HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY. CHAPTER I. REASONS FOR COLONIZATION.—COLUMBUS.--ISABELLA.—PILGRIMS. —PURITANS. Desire for money and desire for religious liberty, in the ratio of ninety-nine to one, were the means of colonizing the New World. Women as well as men have had a hand in this colonization, but whereas the motive in men has been largely commercial, in women it has been largely religious. When Columbus had declared his belief in a round world and had explained to leading men the great commercial advantages awaiting the nation which would finance his scheme, he was ridiculed. Few men believed he could find the gold of the east by sailing west. Columbus, as man has always done when he has utterly failed with men, turned to a woman—a queen. To be sure, he told her of the eastern gold which would be hers and of the fame which would come to Spain but he dwelt at great length on the opportunities she had for planting her religion in a new world. History tells us that, because of her devotion to her church, she sold her jewels and raised the necessary money. At any rate, we know she herself contributed more than half the money he needed, and made the town of Palos give him two vessels. The discoveries he made did reflect credit upon her kingdom, and through the upper parts of South America and most of the West India Islands, Spanish is the language spoken, and the Roman Catholic religion is the universal religion. That religion, especially its ritual, is making itself felt in the United States today in ways we hardly recognize. That church mod- Vol. I-1 2 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY ified. the forms of the pagan worship and adopted them as their own. The Anglican church follows moderately many of these forms, while the ordinary Protestant church follows today at a respectful distance. Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, and so on, read the Psalter, sing the Gloria, say the Creed, repeat the Lord's Prayer, and take on other forms to make the service attractive and effective. Three or four churches other than Catholic and Episcopal in Warren, in this year (1909) had appropriate services during Holy Week. The vestments of the Episcopal priest are fashioned a little more and more after his Romish brother, while the garments of Protestant clergymen distinguish them often from their fellow men. In fact, if the Pilgrims, as they stepped upon the rock, could have had a vision of the church of today, with its stained glass, its organ, its choir, its forms and ceremonies, possibly they would have re-embarked. The Puritans came to this country seeking religious liberty. These Puritans were both men and women, they had been born in a constitutional monarchy where the established church was powerful, and the man became the monarch of the family, and the man preacher, the ruler of the community. On the rocky coast of New England the Puritan mother helped to carve out the nation, as well as did the Puritan father. She loved religious liberty as well as did he, but she spoke and acted at second hand. If she felt so strongly that she let her voice be heard, she endangered her life and was sometimes hung or burned as a witch or disturber. As we look back at the early Massachusetts days, we marvel at those early women. Accustomed to a mild climate, they bore the severities of their new home with utmost patience and resignation. They bore and buried their children, in great numbers, and most of them yielded up their lives when young. Hundreds of grave-stones in New England, with only a little modification, testify that "Mary Anne Smith died at the age of twenty-six, leaving eight children to the tender mercy of God." People of today are not alone in wondering how the Puritan could think he had religious liberty in his new home, for some of the Massachusetts residents at the time also thought so. To have more liberty and a larger chance for making money, these dissatisfied people moved on into Connecticut. Still later, commercialism and religion, the latter's voice somewhat weakened, allured Connecticut people to Pennsyl- HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 3 vania. Here other men, also with love of money and religion, met them and after conflict turned them back, or rather the survivors. Later, the Connecticut people made another effort, going in the eastern corner of the North-West Territory, where they accumulated property and modified their religion and became powerful and prosperous, as we shall see. CHAPTER II SPAIN.-PORTUGAL.-FRANCE.-ENGLAND.-THE VIRGINIA CHARTER. Columbus was not the first man to believe the world was round, but he really believed it, and was anxious to prove what was then a theory. In August, 1492, with three small vessels and about one hundred men, some of them criminals, he set sail, and on October 12th sighted land, one of the Bahamas. Later he discovered Cuba. He returned home in January. Isabella and Ferdinand, and in fact all Spaniards were overjoyed at the success of the enterprise. The Queen hastened to the Pope, Alexander VI, and asked him to grant to Spain dominion over this new land. When in the beginning Columbus had tried to interest the Portuguese in his adventure, that country had pretended it believed nothing in the theory, but true to their reputed natures, while denying his claim, these people started out sailors to make the voyage, thus hoping to obtain the glory themselves. These sailors, however, had not the faith of Columbus, and, soon becoming disheartened, turned back. However, when Columbus returned, Portugal was chagrined and immediately sent an expedition to India, via Cape Hope, and thus De Gama, in 1498, reached the land all were seeking, before any European. These facts would be of no interest to the readers of this history, except that Pope Alexander believed Portugal as well as Spain had reached the "Golden Land," and "drawing a meridian one hundred leagues west of the Azores, decreed that all new lands west of this line should belong to Spain, and those east to Portugal." Columbus died without knowing that he had discovered a new world. On his second voyage he visited Porto Rico, which island, four hundred years later, was a part of the United States. Spain and Portugal owned the land in the new world, pro- - 4 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 5 vided the people who lived here (erroneously named Indians) had no claim to the forests over which their fathers had roamed many centuries before either Portugal or Spain had heard of a round world or a short passage to India, and provided the Norsemen were not exploring with the idea of colonizing, which they were probably not. Stupid, penurious Henry VII was quite disturbed by Columbus' success, and in 1497 sent John Cabot after India's gold, and the next year sent Sebastian Cabot, the son, on the same errand. The father landed on the North American coast and the son in the territory of the United States. Neither found treasure of any kind, and so England discontinued her voyages although upon these two expeditions England later laid claim to a goodly part of the land east of the Mississippi. Spain for many years sent explorers or colonies to the new world, sometimes to South America and the Islands, sometimes to Mexico, to Florida, to California and the country in between. However, about one hundred years from the time of Columbus' first voyage it became understood that Spain would confine herself to the southern part of the Northern continent. France was slow in attempting to colonize in the western hemisphere. It was more than one hundred and fifty years from Columbus' first voyage before the Huguenots, for religious reasons, fled from France to make a new home in Florida. As this land was claimed by the Spanish, the Spanish Christians slew the French. Liberal Christians, and were in turn hanged by the French Regular Christians. Oh ! the agony, the bloodshed, the torture inflicted by those supposing themselves to be the followers of the gentle, loving, the non-resisting Jesus. In 1535 the French sailed into the St. Lawrence and from that time on made excursions in all directions. In 1605 there was a permanent settlement in Nova Scotia. In 1660 they were on Lake Superior, in 1673 on the upper Mississippi, in 1679 La Salle launched a boat of sixty tons, the "Griffin," on Lake Erie, and proceeded up the lakes. In 1682 he was at the mouth of the Mississippi. In fact, on the border of the land claimed by the English, the French military posts were numerous and were constantly encroaching. We remember that it was Isabella who started Columbus on the discovery of the new land, and it was Elizabeth who really began the planting of the English in the western world. As we have seen, Henry VII was a stingy fellow and too 6 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY self-centered to see beyond his borders. It is hardly for us, Trumbull County descendants of the New England pioneers, to dwell on Henry's penuriousness, because this trait our ancestors brought with them into New England, on into New Connecticut, and the great-great-grandchildren of Trumbull County, as a rule, hold on to the purse strings rather closely. They not only do not sell all that they have and give to the poor, but many of them think themselves the poor without reason. However, Trumbull County is not the only spot on earth where people are saving or where the church doctrine is not followed to the letter. Henry VIII had to give much time to what for politeness is called "domestic affairs," but what in reality was a licentious life. He divorced and killed wives, and in the name of the church tortured and dispatched Christians. Many historians try to belittle Elizabeth, saying the success of her reign was due not to her own ability, but to the wise men she drew around her. If this be true, does that fact itself not show a sagacious mind ? It has been said that she was not virtuous. That is what the world says of any woman who has ability and talent, and uses them in a new line. It is the thing women, as a whole, least deserve and most dread. Elizabeth knew what they said,—she did not care. Wise was she, far wise above her generation. She may have had lovers in the insinuating sense, but she judiciously avoided a husband. She was a woman, and in that far-away time, heads rolled off of shoulders easily at a wave of a. majestic hand and she did not like it. The position of heads was quite normal during her reign. She knew husbands could not be divorced without punishment, whereas lovers could be set aside easily the quieter, the better. At any rate, Elizabeth had time for things other than domestic (here, domestic is as applied usually to men), and one of these things was colonizing the new world. She granted charters to Sir Humphrey Gilbert, and she and Sir Walter Raleigh realized that the new world was the place to cripple Spain. With the assistance of Sir Thomas Drake, a gentleman in those days, a pirate in ours, she made the beginning. Of course, colonizing was a new business and she did not know that idle gentlemen, degenerate second sons, laborers who refused to labor, with no women, never had successfully made homes in the wilderness, or anywhere else. The early expeditions of England are so well known to all HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 7 who can read at all that they are not repeated here. These three countries are mentioned in this work because indirectly they had a bearing on Trumbull County. James I granted charters to the London and the Plymouth Companies in 1606. The Plymouth Company was given the land from Nova Scotia to Long Island running indefinitely westwards, while the London Company was given the land from the Potomac to Cape Fear, the intermediate portion being open to both. In 1609 a new charter was granted by James to the London Company, extending the coast line two hundred miles below and above the present Old Point Comfort. The northern line then began a little above the center of the New Jersey coast and ran at an angle of about forty-five degrees, touching near Buffalo, on through Lake Huron, Lake Superior "up into the lands throughout from sea to sea and northwest." This covered nearly one-half of the North American Continent. Therefore, in 1609, the land which later became Trumbull County belonged to England. To be sure it was granted to the London Company, and claimed by Virginia, so called in honor. of the Virgin queen. The people of Trumbull County owe a great debt to the London Company, for it succeeded in doing what Elizabeth began to do—held back the Spanish nation, and established a self-government which a people belonging to a constitutional monarchy could do and which a people belonging to an absolute monarchy could not do. The rulers of Spain were real rulers, not leaders; people had no voice whatever in their own government. The rulers of England were not all powerful. The Virginians were conformers and therefore did not displease the king, as did the northern folks. Hence it kept its charter, while Massachusetts' was revoked in the latter part of the eighteenth century. CHAPTER III. CONNECTICUT CONSTITUTION.-CHARTER OF 1662.—CHARTER OAK. -CONNECTICUT IN PENNSYLVANIA.-CONNECTICUT MASSACRE AND LOSS OF CLAIM.-CHARLES II 'S GEOGRAPHY.-CONNECTICUT RESERVES PART OF HER GRANT. The Connecticut constitution was drawn up in 1639 by the men of the three settlements or towns, Hartford, Wethersfield, and Windsor. It provided for a government by the people and did not mention king or parliament. Other towns later organized under the title of New Haven. It was in this colony that the laws were so strict as to be called the "Blue Laws," although these laws did not compare in severity with many laws of Old England. On April 23, 1662, Charles II confirmed all Connecticut charters and deeds, and because he hated the New Haven colony (it had defied him and denied him certain requests) he turned it in as Connecticut under this charter. The conveyance gave to Connecticut "all the territory of the present state and all of the lands west of it, to the extent of its breadth, from sea to sea." This really gave to Connecticut aside from the home state, the upper third of Pennsylvania, about one-third of Ohio, and parts of what has become Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, and California. This United Connecticut became prosperous and tranquillity seemed near when Andros, the governor of Massachusetts, appeared in the state and demanded their charter. The question of releasing this valuable document was considered for hours, eloquent arguments were made, the hardships of early settlers were depicted, but even when night fell the governor was still demanding. No Tungsten burner lighted the room in which the council was held, but the best of the time—the tallow dip—was there. Suddenly there was darkness. When the dips were set sputtering again - 8 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 9 the charter could not be found. Some patriot, or patriots, had spirited it away and had hid it in the hollow of an oak tree where it remained till Massachusetts rebelled against Andros, when it was triumphantly produced. On Sundays, on Thanksgiving, and on Fourth of July, when the early settlers of New Connecticut had time to think or to hear orations, their hearts swelled with gratitude as they recalled that the charter which gave them the land upon which they had built their homes had been preserved to them by Yankee wit and courage, and the "Charter Oak" was ever held in reverence. Modern historians are cruel. Not only do they declare that there was no William Tell, no apple, no arrow; but that Pocohontas did not leap forth from the darkness and save the life of John Smith. Instead of the latter they give us the picture of a wise, beautiful, gentle, loving Indian girl doing many good deeds for the white people, as well as her own, and who in turn was loved for her devotion and her bravery. Pshaw ! that picture does not replace the other. Too many women have been good, wise and devoted to this great country, in the beginning, later and at this minute, to have "special mention." But more, the historian insinuatingly whispers that the hollow oak may have held nuts, leaves, dead branches, toads, squirrels, but no parchment—no paper upon which the chesty king in 1662 had placed his name and seal. Anyway, even if the story was ethereal, the charter itself was not. The western land held out hope for the Connecticut folks and land companies were formed to establish settlements in northern Pennsylvania, then more or less of a wilderness. When the companies were ready, men and women set out to make new homes in the beautiful valley of the Wyoming. They sought property and liberty, but they found others ahead of them who wanted the same things. Seven times did the Connecticut emigrants attempt to make a settlement. Each time they were unsuccessful, being driven out by whites and Indians, and twice massacred. The life of a pioneer is a hard life at best, but for men and women to be cold, hungry, lonely and fearful most of the time, as they struggled for existence, and to be killed at the end, seems horrible when we know how the fertile land, plenty of it for themselves, their children, and their children's children, stretched out invitingly before them. Sometimes husbands settled their families in this valley and went out to fight or to hunt, and the women did the work 10 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY of both, their children hanging to their skirts, while they listened labored for the whoops of the dreaded red man. So busy were these frontiersmen during the Revolutionary War that they neglected the warning of the wives at home. When at last, they reluctantly returned, they found themselves wholly unprepared for what awaited them. They proceeded immediately to construct fortresses, while the women engaged in the manly occupation of making the powder. However, both efforts were to no purpose, for instead of keeping within the barricades, the men, about three hundred, marched boldly forth to meet twelve hundred Indians, Tories and British. One hundred and sixty were killed outright, while one hundred and forty escaped, nearly all to be recaptured. These unfortunates were tomahawked or tortured to death. Some were pinned down with pitch-forks onto blazing logs, or made to run through crackling fires till they fell fainting and were burned to death. One hundred and fifty widows and nearly six hundred orphans were made that day. When women realized what was happening they seized their children and started for the east, through the "Dismal Swamp." In one of these groups there were nearly one hundred women and children and only one man. Alfred Mathews in "Ohio and Her Western Reserve" says : "All were without food, many scarcely clothed, but they pressed on, weak, trembling and growing constantly worse from this unaccustomed labor through the thicket, mire and ooze. One by one the weakest gave out. Some wandered from the path and were lost ; some fell from exhaustion, some from wounds received in battle, but the majority maintained life in some miraculous way and pressed on. The only manna in that wilderness was whortleberries, and these they plucked and eagerly devoured, without pausing. Children were born and children died in that fearful forced march. One babe that came into the world in this scene of terror and travail was carried alive to the settlements. At least one which died was left upon the ground, while the agonized mother went on. There was not time nor were there means to make even a shallow grave. One woman bore her dead babe in her arms twenty miles rather than abandon its little body to the beasts." HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 11 A court, organized by Congress under the Articles of Confederation entered into by the states during the Revolution, sat at Trenton, New Jersey, in 1787, to consider the dispute between Connecticut and Pennsylvania as to boundary. The decision was for Pennsylvania. When the author was a young girl she accompanied her father as he went from county seat to county seat in the dual capacity of common pleas and circuit judge. Being thus thrown for weeks together with judges and lawyers, she soon learned, to her surprise, that printed, high judicial decisions were not always so clearly and firmly worded as to make differences of opinion among lower judges impossible, and, further, that conditions and circumstances, personal and political, entered into decisions in many cases. The ruling in regard to the right of Connecticut to the western lands is a fair sample. She had charters for land in New York, but Charles had also given the same land to New York. His geography was as shady as was the spelling of our first president. New York and Connecticut began to settle their differences in 1683 and finished in 1733. In 1787, Connecticut was possessed of her charter, shorn of all east of the western Pennsylvania line. But she had that. It was now her turn. The general government was begging the states to relinquish their titles, but Connecticut, coquettishly or mulishly, held back. At last she agreed, reserving for herself the portion of land which was bordered on the north by the lake, east by the Pennsylvania line, south by the 41st parallel, and on the west by a line a hundred and twenty miles west of the Pennsylvania west line. That this request was granted rather strengthens the thought that the judges knew they had been a little unfair in their first decision, and wished to make amends. Otherwise why should Connecticut be the exception to all other states. Connecticut, after all this trouble and uncertainty of years, was at last victorious and she possessed the thing, or part of the thing, for which she had contended. The stories of states are not unlike the stories of people. Connecticut was barely relieved of a great anxiety—that of a possible loss of her land,—before she was beset by another one. She owned the land, but what should she do with it. An unbroken wilderness, hundreds of miles away, was not money in the purse. She had seen the Indians driven farther and farther away, she had had a peculiar experience herself of owning and 12 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY being deprived of, she had seen reversal of decisions, beside she realized the approaching power of central government and knew that individual communities might have to suffer for the good of the whole. She said to herself, "If I am not to be undone even at this late day, I myself must be up and doing." CHAPTER IV. COMMITTEE APPOINTED BY CONNECTICUT LEGISLATURE.-FIRE LANDS.-SECOND COMMITTEE.-ORIGINAL PURCHASERS.- QUANTITY OF LAND ON THE RESERVE.-NATURAL RESOURCES.-MEN WHO PRECEDED CONNECTI- CUT SETTLERS.-GARFIELD'S SPEECH. The legislature in 1786 appointed a committee of three to dispose of this far western land. The price was placed at fifty cents per acre, the territory was to be divided into townships six miles square. The general assembly agreed to make a grant of a township to each purchaser, his heirs and assigns. In each township was reserved five hundred acres of good land for the support of the "Gospel minister," five hundred acres for "the support of the schools forever," and two hundred and forty acres in "fee simple to the first Gospel minister who shall settle in such town."   It was also agreed to survey the tract into tiers and ranges, No. 1 to be what is now the upper eastern corner of Ashtabula county. The legislature of the following year substantially ratified this, making a few minor changes such as placing No. 1 township at the southeast corner, now known as Poland, and making the townships five miles square. Before the survey was made Judge Samuel H. Parsons bought the Salt Spring tract. Although reference is made to tier and range as if there had been a survey, there had not been. This was in 1788 and was the only sale made by the commissioners. This deed is recorded in Warren. During the Revolutionary war the British destroyed property belonging to Connecticut land owners and they demanded reimbursement from the legislature. This was considered by that body in 1791 and in 1792, and 500,000 acres were set off for these sufferers, or their heirs, and this tract was known at first as "The Sufferers' Land," later as "Fire Lands," as most of the property destroyed had been burned. 14 - HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY The shrewdness of Connecticut is seen even in this transaction. She gave to those needing and deserving help, as men usually give alms, that is, she gave that for which she cared least, the land that was farthest away. Neither did she include the islands lying near and belonging properly to the territory. Every emigrant as he journeyed to his new home in the "Fire Lands" helped to make a roadway for the later settlers, and every acre cleared and every cabin erected on these "Fire Lands" added to the value of the land to the east awaiting purchasers. Thus, the present counties of Huron and Erie, although belonging to the Western Reserve, brought no substantial gain, unless cancelling moral obligations be considered substantial gain. In 1795 Connecticut had grown desperate over her "White Elephant" and determined to dispose of it. After formally resolving to sell it, the legislature selected a committee of eight, one from each county, to transact the business. They were John Treadwell, Hartford county; James Wadsworth, New Haven county ; Marvin Wait, New London; William Edmonds, Fairfield; Thomas Grosvenor, Windham ; Aaron Austin, Litch field; Elijah Hubbard, Middlesex; and Sylvester Gilbert, of Tolland county. It will be seen that the names of these men and these towns were used in many ways in New Connecticut, as were also the names of the purchasers. At this time, several individuals wished to buy land for themselves or their friends, but the land company feared that some of them who were not from Connecticut were not financially responsible, while the price others offered was not sufficient. Among the latter were Zepheniah Swift, author of Swift's Digest, ex-chief justice of Connecticut. He offered a million dollars for the tract. This, however, was not entirely individual, as some of his friends were interested. These eight men sold this tract of land to the following persons for the following amounts : HISTORY OF TRUMBULL COUNTY - 15