A history of the Mahoning Valley must deal chiefly with comparatively recent events. Until white men came here to dwell, about 120 years ago, occurrences in this vicinity must be largely a matter of speculation. There is neither history nor reliable tradition concerning the inhabitants of the vast territory north of the Ohio River and west of the Alleghany Mountains prior to that time. For at least 100 years before the coming of civilized men, there is reason to believe, the Mahoning Valley was not permanently inhabited at all, at least not in the sense that term is usually applied; but was a sort of No Man's Land between savage tribes on the east and west, and between advancing European civilization and the already doomed and slowly receding Indians who had been its occupants.

The region drained by the Mahoning River and its lower reaches, now known as the Big Beaver and Little Beaver rivers, was then, as it is now, a principal gateway between the East and West. This narrow area between the southern shore of Lake Erie and the Ohio, where that river receives the waters of the Beaver and then turns sharply southward on its way to the Father of Waters, affords access to those gaps in the Alleghanies through which this mighty range may be crossed with least effort from the valleys of the Potomac and the Susquehanna, as well as to the great table land into which the Appalachian ranges subside before crossing the northern border of Pennsylvania, a plain extending from Lake Erie to the Hudson River and forms the only break in this mountain chain in its entire course from the Gulf of Mexico to the St. Lawrence. Through these gaps passed numerous trails over which Indian tribes moved backward and forward from time immemorial in pursuit of conquest or better hunting grounds. Through this area came, in flat-bottom boats down the Ohio, or in pack trains over the forest pathways, the first white settlers to locate in this part of the world. Within it may now be found the lines of practically all the great transcontinental railroads of the United States.

The Indians found in possession of the North American continent by Europeans were not its first inhabitants. They had been preceded, perhaps by many races, but certainly by one race which has left indubitable

evidence of its existence. Whether the first inhabitants of America came from Europe or from Asia is a disputed question. There are facts supporting the theory that they were of Eastern origin and came here by way of the Behring Straits. The most widely accepted belief, however, is that the continent was first peopled by men who came here from Northwestern Europe, crossing the Atlantic over an isthmus which is supposed to have existed ages ago between the European and North American continents and to have subsided to form the shallow bed of the North Atlantic Ocean. Both of these theories are founded upon pure speculation. There is not a single positive fact to indicate whence came the first race of which we have definite knowledge, and which is generally known as the. Mound Builders, the definite period of its existence, or what became of it. These interesting questions will probably remain forever unanswered, in spite of the industry of scholars and the imagination of writers. Concerning them there is neither history nor legend, and even nature, prone to make amends for the neglect of men by preserving the story of the ages in a more or less intelligible manner, sheds no light that might conduct the historian through the gloom in which they are enveloped.

The Mound Builders must have been a numerous and energetic race. They occupied at one time or another widely separated portions of this continent, a fact proven by their earthworks scattered from the Atlantic to the Pacific and from the Lakes to the Gulf. It is even possible that they were progenitors of the races found in South and Central America, since there is considerable similarity between the monuments of all these peoples. So fare as the earthworks found in North America are concerned, there is reason to believe that they were erected by different races, or at least at widely separated periods. Those found within the present limits of Ohio indicate this, dissimilarity of origin, and even give evidence of having been erected 'for widely different purposes. Those in the northern portion are generally lighter and less complicated in construction, and seem to have been intended for purposes entirely unsuited to those in the southern section of the state.

Interesting as are these relics of a forgotten race, it is possible here to refer to them in only the briefest manner. Great as is the temptation to speculate upon their origin and to dilate upon the fascinating story they tell, this must be left to others whose efforts cover a wider field. Volume after volume has been written concerning these earthworks, the authors including students and investigators on both sides of the Atlantic, who have devoted many years of patient study to an attempt to solve the problems presented by, them. Those who have the time and inclina tion to pursue the subject farther than it may be followed in this volume will have no difficulty in securing in any well stocked library abundant literature. Nor will they have any difficulty in finding plausible and scholarly arguments to support almost any theory they may care to adopt concerning these remarkable mounds. The subject is discussed in this chapter only because these numerous people at one time undoubtedly roamed over the Mahoning Valley, perhaps lived in it and certainly had their most populous cities not fare from this region.

There are at least twelve thousand separate earthworks in Ohio that are unquestionably the remains of construction by the Mound Builders.

They are divided into two classes, enclosures and mounds around which there were no walls. Of the enclosures, which first challenge attention because of their great size, the ingenuity shown in the design and location, and the tremendous labor that must have been involved in their erection, there are not so many as the mounds. These enclosures, however, exist in all parts of the state. The majority of them are on high ground, but some may be found in valleys. Unquestionably they were intended chiefly for purposes of defense, although some of them may have been used in other ways.

Of these walled areas the best known and fortunately the best preserved, because it has been restored and cared for by the state and the Ohio State Archaeological Society, is Fort Ancient. The following description of this remarkable fortress is taken from the files of "The Portfolio," a magazine published in Philadelphia more than a century ago. It was printed before the decay of a century and the still snore destructive operations of relic hunters and neighboring farmers had opportunity to undo the kindly protection of nature, which had covered these ruins with a mantle of sod and trees, preserving them almost intact for centuries. The work of restoration has been guided largely by this early description, and has, it is believed, preserved the original. outlines of Fort Ancient, although its appearance must have been very different when it was occupied by thousands of primitive people and was the metropolis of the race by which it was constructed.

"The site of Fort Ancient is a rolling plateau overlooking the valley of the Little Miami, in central Warren County, Ohio. This plateau is cut off from the surrounding country on one side by the Little Miami River, on another by Randall Run, and on a third by Cowan Creek. On these sides of the work the descent is very abrupt, and in prehistoric times must have been almost perpendicular. The plateau extends into the angle formed by these streams in the form of a narrow, irregular bluff, at least three hundred feet higher than the surrounding valleys. This bluff is, in turn, almost cut off from the mainland by a deep ravine extending into it from the southwest, and beyond this ravine were erected two forts or enclosures, the first of which could be approached only over a very narrow neck, and the second only through the first. Around the entire bluff was built a continuous wall, its outlines conforming to those of the level surface and having a length of three and one-half miles.

"This wall was constructed of earth taken from within it, and the excavation evidently formed a moat. In the wall were seventy-two openings, directly in front of each being a mound, so placed as to block the opening, or leave only narrow passageways around the elevation into the fort. The main entrance was long and narrow. It contained a much larger mound, and the passageways around this mound were long and intricate. In this entrance has been found an incredible quantity of human bones, perhaps those of assailants or defenders slain during attacks and buried on the spot. Besides this burial ground, the main north division of the fort, which was separated by a wall from the other portion, contains the largest cemetery found anywhere among the works of the Mound Builders. Outside the walls at various points are found many

groups of skeletons, these suggesting the possibility that they also were those of enemies slain in an attempt to capture the fortification. Evidently Fort Ancient was the scene of many desperate conflicts, and it may have been the point where the Mound Builders made their last stand in the face of an invincible enemy."

Surrounding this great enclosure were many once populous villages, probably located there so as to be in close proximity to the fort, to which their inhabitants may have fled when attacked by some other more war like people. It is generally believed that Fort Ancient was the principal metropolis of prehistoric times, and that here, surrounded by fertile valleys and depending for protection on its largest and strongest defense work, this ancient people perished, fighting for existence against the inroads of a more skillful and warlike invader, much as did many other nations in history.

More instructive, if less interesting to the imaginative reader, are the mounds, or structures not specially designed for defense. These exist in great numbers and in many sizes. They are especially numerous in the southwestern part of the Ohio Valley, although, as has been seen. they are to be found all over the region north of the Ohio River. Most of these were apparently tombs, although some of them were erected without doubt for other purposes, since they were never used for interment of the dead. From these tombs arid the village sites usually found in close proximity to them it is possible to secure data from which we may gain a reasonably accurate idea of the personal appearance, customs and habits of the Mound Builders. Like all primitive peoples, they believed stoutly in a future existence, and associated with it the desires and necessities of mortal life, supplying their dead, especially those of more than ordinary rank, with all sorts of foods and utensils for use in the life to come. Because of this we get from these burial mounds rather full information of how their builders lived, what they ate, what they wore, and how they armed themselves for offense and defense. This is the sum of their story, and this was preserved only by accident. They had no written language and have left no evidence that they communicated their thoughts in any way other than by the spoken word, if we except the ruins which are supposed to have been signal towers so arranged that a succession of fires built upon them could have carried a message from one end of the Miami Valley to the other.

The Mound Builders usually cremated their dead, so far as they could do so in open fires. They interred the bones in groups, except in the case of rulers or chiefs, who were buried singly. Around the bones of these was wrapped a coarse cloth, woven from grasses and the bark of trees. In the tombs were placed weapons, implements of war and utensils of all kinds. These were sometimes of copper, iron or gold, but usually of baked clay. It is evident that they worked the metals only by hammering, and knew nothing of smelting ores, securing their iron from meteorites and their other metals from nuggets. Their weapons were usually made of flint, immense quantities of which they had quarried from Flint Ridge, between Newark and Zanesville. Some of metals and materials

found in the tombs were not of local origin, however, but were evidently brought from long distances.

Remains of the villages in which the Mound Builders lived, with apparently more permanence than that shown by the Indians, furnish one of the most fruitful sources of information concerning the habits and customs of this ancient people. These villages, the more populous of which are always found close to forts or walled enclosures, were clusters of tepees, with roofs made of bark or skins. Around these tepees are found burial pits and pits used for refuse and for the storage of food, and these furnish surprisingly clear evidence concerning family life. The food most frequently found consisted of practically the same grains, fruits and nuts which grow in this region today. They also show that the birds and animals then inhabiting this region survived the mischances of centuries far better than did the human beings, for they were much the same in species, size and appearance as those found here by the white settlers. From these village sites we learn that the dog was then a family institution, much as he is today, and that he strongly resembled—in his bones, at least, the Scotch collie. From things found on these sites it is evident also that the Mound Builders had games similar to quoits. There is nothing to indicate that they were convivial in their habits, special vessels indicating the use of wines or liquors not being found; but there is abundant evidence that they smoked tobacco and loved their pipes, just as the devotees of nicotine among us do. They were also fond of ornaments and spent much labor and effort in securing these.

Although a great proportion of the mounds explored were used exclusively for burial purposes, this was not the case with all of them. The burial mounds were usually mere heaps of earth, added to as the need for graves demanded, but many of the ancient earthworks have distinct forms, such as those of birds, or reptiles. It is probable that these were intended and used for religious ceremonies or religious symbols, some of them being also used for the interment of the priesthood and ruling classes. The skeletons found in such mounds usually indicate a higher type of development, and the difference is so marked in some cases as to lead investigators to suspect that the Mound Builders may have been slave owners, or at least enslaved their conquered foes.

The largest and most interesting of the non-sepultural mounds is that known as "The Serpent." This is located on a high and narrow bluff overlooking Brush Creek, in Adams County. It is thirteen hundred -feet in length, twenty feet wide at the base, and ten feet high for most of its length. Its outlines are those of a snake stretched along the flat top of the bluff with its head to the west and its mouth opened as if to swallow a peculiar oval-shaped mound erected almost within the jaws. Up to this time explorations have developed absolutely no information concerning the purpose of this huge work beyond the fact that it was not used for burials. The natural conclusion is that it was a religious symbol. Both the trees on its surface and the geological conditions surrounding it indicate that this is probably the oldest of the known prehistoric mounds.

There is no way to ascertain accurately the period at which any of these mounds were erected, or of estimating with any certainty the length of time during which they were in use. From observations concerning the earth formations around tFem and from the age of trees growing on their summits, students of the question have fixed the time of their abandonment at five hundred to one thousand years before the advent of civilization. The mounds at Marietta were surveyed by settlers in 1788, and the trees growing on them at that time indicated growth of from 289 to 443 years. Perhaps these trees had succeeded others of similar or even greater age. It is, however, safe to estimate the age of these earthworks at not less than five hundred years, admitting that they may be much older. At some other points the measurement of trees is said to indicate that they have been growing for almost a thousand years, and in still other places remains of trees are found that would indicate even a greater age for the mounds on which they stood.

As time goes on and additional information is accumulated concerning the monuments left by this ancient race, students and investigators become more and more inclined toward the belief that they were the progenitors of the American Indians. This is entirely within the range of possibilities, since, among people living as the Indians did, with no fixed habitations and no written language, subject to constant warfare with hostile neighbors and frequently losing their tribal distinctions, the disappearance of all •tradition concerning ancestors a thousand years previous might easily be explained. A discussion of this question is not; however, within the province of this work and too much space has already been devoted to this fascinating subject. It must be dismissed with the observation that, whatever theory may finally be accepted to account for the origin and disappearance of the Mound Builders, the facts must remain merely a matter of opinion. We know that such a race once existed ; that it had gods and worshiped them ; homes and cherished them ; vanities and indulged them; was without inclination or skill to record its story for future ages—and this is all we may know with certainty concerning these, probably the first human beings who trod the soil upon which we now live. Over their tombs, altars and fortresses trees have been growing for a thousand years. Over their history hangs, impenetrable, the gloom of ages unlighted by letters. Around their origin, as around their fate, cling the mystery and pathos usually associated in the imagination with things concerning which there are no known facts.

Two elevations believed to have been erected by the. Mound Builders are located along the upper Mahoning River, in Trumbull County, but they are small and have never been explored. Two more may be found within the limits of Mahoning County, near Sebring, but they are not in the Mahoning Valley. A small elevation resembling the prehistoric mounds exists in the northeastern section of Youngstown. This is supposed to have been erected by the Mound Builders, but no excavations have been made in it, and its right to be considered as one of their works seems somewhat questionable.

men other than American Indians have been found in various parts of the Mahoning Valley. While these are chiefly in the form of elevations or excavations in the earth, they are plainly not the work of Mound Builders, and must have been made by people who were here long after the Mound Builders left and yet long before the first settlers came. Near Orangeville, in Hartford Township, Trumbull County, a locality strictly speaking not within the Mahoning Valley but practically a part of it, is a work known locally as "The Old Road." This is an earthen embankment apparently thrown up from excavations along either side for a distance of nearly half a mile. Its direction is straight northeast and southwest for most of the distance, but there are some curves. The first settlers found this embankment covered with forest of apparently the same age as that which surrounded it Such excavations as have been made give no clue to the origin or purpose of this embankment. In the same locality the first settlers found numerous excavations which had evidently been made for wells, as some of them had been walled up with rough stones. These seemed, from the trees above them, to be of the same age as the embankment above referred to, and are equally without explanation.

Near Austintown several evidences of activities such as the Indians were not known to engage in have been found. These are flat areas covered with stones, beneath which were several feet of flat stones set on edge in a way that must have required great labor as well as some skill and some specific purpose. The settlers found them when they came, and usually regarded them as Indian burying grounds, although the Indians have never been known to bury their dead in this manner elsewhere. It is unfortunate that none of these works has ever been explored.

Our positive knowledge concerning the prehistoric dwellers in the Mahoning Valley is, as we have seen in the preceding chapter, confined to the fact that they must have disappeared long before Europeans set foot upon this continent. From that time until the beginning of the seventeenth century, a period variously estimated at 500 to 1,000 years, there is neither history nor plausible tradition concerning the occupants-of this region. These centuries are, strangely enough, wrapped in obscurity deeper even than that of those preceding them, for not even the speculation inspired by prehistoric mounds suggests their story.

DeSoto's ill-starred expedition to and beyond the Mississippi, about 152o, with the earliest explorations along the Atlantic coast, have left some definite information concerning the aborigines of the eastern and southern sections of the United States; but these chronicles, crude and unsatisfactory at their best, throw no light upon the situation west of the Alleghanies. The first adventurers into this region found savages who expressed neither knowledge nor curiosity concerning the ruined earthworks all about them, and apparently had no legends in regard to the people who had constructed these works. They were of the race found by Columbus and misnamed Indians, because he imagined them to be dwellers of the Indies, and were entirely similar to the savages already well, if not favorably, known to the settlers on the Atlantic coast.

Ethnologists have named this the Red Race and classified it, into three groups under the names of Algonquin, Kuskhogean and Siouan. They assign the Algonquins to the region east of the Alleghanies from the Carolinas to Hudson's Bay; the Kuskhogeans to the Gulf coast, mainly east of the Mississippi, and the Sioux to the territory north of the Arkansas River and west of the Mississippi. With the last named group are usually included the tribes in the far Southwest and Southern California. In these groups were scores of tribes. Any attempt to name or locate these geographically would be foreign to our task and merely confusing, since they were constantly changing their tribal appellations, their places of abode and the extent of their dominions. It is fairly certain, however, that the Indians between the Lakes and the Ohio, for centuries before white men entered this region, were of Algonquin stock, with perhaps an admixture of the Kuskhogean along the southern border. What tribes were located in this neighborhood we shall presently see.

Among the American Indians were a number of confederacies, generally more or less temporary and usually formed only for the purpose

of defense. The most notable of these was the Iroquois Confederacy, which will be referred to with some particularity because it was destined to have a far reaching effect on the history of this country through becoming a factor in the momentous decision as to whether the North American continent was to be developed under Latin influences, or whether it was to enjoy the more wholesome civilization of the Anglo Saxons. The Iroquois Confederacy was apparently in existence when the first European settlements were made on the Atlantic coast, and it continued unbroken and powerful until near the close of the French and English war, 1755-59. It was known as "The Long House," from the long tepees in which its tribes dwelt, and also as the "Five Nations." The latter designation arose from the fact that it was 'originally composed of the Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida and Mohawk tribes, occupying the great plain between the Lakes and the Hudson River. Later the Tuscarora nation was admitted to the confederacy, which was thenceforward known as "The Six Nations."

This confederation was the most enduring, most powerful and most aggressive combination in the entire history of the American Indians, and seems to have been equally well adapted for defense and offense, although its fame rests chiefly on its conquests. Much of what we know concerning this remarkable union of savages, which has even been said by some writers to have served as a model for the organization of the colonies, is obtained from the Jesuit "Relations," extensive, although somewhat fragmentary, writings of the French missionaries who labored for more than a Century among its constituent tribes and strove with equal zeal for the glory of God and the aggrandizement of France, risking their lives and enduring dangers and discomforts with courage and fortitude beyond the understanding of those who do not appreciate the lofty motives inspiring them.

During the first half of the seventeenth century the Iroquois attacked the Hurons, Neuters and other tribes on the northern shore of Lake Erie, driving them westward i,000 miles and establishing dominion over their lands. They also made war on the New England tribes, the Delawares and the Adirondacks, bringing these tribes into more or less subjection. Their next conquest, with which this narrative is most concerned, was that of the Eries, a powerful tribe at one time master of the region between the Ohio River and Lake Erie. These Indians were called by the Jesuits the Riquerhonnons, by the French the Cats, and by the Iroquois the Erigas. The "Relations" tell us that in 1655 they were utterly destroyed by the Iroquois, who descended on them in a flotilla of canoes, landing at Presque Isle, now the City of Erie. The Eries were driven to their last stand at the "Place of the Panther," some miles inland, at which they had a strong palisade. Although the Iroquois were armed with guns, which they had obtained' from the Dutch and English, they were unable to make headway against the showers of poisoned arrows rained upon them until they brought inland their light canoes, carried these upturned over their heads and thus reached the palisade. Then they stood the canoes on end. mounted the cross bars and overcame the Erie defense. Most of the Erie braves

were slain, together with hundreds of their women and children. The men who escaped were driven into the forest and the other captives absorbed into the Iroquois tribes, a method these crafty Indians had of making good their losses in war. The other side of this story, as told by the Iroquois, is that the Eries had planned to destroy the Senecas, and that their plot was revealed by a Mohawk squaw who had been captured and married by an Erie brave. Acting on her information the Confederacy- rallied its warriors and fell upon the Erie host as it approached the Seneca lands on the Genesee River, surprising and annihilating it. The victors are entitled to their statement, but their history lends probability to the tale of the Jesuits. It is certain that after this date the Eries disappeared from history as a nation, and the Confederacy claimed dominion over the lands they had occupied, including the region of the Mahoning River. Nor did this end its conquests in the West. Marching its warriors through the territory of the Eries in 1689, the Confederacy made a treaty with the Miami nation, on the Maumee River, took as guides a hundred Miami braves, and fell upon the Illini, or Illinois tribe, which occupied the Wabash. This furious onslaught destroyed the. Illinois, leaving their villages filled with dead and in desolation such as moved to pity the French missionary Joliet, who came on the scene soon afterward and who has left as a record of this affair a masterpiece of tragic description. The Iroquois then returned to the Miamis, picked a quarrel with these Indians and drove them southward over the divide to their allies on the Big and Little Miamis. On their way back to the East, they attacked the Shawnees and other Indians along the Ohio, forcing them, with the Miamis, to appeal to the French for help, but failing to conquer them as they had conquered the Eries and the Illinois. In the meantime these fierce and rapid warriors had subjugated the Andastes, a tribe which occupied the banks of the Allegheny River and the territory east to the headwaters of the Susquehanna.

From this time onward fear of the Iroquois existed among the Ohio Indians. Without openly admitting domination of the Confederacy, they exercised constant care to avoid provoking these fierce and bloodthirsty warriors from the East. Consequently, the claim of the Iroquois to dominion over the lands between the Lakes and the Ohio, while never acknowledged by the native tribes, was respected by them to the extent that they never, attempted to locate permanently on these lands, especially that portion of them which later became the Connecticut Western Reserve. It is probable that the hunted over this section and perhaps occupied parts of it at various times, but evidently they had no permanent villages farther east than the Muskingum or farther north than a few miles up that river. The fact that the Iroquois claims had a certain standing is proven by the treaty made with the Senecas and Mohawks at Buffalo, on June 23, 1796, When General Moses Cleaveland purchased from these tribes a title to the lands in the Western Reserve before he began to survey it.

A further indication of the fear in which the Ohio Indians held the Iroquois was their hesitation and division at the outbreak of the French

and English war. Some of these tribes favored the English, but the greater portion of them took no part at the beginning. The Delawares and Shawnees allied themselves rather indifferently with the British, certain chiefs in these tribes having warned Washington of the ambush at Braddock's Field. After the destruction of Braddock's army, however, the Indians on the Ohio and those farther west openly made cause with the French, because •they then believed that the latter would be powerful enough to defend them against the Iroquois, who were allied with the English at the beginning of the struggle. Again, when Forbes approached the French fort at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela and it looked as if the French were losing ground in the war, the Indians deserted De Ligneri, forcing him to burn Fort Duquesne and abandon that important post. In explanation of this wavering policy of the Delawares and Shawnees it should be remembered that the French and Iroquois were enemies from the time that Champlain first defeated the Mohawks on the banks of the lake to which he gave his name, killing several of their chiefs and frightening their warriors with his "fire sticks," a weapon then unknown to the Indians. This was in 1615, and the French victory over the proud Mohawks was never forgiven. Even the Jesuits, who labored among the tribes of the Confederacy more ardently than anywhere else, were never able to make headway because of the enduring hatred of these tribes for everything reminding them of this humiliation.

This matter has been referred to at some length because it sheds light on the absence of any regularly organized tribes in this rich section, where the fertility of the corn fields and the abundance of game and fish would naturally have led to permanent villages. The first' white men to penetrate this region found here scattered bands of Indians whom they called Mingoes, although some of these bands were evidently not properly classified by that term. The Mingoes were adventurous individuals and refugees from the Iroquois tribes, chiefly Senecas. They seem to have had no acknowledged tribal organization of their own, but to have banded together in this wilderness tb escape the strict regulations that governed the confederated tribes. The other Indians found among them were probably remnants of various tribes who were permitted, because of their servility and lack of pugnacity, to reside in this region, perhaps as much because the corn patches cultivated by their squaws were convenient for the lazy Mingoes as because the latter were not sufficiently organized to drive them out. The conglomeration was not an attractive one, and the early settlers found these Indians cursed with all the vices of civilization, but without the virtues .of the neighboring tribes. They were sometimes called Massasaugas, or "blacksnake" Indians, because of their disposition to laziness and basking in the sun.

Of the few bands that can be identified by the meagre accounts left of the first white adventurers into the Western Reserve, one was undoubtedly composed of Caughnewagas, or Connewagas, a small tribe subjugated by the Iroquois farther north and located for a time on Upper Delaware. Others were remnants of the Andastes, and a few were of Delaware origin, although the Delawares of this section were

farther south and west at that time. It is notable that the name of any recognized tribe is not mentioned in such records of Northeastern Ohio as have been preserved, but they were referred to as Mingoes. Such of these Indians as were personally known to the traders were often given names indicating their tribal origin, such as "Onondaga George," who figured in the first legally recognized murder in New Connecticut. It is significant also that the conversations and other communication with the Indians of this band were held in the Seneca language.

The largest of these roving bands of Indians was located at Deerfield and contained about three hundred persons, many of whom were women

The rent in this huge boulder is supposed to have been caused by a bolt of lightning during a council of Mahoning Valley Tribes.

and children. It had no tribal name other than that of Mingo. These Indians were devoutly hated by the first settlers, but it does not appear that they were greatly feared. They seem to have been lazy, thieving savages, prone to steal, especially when they could steal whisky. At some time the Mahoning Valley was undoubtedly occupied by populous Indian tribes, and numerous legends indicate that it was occasionally the scene of important councils. Such a legend is the story of Council Rock, a huge boulder still one of the curiosities of Lincoln Park, in the City of Youngstown. This legend has been embalmed in a painting in the Mahoning County Courthouse. According to tradition the Indians had gathered in this gorge, as was their annual custom, for a council and feast, when a violent storm occurred. Many trees were blown down and the rock was split by a terrific bolt of lightning, killing many of those who had taken refuge near it. This legend is supported by the fact that Council Rock has evidently been riven in twain by some great

force, as well as by the fact that the earliest settlers here found that an unusually large Indian cornfield occupied the land along the river at the mouth of this gorge. The rock may have been rent by its own weight as it settled in its bed, and the cornfields may have been due to the fact that the land at that point was rich and easily cleared. At any rate, no Indian councils were held in this locality since white men were here to observe the facts.

As to the Indians occupying lands other than the Mahoning Valley during the first half of the eighteenth century, there is considerable well authenticated information. They were numerous and, belonged to well defined tribes. About the middle of that century troublous times among them began and from that time forward there was much shifting of locations, ending finally in their removal west of the Indian line established by General Anthony Wayne after the battle of Fallen Timbers and their rapid disappearance from this side of the Mississippi. At the beginning of the seventeenth century the Wyandots, formerly the Hurons and Neuters, occupied the western banks of the Sandusky and territory north and west of that river. They had been driven along the northern shore of the Lakes during the winter of 1609 by the fierce Iroquois, and later driven back again by the Sioux, finally crossing the Straits and settling in the locality named. With them were some of the Ottawas, relatives who had shared their misfortunes. The Miamis were located on the rivers of that name, having apparently come southward from the Maumee with the advent of the Wyandots. The Shawnees lived on the banks of the Ohio, from the Scioto eastward; and with them were many of the Delawares, already moving farther west from their temporary home on the Allegheny and Upper Ohio. On the Tuscarawas River were bands of the tribe bearing that name, and over the remainder of the state were scattered small villages composed of Indians whose tribal affiliations are uncertain. The Delawares, or what was left of this once lordly tribe, were located on the Allegheny, the Beaver and the Ohio as far west as the Muskingum, those on the latter river mingling with the Shawnees, who had originally come from the Virginias and were therefore of the same stock as the Delawares. There were some Mingoes scattered through the western portion of the state and along the Ohio, as at Mingo Town; where Washington found in 177o a village which he described as having twenty cabins and being inhabited by seventy Indians, "all belonging to the Six Nations."

Since there is a general impression, probably erroneous, that the Delawares were the principal occupants of the Mahoning Valley when it was first settled, it may be well here to give some additional information concerning this tribe and its movements since its history became well known. The Delawares were originally known as Lenni Lenape, and were one of the oldest and most honored of the Algonquin tribes when they first came into contact with the Quakers along the Delaware River in 1684. About 1700 these Indians were conquered by the Iroquois. and they then changed their name, adopting that of the river which had been named after a man from the Old World, thus reversing the usual procedure in such matters. They had in the meantime, sold a vast tract of

their lands to Penn, and when he bought from them and the Shawnees the valleys of the Delaware, Cumberland and Susquehanna, they began to feel the pressure of civilization and moved westward, locating on the headwaters of the Susquehanna and the Allegheny, some of them going as far west as the Beaver. At the treaty of Fort Stanwix, the Iroquois, who claimed dominion over the Delawares, again sold their lands to the English, and they were compelled to fare farther west a second time. In this migration they avoided the Mahoning Valley, as this land was claimed by the Iroquois, or Six Nations, and moved around the lower edge of the region, being anxious to avoid locating again on land that their old enemies could dispose of if they should see fit to do so.

The Delawares were at this time divided into three groups, each of which was known by a tribal sign. These groups were the "Monnsys," or "Wolves ;" the "Turkeys" and the "Turtles."

The Monnsys were the last to leave the Allegheny, the Turkey group having gone earlier to the Beaver and the Turtles to the Muskingum. Later these tribes appear to have intermingled in a move farther westward, and we hear of them on the Miamis and even on the Wabash. But they never came north from the Ohio into the Mahoning Valley unless it was on temporary visits during such times as the Iroquois were engaged elsewhere in war, or for short hunting expeditions. The Delawares were about the most docile of all the great Indian tribes. They made several treaties with the whites and, strangely enough, kept these treaties, one-sided as they were. Their story, while only a repetition of that of all the aboriginal tribes who melted away before the sturdy and rapacious pioneers, is more pathetic than usual, because the Delawares were: at first less given to fierce and savage attacks on settlers, and they yielded their ground only with protests full of feeling and expressing a sense of their titter helplessness, as well as after they had tried very earnestly to arrange some sort of compromise by which they could retain their lands. A striking illustration of their plight is given by the situation in which they found themselves at the beginning of the French and Indian war, and the vacillating course they pursued during that momentous conflict. Between memories of the invasion by English settlers of their hunting grounds, fear of the ancient conquerors of their race in the Confederacy, and distrust of the French policy, they were surrounded with difficulties beyond the power of the Indian mind to solve. This situation is graphically painted by Chief Ackowanothio, made to the English in 1758 and interpreted by Conrad Weiser. As printed in the Pennsylvania Archives this document was as follows :

"Brethren, the English, you wonder at our joining with the French in the present war. Why can't you get sober once and think impartially? Does not the law of nations permit, or rather command us all, to stand upon our guard in order to preserve our lives and the lives of our wives and children, our property and liberty.? Let me tell you that was our care ; have a little patience!

"I will tell you, brethren, your nation always showed an eagerness to settle our lands. Cunning as they were, they always encouraged a number of poor people to settle on our lands; we protested against it

several times, but without any redress or help. We pitied the poor people; we did not care to make use of force, and indeed some of these people were very good people, and as hospitable as we Indians and gave us share of what little they had, and gained our affection for the most part; but after all we lost our hunting ground, for where one of these people settled, like pigeons, a thousand more would settle, so that we at last offered to sell it, and received some consideration for it : and so it went on until at last we jumped over the Alleghany Hills, and settled on the waters of Ohio. Here we tho't ourselves happy !

"We had plenty of game, a rich and large country that the Most High had created for the poor Indians and not for the white people. Oh how happy did we live here! but alas! not for long ! Oh your covetousness for land at the risque of so many poor souls, disturbed our peace again! Who should have thought that that Great King Over the Water, whom you always recommended as a tender father of his people, I say, who should have thought that the Great King should have given away that land to a parcel of covetous gentlemen from Virginia, called the Ohio Company, who came immediately and offered to build forts among us, no doubt, to make themselves master of our lands and make slaves of us. To which we could not agree, notwithstanding their fair words. Onontio [the governor of Canada—Ed.], our Father, heard this with his own ears, went home and prepared, in his turn, to take our lands from us, as we, or some of us, suspected. He made a proclamation to us in the following manner:

" 'Children, the King of England has given your lands on Ohio to a company of wicked men in Virginia, who, I hear, are preparing to come and take possession with a strong hand: be on your guard, don't let them make the least settlement on the Ohio ; they will in a few years settle the whole; they are as numerous as muskeetos and nits in the woods; if they once get a fast hold, it will not be in your power to drive them away again; if you think you can't keep them off, tell me so, and I will keep them off.'

"Brethren, we never liked the French, but some of the Six Nations, in particular some of the Senecas, came with the French and took possession of the heads of Ohio ; we did not like, and therefore sent several messages to them to turn about and go the way they came, to prevent mischief, but to no purpose. The French being numerous, and supported by the aforesaid Senecas and other Indians, we were obliged to be still, and by their craftiness and presents, we were brought over to their side of the question; but a greater number of us stood neuter.

"Now, brethren, when that great General Braddock landed at Virginia, with orders from the King of England, to drive away the French from Ohio, and take possession himself of that fine country for the English; the French did let us know immediately, and told us Children, now the time is come of which I have of ten told such an army is coming against you, to take your lands from you and make slaves of you. You know the Virginians ; they all come with him. If you will stand your ground, I will fight with You for your lands, and I don't doubt we will conquer them. The French General's' words, by the assistance of priests,

had great influence with the Indians on the Ohio, brought the Shawnees over in a body to them, they being wronged in Carolina and imprisoned, and had their chief hanged or put to death in a cruel manner. These Shawnees brought over the Delawares tc their measures; they, the Delawares, were drove from their lands, it being sold by the Mohawks, etc., to the New England people, and just then some of those Delawares came to Wyomock, much incensed against the English and were easily brought over to the French and Shawnees.

"Now Brethren, all this, with many other abuses we suffered from our Brethren the English, yet our heart is much afflicted; there remains sparks of love in it toward our Brethren, the English ; were we but sure that you will not take our lands on the Ohio, or the west side of the Alleghany Hills from us; we can drive away the French when we please, they have even promised to go off when we pleased, provided we would not suffer the English to take possession of the Lands, (for, as the French says) we can never drive you off, you are such a numerous people ; and that makes us afraid of your army, which should not, have come so nigh us, we don't know what to think of it. We sent messages of peace, you received them kindly, and you sent us messages of peace, we received them also kindly, and sent you back again more stronger words. Why did not your army stay at Rays Town, [at the eastern foot of the Alleghanies.—Ed.] 'till matters had been settled between us? We still suspect you covet our lands on the Ohio, for you have come against us; but we never heard as yet what you intended to do (after you drove away the French) with the forts and lands on the Ohio.

"Brethren, one thing more sticks in our stomach, which is, that we cannot thoroughly believe that you are in earnest to make peace with us, for when we lived amongst you, as sometimes it would happen, that our young men stole a horse, killed a hog, or did some other mischief, you resented it very highly, we were imprisoned, &c. Now, we have killed and taken so many of your people, will you heartily forgive us and take no revenge on us? Now Brethren, consider all these things well, and be assured that we are heartily inclined to make a lasting peace with you."

This remarkable speech was made after the Delawares, having tried in vain to choose the forces which seemed least likely to immediately destroy them, found themselves on the wrong side and with a heavy score to settle with the "English Father" because of their activities on behalf of the French. In pursuit of these activities and spurred, no doubt, by a sense of their wrongs at the hands of the encroaching settlers, they had made many raids, along with other tribes, into the Virginia and Pennsylvania valleys. The expedition under General Forbes, which forced the destruction of Fort Duquesne and ended the pretensions of the French to control of the Ohio Valley, accomplished this result on November 24, 1758, and practically ended the French and English war, although the fall of Quebec did not occur until the following year, Ackowanothio was trying to explain the shortcomings of his people and provide against punishment. He might as well have saved his breath, for the Delawares soon found their new home no safer than the old and before long had

an even more relentless tide set against them in the form of colonial emigration to the Ohio after the Revolutionary war.

After the war with France the English King, realizing that the extension of the colonies westward was likely to create a new empire over which he could not maintain control, issued a decree forbidding settlements west of the headwaters of such rivers as emptied into the Atlantic, and even forbidding land purchases from the Indians east of the mountains without his royal consent.

He was as powerless as the Indians to stay the westward tide of empire, however, and the settlers, feeling the need of more elbow room, finding the mild ideas of the Quakers little to their liking, and inflamed with cupidity by descriptions of the lands on both sides of the Ohio as a veritable Garden of Eden, swarmed over the trails from Virginia and Southern Pennsylvania, defying alike Indian tomahawk and regal scepter in order to preempt the banks of the Ohio. They traveled in strong parties and hunted the Indians relentlessly, building rude forts in their forests and appropriating their salt springs and corn fields wherever found. Of course the result was war to the knife, and the years between the fall of Quebec and the defeat of the Indian tribes by Wayne at Fallen Timbers, on the Maumee, were filled with tragedies for both Indians and settlers.

It is impossible to look with anything except regret upon the story of these bloody years. Aside from the fact that their tragedies seem to have been generally avoidable, it is impossible to escape the conviction that both Indians and whites were equally to blame, for the latter were as unchristian in their dealings with the Indians as the Indians were savage in their reprisals. It is some comfort to discover that the arbitrary invasion of their rights which drove the Indians to constantly harry with tomahawk and torch the advance of civilization was carried on chiefly by traders and adventurers, rather than by the pioneers, and that the sturdy men and women who laid the foundations of Ohio's greatness were generally anxious and willing to deal amicably, even if somewhat unfairly, with the original owners of the soil. Likewise the historian is relieved to find that the outrages against the Moravian Missions—an incident in the early history of Ohio that is usually passed over in silence or dwelt upon only briefly—were instigated and perpetrated by traders rather than settlers. Most of the adventurers whose acts of cruelty have stained the history of the Ohio Valley came from the Cavalier colonies and regarded the Indians as mere animals, an attitude which is explainable only when it is compared with their later estimate of the Negroes. It was no fault of theirs either, that slavery was never legally established north of the Beautiful River, and that the soil of the Northwest Territory was made free by the Ordinance of 1787. Nevertheless, not all of the traders and adventurers who were responsible alike for the massacre of the Moravian converts and the constant bloodshed between the Indians and whites were from these colonies. Some of them came from Pennsylvania and were of stock that should have made such things impossible. The Moravians were people of a simple creed. Most of their difficulties came from the fact they were conscientiously opposed to bearing arms and that they opposed the use of intoxicants among their

converts. The crafty traders, finding that these missions invariably destroyed the traffic in rum, lost no opportunity to assail the Moravians, undermining their influence with the Indians by treachery and even resorting to murder and arson against the missionaries and their converts.

There is reason to believe that the Moravians had in their creed the sentiment and poetry that was needed to satisfy the longings of the mystical Indian mind, and that, had they been permitted to continue their work without hindrance, the Red Race might have been absorbed into the new civilization, instead of being destroyed by it; and thus the one unlovely page in the history of this country might have been left unwritten.

For the reason that the fate of the Moravian missions has not been given the attention it deserves, as well as that a few writers have preferred to render injustice to these much wronged people rather than to record a story unpleasant to their readers, a short sketch of these missions and their devoted laborers, the only organized missionaries who sought to Christianize the Indians of the Ohio Valley, will be given. The sect originated in the Palatinate among the Bohemians and Bavarians three centuries ago, as the result of the people becoming disgusted with the fanaticism of church and state alike during that unhappy period. They first appeared in America at a settlement in. South Carolina, but were speedily driven from it. Their next missions were on the Delaware, and they also labored among the Mohicans farther north. The Quakers never opposed them, but the fiery Scotch and Irish' settlers of the Cumberland Valley accused them of harboring unfriendly Indians and instigating attacks on those settlements, for which reason they were forced to abandon their establishment at Bethlehem. Next they began work among the Delaware Indians at Goshgoshink, on the Allegheny, and later moved westward, establishing themselves near what is now Salem and on the Muskingum, where their settlements were known as Schoenbrun and Gnadenhutten. In this region they were along the direct route between Pittsburgh and Detroit, which was at that time, the troubled period about 1767, much traveled by lawless parties of both Indians and whites. After the outbreak of the Senecas and Shawnees which followed the murder of Logan's family by border ruffians, the Moravians moved to the Upper Sandusky, hoping to find a peaceful refuge where they could pursue their labors among the Indians, with whom they had become strongly intrenched. It was in this last refuge that the final disaster overtook them. On March 7, 1781, the little colony was visited by a band of whites under command of David Williamson. On the pretense that they had encouraged and harbored English and Indian raiding parties from Detroit during the Revolutionary war, the Moravian Indians, with their chief Glichican, were disarmed and herded into two buildings. In these two structures the entire band, consisting of ninety-six then, women and children, were brutally shot to death and the buildings burned. This foul deed was committed by border men led by a border ruffian and chiefly from along the Ohio River. It was without authority or excuse and is one of the most savage and inhuman incidents in the history of the Ohio Valley. After that, the Moravian leaders were discouraged and never re-established their missions among the Ohio Indians. Some of their descendants and settlers who followed them West

located on the Sandusky, where traces of their religion and customs may be found to this day.

The close of the Revolutionary war gave renewed impetus to the settlement of the Ohio Valley, increased the troubles with the Indians, and brought about conditions that soon culminated in the practical expulsion of the natives from all of the territory now included within the boundaries of Ohio. As soon as the independence of America was acknowledged, the new government adopted a stern policy against unauthorized settlements beyond the Ohio, but it was unable to restrain the impatience of its people, many of whom had acquired roving habits by service in the army and all of whom were filled with ambition to preempt fertile lands at a cost of little or nothing in money, even though at the risk of their lives. These adventurous spirits climbed the mountains on foot or in wagons and descended the Ohio in flat boats, fighting off parties of Indians on both sides of the river, and landing where they saw fit.

Settlements soon lined the banks of the Ohio and began to extend up the Muskingum, the Scioto and the two Miamis. Gen. William Lytle states that in 1780 one party of sixty-three flat boats, containing more than 1,000 persons, descended the Ohio to the point where Cincinnati now stands, landing some distance above the city more than 500 armed men, who attacked the Indians and put them to flight, following them into the forest four or five miles. Repeatedly troops were sent down from Pittsburgh to drive off the squatters, and in 1785, a number of those on the west side of the Ohio refused to move until forced to do so. Even at that these hardy, tenacious settlers returned to their lands as soon as the soldiers left. There were at this time scores of scattered houses along the Muskingum, the Scioto and Hockhocking. The Miamis were not invaded so freely, as the Indians there put up a desperate and long continued fight which small parties were unable to overcome. It was only after land grants had been regularly made and large colonies organized that the fertile lands in what was then known as "the slaughter house of the Miamis" were appropriated and settled.

Until almost at the close of the eighteenth century the Mahoning Valley was without settlers, even though it harbored few Indians, chiefly because Connecticut stoutly claimed the territory and squatters were deterred from invading it by the fear that they would have later to give up their lands or pay for them. One tract in the Mahoning Valley, very valuable because it contained salt springs and was a source of that scarce and desirable mineral used by both whites and Indians for many miles in every direction, was preempted, however, and the Government was later compelled to send soldiers to drive off the invaders and destroy their cabins. This tract was later acquired by General Parsons.

Such were the conditions under which a large part of the State of Ohio was settled. They made the hard life of the unbroken forest still harder, and would have been sufficient to discourage occupation by any except people with the daring and determination which characterized those who finally conquered both nature and the Indians and laid in the wilderness the firm foundations of a state now among the most prosperous, progressive and important in the Union.

The title to all the lands of North America rested originally, so far as history goes, with the Indian tribes occupying them when Europeans first became aware that there was such a continent. Whether this title was morally any better than that acquired by the successors in ownership to these Indians may be questioned, for it was probably secured in much the same way. After all the moral law has never determined the ownership of any considerable portion of the earth's surface, so far as nations are concerned. The rule that "he shall take who hath the power, and he shall keep who can," has prevailed throughout history. Nor is there reason to expect that it will ever be otherwise, much as we may hope from the treaty of Versailles and the new code of international ethics, for the enforcement of which a League of Nations is proposed. It will be wise, therefore, to pass over the moral right of Europeans to occupy this part of the world and confine ourselves to a brief discussion of the more or less legal titles on which it was claimed by several nations when history began in the region northwest of the Ohio River. The principal reason for doing this is the fact that upon these claims and their enforcement depended the highly important question of whether the New World was to be developed under the influence of the Latin races. or whether it was to enjoy the broader, more virile and more enlightened rule of Anglo-Saxon civilization.

If the right of possession depended purely upon discovery and primary occupation, this vast territory would now undoubtedly belong to the Spaniards or the French, for the former were first to discover it and the latter first to occupy it. But the element of possession, strong in the law and even stronger where there is no law, was destined to give the North American continent to neither the Spanish nor the French, but to the English ; while the fortunes of changing years have permitted the latter to retain possession of only a relatively unimportant part of the continent, in which is included none of the land they originally discovered or colonized.

The first official promulgation of a title to North America was the famous bull issued by Pope Alexander VI, May, 1493, shortly after the return to Spain of 'Columbus from his first voyage to the New World. Pope Martin V had previously conferred upon Henry the Navigator, King of Portugal, all the land he could discover to the East along the coast of Africa, and when Columbus came back from his western voyage and reported a new land in that quarter peopled by savages who knew not Christianity, Pope Alexander was eager to encourage further ex-

plorations in that direction. Accordingly, he exercised the right then acknowledged as belonging to his high office to confer a title to undiscovered and unchristianized lands, wherever they might be, so long as they lay to the west; upon the Spanish King and Queen who had shown such commendable zeal in encouraging hazardous ventures of discovery. This papal bull, one of the most remarkable documents in history, took note of the activities of both Spain and Portugal, dividing the undiscovered portion of the earth between these two nations on a line "drawn through the Cape Verde Islands and extending from the Pole Arctic to the Pole Antarctic." Its promulgation proves that the Pope was then regarded as having temporal jurisdiction over all the earth not already claimed by Christians, and also that the globular form of the earth was then regarded as an established fact.

Later Henry the Navigator found that he had been given the poor end of the bargain, and on his protest the line of demarcation was moved westward "three hundred and seventy leagues," by which Portugal was given title to the east coast of South America, but Spain was left in possession of all of North America, or rather in possession of the title to this continent. To make this possession an actual fact, De Soto was sent to Florida within the next quarter of a century. This remarkable expedition, which had for its ostensible purpose the discovery of the fountain of perpetual youth, was doubtless inspired by the knowledge on Spain's part that it would be necessary to speedily reinforce the pronunciamento of Pope Alexander with something that savored of actual possession. De Soto, fired by a zeal for religion and a spirit of romance that seem equally strange in these more practical days, began his wanderings about 1520. There can be no doubt that he was the first white man who saw the majestic Mississippi. Nor is it questioned by any historian that he laid claim in the name of Spain to the entire region drained by this lordly stream, and did so with all the pomp and ceremony required by the customs of the time. Consequently, by decree of an accepted tribunal, as well as by right of discovery, the first European title to the lands in the Mississippi and Ohio valleys was vested in Spain.

Unlike Portugal, France and England filed no formal protest against a decree that somewhat arbitrarily, it must be admitted, divided a world between two other nations. Nevertheless, both nations lost no time in joining the Spaniards in quest of whatever could be found beyond the Atlantic. On behalf of England, the Cabots crossed the ocean so close in the wake of Columbus that they were rivals for the honor of discovering America and skirted the eastern coast in search of the fabulous gold and silver mines supposed to exist there. They found an abundance of fish and a superabundance of forest, neither of which interested the English King, who needed money worse than usual to carry on his schemes of national aggrandizement and personal pleasure. He was disappointed and for more than a century no further effort was made by England to secure a foothold in the western world.

About the same time that De .Soto was carrying his silver and silken banners through the forests to and beyond the banks of the Father, of. Waters, Jacques. Cartier, a Frenchman bold, was sailing up the $L

Lawrence, stopping at every Indian village and every island long enough to give each the name of a saint and to take from the Indians their surplus furs. He did not forget to claim the St. Lawrence Valley and all the lands adjoining it in every direction for France. Cartier called this country Canada, having heard it given that name by the Iroquois Indians. As early as 1541, however, this slight oversight had been corrected, the country renamed "New France," and Sieur de Roberval made its governor as the viceroy of Francis I.

From that time forward the French advanced their occupation of the wilderness by every means in their power. Their first adventurers were soon followed by the Jesuits and later by the Recollects, two orders of missionaries who labored long and faithfully among the Indians and who, as was the custom of those days, cherished the interests of their country only second to those of their church, and lost no opportunity to establish the claims of France to the lands they visited. The enterprise of the French directly southward was checked by the hostility of the Iroquois Confederacy, which never forgave Champlain for the defeat of the Mohawks on the banks of the beautiful lake to which he gave his name, but farther west the missionaries were able to do much toward establishing friendly relations with the Indians. That these fearless and enterprising advance agents of civilization and religion never established missions in the region now known as Ohio is rather remarkable, especially in view of the fact that La Salle undoubtedly was first among Europeans to sail a boat on the waters of "The Beautiful River." La Salle was a Recollect, and there was much rivalry between this order and that of the Jesuits, the latter being usually first on any promising field of endeavor. There is a possibility that the Jesuits, having learned from the Iroquois that Northeastern Ohio was disputed ground, avoided it. They visited the tribes in the northwestern portion at times, but never had a permanent mission among these Indians.

As time went on the French established themselves, through missions and trading posts, at all important points on the lakes and gradually made their way into the interior, having at one time forts and trading posts on the Wabash and the Miamis. They also built Fort Duquesne, having driven away the small English party sent to that point to construct a fort. By the time English colonies had been firmly planted on the Atlantic coast and their first efforts westward began, the French were fairly well established in and stoutly claimed the Ohio Valley, which seemed destined to Gallic domination. The Spanish claims to the coast of the Mexican Gulf and the territory west of the Mississippi were not challenged, English settlements being made only as far south as the Carolinas.

The treaty of Ryswick, made in 1697 between France, England, Spain and other interested countries, gave to France full title to the Valley of the St. Lawrence and also to that of the Mississippi, Spain surrendering her splendid empire in North America, fading out of the picture and leaving the French and English to battle for supremacy of a continent. And battle for this supremacy they did most royally from that time forward. Both redoubled their efforts to occupy the Ohio

Valley. The English had called a council of the Six Nations at Albany in 1684 to arrange some of the ever present difficulties with Indian tribes subject to the Iroquois, and while they were attending to this they adroitly purchased from the Six Nations title to the land occupied by the Delawares, Shawnees and other tribes along the Ohio. This title was of little value, of course, since it was hotly disputed by the Ohio Indians, but the transaction proves that the Iroquois claimed dominion in this region, as well as that the English feared the encroachments of the French even before the Spanish title was questioned. The sum paid for all this land was ten thousand English pounds, and it is interesting to note that the Iroquois insisted on so high a price because the sale included their lands in what is now Northeastern Ohio, from which they obtained much game and many excellent fruits. The contest of wits and war, in which the Europeans furnished most of the diplomacy and the Indians most of the fighting, went on without interruption until the fall of Fort DuQuesne, in 175$. This event was preceded, and was, in fact, brought about, by the defection of the Indians from the French cause, the Ohio tribes having discovered that the English were gaining in strength and, as usual, hurriedly transferred their allegiance to the side With the best prospect for victory.

The fall of Fort DuQuesne practically ended the contest between England and France for control of the Ohio Valley. One year later Quebec was surrendered, and the following year Montreal was taken, the French, like the Spaniards, withdrawing from a magnificent empire which courage and enterprise had placed within their grasp, but which they had been unable to retain because of complications arising from less worthy ambitions of their rulers in the Old World.

England's possession of the much coveted Ohio Valley was even more brief. Twenty years later her colonies had established their independence and forced her to reluctantly abandon her claim to all territory south of the. Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence. The Louisiana Purchase, in 1803, completed the elimination of European control from all territory, within the present continental limits of the United States, except that of Alaska, Florida, some later disputed territory in the northwest, and that acquired following the Mexican War and by the admission of Texas to the Union.

These mighty changes in the influences dominating development of the North American continent have not been equaled in their far reaching effect on human welfare and progress during any similar period in the written history of men. They seem to have been arranged by a Providence seeking here a home for civilization of a new order which should point the way to old and decadent peoples and light in the name of liberty a torch destined to illumine the world.

We have seen with what complacency the Popes disposed of un christian lands not even yet discovered, but this assumption of authority had later a healthy rival in the freedom with which the English King parcelled out vast areas on this continent before they had even guessed it limits or made the slightest inquiry into the value of that which they wet, giving away to favorites and members of their courts.

The early English grants were usually defined by parallels of latitude so far as the northern and southern limits were concerned. Their boundaries on the east frequently included "Islands in and abou and adjacent thereto," and they extended westward to the "Thy Southern Sea," a name generally accepted as applying to thy Pacific Ocean, because the Spanish had already discovered that ocean any mapped its eastern shores for a considerable distance. Some of these quaint documents indicate that the knowledge of the grantors did no extend more than a few miles from the Atlantic coast, and none of then manifest even a respectable degree of imagination concerning who was to be found west of the Alleghany Mountains. Neither are the, notable for accuracy in point of latitudinal lines and most of them con flirt or overlap others, an evidence that the grantees usually asked for al they could possibly get and generally got all they asked for, even though part of it had been already given to other applicants.

In ordinary legal procedure, the first grant of title is fundamental am all succeeding conveyances must rest upon and be confined within it limits. But in the case of kingly generosity with the lands of the American Indian, this was not held to be good law, it being maintained tha the king was superior to all laws and that it was his privilege to take away that which he had sold or given and bestow it upon another at hi: pleasure. As a result of this, and in consequence of the carelessness and ignorance of the English kings, nearly all the original land grants over lapped, and much confusion was created. The Indians had little better idea of the sanctity of a land contract. They did not hesitate to sell the same territory over and over again to different buyers. There was mud dispute among them as to the ownership of different sections of the land and some of the tribes assumed authority to dispose of regions inhabited by other tribes which they claimed to have subjugated. From these con ditions arose endless claims and counter claims, which occupied the attention of state governments, courts and the national government well into the eighteenth century, caused more or less bloodshed and much hard feeling, and left a cloud upon titles for many years.

The first charter granted was that of Virginia, which was approved by James I after the close of the war between Spain and England had left the latter country free to extend the area of its occupation in America. This charter is dated April, 1606, and conveyed to Sir Thomas Gates and others all the land within one hundred miles of the Atlantic coast between the thirty-fourth and forty-fifth degrees of latitude. A second charter enlarged the political privileges of this colony, and extended its lands westward and northwestward indefinitely. A third, granted in March, 1612, extended its limits to include the Bermuda Islands and all of the territory between the thirty-fourth and forty-first degrees of latitude. The original Virginia charter, it will be seen, included practically all of New England, and the final document left about half of what is now Pennsylvania in the Virginia colony.

The second charter was that of New England, which granted to Sir Ferdinand Georges and others "all that Circuit, Continent, Precincts and Limicts in America, lying and being in breadth from Forty Degrees of Northerly Latitude, from the Equinoctial Line, to Forty-eight Degrees of said Northerly Latitude, and in Length by all the Breadth aforesaid throughout the Maine Land from Sea to Sea," at the same time stipulating that this territory should be known by the name of New England. This comprehensive grant included about one degree of the last grant made to Virginia, and extended northward to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, as well as westward to the Pacific Ocean. This patent is dated November 3-13, 1620, and was issued before the revocation of the Virginia charter, which it overlapped, the latter having been recalled in 1624.

A bewildering succession of charters followed, but, as practically all of the northern portion of the continent had been disposed of, these were located within the confines of the grants already mentioned. Most of them were exceedingly hazy in their definitions. Since it is with the charter of Connecticut, out of which finally grew the Connecticut Western Reserve, that this chapter is principally concerned, we may pass over all of these, leaving to the reader who desires to explore the labyrinth of titles resulting from the other grants to pursue the subject at his pleasure. This may be done in great detail in McDonald's "Select Charters Illustrative of American History," as well as in many other works devoted to this subject.

The original charter of Connecticut was granted by Charles II to John Winthrop and others, its date being April, 1662. Unlike many of the previous charters, it was meant to cover territory actually settled, and Winthrop was at the time governor of the colony of Connecticut. Further, the petition for this charter was made through the general court of the colony, which had, its center at Hartford, and was, with New Haven and other settlements, a part of New England, occupying land conveyed under the original charter of 162o.

After reciting as a reason for the grant that "by the several Navigations, discoveryes and successful plantations of diverse of our loving subjects of this our Realme of England, Several Lands, Islands, Places, Colonies and Plantations have byn obtayned and setled in that part of the Continent of America called New England, and thereby the Trade

and Commerce there hath byn of late years much increased," and stating that he had been informed by the petitioners that "the greatest part thereof was purchased and obtayned for great and valuable considerations, and some other part thereof gained by Conquest and with much difficulty, and att the onely endeavors, expence and Charge of them and their Associates," Charles proceeded to "Give, Graunt and Confirm unto the said Governor and Company and their Successors, All that part of our Dominions in Newe England in America bounded on the east by Norrogancett River, commonly called Norrogancett Bay, where the said river falleth into the Sea, and on the North by the lyne of the Massachusetts Plantation, and on the South by the Sea, and in longitude as the lyne of the Massachusetts Colony, runinge from East to West, (that is to say,) from the said Norrogancett Bay on the East to the South Sea on the West parte, with the Islands thereunto adjoyneinge."

It will be seen that this charter included a majestic territory. Its distances, so carelessly stated, proved to be veritably magnificent. It did not embrace the territory of New Netherlands, then in undisputed possession of the Dutch, and spared by a clause exempting lands held by any other Christian race or people, but it did cover a large part of the grant later made to William Penn under date of March 4-4, 168o, and also the land embraced in the colony of New Haven, which at that time was distinct and separate from the Hartford colony. It extended from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and took in territory from which ten splendid states have since been carved. There has been a general disposition to question the knowledge, as to its extent, of the king who gave away this magnificent territory, but it is certain that, even if he and his advisors did not know or care how much land was involved, others did, for the Plymouth Council, in resigning the grant made to it in 1635, dilated on the extent of territory being given up, saying that New England extended "from sea to sea, being near about three thousand miles in length."

New Haven was settled by a distinct class of people, and for a time resisted amalgamation with the Hartford colony. The New Haven settlers were generally Presbyterians, being distinguished from the Puritans by the stubborn refusal of the latter to recognize the Church of England. New Haven people had given refuge to the murderers of Charles I and refused for some time to recognize Charles II.. Rather than accept the new government they appealed to the Commissioners of the United Colonies and thus the matter stood when, in 1664, the English conquered the Dutch and wrested from them New Netherlands, which was promptly bestowed by the king upon his relative, the Duke of York. This movement in some manner helped to reconcile the New Haven people to a new arrangement and the union was effected. Connecticut recognized fully the value of its charter, and resisted successfully several attempts to have it annulled. When Andros demanded it in 1687 it was hidden, so says tradition, in the famous "Charter Oak," and remained there more than two years, being finally brought forth after Andros was deposed.

A number of complications arose because of the sweeping claims of the Connecticut charter, some of which occupied the attention of various

state and national tribunals for more than a hundred years. The most serious of these was that arising from the conflict between the Connecticut grant and the grant made to William Penn eighteen years later. It was from this conflict that the Pennamite wars arose, forming a chapter in history worthy of more than a passing glance.

About the middle of the Eighteenth Century the people of Connecticut had reached such numbers and strength that they began to look for additional territory. Many of them were descended from families that had migrated from England to Scotland and later moved into the north of Ireland to occupy estates confiscated there by King James and Cromwell, for which tenants could not be secured except among people of a hardy and adventurous spirit. So it was natural that before long these people should find Connecticut, or Eastern Connecticut, bereft of the elbow room and excitement which they craved, and betake themselves westward to the unexplored territories of their state lying beyond the gap in it caused by the unfortunate occupation of the Dutch along the Hudson.

Their first adventure in this direction took them to the Wyoming Valley. This historic valley is located in what is now Northeastern Pennsylvania. It has been celebrated in song and story, and must have been at that time one of the most beautiful spots in the wilderness between the oceans. The present day visitor finds it a busy, dirty, coal mining district. Its hills, once crowned with lordly forests, are to a great extent bare of vegetation. Its streams, once sparkling clear in the sunlight and teeming with trout, are discolored or dried up. Its fertile plains are covered with mining villages and manufacturing towns. Had the canny New Englanders been able to guess that, in addition to the rich soil and natural beauties that captivated them in Wyoming, they would find there great deposits of anthracite coal, the stubborn fight they made to retain this blood-stained land would be more easily explainable.

At any rate, about 1750 some of them visited this valley in search of ground for colonization. They at once organized the Susquehanna Company and sent a party of settlers, who seized the corn fields of the Indians, drove them out, and built log cabins on the banks of the winding Susquehanna. Soon the Penns discovered that there were squatters on the land they had been given by King Charles and had also purchased from several different tribes of Indians. Because their title was a private affair, they could not enlist the aid of the state to eject the intruders, but they made heroic efforts to do so, these efforts being known in history as the Pennamite wars. There were seven of these wars, in which the New Englanders were seven times expelled from the Wyoming Valley. At one time a project was well under way to erect this valley, only three miles wide and about twenty miles long, into a separate state. Finally, the Revolution came, and the people of both Connecticut and Pennsylvania abandoned their petty quarrel over the Wyoming Valley to lend patriotic aid to the national cause. The Susquehanna Company, an organization through which Connecticut sought to colonize the valley, was in possession at this time, and the region had a population of about 6,000, most of which was destroyed when the Iroquois, under the

lead of the British, swept down on it and in one day, July 3, 1778, massacred the small force of old men and boys defending it, together with the women and children, and burned every house within its confines.

The quarrel over this historic parcel of ground was renewed vigorously after the Revolution, and finally, on the appeal of the Penns, was adjudicated by a court selected to try the issue, which met at Trenton November 12, 1782. This court was in session forty-one days and both sides were represented by the ablest counsel of the time. It was realized that upon the verdict of this court hung possession, not only of the Wyoming Valley, but also of a great part of Pennsylvania. The momentous decision was filed in one of the shortest opinions on record, this being as follows :

"We are also unanimously of the opinion that the jurisdiction and preemption of all the territory lying within the Charter of Pennsylvania, and now claimed by the State of Connecticut, do of right belong to the State of Pennsylvania."

This decree was accepted without question by the State of Connecticut. It has not always been characteristic of the people of that state and their descendants to submit quietly to decisions adverse to their interests and opinions, as witness the rumpus which they started when the government first undertook to raise revenue by taxing whiskey in Pennsylvania ; but it can be said of them that when they made a bargain, they usually kept it, and when, under any circumstance, the welfare and safety of the national government was at stake, they were always found supporting it with vigor and whatever sacrifice might be necessary.

The decision was important, but the acquiescence of the parties to this controversy was even more so, because it was the first tribunal under which the new nation had essayed to settle disputes between the states, and a refusal to accept its decision would have had far-reaching effect on the solidity of the infant government. There has always been great curiosity as to why such a momentous decree should have been made without a word of reason being given in its support. And there has always been a suspicion that before it was announced an understanding was had that, if Connecticut surrendered her claims in Pennsylvania, she would receive a certain recognition of these claims farther west. Of course this is no more than mere assumption. There is not word or line on record to establish any such a conclusion. But it will be seen that these western claims did receive recognition in the disposal of the Connecticut Western Reserve, a territory to which the state had certainly no more legal right than she had to the Valley of Wyoming.

The second charter granted to Virginia defined the grant to that colony as extending southward and northward 200 miles from Point Comfort, and westward "up into the land, throughout from sea to sea, West and Northwest." These boundaries would have included a large

portion of what is now the State of Ohio. Little attention was paid by anyone to them, because they were supposed to have been changed by the third charter ; but, in response to a request from the Colonial Congress shortly before the Declaration of Independence, Virginia had adopted, through a constitutional convention, a resolution which conceded the claims of Pennsylvania and Maryland in their boundary disputes with Virginia, and announced the formal boundaries of that state as those set forth in the second charter and the treaty between Great Britain and France in 1763.

This at once raised the question of ownership of the vast region north of the Ohio River, and held up the adoption of the Articles of Confederation, by which it was proposed that all colonial boundaries should be fixed by Congress without consideration of the clause in the original grants extending them from sea to sea. The times were troublesome enough for the colonists without the injection of quarrels between the various members of the confederation over the extension of their domains. In 1779 Virginia opened a land office for entry of lands west of the Alleghany Mountains, and the organization of numerous companies designed to appropriate the lands in the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys was the immediate result. Other states followed Virginia's example, and it seemed for a time as if the cause of American freedom would be jeopardized by a division over the ownership of land which no state might eventually possess. Three years after Virginia's disturbing action Congress passed a resolution declaring all unoccupied lands to the west of well defined state boundaries to be public domain, belonging to the nation at large and not to. be appropriated without purchase from the national government. Already a tide of squatter immigration had set in, and in 1779, Colonel Brodhead, then stationed at Pittsburgh, was directed to proceed down the Ohio and expel all squatters found on lands on either side of it. At the same time a memorandum was sent to Virginia requesting that state to prevent incursions by her people, or at least under her authority. The untimely effort to occupy this territory was even then making much trouble among the Indians and adding immeasurably to the trials of the young government, which was not sufficiently strong to make its voice heard above that of greed or love of adventure. Serious difficulty seemed likely to result from this situation when, during an adverse period of the war with Britain, New York passed a resolution surrendering to the national government any rights to territory west of her borders. She thus assumed the same position taken by Maryland, which had refused to sign the Articles of Confederation unless this course was adopted and had thereby been instrumental in securing from Congress the resolution above referred to. New York's title was based on purchase of Ohio Valley lands from the Six Nations, and was probably as good or better than that of Virginia, which claimed hers on a king's charter, even after it had been supplanted by another.

Connecticut soon followed with proposals for the adjustment of her western claims, and Virginia also made overtures. The rights of neither state were taken seriously, however, and it was not expected that unless

they should recede from all claims to such territory as lay beyond their well defined borders, any agreement could be reached. At the same time all the propositions were laid before a committee appointed by Congress to consider the matter. This committee reported November 3, 1781, just after the surrender of Cornwallis, when the government felt itself strengthened to take a stand upon this vital question. The report accepted the proposition of New York and refused those of Connecticut and Virginia. The claims of the Walpole Company, a London corporation formed of Virginians, and also those of the Illinois and Wabash companies, all of which had been operating under royal grants issued before the Revolution began, were disallowed. At the same time the report recommended acceptance of the Fort Stanwix grant to Croghan, which had given him a large tract in the disputed territory in reward for his services in handling negotiations between the English and the Six Nations. It was generally supposed that this latter recommendation was intended to strengthen the New York title to the Ohio Valley lands against any British claims, as both were acquired in the same way, by purchase from the Iroquois. One after another the states having claims on land west of Pennsylvania and the Ohio River ceded these claims to the national government, until only Massachusetts and Connecticut remained. Maryland was first, New York second, Virginia third, this state reserving certain lands on the ground that compensation was justly due her for her part in subduing British posts, as well as insisting that if she did not have enough good land south of the Ohio to supply her soldier grants, the deficiency should be made up between the Miami and Scioto rivers. A deed of cession was properly executed by Virginia, March I, 1784. Massachusetts surrendered her claims in April, 1785, and in 1786 Connecticut formally transferred to the national government whatever right she had to the territory in the vast domain originally covered by her charter, reserving, however, from this cession a section of land extending from the Pennsylvania border westward 120 miles, and from the forty-first parallel of latitude north to Lake Erie.

These reserved districts are both within the boundaries of Ohio and are known respectively as the Virginia Military Reserve and the Connecticut Western Reserve, and in the latter tract lies all of the Mahoning Valley except that portion eastward of the Pennsylvania state line.

The act of assembly by which Connecticut finally abandoned her claim to all lands west of the Pennsylvania line except the Connecticut Western Reserve, was approved on September 14, 1786, but no formal action was taken as affecting her jurisdiction over the Western Reserve until May 30, 1800.

The next step, taken by the United States in 1787, was the organization of all lands north of the Ohio River and west .of Pennsylvania into the Northwest Territory.

In its cession of 1786, it will be noted, Connecticut retained its claim to one great section of western lands, while surrendering to the Federal Government its claim to title in, and jurisdiction over, "all other lands northwest of the Ohio River." This section held by Connecticut lay in the northern and extreme northeastern part of what is now the State of Ohio. It was a tract of approximately 5,700 square miles, bounded on the east by the Pennsylvania state line, on the south by latitude forty-one, on the west by a line running from' latitude forty-one to the international boundary—paralleling the Pennsylvania line and 120 miles west thereof—on the north by the international boundary. This was the Connecticut Western Reserve, so called because it was reserved when all else was given up. After 1786 it was the only stretch of American soil claimed by Connecticut outside the state's own boundaries.

On its part, the Federal Government accepted Connecticut's relinquishment of other western lands but did not acknowledge Connecticut's claim to this reserved area. The question of ownership of, and jurisdiction over, this great section was merely left in suspense. Taught by previous losses, however, the value of occupation in fact, Connecticut hastened to establish its title to the Western Reserve by actual occupancy, and for this purpose a resolution was adopted by the State Assembly in October, 1786, authorizing the appointment of a committee of three persons to cause a survey to be made of the Western Reserve tract as far west as the Cuyahoga River, the Tuscarawas River, and the portage path between these two rivers, the committee also being authorized to negotiate a sale of these lands. It was provided that sales should be made at not less than fifty cents an acre, as we now compute money, and that townships six miles square should be laid out.

Even at this early day the stress that Connecticut laid on religion and education was apparent. While it was provided that when one or more members of the sales committee should present a certificate of sale of any township the Legislature should make a grant of that township, there was a stipulation that there should be reserved to the public 50o acres in each township for the support of the Gospel and 500 acres for the support of the schools, and likewise a proviso that 240 acres should be reserved in each town, to grant, in fee simple, to the first minister of the Gospel who should settle in that town. This Connecticut spirit and training was reflected throughout the settlement of the Reserve. Its pioneers were men of ample knowledge and many

of them men of higher education, capable not only of pioneering but of giving an intelligent report on any lands newly explored by them. They came, too, instilled with a deep, though perhaps severe, religious spirit.

Prior to 1795 the only sale made under this legislative provision was to Gen. Samuel H. Parsons of Middletown, Connecticut, who, in 1788, purchased approximately 25,000 acres of land known as the Salt Spring tract, lying within what are now the townships of Jackson and Austintown in Mahoning County, and Weathersfield and Lordstown in Trumbull County. The existence of the salt springs or salt lick, from which this tract takes its name, was known fully twenty years before the outbreak of the Revolutionary war. From time immemorial it had been a favorite spot for the forest animals seeking the salt so necessary to life. It was used by Pennsylvania pioneers before and during the Revolution, works being erected there for the purpose of extracting salt from the water. Many a tedious journey probably was made from the older state to these springs, tedious not only because it was through a wilderness, but because the saline properties of the water were so slight that the returns were meager in comparison with the labor undergone. Certain duties in connection with land claims undertaken by General Parsons in colonial times had undoubtedly given him a knowledge of the existence of these springs, and their presence probably influenced the selection of this particular site. Otherwise he would scarcely have selected this inland spot when unlimited acres of lake front and lands in the valleys of the largest streams of the Reserve were his to choose from. It is likewise probable, however, that he did not intend to develop this salt lick solely in an industrial sense, but rather as an attraction for settlers, as the slight percentage of salt in the waters scarcely warranted the hope that the springs would yield large mineral returns. That he had made the purchase of the lands as an investment is further apparent from the fact that he proceeded to make sales of lands within the Salt Spring tract to individuals, although it happened that he was destined never to become an actual settler on the land himself.

The description of the lands sold to General Parsons is given at the time of sale in terms of townships and ranges, although as a matter of fact no survey had yet been made, nor was any made during his life time. The title to the Western Reserve area was clouded and rested only on Connecticut's reserved claim of 1786, a claim that was further jeopardized by the passage by Congress of the Ordinance of 1787, creating the Northwest Territory of all lands northwest of the Ohio River, and the appointment in October, 1787, of a governor and other civil officers for this area. The Federal Government merely ignored the claim of Connecticut. The governor, Gen. Arthur St. Clair, divided the Northwest Territory into counties, including in Washington County, formed in 1788, all the Western Reserve area east of the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers, Marietta being named as the seat of government of this county. That part of the Reserve west of these rivers was later included in Wayne County, with the county seat at Detroit. That General Parsons and his heirs recognized the conflicting claims to West-

em Reserve lands is apparent from the fact that his patent was recorded at Hartford, capital of Connecticut, again at Marietta when Washington County was founded, and finally at Warren with the creation of Trumbull County.

General Parsons was a leader of the New England bar long before his interest in western lands took him to the Ohio country. His acknowledged ability won him an appointment as one of the three judges appointed for the Northwest Territory in 1788 and his promotion to the rank of chief justice in 1789. In this latter year he left Marietta as a commissioner to adjust claims with the Indians on the Western Reserve. Following the conference he began his homeward journey in a canoe and was drowned in passing the falls of the Beaver River, on November 17, 1789.

This single sale ended for the time being Connecticut's attempt to dispose of its western acres. The Western Reserve remained a wilderness visited only by traders, while the tide of emigration swept down the Ohio River and across the mountains from Virginia into Southern Ohio and Kentucky. Partly this was because of accessibility of the latter territory, and partly it was due to the publicity given it by surveyors and sojourners, and through other avenues. Finally it was due to the extremely doubtful title that Connecticut held and the serious question of whether Connecticut was not actually trying to sell something that was part and parcel of the Northwest Territory. Therefore the land went unsold at 5o cents an acre when lands that were no better, and some that were worse, brought several times that amount farther south.

In 1792 Connecticut receded momentarily from her position of land salesman to become land donor. Certain residents of Connecticut having suffered by British raids into that state during the Revolutionary war, the Legislature in the above year authorized the award to these sufferers, or their heirs, of a tract of 500,000 acres of Western Reserve lands lying west of the Cuyahoga River. As these losses were mainly from fire the grant became known as the "Fire Lands," and upwards of 2,000 Connecticut residents profited by the distribution, each in proportion to his losses. The "Fire Lands" included all the present Huron and Erie counties and the Township of Ruggles in Ashland County, except that the islands in Lake Erie were reserved.

Why the fire sufferers were awarded the lands in the extreme western part of the Reserve instead of lands east of the Cuyahoga River is not made clear. The eastern lands were considered the more desirable and susceptible to earliest settlement. The territory west of the Cuyahoga was not merely far removed from the settlements in Pennsylvania, New York and the Ohio Valley, but Connecticut's right to award it to anyone was subject to very serious doubts. Not only was the land claimed by the United States, but the Indian title to it was not extinguished until thirteen years later, or in 1805, when the treaty of Fort Industry between the United States and the Indians was signed. Connecticut, in short, was giving away something that might be nothing at all in the end.

As Connecticut never at any time lost faith in its title to the Western Reserve this disputed question of ownership probably did not influence the selection of such far western lands for award to the fire sufferers. It is more likely that the canny New Englanders mixed a good percentage of business with their philanthropy and believed that an early settlement of the western part of the Reserve would hurry the movement to the eastern part. It does not appear that the beneficiaries of the "Fire Lands" grant were required to remove there themselves, hut

if they did not care to emigrate to the Ohio country they were probably expected to make good land salesmen and vociferous promoters of a movement to people the Reserve. Given, without cost, some desirable land that might be sold at a profit, almost anyone would follow this course.

If Connecticut had any such object in view the movement apparently failed of its purpose. For another three years the Western Reserve remained uninhabited and unknown to white men except venturesome traders and trappers. Then, in 1795, the State Legislature made another, and what proved to be a successful, effort to dispose of Connecticut's western lands, by passing a resolution reading as follows :

"Resolved, by this assembly, that a committee be appointed to receive any proposals that may be made by any person or persons whether inhabitants of the United States, or others, for the purchase of the lands belonging to this state lying west of the west line of Pennsylvania as claimed by said state, and the said committee are hereby fully authorized and empowered, in the name and behalf of this state, to negotiate with any such person or persons on the subject of any such proposals, and, also, to form and complete any contract or contracts for the sale of said lands, and to make and execute, under their hands and seals, the purchaser or purchasers, a deed or deeds duly authenticated, quitting in behalf of this state, all right, title, and interest, judicial and territorial, in and to the said lands, to him or them, and to his or their heirs, forever.

"That before the executing (of) such deed or deeds the purchaser or purchasers shall give their personal note or bond, payable to the treasurer of this state, for the purchase money, carrying an interest of six per centum per annum payable annually, to commence from the date thereof, or from such future period, not exceeding two years, from the date, as circumstances, in the opinion of the committee may require, and as may be agreed on between them and the said purchaser or purchasers; with good and sufficient sureties, inhabitants of this state, or with a sufficient deposit of bank or other stock of the United States or of the particular states; which note or bond shall be taken payable at a period not more remote than five years from the date, or if by annual installments so that the last installment be payable within ten years from the date, either in specie or in six per cent, three per cent, or deferred stock of the United States, at the discretion of the committee.

"That if the committee shall find that it will be most beneficial to the state or its citizens to form several contracts for the sale of said lands, they shall not consummate any of the said contracts apart by themselves while the others lie in a train of negotiation only ; but all the contracts which, taken together, shall comprise the whole quantity of the said lands shall be consummated together, and the purchasers shall hold their respective parts or proportions as tenants in common of the whole tract or territory, and not in severalty.

"That the said committee in whatever manner they shall find it best to sell the said lands, whether by an entire contract or by several contracts, shall in no case be at liberty to sell the whole quantity for a principal sum less than one million of dollars in specie, or if the day of payment be given, for a sum of less value than one million dollars in specie with interest at six per cent per annum from the time of such sale."

"This assembly do hereby appoint John Treadwell, James Wadsworth, Marvin Wait, William Edmonds, Thomas Grosvenor, Aaron Austin, Elijah Hubbard and Sylvester Gilbert, esquires, a committee to negotiate a sale of the western lands belonging to this state lying west

of the west line of Pennsylvania, as claimed by said state, according to the resolve for that purpose, passed at the present session of the general assembly."

These men, representing the eight counties of Connecticut, one from each county, set about to make disposition of the western lands in conformity with the above resolution, which was adopted by the State Legislature on the second Thursday in May, 1795.

Their task was not an easy one. Connecticut, it will be noted, did not guarantee to give undisputed title to the lands, offering only a quit claim to purchasers. Outside Connecticut the state's claim to the Ohio lands was treated lightly, even derisively, and the New Englanders with their sound business sense understood this drawback thoroughly. On the other hand there were some circumstances that made the time selected for the sale especially advantageous. Just as General St. Clair's defeat by the Indians near the Miami villages in 1791 had checked colonization of the West, so did General Anthony Wayne's defeat of the Indians at the Battle of Fallen Timbers in what is now Northwestern Ohio in 1794, encourage emigration to the West by removing the fear of Indian depredations. This was no slight consideration in the Ohio country in the closing decade of the eighteenth century, although there was little need of fear of the Indians of Northeastern Ohio at any time. They were a spiritless lot, treacherous, perhaps, but never a serious menace. Then too, emigration to the West and speculation in western lands were alike at their height in 1795, and even doubtful titles could not check these movements.

Consequently there was no dearth of prospective purchasers on this occasion. The legislative committee did its work well and after negotiations that lasted through the summer finally reached an agreement on September 2, 1795, by which forty-eight persons agreed to purchase the Western Reserve for $1,200,000. This was an immense sum of money for that day, but then, as now, business was largely a matter of credit and there was no disposition to insist on a cash sale, or cash sales. Again exemplifying the staunch Connecticut belief in education, it was provided that the moneys derived from this sale of lands should constitute a fund, the interest of which should be used for support of Connecticut schools. This fund, the principal of which has increased in size, is still being drawn upon for the purpose set forth so many decades of years ago. These forty-eight purchasers, some of whom acted individually and some jointly, together with the amounts of their subscriptions, were:

The Western Reserve lands being as yet unsurveyed no deed could be given in acres, but as the purchase price of the entire tract was $1,200,000, the legislative committee of eight, on behalf of the state, ade out deeds to each purchaser for as many twelve-hundred-thoundths in the undivided tract as he had subscribed dollars to the purhase price. These deeds are dated September 2, 1795. Apparently o cash consideration was given in return, the purchasers giving bonds ith security instead.

In this manner Connecticut disposed of her western lands other tan the "Fire Lands." The purchasers included in their bargain the arsons' Salt Spring tract, yet in making subsequent partition of their and cautiously reserved certain lands in event that they should have o make recognition of this claim.

It was a most remarkable transaction ; this disposition of a great rea of land, larger in size than several individual states of the Union, to purchasers who were allied together merely by agreement, their rganization not having even the dignity of an incorporated company ;

* Properly Cleaveland, but throughout the records of the Connecticut Land ompany the modern spelling is generally given.

38 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY

a transaction all the more remarkable because it conveyed not merely the territorial but the "judicial" right, interest and title. Even the extent of the Western Reserve was not known. It was presumed that it was approximately 4,000,00o acres, whereas it actually contained less than 3,000,00o acres, exclusive of the "Fire Lands."

Three days after this sale was agreed upon, on September 5, 1795, the purchasers met at Hartford, Connecticut, and effected the organization of the Connecticut Land Company, by drawing up "Articles of Association and Agreement." These articles showed unusually good business judgment, a careful determination to provide for every contingency that should arise in the partition and settlement of this great western area, and a studied disposition to give the smallest purchaser just the same measure of justice in the award of the lands that the largest purchaser received. They read as follows :

"I. It is agreed that the individuals concerned in the purchase made this day, of the Connecticut Western Reserve, shall be called the Connecticut Land Company.

"II. It is agreed that the committee, appointed by the applicants for purchasing said Reserve, shall receive from the committee, of whom said purchase has been made, each deed which shall be executed to the purchaser ; and in their hands shall retain said deed until the proprietors thereof shall execute a deed in trust to John Caldwell, Jonathan Brace and John Morgan, and the survivors of them, and the last survivor of said three persons and his heirs forever, to hold in trust for such proprietor his share in said purchase, and to be disposed of as directed and agreed in the following articles.

"III. It is agreed that seven persons shall be appointed by the company at a meeting to be holden this day at the house of John Lee, in Hartford, who shall be a board of directors for said company, and that said directors, or the majority thereof, shall have power, at the expense of said company, to procure an extinguishment of the Indian title to said Reserve, if said title is not already extinguished, to survey the whole of said Reserve, and to lay the same out into townships containing sixteen thousand acres each ; to fix on a township in which the first settlement shall be made ; to survey that township into small lots, in such manner as they shall think proper, and to sell and dispose of said lots to actual settlers only : to erect in said township a saw-mill and grist-mill at the expense of said company ; to lay out and sell five other townships of sixteen thousand acres each, to actual settlers only. And the said trustees shall execute deeds of such part or parts of said six townships as shall be sold by said directors to said purchasers, but in case there shall be any salt spring or springs, in said six townships, or in any or either of them, said directors shall not sell spring or springs ; but shall reserve the same, together with two thousand acres of land enclosing said spring or springs. Said directors shall also have power to extinguish, if possible, the Indian title, if any, to said Reserve, and to make all said surveys within two years from this date, and sooner if possible. And when said Indian title, if any, shall have been extinguished, and said surveys made, said trustees, or a majority thereof, shall con-

YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 39

vey to each proprietor of said Reserve, or any member who shall agree, his or their proportion or right therein, in severalty, the mode of dividing said Reserve, however, to be in conformity to the orders and directions of the major part of the proprietors assembled at any meeting of the proprietors convened, and holden according to the mode hereinafter marked out.

"IV. It is also agreed that said directors shall cause the persons employed by them in surveying said Reserve to keep a regular field book, describing minutely and accurately .the situation, soil, waters, kinds of timber, and natural productions of each township surveyed by them, which book said directors shall cause to be kept in the office of the clerk of said directors, and the said book shall be open to the inspection of each proprietor at all times.

"V. It is agreed that said directors shall appoint a clerk, who shall keep a regular journal of all the votes and proceedings of said directors, and of the money disbursed by them for the use of the company; and said directors shall, once in a year, settle their accounts with the proprietors; and that all moneys, received by the directors for taxes and the sale of lands, shall be subject to the disposal and direction of the company.

"VI. It is agreed that the trustees shall give certificates agreeable to the form hereinafter prescribed, to all the proprietors in the original purchase made from this state, and that the grantees from said state shall lodge with the trustees the names of the proprietors, for whom they respectively receive deeds, and the proportion of land to which said proprietors are entitled, a copy of which shall be lodged, by the trustees, with the clerk of the directors. It is further agreed that all transfers made by any proprietors shall be recorded in the book of the clerk of the directors, and no person claiming as an assignee shall be acknowledged as such unless his deed shall have been thus recorded.

"VII. It is agreed, in order to enable said board of directors to perform and accomplish the business assigned them, that they shall be paid a tax, in the proportion of ten dollars on each of the shares of the company, to the clerk of the directors, to be at the disposal of said directors for the purpose aforesaid, which said tax shall be paid to said clerk on or before the sixth day of October next.

"VIII. It is agreed that the whole of said Reserve shall be divided into four hundred shares, and the following shall be the mode of voting by the proprietors in their meetings: Every proprietor of one share shall have one vote, and every proprietor of more than one share shall have one vote for the first share, and then one vote for every two shares, till the, number of forty shares, and then one vote for every five shares, provided that the question of the time of making a partition of the territory, every share shall be entitled to one vote.

"IX. It is agreed that the aforesaid trustees shall, on receiving a deed from any purchaser, according to the tenor of these articles, give to such proprietors a certificate in the following words :

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" CONNECTICUT LAND COMPANY

" 'Hartford, September 5, 1795.

" 'This certifies that........is entitled to the trust and benefit of .......... twelve hundred thousandths of the Connecticut Western Reserve so called, as held by John Caldwell, Jonathan Brace, and John Morgan, trustees, in a deed of trust, dated the fifth day of September, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-five, to hold said proportion or share to , the said , heirs, and assigns, according to the terms, conditions, covenants, and exceptions contained in the said deed of trust and in certain articles of agreement, entered into by the persons composing the Connecticut Land Company, which said share is transferable by assignment, under hand and seal, witnessed by two witnesses, and acknowledged before any justice of the peace in the state of Connecticut, or before a notary public or judge of the common pleas in any of the United States, and to be recorded by the clerk of the board of directors, which said certificate shall be complete evidence of such person of his right in said Reserve, and shall be recorded by the clerk of the directors in the book, which said clerk shall keep for the purpose of registering deeds.'

"X. It is agreed that the first meeting of said company be at the state-house, in Hartford, on Tuesday, the sixth of October next, at two of the clock, in the afternoon, at which meeting the mode of making partition shall be determined by the major vote of the proprietors there present, taking such vote by the principle hereinbef ore marked out. It is also agreed that in all meetings of the company the proprietors shall be admitted to vote in person or by their proper attorney, legally authorized; and it is further agreed that there shall be a meeting of the company, at the state-house, in Hartford, at two o'clock, in the afternoon, the Monday next before the second Thursday in October, 1796, and another meeting of said company, at the same place, at two o'clock, in the afternoon, the Tuesday next before the second Thursday in October, 1797, and that the said directors shall have power to call, occasionally, meetings, at such times as they think proper ; but such meetings shall always be at Hartford, and said directors shall give notice in some one newspaper, in each county in Connecticut, where newspapers are published, of the time and place of holding said meetings, whether stated or occasional, by publishing such notification in such papers, under their hands, for three weeks successively, within six weeks next before the day of such meeting.

"XI. And, whereas, some of the proprietors may choose that their proportions of said Reserve should be divided to them in one lot or location, it is agreed that in case one-third in value of the owners shall, after a survey of said Reserve in townships. signify to said directors or meeting a request that such third part be set off in manner aforesaid, that said directors may appoint three commissioners, who shall have power to divide the whole of said purchase into three parts, equal in value, according to quantity, quality, and situation; and when said commissioners shall have so divided said Reserve, and made a report in writing of their doings to said directors, describing precisely the bound-

YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 41

aries of each part, the said directors shall call a meeting of said proprietors, giving the notice required by these articles; and at such meeting the said three parts shall be numbered, and the number of each part shall be written on a separate piece of paper, and shall, in the presence of such meeting, be by the chairman of said meeting put into a box, and a person, appointed by said meeting for that purpose, shall draw out of said box one of said numbers, and the part designated by such number shall be aparted to such person or persons requesting such a severance, and the said trustees shall, upon receiving a written direction from said directors for that purpose, execute a deed to such person or persons accordingly; after which, each person or persons shall have no power to act in said company.

"XII. It is agreed that the company shall have power, by a major vote, to raise money by a tax on the proprietors, to he apportioned equally to each proprietor, according to his interest; and, in case any proprietors shall neglect to pay his proportion of said taxes within fifty days, when the proprietor lives in the state ; if out of the state, within one hundred and twenty days after the same shall have become payable; and, after the publication thereof in the newspapers of this state, in the manner provided for warning meetings, that the directors shall have power to dispose of so much of the interest of said delinquent proprietor in said Reserve as may be necessary to pay the tax so as aforesaid due and unsatisfied ; and, in case any proprietor shall neglect to pay the tax of ten dollars upon a share, agreed to by these articles, within fifty days after the time of payment, so much of his share, as will raise his part of said tax, may be sold as aforesaid.

"XIII. In case of the death of any one or more of the trustees, the company may appoint a successor to such deceased person or persons in said trust; and, upon such appointment being made, the surviving trustee or trustees shall pass a deed or deeds to such successor or successors, to hold the premises as co-trustees with the surviving trustees, in the same manner as the original trustees held the same.

"XIV. It is agreed that the directors, in transacting the business of said company according to the articles aforesaid, shall be subject to the control of said company by a vote of at least three-fourths of the interest of said company."

These articles are subscribed to by fifty-two members of the Connecticut Land Company. The subscribers are identical with the purchasers of the Western Reserve tract, except that eight names appearing on the former document do not appear on the latter while the additional names of William M. Bliss, William Battle, Joseph C. Yates, Thaddeus Leavitt, Elisha Strong, Zepheniah Swift, Lemuel Storrs, Benajah Kent, Eliphalet Austin, Samuel Mather, Elijah White and Roger Newbury (for Justin Ely) are found on the second document. Even this list is incomplete, as certain signers are known to have represented share holders who are not among the signers. The whole number of persons included in the Connecticut Land Company is said to have been fifty-seven. William Hart was appointed moderator of this meeting of

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September 5, 1795, and Enoch Perkins. clerk. Perkins was replaced the following spring by Ephraim Root who remained as clerk until the dissolution of the company after its work had been finished. The shareholders conveyed their interests to John Caldwell, Jonathan Brace and John Morgan, as provided in article two of the above agreement, and seven directors of the company were named as provided in article three, these appointees being Oliver Phelps, Henry Champion, 2nd, Moses Cleaveland, Samuel W. Johnson, Ephraim Kirby, Samuel Mather, jr., and Roger Newbury. Changes were made in the director. ate at different times.

Before the company still lay the immense task of preparing the Western Reserve for settlement, for it should be remembered that while many members of the company themselves proposed to emigrate to the western country, they had likewise made their investments for speculative purposes, and the land could not be sold in its wilderness state. The land company members were not in a position to sell, since their interests in the Western Reserve tract were still undivided and no division could be made until the ground had been surveyed.

Toward this task the company first bent its energies. Arrangements were made for a survey to be conducted under the superintendency of Gen. Moses Cleaveland and at a meeting of the company on April 5, 1796, a committee comprising Oliver Phelps, Moses Cleave-land, Isaac Mills, Samuel Hinkley,* Henry Champion, William Hart and Uriel Holmes was named "to take into consideration making partition," of the Western Reserve. Joseph Howland, Joseph Perkins and Robert Brick were later added to this committee. On April 9, 1796, this committee reported back to a meeting of the company recommending the election of a committee of "three or more judicious persons," to make a division of the Western Reserve. As this apportionment could not be made without an intimate knowledge of the ground it was also recommended that the committee "go upon said lands and view and explore the same," with a view to analyzing all natural advantages of each section so that division could be made equitably. With a splendid spirit of fairness it was proposed to follow a most intricate method of apportionment so that the most valuable, the medium, and the least valuable lands should be shared alike. The mode of making the division was prescribed by the committee of ten making this report. The equalizing committee recommended was not named at this time as naturally there could be no division until a survey had been made.

Six townships of the Reserve were to be left out of this division, the company having agreed in its articles of association that the directors should survey one township into small lots and sell these lots to actual settlers, and likewise lay out and sell five other townships to actual settlers. The six townships subsequently selected are now known as Cleveland and Euclid in Cuyahoga County, Youngstown in Mahoning County, and Madison, Mentor and Willoughby in Lake County. It was under the terms of this provision that the directors made a sale to John

* Given also as Hinckley.

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Young and others of the lands that were later to be the site of the city of Youngstown. This sale was made some time in 1796, the exact date not being obtainable.

In May, 1796, the surveying party began its trip from Connecticut to the Western Reserve under command of Gen. Moses Cleaveland, as superintendent. The party numbered fifty-three persons in all, in-

MAP OF NORTHWEST TERRITORY

cluding one child. In addition to the superintendent there were Augustus Porter, principal surveyor ; Seth Pease, astronomer and surveyor; Moses Warren, John Milton Holley, Amos Spofford and Richard M. Stoddard, surveyors ; Theodore Shepard, physician ; Joshua Stow, commissary; Joseph Tinker, principal boatman ; Francis Gray, Joseph McIntyre, Samuel Forbes, George Proudfoot, Amos Sawtel, Samuel Hungerford; Amos Barber, Asa Mason, Stephen Benton, Amzi Atwater,

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Samuel Agnew, Samuel Davenport, Michael Coffin, Shadrach Benham, William B. Hall, Elisha Ayers, Thomas Harris, George Gooding, Norman Wilcox, Timothy Dunham, Wareham Shepard, David Beard, Titus V. Munson, John Briant, Joseph Landon, Olney F. Rice, James Hamilton, James Halket, John Lock, Charles Parker, Ezekiel Morley, Nathaniel Doan, Stephen Burbank, Samuel Barnes, Luke Hanchet, Daniel Shulay, Job V. Stiles and Tabitha Stiles, Elijah Gunn and Ann Gunn and child. The two remaining members of the party were hunters and traders, Nathan Perry and Nathan Chapman by name, who were to furnish fresh meat for the party.

The voyagers made the trip by the northern, or lake, route, assembling at Schenectady, New York, early in June, with their stores and flat boats, and thence proceeding by way of the Mohawk River, Wood Creek, Oneida Lake and Oswego River to Lake Ontario and on to Buffalo. The cattle and horses, however, were driven overland from Schenectady through Canandaigua to Buffalo. At this time control of the lakes was in British hands, but an agreement had just been concluded by which Americans were permitted to use these waterways, so a stop was made at Fort Stanwix, New York, to procure the credentials that were necessary before they could pass Fort Oswego, which commanded their path into Lake Ontario. The records of the Ashtabula Historical and Philosophical Society contain an account of this journey, which relates that at Fort Stanwix the Americans met Captain Cozzens, who had been sent by the British minister to announce that Jay's treaty permitting free navigation of the lakes was in force. Apparently this removed any complications, the pathway being made easier by the fact that Captain Cozzens accompanied the Americans to Fort Oswego. At Fort Oswego, however, a new difficulty arose. The British commander declared he had received no orders from his superior officer at Fort Niagara relative to free access to the lake and until such instructions were received the Americans must wait in idleness. Anticipating such a contingency the land company had given orders to Commissary Stow not to attempt to run by the fort without permission and the party was therefore under a double command to loiter.

It was a most discouraging situation. There was an immense task ahead in laying out the western lands and only a few months in which to do it. Summer was approaching. There was sickness in the party due to the unhealthy spot at which it was encamped and there was the usual irritation and complaining that comes of idleness. Confronted by such an intolerable state of affairs the members of the party decided to resist both military and company edicts and risk the safety of the entire enterprise by passing Fort Oswego without permission. The boats were secreted in a small bay in the river four miles above the fort, where one of them was manned with double oars and, with Commissary Stow on board, pulled boldly past the fort. Believing that the commissary was en route to Fort Niagara to obtain the required permission from the commander there no resistance was offered by the Oswego garrison, and the single boat proceeded to Sodus where a meeting place had been arranged. Deceived completely by this apparent surrender to orders

YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 45

the Fort Oswego garrison relaxed its vigilance and in the darkness the three remaining boats slipped past the fortification and out into Lake Ontario, as prearranged. But just when the ruse appeared to have succeeded a greater disaster loomed before them. Continuing the account of the escape from British vigilance the narrative says :

"At Sodus the fleet intended to make harbor. A sudden storm arose and overtook the three boats before they could reach Sodus. The darkness was intense; the storm became more and more violent, the situation was one of peril. Beacon-fires were built by the crew of the boat which had landed, but it was impossible for the rest of the boats to make the harbor. The situation of the agent at this moment was intensely painful. His companions were in a perilous situation, and it was out of his power to afford them any relief. They were but a short distance from a dangerous shore, and the next billow might dash their little bark in pieces. Besides, he had assumed the responsibility of running by the fort, and although successful in that attempt, yet if the boats were cast away or lost, the whole responsibility of the catastrophe would rest upon him. In this state of suspense and alarm, a man from one of the boats came running from the beach with the intelligence that all was lost. No anxiety could be greater or suffering more intense than that of the men on shore. They ran up and down the beach to see if it were not possible to render some assistance or gain some tidings from their companions. They found thrown upon the shore a gun and an oar, which they recognized as belonging to Captain Beard, who was in charge of one of the boats. This increased their alarm. The next moment, however, they met Captain Beard himself, and anxiously asked if all were lost. He replied that nothing was lost but a gun and an oar. No lives were lost. The boats sustained much injury, and one was so badly damaged it could not be repaired, and was abandoned."

Substantially this story is correct, although it is probable the boats were dashed on the shore and that the great danger to the members of the party lay in the fact that they were exposed to the extreme likelihood of losing their lives and supplies alike in the angry surf, rather than in any inability to make harbor. One version says that Stow actually gave the boats up for lost and had gone to Irondequoit.

General Cleaveland's commission from the Connecticut Land Company provided that the party was "to enter into friendly negotiations with the natives who are on said land, or contiguous thereto, and may have pretended claim to the same," and barter with them for the sale of their claims. At Buffalo the superintendent had his first experience with the Indians, although the claim of the Mohawks and Senecas to lands in the Ohio country was certainly hazy. Their chief asset may, in fact, have been their reputation for bloodthirstiness, but they appear to have been apprised of the coming of the Connecticut men, as they were waiting for conference, the renowned chiefs Captain Brant and Red Jacket being among the number. There were lengthy negotiations, suspended at least once by the chiefs that the Indians might get drunk, but on June 23d General Cleaveland finally offered the equivalent of $1,000 for the red men's title and good will, mostly good will. This

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was finally accepted with the additional provision that General Cleave-land would use his good offices to secure an annuity of $500 for the Indians, or, failing in this grant from the Government, he would insure an additional $1,50o from the land company. General 'Cleaveland also gave two beef cattle and one hundred gallons of whisky to the Indians and negotiations were happily closed. Considering the nature of the general's gift it is likely the Red Men celebrated the termination of the conference joyously, as getting drunk was a feature that the Indians considered a most important part of the ceremony and it was never neglected by them.

It is indicative of the little regard that the State of Connecticut and the Connecticut Land Company had for the Federal Government's claim to the Western Reserve that General Cleaveland acted solely as representative of the company in making this agreement with the Indians and that there was no government agent present.

While the land company and the Indians reached an adjustment easily enough the latter did not agree so well among themselves. The Mohawk Indians, who are said to have been residing then on the Grand River in Canada, appear to have claimed the lion's share of the treaty money, awarding but little to the Senecas and none to other tribes of the Six Nations. In January, 1797, the Connecticut Land Company accepted General Cleaveland's report of his treaty with the Indians, but a year later a report was made at a meeting of the land company that the Indians had appeared before the proprietors of the Connecticut Land Company and said a disagreement had arisen between the Mohawks and the Indians on the American side of the border over the distribution of this money, and that trouble would ensue if the money were paid over to the Mohawks. The Indians asked that payment be withheld, and the land company readily agreed to this request, inasmuch as its own finances were not in good shape at that time. How the distribution was finally made does not appear.

It is creditable, however, to the Connecticut men that they strove earnestly to satisfy the Indian claims to the lands they sought to colonize and bargained openly for the Red Men's title. On the other hand, the Indians who promised at Buffalo that the white men should not be molested in their efforts to settle the Western Reserve kept their promise religiously.

With perhaps one more stop at Presque Isle (now Erie) the surveying party moved onward and on Independence Day, July 4, 1796, landed at the mouth of Conneaut Creek, in what is now Ashtabula County.

Two months had elapsed since they left Connecticut. It had been a journey fraught with even greater hardships, more dangers and far more delays than they had anticipated. But they had come to found a new land in the wilderness of what was then the West and there was unrestrained joy that the pilgrimage was ended. It was especially fitting that they landed on the birthday of the nation, not only because they were founding a new colony, too, but because they were Revolutionary war soldiers and the sons of Revolutionary war sol-

YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 47

diers who had witnessed the birth of their own country but a few years before. That they had fenced with the British a few weeks earlier at Oswego and had outwitted them as Washington would have outwitted them, probably added considerable zest to this independence Day celebration. At any rate they pledged their loyalty anew to America, to their home state, to the new land that they were to conquer peaceably, and fired a salute from their small arms in honor of the day. They had reached the threshold of a great empire that had at that time not one solitary white inhabitant with a permanent abode, a land of magnificent forests, splendid streams and fertile soil. They hoped to make it a populated and prosperous land—as great perhaps as Connecticut—a country where there would be not alone material prosperity but also the learning and the religion that the promoters of the land company had wisely provided for. Their visions, of course, were wholly unable to comprehend a land that in a century and a quarter would have upwards of three millions of inhabitants, a land that would become great in agriculture as they planned, but whose farms would be dwarfed in wealth in comparison with the vast industrial richness of its cities. In their happiness they named their landing place Port Independence and, in clear water from the lake, and in whisky too, drank the following toasts :

"The President of the United States.

"The State of Connecticut.

"The Connecticut Land Company.

"May the Port of Independence and the fifty sons and daughters who have entered it this day be successful and prosperous.

"May these sons and daughters multiply in sixteen years sixteen times fifty.

"May every person have his bowsprit trimmed and ready to enter every port that opens."

And probably a score or two of other toasts equally resolute and optimistic.

However there was work ahead. On July 5th business was suspended only long enough to greet the Indians who came with friendly intent and made flowery speeches, presenting General Cleaveland with a pipe of peace. The general reciprocated by bestowing presents of wampum, silver trinkets and whisky to the value of $20. That the Connecticut voyagers were supplied with such ample quantities of strong liquors may appear strange in this year when national prohibition became effective and alcoholic drinks were outlawed, but one cannot judge a past age by the present. Whisky was then one of the most common of commodities. It was the chief stock in trade of the white men who bargained with the Indians for furs, and while some of these traders were low-bred and vicious, many others were men of recognized standing in their home communities. Whisky was an every-day article of use even in homes where the rigidly strict lives common to that day were lived. That the whisky of these olden days was a vastly superior article with none of the evil properties attached to it today is a pure myth. There were drunkards then as there are now, and there were men—and many

48 - YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY

more women—who opposed the use of strong liquors in any form. The curse was not the less, except, perhaps, that alcohol was less potent for evil in the staunch minds and the iron constitutions of the forefathers of this prohibition state.

On July 5 work was begun on the erection of a log house on the east bank of Conneaut Creek. It was a structure of no architectural pretensions, being intended as a storage place for supplies. On July 7, Porter, Holley and Pease, surveyors, and five other men, left the headquarters at Conneaut Creek to seek the south line of the Reserve. With the project fairly under way General Cleaveland started for the mouth of the Cuyahoga River to lay out the township that was to mark the first settlement on the Western Reserve, the Conneaut settlement not being considered a permanent one. General Cleaveland reached his destination on July 22, 1796. He was accompanied by Commissary Stow, by Job Stiles and wife Tabitha, and perhaps by others. While in many respects the site did not look promising in its raw and primeval state, it appealed to the farseeing and sagacious General Cleaveland. After preliminary observations he journeyed to Conneaut Creek on August 5, 1796, and from there sent word to the directors of the Connecticut Land Company that the choice of a place of beginning settlement was a wise one. He then returned to Cleveland to complete his work. When he left for Connecticut three months later General Cleaveland was destined never to return to Ohio to locate, but he bequeathed his name to the settlement he founded—an embryo village that was intended to be the "capital" of New Connecticut and that was eventually to become the greatest city in Ohio.

Meanwhile the surveying party under Pease, Holly and Porter journeyed southward. They experienced no difficulty in finding the Pennsylvania line, which had been cleared some time before, and the work ahead of them therefore was that of making observations of the country and taking measurements to find the forty-first parallel of latitude, the southern line of the land purchase. By training and knowledge they were equipped for the former task as well as the latter and their inspection was made carefully, as they were under pledge to make reports to the land company that would acquaint prospective purchasers with the nature of the Western Reserve country. These observations were faithfully made and truthfully reported. They speak of the excellent land, the clear and ample creeks and rivers and the wealth of chestnut, oak, maple, beach, whitewood, and walnut timber; but likewise Make note of "abominable" swamp land, of miasmatic forests and of stony ridges.

Working with comparative rapidity, considering that they were land observers as well as surveyors, the party reached the southeast corner of the Reserve on July, 21, 1796. It was from this spot that their actual work of surveying the land purchase began. It is now the southeast corner of Poland Township, Mahoning County. As the Western Reserve, or "New Connecticut" was to include only lands lying north of the forty-first parallel of latitude it is reasonable to presume that the surveyors believed they had located the spot where this parallel

YOUNGSTOWN AND THE MAHONING VALLEY - 49

intersects the Pennsylvania state line. In this they were mistaken, as they were some distance below the forty-first parallel—one-half mile it is generally estimated, and perhaps more. Later when the south line was surveyed to the extreme western end of the Reserve the southwest corner was located exactly on the forty-first parallel. This variation was destined to cause much controversy between the Federal Government and the Connecticut Land Company, a dispute that was finally terminated by the surrender of the contested ground to the land company. This, it might be remarked, was the usual result when the Federal Government and the people of Connecticut happened to want the same thing.

On July 23, Warren and Spafford, with their assistants, arrived at the same spot and a marker was set up at the starting point of the survey. Range lines were run back to the lake, Holley running the first range, Spafford the second, Warren the third, and Pease and Porter the fourth. The range, or meridian, lines were five miles apart. Lines of latitude were then run, also five miles apart, thus dividing the land, as directed, into townships approximately five miles square. The survey, however, was made with instruments far inferior to those in use today, it was made in haste because the summer was already far advanced, there was no time for the surveyors to take correct observations or check up their work, and they labored under the extreme difficulties common to wilderness country. Because of these great drawbacks the work was done imperfectly ; a circumstance that quite evident in the varying size of Trumbull County townships and the Reserve Townships of Mahoning County. It was intended that each of these should contain twenty-five square miles, or 16,000 acres, while as a matter of fact there is not one of the thirty-five townships in these two counties that contains exactly that area of ground. They range in size from 14,492 acres in the case of Lordstown Township to 17,317 in the case of Hartford Township. The nearest approach to accurate measurement is in the case of Bloomfield Township with its 16,039 acres.

Just how much time was required to run these first four rows of townships back to the lake does not appear, but the work probably was completed early in September. There was no time to return to the south base and begin a survey of additional townships, as it was necessary for the surveyors to adjourn to the mouth of the Cuyahoga River to plat the ground in that vicinity. Here they met Gen. Moses Cleaveland, who had picked the township in which. the "first settlement" on the Reserve was to be made, as provided by Article III of the Connecticut Land Company's articles of agreement and association, and proceeded to survey that township into "small lots," an undertaking ordered by the same article. The lots within the proposed village were to consist of two acres, lots immediately adjoining the village were to contain ten acres, and the remainder of the township was divided into 100-acre lots. These may not appear as "small" after all, but as a "lot" in the vernacular of the Connecticut Land Company was 16o acres, the smallness of the Cleveland Township lots is easily understood. It is a tribute to the discretion and foresight of Cleaveland, also

Vol. 1-4