USA > Ohio > Cuyahoga County > Cleveland > The pioneer families of Cleveland 1796-1840 Vol. I > Part 13
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When Mrs. Williamson looked across the way from her front door, she saw a rail-fence extending from Superior Street nearly to the lake bank. The grounds thus enclosed were pretty well cleared; the northern end, Lorenzo Carter's 12-acre farm, much more so, and usually covered with growing grain, and on both sides of the street elder-bushes had sprung up after the trees were felled, making a thick underbrush. In short, it looked like any newly laid out country-road through the woods today, nothing more nor less. Behind the house the grounds were level for about 200 feet, then sloped unevenly to the river. This bank was
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covered in spring and summer with beautiful wild flowers, some of them now extinct in Northern Ohio. Wild grapes and bittersweet vines ran riot, filling the air with fragrance and color, and down near the water's edge grew fleur-de-lis and sweet-flag. The family lived on this spot many years, then removed to Euclid Avenue, where the Williamson Building now stands.
Samuel Williamson belonged to the first village official staff, one of the three trustees chosen in 1815, David Long and Nathan Perry, Jr., be- ing the other two. He was associate judge of the Common Pleas Court in 1823.
In the Cleveland Herald of 1834 appeared this death-notice: "After a protracted illness, Hon. Samuel Williamson, much esteemed for his in- tegrity and moral worth. His funeral was attended by a large concourse of citizens."
In 1821, the year following the organization of the Old Stone Church, Mrs. Isabella Williamson became a member of it. After the marriage of her son, she continued to live in a small frame-cottage east of his new residence. Her unmarried daughter shared her home. Nothing can be learned of her, and yet, how much! except the testimony of a now aged resident who recalls her as a beloved friend of her mother's and a "dear old lady." She lived 25 years after her husband's death, her own taking place in 1859, at the age of 77.
Matthew Williamson, the brother, was one of the patriotic company of militia, who organized in the War of 1812 to protect the hamlet from invasion, to march out to attack an advancing enemy, or to respond to calls for other military services.
There were seven children in the Williamson family. They attended school in an old building back of the present site of the American House, and in the old Academy on St. Clair Street, that structure so tenacious in the memory of the youth of that day, and 20 years of other days to come, each and all loving to dwell upon, and talk over their experiences as pupils in the old Academy. Afterwards the Williamson children were given other and higher education than the town afforded, whenever thought desirable for them; the boys, especially, attending colleges in eastern states.
The children of Samuel and Isabella Williamson :
Mary Williamson, m. Martin Bowen Sarah Williamson, died aged 63 Scott. years.
Samuel Williamson, m. Mary E. Tis- dale.
Samuel Williamson, Jr., was two years old when his parents came to Cleveland, and he lived here 74 years. Into that 74 years was crowded an experience that few Cleveland men could boast. He was one of the 57 inhabitants of the hamlet in 1810, and one of the population of 200,000 that the city of Cleveland claimed in 1884.
Between that time, Mr. Williamson had been a practising lawyer, a legislator, a county officer, and the president of the largest savings-bank in the city.
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BALDWIN
Of all the traits of character attributed to him, that which seems to count most now is that he was the kindest of men, the tenderest and most considerate of friends, that he carried into his private life all that he publicly professed.
In 1843 he married Miss Mary E. Tisdale of Utica, N. Y., an eastern town that furnished to Cleveland in those early days many beautiful brides, and some of its most valued sons.
The children of Samuel and Mary Tisdale Williamson :
Judge Samuel E. Williamson, m. George T. Williamson.
Miss Mary P. Marsh of New Haven, Conn .; 2nd, Miss Harriet W. Brown of East Windsor, Ct.
Rev. James D. Williamson, m. Miss Ely of Elyria, Ohio.
1810
BALDWIN
There were several families of Baldwin who came to Cleveland, Doan's Corners, and Newburgh at a very early day. It has been found extremely difficult to secure accurate data regarding Newburgh's earliest settlers. Records are not to be obtained. If any were kept, they are buried in the tons of records stored in the basements of court-house and city hall. As near as can be ascertained, Philemon Baldwin and his sons were among the first to arrive, before the year 1810. They settled on farms in Newburgh.
Philemon Baldwin, Sr., came from Yates Co., N. Y. He had been a pioneer of that county, and to him is accorded the honor of naming Penn Yan, N. Y.
There was much strife among the residents of the place concerning the naming of the newly settled town. Settlers from Pennsylvania wished it called one way, and New England settlers another. It was Philemon Baldwin who satisfied all parties by suggesting Penn for one party, and finishing with the first syllable of Yankee for the other. He must have been over 50 years old when he made his second venture in pioneer life. He is said to have been an interesting man, shrewd, witty, and full of fun, a genial companion, more ready to see the bright side of life's shield than its darker one. He died in 1830.
There was a large family of children, the oldest members of which, possibly, did not accompany their parents to Newburgh. They were:
Asa, Philemon, Amos, George, Mary, Sally, Elisabeth, Esther, Caleb, and Runa Baldwin.
Philemon Baldwin, Jr., was born 1785, married Polly Rose of Norris Landing, Conn. They moved first to Niagara Falls, and then to New- burgh in 1810. The only personal record of this family is found in an ad- vertisement in the Herald for the return or apprehension of a bound boy.
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LONG
The children of Philemon, Jr., and Polly Baldwin :
Calista Baldwin, b. 1810; m. H. A.
Graves in 1830, of East Cleve- land. They both died in Bed- ford, Ohio.
Starr Baldwin, b. 1812; died in San Francisco, Cal.
Henry Baldwin, b. 1814. Martha Baldwin, b. 1822. Lucette Baldwin, b. 1830.
Philemon Baldwin, Jr., died in Newburgh, 1831.
Caleb and Runa Baldwin, sons of Philemon, Sr., married the daugh- ters of Judge James Kingsbury, the Cleveland pioneer. It was a double wedding on December 7, 1814, and it is reported that the affair was a big social success, participated in by nearly all Newburgh, and Cleveland as well, and we can imagine that the jovial father of the bridegrooms did his full share in making everybody feel happy on the occasion. Also, that certain young neighbors and friends of the couples made right merry, and that Samuel Jones and his violin beguiled their footsteps.
The residence of Judge Kingsbury was so much larger than the usual pioneer home that there was no necessity for setting the furniture of the house outside of it during the party, as was the custom in the log-cabins of that day in order to make room for the company. Horace Perry, Cleveland's justice of the peace, performed the ceremonies.
The children of Caleb and Nancy Kingsbury Baldwin :
Nancy Baldwin, m. Gardner. James Baldwin.
Caleb Baldwin, went to Missouri Waldo Baldwin.
and was in the government serv- Ellen Baldwin.
ice.
This branch of the Philemon Baldwin, Sr., family joined the Mormons in Utah.
The children of Runa and Calista Kingsbury Baldwin :
Albert and Sherman Baldwin, phy- Sophrona Baldwin, m. Preston Bur-
sicians of Toledo, Ohio. roughs. Lived in Chicago, Ill.
Almon Baldwin, m. in Paulding Co., Martha Baldwin, m. Charles Lou- Ohio. gee. Lived in Oakland, Cal.
1810
LONG
The year 1810 was epoch-making in the history of Cleveland through the arrival of Dr. David Long, the first resident physician of this locality. To be sure, he might have been considered rather young, 21 years, to be entrusted with surgical cases, for instance. But a community that for 14 years had managed its broken bones unaided would not be apt to demand
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LONG
age and experience when a full-fledged doctor appeared unheralded upon the scene.
Moreover, the young man probably had absorbed more medical lore before he had even opened a text-book than many an older man possessed after years of study; for he was in the third generation of a family of physicians, and his profession an inheritance as well as a choice. His grandfather, Dr. John Long, was a noted practitioner of Shelbourne, Mass., whose two sons, Dr. Long, Jr., and Dr. David Long, followed closely in his footsteps, while their sister, Diana Long, kept the feminine side of the family in line by marrying Dr. Robert Severance.
Dr. David Long, Sr., and his wife, Margaret Harkness Long, removed to Hebron, N. Y., and there, in 1789, was born their son, David, Jr., who was destined to make the family name a household word and of historical value in this western city.
The young doctor did not expect that the first years of his practice would be adequate for his support, especially if he married, which he proceeded to do within a twelvemonth. Indeed, in scanning the pages of the earliest newspaper, his advertisements suggest merely a commer- cial life. He offers salt and other commodities for sale. He has a dry- goods store. In connection with Levi Johnson, he builds a warehouse on the river.
He found time for civic duties, assisting in the promotion of the little hamlet to the dignity of a village, and, as county commissioner, his vote saved to Cleveland the county-seat and prevented its threatened removal to Newburgh.
In the cholera epidemics he served on the board of health, and was one of that quartet of medical heroes, who, with unsinking courage, fought the dread disease unarmed with adequate knowledge concerning its cause or its cure.
Dr. Long was loyal to his inheritance of religious belief. It was quite the fashion among the earliest local physicians to belittle the sacred Scriptures, and to claim that science had proven them false. At least three of Dr. Long's associates, preceding 1830, were openly free-thinkers, but when, in 1817, Old Trinity was organized, he was at hand to help the cause, even though raised in, and, at heart, of another orthodoxy. But in 1844 we find him an active member and the elder of the Second Pres- byterian Church.
The professional life of Dr. Long for many years was strenuous and often perilous. When he arrived in Cleveland, there was no other physi- cian west of Painesville or north of Hudson. Often he would be called out of his own bed to that of some patient whom it would take hours of weary horseback-riding to reach, through terrible roads or dense woods, and over swollen streams that his horse would have to swim. Frequently he would be caught in one of those electrical storms, the severity of which we have in these days no counterpart, and he would be drenched to the skin, with his destination yet many miles away.
In this era of exorbitant fees, it will be of interest to note that quite often the patient who was farthest away and most inaccessible was unable to pay the good doctor; for money was scarce and pioneers very poor.
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So it will be readily seen why a physician of that day had to sell salt to eke out his income.
The toil, self-sacrifice, and generosity of the medical profession of the Western Reserve during the first half century of its history can never be adequately estimated. Some of those men kept no accounts, accepting whatever their patients could afford to pay, and that often, not in money, but in produce. The love and esteem of the people to whom they minis- tered seemed to them an adequate return for their services when nothing more material was at hand with which to be paid; and the presence of a physician in the lonely little cabins of the wilderness was that of coun- selor and friend, as well as medical adviser and healer.
The domestic life of Dr. David Long was ideal. In 1811, he married Juliana Walworth, daughter of John and Juliana Morgan Walworth, the Cleveland pioneers of 1806. Mrs. Long was eminently fitted to be the wife of such a man as was Dr. Long. Broad-minded, public-spirited, and generous to a degree. All her social duties were marked by simplicity and sincerity. Her roof continuously sheltered some homeless one in need of her pity and care. No one was ever turned from her door unassisted by what they claimed, whether it was food or sympathy. She was espe- cially kind to young strangers in town, and their loneliness was often lessened through evenings spent in her hospitable home.
Mrs. Ellen R. Miller of this city relates an incident connected with the War of 1812, and of Mrs. Long, which is very characteristic of the latter. Mrs. Miller's grandfather, Dr. Coleman of Ashtabula, enlisted as a sur- geon in that conflict. He was taken very ill, and as he lay in the little hospital on Superior Street near the Public Square, grave doubts were felt as to his recovery.
A messenger about to carry a dispatch to Erie was requested to stop at Ashtabula on his way, and acquaint Mrs. Coleman of her husband's condition. She at once began preparing to come on to Cleveland, and in- duced the nearest neighbor of her own sex to accompany her.
The two women started on horseback, Mrs. Coleman guiding her own animal with one hand, while with the other she held her infant close to her breast. Night overtook them in the forest, far from any pioneer log- house, and they encamped in the lonely wilderness, trembling every moment and sleepless with apprehension whenever the howling of wolves seemed to draw nearer.
Morning dawned at last, and they renewed the journey. Alighting at the door of the hospital, they were met by Mrs. Long, who was assisting in the care of the sick soldiers. She insisted upon taking them to her own home for food and rest, then said to Mrs. Coleman:
"You are to make this your headquarters while you remain. Further- more, leave your babe with me while you are at the bedside of your hus- band. I will care for it tenderly whenever you are absent."
Which she proceeded to do. Contrary to all previous conclusions, Dr. Coleman recovered and returned to his home in Ashtabula. Dr. and Mrs. Long often exchanged visits in after years with the Colemans, and their names and memory have been cherished and revered to this day by the descendants of the latter.
The Longs lived in the log-house back of the present site of the Ameri-
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ALFRED KELLEY
can House, and at one time in a small frame-house on Water Street. In the early '30s, Dr. Long built a substantial stone-house on Superior Street, south-west corner of Seneca, which he occupied for two years, then removed to his farm on Woodland Avenue, on the north side of which he erected a fine Colonial residence. This, with 171/2 acres of land sur- rounding it, he sold in 1845 to Erastus Gaylord, and built himself another fine home west of it, in which he died in 1859. Long Street, parallel to Superior, cut through Dr. Long's pasture, whence its name; and Long- wood Avenue, once a beautiful thoroughfare, running north from Wood- land, received its name in honor of the family.
The children of David and Juliana Walworth Long:
Mary H. Long, m. Solomon Lewis Horace Long, d. 1845, aged 12 years.
Severance. Solon Long, d. 1850.
1810
ALFRED KELLEY
Alfred Kelley, the second son of Thomas and Jemima Stow Kelley, and 21 years of age, rode into Cleveland on horseback, having traveled all the way from Oneida Co., N. Y. It was in 1810, the year Cuyahoga County was organized, and as a lawyer, he became its first prosecuting attorney.
From that day until he took up his residence elsewhere he was loyal to the town and city of his adoption, and in return Cleveland was ever proud of her gifted son. He was a handsome young man, and possessed a brilliant mind, an inheritance from his mother's family.
When the little hamlet became a village in 1815, Alfred Kelley was made its president, and at 25 years of age, barely old enough to acquire the position, he was sent to represent this district in the Ohio Legisla- ture.
August, 1817, he married Mary Seymour Welles, daughter of Melanc- thon Woolsey and Abigail Buel Welles of Stamford, Conn. The young couple accompanied by the bride's sister, Sarah Welles, traveled from Lowville, N. Y., to Cleveland in a carriage. Mrs. Kelley's letters to her former home describing the wedding-journey were exceedingly interest- ing and graphic.
"The first day after leaving Buffalo we traveled but 19 miles over the most terrible roads you can possibly conceive of. I had no idea that roads could be so intolerable.
"We stayed that night in a log-cabin crowded with movers who spread their beds so thickly upon the floor that you could scarcely move without stepping on some one. Alfred drove the carriage, the next day, on the beach around the jutting rocks into the water where the waves dashed over the backs of the horses. In this way, had the lake been calm, we could
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ALFRED KELLEY
have avoided the miles of Cataraugus woods which are a terror to all travelers in this country.
"Sarah and I walked four miles that day. We saw wagons stuck in the mud, children crying and many discouraged mothers.
"We reached here just a week from the day we left Buffalo. The village looked much pleasanter than I had dared to expect. I was re- ceived very affectionately by all the family, particularly by the old gen- tleman,"-Daniel Kelley, Sr., her father-in-law.
Much of the early prosperity of the town was due to Alfred Kelley's keenness of vision. Had he not been a resident of the place, identified with its interests and present in person to suggest and to guide at crucial moments of its history, Cleveland might have seriously blundered or neg- lected to embrace opportunities that gave her the impetus from which she never retrograded. There were better harbors, by far, on the lake than the Cuyahoga River afforded. Huron but 50 miles west had a wide, deep river, never closed by sand-bars, and had that town possessed an Al- fred Kelley it would in this day have been the leading Ohio city on Lake Erie. It was he who secured for Cleveland the northern terminus of the Erie Canal, and he it was who pushed and exploited for her the first rail- roads to enter the city.
Circumstances forced him to remove to Columbus, O., after a ten- years' residence on Water Street in the brick-cottage erected for his par- ents. He had a large family of children, seven daughters and four sons. The eldest born in Cleveland in 1818, the youngest in Columbus in 1841. Mrs. Kelley died 1882 in a beautiful home that her husband had erected in the latter city.
The children of Alfred and Mary Welles Kelley :
Maria Kelley, b. 1818; m. Judge Bates of Columbus.
Jane Kelley, b. 1820; m. William Collins of Lowville, N. Y., a law- yer. She lived most of her life in Cleveland, corner of Euclid Ave- nue and Collins Place.
Anna Kelley, b. 1836; m. Col. Carl G. Frendenburg, U. S. A., and lived in Washington, D. C.
Alfred Kelley, b. 1839; m. Mary Craig Dulevy.
Helen Kelley, b. 1831; m. Francis Collins, a lawyer and brother of William.
Katherine Kelley, b. 1841; m. Rev. William H. Dunning of Mobile, Ala .; 2nd, Rev. Edward Abbott, brother of Lyman Abbott.
Five of the Kelley children died in infancy.
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1810
MURRAY
Much locally historical interest is centered in the brothers Elias and Harvey Murray, who arrived in Cleveland early in the summer of 1810. Enoch Murray of East Cleveland, who died 1819 and left a widow, Katherine Smith Murray, and young children, may have been another brother, as there is a tradition to that effect preserved by the descendants of Harvey Murray, and Enoch is a name common to the family.
Elias Murray did not remain long in Cleveland, but went on to a more western state, in what year is not known. He wrote a long letter, in the 40's, to Col. Whittlesey from Sheboygan, Wisconsin, in which he gave his first impression of Cleveland, received from a sailing vessel anchored off shore, and how the town looked to him in a nearer view as he landed in a small row-boat.
This letter was published in a newspaper, then clipped from it and pasted in a book containing similar letters from other pioneers. It is pre- served by the Western Reserve Historical Society.
The record kept in 1810 of books drawn from the first, small library of the hamlet contains frequently the names of Elias and Harvey Mur- ray, and shows not only that they were fond of reading, but cared only for the best literature.
They built a store on the south side of Superior Street near the Pub- lic Square and adjoining the present site of the Forest City House. There is no evidence that they ever stocked it with merchandise, but it was used as a hospital during the War of 1812, even after a Government hospital was built on Water Street after Hull's Surrender. It became the prop- erty of Theodore Miles, and various uses were made of the building in the many years it stood on Superior Street, and at the time it was torn down, 1855, was pronounced the oldest one in town.
Harvey Murray brought a wife and one or two young children with him to Cleveland. He distinguished himself in the War of 1812 by com- manding the company of militia organized to resist invasion from the British.
Capt. Harvey Murray had a grist-mill on a creek in East Cleveland, and probably was living there at the time of his death, which occurred about 1827. As his wife died then also, they were undoubtedly victims of the typhoid fever scourge of that year. Their children were left orphans at a tender age, and were cared for by sympathetic friends and neighbors.
The children of Capt. Harvey and Emily Murray :
Elias Murray, married, had two sons, left this locality in 1840. Eli Murray, married, had two chil- dren, Mansfield and Mary Mur- ray. The family also removed in 1840.
Lyman Murray, died young.
Emily Murray, b. 1814; m. Elisha Benjamin in 1830 at Warrensville.
She died of consumption at North- field, O., 1851, aged 37, leaving a large family of young children.
Eliza Murray, m. Russell Nugent. She had three children: William, Emily and Gabriel Nugent. She died in 1842, at the age probably of 26 years, and at the home of her sister in Northfield.
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1810
TOWN
Mrs. Emily Murray Benjamin had nine children: David, Hester, Theresa, Lyman, Emily, Bianca, Frances, Enoch, and Cynthia Benjamin. To Miss Frank E. Benjamin, daughter of Lyman Benjamin of this city and great-granddaughter of Capt. Harvey Murray, we are indebted for the family genealogy.
1810
TOWN
The earliest records of Newburgh contain mention of Dr. Town, who evidently practised medicine and entered into the public affairs of the village. He removed to Hudson, Ohio, where he was widely known as a physician, and where he died in 1859.
Dr. Israel Town was born in Granville, N. Y. He was the son of Joseph and Hannah Coleman Town. His wife was Lucy White Town, who shared in her husband's busy professional life both in Newburgh and in Hudson.
Their only child was
Mary Helen Town, m. Joseph Mur- ray.
1810
PEET
Elijah Peet, born in 1765 in New Milford, Conn., was fifth in line from John Peet, the American ancestor of the family. Elijah Peet married Betsey Leavenworth of Woodbury, Conn. He lived in Vermont until of middle-age, and then about 1812, perhaps earlier, came with his family to Newburgh. He died in Lee, Mass., in 1814. Probably he had a family of children, but only one, Stephen Peet, has been found. In the records of the probate court of Cuyahoga County the name of the Rev. Stephen Peet occurs often in connection with marriage ceremonies between 1825 and 1836. The couples at whose weddings this clergyman officiated were mostly residents of Cleveland, Newburgh, and Euclid, Ohio.
Stephen Peet was the fourth child of Elijah and Betsey Peet, the very early pioneers of Newburgh. When but 17 years of age he taught the winter school of 1814 and 1815 in a little building in Broadway. Isham Morgan of Newburgh, then a small lad, was one of Mr. Peet's pupils, and he has handed down to the present generation a vivid picture of school life in those days.
"During the term, Mr. Peet got up an exhibition for the evening of
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the last day of school. On the road from Newburgh to Cleveland, now called Broadway, and where you first get a view of the river from the high land, stood the log-house of Samuel Dille. It was large for the time, and in it was a spacious upper room the length and breadth of the house. "There the people of Cleveland and Newburgh assembled to witness our school exhibition. First on the program was "The Conjuror.' Then followed 'The Dissipated Oxford Student' (both taken from a book called the 'Columbia Orator.') The scene between Brutus and Cassius was ren- dered, besides other well-known pieces. The various parts were pro- nounced by critics present to have been performed in admirable style.
"My father, mother, two little sisters, and myself returned home, a distance of a mile and a half, on the family horse, presenting a cavalcade somewhat uncouth on the streets of present Cleveland." The Morgans lived in the vicinity of Broadway and Willson, now East 55th St.
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