USA > Pennsylvania > Bradford County > Annual of the Bradford County Historical Society, 1906 > Part 8
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First White Men in Bradford County.
When a short distance from her cabin one day, the sound of footsteps suddenly fell upon her ears. She was greatly alarmed at first, thinking the Indians were coming. Peep- ing out from behind a tree, she saw a pack of wolves advanc- ing, and as she remarked, " her fears were gone." Pick- ing up a pine knot, she struck it against a tree, making a sharp, ringing noise, which frightened the grey denizens and they turned and scampered away. She kept her post seventeen days, when after eating the last of her provis-
ND A.
. Elizabeth, while For a gut of thirt en years is given in thatder Ill., to which our readers are especially referred. Mr. Fox was sal sequeath drowned in the Susquehanna.
MRS. ELIZABETH MEANS.
Elba Forsyth was born in Connecticut, in 1776. The tumily was a Scottish one from Edinburgh, the ancestor coming to America with his three sons, John. Jonathan, . and lotus
ELIZABETH FOX MEANS, THE HEROINE.
Born, Sept. 1, 1770, being the first child of pioneer parents, born in Bradford county : died July 21, 1851 in Towanda, Pa.
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First White Men in Bradford County.
ions, and seeing no prospect of relief, she set out to meet the family or find a hut where she might procure some food. She had proceeded but a few miles, when, at Gordon's Island she discovered the boat with her family slowly ascending the river. The moment of deliverance from peril was not only a moment of pleasure, but of pleasantry. The father inquired, " Where are you going ?" " To Wilkes-Barre to get something to eat," replied the daugh- ter. She was taken on board and they reached home after an absence of five years.
The question is frequently asked if Rudolph Fox was a soldier in the Revolutionary War ? In 1775 he joined and was an Ensign in the Ninth or Up-River Company of the 24th Connecticut Militia. Owing to the scattered condition of this Company its members were never brought together for active service. Further than this we have no knowledge of Mr. Fox belonging to any other command.
From 1783 Mr. Fox and his family lived in compar- ative security and comfort. Sometimes, however, the crops failed. At one time they were several weeks with- out grain or garden vegetables. Like shepards of old, they lived upon the milk and flesh of the flock. A boat-load of grain passed down the river in the mean- time. Money was out of the question, and Mr. Fox offered to exchange a cow for a barrel of grain, but was refused. Wintergreen berries were about the only fruit of the forest, and upon these and milk the family sub- sisted for four weeks. When the rye was far enough advanced that it could be rubbed out of the head, they gathered of it, boiled and added to it milk, which made a dish, as the children afterwards expressed it, of " the most delicious food they had ever tasted." A root found in the low lands and known to the early settlers as " sweet
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First White Men in Bradford County.
cieley," furnished considerable nourishment, while the " island cherries " were a luxury. At this time the near- est milling point was Wilkes-Barre, and moreover it required strong men to pole a boat up the river. There- fore Mr. Fox was required to resort to the Indian's or Yankee's invention in preparing his grain for food. When Mr. Fox came to Towanda the flats were covered with thorn trees and other timbers, save an occasional opening, where the Indians had burned away the trees and grown their maize. Upon settling Mr. Fox set assiduously at work in clearing the land and preparing it for cultivation. Before the Indians had driven him off his possession, he had made considerable progress, afforded horses, cows and many other comforts, and indeed, had really begun to enjoy himself in his wild and isolated home.
After returning in 1783 he occupied the original site for a few years, then built another and better log house about twenty rods west of the brick house standing near the railroad crossing at South Towanda. The great over- flows that sometimes occurred in those days, no doubt drove him to the hillside. The career of this interesting man, the first permanent settler in Bradford county, was brought suddenly to a close, March 4th, 1806. It being spring, Mr. Fox concluded to have a mess of fish. Con- sequently he repaired to the river, a short distance above the mouth of the creek, where he ventured out on the ice to cast his line in a hole. The ice being thin it gave way with him, and being unable to get out without aid was drowned. The place to this day is familiarly known as " The Fox Hole."
Rudolph Fox, the courageons pioneer, was born March 29th, 1739, O. S., and was therefore sixty-seven
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First White Men in Bradford County.
years of age at the time of his death. He was a man of heroic mould, having all the elements that combine in courage and physique to make a man equal to the test in a wild country. He was short and thick-set, a regular German, both in figure and language. He, however, acquired the English venacular, but spoke it very brokenly. In religion he was a Methodist, as were all the family save " Deacon John." He married Catherine Elizabeth Miller, a German woman. She is described as " a large, fleshy lady, weighing over two hundred pounds, possessed of a kind and noble heart." In sickness she was ever ready to minister to the wants of the afflicted, and at the instance of her death, the good Samaritan was on the road to care for the sick. She was born May 4th, 1748, O. S., and died very suddenly April 3d, 1810. This heroic couple are buried at Cole's, where a plain grey stone marks their resting place.
Rudolph and Catherine Elizabeth Fox were the parents of fifteen children, five sons and ten daughters. Of these three were born before their removal into Bradford county. Their children in order of birth were Catherine, Mary, Philip, Elizabeth, Dorothy, Daniel, Rudolph, John, Anna Eleanor, Susanna, Abraham, Margaret, Delia and Chris- tiana. The daughters married are as follows : Cath- arine to Henry Strope, Mary to Jacob Bowman, Elizabeth to Wm. Means, Eleanor to John Strope, Margaret to Amos Goff, Delia to Wm. Goff-these all spent their days in the vicinity of their old home; Dorothy married a Mr. Townsend of Penn Yan, N. Y., and Christiana a Mr. Grant of the same place ; Susanna married Nathan Farr and removed West. All were good and useful women, and in most part mothers of large families. Of the sons Daniel
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First White Men in Bradford County
and Rudolph removed to the State of Ohio, where they died. Abraham spent his days in Monroe township. Philip lived some years in Ohio but returned to Towanda and died on the homestead. John, known as " Deacon John Fox," occupied the homestead, was a man of influ- ence and one of Towanda's most prominent citizens. It would be a matter of much pleasure to treat this interest- ing family more fully, but we must forego, fearing our paper has already been too wearisome. After a lapse of one hundred and thirty-eight years scarcely one of the Fox name remains among us, yet there are numerous descendants of the Fox daughters. The most venerable of these is our worthy townsman, Wm. Scott, aged eighty- eight years, who is not only a descendant of Rudolph Fox but of Sebastian Strope, the pioneer hero of Wysox.
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INDIAN TOWNS AT NORTH TOWANDA.
PAPER BY CAPT. J. ANDREW WILT.
A few weeks ago I took a walk and visited the place where was located an important and historic Indian town, or village. I became somewhat interested, and I will therefore give what I find in the writings and his- tories of others in relation to this ancient village of the Indians.
In a foot note in the book entitled " Gen. Sullivan's Expedition of 1779," on page 124, is the following: " NEWTYCHANNING .- This day (August 8th, 1779,) Col. Proctor destroys the first Indian town, named Newtychan-
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Indian Towns.
ning, containing about twenty houses, located on the west side of the Susquehanna on the north side of Sugar Creek, near North Towanda. Sullivan says it contained twenty-two houses ; Canfield, that it was built the preceding year and contained from fifteen to twenty houses. This was near the site of Oscalui of a previous date, and the same site called Ogehage on Captain Hendrickson's map of 1616 and was then one of the towns of the Carantouannais, an Iroquois tribe, destroyed or driven out by the Five Nations previous to 1650."
David Craft, in his his history of Bradford county, published in 1878, on page 13, makes the following state- ment : " Oscalui was a very ancient Indian town, situ- ated just above the mouth of Sugar Creek on the farm now owned by John Biles and the one lately owned by Judge Elwell, about opposite the lower end of Bald Eagle Island. Conrad Wesier, the celebrated Indian agent and provin- cial interpreter, visited this place March 28th, 1737, on his way to a council with the Six Nations at Onondaga. He describes the settlement at that time as consisting of a few hungry people who were subsisting chiefly on the juice of the sugar trees. The only food he could procure here was a little weak soup made of corn meal. In 1745, on the 11th of June, Spangenburg and Zeisberger, passed this place on their journey to the capital of the Iroquois confederacy, a journey for both political and religious purposes. They were accompanied by Weiser, Shikel- limy, a Cayuga sachem and the Iroquois viceroy at Shamokin, one of his sons, and Andrew Montour. Their object was to induce the Six Nations to conclude a peace with the Catawbas, to make satisfaction for murders per- petrated by the Shawanese, and to obtain permission for the Christian Indians to begin a settlement at Wyoming.
+
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Indian Towns.
At this time but few Indians were observed at the settle- ment ; but they found many pictured trees about this place, it being on the great war-path. War parties were, in this way, accustomed to record the results of their campaigns. The bark was peeled off one side of a tree and on this were painted certain characters by which they understood from what tribe and of how many the war party consisted, against what tribe they had fought, how many scalps and prisoners they had taken, and how many men they had lost. In 1750 this town had been abandoned, and there is no record of its again having been inhabited previous to the Revolutionary War. Below the town, and about one-fourth of a mile above the creek, when the North Branch Canal was excavated, a large burying ground was discovered extending from fifteen to twenty rods along the line of the canal. This bore marks of great age. In several instances not a bone had survived the ravages of decay ; in others only the larger ones were found. These, as they were exposed by the excavation, were gathered up and re-buried in the orchard adjoining."
Wm. H. Egle, M. D., in his " History of Pennsylvania " on page 409, says, " At the mouth of Sugar Creek, Oscalui, (meaning the fierce,) was an old Indian town, second in importance to Tioga, standing at the junction of the path leading from the West Branch to the Susquehanna, with the Great Warrior path down the river. It was a con- venient resting place for travelers and a rendezvous for hunting and war parties. At this place are the remains of what appears to be an ancient fortification which from its construction and the relics found in it, would indicate that it was constructed by a people allied to the mound builders of the West and point to an occupancy anterior to that of the Iroquois."
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Indian Towns.
In the " History of the Towandas," page 19, Mr. C. F. Heverly says, " Three of their palisaded villages were within the limits of Bradford county-the Carantouannais at Spanish Hill-with whom Stephen Brule' connected with one of Champlain's expeditions, spent a winter ; Oscalui on the north bank of Sugar Creek on the point of the hill, bounded by the creek and the Pennsylvania and New York railroad, and which received local importance from the fact that it was near the junction of the great trail leading from the West to the East Branch of the Susquehanna with the Great Warrior Path, leading down from the latter."
" In an address entitled, " Indian Tribes and Villages of the Upper Susquehanna," by J. W. Ingham, Esq., delivered before the Society on March 24th, 1906, he makes the following statements : " In 1616, a French- man named Stephen Brule' was sent by Champlain, Governor of Canada, to visit a tribe of Indians who had a palisaded town near Tioga Point (now Athens). His mission was to induce them to assist the French who were engaged in a war with the Six Nations, but did not suc- ceed at that time in persuading them to take up the hatchet. It is said that the Dutch who were settling along the Hudson and were on friendly terms with the Six Nations, used their influence against any alliance with the French. There is no doubt that this was one of the ten tribes of Susquehannocks, or Andastes (as the French called them) as it is known that one of their 40 palisaded towns was located somewhere about the junction of the two rivers, and the two others at favorable points along the Susque- hanna all the way down to Chesapeake Bay. A palisade is a strong fence made with large stakes, or small logs, 10
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Indian Towns.
or 12 feet long set firmly in the ground as a defense against an attacking enemy. The next ancient town of the Susquehannocks following down the river was Oscalui, built on the bluff at the upper side of Sugar Creek, just where it falls into the river. The field in which it was situated has from the first settlement by whites been known as the ' Fort Lot.' "
On the evening of March 28th, 1737, Conrad Weiser on his way to Onondaga on a mission to the Six Nations, accompanied by two Indians and a Dutchman named Stoffel arrived at the mouth of Sugar Creek, entirely out of provisions, having eaten nothing since morning; they found a few Indian families living here on the verge of starvation. All the able-bodied men were away vainly hunting for game, and the old men, squaws and children had been living for weeks on maple molasses and a skrimped quantity of corn meal. Weiser could buy no meal with trinkets or money, but with true Indian hos- pitality the women made him a weak soup of corn meal and ashes boiled separately and then mixed. The two Indians ate greedily of it and it made them sick. Stoffel, the Dutelnman, ate greedily of it and experienced no in- convenience. Weiser, though very hungry, could not stomach the stuff and gave his share to the hungry chil- dren who were looking on so wishfully. Later in the evening at another hut Weiser succeeded in buying with 24 neeedles and six shoe strings, five small loaves of corn bread of about a pound weight each. Of these Weiser could eat and Stoffel helped him devour them, but the two Indians had not yet recovered from their soup sick- ness. Nothing more could be purchased. The next morning when Weiser told them that he had been sent by the Governor of Pennsylvania on a mission for the
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Indian Towns.
good of the Six Nations, they broke open the hut of an Indian who was away and sold him about one-third of a bushel of corn, which he had pounded into meal, and then resumed his journey to Onondaga.
Thus you will comprehend the history of this ancient Indian village so far as it is known to white civilized man. Let us, however, not forget that at this point, for hun- dreds of years prior to the first time it became known to the white race, the Indian had his abode, either perma- nent or temporary as convenience suited his habits and customs. Here, these uncivilized aboriginies of America, then in what is now Bradford county, had their govern- ment, tribal, it may be true, but government and laws applicable to them and their conditions. Here the tribal and family relations were carried out. Here were erected his dwellings, however humble and crude. Here his children were born. Here the fond mother cooed and played with her child or children with that motherly af- fection and interest that God has implanted in the heart of every mother. Here the mother taught her children to walk and utter the first syllable of their language, and taught them to perform the tasks which should be re- quired of them when grown to manhood or womanhood.
We can by a slight imagination, see the Indian boys and girls on the flats between this high mound and the banks of the river, or on the flat-land on the south side of the creek on a bright summer day playing with the pebbles of all sizes and all colors that had been deposited by the waters and worn smooth and into various shapes by the long travels they had taken by the power of the water at the spring and summer freshets. Here is a group of tawney faced long haired dirty children taking their first lesson in the use of the bow and arrow ; the bows are of
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Indian Towns.
different sizes and strength suited to the strength of the boyor girl being instructed ; here, also, are the interested mothers of these future to-be warriors and hunters ; each of these mothers smiles with approval when her son shows an ap- titude in holding the bow and sending its speeding arrow nearer the object than other boys. These simple people with few wants and necessities, are as anxious and solicit- ious about their children as we are to-day. To excel in any particular was a mark of distinction and gave prefer- ment. These Indian girls were carefully instructed and taught to prepare the skins of wild animals suitable for the clothing ; they were shown how to stitch together these skins and hides for garments ; those who had a taste and ability were also taught to fasten together in their crude way fancy articles made of nuts, pebbles and shells for ornament. These Indian mothers no doubt exercised as much care in teaching their daughters all these things so as to be fitted to become the partner of a distinguished hunter or warrior, as do the mothers of to-day, to fit their daughters for the duties of life whether high or low.
These original people had feelings, perhaps in a lower degree, than we have, but they were human and had them. They had pride and showed it; they had fear and mani- fested it ; they had sorrows and grief and expressed them in acts and conduct. The remains of the Indian dead found near this place is sufficient evidence that not alone did these people live here and raise their families but that disease and war laid low in death the old and the young. The grief and sorrow at the loss of those near and dear to them was, no doubt, just as great to them as it is to us ; it was just as heavy and burdensome to them in their con- dition as it is to us. We can almost see the mother of a family of six children, ranging from 1 to 12 years of
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Indian Towns:
age, with the assistance of her friends carrying the dead body of each of her children along the slope of the knoll towards the north of the village to the place of burial, each having been the victim of that dread disease, small- pox ; here she is the chief bearer of the dead as well as mourner ; she no doubt expresses her great grief and sor- row, by what we would call unintelligible grunts, but to this fond mother her deepest affection. The father of this once happy family on his return from the war-path or hunt, also in stoic silence, expresses his sorrow and grief and goes west on the hill from the village and communes with the " Great Spirit."
Happiness too must have been the greatest when the men returned from the hunting trip with plenty of game. Then the squaw and the children had their happy times, as well as hardest tasks in skinning and dressing the ani- mals brought in by their mighty hunters. Before the time of iron and steel implements this work was all done with stone implements. We can only conjecture how much labor and patience it required for those squaws to cut up and sever the muscles, sinews and bones of these animals, so as to prepare the flesh for food, as well as to dry it over the wigwam fires, to preserve them for future use.
As our villagers stand on this knoll, they too can see up and down the river and observe the approach of war parties -friend or foe-from either direction. What commotion among the women and children when there comes silently floating down on the Susquehanna fifty small canoes, made from trunks of trees burnt and dug out with great skill and a warrior in each end. The excitement of the in- habitants of the village is only allayed by a runner from the banks of the river, that it is a war party of friendly Indians coming from above, going down to subdue and
-
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Indian Towns.
punish some tribe farther down towards the Chesapeake Bay. Here too the savage warfare of these now extinct people had its most horrid realization. When this pali- saded village was captured by its powerful enemies what heroic efforts were made by its warriors to repel the attack but all to no purpose, and the village was taken and its inhabitants all killed or captured. The prisoners here are subjected to the stake and scalp and all the torture pos- sible.
We will not pursue this farther but will leave it to those who revel in the horrid practices of those untutored minds. That all these things took place in and about the mouth Sugar Creek in North Towanda, cannot be questioned. It is not written in the Indian books, for they made none ; it is not recorded in their monuments, because they erected none. They had a history but recorded it not. Only as we now gather it from the early explorers, pio- neers and early settlers, can we learn what they were and when they came in contact with them.
We have only attempted in a small way to fill in some of the unrecorded events that must have occurred at this locality. Let us not forget that where now our most fertile farms are, and on them where we now sow and reap in peace and plenty, there was once in existence a " pecu- liar people " whose origin and history we know but little, about or understand.
THE CONNECTICUT CLAIM AND ITS IMPORTANCE IN OUR HISTORY.
ยท -
PAPER BY HON. GEORGE MOSCRIP.
For many years during the early days of Pennsyl- vania, the controversy which grew out of what is known as the " Connecticut Claim " and the conflicts involved in its settlement and the means which finally brought peace, are matters which may well interest citizens of Bradford county. In 1620 the Plymouth Company was incorpo- rated by letters patent under the name of the Great Coun- cil of Plymouth, and its boundaries determined. To this company were granted both the jurisdiction and pre-emp- tion of the soil.
Ten years later, 1630, the Earl of Warwick, president of the Plymouth Council, procured a grant of a certain tract of land from the said Council and the same year ob- tained the King's Charter of confirmation. This he con- veyed to Lords Say-and-Seal, Brooke, Humphrey, Wyllys, Saltsonstall and others by deed dated March 19, 1631. Included in this grant were lands in Northern Pennsyl- vania, claimed under the Connecticut title and are thus described : " Bounded on the north by the south line of the Massachusetts grant, on the south by the forty-first parallel of latitude, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean." The forty-first parallel passed through Pennsylvania touch- ing at or near Stroudsburg, Bloomsburg, Clearfield and New Castle. All of Pennsylvania north of this line was embraced in what was afterward known as the Connecti- cut Claim.
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The Connecticut Claim.
John Winthrup was appointed by Lord Say and others their agent, who entered upon and took possession of these lands, made their first settlement at the mouth of the Con- necticut river calling the place Saybrook, after Lords Say and Brooke. In 1661 a number of English Colonists in Connecticut finding they were outside the Massachusetts patent, took upon themselves the name of the "Colony of Connecticut," adopted a plan of government and purchased of George Fenwyck, Esq., then agent of Lord Say and others, all their lordship's rights derived from the Great Plymouth Council. They were granted a charter dated April, 1662, under which they were ordained and consti- tuted a body corporate and politic, by the name of " The English Colony of Connecticut, in New England, in America." This charter covered all the territory included in the grant to the Earl of Warwick which I have pre- viously mentioned and therefore included Bradford county.
This claim of the land in this vicinity was for many years recognized by the home government of Great Brit- ain and the Colonial governments of America. Later, 1754, a Congress composed of Deputies from the British Colonies north of Virginia held at Albany, declared, " the Ancient Colonies of Massachusetts Bay and Connecticut were, by their respective charters made to extend to the South Sea." It is of recor that in 1755 the Governor of Pennsylvania spent a whole session in a dispute with the General Assembly relative to the jurisdiction of Fort Du- Quesne, the Governor affirming that it was within the province of Pennsylvania, and the Assembly declaring that it was in the Colony of Connecticut. This is amus- ing from the fact that William Penn secured his patent from King Charles II, February 28, 1681, which was
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