History of Fayette County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 36

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 1314

USA > Pennsylvania > Fayette County > History of Fayette County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 36

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Each of the four county committees deputed three of its members to meet at Pittsburgh on the first Tues- : day of September following, for the purpose of ex- pressing the sense of the people of the four counties in an address to Congress " upon the subject of the excise law, and other grievances." The meeting of delegates was held at Pittsburgh, as appointed, on the 7th of September, 1791, on which occasion (according to the minutes of the meeting) "the following gentlemen appeared from the counties of Westmoreland, Wash- ington, Fayette, and Allegheny, to take into consid- eration an act of Congress laying duties upon spirits

1 Address of Rev. Dr. Carnahan.

3 " In order to allay opposition as far as possible," says Judge Wilke- son, "Gen. John Neville, a man of the most deserved popularity, was appointed to the inspectorship for Western Pennsylvania. He accepted the appointment from a sense of duty to his country. He was one of the few men of great wealth who had put his all at hazard for independence. At his own expense he raised and equipped a coorpuny of soldiers, marched them to Boston, and placed them, with his son, under the command of Gen. Washington. Ile was brother-in-law to the distinguished Gen, Morgao, and father-in-law to Majs. Craig and Kirkpatrick, officers highly respected iu the western country. Besides Gen. Neville's claims as a soldier and a patriot, be had contributed greatly to relieve the suf- ferings of the settlers in his vicinity. He divided his last loaf with the needy; and in a season of more than ordinary scarcity, as soon as his wheat was sufficiently matured to be converted into food, he opened his

fields to those who were suffering with bunger. If any man could have executed this odious law Gen. Neville was that man. He entered ujwon the duties of his office and appointed his deputies from among the most popular citizens. The first attempts, however, to enforce the law were resisted.""

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distilled within the United States, passed the 3d of March, 1791.

"For Westmoreland County : Nehemiah Stokely and John Young, Esqs.

"For Washington County : Col. James Marshal, Rev. David Phillips, and David Bradford, Esq.

"For Fayette County : Edward Cook, Nathaniel Bradley [Breading], and John Oliphant, Esqs.

" For Allegheny County: Col. Thomas Morton, John Woods, Esq., and William Plumer, Esq.

"Edward Cook, Esq., was voted in the chair, and John Young appointed seeretary."

The meeting then proceeded to pass a series of resolutions, censuring the legislation of the late Con- gress, especially the obnoxious excise law, which they 1 characterized as "a base offspring of the funding system, ... being attended with infringements on liberty, partial in its operations, attended with great expense in the collection, and liable to much abuse," and declaring that " it is insulting to the feelings of the people to have their vessels marked, houses painted and ransacked, to be subject to informers, gaining by the occasional delinquency of others. It is a bad pre- cedent, tending to introduce the excise laws of Great Britain, and of countries where the liberty, property, and even the morals of the people are sported with, to gratify particular men in their ambitions and inter- ested measures." The meeting also adopted a remon- strance to " be presented to the Legislature of Penn- sylvania," and further " Resolved, That the foregoing representations [the series of resolutions adopted] be presented to the Legislature of the United States." An address was also adopted, which, together with the proceedings of the day, was ordered to be printed in the Pittsburgh Gazette, and the meeting then ad- journed.

In reference to this meeting at Pittsburgh, and others of similar character, Mr. Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury, said that, being " composed of very influential individuals, and conducted without mod- eration or prudence," they were justly chargeable with the excesses which were afterwards committed, , tinues: " Mr. Johnson was not the only officer who, serving to give consistency to an opposition which at length matured to a degree that threatened the foun- . dations of the government.

On the 6th of September, the day before the meet- ing of the committees' delegates at Pittsburgh, the opposition to the law broke out in an act of open vio- lence, said to have been the first of the kind com- mitted in the western counties. At a place near Pigeon Creek, in Washington County, a party of men, armed and disguised, waylaid Robert Johnson (col- lector of revenue for Allegheny and Washington ), cut off' his hair, stripped him of his clothing, tarred and feathered him, and took away his horse, " obliging him to travel on foot a considerable distance in that morti- fying and painful situation." The case was brought before the District Court, out of which processes issued against John Robertson, John Hamilton, and Thomas

McComb, three of the persons concerned in the out- rage. The serving of these processes was confided by the then marshal, Clement Biddle, to his deputy, Jo- seph Fox, who in the month of October went into Al- legheny County for the purpose of serving them ; but he was terrified by the " appearances and circumstances which he observed in the course of his journey," and therefore, instead of serving them himself, sent them forward under cover by a private messenger. The marshal ( Mr. Biddle), in bis report of this transaction to the district attorney, said, " I am sorry to add that he [the deputy, Fox] found the people in general in the western part of the State, particularly beyond the Allegheny Mountains, in such a ferment on account of the act of Congress for laying a duty on distilled spirits, and so much opposed to the execution of said act, and from a variety of threats to himself personally (although he took the utmost precautions to conceal his errand), that he was not only convinced of the im- - possibility of serving the process, but that any attempt to effect it would have occasioned the most violent opposition from the greater part of the inhabitants, and he declares that if he had attempted it he be- ; lieres he would not have returned alive. I spared no expense or pains to have the process of the court ex- ceuted, and have not the least doubt that my deputy would have accomplished it if it could have been done."

In Fayette County the collector of revenue, Benja- min Wells, was subjected to ill treatment on account of his official position. That Mr. Wells was pecu- liarly unpopular among the people of his district ap- pears from the letters of Judge Alexander Addison,1 and from other sources, and he was afterwards several times maltreated, and his house sacked and burned. These acts were done in 1793 and 1794, but the first instance of abuse to him appears to have occurred in the fall of 1791, as the Secretary of the Treasury in his report to the President, after narrating the cir- cumstances of the attack on Robert Johnson, in Washington County, on the Gth of September, con- about the same period, experienced outrage. Mr. Wells, collector of the revenue for Westmoreland and Fayette, was also ill treated at Greensburg and Union- town. Nor were the outrages perpetrated confined to the officers, they extended to private citizens who

1 Judge Addison, in a letter addressed to Governor Mifflin (Pa. Ar- chives, 2d Serjes, vol. iv. p. 621, said, " Benjamin Wells, so far as I have ever heard him spoken of, is a contemptible and unworthy man, whom, I believe, the people of this country would never wish to see in any office or trust with an ol ject of any importance." But it should be remarked in this connection that the julge's opinion, as above expressed, may have been strongly biased by his own well-known personal dislike to Wells. In a communication by Alexander Hamilton to President Washington, the former related that on one occasion when Judge Addison was stop- ping, during a term of conrt, at n public-house in Uniontown. " Wells went to the sumne tavern, hunt was informed by the taveru-keeper and his wife that he could not be received there assigning for reason that Judge Addison had declared that if they took bitu in again he would leave the house."-Pu Archires, 21 Series, vol. iv. p. 292.

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only dared to show their respect for the laws of their country." 1

Another outrage was committed in Washington Connty, in the month of October of the same year, on the person of Robert Wilson, who was not an ex- cise officer, but a young schoolmaster who was look- ing for employment, and carried with him very reputable testimonials of his character." ? It was supposed that he was a little disordered in his intel- lect, and having, unfortunately for himself, made some inquiries concerning stills and distillers, and acted in a mysterious manner otherwise, he was sus- pected of being in the service of the government. On this account he "was pursued by a party of men in disgnise, taken out of his bed, carried about five miles back to a smith's shop, stripped of his clothes, which were afterwards burnt, and having been inhn- manly burnt in several places with a heated iron, was tarred and feathered, and about daylight dismissed, naked, wounded, and in a very pitiable and suffering condition. These particulars were communicated in a letter from the inspector of the revenue of the 17th of November, who declared that he had then himself seen the unfortunate maniac, the abuse of whom, as he expressed it, exceeded description, and was suffi- c'ent to make human nature shudder. . . . The symptoms of insanity were during the whole time of inflicting the punishment apparent, the unhappy sufferer displaying the heroic fortitude of a man who conceived himself to be a martyr to the discharge of some important duty."3 For participation in this outrage Col. Samuel Wilson, Samuel Johnson, James Wright, William Tucker, and John Moffit were in- dicted at the December Sessions, 1791; but before the offenders were taken upon the process of the court,4 the victim, Wilson (probably through fear of further outrage), left that part of the country,5 and at the June Sessions, 1792, the indicted persons were dis- charged.

The demonstrations above mentioned comprise all of the more notable acts of violence which were done in these counties by the opponents of the law during the first year of its existence. On the 8th of May, 1792, Congress passed an act making material changes in the excise law, among these being a reduction of about one-fourth in the duty on whiskey, and giving the distiller the alternative of paying a monthly in- stead of a yearly rate, according to the capacity of his still, with liberty to take a license for the precise

term which he should intend to work it, and to renew that license for a further term or terms. This pro- vision was regarded as peculiarly favorable to the western section of the State, where very few of the distillers wished to prosccute their business during the summer. "The effect has in a great measure," said Hamilton, in 1794, " corresponded with the views of the Legislature. Opposition has subsided in sev- eral districts where it before prevailed," and it was natural to entertain, and not easy to abandon, a hope that the same thing would, by degrees, have taken place in the four western counties of the State."

But this hope was not realized. The modifications made in the law, favorable as they had been thought to be to the western counties, did not produce acqui- escence and submission among the people of this sec- tion. On the 21st and 22d days of August next fol- lowing the passage of the modified law there was ! held at Pittsburgh " a Meeting of sundry Inhabitants of the Western Counties of Pennsylvania," the pro- ceedings of which plainly indicated that the feeling of opposition had not been lessened, but rather inten- sified. At that meeting there were present the fol- lowing-named delegates from the western counties, viz .: Edward Cook, Albert Gallatin, John Smilie, Bazil Bowel, Thomas Gaddis, John McClellan, John Canon, William Wallace, Shesbazer Bentley, Benja- min Parkinson, John Huey, John Badollet, John Hamilton, Neal Gillespie, David Bradford, Rev. David Phillips, Matthew Jamison, James Marshall, James Robinson, James Stewart, Robert McClure, Peter Lyle, Alexander Long, and Samuel Wilson. The persons composing this meeting were, in general, men of ability and influence, and in this particular the Fayette delegation (comprising the first six named in the above list) surpassed those from the other counties.

The meeting was organized by the choice of Col. John Canon as chairman, and Albert Gallatin, of Fayette County, as clerk. The subject of the excise law was then "taken under consideration and freely debated ; a committee of five members was appointed to prepare a draft of Resolutions expressing the sense of the Meeting on the subject of said Law ;" and on the second day the resolutions were reported, de- bated, and adopted unanimously. After a preamble denouncing the excise law as unjust in itself, oppres- sive upon the poor, and tending to bring immediate distress and ruin on the western conntry, and declar- ing it to be their duty to persist in remonstrances to Congress, and every other legal measure to obstruct the operation of the law, the resolutions proceeded, first, to appoint a committee to prepare and cause to be presented to Congress an address, stating objec- tions to the law, and praying for its repeal ; secondly,

1 Pa. Archives, 2d Series, vol. iv. p. 88.

2 Letter of James Brison, of Allegheny, to Governor Mifflin, dated Nov. 9, 1792,-Pa. Archires, 21 Series, vol. iv. pp. 44, 45.

3 Report of the Secretary of the Treasury ; Pa, Archives, 2d Series, vol. iv. p. 88.

4 Pa. Archives, Brison's letter, before quoted.

5 " The audacity of the perpetrators of these excesses was so great that an armed banditti ventured to seize and carry off two persons who were witnesses against the rioters in the case of 'Wilson, in order to prevent their giving testimony of the riot to a court then sitting or about to sit."-Alexander Hamilton to President Washington ; Pa. Arch , iv., p. 89.

6 Opposition to the law of 1791 was violent, not only in the "four western counties" of Fayette, Westmoreland, Washington, and Alle- gheny, but also in several other counties of the State, notably Chester, Bedford, Bucks, and Northumberland.

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to appoint committees of correspondence for Wash- ington, Fayette, and Allegheny, charged with the duty of corresponding together, and with such com- mittee as should be appointed for the same purpose in Westmoreland, or with any committees of a simi- Jar nature from other parts of the Union. The com- mittees appointed for this purpose for the three coun- ties named were composed of the following-named persons, viz. : Thomas Gaddis, Andrew Rabb, John Oliphant, Robert MeClure, James Stewart, William Wallace, John Hamilton, Shesbazer Bentley, Isaac Weaver, Benjamin Parkinson, David Redick, Thomas Stokely, Stephen Gapen, Joseph Vanmeter, Alexan- der Long, William Whiteside, James Long, Benjamin Patterson, Samuel Johnston, William Plummer, and Matthew Jameson.

The final declaration of the meeting was to the effect that, "Whereas, some men may be found amongst us so far lost to every sense of virtue and feeling for the distresses of this country as to accept offices for the collection of the duty, Resolved, there- fore, that in future we will consider such persons as unworthy of our friendship; hare no intercourse or dealings with them ; withdraw from them erery assist- ance, and withhold all the comforts of life which depend upon those duties that as men and fellow-citizens we owe to each other ; and upon all occasions treat them with that contempt they deserve ; and that it be and it is hereby most earnestly recommended to the people at large to fol- low the same line of conduct towards them."

It is difficult to understand how men of character and good standing, such as were a majority of those composing the Pittsburgh meeting, could have given their assent 'to the passage of these extreme resolu- tions. They were aimed in a general way (as appears on their face) at all who might be even remotely con- cerned on the side of the government in the collection of the revenue, but in particular, and more than all, at Gen. John Neville, against whom no charge could be brought, except that he had dared to accept in- spectorship of the Western Revenue District.

A few days before the holding of the Pittsburgh meeting, an outrage had been committed upon Capt. William Faulkner, of the United States army, who had permitted his house in Washington County to be used as an inspection-office. Being out in pursuit of deserters in the same neighborhood where Johnson was maltreated in the previous autumn, he was en- countered by a number of disguised men, who re- proached him with having let his house to the govern- ment officers, drew a knife on him, threatened to sealp him, tar and feather him, and burn his house if he did not solemnly promise to prevent all further use of it as an inspection-office. He was induced by their threats to make the promise demanded, and on the 21st of August gave publie notice in the Pittsburgh Gazette that the office of the inspector should no longer be kept at his house.

On receiving intelligence of this occurrence, as also

of the proceedings of the Pittsburgh meeting, the Sec- retary of the Treasury reported the facts to President Washington, who thereupon, on the 15th of Septem - her, 1792, issued a proclamation admonishing all per- sons to refrain and desist from all unlawful combina- tions and proceedings whatsoever having for their object, or tending, to obstruct the operation of the laws, declaring it to be the determination of the government to bring to justice all infractors of the law, to prosecute delinquents, to seize all unexcised spirits on their way to market, and to make no pur- chases of spirits for the army except of such as had paid the duty.

A supervisor of the revenne was sent into the western counties immediately afterwards to gain ac- curate information of and report on the true state of affairs ; but his mission " had no other fruit than that of obtaining evidence of the persons who composed . the meeting at Pittsburgh, and two of those who were understood to be concerned in the riot [against Capt. Faulkner], and a confirmation of the enmity which certain active and designing leaders had industriously infused into a large proportion of the inhabitants, not against the particular lairs in question only, but of a more ancient date against the government of the United States itself."1

In the following April (1793) a party of men, armed and disguised, made an attack upon the house of Ben- jamin Wells, who was then collector of revenue for Fayette and Westmoreland Counties. His house, which stood on the west side of the Youghiogheny River, opposite the present borough of Connellsville, was visited in the night by these rioters, who, having forced an entrance, finding that Wells was absent, contented themselves with threatening, terrifying, and abusing his family, without proceeding to any further outrage. Warrants for the apprehension of several of these rioters2 were issued by Justices Isaac Meason and James Finley, and placed in the hands of the sheriff of Fayette, Joseph Huston, who, how- ever, refused or neglected to serve them, and was therefore indicted in the Circuit Court.

A second attack was made on the house of Wells, the collector, in the night of the 22d of November by a body of men all armed and in disguise.3 They broke and entered the house, and demanded a surrender of the officer's commission and official books, and upon

1 Report of Secretary Hamilton; Pa. Archives, 2d Series, vol. iv. p 93. : "Caleb Mount, then a Captain, since a Major of Militia, stands charged before Isaac Mrason and James Finley, Assistant Jnilges, by information upon oath of Benjamin Wells, Collector of the Revenue, aml hus wife, with being of a party that broke into the House of the Said Collector some time in April, 1793."- Report of the Secretary of the Treasury to President Washington : Pa. Archires, 2d Series, vol. ie. p. 288.

3 . Indictments having been found at a circuit court holden at Phila- delphia in July last, against Robert Smilie and John McCulloch, two of the rioters in the attack which, in November preceding, had been made upon the house of a collector of the revenue in Fayette County; pro- cesses issued against them ulso to bring them to trial, and if guilty, to punishment."-Hamilton to Presid nt Washington, Aug. 5, 1594; Pa. Ar- chires, ir., p. 100.

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his refusal to deliver them up they threatened him, with pistols presented at his head, and swore that if he did not comply they would instantly put him to death. By this means they forced him to surrender his books and commission, and not content with this, the rioters, before they left the premises, compelled Wells to promise that he would, within two weeks, publish his resignation. It does not appear, however, that Wells did resign his office at that time, for he certainly held it in the following year, and was then an object of peculiar hatred to the opponents of the law.1

" At last March [1794] Court, in Fayette County," said Judge Addison, " in a publick company at din- ner in the tavern where I lodged, some of the most respectable gentlemen of that county. and most strenn- ously opposed to the Excise law, proposed that a meeting of the inhabitants of that county should be called, in which it should be agreed that they would all enter their stills, provided Benjamin Wells was removed from office, and some honest and reputable man appointed in his stead. I will not say that these are the words, but I know it is the amount of the conversation." This was written by the judge in a letter addressed to Governor Mifflin, dated Washing- ton, May 12, 1794.2 In a reply to that letter, written by Secretary Dallas,3 on behalf of the Governor, he says, "The truth is that such general dissatisfaction has been expressed with respect to Wells that, for the sake of the western counties, as well as for the sake of the General Government, it was thought advisable to transmit all the information that could be collected on the subject to the President, and the extract from your letter . . . made a part of the documents."

Finally, about the 1st of July, 1794, the rioters de- stroyed Wells' house and forced him to vacate his office, the circumstances being as follows : The ex- cise-office for Westmoreland County had been opened in the house of Philip Reagan, whereupon an attack was soon after made upon it by the insurgents. This attack had been expected by the owner of the house (Reagan), who bad accordingly prepared for it with a guard of two or three armed men. When the as- sailing-party approached they were fired on by Rea- gan's party, among whom was John Wells,+ son of

1 " Andrew Robb [ Rabb], a Justice of the peace, stams charged by in- formation upon oath before Jacob Beason, another Justice of the peace, with having offered a reward of Ten pounds for killing the Excise man. meaning, as was understood, Wells, the Collector. This fact is stated on the information of the said Collector."-Pa. Arch., 2d Series, vol. ic. p. 288; Letter of Alexander Hamilton to President Washington.

2 Pa. Arch., iv , p. 63.

3 Ibid, p. 64.

4 In the accounts which have been usually given of this affair, John Wells has been mentioned as the collector for Westmoreland, and the time of the final abandonment of Reagan's house as an exc'se-office as being in the month of June; but both these statements are disproved by the report of the Secretary of the Treasury to President Washington, dated Aug 5, 1794 (Pa. Archives, 2d series, iv., 95), in which he says, " June being the month for receiving annual entries of stills, endeavors were used to open offices in Westmoreland and Washington, where it had hitherto been found impracticable. With much pains and difficulty

Benjamin Wells, of Fayette, and deputy collector under him. The fire was returned, but without effect on either side. Then the party set fire to Reagan's barn, and having burned it to the ground, moved off without making further depredation. In a day or two a much larger party of assailants (numbering about one hundred and fifty men) ap- peared at Reagan's, and he, knowing the folly of attempting to resist so large a force, and wishing to avoid the shedding of blood, consented to capit- ulate, provided. they would give him assurances that they would not destroy his property nor abuse him or his family. This was agreed to, with the con- dition that his house should no more be used as an excise-office, and that John Wells should agree and promise never again to act as an officer for the collec- tion of the excise duty. The stipulations were reduced to writing and signed by the parties. The house was then thrown open, and Reagan produced a keg of whiskey, from which he "treated" the assailants. But after they had drank the whiskey they began to grow more belligerent, and some of them said that Reagan had been let off altogether too easily, and that he ought to be set up as a target to be shot at. Some of them proposed that he be tarred and feath- ered, but others strongly opposed this, and took Rea- gan's part, saying that he had acted in a fair and manly way, and that they were bound in honor to treat him well after having agreed to do so as a con- dition to the surrender. Then they drank more whiskey and fell to quarreling among themselves, and the proposition was made to " court-martial" Reagan, and to march him to the house of Benjamin Wells, in Fayette County, and try them both together. This suggestion was immediately acted on, and the party moved towards Stewart's Crossings, taking Reagan with them. Arriving at Wells' house they found that he was absent, and in their disappointment and anger they set fire to his dwelling and entirely destroyed it, with all its contents. Several of them remained hid- den near the ruins for the purpose of capturing Wells on his return,-a design which they effected in the following morning. On making him prisoner they demanded of him that he resign his commission as collector, and promise to accept no office under the excise law in the future. These demands were made as the conditions on which his life and safety de- pended. He accepted them and submitted to all their requirements, upon which they desisted from all further ill treatment and liberated him. This was the end of his career as an excise-officer. He afterwards removed to the other side of the river (at Connellsville) and made his residence there.

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History of Fayette County, Pennsylvania : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 36

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885 Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 1314

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 1314