History of the city of Washington and Washington County, Pennsylvania and representative citizens 20th century, Part 9

Author: McFarland, Joseph Fulton; Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1474

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No doubt Washington spoke of his journey out to the Kanawha River in Ohio and of the lands he was inter- ested in there. He probably told of the three deer and five buffalo killed and some others wounded on the Kanawha by himself, Dr. Craik and Capt. Crawford, his travelling companions on that trip; and possibly some of his guests would tell him that, far to the east of Pittsburg, there was a creek called Clearfield by the Indians, because, they said, the buffaloes formerly cleared large tracts of undergrowth there so as to give it the appearance of cleared fields. (Bausman's History of Beaver County.) Our host would more particularly describe his return journey from Mingo Town along the Indian trail from west to east across the goodly lands (now in Cross Creek, Smith and Mt. Pleasant Town- ships), "where the branches of Raccoon Creek inter- locked with those of Shirtee, as stated to him last month by Croghan, the very lands he afterward obtained, much to Croghan's dissatisfaction.

On this return trip they must have passed through the dense forest not far from Matthew Rankin's im- provement on the edge of Mt. Pleasant Township, ad- joining lands which afterwards became the location of Cherry's Fort. Rankin obtained 380 acres and had his survey made 15 years after this, based upon the Vir- ginia authorities certifying that he was "entitled to 400 acres of land in the County of Youghiogheny to include his settlement made in the year 1770, also a right in prescription to 1,000 acres adjoining thereto." Others of this family located adjoining. This land is still occupied by some of the Rankin family, one of whom is S. Dallas Rankin. "Rankin" is marked on the map of Pennsylvania made by Reading Howell in 1792. There were other settlers at this early day scattered through the woods and those who were blazing trees, perhaps building a cabin and then selling their claim.

Of the early settlements along the Monongahela River, none were so prominent on the west side as the land now occupied by the only city in our county, Mononga- hela. Abram Decker and Paul Froman obtained war- rants and surveys from Pennsylvania in the midsummer of 1769 for tracts called Southwark and Gloucester, which, with a smail arm of a survey called Mount Pleasant, covered all the river front from the mouth of Pigeon Creek down to "Dry Run." Decker sold to

HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY

Joseph Parkinson, his rights extending from Pigeon Creek down the river, but Parkinson did not complete his title from Pennsylvania until 28 years later. A river ferry was started here and the locality became well known as Devoe's Ferry and Parkinson's Ferry. Joseph was the inn-keeper for many years at this point, and had several brothers, one of whom, Benjamin, figured promi- nently in the Whiskey Insurrection. William Parkinson Warne, Esq., and Boyd E. Warne, Esq., of the Washing- ton County bar, are great-grandsons of Joseph. Paul Froman, next down the river, soon obtained other lands in the county, and his name is frequently used in con- nection with public roads and mills.

Beginning at Dry Run and extending on down the river, was the tract called Wood Park, surveyed in 1785 under authority of a Virginia certificate, which indicates that either Joseph Parkinson or his assigns, Brady and Brooks, had a settlement on it in the year 1770. The plan of lots now below Dry Run is called West Mononga- hela. It does not clearly appear whether Joseph Parkin- son resided first on that tract just below Pigeon Creek or this tract just below Dry Run, neither is it easy to explain why he seemed to lose faith in Pennsylvania and obtained title to the last mentioned land from Virginia. His actions, however, illustrate the perplexities of the early settlers and of this well informed inn-keeper.

The county filled up so rapidly, that on April 20, 1771, Capt. William Crawford, referring to Col. Croghan's great tract of land, informed George Washington by letter that "what land is worth anything is already taken by somebody whose survey comes within the line we run." It was impossible, even at that early date, to get in one tract, as many acres as Washington desired, so his agent, Crawford, had settlements made on lands in Mount Pleasant lying near and east of Rankins. He finally succeeded in obtaining possession by driving out the actual settlers, the MeBrides, Biggers, Reeds, Scotts and others, by action of ejectment in Washington County courts, in 1784. He based his action in this Pennsylvania court upon a patent describing the land as in Augusta County, Virginia, issued by Lord Dunmore, dated July 5th, 1775, although Lord Dunmore had become an Eng- lish Tory and had been driven away from that state by its armed patriots, led by Patrick Henry, on the 8th day of June, preceding.

Lund Washington, a relative of George Washington, obtained a patent in 1779 for 1,000 acres adjoining the Rankin and Cherry lands on the northwest. A portion of this land lying in Cherry Valley in Smith Township was purchased in 1804 by Samuel McFarland, grand- father of the writer, and was his residence and that of his descendants until the year 1890, when it was sold to Maxwell Work, who still resides upon it. The ancient Indian trail from the forks of the Ohio to a point

between Steubenville and Wheeling, ran near or through the George Washington tract, within a few feet of Cherry's fort, through Lund Washington's tract and the Leech settlement. This was probably the by-path which led our illustrious land-hunter, in 1770, to the promised land for which he afterwards made his legal fight, and through the 1,000 acres of good land which Lund Wash- ington patented after he had purchased a military war- rant from Capt. William Crawford.

The methods of the Virginia gentlemen and the specu- lator differed from that of those who came to live on the 300 acres (if so much could be found unoccupied) then allowed to actual settlers. The following picture taken from the diary of Dr. Doddridge (p. 118), shows something of the hardship of the latter.

"April 24, 1773, Reached Ligonier. In this journey we overtook several families removing from the old settle- ments in the State, and from Maryland and New Jersey, to the western country. Their patience and perseverance in poverty and fatigue were wonderful. They were not only patient, but cheerful and pleased themselves with the expectation of seeing happy days beyond the moun- tains.

"I noticed, particularly, one family of about 12 in number. The man carried an ax and gun on his shoul- der-the Wife, the rim of a spinning wheel in one hand, and a loaf of bread in the other. Several little boys and girls, each with a bundle, according to their size. Two poor horses, each heavily loaded with some poor necessaries. On the top of the baggage of one was an infant rocked to sleep in a kind of wicker cage, lashed securely to the horse. A cow formed one of the company, and she was destined to bear her portion of service; a bed cord was wound around her horns, and a bag of meal on her back. The above is a specimen of the greater part of the poor and enterprising people, who leave their old habitations and connections, and go in . quest of land for themselves and children, and with the hope of the enjoyment of independence, in their worldly circumstances, where land is good and cheap."

We have heretofore spoken only of our land being embraced in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. In this year, 1771, Bedford County was erected "because of the great hardships the inhabitants of the western part of the County of Cumberland lie under from being so remote from the present seat of jurisdiction and the public offices." The former county seat, Carlisle, had been distant about 175 miles from Catfish's Camp, but now the county seat at Bedford is not more than 100 miles away. How convenient it must have been for litigants, witnesses and jurors, who must either go to court astride a horse, or walk. However, the earliest pioneers west of the river were not yet office-seekers. They were seeking farms and homes and were left largely to fight for them among themselves.

The dissatisfaction naturally arising in those residing far from the seat of county government was decreased but little by the new organization, and it extended over

HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY

our lands for only two years. There were but two town- ships in this great region west of the river, Pittsburg being north of Spring Hill Township, the dividing line between them running due west from the mouth of Redstone Creek to the (unknown) western line of the Province of Pennsylvania. The land of Greene County, and a strip of Washington County, lying a little north of Ten Mile Creek, was settled with more than five times as many men as the whole residue of old Washing- ton County, including from the Ohio River south almost to Greene County. It is evident that the great influx of earliest pioneers was over the Braddock and Col. Burd roads, instead of over the Forbes road through Pittsburg. This southern part, or Springhill Township, was safer because nearer Virginia and farther from the forks of the Ohio and the Indian country.

Difficulties soon arose between the newly arrived and the provincial tax collector, and the sheriffs and other officers were no doubt often evaded, and no doubt often exercised, or seemed to exercise, great hardships on those who were haled into court, 100 miles away. Costs for long mileage and days' travel became enormous to those who had but little money, and the taxables thought . it was "an imposition to oblige them to pay taxes for building court houses, etc., in Bedford County."

They looked forward to an early time when His Majesty the King would establish a new organization, a colony or state west of the mountains. A certain Col. Michael Cresap, a fur trader, who had been at Redstone for a year or two, was prominent in furnishing arguments against Pennsylvania, while Col. Croghan re- sisted the tax collector with threats of death. Combina- tions were attempted and papers signed to oppose, even to the risk of their lives, "every of Penn's laws," as they called them, "except felonious actions." A petition signed by 220 names of people living to the westward of Laurel Hill, was presented to court at Bedford in July, 1772, charging the government and officers of the court with great oppression and injustice, and prayed that directions be given to the sheriffs to serve no more process in that county, as they apprehended it was not in Pennsylvania."

The attorney who presented this petition, Mr. Brent, a Marylander, offered as argument in support of it "the uncertainty where Pennsylvania ends and the hard- ships on the people to live under authority that was perhaps usurped." We of the 20th century would not expect to attend court at so great a distance from home, yet Capt. Arthur St. Clair, prothonotary of Bedford County, whose letter reports this proceeding, says, that "many people from the doubtful part of the country

were present." These apparently were not the peti- tioners, for they seemed pleased with the conduct of the court in rejecting the petition.

The failure to get relief through court did not allay the irritation, and soon we hear of the sheriff and his deputy being waylaid by about a dozen armed men, who threatened to put them both to death and swore in the most dreadful manner, that if they returned to attempt to serve process, they would be sacrificed or followed to their own houses and be put to the most cruel death. The sheriff knew several- of them and mentions as the ring- leaders the two Teagardens, Abraham and William, Jr. This intimidation must have been on or near Washington County soil, as the Teagardens were assessed in 1772 in Springhill Township, above mentioned, and were located on lands near the mouth of Ten-Mile Creek.

It does not appear that our inhabitants were much benefitted by being almost two years under the control of Bedford County. They were left to travel the old single-file Indian trails and to go across the Mononga- hela River to find any active justice of the peace or constable. The horrid savage, with his unintelligible grunt, frequently appeared, startling the laborer in the clearing or the dwellers in the little cabin with his stealthy actions or his demand for food, although pro- fessing friendship. The sense of insecurity was increased when, by orders of Gen. Gage, the garrison at Fort Pitt was abandoned in the fall of 1772, and the British, who had been guarding this frontier since the fort was built in 1759, marched off, leaving this region entirely in the hands of a civil government whose efforts, as they appeared to the frontiersman, were limited to the col- lection of taxes.

What became of the early settlers who refused to remove from Redstone has not been recorded, but years afterward the courts decided that settlements on land prior to the opening of the land office gave no priority of title whatever, and that to obtain a title to lands lately sold by the natives it was absolutely necessary to apply to the land office in the usual and accustomed method. Indeed, "for a few years after the American Revolution, the sentiment of some of the judges were unfriendly to settlers and improvers, but a change of opinion took place about the year 1793, and the courts of nisi prius, held in the spring of 1795 in Washington County, gave preference to an actual settler over a subse- quent right expressly created by the laws of Virginia." (Per Yeates, judge, in 3 Binney, p. 175; decided in the year 1810.)

We are now entering into a long period when titles, jurisdictions, lives and liberty, are all uncertain.

CHAPTER VI

CONFLICTING CLAIMS OF PENNSYLVANIA AND VIRGINIA

Westmoreland County Established-Western Boundary Uncertain-Lord Dunmore Visits Pittsburg-Westmoreland County Judge becomes an Adherent of Virginia-Dr. John Conolly Takes Possession of Fort Pitt-Dissatis- faction with the Location of the County Seat-Virginia also appoints Magistrates at Pittsburg-Conolly Arrested-Intimidates the Court-Arrests of Justices and Others-Attempts to Compromise on State Line -Cresap and Other Traders and Speculators declare War of Annihilation-Indian Massacres-Logan Retaliates-Dunmore's War-Peace Treaty.

We come now to the establishment of Westmoreland County. Two years previously Bedford County had been organized upon petition of the frontier people, but it is clear the government by courts must be brought closer. The violent evidences of dissatisfaction and the deter- mined effort to avoid taxation and process was no doubt the chief incentive inducing those loyal to Pennsylvania to again petition the Legislature early in 1773. The first petition from a number of Freeholders and inhab- itants on the west side of Laurel Hill in the County of Bedford, praying the governor and Council "to erect said part of the County of Bedford, west of Laurel Hill, into a separate County," did not arouse that slow acting body. But another petition being presented a few days later, and the information coming from the governor, Richard Penn, that he was ready to act, a bill was passed February 26th, erecting a county "henceforth to be called Westmoreland." Up to this date county names, with the exception of Philadelphia, had been exclusively English, but the names of the counties hereafter will show allegiance to a new idea. This was the last county erected under the Proprietary Government, and we remained in it eight years-years full of disputes, doubts, war and lurking danger.

The first doubt is the old uncertainty which had caused the riotous conduct during the two years we were in Bedford County. The line of Westmoreland followed the top of Laurel Hill or Ridge, so far as it can be traced, "thence along the ridge dividing the waters of Susquehanna and the Allegheny River to the purchase line, thence due west to the limits of the Province and by the same to the place of beginning." To state this boundary, with the map of Pennsylvania of today before us, we would say: "Westmoreland embraced the south- western corner of the State. The line followed the

eastern line of Fayette, Westmoreland and Indiana to. the corner of Clearfield County, thence across Indiana County westward to near Kittanning, thence due west to the western limits of the State, and thence by the un- known western and southwestern limits to the top of Laurel Ridge Mountains. The county seat was estab- lished at the house of Robert Hanna, in Hannastown, a little settlement on the Forbes road, 35 miles east of Pittsburg and about three miles northeast of the site of Greensburg. Arthur St. Clair, who had been prothono- tary or chief clerk of courts, at Bedford, petitioned for the same official position in this new county and got it. This is the name we must not forget, and his appoint- ment was an act of wisdom. He was a Scotchman, 38 years of age, a graduate of the University of Edin- burg, and had been an English soldier and with Gen. Wolf in that decisive battle upon the Plains of Abraham. It was his pen that reported to the council in Phila- delphia the lawless acts of the dissaffected, and it is from his large correspondence we get the most interesting news from the early days. He held this office about two years, until he went into the American army in the Revolutionary War.

William Crawford, the friend of Washington, being first named in the general commission of justices of the peace issued for this country became its leading justice, or president judge of the courts. He held his office about two years, when his commission was revoked because he had accepted a similar commission from Vir- ginia.

In the midsummer of 1773 the newly appointed gover- nor of Virginia visited Capt. William Crawford, at his home, about 16 miles east of Brownsville on the Youghie- gheny River, and passed on down the Braddock road to Pittsburg. This Lord Dunmore was full of the im-

HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY

portance of his office under the King, and the air of royalty about him must have made quite a favorable impression upon the newly appointed president judge in the backwoods of Westmoreland County. Had he been attended on this trip by George Washington, who was only prevented from accompanying him by the death of his step-daughter, Crawford would probably have gone with them down to Pittsburg, where Lord Dunmore met Dr. John Connolly.

Governor Dunmore had come up from Virginia to arrange a scheme to secure Pittsburg, the Monongahela Valley and the land westward, for Virginia. It has been written by John Ormsby (or in a hand similar to his), that he came "to sound the inclinations of the in- habitants as well as the Indians. When Lord Dunmore arrived in Pittsburg he lodged at my house and often closeted me, as he said, for information respecting the disposition of the inhabitants. He threw out some dark intimations as to my usefulness, in case I would be concerned, but as he found I kept aloof he divulged his plans to Connolly, and I suppose to John Campbell, else why give him the aforesaid grant of land which he enjoys and is very valuable." The same writing states that "Connolly, like a hungry wolf, closed with Dunmore a bargain that he would secure a con- siderable interest among the white inhabitants and the Indians on the frontier. In consequence of this agree- ment my lord made him a deed of gift of 2,000 acres of land at the Falls of the Ohio, and 2,000 more to Mr. John Campbell, late of Kentucky, both of which grants are now owned by the heirs of Col. Campbell." (From 11 Olden Time, p. 93.)

Dunmore's influence is shown by Campbell's actions. It is reasonable to conclude that the governor's argu- ments and plans, revealed to Capt Crawford on that visit, led that president judge of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, to advise his friend, George Washington, to take out a patent from Virginia for his Westmoreland County (now Washington County land, the land men- tioned in the preceding chapter), as in this way he would be sure to prevent future dispute and trouble. This letter of advice was written January 10, 1774, and no time was wasted in getting a survey made by Crawford, followed by patent dated July 5, 1775, issued by Lord Dunmore, governor of Virginia, to George Washington, for the lands, describing them as "being in Augusta County, Virginia, on the waters of Miller's Run, one of the branches of Chartier's Creek, a branch of the Ohio." Strange to say, this patent is dated 27 days after Dunmore was driven from Virginia by the enraged inhabitants of that colony.

On the 20th of June of that year Lord Dunmore wrote to Connolly at Pittsburg suggesting that he send Capt. William Crawford to fight the Indians, saying, "I know

him to be prudent, active and resolute, and therefore very fit to go on such an expedition."' By the 1st of October Crawford is a major under Dunmore and one of his leading officers in what is known as Dunmore's War. On the following January 25th, Crawford's com- mission as justice or president judge was revoked by Pennsylvania, because he had accepted a commission as justice under Virginia and became a violent partisan.

It has been suggested by some writers that Lord Dunmore on his visit to Pittsburg had a deeper design than the mere holding of Pittsburg and old Washington County for the State of Virginia. That he expected to bind the disaffected in this region to Virginia, to stir the Indians into war, then make a peace treaty, by which means he would have control of the dissatisfied whites as well as the Indians, to use them in behalf of Great Britain in her war with the colonies, now about to break out. Thinking men were then forming opinions and making alliances for or against the mother- country. A royal schooner anchored at a seaport in Rhode Island had been burned by a mob of so-called patriots in 1772, and the "Boston Tea Party,"' on December 16, 1773, had blackened the waters of the bay with tea chests upon which the colonists refused to pay import duty. Such unlawful and violent acts did not receive the approval of some of the wisest men, and tended to make them royalists in sympathy.

Washington was a loyal Virginian, but not yet fully tested and known to be an American patriot. He could not then foresee that within two years he would be commander-in-chief of a continental army, fighting against the troops of Great Britain, under whose banner he had formerly marched; fighting against the imperious king whose subject he was. Had he traveled with his governor, the royal representative; had he been at the meeting at Capt. Crawford's and with Dr. John Con- nolly at Pittsburg-Connolly, of whom he had written two years ago that he was "a very sensible and intelli- gent man"; had he joined these men in their loyalty to the mother country and in their efforts to oppose the jurisdiction of Pennsylvania, making their schemes his own-who can calculate the result and who can say what would have become of the War of the Revolution.

It is not surprising that Justice Crawford became dis- gusted with the weakness and lack of support he received from Pennsylvania's chief officials. However, he did not go so far from his allegiance as some of his associate justices. At least two of the dozen or more appointed with him to uphold the laws in Westmoreland County soon became English Tories, influenced no doubt by their daily associations with Dr. Connolly at Pittsburg.

The Doctor had returned the visit of my lord and imbibed more fully of his ideas of vigorous government, so on January 1st, 1774, he proposed a New Year's

HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY

gift, and surprised the settlers by issuing a proclamation showing how he intended to aid the people in their government. He pasted up notices at Pittsburg to the effect that he was now "Captain Commandant of the militia of Pittsburg and its dependencies, under appoint- ment from his excellency John, the Earl of Dunmore, Governor-in-Chief and Captain-General of the Colony and Dominion of Virginia, and Vice-Admiral of the same." After overwhelming our plain people with this high sounding introduction, he assures "His Majesty's subjects settled on the western waters, that, having the greatest regard to their prosperity and interest, and con- vinced from their repeated memorials of the grievances of which they complain," the governor proposes the erection of "a new County, to include Pittsburg, for the redress of your complaints, and to take every other step that may attend to afford you that Justice for which you solicit."'

He required and commanded "All persons in the De- pendency of Pittsburg, to assemble themselves there as a militia on the 25th instant, when other matters would be communicated."'

Much adverse comment has been made on this move, by Virginia, but it was a most natural and reasonable action. The inhabitants at Pittsburg had been much disappointed when the trustees to select a county seat for Westmoreland ignored Pittsburg and selected Robert Hanna's house, 35 miles out in the country. Eneas Mackey, one of the justices at Pittsburg, complains seriously to the new prothonotary, St. Clair, about locat- ing where there are "neither houses, tables or chairs. Certainly the people must sit at the roots of trees and stumps, and in case of rain the lawyers' books and papers must be exposed to the weather and they cannot be presumed to write. The whole inhabitants (of Pitts- burg) exclaim against the steps already taken, to the injury of the county, yet in its infancy, and that too, before it got its eyes or tongue to speak for itself." George Wilson, another justice, who lived among a nest of Virginians at George's Creek above Redstone, shared the disappointment, for he, as one of the trustees to choose the location, had voted for Pittsburg, which was much easier reached by his neighbors.

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History of the city of Washington and Washington County, Pennsylvania and representative citizens 20th century, Part 9

Author: McFarland, Joseph Fulton; Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co., Chicago, pub Publication date: 1910 Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1474

Author: McFarland, Joseph Fulton; Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1910
Publisher: Chicago, Richmond-Arnold Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1474