History of the city of Columbus, capital of Ohio, Volume I, Part 36

Author: Lee, Alfred Emory, 1838-; W. W. Munsell & Co
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York and Chicago : Munsell & Co.
Number of Pages: 1202

USA > Ohio > Franklin County > Columbus > History of the city of Columbus, capital of Ohio, Volume I > Part 36

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February 14, 1821, to her brother :

Columbus has been very lively this winter. The Legislature sat two months, and the Circuit Court sat here at the same time. Besides, we had most excellent sleighing nearly all winter. The Courthouse is to be placed on the Public Square, near our lot.

We have had a number of conspicuous characters in Columbus this winter, among whom were Henry Clay, of Kentucky, a very genteel man in his appearance, but very plain, indeed. Tell father I always thought he was plain in hisdress, but Mr. Clay is much plainer. If you recollect Uncle Ben's old-fashioned drab-colored cloth coat, with the buttons as big as a dollar, you will have some idea of Mr. Clay's coat which he wore all the time he was here.10

With the financial crisis of 1819, and the industrial and business depression which followed, a scourge of malarial disease prevailed in Central Ohio. During the spring and summer months the undrained forests of that region, with their rank growth and deeay of vegetable matter, exhaled miasma, and filled the atmosphere with poison. In January, 1819, Mrs. Deshler lost her firstborn infant, a daughter,

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after a brief illness with inflammatory fever. From that time forward her letters make frequent mention of the miasmatic and febrile diseases with which herself, her husband, the borough and the country settlements round about were almost con- stantly afflicted. Rising from a prolonged and nearly fatal attack of the prevailing fever, her convalescence was just in time to enable her to nurse her sick husband whose life, for a time despaired of, was preserved by her faithful attentions. To such distresses were added, not for this particular family only, but for scores of others, indeed for the entire community, the gloom and discouragement of almost hopeless deht arising from the currency derangement and consequent industrial stagnation of the country. The following additional extracts from Mrs. Deshler's letters will convey some idea of the general condition of things which then prevailed :

May 17, 1821, to her father :

We have had a remarkably cold and backward spring; things in the garden are but barely up. On the seventeenth of April a snow fell several inches deep, and as yet we have not had more than two warm days in succession. Almost everybody here has been sick, owing to the disagreeable weather.

September, 1, 1821, to her mother :

We have had nothing but sickness and trouble in our family since June. . .. David was taken with the bilions fever on the first of July, and was confined to bed for nearly seven weeks, and part of the time entirely deranged. Without help, I took care of him fourteen nights in succession. . . . There has been, this season, considerable sickness in Columbus, but none to compare with that in the country. . .. There is not enough business for onehalf of the people who are well enough to work.

October 20, 1821, to her brother :

It is, and has been, more unhealthy this season than for many years. .. . The most that appears to occupy the minds of the people this year is siekness, taking care of the sick, going to funerals, and hard times. There is no business, and any one who can keep what he has does well, without adding "a mite to the morsel."

March 15, 1822, to her sister :

Very dull times in Columbus. But one building going up next summer that we can hear of. Produce of every kind sells for little or nothing. The first tire of any consequence that ever took place in this town happened a few weeks since. Eight buildings were consumed. They were all small shops except one, a small dwelling house.

May 28, 1822, to her brother :

Business of all kinds is very dull and produce very low ; four $1.25 per cwt., corn 12} cents, bacon 4 cents, butter from 6 to 8 cents, eggs 3 and 4 cents, chickens 5 and 6 cents apiece, feathers 25 cents per pound, wool 50 cents, flax 8 cents per pound, country linen 20, 25 and 37 cents per yard, domestic molasses (for such is all we have) 50 cents per gallon. We laid in our sugar in time of sugar-making for six cents per pound, but now. owing to the badness of the season, it brings eight cents per pound cash.

September 29, 1822, to her brother:

There has been much more sickness this season than has ever been known since the settle- ment of Franklin County. Our burying ground has averaged ten new graves per week, for a number of weeks past. ... The most healthy, robust and vigorous persons are liable to be taken off with bilions fever, the prevailing sickness of the western country, and you would be as- tonished to see the anxiety of the people in settling up their worldly business before the sickly season commences. None feel safe, not one ; for in three or four days, from perfect

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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF COLUMBUS.

health, many of our enterprising, useful and beloved citizens are laid in the grave, and many, many are the orphans and widows that our town presents. . .. Mr. Desbler has not in eighteen months received twenty dollars in cash for his work. We can get produce of every kind for work, but more than what we can eat must be thrown away, for it cannot be sold, and produce will not buy store goods, except a few articles such as whisky, feathers, beeswax and wool, and these the country people keep for themselves.

Prices of provisions are low : wheat 25 cents, corn 1212 cents, oats 14 cents, pork $2 per cwt., beef $3 per cwt., butter 6 to 8 cents, eggs 4 cents, chickens 4 and 5 cents apiece, honey in the comb 8 cents, lard 6 cents, tallow 8 cents, sweet potatoes 75 cents, potatoes 1834 to 25 cents, apples 3712 cents per bushel, peaches 1212 to 1834 cents per bushel, dried peaches $1 per bushel, shellbarks 50 cents per bushel, &c. Groceries are lower than they have ever been ; tea $1.25, coffee 3712 cents, loaf sugar 3712 cents, maple sugar 10 cents. pepper, ginger and allspice 50 cents, salt $1 per bushel, feathers 3114 cents, wool 50 cents, flax 10 cents, &c.

February 27, 1823, to her brother :

Business is yet dull in Columbus, but I think times are not so hard as they have been. . .. They [the hard times] have proved the greatest blessing to this country. People have felt the necessity for economy. They have learned the true valuation of property, and are much more careful about contracting debts.

August 10, 1823, to her parents :

This State has been very sickly this season, and the condition of this town has been for the last two weeks, and continues to become, very alarming. The fever which a great number of our citizens have become victims of is bilious, attended with extreme pain, some losing sight and hearing and still retaining reason. From perfect health, some die within four days' sickness, and I know of no instance of the patient lying more than ten or twelve days.

Our town is at present nothing but a scene of trouble, sickness and death. If you go to the door at midnight you see a light in almost every house, for watching with the sick and dead. No business of any kind doing, our town perfectly dull, people in the country sick, and strangers afraid to pass through the town.

October 4, 1823, to her brother :

The sickness of this country does not abate. The distress that the citizens of this State, and of this western country, and particularly this section of the State labor under, is unparal- leled by anything I ever witnessed. This town, and towns generally, have been awfully visited, and with such distress as I never wish to behold again, but at the same time nothing to compare with what has heen endured in the thinly settled parts of the country. I could relate cases that would appear incredible and impossible, some of which are these :

On a small stream called Darby, ahout eighteen miles from here, there are scarcely enough well people to bury the dead. In one instance a mother was compelled to dig a grave and bury her own child in a box that was nailed up by herself, without one soul to assist her. Only think of it! Another case was that of a man, his wife and four children who had settled three miles from any other house. The father, mother and all took sick, and not one was able to hand another a drink of water, or make their situation known. At length a man in search of his horse happened to call at the house to enquire, and found a dead babe four days gone, in the cradle, the other children dying, the father insensible, and the mother unable to raise her head from the pillow.

In another family, ten in number, only a few miles from town, all were sick except two small children who actually starved to death, being too small to go to a neighbor's, or prepare anything for themselves. In numbers of families all have died, not one member remaining. A person a few days ago passed a house, a short distance from town, out of which they were just taking a corpse. One of the men told him there were three more to be buried the next morning, and a number sick in the same house. Such is the distress of our

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country that the farmers can do no ploughing, nor gather their corn, potatoes, or anything else.

Provisions of every kind are very high, and scarcely to be had. There is no money in circulation, and hundreds who never knew what it was to want, are sick and actually suffer- ing for the common comforts of life. .. . You would be astonished to behold the faces of our citizens. There is not one, young or old, but that is of a dead yellow color. No kinds of business are going on except making coffins and digging graves.

We are glad to get flour at $4 per barrel, beef at 4 cents per pound, butter at 123 to 16 cents per pound, and everything else in proportion ; so you may judge how living is, between sickness and scarcity.

October 13, 1824, to her mother :

You have no idea what a scene of trouble and sickness we have passed through the last four months. George was sick five weeks with bilious fever, and never walked a step in four weeks. [This letter was written by Mrs. Deshler in her sick bed, on which she had lain for twelve weeks.]

November 20, 1824, to her brother :

I was, perhaps, when I wrote home last, as low in spirits as I ever was in my life, and no wonder; all sick, all trouble, everybody dying, and, as a poor negro says, "everybody look sorry, corn look sorry, and even de sun look sorry, and nobody make me feel glad."

May 12, 1825, to her brother :

We have had an unspeakable winter in this country -scarcely cold weather enough to make it appear like winter. . . . I hope we shall have a more healthy season than the past ones have been. If there is any change in the times, I think it is for the better. Produce, low- ever, is very cheap, and store goods are very low, more so than I ever knew them at Easton. While domestic cotton sells for 12} to thirtyseven and a half cents per yard, good hed ticking 37}, tea $1.50 per pound, coffee 3t} and other things in proportion. Columbus has altered much as respects dress in the last three or four years. A woman will not now be seen on the street unless she has on a leghorn flat and a cross or figured silk or Lafayette calico, or some- thing as fine. . . . Lafayette prints, belts, vests, shoes and boots, and even pocket handker- chiefs prevail.11

March 6, 1826, to her brother :

Every body in this town has been severely afflicted with influenza." Some few have died, but the prevalence of the disease has abated. . . . I have three little darling children in the graveyard. . .. We have two here.

October 10, 1826. Has visited Easton and returned. Writes to her brother : You can't imagine how much handsomer it looks in Ohio than at Easton.

November 26, 1826, to her brother and sister:

Our town is quite healthy and very lively. Provisions are plenty and cheap.

Mrs. Deshler died August 2, 1827, when her son, our present well-known fellow citizen, Mr. William G. Deshler, was but ten weeks old. She passed away, at the age of thirty years, while yet in the prime of her womanhood, a victim to the anxieties and maladies incident to the frontier. Yet her life, albeit so unpreten- tions and inconspicuous, failed not of enduring results. With such mothers as she to give birth to the architects of her civilization, it is not strange that Ohio has won her present distinction in the family of States. But we owe to such mothers something more than distinction, for it was by their efforts and sacrifices, no less than those of their husbands and brothers, that the rude forces of nature were sub- dued, and the wilderness converted into smiling hills, valleys and plains, spread with blossoms and waving harvests.

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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF COLUMBUS.

NOTES.

1. A more circumstantial account of the organization of the borough government, to- gether with a complete copy of the statute of its incorporation, is reserved for the history of The Municipality.

2. A formal reception was given to the President at Worthington. The address of welcome was delivered by Hon. James Kilbourn.

3. Martin.

4. Ibid.

5. Ibid.

6. See page 171.

7. " Pineknots, tallow candles, and lard-oil lamps furnished light. The embers in the fireplace were seldom suffered to burn out, but when the last coal chanced to expire the fire was rekindled by striking a spark from the flint into a piece of tinder. The tinder-box was to our ancestors what the match-box is to us. Sometitues, when the fire went out, a burning brand was borrowed from the hearth of a neighbor. Bread was baked in Dutch ovens, or bake- pans, set over beds of live coals raked npon the hearth, and meats and vegetables were boiled in pots hung by hooks upon a strong piece of green timber, called the " lugpole," which was placed across the wide chimney-flue, just above the blaze. In time the lugpole gave place to the iron crane. There was invented also a cooking ntensil of tin called a reflector, by means of which biscuits were baked. . .. Corn bread was often prepared in the form of a johnny- cake - a corruption of journey cake - a loaf baked upon a "johnny " board, about two feet long and eight inches wide, on which the dough was spread and then exposed to the fire. In Kentucky, the slaves used to bake similar loaves on a hoe, and called them hoe-cakes."- l'enable's Footprints of the Pioneers in the Ohio l'alley.

8. Much of the flat land on the west side of the Scioto was thickly overgrown with wild plum bushes.

9. These shelves, or rather cases, were afterwards called alcoves. About twenty of them were made by Mr. Deshler's own hands. When the old state building was demolished and the library removed to the present Capitol, these shelves were stored in the basement as old lumber. Mr. William G. Deshler bought one set of the cases of Governor Chase for ten dollars, and it now stands in the City Library as the Deshler Alcove, to which are attached over two thousand volumes.

10. Mr. Clay was then attending trial of the suit of the Allen heirs vs. Starling, men- tioned in the earlier part of the chapter.

11. At that time Lafayette was revisiting and making a tour of the United States. The gratitude of the American people for his helpful services during the War of Independence was such that he was fêted and lionized wherever he appeared, and one of the forms which the popular enthusiasm assumed was that of bestowing his name on the prevalent fashions of the day in articles of clothing. Lafayette was invited to visit Columbus, but was unable to do so, and sent his regrets.

12. Perhaps a malady similar to that now known as la grippe.

6.5. Pfaff

CHAPTER XV.

THE CAPITAL AS A BOROUGH. 1816-1834. II.

The contemporary descriptions of Columbus during its borough period fre quently refer to " its excellent springs and fine running streams of water." Good wells, it is said, were " easily obtained in all parts of the town."' Later authorities corroborate these statements. They also concurrently represent that in and about the borough were numerous marshes, quagmires and ponds. In other words, the " high bank opposite Franklinton " on which the capital was located, while being saturated intermittently from the clouds above and constantly from springs be- neath, had the sponge-like quality of retaining much of the water it received, and held more of it, in solution with decaying vegetable matter, than was good for the people who dwelt in that locality. Doubtless much of the sickness mentioned in the letters just quoted was due to this fact. The ground had no drainage except that of the surface, and the imprisoned water, as often happens with other idle agents, became a source of deadly mischief.

The principal morass, with its outlying swales and ponds, embraced the present sites of the Fourth Street Markethouse, Trinity Church, and the Cathe- dral, crossed the line of Broad Street, and extended in a northeasterly direction to the neighborhood of Washington Avenue. That part of it comprising the tract now known as the Kelley property, and a considerable area east of it, was a quagmire, of such an unstable nature that the falling of a rail, or other similar concussion, would cause it to shake for yards around. Mr. Joseph Sullivant was accustomed to say that he could take a station on Spring Street from which he could shake it by the acre. Its most elevated point was the natural mound on which now stands the residence of the late Judge James L. Bates, near the corner of tirant Avenue and Broad Street.

When the HIon. Alfred Kelley built on this ground, in 1836, the large, colon- naded mansion which still stands there, it was popularly termed " Kelley's Folly." But Mr. Kelly knew what he was about, as the sequel proved. He perceived that the morass was due, primarily, to saturation caused by a spring of strongly cha- lybeate water which issued in great volume at a point near the site chosen for his residence, just mentioned. So copious was the discharge of this spring that its tall over a ledge near its origin could be heard, during a quiet evening, to the distance of several squares. As soon as Mr. Kelley had changed the direction of its current so as to afford it a ready escape, the bog around it began to dry up, but not sufficiently to prevent it from hopelessly miring the village cows which were

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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF COLUMBUS.

seduced by its marsh grass within its quaggy precincts. The soil of this morass was a black loam, and produced some excellent crops of corn for Mr. John L. Gill, who at one time owned part of it, for which he paid the sum of eighty dollars per acre. The price paid by Mr. Kelley was abont thirty dollars per acre.

That part of Broad Street which passed through the swamp was easily cut by wheels, and in wet weather almost impassable. To make it a practicable thorough- fare, it was corduroyed, about 1820, from the site of the Cathedral eastward, by citizens working out their road tax. The roadway was thus considerably im- proved, but for a long time afterwards remained in a very bad condition, insomuch that even the light carriages which traversed it on social errands were often foundered.

The entire East Broad Street region abounded in springs, one of which, issn- ing in the street a short distance beyond Cleveland Avenue, is said to have supplied the Old Statehouse with water, conducted to it by piping. When the sewers were laid, the waters from these springs, and of the swamp generally, were gradually absorbed, and so strong was the current which gushed into the channel cut for the Broad Street sewer that the progress of that work was seriously interfered with.

Spring Street took its name from numerous natural fountains which issued in its vicinity, and fed a brook of clear water known as Doe Run. This rivulet had two or three branches, one of which extended through the grounds now occupied by the railways. Another, which had its origin in a copious spring near the present Church of St. Patrick, coursed southwesterly to a point near Fourth Street between Spring and Long, then, by a sudden bend, changed direction to Spring. Mean- dering through a wide and treacherous bog, sometimes called " The Cattail Swamp," Doe Run was confluent on Spring Street with Lizard Creck, the waters of which were gathered from the springs of the Broad Street morass, and descended Third Street from a point near which now rises the Cathedral. Pursuing its westward course, after being fed by Doe Run, Lizard Creek crossed High Street by a depres- sion of ten or fifteen feet, and thence rushed down a gulley twentyfive feet deep to the Scioto. The High Street roadway at first descended to the bed of this creek, but afterwards leaped it by a wooden bridge. Mr. John M. Kerr informs the writer that he caught minnows in its waters in his youthful days, and Mr. Harri- son Armstrong states that when attending a school kept in a building ancestral to the Merchants' and Manufacturers' Bank, he and the other boys of the school used to amuse themselves in stoning the water snakes which glided in and ont among the rocks in the bed of the creek on Chestnut Street.

Of all the bogs of the borough, that of Lizard Creek seems to have been the most untrustworthy for all pedestrians, whether biped or quadruped. Wheels, of course, dared not venture into it, nor could a horse, much less a cow, expect to get through it without human assistance, but a judicious man might get over it by cautiously stepping on the hummocks, called in the borough dialect " nig- ger-heads," formed by tufts of swamp grass. A " nigger-head " violently jumped on, however, would suddenly disappear, together with the jumper. On West, no less than on East Spring Street, the bog was totally unreliable. Mr. John M. Kerr says he offered town lots there at one time for five dollars apiece, without takers. In times of freshet Lizard Creek sometimes asserted itself tre-

ag.

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THE CAPITAL AS A BOROUGH. H.

mendously, and became a roaring torrent. Mr. William Armstrong says he has seen it deep enough to swim a horse. Although no traces of it are now to be seen, as late as May, 1833, the Council of the borough provided by ordinance for graveling Third Street on both sides of it, and for repairing two culverts over it on Fourth Street. The same ordinance provided for draining a pond at the east end of State Street, opposite the residence of Judge Parish, for repairing the bridge at " the south end of High Street," for filling up holes in Front Street, and for making a culvert at the corner of that street and Rich. About a quarter of a mile east of the Union Station a sulphur spring gushed forth. The ground where the Station now stands, and all the territory round about, was of a swampy nature.

On East Broad Street, near its junction with Twentieth, lay an inconvenient body of water, commonly known as the "Crooked-wood Pond," in which the piscatorial boys of the borough were accustomed to angle for catfish. A practic- able roadway was finally carried through this slough by rolling logs into it. Some of these logs were encountered in cutting for the sewer, five or six feet below the present surface of the street. From this point castward to Alum Creek most of the street was laid with a corduroy track as late as 1830. Going westward, the outlying swales of the great Broad Street bog began to be encountered in the neighborhood of Monroe and Garfield avenues.

Where the Fourth Street Markethouse now stands, so say several citizens, who remember it, was a pond in which contemporary boys often went swimming. The northern extremity of this pond was a few rods south of the present corner of State and Fourth Streets. Mr. William Armstrong says he has often mired his horse in a marshy place where the First Baptist Church now stands, and some- times had great difficulty in extricating him.

Brooks which descended Fourth and Main streets poured unitedly into Peters's Run, and turned the wheels of Conger's Flonring Mill, which, in 1825, stood in the ravine back of the Hoster Brewery. The Fourth Street brook drained a portion of the marshy territory east of High Street, and was a living stream the year round. Mr. John Otstot says it sometimes became so rampant in rainy weather as to sweep away the worm fences along its banks. Mr. J. F. Necreamer, born here in 1822, says the Fourth Street Run began near the present Highschool building, coursed westerly on State Street, descended Fourth, formed Hoskins's Pond where the Markethouse stands, and near the present junction of Fourth and Main streets was joined in forming Peters's Run by a brook the source of which was near the corner of Rich Street and Washington Avenue.

The grounds of the Institution for the Deaf and Dumb were originally swampy, and were overgrown with the bushes of the wild blackberry. Dick's Pond, a favorite skating place in winter, was at the junction of Third and Broad streets, its deepest part being the present site of Trinity Church. Where the Denig & Ferson block now stands, on High Street, the surface of the ground was depressed three or four fect, forming a pond which was also a winter resort of the skaters.

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History of the city of Columbus, capital of Ohio, Volume I, Part 36

Author: Lee, Alfred Emory, 1838-; W. W. Munsell & Co Publication date: 1892 Publisher: New York and Chicago : Munsell & Co. Number of Pages: 1202

Author: Lee, Alfred Emory, 1838-; W. W. Munsell & Co
Publication date: 1892
Publisher: New York and Chicago : Munsell & Co.
Number of Pages: 1202