History of the Ohio falls cities and their counties : with illustrations and bibliographical sketches, Vol. I, Part 16

Author: Williams, L.A., & Co., Cleveland
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio : L. A. Williams & Co.
Number of Pages: 814

USA > Ohio > History of the Ohio falls cities and their counties : with illustrations and bibliographical sketches, Vol. I > Part 16

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HISTORY OF THE OHIO FALLS COUNTIES.

occurs the Governor issues a writ of election to fill it for the remainder of the term, unless that remainder be less than one year, when the Gov- ernor appoints a judge.

Each judge of the circuit court is a conserva- tor of the peace throughout the State, and may grant writs of error coram vobis et nobis. He may exchange circuits with another judge, unless a majority of the members of the bar prefer to elect a special judge to act temporarily in his stead. When this is done the attorneys retained in a case about to be tried are not allowed to vote for the special judge. He may hold a special term, whenever the business demands it, in any county in the district, to try penal, criminal, and chancery cases, or any class of them, and may order a grand and petit jury to be impanneled for any special term, in term-time or during vaca- tion. If he fail to attend a term, or, being pres- ent, cannot properly preside in a cause or causes pending, the attorneys of court who are in at- tendance, with the exception above noted, may elect one of their number in attendance to hold the term, and he shall preside and adjudicate accordingly. More recently the provision has been extended to include equity and criminal courts. The judges are paid each $3,000 per annum, and in criminal or penal prosecutions, if a judge is assigned to hold court in another dis- trict than his own, he is allowed his traveling ex- penses and $10 a day while holding the court.

The circuit court assumes original jurisdiction of all matters at law and equity within this coun- ty, except those of which jurisdiction is exclu- sively lodged in another tribunal, and is fully em- powered to carry into effect its jurisdiction. When the debt sued for is less than $50, it has jurisdiction of an attachment of lands. The General Assembly has power to alter the jurisdic- tion of the court, but not to change the judicial districts except when a new one is added. Ap- peals on writs of error may be made to this court from the decisions of county courts in the same county, in all controversies relating to the estab- lishment, alteration, or discontinuance of ferries, roads, and passages, and in cases arising from the probate of wills and from orders concerning mills or water-works, or refusing or allowing dams to be built across water-courses, or from judgments in bastardy cases, or judgments and final orders in penal cases. Appeals lie to it

from decisions of the quarterly courts and of justices of the peace and other tribunals having a similar civil jurisdiction as justices of the peace, in all civil cases when the amount in controversy is $20 or more, exclusive of interest and costs; and in all actions of trespass or trespass upon the case, before justices of the peace, the aggrieved party has the right of appeal to the circuit court of the same county.

A Commonwealth's or State's attorney is also elected in each district ; and a clerk of the cir- cuit court is elected for each county. The com- monwealth's attorney in the Ninth district is en- titled to forty per cent. of the amount of all judgments returnable to or for appearance in the Jefferson circuit court. In other counties of the State the fee is thirty per cent., unless the judg- ment is less than $50, when he receives $5 in- stead. Once every four years, and oftener in case of a vacancy, the judge appoints a master commissioner for the court. When a receiver is to be appointed in a case, the judge may appoint, if the parties fail to do so, and may likewise ap- point examiners to take depositions. For Jeffer- son county, the office of interpreter of the circuit court was specially created by legislative act Feb- ruary 4, 1865. The incumbent thereof is ap- pointed by the court, and is removable at the pleas- ure of the judge. He may appoint the same person who is serving as interpreter in the city court of Louisville. Such officer must be thor- oughly competent to speak both English and Ger -. man, is to hold his office, unless removed, for one year from date of appointment, and receive a salary of $500 a year.

The Ninth Judicial district consisted for a number of years of Jefferson, Shelby, Oldham, Spencer, and Bullitt counties, but is now co- incident with Jefferson alone. In 1838 Jefferson and Oldham composed the circuit.

THE COURT OF COMMON PLEAS.

This court was established by law February 8, 1867. It is virtually in perpetual session, and all summons executed in any action in said court in Jefferson county for twenty days, or for thirty days in any other county of the State, is suffi- cient to authorize a plaintiff or defendant to set his action on the trial-docket for trial or hearing. Actions in the court not contested are tried or heard in open court as they are placed for trial -

HISTORY OF THE OHIO FALLS COUNTIES.

and called upon the trial docket, unless the judge takes time to consider the law or fact in such ac- tion, or time is given for argument of either the law or fact of the case, when the court may lay over the action to a future day.

If the judge of the court of common pleas is at any time disabled from discharging his duties, an election is held by the attorneys participating in said court, for a judge pro tempore, who must be one of their own number. Upon election, he possesses the same powers, and draws during his period of services the same salary, pro rata, as the regular judge.

The judge of this court may appoint commis- missioners to take depositions for the court. This court is for Jefferson county alone.

THE COUNTY COURT.

A county judge is elected in each county, whose term of office is four years. He holds the quarterly courts, in which his jurisdiction is concurrent with justices of the peace, in all civil cases, in both law and equity. He has also juris- diction throughout the county in proceedings against constables for defalcations in office, and has concurrent jurisdiction with the circuit court in all civil cases where the amount in contro- versy does not exceed $100, exclusive of interest and costs, and where the title or boundary of real estate is not in question. Land is not levied on or sold under execution from the quarterly court; but where any such execution has been returned as finding no property, in whole or in part, a certified copy of the judgment and ex- ecution may be filed in the clerk's office of the county in which the judgment was rendered, which shall be copied in a book kept for the purpose. The court may appoint a clerk, who has power to issue summons, subpoenas, execu- tions, etc. At its quarterly sessions it makes all necessary orders relating to bridges, changes or erections of precincts, and such matters as in other States are usually confided to boards of supervisors or county commissioners.

THE COUNTY JUDGE

is the probate judge or surrogate judge of the county. His court is held quarterly, and must remain in session until business on the docket is disposed of. In it wills are proved, administra- tors' and executors' business transacted, and the customary matters relating to estates of deced-

ents are heard and determined. The judge has exclusive jurisdiction to grant administration on estates of deceased persons in Kentucky. He may appoint or remove guardians; he has con- current jurisdiction with justices of the peace in all cases of riots and breaches of the peace, and of all misdemeanors under the common law or statutes of the Commonwealth. He is a con- servator of the peace in his county, and has all the powers of a justice of the peace in penal and criminal proceedings and in courts of enquiry. He has appellate jurisdiction of the judgements of a justice, when the amount in controversy is $5 or more, but not of judgments on injunctions of forcible entry and detainer. He has concur- rent jurisdiction with the circuit court where the sum in controversy, exclusive of interest and costs, does not exceed $100, and where the title or boundary of real estate is not in question. He is ex-officio presiding judge of the quarterly court ; when the sum in controversy in that court is above $16, without reckoning interest and costs, either party to the case may have a change of venue to the circuit court of the same county, by order of a circuit judge, upon the party de- siring the change making affidavit that he does not believe he can obtain a fair trial before the presiding judge. And when the county judge has not his office at the county-seat or within one mile of it, or is absent from his office, the clerk of the county court may issue the summons in an action in the quarterly court in the same manner and under the same circumstances as the judge, and also subpoenas for witnesses, and shall be allowed the same fees as the judge.

In his own court, or in the circuit court of his county, the county judge is authorized to grant injunctions and attachments at common law or in chancery. He has jurisdiction to hold in- quests upon idiots and lunatics. He shall be his own clerk, with the powers and duties of clerks of such courts, and must keep a record of his proceedings. For all services rendered in the quarterly court, where their jurisdiction is concurrent with the circuit court, the county judge is entitled to the same fees allowed by law to the clerks of circuit courts for similar services, and where his jurisdiction is concurrent with jus- tices of the peace, he is entitled to justices' fees in like causes. He also examines and audits the accounts of the commissioners of common

HISTORY OF THE OHIO FALLS COUNTIES.

schools, for services rendered. He holds his office for the term of four years.

THE CITY COURTS.

The city of Louisville has its own chancery court and city court.

The act of General 'Assembly approved March 26, 1872, provides for the election of a vice- chancellor for the period of six years, to discharge the duties of chancellor in case of his absence or incapacity for other reason to sit in a cause, and also to hear and determine any other causes or questions which may be assigned to him by the chancellor. He may hold the Jefferson court of common pleas, if the judge of that court be ab- sent or incapacitated, and may hold the chancery court to aid in clearing the docket of the com- mon pleas. Hon. James Harlan was the first vice-chancellor under this act.

A REMINISCENCE OF 1786.

The following account is extracted from that part of Mr. Casseday's entertaining History of Louisville which deals with the events of 1786:

The following extracts from the records of the court during this year will not give a very favorable idea of the high degree of enlightenment among our ancestors in 1786. On the 21st of October in this year, it is recorded that "negro Tom, a slave, the property of Robert Daniel," was con- demned to death for stealing "two and three-fourth yards of cambric, and some ribbon and thread, the property of James Patten." This theft, small as it now appears, if estimated in the currency of the times would produce an astonishing sum, as will appear by the following inventory rendered to the court of the property of a deceased person :

To a coat and waistcoat {250; an old blue do., and do. 4,50 .. £300

To pocket-book {6; part of an old shirt £3. 0

To old blanket 6s; 2 bushels salt £480 480 6s

£789 6s

These were the times when the price of whisky was fixed by law at $30 the pint, and hotel-keepers were allowed and expected to charge $12 for a breakfast and $6 for a bed. Pay- ment, however, was always expected in the depreciated Con- tinental money, then almost the only currency.

MR. FLINT'S NOTES.

Mr. James Flint, a Scotchman, spent consider- able time about the Falls, during the years 1819-20, and wrote many interesting observa- tions and reflections to his friends abroad, which were afterwards published at Edinburgh in a book of Letters from America. In an epistle dated at Jeffersonville, September 8, 1820, he says :

I have made several short excursions into the country. I was at Charlestown, the seat of justice in Clark county,

while the circuit court sat there, and had opportunities of hearing the oratory of several barristers, which was delivered in language strong, elegant, and polite. A spirit of emula- tion prevails at the bar, and a gentleman of good taste in- formed me that some young practitioners have made vast progress within two or three years past. The United States certainly opens an extensive field for eloquence.

The foregoing remarks, as well as those which follow, were no doubt equally applicable on the Kentucky side of the river. After some notice of the composition of the court and the waggery practiced by lawyers, Mr. Flint says :

Freedoms on the part of lawyers seem to be promoted in the back country, in consequence of the bench being occa- sionally filled with men who are much inferior to those at the bar. The salary of the presiding judge. I have been told, is only $700 a year. The present presiding judge is a man who has distinguished himself in Indian war- fare. Whatever opinion you may form of the bench here, you may be assured that it is occupied as a post of honor.

Amongst the business of the court, the trial of a man who had stolen two horses excited much interest. On his being sentenced to suffer thirty stripes, he was immediately led from the bar to the whipping-post. Every touch of the cowhide (a weapon formerly described) drew a red line across his back.

THE COUNTY COURT-HOUSE

was built in 1838-39, substantially in the shape in which it now appears. The city directory of those years, published before its completion, boldly says: "It will undoubtedly be the architectural ornament of the place, if not of the whole West. Its structure is stone facing, with a brick wall of two feet in thickness."

THE OLD JAIL.

The jail (or "gaol," as he called it, after the orthography then current), was described by Dr. McMurtrie in 1819 as "a most miserable edifice, in a most filthy and ruinous condition, first cousin to the Black Hole of Calcutta." A new and more roomy one had been contracted for, which was to be commenced shortly, and "to be built, as is the old one, of stone, with arched fire-proof apartments and cells secure, but so constructed as to afford shelter to the unfor- tunate victim of the law, who may there 'address himself to sleep' without any fear of losing his ears through the voracity of the rats and other vermin that swarm in the present one."

A PILLORY AND WHIPPING-POST.

"It would be well," thought the humane Doc- tor, "to surround the new building, when finished, with a high stone wall and to inclose within its limits that horrid-looking engine now standing opposite the Court-house. I allude to the pillory

HISTORY OF THE OHIO FALLS COUNTIES.

and whipping-post. Such things may perhaps be necessary (and even that is very doubtful) for the punishment of the guilty ; but I am sure it never came within the intention of the law to inflict through it pain upon the innocent, its very appearance, combined with a knowledge of its uses, sufficing to blanch the cheek of every man who is not, through custom or a heart callous to the sufferings of humanity, totally regardless of such scenes."

THE NEW JAIL.

The city and county jail was completed and occupied in 1844. It was 72 feet long by 42 wide, and in its construction resembled in many re- spects the celebrated Moyamensing Prison, at Philadelphia. It had 48 single cells, each 6 feet by 10, and double cells, 10 feet by 13, all of solid stone and dry, well warmed and ventilated. They opened on interior galleries, constructed of wrought iron to the third story. A large cistern on the third gallery supplied the prisoners with water, and was also used to clean the conduits from the cells. Gas was used in all parts of the prison. Its architecture was Gothic, with a para- pet wall three feet high, and turrets and watch- towers, a cupola for a bell, and a copper covered roof. The whole was enclosed with a wall twen- ty feet high, of brick, in a stone foundation plast- ered and pebble-dashed. The original plan, sub- sequently abandoned, contemplated a subter- ranean communication between it and the Court- house. The city architect, Mr. John Jeffrey, drew the plan for this building aud superintended its construction.

CHAPTER IV. MILITARY RECORD OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.

Introductory - The Revolutionary War -Clark's Great Achievement-Bowman's Expedition-Captain Harrod's Company of 1780-Clark's Later Expeditions-The Ken- tucky Board of War-General Scott's Expeditions-Wil- kinson's Expedition-Hopkins's Expedition-The War of 1812 -- 15-The Jefferson County Contingent-The Mexi- can War-The Utah War-The War of the Rebellion- Movements in Louisville-A Delegation to Cincinnati- Recruiting Begun-The Sanitary Commission-State Mili- tary Officers from Louisville -- General and Staff Officers from Louisville-The Jefferson County Contingent-The

Infantry Regiments-The Cavalry Regiments-The Bat- teries-State Militia in United States Service-The Louis- ville Legion-The Louisville Troops in the Southern Army.

The soldiership of the region now or anciently included within the limits of Jefferson county began more than a century ago; and Kentucky military history, recorded in full, would make a book in itself, comprising as it does much of the entire narrative of Indian and border warfare in the Northwest during a period of nearly forty years. It is a brilliant page in the annals of the conflict of civilization with savagery that is filled by the story of the men of Kentucky, and by none more nobly than by those who clustered in the early day about the Falls of the Ohio. When- ever, too, in a later time, the call to arms has come, the martial blood of Jefferson county, flowing unimpaired in the veins of worthy de- scendants of noble sires, has stirred again with the fierce joy of battle, and sent forth many a hero to do and die for the cause to which he gave his allegiance. To the Indian wars of the last quarter of the last century and the first of this; to the war of the Revolution; the last war with Great Britain ; the prolonged skirmish with Mexico; to both the Northern and Southern armies in the recent great civil conflict, the con- tingents from this county have been large and brave and effective in the field, in proportion to the numbers then settled here, as those from any other part of the land, placed amid similar cir- cumstances. It is a proud record which Jeffer- son county contributes to the history of wars in the New World. We can but outline it in this work.

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.

Until near the close of this eventful struggle, Louisville was not, even in name; and Jefferson county had not yet been set apart from the vast domain so far comprised in the State of Virginia. The State of Kentucky to-be was as yet the great county of Kentucky. Nevertheless, the region around the Falls is associated with one of most interesting and important events of the entire seven-years' contest, in that here was the final point of departure from civilized settlements, for the renowned expedition of General George Rogers Clark, in the summer of 1778, against the Illinois country, which permanently retrieved that region from the British possession, for the rising young empire of the United States. The

HISTORY OF THE OHIO FALLS COUNTIES.

story is well told, with sufficient fullness for our purposes, in the Rev. John A. McClung's Out- line History, included in Collins's History of Kentucky:

When Clark was in Kentucky, in the summer of 1776, he took a more comprehensive survey of the Western country than the rude pioneers around him; his keen military eye was cast upon the Northwestern posts, garrisoned by British troops, and affording inexhaustible supplies of arms and am- munition to the small predatory bands of Indians which in- fested Kentucky. He saw plainly that they were the true fountains from which the thousand little annual rills of Indian rapine and murder took their rise, and he formed the bold project of striking at the root of the evil.

The Revolutionary war was then raging, and the Western posts were too remote from the great current of events to at- tract, powerfully, the attention of either friend or foe; but to Kentucky they were objects of capital interest. He un- folded his plan to the Executive of Virginia, awakened him to a true sense of its importance, and had the address to ob- tain from the impoverished Legislature a few scanty supplies of men and munitions for his favorite project. Undismayed by the scantiness of his means, he embarked in the expedition with all the ardor of his character. A few State troops were furnished by Virginia, a few scouts and guides by Kentucky, and, with a secresy and celerity of movement never surpassed by Napoleon in his palmiest days, he embarked in his daring project.

Having descended the Ohio in boats to the Falls, he there landed thirteen families who had accompanied him from Pitts- burg, as emigrants to Kentucky, and by whom the founda- tion of Louisville was laid. Continuing his course down the Ohio, he disembarked his troops about sixty miles above the mouth of that river, and marching on foot through a pathless wilderness, he came upon Kaskaskia [on the 4th of July] as suddenly and unexpectedly as if he had descended from the skies. The British officer in command, Colonel Rochdu- blare, and his garrison, surrendered to a force which they could have repelled with ease, if warned of their approach; but never, in the annals of war, was surprise more complete. Having secured and sent off his prisoners to Virginia, Clark was employed for some time in conciliating the inhabitants, who, being French, readily submitted to the new order of things. In the meantime, a storm threatened him from Vincennes. Governor Hamilton, who commanded the Brit- ish force in the Northwest, had actively employed himself during the fall season in organizing a large army of savages, with whoin, in conjunction with his British force, he deter- mined not only to crush Clark and his handful of adventur- ers, but to desolate Kentucky, and even seize Fort Pitt. The season, however, became so far advanced before he had completed his preparations, that he determined to defer the project until spring, and in the meantime, to keep his Indians employed, he launched them against the frontiers of Pennsyl- vania and Virginia, intending to concentrate them early in the spring, and carry out his grand project.

Clark in the meantime lay at Kaskaskia, revolving the diffi- culties of his situation, and employing his spies diligently in learning intelligence of his enemy. No sooner was he in- formed of the dispersion of Hamilton's Indian force, and that he lay at Vincennes with his regulars alone, than he deter- mined to strike Vincennes as he had struck Kaskaskia. The march was long, the season inclement, the road passed through an untrodden wilderness and through overflowed

bottoms; his stock of provisions was scanty, and was to be carried upon the backs of his men. He could only muster one hundred and thirty men; but, inspiring this handful with his own heroic spint, he plunged boldly into the wilderness which separated Kaskaskia from Vincennes, resolved to strike his enemy in the citadel of his strength or perish in the effort. The difficulties of the march were great, beyond what his daring spirit had anticipated. For days his route led through the drowned lands of Illinois; his stock of pro- visions became exhausted, his guides lost their way, and the most intrepid of his followers at times gave way to despair. At length they emerged from the drowned lands, and Vin- cennes, like Kaskaskia, was completely surprised. The Gov- ernor and garrison became prisoners of war, and, like their predecessors at Kaskaskia, were sent on to Virginia. The Canadian inhabitants readily submitted, the neighboring tribes were overawed, and some of them became allies, and the whole of the adjacent country became subject to Virginia, which employed a regiment of State troops in maintaining and securing their conquest. A portion of this force was af- terwards permanently stationed at Louisville, where a fort was erected, and where Clark established his headquarters.

The story of this fort and its successors will be told in connection with the annals of Louisville, to which division of our narrative it seems more properly to belong.

The following-named soldiers of the Revolu- tion were found to be still living in Jefferson county as late as July, 1840: Benjamin Wilke- son, aged 95; Levin Cooper, Sr., aged 87 ; Samuel Conn, aged 78; John Murphy, aged 76; Jane Wilson (probably a soldier's widow), aged 78. Many had by this time died or been killed in war who were known to have been Revolution- ary soldiers, as Colonel Richard C. Anderson, General George Rogers Clark, Colonel John Floyd, and other heroes of the war for inde- pendence.

BOWMAN'S EXPEDITION.

The next year after Clark's great achievement is made famous, in part, by the expedition of Colonel John Bowman, county lieutenant of Kentucky - not against white enemies, but against the savages of the Miami country, now in the State of Ohio. His command, variously estimated as numbering one hundred and sixty to three hundred men, did not rendezvous here, but certainly included a company from the Falls, numbering enough to make a large fraction of the entire force. It was commanded by the celebrated Kentucky pioneer and Indian fighter, William Harrod. Long afterwards one of the witnesses in a land case involving early titles in Kentucky testified that "a certain William Har- rod, who, this deponent concludes, commanded then at the Falls of the Ohio, harangued the

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History of the Ohio falls cities and their counties : with illustrations and bibliographical sketches, Vol. I, Part 16

Author: Williams, L.A., & Co., Cleveland Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio : L. A. Williams & Co. Number of Pages: 814

Author: Williams, L.A., & Co., Cleveland
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Cleveland, Ohio : L. A. Williams & Co.
Number of Pages: 814