USA > Pennsylvania > Westmoreland County > History of Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, Vol. I > Part 22
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HUGH MARTIN. ALEXANDER MITCHELL,
WILLIAM JACK. .
RICHARD .WILLIAMS,
CHRISTOPHER TRUBY, GEORGE WALLACE,
GEORGE BAIRD.
JOHN MILLER,
There was still a great deal of hostility against Newtown (now Greens- burg) as a county seat. This dissatisfaction came from north of the Forbes road, and from the region around Pittsburgh. All these interests united to overthrow what had already been done in the way of permanently locating the seat of justice at Greensburg. As a result of this agitation the legisla- ture on December 27, 1786, passed an act suspending the authority granted to the trustees to establish a county seat, etc., until further directed. The act further provided that the trustees were to exhibit their accounts, with proper vouchers for all expenditures made by them in their work so far as they had gone. These were to be inspected by William Moore, Charles Campbell and James Bryson, and to be laid before the justices of the court and the grand jury. Two of these inspecting committeemen were from un- friendly sections, Bryson being then a resident of Pittsburgh and Campbell of Wheatfield township, now in Indiana county. The subject was taken up by the people, who discussed it in the Pittsburgh Gazette, there being then no newspaper in Greensburg. Some one from Brush Creek, who signs himself "A Friend of His Country,' has a letter in the Gazette of October 26, 1786, from which we quote extensively.
"It is well known that the establishment of our present seat of justice was not a hasty, rash or inconsiderate piece of business. Almost sixteen years elapsed since it first claimed the attention of the Government; it has been deliberately considered and cat- tiously conducted ; the sense of the people have been generally and repeatedly known by petition, remonstrance, etc., and in consequence thereof no less than four different Acts of the Legislature have been passed to effect and complete its establishment. When we reflect upon the many evils which have resulted from the want of such establishment, I think we ought rather to congratulate ourselves on the event, and rest perfectly satis- fied that it is at last fixed anywhere nearly centrical to the body of the people."
Hugh Henry Brackenridge, who was then a member of the legislature from this county, and a resident of Pittsburgh, on December 16, 1786, wrote the following letter, which was published in the Gazette of January 6, 1787:
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"A bill is published superceding the powers of the Trustees for building a Court House and jail in Greensburg. The object is to prevent any further expenditure of public money in public buildings at that place, inasmuch as the Court House and jail already erected are sufficient, at least for a number of years. This appeared to us, the Representatives from Westmoreland, to be sufficient for the present. It must remain with future time to determine whether the seat of justice shall be removed or a new county erected on the Kiskiminetas. The last, I believe, will be deemed most eligible."
In the same paper of February 10, 1787, the following letter appeared, written by one who signed himself "A Friend of Westmoreland":
"We find by Mr. Brackenridge's late publication that the seat of justice in this county yet remains an object of envy in our Legislature, as 'a bill is published superceding the powers of the Trustees for building a Court House and jail in Greensburg': I wonder when we shall see an end of the cavilings on this subject, and the succession of ridiculous laws occasioned thereby. By the first law we find a number of Trustees appointed for erecting a Court House and prison, etc. By the, second law we find their proceedings rejected, though perfectly legal, and the former repealed, and another set of Trustees appointed, with more extensive and conclusive powers. A third law approves and con- firms their proceedings, and a fourth law supercedes their powers in the midst of the duty assigned them ; and to carry the farce a little forther, I think the fifth law ought to amount to the total annihilation of the county."
The reader will discover that in the justices' letter or certificate given above, and dated August 10, 1786, they say that they have adjourned the courts to the new court house in Newtown. They had probably done this, but even then troubles were brewing, engendered largely by Hanna and his friends, who were loathe to see the courthouse leave Hannastown. So, to in some degree appease the wrath of these adherents of Hanna, it was determined to hold the October term of court in Hannastown, and this was accordingly done. The first court held in Greensburg was the January term of 1787, beginning on January 7th, with Judge John Moore on the bench. The following is a list of the jurors who served at this first court in the new county seat : Grand Jurors-David Duncan, James Carnahan, John Carna- han, John Sloan, Abrahm Fulton, Charles Baird, William Best, Nathaniel McBrier, Joseph Mann, James Fulton, William Mann, Charles Johnston, Jacob Huffman, Samuel Sinclair, and John Craig. Traverse Jurors: Al- exander Craig, John McCready, Peter Cherry, John Giffen, John Buch, Philip Carns, Patrick Campbell, George Swan, Isaac McKendry, Robert McKee, John Anderson, James Watterson and Lawrence Irwin.
The term only lasted for about three days, and the minutes do not show any proceedings of momentous interest. The grand jury, however, reported
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that the new jail was insufficient, and not strong enough to hold the pris- oners.
The trustees submitted their account as required by the suspending act. The total expenditures so far had been less than a thousand dollars. The ac- counts were finally laid before the grand jury on July 17, 1787.
It may be added here by way of explanation, that much of Brackenridge's opposition to the court house and county seat proceedings arose from his de- sire to form a new county. This is intimated in his letter above quoted, though there he, for reasons of his own, located his proposed new county on the Kis- kiminetas. His object was probably to unite the north with him in opposition to Westmoreland and in the end take them into the new county at the forks of the Ohio river. It is admitted on all hands that he was elected to the legisla- ture for the purpose of erecting a new county. To this project our part of .Westmoreland was naturally hostile. They were proud of their large dimen- sions, as the county was originally formed, but in- 1781 Washington county, and in 1783 Fayette county, were entirely carved from our territory. Naturally they tried to prevent any further encroachments on their territory. Neverthe- less, by the Act of September 24, 1788. Allegheny county was organized from Westmoreland.
After the formation of Allegheny county an act was passed on February 14, 1789, repealing the superceding act, and authorizing the Westmoreland trustees to proceed in the erection of a court house and jail. The act itself is all the defense they need as against the act supending them. It recites that, whereas they found it expedient to erect at once a small wooden structure to accommodate the business as a temporary convenience, until a more substantial one could be built, and that whereas the temporary structure was too small and inconvenient, that Westmoreland county should have "a decent, sufficient and permanent building," constructed by the expenditure of the balance of the money levied and collected for that purpose agreeable to the intention of the law. Therefore it was enacted that the said trustees be required to apply the remaining part of the money as indicated above. This remaining part was about four thousand dollars, and in 1796 and 1797 they proceeded to build our second court house, though really the first permanent one in Greensburg. During the Whisky Insurrection the building of it was temporarily abandoned. It was not completed till 1801, although the courts were held in it a year or two before that, and the state supreme court met in it in 1799. It was a two- story brick building, for by this time a law was passed compelling all counties which had not already done so, to build court houses of brick or stone. It fronted towards the east, that is, on Main street, with an arched door entrance in the center. In the rear was a smaller door which led to the jail yard. The main building stood on the old courthouse square, with its gable front on Main street. The whole of the first story was used as a court room. This room
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was divided by a balustrade running north and south. The part west of the division, that is, the rear of the room, was reserved for the judges, lawyers, jurymen, litigants, etc., while the front, or eastern division, was used as an audience room by those who attended court. The judges sat against the west- ern wall, facing the east. There were large round columns in the center, along the line of the balustrade, which supported the ceiling. In the upper story was a large grand jury room, where theatrical performances and other public meet- ings were frequently held when not in use by the courts. Above the second story was the belfry, wherein the old courthouse bell was hung.
North of this structure, but built against it, was a two-story brick building in which were the offices of the sheriff, recorder, prothonotar, clerk of courts, etc., etc. South of it was a brick building one-story high, which was used as a county commissioners' office only.
The old log court house served its purpose until about 1794. After that time it was used for public offices until 1797, when it was removed. From June, 1794, until April, 1795, the courts were held in a tavern kept by Robert Taylor. After that, for about three years, they were held in a tavern kept by Bartel Laffer. The new brick courthouse when completed in 1801 was con- sidered a very handsome structure, and was so commented on by many travelers who chanced to pass through Greensburg.
The long continued contest with the trustees who built the log court house, and the opposition to their expenditure of the public money, has been urged in defense of a mistake which they committed from which the county can never recover. It will be remembered that they purchased two acres of ground in Newtown (or Greensburg) for county buildings. It can scarcely be said that it was purchased, for the purchase money was only five shillings, or about the nominal sum of one dollar-common even yet, in such transactions, for the purpose of making a legal transfer. Two acres was more ground than they needed in that day, and in order to reduce the grounds of complaint to their minimum, they concluded to sell over three-fourths of it. The two acres were divided into ten lots by Benjamin Davis, who was one of the trustees and a sur- veyor as well. In October, 1786, after publicly advertising them, nine of these lots were sold, the other being reserved for court house purposes. The original two acres were bounded by Main street, West Otterman street, Pennsylvania avenue and West Pittsburgh street, being one full square, and the lot reserved is the ground upon which the new courthouse, the fourth in Greensburg, is now being builded. For these nine lots the trustees received $258.88. In 1795 a law was passed by the legislature legalizing the sale.
The new county town was at first named Newtown, most likely by Christo- pher Truby, one of the original land owners. He had removed to our county from Bucks county in 1771. In the east he had lived in or near a small village named Newtown, which had become historic during the Revolution, for there Washington had his headquarters for a time in 1776, when he was battling
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with almost a forlorn hope, against the British army. It is supposed that he named the cluster of log houses springing up on his land after his historic home in Bucks county. In 1786 it was named Greensburg, in memory of the Rhode Island Quaker, Major General Nathanael Greene, to whom most writers have given first place among the generals of the Revolution after Washington.
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CHAPTER XIV
The Whisky Insurrection.
The Whisky Insurrection was confined almost entirely to four counties in Southwestern Pennsylvania, viz .: Allegheny, Westmoreland, Washington and Fayette. Of these four, Westmoreland county was the least concerned. The trouble was due to the method adopted, mainly by the National Government, of raising money by taxation. This tax was known in the popular language of that day as an excise tax, a term extremely opprobrious to the English speak- ing people of all ages. These people were not opposed to paying tax, if levied, for example, on landed property, for then it was at least supposed to be based on the valuation of the land. Nor did they seriously object to a tariff, which is primarily a duty collected on all articles brought into this country from abroad. But an excise tax is one levied on home manufactures, and collected either when the material is produced, or when it is first offered for sale. If fairly collected, its very nature demands that the government imposing and collecting it shall take charge, to a very great extent, of the labor and the raw material which produces the commodity to be taxed. Because of this neces- sary supervision on the part of the government, the excise tax had for ages been obnoxious in Great Britain. In Scotland the inherent hatred of excise duties had become proverbial before the days of Robert Burns, for in his age, among the peasantry, the killing of an excise tax-collector was considered almost, if not entirely a virtue. This was largely due to the necessary supervision which the collector imposed on the private affairs of the individual.
The predominating nationality among the pioneers of these four counties was Scotch-Irish. But whether they were Scotch-Irish, English, Scotch or Irish, they brought here a deep-rooted hatred for the excise system of the Eng- lish government. These four counties, as we have seen, were moreover well adapted to the product of grain, and could in that day of limited market, pro- duce but little else that was salable to any extent. Of course, we have spoken of the skin and fur trade, but that was necessarily the business of but few of the early pioneers, and could not be followed by our people generally. There seemed to be an injustice in the excise tax on liquor for the reason that the tax
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was based on the quantity of goods, and not on their value. Our owners of poor lands of today could with reason object to a system of taxation if the same amount of tax was levied on every acre of land in the state. Land in our mountains may be assessed at one dollar per acre, and lands near our cities at a thousand dollars per acre, and the tax based on these valuations may be per- fectly equitable. Our pioneers imagined that the very opposite of this equit- able adjustment was brought about by the excise tax on distilled spirits. To illustrate their view of the situation: Whisky in any of these four counties could be purchased in any desirable quantities at from twenty to twenty-five cents per gallon, and an excise tax of seven cents per gallon was a little more than one-fourth of its value. But this same whisky, if transported to Philadel- phia, or if a liquor of equal grade was produced near there, would readily sell for fifty or sixty cents per gallon, and the excise duty of seven cents per gallon was therefore less than one-eighth of its value. So they theorized and rea- soned that if a farmer in Westmoreland county raised a hundred dollars' worth of rye and made it into whisky, he paid twenty-five dollars tax on it, but if he lived near Philadelphia, and by the same labor produced the same amount of rye, he paid but twelve dollars. Those who framed the law had in view, of course, the greater value of the land in the east than in the west. Nevertheless the apparent injustice was very patent to those who, while they could not un- derstand fine theories of economics, could see the difference between giving the government the one-fourth of their grain product in Washington county, and only the one-eighth of it in another section.
An excise law in Pennsylvania had been passed by the legislature in 1772, but had never been carried out, particularly in the western section, largely be- cause there were but few products here to tax. But the state still owed con- siderable money on the Revolutionary war debt, which had been appropriated but never paid. This law of 1772 was greatly opposed by the counties west of the Allegheny Mountains. It was complied with in a measure by the eastern counties, who rightfully complained violently of the growing injustice of forcing them and not the western counties to pay the excise tax. It was there- fore concluded in 1785 to pay the Revolutionary debt by an enforcement of the excise law of 1772. This, they reasoned, was such a debt that the patriotic men of the west, who had done so much for the cause of freedom, would gladly help to pay regardless of the mode of taxation. So in June, 1785, an excise collector named Graham was sent out to enforce the obnoxious law. He met with much opposition by all our people, but succeeded in collecting some money in Fayette county, and perhaps a few small amounts in Westmoreland county. When ready to begin on our county he came to Greensburg and put up at a hotel. About midnight he was awakened and called to his door by a man of gigantic proportions, in complete disguise, who told Graham that his name was Beelzebub, the Prince of Devils, and that a number of his smaller devils were outside waiting for him, and that it was his pleasant duty to hand him
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over to them. After much trouble, with the assistance of the landlord, the collector managed to escape the mob. He had a man arrested whom he thought to be the pretended Beelzebub, but on a trial the defendant proved an alibi, and was discharged. So he left Greensburg and went over to Washing- ton county, where he received still rougher treatment. The Washington mob took his pistols and broke them to pieces before his eyes. They also took his commission and all of his papers, and threw them in a very muddy part of the street, and then compelled the collector to walk back and forth over them and tramp them out of sight in the mud. Then they shaved one side of his head, fixed his hat up so that it looked ridiculous, and compelled him to wear it wrong end foremost, for the cocked hats of those days were made with a well- defined front to them. They also shaved his horse's tail, and then put him astride of the animal and started him toward the Westmoreland county line, with instructions that he should not stop until he passed from Washington county. A committee of the mob went with him and made him "halt" at every still house, where they compelled him to drink a sample of their product. When he reached the county line he was passed over to Westmoreland, and threatened with treatment compared with which his present treatment was mild, should he ever return. So the west would not pay the excise tax on whisky, and rather than engage in an open war the legislature repealed the law. But in 1791, Congress passed a law laying four pence (about eight cents) per gallon on all distilled spirits. These four counties with which we are dealing, had two members in congress. They were Smiley, from Fayette- county, and William Findley, from Westmoreland. They opposed its passage all they could, but it was nevertheless passed. In opposing it they undoubtedly expressed the almost unanimous sentiments of their constituents. Findley, at least, was a man of fine ability. Albert Gallatin, undoubtedly one of the greatest men of the nation, was then a citizen of Fayette county, and opposed it with all his power.
But when they came to appoint a collector, for once no one wanted the ap- pointment. The government also, on March 3rd, 1791, modified the tax and the general provisions of the law, to take effect, however, only in 1794.
In the meantime the four western counties were united in their opposition to the law or its execution, and were boastful of the victory they had achieved over the state government. They were now emboldened by their success to resist the national authority as well.
The state was divided into districts for the purpose of collecting this excise tax on liquor, and an inspector was appointed for each district, or "survey," as they were denominated in the act. By the terms of the law each distiller was to furnish the inspector nearest his works a full description of his estab- lishment, which was at any time to be open to a visit and a searching examina- tion on the part of the inspector. This does not seem unreasonable to us now, but it appeared to raise the wrath of the pioneer to its highest pitch. A public
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meeting to oppose the law was accordingly called at Redstone (now Browns- ville) for July 27th, 1791, and all of the four counties were to be represented by delegates. The meeting was held on the day appointed, with a very general attendance of delegates. They recommended county meetings in the county seats of the counties of Allegheny, Westmoreland, Fayette and Washington. The Washington county meeting was the most hostile. They resolved in a published resolution, that any one who accepted an office under Congress, and who tried by virtue of the office to execute the provisions of the excise law, should be regarded as an enemy to his country. They advised the people to treat all officers with scorn and contempt, and to refuse to associate with them. A meeting of delegates was held in Pittsburgh, on September 7, 1791, which also passed resolutions against the law.
The government finally appointed Benjamin Wells, of Fayette county, as the excise collector for Fayette and Westmoreland counties, and Robert John- son, of Allegheny county, for Washington and Allegheny counties. Wells was not a man of high character by any means, and could not have been chosen to any office by those who knew him. Johnson was a good man, of honest inten- tions, though not a man of great force. Wells opened an office at his own house near Connellsville, on the south side of the Youghiogheny river. John- son was overtaken on the road home, on September 6, by a band of disguised men, who stripped him naked and gave him a complete coat of tar and feathers, then shaved his head, and, taking his horse, started him home on foot in this condition. Then came an officer to arrest the supposed offenders. He was promptly horsewhipped, tarred and feathered, and his money and horse taken from him. Then he was blindfolded, taken to the woods, and tied to a tree where he remained for five hours, till an accidental passerby released him.
In May, 1792, Congress lowered the rate of tax and permitted the distiller to take out a monthly license instead of a yearly one, but the penalty for not complying with the law was raised from one hundred to two hundred and fifty dollars. No office could be procured for the officer in Washington or West- moreland county, but each officer established his home as his office in the other two counties. In June, 1792, Wells undertook to open an office in Greensburg and one in Uniontown, but he was soon forced to abandon both offices.
Some of our distillers returned their establishments, but the large majority refused to do so, hoping that by a united opposition they could soon force the government to abandon the execution of the law. Still others abandoned the liquor business as manufacturers entirely. On August 21, 1792, a meeting ·was held at Pittsburgh, which was attended by prominent men from all of the four counties. They drafted resolutions urging the people to obstruct the exe- cution of the iniquitous law in every legal way possible, and to petition Con- gress to repeal it at once. On September 15th, 1792, President Washington, in a very dignified but firm published address, admonished all good citizens to refrain from unlawful combinations and from doing anything looking toward the obstruction of the law. The time for returning stills was in June of each
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year, and the difficulty with the government was to get offices in the var- ious counties in the district. On June Ist, notices appeared in the Pittsburgh Gasette, giving the location of the various offices. Philip Reagan's house was designated as the place where the office would be opened for Westmoreland county.
The Secretary of the Treasury at that time was Alexander Hamilton. He made a complete report of the entire trouble, and this report has been the ground work of nearly all that has been written about the subject since. In it he notes the great difficulty the officers found in procuring an office in Westmoreland county. Wells was still the officer for our county, and held to his position with 2 zeal that might be expected from a better man. He was insulted and abused both at home and abroad, and his family was ostracised, and even threatened with violence, when he was not at home. His house was attacked in April, 1792, by a large party of men in disguise. It is likely they thought he was at home, for on finding him absent they left without doing much mischief. On November 22 a similarly attired band found him at home, compelled him to surrender his books and commission, and to sign and publish his resignation in the papers within two weeks, or have his house burned on his failure to do so. This he promised to do, and the disguised band left without committing further depredations. The reader has doubtless noticed that the entire community seemed to be personally interested in overthrowing the law. There were, of course, many distillers in comparison to the whole number of inhabitants, but these could not have held up as they did had they been unaided. The sequel to the popular uprising, lies in the fact that nearly every man in the community was engaged in producing rye, and therefore the law came home to each and every one of them.
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