USA > Ohio > Pioneer history : being an account of the first examinations of the Ohio valley, and the early settlement of the Northwest territory ; chiefly from original manuscripts > Part 19
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41
"Near the same time Colonel May, Colonel Stacey, and a number of other adventurers arrived, who, with the others, began to clear and plant the land intended for the city, with the risk of giving it up whenever it should be claimed by the owners." (This field lay on the elevated plain east of Campus Martius, was rather a thin, light, soil, but free of underbrush, as were the woods generally at that day, being annually burnt over for a long series of years, by the au- tumnal fires of the Indians.) "So great was the industry of the people, that by the 20th of June one hundred and thirty-two acres of land were planted with corn, besides a large quantity of potatoes, beans, &c." " About thirty-five acres of the corn land was either plowed or harrowed; the rest of the field was planted with the hoe. But the great misfortune was, that the leaves of the beech and poplar trees, which formed a considerable portion of the growth, did not wither by the girdling, and so shaded the corn as to injure the crop very considerably. The prospect in the fore part of the season was so discouraging, that some of the planters did not hoe their corn at all, while others hoed but once. However, under all these adverse circumstances, there
227
CAMPUS MARTIUS.
is a great deal of corn and forage raised. The crop will ยท average from twenty to thirty bushels an acre on the plain. A piece of bottom land on the bank of the Ohio, belonging to Mr. Corey, has been harvested, and measured one hun- dred and four bushels of ears to the acre. Some of these ears yield a pint and a half of shelled corn each, and when fully dried, a bushel weighs sixty-two pounds. In short, the quality of the corn of this country is in all respects fully equal to that of New England. As for beans, turnips, pumpkins, squashes, cabbages, melons, cucumbers, &c., they are in flavor the finest I ever tasted, and the great pro- duction is truly surprising."
Campus Martius.
The annexed plate shows the appearance of this noted garrison, after it was fully completed, and enclosed with pickets after the commencement of the Indian war, in the year 1791. The ground plat and front view of the face, next the Muskingum river, was engraved and published in the Columbian Magazine, from a plan made by Winthrop Sar- gent, Esq. The present drawing is copied from that, with additions from Mr. Horace Nye, of Putnam, Muskingum county, Ohio, who was an inmate of the garrison during the period of the war, and for some time after.
" Campus Martius is the handsomest pile of buildings on this side the Alleghany mountains, and in a few days will be the strongest fortification in the territory of the United States. It stands on the margin of the elevated plain on which are the remains of the ancient works, mentioned in my letter of May last, thirty feet above the high bank of the Muskingum, twenty-nine perches distant from the river, and two hundred and seventy-six from the Ohio. It con- sists of a regular square, having a block house at each angle, eighteen feet square on the ground, and two stories high ; the upper story on the outside or face, jutting over the lower one, eighteen inches. These block houses serve
228
CAMPUS MARTIUS.
as bastions to a regular fortification of four sides. The curtains are composed of dwelling houses two stories high, eighteen feet wide, and of different lengths. The block houses and curtains are so constructed by high-roofs, &c., as to form one complete and entire building. The timber of which they are built is either sawed or hewed, four inches thick, so that the walls are very smooth, and when the seams are pointed with mortar, will be very warm and com- fortable. On the top of three of the block houses are very handsome watch towers, which are to be made musket proof; and are large enough to hold four men, their arms, &c. On the top of the fourth (in the north-west corner), above the watch tower, is a balcony with a cupola, spire, &c., for the reception of a bell, which we are told is com- ing on as a present from a gentleman at Boston. The chimneys will be mostly of bricks; several kilns have already been burnt, and more ready to set. All the block houses, and part of the curtains, are built at the expense of the company. The block house, intended for the bell, with a part of the adjacent curtains, has a hall appro- priated to public use, where three hundred people may assemble. The open space within the square of buildings is one hundred and forty-four feet, on each side, in the cen- ter of which a well is now digging. (This well is upwards of eighty feet deep.) The block houses are all up, the gates and a greater part of the curtains, and I expect the whole will be completed by the 1st of December. In all the buildings of this square, there will be seventy two rooms of eighteen feet and upwards, exclusive of the lofts and garrets, which, at twelve persons to a room (a moderate proportion in case of necessity), will lodge eight hundred and sixty-four people."
Soon after, the Indian war broke out, and the garrison was put under the discipline of a regular camp. It was found that the watch towers on the roofs of the block houses were at such an elevation as to render it inconvenient
229
CAMPUS MARTIUS
ascending and descending from them at night, in changing the guards. As a substitute, square bastions or sentry boxes were erected on four stout posts, sixteen feet high, at the corner of each block house, into which the guard could enter from the upper story by a single step, through a door cut for that purpose. These boxes were about six feet square, and six feet high, made of plank, proof against musket balls. Around the inside, above the floor, ran a slight elevation, or "banquette," on to which when the sen- try stepped, his head appeared above the bulwark. They were open to the weather on top, and furnished with loop holes and embrazures for the discharge of fire arms. In the south-west and north-east bastions, was placed a small cannon or four pounder, which was fired as an alarm, when Indians were discovered in the neighborhood, to call in the people who might be in the fields at work, or to be used in defense, in case of an attack. The roofs of the buildings were covered with well made oak shingles, fastened with nails, instead of roof pools, as was common to all the log houses on the frontiers.
At one time during the war, soon after the attack on the garrison at Waterford, it was thought advisable to cover the roofs with a coating of clay mortar, two or three inches thick, to protect them against combustible missiles, that might be thrown on them by the bows and arrows of the Indians. Happily for the inhabitants this experiment was never put to the test, and a few heavy showers of rain de- molished this earthen coat of mail, that had cost them so many days of hard labor. In the west and south fronts were strong gateways, and over that, in the center of the west front, was a chamber surmounted by a tower. This room projected over the gateway like a block house, and was intended for the protection of the gate underneath in time of assault. It was occupied for several years by Hon. Winthrop Sargent, secretary of the territory, as an office. The south-west block house was appropriated to the use of
.
230
CAMPUS MARTIUS.
Governor St. Clair and his family. The north-east was devoted to the use of the directors of the Ohio company, and for a store house. The south-east to private families and house of entertainment. The north-west, as before stated, to religious worship, and for the sitting of the courts during the first years of the settlement. In the year 1791, other defenses were added. Running from corner to cor- ner of the block houses, was a row of pallisades sloping outwards, resting on stone rails. Twenty feet in advance of these was a row of very large and strong pickets, set upright in the earth, with gateways for the admission of the inhabitants. A few feet in advance of the outer pal- lisades was placed an additional defense or abbatis, made from the tops and branches of trees sharpened and pointing outwards, so that it would have been very difficult for an enemy to have penetrated even within their outworks.
Suitable plats for gardens were laid out between the gar- rison and the river, for the officers and for private families, who lived in Campus Martius. The appearance from with- out was grand and imposing; at a little distance resem- bling one of the military palaces or castles of the feudal ages. 2
The writer goes on to state, "besides these buildings at Campus Martius, twenty very comfortable houses, made of round logs, for families, and covered with long shingles, are already erected in the town, and several more are going forward. Nor is this all the labor we have done. Large quantities of land have been cut over and fitted for wheat and rye; besides which, several persons have begun to pre- pare land for planting next spring. And what is very extra- ordinary, very few of us have been able to work on our own land, and our labor must in the end contribute more to the general emolument of the company, than to the particular advantage of those who have performed it. However, I hope the December meeting will conclude with such encouragement to industrious adventurers, as will be
231
DINNER TO GOV. ST. CLAIR.
promotive of the interest of the proprietors in general, and sufficient reward for those who encounter the risks and fatigues always incident to a new and savage country."
By the 20th of August the north-west block house was so far completed, that the directors of the company on that day gave a dinner to Governor St. Clair and the officers of Fort Harmer. On this occasion the judges and all the prin- cipal inhabitants attended, with the wives of a number of the officers, and several ladies of General Tupper's and Ma- jor Goodale's families, who had ventured thus early into the wilderness. A fine barge, rowed by twelve oars, brought the company from the fort up the Muskingum and landed them on the bank opposite the new garrison.
The gardens at this time attached to the fort were under fine cultivation, and already produced the finest peaches from pits planted by Major Doughty at its first establishment. So rapid was the growth of the peach in the light, rich, virgin soil of the Ohio, that fruit was sometimes produced the second, and always the third year after planting. There is a fine variety of that fruit now in Marietta, descended from this early stock, and called the " Doughty peach."
On the 24th of August, the second sermon ever delivered in the territory, was preached at the hall of the north-west block house, by the Rev. Manassah Cutler. He was one of the directors of the Ohio company, and was now on a visit to Marietta, to see the country of which he had heard so much. His home was in Ipswich, Massachusetts. He was the principal agent in negotiating the purchase with Congress for the Ohio company, and stood deservedly high as a man of acute intellect and highly cultivated mind. He was an accomplished botanist as well as a faithful preacher of the gospel; a man of great observation and critical research. In science he was far in advance of the age and country in which he lived, as will appear from various arti- cles from his pen in the early transactions of " the American Philosophical Society."
232
FIRST COURT.
The first court.
The first court of common pleas in the north-west ter- ritory, was opened at Marietta, on Tuesday, the 2d day of September, 1788. A procession was formed at " the point," composed of the inhabitants, and officers from the fort, who escorted the judges of the court of common pleas, with the governor and supreme judges of the territory, to the hall in the north-west block house of Campus Martius. The procession was preceded by the sheriff, with his drawn sword and wand of office, the whole making quite an im- posing appearance, and exciting the admiration of the friendly savages, a number of whom were loitering about the new city. When all were assembled, the duties of the day were opened with prayer by the Rev. Manassah Cutler. The court was then organized by reading the commission of the judges, the clerk, and the sheriff; after which it was opened for business by the proclamation of the sheriff. The first judges were General Rufus Putnam, General Benjamin Tupper, and Colonel Archibald Crary ; the clerk was Col- onel R. J. Meigs ; and the sheriff, Colonel Ebenezer Sproat. Paul Fearing, Esq., was admitted an attorney, and was the first lawyer in the territory. R. J. Meigs, jr., was admitted some months after. There being no business before the court at this term, it was adjourned without day. A law was published at this time by the governor relating to oaths of office. In the year 1790, Joseph Gilman, Esq., was ap- pointed a judge in place of Colonel Crary, resigned. In 1792, Dudley Woodbridge, John G. Pettit, Daniel Loring and Robert Oliver were added to the bench.
First court of general quarter sessions.
On the second Tuesday of September, which was the ninth day, this court sat for the first time. It was held in the south-east block house, occupied by Colonel E. Battelle. The court was opened with the usual proclamation of the
233
NAMES OF GRAND JURORS.
sheriff, after the general commission appointing the judges was read by the clerk. By this commission General Rufus Putnam, and General B. Tupper were constituted justices of the quorum, and Isaac Pearce, Thomas Lord, and R. J. Meigs, assistant justices. Colonel Meigs was clerk. Paul Fearing was admitted an attorney to plead in all courts of record in Washington county. He was also appointed by the court counsellor for the United States in said county.
The grand jury was then called, and William Stacy ap- pointed the foreman. The names of the jurors were, Wil- liam Stacy, Nathaniel Cushing, Nathaniel Goodale, Charles Knowles, Anselm Tupper, Jonathan Stone, Oliver Rice, Ezra Lunt, John Mathews, George Ingersol, Jonathan De- vol, Samuel Stebbins, Jethro Putnam, and Jabez True.
The charge was given with much dignity and propriety by Judge Putnam. At one o'clock the grand jury retired, and the court adjourned for thirty minutes. At half past one the court again opened, when the jurors entered and presented a written address to the court, which after being read was ordered to be kept on file. Judge Putnam made a reply to the address. There being no suits before the court, it was adjourned without day. Thus closed the first court of quarter sessions in the new territory. This court was one of the greatest importance to the people, as in ad- dition to its civil and criminal jurisdiction, it had the power of laying out public highways, establishing the bounds of townships, and appointing the township officers; with a general supervision of the county, similar to that of the present county commissioners. In 1789, Griffin Green, Esq., was appointed by the governor, one of the assistant justices.
In 1790, Joseph Gilman was appointed a judge of the quorum, in place of General Putnam, resigned. Robert Oliver was also appointed one of the quorum, after the death of Judge Tupper, in 1792. These courts continued to transact the law business of the county, until the territory
234
PROGRESS OF THE TREATY.
became the state of Ohio. They were held for a num- ber of years in the hall of the north-west block house. The jail used by the early courts before the war, was a strong log cabin, that stood at the foot of the plain, near the south-west corner of Campus Martius. During the continuance of the war, and for several years after, a block house in the garrison at the mouth of the Muskingum was used for a jail, and may be seen in the plate representing that garrison.
The first death.
The first death in the new city, was that of a female child of Major N. Cushing, aged thirteen months, on the 25th of August, 1788.
In August, eight families arrived from New England, amongst them were those of General Tupper, Major Cush- ing, Major Goodale, Major Coburn, and Mr. Ichabod Nye ; and in the course of the year there were fifteen families in all, with eighty-four men, which with the forty-eight who first landed on the 8th of April, enlarged the number to one hundred and thirty-two, in the year 1788. At the close of this year, Marietta was the only white settlement in the ter- ritory, now constituting the state of Ohio.
Progress of the treaty.
In the month of September, the Cornplanter, a principal chief of the Seneca tribe, with about forty Indians, arrived at Fort Harmer, escorted by a company of soldiers from Fort Pitt, under the command of Captain Zeigler. This chief was an influential man with the Six Nations, and very friendly to the United States. Much good was expected from his assistance in bringing about a treaty with the wes- tern tribes, several of which still appeared cold and averse to any amicable adjustment of existing difficulties. So valuable were the services of this enlightened savage, that the Ohio company, in the month of December, voted him a mile square of land, to be located within the purchase.
235
TREATY AT FORT HARMER.
A son of the celebrated Brant, with two hundred warriors, was at the falls of Muskingum in November, and sent a messenger to Governor St. Clair, with a request that the treaty might be held at that place. He returned a mild but decided refusal; on which Brant, with a large portion of his followers, retired to their towns, and, it is supposed, per- suaded the Shawanees not to visit Fort Harmer, as very few of them were present in January.
On the 13th of December, about two hundred Indians, from the different tribes, arrived at the garrison: They marched down the banks of the Muskingum, many of them on horseback, with the flag of the United States displayed in their front; and as they approached the fort, fired their rifles into the air as a token of friendship. The salute was returned by the cannon and musketry of the soldiers for se- veral minutes, sounding so much like a real engagement of hostile bands, that the old officers at Campus Martius were quite animated with the sound. A guard of soldiers, with music escorted them into the garrison in military style, which much pleased the chiefs, who expressed their thanks to the governor in a set speech, at their cordial reception. They also expressed their desire to meet him at the council fire. The governor answered, that he was glad to see them, and as he had been waiting a long time for them, hoped they would be expeditious in finishing the treaty.
The following day the council fire was kindled in the council house, which was a large log house that stood near the north-east bastion, on the outside of the fort. As the Indians are proverbial for transacting all their civil con- cerns with great deliberation, the time was protracted to the 9th of January following, before the articles were all adjusted and agreed to on the part of the tribes. Governor St. Clair was quite ill with an attack of the gout, to which he was subject, during the course of the treaty, and was car- ried daily by the soldiers, in a large chair, to the council. General Butler assisted, as a commissioner, at this treaty,
236
TREATY AT FORT HARMER.
which was finally closed, to the apparent satisfaction of all the parties. The Rev. John Heckewelder, an old Mora- vian missionary, by his kind offices and salutary advice to the Delaware and other Indians, whose language he spoke with fluency, contributed largely to the final success of the treaty. He was held in great veneration by all the chris- tian Delawares, and highly respected by the most heathen portion of them all. Their intercourse with General Put- nam and the new settlers, during the summer, who treated them with uniform kindness and hospitality, often inviting them to eat with them, won greatly on their favorable opi- nion of the new comers. They were also represented by those who saw them, to the other Indians, as an entirely different people from the long-knives and backwoodsmen of Kentucky, with whom they had heretofore had intercourse, being a pacific and brotherly community, who loved the red men, and not of a blood-thirsty and revengeful disposition. These favorable impressions, no doubt, inclined them the more readily to treat, although very few of them did it free- ly or with a sincere good will; and no doubt they operated more or less on their minds during the following war, as they did not attack the settlements of the Ohio company with that determined spirit of revenge so common to the Indians, but oftentimes were known to pass by them un- harmed, in their marauding parties into the western coun- ties of Virginia, the territories of their inveterates foes, "the long-knives"- a name by which they were familiarly known to all the western tribes.
An abstract of the treaty,
Made at Fort Harmer the 9th of January, 1789, between Governor St. Clair, and the sachems and warriors of the Six Nations.
The treaty was signed by twenty-four of their chief men, and they agreed to renew and confirm all the engagements and stipulations entered into with the United States at the
237
TREATY WITH THE WYANDOTS, &C.
treaty of Fort Stanwix, the 22d day of October, 1784. By this treaty they relinquished all claim to lands in the west- ern territory, lying west of the following boundaries, viz :
" Beginning at the mouth of a creek about four miles east of Niagara, called O-non-wa-ye-a, or Johnson's landing place, upon the lake named by the Indians Os-we-go, and by us Ontario ; from thence southerly in a direction always four miles east of the carrying place, between lake Erie and lake Ontario, to the mouth of Te-ho-se-ro-ron, or Buf- falo creek, upon lake Erie; thence south to the northern boundary of the state of Pennsylvania; thence west to the end of the said north boundary ; thence south along the west boundary of the said state to the river Ohio." For thus renewing the treaty they received a present of three thousand dollars in goods. The Mohawks did not attend, but were allowed to be considered as parties, if they desired so to do within six months. A separate article was attached to the treaty, by which it was agreed that if any murders were committed by the Indians on the whites, or the whites killed any Indian, the guilty persons should be given up to be punished agreeably to law. So also if any horses were stolen, they should, if found, be reclaimed by either party.
Treaty with the Wyandots, &c.
On the same day a treaty was made by Governor St. Clair, with the Wyandots, Delawares, Chippewas, Potte- watemie and Sac nations. The Indians had been invited to come in to a treaty in the summer of 1788, and had begun to assemble for this purpose, and to trade with the whites as early as the month of April. But from various causes, a part of which have been narrated in the foregoing pages, nothing definite was accomplished until January, 1789. Many of the Indians were not disposed to treat on any terms, and generally they felt reluctant to give up any more of their territory and hunting grounds to the whites ; fore- seeing that the day was rapidly approaching when they
238
ARTICLES OF THE TREATY.
would be forced to abandon all their country in the valley of the Ohio to the United States. They, therefore, entered into the treaty reluctantly, and with no sincere and decided intention of abiding by its stipulations any longer than they found it for their advantage to do so.
By the first article, the tribes confirmed the treaty made at Fort McIntosh in January, 1785, and agreed to give up all white prisoners in their hands to Governor St. Clair at Fort Harmer, as soon as they conveniently can.
Art. 2d. Describes the boundaries of the lands belong- ing to the said tribes, as follows, viz .: "Beginning at the mouth of the Cuyahoga river, and running thence on said river to the portage between that and the Tuscarawas branch of the Muskingum ; thence down the said branch to the forks at the crossing place above Fort Laurens; thence westerly to the portage on that branch of the Big Miami river which runs into the Ohio, at the mouth of which branch the fort stood that was taken by the French in the year 1752; thence along the said portage to the Great Mi- ami, or Ome river, and down the south-east side of the same to its mouth ; thence along the southern shore of Lake Erie to the mouth of the Cuyahoga, where it began." At the same time, in consideration of six thousand dollars, paid them in goods and other presents at former treaties, the In- dians ceded and quit-claimed all right to the lands east, south, and west of the lines above described, so far as the said tribes formerly claimed the same, to the United States forever.
Art. 3d. The United States relinquished and quit-claim- ed to the tribes aforesaid, all the lands included in the boundaries described in article 1st; but forbid their selling it to any foreign power, or to the private citizens of the United States.
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.