USA > Pennsylvania > Wayne County > History of Wayne County [Pa.] > Part 16
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HISTORY OF WAYNE COUNTY.
After the building of said Oghquaga turnpike, Ira Cargill, from Connecticut, started a flourishing settle- ment on the public road leading from said turnpike to Starrucca.
Peter C. Sherman began at Preston Center. In 1829, he assessed to himself ten acres of improved land, and four hundred and thirty-six acres of unim- proved, and one house of the value of eight dollars. The township and general elections were held at this place, until a few years ago, when the township was divided into two election districts. The Sherman place fell into the hands of J. Carr, who disposed of it to C. B. Dibble, its present occupant. Merrill Hine appears to have been a very early settler at Hines Corners, and Perry Hine settled in another part of the township.
The following account is from manuscript furnished by C. P. Talhnan, Esq., regarding the early settle- ment of Mount Pleasant, Preston, and Scott. Want of space has obliged me reluctantly to abridge his contribution. What he herewith presents cannot fail to be interesting :
" My father, Elihu Tallman, was born in New Bed- ford, Mass., in 1780. My grandfather, William Tall- man, was a real estate and ship owner; and as he took a firm stand for the cause of Independence, much of his property was destroyed by the tories, which left him much reduced. My grandfather, (on my mother's side) Christopher Perkins, married a Palmer, in Ston- ington, Conn. They moved to what they called the
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far West, one horse carrying grandmother and all their movable goods, and grandfather going on foot. They went to and settled at Saratoga, about one mile from the Rock spring. There were several of the native Indians near them, and my mother has of- ten told me that her mother had such an abhorrence and fear of the Indians and tories, that she had sev- eral times taken her and her older brother, John, when her father was gone from home, and hid them away to lie and stay in the wilderness during the long, dismal nights. At an early age, my father was put on a coasting vessel as a cabin-boy and cook, and subsequently learned the shoe-making trade. He mov- ed to Saratoga, and was married on the 17th of De- cember, 1799, and soon after came to Mount Pleasant to look up a new home. Samuel Stanton, the first prominent settler of that place, was my mother's half- uncle, which was their probable motive for coming to that place.
They commenced on a piece of new land north of where Pleasant Mount now stands on the road then running east and west. Subsequently father bought on an adjoining lot about sixty rods east of where William Wright, Esq., now lives. I was born there in 1806. In that year father made one mile of the Cochecton and Great Bend turnpike road. Then he bought, about three-fourths of a mile northward, and cleared up a good-sized farm. In 1813 or 1814, he sold this place to a Mr. Hall, of Connecticut, for $1400, and bought the place where Godfrey Stevenson now
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lives, and, also, a carding-machine of Jacob Plum, who had run it one summer on the stream below where the Seth Kennedy mill now stands. This was the only place where wool was carded by machinery in the region. Wool was brought from all parts of the country. The business was excellent. He also built and ran a saw- mill. In or about the winter of 1818, father sold said property to Heaton Atwater, and took in payment $1500 in patent-rights, and $1500 in an exhibition of wax-figures and paintings. These payments were a little better than $3000 lost. The next spring he bought a property in Susquehanna county, and, having paid $750 down, lost that. These losses of $3750 left him with only his farming utensils and a few uncol- lected accounts."
The following episode is designed to show what were the hardships of the first settlers. Mr. Tallman relates the following account which he had from his father:
"About 1805 the neighborhood was entirely out of salt, and there was none nearer than Shehawken. Father had made a start so that he had a breeding mare, but had nothing wherewith to buy salt but some maple sugar, so he took enough of that to buy a half bushel of it, which would cost $2.00, put his sugar in a bag and started for Shehawken, (now Hancock, N. Y.,) twenty miles distant, on a road where only the under- brush was ent out. He exchanged his sugar for salt, and, putting it in his bag, he started homeward on a cold, windy fall day, when there was nearly a freshet
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in the Delaware, rendering the fording of the same dangerous. When about midway of the river, the old mare made a blunder and down she went, throwing the rider and the salt clear from her. After swimming about twenty rods quartering down stream, loaded down with winter clothing, overcoat and boots, he reached shore, (the mare did the same,) but his salt and hat were gone, and he had no funds with which to buy more."
How his father succeeded in getting along without the salt we are not told. But to resume the narrative :
"Since my recollection our goods were teamed from Newburg, eighty-one miles distant, at a cost of $2.50 per hundred pounds. Rock-salt was worth $4 per bushel, rye fifty cents, and oats twenty-five cents. The worst feature in the case was we had only rock and packing salt. All we used for butter and for the table was pounded in a hand mortar. I can recollect when we had no carding-machines or cloth-dressing mills. All our clothes made of flax, tow, cotton, or wool, were carded, spun, and woven at home, in which work our mothers and sisters were well skilled. Very scanty were the means afforded for the education of children. I have heard father speak of Truman Wheeler as one of our first teachers. Eber Dimmick was my first teacher, and a Miss Bigelow the first female one.
"In 1819 real estate and personal property had be- come so depreciated in value that father despaired of paying for his farm in Susquehanna county, and, hav-
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ing more ambition than prudence, determined to re- trieve his fortune and made a dash into the lumber- woods and bought the pine lot at Six Mile lake, (now Como.) Samuel P. Green, of the east branch, had contracted for the lot and commenced a dam and saw- mill on the outlet of the lake. Father bought out Green, finished the mill, and sawed out and hauled to Stockport a raft of pine boards to run in the spring of 1820. This was the first raft ever manufactured and hauled to the Stockport banks. At that time there was no road running north or south for many miles except the Mount Pleasant and Stockport road. The first road was what was called the Harmony road in Susquehanna county. The first road cast was the Union Woods road, which connected with the Cochec- ton and Great Bend turnpike at Conklin's Gate, six miles west of Cochecton. The old Stockport road had nothing but the small trees and brush cut out, and the large trees marked so as to enable any one to follow the course in deep snows. On our new farm was about half an acre partly cleared, and two or three acres chopped. At this time there were very few settlers in Buckingham except on the river flats. Three of the Kingsbury family, and two men by the name of Whelpy, had commenced on Kingsbury Hill. Fred- erick Stid and Thomas Hohnes had commenced about a mile up the Shehawken. Holmes ran a little tannery and ground all his bark with a stone, and tanned in cold liquor. He also did some shoe-making. There were a few settlers in the Union Woods. Jirah Mum-
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ford and Ezekiel and Henry Sampson had commenced in Starrucca.
There was a private road cut out by the way of Maple hill to Hale's Eddy. About this time Michael Weyant and Uriah Smith, from Long Island, settled on said road near the top of Maple hill. We had no communication with any of these families without go- ing a great way round. Nobody lived at Equinunk until several years after our location at Six Mile lake. The families living on the Stockport road toward Mount Pleasant were John Tiffany, one of the pioneer settlers, John Stearns, Chandler Tiffany, (on the John Page place), Joseph Monroe, and Ashbel Stearns, near or on the Deacon Wilcox place. John Fletcher and William Fletcher lived near Peter Spencer, who located on the farm now owned by Nathan A. Monroe. Our nearest neighbor, south four miles, was Peter Spencer, and one mile north was Rufus Geer. A lit- tle east of the Upper Twin pond, about three-fourths of a mile, were Gideon, James, and Thomas Wood- mansee. There were no other settlers until we reach- ed Stockport. Abner Stone commenced where H. K. Stone now lives. Esaias Wilcox had commenced on the lot adjoining said Stone. It was impossible to concentrate a sufficient number of children to make up a school between Mount Pleasant to one mile above Stockport on the New York side. During the four years that we lived at Six Mile lake, there was no. school-house between Mount Pleasant and Stockport- sixteen miles-and no place where the preaching of the
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gospel could be sustained. At the time of our sojourn at Six Mile lake, the whole population of what is now Preston consisted of twenty-eight men, women, and children. Our family made up twelve of the number.
In 1822, father purchased the large pine lot known as the Kryder tract. This was situated five miles northwestward of Six Mile lake, and four miles cast- wardly from Starrucca. It was seven miles northward to the nearest inhabitants at Ball's and Hale's Eddy, and seven and one-half miles southward to Abner Stone's. There was no road in either of these direc- tions. There had been a road laid out from Mount. Pleasant to Hale's Eddy, nineteen and a half miles. This road crossed the pine lot, but it was merely run through and marked so it was impossible to make a road on the route where it was laid that could be tray- eled, as the viewers paid no regard to hills, ledges, or swamps, only aiming, apparently, to get a line from one end to the other. Not the first blow had been made to open it, and when this was afterwards done, in many places it was made a mile from the survey. There had been a road laid out from Starrueca to Stockport, and in some places the underwood cut out, and, on other parts, the down timber had been cut up, but not cleared out. The marks for this road were about one mile from the said pine lot. In August, 1822, my brother-in-law, David Babcock, my older brother, William, and myself, took an outfit and went to commence an improvement on said land."
Omitting the interesting, and, no doubt, truthful ac-
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count of the manner in which the said youthful ad- venturers contrived to live in the wilderness until necessity compelled them to build a cabin, we resume the narrative:
"The cold nights of November reminded us that a further improvement of our cabin was necessary. We now cut out a road, such as it was, and hauled in some half-inch boards for a roof and cutting and splitting some pine for floors, we built part of a chimney, and made up some bunks to sleep in; my brother-in-law moved his wife and child in and then we set up house- keeping on a different scale. When winter set in we moved back to Six Mile lake to lumber through the winter. In the spring of 1823 we moved the whole family to the Kryder lot, cleared up the fallow that we had chopped the fall before, built a saw-mill, cut another fallow, and commenced on a larger scale. In 1824, my father hired a young woman for three months to teach four, and part of the time, five chil- dren, in the log-house that we first built. Her name was Sarah Jane Stoddard. The next summer a Miss Sally Kennedy taught the same children three months, and the summer thereafter Miss Miranda Chittenden taught them, making in all one year's private school. Each teacher was paid seventy-five cents per week. There was no other school in what is now Preston township until the public schools in 1830. When about fifteen years old, while living at Six Mile lake, I became satisfied that if I ever obtained an education I should have to dig it out myself. I accordingly pre-
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pared some fat pine, a single stick of which made a beautiful light by which to study. I read such books as I could get ; our common school-books were Web- ster's spelling-book, Dilworth's and Daboll's arithme- ties, Second and Third Part, English reader, Hale's His- tory of the United States, and the New Testament. We had no novels or newspapers. My father had an extra library, namely, two volumes of the life of Christ and his Apostles, a Bible, and Walker's dictionary.
I occasionally borrowed such books as I could. In 1825 I worked doing chores to pay my board, and went to school six weeks; I did the same again in 1826, for about twelve weeks. That was all the school- ing I had after I was twelve years old. From 1823 to 1827, we engaged in pine lumbering and cleared up a large quantity of land. At this time the settlement at Starrucea sustained a public school, and had occa- sional preaching by Ezekiel Sampson, a Baptist. In the fall of 1823, we cut out the road from our place to Mount Pleasant. In the fall of that year, David Babcock settled on the place now owned by John Clark, and Luther Chafee on the lower part of my present farm; John Stanton on the farm now occupied by D. W. Tallman; Peter C. Sherman on the present farm of C. B. Dibble, (at Preston Centre); and Wil- liam Tallman on the A. D. Reynold's farm. About the same time Joseph Dow settled on the flat now owned by Alpheus Dix, JJoseph Dow, Jr., on the lot where Arnold Lloyd now lives, and Jeremiah Flynn on the farm now owned by Robert K. King. We now
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began to feel as if we had gained a great victory, for the forest was fairly broken up, and we had neighbors.
Rev. Gershom Williams began about 1823 or 1824 at what is now called Scott Centre, built a saw-mill, and cut a road to the private road near Uriah Smith's. John Starbird commenced on the lot where Win. P. Starbird now lives soon after we began on the pine lot.
The order of our new settlement was as follows : In 1820, Willet Carr commenced on the place where Amos O. Sherwood now lives. In 1822, Messrs. Henry and Vancott bought adjoining I. M. Kellogg's farm and hired a piece chopped, only to grow up again. About the same time James Moore, David Wooley, and Franklin Duval bought in what is now called Little York. The three last-named were from N. Y. city and paid for their land in advance. The next settler was a Joseph Marguerat, then Joseph Simpson, then James Simpson; began near the creek south of Sherwood's, and John Stanton, from Conn., settled on twenty-two acres of land north of the upper Sands pond, and George Hall on the south side there- of. About 1822, Daniel Rose commenced on a wild lot now owned by George Wainwright. Charles Case, of Gibson, Susquehanna county, and his son, Riley Case, began where Samuel Decker now lives. All of these new settlers, excepting those of Little York, and the Charles Case family, were in indigent circum- stances. The locality and position of their families were such as to preclude the possibility of sustaining a school or the preaching of the gospel among us.
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Some attempts were made for those purposes, but were necessarily abandoned, and as a natural conse- quence, our Sabbaths were very loosely spent, and the children left to grow up with but little education or culture.
In 1826, I had become acquainted with a large scope of the wilderness, and had fixed on the piece of land on which to make a farm, and, though not of age, fearing that some one would get ahead of me, in October, carrying provision enough to last me to Philadelphia and part of the way back, I started on foot and bought nothing going but three nights' lodg- ing, at six cents a night. I found the man who own- ed the land and the timber about it. He wanted four dollars per acre for the land. I offered him two dol- lars. He finally agreed to my proposals, binding me to put a family on the land, clear up three acres a year, build a house and barn on it, and to pay for it in three years. This contract was dated in October, 1826, and I obtained my deed on the 29th day of April, 1829. This was the first piece of land paid for in this region of country. The man that sold me the land was so well pleased with my promptitude that he gave off the interest and made me a parchment deed for one hundred and seventy-five acres of land. I bought, also, three lots of timber, enough to last three years' lumbering. On the 20th of May, 1827, I was mar- ried to my first wife, Lucinda, daughter of Benjamin King, Esq., of Mount Pleasant. In the spring of 1829 or 1830, we agreed to start a school and fixed
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on a site on the east side of my lot, where the ma- ple grove is now growing up, on the road as it then ran. I found nails, glass, and sash, costing four dol- lars and eighty-four cents, which the neighbors agreed should be my share. This was the first money ever used, in what is now Preston township, for public im- provements and the first school-house erected. The first school therein was taught by a Miss Watrous, at one dollar per week. She was an old, experienced teacher, and some of the scholars came two and a half miles. Each parent paid in proportion to the num- ber of days that he sent his children. If any were too poor to school their children, on application to the assessor, return of the fact was made to the county commissioners, and the tuition of such children was paid by the county. Our school-house was sixteen by twenty feet, built of logs, chimney in one end, and burned four-foot wood. The roof and floor were made of rough hemlock, and the door of the same with wooden hinges and a latch of our own make. Our benches were made of slabs, our writing-desks were a board fastened to a log across the back end of the house, which was chinked and mossed instead of being mudded. On the whole it had a very respecta- ble appearance for the times. After our first school, I think we never paid more than seventy-five cents a week for a woman teacher, and ten dollars per month for a male teacher. This house was a very worthy enterprise for the time. The summer following, a Sunday-school was organized by Sheldon Norton, who
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then lived on the place now owned by his son, E. K. Norton. This school was made auxiliary to the Sun- day-school of the Methodist Episcopal church. I pur- chased of Mr. Norton a few Testaments, at ten cents a piece, and he left us a number of tracts and papers. We had a large school, and scholars came from near Como and Little York by marked trees and also from Shadigee and Flynn's. Quite a large number of them came from two to four miles and barefoot at that. Some began with the alphabet, others in spell- ing lessons of one or two sylables, and some of the pupils were twenty years old. The next spring I bought of the Methodist Book Room ten dollars' worth of books, including some Testaments, and made a present of them to said school. Our school succeed- ed admirably and we ran it about six months in the year for several years with the most satisfactory success. At this time (1879) there are fourteen school-houses averaging in value $500 apiece, all well arranged and painted, which is an increase in fifty years from nothing to $7,000 in value. Sixty years ago we had six voters, now there are about four hundred. The first and oldest religious society between Mt. Pleasant and the Delaware river, was a close-communion Church, started about 1820, at Starrucea, under Eze- kiel Sampson. The next was a class of Methodists. consisting of nine persons, at Tallmanville, in 1830. This society increased rapidly, till it numbered about forty members, and it originally covered the ground where there are now four societies. In the town now
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there are six societies with two hundred and fifty members; three churches, one at Como, one at Tall- manville, and another at Hine's Corners, with a good parsonage at Como. The close-communion Baptists have a very good society at Preston Center, and a small society at East Preston. There are large and prosperous lodges of Good Templars at Como and Preston Center, with about two hundred and forty members. The Odd Fellows have a lodge at Como. There is no licensed tavern or beer saloon in the town. There are two stores, thirteen saw-mills, one small grist-mill, two turning-establishments, and three cabi- net-shops. Very little timber remains to support lumbering, but the town will very soon be one of the best dairy districts in the county. Twenty-one natur- al ponds of clear water, well supplied with fish, are scattered over the town. A large number of fruit- trees has been obtained from the most approved nurser- ies, and they are thrifty and promising. There is very little waste land. The Erie Railroad on the east, and the Jefferson Branch on the west afford convenient access to market."
Mr. Tallman relates the following amusing hunting- story :
"When father moved back from Susquehanna county to Mount Pleasant, he had an old queen's-arm musket, a charge for which was an ounce ball and nine buckshot, which made up nearly two ounces of lead. This load, if the game was near by, made dead- ly work and injured the skin badly. There were no
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HISTORY OF WAYNE COUNTY.
rifles in those days. My father was not a great hunt- er but killed a large part of his own meat. On a cer- tain time he and his brother-in-law, Chandler Tiffany, concluded to hunt some larger game than deer, and, consequently, rigged out for a bear hunt. When they had advanced four or five miles into the woods, they saw a large bear which had not discovered them; by concert they both shot at the same time, and doing so, down went the bear. They were so elated that they forgot to load their guns, and both ran their best, and, when in close proximity to their game, the bear discovered them and came to her feet and made battle, approaching them with her mouth wide open. Father made a lucky thrust and jammed his gun into her mouth. She seized it, crushing the stock and denting the barrel with her tushes, as she reared up on her haunches; he threw her nearly on her back, in reach of Tiffany, telling him to take his hatchet to her; he did so, but struck her with the head of it. She struck him on the breast with one paw and strip- ped him of every vestige of clothing as well as his moccasins and stockings. Father cried, "Strike her . with the edge!" and the third blow was given edge first, square between her eyes, which checked her fury, and, the blows being promptly repeated, she was overcome. Father's musket was badly crushed and Tiffany half naked, and though they were lords of the forest by virtue of good luck, they estimated a bear hunt of less importance than before their adven- ture."
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STARRUCCA. This borough was erected in 1853, and then called the borough of Wayne. It is three miles long on the Susquehanna line, and two miles wide. It was taken about equally from Scott and Preston town- ships. Benjamin T. West, Esq., lived in the place in 1824. He was a son of Jones West, a blacksmith from Albany Co., N. Y. According to 'Squire West, Henry Sampson was one of the first settlers at Star- rucca. His children were. Esquire Sampson, John Sampson, Benjamin Sampson, Henry Sampson, Jr., Stephen Sampson, Hasadiah Sampson, and William Sampson. He had three daughters. Hasadiah Samp- son married a sister of Benj. T. West. Jirah Mum- ford, Jr., a son of Jirah Mumford, Sen., the progeni- tor of all the Mumfords, was one of the first if not the first settler of the place, and the father of Hon. James Mumford, deceased, who lost two sons in the Rebellion. E. C. Mumford, the present district-attor- ney of the county, is one of the Judge's sons, also, W. W., late Representative of Wayne, Clinton D., and Clarence G. Mumford. W. W., and Clinton D., have a manufactory of pyroligneous acid and naphtha, the only one in the county. David Spoor early lived at Starrucca, and 'Squire Whitaker, who removed to Lizard Lake. Henry Sampson, Sen., built the first grist-mill. All the men were more or less engaged in lumbering pine which was taken to Hale's Eddy. El- der Peck was the first minister, and Elder Smitzer formed the first Baptist church in the place. Nelson M. Benedict lived in the place almost fifty-three years
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ago, and had eight children. One of his sons, Nelson M. Benedict, now living, is a justice of the peace. Dr. Thomas was the first physician, and Dr. J. P. Shaw has lived in the place twenty-two years.
HI. McMurray, a well-known and intelligent man, lives in the place. Wmn. Graham and John McMur- ray began the first tannery and were succeeded by Mr. Cowan, then by Drake & Salisbury, and finally by Major E. P. Strong, who now owns one of the largest tanneries in the county. The Jefferson rail- road passes near the place. The village is kept very neat and tasteful. There is a Roman Catholic and a M. E. Church, and three common schools. There is also a Baptist society in the place, of which Rev. S. W. Cole is the pastor.
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