History of Stark County, with an outline sketch of Ohio, Part 80

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892? ed
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago, Baskin & Battey
Number of Pages: 1060

USA > Ohio > Stark County > History of Stark County, with an outline sketch of Ohio > Part 80

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 above named citizens were the first Jus- tices of the Peace for the township, so far as any record can be found. They held for three years, when it appears that Matthew Rowland and John Taylor were commissioned Justiecs of the Peace. They are both remembered as upright, worthy men, of whom, living or dead, nothing but good can truthfully be said. Since their day. Abram Stevens. Alexander Porter, Alexander M. Russell. Dugald Campbell and William Alban, and many others who have passed away, held the office of Justice of the Peace, and their acts and example were the foundation of the great moral edifices of which the township is proud. They aided in estab- lishing schools and the means of instruction, and they are the edifices that are enduring monuments of the greatness of the township. James F. Leonard, after a life of great useful- ness in Stark County, removed to Independence, in Cuyahoga County, where he died. and left the memory of a good name.

The entire population of the township at its organization was made up of men and women of singularly developed character. They were far in advance, in view of education, and that sort of social eulture, of any township in the north- ern part of the county, and. as a rural dis- triet, their successors may be said to have kept their position. The earliest settlers in what became Lawrence Township, in the defining of the boundaries of Perry, Jackson, Tuscarawas and Lawrence, were William Crites, Henry Clapper, Jacob Clapper, the brothers Harris, John and Stephen, Massum Metcalf-incor-

155

LAWRENCE TOWNSHIP.

rectly written Matthew Metcalf. in Evart's Atlas of Stark County. He is well remembered by the writer, and was ordinarily known as " Madcap." He is referred to in the history of Tuscarawas Township, his name appearing in the third United States census, as a resident of that township, the census being taken in 1810, six years before the organization of the township of Lawrence, and at the taking of which all residents on the west side of the Tuscara- was River south of the 41st parallel of lati- tude. which is the base line of the Connecticut Western Reserve, and north of the south line of Stark County, as established by Act of the General Assembly of Ohio. February 13, 1868 (Chase's Statutes, Chapter 367). were included. As all the territory west of the Tuscarawas River was, at the organization of Tuscarawas Township, included in that town- ship, in several instances the same persons appear as the first settlers of the townships of Tuscarawas and Lawrence.

The first permanent settler of what is now Lawrence Township, and who remained on the soil after the township was organized, was William Crites. He remained many years in the township. His name, with that of Stephen llarris, Henry Clapper. Daniel Clapper. John Clapper. Adam Lower. Adam Grom ds. George Baystone, Massum Metcalf, Jacob Metcalf and Jeremiah Atkinson, appear in the consus. neither of whom, except llon. Stephen Harris, ever resided in Tuscarawas Township after it was reduced to its constitutional limits. Some of the persons named resided in Lawrence until it was organized, and some went farther west, before any division of the territory west of the river was made.

During the war of 1812, when it became necessary for the Government to remove troops to the west, Col. Gibson, in command of a reg- iment, cut a road through the south end of the township. running northwesterly from where is now the city of Massillon, and is known as the " army road," or the "territorial road." The late Gen. William Robinson, Jr., the first Presi- dent of the Ohio & Pennsylvania Railroad, being then a Lieutenant in the United States Army. was with the regiment and with it en- camped where now is the Second Ward of the city of Massillon, between the river and canal, the objective point of the regiment being Fort Miegs, or Defiance. Subsequently a State road

was laid out on the road opened by Col. Gib- son, and has ever since been used as such.

The first efforts by any religious society to organize a subordinate society or obtain a place for religious worship in what is now Lawrence, then Tuscarawas, Township. were made by Rev. James Dixon, who was appointed by the Western Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, held at a chapel in Shelby County, Ky .. in November. 18IO. The circuit was known as - Tuscarawas Cir- cuit," and extended from Coshocton to New Portage. alout ninety miles. The district was known as Muskingum District, and Rey James Quinn was Presiding Elder, and from the best information that can be had. Mr. Dixon preached at the house of William Crites, but whether Mr. Dixon formed a society north of what is now the south line of Lawrence Township, cannot be ascertained. In 1812, John Somer- ville was appointed to the circuit and returned 491 members, and from that day to the present it is safe to say that the township has not been without Methodist preaching and from the best information that can be had. Mr. Somerville organized the first Methodist society in the township. He was a man of wonderful energy and perseverance, doing his Master's work with all his might. In 1831, a church was organized in Fulton, and the village was put. into what was called the Dover Circuit, Fut what district it belonged to cannot be ascor- tained. The Presiding Elder was Rev. W. B. Christy. He was a man of great power, but was cut off in middle life and before he had at- tained the height of his popularity. The cir- cuit was composed of Dalton, Greenville. Brook field and Fulton. Among the preachers of those days were Charles Elliott. Harry O. Sheldon and William Swazey. all of whom were men of strong character and untiring energy. Fulton is yet in a circuit of these charges. the Rev. Mr. Bell being the preacher. The absence of records has rendered it difficult to obtain any- thing like an authentic history. The conference to which Fulton belongs is the North Ohio.

The first Roman Catholics to settle in the township came in 1812. and were John McCad den, Matthew Patton and Daniel O'Boyle. In 1813, Charles MeCadden and John Gallagher settled in Bavgl.man Township, in Wayne County, but so near the western line of Law- rence as to be scarcely separated, and these

456

HISTORY OF STARK COUNTY.

tive families composed the nuelens of the now flourishing parish of St. Philip and St. James, in Fulton.

In the year 1817. Rev. Edward Fenwick, from the diocese of Bardstown, Ky., left his home and traveled through the southern and eastern parts of Ohio in search of persons pro- fessing the Catholic faith. and came to Canton, and there found the several Shorb families, George Roofher and his family, and a few others. By way of parenthesis, it may be re- marked that George Roofner was a well-digger by profession, and dug and walled the well on the premises in Kendal (now better known as a part of the city of Massillon) on which Adam Braehm resides. Roofner was killed by falling from the mouth to the bottom of a deep well, the fall being occasioned by the breaking of the rope used for hoisting the earth from the bot tom. He was a devoted Catholic. The few families of Catholics at Canton informed Rev. Father Fenwick of the Catholic families in Law- rence Township and west of the Tuscarawas River. He immediately came into the town- ship. celebrated mass. and preached and in- structed the youth and ministered to the spirit- ual wants of the six families, and promised to return next year. True to his promise, the good Father returned the next year and celebrated mass in the log-cabin residence of Daniel ('Boyle, and which was the first mass cele- brated in Lawrence Township. The celebration of mass the previous year was at the log-cabin residence of Matthew Patton, who had removed just over into Baughman Township. Wayne County.

In the following year, 1818, the Rev. Father Fenwick and several young priests of the same order located or settled on a farm two miles from Somerset, in Perry County. Ohio, after which the Catholics of the township were attended yearly by some one of the priests of that mis- sion, which was known as St. Joseph's. Rev. N. Young and Rey. Thomas Martin being most frequent in their attendance until 1823. After that they were visited ocesionally by Rev. Fathers Hill and lenni, from Canton. Father HIill died in Canton, in 1828, and Father Henni is now Archbishop of Milwaukee. Wis. Father Ilill was a most brilliant and eloquent priest ; is well remembered by the writer, as is Arch- bishop Henni. Up to 1831, it would seem that the Catholies of Lawrence and Baughman had

no church edifice, as religious services were held at the houses of Matthew Patton and others. A few Irish and German families were added to the congregation, and they resolved to build a church, and the farm of Phillip McQue being considered near the center of the congregation, a chapel was built on the west side of his farm; which farm is now the residence of his widow and her son, Thomas MeQue, Esq., and his fam- ily, Mrs. MeCue being in the eighty-second year of her age, and to whom, with Phillip Patton, Esq .. of Baughman Township, the writer desires to acknowledge his obligations for many of the most important faets herein narrated. "The chapel was built," says Mr. Patton, - 30x40 feet on the west line of the farm, and was the first Catholic chapel in the township." The families worshiping in that little church were from the townships of Baughman, Chippeway and Sugar Creek, in Wayne County, as well as from Law- rence, in Stark County. By this time the vil- lage of Fulton began to improve, and German Catholies began to settle in the village and in the eastern part of the township, among whom should be named the late Gottfried Bernower, the Hammers, Warners, Gills and others. The different religious denominations throughout the township, that had erected temporary houses for worship, in the country, began to ereet perma- neut church edifices in the village. The Hon. Iliram Griswold, now of Leavenworth, Kan .. representing large interests in real estate in the village, the Catholics purchased of him a block of lots, in 1844, on which to erect a new church edifice, and work in that direction was immedi- ately begun. The corner-stone was laid by Bish- op. now Archbishop, Purcell, in 1845. A build- ing was erected. 35x50 feet, at a cost of $1,500. In 1868, the chapel being found to be too small to accommodate the large congregation, they "re- solved," says Mr. Patton, " to erect a chapel to honor the Supreme Being. They drew a plan of a building, to be 50x100 feet, tower 100 feet in height, brick, Gothic architecture, and which was erected at a cost of $30,000."

As reference has been had to that excellent man, Rev. Edward Fenwick, it is deemed proper to state that in 1821 he was consecrated Bishop, his diocese being in the States of Ohio. Indiana. Illinois and the Western Territories, the diocese being known as the " Diocese of Cincinnati." In 1823, he administered the rite of confirmation to eight or ten persons in Law-

457

LAWRENCE TOWNSHIP.

rence Township. among whom was the respected Mr. Patton. so frequently and necessarily named in this sketch. The year 1832 will be remembered by some yet living as the first year of that frightful scourge, the Asiatic cholera. In that year, Bishop Fenwick went on an ex- tensive Episcopal visitation through Michigan and Wisconsin, returning through Northern Ohio, taking Canton en route to Cincinnati, and traveling by stage coach. On his arrival at Massillon accompanied by one of the Sisters of Charity, it was made known to the person having the hotel in charge at which the coach stopped that the Bishop was very ill. He was urged to stop, and was assured of every atten- tion the house could furnish, the proprietor being absent from town. The Bishop, however. thought he could go on with safety, and did go on. That night he died in Wooster, of cholera. He was attended by Drs. Bissell and Coulter and a black boy. The hotel at which he died was kept by Samuel Coulter, one of the carly residents of Canton. The rite of confirmation referred to, administered by Bishop Fenwick, was at the house of Matthew Patton, about twenty rods west of the Stark County line. At this time there are about one hundred fam- ilies who compose the congregation of St. Philip and St. James, Rev. Father Zattman being the priest in charge.

The first Presbyterian preaching in the town- ship was by Rev. James Adams, whose name appears elsewhere in these sketches. He preached first at the house of John Morehead. and was a thorough believer in the doctrine that " by faith shall all men be justified." .At that time the Presbyterian Church was strong and influential on the west side of the river. The members were of the hardy Scotch Irish people of Western Pennsylvania, who, as has been said elsewhere in these sketches of the Quakers. " Bore with liberty and law the Bible in their train." With such antecedents, Law- rence could not nor has ever been a second-rate township. Its present population is 6,000. It has the growing and enterprising village of Fulton. the post office of which is known as Canal Fulton, situate in the northern end of the township, and nearly in the northwestern corner.

Originally, that part of the village lying west of the Tusearawas River was known as Milan, and was laid out in 1814. by Matthew

Rowland, Esq .. afterward prominent as a Jus tice of the Peace, on the organization of the township and in the history of the county, and died in 1821. The township had a decided military taste, as it furnished no less than four Colonels of regiments, on what the late Gov. Corwin, in his celebrated speech in reply to Gen. frary, called the " peace establishment." Their names were Isaiah Bowen. William Alban. William Elliott, and, at a later date, Jacob Harsh. Col. Bowen was a millwright by trade. and did much of the millwright work west of the Tuscarawas River, in the now County of Stark, and also did the millwright work on the tirst mill built in Perry Township, known as Folger's mill. John Sturgeon, also a military man and millwright, worked with Isaiah Bowen, was a son-in-law of Matthew Rowland. Esq., and is believed to have erected the first dwell- ing house in the village of Milan. James O'Boyle. incorrectly written . Boiles." was Captain of a rifle company, made up of many of the young men of the township, and known as the " Kendal Rifle Blues." Their place for muster, exercise and drill was on the North square, in Kendal. The company retained its organization but a few years, but during its ex- istence was regarded as a "crack " company. To those who remember the military spirit called into existence by the war of 1812, with Great Britain, it is a little remarkable to wit- ness the degeneracy of that spirit in later days. In those carly times. the citizen-soldier felt that he was the right arm of the Federal Gov- ernment. No West Point graduate excelled him in patriotism or bravery, and as Indian fighters, the hardy pioneers of what was then the frontier settlements viekled to nobody. whether he regulated his ideas of fighting by subtle criticisms ou strategy and careful re views of marches, sieges, battles, regular and casual, and irregular onslaughts, or whether he fought by the practical notion of " the devil take the hindmost." the pioneer settler was always ready, and made his faith manifest by his works; and of such were the men who peopled the Tuscarawas Valley, as soon as the right to take peaceable possession under the treaties already referred to was guaranteed to them.

The first grist mill erected in the township was built by Col. William Goudy, and was built in 1812, and was the one sold to Leonard

454

HISTORY OF STARK COUNTY.

Kerstetter, in 1814, already referred to, and was lin ully destroyed by fire, while owned by the late Cyrus Young. At an early day, another mill was built, on Fox Run, by Col. Isaiah Bowen, which proved of little value.

Some three years before the organization of the township, George Il ish removed into the territory then known as Tuscarawas Towaship. In 1812 he had sent his son John from Wash- ington County. Pennsylvania, who purchased 100 acres of land from Col. William Goudy, who had purchased the quarter-section, the same Goudy who had erected the mill. The hundred acres purchased by Jolm is the same land now owned by John JJacobs, of Massillon, and which has been most fruitful in its yield of mineral coal of the best quality. On the arri- val of Mr. Harsh. the father, he entered the quarter adjoining the 100 acres already pur- chased. on the north. at the Government land office. That quarter is now owned by the only surviving son, Hon. George WFrsh, of Massil- lon. and on which is situate the celebrated . Mountain Coal Mine." The father, George Harsh. died August 16. 1833, aged seventy-three years. His wife survived him ten years, and died at the age of seventy-six. He was married twice, having by his first marriage two sons, Henry and John. Henry lived in Virgina, now West Vir- ginia. and John in Wayne County, Ohio. Both have been dead many years. By the second marriage he had Benjamin. Joseph, Jacob. Barbara and George, now sole survivor of the family, in his seventy-second year. Of the des- cen laints of Leonard Kerstetter, but two grand- sons remain. David and Daniel, and one grand- daughter, Mrs. Daniel Kleckner. The descend- ants were numerous, and contributed largely to the growth and prosperity of the township. Leonard Kerstetter served in the war of the Revolution, and had two sons in the war of 1812.

The first Presbyterian Church edilice in the township was built in the northwest corner, and was known as Newman's Creek Presbyterian Church. The congregation was composed of members from the townships of Chippewa, Banghman and Sugar Creek, in Wayne County, and of those living north of Newman's Creek in Stark County. The first Presbyterian min- ister was Rev. James Adams, who resided in Sugar Creek Township, Wayne County. He was succeeded by Rev. James Galbraith and Rev. James Snodgrass, on the west side of the

river, who preached occasionally at Newman's Creek. Of the early Presbyterians the names of Porter, Lytle, MeCanghey, Mc Dowell, Fulton, Morehead, Wilkins, Alban, Whitcraft, Tate and many others, Scotch, Irish and the descend- ants of Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, from West- Fern Pennsylvania, will always be found promi- nent. In June, 1842, the church was removed to Fulton, Rev, Jonas Denton being Pastor, and James Lee, Richard Porter, William Alban, and Thomas Ritchie, Elders. During the long period that has elapsed since the organization of New- man's Creek Presbyterian Church, being more than sixty years, the Presbyterians have had the stated preaching of the Gospel in the town- ship, and are now growing and increasing under the ministry of Rev. Mr. Carson ; D. C. McDowell. Andrew Lytle and John Porter, Elders.

In 1826, under the impetus given to the im- provement of the country generally, by the lo- cating of the Ohio Canal, the village of Fulton w.is laid out by William Christmas and James W. Lathrop, both of whom resided at Canton, and was, on the opening of canal navigation, a most important point for the purchasing of produce of all kinds. Among its merchants, the first was llenry A. Stidger, a nephew of Gen. George Stidger, one of the first merchants of Canton, and also an Associate Judge ; he, however, did not remain. He went to Carroll- ton, in Carroll County, where he has remained, having been a prominent citizen of that county seat ever since its organization. During his long residence in that county he has been Brig- adier General, and held other offices of distinc- tion, and it is said of him that he has on hand some of the identical goods which stocked his store in Fulton, fifty six years ago.

The Ohio Canal. when opened from Cleveland to Massillon, in 1828, was the great highway and medium of transportation through the State of Ohio, as far as finished. It brought a new people into the State, especially along its line, some of whom were of the hardy adventurers who, years before, had been tra lers up the Cuyahoga, from Cleveland to the Cuyahoga Portage, across the Portage to the head-waters of the Tuscarawas, and down that river through the navigable streams already described, as far as interest or enterprise might offer induce- ments to go. Once on the Tuscarawas, as far south as Clinton. in Franklin Township, in the

459

LAWRENCE TOWNSHIP.

now county of Summit, the way was open to New Orleans and the Gulf. One trader, who used to boast of his enterprise and success, was Capt. Henry Clarke, well recollected by the writer, in 1826, as an explorer along the line of the canal, and afterward as a hotel-keeper at New Portage and the now city of Akron. Capt. Clarke, in telling his experience, on one occasion while the building of the canal was progressing, said he had transported salt from Cleveland up the Cuyahoga in canoes, and packed it in sacks on horseback over the Portage, and taken it down the Tusearawas Valley and sold it ont by the half-pint to the retailers. Those who remember Capt. Henry Clarke will recognize the likeness of the man in the story just re- lated.

Prominent among the carly business and successful operators in Fulton was the late John Robinson, Esq. Mr. Robinson was trained to the profession and business of a merchant. under the care of Judge William Henry, com- meneing his apprenticeship in the brick build- ing on the extension of Cherry street, in the now city of Massillon, as early as 1823. On the locating of the canal and the laying out of Fulton. Judge Henry, with that shrewdness that marked his character, established Mr. Robinson in business, the firm being J. Robin- son & Co. Mr. Robinson, being a man of striet business habits, and equally strict in all other respects, commanded the business of the entire surrounding country, including the northern part of Wayne County. The post office. which had been originally kept by Amzi D. Meese, and while, in his hands, discon- tinued. was re-established, and Mr. Robinson appointed Postmaster, and Fulton took a start and attained a prominence as a business point, that it has kept. Many of the best buildings for business purposes in the village, and which gave the place a start, were erected by Mr. Robinson, or through his influence. In 1836, he purchased the interest of Judge Henry, who had never advanced any capital, or if any, it was merely nominal, and continued business in his own name up to to the time of his death, which occurred in the city of Philadelphia, April 14, 1860.

The merchant longest in business in Fulton at this time is JJohn Mobley, who has resided there forty-six years, and has succeeded amid all the changes of almost half a century. and

may be said to be one of the ancient land- marks by which the existence of Fulton may be established.

In 1853. a general law was passed by the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, author- izing the forming of municipal incorporations, and the citizens of Fulton availed themselves of its provisions and became an incorporated village, including the okl town of Milan, under the name of the Incorporated Village of Ful- ton, sinee which its growth has been steady and permanent.

The first lawyer in Fulton was the late William M. Cunningham, Esq .. who opened an office in 1812 ; was a Justice of the Peace, and acquired property ; removed to Akron. where he died.

The first teacher of a school in the township was Alexander Porter, who opened a school in a log house, built on the farm of William Alban in 1816. It seems he taught but one year, when George Waggoner took charge of the school, and wielded the birch and ferule, as the backs of the boys bore witness. Next to bim was Stephen t'assel, who was First Lieutenant of the Kendal Rithe Blues, and was a man of taste and culture ; he removed to Holmes County, and remained until his life's work ended.

An important item in the history of Fulton is the Stark County Orphans' Institute, a cor- rect history of which has never been written, and probably never will be. The following, however, is believed to be as nearly correct as will ever appear: In 1837 or 1838, there came to the then village of Massillon a merchant by the name of Osee Welch, and a certain Dr. John Cook Bennett ; there came also a produce dealer from Buffalo, N. Y .. by the name of Henry Roop, who had a brother residing in Paris, Stark County, Ohio, and who had resided there many years. There was also in existence, at that time, an institution known as the Gran- ville Alexandrian Society, having a charter as a literary society, which was granted carly in 1807, and during the mania for banking. at the close of the war of 1812. it was claimed that the Library Company of Granville had banking powers, and it at once commenced to exercise those powers by opening an office of discount and deposit. In the crash which followed the chartering of the Bank of the I'nited States. in 1816. the Granville Alexandrian Society, and the bank established under the provisions of its charter, went down with a crash. By some

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Stark County, with an outline sketch of Ohio, Part 80

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892? ed Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Chicago, Baskin & Battey Number of Pages: 1060

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892? ed
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago, Baskin & Battey
Number of Pages: 1060