USA > Ohio > Madison County > The history of Madison County, Ohio > Part 31
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in a glass, "for his stomach sake." Douglass looked after Hewey's law business, and Hewey paid him in hospitality. Judge Orris Parish was then on the bench, and " Dick " Douglass was Prosecuting Attorney of Madison County. One morning, court was kept late by the non-arrival of the prose- cutor, but soon Douglass and " Uncle Jimmy " Hewey made their appear- ance, arm in arm. It was evident to the spectators that Hewey "had more than he could carry " conveniently. Reaching the court room, he raised his hand and shouted, "The court can now proceed, Dick Douglass and Jimmy Hewey are here, by G-d." It is needless to say that this expres- sion was long a standard quotation among the Madison County bar, and the lawyers who rode this circuit. On the same foundation that these brothers erected their cabin, now stands a residence in which are some of the same logs used by the Heweys eighty-five years ago.
DAVID MARTIN.
A little northwest of the Heweys, on the same farm, another cabin was erected by David Martin, in 1797. He also came from Kentucky, but nothing is further known of him than that he once lived on this land. Neither Hewey nor Martin have left any descendants to preserve their name or record of their lives, and they are but dimly remembered by a few old settlers, who love to speak of those pioneer days which have passed away forever.
WILLIAM ALKIRE.
Prior to the Revolutionary war, four brothers-Monus, Michael, John and William Alkire-emigrated from Scotland to America. and all served in that struggle for independence. Subsequently they settled in Maryland, but finally Michael and William removed to Kentucky, one of the others in Tennessee, and the remaining one in an adjoining State. Our sub- ject was the son of William Alkire, and in the fall of 1799 he came with three of his sons to the Northwest Territory, and purchased 1,400 acres of the Baylor Survey, 464, on Deer Creek, in what is now Pleasant Township, Madison Co., Ohio. The sons crected a cabin and began clearing the land that fall, while the father returned to Kentucky, and in the spring of 1800 brought the balance of the family to their new home. Mr. Alkire was the father of fourteen children-eight sons and six daughters-all of whom grew to maturity. The sons were Robert, Isaac, Abraham, Jacob, Monus, Will- iam, Joseph and John. Of the danghters, three married and moved to the West, one died, while Margaret and Lydia married and settled here. Mr. Alkire died about 1825. Two of the sons, Monus and Joseph, moved to the West and there died. William, in later years, settled near Pendleton, Putnam Co., Ohio, where he now resides. The balance of the children remained near the old homestead all their days, excepting Margaret, the widow of James Dennison, who is living in Pickaway County. With the exception of 194 acres belonging to Mrs. Young. the 1.400 acres purchased by William Alkire in 1799 are still owned by his grandchildren. Many of the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of this worthy pioncer have set- tled in the West, while a large number are still residents of Madison Coun- ty, and among its best citizens.
Our American continent, which we are wont to term our Western World, is eminently a land of rapid development and marvelous progress.
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
Our forefathers and foremothers were men and women of great toil, pa- tience, endurance and perseverance. They began on the Atlantic coast where they founded colonies, thence they proceeded to found and people State after State in their westward course, not stopping for mountain barri- ers or savage opposition. As they advanced, they had to penetrate vast forests and traverse great mountain ranges, with or without roads, and with or without teams, carrying firearms to secure game for their sustenance and to protect themselves from savage assaults. Selecting the sites for their dwellings and for their prospective towns, they wielded the echoing ax to fell the timbers of the dense woodlands, and constructed substantial but rude cabins of primitive materials. The labor and hardship and exposure they went through would to us seem unendurable, but they heeded it not. Many of them had come from sections where wealth had drawn social lines not to be passed over; and there was a servitude and a caste galling to men, who looked for better things. We need not be surprised, then, to find that a large ma- jority of the men who for these reasons braved the wilderness were not or- dinary men. The true men counted the cost and never " bated jot of heart or hope," and in the struggle developed the manly character with which they were endowed by nature. Their methods, their experiences, their suf- ferings, their exploits, men have loved to hear them relate. But alas ! all of them have passed away, and many of them have left no record of their eventful and adventurous lives.
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
CHAPTER V.
PRINCIPAL LAND DIVISIONS OF ONIIO-TIIE VIRGINIA MILITARY LANDS-PERILS OF THE SURVEY-PIONEER DAYS AND TRIALS-PIONEER CABIN-FURNI- TURE, FOOD AND MEDICINE-HIABITS AND LABOR-CLOTHING
AND BOOKS-EARLY MANNERS AND CUSTOMS, ETC .- MILLS, STORE GOODS, PERIOD OF 1812.
T THE pre-historical history of Ohio, so far as regards civil organization and the exercise of authority, begins in 1769, when the colony of Virginia attempted to extend her jurisdiction over the territory northwest of the River Ohio. The House of Burgesses passed an act establishing the county of Botetourt, with the Mississippi River as its western boundary. This was a vast county. The act which established it contained the following passage :
Whereas, the people situated on the Mississippi, in the said county of Botetourt, will be very remote from the court house, and must necessarily become a separate county as soon their numbers are sufficient, which will probably happen in a short time, be it therefore en- acted by the authority aforesaid, that the inhabitants of that part of the said county of Botetourt which lies on the said waters shall be exempted from the payment of any levies to be laid by the said county court for the purpose of building a court house and prison for said county.
Civil government between the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers existed only nominally until 1778, when, after the conquest of the country by Gen. George Rogers Clark, the Virginia Legislature organized the county of Illinois, embracing within its limits all of the lands lying west of the Ohio River to which Virginia had any claim. Col. John Todd received appoint- ment from the Governor of Virginia as civil commandment and lieutenant of the county. He served until his death, at the battle of Blue Licks, in 1782, and Timothy Montbrun was liis successor.
In 1787, Virginia, having made her deed of cession to the United States, and the title having been protected through other deeds of cession, and through Indian treaties, Congress took the great step which resulted in the establishment of a wise and salutary civil government. Upon ths 13th of July, after a prolonged discussion of the principles and issues involved, there was issued " An Ordinance for the Government of the Territory of the United States Northwest of the River Ohio," which has since been known as " the ordinance of 1787," or the "ordinance of freedom." By this great and statesmanlike ordinance, provision was made for successive forins of territorial government, adapted to successive steps of advancement in the settlement and development of the Western country. Chief Justice Chase says of this ordinance : "This remarkable instrument was the last gift of the Congress of the old confederation to the country, and it was a fit consummation of their glorious labors."
At the time this ordinance went into effect, there had been made no permanent settlement of the whites upon the territory embraced, except the few French villages, and their immediate vicinities, in the western and northwestern portions of it. If any such existed within the present limits
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
of Ohio, they must have been situated along the Maumee River, and were of small extent. The Government had discouraged the settlement of whites up to this time, to avoid infringement upon the rights of the Indians, and consequent troubles. Military force was resorted to to break up some small settlements made along the Ohio, and in other parts of the State. After the passage of the ordinance, emigration was encouraged. "When the settlers went into the wilderness they found the law already there. It was impressed upon the soil itself, while it yet bore up nothing but the forest."
When Ohio was admitted to the Federal Union as an independent State, one of the terms of admission was the fee simple to all the lands within its limits, especially those previously granted or sold, should be vested in the United States. The different portions of the lands have, at various times, been granted or sold to various companies, bodies politic, and individuals. The principal divisions were known as follows : 1, Congress lands ; 2, United States Military Lands ; 3, Virginia Military District; 4, Western Reserve ; 5, Fire Lands ; 6, Ohio Company's Purchase ; 7, Donation Tract ; 8, Symmes' Purchase ; 9, Refugee Tract ; 10, French Grant; 11, Dolerman's Grant ; 12, Zane's Grant ; 13, Canal Lands ; 14, Turnpike Lands ; 15, Maumee Road Lands ; 16, School Lands ; 17, College Lands; 18, Min- isterial ; 19, Moravian ; 20, Salt Sections. All of the lands in this county are in the Virginia Military District, and among the finest in the State.
THE VIRGINIA MILITARY LANDS.
At its session, beginning October 20, 1783, the General Assembly of Virginia passed an act to authorize its Delegates in Congress to convey to the United States, in Congress assembled, all the right of that common- wealth to the territory northwest of the Ohio River. Congress stipulated to accept this cession upon condition that this territory should be formed into States, containing a suitable extent of territory, and that the States so formed should be distinctly republican, and admitted members of the Federal Union, having the same rights of sovereignty and freedom as the other States. On the 17th of March, 1784, Thomas Jefferson, Arthur Lee, James Monroe and Samuel Hardy, the Virginia Delegates to Congress, con- veyed to the United States " all right, title and claim, as well as of juris- diction, which the said commonwealth hath to the territory, or tract of coun- try, within the limits of the Virginia charter, situate, lying and being north- west of the River Ohio."
This act of cession contained, however, the following reservation : " That in case the quantity of good land on the southeast side of the Ohio, upon the waters of Cumberland River, and between the Great and Tennes- see Rivers, which have been reserved by law for the Virginia troops, upon continental establishment, should, from the North Carolina line, bearing in further upon the Cumberland lands than was expected, prove insufficient for these legal bounties, the deficiency should be made up to the said troops in good lands, to be laid off between the Rivers Scioto and Little Miami, on the northwest side of the River Ohio, in such proportions to them as have been engaged to them by the laws of Virginia." The land embraced in this reservation constitutes the Virginia military district in Ohio, and is composed of the counties of Adams, Brown, Clinton, Clermont. Highland, Fayette, Madison and Union, and portions of Scioto, Pike, Ross, Pickaway,
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
Franklin, Delaware, Marion, Hardin, Logan, Clark, Greene, Champaign, Warren, Hamilton and Auglaize. Congress passed an act authorizing the establishment of this reservation and location as defined, upon the report of the executive of Virginia that the deficiency of good lands upon the waters of the Cumberland existed.
The Virginia soldiers of the Continental line, who served in the Revo- lutionary war, were compensated in bounty awards of these lands according to the rank, time of service, etc. The first step necessary, after securing the proper certificate of actual service, was that of procuring a printed warrant from the land officer, specifying the quantity of lands and the rights upon which it was due. This military warrant was issued from the land office, in the State of Virginia, which empowered the person to whom it was granted, his heirs or assignees, to select the number of acres specified in the lands re- served for that purpose, and to have the same appropriated. After the loca- tion was made and the boundaries ascertained by surveying, the owner of the warrant returned it to the State authorities, and received in its place a patent, or grant, from the Government. This graut was equivalent to a deed in fee simple, and passed all. of the title of the Government to the grantee.
On the same day on which the act was passed, Richard C. Anderson, a Colonel in the army, was appointed surveyor for the Continental line of the army, by the officers named in the aet and authorized to make such appoint- ment as they saw fit. He opened liis office at Louisville, for entries in the Kentucky lands, on the 20th of July, 1784. When the Kentucky grant was exhausted, he opened another office for entries in the Ohio tract. He held his position up to the time of his death, in October, 1826, and during the long period faithfully discharged the onerous duties devolving upon him. His son-in-law, Allen Latham. Esq., was appointed surveyor some time after Colonel Anderson's death, and opened his office at Chillicothe in July, 1829.
Any soldier who held a warrant, or the heir or assignee of any soldier who held a warrant, was at liberty to locate his lands wherever he pleased within the Virginia Military Lands, and in consequence of the irregularities with which many locations were made, and the encroachment of some loca- tions upon others, far more litigation has arisen relative to lines and titles in this distriet than in those which were regularly surveyed and laid off in sec- tions. The Virginia Military Traet was never surveyed into ranges or town- ships until it was done in the different counties, by order of the County Commissioners, when it beeame desirable to organize the townships for civil purposes. Hence their irregular shape and size.
PERILS OF THE SURVEY.
The original survey of the lands comprised in Madison County was attended with great difficulties, and ofttimes danger from prowling bands of Indians that infested this whole region of country, and who were bitterly hostile to those intrepid men, who, with compass and chain, were the avant couriers of civilization in the Scioto Valley. This land district was opened in 1787, and soon after, Massie, Sullivant, McArthur and others com- menced the adventurous undertaking of surveying it. All of the locations of land warrants prior to 1790 were made by stealth. "Every creek which was explored, every line that was run, was at the risk of life from the sav-
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
age Indians, whose courage and perseverance were only equaled by the per- severance of the whites to push forward their settlements." Col. R. C. Anderson, Surveyor-General of the Virginia Military District, placed a large number of the warrants in the hands of Nathaniel Massie, in 1790, when Congress removed the last obstruction to the taking of the lands, and he im- mediately proceeded to enter and survey on such terms as he could make with the owners. The risk being great, and as the holders of claims were anxious to have them located as soon as possible, in order that they might obtain the best selections, they were willing to pay liberally for the labor and danger of the survey. One-fourth, one-third, and sometimes as much as one-half, of the lands acquired by entry, were given by the proprietors to the surveyors. If the owners preferred paying in money, the usual terms were ten pounds, Virginia currency, for each one thousand acres surveyed, exclusive of chainman's wages. Massie continued to survey during the win- ter of 1792-93, and in the fall of the latter year he pushed his way far up the Scioto. He employed about thirty men to accompany him on his dangerous expedition. The greater part of Ross and Pickaway Counties, west of the river, was well explored and partly surveyed. The party returned without having met with any harm, and delighted with the richness of the valley. Massie resumed his labors in the winter of 1793-94, and braved many hard- ships and dangers.
Lucas Sullivant, one of the first settlers on the site of Columbus, and who died August 8, 1823, surveyed much of the lands within the pres- ent limits of Madison County. In some of his first attempts he was driven back by the Indians, but, finally, having formed a large party, about twenty men, surveyors, chain-bearers, markers, hunters, scouts and pack-horse men, with pack-horses, he made his way up the Scioto Valley, through the un- tracked wilderness to the vicinity of what is now Columbus. The party experienced much suffering, sometimes having a short allowance of food, and because of the proximity of Indians, not daring to use their rifles to bring down game. Wolves were constant visitors to the encampment, and the panther was more than once found prowling around. "Once," says the Sullivant memorial, " when encamped near what the early settlers knew as the ' salt lick,' on the west side of the river, three miles below the present city of Columbus, a panther was discovered crouching upon the horizontal limb of a tree, nearly overhanging the place where they were sitting around the brightly blazing fire. The tail of the panther was swaying to and fro, and he seemed about to spring upon them, when one of the hunters, seizing his rifle, aimed at the head, between the glaring eye-balls of the animal, and. with a steady hand, pulled the trigger. Simultaneous with the crack of the gun, the beast gave a spring, and falling in their midst, scattered the camp-fire in his death struggles.'
The rear guard of Mr. Sullivant's party attacked, on one occasion while surveying in what is now Madison County, a party of Indians, and killed a Frenchman who was with them-probably an Indian trader. For this the men were severely reprimanded by Mr. Sullivant, who believed that this wanton attack would be followed by a retaliating blow. The Mingo Indians held a consultation and sent out a party of warriors to capture or destroy the surveying squad. Mr. Sullivant, who, apprehending such a result, had hurried his work and was about ready to leave the country, was
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY.
met on the fourth day after the Frenchman's murder by Indians. He held a council with his men to determine whether they should attack the redskins or not, and it was decided not to take the initiative in battle. After direct- ing the men to keep together, remain quiet, and on no consideration to fire a gun unless attacked, Mr. Sullivant resumed his work, and, just at twilight, as he was making his last entry, some of the men fired at a wild turkey, and their whereabouts thus being made known, the Indians rushed upon them with a whoop and a volley. Mr. Sullivant threw his compass and other instruments under the top of a fallen tree, and swinging a light shotgun, which he always carried, to his shoulder, he fired upon an Indian who was rushing upon him with uplifted tomahawk. Turning about to look for his men, he saw they were in a panic and rapidly dispersing, and he also took to his heels, and, fortunately, in about a quarter of a mile, fell in with six of them. Favored in their flight by the darkness, they journeyed all night and most of the next day. Two of the men in this surveying party were killed when the Indians made their first onslaught. Mr. Sullivant had some other experiences with the Indians, but none so dangerous or nearly fatal as this.
The surveys of the lands upon the cast side of the Scioto were accom- panied by dangers similar to those that attended the survey of the Virginia Military District, though lesser, on account of the surveying being done at a later date.
Col. Elias Langham, Walter Dun, Joshua Ewing and James Galloway did much of the early surveying in Madison County ; while at a later day Patrick McLene, Henry Warner, Henry Alder, David Chapman and John Rouse divided most of the original surveys. Every man locating land was at liberty to bring his own surveyor, thus many of the first surveys were made by men who never again came into the county.
PIONEER DAYS AND TRIALS.
In nearly all great and thoroughly organized armies there is a corps of active, brave men, usually volunteers, whose self-imposed duty is to go ahead and prepare the way with ax, mattock and pick for the advancement of the army-the fighting rank and file. They are called pioneers, and are armed with guns, as well as implements of labor, for their position and their work is a dangerous one. They are obliged to keep a constant lookout for an ambush, in momentary fear of a sudden attack, for the enemy, with a full knowledge of the country, which to the advancing corps of pioneers is a terra incognita, is liable any instant to send a sudden volley of arrows or rifle balls into their midst, or to hem them in and overpower them with a superior force.
The men who pushed their way into the wilderness along the Scioto and its tributaries, and all those earliest settlers of Ohio from the river to the lake were the pioneers of one of the grandest armies that carth ever knew, an army whose hosts are still sweeping irresistibly ahead, and which now, after more than eighty years, has not fully occupied the country it has won. It was the army of peace and civilization that came, not to conquer an enemy by blood, carnage and ruin, but to subdue a wilderness by patient toil ; to make the wild valley blossom as the rose ; to sweep away the forest, till the soil, make fertile fields out of the prairie lands and build houses,
F
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which were to become the abodes of happiness and plenty. The pioneers were the reliant vanguard of such an army as this.
The first hardy and resolute men who penetrated the valley of the Scioto, coming up the stream from " la belle rivere," found a land fertile as heart could wish, fair to look upon, and fragrant with the thousand fresh odors of the woods in early spring. The long, cool aisles of the forest led away into mazes of vernal green, where the swift deer bounded by unmo- lested, and as yet unscared by the sound of the woodman's ax or the sharp ring of his rifle. They looked upon the wooded slopes and the tall grass of the plains, jeweled with strange and brilliant flowers, where once the red man had his fields of corn. All about them were displayed the lavish boun- ties of nature. The luxuriant growth of the oak, walnut, sycamore, maple, beech, hickory, elm, chestnut and the tulip tree, with the lesser shrubs, such as the dogwood, wild plum and crab-apple, the red bud, the papaw, the heavy-hanging grape-vines, the blueberry and raspberry gave evidence of the strength of the virgin soil and the kindness of the climate. The forest covered the land with an abundance of food for the smaller animals, and the deer, as common as the cattle of to-day, grazed upon the rich grass of the prairies, and browsed upon the verdure in the little glades. Other animals were abundant. The opossum, raccoon, rabbit and ground-hog existed in great numbers. The wild hogs roamed the woods in droves, and fattened upon the abundant mast, or "shack." The bear was occasionally seen. Wild turkeys appeared in vast flocks, and in the season came the migratory fowls and tarried by the streams. The streams had their share of life, and fairly swarmed with fish.
But the pioneers came not to enjoy a life of lotus-eating and ease. They could admire the pristine beauty of the scenes that unveiled before them ; they could enjoy the vernal green of the great forest, and the love- liness of all the works of nature. They could look forward with happy an- ticipation to the life they were to lead in the midst of all this beauty, and to the rich reward that would be theirs from the cultivation of the mellow, fertile soil ; but they had first to work. The seed-time comes before the harvest in other fields, too, than that of agriculture.
The dangers, also, that these pioneers were exposed to, were serious ones. The Indians could not be trusted, and the many stories of their out- rages in the earlier eastern settlements made the pioneers of the Scioto country apprehensive of trouble. The larger wild beasts were a cause of much dread, and the smaller ones were a source of great annoyance. Added to this was the liability to sickness which always exists in a new country. In the midst of all the loveliness of the surroundings, there was a sense of loneliness that could not be dispelled, and this was a far greater trial to the men and women who first dwelt in the western country than is generally imagined. The deep-seated, constantly-recurring feeling of isolation made many stout hearts turn back to the older settlements and the abodes of com- fort, the companionship and sociability they had abandoned in Virginia, Pennsylvania and the Southern and Eastern States, to take up a new life in the wilderness.
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