or decision of court, deprived a man of any civil right for being poor.

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History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 27

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