USA > Ohio > Montgomery County > Memoirs of the Miami valley > Part 6
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That speculation in land became a flourishing business is indi- cated by the numerous newspaper advertisements of the time, and the land law of 1800 did much to accelerate the movement of popu- lation into the Miami valley. For the next few years almost every edition of the Cincinnati papers contained numerous advertisements of land for sale. Small tracts were sometimes offered, but gen- erally the advertisements were for tracts of from 500 to 2,000 acres. Proximity to a mill site or a navigable stream, or on a road recently laid out, or near a community already somewhat settled added much to the value of the land. Notwithstanding that a large area had
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been opened to settlement by the land law of 1800, and the minimum price had been fixed at $2 per acre, the price continued to advance, according to the Western Spy and Miami Gazette of November, 1815, especially near the few towns that were beginning to become local centers of industry and trade. And Melish, in his Travels in the United States, says that in 1805 good land near the mouth of the Great Miami was offered at $6.50 per acre, and that as late as 1809 uncleared land could be purchased as low as $5 per acre.
By 1805 immigration to Ohio and the Miami valley was truly astonishing. Says the American Pioneer: "New settlements and improvements were springing up along the banks of the Ohio; and the busy hum of civilization was heard where silence had reigned for ages, except when broken by the scream of the panther, the howl of the wolf or the yell of the savage." There were no less than twelve towns in the distance between Cincinnati and Lime- stone, and some of them were of considerable importance. Espy, in his Memorandum of a Tour, estimated that from 20,000 to 30,- 000 immigrants had come into Ohio within that year. Many of them who settled in Southern Ohio came from the southern states, whence they had emigrated to escape the environment of slavery. The Western Spy and Miami Gazette of January 8, 1806, says that one ferry at Cincinnati, within eight months of 1805, transported 2,629 immigrants from the southern states. Of that number North Carolina furnished 463, South Carolina 669, Kentucky 568, Ten- nessee 200, Virginia 465, and Georgia 264. It is difficult to say what proportion of this population from the south settled in the Miami valley, but it must have been small in comparison with the number of settlers arriving from the free states. According to the Cin- cinnati directory for 1825, the immigrants from the southern states and their descendants then living in Cincinnati formed but 14 per cent of the inhabitants.
The most important centers of population in the interior at this time were Dayton and Lebanon. In 1806 Dayton contained about forty houses, was situated in the midst of a prosperous farming community, and an excellent beaten public road, the borders of which were sprinkled with settlements and neat and improved farms, connected that town with Hamilton. And Ash, in his Travels in the United States, says that Lebanon was situated in the midst of a fine agricultural region that had been settled within five years, and that it had a church and schoolhouse and a popula- tion of about 200 inhabitants, living in neat log and frame houses. Other towns not heretofore mentioned that were marked on Rufus Putnam's map, which was published in 1804, were Newtown, Wil- liamsburg, and Deerfield. This map, prepared by the Surveyor- General of the United States, near the beginning of the last cen- tury, located but ten towns in the Miami valley, and none of them, except Cincinnati, was much more than a collection of log cabins.
This great increase in population in the Miami valley between 1795 and 1805 must have meant considerable agricultural develop- ment and the production of a surplus that the farmer would desire to exchange for commodities that he could not produce. This sur-
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plus was the basis of the early commerce of the Miami valley; and the improvement in means of transportation and the building of a commercial system were two most important questions that the pioneers had to meet. And this surplus called for a trade center to which the produce of the region might be brought for export and from which also imported goods could be distributed. The build- ing of Fort Washington at Cincinnati had given that place an ad- vantage over other points in the Symmes purchase during the In- dian wars, and to the remainder of the Miami valley, it was the most accessible point on the Ohio. It at once became the metropolis.
In early settlements there have always been a number of the well-to-do among the settlers who were prepared to buy some of the conveniences of life, even at frontier prices. To accommodate such as these, traders followed closely the advance line of the frontier ; therefore, soon after the founding of Columbia and Losanti- ville, there were merchants in the Miami valley who were prepared to furnish to the army and to the settlers whiskey and tobacco and some of the more necessary articles of eastern and foreign produc- tion. Although such commercial operations must have been limited because of the small number of immigrants who were prepared to indulge in the luxury of store goods, there were several merchants advertising groceries and dry goods for sale in Cincinnati before the time of Wayne's victory. Judging by an advertisement which appeared in the Centinel of Northwest Territory on November 29, 1793, and again on January 4 and February 22, 1794, one enter- prising tradesman even considered that this frontier community had so far advanced in the scale of civilization as to be a market for imported wines. And in the same newspaper, on Nov. 30, 1793, another advertised that he would receive corn, beef, pork, but- ter, cheese, potatoes, furs and skins at his store in Columbia, in exchange for merchandise, groceries, etc.
But beyond the sale of a few commodities to the settlers under the protection of the guns at Fort Washington, there was no op- portunity for an extension of commercial operations before the treaty of Greenville, but following that, trade was much stimulated by the rush of population to the Miami valley, as most of the immi- grants to this region landed at Cincinnati, and perhaps not a few of them bought some necessaries before breaking into the wilder- ness. It was also increased by the fact that Cincinnati became the grand depot for stores that came down the Ohio, bound for the forts that were located near the Indian treaty line, as we are in- formed by Bailey, in his Journal of a Tour.
These pioneer merchants were usually young men with abun- dant energy and small capital. McBride, in his Pioneer Biography of Butler county, says that such a one would purchase a stock of goods in Philadelphia or Baltimore and transport it in wagons over rough roads to Pittsburg at a cost of from $6 to $10 per hundredweight. There he would buy a flatboat or a keel-boat, load his goods in it, and float them down the river. He was usually unacquainted with the stream, and if the water was low he would be frequently in danger from sand bars, snags and other obstruc- tions. If fortunate he would reach Cincinnati within fifteen or
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twenty days. Perhaps he would stop there, or maybe hire a team and haul his goods to one of the inland settlements.
Referring again to the Centinel of the Northwest Territory, issue of May 23, 1795, one of those pioneer merchants, having es- tablished himself, advertised that he had just arrived from Phila- delphia with a large assortment of dry goods and groceries which he would sell on very low terms for cash only. These merchants usually found, however, that frontier conditions were unfavorable to the maintenance of cash sales; yet the general impression pre- vailed that these early dealers made enormous profits and generally were able to increase their stock as rapidly as the expanding busi- ness of the country demanded. But this early business of supplying eastern goods to settlers admitted of little expansion, for any con- siderable commercial development must depend upon the produc- tion of a surplus of agriculutral products. As the Miami valley was rich in agricultural possibilities, the energetic pioneer farmer did not keep trade waiting long for those products that were to furnish the basis of early commerce.
But for the first ten years following the treaty of Greenville, the growth of Cincinnati was slower than for any succeeding period of its early development, nor did it in any way keep up with the development of the Miami valley. In 1795 the population was about 500. By 1805 it had increased to about 960. This was an average increase of forty-six persons, or less than 10 per cent per year. In all it amounted to 90.2 per cent in ten years, whereas the increase of the Miami valley for the same period was about 480 per cent. This relatively slow increase may be easily understood when we re- member that in 1795 the Miami valley, outside of the few settle- ments on or near the Ohio, was an uninhabited region and could supply nothing as a basis of commercial life. Agriculture must be developed before there could be any considerable growth in the towns of the region. So, while the preliminary house-raising, and clearing and planting was going on, Cincinnati in a great measure seemed to have been playing a waiting game. She could do nothing else. She received great numbers of immigrants and retained but a few of them. A few incomplete pictures have been left, in the Cincinnati directory of 1819 and in Burnet's Notes on the Settlement of the Northwest Territory, that may in some degree assist us in an appreciation of the growth of Cincinnati during the first decade following the treaty. In 1795 the 500 inhabitants were housed in ninety-four log cabins and ten frame houses, and the public im- provements, aside from Fort Washington, consisted of an un- finished frame schoolhouse, a strong log building occupied as a jail and a Presbyterian church. The jail was ornamented with a pillory, stocks, and whipping post. The church was a building, 40x30, en- closed with clapboards, neither lathed, plastered nor ceiled. The floor was of boat plank laid loosely on sleepers and the seats were of the same material supported by blocks of wood:
In the work called American Pioneer it is stated that by 1805 the log cabins of Cincinnati had decreased to fifty-three and the frame buildings then numbered 109. There were also six brick and four stone houses. The town boasted of two churches, a court-
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house and a prison. Large warehouses had arisen near the water for the storing of groceries and merchandise, brought up in barges and keel boats from New Orleans. The abandonment of Fort Washington, which occurred in 1803, was probably the most significant change to be noticed. Like all other frontier forts of its kind, when no longer needed, it was falling into decay. In 1808 the government sold the property and the land was soon afterward divided into city lots. Says Mansfield in his Memoirs of Dr. Daniel Drake: "The enlivening notes of the fife and drum at Reveille were no longer heard, and the loud booming of the morning gun as it rolled its echoes along the hills and the winding shores along the river had ceased to awaken the inhabitants from their slumbers. The enlivening hum of commerce was now beginning to be heard on the landings, while the hustle and hurry of hundreds of immigrants thronged the streets as they took their departure for the rich valleys on the banks of the Miamis."
However, the streets were yet in a state of nature and the roads consisted of traces of narrow pathways, almost impassable on ac- count of mud, stumps and roots. According to the Cincinnati di- rectory for 1819, in what is now the very heart of the city many of the forest trees were still standing and the trunks of others which had been cut down encumbered the ground for several years after- ward. Such in brief, was the metropolis of the Miami valley ten years after the treaty of Greenville. (Treaty signed in 1795.)
We have seen that the decade between 1795 and 1805 was a period of locating first setlements and clearing new farms. A few towns were located and the more important roads were marked out. The production of a surplus was begun, a commercial system had been organized and the manufacture of a few articles had com- menced on a small scale. Yet the entire region retained its former character and the development of the Miami valley was only be- gun. After the demands of the home were met, those farmers who were near Cincinnati or some other center into which the settlers were moving, found a limited market among the newcomers. A little later the surplus corn, wheat, pork, whiskey, etc., began to demand a larger market, and no place in the Mississippi valley could furnish such a market, as the entire region was agricultural in character. The long and expensive haul prevented sending this surplus over the mountains to the east, and so the only outlet was by flat-boat down the Ohio and Mississippi rivers to New Orleans, there to reshipped to the eastern seaboard or to a foreign market. But the attitude of Spanish officials toward this trade was unsettled and wavering. High tariffs for the privilege of deposit and reship- ment were the rule, and it was not uncommon for whole cargoes to be confiscated. This situation, however, had existed prior to the Spanish treaty of Oct. 27, 1795, which gave Americans the free navigation of the Mississippi and allowed them to use New Orleans as a place of deposit and reshipment. The adjustment of this diffi- culty with Spain was of much importance to the older settlements south of the Ohio, and it came at an opportune moment for the Miami valley. Two months before that event, the Treaty of Green- ville had been signed, and by 1805 all of those western influences
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that affected immigration were in full force. The first break into the wilderness had been made, it was seen that the land would pro- duce abundantly, favorable land laws had been passed, Ohio had become a state, and the annexation of Louisiana had removed every obstacle to the free navigation of the Mississippi river. These in- fluences, combined with the decline of commerce and the hard times that followed as a result of the embargo of 1807, sent an increasing number of settlers into the west, and no section profited by this more than did the Miami valley.
But other problems presented themselves for solution in the matter of marketing the surplus products of the farms. In the first place, there were no roads over which produce might be transported. As centers of population grew, trails were made which later were developed into wagon routes, but it was many years before any of these were passable for loaded wagons, except in the most favor- able seasons. The forest must be cleared, improvements on the farms must be made, and population must be increased before highway construction could proceed on any considerable scale. Before 1809 roads had been located connecting the principal towns of this region, and four principal routes extended from Cincinnati through Southwestern Ohio and one through Kentucky to Lexing- ton. One of these roads led up the Ohio to Columbia and from there through Williamsburg, Newmarket and Bainbridge to Chilli- cothe; another led down the river to Cleves. Two roads led to the north-one to Lebanon and the other through Hamilton and Frank- lin to Dayton. Dayton was also connected with Springfield, Urbana and Piqua. The road to Hamliton followed the old military trail used by St. Clair and Wayne. From Hamilton a road led north- west to Eaton and another led eastward through Lebanon to Chilli- cothe. Those highways connecting points in the Miami valley with Chillicothe were of particular importance, as they joined, some miles east of that point, with the main road to the east. Melish, in his Travels in the United States, says that this was originally the trace located by Ebenezer Zane, in 1795, extending from Wheeling to Maysville via Zanesville, Lancaster and Chillicothe.
Between 1800 and 1810 Hamilton county had been subdivided by the admission of Ohio and by the formation of new counties. Eight of these new counties lie entirely within the original bound- aries of Hamilton county and in 1810 returned a population of 75,- 349, or more than one-third of the population of the entire state. This was an average of a little more than twenty-one persons per square mile, whereas the average of the entire state was 5.8 per square mile. Hamilton county showed a density of 38 persons per square mile; Butler county 36; Warren 23; Montgomery 15; and Miami 9.9. Within the present boundaries of Hamilton county alone there were living 629 more people than occupied the whole Miami country a decade before.
Although numerous roads had been laid out in Southwestern Ohio before the beginning of the War of 1812, no effort had been made to improve them, and they were impassable for a loaded wagon the greater part of the year. This condition must have re- tarded the agricultural development of the country, and during the
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SETTLEMENT OF THE MIAMI VALLEY
war it so seriously interfered with the movements of the north- western army as to bring about a proposal for a series of military roads. And the war seems to have retarded immigration to some extent, as an estimate made in 1815 gave the average density of population in the Miami country as but twenty-three to the square mile. Generally speaking, the growth of the towns was hardly keeping pace with the development of the country, although a few of them were growing rapidly. In Dayton the number of houses was doubled within three years, and in 1809 it contained a brick courthouse and four other brick buildings. South of Third street was called Cabin Town, while on Main street were located thirteen log cabins, two frame and two small brick houses, a tavern and a courthouse. Within the same period the number of houses in Lebanon had increased from about forty to about one hundred ; while Franklin had about sixty houses and was rapidly increasing. Columbia and Hamilton both seemed to suffer by the influence of more favorably situated Cincinnati. Columbia, although established more than twenty years, contained but forty houses, and Hamilton, the first town to be laid out in the interior of the Miami valley after Wayne's victory, had ten or fifteen, according to Cutler, in his description of Ohio. By 1815 there were about ten towns in the Miami country that contained forty or more houses, but Kilbourn, in the Ohio Gazetteer, says that not more than four of them, except Cincinnati, contained as many as 100. Troy was as yet only a vil- lage of a few cabins.
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The general advance of the section is probably well indicated in the rise in value of real estate. The following estimate was made by Dr. Drake in 1815: Within three miles of Cincinnati the price of good unimproved land was between $50 and $150 per acre. From this limit to the extent of twelve miles from the city land ranged in value from $10 to $30 per acre. Near the principal villages of the Miami valley the price was from $20 to $40 per acre, and in more remote sections from $4 to $8. An average for the settled por- tions of the valley, for fertile and uncultivated land, may be stated at $8 per acre, and if cultivated at $12 per acre.
The rapid development of the valley soon brought about the production of an ever increasing surplus that furnished the basis of a commerce that was to build up Cincinnati as a metropolis. The very slow growth of that city during the first decade following the treaty of Greenville has already been noted, but by 1805 products were flowing in that direction for export in such quantity as great- ly to increase the commerce and accelerate the growth of popula- tion. The census of 1810 returned a population of 2,320, which showed a gain of 201 per cent within five years; while within the preceding decade the gain had been but 90 per cent. The War of 1812 seems to have retarded slightly the growth of population in the metropolis, as well as in the tributary region, but regardless of that the population had grown to about 6,000 by 1815. This was a gain of 158 per cent, or about 43 per cent less than for the preceding five years.
In Cuming's Tour, Thwaite's Travels, a traveler of the year 1808 described Cincinnati as covering more ground and seeming to con-
.
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tain nearly as many houses as Lexington. Many of the houses were of brick, generally well built, and had an air of neatness about them that was characteristic of Connecticut and New Jersey, from which many of the settlers came. Some of the new brick houses were three stories high, with flat roofs, and one four stories high was then building. The Burnet residence, at Third and Vine, and the Suydam residence, where Sedamsville was afterward located, were the most imposing.
For a knowledge of Cincinnati immediately before and after the War of 1812, we are largely indebted to Dr. Daniel Drake, one of the most honored citizens in the early days of the city. As a boy he settled there when it was a small village composed largely of log cabins. He continued to reside in Cincinnati, with the ex- ception of a brief interval, until the time of his death, some time in the fifties; and in his time no man surpassed him in promoting the economic and intellectual welfare of the community of his adoption. In 1810 he published Notices Concerning Cincinnati, the first of a long line of books, describing the Queen City of the West. This little book gives but a brief glimpse of the frontier metropolis, as the most of it is taken up with topographical and other physical conditions of the Miami valley. Five years later he published A Natural and Statistical View of Cincinnati, which gives a good picture of the then youthful western city. It was written for the purpose of encouraging immigration, but its evident honesty and sincerity is in striking contrast with pamphlets that have been issued by some boom towns of a more recent period. This booklet states that in 1810 the residents of Cincinnati were domiciled in 360 dwelling houses, chiefly of brick and wood; about two-thirds of them were in the bottom and the rest were "on the hill." Main street, the principal thoroughfare, was well built up to Sixth or Seventh, but as yet all of the streets were unimproved. The town contained a courthouse, three market houses, two printing offices, a bank of issue and about thirty mercantile stores.
To the same source we turn for the chief facts about the subject of our study at the close of the War of 1812. By this time the population of Cincinnati was not far from that of Pittsburg, and by 1820 it exceeded that of Pittsburg by 2,359. It extended a half mile back from the river and occupied nearly a mile of the river front. Of its 1,110 houses, twenty were stone, 250 brick and 800 wood. There were four places of public worship and the Cincinnati Lancaster Seminary was housed in a commodious building that would accommodate 900 students.
There was a regular influx of immigrants to Cincinnati for some years after the close of the War of 1812, and for a period of five years the increase in population was more than 700 annually. A visitor has left us the following flattering description of conditions in 1817: "Cincinnati * a most thriving place, backed as it is already by a great population and a most fruitful country, bids fair to be one of the first cities of the west. We are told and we cannot doubt the fact, that the chief of what we see is the work of four years. The hundreds of commodious, well finished brick houses, the spacious and busy markets, the substantial public build-
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SETTLEMENT OF THE MIAMI VALLEY
ings, the thousands of prosperous, well dressed individuals with in- dustrious habits, the numerous wagons and drays, the gay carriages and elegant females, * * * the shoals of craft on the river, the busy stir prevailing everywhere, house building, boat building, paving and leveling streets, the numbers of country people, constantly coming and going, with the spacious taverns, crowded with travelers from a distance." Another said that the "general appearance is clean and handsome; indeed elegant and astonishing when we re- flect that less than forty years ago it was the resort of Indians and the whole surrounding country a wilderness full of wild beasts and savages."
Between 1815 and 1820 immigration to the Miami valley was rapid, and it was stated that the growth of population had been so rapid that many good towns and villages had arisen on different streams, but a few miles distant from each other, between which there was hardly any road or communication. This statement was made by Palmer in his Journal of Travels in the United States, and the same author, in describing the road leading from Cincinnati to Lebanon, said: "We pass through a thickly, but lately settled country, frame and log houses, and cabins, and fine farms of corn, wheat, rye and oats ; ' * the smoke of the fire made in burning trees and underwood rising around us, and large fields of naked trunks and branches of the girdled trees meet the eye at every turn of the road."
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