History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, Part 61

Author: Smith, Robert Walter
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago : Waterman, Watkins
Number of Pages: 790

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In his eighty-fourth year this good old man went to his reward, " full of days, riches and honor." He died on the farm to which he removed soon after his marriage, and which is in possession of his son Robert, His wife survived him until she attained the ripe old age of eighty-four, beloved and honored by all her aequaintanees. " None knew her but to love her, None named her but to praise."

They reared a family of nine children-Daniel, John M., William H., Robert, Sarah, Elizabeth, Naney, Anna J. and Abbie M.

In his political and religious affiliations, Mr. Wray was a republi- ean and a Presbyterian ; all religious enterprises found in him a friend and supporter. His interest in politics was great, and he took a lead- ing part and was one of those citizens desirous of the best welfare of the state and society.

JOHN M. WRAY.

John M. Wray, the second son of Robert and Abagail Manners, was born in 1818, and was reared on the old homestead in Kiskimine- tas township, Armstrong county, His early life was replete with toil and hardship, and it was only by the possession of strong hands and a robust constitution that he was able to endure the arduous labor imposed upon him in making the great transition from the wilder- ness to produetive fields. The present generation can seareely com- prehend the magnitude of the work performed by this pioneer and his cotemporaries, and to them we are indebted for the substructure of our present wealth and prosperity. The father, with his sons, John M., Daniel, William and Robert, cleared a trio of the finest farms in Western Pennsylvania, one of which is still occupied by John M., the others by Dauiel and Robert (his elder and youngest brothers). In histwenty-first year he married Miss Anna Margaret, daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Townsend, whose portraits and biography ap- pear elsewhere in this volume. The result of this nnion were eight children, Harriet M. (Scott), Clara E. (Marshall), Abagail G. (Alexan- der), Hiram H., Anna M. (deceased), Robert T., Mary A. and Emma E. (deceased). Robert T. is a prominent and snecessful business man, and is at present connected with extensive coke works in the Fayette region. The only child remaining under the parental roof is Mary A., the youngest ehild. Mr. Wray has devoted his life to agricultural pursuits, and in his ehosen avoeation has been eminently successful; he has given special attention to the rearing of fine stock. especially English draft horses. Notwithstanding he has passed threescore years he is still active, and gives promise of many years of indus- try and usefulness. During his eventful eareer he has been three times engaged in mercantile pursuits, but his preferenee has always been for the farm, which is endeared to him by many precious associations.

But few men can retrospect a more successful eareer ; starting in life with only his natural resources for his capital, he has eonqnered success in everything, and now in his old age surrounded by his children, whose love and respeet he holds in the highest degree, and whose positions both in business and society refleet credit upon him, he is still actively engaged in business, and bids fair to attain the position reached by his father.

285

MADISON TOWNSHIP.

investigated, they are devoid of importance. The Lower Kittanning Coal has been quite exten- sively developed, it being the bed worked on the property of the Mahoning Coal Company. The ferriferous limestone underlies all the center of the township, and far above water level. The buhr- stone ore accompanies it, and hence the supply of Stewardson Furnace is chiefly derived. The Potts- ville conglomerate is above water level through- out the whole length of valleys of the Allegheny, Mahoning and Red Bank in this township, and is nearly three hundred feet above water level at the mouth of Mahoning.

STRUCTURE.

An anticlinal divides the township nearly in halves in a northeast and northwest direction. It crosses the river just above the mouth of Mahoning, and the Red Bank above Lawsonham. It has sharp dips on its southeastern flank. The eastern and western portions of the township are in the synclinal.

Prof. Lesley, in his Geological Report on the present Red Bank Furnace property, says, respect- ing the chief supply of ore for this furnace: The ore-bed is a layer of brown hematite mixed with blue carbonate, out of which the hematite seems to have been made by decomposition. The less blue carbonate, the more brown hematite, and the softer and better the ore, is the accepted rule. The ore- bed is very irregular, sometimes running down to six inches, and sometimes up to five feet. It will probably average two feet along its whole outcrop. It is mined along the hillsides at about the same level on the south side of Red Bank and down the river. *

* * It covers the ferriferons or great fossiliferous limestone, a bed of fifteen feet thick, filling depressions of all sizes in its upper surface,

and penetrating its top layer, so as to render it a superior flux, yielding a large percentage of its own. Above the ore-bed is a mass of shales many feet thick, more or less silicious, and more or less charged with balls of blue carbonate of iron. This ore-bed is remarkable for its extent of area, cover- ing Armstrong, Venango, Clarion, Jefferson, and Butler counties, and it has been, in fact, the prin- cipal reliance of the fifty furnaces in Northwestern Pennsylvania, and the forty-odd furnaces of South- ern Ohio and Eastern Kentucky. Its outcrop is usually very soft, easily mined by stripping, and afterward by gangways, driven partly in the lime- stone and partly in the ore. * *

There must be over two miles of ore outcrop on the 538-acre lot south of Red Bank-Nicholson tract No. 1151-and allowing only two feet of an average thickness, and forty feet of stripping floor before commencing the drift, we have one hundred thousand tons of soft brown hematite in sight. The quantities lying back of the outcrop are too large to need estimation. * * The Kittan- * ning, or "middle " coalbed south of Red Bank, is only about twenty inches thick, and, if it underlies two hundred acres, contains about five hundred thousand tons.

Levels referred to tide, or hights above the ocean in feet and tenths of a foot: north abutment of Mahoning bridge, lower outside corner, 826.2; upper inside corner, 829.6; opposite Rimerton Sta- tion, 836.7; north abutment, lower inside corner, 831.5; south bridge seat, lower inside corner, 836.6; south abutment, lower outside corner, 850.4; south abutment Red Bank bridge, inside corner, 840.4; north abutment, Red Bank bridge, lower end, 849.6; Red Bank junction, 850.8; Fiddler's run, 915; Lawsonham, 919; Buck Lick run, 939; Rock run, 966; Leatherwood, 1027.

CHAPTER XIII.

COWANSHANNOCK.

Its Organization in 1848-First Officers-Indian Purchase Line of 1768-The Original Land Warrants - Timo- thy Pickering & Co.'s Tracts-An Ancient Earthwork -Relics -Land Disputes Settled by Arbitration - Village of Atwood- U. P. Church -Green Oak -Town of Bradford-St. John's Lutheran Church - Dunkard Church - An Early Day Indian Encounter - Example of the Low Price of Land -Eight Hun- dred Acres for $44-The Roberts Lands -First Store Opened in 1831 by the McElhinneys- The Findley Lands -Huskens' Run and the Man it was Named After - Rural Valley -The Bryan Lands - Fourth of July, 1837-Salem Reformed Church - Isaac Simpson - Roads -Schools -Miscellaneous Statistics - Rural Village - Mercantile and Other Occupations - Educational Matters - Religious - Postoffice-I.O.O.F. Lodge.

O N the 22d June, 1841, the petition of divers inhabitants of Kittanning, Plum Creek and Wayne townships was presented to the proper court of this county, asking for the erection of a new township out of parts of those above named. On the 25th of the same month it was dismissed because of informality ; no particular part of either of these parts was designated in the petition. The application was renewed December 21, 1847, and John McEwen, Findley Patterson and George B. McFarland were appointed commissioners, who presented their report, designating the boundaries of the proposed new township, February 8, 1848. A remonstrance against its confirmation was pre- sented and filed March 20. The report was con- firmed December 22, 1848, and the township of Cowanshannock was by decree of the court erected, with these boundaries : "Beginning at the pur- chase line on land of Samuel Elgin, thence north 62 perches to the Cowanshannock creek; thence north 6 degrees east along the Pine township line 898 perches to a stone on Hannegan's land ; thence east 8 miles to a post on John McEwen's farm, at the Indiana county line; thence south along said county line 4 miles and 100 perches to a chestnut at the purchase line; thence south 37 degrees west along county line 3 miles to a post on Hoover's land ; thence north 75 degrees west 73 miles to a post on Bradford's lands, at the Kit- tanning township line ; thence along said township line north 24 degrees east 2 miles and 14 perches to the purchase line, the place of beginning."

At the first spring clection, 1849, the following township officers were elected :

Justice of the peace, Samuel Cassady ; constable, John Adams ; assessor, Samuel Black; assistant assessors, Jacob Beer and James Stewart ; super- visors, John Whittaker and John Stoops ; school directors, Samuel Elgin, John McEwen, Samuel

Fleming, Samuel R. Ramage, William McIntosh and Joseph Elgin ; overseers of the poor, Alexan- der P. Ormond, William Rearich ; judge of elec- tion, George Stewart; inspectors of election, James Reid, Robert Neal ; township auditors, Jo- seph Kirkpatrick, William Sloan, Samuel Potts ; township clerk, David Hill. ..

The township was named Cowanshannock after the creek flowing through the very picturesque val- ley which it drains the entire length -beyond the entire length -between its eastern and western boundaries. Cowanshannock is an Indian name, and, like other such names, is significant. The general opinion of the people of this region is, that it means " banks of flowers." On the 26th of January, 1833, " C.", enchanted with the beauty of this valley, as he or she had seen it in the different phases, indited a poem, the theme of which was, " Cowanshannock, or Bed of Roses," from which this stanza is cited :

From sloping hills and valleys deep, The Bed of Roses takes its rise, Winding its way through glade and steep, From eastern tow'rd the western skies.

That pretty conception of the meaning of Cowanshannock is, however, spoiled by the reality, for Heckewelder says : "Cowanshannock, a branch of the Allegheny in Armstrong county, corrupted from Gawansch-hànne - signifying green-brier* stream, or brier creek. Gawunschige - briery. So it must be inferred that the Indians found this now lovely valley more thorny than rosy.

The purchase line of 1768, or the old purchase line, as it is often called, traverses the township from the chestnut-tree mentioned in the bounda- ries at the angle south of the north branch of

* Green brier -a thorny climbing shrub having a yellowish green stem and thick leaves, with small bunches of flowers. It is common in the United States, and is also ealled cat-brier.

D. K. Duff

Jannie H. Duff.

REV. DAVID KENNEDY DUFF.

David Kennedy Duff was born in Beaver county, Pennsylvania, May 8, 1825. He left home when seven- teen years of age to attend school at the academy in Darlington, Pennsylvania, and remained there two years ; thence he went to the college in Athens, Ohio, where he finished his literary collegiate course in 1849. After teaching school for about a year at Mount Jackson, Pennsylvania, he entered, in 1850, the theological semi- nary at Canonsburg, where, during the next three years, he completed a careful theological course. He was im- mediately licensed (in November, 1853) to preach as a home missionary, and traveled in that capacity for two years, performing useful services in Ohio, Indiana, Illi- nois, Iowa, Eastern New York, and also in the cities of Philadelphia and Baltimore.

In May, 1856, he entered upon the duties of his first settled charge, being installed as pastor over the United Presbyterian church at Dayton, Wayne township, and Mount Zion church at Pine Creek. He remained in active duty as pastor of these congregations until September 14, 1862, at which time, having previously enlisted, he was mustered into service as captain of Co. K, 14th regt. Pa. Cav., in which capacity he served until his discharge in 1865. He was in the following engagements: Droop Mountain, August 27, 1863; in Newmarket (on the Averill Salem raid) ; Jefferson, May 8, 1864; Wytheville, May 10, 1864; Union, May 13, 1864; Piedmont, June 5, 1864; Buchanan, June 13, 1864; Lynchburg, June 17 and 18, 1864; Liberty, June 19, 1864; Salem. June 20, 1864; Bunker Hill, June 26, 1864; and then with Sheridan, at Darkes-

ville, July 2, 1864 ; Opequau, September 19, 1864; Stone Bridge, September 18, 1864; Fisher Hill, September 21 and 22, 1864; Forrestville, September 24, 1864 ; Mount Crawford, September 25, 1864 ; Wyer's Cave, Sep- tember 26 and 27, 1864; Middletown, October 19, 1864 ; Milford, October 25, 1864; Mount Jackson, November 22, 1864 ; Ashby Gap, February 19, 1865. Captain Duff, in the cavalry engagement at Ashby Gap, Virginia, was wounded three times-in the head, right shoulder and left hand. He was honorably discharged because of these wounds May 15, 1865. In June he resumed charge of his congregations at Dayton and Pine Creek, and upon June 21, 1866, took pastoral charge of the Concord (now Atwood) church. His time was equally divided among the three until 1870, when he was released from the charge of the Mount Zion church at Pine Creek. He is now pastor of the congregations at Dayton and Atwood. Mr. Duff was principal of the Dayton Academy from the spring of 1857 to the fall of 1862, and from the winter of 1866 to the spring of 1867. He was united in marriage October 27, 1868, with Miss Nannie Henry, who was born in East Franklin township, Armstrong county, September 30, 1840. Her parents, James and Sarah (Richmond) Henry, were natives of Ireland. To Mr. and Mrs. Duff six children have been born, as follows: James Gordon, August 21, 1869; Samuel Calvin, April 20, 1872; Willie Richmond, December 5, 1874 (died April 14, 1876 ) ; Johnie, March 11, 1877 (died March 23, 1877) ; Robert Marshall, January 21, 1879; and Alice Gertrude, May 17, 1881. Mr. Duff lived at Dayton until 1878, when he removed to Atwood, where he owns 92 acres of well improved land.

RESIDENCE OF REV. D. K. DUFF, ATWOOD , PA.

287

COWANSHANNOCK TOWNSHIP.

Plum creek in the line between this and Indiana county, north 79 degrees west, passing through the brick house of Jno. Boyer about twenty-five rods east of Huskins' run, and crossing the western boundary of the township a little above the angle therein. All that portion south of that line was taken from Plum Creek township, and was in- cluded in the old purchase of 1768, and it consti- tutes about one-third of the territory of Cowan- shannock township. The original tracts in this portion were in the names of warrantees as fol- lows : A part of the Alexander Dallas tract ; the John D. Mercer tract, 402 acres, seated by David McCausland ; James Dundas, 402 acres ; Parsons Leaming, 4064 acres, seated by John Byerly ; parts of the Jacob Amos and Mary Semple tracts ; Joseph Fisher, 402 acres ; Joseph Nourse, 402 acres, seated by David McCausland; Patrick Farrell, 4062 acres ; Samuel Fisher, 4432 acres, seated by William McCausland ; Joseph Norris, 356 acres, seated by James Guthrie ; Thomas Bradford, 452 acres; Elizabeth Henderson, two tracts, 415} and +134 acres ; nearly all of Andrew Henderson's, 4132 acres, seated by George Mclaughlin ; the greater part of Robert Semple, Jr., tract, 421 acres ; Will- iam Finney, 427.2 acres, seated by John Black ; William Wistar, 306 acres; John Dealing, 318} acres; parts of the Isaac and Samuel Morris tracts; John Lart, 3304 acres, seated by Daniel Wampler; George Snyder, 307} acres ; John Gill, 321} acres, seated by Jacob Beer, Jr .; Benjamin Davis, 3253 acres, one-half above the purchase line, seated by George and Michael Somers ; Jonathan D. Sergeant, 402 acres - small portions of it are in Kittanning and Plum Creek townships; parts of the Larken Dor- sey and James Dubbs tracts ; Richard Wells, 330% acres, seated by Jacob Beer. Wells purchased, Jan- uary 7, 1774, the George Snyder tract and various other tracts elsewhere mentioned, at five shillings per tract .* He was an adherent of the English in the revolutionary struggle. Colonel John Bay- ard, in his letter to the Council of Safety, from the camp at Bristol, Pennsylvania, December 13, 1776, wrote this of him : " We are informed today by a gentleman from Burlington that Richard Wells was there yesterday, doubtless with advice to the enemy, and returned that night. He informed the people that General Putnam intended burning the city." At a meeting of the Council of Safety, Jan- uary 14, 1777, Wells was nominated as a member of that body. In his reply to the communication informing him thereof, the next day, he said : "Sincerity and candor forbid my concealing the true reason of my wishing to decline the appoint-

ment ; I hope not to offend by my honesty, yet I cannot, I think, with an upright conscience, with- hold the confession. The post, gentlemen, which you fill is built on a foundation so opposite to my sentiments, and the money I should have to dis- tribute on your account so expressly put into your hands for the purposes of war, that I should stand condemned by my own heart if I accepted the charge. Far be it from me to undertake here to arraign your conduct in the prosecution of your office ; I cheerfully grant to all men that freedom of action which I claim in return, and assure you with great sincerity that whilst, on the one hand, I cannot give a hearty approbation to the present system ; on the other, I will never oppose or disturb it ; my constant study being to pass through life at peace with my own breast and all the world. I know that I have been more ex- plicit than common policy might have dictated, but thought I should have been wanting in justice to you and myself not to have ingenuously told you the truth. I am much obliged by your enter- taining so good an opinion of my integrity as to nominate me to so important a trust, and hope you will not think too unfavorably of me for the part I act."

In the other portion, north of the purchase line, were these tracts: Henry Shade, 400 acres, warrant 584-bounded by the purchase line on the south, which, according to the description of this tract in the mortgage from Shade to John Foyle, Jr., July 2, 1805, must have been the northern boundary of Westmoreland county, for this tract is there repre- sented as having previously been in Northumber- land county, and if so, that northern boundary line of Westmoreland county must have struck the Allegheny river near Truby's run, in Kittanning, instead of near the mouth of the Cowanshannock, as seems to have been the case by its location on some of the old maps; H. Le Roy & Co., 958 acres, warrant No. 3118, along the north side of the pur- chase line; H. Le Roy & Co., two tracts, 9483 and 990 acres, warrants Nos. 3126 and 3128, partly in Indiana county ; H. Le Roy & Co., 10963 acres, warrant 3125; James Kirkpatrick, 100} acres, mostly in Indiana county ; Samuel Bryan, 544 acres and 106 perches, warrant 679; T. W. Hiltz- . imer, 1,100 acres, warrant 5146, partly in Wayne; H. Le Roy & Co., 8473 acres, warrant 3095, seated by John Simpson and John Kirkpatrick; John Denniston, 1804 acres, warrant 3829, tract called " Dublin;" John Denniston, 170} acres, warrant 3830, tract called "Abbington ;" John Sloan, 226} acres, warrant 5639, tract called "Stanton;" Joseph Cook, treasurer of Westmoreland county, Pennsyl-

* Vide sketch of Plum Creek township.

288

HISTORY OF ARMSTRONG COUNTY.

vania, in 1789-90, 393 acres, warrant 5637, called "The Grove;" part of the Wallace tract, warrant 4162; part of the Dr. Wm. Smith tract, mentioned in the sketch of Wayne township-he was a mem- ber from Philadelphia of the committee for the Province of Pennsylvania, July, 1774, and one of the deputies chosen by the several counties ; George Bryan-he was vice-president of the supreme executive council of this state in 1777, and was commissioned a puisne judge of the supreme court, April 3, 1780-548} acres, warrant 669; Samuel Denniston, 2553 acres, warrant 3621, tract called "Alexandria;" John Denniston, 239 acres, warrant 3922, tract called "Derry ;" Joseph Cook, 4474 acres, warrant 3636, tract called " Wheatfield ; " Aaron Wor, 447 acres, warrant 5483; John Craig, 245 acres, warrant 3652; John Denniston,* 309 acres, warrant 3618, seated by Robert McIlwain ; William Denniston, 220 acres, warrant 3620; Archibald McGahey, 100 acres; Meason & Cross 543} acres, warrant 675 ; George Bryan, 1,097} acres, warrant 672-500 acres seated by John Schrecongost, and 500 by Jacob Torney; William Findley, 281 acres, warrant 5638, dated June 27, 1894, tract called " Fidelity," patent to George Rob- erts, March 2, 1895, Roberts' heirs to Samuel Patter- son (55 acres), April 16, 1836; Robert McClenechan, 3284 acres, warrant 515; William Findley, 100 acres, warrant 3658, seated by Daniel River; Rey- nolds & Clark, 4282 acres, warrant 6041; H. Le Roy & Co. (Holland Company), two tracts, 1,0282 and 1,000 acres, warrants 3022 and 3030; Timothy Pickering & Co., 6273 acres, warrant 11, seated by James Craig, James Simpson and Isaac Simpson; Timothy Pickering & Co., 1,057} acres, warrant 176; Timothy Pickering & Co., 1,1324 acres, war- rant No. 25.

The last-named company consisted of Timothy Pickering, Tench Coxe, Samuel Hodgdon, Dun- can Ingraham, Jr., Andrew Craiger, and Morris Fisher. It is set forth in their article of agree- ment, dated April 6, 1785, that they expected a land office to be opened on the 1st of the next month for the sale of lands purchased from the Indians in 1784, which is frequently called "the late purchase," and that they were desirous of purchasing a considerable quantity of these lands. Pickering, Coxe, Hodgdon and Ingraham were appointed a committee to procure warrants and manage the other business of the company. It was stipulated that the members of the company should be joint tenants, that the lands purchased by their committee

should be conveyed to them as such in fee, and that a contract should be made with Gen. James Potter to locate their warrants, to show the lands covered by them to the surveyors of the districts or coun- ties in which they lay, and to cause returns thereof to be made to the Surveyor-General's office. Pot- ter was to receive seventeen thousand acres as his compensation for surveying and locating sixty-three thousand acres for the company, for the division of which from the company's land, by his execu- tors or two of them, he provided in his will, dated October 27, 1789. The company and Andrew Gregg and James Poe, two of Potter's executors, entered into an agreement for the partition, March 3, 1795. By that partition the Pickering tracts, warrants Nos. 11 and 176, were allotted to Potter's executors for the use of his heirs.

The ostensible evidences of earliest occupation in that part of this township south of the purchase line are on the farm now owned by Thomas Mc- Causland, which is a part of the Joseph Nourse tract.

There are vestiges of a circumvallation on that Nourse tract, which encompassed about one acre and a half, and was circular. According to reli- able information, which has been transmitted from the persons who settled thereabouts in and prior to 1812, the parapet must have been four or five feet high, with a fosse or trench surrounding it, the depth and width of which could not be accurately ascertained, as it was partly filled when it was dis- covered. There is the stump of a cherry-tree within the parapet, eighteen inches, and another one of the same kind in the trench, twenty inches in diameter. The tree had grown from an old stump which is very much decayed. Both of these trees were cut down in 1872 or 1873.

There is a mulberry-tree from twelve to fifteen inches in diameter two rods south of the parapet, which has also grown from an old stump, and there are two white-oak trees about two feet in diameter about the same distance east of the parapet. There appears to have been a well at the center within the parapet.

Clay smoking-pipes, with the initials "W. W." upon them, and hatchets, of a superior quality of steel, supposed to be of English manufacture, were found here by the early settlers. Traces of that circumvallation are still visible. Its location is on a beautiful elevation, which commands an exten- sive view up and down the valley of the north branch of Plum Creek, anciently called Finney's Run, thirty rods north of this branch and twenty rods west of McDole's, or Madole's run; between that location and Branch is the Plum Creek road;

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History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, Part 61

Author: Smith, Robert Walter Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Chicago : Waterman, Watkins Number of Pages: 790

Author: Smith, Robert Walter
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago : Waterman, Watkins
Number of Pages: 790