Centennial history of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, Part 98

Author: Stocker, Rhamanthus Menville, 1848-
Publication date: 1887
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : R. T. Peck
Number of Pages: 1318

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In November, 1876, the foundation for a church was laid at Stanfordville, but the superstructure was not fully completed uutil December, 1878. The building has since been supplied with blinds and painted, so that the property has an attractive ap- pearance. There are sittings for a few hundred peo- ple, and the building is valued at one thousand two hundred dollars. It was erected mainly through the efforts of Deacons Warner and Howard, and is a worthy memorial of their zeal and energy. The trustees in 1886 were L. W. Howard, Erwin Marvin and Spencer Luce.

The ministers of the church have been Elders C. L. Vail, John Webster, R. Carpenter, L. D. Howe, Stillman Fuller, A. H. Fish, O. Phelps, B. Coggs- well, Elder Prescott, Elder John Green and a few others. Seventy-eight persons have been connected as members; but, in December, 1886, the number belonging did not exceed thirty.

The Liberty Presbyterian Church .- The first records of this church pertain to a meeting over which Chauncy Turner moderated, and A. Southworth was secretary. Caswell Ives, Garry Law and A. South- worth were appointed a standing church committee at the same meeting, held October 10, 1836. Other members present were Archi Marslı, Newton Hawley, James W. Truesdell, David Rockefeller and S. W. Truesdell. The Rev. Barlow, of the Franklin Church (where most of these persons formerly belonged), was secured to preach at the Ives School-house (Laws-

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HISTORY OF SUSQUEHANNA COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

ville Centre) one-fourth of his time, and meetings were thereafter statedly held. In 1842 the Rev. John G. Lowe became the minister. Six years later the people of Lawsville Centre and surrounding country united in a call for building a church near the old preaching-place, in which the Presbyterians should be given the preference in the house of ser- vice, but when not occupied by them, should be at the disposal of other denominations.

Those signing the call were Chauncy Turner, H. N. North, W. W. Pierson, N. P. Wheaton, Kirby Marsh, Philo C. Luce, Garry Law, Turner South- worth, Joseph Bell, George H. Hamlin, A. South- worth, H. A. Truesdell, Lorenzo Vance, B. W. Southworth, Amos Barnes, Willard Truesdell, Lam- bert Smith, S. V. Barns, Samuel Truesdell, Jesse C. Disbrow and Edwin Summers.

The meeting-house, a plain frame building, was soon thereafter built, and placed in charge of Benja- min Southworth, N. P. Wheaton and Jarod Marsh, as a society committee, and is now cared for by their successors. In 1857 a number of horse-sheds were built on the church lot, and three years previously the cemetery, near Ives, had been fenced by a com- mittee appointed at a church-meeting.

In 1865 the Rev. J. N. Diament is recorded as the pastor, and 1867 the Rev. I. W. Smith sustained the same relation. In October, 1872, the Rev. Doremus became the pastor for a short period.

After this Presbyterian meetings were here only occasionally held, most of the remaining members preferring to worship at Franklin Forks, and, in 1883, the remaining interests were transferred to that place. The church at Lawsville Centre is now occu- pied by the Methodists.

The Liberty Methodist Episcopal Church .- In the northern part of the township Methodist meetings were held soon after its settlement, but no permanent organization was effected. A local minister, Father Davy, and others preached at Brookdale, and among the members were Peter Gunsalus and family, James Travis and family, Ruth Stanford and a few others. Later meetings were held at the Bailey School-house (now removed) by the Rev. John Carver and others, in 1851, when many persons were converted and a class was formed, which had among its members Daniel Brown and wife, D. D. Stanford and wife, Charles Stanford and wife, Harry Northrup and wife, William Stanford and wife. In the course of the year many others joined, so that a meeting-house was erected for their accommodation in 1852. This build- ing was of brick, thirty-six by forty feet, and stood on turnpike in the hamlet of Stanfordville. It was used as a place of worship until its destruction by a cy- clone, July 2, 1883, and, being almost a total wreck, it was not rebuilt. A short time before the storm the building had been repaired and supplied with new furniture, which was much damaged. After this the meetings were held in the Presbyterian meeting-house

at Lawsville Centre, one mile above the old church, which has since been the regular place of worship, and is now practically the Methodist Church of the township.

At one time the Methodists numbered eighty mem- bers, but their ranks have been decimated by re- movals and by connections with other churches in the township. In December, 1886, there was but one class of thirty-four members, under the leadership of D. D. Stanford. These were associated with the members in the adjoining township in forming the Franklin Forks Circuit. Former circuit relations were with Hawleytown, N. Y. Several former mem-' bers of the church have become ministers of the Gospel, among them being D. D. Brown and John Green, the latter afterwards of the Free-Will Baptist Church. In all the above-noted churches Sabbath- : schools have been conducted, which have been valu- able instruments in elevating the moral tone of the community.

On Ranney Creek the Old School Baptists have an organization numbering about twenty-five members, who hold meetings in the Chalker School-house every fifth Sabbath, and statedly at the houses of the mem- bers, composed of the Chalker, Roe, Bailey, Luce and other families of that locality. They have the same ministry as the members of this sect in Osborne Hol- low, N. Y. Elders Bundy and Durand are among the preachers at this place.

In the southeastern part of the township the Free Methodists made an effort to erect a house of worship on a lot secured from the Chitister place. A frame was raised and the building partly inclosed, but the house was never finished on account of the removal of most of those who were interested in building it.

The cemetery at Lawsville Centre is under the care of the meeting-house society of that place, and is : usually well kept. It contains the graves of the pio- neers of that part of the township. Lower down the creek, in the Bailey neighborhood, and on the left- hand side of the turnpike, is a well-located burial- ground, which is controlled by the Liberty Cemetery Association, which was incorporated August 28, 1865, ' on the petition of O. W. Stanford, D. D. Stanford,' Charles Stanford, Z. A. Lindsey, R. Bailey, David Bailey, Newell Bailey, B. F. Bailey and Albert Bailey. Here are interred many members of the Bailey fam- ily and others of the deceased early settlers in the central and northern parts of the township.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

FRANKLIN TOWNSHIP.

FRANKLIN occupies a central position among the townships of the county, in the second tier from the

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north. It was erected by a decree of the court in December, 1835, its territory being taken from the old township of Lawsville, and a part from the northern end of Bridgewater. On the east are the townships of Great Bend and New Milford, and on the west are the townships of Silver Lake and Forest Lake. Its southeastern boundary is irregular, New Milford ex- tending into the township and taking off from its rectangular shape about a square mile. For thirty- seven years the principal part of Franklin was em- braced in the old township of Lawsville, the remain- ing part being what is now Liberty township, which title was assumed in September, 1836, after the new township of Lawsville had an existence of less than a year. The name of Lawsville had been bestowed in honor of the Hon. S. A. Law, of Cheshire, Conn., when the original township was erected, in January, 1798. Law was one of the largest land-owners in this section, and through his influence many of his fellow-citizens became residents here prior to 1805. He frequently visited this region, and took a deep interest in its improvement, but was never a resident here, as was Timothy Pickering, another of the orig- inal land-owners.1 The latter received a patent for his lands, lying along Snake Creek and west to the present township line of Silver Lake, as early as 1788, but did not occupy them within the next ten years. The lands east of him were patented to Henry Drink- er at a later period, and embraced a tract of twenty thousand seven hundred and fifty acres. This was conveyed about 1796 to Ephraim Kirby, Samuel A. Law, David Welch, Jacob Tallman, Robert Bound, Rufus Lines (five hundred acres) and others, and the whole was soon after resurveyed into one-hundred- acre lots. A few only of the above made actual im- provements on their lands ; but it was through the influence of these non-resident land-owners that the township was first erected. As early as August, 1796, the court of Luzerne County, then in session at Wilkes-Barre, was petitioned by Ephraim Kirby and others to set off a new township, six miles square, extending from the twenty-first to the twenty-seventh mile-stone on the State line. This petition was not finally confirmed until January, 1798, when the court decreed that such a township be made with the name of Lawsville. In 1805 the limits from north to south were extended by the annexation of one and a half miles of territory on the south, the same being taken from Bridgewater. In the southern part of the town- ship the population was for many years the most numerous, and hence controlled its affairs. But after the northern part was settled and developed, mainly after 1825, this rule was disputed, and when, in 1828, it was decided to hold the elections and other meet- ings in what is now Liberty, the discontent of the vanquished became so great that the question of forming a new township was agitated. But no deci-

sive action was then taken, nor for several years to come. The separation finally took place in 1835, when it was found no longer practicable to sustain the foriner relations on account of disagreements in regard to churches and schools, as well as the incon- venience attending the transaction of the public bus- iness.

There is but little table-land in the township of Franklin. The surface is made up of small valleys and hills, sloping so that most of them are tillable except those immediately bordering on the larger streams. Some of the latter are still in a primeval condition, though most of them have the larger tim- ber cut out, and on their surface large boulders may be found. The soil ranks in fertility with that of ad- joining townships.

The principal streams of Franklin are Wylie Creek, Snake Creek and its chief tributary, Silver Creek. The first-named rises in the eastern part of the township, and, after taking the waters of many small brooks in a general northeasterly course, passes into Great Bend; thence, after coursing several miles, bends over into Liberty township to again pass into Great Bend and to empty into the Susquehanna near the former home of Simeon Wylie, in honor of whom the creek was named. Its volume in Franklin is small, but upon its southern branch there were sev- eral mill privileges before the country was cleared up.

Snake Creek has its sources in Jones' Lake and Williams' Pond, both in Bridgewater and nearly two miles apart. They fall rapidly into the lower valley, and, as long as the water supply was abundant, afforded a number of good powers in the southern part of Franklin and west of its centre. The course of the stream is almost due north, the two branches uniting about two miles north of the Bridgewater line. Near the north line of Franklin it takes the waters of Silver Creek, flowing from the west as the outlet of Silver Lake, in the township of that name. Its distinguishing features are the saline or mineral springs found along its south banks, a mile above its confluence. These have been invested with legendary interest,2 and the springs possess undoubted qualities which have made them interesting objects ever since they were known by the whites. Excellent salt was here made, as is related further on. In early times this place was a favorite haunt for wild animals, and the efforts of sportsmen to capture them were usually bountifully rewarded. Hunting- parties frequently made the springs a common centre, and sometimes a chase of unusual importance took place near the springs. "In December, 1818, a great hunt was started of five hundred men, including a circle of forty-scven miles. The hunters were divided into squads of tens and twenties, and, properly officered, moved towards the centre. Droves of deer were thus

1 See Liberty township.

2 See Indian History.

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HISTORY OF SUSQUEHANNA COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

hedged in, but no wolves and but one bear and one fox were captured."1 The scenery at the spring is ro- mantic, on account of the cascades on Cold Brook, whose waters fall into Silver Creek a short distance from them. The little stream plunges through a nar- row defile, nearly a hundred feet deep, and, leaping over rugged rocks, delightsthe visitor with its beauty. For a number of years it was a favorite resort for pleasure-parties, and large excursions frequently visited this locality to drink the waters of the springs and to enjoy the scenery.2 The efforts to utilize this spot for manufacturing purposes has marred its beauty to such an extent that but few of its former attrac- tions remain.

The greater portion of Franklin has been cleared up, and, in the better parts, fine farms have been made, the buildings giving unmistakable evidence of the prosperity and contentment of their owners. How great has been the change from the primeval con- dition can readily be seen by the contrast afforded by reading the sketch of the country before its im- provement, as given so well by Mrs. N. Park :

"Three-quarters of a century ago the forest that covered the land of botlı townships was unbroken, except where the beavers had destroyed the timber to build a dam across a branch of Wylie Creek. One or two small lakes, fringed with pond-lilies, reflected from their still depths the varied aspects of the sky. These and the busy brooklets were breathing-places within the great mass of vegetable life. The princi- pal timber consisted of hemlock, beech, sugar and soft maple, birch, ash, chestnut, pine, poplar, basswood, ironwood, elm and cherry ; these were found proportionally much as in the order here given. Interspersed through the forest, in many places, was an underwood of smaller growth, such as the blue beech, whistlewood or black maple, shad or June-berry, several varieties of alder and elder, witch-hazel, sassafras, spice or fever bush, sumach, thorns, willows by water- courses, and occasionally on high lands, box and leather wood. Among the many plants and roots now abounding in the forests of Franklin, and reputed to possess healing virtues, are spikenard, sarsaparilla, several kinds of cohosh, wild turnip, ginseng, Solomon's seal, valerian, prince's pine, gold thread, snake root, brook-liverwort, low centaury, golden rod, and balmony.

"Only one or two eagles are known to have been seen here. The Vir- ginia horned and the little screech owl ; hen, night and sparrow-hawks ; ravens, black birds, crows, cat birds, king birds, bobolinks, pigeons, partridges, quails, meadow larks, blue birds, song sparrows, robins, yellow birds, chipping birds, thrushes, Phoebe birds, snow birds, hum- ming birds, wrens, swallows, cuckoos, blue jays, the whip-poor.will, and several varieties of woodpeckers are well known in the vicinity. A red bird about the size of a robin, with black wings, is sometimes seen, and also another variety of the red bird, which is smaller.

"Wolves, bears, panthers and wild cats were formidable foes to the early settlers. Foxes, skunks, minks, weasels and muskrats, found or made them 'holes' in Franklin, and all are not yet ousted. The ani- mals subsisaing on the bark of trees, on browse, seeds, plants, roots, nuts and fruit, were deer, woodchucks, raccoons, rabbits, squirrels, rats, mice and moles. It is not known that any beavers were seen by the first settlers ; certainly not by their descendants. There was no lack of striped snakes and water snakes. Rattlesnakes infested only the eastern part of the township ; many have been destroyed, but the race is not extinct. The milk snake has occasionally been found in the dairy coiled in a pan of milk. Frogs in great numbers inhabit all the swamps and ponds. Toads abound. A species of turtle or land tortoise is sometimes found in Franklin, but so rarely as to be of but little inter" est. The bat is also seen, and innumerable species of insects."

It has already been stated that the first settlers were natives of Connecticut, and coming at the early period they did, much of the two hundred and fifty miles they had to traverse was a wilderness. They usually crossed the Hudson at the Catskill Moun- tains, thence passed to the head-waters of the Dela- ware and from there to the valley of the Susque- hanna and down to Great Bend. From the latter place marked trees were followed to the localities which had been opened for settlement. The roads being very rough, many of the settlers preferred to come in winter, when the ground was covered with snow, as it was easier to carry their goods on sleds, which were generally drawn by oxen. It is easy.to conceive of the suffering and privations which attended such an immigration, and some of the settlers actu- ally lived in the shelter afforded by an upturned wagon- box until a cabin could be erected. Before enough grain could be raised to supply the wants of the set- tlers, actual suffering for bread often took place. "It is said that such was the scarcity of provisions in the spring of 1799 that the new settlers had to dig up and eat the potatoes they had planted. The few inhabitants of the surrounding towns could do but little more than supply their own wants. Great efforts were made to procure even very limited sup- plies. At one time Mrs. Merriman went twenty miles to get as many potatoes as she could bring on the back of the horse she rode, crossing the Susque- hanna River by fording it."

The first clearing in Franklin was made in the spring of 1797, by James Clark, on a tract of land which is now included in the Fred. A. Smith farm. He was induced to settle here by S. A. Law, the land- owner, as were also three other natives of Connecti- cut, bearing the names of Bronson, Clemons and Buell, all of whom were here at work in the fall of that year, clearing up roads. Buell made his clear- ing on Wylie Creek, near the township line; but, like Clark, soon moved from Franklin, leaving to Rufus Lines the credit of being the first real permanent set- tler. Having purchased a tract of five hundred acres of land in the projected new township, Lines left Cheshire, Conn., in September, 1797, for his new home in the wilderness, being accompanied by Titus Smith, at that time in the eighteenth year of his age. Rufus Lines selected his farm south of the cross-roads at Upsonville, and young Smith fixed upon a lot west from him, where he began his chopping. All the above settlers spent the succeeding winter in Con- necticut.

The following spring Rufus Lines returned to his new home, in Franklin, where he remained until his death, except for short periods, when he went to his native State. The large frame house he built, in later years, still stands as one of the few remaining land- marks of that early period. His family consisted of five sons and four daughters, as follows : Schubel, a sea captain ; William, who moved to New York ;

1 Montrose Republican.

2 The medicinal qualities of these springs are very highly regarded by those who have tested them. They are said to be an infallible specific for humors of the blood and kindred diseases.

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FRANKLIN.

Rufus, who moved to Illinois ; Joseph died in Brook- lyn ; and Frederick moved to Great Bend. His daughter Laura became the wife of Billosty Smith. The elder Lines was a blacksmith as well as a farmer, and had the first mechanic-shop in Franklin. He was appointed justice of the peace by the Governor in 1814, and held the office many years.

About the same time as Lines returned from Con- necticut came David Barnum and his wife and his brother, an unmarried man, also from that State. David Barnum bought the lot on which young Smith had done some chopping the preceding fall, and put up a house, in which the public was entertained after 1798. He removed, prior to 1805, going to Baltimore, Md., where he established the celebrated Barnum's Hotel. Of his wife the Hon. Charles Miner said, June 2, 1858:

" Barnum, of Lawsville, had married a sister of Colonel Kirby (about that time one of the candidates for Governor of Connecticut), a very su- perior woman independent of her relationship. The Yankee girls of the best families readily accepted the invitations of clever, enterprising young men, though poor, to try their fortunes in subduing the wilder- ness."

After his removal Richard Barnum took his place. Stephen Barnum cleared up a farm about one and a half miles west from his brother David, where he re- mained many years. The farm later became known as the Asa Townsend place. He moved to New Mil- ford, where he died in January, 1859, aged eighty-two and a half years. His sons were Pharon, of St. Louis; Elijah and Hiram, of Great Bend; Allen, of Bos- ton ; and Horace, of New Milford.

In February, 1798, Titus Smith and his brother Ephraim, two of the seven brothers who settled in the township and became such important factors in its history, arrived with an ox-sled laden with provisions and a few farming tools. Titus Smith having sold out his place, began a new farm about one and a half miles distant, where a few years later he became a permanent settler and reared a large family. Before his death he was disabled by a paralytic shock. One of his sons, Lambert, resided at Lawsville Centre, and Titus became a merchant in Binghamton, N. Y.

Ephraim Smith was older than Titus, having a family, which, however, he did not bring into Frank- lin until 1799, having returned to Connecticut in the winter of 1798, so that Mrs. Clark and Mrs. Barnum were the only women in the township until the spring of 1799. He settled on the lot south of Rufus Lines, where later lived R. Seaman, and resided there until his death. He was the father of three daughters and four sons, the latter being William, Ephraim, Jr., Henry B. and James. He died November 4, 1856, aged eighty years.

In a ycar or so later Roswell Smith and another unmarried brother, Raymond, joincd their brothers. The latter began a clearing in the eastern part of the township, but afterwards sold out to his brother Ros- well, and began improving a farm farther north. These two brothers married sisters (step-daughters of

John Hawley), and all four lived to be more than eighty years old. The wife of Raymond Smith, widely known as Aunt Roxy, died in 1868, but he survived until 1870, when he departed this life in his eighty-ninth year-the last of the old pioneers. Of him it was said, " He was endowed with a fine con- stitution, a well-balanced mind, a cheerful disposition, which he maintained by temperate habits and pure morals." He reared one son-Andrew L .- and three daughters, one of whom married Garry Law, of Lib- erty.

RUFUS W. SMITH .- The Smith family were early identified with the settlement of Franklin (then Laws- ville) township, seven brothers having come in the latter part of the eighteenth century and in the early part of the nineteenth century from Cheshire, Conn. One of these brothers was Captain Roswell Smith, whose wife, Lucy Ann Norton, died in Connecticut in 1803, who settled in Lawsville in 1804, where he spent the remainder of his life and died in 1855, about eighty years of age. Colonel Rufus Smith (1800-77), a son of Captain Roswell -Smith, married Sabrina (Wakelee) (1799-1861), who bore him the following children : Hannah Frances, died at the age of seven ; Lucius N., who held the rank of major in the old State Militia, enlisted in the late Rebellion and was never heard from since; Henry M., who held the rank of drum major in old State Militia, a farmer near Binghamton; Lucy Ann, first the wife of Isaac N. Applin, after his death married Charles G. Park, a machinist of Susquehanna, where she died in 1884; Frances Mary was the wife of Charles Brundage, a blacksmith of Campville, N. Y., supposed to be dead; Julia Eveline is the wife of George Kirk, a machinist of Susquehanna; Emeroy Janet died in early woman- hood; Rufus W., born January 21, 1833; Margaret Jane died in early womanhood; Winfield S., formerly Rev. Dr. Winfield S. Smyth, a publisher in Chicago, Albert R .; Rhamnanthus A., died young ; and Eliza died aged twenty. Colonel Smith settled where his son Rufus W. now resides. He was lieutenant-colonel of a regiment of militia of this county ; was a man interested in every worthy enterprisc; was identified with church and school interests; believed in a high moral sentiment and entertained progressive ideas. Those who knew him remember his hospitality, his courtesy and large-heartedness. He was ever ready to assist those less fortunate than himself, and liberal commensurate with his means. He was the pioneer in buying, selling and breeding pure Devon stock in Susquehanna County. His resolution and determined perseverance to accomplish whatever he undertook was practically illustrated when, at the age of nine- teen, he twice made a journey on foot and back to Connecticut from his home here while courting his wife, a native of that State. For his second wife he married, in 1865, Mrs. Diantha Keeler, of Montrose, who died in May, 1876, followed by the death of her husband the year after.

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Centennial history of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, Part 98

Author: Stocker, Rhamanthus Menville, 1848- Publication date: 1887 Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : R. T. Peck Number of Pages: 1318

Author: Stocker, Rhamanthus Menville, 1848-
Publication date: 1887
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : R. T. Peck
Number of Pages: 1318