50 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY on the frontiers. The British were trying to influence all the tribes of Indians to join them and fight the Americans. A chief of some tribe visited Chief Pipe at Jerometown and Armstrong the chief of Greentown, and used his best endeavors to persuade them to join the British in the war against America. The Indians agreed to call a council and decide on the course they would pursue. The council was held and they decided to remain neutral. I was sent to Odell's still with a sack of corn and had to go through Jerometown as there was no other trail. When I returned in the evening they were holding their war dance. They wanted me to stay and see the performance. I hitched my horse and staid till the dance was over, then rode home a distance of nine miles through the wilderness, arriving at home about two o’clock in the morning. “The chief visited all the states and territories. Were he could get their consent to join the British he would give them a red stick in token of blood. Consequently he was known as the chief red-stick. This council at Jeromestown was held about the last of June, 1812. But after Hull’s surrender August 16, 1812, the government thought best to remove them; not so mach for fear of their making trouble, but to keep them from harboring unfriendly Indians. “When Captain Douglas informed them that he came with orders to remove them they were much excited and would not consent to go. Captain Douglas called on Mr. Copes to go with him and use his influence to obtain their consent. Mr. Copes replied that he and the Indians were on friendly terms and they would not think it kind in him to persuade them to leave against their wills. But Douglas threatened to arrest him as a traitor if he refused. He consented on condition that their town and property should be respected. As they could not talk with them Mr. Copus was prevailed upon to go as an interpreter. Hr told them that if they would consent to go their property should be taken care of and that the officer had authorized him to say so, on the strength of this promise they reluctiantly consented to go. They packed up what they could take with them and started. They had not gone more than two miles when looking back they saw their village on fire, some of Douglas' soldiers having lingered behind and applied the fatal torch. They were greatly excited in viewing the smoke ruins of their village and property when they had the pledge of soldiers and friends that their property, should he taken care of. They were removed immediately after Hull's surrender and token to Urbana. They were not kept very long for they had asked the privilege of going to their friends at or near Sandusky, on the pledges that they were to remain peaceable and quiet they were permitted to go. On the 10th of September, 1812, a board of about forty-five of them returned, no doubt, with the intention of avenging the wrongs done them, and at this time Martin Ruffner, Fredrick Zeimer, his wife and daughter Kate were inhumanly murdered in cold blood. Five days after this, on the 15th, occurred the, massacre of James Copus and three soldiers. "Immediately after the attack and repulse at the Copus place, they came over into the Jerome Fork valley and burned Robert Newell's house, situatel three and a half miles southeast of the present site of the village of Ashland. Previous to these Indian raids Captain Murray came with a company of soldiers to where Jeromeville now stands, as a guard to the frontier settlers and built a HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 51 blockhouse. When we got the news of the Zeimer family murder, all excepting father's family fled to the blockhouse. In about five days after the Copus family were attacked the news reached Captain Murray, when he immediately dispatched thirty soldiers for relief. The news came to Captain Murray the morning after the Copus murder the morning after the Copus murder. At the same time Absolom Newell volunteered to go on foot, to give us notice to flee, but when he got in sight of his father's house in flames, he ran bavk to the blockhouse. Father had just got in with his horses from the woods. David Noggle mounted a horse, took his rifle and rode as fast as he could to give its notice to flee to the blockhouse. Father and Noggle threw the harness on the hores and hitched to the wagon while mother and us boys threw some bedding in the wagon and tumbled in. Father with gun in hand mounted one of the horses and drove as fast as he could while Noggle on horseback rode ahead. “When the Indians were told that they had to leave they told father to remain right white he wars, that they would not harm him, that he had been their friend, and had always used them well. Their passing within eighty yards of the house when we were there on their revenging raid show's that they fuel kept their pledge in good faith. In about a week father with a guard of soldiers returned for the balance of our goods. I went along with them. We counted the tracks of thirty-seven Indians who had passed through our corn field going in the direction of Cuppy’s which indicated a loss of eight killed and wounded at the Copus battle. They had passed before we left and before solders got there. The soldiers found Cuppy's house on fire and saw the Indians run out of the cornfield into the woods and a little further up found Fry’s house on fire. I have no doubt that had Newell. Cuppy and Fry been at home they would all have been murdered, as it was known that they had not treated the Indians well. Newell, although a good neighbor, would not allow the Indians around him, neither would he feed or harbor them, but drove them away when they came about his premises. Cuppy, when they came hungry and asked for anything to eat, would order them away without giving, them a bite. Fry, although a preacher, would not allow than around him. “After getting the balance of his goods father concluded to go back to Canton; got as far as Massillon and met William Rhodes, an old acquaintance, who invited him to come and stay with him as he had in empty house and could give us work to do so that we could earn ourselves a living, where we remained until about the 10th of February, 1813. As there was no disturbance along the frontier we found our corn all standing in the field excepting, what the turkeys had eaten. We then opened our sugar camp and commenced making sugar when the news came that the Indians had made their appearance at Colonel Colyer’s about four miles below the blockhouse. We had almost two kettles of syrup almost ready to sugar when we received the news to flee. We set the kettles off the fire, covered them and fled to the blockhouse about the 5th of March. Colonel Colyer living on the Muddy Fork of the Mohican. Three Indians made their appearance at the door and asked for something to eat. Colyer told them that if they would give up their guns and tomahawks to him that he would give them something to eat. They handed him their guns and tomahawks, when he set them back in the house where he could stand 52 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY between then and their guns and told Mrs. Colyer to set on the table what meat and bread she had, calculating that when they got seated at the table that he would arrange to shoot two of them at one shot and kill the other with the breeeh of his gun. Mrs. Colyer was a weak woman and was nearly scared to death, and when he raised his gun Mrs. Colyer screamed, fainted and fell to the floor. This alarmed the Indians; they sprang to their feet, held up their hands and begged him not to shoot as they were friendly Indians and meant no harm; that they were on their way to their friends in Goshen in the Tuscarawas valley. Colyer told there to go out and come around to the window, and if they would promise to go off he would hand out their guns and tomahawks and what they were to eat. Colyer then raised his wife and put her on the bed, then took, out the flints from the gums threw out the priming, plugged the vents and handed them out together with their food and told them to leave and not be seen a again around there or they would be killed. Colyer and his wife started to the eagle blockhouse as soon as the Indians were out of sight. Colonel James Colyer was a stout, resolute trlan, who scarcely knew fear by that name unless the odds were too great. "All around and about the blockhouse took shelter. There were eight families in all who took sheller at the Jerome blockhouse. We were almost without food or raiment. There were about fifteen acres belonging to Mr. Carr and Warner of Cleveland. We all joined in plowing, planting and working; that to corn and potatoes. Some worked while others were posted as sentinels. In this way we got some corn and potatoes a rid in the spring of 1814 we all left the blockhouse. Some of these families had sold their lands and began again in the woods. “As I had frequently seen Captain Pipe, chief of the Jerometown Indians, perhaps it would not be amiss to give a short description of him. He was about six feet in height, straight and well proportioned, rather round features, slightly pale face with a grave countenance and to a appearance was about fifty years of age and I should judge had perhaps one-fourth white blood in his veins. ''I have also seen Armstrong!', the chief of the Greentown Indians, amd think he had a mixture of white blood in him. I will give the location of those towns for the satisfaction of those who were not here until the last traces of then were wiped out. “Jerometown was situated one and one-fourth miles a little southwest from Jeromeville, on the state road from Wooster to Mansfield. Greentown was in the Black Fork valley about. five miles southeast of Petersburg. “I saw Captain Lyon, one of the Jerometown Indians shortly after the war was over. He knew me and asked if we had seen them when they went up to burn Cuppy and Fry's houses. I answered `no.' He then asked if we had seen their tracks in the corn field ? I replied 'yes.' He then said, ‘we saw you and would have gone to the house and got something to eat but we were afraid you would be frightened ; we did not wish to scare you.'” HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 53 LEADING ROAD AND WATERWAYS- STAGE LINES, TAVERNS AND FLATBOATS Before taking up the history of townships, there are matters of a general character that should he given a separate chapter, and one of these is the state and other leading roads of the county and the travel and traffic over them. When the first settlement was made in Ashland county in 1807, there were no roads, within its borders, except the Crawford route (if that could be called it a road) and some blazed trails. The first road that could be called by that name was from Wooster by way of Greentovwn to the Newman settlement, thence to Mansfield. The next road was from Mt. Vernon north through the McCluer settlement (Bellville) to Mansfield and on to Huron on Lake Erie. History states that a road from Wooster to Mansfield was opened in 1810. Some claim it was at on earlier day. Beall’s trail opened up the country in northwest Ohio in 1812, and General Crook's army opened a road from Mansfield west to Upper Sandusky the same year. The road from Mansfield to Ashland was cut through the forest in 1813, at a cost of nine dollars per mile. One of the most important and most used of the early roads was the one from Mt. Vernon through Mansfield to Lake Erie. This later became a state road, and the greatest stage and freight route between central Ohio and Lake Erie. Portland (now Sandusky) was the great mart upon the lake for Ohio trade and traffic. From Mansfield the state road ran directly north to Brubaker's creek, thence to the northwest through Ganges to Planktown, where it struck the Beall trail -the stage road running through Ashland to Tiffin. From Planktown there were two roads to the lake, one through Paris (now called Plymouth) to Sandusky, the other north to Huron. Prior to the opening of the New York and Erie canal there was but little market for the farm products of this part of Ohio. Wheat sold at twenty-five cents a bushel with other cereals proportionately low—too low to pay for transportation. The principal commodities at that: time for shipment were ginseng, beeswax, feathers and maple sugar. Merchants then bought their goods in the eastern cities, usually in Baltimore, and the same were hauled through to Ohio in wagons. The wagons then used were generally of the style called “Pennsylvania wagons” or freighters. These wagons had long, deep beds, set on wooden bolsters without. springs. Wooden bows surmounted the beds, and these were covered with canvas. The bed of the Pennsylvania wagon was a frame work mortized together, the slats both horizontal and perpendicular, conformed in curve to their respective body pieces and made the top of the bed longer than the bottom and curved upward. The poles of these wagons were known as "stiff-tongue” and were not supported by neck yokes, as the Ashland county wagons are today. The poles were used to guide the wagon and to hold the same back when going down hill, for which purposes breast-chains were attached from the hames to the end of the pole. Teams of from lour to six horses were attached to these wagons and the driver used hilt a single line in 54 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY driving them.  The line was attached to the bridle rein of the near lead horse, and might be called the signal rein, for whenever the driver wanted the team to turn to the left, he called out ''haw,'' and pulled on the line, and if he wanted the team to tinn to the right, he called out "gee," and gave the line two or three jerks. A trained leader obeyed these signals. There was a saddle on the moo wheelhorse and the driver could ride or walk at will. The route of these freighters was along the National road, after it was completed, and it took weeks to make the trip from the seaboard to Ohio. The first transportation line established through Mansfield was by Barney & Marsh, and its purpose was to earry freight between Mt. Vernon and intermediate points to the lake. After a lake market had been made. by the opening of the Erie canal many farmers hauled their own products to the lake, and agter harvest as high as five hundred teams have been known to pass through Mansfield in one day, hauling grain from the central part of the state to Huron and Sandusky. The old Portage road deserves special mention. It was cut through the wilderness in 1812 by General Harrison's army. This road enters Worthington township in the south part of Frankland county, and rims diagonally through the same from the southwest to the northeast and crosses Cold Run valley in the vicinity of the Butler on region, then through to Bunker Hill, the Davis settlement and Ashland county, to its terminal at Old Portage on the Western Reserve. It was called the " Portage" road from the fact that it terminated at Portage, on the divide between the Tuscarawas and Cuyahoga rivers. Old Portage, on the Cuyahoga side of the divide, was an old trading post for both whites and Indians, and in the war of 1812, it was a rendezvous for troops. New Portage, on the Tuscarawas side of the divide, was in the vicinity of the present town of Barberton. The old Portage path, between the Tuscarawas and Cuyahoga rivers, in Summit County, was one of the most important trails for its length (eight miles) in the state. This path was defined as a portion of the western boundaryof the United States in the treatiesof Fort McIntosh, in 1781, and Fort Harmar, in 1789, and thus this Portage path became a noted land mark, and when General Harrison opened a military road across Ohio from the southwest to the northeast it took its name Portage road from the Portage path. Since the opening of the Portage road no other period of equal length in the world's history is fraught with so many marvelous, industrial and seientific achievements as are crowded into the years since this part of Ohio was settled. Railroads have been made Since then to span the continent; wires have been strung to carry tidings of the world's affairs around the earth and under the waters of the sea ; the human voice to steal swiftly over the mountains and across the plains to convey to distant ears messages of comfort. and of love, and the dark places of the earth have been made dcminbms by electric lights and trolley errs are hieing propelled by electricity along our roads and throughout streets. In referring to the early transportation facilities, it should here be stated that flatboats were built at different times at Perrysville and Loudonville and sent down the Mohican to the Ohio river and thence to New Orleans, where the cargoes found a money market. The volume of water in the streams of the county at that time was larger than it is now. There were no dams inn the HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 55 Mohican nor its tributaries at that time. One or more flatboats were built at Newville, loaded and sent down to the Cresent city. One boat built at Loudonville carried a cargo of fifth tons. How to get grain and other products to market was it a perplexing question with the pioneers. To relieve the situation, the National road was built and canals carrels were made. As early as 1816, the Hon. Jeremiah Morrow was placed at the head of a committee of the United States senate, to whom was referred so much of the president's message as related to roads and canals, and on the 6th of February of that year, he presented a report recommending a general system of internal improvements. When Mr. Morrow's term in the senate expired, in 1819, he declined a reelection and returned to private life. But public sentiment was against his retirement and he was appointed a canal cruurrissioner in 1820 and again in 1822. Having, however, been elected governor in this latter year, he declined to act as commissioner. But during; the four years he occupied the gubernatorial chair, he was industriously encouraging construction of roads and promoting the great enterprise of connecting the Ohio river with Lake Erie by means of a canal - the success of which had a remarkable influence over the future character of the population of Ohio, and of Ohio, and of advancing the grade of the state in the Union. The two laws of 1821 and 1825 for the construction of the Ohio and Erie canal were secured by a coalition of the "school party'' and the "canal party'' as certain factions in the Ohio legislature were then called, rind neither of which could secure an enactment without the aid of the other. The school party wanted a free school system and the canal party wanted canals constructed as waterways for commerce. The two parties worked together and won both schools and canals. On the 4th of July, 1825, ground was broken fur the Ohio and Erie canal by DeWitt Clinton, then governor of New York, and Governor Morrow of Ohio. But it required years of work before the canal was ready for business. The first passenger packet to reach Massillon was on August 21, 1828, and it was called “Monticello.” The completion of the canel was hailed with great joy by the people, especially by the farming community, for with its opening the price of wheat advanced from twenty-five cents to seventy-five cents a bushel. The canal extends from Cleveland on the like to Portsmouth on the Ohio river, a distance of three hundred and six miles. In 1842 the Walhonding canal was projected, which was to extend from Coshocton by the Mohican to Ganges, Richland county, but at that time the building of railroads began and the canal was never finished farther than to Rochesterm a distance of twenty-five miles. The legislature had previously passed a law declaring the Blackfork of the Mohican a navigable stream up as far as Ganges. This reference to the Ohio and Erie canal is given to show the great value of the rural, as it opened nearer and competitive markets for farm products. Had the canal been completed to Ganges and the old conditions continued Ganges would have been tine ruetroprrlis of the part of Ohio lying between the “divide'' and Lake Erie. Doubtless large warehouses would have been erected at Ganges and the water power of the Blackfork been utilized to operate mills 56 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY and factories, and by the schemes for new counties prevalent at that time Piehland would probably have been divided from east to west instead of from north to south, and Ganges would probably have been the county seat of a new County to the north, but things went the other way, and Ganges barely holds its place on the map today. And pleasure seekers and other transient persons hurrying through the old village today neither know nor care about the history of the little place that was named after the famous river of the Hindus. BLOCKHOUSES. The people of today doubtless know very little of the blockhouses of the pioneer period. They were usually constructed of hewn logs, closely fitted together, were two stories high, the length and width of the building being about twenty feet. The logs resting on each other, prevented balls from the enemies guns from entering cracks or crevices, which would otherwise have been between the logs. The doors were made of thick planks or puncheons, hung on strong hinges and bolted on the inside. A door was sufficiently thick to prevent ordinary musket baIls from passing through it. The first story of these blockhouses was generally about eight or nine use feet high. Sometimes the floor consisted of well packed earth. The second story projected over the lower story about three feet on the skies and curl. This over-jet rested upon logs or joists, which were allowed to project over the lower story. The second story was about seven or eight feet high, and was perforated by numerous port-holes, pointing in every direction, so as to guard ago inst the approach of an enemy. The floor of this story was thick and strong, and had port. holes pointing downward, so that if an enemy conic under the projection, to set fire to the building, he conk be shot from above. There were also port-holes in the louver story, from which the savages could be seen and cut off before they reach the building. The roof was of clapboards, supported by, logs. These blockhouses were generally erected in an open space upon some slight elevation of around, so as to prevent the approach of the sorvagges without being seen by the irnnates. Another point to be considered in the loeation of a bloel:house, was to be near a spring of water. The blockhouse at Jeronreville had a well of water within it. In such a blockhouse, twenty or thirty families could be accommodated, by spreading their beds upon the floors. During the day the inmates could press in and out most of the time and attend to their duties without being molested by the Indians; their raids being only semi-occasionally and very unexpectedly. Dr. hill says in his history that there were only two blockhouses in the, county which were surrounded by stockades. Life in bloekimuses was extremely irksome and monotonous, and the inmates were always pleased when assured they could return to their deserted cabins with safety. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 57 THE PIONEERS SEEK REFUGE IN THE BLOCKHOUSES. The pioneers along the different branches of the Mohiean creek were almost panic-stricken upon hearing of the murders of Martin Ruffner and the Zeimer family by the Indians, and immediately sought refuge in the blockhouses. Pack-horses, wagons and carts, were in demand-in fact, every means of conveyance was put into speedy requisition; and such articles of bedding and wearing apparel as cold not be dispensed With, were put in packs and conveyed along with fugitives. As near as can be remembered, the following families fled to Clinton, Moses: Ebenezer Rice and family, Joseph Jones and family, Calvin Hill and family, Moses Aidzit and family, Abraham Baughman and family, Allen oliver and family, and J. L. Hill and family. There were in all about thirty persons, and they made their way, as rapidly as possible, along the paths leading through the forests to the village of Clinton, near the present site of Mt. Vernon, then a sort of depot for supplies for the army. The upper settlement on the Blackfork, hastened to the Blockhouse on the Clearfork, owned by Samuel Lewis. At that time, some twenty or thirty soldiers, under Lieutenant Barkdall, were there as a guard. Those seeking refuge there were Peter Kinney and family, James Cunningham and family. Andrew Craig and family. David Davis and fancily, John Davis, William Slater and family, John Wilson anal family. Peter Zimmerman and family, Harvey Hill and family, Henry McCart and family, and Henry Nail and family. most of these families made a temporary stay at the blockhouse, returning to their cabin frequently, during the fall months, to keep watch over such household goods as were left in them, and to take care. of their abandoned stock. The next day after the light to the Lewis blockhouse, Harvey Hill and John Coulter, who aided the fugitives in driving along most of their cattle, returned; and by the aid of the Tannahills, and others, whose names are not now remembered, the roof of the cabin of Thomas Coulter was thrown off, and a second story put on, and the cabin thereby became "Coulter's blockhouse." The Coulter cabin was perhaps sixteen or eighteen feet, built for their first dwelling in the fall of 1810, the overjutting part being put on as referred to above. It stood at the base of a bold bluff, on the bank of the Blackfork, near where the mill-dam now is, about half a mile southeast of the village of Perryville, and furnished a safe retreat for the neighbors of Mr. Coulter, when endangered by the savages. As soon as this blockhouse was completed, the following persons occupied it: Thomas Coulter and family, Allen Oliver and family, Melzer Tannahill and family, Jeremiah Conine and family, and George Crawford and family. When the forgoing families had gathered in, Thomas Coulter and Harvey Hill volunteered to go to Wooster, through the forest, to secure soldiers to defend the settlement against Indian incursions. They succeeded in obtaining a guard of eleven soldiers, under the command of Lieutenant Winterringer, of the Tuscarawas militia, of the army of General Beall, then collecting at Wooster, for an expedition to Upper Sandusky. The guard accompanied them 58 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY home, and in the daytime skirmished about, the hills, and up and down the valleys for Indian signs, and then stood guard at night to prevent an attach by the Indians. While a resident of the blockhouse, the wife of Jeremiah Conine died and was buried in the cemetery at Perryville. She was the second person interred in that ground, the that being Mr. Samuel Hill who died the preceding June. The settlers along the Jeromefork and its branches were also greatly excited and alarmed over the murder of Ruffner and the Zeimers.   Thomas Eagle hastened to Wooster for assistance. The blockhouse at Wooster, then a mere village, was under the command of Captain Stidger, whose company constituted a part of the amay of General Beall. The company of Captain Nicholas Murray, composed of about Sixty soldiers, inrmediately hastened to the the relief of Jerome settlement. A blockhouse was erected by his men, a Short distance northeast of the present site of the mill, on a gentle rise of round, where the settlers commended at once to concentrate. Mr. Eagle also conducted a guard of eight or ten men to protect a small blockhouse or cabin at the Findley and Collyer settlement, about five miles down the Jeromefork, near were Tylertown now stands. In the meantime, Robert Newell and family, George Ecldev and Jonathan Palmer and family, James Wallace and family, Christopher Tri family, James Bryan and family, Ezra Warner and family and David and others, not now remembered, gathered at the new blockhouse. The of families of Benjamin Cuppy and Jacob Fry did not remain at the fort, but passed on east. It was noticed, when all had gathered in, that Daniel Carter and family were missing. Much uneasiness was evinced concerning the safety of Mr. Carter and family. He resided up the stream, about nine miles from the blockhouse, and one mile northeast of the present site of Ashland. Absolom Newell, the eldest son of Robert Newell, volunteered to go and inform Mr. Carter and family of the danger that threatened them. Being an active young man, he soon reached the cabin of his father, some five miles up the Jeromefork, which he found almost consumed by fire. Supposing Indians had set on fire and were concealed in the vicinity, he hastened back and related the circumstance to the company at the blockhouse. David Noggle, a. warm friend of Mr. Carter, at once offered to undertake the hazardous task of reaching him on horseback. Thirty soldiers were detailed for the expedition. Mr. Noggle and the soldiers followed a trail cut through the forest by Mr. Carter when he removed his family to his new cabin, which passed south of Newell's, thence over lands more recently owned by Mr. Smucker, Samnel Swinford, and the late farm of Daniel Carter, Jr., and so on to his cabin. Mr. Noggle reached the cabin sometime before the soldiers and found Mr. Carter at work with his team, all safe. From circumstances afterwards developed, it appears that a body of Indians had that very morning passed through the corn held near the cabin, but had offered no harm to Mr. Carter and his family. Mr. Carter hastily placed such clothing and bedding on his wagon as he could conveniently reprove, and taking his family, accompanied Mr. Noggle. They had gone but a short distance when they met the guard. The soldiers continued in the direction of the deserted cabins of Cuppy and Fry. and on HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 59 approaching the former, found it yet burning, and some of the soldiers discovered the rear guard guard or the Indians skulking in a cornfield. On looking towards the cabin of Mr. Fry, a half-mile west, they could see the smoke ascending from it. They then turned about, and retraced their steps to the blockhnuse at Jerome’s place, where Mr. Carter and family had arrived a short time before. Mr. Carter and family did not remain at the blockhouse; but passed on through Wooster to New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county, where he and his family remained until February, 1813. The band of Indians that burned the cabins of Newell, Cuppy and Fry was undoubtedly the same that the day before made assault on the Copus cabin. At this time there. were Six or eight. families in the Vaehel-Metcalf settlement, some two and a half miles southeast of the fort on Jerome's place, among whom were those of William Bryan, James Conley, Elisha Chilcote, Benjamin Bunn, James Slater and James Bryan. These met and constructed a fort two stories high, the walls of the second story projecting beyond the first on all sides. The floor and sides of the second story were pierced with port-holes. The pioneers with ox terms, saes and strong arms soon erected the fort. The lower story had strong doors securely fastened, and were occupied by the women and children, while the men with their rifles occupied the second story in hour's of danger and alarm A patch of ground was cleared around the fort and enclosed by a palisade twelve feet high, with a strong gate, which enclosed about one fourth of an acre, all the families of the neighborhood gathered into this fort, while their horses and cattle were placed within the palisade. The settlers remained in this fort dun rig the winter of 1812-13, and a part, of the summer in 1813, while cultivating, by occasional visits, small patches of corn and vegetables with pickets to prevent Surprise by the Indians. Hill's History of Ashland county says that the Priest fort was erected near the banks of the Mohican, not far from the point where the Pittshnrg, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad crosses that stream at Loudonville. The fort was surrounded by a picket of heavy split timber about twelve feet high and enclosed about about one-fourth acre of ground. It had a strong gate hung on wooden hinges. In eases of necessity the horsess and cattle were brought within the enclosure. ADVENTURES AND LIFE IN THE BLOCKHOUSE General Crook's command, which passed through the southern part of Ashland county and moved to the northwest in the fall of 1812, saw very hard service after leaving Upper Sandusky. The command was ordered to Fort Meigs, with an artillery train and stores, which were dragged through the rain and mud by the soldiers. The command endured great hardships and suffered severe exposures, part of the time wading through mud and water two or three feet deep and being compelled to cut brush and logs to lift them above the water when they encamped at night., General Winchester had advanced with his army, abut one thousand strong, to within eighteen miles of Malden, where he was surprised be General Proctor, with his British and Indians, and a battle 60 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY ensuing on the twenty-second of January, 1813, Winchester was defeated with great slaughter. The loss of the Americans was about four hundred in wounded, killed and missing, being fully one-third of all the force engaged in the battle! General Winchester was taken prisoner in thecommencement off the engagement ; and many of his soldiers, after having surrendered, were butchered. by the savages in the most wanton manner, without the interference of the British commander to prevent it. This misfortune disconcerted all the plans of General Harrison for the spring' campaign; and compelled him to fall back to Fort Meigs, until the troops ordered into time field by Governor lieigs. should arrive. While these bloody scenes were transpiring, the people of Riehland Wayne, Knox and what is now Ashland counties were again compelled to seid; safety in the blockhouses, not knowing what moment the infuriated savages lead on by Tecumseh, might appear in their midst. Along the Blackfork and Clearfork the fugitives that found safety at Clinton, the fall before, had returned their homes in the vicinity of Coulter's blockhouse and that of Samuel Lewis on the Clearfork; though they had spent most of the winter at their own cabins, Their corn crops, though small, had been secured and safely stored; their cattle and swine were under their control. The mills in Knox county, and, below Wooster, had been visited and a stock of corn meal laid in for the uvintcr. that they had an abundance of cornbread and meat; and by the aid of hominy blocks, there was no imneitient danger of starvation, though the situation we rather exciting. Along, the Jeromefork, the majority of the fugitives remained in blockhouses during the winter. In the fall of 1812, when Captain Nicholas Murray, with a company of sixty men was ordered by General Beall to advance to Jerome's place, to build a blockhouse, just after he had crossed the Killbuk, he met the fugitive families of John Carr, Christopher Trickle, Matthew Williams, Robert Newell, Ezra Warner, Daniel Carter, Jacob Fry, and Benjamin Cuppy. Captain Murray offered all these families protection, and they all returned with him to Jerome's place, except Mr. Carter and family, who continued their Flight to New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county. These families remained in and around the blockhouse all winter. About the middle of February, 1813, Daniel Carter and family returned from New Philadelphia and again occupied his old cabin, one mile northeast of the present site of Ashland, where he found everything; as he had left it the fall before. His corn was yet standing in the field undisturbed, except what had been devoured he deer wild turkeys and small animals. A pioneer gives the following version of the Collyer affair: "About the first of March, 1813, in the morning four strange Indians, appeared at the cabin of James Collyer, then residing about two miles from the junction of the Jerome and Muddy forks of Mohican, a short distance from Findley's bridge, and asked for something to eat. They appeared to be well armed, and his suspicions were excited. There had not been an Indian seen in that neighborhood for several months, the last of the Mohican John Indians having been sent away by order of General Beall, when he cut his trail the fall before. Putting on an air of confidence and calmness, he invited them into his cabin, entering which they leaned their guns against the wall near the door, HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 61 and were seated. Mr. Collyer told his wife, who was much alarmed, to set some cold victuals on the table for them to eat. She did so putting on a lot of meat, cornbread and such other articles as she had at hand. Mr. Collyer motioned for them to sit down and eat. They went to the table and were seated, and began to eat, heartily of the food. While they were eating Collier moved cautiously to the point where he kept his gun, which was always loaded, and securing it, placed himself, unobserved, between the Indians and the door, and carefully raised his gun so as to get a range on two of them, prepared to fire, seeing which, Mrs. Cllyer shrieked out, and fainting, fell to the floor. This alarmed the Indians, and they sprang to their feet; but seeing the threatening attitude of Collyer, raised their hands and begged him to spare their lives, saying, “me Goshen Injun, me harm you.' Thereupon Collyer withheld his fire, still keeping his gun pointed at them—his intention having been after killing or wounding two of them at the table, to club it over the other two, and thus secure them all—he being" a powerful man and having had a good deal of experience as a hunter, and in Indian warfare. They continued to protest their innocence of any intended harm to hire or his family, when he told them he would spare them on condition of retiring from the cabin and leaving their gnus within, when he would remove the flints and priming, and hand them the balance of the food on the table, out at the window, when they should immediately the neighhorhood and never return again. They accepted these conditions, and retired at once from the cabin. After securing the door, Mr. Collyer plated his wife on a bed, and proceeded to remove the priming and flints from the guns of the Indians, and having done which, he passed them out at a small window; after doing so, he handed them the balance of the food, and they disappeared in the forest After waiting until he was satisfied they were gone and were not intending to attach him, he took his wife and such valuables as he possessed and hastened to the `Eagle' blockhouse, a strong cabin prepared by Thomas Eagle for himself and neighbors " The news of this exploit soon reached the blockhouse at Jerome's place, and word of it being sent to Daniel Carter, he again took leave of his cabin, never to return to it, for he was compelled to remain at the blockhouse until the spring of 1814. A few day's after this, a number of Indians appeared in view if Eagle's fort, and made some hostile demonstrations, but owing to the strength of Eagle’s force, they retired in the direction of Jerome's place, killing a number of hogs on their and finally disappeared from the neighborhood without doing further mischief. This added to the excitement produced by Winchester's defeat, the particulars of which were now understood at the blockhouse. On the approach of the season for planting corn, a few fields were put out by the pioneers of the blockhouse. John Carr had about twenty acres cleared; Ezra Warner had about the same number of acres ready; and Jerome had some thirty acres, on the bottom beyond the blockhouse. Mr. Carter' had four or, five acres near the old Indian village, across the Jerome fork. These fields were plowed, and the planting, was done, by the residents of the blockhouse, as a community. While part of them planted and cultivated the corn, during; the summer, the others patroled the forests in the vicinity of the fort, to prevent surprise and capture. by the Indians. When the corn hail become sufficiently 62 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY matured for arse, the same vigilance prevailed in and about the neighborhood, to prevent surprise. When the crop was gathered it proved to be quite large. The summer months in this way seemed to pass slowly. The inmates could rarely get news from the frontiers. The defense of Fort Meigs by General Harrison, and his victory of the 5th of May, 1813, sent joy to the blochouse along both forks of the Mohican. Harrison and his army had endured, in the most heroic manner, the British army, and finally complelled them to march down the Maumee river. In August. the monotony of the blockhouse was again removed by the reception of the intelligence of the splendid defence of Fort Stevenson (Lower Sandusky) by the heroic Major Crogham and his men. The signal repulse of the British under Proctor and their hasty retreat from the locality, gave renewed hope and confidence. On the tenth of September, Commodore Perry captured the whole British fleet on Lake Erie, and by that great achievement the territory of Michigan passed into the possession of the Anierican forces. In the month of June, Mrs. Anna. Carter, the Wife of Daniel Carter, and his son James, a lad of six years of age, died in the blockhouse at Jerome place and were buried in the Carr cemetery near the fort. In September, Christopher Trickle also died in the blockhouse, and was buried in the same cemetery. These deaths were occasioned from malaria and want of proper medical attendance, there being no phvsinian within the present limits of the county, at that time. Upon the recurrence of autumn, the pioneers along the Black fork, the Cedar fork, the Lake fork and the Jerome fork, busied themselves in storing their meagre crops for winter. Stibbs' mill, and one or two other mills on the Vernon river, each running one set of buhrs, some of which were "nigger head,” were visited by pioneers with pack horses and small canoes, loaded with shelled corn, to be converted into meal. Their food consisted of cornbread, johnnycake, mush and milk, potatoes, vegetables. and principally wild meat, cattle and swine being very scarce. "Store tea" and coffee, were exceedingly rare and very costly. "Store goods" were a thing of note; and the calicoes of that day were a luxury few could afford. Homespun and wove linseywoolsey, and flax or linen garments were the best to he seen; and many a daring, whole-souled pioneer felt proud, clothed in such garments. Salt and flour were luxuries that few could use profusely. Salt was purchased at Zanesville and Pittsburg, and from its price had to he used sparingly. Ammunition, such as lead and pounder, was obtained from the supplies furnished the soldiers left to guard the blockhouses. So far, then, as food was concerned, the inmates of the blockhouses "fared sumptuously''—to use an expression of an old gentleman who was quartered in one, about two years. Nothing happened in the fall of 1813 to materially disturb the quiet of the pioneers of this region. THE EARLY MILLS. The first settlers of Ashland county experienced many privations and inconveniences. A majority of the first settlers were in moderate circumstances. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 63 and land to depend upon their own strong; arms and the smiles of Providence for subsistence. Their food was exceedingly plain, and their habits industrious and economical. Their clothing was generally of the most primitive character, and spun and woven by the faithful pioneer mothers. From l809 to 1813 there were but two grist mills within a. radius of some thirty-five miles. These mills were owned by Messrs. Shrimplin and Stibbs, and were of hewed logs and quite primitive, in appearance. The former was located on Owl creek, some distance below Mt. Vernon. This mill could be reached by descending the branches of Mohican to the Walhonding, and ascending Owl creek or by Indian paths through the forest. By either route it took several days. Stibbs' mill, near Wooster, was less distant, and could be reached by wagon or bridle paths. Packhorses, radin by small boys, generally made the trip to Stibb’s, in from two to three days, depending upon the throng for their grist. These settlements being somewhat earlier in their improvements, generally had surplus corn crops, and were able to supply the new settlers on the branches of the Mohican. What was known as the "horsemill" was erected in many parts of the county. They were rude affairs, and the machinery was somewhat complicated. They were propelled by horse power, somewhat like a cider mill. Many produced very good meal and flour, and generally had hand-bolds. A description of their machinery would occupy more space than can allotted in these notes. They were in very general use for a period of about fifteen years. The buhrs of the horse-mills were made, mostly of boulders or “niggerheads” and fitted and secured much like the buhrs now in use in the waters and steam grist mills. An ingenious coffee-mill was invented in the days of the early settlement, of the county, and it was known as the handmill. They were made from a large boulder much after the fashion of the coffee mills of today. A hopper was drilled in a niggerhead-stone—and made in the shape of an inverted cone; a cylinder of the same material, exactly fitting the hopper, perforated through the center by a shaft, and also regularly grooved, was placed therein on a pivot, and propelled by the aid of lever, by one or two hands, its necessity required. The meal was received in a box below, and sifted by hand. It operated much like the modern coffee mills. and was a great improvement to the former way of putting the coffee in a strong, cloth and portntling it fine. Hill’s IIistory of Ashland county tells as follows of the first waterrnills: “The numerous small streams throughout the county, during the earlier settlement. furnished valuable mill sites; and a great, number of enterprising pioneers erected small grist and sawmills upon them. Before the removal of the heavy forests that covered most of the county, sufficient water was obtained to prower one or two sets of buhrs, in the smaller mills, the major part of the year; but since the forests have been away, the water produced by heavy showers is rapidly conveyer by brooks and small streams to the larger ones, while the moisture left on the surface soon evaporates; the result being, that nearly all the smaller mills were compelled to suspend work three-fourths of the year. The consequence is that while, in our earlier history, every little stream had a grist sawmill, the number has gradually diminished, until there are not over a doxen good mills left, and these are chiefly propelled by steam. 64 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY "It will be interesting to note the history of our mills, from the early settlements to the present time. “It is generally conceded that the first grist mill within the present limits of Ashland county, was erected by Benjamin Cuppy, on a small stream one and half miles northeast of Ashland, on what is now the Orange road; in March 1816. It had one run of stones, and ground very slowly, not exceeding four bushels of corn per day. It long; since has disappeared. “About four weeks after the completion of the Cuppy mill, Martin Mason finished a small waternmill upon the present site of Samuel Leidigh's mill, on the Troy road, four miles north of Ashland. It had one run of hardhead stones. It was of hewn logs. It was a convenient neighborhood mill for many years and did fair work.  "About the year 1817, John Haver put up a small grist and sawmill on a run about one-fourth of a mile northeast of the present site of Rowsburgh, in Perry township. It run about one-third of the time, had an under-shot wheel and one set of stones and a hand-bolt. It stood several years, and was replaced by a Mill built some years later.  During the fall of 1817, it is believed that Constance Lake, of Jeromesville, erected a small log, gristmill, where what is known as Goudy’s mill, was subsequently built. The Goudly mill was accidentally burned about 1850. It had sustained a good reputation, and was a great loss to the community. It was not rebuilt, and the site is abandoned. "Conrad Kline, about the year 1819, built a small horsemill one and a half miles northeast of Ashland, near the late residence of John Mason. It was constructed in the usual form of such mills, had one run of stones and a hand bolt. It made good meal and flour. It long since tumbled into ruins. "Jabez Smith, in 1820, erected a sawmill and gristmill half a mile south of the present site of Mohicanville, in Lake township. He sold it Chandler, who kept; the mill moving until the spring of 1875, when it accidentally burned. It was long a convenience to the farming community, and its destruction was much regretted.  “Robert Crawford, a rugged, enterprising pioneer, put up a large and expensive horsenrill on the present land of Albert Tilton, in the southeast part of Orange township, in 1820-21. It had one run of stones, a fine bolt and did large business for those times. It was finally abandoned about the year 1837.   "About the year 1823 Thomas Ford put up a small horsemill near what is now known as Ford's meetinghouse, in Clear Creek township. It was a neighborhood mill, and did some business for a number of years. It has long since give way to the march of improvement. "It is believed that Oliver Sloan put a saw and gristmill two miles southeast of Hayesville, about the year 1830. It had one run of stones and a bolt, and did good deal of neighborhood work. It was conducted, for some years, by a Mr. Vangilder. It is now in ruins. John Hendricks built a watermill on Vermillion creek, about one mile west of Savannah, in 1823. It had one run of stones, and a bolt, and did some business. He subsequently sold to the late Joseph Roop, who caused a deep ditch, at heavy expexise, to be dug from the lower lake, in the hope of increasing HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 65 the flow of water; but only succeeded in draining the lower lake. The enterprise was a financial failure, and the mill vent down. “Conrad Kline erected a small gristmill, about two miles east of Ashland at the foot of Roseberry hill, in Montgomery township, in 1825. It did some business and was carried on some eight or ten years, when it was abandoned. “John Haney built a small horsemill, on a run east of the village of Savannah, in Clear Creek township, in 1825. It was chiefly used for chopping, in connection with a distillery. It stood but a few years, and went to ruin. "David Weitzel erected a small saw and gristmill on the present site of the Ashland woolen mills, about the year 1825. It had a pair of coffeemill stones and was used chiefly for chop work. It had also a hand bolt. It subsequently became the property of the late John Jacobs, and was by him considerably improved. It was superseded by the large brick flouringmill now owned by John Damp & Company. This mill is propelled exclusively steam, and its work has long been classed among the finsest in the county, Iit has a, fine run of stones and can produce seventy-five barrels of flour per duty. “Andrew Newman built what is now known as the Hershey mill, on the Blackfork, two and one-half miles northwest of the village of Mifflin in the year 1820. It is regarded as one of the best of its kind. It is chiefly a neighborhood mill, does fine work, and is run by water. It is now owned by Stamen Brothers. “Silas Longworthy built a small watermill three miles southeast of the village of Mifflin, on the Blackfork, in 1825, and sold to John Hewhey, he to Charles Lewis, and he to Daniel Kauffman. It was carried on until 1845, when Daniel Kauffmam, a skilful millwright, tore it down and erected a valuable mill which he sold to John Charles. It is propelled exclusively by water, and is regarded as one of the best in the county. It has a sawmill attached. “It is believed that James Neely erected a gristmill, on Zimmer', run, two and one-half miles southeast of Mifflin, as early as 1825. "Jonathan Harvout built a small horsemill, about one mile northwest of Ashland, on lands recently owned by James Wells: abont the year 1830. It had a brief career, and was used mostly as a chopmill by the farmers. "Joseph Sellers put up a small watermill, on Clear Creek, two miles west of Savannah. in 1830 It struggled along a few years and went dawn. "Colonel John Murray erected, for himself, a grist and sawmill, on Mohican creek one and a half miles north of Orange, in 1831. It did considerable business in wet seasons but finaly became of little value, because of a want of water. “George McCartney constructed a small watermill in connection with a carding machine - on lands since owned by the late Samuel Urie, in Milton township, in 1830. It had insufficient power, and the enterprise failed and brought disaster iipom its owner. "William Goudy and sons put up the present large gristmill it Jeromesville, about the year 1836. It passed through many ands, and is yet regarded as a valuable property. It has fine water power. It has a good sawmill connected with it. ''Armstrong Meanor, erected a small gristmill three miles north of Loudonville, on the Hayesville road, near a small stream, about the year 1831. It was subsequently rebuilt. 66 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY "About the same time (1831), Mr. Newman built a gristmill three miles northeast of Hayesville, on a small stream in the Finley settlement. It was carried on for many years, and did a prosperous business. A new mill, not known as Smith's mill, was erected in the neighborhood some twenty yea since, and the old mill is going to decay. "Jacob Mason built a small undershot mill about four miles north of Ashland, on Leidigh's run, in 1831. It was Ysed principally as a. chopmill for a distillery. It has long since disappeared. "Daniel Beach built a sawmill in 1824. and a gristmill on Vermillion river one mile north of Ruggles corners, in 1832. It run to about 1858 and is now the, in ruins. It passed through four or five hands. "Daniel Carter, Jr., put up a watermill two miles east of Ashland, nearth Wooster road, in 1832. It did a fair business eighteen or twenty years. It is now in ruins. The Loudonville mill—a frame—two runs of stones, was built by Alexander Skinner in 1818; Caleb Chapel was carpenter and first miller.  He died in 1821 and T. J. Bull became the owner of the mill; he sold to Thomas Carlisle; and in 1835 the mill became the property of Gray & Freeman, of Cleveland. They run it until 1845; then it passed into the hands of James Christmas and John C. Larwill, and in 1.861, A. A. Taylor who erected a new mill." Haney and Smith, from Rochester, New York, put up a large flouring mill on the Lakefork, three miles southeast of Mohicanville, in 1836. It had fine water power and did a thriving business. Michael Diblebess erected a small mill on the Catotaway in Montgomery township in 1840. It made some flour and had a hand bolt. Thomas Stringer erected a large gristmill on the Blackfork below Perrystiil in 1839. He owned it but a. short tone. It had a, stirring career and passe through many hands. John Scott, Sr., put up a valuable gristmill one mile north of Hayesville on the Ashland road, in 1846. In 1874 Messrs. Roop, Coble & Myers erected a large brick mill in Ashland driven by steam and complete in its machinery. References are frequently made to the distilleries of the olden time, from which it might be inferred that the pioneers were noted for intemperance, but such is not the fact. Chopmills and distilleries were then considered necessities. There was a surplus of corn and of rye, while there was neither a purchaser no a market for them. Transportation by wagon to the eastern markets was intended with much expense. The only way surplus corn and rye could be nia available was to convert them into whiskey, which could be exchanged for groceries and other goods. The result was that many distilleries were erects which since our improved modes of transportation have long since gone out o commission. But whiskey is still an "institution,'' nevertheless. It pays enormous revenue, and is feared alike by moralists and politicians. It Is been said that "the mills of the gods grind slow but exceedingly fine." But the mills of the pioneers ground not only exceedingly slow, but exceedingly HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 67 REMINISCENCE OF PIONEER TIMES In those days when mills were distant, the pioneers often pounded corn in a hominy block. When sifted, the finest meal made bread, the next mush and the third grade was grits, or hominy. These, with butter and milk, constituted a large part of the daily food. The mush made by the pioneer women was remembered by the pioneer boys long after they became men as the best they had ever eaten, and it was a compliment to their wives if they said they made as good much as their mothers had. An Ashland county farmer gave an interesting account, a few years before his death of the conditions that prevailed in his part of the county in the '40s. He said: '' I had to go as far as forty-five miles to the city of Akron to get a grist of flour. The home mills were run by water then, but owning to drought we were compelled to go elsewhere. We would drive mostly with oxen. I remember one night whom I came to Huron with a load of wheat on my way to Milan. here all hauled their wheat at that time, I stopped at Ruggles' Corners. There were two hotels there, and I counted one hundred teams, all headed for Milan with wheat. I will never forget the time I walked to Savannah, a distance of four miles, through the mud, and carried butter and eggs, which I sold at the store at five cents a pound for butter and three cents a dozen for eggs.'' The late Francis Graham, father of Mrs. J. H. Black, of south Main street, Mansfield, in giving reminiscences of pioneer life, a few years before his death, stated that he located at Ashland, then called Uniontown, in 1821, and engaged in the mercantile business. Uniontown then contained about fourteen or fifteen houses. The prices quoted by Mr. Graham were, no doubt, the same at Mansfield that they were at Uniontown. The products of the country brought low prices at that time, from the fact that there was no market or demand for them beyond home consumption. It was difficult for people to get money to pay their taxes. Wheat was twenty-five cents a bushel, oats from twelve to fifteen cents and corn from fifteen to twenty cents. Butter from five to six sents a pound and eggs from four to five cents a dozen. Maple sugar was an important article trade in Ashland county, not from the high prices it commanded, for only brought from five to six cents a pound, but from the large quantity made, some ''camps'' ranking a yield of from fifteen hundred to twenty-five hundred pounds a season. One season Mr. Graham bought maple sugar that filled forty-two barrels, of about two hundred and fifty pounds to the barrel. About the year 1825 John Stewart, for many years surveyor of Richland county, built a flouring mill on Bentley's Run, a branch of the Rockyfork, three miles southeast of Mansfield. Mr. Stewart advertise that he would pay thirty-one and one-fourth cents cash per bushel for good merchantable wheat delivered at this mill. The farmers for twenty-five miles around hauled their what to this mill, pleased with the idea they could sell it for cash. Money continued scarce until after the opening, of the New York and Erie canal, after which product of all kinds gradually advanced in price and the volume of currency increased. Swindling, theft or robbery was of rare occurrence in northern Ohio at that time, Mr. Graham stated. 68 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY Wolves were both numerous and troublesome when Ashland county was First settled, and the pioneers had to put their sheep and hogs in enclosures night to protect them. When driven by hunger the wolves would sometime succeed in getting inside of these enclosures find kill pigs and sheep. Upon such occasions they usually gorged themselves to such an extent that they could not get out of the pen as easily as they had entered, and were killed the m morning by the morning by the proprietor. Of the wolf stories told the following are given: A farmer was riding along a path one evening and when nearing his home discovered in the gloaming a pach of wolves ahead of him. One broke from the pack and jumped at His horse's head. The frightened animal sprang so suddenly to one side that the farmer nas unhorsed and falling to the ground was at once attacked by the wolf. His half wolf-dog came to his rescue and attacked the wolf with so ferocity that it turned from to defend itself and ere the path eonld come its relief, the farmer had taken refuge in a tree, where he remained until the wolves had left. The horse did not wait to see the program through and dog put in his appearance at home the next day and his looks indicated that his fight had not been a "glove contest." Hogs in those days ran at large and in the fall they fattened on chestnuts and acorns, then so plentiful in the forest. And one day as the farmers were making hay a wolf chased at pig into the meadow. It was followed by the drove of hogs, which came to the relief of the pig, and, cathcing the wolf, tore it into shreds in a few moments. Although those old stage day's are numbered with the past, many things connected with theat period are interesting to the people of today. The stage was the only public mode of travel then, and stage drivers were important personages in their time and were character readers of both men and horses. They were terse and sententious in expression upon lines of their duties and could be entertainingly loquacious in narrating events of the past and in giving the history of the country, through which their line passed. They would talk to their horses, which, as a rule, intelligently obeyed the orders given them. A story is told of a stage driver who had inherited a farm, bade good-by to the hardships of the road and settled down to the pleasures of sheltered prosperity. After enjoying the seelrnsion and qnietotde of the farm for a week, he went out to the road to see the stage pass. The driver gave him a salute, and snapping; his whip, the horses started ahead on the gallop, the coach bounded and disappeared. The farmer felt lonely, and as he leisurely walked back over the fields to his new home, he formed the resolution to again go on the road. Accordingly he packed his carpet bag, went to the nearest stage office, reentered the service, and two days later drove down the same road on the same coach snapping his whip and waving a good-bye to his farm. He had one week farm life, and that was enough for him. He preferred the excitement of the road and liked to be in close touch with the living, moving world. He left record of having driven one hundred and thirty--five thousand miles during his stage service—more than five times round the globe. When stages were relegated to the past in England, stage men refused to realize the fact that their occupation was done. This was not the case in HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 69 America, where, with Yankee shrewdness, the adjusted themselves early in the day to altered conditions and obtained employment with the railroad companies, and many were advanced in position, and finally obtained wealth. American and stagefrivers accepted the railroad and profited by it, and we should accept the improved utilities of our generation. What changes a hundred years have brought. Ohio is but one of five great states that have been created from what was once known as the "territory lying northwest of the river Ohio.'' Our forty thousand m uare. miles of area are covered with all the improvements, conveniences, facilities, beauties and adornments of christian civilization, and Ohio is but typical, not only of that, original northwest territory, but also of that further west lying still beyond and stretching away to the golden shores Pacific. THE PIONEER PERIOD. When the term pioneer is used it includes the women as well as the men of that period, for the women shared with the men the dangers, work and hardships of the early settlements, and besides their household duties often assisted in the fields and had at times to defend their homes against the attacks of the Indians. It was not “lady” then, but that better word, "woman." And although clothed in homespun and her hands hardened with toil, she lead nobility of soul and character, her courage did not falter at the approach of danger and her deeds well deserved to be written in history and sung in song. The pioneers are sometimes spoken of as all unlettered people. Some of them were, perhaps, while others had scholastic attainments. All classes from the Atlantic states were represented here. It is true, that that was an age of scanty records, and yet the deeds of those who lived in it were more influential in shaping the civilization which followed than all the other years combined. Pioneer times are as fountains in the wilderness from which rivers ae formed, whose waters through all the coming ages will flow in the channels first selected. Ashland county today with slight variations is what the pioneers made it and it will thus continue through generations to come. That I do exaggerate in my estimate of pioneer times, let us look at the facts of the case in the state of Ohio. 1. Our constitution and laws with all their peculiar differences from other states, are substantially what the pioneers made them, and labor as we will it is impossible to secure any large modifications. 2. Our political divisions into counties and townships, with all their distinctive names and local combinations, which so powerfully affect the daily associations of our people, were all substantially the work of the pioneers. 3. The locations of cities, county seats and roads, in which and through which the public and private life of our people must eontinne for the most part to manifest itself remain almost entirely as the pioneer's decreed. 4. Our religious institutions and tendencies are mainly its the pioneers made them. Men in communities or as individuals develop according to their faith. Unlike an animal, a man's life is the outgrowth of what he believes, 70 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY and what he believes is for the most part what he is taught in his youth. So a community develops according to its faith, aad its faith in its fountain head is the faith of the men who founded it. In accordance with this jaw the faith of Ashland county, not only in religion but also in politics is stamped with the image and superscription of John Wesley, John Calvin and Thomas Jefferson, the faith of the pioneers, and ao it will remain for generations to come. 5. The equality of our social life with none very rich, and but few very poor, we owe largely to the pioneers. They were mostly men of moderate means and fulfilled the prayer of the Psalmist who desired neither poverty nor riches. There were no great landed proprietors to absorb the public, domain and crowd our population into tenant homes, and the result is that today the average size of the farms in Ashland county is less than one hundred acres, and the great us body of our farmers own the land they till, and non-resident proprietors are few and far between. The advantages of this are immense and will continue a subject of thankfulness for generations to come. So in every direction we look we have reason to rejoice in the legacies we have received from the pioneers of Ashland county; they were wise and prudent in their generation and it is ,just and fitting that we should honor their memory. The pioneers of Ohio were a different type of men from those who, for the most part, have settled the prairie states to the west of us. They were hardier and more adventurous, and for the simple reason that the dangers to be encountered and the difficulties to be overcome were greater. Ohio was a gigantic forest, which to subdue was a work in itself so enormous as absolutely to appal the average civilized man. The amen in war who volunteer to lead a storming column in battle are honored for life if they survive. So it seems we should honor those who volunteered to charge upon the howling wilderness of Ohio during he early years of the present century. No wonder Ohio stands today the foremost state in the Union. Her people are the descendants of the mighty men of valor who conquered the wilderness. REMINISCENCES OF A PIONEER. Pioneer Jonas H. Gierhart gave the following account of his early life in Jackson township. I3e removed from Maryland to the vicinity of Polk in July 1817. The township was then unorganized and formed a part of Perry. His nearest neighbor resided about two miles south of him, while on the north, he believed there was not a single white family between him and the lake. When he came to the county with his wife and child, he placed the two latter in temporary charge of the family of Martin Hester, (being the place owned by David and Henry Fluke,) in Orange township, about three miles distant from the tract he owned. The land above mentioned was in. its wild condition not a tree or shrub being cut, and of course without a cabin to afford him and his little family shelter. On the first day he made a small clearing, and preparation for raising a cabin. This work he done himself, although utterly inexperienced in the use of the woodman's axe, as he had never in his life HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 71 chopped a cord of wood, made a fence rail, or cut down or even deadened a tree, hariug previously worked only upon farms long cultivated. On the second day his wife requsted to visit the home her husband was engaged in preparing, and accompany him to it with their child. They accordingly set out on horse and in due time reached the plane, when he proceeded with his work, and Mrs. Gerhart employed herself with her needle and the care of their little Child. One of the mares had been belled and hobbled, and, with her mate, was permitted to range for such food as the woods afforded. Thus the day nearly passed. and toward evening, the sound of the bell had disappeared, and Mr. Gierhart, taking in his arms his little child, and leaving his wife under the shelter of a tree, started in search of his beasts. His animals had wandered a much greater distance than he had supposed; but he finally recovered the one that had been hobbled, and mounting it with his child, set out on his return to his wife. He had not traveled far before he discovered that he was unable to find the blazed timber; and conduded it the safer way to make for the Jerome Fork, where he would be enabled to intersect the trail that led from Martin Hester's to his land. On his way he met an old hunter, named John McConnell, to whom he explained his situation, and asked aid in finding his way back to his wife. Mr. McConnell gave it as his opinion that he could not that night each the place, but proposed that he remain at the house of Mr. Hester, than not far distant, until mornoning. On their way to Hester's they struck the blazes which led to the place where he had parted with his wife; and committing his child to the care of Mr. McConnell, with directions to leave it with Mrs. Hester, he determined, against the protest of Mr. McConnell, who assured him of the impossibility of success, (as night was then rapidly approaching,) to go to the relief of his desolate wife. He accordingly pressed forward on his way, guided by the blazed trees, and continued until the darkness rendered the marks upon the trees indistinguishable. Here was before him a "night of terror" indeed—such a one as he had never passed, and never dreamed that he would be called upon to pass. The thought of a helples wife, in the depth of a wilderness of which the savage beast was the almost undisputed monarch, and no possible hope of affording any relief before the dawn of another day, was enough to wring any soul with agony. Despite the darkness, he plunged blindly forward a few rods in what he supposed might be the right direction, and then, impressed with the utter hopelessness of proceeding farther, halted; and, raising a voice, the power of which was made terrible by his agony, called to his wife. Its echoes reached her, and were recognized. She sent forth her answer, but her voice having less than that of her husband, the sound did not reach his ear. In his despair he laid himself down beside a tree, and maintained his sleepless vigils until mourning, when he resumed his search, and finally came upon the trail he was seeking. Pursuing it rapidly, he soon reached Mrs. Gierhart, who had wisely maintained her position throughout the night, notwithstanding the distraction of mind which her anxiety for the safety of her husband and child her own lonely situation, and the distant howling of wolves, were all calculated to inspire, Soon after he had found his wife, and while they were yet relating to each other the experiences of the night, they heard the blowing of horns, and 72 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY were soon met by neighbors, who had been alarmed by Mr. McConnell, who had started forth at the first dawn of day in pursuit of the lost husband and wife, AS TOLD BY PIONEERS. The principal occupation of the first pioneers of Ashland county was clearing the land and farming. In the spring of the year considerable maple sugar was made, which as exchanged for salt and groceries. Clothing was most manufactured at home, as each farmer kept a few sheep, and the wool was spun and wove into cloth by members of the family, and made into clothing for winter. A small piece of ground was sown in flax by each farmer, from the lint of which the summer clothing was manufactured ; all the labor of producing this cloths being performed at home. All farm products were sold at very low prices wheat seldom so high as forty cents a bushel, and corn brought from eight to fifteen cents. A first class cow would sell for eight or ten dollars, and all other farm products at equally low rates. Even at these rates it was almost impossibility to get the cash.  Money was scarce and almost all kinds of business is as carried on by barter. The merchants would sell their goods to the farmers on time the farmer agreeing to pay with wheat, or pork. when he slaughtered his hogs. The wheat and pork were again exchanged by the merchant for goods. The trade was carried on with a small amount of money. The wheat was made in flour and packed in barrels, the pork was also packed in barrels, and a considerable quantity of corn converted into whiskey. The pioneers were also always ready to help each other or a stranger on and all occasions, and for this purpose would put themselves to ar inconvenience and travel great distances. Did one of them want a cabin raised he had only to let his neighbors know (and all were considered neighbors within a circle of five or ten miles) and they would be there promptly. Log-rollings were a weekly occurrence; every settler would have one more of these gatherings every year until his lands were well cleared. Settlers for miles around would come with their axes, oxen and hand spikes; the logs were cut, hauled together and piled in great heaps to be set on fire after drying. The younger members of the community, girls and boys, piled the brush around smaller sticks in immense heaps; the boys not yet old can remember when the heaps were set on fire at night and how all the young people for miles area gathered and played ''goal'' and "round-town" by the light of the cracking brush. Cornhuskings are even yet occasionally indulged in by the farming community, though rarely, and will soon be entirely unknown. A night was selected for the cornhusking when the moon was full. Sometimes the corn was husky as it stood in the field, and large fields were thus cleared of corn in a single evening. At other times the owner of at cornfield would go through it it day or two before the hushing was to take place, jerk the ears from the stalk and haul them to some dry spot in the meadow, where they were piled in a huge circle. About this circle, on the outside, the men would gather in the evening, and amid the rattle of husks and the general hilarity the yellow ears would flow toward HISTORY OF ASIILAND COUNTY - 73 the center of the cirile in a continual stream, while the huskers buried themselves deeper and deeper in the husks, until they emerged and stood upon the inner line of the circle with a great pile corn in front and a, pile of husks in the rear. Occasionally the corn was as near1y as possible divided into two heaps; captains or leaders were chosen bu the men, who in turn choosing their men arranged themselves in opposition. Each of the opposing parties endeavored to get through first, the bottle being passed frequently, each one helping himself to as much of the contents as he desired. The successful captain was elevated upon the shoulders of his nuen and carried around the pile amid prolonged cheers. Sometimes the beaten party was aggravated until knockdowns ensued, after which all would repair to the house of the host and partake of the good things prepared for the occasion. The settlers exercised a good deal of ingenuity in making traps to secure the wild animals of the forest. This was one of the principal occupations and sources of pleasure for the boys. In certain localities it seemed almost impossible for the pioneers to raise sheep or hogs on account of the depredations of wolves and bears; the latter invariably preferred pork to mutton, but the wolves always attacker) the sheep in preference. The state offered six dollars each for wolf scalps; this ;intl other considerations stimulated the efforts of the settlers to destroy them. Many of the young men devoted their time almost exclusively to this business. For the purpose of catching there, a wolf pen was constructed of small logs, Six feet long four feet wide and three feet high. It was formed like a large box, with puncheon floor, the lid was made of heavy puncheons, and was removed by an axle at one end made of a small round stick. The trap was set by the ordinary figure 4 combination, and baited with any kind of meat except wolf meat, the animal preferring any other to his own. Upon gnawing the meat the lid fell, enclosing the unwary native for the benefit of the trapper. Steel traps were generally used for the mink and muskrat, but for the coon the figure 4 arrangement was often used. The habits of this animal (as well as of all others) were taken into consideration. It is well known that the coon frequents swails, swamps and stagnant pools in search of frogs, of which he is very fond, and upon which he subsists largely when roastingears are not at hand. In his search for frogs he will traverse the logs that are always to be found in the swamp. The trapper understands this, and places his trap upon the log upon which the unwary animal must enter the swamp or make his exit therefrom. The trap is simply a small log, placed lengthwise of the log which the coon must walk, and held up by the figure 4, to the treadle of which three or more strings are attached and stretched along between the two logs in such a way that the coon must come in contact with them ire his passage, and thus spring the trap, letting file small logs fall upon him. This small log must be made sufficiently heavy by weights to crush him. Wild pigeons were once very numerous, and were caught in large numbers in traps. During, the season when the roast was ripe and plenty, millions of these birds frequented the country.  The flocks were so great that they would sometimes be hours in passing over a given spot, and it is said that they would occasionally obscure the sunlight, and bring' on twilight in Midday by their im- HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 74 mense numbers. For the last twenty years these birds have been gradually disappearing until at present only small flocks are occasionally seen. Probably the clearing up of the country and the gradual disappearance of the mast-bearing trees has caused them to seek other feeding grounds. They were here slaughtered in great numbers, both by gun and trap, and were considered great table delicacy.  When the white settlers first touched the borders of this county, a great variety of wild animals contended with the Indian for supremacy. Some of the native animals of this primeval forest had gradually given way to the general westward movement of the white race.  The elk was gone when the pioneers came, but the numerous wide-spreading antlers he once carried, were found profusely scattered in the forest, showing conclusively that he had once been here in considerable numbers, and at no remote period; but probably no living wild elk was ever discovered here by the pioneers.  Panthers were not numerous, but occasionally one was seen or heard, and a few were killed during the first ten or fifteen years after the first settlement.  They disappeared from this section about 1812. Bears were more numerous and remained longer, an occasional straggler is being seen at intervals of many years, until 1846, or later. Bruin was hard on young domestic animals, pigs particularly, he had a good appetite for, and it was with great difficulty that the pioneers were able to raise their own pork.  Wolves were found in great abundance, and long continued to be a great annoyance to the settlers. The legislature encouraged their extermination by laws which authorized the payment of liberal sums for wolf scalps, both old and young. The records of the county commissioners show that large sum were paid the pioneers of the county for wolf scalps, four dollars being the price for full grown and two dollars for those less than full size. They have long since disappeared. Deer were very abundant, and for many years after the first settlement, supplied the pioneers with most of their animal food. The pioneers were mostly hunters, and the chase yielded them much profit as well as amusement. So numerous were the deer in early times that an hour's hunt was generally sufficient for securing a fine buck or the more palatable doe or fawn. So plenty and tame were they, that they were killed frequently with a shot gun charged only with squirrel shot. Gray foxes, raccoons and ground-hogs were plenty, and hunting them afforded fine sport. The two latter of these are yet found in limited numbers, if a but the first has, probably, entirely disappeared. Red foxes, catamounts, wild-cats and porcupines, were found in large numbers but they early disappeared, except the first named, which may, perhap, even yet be occasionally found. Rabbits and squirrels, if not here before the settlement of the county, came soon after in great numbers, and still remain. They seem to follow rather than precede the settlements. The beaver and otter were here in considerable numbers, and were much sought after by the trapper for their valuable furs. The former has long   HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 75 since disappeared, and the latter is exceedingly scarce, if indeed, any remain. Muskrats are very numerous and have continued so, affording much profit to the hunter and trapper. Wild turkeys were also very abundant in pioneer days, and so continued for many years, affording no inconsiderable portion of the food of the early settlers. They were so numerous and tame that they could be procured by the hunter on very short notice. They are yet occasionally found in the woods. Pheasants were not so numerous as the turkey, and have almost wholly disappeared. Wild geese and ducks were plenty around the little lakes and swamps, and along the streams. These are rarely seen at present. Quails are not natives of the wilderness; neither are crows, blackbirds, bluebirds nor turtle doves, but they all became plenty after the settlement of the county, and still remain in moderate quantities. Bees were plenty, and the tables of the pioneers were generally supplied with honey. Cranes, woodcocks, woodpeckers and pigeons were plenty, and yet remain, with this exception of the first named. Birds of prey, such as turkey buzzards or vultures, hawks, ravens, owls and eagles, were very numerous, but have been slowly disappearing, particularly the eagle, which is now seldom seen. Singing birds of various kinds became plenty soon after the settlement of the county, and yet remain. The streams abounded in fish of large size. The pike were from two to five feet in length, It has almost, if not entirely, disappeared from the waters of the county. The catfish were plenty and of large size, but there were no eels. The white' perch and sucker were numerous and of large size; the black jack and clear jack were here and grew large, but have long since disappeared. The streams, no less than the forests, contributed to the support of the early settlers. Indeed, so plenty were game, fish, fur animals and the fruits and other spontaneous productions, that it was hardly necessary to till the ground to procure subsistence. Serpents were of many varieties and in great abundance. Especially numerous were the rattlesnake, the copperhead, the viper, blacksnake, the garter and watersnake. They were often found in the cabins of the settlers, and even in their beds. It was not unusual for the settlers to be bitten by them, but few, if any deaths occurred from this cause, as the settlers understood the treatment of snake bites. The flax was grown in the summer, scutched in the fall, and during the long winter evenings was heard the buzz of the little flax-wheel, which had a place in every cabin. Even those who are not pioneers can remember this flax-wheel, for it was in use as late as 1800, or later. It stood in a corner, generally ready for use by having a large bundle of flax wrapped around its forked stick, a thread reaching to the spindle, and a little gourd filled with water hanging conveniently at the bottom of the flax-stick, and whenever the good pioneer mother had a little spare time from cooking for a dozen work hands, caring for a 76 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY dozen children, milking a dozen cows, and taking care of the milk and butter be sides doing all the housework and keeping everything clean and neat as a pill, she would sit down to this wheel and with foot on the treadle and nimble fingers, pile thread upon thread on the spindle, to be reeled off on a wooden reel that counted every yard with a snap, and then it was ready for the great loom that occupied the loft. This loom was a wonder—it would he a wonder today, with its great beams, larger than any beams they put in the houses of today treadles, its shuttles, etc. Day after day could be heard the pounding of that loom, the treadles went up and down, the shutilles flew swiftly from one hand to another through the labyrinth of warp. and yard after yard of cloth rolled upon the great roller. And then this cloth was to be cut into little and big cloths and made up with the needle, and remember, this and a great deal more than any one can think of was to be gone through with very year. Wool went through about the same operation, only it was spun on the barge wheel, colored with butternut bark and other things, but woven on the loom and anode up for winter clothing. The cultivation of domestic animals, both beasts and fowls, for the purpnu of food, began early. Cows for milk, butter, beef, and leather, and swine for pork, were bred, ear marked and turned into the woods to browse. ''Root hog or die," was the law for man and beast, but the woods were prolific and the hog grew fat. The young pigs were exceptionally a sweet morsel for the bear. Bruin always singled out these young animals in preference to any other meat: but the pigs were often successfully defended by the older hogs, who, upon tb least signs of distress from one of their number, would go boldly to the rename and fiercely attack the foe, however formidable, often the meat was released and bruin, or the panther, compelled to ascend a tree for safety. The boys often found wild turkeys' nests in the woods, and would bring home the eggs, and place them, to be hatched, under a trusty old hen, in outside chimney corner, where they could assist the hen in defending the and brood from the opossum or hawk. A flock of turkeys sometimes originated in this way, but more, often, as they grew to maturity, they would fly away into the woods and never reappear. This grandest of birds is identical in civilized and savage life, and is the peculiar production of America. The wild ones were always a dark brown, like the leaves of their native woods, but when tamed or "civilized" the diversity of color becomes endless. When cornbread and milk were eaten for breakfast, hog and hominy for dinner and mush and milk for supper, there was little room for tea and coffee and at a time when one bushel of wheat for a pound of coffee and four bushels, for a pound of tea, were considered a fair exchainge, but little of these expensive articles was used. Next to water, the drink of the pioneers was whiskey -copper-still rye whiskey. Everybody drank it. It was supposed to be indispensable to health to strength and endurance during the labors of the safe, and to sleep at nigh It was supposed to be absolutely indispensable to warmth and animation in cold chilly winter weather. It was the sacrament of friendship and hospitality; it was in universal use ; yet there was probably less drunkenness in those data HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 77 than at present The whiskey was absolutely pure; it was not drugged, doctored and poisoned as it is today. At a hide later time, say from 1820 to 1840, the pioneers were living a little easier. Their farms were partially cleared, many of them were living in hewed log houses and many in frame, and even brick houses. Most of them had barns and innumerable out-houses. They generally had cantle, horses, sheep, hogs and poultry. and were living in comparative comfort. Their neighbors were near, and always dear. Their schools and churches had improved somewhat, yet even at a later day there were hundreds of log schoolhouses and churches. About three months in a year was all the schooling a farmer's boy could get. He was sadly needed at home from the age of five years, to do all sorts of chores and work on the farm. He was wanted to drive the cows to water and to pasture; to feed pigs and chickens and gather the eggs. His duties in the summer were multifarious ; the men were at work in the field harvesting and generally worked from early morning until late at night, and the boys were depended on to "do the chores;" hence it was impossible to spare them to attend school in summer. There was no school in spring and fall. In winter they were given three months' schooling. Their books were generally anything they happened to have about the house, and even as late as 1850, there was no system in in the purchase of school books. Parents purchased for their children whatever book pleased their fancy, or whatever thy, children desired them to purchase. A geography was a, geography, and a grammar, regardless of who was the author. This great confusion in school books made trouble for the teacher, but that was of small moment. He was hired and paid to teach whatever branches, out of whatever books the parents thought were best. The branches generally taught in the early shook. however, were reacting, writing, spelling and arithmetic and later geography and grammar. Boys attending school but three months in a year made but little progress. There were always three or four classes in spelling, and this exercise was the last before school was dismissed in the evening. The old books were conned over year after year, until they were worn out and the children grew, up to manhood and womanhood and never knew, and perhaps do not know to this day, what was in the back part of them. This was the kind of a start many a great man had. There was always much competition in the spelling classes as to who should get the 'head mark." In the later schools it was the custom that the best speller might stand at the head until he missed, when the one who spelled the word correctly should take his place, and he then stood next to the head; but they did things differently in the earlier schools; the head of the class once gained and hold unitil the last spelling at night, the headmark was received and the lucky scholar then took his place at the foot of the class, to again work his way gradually to the head. These classes sometimes contained thirty or forty scholars, and it was something, of an undertaking to get from the foot to the head. Spelling were the beauty and glory of school-days. The scholars were always coaxing, the teacher to appoint a night for a spelling school, and were usually gratified one or two nights in month or oftener. A night 78 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY was chosen when the moon shone, and the sleighing was good, and then the entire neighborhood and perhaps the adjoining neighborhood would turn out to the spellingschool; whole families came on the great two-horse sled, including the old lady and gentleman, all the children, little and big ; even the baby and its dogs came. Schools in adjoining districts sent their best spellers to try and carry off the honors. KATOTAWA. Upon the theory that the traditions of a place are a part of its history, ire give the traditions of the locality in the eastern part of Ashland county know as Katotawa, copying the followings from the Times “Your correspondent has received numerous inquiries as to the correct pronunciation and spelling of Katotawa.  My own way of spelling is as I have always spelled it and pronounce it Ka-tot-a-wwaw. There is no real authority for spelling the word and every one can spell it his own way if he chooses. Will give some of the numerous ways of spelling : Catotaway, Katatawa, Katotora, etc. or if you wish you can grind it out thins ; Cha-tacht-a-Nyaugh and still be correct. Believing, with Josh Billings that the easiest way of spelling a word is as it is pronounced I think my way as near correct as any other. Perhap a sketch of the tradition of Katotawa will be interesting to the readers of the Times. Old Katotawa was a chief of one of the many tribes of Indians that once populated this—then wilderness. Through our valley runs a small stream which has its source near Polk and flows southward, unites with the creeks east of Ashland and flows into what is called Jeromefork. On the banks of th former stream Old Katotawa or `Cha-tacht-a-waup;h' often pitched his tell and fished in its waters which are always cool being fed by fresh water sprig and small tributaries, and once well stocked with river trout.. When advancin civilization reached this point, as usual, the `noble red man' was significantly pointed toward the setting sun and given Horace Greeley's advice `Go West' The Indians were steadily crowded back from the frontier but not however, without several desperate fights of which the History of Ashland county gives sketches. Katotawa, then a very old man. remained alone in his hat on the banks of the stream, the few remaining days of his life. Some say that he was killed---beheaded; and the superstitious claimed that his ghost--the ghost of headless body wandered along the river on dark and foggy nights. Your correspondent never had the pleasure of seeing his royal ghostship or any one who eye did; yet this is part of the tradition of Katotawa. The stream has ever sines been known by that name which it is said was given by this old sachem and the prosperous valley along the Katotawa. stream we call the Katotawa valley." HISTORIC LYONS' FALLS. There are traditions that are not historically correct.  For years past, it has been generally believed in these parts that Lyons' Falls were named for the old Indian chieftain, Captain Tom Lyons. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 79 It may seen like uncalled-for iconoclasm to dispel belief in such a mythical personage as Lily Pipe, or to rob Lyons' Falls of Indian traditions. But history should be accurately given, and its correct narration is more instructive and can be as entertainingly told as though its warp were woven with the woof of fiction. Lyons’ Falls are situated about fifteen miles southeast of Mansfield. There are two falls, and the place, which has been a noted picnic resort for many years, is wild in its primitive forest and grand in its rugged picturesqueness. During the past summer it party of ladies and gentlemen, whose names are conspicuous on the list of Mansfield’s, '400"' took a day's outing at these falls, and a grave was pointed out to there as that of the "noted Lyons," and like many others they inferred that the Lyons buried there was the celebrated Indian chieftain of that name. Upon their return to Mansfield they told entertainingly of the wooded and sylvan dell. of the overhanging rocks and of the eighty-foot leap of the waters from the edge precipice to the basin at the bottom of the chasm, casting its spray's into the cool grottos which the hand of nature chiselled out of the rocks. And the further fact that the party had seen the grave of a great warrior, lent additional interest to the story and to the locality. With such allurements it was not long until another detachment of the “400" also visited these noted falls, and the gentlemen of the party fired volleys over the grave, danced it war-dance and gave Indian funereal whoops and came home satisfied that they had held suitable commemorative ceremony over the resting place of the body of an Indian chieftain. Tom Lyons, the Indian, who took a prominent part in the Wyoming massacre (1778). and was afterwards a noted character in the early history of Richland county, was killed by it young man named Joe Haynes, to avenge the murder of it kinsman and he buried the old chief in Leedy's swamp in the southern part of Jefferson Township. The Lyons buried at the falls was Paul Lyons, a white man. He was not a hermit, as one tradition states, for he took to himself a wife, who bore him a son, and he did not particularly Ann his neighbors, although he did not admit them into his confidence. What Paul Lyons’ object and motives were for leaving the civilization of the east and seeeking a home amid the rocks and hills of that wild country are matters only of conjecture, for he never gave his antecedents and refused to explain or to give reasons for hiding himself away in the forest and leading such a retired life. He had 'squatted” on land too rough to till, and never attempted to clear off the timber nor to cultivate the rocky soil. He simply built a cabin amid the trees and passed his time principally in hunting and fishing, but as country became settled around him, and farmers needed help to harvest their he often assisted them in such work. He never made any exhibition of money, yet always paid rash for what he bought. He has been described as a large man and that he had ability and education is shown by the statement of a Lady now living, who says that he was an intelligent and entertaining conversationalist and that at the funeral of a neighbor he read a chapter and sang a hymn, and that was the best reading, and singing she had ever heard. In about 1855 Lyons, while assisting in hauling logs, met with an accident 80 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY which resulted in his death, and he was buried upon the hill, between the water falls. The late Rosella Rice had a headboard, painted and lettered, put up at the grave, but visitors shot at the board until it was riddled into slivers be bullets and later the body was exhumed and the skeleton mounted by a physician. A slight depression in the ground is the only sign showing where the body had been interred. Lyons' wife was not an intellectual woman and it is said that she was sent away and died in an asylum. It is also reported that the boy was to an eleemosynary institution after his father's death, and that when he grew to manhood he went west and prospered. The most noted personage for the past twenty-five years in the region of the falls was Lewis M. Lush, the fiddler who played for hundreds of dances. In past seasons there were danceing floors at the falls, and Lusk furnished the music with his "fiddle and his bow.'' while the dancers kept step to its enlivening strains. Mr. Lusk is now dead, but tourists will long remember seeing him sitting in the door or in the yard of his cabin, playing his fiddle, while the ripples of the waters of the Mohican seemed to echo the refrain of the music as the current of the stream swept around its grateful bends in front of the humble dwell the rugged rocks forming a rustic background to the picture framed by the encircling hills, all combined to impress the passerby with the thong how sweet is the music, how dear is home and how inspiring is all the handiwork of the Creator. OLD TOM LYONS Tom Lyons, an old Indian of an infamous character, who had taken bloody part in the Wyoming massacre, (1778), was killed in the southern part of Ashland county in about 1820, by a young man named Joe Haynes to avenge the murder of a kinsman. The killing occurred on the outskirts of the Leedy swamp, in the southern part of Jefferson township, Richland county. He was an ugly looking savage, and was known to all the pioneers. On a few occasions he related his achievements. He had been in many battles on the border, and had taken many scalps. He related some of acts of extreme cruelty. and a few of his barbarities inflicted upon the wives and children of the border settlers. He was with the other Greentown and Jerometown Indians in the battle of the Fallen Timbers. AN INDIAN HUNTER John McConnell was called an Indian hunter as well as a beast hunter, the reason that his kindred had suffered more from the murderous assault pf Indians than from the wild beasts of the forests, had an encounter with a couple of Indians on the Wabash which is worthy of record. At an Indian camp he HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 81 was visiting his hunter's knife had attracted their attention, and he was importuned to sell it. When he positively declined their propositions, his wary eye detected mischief in their looks. He took his leave of them, and had not traveled many miles, before he became convinced that he was being pursued by the Indians. To confirm his suspicions, he suddenly quit the trail after crossing a prairie and took observations from behind a tree—the result being to fully establish in his mind that their designs were against him. This was in the afternoon of the day, and he resumed the trail and pushed forward rapidly until the shades of night began to gather, and he had left; his pursuers some distance in the rear. Again quitting the trail he hastily kindled a fire, a few rods distant. within a few feet of the fire he arranged an effigy on a log by adjusting his banket in such a manner as would lead one to suppose that it covered its owner; and then concealing himself at a proper distance, awaited the progress of events. He had not long remained in this situation before a rifle ball from a concealed foe entered his blanket, soon the two Indians were hurrying towards the effigy with uplifted tomahawks. The progress of the larger Indian was instantly arrested by a ball from McConnell's unerring rife; and the smaller Indian reversed his movement, and escaped in the woods before McConnell could reload his gun. SIMON GIRTY The notorious renegade, Simon girty, was the son of a notorious drunkard, who had emigrated from Ireland. The old ruan was beastly intemperate, and nothing ranked higher in his estimation than a jug of whiskey. His sottishness turned his wife's affections, and she yielded her heart to another, who knocked Girty on the head, and but off the trophy in his prowess. Four sons remained behind, Thomas, Simon, George and James. The three latter were taken prisoners in Braddock's war by the Indians. George was adopted by the Delawares, and died in a drunken fit. James was adopted by the Shawnees, and became a bloody villain. Simon was adopted by the Senecas, became an expert, hunter. In kentucky and Ohio, he distinguished himself as an unrelenting barbarian. It was his constant wish that he might die in battle. This was gratified. He was cut to pieces, by Colonel Johnson’s mounted men, at Proctor’s defeat defeat. JOHNNYCAKE AND HIS WIFE The Indian was well known to the early settlers to the early settlers by the above name. He was a tall, wellbuilt, finelooking man, of genial temper, good moral habits. I enjoyed much the society of his friends. His wife was a half-breed the daughter of a white woman who had been taken prisoner by the Indians, near Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Her mother, after having endured several years of captivity, made her escape, and returned to her white friends, leaving her little daughter among the Indians. This 82 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY infant child remained among the Indians—attained the condition of womanhood —married—and became an exemplary and faithful wife and mother, and remarkable for shrewdness and tact. Mr. Knapp refers to the residence of Johnnycake in Clear Creek township at a late date. In 1824, in the spring, Johnnycake had a wigwam in the vicinity of the present site of Savannah. In 1829, when the Delawares were removed to their new home, west of Mississippi, Johnnycake and his family went along. Johnnycake died on the Delaware reservation, in Kansas, leaving two or three sons. In the war of the Rebellion of 1861-5, three grandsons of Johnnycake served in Company M, Sixth regiment of Kansas Volunteer Infantry, under Captain John W. Duff their names were John, Benjamin and Philip Johnnycake. Captain Duff says they were excellent soldiers. A PIONEER TALK. Essay by Miss Rosella Rice (now deceased) read Before the Ashland County Association in 1879. There is a vast store of rich material almost untouched lying waiting for some writer who will hold the mirror up to nature and give us pictures of the people and the manners and customs of early times. What a royal book could be made! We grow so weary of polities, the sham side of religion; the ruthless clambering after high places ; the desperate struggles for riches and fame and honor; men standing on other men's necks to elevate themselves. Oh, sometimes if it were not so sentimental and so like twaddle, or the talk of whispering lovers we could cry out in the language of Moore "O, had we some bright little isle of our own. In a blue summer ocean, far off and alone, Where a leaf never dies in the still blooming bowers. And the bee banquets on through a whole year of flowers." etc. etc. You all remember it. and how charming you thought it sounded when you almost sang it to lengthen out its delicious sweetness. There is not half the material nowadays for the manufacture of readable stories and sketches there was in pioneer times.  We are surprised when we the field over. How fresh and charming; and breezy were the stories written by Eggleston, the only writer who has ever ventured into this broad and beautiful field. The stories that are the simplest and most natural and that saddle the closest to Nature's great warm, true heart are the best. Their narrationl brings the quick, hearty laugh and the sudden mist of tears the soonest. Bret Harte may, in his strange, bold way, bring out wonderful words, pictures of heroism, history may tell of great men who sacrificed their lives in a fury of HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 83 enthusiasm, forgotten everything only fame that was to follow after. But in our own humble opinion we do believe God and the angels have looked down and beheld the truest heroes in the lowliest walks of humble life. Oh, we bare our heads in the presence of our grandees; we bow graciously, we smile and fawn upon them because they are great. The richest carpet is spread for them to walk upon from the doorway to the glittering carriage in the street; we beg for their autographs; we look after them adoringly and we sigh when they are gone and he read glowing accounts of where they go and how they are received and honors that are heaped upon them, and our hearts warm with exultation. We believe the heroism hidden in the commonest walks of life, and perhaps not known beyond the horizon’s rime not read about nor sang about, nor talked about, and scarcely known or dreamed of by the nearestneighbors, is the grandest example of brave courage and devotion that there is. In pioneer times such heroes were found in every neighborhood. They were not shrined, neither did they stand on pedestals. They sat on benches at their looms, and on rickety chairs close up to their little wheels, and from early dawn until bedtime they made music; the music of the flying shuttle and the banging of the lathe, the buzzing of the flyers, and the fine metalic ring of the sharp teeth of the hackle. They dressed in clothing that they had manufactured themselves, and they clad their husbands and their children in the same. The heroism of these wonderfully energetic women will never be know it not themselves. We may talk of the spirit of our missionary women and laud them, but no need of theirs can compare with the self-denial of these managing. planning, contriving, overtasked, active foremothers of ours. Their creative ability was marvelous. Their generalship was splendid, Their strategy and maneuvers and devices without parallel. And yet, revering memory as we do, cherishing the hold, brave, beautiful examples they have left us, we cannot but lament the sad heritage they bequeathed likewise, These noble grandmothers and mothers wrought with hands and brain; they toiled beyond there strength; they used up the vitality that they should have shared with us--their defrauded bodies. They robbed us, and the consequences abide with us today. We have white faces and flabby muscles and are health, and we have to coax ourselves to walk up hill, and then we hold a hand on our side and gasp. Instead of springing out of a wagon or off the side saddle, or from the top rail of the fence, we creep down as though we carried a set of china or a basket of imported eggs. They world have run up stairs three steps at a clip if they’d only had the stairs. As it was, they tripped up the ladder that stood in the corner, carrying a bushel of corn or twelve dozen skeins of flax thread with the ease that one of us would carry a glove box. We know one mother who died at middle age with a flush as of roses on her lips and her cheeks and a sunny sparkle in her eyes, and her glossy brown hair smoothed back from her white forehead. She lay down to sleep and to dream at night and the sleep came in the twinkling of an eye, but it was the dreamless slumber of death, and the word went forth that she died of heart disease--a very pretty name by which to designate such sudden calls of death, such untoward freaks of Providence. But her bereft family knew the limits 84 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY of a life spent in overwork, an energy that knew no boundaries at all. She had said, "Now I will make fifty linen sheet's for ourselves and then I will quit spinning and weaving." That was two hundred and fifty yards of linen. Any one who has raised flax and carried it through the stages prescribed, will know what that means. Raising, pulling, spreading. ratting, gathering into hundles then breaking, seutchhing, hackling. shinning, boiling the skeins in ashes and water, spooling, warping and weaving. Then comes the bleaching out on the grass in March and April and the web is ready for use. Besides the stores pf family and bed and table linen she wanted the fifty homemade linen sheets to lay aside for herself and husband in their old age and after the children were all married and settled in life.  Poor, short sighted woman ! She died before half the number were made. Her husband, a young man, was left disconsolate with five little children between the ages of fourteen and four. What an absurd mistake she made ! And the linen sheets. The cold, clinging, clammy things. Well, the daughters-it-law cut them up and used them for baby linen and tea towels and dish rags, with never a thought of what they cost. And the sons-in-law wipe their bearded faces and tidy about their ears with the towels made out of them, and instead of thinking that the life of a noble but imwisely energetic woman wes twisted up into the nicely spun woof and warp, and the fine gold of it beaten up into the flossy fabric they scrub diligently, thinking of the sharp bargains they make in swapping horses, perhaps getting a good, two year colt for an old crpwbaot with its bony back thatched over with newspaper. If there is one thing in this life that we sorrow over more than another, is to see energy—that great lever that moves the world—misspent, poured wastefully. Our possibilities for accomplishing good and great works wonderful and we have no right to trifle them away and spend our time making overmuch provision for our perishable bodies. Why the very time devoted to making pies, if spent out in the woods under the gracious roof of gold and green when days are long and skies are bright, and woods are green and fields breezy, would tend to make one fresh and active and interesting, and to mellow in a kindly way. So runny lives dwarfed and disappointed, and complete owe their failure to the wearing of the shackle that they impose upon themselves. They seem to glory in their manacles. They hug their thralldom. We say to such: There'll come a day when the supremest splendor Of earth, or sky, or sea, What e'er their miracles, sublime or tender, Will wake no joy in thee. Sometimes we wonder if our own township is an exception in its wealth of store making material. Every old cabin hearth stone holds a store, sometimes wonderful. sometimes tragical and sometimes stranger than fiction. Away off in the woods on our way to and from the school we taught long ago we used to need sit and dream and rest, awhile on a heap of old hearth stones, birthplaces of a poor little boy who, when he came up to teach, received the appointment of Foreign Minister. His father made baskets and trays and half bushels, and his mother spun sewing thread amd hackled flax and colored copperas and rocked her babies in a sugar trough HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 85 What to them was poverty? Contentment disarmed of its sting. Their wants were few. There was no aristocracy in those early days. When the woman wanted to visit neighbor Prudence and have a good social time and not tax the poor family, they took provisions with them. One would take half a quarter of tea and a pitcher of cream, another a loaf of bread and a roll, of butter, another some maple syrup or wild honey, with venison or pork or raised cornbread or doughnuts, always carrying a good deal more than was needed, and thin the woman whose honored guests they were could get up a plain meal without any embarrassment, whatever. At the time we used to indulge in these dreams, William was abroad an honor to the nation he represented, and perhaps many a time in his far-away political home, there came up before him the shady little nook in the wildwood, with it rich undergrowth of cool ferns and mosses leaves mingling in wild luxuriance. Oh, such examples are so encouraging to poor boys. Energy and perseverance with a character based on good sound principles can accomplish anything. And how true and full of exaltation comes to such the ringing song of the sweet minstrel girl, Alice Carey. Her own soul alive with the inspiration that thrilled herself and others when she sang. “For many a lad born to rough work and ways Strips off his ragged coat and makes men Clothe him with praise." But one hearthstone there was that could have told a boss story, as the boys say. Just the man and his wife and her sister comprised the family. It was the bleak November time, when the rains seem to have a sobing sound and the winds cry about the leaves, and the dead vines swing mournfully, and the waters drip like tears from the dead leaves. The husband was away at the mill down at Shimplins, and would not get home till late that night. The two women sat conversing over the embers. One subject only was in their thoughts, and that was “There will be no dress for the baby.” Now did anybody ever hear of a wideawake woman who couldn’t see her way through or over or under or around the obstacles in her path? Surely not. The husband came home late, ate his corn bread and milk, buried the glowing coals and went to bed Away in the nigh the young wife woks' her sister with ''Bit, say Bet, I've studied it out, Hark'ee. Early in the morning he will kill Old Nan, for what’s the use o’ keepin’ just one sheep, poor, lonesome creetur’, and you’ll go to work and we’ll make a hit o’ flannel out o' the fleece, an’ that’ss be very daddle for a good, warm soft baby dress. Don't. ye see. Bet?" Poor, sleepy Betsy. We don't know whether she saw it or not, but she acquiesced with a drowsy "eh, heh." He killed the sheep bright and early the next morning. The two sisters picked off the wool nicely carded, spun, put the infantile web into the loom and wove it that day and evening, and at night they cut out the dearest little cpatoe amd ,ade ot before they went to bed. There wasn't much margin left to boast of, because the next day’s down found a sturdy little man child taking the tailor out of the bran new coatie. A little sprout of a pioneer with round, red fists nd heels that tested the new flannel vigorously. And this was the staff that pioneer women were made of the long ago. 86 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY Sixty years ago a poor boy in Green township used to get up very early winter mornings, when the snow lay deep and white upon the ground, and as he flipped his homeknit suspenders over his shoulders he peered out between the cracks of his cabin home and whispered through his chattering teeth, “Jinks do b'lieve I see tracks!" Then despite the cold he clad his feet in his father’s old boots and sallied out to hunt rabbits. That boy wanted an education. He needed one of the first requirements—a spelling book. If it had been summer time he could have dug ginseng; or columbo roots and sold them. But the winter season locked up this only resource, and all he could do was to catch rabbits and sell the skins for one cent apiece. Forty rabbit skins would buy a spelling book, a nice one with a good wooden back to it. That man died worth one hundred thousand dollars. And this was the stuff that pioneer men were made of. Those were close times when rabbit skins and ginseng roots and wolf scalps and whiskey were currency. We often take down from the top shelf in the library a homely old leather covered account book of our grandfather's, and look over the items of trade. In the way of a deal, our dear old ancestors once obtained a barrel of the currency of those times, whiskey, which he used to deal out, we presume, to the best advantage. This was over sixty years ago. One page in a clear, bold, graceful style of penmanship runs thus, Dr. John Smith. dr. Aug. 1, to five quarts of whiskey - $0.50 ... 3, to two quarts of whiskey - .25 ... 5, to one bottleful of whiskey - lent Sept. 1, to one quart of whiskey lent, - .07 Sept. 26, to two quarts of whiskey .25 Sept. 11, to three gallons of whiskey, lent  Oct. 2, to three bushels of rye at 5 ets. per bushel - .15 Nov. 4, by one quart of whiskey - .12 And then the mother and wife cane, a pa.lefaced sad woman and her tears stopped the flow of currency. And our heart is glad when we look the old book over and follow the track of that barrel of whiskey, peddled out and discover that not the man who sold it nor one of those who bought it are represented today by one bloated face or pussy form, or red nose, or blear eye. We thank God for that signal favor. If ever our dead grandfather helped to foster the love of strong drink in any one whose tainted blood was inherited today by a weak son or grandson, we'd root out and Wash out the foul curse, with our prayers and our tears. The John Smith referred to has three sons, elderly men, and because of the father's bad example, and the mother's tender watchfulness, her careful early training and early teaching, every man of them is a strictly moral man, advocating total abstinence. So we sit down and look the old book over as calmly as we would turn through Watt's hymns; but if he'd had a distillery and one of our beautiful springs hidden in a green gush in a hillside had bee perverted to such a base use, its sweet gushing waters made accursed and instrumental to the degradation of his fellowmen, our poor shamed face would have been bowed today with marks of Cain on the forehead. There always was a charm to its in the relation of the incidents of pioneer life. It is so good to heir about flume who have passed away, and are passing HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 87 away-people, just like ourselves in all their loves and hates, their hopes and fears, their aims and aspirations. How often we hear these people say : "we never were happy as when we lived in the cabin.  I can't slake such corn bread as I n to make, and oh how I would like to taste of the nice corn cake I used to bake, on a clear shingle, tilted up before the fire with a flat-iron back of it. What a sweet crisp take it was and how nutty the fine flavor." No elegant parlor an have that air of cosiness that had the one room in the cabin home. How high the pile of beds did puff up. How neat the pile of bed clothes looked heaped upon an old arm chair, or box, or somethirt ; between the windows folded just as evenly as possible. The little mirror was the one nice thing in the house. Across its top wound a string, of the shells of bird eggs, and a spray of asparagus drooped over like dainty mist. Under the glass hung a snow-white towel ironed in the most perplexing and and abstruse folds and checks and diamonds and octagons. A very precise pin cushion hung over the white towel so as to show to the best advantage; sometimes the bullet pouch hung inside of it. The dresses and skirts turned best side out hung on pegs around the walls.  The old bureau if there was one had a cloth netting and fringe around it, and the bandbox containing the Sunday bonnet held its place of honor on the top of it. The gun lay in hooks upon a just over head. If there was a fiddle in the family it dozed in a green baize bag from a iron a nail beside the window. The dresser stood in one corner with a scant supply of delf ; one whole shelf devoted to the cups and saucers which were ranged in a row, every cup standing on the bottom of saucer. The ladder stood in the other corner, and a wide fire place filled almost one end of the cabin. Overhead hung bags of seeds and hops and roots, and the poles suspended by leather thongs above the heads of the family, had socks hangingon them, and dried pumpkins and choice seed corn and wallets of dried and dried cherries. Sometimes a knotty branch of a hickory was cut off and hung up and strung full of tallow dips. But you all remember these old time things. Some of your women will recall the satisfied feeling you had at night, after a hard day’s work, when you sat with the baby on your lap, swaying in the easy old chair that creaked out a weake-wock-weake, wock, and you sat and sang little aimless odds and ends of cramp meeting songs, your thoughts far away and as you looked up, and surveyed the little stores, you felt gratified that everything was in order, kept with an eye to economy and neatness. Oh, not riches nor fine clothing, nor or grand furniture nor any of these things can bring back that sweet sense of enjoyment that was yours in your humble little home. On a birthday occasion, an old pioneer dined with us a few years ago. We were telling what roused our anger soonest, and with a gurgling musical laugh, the old man said, “nothing ever made me madder than when I used to plow out in the clearings. My shins were all bundled up with hits of sheep skins so I could endure the blows of the little roots that spring up with such vengeful force when cut off by the plow share, and yet many and many a time I swore in spite of me. I was called a good Methodist and the Lord knows I tried to be a Christian and a good man. I had it great deal of very substantial praying to do for myself.” On the same pleasant occasion, another old pioneer related a funny incident on himself. He was a young farmer who held the position of 88 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY drum major in the militia. He didn't know every thing. The crows were very troublesome, pulling up his corn. One day when lie was plowing it, he "shooed" at them and waved his hat, and threw' clods, and finally a master ides entered his mind: He could get his drum and drum them away. He sling it over his shoulder and carry it with him, and how much nicer that would so be, and so genteel, too, and such a patriotic way of protecting his crop. When opportunity offered lie turned his back to the old horse and struck up the strain of Yankee Doodle, just as if he were at general muster. The result was that the horse didn't concur with this new departure, and kicking up its heels it ran off and broke the plow and the harness and helped to scare away more crown than did the man with the new idea. The narrative of this incident was never drusick, but once, and then he was out on the creek in a canoe with his friends and fell a overboard. The splash in the water roused him a little and he felt a touch of shame and humiliation and tried to take his own part, when they dragged him back in the canoe. He fumbled around and found one of his suspender buttons was gone. "There,'' said he "ding it all how could a fellow help fall in' in right backwards, when his gallus give way suddent`?" We used to visit at his home a good deal. Such boisterous boys and girls we never saw to play blackman, and brill, and shinny, and silky bang, and poison, stud steal partner. The mother would let us all turn summersaults on her bed and the father would let its slide all in a row down the sides of the straw stacks, no matter if the straw all scooted down to the ground. And they would let us boil chestnuts in the tea kettle, and roast potatoes in the ashes, after night, and have all the nice butter we wanted to eat with them. And in improvising plays and theatricals they allowed us the use of all the wearing apparel the house afforded. The old mare was free for any four of us to ride at one time, out on the rice course, which was round and round the house. How we longed to exchange mothers with the jolly little ones of this favored family. She scolded frequently to be sure, and declared that the terrible racket would kill her, but her husband, the drum major, assurred us in homely language, that "her bark was wuss nor her bite." How the little mother would scold sometimes. She'd say : "Andre Jackson yon and Thomas Jefferson and Jonathan Edwards git right down off o' that table! or Peter Cartright. you're swingin' on that trammel again first thing you know down it'll come and hurt Martha. Washington or Molly Stark, or John Wesley; or Mary Magdelene, that's not the first time I kitchece yon eatin' erout by the handful right out 'as the bar '1.” When the little woman died a dozen years ago, we were glad the old drummer didn't ask us to write an obituary. No language could have expressed our thoughts. We loved her dearly. We are indebted to her. A few days ago the men who were working with plow and scraper removing the gravelly little knoll on the bank of the creek at the edge of our village brought to surface some human bones. There was the sturdy thigh bone, the arm, the ribs and finally the bold square jaw of the resolute old red man, the teeth worn down as though for a century he had eaten his tough venison seasoned with sand. And then came a, shelly bit of a woman's skull, and her jaw tight and more delicately fashioned by far than was that of the old slumberer who had HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 89 shared red her dreamless counch for so many, many years. This incident impressed us forcibley. The fine quality of gravel in which lay for so long; the bones of these unknown savages, was discovered to be just the thing needed on the principal streets is in our village. No doubt the old chieftain selected that breezy knoll, on the banks of the then beautiful and freely flowing stream under the magnificent trees that crowned its summit, for at that time the fertile valley had not been trodden by the foot of the bold pioneer. Whoever selected that spot had an eye for the beautiful in nature, and had the same thought that comes to us when we mediate on the last sad and closing scenes. Who knows! May be the poor old chieftain loved that pretty knoll as we did in our early years, and he may have dreamed there in saddened mood of the tide of civilization that was slowly coming nearer and nearer to crowd aside his people even as they had obliterated the mound builders, and in turn possess their vast hunting grounds. Bryant must have had such as this in his mind when he coined into song the painful thought of the Indian I hear the tread of pioneers, Of nations yet to he, The first low wash of waves where soon Shall roll a htuuan sea. Be the little knoll is profitable and according to one of nature's immutable laws, the Indian's grave and its mouldering contents will live anew in a highway to be trodden under foot of man and hereafter whoever drives down main street, may grind his marriage wheels upon bones that are turning to dust. And the old chieftain’s yellow teeth way he picked up any day and find a lodgment in the pocket of the little Arab’s ragged jacket. It is related that an apple tree planted on the grave of Roger Williams, the founder of the state of Rhode Island, who died in 1683, that the roots of the tree struck down and spread out into the shale and figure of the man, following his arms and legs and trunk. So that learned men familiar with the mysteries of nature and her strainge, metamorphoses, declare that Roger Williams passed an apple tree. anal lives again on this earth in another form, that of red cheeked juicy apples. The statue of Sir Robert Peel, a very eminent British statesman, was melted over to make one for Lord Palmerston. We need not shudder at these things, for nature set the first example. With her there is no death, no decay, nothing repulsive. Where Hamlet spoke of turning the relay of Alexander into the bung of a beer barrel, be spoke the naked truth. The heathen gods, even vaguely, penetrated this great mystery as those familiar with mythology will remember. But at first when the old mound was opened and its sacred treasures. Brought to the surface by plow and scraper, ‘we' almost rebelled. We woke in the morning after, and walked omit under the pines and looked down that love1y sweep of picturesque valley below its and we sighed as the words of the old quaker poet Whittier came, as though borne to its on the breath of fire serene summer's dawn. And city lots are staked for sale, Above old Indian graves. 90 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY The words followed us about our work; they seemed so sad; they expressed so much. We thought of the poor old pioneers who had beheld this vast wilderness, its grandeur of woods and waters, until now it blooms like unto the gardens of the rods. flow beautiful the labor of their hands ! How much we owed them! But the olden time, with its white crowned patriarchal heads is passing aways. The glory of one age is dimmed in the golden glory of the age succeeding it. Change stamps its seal upon all things. The trail of the redman will soon be lost in the net work of the railroad, that like great arteries stretch themselves among our beautiful hills and smiling valleys. The green oral mulitply. The old graves dimple the quietest corners of our cemeteries. And still the words, full of prophecy that makes us sadder, abide with us, and bu with our thoughts: And city lots are staked for sale, Above the Indian Graves. MISS ROSELLA RICE. The following sketch of Miss Rosella Rice, late of Perrysville, Ashland county, was written by Colonel Sullivan D. Harris, and appeared in William T. Coggeshall's Poets and Poetry of the West a work which appeared in 1860 Rosella Rice is a native of Ashland county. Ohio. Her father Alexander Rice, was among the early settlers of Perrysville, and Rosella, has always resided at the old homestead, where she was born, about the year 1830. Miss Rice is a born poet, and has nursed her strange wild fancies amid the equally wide hills and glens and rocky caves which she has haunted with a devotion that has amounted to a life passion. Meeting with but few associates who could appreciate the depths of her passions for such cummunings her spirit was want to retire within herself except when it was called forth by the presence of the sylvan gods which she worshiped. Her early contributions to the county papers are marked by her own rude, but genuine original characteristics. Coming but little in contact with the world at large, she built upon ideal models, whe she departed from her own original. Miss Rice has read much and well, within the last few years she has visited the wide world considerably. She contributed to Arthur's Home Magazine, Philadelphia, and to several of Cleveland, Columbus and other Ohio papers. Her prose writings always attract attention and secure a wide circulation from their peculiar original vigor and directness. In addition to the foregoing from Mr. IIarris, the author adds that Miss Rice was on the regular staff of Arthur's Home Magazine for at least a quarter of a century. Miss Rice died June 6. 1888. EARLY DAY SPORTS. It may be interesting to the younger as well as to the older class of people recall some of the sports and pastimes of the early settlers of county. Miss Rice died June 6, 1888. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 91 A commendable feature of pioneer sports was that utility was blended with amusement social gathering being cabin and barn raisings, logrollings, cornhuskings, woodchopping and quilting parties. Rich and poor then met upon lines of social equality and the old and the young mingled alike in these old-time sports. The people of those early days were helpful to each other not only in ''raisings” and ''rollings” requiring a force of men, but also in many other ways, If a man was incaptcitated by sickness or other causes his neighbors set a day and went in force and plowed his corn, harvested his grain or cut his wood for the winter, as the season required. And when a pig, or a calf, or a sheep was killed in the summer a piece of the meat was sent to each family in the neighborhood, who reciprocated in kind, and in this way all had fresh meat the greater part of the season. Cornhuskings were gala occasions. Frequently the ears were stripped from the stalks and hauled to a favorable place, where the unshucked ears were put in parallel or semi-circular windows. Moonlight nights were usually chosen for for husking occasions, and when the eompany gathered in the evening, captains were selected and the men chosen into two platoons, which competed in the husking work, each platoon trying to finish its pile or row first. At the finish the captain of wining squad would he carried around on the shoulders of his men, amind their triumphal cheers, after which the bottle would be passed. Women attended such gatherings, also, and sometimes assisted at the husking, but were more frequently engaged during the early evening in quilting or sewing, or knitting and in helping to prepare the great supper feast which was served after the work was done. There was a rule that a young man could kiss a girl for each red ear of corn found at it husking. It voes without saying that the girls all got kissed, some of them many times, for it was surprising how many red ears were found - so many that the smiler was prima facie evidence that some of the boys went to the gathering with their pockets full of red corn ears. Nearly all the pioneer gatherings wound up, after supper, with a dance, in which the old joined as well as the young. When a fiddler could not be obtained, music was furnished by some one blowing on a leaf, or by whistling "dancing tunes.” This dancing was more vigorous than artistic, perhaps, for there wire vigorous in those days, effeminacy not becoming fashionable until later years. The pioneers were industrious people. The situation required the men to chop and grub, and clear the land ere they could plow and sow and reap. And the women had to spin and knit and weave and sew in addition to their household work. Upon one occasion a minister's wife was telling about her day's work, that in addition to making a pair of pantaloons and a bed-tick, “I’ve washed and baked and ironed six pies today.” Wool had to he carded into rolls by hand, and after it was spun into yarn and the yarn woven into cloth, the flannel had to be thiekened or fulled to make it heavier for men’s wear. This necessitated ''fulling” or “kicking” parties, an enjoyable line of amusement. Upon such occasions the web of flannel was strectched out on the puncheon floor and held loosely at each end, while men with 92 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY bared feet and rolled up trousers sat in rows at each side. Then the women poured strong hot soapsuds on the web, while the men kicked it vigorously, making the white foam of the suds fly over both kickers and attendants. This pouring and kicking lasted an hour or two, after which supper was served after the fashion of the times. Carding and fulling mills and spinning and weaving factories came later served their purpose, and their time, and now they, too, are gone, and now people can go to stores and get "hand-me-down" suits, without asking or caring where or how they were made. While there were many social amusements in the early times, religious devotions were not neglected. As there were but few church buildings camp meetings were frequently held during the summer months. While the Methodists and "Brethren" took the lead in these outdoor gatherings, the Christiansr (Disciples) held similar convocations, one of which was at the Bently spring, south of Mansfield. At that meeting Captain James Cunningham was baptized by immersion by Elder McVay. This was the first baptism by that denomination in Ashland county. Camp meeting trips were enjoyable to both old and young. The roads these "camps" often ran by sequested farms and through shady woodlands, where the rays of the sun shimmered through the leafy treetops, and the fragrance of the June flowers sweetly perfumed the morning air. At last glimpses of white tents could be seen, forming a semi-cirele and surrounding an amphitheatre of rude seats in front of a pulpit canopied by boughs of trees. At the camp, visitors were received with cordial greeting for the "campers" had the warmth of friendship in their hearts and of Christi zeal in their souls, and their Frank, unstudied manners and winsome ways o favorable preludes to the services that were to follow. At these camp exercises some of the worshipers became quite demonstrative for the personal manifestations of joy or devotion differ as much as our natures differ. No two persons give expression in precisely the same terms to any human experience ; the law of temperament forbids it. Religion can come to you only in accordance with your nature, and you can respond to it only in the same way. Singing was a prominent feature of the religions services. It was the old-fashioned singing, such as our dear old mothers sang, and although family, perhaps. in note, came from the heart and went to the heart. The singing of today may be more artistically rendered, brat it is the old-time tunes that comfort us in our sorrow and sustain us in our trials, as they come back to us in sweet remembrance from the years that are past. A SALT-BOILING INCIDENT. In the early history of Ohio salt boiling was conducted wherever there were saline springs. Generally two or three men would join fortunes, erect a rough cabin and build a furnace near a saline spring, and there spend weeks, perhaps months, boiling salt in the wilderness. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 93 One of theses was owned and operated by a rough, mischievous fellows by the name of Miller, who was always ready for a joke, no matter how severe, or at whose expense. While Miller and his two associates in the enterprise were seated around the great roaring furnace one morning, a stranger, lean and lank, having every symptom of a genuine Vermonter, approached on horseback and asked permission to leave his pack saddle and other traveling appendages in their care, while he should spend the day in hunting. The favor being cheering granted, he dismounted, left his saddle, and wandered off in quest of deer. As soon as the new comer was fairly out of sight, Miller, who looked upon him as an intruder, determined to annoy him ; and as a convenient method of testing the caliber of the stranger he threw his pack saddle into the furnace, where it was soon reduced to ashes. Towards evening the hunter returned, and on very deliberately making inquiry for his saddle was told the less he said about that the better, otherwise he might share the same fate. The remark was accompanied by a significant look towards the fire, which instantly suggested to the indignant stranger there whereabouts of his saddle. However, he said nothing and was soon on his homeward way. In a few days he returned once more, seeming in a fine humor, and brought a new pack saddle, which he left in Miller's care, as before, charging him emphatically not to burn that one, or else there would be a noise about it. Of course the a warning not to repeat the saddle was more than Miller was willing; to bear, and he resolved to repeat the experiment as soon as the stranger should start on his hunt. No sooner had he turned his back upon the furnace than Miller called after him, “Look-a-here, mister! I'll show you who's a goin’ to do the orderin’ round here.'' amid into the fire uvvent the saddle with a will! But in a moment the huge kettles, the walls of the furnace, and everything thereunto pertaining, were scattered in one universal wreck, the hot fluid sprinkling freely over the unsuspecting heads of the salt boilers, and the clouds of hissing steam completely blinding them for awhile, thus affording the revengeful stranger opportunity to make good his escape, which he did without the formality of bidding his victims good bye! The turtle flashed upon Miller's mind about as soon as the hot ashes flashed in his face: the pads of the new pack saddle had been stuffed with gunpowder. FACTS VERSUS FICTION. The book entitled, “Philip Seymour, or Pioneer Life ill Riehland County,” by the Rev. James F. McGaw is a work of fiction and is not a history. It only claims to be a "romance founded on facts." The Rev. McGaw was a minister of the Wesleyan denomination and at the time of writing that romance was a resident Washington village, Washington township, Richland county. The story was written for the old Mansfield Herald newspaper, and appeared as a serial in 1857. The events narrated in the work are true in the main, but the characters introduced are party mythical, while others are given fictitious 94 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY names. The name Zeimer and Anglicized into Scyrnour, and later others Americanized the name into Zimmer. In 1799 Frederick Zeimer came with his family, wife and seven children, from Maryland to Ohio and entered one-half of section 27, in Washinton township. Pickaway county. He was a man of means and after getting: considerable land upon which he established his married sons, he removed to Richland county, with his wife, youngest. son, Philip, and daughter Kate, and entered a quarter section of land in the Blackfork valley, now in Mifflin township, Ashland county, where the terrible tragedy, narrated in this work, occurred September 10, 1812. At the close of the war of 1812, Philip returned to his former home in Picka way county, and later sold the Riehland county land to Michael Culler, the deed for which was executed May 1, 1815, before Thomas Mace, a justice of the peace in and for the county of Pickaway, Ohio. On the 2d day of April, 1815, Philip Zeimer was married to a Pickaway county girl named Betsy Valentine, whose family was a prominent and numerous one of that county. Their marriage is recorded in the probate court records at Circleville. Philip and Betsy Zcizner were the parents of five children. three sons and two daughters, all now deceased. Philip's wife died in 1836, aged forty-eight years and seven months. Philip died August 8, 1850, aged sixty five years. The foregoing are facts from historical records, from the muniments of their estates and from monuments erected to their dead. The man who was said to be engaged to Kate Zeimer was Jededich Smith, who came and entered land in Washington township, Richland county, Ohio, in 1812. Mr. Smith, in looking for land, as McGaw's story goes, was directed by Johnny Appleseed to the Zeimer cabin, where he met and fell in love with Kate McGaw gives Mr. Smith in his romance the name of Henry Martin. Mr. Smith was at his old home in Washington county, Pennsylvania, when the Zeimers were killed by the, Indians, and did not return to Ohio until 1816; he married some years later and lived to an advanced old age. The Billy Bunting in the McBaw story was Levi Bargahiser, who became a wealthy farmer in Sharon township, Riehland county, where he died December 26, 1868. aged seventy-seven years. While he may have had some peculiarity of speech, he did not lisp as McGaw represented, and neither did he marry an Indian. His wife's maiden name was Susanna Eshelman, whose family lived in Licking county, Ohio. A daughter of Mr. Bargahiser married the late J. C. Skiles, at one time a commissioner of Richland county. Some of the Bargahier yet live near Shelby. McGaw's work was a very, interesting one and in book form passed through three editions.The copyright for the same is owned by A. J. Baughman, of Mansfield. The story is a very absorbing one as it graphically depicts and portrays pioneer life and conditions, but it should not be taken seriously as a history of the county. HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 95 V. EARLY INCIDENTS There are many incidents which are difficult, to classify and yet which were events that left their impress upon the history of the county and deserve to find a permanent place in the early records. One of these was THE MASSACRE. “The Indians shook the morning air With their wild and direful yells.'' As the dawn of Tuesday morning. September 15, 1812. approached, the nine soldiers true to their promise, left their conches of hay at the barn and went to the cabin. As they grouped around the door, amber streaks darted into golden rays in the eastern sky, heralds of the coming, day. The troops, no doubt, recalled the red-flamed sky of the preredint; sunset and were thankful that the night was being succeeded by the glorious light of another day, so beautiful in it aerial aspect that one might have imagined it presaged the resurrection and looked for angels to appear and proclaimed that "Time was, tine is, but time shall to no mare," but it was the angel of death that was soon to claim four of that little band. Mr. Copus, still apprehensive of danger, cautioned the soldiers to be on their guard, but they laughted at his fears and, leaning their muskets against the cabin, went to the spring, a few rods from from the house, but ere they had finished their lavations the Indians came upon them with demoniacal yells, and—“On the right, on left, above, below, sprung up at once the lurking foe.'' And forty-five painted savages, armed with muskets. tomahawks and scalping knives rushed upon the unarmed soldiers and a scene of carnage, of hatchery and death ensued. When the attack was made Mr. Copus hastily seized his rifle and went to the door and as he opened it, a hall fired by an advancing savage passed through the leather strap that supported his powder horn and entered his breast, inflicting a wound from which he expired within an hour. When fired upon, being unarmed, the soldiers fled in different directions; teo attempted to reach the forest upon the hillside for protection, but were pursued by the Indians, were overtaken, murdered and scalped. Their names were John Tedrick and George Shipley. A third, named Warnock, was shot through the bowels, but some distance and, becoming weak from loss of blood, sat down by a true and died. He had stuffed his handkerchief into the wound to stop the flow of blood. His body was found several weeks afterward in a sitting posture. Five of the soldiers who were nearer the cabin got inside safely, but the sixth, named George Dye, was not so fortunate and was shot through the thigh as he entered the door and George Launtz was shot in the arm, a short time later, while removing a chink to make a port hole in the wall. 96 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY Mr. Copes, who realized that he was mortally wounded, entreated the soldiers to defend, as best they could, his wife and children. The scene within the cabin was pathetically dramatic. He. who an hour before stood as the protector of the family, now lay in the throes of death, his greaf stricken wife and seven children grouped about the bedside and as the spirit of this just man took (light, the another, as the center of that little band of mourners, was seen to gaze upward, heavenward, as if in prayer commending her fatherless children to him who tempers the winds to the shorn lamb and who alone earn bind up the broken heart. But; they had to soon torn front the dead and assist the soldiers in their defence of the cabin. Early in the contest, Nancy Copes, aged fifteen, was shot above the knee, inflicting a painful wound. The children were then placed upstairs for greater safety and that was but poor, for a number of the Indians upon the hillside in front. of the house and kept up an incessant firing; upon roof of the cabin, until the clapboards, it was said, afterwards presented almost a sieve-like appearance. And nearly all that forenoon the battle raged and the deadly lead was fired not only upon the roof, but upon the walls, windows and door of that. home and the Yells of the murderous savages were enough to daunt the bravest heart. The few soldiers within made a heroic defence. They fired through portholes and their aim was often unerring as a number of the redskins were to fall to rise no more. After five long hours of murderous assault out side from on and of valiant defence from within, the awful contest ended by the Indians retreating, taking, their dead with Miens, and firing a parting volley into a flock of sheep which had huddled together in terror near the barn. After the Indians ha.d disappeared, one of the soldiers got. out upon the roof of the cabin and cautiously glanr'ed around arid, seeing no foe, limbed down and went to the Beam in blockhouse for assistance. About one o'clock Captain. Martin and his squad of soldiers, who had been expected the night before, arrived upon the scene two hours after the battle had ended, but before assistance had time to come front the blockhouse. Captain Martin, not seeing, any Indians is reconnoitre the day previous and not expecting any trouble at the Copes had bivouacked for the night, at the Ruffner cabin, near where Mifflin now stands and three and it half miles north of the Copus settlement. During the forenoon, Captain Martin thought he heard firing, but supposed the troops below were at target practice. When Martin and his troops arrived at the scene of the tragedy, they were appalled at the horrible spectacle the met their view. Attention was given to the wounded and the cabin and dead were buried. An attempt was made to track the Indians and it was thought they west east, but as they had three hour's start they were not pursued. The bodies of Copus, Tedrick and Shipley were buried in one grave a few rods from the and a monument now marks their grave. Stretchers were made upon which to carry the wounded and the march of the whole party t.o heart's blockhouse was commenced. As it was late in the day when the start was made, then only went a short distance until then they stopped for the night. By that time the number of the party had increased to abut a HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 97 hundred and pickets were thrown out to guard against surprise. The march was resumed the next morning, the route being up the valley to Muffin, thence west along a trail now known as the Mansfield-Wooster road, and then down to the Beam blockhouse, the distance being about thirteen miles, where they arrived in safety in the evening. Several weeks afterwards a squad of soldiers, accompanied Henry Copus, a son of James Copus, to the cabin, and on the way, some distance from the house, they discovered the missing soldier (Warnock) sitting against a tree dead. They buried him near where he was found. They also found the bodies of two Indians, which were left to their fate. Mrs. Copus and children remained in the blockhouse about two months and were then taken Guernsey county where they lived until the close of the war, when they returned to their home on the Blackfork and where Mrs. Copus reared the family and lived to it good old ago, beloved and respected by her neighbors and friends. Sarah Copus, the daughter became Mrs. Vail, and lived to be present at the unveiling of the nouunvunt, September 15, 1882, erected to the memory of her father and the soldiers who were killed in that awful tragedy at that humble cabin in the wilderness. September 12, 1812. Among the incidents of the fight, it is stated that Copus and an Indian fired at each other simultaneously, the former receiving a mortal wound and the latter being killed instantly. Copes did not fall when he was shot, but staggered back across the room to a table, from which he was assisted to the bed. He told his wife that he could not live and that she would have to rear the children as best she could. A number of times while the battle lasted the savages tried to take the cabin by storm, but the soldiers had taken the precaution to barricade the door and windows with puncheons removed from the floor. George Launtz, the soldier who had an arm broken by a bullet, caught sight of an Indian peeping around a tree and, taking deliberate aim, fired and had the satisfaction of seeing the savage bound into the air and then roll down the hill, dead. Another redskin, who had been shot, fell in the yard. His groans were heard as he attempted to crawl away, but a well directed bullet from the cabin put an end to his suffering. Forty-five scoopouts where fires had been were afterwards found in the cornfield where the Indians had roasted corn and from that it was taken that there had been forty-five savages in the assault. Of that number nine were carried away by this Indians when they retreated, which, with the two bodies found later, made their loss eleven killed and wounded. During the greater part of the battle the Indians fought from ambush, taking refuge behind the trees on the hillside in front of the house. The same day of the Copus battle, this cabins of Newell, Cuppy and Fry, farther east, were burned and the Indians, who attacked the Copus family, were supposed to have been the incendiaries, as they went in that direction. Those families were at the Jerometown blockhouse. After eh close of the war a number of Indians returned to this county. Sarah Copus, the girl who had seen the Indians lurking around the day before the attack was made on their home, did not seen; to be in favor with the savages. 98 - HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY Going to the hill beyond the spring one days after the family had returned from Guernsey county, she saw one hiding behind a tree. She ran towards the he the house, Indian pursuing her almost to the door. They said the girl "knew too much" was too observant of them and their actions. Tom Lyon, an ugly old redskin of the Delaware tribe, in a conversations with Mrs. Copus in 1816, admitted he knew all about the attack on their cabin, but denied that he took part in it. After the times became more secure the, settlers returned to their homes, but affairs were more or less troublous until the close of the war. STORY OF KANOTCHE. The principal object of the Indians in killing, the Zeimers was plunder, Frederick Zeimer was wealthy, as wealth was rated in the pioneer times, and a was supposed that he kept considerable money in the house. The news of the massacre soon spread over the country. Although there was neither telegraph nor telephone in those days, yet news spread and flew— "Like heath-bird, when the hawks pursue." In the clanish days of Scotland, whenever a chieftain, upon a sudden emergency, wished to summon his clansmen, a swift and trusty bearer was sent with a "fiery-cross" and ran with it to the next hamlet, and it was from there taken by relays until the news and summons were spread from district to district. Ways and means to send news from one place to another have been devised and used in all ages of the world, and the pioneers were as resourceful in this respect as they were vigilant and brave in the defense of their country and their homes, and the news of the Zeimer massacre flew as upon the "wings of the wind," and the settlers were soon aroused to a sense of the dangers which environed them. Upon news being received at Wooster that three suspicious-acting Im had been seen in the vicinity of Odell's Lake going eastward, with the Tuscarawas county as their probable destination, Captain Mullen's militia company was ordered out and pursued them, and arrived at New Philadelphia the day after the Indians had been captured. Soon after the report of the Zeituer massacre had been received at New Philadelphia, it was learned that three Indians, supposed to be the Zeimer murderers, had been seen going down the Shoenbrun trail, whereupon Captain McConnell called out the New Philadelphia militia, and, traced and follow the redskins down to Fern Island, where they were captured and taken to New Philadelphia and lodged in jail. As Captain Mullen's Wooster company was approaching New Philadelphia from the west, John C. Wright, then a Steubenville lawyer, rode into town on horseback from the east. He saw an excited crowd of people on the public square, and upon inquiry, Sheriff Henry Laffer explained the situation to Mr. Wright, that the Indians who had murdered the Zeimers were confined in the jail, and that a company of militia from Wooster was then coming down High street to wreak vengeance upon his prisoners. Judge Wright, looking at the HISTORY OF ASHLAND COUNTY - 99 case from legal standpoint, declared that the prisoners should not be punished without a trail. He suggested to Sheriff Laffer replied that an alarm be sounded and the citizens called out. To this Sheriff Laffer replied that the people were so excited and exasperated over the news of the massacre that he feared they would side with the soldiers and put the Indians to death. “Is there no one to stand by you to prevent such a murder?” Judge Wright. "None but Captain McConnnell, who captured them,” replied replied the sheriff. He also added that one of the Indians, Kanotche, had admitted that he was the slayer of Kate Zeimer, which had still further incensed the people against the prisoners. The three men, Wright, Laffer and McConnell, took their stand at the jail door and declared if the prisoners were taken, it would be over their dead bodies. Parley, treats, entreaty and remonstrance ensued, but the men retained their position. Finally, Captain Mullen ordered his men to fire upon them, but, this they refused to do. The militia company finally gave way and abandoned the project of lynching the murders. The Indians were kept in jail until Governor Meigs instructed Lieutenant Shane, then recruiting for the United States army, to take the Indians with his men to the rendezvous at Zanesville. From Zanesville the Indians were taken to the western part of the state, where under the terms of a cartel, they were released as prisoners of war, the charge of murder not being placed against them. While enroute to Zanesvlle to the west, the Indians and their military escorts stopped over night at Newark, where an attempt was made to poison the prisoners. On account of the atrocities and murders committed by the redskins, an avenging feeling had been aroused against them. The attempt to poison them at Newark was made principally on account of Kanotche, the avowed slayer of Kate Zeimer. John C. Wright, who figured so conspicuously in this New Philadelphia incident was later a judge of the supreme court of Ohio, and served in congress from 1823 to 1839. He died in February, 1861. while a delegate to the peace congress in Washington. Judge Wright was for several years the editor of the Cincinnati Gazette. He wrote an interesting account of the capture of the Indians at Fern Island and the subsequent attempt to release and lynch them at New Philadelphia. From that article the facts in this sketch are taken. The following is taken from a “Seymour” massacre story recently published: "A short distance from the house they met Billy, who had come to see if help was needed, and took him a prisoner, but he escaped from them one night and by accident met Philip. who, after burying the body of his parents, sister and friends, had gone in search of revenge. “Shortly after he had gone into the woods he met Kate's betrothed on his way to claim his bride. Deep indeed was his grief at the death of his love. He too, vowed vengeance. On the same night that Billy came to them they saw a light shining up from a deep ravine and on stealing up they saw three Indians sitting by the fire. Each took his man, Billy taking the center one, for two of them were at the Seymour massacre and this one had tried to tomahawk him when he was taken prisoner. They fired together. Two fell over dead and the other mortally wounded. After some time they went into the