USA > Ohio > Seneca County > History of Seneca County, from the close of the revolutionary war to July, 1880 > Part 69
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The days of inspiration did not close with the end of Holy Writ, and I mean no sacrilege when I say that every holy, noble, generous thought, mo- tive or action, is inspiration, and proves the better part of man. the spark of the deity that is within ns. and I claim the right for myself to believe that the work of those great and good men on that day, the fruit of their deliber- ations in the form of the declaration of those principles of human rights. with the glorious results of a century gone, was the work of inspiration in which God's holy purpose seems manifest. Now while we meet and have just cause to rejoice, every heart should give thanks to Almighty God for the blessings we have enjoyed as a people under the sun of freedom, and pledge anew our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor that we will, for ourselves and our posterity. preserve and maintain that same form of gov- ernment in its purity so vouchsafed to us by those noble men of 1776.
Time will not permit me here to give you anything like even a synopsis of the achievements of these one hundred years. Permit me only to say that the thirteen colonies have increased to thirty-eight prosperons states; the three millions of inhabitants that struck for freedom have increased to 44 .- 000,000, enjoying the same, spreading from ocean to ocean, and from the lakes to the gulf : that the ship of state during this period breasted the storms of two terrible wars with foreign powers, and a most lamentable fra- ternal one, and safely sailed home into the harbor of the constitution, and came out of the fire as those youths did out of the fiery furnace, without even the smell of smoke upon their garments.
The form of government is all-important when man claims his natural rights. Perhaps the best interpretation that can be given to the word free-
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dom is " that form of government where man is left free to do as he pleases, except where the rights of his neighbor and public safety need restraint." (Blackstone.) Now if that be freedom, the form of government must be shaped to meet all its demands. Nothing but a republic with democratic institutions can secure that degree of liberty. And I desire here to be strict- ly understood that I shall use the words " Democracy " and " Republican- ism " in no party sense, for both termsare synonymous, mean and express the same thing. " Demos" (people) and " Kratos " (government.) put together make " Democracy," which is the people's government, or a " Republic." and " Republicanism " in its best sense is nothing more than an attachment to a republican form of government. If Alexander Pope had lived in the present age and observed the spread of the principles, expressed in the Declaration of Independence-man everywhere claiming his rights-had no- tired the progress of events ; the demands of humanity and human rights throwing their storm-waves against thrones that are simply permitted to exist while they reel and totter before they fall-he would not now say again :
" For forms of government let fools contest. Whatever's best administered is best."
It is not true. A bad form of government cannot be well administered. You can enjoy no right as a free man under a despotism. Talk about free speech, free press, freedom to worship God in accordance with the dictates of your own conscience, where the crude will of a Czar is the supreme law of the land. The form of government is all-important for the preservation of human rights in their purity. What a spectacle to the patriot, the organ- ization and form of the government of these states : Thirty-eight free and independent states, each with its own Republican form of government, making up in its municipal organization a free and independent government of its own, surrendering for unity only such of its natural rights as are ab- solutely indispensable for the purposes of the general government, and reserving all other rights " to the state and the people." This principle kept intact and cherished and loved as the fathers did, will forever protect and defend the constitution in its purity. make succession and centraliza- tion both alike impossibilities. Such a form of government requires for its perpetnation and perpetuity a people who are both intelligent and virtuons intelligently moral. People well edneated in letters and figures, but vivions, are no more capable to preserve and maintain a Republic than a people merely moral but abjectly ignorant. Intelligence, embellished by all the virtues of religion and morality, alone qualifies man for the rich boon of freedom. And if this Republic shall ever suffer the fate of Republics that have flourished in time past and are no more, it will be because the people shall, by corruption. luxury and vice, make themselves untit for the enjoy- ment of it.
As a man wears clothes that fit him. so does a nation wear just such a form of government as it is capable of maintaining. Now. if we claim to have, and glory in the possession of, the best form of government ever con- ceived by man. a government just grown out of its childhood to manhood. triumphantly preserving its integrity through a thousand trying ordeals in its history, how necessary and indispensable, that we, to preserve it, should
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also be inspired with a just appreciation of the responsibility resting upon IS.
Judge Marshall, in the Virginia convention of 1788, said : " What are the favorite maxims of Democracy ? A strict observance of justice and public faith, and a steady adherence to virtue. These, sir, are the principles of good government." ( Elliot's Debates, vol. 111., p. 77). This form of govern- ment is best because its standard of moral requisition is the highest. It claims for man a universality of interest, liberty and justice. It is chris- tianity with its mountain beacons and guides. It is the standard of Deity based in the eternal principles of truth, passing through and rising above the clouds of ignorance into the region of infinite wisdom. The great ob- jects of knowledge and moral culture of the people are among its most prominent provisions. Practical religion and religious freedom are the sun- shine of its growth and glory. To say that an ignorant and immoral people are capable of self-government, is to say that government may be adminis- tered without knowledge and without justice. I am speaking of the inhabi- tants of the United States as a people, not as a nation.
Whether we possess the attributes of a nation, or whether our general government be a national government, I have neither the time nor inclina- tion to discuss. Enough for me to know and believe that the ends of knowl- edge, freedom and happiness can be promoted by a proper appreciation and preservation of the form of government we have, and to which we, eith er by virtue of birth or adoption, all owe allegiance ; and who for himself will not say :
" In youth it sheltered me, And I'll protect it now."
Having been born and raised under a bad form of government, and lav- ing made the government of these free states mine by free choice, I can but feel the thrill that this occasion sends through my being while I may not be able to express the emotions that prompt a renewal of the vow of allegiance given in my early manhood. And I will not try. From every city, town and hamlet of our land, shouts and rejoicings rend the air at the close of a century since the " Declaration of American Independence " first saw the light of day. The young shout and cheer with sounds of glee and hilarity the middle-aged man feels a just pride in the discharge of ever duty pertain- ing to a citizen, and due and owing to the state. The aged pioneer joins the throng with a heart full of gratitude and praise to the Giver of all good, for the preservation of a government he perhaps helped to protect with his treasure and his blood. These emotions are proper and patriotic and holy. None but a slave could to-day feel indifferent, and there are none to be found within our borders. thank God.
The beginning of our government does not date from the 4th of July, 1776, but from the adoption by the states of the constitution in 1788. So asa government we are not 100 years old, but as a people. For the declaration of independence at once and forever separated the allegiance of the colonies and opened fully the war of the revolution. The end of seven long and bloody years of war made England acknowledge, while our people rejoice in, our independence. How fortunate for human rights and freedom that at that epoch, when we were weak and exhausted, when it would have been
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easy for some military chieftain to have grasped the reins of power and to have established here a monarchy-that with Washington and his compeers, not a man was to be found who would do and dare. Man, prone to love of power as he his, did you ever think of it, my friends, how little it would have required to have lost all that was won by the blood of the revolution ? Does it not seem that the hand of Providence was in all this? The spirit that. opened the war seemed to close it, and commence the Republic. The spirit. that appealed to God for the rectitude of their conduct, moved the men in power, when the war was over. to return their swords and lay them upon the altar of their country.
History never produced such a spectacle since the world began.
And how they shouted and sang of the liberty they had thus achieved :
" In a chariot of light from the regions of day, The Goddess of Liberty came ; Ten thousand celestials directed the way. And hither conducted the dame. A fair budding branch from the gardens above, Where millions and millions agree. She brought in her hand as a pledge of her love, A plant she named Liberty Tree.
This glorious exotic struck deep in the ground, Like a native, it flourished and bore : The fame of its fruit drew the nations around To seek out its peaceable shore. Regardless of name or distinction. they came- For freemen. like brothers, agree- With one spirit endued they one friendship pursued. And their temple was Liberty Tree."
They sang of Columbia thus :
" Columbia. Columbia, to glory arise. The queen of the world and the child of the skies. Thy genius commands thee, with raptures behold. While ages on ages thy splendor unfold : Thy reign is the last and the noblest of time, Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime. Let crimes of the east ne'er crimson thy name. Be freedom. and science and virtue thy fame."
The French revolution produced a despot-the American revolution, liber- ty and free states. Liberty fails when sovereigns become tyrants. The American citizen is the sovereign of the land and makes and enforces his own laws. So long as wisdom and humanity shall be his guide and counsel. he cannot fail of success.
If time would permit. I should be glad to indulge in a few passing remarks on many of the events that have characterized our history as a people hith- erto, but I must abstain while I will invite your attention to things and sur- roundings at home. Let me speak to you a little while on the rise and pro-
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gress of our own immediate neighborhood-of Seneca county, hier history. her resources, and her people.
As the triumphs of liberty constitute the way-marks of the world, they have guided and directed the pioneers in opening and developing the re- sonrees of this vast country to labor, to commerce, to knowledge and to greatness. The pioneers of Seneca county found here a vast unbroken wil- derness, run over by savages and wild animals hunting their prey. The silence of the forest broken only by the crack of the Indian's rifle, and the nights made hideons by the howlings of the wolf and the panther. The woodman's axe brought the first sound of the approach of civilization. West of the Sandusky river was an almost unbroken swale, but the eastern and some portions of the southern parts of the county offered localities better adapted for settlements and homes, and these were selected as the first home- steads in this county. The western portion was taken up much later.
Seneca was formed from old Indian territory, April Ist, 1820, organized April 1st, 1824, and named after a tribe of Indians who had a reservation a short distance north of Tiflin, near the river, and north of the farm owned by the late John Keller. The conuty was formerly a part of Sandusky county. It extends eighteen miles north and south, and thirty miles east and west. with the base lineon the 41st parallel.
There were two general surveys made by the authority of the United States in northern Ohio. The first one established the base line, counties and townships of the " Western Reserve." so called, the fire-lands, etc. It started on the west line of Pennsylvania, running west, and ended at the southwest corner of Huron county. The second survey started at the east line of Indiana, and ended at the southeast corner of Seneca, making the south line of Seneca the base line. This survey made townships and ranges. The townships in Seneca number one, two and three, and the ranges run from 13 east to 17 and Is east inclusive, making each township contain thirty- six square miles, being six miles square ; each section-thirty-six in num- ber-one mile square and containing six hundred and forty acres. Fort Seneca was also named after the Indians, and was sitnated on the left bank of the Sandusky river, near the village of Fort Seneca, six miles north of Tiffin, and about eleven miles south of Ft. Stephenson, afterwards Lower Sandusky, now Fremont, where the Republican party of the United States. in their deliberations at Cincinnati, have lately, for the choice of a proper person for the presidency, fonnd our distinguished neighbor, Gov. Hayes. General Harrison's troops occupied Ft. Seneca at the time the British and the Indians made an attack on Ft. Stephenson, on the 2d day of Angust. 1813. General Harrison, while at Ft. Seneca, narrowly escaped being mur- dered by an Indian.
The circumstances are highly interesting. but I have no time to relate them. Let me refer you to the memoirs of General Harrison for particulars.
The Senecas, of the Sandusky, so called, owned and occupied 40,000 acres of choice land on the east side of the Sandusky river, being mostly in this and part of Sandusky county. Thirty thousand acres of this was granted to them on the 20th of September, 1817, at the treaty held at the foot of the Manmee rapids, Hon. Lewis Cass and Hon. Duncan McArthur being the United States commissioners. The other 10,000 acres, lying south of the
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other, was granted by the same commissioners at the treaty of St. Mary, on the 17th of September, the following year. On the 24th of February, 1831. these Indians ceded their lands to the general government and agreed to re- move southwest of Missouri, on the Neosho river.
At that time their principal chiefs were Coonstick. Small-Cloud, Spieer (whom our esteemed friend, Dr. H. Kuhn, of this city, well knew, as well as some of the others), Seneca Steel, Hard Hickory, Tall Chief and Good Hunter.
General Henry C. Brish, now deceased, was the sub-agent of this band. which numbered abont 400 souls at that time, and were considered to be a remnant of the Logans. I remember well in several conversations I had with the General about these Indians, in each of which the General expressed his surprise why they were called Sonecas, as he said he never found a Seneca amongst them. He said they were Cayugas-who were Mingoes ; that they had amongst them some Oneidas, Mohawks, Onondagas, Tuscarawas and Wyandots. They believed in witchcraft, and while here executed one of their best men for that crime. Time will not permit me to give the narrative of the execution.
If you had been present at a meeting of the "Seneca County Pioneer As- sociation," about two years ago, and listened to the address of our esteemed friend, Isaac I. Dumond, near Ft. Seneca, you would have heard an inter- esting narrative of the annual dog dance and feast of these Indians.
While speaking about the Indians, let me say to you that a question of title to a portion of these lands is still pending and undisposed of. I men- tion this fact only as a matter of history.
It is very doubtful whether any remnant of that tribe sees this day. The greater probability is, that they have all fallen to the law that seems to rule the general destiny of the race. All we have of them is their name, their lands and their short history. The new purchase. so called, included the lands of the Seneca Indians. In 1820 and 1821 the other lands of the " new purchase " were laid off into townships and sections, but the Seneca Reser- vation was not surveyed until 1832. Speaking of the new purchase. I desire to record an incident in connection with it, too important to be lost. My venerable friend, Isaac I. Dumond, of Pleasant township, built a house near the left bank of the Sandusky river, northeast of Ft. Seneca, in 1820, (a cabin rather,) which is still fit for human habitation and occupied by a family. while Mr. Dumond lives close by in more comfortable quarters.
A few tracts of these lands were sold when the land office first opened at Delaware, at the government price, $1.25 per acre. The greater portion of our county was entered at the same price, after the sale and about the time the land office was removed to Bucyrus, and later still to Titlin, when Mr. David E. Owen held the office of receiver at this place. The government re- ceived nothing but specie for the land. The receiver was provided with a strong iron chest, in which the books and money were to be kept. The chest was abont twenty inches wide and twenty deep, and about two feet long. I remember on several occasions when Mr. Owen was about to make his quarterly report at Columbus, Ohio, that quite a number of men were re- quisite to move the chest from the house into the wagon. The late Daniel Dildine was the teamster generally, who hauled the coin to Columbus Mr.
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Owen had his office in the frame building belonging to Esq. Keen. on the north side of East Market street, near the stone bridge. It generally took from three to four days, with a good team of horses, to hanl the little iron monster to Columbus. Without any guard or other protection the two men started. and winding their way alone through the forest, found Upper San- dusky, Little Sandusky. Marion, Waklo and Delaware, their stopping places. I remember hearing father Owen relate his troubles with the chest at one time at Waldo, I think. Night overtook them when they got there, and the cabin hotel was full of people. As a general thing, they would back the wagon up to the door and take the chest into the house. But Mr. Owen did not like the looks of the men about the premises, so he conchided to leave the chest, with its contents of about $50,000, in the wagon and cover it with straw. They did so and went to bed. It rained all night, and when they got up in the morning they found everything all right.
It was fortunate for Seneca county that her lands did not fall into the hands of speculators. The men who entered and located, did so for the pur- pose of acquiring homes, and the purchases were made in conformity with the pile of gold and silver. These piles were usually very limited, and although but fifty dollars would buy forty acres, many of the new-comers didn't have the fifty dollars. All the most valuable lands were soon taken up, however, and when the war with Mexico was over and our soldiers had land warrants to locate, several tracts were still found in Liberty township and taken up by these warrants. Those were the last of the entries and the time for cheap lands in Seneca county has long since passed away, never to return.
The early settlers here came from Maryland, Virginia, New York, Penn- sylvania, New Jersey, etc., Germany and Ireland, and made np as com- pletely a mixed population as you see them, or their descendants, to this day. Differing in language, habits and customs, and almost everything pertaining to civilized life, a more generous, kind, hospitable, frugal, industrious peo- ple never lived anywhere. Whether mutual poverty and dependence made them so " wondrous kind " I will not stop to decide, but it is enough to say that the latch-string was always ont. The inmates of the cabin were ready to divide the best they had with the hungry stranger. No night was too dark or stormy, no swale too wide or deep, when distress or sickness called for help. When a man wanted a cabin raised or needed help, a simple notice was sufficient to make the neighhors all around leave their own work and go, often as far as four or five miles. And go they would and did with- out asking about the man's religion or politics, nor upon what part of God's green earth he was born, work all day faithfully without price or reward other than that such kindness, if needed, should be returned. I sometimes wished that the primitive life in Seneca had continued all along. Now in these days when you need material help to secure a home, who will volunteer and stand by you until you have one ? Now ask a man to help you work one day and when evening comes he wants his pay. Those days are gone. and the men and women that brought here and established the first land- marks of civilization, are fast passing away with many of their primitive virtues that characterized their lives in those days. That generous and open-hearted hospitality of the pioneers has given way to the struggle after
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the mighty dollar. Even the tales of the trials, difficulties and hardships, the deprivations and sufferings of the early settlers, when told and repeated to the present generation, are received with doubts or indifference. Yet will [ venture to call to mind the life in the cabin with some of its incidents as 1 saw it. There were but few of my German countrymen in Seneca when, in the summer of 1533, I came to this place with my father's family. The large number by far came and located afterward, and as you pass through the comity now, and observe a vast " Dutch barn," with many well cultivated fields round about, and a stately mansion with orchard, gardens and every- thing denoting and speaking of the comforts of life, you ask who lives there ? and perhaps you will be told, that that gray-headed venerable look- ing old man sitting on yonder porch. "smoking his pipe of clay," entered forty acres of land when he first came from Germany, for which he paid fifty dollars, all the money he had, and perhaps a part of that was borrowed from a friend. Right back of where his brick house now is he built for him- self a small cabin and made a little opening round about it for a garden, a little trek path for corn and potatoes. He was young then, and his young wife assisted him in his hard work, all she could, to fix up their home in the forest as best they could under the circumstances. Now their money was all gone. More was needed to get a cow, some hogs, tools, a wagon and oxen, etc., and withont which no further progress upon the forest could be made. The chances to earn money in the neighborhood were very bad. Nobody had any to pay with as a general thing, and the few that had could hire a laborer very cheap. At $5 and $6 a month it took a long time to buy those necessaries, and to live and not die of despondeney under such circum- stances took more moral courage than we. in these degenerate days, possess. The endurance and self-denial of the men and women of those days is be- yond the power of a pen to describe. Imagine, now, that cabin, miles away from any neighbor, with only a very crooked road, marked by blazed trees, leading to it : dark forests all around and a small opening made by the little clearing to see God's blue sky.
The nearest public work where money could be earned was the Dayton & Michigan canal, 100 miles away. Here necessity compelled him to leave his wife and little ones and work on the canal all summer, returning home in the fall, when publie work was stopped, and thuseconomizing with his earn- ings. improved the condition of his famlly, from time to time, until the clearing had enlarged enough to produce the support of life, and perhaps something for market.
Did you ever think. my friends, how those pioneer women must have felt to be thius left alone in the wild forest, for weeks and months, all summer and fall, with their little ones, and nobody to see to and protect them ? Yon ladies, who live in the lap of mixury and refinement, enjoying the products of nature and art. did you ever think how those noble pioneer mothers lived through those weary years of hardship ? The only way that can be account- ed for is, they put their trust in God. But to return. After several sum- mers' work on the canal, and having a team of oxen, the little clearing be- came larger, and the comforts of life gradually increased. Other families settling closer by, all hands joined to open out a road to some mill or market. The oldest of the children grew up large enough to be of some help at the
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