History of Shelby County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 33

Author: R. Sutton & Co.
Publication date: 1883
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 427

USA > Ohio > Shelby County > History of Shelby County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 33

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liberty and manhood can be purchased at too high a price ? Until the. amendments were adopted "we, the people," only applied to a portion of the people, just as the clause, " all men are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," as used in the Declaration, could only apply to a portion of the race, and that portion was determined only by a color line which shut away from the black man all rights which a white man was bound to respect. A storm of thought, succeeded by a tempest of armed force, gave to those expressions a literal significance, and the Nation withstood the shock to become in reality what it had before been but in name, " the land of the free and the asylum of the oppressed." When the shock did come, when armed rebellion sought to destroy the union, when the constitution became too narrow for the crisis of the hour, then above all constitutions and all written laws was seen the light and strength and justice of the unwritten law of nature, the law of self-pres- ervation. Under that law, the life of the Nation was the first object to be secured, and after that came the liberty of the individual. The result was life to the Nation and liberty for every man beneath the flag, with a constitution so amended as to secure forever these inestimable jewels to generations yet unborn.

RATIFICATION.

The constitution itself provided that: " the ratification of the conven- tions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment of this con- stitution between the States so ratifying the same."

In accordance with this provision eleven of the thirteen States, by their conventions ratified the constitution, and it went into operation and became the supreme law on March 4, 1789, that being the date fixed by Congress under the convention resolutions of September 13, 1788, The order of the ratification by the several States will appear by the following list : Delaware, Dec. 7, 1787; Pennsylvania, Dec. 12, 1787; New Jersey, Dec. 18, 1787 .; Georgia, Jan. 2, 1788; Connecticut, Jan. 9, 1788; Massachusetts, Feb. 6, 1788; Maryland, April 28, 1788; South Carolina, May 23, 1788; New Hampshire, June 21, 1788; Virginia, June 26, 1788; New York, July 26, 1788.

Afterward the States of North Carolina and Rhode Island were ad- mitted into the union by Congress, upon the presentation of authenti- cated forms of ratification ; North Carolina being admitted Nov. 21,' 1789, and Rhode Island May 29, 1790. The union of the old States was thus secured and perfected, but the constitution did not rest here. After

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providing for its own adoption by ratification, it further provided that "new States may be admitted by Congress into this union," upon equal terms with the original States which had fought out their independence of the mother country, and founded a new form of government, under new conditions, in a new world. Under this provision Vermont applied for admission into the Union in 1791; Kentucky in 1792; and Tennessee in 1796. Herein was the inauguration of the new order of things which, planted in hope, has flourished in strength. Brought forth in tearful, anxious travail, it was baptized in blood to live in hope. In the midst of these events in the east, what of the vast region west of Pennsyl- vania ? We will see.

While the thirteen old colonies were thus declaring their independence, the thirteen new States, which now lie in the western interior, had no existence, and gave no sign of the future. The solitude of nature was unbroken by the steps of civilization. The wisest statesman had not contemplated the probability of the coming States, and the boldest patriot did not dream that this interior wilderness should soon contain a greater population than the thirteen old States with all the added growth of one hundred years.

Ten years after that the old States had ceded their western lands to the General Government, and the Congress of the United States had passed the ordinance of 1785 for the survey of the public territory, and in 1787 the celebrated ordinance which organized the Northwestern Ter- ritory, and dedicated it to freedom and intelligence.

Fifteen years after that, and more than a quarter of a century after the Declaration of Independence, the State of Ohio was admitted into the Union, being the seventeenth which accepted the Constitution of the United States.

It has since grown up to be great, populous, and prosperous under the influence of those ordinances. At her admission in 1803 the tide of mi- gration had begun to flow over the Alleghanies into the valley of the Mississippi, and although no steamboat or railroad then existed, not even a stage coach helped the immigration, yet the wooden "ark" on the Ohio, and the heavy wagon slowly winding over the mountains, bore these tens of thousands to the wilds of Kentucky and the plains of Ohio. In the spring of 1788-the first year of settlement-4500 persons passed the mouth of the Muskingum in three months, and the tide continued to pour on for half a century in a widening stream, mingled with all the races of Europe and America, until now the five States of the North- western Territory, in the wilderness of 1776, contain over twelve mil- lions of people, enjoying all the blessings which peace and prosperity, freedom and Christianity, can confer upon any people. Of these five States, born under the ordinance of 1787, Ohio is the first, oldest, and, in many things, the greatest State in the American Union. Ohio is just one-sixth part of the Northwestern Territory-40,000 square miles. It lies between Lake Erie and the Ohio River, having two hundred miles of navigable waters, on one side flowing into the Atlantic Ocean, and on the other into the Gulf of Mexico. Through the lakes its vessels touch on six thousand miles of interior coast, and through the Mississippi on thirty-six thousand miles of river coast ; so that a citizen of Ohio may pursue his navigation through forty-two thousand miles, all in his own country, and all within navigable reach of his own State. He who has circumnavigated the globe has gone but little more than half the dis- tance which the citizen of Ohio finds within his natural reach in this vast interior.

Looking upon the surface of this State, we find no mountains, no bar- ren sands, no marshy wastes, no lava-covered plains; but one broad, compact body of arable land, intersected with rivers, and streams, and running waters, while the beautiful Ohio flows tranquilly by its side. From this great arable surface, where upon the very hills the grass and the forest trees grow exuberant and abundant, we find that underneath this surface, and easily accessible, lie ten thousand square miles of coal and four thousand square miles of iron-coal and iron enough to supply the basis of manufacture for a world ! All this vast deposit does not interrupt or take from that arable surface at all. There you may find in one place the same machine bringing up coal and salt water from below, while the wheat and corn grow upon the surface above. The immense masses of coal, iron, salt, and freestone deposited below have not in any way diminished the fertility and production of the soil.

The first settlement of Ohio was made by a colony from New Eng- land at the mouth of the Muskingum. It was literally a remnant of the officers and soldiers of the Revolution. Of this colony no praise of the historian can be as competent or as strong as the language of Washing- ton. He says, in answer to inquiries addressed to him : " No colony in America was ever settled under such favorable auspices as that which has just commenced at the Muskingum. Information, property, and strength will be its characteristics. I know many of the settlers person- ally, and there never were men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a community ;" and he adds, "that if he were a young man, he knows no country in which he would sooner settle than in this western region." This colony, left alone for a time, made its own government, and nailed its laws to a tree in the village; an early indication of that law-abiding and peaceful spirit which has since made Ohio a just and well ordered community. The subsequent settlements on the Miami and Scioto were made by citizens of New Jersey and Virginia, and it is certainly remarkable that among the early immigration there were no ignorant people. In the language of Washington, they came with "in- formation"-qualified to promote the welfare of the community."

Soon after the settlement on the Muskingum and the Miami, the great wave of migration flowed on the plains and valleys of Ohio and Kentucky. Kentucky had been settled earlier, but the main body of immigrants in subsequent years went into Ohio, influenced partly by the ordinance of 1787, securing freedom and schools forever; and partly by the great security of titles under the survey and guarantee of the United States Government. Soon the new State grew up with a rapidity which, until then, was unknown in the history of civilization. On the Muskingum, where the buffalo had roamed; on the Scioto, where the Shawnees had built their towns; on the Miami, where the great chiefs of the Miamis had reigned; on the plains of Sandusky, yet red with the blood of the white man ; on the Maumee, where Wayne, by the victory of the " Fallen Timbers," had broken the power of the Indian confed- eracy, the immigrants from the old States and from Europe came in to cultivate the fields, to build up towns, and to rear the institutions of Christian civilization, until the single State of Ohio is greater in num- ber, wealth, and education than was the whole American Union when the Declaration of Independence was made.

The territory now comprised within the limits of Ohio was formerly a part of that vast region claimed by France between the Alleghany and Rocky Mountains, first known by the general name of Louisiana. In 1670, Marquette, a zealous French missionary, accompanied by Monsieur Joliet, from Quebec, with five boatmen, set out on a mission from Mack- inac to the unexplored regions lying south of that station They passed down the lake to Green Bay, thence from Fox River crossed over to the Wisconsin, which they followed down to its junction with the Mississippi. They descended this mighty stream a thousand miles to its confluence with the Arkansas. On their return to Canada they did not fail to urge in strong terms the immediate occupation of the vast and fertile regions watered by the Mississippi and its branches. About 1725, the French erected forts on the Mississippi, on the Illinois, on the Maumee, and on the lakes; still, however, the communication with Canada was through Lake Michigan. Before 1750, a French post had been fortified at the mouth of the Wabash, and a communication was established through that river and the Maumee with Canada. About the same time, and for the purpose of checking the progress of the French, the Ohio Com- pany was formed, and made some attempts to establish trading houses among the Indians. The French, however, established a chain of forti- fications back of the English settlements, and thus, in a measure, had the entire control of the great Mississippi Valley.

The English government became alarmed at the encroachments of the French, and attempted to settle boundaries by negotiations. These availed nothing, and both parties were determined to settle their differ- ences by force of arms. The principal ground, whereon the English claimed dominion beyond the Alleghanies, was that the Six Nations owned the Ohio Valley, and had placed it, with their other lands, under the protection of England. Some of the western lands were also claimed by the British as having been actually purchased at Lancaster, Pennsyl- vania, in 1744, at a treaty between the colonists and the Six Nations at that place. The claim of the English monarch to the late Northwestern

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Territory was ceded to the United States, signed at Paris, September 3, 1788. The provisional articles which formed the basis of that treaty, more especially as related to the boundary, were signed at Paris, No- vember 30, 1782. During the pendency of the negotiation relative to these preliminary articles, Mr. Oswald, the British commissioner, pro- posed the Ohio River as the western boundary of the United States, and but for the indomitable perseverance of the Revolutionary patriot, John Adams, one of the American commissioners, who opposed the proposi- tion, and insisted upon the Mississippi as the boundary, the probability is that the proposition of Mr. Oswald would have been acceded to by the United States commissioners.

The States which owned western unappropriated lands, with a single exception, redeemed their respective pledges by ceding them to the United States. The State of Virginia, in March, 1784, ceded the right of soil and jurisdiction to the district of country embraced in her char- ter, situated to the northwest of the Ohio River. In .September, 1786, the State of Connecticut also ceded her claim of soil and jurisdiction to the district of country within the limits of her charter, situated west of a line beginning at the completion of the forty-first point degree of north latitude, one hundred and twenty miles west of the western boundary of Pennsylvania, and from thence by a line drawn north parallel to and one hundred and twenty miles west of said line of Pennsylvania, and to con- tinue north until it came to forty-two degrees and two minutes north latitude. The State of Connecticut, on the 30th of May, 1801, also ceded her jurisdictional claims to all that territory called the " Western Re- serve of Connecticut." The States of New York and Massachusetts also ceded all their claims.

The above were not the only claims which had to be made prior to the commencement of settlements within the limits of Ohio. Numerous tribes of Indian savages, by virtue of prior possession, asserted their re- spective claims, which also had to be extinguished. A treaty for this purpose was accordingly made at Fort Stanwix, October 27, 1784, with the sachems and warriors of the Mohawks, Onondagas, Senecas, Cayu- gas, Oneidas, and Tuscaroras, by the third article of which treaty the said Six Nations ceded to the United States all claims to the country west of a line extending along the west boundary of Pennsylvania, from the mouth of the Oyounayea to the Ohio River.

Washington County was formed July 27, 1788, by proclamation of Governor St. Clair, being the first county formed within the limits of Ohio. Its original boundaries were as follows: Beginning on the bank of the Ohio River, where the western boundary line of Pennsylvania crosses it, and running with that line to Lake Erie; thence along the southern shore of said lake to the mouth of Cuyahoga River; thence up the said river to the portage between it and the Tuscarawas branch of the Muskingum; thence down that branch to the forks at the crossing place above Fort Laurens; thence with a line to be drawn westerly to the portage on that branch of the Big Miami, on which the fort stood that was taken by the French in 1752, until it meets the road from the lower Shawnee Town to Sandusky; thence south to Scioto River, and thence with that river to the month, and thence up the Ohio River to the place of beginning.

Hamilton was the second county established in the Northwest Terri- tory; it was formed January 2, 1790, by proclamation of Governor St. Clair, and named from General Alexander Hamilton. Its original boun- daries were thus defined: Beginning on the Ohio River at the confluence of the Little Miami, and down the said Ohio to the mouth of the Big Miami, and up said Miami to the standing stone forks or branch of said river, and thence with a line to be drawn due east to the Little Miami, and down said Little Miami River to the place of beginning.

Wayne County was established by proclamation of General St. Clair, August 15, 1796, and was the third county formed in the Northwest Territory. Its original limits were very extensive, and were thus de- fined in the act creating it: Beginning at the mouth of Cuyahoga River upon Lake Erie, and with the said river to the portage between it and the Tuscarawas branch of the Muskingum ; thence down the said branch to the forks at the crossing place above Fort Laurens; thence by a west line to the east boundary of Hamilton County, which is a due north line from the lower Shawnee Town upon the Scioto River; thence by a line west-northerly to the south part of portage between the Miamis of Ohio

and the St. Marys River; thence by a line also west-northerly to the southwestern part of the portage between the Wabash and Miamis of Lake Erie, where Fort Wayne now stands; thence by a line west-north- erly to the south part of Lake Michigan; thence along the western shores of the same to the northwest part thereof, including lands upon the streams emptying into said lake; thence by a due north line to the territorial boundary in Lake Superior, and with the said boundary through Lakes Huron, St. Clair, and Erie to the mouth of Cuyahoga River, the place of beginning. These limits embrace what are now parts of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and all of Michigan, and the towns of Ohio City, Chicago, St. Marys, Mackinaw, etc. Since then States and counties have been organized out of this territory.

It will be observed in the Virginia Military Districts in Ohio, which comprise the lands between the Scioto and Little Miami rivers, that when the State of Virginia, in 1783, ceded to the United States all her right of soil and jurisdiction to all the tract of country she then claimed northwest of the Ohio River, it was provided that the Virginia troops of the Continental establishment should be 'paid their legal bounties from these lands (and here it may not be amiss to define these land denomi- nations). The United States Military Lands were so called from the fact that they were appropriated by an act of Congress, in 1796, to satisfy certain claims of the officers and soldiers of the Revolution. The patent to the soldiers or purchasers of these lands, as well as of all other Ohio lands, is derived from the general government. The district was not surveyed into ranges and townships, or any regular form, and hence the irregularity in the shape of the townships as established by the county commissioners for civil purposes ; any individual holding a Virginia Military Land warrant might locate it wherever he desired within the district, and in such shape as he pleased, whenever the land had not been previously located.

We now turn to a chronological review of these circumstances and events.

By the treaties with the Indians of 1785-6, Congress acquired the lands watered by the Muskingum, Scioto, and Little and Great Miami rivers.

Territory Northwest of the Ohio .- By ordinance of July 13, 1787, formed out of the cession of Virginia, being that part of the territory south of the 41st parallel, and out of other territory acquired from Great Britain by the treaty of 1783, being the part of the territory north of the 41st parallel. Article 5 of this ordinance provided that there should be formed from this territory not less than three nor more than five States; that three of the States should extend from the Ohio River northward-that the boundaries between these three States should be established as in the ordinance described-and that Congress should have authority to form one or two other States out of that part of the territory which lay north of an east and west line drawn through the southernmost extremity of Lake Michigan.

The provisions of this article have been carried into effect by the erec- tion, on the Ohio River, of the States of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, separated by the boundaries prescribed by the ordinance, and out of the land north of them, of the States of Michigan, Wisconsin, and that part of the State of Minnesota which lies east of the Mississippi River.

Territory South of the Ohio River .- By the act of May 26, 1790, de- clared to be "one district" for the purpose of temporary government, and its government constituted like that of the territory northwest of the river Ohio, except as otherwise provided in the act of April 2, 1790, accepting from North Carolina the cession of the State of Tennessee. The district included the territory comprehended in the present States of Kentucky and Tennessee and the territory ceded to the United States by the State of South Carolina. It was limited on the south by the original State of Georgia, and which were ceded by the State of Georgia, in 1802 and which by act of March 27, 1804, became a part of the Mis- sissippi territory.

In 1788 another treaty was made by which the country was purchased from the mouth of the Cuyahoga River to the Wabash, lying south and east of a certain line mentioned in the treaty. The Indians were dis- satisfied with this treaty and it was not relied on by our Government. In 1795 twelve tribes attended on Gen. Wayne and treated with him for the sale of a considerable portion of the territory, included within the

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limits of Ohio. In 1805 seven tribes sold to the United States all that part of New Connecticut lying west of the Cuyahoga River. In this treaty the Connecticut people joined, and paid four thousand dollars to the Indians and agreed to pay them twelve thousand dollars additional. In 1807 that part of this which lies north of the Maumee and east of a me- ridian line, passing through the mouth of the Auglaize River was pur- chased of the Indians. In 1808 a strip of territory two miles wide was acquired by treaty, running from the western boundary of the Western Reserve to the Maumee River at the rapids. In the same treaty another strip one hundred and twenty feet in width was acquired, running along the bank of the Maumee. By these treaties the United States acquired the four-fifths of the State of Ohio.

That portion of the ceded tracts above latitude 41º north, extending from Pennsylvania on the east, to the western limits of Sandusky and Seneca counties, was given by Congress to Connecticut, and is called the Western Reserve, or New Connecticut. It extends one hundred and twenty miles from east to west, and on an average is fifty miles in width from north to south. Its area contains about three millions eight hun- dred thousand acres. Five hundred thousand acres of this tract, off the west end, the State of Connecticut gave to certain sufferers by fire in the Revolutionary War. A part of the ceded lands lying along the Ohio River, including the mouths of the Muskingum and Hockhocking rivers, was sold by the old Congress to the Ohio Company. This was the first sale of lands before the present Constitution of the United States was adopted. It was sold for one dollar per acre, payable in Congress notes, at twenty shillings in a pound, whereas the interest on those notes made them worth twenty-eight shillings and six pence on the pound at that time. These securities were funded under the Constitution of the United States, and became a part of the national debt. Benjamin Stites, Esq., of old Redstone Fort (now Brownsville, Pa.), who had examined the valley of the Shawnese soon after the treaty of 1786, by his statement induced John Cleves Symmes to visit that region. Symmes found them all and more than all they had been represented to be, and upon the 29th of August, 1787, wrote to the President of Congress asking that the Treas- ury Board might be empowered to contract with them for the country between the Miamis.

John Cleves Symmes of New Jersey was the next purchaser of land in Ohio, as he bought of the old Congress land lying between the mouths of the two Miamis and extending northerly so as to contain six hundred thousand acres ; he gave sixty-six cents an acre for this land.

In addition to the above facts, let us detail the circumstances which led to the cession of the Northwestern Territory, and the States which relinquished their lands for the common benefit of the United States.

In September, 1780, the Congress of the Confederation passed a reso- lution, stating that, if these unappropriated lands were ceded to the United States, they should be formed into distinct republican States, and become members of the Federal Union and have the same rights as the thirteen original States; that each State shall contain a suitable extent of territory, not less than one hundred nor more than one hundred and fifty miles square, and that the necessary and reasonable expenses which any State shall have incurred since the commencement of the Revolu- tionary War, in acquiring any part of the territory that may be ceded or relinquished to the United States, shall be reimbursed.

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History of Shelby County, Ohio, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 33

Author: R. Sutton & Co. Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Number of Pages: 427

Author: R. Sutton & Co.
Publication date: 1883
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 427