|
12 - CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES CHAPTER II EARLY SETTLEMENT FIRST ACTUAL SETTLERS-COUNTY SEAT LOCATED-PIONEER BURIALS -GOING TO MILL--BUILDING THE CANAL-FIRST WHITE MAN’S GRAVE-VARIOUS ITEMS OF INTEREST-STYLE OF LIVING" JOHNY APPLESEED"-EARLY STATE OF SOCIETY-FIRST STILLHOUSE-EARLY TEMPERANCE DAYS-THE JAIL-THE COURTHOUSE-POPULATION DECREASED-EARLY RAILROAD LINES. In his speech before the "Centennial" in Carrollton, William McCoy, a native of the county, gave a greater part of the facts herein stated on the pioneer settlement of this county. The first approach of a White face near to its border (this county) was in 1761-2 when the Revs. Frederick Post and John Heckewelder —Moravian Missionaries—had penetrated the "wilderness" as far as the Tuscarawas Valley and labored with the Indians at three stations —Shoenburn, Gnadenbutten and Salem, Tuscarawas County. Tradition informs us that about 1800 one Jesse Palmer, a hunter effected his settlement in Washington Township on the stream now bearing his name, being so called on account of this pioneer being the first to invade the wilds of the country for the purpose of making first settlement, and he chose the banks of this pretty stream for his log cabin. One account fixed Palmer's settlement on a part of section 16, later owned by William Miller, while another version declares it to have been farther up the stream on land later owned by Robert Huston. About the same date John Jackman settled on land on the Elkhorn in Lee Township, later known as the Oliver Cogsil farm. These two are generally believed to have been the original white settlers within the present Carroll County, but just which one settled first is, and ever will be, a disputed question, but there was but little difference in the dates of their corning to what was then a "green glad solitude." Immediately following came Jacob Gotshall, 1801 ; Peter Albaugh, 1805 ; Daniel Shawver, 1807; then Lucas and Solomon Stine in 1808 ; Adam Simmons, 1809 and others within that decade in the southeastern part of the county. The Downings came in 1805; Richard Vaughn, Moses Porter, 1806 ; Isaac Craig, Amos Jenney, William Thompson, James Hewitt, 1808: John Reed, Sr., Isaac Miller, 1809, all in Sandy Valley, extending from Pekin to Magnolia. Benjamin Knight, Samuel Dunlap, 1807, on the Conotton, near Leesville and New Hagerstown ; also Joseph McCausland, 1807, in Lee Township; Isaac Dwire, John Coakey and William Croxton in 1808, near Carrollton and others along the road leading from Canton to Steubenville; also by Robert George, who settled near Scroggsfield in 1808-09, so that by the close of the first decade of the nineteenth century, considerable settlement had been made along the principal avenue of travel from the Ohio River westward through this county. 12 CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES- 13 September 17, 1808 the town of Pekin in Brown Township, then in Stark County, was laid out by Isaac Craig and Amos Jenney, hence must be the oldest village plat within Carroll County. During the second decade the settlement within the territory of this county was a little more rapid, and in addition to an enlargement of the few scattered settlements already noticed, others were effected amongst whom were those who settled near Norristown in East Township, by Norris, Baker, Battin and others ; also the "New Jersey Settlement" as it was termed, in Monroe Township, by the Davises and others; also the Baxters in Harris Township. COUNTY SEAT LOCATED During the first ten years of settlement the county seat was located for the newly organized county. Peter Bohart who had purchased a quarter section of land on which the greater part of PICTURE OF PETER BOH ART, LAID OUT CENTREVILLE IN 1815. Carrollton now stands, settled thereon about 1810 and October 4, 1815 laid out the town of "Centreville" (now Carrollton). The house on the Helfrich corner was built that year by pioneer Bohart. Leesville was laid out by Thomas Price and, Peter Sanders, August 12, 1815. New Hagerstown ways platted March 20, 1816, by Samuel Dunlap, who represented the county in the Ohio Legislature that year. Millinsburg was platted by William Vaughn, Alexander Lee and David Milligan. Queensborough was platted by George Peterson March 24, 1817 —both last named towns long since defunct villages. Augusta was laid out by Jacob Brown, February 28, 1818. From 1820 to 1830, only towns laid out in the county were Valdarno, between Pekin and Minerva, by J. W. Condy, September 22, 1827-long since obliterated and forgotten. New Harrisburg, by Jacob Harsh, April 21, 1827. 14 - CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES During the first twenty years after the settlement of Carroll County, there were few disturbances of a serious character, although numerous cases of hardship, bravery and courage are related. The Indians committed occasional depredations, but they were generally peaceable. PIONEER BURIALS When Jesse Palmer, the hunter and original settler departed this life his Scroggsfield neighbors gave him the best possible burial that circumstances would at that date permit. No undertaker being near by they provided him with a walnut coffin, made from a native tree, and in the most primitive manner, yet respectable in appearance. BARN RAISINGS In 1810, so sparce was the settlement in Carroll County and near Centreville, that when Isaac Dwire raised a log barn, persons came from six to ten miles around and among them a Mr. Rumple, living east of Harlem, who was accidentally killed at the raising by a falling timber crushing him. GOING TO MILL Before the erection of the Perkins Mill, by Craig and Jenney in 1808-first water mill built in Carroll County—the settlers on the Sandy were under the necessity of carrying their grain to Canton to be made into flour, or perform the tiresome task of producing meal by the hand-mill which was effected by several families. BUILDING OF THE CANAL February 1825, "An act to provide for the internal improvement of the State by navigable canals" was passed by the Ohio Legislature; and in pursuance of it, the Ohio Canal was located across the State extending from Lake Erie to the Ohio River. January 11, 1828, the Sandy and Beaver Canal Company was incorporated for the building of a canal near Bolivar to the Ohio, at Beaver, Pennsylvania, traversing the Sandy. THE COUNTY'S FIRST WHITE MAN'S GRAVE The first white man buried, in what is now Carroll County, and of which there is any record, was in 1789. His name was Swearingen, who, with a number of other men, had been hunting for ginseng. Swearingen being ill, had remained in the camp along the banks of the Ohio, near Steubenville. Indians captured him and hurried away with him. Upon returning to their camp his companions discovered his absence and took up the trail. They found him scalped and dead, at the J. B. McCully spring, a mile and a half west of Carrollton. He was buried on top of the hill, just southeast of the spring. CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES - 15 VARIOUS ITEMS OF INTEREST The geological reports for Carroll County show that "In the Sandy Creek Bottoms, not far from Waynesburg, Daniel Wagoner has found two teeth of a Mastodon, of great size, and almost perfect in state of preservation. Together, they weigh fifteen pounds. Also a tooth of large size was found in 1882 by W. H. Morgan, near the Canal at Oneida. STYLE OF LIVING The early settlers were all comparatively poor in this world's goods, but had a mind to do and to dare. Their style of living was, of course, plain and certain articles of food were difficult to obtain, although game and wild meats were plentiful and very cheap. Salt was a very scarce article and had to be brought over the mountains from Pennsylvania on pack-saddles, until Moore's salt works were established in Jefferson County, by the United States Government. The belief in witches prevailed as late as 1825, when several were shot or burned in effigy. The great storm of 1830 made a clearing of land more difficult by its uprooting much of the timber throughout this county. Provisions were so cheap that owners of the land were enabled to clear and fence at a cost of less than $10 per acre. "JOHNY APPLESEED" Jonathan Chapman traveled over Carroll and Harrison counties and distributed his apple seeds for many of the first orchards here. He was born in the City of Boston, Massachusetts, 1775, and was called a crank, but in his forty-five years' career at distributing apple seeds, he made out to accomplish something worth while throughout the entire Northwest Territory. He usually secured the seeds from about cider presses in Pennsylvania. One orchard in Carroll County is known as having been from his sowing—the one on the old Ward farm one mile southwest from Carrollton. The place was later owned by James Huston. This strange personage died aged seventy-two years. Let this single paragraph stand as his monument in Carroll County, for be it remembered that every county history in this and adjoining states, in the Northwest Territory, where John Appleseed operated, has had from a few lines to many pages concerning this peculiar character, who loved to plant for others, but lived like a recluse and beggar himself. EARLY STATE OF SOCIETY Gen. Ephraim Eckley, well-known in Carroll County, as pioneer and statesman, as well as a military man, once wrote the following substance, concerning early manners and customs in this part of Ohio: The life of an early pioneer was an unintermitted round of labor. Each day must add unto the aggregate of its predecessor in falling the timber, or pursuing the chase to keep the scanty larder from becoming empty. Their lives were so burdened with labor that their 16 - CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES diversions simple and rustic as they were, were daily toil. A new corner's cabin had to be raised, they gathered from miles around and the hills were made musical with the resounding echoes of their axes, each striving to outdo their fellows in the hospitable effort to give their new neighbor a home. The day is one of such labor as would make their progeny today tremble at its contemplation. But it was only their ordinary daily toil and exercise ; ere night brooded over them, the cabin is completed—taken from the stump, as it were, the logs adjusted, the clapboards for the roof put on, the puncheon floor laid, and yet some time spared in shooting at a mark, running races or jumping. The refreshments, hog and hominy, or maybe bear meat, venison or roasted wild turkey, accompanied by the never absent corn- cake, the whole invariably supplemented by the contents of the little brown jug, were served in rudimentary style and dispatched with vigorous appetites. The wives and daughters have followed their husbands and brothers to the new corners clearing, and when too dark to sight along the rifle barrel, the house-warming begins. The fiddler of the country is sufficiently advanced to boast of an instrument, resins his bow and gives a few strokes across the strings, when the merry couple fall in for the dance. The men in their hunting shirts and homespun trousers, stuffed in the tops of their boots of raw-hide; the women in Linsey dresses of their own weaving and making, join in the rivalry of the quickest step, the highest jump and the liveliest shuffle. The perfume of honest sweat had not then given way to the delicate rose-water of modern assembly ; they threw themselves into the spirit of "Chase the Squirrel," "Peel the Willow" and the like as it was scratched from the fiddle in the corner or sung by the bystanders. - A corn husking, flax pulling, log-rolling were the holiday amusements, which were always crowned by the shooting match or trail of athletic achievements topped off with an all-night dance. The sparseness of population gave additional impetus to their natural honesty, for if a debt had been dishonored it was speedily called to the attention of all the neighborhood and he who refused prompt payment of his obligation, either in furs, whiskey or powder, the circulating mediums of those days, was sure to be unpleasantly reminded of it. If sickness or other misfortune overtook one, the whole community was converted into a committee to look after them and minister to their wants. There was no room for selfishness in their hearts, but each one took a kindly, active interest in the welfare of his fellows. Then, probably more than ever since, by their lives and their actions, did the people of this community answer and exemplify their answer to the question, "Am I My Brother's Keeper?" FIRST STILL-HOUSE Tn the spring of 1814, David Eakin moved into Brown Township and settled on the land later owned by Thomas J. McCobb, southeast of Oneida. There was a fine spring here, and a number of neighbors suggested the idea of a distillery as a profitable investment and accordingly a "still-house" was erected the next year. Whiskey was then active in the markets at $1.50 per gallon. Liquors in the early CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES - 17 days of the settlement on this county were a "household necessity" and found everywhere, and kept as an article of entertainment in almost every family. It was always offered when friends or neighbors met. Indeed it was an insult to not "set out the bottle" when friends called. EARLY TEMPERANCE DAYS It is interesting in these days in 1921 when not a full year has passed since we had nation-wide prohibition, to read of the days when our fathers and mothers, too, thought liquors a fit article to grace every sideboard. But there were temperance advocates even way back in the '40s and '50s, who kept everlastingly at their cause until the end was crowned with success, and now the persons who used to say "Prohibition will not prohibit" have had a chance to change their minds. The original manuscript showing resolutions regarding the question explains itself : "Agreeable to previous notice, a meeting convened at the house of William Hardesty, Sr., in Troy Village, Brown Township (at early candle-lighting) January 19, A. D. 1838. On motion the house was called to order by appointing Dr. N. Steel, president and George Hardesty, secretary. Whereupon, on motion of Rev. James McKain it was resolved that the meeting consider the propriety of discussing the subject of temperance. Resolved that the chair appoint a committee of five to draw up a pledge. The chair appointed said committee, who retired for a few minutes and reported as follows : 'We, the undersigned, do pledge ourselyes and our sacred honors that we will abstain from the use of all intoxicating liquors as a beverage and that we will use our influence to discountenance their use among those in our employ, and that we will not traffic in them in any manner nor suffer them to be used in our families, unless in extreme cases of sickness,' which pledge was received by the meeting and signed by a large number of names. They then resolved : That this society be called the 'Brown Township Temperance Society, auxiliary to the Carroll Couy Temperance Society.' " On motion the meeting then adjourned to meet at Bethlehem meeting-house on Wednesday evening next at early candle-lighting. (Signed) George Hardesty, secretary, and N. Steel, president. THE JAIL June 8, 1833, the building of the jail was let to Kendall Jackson and was completed and accepted by the county commissioners January 13, 1834. The conclusion of the remarks in the commissioner's journal at that time read : "Ordered by commissioners that John Beatty, sheriff, get possession of the jail immediately, and that he hold it until his successor be elected and qualified into office." This was rather a peculiar entry. COURTHOUSE May 1, 1834 the building of the Carroll County courthouse was awarded to James McMullin for the sum of $3,500, but he failing to 18 - CARROLL AND HARRISON COUNTIES enter into contract with the county commissioners, it was re-let to one John M. Lacey at $3,699, but Lacey having failed to complete the building John Rankin completed it for $1,500, but his work proved unsatisfactory and the matter was settled by arbitration December 7, 1836 and the finishing of the work was let to George Y. Hampson, June, 1837 and he completed the structure so long in course of construction, May 2, 1838 at an additional cost of $2,079.64. POPULATION DECREASED In 1840 Carroll County had a population of 18,108, equal to forty-five persons to every square mile of its area. The active industry of its people was that of farming and felling the huge forests and subduing the lands suitable for argricultural purposes. But the sons of such energetic sires were not contented with the slow progress they were making, trying to make a garden spot out of such a wilderness as "Little Carroll" presented at that time. They pushed on farther toward the setting sun, after first having disposed of their lands here. This caused a perceptible decrease in the population of the county thus early in its history. In 1850 the county had a population of 17,685; in 1860 it was only 15,738; in 1870, 14,490, a decrease of 3,617 during thirty years. EARLY RAILROAD LINES In 1850, the Sandy and Beaver Canal was completed, but proving a dismal failure it was abandoned in about two years thereafter. The Tuscarawas branch of the Cleveland & Pittsburgh Railroad was built along the Sandy in 1853-54 and about the same time the Carroll County Railroad from Oneida to Carrolltown was completed. The last named railroad was changed to the Ohio & Toledo Company and was a narrow gauge road extended from Oneida to Minerva and from Carrollton to Cannonsburgh, reaching one of the best coal fields within Carroll County. The Wheeling & Lake Erie railroad by 1876 had reached the southwest portion of the county with its grade, which ran along the valley of the Conotton River. |