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Press Of J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia, Penn'a. 1876.
Press Of W. E. Monison & Co., Ovid. New York
ff. Woyns, ir/dicno
LIST OF EEPUELICATION PATEONS.
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— Those In Parenthesis Provided Remuneration To Aid In This Endeavor
The Original Coiirt-House In Ovid Village. 1840. (Christensen Gray Corp. General Insurance, Ovid.) Page
Paul A. Christensen, Agent.
General John Sullivan. 1858. (The Board of Supervisors, Seneca County.)
The Baptist Church, Ovid Village. (Lloyd W. Koke, Ovid,)
Page 10 Page 24
The Richmond Aqueduct. 1860. (The Town Board, Tyre.) Facing Page 41
The Pi-anklin House, Ovid. 1858.
The Seneca Collegiate Institute, Ovid. 1858.
(The First National Bank Of Ovid, Ovid.) Facing Page 45
First Methodist Church, Ovid.
First Presbyterian Church, Ovid. 1858.
(The Ovid Federated Church, Ovid.) Facing Page 51
Engine House Of Torrent Co., No. 3, Waterloo. 1855.
Residence Of The Late Judge Watkins, South Waterloo. 1855.
(The First National Bank Of Waterloo, Waterloo.) -._.. Facing Page 55
Abraham Lincoln & Ulysses S. Grant. (D. G. Cay wood Camp No. 146, S. U. V., Ovid.) Facing Page 63
Holmes, Shoemaker & Co's. Flouring Mills, Seneca Falls. 1856. (George G. Souhan, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 65
Trinity Episcopal Church, Seneca Falls. 1856. (Trinity Episcopal Church, Seneca Falls.) _-._ Facing Page 71
Residence Of Col. John Y. Manning, Ovid. 1858. (Mr. and Mrs. Wayjie E. Morrison, Sr., Ovid.) Facing Page 73
List Of Supervisors, Town Of Waterloo. 1876. (The Town Board, TFa/erZoo.) Facing Page 83
South View Of The Court-House In Waterloo. 1841.
Village Plat Of Waterloo. 1852.
(Village Board Of Trustees, Waterloo.) Facing Page 85
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Methodist Episcopal Church, Waterloo. 1855.
Residence Of Mrs. A. Draper, Waterloo. 1855.
(Mrs. George Samuel Brown, Waterloo.) Facing Page I
The Waterloo Park &c., Waterloo. 1855. (Waterloo Library & Historical Society, Waterloo.) .._. Facing Page 93
The Waterloo Woolen MiUs, Waterloo. 1852. (L. M. Sessler, Waterloo.) Facing Page 95
Harris & Thomas's Steam Saw Mill & Boat Yard, Sheldrake. 1858.
Seneca Co. Court-House & Clerk's Office, Ovid. 1858. (The Town Board, Ovid.) Facing Page 97
South View Of Court-House Square In Ovid. 1841. 2025303 Village Plat Of Ovid. 1852. (Village Board Of Trustees, Ovid.) Facing Page 99
The State Agricultural College, Ovid. 1861. (Benjamin Franklin & James A. Gabriel, Ovid.) Facing Page 101
East View Of Seneca Falls Village. 1841.
Village Plat Of Seneca Falls. 1852.
(The Village Board Of Trustees, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 107
Downs & Co's. Pump Factory & Iron Works, Seneca Falls. 1856. (State Bank Of Seneca Falls, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 109
Works Of Westcott, Downs & Gould, Seneca Falls. 1856. (Seneca Falls Savings Bank, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 111
Island Works Of Silsby, Mynderse & Co., Seneca Falls. 1856. (The Town Board, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 117
The Seneca Falls Academy, Seneca Falls. 1856.
Residence Of Edward Mynderse, Seneca Falls. 1856.
(Seneca Falls Historical Society, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 121
Works Of Cowing & Co., Seneca Falls. 1856. (GTE Sylvania, Incorporated, Seneca Falls.) Facing Page 123
The Baptist Church, Scott's Corners, Ovid. (The Baptist Church Of Ovid Centre, Ovid.) Facing Page 133
Captain Elijah Kinne. (The Kinne Family.) Facing Page 135
The Stone Church, Junius. (The Town Board, Junius.) Page 138
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List Of Supervisors, Town Of Lodi. 1876. (The Town Board, Lodi.) .._ Facing Page 147
List Of Supervisors, Town Of Romulus, 1876. (The Town Board, Romulus.) Facing Page 153
Rev. Diedrich Willers. (The Town Board, Varick.) Facing Page 159
The Indian Chief Red Jacket. (The Town Board, Fayette.) Facing Page 161
List Of Supervisors, Town Of Covert. 1876. (The Town Board, Covert.) Facing Page 163
Cayuga Bridge & Seneca Lake. 1857. (Mr. and Mrs. Miles J. Bond and Family, Ovid.) Facing Page 165
Map Of New-York State. 1813. (Andrew J. Morrison, Ovid.) Page 166
— vwwwwwwwwiiwwvw*
The Presbyterian Church, Seneca Falls. 1856. (First Presbyterian Society & Church, Seneca Falls.) Page 14
Residence Of Lewis Bodine, Fair- View, Ovid. 1858. (The Boyce Family, Ovid.) Page 14
St. Paul's Episcopal Church & Parish School, Waterloo. 1855. (St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Waterloo.) Facing Page 87
See Also Pages 23, 88, and Facing Page 92.
Business Blocks, Waterloo. 1855, (Dr. and Mrs. H. J. Waldman, Waterloo.) Facing Page 87
Residence Of J. E. Seeley, Ovid. 1858. (Robert Corning, Ovid.) Facing Page 127
Residence Of Corydon Fairchild, Ovid. 1858. (Homer Duncan, Ovid.) Facing Page 127
Residence Of John J. Covert, Ovid. 1858. (John B. Usher, Jr., Ovid.) ._ Facing Page 157
Residence Of Abraham Van Doren, Pair- View, Ovid. 1858. (Peter M. Depew, Ovid.) Facing Page 157
M
TABLE OF OOl^TEl^TS.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
Silver Thread Falls, Lodi (Frontltpiece)
Map of Seneca County
Court-House and Jail, Waterloo (Plate II.)
Court-Houae, Ovid (Plate H.)
St. Mary's Church, Waterloo (Plate III.)
Portrait of Erastus Partridge, Seneca Falls (Plate IV..) .... " Le Roy 0. Partridge, Seneca Falls (Plate V.) .
St. Paul's Parish Church, Waterloo (Plate VI.)
The Towsley House, Waterloo (Plate VII.)
Residence of William C. Button, Waterloo (Plate VIII.) ....
" James C. Hallsted, Waterloo (Plate IX.) ....
Farm Residence of James C. Hallsted, Waterloo (Plate X.) . . .
"Holy Cross" Catholic Church, Ovid (Plate XI.)
The Pastoral Residence, Ovid (Plate XI.)
Farm and Residence of Michael B. Ritter, Fayette (Plate XII.) Residence of W. H. Burton, Main Street, Waterloo (Plate XIII.) .
Portrait of W. H. Burton, Waterloo (Plate XIII.)
Manufactory of the Waterloo Yeast Company (Plate XIII.)
View of the Willard Asylum (Plate Xn^, rfooHepaje) . . . .
Besidenceof Joseph Barnes, Junius (Plate XV.)
" Barney Snyder, Junius (Plate XV.)
" P. K. Carver, Tyre (Plate XVI.)
" Thomas W. Compson, Tyre (Plate XVI.) ....
" and Farm of Henry Hosier, Fayette (Plate XVII., double page)
Portrait of Henry Hosier, Fayette (Plate XVII.)
" Mrs. Henry Hosier, Fayette (Plate XVII.) ....
Residence of D. E. Partridge, Seneca Falls (Plate XVIII.)
William H. Newton, Junius (Plate XIX.) . . . .
Portrait of Col. Halsey Sandford (Plate XX.)
Mrs. " " "
Residence of Jacob Nearpass, Tyre (Plate XXI.)
" James Carris, Tyre (Plate XXI.)
Hotel and Residence of M. R. Cole, Kidder's Ferry (Plate XXH.) . Residence of A. D. Southwiok, Junius (Plate XXII.) . . . .
John S. Knight, Lodi (Plate XXII.)
Herman D. Eastman, Lodi (Plate XXII.) ....
" I. H. Peirson, Waterloo (Plate XXIII.) ....
" Peck Slip," Property of A. S. Rollins, formerly owned by Joseph Wright,
west of Waterloo (Plate XXIIL)
Portrait of Samuel Birdsall, Waterloo (Plate XXIV.) .... " S. H. Gridley, D.D., Waterloo (Plate XXV.) ....
Residence of S. H. Gridley, D.D., Waterloo (Plate XXV.)
" Thomas Fatsinger, Waterloo (Plate XXV.) ....
Mansion House, Waterloo (Plate XXVI.) . . . .
Portrait of E.Williams, Waterloo (Plate XXVL)
Residence of Charles Bonnel, Waterloo (Plate XXVII.) .... Portrait of « « « « ....
Residence of 0. E. Maynard, Waterloo (Plate XXVIII.) ....
" Robert Raster, Waterloo (Plate XXVIIL) ....
" Nathaniel Seely, Waterloo (Plate XXIX.) ....
Portrait of ■< « « .< ....
Residence of Henry Bonnell, Waterloo (Plate XXX.) ....
Portrait of " " " " ....
" Mrs. Henry Bonnell, Waterloo (Plate XXX.) ....
Residence of J. C. Wolf, Waterloo (Plate XXXI.)
SU John's Chapel, Waterloo (Plate XXXI.)
Residence of Alfred Vail, Waterloo (Plate XXXL)
F. L. Manning, Waterloo (Plate XXXI.) .... Manufacturing View— T. A. Mclntyre's Rectifying Works, Waterloo
(Plate XXXII., rfou4(epcije)
Portrait of Gardner Welles, M.D., Waterloo (Plate XXXIII.) . " Rev. Aaron D. Lane, Waterloo (Plate XXXIII.) .
D. S. Kendig, Waterloo (Plate XXXIII.) .... " Rev. John M. Guion, S.T.D., Seneca Falls (Plate XXXIII.) . Residence of the late Edwin R. Dobbin, Waterloo (Plate XXXIV.) . Portrait of Edwin R. Dobbin, Waterloo (Plate XXXIV.) Mrs. E. R. Dobbin, Waterloo (Plate XXXIV.)
Joshua Wilson, Ovid (Plate XXXV.)
Mrs. Joshua Wilson, Ovid (Plate XXXV.) .... Residence of Joshua W. Wilson, Ovid (Plate XXXV.) ....
facing title-page
<!ipg page 8
8
50
50, 51
54
54
62
62
62,63
62,63
62, 63
64
66
Residence of Aaron Wilson, Ovid (Plate XXXVI.) . Portrait of " << « « ...
" Julia " " " ...
Residence of. James Barry, Ovid (Plate XXXVIL, double page)
John Q. Messier, Ovid (Plate XXXVIII.) . Portraits of John Q. Messier and Family, Ovid (Plate XXXVIII.) Portrait of Abraham Van Doren, Ovid (Plate XXXIX.) .
Jane " " " . .
View of Seneca Falls in 1817 (Plate XL.)
View in Seneca Falls, 1376— Water-power and Manufactories (Plate : Residence of Benjanin Moses, Seneca Falls (Plate XLI.) National Yeast Company's Works, Seneca Falls (Plate XLII.) . Residence of Senator William Johnson, Seneoa~ Falls (Plate XLIII.) Portrait of Hon. " " " (Plate XLIV.)
Residence of Thomas R. Collings, Seneca Falls (Plate XLIV.) " N. H. French, Junius (Plate XLIV.) .
H. C. Silsby, Scaeca Falls (Plate XLV.) " Jacob P. Chamberlain, Seneca FaUs (Plate XLVL)
H. Chamberlain, Seneca Falls (Plate XLVI.) Portrait of J. P. Chamberlain, Seneca Falls (Plate XLVL)
" D. B. Lum, Seneca Falls
" Benjamin Moses, Seneca Falls (Plato XLVn.)
Jason Smith, Tyre (Plate XLVII.) . " William Kline, Tyre (Plate XLVIL)
Robert L. Stevenson, Tyro (Plate XLVIIL) . Residence of Robert L. Stevenson, Tyro (Plate XLVIIL)
David Odell, Tyre (Plate XLIX.) Portrait of " " " " . .
" Thomas H. Arnold, Tyre (Plate L.)
Residcno of Thomas II. Arnold, Tyre (Plate L.)
" Hiram Lay, Tyre (Plate LI.)
Portrait of " " « " ...
Mrs. Hiram Lay, Tyre (Plate LI.) . Residence of Benjamin Kime, Fayette (Plate LII.) . "Aubrey Farm," Residence of Mrs. James G. Stacey, Fayette (Plate ] Exterior View of Grace Church, Fayette (Plate LIV.) Interior " " " " "
Residence of Mrs. Elizabeth Chandler, Waterloo (Plate LIV.) . Mrs. J. K. Richardson, Waterloo (Plate LIV.) " L. S. Frantz, Fayette (Plate LV.)
" Jacob Burroughs, Fayette (Plate LVL, doublepage)
" " " (Front View), Fayette (Plate LVL, <
^"9')
Portrait of " " Fayette (Plate LVL, rfouiiepaje)
" Mrs. Jacob Burroughs, Fayette (Plate LVL, double page) Residence of George H. Zartman, Fayette (Plate LVIL) . Portrait of " " " "
LydiaM. Residence of Isaac Belles, Fayette (Plate LVIIL) . Portrait of " " " " . .
Harriet P. Belles, Fayette (Plate LVIIL) Residence of Andrew J. Sheridan, Fayette (Plate LIX.) . " Henry I. Long, Junius (Plate LS.)
" Joseph Thorn, Junius (Plate LXL)
Portrait of " " " " . .
Mrs. Joseph Thorn, Junius (Plate LXL) " Benjamin Turbush, Junius (Plate LXII.) " Sally Turbush, Junius (Plate LXII.) Residence of " " " " . .
" Colonel Ralph Smith, Lodi (Plate LXni.) .
Portraitof " " " " "
" Eliza a. Smith, Lodi (Plate LXIII.) Residence of General John De Mott, Lodi (Plate LXIV.) . Portrait of " " " " "
Mary Ann De Mott, Lodi (Plate LXIV.) Residence of John Townsend, Lodi (Plate LXV.) . Portrait of " " " " . .
" Elijah " " " . .
" Judge Silas Halsey, Lodi (Plate LXVI.) . " Judge James De Mott, Lodi (Plate LXVI.) . Residence of Aaron Brown, Romulus (Plate LXVII.) Portrait of " " " "
Residence of John M. Yerkcs, Romulus (Plato LXVIU.) .
facing page 100
120 123 122 122 122 122 124 124 12.6 125 126 126 128 128
132,133
132, 133
132, 133
134
134
134
136
136
136
137
137
Jttga 140
140
140
141
142 142 142 143 143 143 ■146 146 146 148 148 149 149 149 162
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
Portrait of RobertWooden, Waterloo (Plate LXVIU.) .... facing page
" D. Boardman, Seneca Falls (Plate LXVIII.) .... "
Eesidence of Enoch Emens, Varicls (Plate LXIX.) "
Portrait of " " " " "
Mrs. Emens, Yarick (Plate LXIX.) "
Residence of Gen. A. D. Ayres, Varick (Plate LXX.) .... "
" Hon. E. R. Steele, Varick (Plate LXX.) .... "
" and Farm of J. and J. Lautenschlager, Varick (Plate LXXL,
double page) .......... "II
" of the late Jesse Abbott, Varick (Plate LXXIL) ... " " Mrs. Harriet A. Wheeler, Varick (Plate LXXn.)
" Charles Pinkerton, Varick (Plate LXXIIL) ... "
Portrait of " « <. « ... "
Mrs. Pinkerton, Varick (Plate LXXIIL) ....
Residence of William W. Boorom, Covert (Plate LXXIV.) ...
" Addison Boorom, Covert (Plate LXXIV.) .... "
" Jacob Boorom, Covert (Plate LXXIV.) .... "
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.
HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE.
Erastns Partridge, Seneca Falls (Plate IV.)
Le Roj- C. Partridge, Seneca Falls (Plate V.)
Colonel Halsey Sandford (Plate XX.) facing
Samuel Birdsall, Waterloo (Plate XXn'.) "
Hon. Elisha Williams, Waterloo (Plato XXVI.) "
Charles Bonnel, Waterloo (Plate XXVII.) "
Edwin R. Dobbin. Waterloo (Plate XXXIV.) "
Rev. Samncl H. Grtdley, D.D., Waterloo
Gardner Welles, M.D., Waterloo
Daniel S. Kendig, Waterloo
Henry Bonnel, Waterloo
Jedediah Peirson, Waterloo
Hon. Samuel Clark, Waterloo
Hon. Jesse Clark, Waterloo
Abraham Van Doren, Ovid (Plate XXXIX.) facing
The Wilson Family, Ovid
Hon. William Johnson, Seneca Falls (Plate XLIV.) facing
Jacob P. Chamberlain, Seneca Falls (Plate XLVI.) "
David B. Lum, Seneca Falls
Rev. John M. Guion, S.T.D., Seneca Falls
Henry Moses, Sencoa Falls (Plato XLVII.) facing
Robert L. Stevenson, Tyre (Plate XLVIII.) "
David Odell, Tyre (Plate XLIX.) "
Thomas H. Arnold, Tyre (Plate L.) "
William Kline, Tyre
Jason Smith, Tyre
Hartwell B. CompEon, Tyre
Judge Silas Halsey, Lodi (Plate LXVI.) facing
Judge James DeMott, Lodi (Plate LXVI.) "
General John DeMott, Lodi
Colonel Ralph Smith, Lodi
The Townaend Family, Lodi
Israel Brown, Romulus
Deacon John Boorom, Covert (Plate LXXIV.) facing
IKTBODIXTIOS =
Chapter I.— Pre-Columbian Discovery— National Claims to Territory of Kew York,
and Bases of Claims 6, 6
Cbapter II.— Tho Indians of Central New York— Their Treaties, Wars, Character,
Civilization, and Fate 6, 7
CHAPTEn HI.— Land Purchases— Character of Country- Terms and Manner of Dis- posal to Settlers — Course of Travel — Course of Migration — Localities first Settled —Classic Nomenclature— A Broad Domain awaiting Owners— Dissimilarity of its People to all previous Precedent 7, 8
Chapter IV.— Line of Organization— Events connected therewith- Progress of Set- tlement West- Reduction of Area and Gradual Changes from a General to a Local Character 8-11
Chapter V.— The Pioneer- Seneca, while a part of Herkimer, from 1791 to 1794 — Cayuga Bridge— Grist-Mills-Public Mccling— Au Old-Time Article— The Old Pre-emption Lino— The Albany Turnpike 12-17
Chapter VI.— 1794 to Organization of Seneca County in 1804— Tho State's Hundred —Courts and Officers— Migratory Hardships— The Cayuga Reservation— Tho Bayard Company— A Reminiscence of Waterloo in its First Decade . . . 17-22
Chapter VII. — A New Country — Kinds of Trees, Game, Houses, and Furniture — Climate and Dross— Character of Settlors— Manners and CuBtomB,and Contrast with tho Present Day 22-25
Chapter VIII.— Clearing Lands— Products — Resorts- Tavorn-keeping- Trade- A
Settler's Recollections 25-29
Chapter IX. — Early Preachers and Churches — Schools and Teachers — Marriages,
Births, Deaths, and Cemeteries 29-?]
Chapter X.— Tho Boys of 1800— The Panther, Bear, and Deer— Tho Casualties of
CayogaLake 31,32
Chapter XI.— Line of Organiiation— Seneoa in 1810— County Seats— First County
Officials— Present Boundaries and Towns— Poor Farm 32, 33
Chapter XII.— Town Meetings— Celebrations— Early Manufactures— Schools for
Singing and Dancing — Visitors, Joseph Smith, La Fayette, Lorenzo Dow, and
Andrew Johnson— Raising Mills and Churches— Burning a Whale . . .33, 34
Chapter XIII.— Militia Musters— War of 1812— An Incident of that Period . . 34-36
Chapter XIV.— Geographical— Towns— Villages— Surface— Soil— Products— Water-
■courses — Water-power — Lakes — Natural History — Trees — Animals — Reptiles —
Fish 36,37
Chapter XV.— Agrioulture— Trade— Routes for Markets— Grains— Agricultural So- ciety—Statistics-Agricultural College— Patrons of Husbandry .... 37-39 Chapter XVI. — Geology — Onondaga Salt Group — Gypsum Group — Marcellus Shale — Seneca Limestone — Hamilton Group — TuUy Limestone — Genesee Slate and
Drift Deposits 39, 40
Chapter XVII Political Legislation— Parlies— Population— Popular Vote and
Civil List 40-42
Chapter XVIII.— Traces— Roads— Turnpikes— Bridges— Soneoa Look Navigation
and Erie Canals— Navigation 42-44
Chapter XIX.— First Railroads— The Auburn and Rochester Railroad, Pennsylvania and Sodus Bay Railroad, and the Geneva and Ithaca EaUroad- Old Tracks— In- cidents 44,45
Chapter XX. — Banks: State, National, and Savings; their History in Seneca . 45,46
Chapter XXI.— The Leading Manufactures of Seneca County 46-49
Chapter XXII.— The Insane Poor and .the Willard Asylum 49,50
Chapter XXIII.— Religious Denominations and Church Statistics .... 60-52 Chapter XXIV.— Religious, Literary, and Benevolent Societies . . . .52,53 Chapter XXV.— The Press and its Publishers in Seneca County .... 53-55 Chapter XXVI.— Academics and Public Schools— The Pioneer Ovid Academy— "Seneca Collegiate Institute" — The Seneca Falls Academy — Waterloo Academy —
Public Schools of the County 66-58
Chapter XXVII.— Seneca in the War of the Rebellion— Statistics—The Nineteenth New York Volunteers— The Fifteenth Engineers— The Thirty-third New York
Volunteers 58-61
Chapter XXVIII.— Battles of Antietam and Fredericksburg, and Return Home . 61, 62 Chapter XXIX.— The Forty-fourth New York Volunteers, and the Fiftieth Engi- neers 62-66
Chapter XXX.— The Seventy-fifth New York Volunteers 66-68
Chapter XXXI.— The One Hundred and Twenty-sixth New York Volunteers . . 68-70 Chapter XXXII.— The One Hundred and Forty-eighth New York Volunteers . - . 71, 72 Chapter XXXIII— The One Hundred and Sixtieth New York Volunteers ' . .72, 73
Chapter XXXIV.— The First New York Cavalry 73, 74
Chapter XXXV.— The Eighth New York Cavalry— The First Battery New York
Light Artillery 74,76
Chapter XXXVI.— The Third New York Volunteer Artillery 76-78
Chapter XXXVIL— Seneca County Medical Society- First Physician in Seneca
County— Biographical Sketches of the Profession in the County . . . .78,79 Chapter XXXVIII.— Conclusion 79,80
[ISTORY OF TOWNS AND VILLAGES.
Waterloo.— The Original Town of Junius— Organization of Waterloo— Waterloo Village— First Cars, First Bridge— Water-Power and Manufactures— Fire Depart- ment—Churohes—Education—Waterloo in the Rebellion, etc 81-93
Ovid. — Organization — Early Settlement — Early Marriage— Ancient Fortification — Church History— Civil History— Ovid Village— Societies— Population— Military Record, etc 97-104
Seneca Falls.— Taverns— Stores— Town Settlements— Bridgeport in 1820— Seneca Falls in 1823— Old Mills and Early Manufactures— History of the Churches- Military Record, etc 106-122
Tyre.— Early Settlement— First Improvements— First Death. and Marriage- Silk- Worm Nursery— FirstStorehouso— TyreCity- ThcOldestResident- FirstSchools —Tyre in the Rebellion, etc .124-127
Fayette.- Organization— Red Jacket— "Joe Smith"— First Baptism- First Settle- ment— Bearytown named — Canoga — Pioneer Mills — Documentary and Civil History— The Churches- Military Record, etc 129-136
Junius.— Formation of Town— Roll of Pioneers— First School— Meetings, First Church —Cemetery, First Deaths— Post-Oflice established- Initial Trade and Manufac- tures— First Saw-mill — Early Justices— Final Organization — Listof Town Officers —Junius Soldiers in the Civil War, etc 137-142
Lodi.— Organization— Indian Orchard and Burial-Plaoe— First Settlement— First Physician— Village of Lodi— Civil History— Societies-Church History— Popu- lation—Military Record, etc 143-147
RoMULiis.- Primitive Settlement— Postal Service in 1806— First Native White Birth — Old-Time Tavern — Short-Lived Hamlet — Pioneer Farmer-Mechanics — First Saw-Mill— Founding of Baleytown-Villagcs and Post-Offices—Uighways— Early Records — Emancipation of Slaves— Schools — Romulus Baptist Church — Rebel- lion Record, etc 149-165
Varick.— Early Settlers— First Frame House— Home Manufactures- A Pioneer Preacher-" Buys's Tavern"— The Cayuga Reservation— East Varick— First Post-Office— Early Teachers— Religious Services— First Frame— First Store— Varick Inns and Inn-keepers- Births, Marriages, Deaths— Religious Societies- Churches— Tho Records— Varick Soldiers in the Civil War, etc 156-162
Covert Organization— Pioneers— Farmer Village— Cemetery— Farmer Lodge, No.
357, F. and A. M.— Farmer Village Grange, No. 160, P. of H.— Church History —Population, etc 163-165
Errata 166
List op Patrons 107-170
SENECACOUNTY
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HISTOET
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SENECA COUNTY, NEW TOEK.
Truth is the mother of history, the preserver of great actions, the enemy of oblivion, the witness of the past, the director of the fatare.
INTRODUCTION. To write the history of an Eastern power, tlie recorder follows the ruler as the representative of government, exposes his intrigues, blazons his deeds, and measures his renown by the number and severity of his wars. In America, the nation is a conclusion, and true history begins with the people acting as the arbitei-s of their own destiny, and framing their fabric of free government by the action of communities in frequent meetings, and delegating certain powers to the State and General Government. Viewed in this light, the history of a county rises iu importance ; and while it affords a laudable gratification to the citizen, it serves as an index of the source and means by which a free people have become great. All classes are arousing from their apathy concerning the past, and men are asking. What part have our ancestors played in this drama, and where does our county, as a community, stand ? To foster local ties, to furnish examples of hero- ism, to exhibit the results of well-applied industry, and to mark a period of national existence, literature, art, and topography — an attractive trio— are freely employed to embellish and make of interest a practical and valuable work. Herein we essay a brief outline of State history, and then the detail of Seneca's development from the exit of the Iroquois, the settlement by migrations from the coast and immigration from Europe, the gradual assimilation of heterogeneous elements, the diversified changes wrought by labor and the happy results of industry. Gleaning from the memories of aged pioneers and the manuscripts of the provi- dent, we aim to describe successive aspects of early and later society, characters prominent in art, literature, the pursuits of peace and the arena of war. It will be found instructive to note the character of primitive .settlers, — their culture, habits, and health as influenced by a life in a region environed by beautiful lakes and dense with the growth of centuries. The presence of game, the prospective occupation of lands, and the founding of centres of trade are seen to originate the various classes of hunter, speculator, and actual settler. The many themes essential to true delineation of local interests impart variety, and are relieved by unison with sketches of scenery illustrative of architecture and surroundings in the quiet of the productive farm and iu the busy marts of trade. Perforce the field of research, limited in area, finds its material in the narratives of colonization, border warfare, and all the minuteness of biographical detail. Epochs pass, and races disappear. The generation of to-day, halting in their race for supremacy, look around and behind them, and, tardily recognizing the incalculable service of the first settlers in central New York, seek ere too late to reclaim their lives from a threatened oblivion. A few octogenarians in each town are all that are left of tiieni, — left of the pioneers, — white-haired reminders of a heroic age which has had its rise, growth, maturity, and decay, and given place to an age of transition which in its turn must yield to permanence, prosperity, and the highest stage of enlightenment. Prominence is given to the pioneer all the more because his impress was the germ of the present; his endowment was au example of high courage and unabated energy ; a race of settlers sprung from blended nations has durably stamped its characteristics upon worthy successors. Sterile coasts, frozen plains, and mountain cViSs have endeared them.selves by the ties of home, but the region embraced by the boundaries of Seneca County fastens a spell by historic association upon native and stranger through the attractions of a beautiful and diversified scenery. Undulating hills melt away into flat alluvial plains. Innumerable small streams, originating midway between the elongated lakes of Cayuga and Seneca, contribute their waters to replenish those natural reservoirs. Belts of timber, cleared field, and manor are seen at intervals, while town and
city, advantageously placed, reveal their presence by the spires of churches and the hum of industry. The panorama of art and nature changes as the combinations of the kaleidoscope, and what this region was and is the future will discover only from the historic page. Ninety-two years ago the first white man established by his rude cabin an outpost of civilization in a vast wilderness west of Albany. Till then and later, individuals and parties of adventurous hXiuters only had dis- turbed the solemn quiet of the forest, the smoke from the towns of the Six Nations circled lazily upward, and the light birchen canoe sped along the surface of the lakes. Three-quarters of a century have established an unrivaled civilization in those solitudes. Despite privation, danger, and misfortune, fai-ms multiplied and towns grew. The Erie Canal linked Albany with BuflTalo, and along this water-way the tide of settlement moved westward. Then came the railw;iys, swift and sure, and progress knew no hindrance. Improvements of the century find here a use in field, workshop, and office, while the speedy trains, proceeding cast, west, north, and south, convey the traveler to his destination, bear away the products of the fields, and return laden with the commerce of the seas. Added to a description of the rise and growth of education, religion, trade, and manufacture is the attrac- tive and encouraging biogi-aphy of the successful. It becomes a memento of triumphant energy, and pledges a like career to corresponding enterprise. The delineations of history pertaining to eminent and worthy men impart pleasure, excite ardor, and illustrate character to the advancement of the capable of this and coming generations. It cannot be unimportant and devoid of interest to trace the outlined progress of Seneca's surprising and gratifying development from crude beginnings to her present creditable rank among her sister counties; heuee the following clues to the labyrinths of past existence, leading downward to the arcana of the present.
CHAPTER I.
PRE-COLUMBIAN
Aqe succeeded age since the world was ushered into bemg, and America, un- named and unknown, a home of nations yet to be, remained, so far as pertained to the Eastern Continent, as though she had no existence. Then, as now, the noble Hudson swept past the Palisades, the thunders of Niagara reverberated far amid the dim aisles of the forest, our lakes spread out their vast expanse of waters. Brine and oil gathered their stores beneath the surface, while the coal, the iron, and the treasures of the mines awaited the lapse of time. To what people were these grandeurs presented and these resources ofiered ? What moral changes had occurred while Nature, gi-and apd vital, moved on in her unvarying course? Tradition is shadowy, legends are fabulous, and history is silent. Standing amid the ruined cities of Yucatan or upon one of the numerous mounds common to the valleys of the Ohio and Mississippi, the antiquary indulges in vain conjecture. He questions whether mighty nations have ever existed here, whether arts or letters have been cultivated, or did the savage Indian for untold centuries reign sole lord of the New World? Wlience, when, and how came hither the first inhabitants of this Continent? These are questions naturally arising whik tracing the historic page, until the Western Continent bursts upon our -vision. Various speculations have from time to time been harbored respecting the proba-
6
HISTORY OF SENECA CXDUNTY, NEW YOEK.
ble liistory of America before its discovery by Columbus, but the subject is shrouded in darkness and obscurity. In 1147, while the fanatics of the Second Crusade were surging towards Palestine, a party of eight persons, sailing to dis- cover the limits of the " Sea of Darkness," the Atlantic, finally reached an island whose inhabitants told of a " dense gloom" beyond, and the terrified explorers hastened to return. In 1291 two Genoese mariners set sail westward, and never returned. Discoveries and settlements have been claimed in behalf of the North- men ; but, if made, were transient and ineffectual. In 1492, Columbus, sailing westward, discovered land off the east coast of Florida, and opened a highway over the broad Atlantic to the down-trodden and oppressed of Europe.
Three nations claimed an ownership in the region embraced in part by the Slate of New York. They founded their title in the rights of discovery and occupation, and severally yielded only to the supremacy acquired by force of arms. Authorized by lett«rs patent from Henry VII., John Cabot, a Venetian, accompanied by his son Sebastian, set out on a voyage of discovery. He struck the sterile coast of Labrador on June 24, 1497, and was the first to see the Con- tinent of North America. In 1498, Sebastian Cabot, returning, explored the coast from Newfoundland to Florida ; hence arose the English claim to territory eleven degrees in width, and extending westward to tl-.e Pacific. Francis I. of France,. emulating the enterprise of Spain and England, sent upon a voyage of exploration John Verrazzani, a Florentine. This persevering navigator, visit- ing America in 1524, was the first European whose feet trod the soil of the Empire State. He sailed along the coast a distance of twenty-one hundred miles in frail vessels, and safely returned to report his success and establish for France a claim in the New World. The Dutch East India Company employed Henry Hudson to seek a northern passage to India. In a mere yacht, he ventured among the northern bergs, skirted the coast of America, and, sailing up the noble river which perpetuates his name, cast anchor in the stream and opened up a trafiic with the Indians. From them Hudson obtained corn, beans, pumpkins, grapes, and tobacco, — products indigenous to the clime; and to them he imparted the baneful knowledge of the effects of whisky. Holland laid claim to territory from Cape Cod to the southern shore of Delaware Bay, basing its right upon these discoveries of Hudson made in September, 1609. To this thrice-claimed region the Dutch gave the name New Netherlands. They planted a fort upon Manhattan Island in 1614, and in 1623 made settlements at New Amsterdam and Fort Orange. For a time on amicable t«rms with the Indians, the colonists lived in security, but the cruelty of Keift, one of the New Netherlands' four Governors, awakened the fires of revenge and threatened the colony with exter- mination. Restricted in rights, and desirous of the privileges accorded the Eng- lish colonists, the Dutch refused to contest supremacy with the fleet of Admiral Nichols, sent out by the Duke of York in 1664; and the warlike Stuyvcsant, reluctantly yielding to the English, resigned his command, and the province received the name of New York. The settlement of New Amsterdam was given the name New York, and Fort Orange, Albany, the present State capital. Hail- ing with satisfaction the change of masters, the Dutch and English colonists, whose plantations had been devastated by the Raritans and their allies, and whose lives had been saved by the interposition of the friendly Mohawks, soon found themselves involved in a protracted struggle with the royal Governors, Repeatedly defrauded of their means, they raised revenues under their own officers, and stoutly battled for their rights.
In October, 1683, the first Colonial Assembly for the Province of New York held session. It consisted of a Governor, Council of Ten, and seventeen members chosen by the people as the House of Representatives. In conflict with their French enemies on the north, the timidity and delays of Governors brought the English into contempt with their fierce allies, the Irorjuois, on the west. This misfortune was averted before treaties were annulled by the activity of Schuyler and Fletcher in the winter of 1693. The changes and revolutions in England extended to the royal province, and occasioned an event very important upon the subsequent affairs of the State. The circumstance of the hanging of Leisler and Milbourne, so familiar to many, opened a chasm bclwccn a people whose hard- ships in a new land entitled them to a v.iicc in ihi^ir own government, and proprietors of large tracts of land and ihtnulrd ;^i^ln,•^ats, who aimed at a complete usurpation of all rights and inivil.;;, <, Tlie aiitngimism here fostered kindled to a flame upon the breaking out of the Revolution, and under the appellations of Wliig and Tory the people were ranged in nearly equal numbci-s. During the Revolution, eastern New York was the scene of various severe struggles. The defeat of the Americana on Long Island was the commencement of a period of gloom and depression, but the surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga inspired a hope and resolution which never ceased till the conclusion of the war. With the arrival of peace and freedom from foreign influence, and during a cessation of internal dis.sension, many soldiers, receiving grants of lands in lieu of bounties, proceeded westward to find and settle upon their tracts. Large areas
of lands were bought, and sometimes, after many changes of ownership, the pro- prietors or company, offering liberal terms, invited settlers, and laid the foundation of towns now grown to cities important and populous.
CHAPTER XL
THE INDIANS OF CENTRAL NEW YORK — THEIR TREATIES, WARS, CHARACTER, CIVILIZ.iTION, AND PATE.
As was the Indian when Hudson sailed up the river which bear^ his name, so is the Indian of the present day. The approach of the whitfe race was the signal for the migration westward of game. The savage, who subsisted by the products of the chase, was compelled to follow, and the Modocs in the Lava Beds and the Sioux of the Black Hills, save the demoralization occasioned by contact with the pale-faces, are the same as the warriors of the East who disputed domin- ion with the English.
There is reason to believe that centnd New York contained a large Indian population at a period far in the past. A favorite resort for various tribes, as early as 1535, was the vicinity of Onondaga Lake, then called Gannentaha. Knowledge of them begins in their defeat by a party of their Algonquin foes, led on by Champlain during the year 1009, at which time the Iroquois, called by the Dutch the Maquaas, first experienced the terrible effects of fire-arms, and imbibed that lasting resentment which barred their coasts to the French Jesuit, and made them a wall of defense to the English.
The Confederates, consisting of the Onondagas, Oneidas, Mohawks, Cayugas, and the Senecas. had formed their compact when Europeans first saw them, and the time of their union is lost in antiquity. Opposed to Indian custom, these tribes gave their attention to cultivating the soil, and exchanged with other tribes the products of their fields for the fruits of the chase. The Canadian Algon- quins were powerful and inveterate rivals; and, in self-defense, the Confederates learning the arts of war, soon gave ample proof of ability and carried fearful retribution to the villages of their enemies. The territory dominated by the Iroquois extended from Lakes Erie and Ontario along the St. Lawrence around Lake Champlain, and the basin of the Hudson and its tributaries as far south- ward as the Highlands. The principal settlement and the capital of the league was at Onondaga, where councils were held and movements planned. Prior to the arrival of Europeans, their sagacity was shown by the construction of ex- tended and strong works of defense. These fortifications consisted of a double row of palisades, inclosed by an earthen embankment. Living in a fertile region, the soil returned ample yield of supplies, and, uniting their strength, thousands of warriors set out on distant raids, from which they generally returned successful. Observing the homes of the whites, they abandoned their rude huts for good dwellings, planted orchards, and cultivated large fields of corn. Their form of government was an approximation to the federal. Separate governments were upheld by each tribe, and the Grand Council settled the affairs of the tribes as one people. In the council, the utmost decorum prevailed, and speeches of their chiefs evince a high degree of eloquence. In war, they knew no fear ; and, if captured, met their death with lofty resolution.
We have earlier spoken of the rival claims of France and Great Britain, and despite the intrigues of the former nation and the treachery toward them of the latter, the Iroquois remained faithful to the British. Three several French armies, commanded respectively by Do La Barre, Denonville, and Count Frontenac, came against them in vain, while a force of twelve hundred waiTiors moving into Canada swept the country with a severity which threatened with extinction its people. On January 22, 1C90, a council was held at Onondaga, at which eighty chiefs were present. During the year 1710, Colonel Schuyler took with him to England five sachems, and the treatment received was a step in that loyalty which, later, cost the colonists so dear. During 1725, the Tuscaroras, having met signal defeat from the colonists of North Carolina, came north, and were received by the Iroquois into the Confederacy, and henceforth the League was known as the Si.'s Nations. The Governor of New York had established a trading-post at Oswego in 1722, and five years later erected a fort at the same place, with the intention of securing the Indian trade. The encroachments upon their territory by the colonists were viewed with dissenting, revengeful mind, and when the war of Independence took place the Confederacy sided with the British. Agents at Oswego and Niagara plied their allies with gifts of blankets, liquors, and finery ; tories flying from the revenge of the patriots added to their strength, and massa- cres like Cherry Valley and Wyoming stain the pages of history. For years renegade white and merciless savage laid waste with knife and torch the settle-
HISTOEY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
ments of the frontier and drove their captives to the strongholds, the forts previously mentioned ; but there came a time when stern retribution should be meted out and the power of the Confederacy irretrievably broken. Congress resolved to send an expedition to lay waste the Indian country, and intrusted its command to General Sullivan, who was directed to march northward along the Susquehanna, to Tioga Point ; there being joined by a force under General Clinton, he proceeded upon the proposed campaign. On the 2Gth of August, 1779, the united force, consisting of Continental troops, with fifteen hundred rifle- men, four six-pounder guns, two three-pounders, and a small mortar, — in all a body of five thousand men, — began their march with one month's provisions. Sullivan was ordered to burn the Indian towns, cut down their corn, and do them all the harm possible, and so .avenge the barbarities inflicted upon the frontier settlements. The Indians scouted the idea of a regular army penetrating the wilderness and ruining their homes, but when the danger became real they gathered a large force, and, fighting bravely at Newtown,* were defeated, fled in .a panic, and left the route to their village open. Sullivan pressed cautiously forward; the road taken is still pointed out where his pioneers leveled obstructions ; old men tell us of the bridge built at the head of Seneca Lake and a cannon lost in the waters, while on the tables of the Waterloo Historical Society may be seen grape-shot and canister fired from his artillery. Down the eastern shore of Seneca and upward to Geneva they made their way, large corn-fields, vegetable-gardens, and fine orchards being totally ruined, and the smoke of burning dwellings rising from the principal villages of the Seneca. The women and children 'fled in crowds to Niagara, while the warriors, concealed in ambush, vainly waited an opportunity to rush upon their relentless foe. Here two Oueidas, guides to Sullivan, were captured, and the hatchet of a brother laid one of them dead at his feet. Lieutenant Boyd and a Virginia rifleman named Murphy, with thirty men, advancing seven miles to reconnoitre, were ambuscaded by Brandt and Butler with .savages and rangers, five hundred of each, on tboir return. With brandished weapons and hon-id cries the attack was made, yet thrice did that heroic band attempt to force their way. Murphy, by a stroke of his fist, felled an assailant and escaped, while Boyd was taken and cruelly tortured. Sullivan returned from his expedition successful, while the Indians, deprived of their all, .sought food and shelter with the British. The campaign of Sullivan destroyed the Confederacy, but many a defenseless family was murdered upon the frontiers between 1783 and 17S9. The Scneciis looked longingly upon their old homes and hunting-gronnd.s, and stipulated by treaty that the burial-grounds of their tribe should be sacred from the plowshare. In- dividuals and parties were occasionally seen by the white scttlei-s for years later, hut rather as pilgrims to a shrine than as natives to the land. The remnants of the Nations were located on the Genesee, the Allegheny, Buflalo Creek, and at Tuscarawas, and received annuities from the Government in lieu of their lands, and a specified sum annually from the State. They tilled farms, raised cattle, and accumulated property of considerable value. In 1809, eight or ten leading Indians resolved to drink no more strong drink, and within the year the whole body had taken the same pledge, and have never broken it. They are peaceable, tender to their families, and devote themselves to agriculture. They raised their first wheat, about thirty bushels, in 1809, and harvested one hundred acres in 1811. Thus briefly we have outlined the history of the Indian and shown his fate.
CHAPTER III.
LAND PURCHASES — CHARACTER OF COUNTRT — TERMS AND MANNER OF DIS- POSAL TO SETTLERS— COURSE OP TRAVEL — COURSE OF MIGRATION — LO- CALITIES FIRST SETTLED— CLASSIC NOMENCLATURE — -V BROAD DOMAIN AWAITING OWNERS^DISSIMILARITT OF ITS PEOPLE TO ALL PREVIOUS PRECEDENT.
At the close of the Revolution northern and western New York was a wilder- ness, but the march of armies and the forays of detachments had made known the future promise of these erst untrodden regions, and companies. State and Government, took immediate steps, as policy and duty seemed to dictate, to acquire their ownership. It is notable that the seasons seemed to conspire to render the woods untenable to the Indians when the time approached for the first few isolated settlements of adventurous pioneers. The winter of 1779-80 was marked by its unprecedented severity. Air western New York lay covered by a blanket of snow full five feet in depth. Wild animals, hitherto numerous, perished by thou- sands. The dissolving snow in spring disclosed the forests filled with the carcases of the deerj and the warlike Senecas became dependents upon English bounty and
• Now ]
hoped for British success. The conclusion of that peace by which American Independence was acknowledged secured no terms to England's savage auxiliaries, although their ancient possessions passed by the treaty of 1783 into the hands of the United States. The new government desired to make peace with the Six Nations, and a cession of their rights to the vast territory claimed by them. By Act of April 6, 1784, Governor George Clinton, President of a Board of Com- missioners consisting of four persons, was authorized to ally with them other persons deemed necefssary, and proceed to enter into compact with the Indians. Fort Stanwix was appointed as the place for assembly. Pending proceedings, Clinton learned by letter that Congress had appointed Arthur Lee and Richard Butler Commissioners to negotiate treaties with the same parties ; thus the un- defined powers of the United States opened ground for conflict of interest and authority between State and Confederation. The General Government maintained its prerogatives, and concluded a treaty at Fort Stanwix on October 22, 1784. Its provisions were the terms of a conqueror, as the penalty of opposition. It has been asserted that among the sachems whose speeches on that occasion moved their hearers by their eloquence was the renowned Bed Jacket, but the evidence . is unworthy of credit. This warrior of the Senecas, promoted to a chieftaincy by the influence of his grandmother, became renowned among the whites for oratorical ability, and stands prominent, rather as the last of a line of natural speakers than as illustrious among them. His death occurred in 1830, at the age of about seventy, and while we find many who had seen him in life, it is a mooted question what immediate locality was honored as his birth-place : per- haps Senecii has grounds as strong as any, and may with justice present her claim. The conclusion of the Stanwix treaty threw wide open the doors to sale and occu- pation of a large extent of territory. Pending State and national negotiation, companies of active and influential men were organized to evade the law and obtain for themselves a lease of land, equivalent to actual ownerehip : these com- panies were defeated in their schemes, their leases were pronounced void, and their final resort was the purchase from the States of New York and Massachu- setts of such portions of the desired lands as they had the ability to acquire. In the western part of the State the work of settlement was undertaken by the Hol- land Land Company from 1797, prior to which date an immense tract of land, a part of whose eastern boundary ran through the middle of Seneca Lake, had been sold to Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham, and by them disposed of to Robert Morris, an Englishman, who in turn sold a large portion of it to Sir William Pulteney and others, of London, England, and the settlement of Montgomery County in its western portion began. We have remarked that military expe- ditions had attracted the attention of soldiers to lands, beautiful, fertile, and ex- tensive, and, on their discharge from service, their descriptions of the scenery, soil, and valuable water-power of the Seneca region induced restless families, princi- pally at first from New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and later, Yankets from New England, to set out upon the line of march of Sullivan's army and locate them- selves along its route. From an elevation where is now the town of Ovid, the immigrant could stand and look upon an extensive and magnificent view. Nine counties are included in the prospect, which has been changed from an un- broken forest to the valuable homes of a great people. In comparison with other localities of the Empire State, central New York constitutes one of her most attractive sections. Upon ridge, bluflF, slope, or plain, the settler could fix his habitation, while from the lakes adjacent could be obtained savory and ample food from the choice fish which teemed in shoals amidst their, healthful waters.
By Act of May 11, 1784, Land Office Commissioners were created, whose duty it was made to carry into efiect the promises made to soldiers of the Revolution by the Legislature of 1780 of bounty lands for reward of services. State lands, on being surveyed and appraised, were advertised for public sale, and any lot un- sold could be taken by any applicant by a one-fourth payment and security for the remainder. By the treaty with the Onondagas made in 1788, all those lands origi- nally composing Onondaga County, and now divided and organized as the Counties of Seneca, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Cortland, with portions of Oswego, Wayne, and Tompkins, were set apart by the Land Commissioners for bounties to soldiers, and became known as the Military Tract. This tract was surveyed into twenty- five townships of sixty thousand acres each, and each township was then re-surveyed into lots of six hundred acres each. Three additional townships were subsequently added, to provide for persons in the Hospital Department and others not accom- modated ; and the townships of the tract were thus twenty-eight in number. As a matter of curiosity, showing a reference to or knowledge of Roman history for names of these townships, we give the reader the primitive list, as follows: Lysander, Hannibal, Cato, Brutus, Camillus, Cicero, Manlius, Aurelius, Marcel- lus, Pompey, Romulus, Scipio, Sempronius, Tully, Fabius, Ovid, Milton, Locke, Homer, Solon, Hector, Ulysses, Dryden, Virgil, Cinciunatus, Junius, Galen, and Sterling. From those townships the present towns of Seneca ai-e derived in the following order: Junius constituted Junias, Tyre, Waterloo, and the north part
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
of Seneca Falls ; .'Romulus is now known as the west parta of Fayette, Varick, four lots in Seneca Falls, and the town of Romulus; and Ovid as Ovid, Lodi, and Covert.
The original course of travel was by way of Oneida Lake and River, and from the south upon Cayuga Lake ; but when a State road was cut through by way of Auburn, from Whitestown to Geneva, in 1796, and the famous Cayuga Bridge was built in 1800, this route became the great highway of western emigration. He who rides to-day upon the smooth track, at a fare of two cents per mile, and passes safely and swiftly from one side of New York to the other, — he who per- forms a journey of a thousand miles perusing the news of the day, or slumbering in the luxurious retreat of a palace car, — may find it interesting to learn of journey-' ings some eighty years ago. Those emigrants entitled to military lots came chiefly from the eastern part of the State of New York. Others, however, were from Rhode Island and her sister States, while a large proportion of the families settling on the south side of the outlet were from the Keystone Stato. The road referred to above was, in 1792, but a slightly improved Indian path, along whose sides, at varying intervals of ten to twenty miles, for a hundred miles, a few rude cabins were scattered. The road was little used, the Erie Canal was not projected, the Cayuga and Seneca Canal was not in existence, and even the Seneca Lock Navi- gation Company was yet in the future. The emigrant had still a choice of methods : he could follow the Indian trail on foot or horseback, or use the water-course formed by nature, and which in the far background. of history had been traversed only by the Indian canoe. If he came from Long Island, be launched his bateau upon the SouiTd and came to New York, thence up the Hudson River, whence, transporting boat, passengers, and effects to Schenectady, lie passed up the Mohawk to Fort Stanwix, or Rome; thence crossed by land a brief portage to Vilrick, or Wood Creek, and by that reached Oneida Lake. Sweeping slowly along the lake, the Oswego River was entered, and by that stream he found access to the lake-bound region of Seneca and the Genesee plains beyond.
To one who made that voyage, looking back after an interval of poling, rowing, floating, and transporting, for a period of four to six weeks, his former home seemed very distant, and present ills preferable to a like return. Another, and southern route, brought the emigrant along the Susquehanna and Tioga Rivers to Newtown, now Elmira ; thence, after transporting boat and effects, he reached the Seneca Lake, and through its outlet came to the port of Scauyes, or, mounting his horse and following Indian trails, he traversed the dense wilds for many leagues to reach thLs, his future home. Yet a few remain with us who realized these modes of travel; but most of these pioneere have "fallen asleep." Farther on, the detail of actual travel will be given, of which we have presented the true ideal. The cause of westward migration deserves consideration. The annals of colonial days reveal the fact that, while the Spaniard ravaged the New World in hi,-; lust for gold, the Puritan, Huguenot, Catholic, and Quaker came here to enjoy the rights of conscience and freedom to worship in their own way. From 1620 to 1776 the sterile Atlantic coast received these voluntary exiles. Families increased in numbers, and the scanty soil gave little return for labor. A rich soil, a large farm, a belief in the growth of the future, the desire of a com- fortable home with children tilling their own fields around them, and a love of novelty, urged on by the example of others, all conspired to scatter a population in this region of a varied character. It is on record that Seneca's pioneers who changed her hunting-grounds to cleared and productive farms were in general a hardy, energetic race. They were influenced by like motives and circumstances, and acknowledged a common dependence, a deep symp,ithy, and a necessity of co- operation. In cutting roads, building bridges, erecting public dwellings, and defending themselves from mutual danger, they cheerfully shared labor and pro- moted sociality.
The sOTithcrn part of Seneca was first settled, and George Faussett, of Pennsyl- vania, was the enterpri-sing man ; while the first recorded resident in northern Seneca was James Bennett, likewise a native of the Keystone State. The narra- tive of these and of tliose who soon followed them is material for a future chapter, but this much li.re is given, that the early settlers of every town in the County were not only industrious and full of energy, but were men of rectitude, who knew and practiced moral duties, and instinctively perceived and practiced right.
CHAPTER IV.
LINE OP OROANIZATTON — EVENTS CONNECTED TIIEREWITH-
SETTLEMENT WEST— REDUCTION OP AREA AND GRADUAL CHANGES PROM A GENERAL TO A LOCAL CUAKACTER.
Seneca traces her genealogy from an honorable and ancient source. Her reduced area is the natural result of a growing population and a republican form of gov-
errmient. On November 1, 1683, Albany was organized as one of ten original counties of the New York province, and was by legal enactment bounded north and west by the provincial limits. At Albany, on June 19, 1754, the first Congress of the colonies met for purposes of union and defense, and the plan as drawn by Dr. Franklin was rejected as too advantageous to the other by both the colonies and the British king. Montgomery County was formed from Albany on the 12th of March, 1772, and at that time bore the name of Tryon County. The name Montgomery was given during April of 1784, at the clo.se of the war, in honor of Richard Montgomery, a gallant officer in the Continental army. The cramped settlements and over-crowded Eastern towns and villages began to send out families and colonies northward and westward, and speedily required a further division of counties for convenience of jurisdiction and fair representatioij of interests. Accordingly we find Montgomery reduced in 1789 by the formation of Ontario, and her territory yet further diminished in 1791 by the erection of Tioga, Otsego, and Herkimer. It is not our purpose to dwell upon the con- tinued changes of counties, by which their present number and area was obtained, ftirther than they apply in the exhibit of a line of organization by which Seneca can be readily traced. Whether there seemed to be disadvantages connected with settlement, or whether, as is more probable, the tide of emigration followed its ancient custom of following the course of river and lake, Seneca still lay undisturbed, and portions were late in occupation. There came in the year 1784, from Middletown, Connecticut, tire first lone settler in the forests of western Montgomery. Resolute and decisive, this man, Hugh White, planted himself in a log habitation at what is now the village of Whitesborough, and, mingling with the Indians to win their approval, found relief from his labors of improve- ment in the society of his wife and children. One afternoon. White being absent, his wife sjiw a party of Indians coming along the trail towards her habita- tion. Following a natural impulse, she gave them cordial greeting and proffered food. Presently one of their number, whose bearing showed the chief, asked permission to take her daughter with them on a visit to the red man's home. To trust her darling child to the ruthless savages was a hard requirement, yet to refuse might bring some far worse fate. While the heart of the mother was troubled by conflicting emotions, and the stoical foresters looked on and awaited a reply, a step was heard, and White came in. He saluted his visitors with frank and open countenance, and, learning the object of their call, consented instantly, and directed his child to go with them.
The Indians disappeared in the forest, and the hours' were made long by anxiety. Evening drew near, and with it the time for the return of the child. In the distance were seen the waving plumes of the chief, and by his side tripped the proud girl, arrayed in the ornaments of Indian life. The test of confidence had been made and withstood, and henceforth White knew no friends more faithful than his red brethren. During the year 1786, a trading-house was opened near Waterloo of to-day, by a man whose history is -all the more of interest here since he was recognized as the first white settler west of the Gene- see River. Captain Horatio Jones was born in Chester County, Pennsylvania, November, 1763. His father was a blacksmith and frequently repaired rifles. The son was daily in the habit of seeing and trying them, and hence while quite young he became an expert marksman. Energetic, bold, and skillful, he seemed born with a disposition for adventure, which was stimulated to activity by. the frequent passage of troops by his home on their way to the Indian country. Fourteen years of age, he was a man in spirit, and joined the soldiers as a fifer in the regiment commanded by Colonel Piper, with whom he remained during the entire winter. During the month of June, 1781, bis desire for more active service induced him to enlist in a company of riflemen called the Bedford Rangers, recruited by Captain Boyd, of the United States army. Aft«r a scout of a few days, one morning about sunrise, while a fog hung heavy over the ground, the rangers, thirty-two strong, encountered a body of Indians, numbering about eighty, upon the Ragstown branch of the Juniata River. They soon found themselves ambuscaded, and a destructive fire from unseen rifles speedily laid nine rangoi-s low in death ; eight more were captured, and the whites were com- pletely defeated. The battle being ended Jones retreated rapidly, and, ascending a hill, discovered but a few feet in front two Indians armed with rifles aimed at his pei-son. Having no reason to regard their intentions as friendly, he diverged from his course and ran for dear life. He would undoubtedly have distanced hia pursuers, but unluckily his moccasin-string became untied and caught around a twig, which threw him to the ground. The Indians at full speed ran by him before they could stop, the one nearest him raising a claim to him as his prisoner. Distrusting their ability to retake their captive if their fleetness should again be called into action, the warriors bound their blankets around him and allowed them to trail behind. The wet grass saturated the blankets and thereby frus- trated any attempt at esc^^ie. He was brought back to the battle-ground where the prisoncre were arranged, and immediately marched into the woods. It was
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11
observed by an Indian that Captain Dunlap of the militia, being wounded, faltered in his tread as he ascended a hill. The savage struck his hatchet deep into the disabled soldier's head, drew him over backwards, and, scalping him, left the poor fellow to die with his face turned upward. Two days they marched on and had no food ; then a bear was killed, and to Jones fell the entrails fur his portion. With scanty dressing, these were emptied, hastily cooked, and, without other seasoning than the promptings of hunger, hastily eaten. The captives were tied by night, and the journey continued under close guard by day, until they arrived ■ot what is now Nuuda, Livingston County, New York. During the ascent of Foot Hill, Jack Berry informed Jones that he must run the gauntlet to a house in the distance, and, if he was successful in reaching it, his safety would be secured. Indians and squaws, swarming from their huts, formed themselves into two parallel lines, between which Jone.9 began his perilous race. Numerous blows were struck at him, with clubs, tomahawks, and stones, as he dashed along. A noted chief, named Sharpshins, struck at him desperately with his hatchet ; and then, as Jones passed unharmed, he threw the deadly weapoo after him ; the blow was evaded and the goal safely reached. William McDonald came next, and as Sharpshins prepared to throw again at Jones, McDonald came by, and the merciless savage, buryiug his tomahawk in his back, drew him over, cut oflF his head, and placed it, scalped, upon a war-post. The rest escaped with little injury. The smallpox broke out during the following winter, and Jones, suifering in the hospital from the loathsome disorder, saw men borne away for burial while yet living. Speechless, he yet was able to exhibit signs of life, and finally recovered health. Young and handsome. Captain Jones was a great favorite, and was early adopted into an Indian family, and shared all the privileges of Indian hospitality. He received the name of Ta-e-da-o-qua, and was always claimed as a prisoner by his Indian cousin Ca-nun-quak, or Blue Eyes. Captain Jones established a trading-house within the borders of Seneca, thence removed to Geneva, where he located under the hill on the bank of Seneca Lake, and sold to John Jacob Astor his first lot of furs. Ho was mai-ried in Schenectady by Kev. Mr. Kerkland ; and, in 1789, leaving Geneva, he settled near Beard's Creek, in the town of Leicester, raised the first wheat west of the Genesee River, and was the first white settler in the valley of that stream. An Indian hut was his habitation for the first year. In this rude abode himself, his wife, and three children found shelter. Appointed by President Washington, he held the position of interpreter with tlie Iroquois for a period of forty years, and died in 1836, at the age of seventy- five years.
The name of Job Smith appears next as that of one of that class whose liking was a region wild and full of game, who felt an irksome restraint in the compan- ionship of his fellows, and who might be aptly termed a guerrilla in the warfare of civilization with nature. This character emigrated from Ulster County in 1787, and was the first settler upon the military tract. He erected his cabin upon the flats at Seneca Falls, near the later site of the Upper Red Mill, owned by Col. Mynderse. Historians ascribe to Smith a roving, unsettled character and an absence of certain necessary elements of genuine manhood. Rumor reported that his retreat in these wilds was more of an act to shun the clutch of the law than a love for the scenery of the locality. His route was along the Mohawk and Seneca streams, and his food upon the journey consisted of corn pounded in an old-fashioned mortar, wild game from the woods, and fish from the river. He lived alone, trafficked somewhat with the Indians, and was the owner of a yoke of oxen. A party of travelers, passing up the river in 1788-'89, was transported by him around the falls upon a cart whose wheels were sawed entire from logs. Smith moved to Waterloo, married u Miss Gorham, and returned to the flat. Soon he disappeared and dropped from remembrance, until in 1813 he was sub- poenaed as a witness at the court, in relation to the settlement of several pending and important law-suits. Two Connecticut traders, bearing with them on their journey packs of goods, visited the Canoga reservation in 1785, and traded their merchandise for furs, and returned. James Bennett, from Northumberland County, Pennsylvania, reached the hordei-s of Seneca in 1789, and was soon engaged in running a/crry across Cayuga Lake, not fai- south of the later bridge. On the return of General Sullivan's army from their work of spoliation, a detachment of one hundred men was sent out from the main column, which had reached the present site of Geneva, to march through the lauds of the Cayugas, Onondagas, and Oneidas towards Albany. This command, in charge of Major Gansevort, went into camp the first night at Seneca Falls, on the north bank of the river. Not a few were impressed by the natural advantages about them for settlement, and one Lawrence Van Clecf, an old Continental, on receiving his discharge, returned hither in the spring of 1789, and, choosing a site for a dwelling upon the flats, not far from Job Smith, erected upon it a double log house. This durable but humble abode stood a.s the first of its class in that region, and in himself was known the first permanent settler. The first desideratum to the immigrant — a shelter — having been prepared, the next proceeding was the preparation of ground
and the planting of corn upon the flats. Jealous of intruders and smarting under a sense of wrongs suffered, Indians gave him petty annoyances and rendered diffi- cult his endeavors to raise a crop. An understanding and friendly feelings were secured through his generosity and abundant good nature, and from that point he was unrestricted in his plans for private emolument and the public good. We have outlined the long route, and hinted at the hardship not unmixed with peril connected with pioneer journeys between the cabins and camps in the wilderness and the settled regions of the East; but necessity knew no law, and the tramp of Weston upon chosen roads to distant Chicago was no more to be admired in com- parison with the journeys of the pioneers of this section than the fast train, with a clear track, to the steady movement of the canal-boat, delayed by the locks, upon its course. Van Cleef established or followed the custom of individual exploration for a home, and then went east for his family to Albany. During the fall of 1789 he is found associated with Job Smith in the ownership and use of a team and a truck, the latter their own handiwork, formed from forest material alone, and sub- serving a good purpose in transferring the goods of western-bound emigrants around the falls. At a later date. Van Cleef and Smith turned their attention to the construction of boats upon Seneca Lake, and the former achieved renown for his success in running boats over the rapids, — a business he continued to follow till brought to a close by the construction of the locks, in 1815. It was his pride that in all his experience he never occasioned loss or damage to a boat, which could not be said by his cotemporary pilots. Generous and hardy, well fitted for pioneer life. Van Clecf was the projector of various affairs of public enterprise, and, dying in 1830, was buried upon the spot where as a soldier he had built his camp-fire fifty-one years before. Turning our attention to the southern part of the County, we learn from "Smith's Gazetteer," of 18G0, and "Transactions of New York Agricultural Society," of 1850, that the pioneer of that locality was George Faussett, of Pennsylvania. Bidding adieu to his wife, he left herself and child at the old home, and set out in the spring of 1789 to select a home within the present limits of Seneca County. Choosing a favorite and pleasant locality in Ovid, he founded a claim upon the place by right of tomaliawk improvements : these consisted in the building of a pole cabin thatched with bark, the deadening of timber in the vicinity, and the clearing of a small patch of ground. Legally these acts had no force, but among pioneers they gave a patent to the claim which a purchaser was bound to respect both on account of local agreement and the good will of the occupant. These preliminaries being arranged, Faussett returned to Pennsylvania, and passed the following winter. In the spring of 1790, with the melting of the snow and ice, he set out with his family upon the extended journey, and finally reached their home in the wilderness. With what feelings did that wife survey the scanty provision for her shelter, what a depression of feeling to look around upon a solitude however beautiful, what wonder if the lip trembled and tears fell as the endeared remembrance came of friends and kindred far removed, and perhaps forever ! Custom ameliorates condition, and each year saw their circumstances improve. Frugality and labor brought a competence, and with the lapse of time came heavier crops, enlarged fields, and extended ownership. Unsatisfied with undisputed possession, Faussett sought out the legal owner to lot No. 88, and from him purchased two hundred acres of the tract. Husbanding his resources, a few years elapsed, and another two hundred acres was added to the first. For many years this worthy man engaged in farming, and finally left the stage of action at the ripe age of eighty-three. There were other settlers during the period of which we write than those we mention, but our chapter intends but allusion to prominent pioneers to this part of Montgomery up to 1791. Pennsylvanians were early settlers of States northward and westward, and if Virginia may wear the title of Mother of Presidents, the Land of Penti may well lay claim to the appellation of Founder of Colonies. Among others who sought a home in southern Seneca during 1789 were the Dunlap brothers, Andrew and William, and with them came James Wilson. Arriving in May, Andrew Dunlap located upon lot No. 8, in the town of Ovid, and b known as the man whose plow turned the first furrow in breaking for cultivation the soil between the lakes. It was in the latest days of the month that a half-acre of surface was turned and the area planted with potatoes brought by him for that purpose from his former home upon the Susquehanna. But a brief interval elapsed before Mr. Dunlap was enabled to make full payment for his lot, and he thus became the possessor of a fine farm of six hundred acres, whose value constantly became enhanced as time passed on, and enabled the proprietor to live in comfort and independence in the winter of his days.
12
HISTOEY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
CKAPTER V.
-SENECA, WHILE A PART OP HERKIMER, FROM 1791 TO 1794 — CAYUGA BRIDGE — GRIST MILLS — PUBLIC MEETING^ AN OLD-TIME ARTICLE — THE OLD PRE-EMPTION LINE — THE ALBANY TURNPIKE.
Herkimer County was formed from Montgomery on February 16, 1791 ; its name was given to commemorate General Nicholas Herkimer, who received wounds which caused his death at the battle of Oriskany, where he battled bravely for the liberty of the Slates. We have to do in this chapter with Seneca's history and surroundings for the brief period of three years. When we search the memories of the living, glean the brief allusions of the press, and ponder the paucity of facts, we realize the transitory character of American life, and are ready to exclaim, —
" A shadow, a vapor, a (alo that is told. Ah, where is the figure so tru« As justly to picture the bygones of old repassing in dreamy review?"
Within the limits of a lifetime a marvelous change has swept over the face of all this region. Farmer's Brother, Cornplanter, and Eed Jacket have vanished before the swelling tide of western-bound humanity, and the last of the Senecas was borne down upon the flood. Their fields are cultivated, as of yore, by the sons and grandsons of the pioneers, whose last surviving members totter upon the verge of dissolution. Fine farms and growing cities and an advanced society are the outgrowths of pioneer cntei-prise; yet the shadows of oblivion are gathering. The memory of what these enterprising and hardy men were and of the parts they acted, though lingering in the minds of a few cotemporaries and handed down to their descendants, is, nevertheless, daily losing its distinctness, and will soon be gone beyond recovery. What will be known a few years hence of Samuel Bear, John Green, and Jabez Gorham? of Elder Rorison, Disbrow, the Yosts, Mynderse, Van Cleef, and the Dunlaps ? What of Halsey, Asa Smith, the ill-fated Crane, and scores of others whose labors broke the solitude and changed the features of this then wilderness? It is no puerile task to wrest from obscurity a record of early events and those who caused them. It amazes the student of history to note the discount laid upon the life of our older citizen^ during the last quarter of a century. Familiar faces are sought which can never more be found. The harvester has gathered the pioneers ; a few remain as the gleanings, even as some fruit clings to the branches when the time of the vintage is past. These are the veteran survivors of life's battles, the witnesses of strange mutations. Gathered a little band, the pioneers of Seneca are thus addressed by S. H. Gridley, D.D., Historian of Waterloo Historical Society: "A kind word to the few earlier settlers of the village and vicinity who still linger among us. You remember the privations and hardships of pioneer life, — the hard blows needed to reduce the wilderness to a fruitful field, and something of the heart and brain work which have been the cost of the privileges conferred upon your de- scendants. You have labored well in your several spheres ; and, in behalf of the generations which follow you, I give you assurance of their appreciation of the heritage you have bequeathed to them. No service of ours is sufficient to requite the work you have done for us, or reward the cares and burdens which have been
of this inheritance. We can only assure you that what we have received shall be held in memory of your names, virtues, and label's. If, in our cultiva- tion of the moral virtues, we may give you some pledge of oiir proper use of wliat you bequeath ; if, as the wrinkles upon your brows grow deeper, and your steps arc less elastic, and you shrink from life's burdens, we may lighten your cares and gladden the evening of your earthly history, we .shall count it both a duty and a privilege. And if the Father of Mercies shall deign to hear our prayer, then shall your sun decline slowly towards its setting, its closing beams shall be its richest and most cflulgent, and it shall set only to rise to a higher orbit in that pure world in which God's presence is the central light and glory." Worthy words these, well spoken and fully deserved, and here embalmed to recall in after-times an occasion fraught with interest. Where individuals had been seen to take up homes in Seneca, now small parties of twos and threes and more, fre- quently arriving, the population increased, until the spring of 1793 saw full thirty families established in the southern portion, groups gathered at Seneca Falls and Scauyes, and isolated families scattered at distant points in other localities. At Goodwin's Point Philip Tremaine made a beginning, and was soon joined, in 1793, by the Kings,— Reuben, Bassler, and Nathaniel; in another year that nucleus was augmented by Jonathan Woodworth, accompanied by his sons Nehe- miah, Charles, and Oliver, and his daughter DcbnrM, fv.-I, Cn.n, Nnrwirh, Con- necticut. In 1790 James Jackson settled on lot Nn, ::.">, ill 1 1, i, I. Ini!,, w.strni
part of the town, prior to and in 179-t, were Elijah Kuni' ii. m I L.C .'inty ;
John Seeley, from Saratoga County; Peter Hugli.vs Niiln his m.'\ Ki.liaid Huff, Abraham De Mott and James, his son, Abraham Covert and his son Abraham A., William and Eubert Dunlap, and Tennis Covert, the last settlers of .1794. James
McKnight settled about 1790 iii what is now Varick, David Wisner in Romulus, and Ezekiel Crane, of New Jersey, in the town of Tyre in 1794. At this period the privations of settling a forest were very trying. With mortar and pestle Indian corn was broken into a coarse meal and boiled as mush ; venison, fresh or. dried, added to the simple fare, and beards meat was a luxury. Cattle ranged the woods in droves, grazing or browsing as gra.ss or twigs predominated, and deep- toned bells of difierent note proclaimed to boys or older ones, who went to bring them home for milking, their whereabouts. About the year 1790, the settlers went to Newtown, now known as Elmira, a distance of forty miles, to buy groceries, seed, and provisions ; and could we obtain the incidents of those long and weari- some journeys through the woods on winding roads to tell them here, it would be read with feelings akin to pity and astonishment.
We are disposed in these days to look upon a former generation as wanting in that spirit which projects afiairs of moment, and herald the changes of recent date as the only ones worthy of mention. It afibrds pleasure to be able, in connection with this history, to give brief mention of the Long Bridge over the Cayuga Lake. A company, known as "The Cayuga Bridge Company," consisting of John Harris, Joseph Annin, Thomas Morris, Wilhelmus Mynderse, and Charles Williamson, was incorporated in 1797; their pui-pose was the construction of a bridge across the northern end of Cayuga Lake, to further and expedite the passage of travelers and emigrants west. The work was commenced in the month of May, 1799, and completed September 4, 1800. Its dimensions were as fol- lows : length, one mile and eight rods, and width, twenty-two feet, there being twenty-two feet between trestles, and sufficient space on roadway to allow the movement of three wagons abreast. The time occupied in its construction was eighteen months, and the entire cost is given as one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Eight years it performed good service, and was then destroyed. It was afterwards rebuilt, and for a great many years the Cayuga bridge was generally regarded as one of the greatest public improvements in the State, and was taken as the dividing line between the East and West. -The bridge was finally aban- doned in 1857, and the lake was crossed by a ferry. Portions of the ruins are yet to be seen, and mark its original site.
Prominent in the history of early settlement appear the erection of mills "and the trials of their patrons. The families between the lakes," having no home mill, were accustomed to go with their grists in canoes or boats across Seneca Lake to a mill near Penn Yan. Grain could be floured at Rome and at the mill just named. Although beyond the limits of Seneca County, it is identified with her history, as for years the pioneers came to it to get their grinding, done. Among the strange characters who made their appearance among the early settle- ments was a woman named Jemima Wilkinson, who rode in style through the streets of.Geneva in a coach, on whose panels were the mystical characters " U. F.," — translated, we have " Universal Friend." Some flocked to see her to satisfy curiosity, and some became her followers. Among these latter was a party of settlers who, leaving Connecticut in 1789, followed the road made by Clinton on his march to join Sullivan, and, reaching Geneva, cut for themselves a road to Crooked Lake outlet, where they settled and erected the mill above mentioned. Here was ground the first bag of grain milled in Western New York.
A mil! in that day was a place of importance ; mill-builders were recognized as persons of prominence, and first roads were cut to the mills, which, as we have shown, were few and distant. Stormy and severe weather, and busy seasons at times, prevented the accustomed journey or voyage to the mill. In this dilemma the pioneers were compelled to resort to the family hand-mill or the hominy block. The hand-mill, described in brief, was a three-foot piece of a log from a beech or a maple, hollowed from one end by free use of chisel and auger into the form of a cone. This hollow, made smooth and hard by a fire of coals kindled therein, was scraped clean, and the mortar prepared. A stick, wrist-thick, split at one end, holding in the cleft an iron wedge, with edge to the split, and kept in place by an iron ring, formed the pestle. Corn was placed in the mortar and beaten by the pestle. The finest, being sifted, was corn meal ; the balance, minus the bran, was hominy. Another form of this rude appliance, used in the open air, was simi- lar, as regards the mortar, in make and appearance, only possessing more stability when hollowed in a stuuip ; the pestle was swung over the block from a hori- zontal pole, whose elasticity gave it the eff'ect of a spring and lightened the labor of the operator. It is not for us to say which of two mills built, the one in the northern, the other in the southern part of Seneca, claims priority. So far as can be learned, their construction took place during 1794. Each built by representative men, the circumstances attending are full of interest. As a measure of justice and a matter of history, the builders of these miJls, together with their work, are spoken of as follows : Silas Halsey, living at Southampton, Long Island, determined to "go West." Accordingly he took passage in a sloop for New York some time in 1792, having with him a hired white man and a colored servant. From New York he embarked, with such material as he pur-
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posed to take with him, on another sloop, and voyaged up the Hudson to Albany. He was necessitated to make a detour around the Cohoes Falls, on the Mohawk River, and transported his baggage and supplies to Schenectady across the inter- vening plains and sand hills. At this point Hulsey bought a "bateau," and began to work his way up stream, employing pole, paddle, and oar, singly or all at once, and in time came to Rome, early known as Fort Stanwix. A portage was then made to Wood Creek, and their bateau, borne on wheels to that stream, was duly launched, and the little party successively navigated the waters of lakes and rivers Oneida and Seneca. Piissing southward along the eastern shore of the Seneca Lake, Halsey noted the lands before him, and finally stopped at what has been known in turn as Cooley's, Goff's Point, and Lodi Landing. A desirahle location was found on lot No. 37 in Ovid, and the hands set to work. In a short time, with favoring weather, a deadening of half a dozen acres was made, the brush was cleared aw-iy, and the ground, unplowed, was sown to wheat. A partial covering was effected by the use of a clumsy harrow with wooden teeth. This agricultural agency was drawn over the field several times from difierent direc- tions to secure the advantages of cross-harrowing in reaching the immediate vicinity of the girdled trees. A settler's log cabin having been built, Halsey, learning that the apple was very fruitful in this region, obtained a quantity of seeds from an Indian orchard, saw them carefully planted, and, a beginning being made, once more embarked upon his bateau and set out on his return. While engaged in overcoming the natural obstacles to his progress, we temporarily leave him to note the strangeness of finding the apple of civilization in the heart of a far-off wilderness, thriving luxuriously, and furnishing subsistence to the lodges of an ancient tribe of aborigines. Wild fruits were abundant for unknown periods ; but when the settlements of Jlontreal and on the Hudson were visited by the Iroquois, and the apple seen and eaten, these people carried to their towns the fruit and planted out large fields. These orchards yielded heavily, and from their number and size the apple crop was very large. The soldiery of Sullivan, obeying orders, cut down many trees, and when they reached Kendaia .so many orchards were found that they gave the place the name of Appletown, — a term often employed by the old settlers to designate the locality. Some few apple- growers escaped notice, and from them the whites continued their propagation. 5Ir. Halsey had passed the winter east, and in various conversations with his neighbors had given so favorable a report, that on his return for permanent loca- tion during the spring of 1793 quite a party desired to go with him. A colony embracing besides his own family that of his son and of his son-in-law, eigh- teen in number, followed the same general route as that previously pursued by the energetic founder. Six weeks elapsed before Cooley's Point came in view, and then the gifts of nature, intelligently utilized, made life pleasurable and enlightened the future with hopefulness. The Halsey settlement was welcomed by the few neighbors, so called, although a half-score of miles away. Among those nearest were the cabins and improvements of James Jackson, a settler on lot No. 35, a mile and a half to the west ; of Elijah Kinne to the northward four miles, upon the present site of Ovid ; Andrew Dunl.ip, about the same dis- tance to the northwest ; George Faussett, six miles southwardly ; Philip Tremaine, upon the Cayuga Lake, at Goodwin's Point; some fifteen miles away and nine miles northeast was the home of David Wisner. A dense forest was all this country, broken by these slight openings. Along the higher lands there was no break save where a trail wound its serpentine course amidst the underbrush over- hung by primal forest-trees ; upon the lake shore were met occasional corn-fields, but all was wild, picturesque, and suggestive of patient labor to make it produc- tive. Mr. Halsey soon received an appointment as a Justice of the Peace and took prominent part in public affaii-s, not the least of which was to cause the erection of a grist-mill, during the summer of 1794, upon the waters of Lodi Creek, above the falls. The millwrights who executed this necessary and pioneer work were three brothers, named re.^ipectively Casper, John, and George Yost. It is a pleasure to state in this connection that Judge Halsey lived to see the transformation of forest to farms completed ; he departed this life at the goodly period of ninety years. Turn we now to the rapids of the Seneca River, called in Indian dialect Scauycs, and interpreted " the dancing waters." Thither in the spring of 1793 came the first permanent white settler in what is now called Waterloo. Anticipatmg the growth of a prosperous community, and foreseeing the advantages to be secured from that knowledge, S.amuel Bear, of Lanca.ster County, Pennsylvania, set out alone on horseback for this point, located on the western border of the military tract. Streams were forded, provisions were carried along in saddle-bags, and nightly bivouac w.is made wherever darkness overtook him. He kindled his fire with tinder and flint, wrapped himself in his blanket, and lay down to refreshing slumber while his horse grazed near by. E.ich morning saw him on his way. Proceeding past Newtown, now Elmira, his thoughts were recalled to the dangere he might encounter by the block-house standing there, and the memories of the battle which broke the Indian power for
all time. Continuing on up the western shore of Cayuga Lake, he pitched his tent in Scauycs. For some reason there was a marked difference in the lands north and south of the outlet, those on the south being regarded as much the more valuable. A journey was now made to Albany, where Bear purchased three hundred acres of lot No. 4, fifty acres of lot No. 5, and a portion of lot No. 3, all being bounded on JLhe north by Seneca Outlet. These tracts had been previously surveyed by Simeon De Witt and placed by the Commissioners in the market. Returning to his old home the pioneer secured a helpmate, and together they set out on horseback on their bridal tour for their western New York home. A miller by trade. Bear at once set about the construction of a grist-mill. It was the first enterprise in Scauyes contemplating the social necessities of the people. Up to this time, 1794, the early inhabitants were obliged to repair to a. mill at the foot of Crooked Lake. The mill was erected of logs, and stood' on the site of the later " white mills" of Messrs. Pierson, Becker and Raymor, The race was dug in part by Indians, who also aided in the raising. A part of the building was used by Mr. Bear as a residence. The mill being in running order notice was given to that effect far and near, and the tidings were received gladly. On foot, carrying their grist upon their shoulders, or on horseback with a bag for a saddle, having one end filled with corn and the other at times with buckwheat, the customers came in along old or breaking new paths. An aged resident speak- ing from personal knowledge evidently regards the old mill in the same light that a passenger upon the Auburn Branch Railroad would a stage running upon the old Albany road, — good, where one cannot do better. Arrived at the mill every man had to take his ch.ance, and sometimes had to wait a whole day or longer for his turn. They usually came with provisions provided for any emergency, using stumps of trees for tables, lodging in the mill when there was no other room, on the bags of grain. Some of the customers came from twenty to thirty miles to get grinding done. The mill soon became a point of settlement, and various persons located near by, so that, as we shall have occasion to ;mention, another mill was erected, a town plat made, and the foundations of Waterloo laid.
The real power behind the screen to the foreigner, who, fresh from the ob- servance of all the machinery of arbitrary government, first looks around upon the bustle and energy of American every-day life, is unknown and unsuspected. It had its origin and maintains its full vitality in the equality and freedom of the town-meeting. The earliest known assembly of this character was held aa in- dicated by the following copy of the proceedings :
" At a Town- Meeting, held in the Town of Ovid, in the County of Onondaga, on Tuesday, the first day of April, 1794, for chusing Town Officers, the Free- holders and Inhabitants of said town being meet, proceeded to their choise, as Follows, viz. : Silas Halsey, Supervisor ; Joshua Wickhoff, Town Clerk ; Elijah Kinne, Abraham Covert, and, George Fassett, Assessors; Abraham Lebeun, Col- lector; Elijah Kinne and Andrew Dunlap, Overseers of the Poor; James Jack- son, John Livingston, and John Selah, Commissioners of Highways ; Abraham Lebeun, Constable ; -Elijah Kinne, Abraham Covert, and George Fassett, Over- seers of Highways ; Henry Scivinton, Daniel Everts, Elijah Kinne, John Selah, James Jackson, and Samuel Chiswell, Fence Viewers ; Thomas Covert, Pound- Master ; also voted that Hogs run free Commoned for the year Insuing ; also voted that every fence be 4i feet high to be accounted suflicient,
" The above Town-Meeting, held the first day of April, in presence of me, " Silas Halsev, Justice of the Peace."
It is observed in this document that, while there is a lack of education, there is an ability to express themselves undcrstandingly. The fewness of numbers has compelled the choice of several persons to fill the same offices. It is also to be noted that the same freeholders voted the sum of six pounds for the support of their poor, — an ample donation', considering their resources. Of the town officers then elected Andrew Dunlap died in 1851, at the age of ninety-one. He died but a short distance from the site of his first log house, and on a farm familiar to sixty-three years of his existence. The last survivor of that meeting was Abra- ham A. Covert, whose vote on every recurring election was invariably cast, with an exception caused by illness, up to well-nigh his hundredth year.
We continue our chapter by the reproduction of an article on the Genesee country, published in the Commercial Agricultural Magazine., in London, Eng- land, August, 1799, both as a curiosity, and showing the explicit terms in which proprietary efforts were expressed and the strong inducements offered to colonists in this vicinity. It is entitled, " An Account of Capt. Williamson's Establish- ment on Lake Ontario, North America."
" This immense undertaking is under the direction and in the name of Captain Williamson, formerly a British officer, but is generally supposed in America to be a joint concern between him and Sir William Patence of London ; in England Patenee is believed to be the proprietor, and Williamson his agent. The land in the Genesee country, or that part of it which belongs to the State of Massa- chusetts, was sold to a Mr. Phelps for fivepence an acre; by him, in 1790, to
16
HISTOEY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YOEK.
Mr. Morris, at one shilling per acre, being estimated at a milUon of acres, on condition that the money should be returned provided Captain Williamson, who was to view the lands, should not find them answerable to the description. Captain Williamson was pleased with them, and, on survey, found the tract to contain one hundred and twenty thousand acres more than the estimate, the whole of which was conveyed to him. This district is bounded on one side by Lake Ontario, and on the other by the river Genesee. Williamson also bought some other land of Mr. Morris, so that he is now proprietor of more than a million and a half acres. After surveying the whole be resolved to found at once several large establishments rather than one capital colony. He therefore fixed on the most eligible place for building towns, as central spots to his whole system. There were Bath, on the Cohetoon ; Williamsburg, on the Genesee ; Geneva, on the extremity of Lake Seneca; and Great Sodus, on Lake Ontario. The whole territory he divided into squares of six miles, or so near as local circumstances would permit. Each of these sections he forms into what he calls a district. Sure of finding settlers and purchasers when he had established a good communication between his new tract and Philadelphia, and as the old road was by way of New York and Albany, Williamson opened a road which has shortened the distance near three hundred miles. He has also continued his roads from Bath to Canandaigua, to Geneva, and to Great Sodus, and several other roads of communication. He has already erected ten mills, — three corn and seven sawing, — has built a great many houses, and begun to clear land. He put himself to the heavy expense of transporting eighty families from Germany to Ms settlements ; but, owing to a bad choice made by his agent at Hamburg, they did little, and after a short time set off for Canada. He succeeded better in the next set, who were mostly Irish. They put the roads into good condition, and gave such a difference to the whole that the land, which he sold at one dollar an acre, was soon worth three ; and he has disposed of eight hundred thousand acres in this way, so as to pay the first purchase, the whole expense incurred, and has made a profit of fifty pounds. This rapid increase of property is owing to the money first advanced, hut the great advantage is Williamson's constant resi- dence on the settlement, which enables him to conclude any contract or to remove any difficulty which may stand in the way ; besides, his land is free from all dispute or question of occupancy, and all his settlement is properly ascertained and marked out. The land, which sold at one, has gradually risen to three dollars an acre ; and a proviso is always inserted in the deed of sale, to those who purchase a large quantity, that a certain number of acres shall be cleai-ed and a certain number of families settled within eighteen months. Those who buy from five hundred to one thousand are only obliged to settle one family. These clauses are highly useful, as they draw an increase of population and prevent the purchase of lands on speculation only. Captain Williamson, however, never acts up to the rigor of this clause where any known obstacles impede the execution. The terms of payment are to discharge half the purchase in three years and the remainder in six, which enables the industrious to pay from the produce of the land. The poorer families he supplies with an ox, a cow, or even a home. To all the settlements he establishes he takes care to secure a constant supply of provisions for the settlers or supplies them from his own store. Whenever five or six settlers build together he always builds a house at his own expense, which soon sells at an advanced price. Every year he visits each settlement, which tends to diffuse a spirit of industry and promote the sale of lands, and he employs every other means he can suggest to he useful to the inhabitants. He keeps stores of medicines, encourages races and amusements, and keeps a set of beautiful stallions. He has nearly finished his great undertaking, and purposes then to take a voyage to England to purchase the best horses, cattle, sheep, implements of agriculture, etc. Captain Williamson has not only the merit of having formed, and that in so judicious a manner, this fine settlement, but he has the happiness to live universally respected, honored, and beloved. Bath is the chief settlement, and it is to be the chief town of a county of the same name. At this town he is building a school, which is to be endowed with some hundred acres of land. The salary of the master Williamson means to pay until the instruction of the children shall be sufficient for his support. He has built a session-house and prison, and one good inn which he has sold for considerable profit, and is now building another which is to contain a ball-room. He has also constructed a bridge, which opens a free and easy communication with the other side of the river. He keeps in his own hands some small farms in the vicinity of Bath, which are under the care of a Scotchman, and which appear to be better ploughed and managed than most in America. In all the settlements he reserves one estate for himself, the stock on which is remarkably good. These he disposes of occasionally to his friends and on some handsome offers. To the settlements already mentioned he is now adding two others on Lake Ontario, near Aondcgut, on the river Genesee, and tlic other at Braddock, thirty miles farther inland. Great Sodus, on the coast of this district, promises to afford a safe and ' convenient place for ships, from the
depth of water, and it may be easily fortified. The climate here is much more temperate than in Pennsylvania. The winter seldom lasts more than four months, and the cattle even in that season graze in the forest without incon- venience. These settlements are, however, rather unhealthy, which Captain Williamson ascribes to nothing but the natural effect of the climate on new settlers, and is confined to a few fits of fever with which strangers are seized the first or second year after their arrival. The inhabitants all agree, however, that the climaie is unfavorable, and the marshes and pieces of stagnani water are thickly spread over the country; but this will be "drained as the population increases. On the whole, it promises to be one of the most considerable settle- ments in America."
We note here a rise in value which has been far exceeded, — a growth attributable to the generosity of the proprietor and a laudable importation of choice live-stock. It is in evidence that although the frequent arrival of persons seeking homes created a demand for the surplus products of the pioneers up to 1800, from that date the farmers of Seneca began to seek a market for their wheat and corn. Ehnira, once known as Newtown, was the market-town to which with extreme difficulty the products of the fields were convoyed. Rafts and floats were used during the floods of spring-time to convey the crops to points on the Susque- hanna, and the producer realized a profit per bushel of half a dollar. William- son evidently perfiirmed a great service for the people of this region, but failed in his endeavors to establish here that distinction of rank which, while a permanent feature of the old world, has no place and can have none in the new.
We have said that Seneca formed part of the western portion of the Military Tract: between this tract and the Genesee country was run a boundary line whose history is full of interest. Massachusetts, under its colonial charter, claimed all lands west of its western border to the Pacific Ocean. The charter of New York did not recognize this claim, — hence controversies arose whifch were finally ad- justed at Hartford, Connecticut, on December 16, 1786, where it was mutually agreed between Commissioners from each State, that Massachusetts cede to New York all her rights in the latter State. New York, in turn, ceded to Massachu- setts her rights to all land in the State west of a line running north from the eighty-second mile-stone, on the north boundary of Pennsylvania to British pos- sessions in Canada, except a tract one mile in width along the Niagara River I The running of this line, known as the "Old Pre-emption Line," was a matter of much interest, but of mere speculation as to its accuracy so far as regarded the vicinity of Seneca Lake, and there were those who desired that the line should pass west of the promising village of Geneva, leaving quite a body of land between the two tracts. Two Indian traders, Seth Reed and Peter Ryckman, made application to the State for the satisfaction of a claim presented for services rendered in negotiating with the Six Nations, and made the proposition that a patent should be given them for a tract whose limits should be defined as extend- ing from a certain tr.ee which stood on the bank of Seneca Lake southward along the bank until a strip of land, in area equal to sixteen thousand acres, should be included between the lake and Massachusetts lands. Their claim was allowed, and a patent given. Massachusetts sold her lands in 1787 to Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham, they paying one million dollai-s for six million acres. The former moving on from Granville, Massachusetts, with a colony and outfit, ex- tinguished the title of the Indians, by a treaty made «t Kanadesaga in July, 1788, to the eastern portion of their extensive purchase.
Reed and Ryckman now proposed to Phelps and Gorham to unite in running the Pre-emption Line, each party to furnish a surveyor. The result was what is known as the " Old Pre-emption Line." The survey was highly favorable to the traders, and disappointed Messrs. Phelps and Gorham, who, however, made no re-survey, but sold their purchase to Robert Morris, and — influenced by their suspicions of fraud on the part of the surveyors, caused by an " offer" by one of the Lessee Company for " all the lands they owned east of the line that had been run" — specified in their deed to Morris a tract in a gore between that line and the west bounds of the Military Tract. Morris was satisfied that the survey was incorrect, and in his sale to Pultney and others articled to run a. new line. Under the superintendence of Jlajor Hoops, Andrew Ellicott and Augustus Porter performed the work. A body of axe-men were set to work, and felled the timber a width of thirty feet; down this line the survey was continued to the head of Seneca Lake, whence night signals were employed to run down and over the lake. The care taken to secure accuracy established credit in the 'survey, and in this manner the " New Pre-emption Line" became known as the true line of division between the two States' claims. Major Hoops then examined the former survey, and found that a short distance from the Pennsylvania line it bad begun to bear off gradually till, reaching the outlet of Crooked Lake, it there made an abrupt offset. An inclination was then made in a northwest eouise for some miles; then the line inclined eastward till, reaching the foot of Seneca Lake, it struck out in a line nearly due north to Lake Ontario. Consulting an old map.
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
the site of Geneva included in Reed and Ryckman's tract is seen to have been the magnet which caused this unusual variation in the surveyor's compass. The' old line reached Lake Ontario, three miles west of Sodus Bay, and the new line near the centre of the head of the bay. The space between the two lines, aside: from the departure at Crooked Lake, became of a triangular form, havinj; an acute angle near the Chemung, and its base resting on Lake Ontario, and was familiarly . known as "The Gore." The State had permitted land warrants to be located on disputed territory under the impression that the first line was correct ; hence the -addition of what were 'called " Compensation Lands" to the Military Tract in what is now Wayne County. We conclude our chapter by a reference to the old turnpike road which eighty j-ears ago connected Albany with Buffalo. This famous road pursued a line through State Street, Albany ; Main Street, Utica ; Genesee Street, Auburn ; Fall Street, Seneca Falls ; Main Street, Waterloo ; and Main Street, Buffalo. .We have said that the road was little else but a trail prior to 1794. From Geneva on to Avon there were no more than half a dozen log cabins in 1792 to cheer the vision of the weary western-bound traveler, but on the 22d of March, 1794, three Commissioners were appointed to lay out a road, which was authorized by legislative enactment, from Utica, formerly known as "Old Fort Schuyler," as nearly direct as possible to the Cayuga Ferry; thence to'Canandaigua, and from that point to a settlement at Canawagus, on the Gene- see River, where the first bridge spanning the Genesee River was erected. The road from Utica to the Genesee, which in June, 1796, was little else but a name, was improved, and travel upon it began rapidly to increase. In the year 1793, the first mail west of Canajoharie was transported from that point to Whitestown. In pursuance of an arrangement of the Post-Office Department, the route was made self sustaining by leaving the expenses incident to be met by the people along the road. The distance was fifty miles, and the time twenty-eight hours. The contract passed into the hands of Jason Parker, Esq., the enterprising and well-known founder of a great line of stages which later traversed the country in every direction, whose main trunks have been superseded by railroads in the East, and whose career, following the rush of the emigrant and gold-seeker, is glorious in the reckless yet skillful driving down into the canons of the rivers and skirting the precipices of the Rocky Mountains, and will be famous till there too the rushing car will outstrip the coach and consign it to a recollection and a reminiscence of the aged and the past. A stage was started from Utica on Sep- tember 30, 1796, and on the afternoon of the third day out arrived with four passengers at Geneva before the old Williamson Hotel, whoso appointments, in charge of landlord Powell, were then equaled by few inns in America. There are those yet living who have traveled along this old thoroughfare in the old stage coach. They will recall the long night rides, when each, subsiding into silence, indulged a growing drowsiness, half conscious of cro.ssing the " Long Bridge," being jostled in passing over a piece of corduroy ,' and awaking chilled as the crack of the driver's whip, the increased motion, and the final stop before a group of spectators indicated the arrival at a terminus. Then each stepped out and exercised his stiffened limbs, enjoyed warm, pleasant rooms, and refreshed the inner man with well-cooked steak, hot coffee, and unrivaled liquor. Those who daily traverse the "old line" railroad little know the good and ill experienced in old-time travel on the Albany Turnpike. A few years, and this old road will be blotted from the memory of man. James Cotton, familiarly known as "King Cotton," was a contractor and the builder of that section of the road which passed through Seneca Falls, and as landlord of a tavern built in that place in 1800 by Parkhurst, on the present site of the Globe Hotel, received in patronage a second payment for services ; but there were those whose toil and labor, given cheerfully, deserve the respect of posterity. John Salisbury was one who walked from Iiis home on Melvin Hill to what was called the Narrows, in Waterloo, and there engaged in cutting out stumps, repairing, and improving, and returned weary from hard toil to his habitation. During the war of 1812 this road, continued by slashed track and corduroy to Niagara frontier, was burdened to its full capacity with four to six and eight horse teams used in the conveyance of goods for western settlere, and return of all produce which would bear the cost of transportation to Albany. These, with emigrant teams, and the constant passing of troops and munitions of w-ar, made almost a continuous line. Nearly every house was a tavern, and every few miles was a gate to collect tolls. In 1814-15, peace being de- clared, the Governor of Upper Canada and suite, with a numerous retinue in carriages and on horses, carrying beds, silver, and conveniences, ladies, lap^logs, and luxuries, made a journey along the road, eastward bound ; but the caravans of emigrants, the trains of produce-bearing wagons, the stage lines and the taverns are already of past record.
CHAPTER VL
1794 TO ORGANIZATION OP SENECA OOUNTr IN 1804 — THE STATE'S HUNDKED — OOITRTS AND OFFICERS— MIGRATOliT HARDSHIPS — ^THE CATtFOA RESER- VATION— THE BAYARD tOMPANT — A REMINISCENCE OP WATERLOO IN ITS FIRST DECADE.
"Ours is a free republic where, beneath the sway of mild and equal laws framed by themselves, one people dwell and own no lord, save God." The war of the Revolution produced a great and favorable change in the State character,. The prosperity which followed peace diffused an enterprising spirit. Individual freedom of action was unrestricted, yet infringement of social rights brought condign punishment. From 1794 till March 8, 1799, Cayuga formed a portion of Onondaga County, the first courts of which were held in barns and settlers' habitations at Onondaga; Levana, on the shore of Cayuga Lake, Cayuga County; and at Ovid, in Seneca County. The first officials of the then large county were Seth Phelps, first Judge ; Benjamin Ledyard, Clerk ; John Harris, Sheriff; and Moses De Witt, Surrogate. This County was the homo of the tribe whose name it bears. Upon its lands were held the great councils of the Iro- quois, and to the Onondagas, or " men of the mountains," was intrusted the care of the sacred council-fire. By treaties of various dates the remnant of the tribe has disposed of its lands until their reservation embraces something more thau six thousand acres, located in Onondaga and Lafayette. Of that renowned and powerful tribe but a few hundred remain, yet these lay hold of civilization and show improvement. Cayuga was formed from Onondaga in 1799, and retained its area unbroken but five years; during this period it included the territory embraced east and west by Cayuga and Seneca Lakes. The population was sparse and busily occupied in projecting and carrying forward improvements individual and general. To accommodate all parts of the County, Aurora, on the east shore of Cayuga Lake, was designated as a temporary county seat, as being centrally located. The first and a truly primitive court-house was erected in 1799, the materials employed being poles for the walls and rafters, and brush for roofing in lieu of shingles or clapboards. Humble though it were, yet with it is associated the conclusion of a tragedy, of which this region has known but few, and whose recollection is all the more distinct from its rarity. The year 1803 still saw the Indians swarming in the forests. They were peaceable, but annoy- ing as importunate beggars and inveterate thieves. Between them and whit€ settlers there was little confidence, and many families lived in fear. There was one among the Indians who made himself at home in the cabins of the pioneers. He was aged ; but " Indian John," the Seneca, had not learned to rule his tem- per, and this was not to his advantage. When the leaves fell and sharp frosts foretold the winter near, settler and savage set out to gather stores of meat, that when the snowS lay deep they need not hunger. A settler named George Phadoc, in company with the Seneca, built a bark shelter on the watei-s of Black Brook, and both went out in search of game. Again and again the deer fell before the settler's deadly aim, while the Indian leveled his rifle at bird or beast in vain. On the evening of December 11 the savage returned with empty hand, and his fierce heart burning with thoughts of magic and revenge. Phadoc had killed a deer, for which next morning he early left the hut, and, coming back, was in the act of throwing down the carcass at the door, when a rifle-ball sped from the Indian's weapon through the deer into the white man's side. Phadoc drew his tomahawk to meet his enemy, then snatched his rifle, and hurried for relief to the cabin of Asa Smith, where much alarm arose from a knowl- edge of " Old John's" accustomed fits of rage. Like a wild beast in his lair crouching for a victim, the Indian watched in the hut with loaded fire-arm to shoot the first who came. Ezekiel Crane, with wife and children, had come from New Jersey in .1794, and made a settlement on lot No. 48. The woods around his habitation were felled, crops had been gathered, neighbors had moved in, and the chief difficulties of this pioneer of Tyre seemed overcome. On the morning of December 12, Mr. Crane and Ezra Degarrao, a settler on the same lot and a relative by marriage, together set out to select additional land. Crane resolved to go by the cabin where the Indian lay in ambush, and obtain some venison from the hunters. The white men came up, and Crane rapped at the door, and was im- mediately answered by the report of a rifie, and a ball passing through his left breast buried itself in his left shoulder, causing him to fall as though dead. Degarmo hastened away to spread the news and gather aid ; meanwhile, the wounded man recovered consciousness, and found his w.ay to Asa Smith's, where, after five days of suffering, he died. At dark of the day of the fatal shot the settlei-s gathered at the cabin, and cautiously stole near it. The savage, with the wily cunning of his race, expected an attack, and, catching sight of the backwoods- men, raised a loud and ringing war-cry. Some of the party were for shooting him down, but this was opposed to the plan of giving him np to be tried by the
18
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YOEK
white man's law. The old Indian, while conversing with some Indians friendly to the whites, was cautiously approached, captured, pinioned, etc., and taken to Smith's, where his eye fell upon Phadoo and blazed with baffled fury ; but he looked with deep regret upon the death of Mr. Crane. The prisoner was con- fined in a room — built in one of the abutments of Cayuga Bridge — for a time, and then sent to a jail at Canandaigua. In 18U-t, a circuit court and court of " oyer and terminer" was held at Aurora by Judge Daniel D. Tompkins, at which John, the Indian, was tried, convicted, and sentenced to be hung. He asked that he might be shot, but the request could not be granted. As he stood on the platform, with a pipe and some leaf-tobacco at his belt, he told the officials that with these he wished to smoke a pipe of peace with Crane in the land of spirits. The effect of the execution was to drive back into the forests the greater portion of the Indians, and cast a wholesome dread on those remaining.
There was a terra employed in reference to the Military Lots which, once well undeistood, has now but little meaning and deserves an explanation. The Military Xot called for tracts one mile square, and a reservation was made by the State of the right to retain one hundred acres from the southeast corner of each lot, and donate instead a like amount of Ohio land. This lot so reserved was entitled " The State's Hundred." Did the purchaser of a lot desire to keep the entire .tract, he had only to give due notice to that efi'ect, and pay eight dollars for the survey. Should default of payment occur, the State withheld fifty acres of the mile square, which reserve was called the " Survey of Fifty Acres."
We have already remarked with regard to county and town officers that salaries were nominal and persons desirous of the honors few ; yet it is seen to occur that the same persons, being once installed in the confidence of the citizens, hold the places of trust for many terms. Hence it is not surprising to find that on the organization of Cayuga, in 1799, some of our Onondaga officials again come to notice as the former's first county incumbents. Here we see Seth Phelps occu- pying the bench, William Stuart serving as District Attorney, Benjamin Ledyar3 acting in the capacity of County Clerk, with Joseph Annin for Sherifl', and Glen Cuyler for Surrogate. With no court-house and a log building authorized to be used as a jail, — a public building but little in the Hue of architectural display now become so common and indulged in so extravagantly, — Cayuga village, on March 25, 180U, can boast of early public proceedings. County history is intimately allied to early settlement, and brief narratives of hardships endured turn our minds backward to a period of privation whose rough edges are rounded by time and made to appear as very desirable to the children of the third generation.
While in many instances a settler took up land, cleared it up, built a house, made fences, and settled down to an annual routine of summer care of crops and winter's chopping and choring, and, when grown old and feeble, still lived upon it, there were others who stopped but briefly, and, abandoning their improve- ments, pushed on to find a better ; these migrations united relatives and friends as neighbors.
Samuel Clark and his son Samuel, from Massachusetts, were settlers in 1802 in Genesee County. Samuel Hall, from Seneca County, and Johu Young came a httle later. Mi-s. Young gives in " Turner's Pioneer History" this account of pioneer life as it was :
" My husband having the year before been out and purchased his land upon the Holland Purchase, in the fall of 1804 we started from our home in Virginia, on horseback, for our new location. We came through Maryland, crossing the Susquehanna at Milton, thence by way of Tioga Point and the then usual route. Iq crossing the Allegheny Mountains night came upon us, the horses became frightened by wild beasts, and refused to proceed. Wc wrapped ourselves in our cloaks and horse-blankets and attempted to get some rest, but had a disturbed night of it. Panthers came near us often, giving terrific screams. The frightened horses snorted and stamped upon the rocks. Taking an early start in the morning ■we soon came to a settler's house, and were informed that we had stopped in a com- mon resort of the panther. Mr. Young built a shanty which was about ten feet square, flat-roofed, covered with split a.sh shingles ; the floor was made of the halves of split basswood, and no chimney. A blanket answered the purpose of a door for a while, until my husband got time to make a door of split plank. We needed no window; the light came in where the smoke went out. For chairs we had benches made by splitting logs and setting the sections upon legs. A bed- stead was made by boring holes in the sides of the shanty, inserting pieces of timber which rested upon two upright posts in front, a side piece completing the structure ; •peeled basswood bark answering in place of a cord. We, of course, had brought no bed with us on horseback, so one had to be procured. We bought a •cotton bag, stuffed it with cat-tail, and found it far better than no bed."
The fever and ague attacked most new-comers with more or less severity. With •the means at hand a settler did well to clear four to six acres, and there was little leisure for those who were able to work. It was no uncommon thing for sick- ness and euufinemeut to be endured unaided, not alone by a physician, but by any
attendance outside the family. • During the spring of 1797, while Cortland and Seneca formed part of Onondaga, there came to Cortland from Ulster a man named John E. Koe. He took board with John M. Frank and went to work upon his lot. Upon a satisfactory site the trees were cleared away, logs prepared, and by neighborly aid put in place to .form the walls of a house. Puncheons were split out and used to lay a floor, bark was peeled to use for roofing and a man engaged to put it in place. Of the wild grass bordering a swamp he cui and cured a portion for future need and returned- home. During the interval .atthe old home this rude beginning was constantly in mind, every preparation was made for moving, and finally a start was made in winter, when discomfort seemed certain to attend their journey. Roe and his wife set out in a sleigh, bringing with them a young cow. They came forward without incident until they reached a stream ojq)osite the dwelling of Joseph Chaplin. The water ran high, and a canoe, the usual means of ferriage, had been carried away. Chaplin bethought himself of the hog-trough : this was secured, launched, Mrs. Roe placed therein, and safely taken across. Standing upon the bank she watched anxiously the crossing of the team and cow. Urged in, the horses swam across with the sleigh, followed by the cow. The current was strong and the result was doubtful, but the oppo- site shore was finally reached in safety. Night came, and the horses being secured to the sleigh for want of any shelter, lunched upon the flag chair-bottoms. Over a trackless country, in snow two feet in depth, from morning till night they labored on from the river to their new home. No lights shone out a welcome,- no warm fire and ready meal to comfort and restore them, no one to take and feed the team, no bed to rest their tired limbs, but a roofless house and snow piled up within. It was discouraging but not hopeless. The snow was cleared from the floor, a fire was kindled against the logs, blankets were drawn across the beams for a covering, the horses were secured in one corner, a bundle of marsh hay obtained and placed- before them, a frugal meal prepared and eaten ; and then they lay down to rest, their journey ended, and while much hard work was before them a lifetime was given to do it.
From C. Fairehilds, a resident of Waterloo, and who at the advanced age of eighty-one looks back with vivid memory upon the changes iu Seneca since the commencement of the century, we learn that it was generally understood on the Atlantic coast that this region was excellent both for agriculture and for busi- ness. There were those who had been out and returned, who, in answer to inquiry, gave glowing details of a western paradise. Among other extravagances it was said, " New-comers need not trouble themselves to bring feather beds, for the wild fowl were so abundant that feathers could easily be procured." The wild fowl were in flocks, and Fairehilds at a single shot obtained ten ducks while hunt- ing on the Seneca, but those who brought along their bedding experienced no regret therefor. The charter for the Great Western Turnpike had been granted, and the entertainment of travelers and the raising of supplies were thought to open a way to competence, and, as a result, every man's cabin was an inn, and the settler was glad to see guests.
Influenced by various reports, Joseph Childs, father of Caleb, came out in 1801 from Somerset, New Jersey, riding on horseback, visited Geneva, then a kind of metropolis for the great Genesee country, as all western New York was termed, returned east, and set out on his return westward accompanied by the family, consisting of his wife Phoebe and five children. The household goods were conveyed in two wagons equipped with bows and covered with canvas ; each wagon was drawn by a yoke of oxen. Fairehilds drove one yoke, and one Joseph Saunders, a hired hand, the other. They took their slow way to the Delaware, where, on a post by the bank, was suspended a tin horn ; Fairehilds blew a blast and called the ferryman. With both wagons on the scow the transfer was made to the opposite bank.
On through the beech-woods of Penn, and rolling the wheels through the deep mire, the emigrants proceeded, and, reaching, crossed the Susquehanna. The children, looking from the wagon over the scow upon the water, saw the .oxen begin to back and to carry them towards the edge, and were badly fright- ened. No such catastrophe occurred, and day by day the journey went on. Whenever possible, stops Wore made at iims or cabins, and finally the upper end of Seneca Lake was reached, and they arrived at Ovid. Here was an old man known as Captain Kinney, a large land-owner. He kept a tavern in a small, red-painted building, which stood solitary and alone. Ferried across the outlet by a man named Widener, and moving through the woods, they reached Geneva, a place which then commanded the trade of northern Seneca. Judge John .Nicholas and Robert S. Rose came from Virginia in 1803. They were owners of some sixty or seventy slaves, who, being freed by Legislative act in 1827, formed a little community by themselves, and were known as the Colored Settle- ment. Rose bought a tract of sixteen hundred acres of land in Seneca, and placed in charne a man named Bumsey. This estate is now separated into several fine farms. Mr. Rose built a fine house for the times, engaged extensively in wool-
G Ir-djJy^yiA/^
U^Or^^VTA^i
The early life of Erastus Partridge,
nnccted with later successful effort, is replete with encouragement for emulative young men; and a brief sketch, while a fitting tribute to his memorj', serves also as an exampler for those who would know how a poor boy may become the successful banker and skillful financier.
Mr. Partridge was born near Norwich, Connecticut, on the 9th day of May, 179S. As in most instances of self-made men, pressed for means in early life, he won his way steadily to position, influence, and competence by industry and perseverance. In 1821 he came to this section of the State, settled at Cayuga, then a promising locality, where he engaged in the mercantile trade. Here was laid the foundation for successful and prosiierous business, and here were the scenes and incidents to which in later years he frequently and fondly referred. During the year 1824 he established a branch store in Seneca Falls, and soon thereafter entered upon a large and lucrative trade ; but it was not till 1837 that interests at Cayuga were transferred and a perma- nent removal made to Seneca County. From this time forward business increased, and his store became known as an established institution of the village. Keeping pace with town growth, his aid and encouragement were given to every worthy en- terprise. He identified himself with various manufactures, and liberally advertising, made known to public favor his business interests. Kindly counseling and advising those who recognized his good judgment and ample qualifications and sought to profit by them, erratic conclusions were seldom made. Opinion or person was never obtruded, and he ever maintained both his dignity and deliberate judgment. He was ready to perceive, accurate to estimate character, prudent in opinion, and unswervable in principle. Remarkably successful in mercantile business, Mr. Partridge com- menced private banking in 1848, and in the month of January, 1854, established the Bank of Seneca Falls, with a capital of fifty thousand dollars; himself president; his son, Leroy C. Partridge, cashier. This was the first bank organized at Seneca Falls, and was regarded by its business interests with no little pride and pleasure. The business of the bank increasing to an extent requiring all his time, Mr. Partridge disposed of his mercantile business, in the spring of 1856, to W. B. Latbrop, and devoted his entire attention to the banking interest. The bank, originally located in old Mechanics' Hall, was removed in April, 1858, into the new and commodious structure erected for banking purposes on Fall Street, and known as the " Bank Block." The bank, known as " individual," made contributory to the best interests
of the community, possessed its confidence and good will. Foreseeing and prudent, the great financial revulsion of 1857, which caused suspension of all but three or four banks of the State, found the Bank of Seneca Falls promptly meeting all its obliga- tions, and paying in gold its notes presented for redemption. Known and continued as an individual bank until the inauguration of the national banking system, it was early changed by Mr. Partridge to "The First National Bank of Seneca Falls.-' Associated with Mr. Partridge in the transaction of bank business have been his two sons, L. C. and D. E. Partridge, by whom the later affairs of the institution have been conducted.
The death of Erastus Partridge occurred January 20, 1873, at the advanced age of seventy-four years. Impressed by sense of loss, business houses were closed and all classes of citizens united in expressions of sadness and regret at his decease. As a merchant and as a banker, the dealings of Mr. Partridge were characterized by business exactness; advantage was never taken of necessity, and he was lenient in the extreme to his debtors. To the influence of Mr. Partridge upon the mechanical industries of Seneca Falls is due much of their stability and ultimate extension. His domestic virtues, his personal excellencies of character endeared him to his relatives. He was a kind husband, an exemplary and considerate father. He had, on August 0, 1820, married, at Homer, Miss Sarah Bruffee, daughter of "William and Anna Bruffee, and for more than half a century they had journeyed through life in company. To his widow and children he left the priceless heritage of a stainless name and the memory of an exemplary life. In his social relations, his disposition and bearing towards neighbor and friend were frank and courteous, while all recog- nized in him a citizen who combined in one character modesty, kindness, sincerity, and integrity. Of kindly impulse, the comfort of others was second only to his efforts for their business advancement. Unostentatiously and quietly he gave of his abund- ance to the relief of the needy. Happy in the timely aid of worthy and judicious investments, his influence is yet manifest upon men now prosperous, who attribute their success to his timely advice and assistance. Invaluable to the community, Mr. Partridge lived to see his adopted home puss the doubtful era of its existence, and firmly established as a successful business community, and it is in strict justice that wherever the early history of Seneca County shall be known, the name of Erastus Partridge shall be coupled with it.
Le Roy C. Partridge, son of Erastus Partridge, was born at Cayuga, July IG, 1832. "When about five years of age his parents removed to Seneca Fulls. Associates of his school days recollecta high-minded lad, ardent in scholastic research, a student of mechanics, and a lover of geologic investigation.
Growing to manhood, influence, and usefulnes?, his cheerful and social disposition rendered his companionship attractive, genial, and pleasant, and surrounded him with "an extended circle of warmly-attached friends.
Employed in the Bank of Seneca Falls when twcnt3'-one years of age, he became its cashier at the age of twenty-two. Later, he was vice-president of the institution, and upon the death of his father became its president. For several years he conducted an independent banking house at Ovid, — a great convenience to the people of the south jury district. This institution, known as the Banki-ng House of Le Roy C. Partridge, under the direction and impetus of its fuunder, has proved a sound and thriving business, and is still continued, under the control of Mrs. Ellen Partridge. Mr. Partridge was also secretary and treasurer of the Seneca Falls Savings Bank.
"While seeking no political preferment, he shrank from no public duty, and when elected by large majorities to the positions of President of the village and Supervisor of the town, he discharged the functions of the office with zeal and honor.
Le Koy C. Partridge was married in 1861 to Miss Ellen Deppen, daughter of "William Deppen, then a resident of Seneca Falls.
During the year 1874, failing health warned him to lay aside the onerous burdens borne for years, and seek in change of climate relaxation and recovery ; but this was not to be, and in January, 1875, he returned to home and friends— to die. Medical skill and the promptings of affection were of no avail, and cheerfully, as in health, he bore with suffering, and passed away on the morning of February C, 1875. The funeral took place at Trinity Church, in the afternoon of February 11, to which not only the friends at Seneca Falls, but many from neighboring villages proceeded. During the time of the funeral, at which the Rev. Dr. Guion officiated, all places of business were closed, and the bells of the village were tolled. Casket and church were adorned with floral offerings, and every mark of respect and sincere sympathy shown by the entire community. His remains were taken to Reatvale Cemetery for burial, and those who had so long and pleasantly known him in life now revert to the asso-
ciations of the past, and study his character in public and private influences. So well, so favorably known, and so intimately connected with the varied and material inter- ests of the village, his loss fell little short of a public misfortune.
In business and social relations his generosity was unstinted, and his personal inter- course with all won many sincere, devoted friends. In sterling mental qualities, and in the kindly virtues of the heart, he won a place in the affections of kindred and friends beyond the limit of expression. Eminently possessed of qualities and virtues of life, his friends were real, intimate, and numerous. Scorning to do or countenance dishonorable actions, his sense of honor was proverbial, and his business relations were characterized by a scrupulous observance of the true spirit and v.ery letter of every agreement. Careful and sensitive of honor and integrity, the slightest shadow of reflection upon them was unendurable. Sympathizing with want and distress, in- stances are numerous where munificent gifts for religious and benevolent objects illustrate philanthropy ; and happily situated to relieve necessity, most generously did he avail himself of his opportunities. Generous without being lavish, famiKar with- out loss of dignity, he constantly maintained a natural' ease and self-assertion which challenged regard, while good-nature, quiet humor, and courteous deportment marked him a favorite in social or business circle.
Closely identified with matters of finance, the honorable position reached by the First National Bank of Seneca Falls is greatly the result of his faithful and sagacious efforts. Realizing that the prosperity of business and manufacturing interests is the basis of successful banking, Mr. Partridge, wisely discriminating between the deserv- ing and the unworthy, gave generous encouragement to these classes through periods of financial depression, and thereby contributed to the welfare and prosperity of the community at large. The domestic virtues, personal excellence of character, frankness and liberality of Le Roy C. Partridge were known and admired by all. Courteous and dignified, inflexibly exact, and scrupulously honest, he was honored for his worth. Himself beneficent, kind, and sympathetic, like qualities were awakened towards him in the minds of relative, friend, and citizen. Many besides his estimable family shared with them in grief at his death, and the name of Le Roy C. Partridge is deeply engraved and fondly remembered by those who knew him as a prorilising youth, a successful man, a kind husband, a valued citizen.
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
growing, and improved the breed of sheep. He was a prominent citizen, and served as representative in Congress. He died in, 1845, in Waterloo. His wife, a most exemplary person, followed him some few years later. In default of roads, the lakes were used when practicable. Williamson had a sloop upon Seneca Lake and used it in bringing in lumber. Settlers used skiffs large enough to convey a family. In one of these Fairchilds took frequent trips down the outlet to visit a sister, who, with her husband and family, resided on the south bank of the river, a short distance below Gorham Bridge. At other times this was the route to Bear's Mill. The boats were left above the rapids to avoid the labor and danger of running them. Workmen were busy digging a race for a water-power at a lower level, where a saw-mill was erected and put in motion. A cluster of buildings gathered about the little old mill with its one run of stone bore the name of Scauyes, and formed the unprombing nucleus of the present fine town of South Waterloo. In connection with this locality comes up the subject of t'he Cayuga Reserve and the disputed question of a chief's nativity, la 1785, the Oneidas sold a large tract of land to the State. In 1788, the Onondagas sold all their territory, save a limited area about their chief villages, and retained the rights of hunting, fishing, and salt-making, heretofore enjoyed. The Cayugas sold their lands in 1789, with the exception of a narrow reservation, including both shores of the Cayuga Lake and also a reservation on the Seneca'outlet for an eel-fishery, and a convenient spot on the south side for curing their fish. They also retained the right of hunting over all the lands sold. An agreement was made with the. Cayugas, by which the tribe received an annuity of five hundred dollars. The ;point reserved for the eel-fishery was what is now the town of Waterloo, including both sides of the river, and this assertion finds strength in the designation of lands in the early deeds and titles as forming a part of " Tlie Cayuga Resenalion at Scauyes." It was said by Eed Jacket, in a speech in Waterloo, that the Cayugas sold the ground of the reserve to the Senecas for a tanned wolf-skin.. If the chief spoke knowingly his tribe made an excellent bai'gain, for of eels a barrel of them had been taken during a single night in a w'eir set in the middle of the river, with wings to each shore. The early residents were accustomed to skin and salt them down by the barrel, and when dried and smoked they were equal to the best mackerel. Besides eels, the waters of the outlet were full of the finest fish, among which were Oswego bass, black bass, salmon, and trout. One of the latter was speared by an old settler, and its weight proved to be eighteen pounds. With deer and other game, bears and wolves, the location was an Indian's Eden ; but the settlers came ever thicker, and the Indians, selling this their last foothold, retreated to the forest and disappeared ; even the tribe who lived here involved in doubt, and the question giving rise to some discussion. At what was called the island, near an old apple-tree, the birth-place of Red Jacket has been pointed out. Whether he there saw the light or elsewhere, he belongs not to us. Migra- tory in habit and unreliable in legend, he was a Seneca, an orator of no mean pretension, and a native of the little lake region. About 1794, the lands upon the outlet were sold by the State ; some of them passed into the hands of soldiers, who mainly sold to others ; some were purchased by various parties. It was held at the common rates of government lands. Lot No. 08, on which Waterloo is mainly located, was patented by the State to John McKinstry, of Columbia County, for military services; and, at nearly the same time, one hundred acres on the north side of the river, embracing the water-power on which has grown up a part of Seneca Falls, was sold by the State for twenty dolKars and sixty cents per acre, this price being the result of a representation of the great value of the water-power as believed in by the Surveyer-General. The purchase Wiis made in 1794 by a.party consisting of Robert Troup, Nicholas Gouverneur, Stephen N. Bayard, and Elkauah Watson. Colonel Jlynderse, in 1795, bought a one-fifth interest in the purchase and water- power, and was made the business agent. During the same year the company known as the " Bayard Company" began the erection of what were known as the "Upper Red Jlills," under the direction of Colonel Mynderse. The mills were finished and completed during 1796. In 1798, the company bought lot No. 6, on the reservation. This lot included about half the water-power on the south side of the river, and contained two hundred and fifty acres. They built the Red Jlills, in 1807, on the lower rapids on lot No. 6, and, in 1809, obtained possession by purchase of lot No. 9, containing six hundred and fifty acres. Their title came from the notorious Aarcn Burr through Leicester Phelps. This acquisition secured to them the remainder of the south side water-power, so that when, in 181C, four hundred acres of lot No. 86 had been purchased from the heirs of Thomas Grant, the Bayard Company owned the entire water-power, and one thousand four hundred and fifty acres of land. From 1795 until 1825, a period of thirty yeai-s, a monopoly of territory was maintained, and Seneca Falls was bound fast while other points less favored by nature strode ahead. Repeated but fruitless efforts were made to obtain a foothold, and, in 1816, ten thousand dollars was refused for ten acres of land and water-power to run a woolen and cotton mill. In 1825 the company was compelled, by failures among
its members, to divide and dispose of the property. In 1817 a circular was issued advertising the sale of the entire rights of the company, and, as this document shows up the advantages of the County as then understood, it is per- petuated in these pages, as follows ;
"TO MEM OF ENTERPRISE AND CAPITAL. "An occasion is now offered for the profitable employment of both. The sub- scribers offer for sale their establishment at and near the Seneca Falls, in the County of Seneca and State of New York, commonly known by the appellation of, the Red Mills. To those who know the country lying between the Cayuga and Seneca Lakes, and the particular advantages connected with this property, no recommendation is necessary, and those advantages need only to be investigated to be duly and highly appreciated. The whole establishment viiU be sold together or may be divided in four several classes, viz. : the first to contain about eleven hundred and sixty acres, in one connected parcel, on which are erected two grist- mills, each with two runs of stone, with every ;ieeessary machinery for manu- facturing flour of the very best quality, and ample storage for thirty thousand bushels of wheat; a saw-mill, fulling-mill, clothier's work, drying-house, and three carding-machines, all in the best order ; a large dwelling-house with proper outhotises ; two very convenient dwelling-houses for the millers, a cooper-shop and implements, a new storehouse for mercantile purposes, and another for storage of flour and merchandise. Of this tract a due proportion is under cultivation, and the residue is well timbered. The land is of the best quality, well cleared and fenced, with good barns and other buildings calculated for the use of fanners. ' " On this tract are also beds of plaster of Paris, of excellent quality, supposed to be inexhaustible, and adjoining to the boatable waters of the Seneca outlet, by which the tract is almost equally divided. In addition to the mill sites already occupied eight more of equal utility may be improved, the supply of water and the elevation of the falls being always adequate thereto. The country which supplies these mills with wheat is acknowledged to afford a supplyin quantity and excellence superior to any other part of the State, and the established repu- tation of the flour made at these mills is the best test of their value and advan- tages. The flour manufactured here is transported to New York with only fourteen miles land carriage, from Schenectady to Albany ; to Lake Ontario, with no other portage than that at Oswego Falls, of one mile ; or to Great Sodus Bay, with a portage of ten miles, and thence to Montreal. Wheat is transported to the mills from the shores of Cayuga and Seneca Lakes by water and by laud. The premises are situated between the Cayuga and Seneca Lakes, on the outlet of the Seneca, which empties into the Cayuga within two miles from the Cayuga bridge and eleven miles from Geneva. Turnpikes and other roads concentrate herfi at the village ofSeneca Falls, which stands on a part of these lands and is progressing. Locks and canals are erected here, from which great and increasing advantages may be anticipated. No situation in the interior of the State can offer superior inducements to a company or to individuals disposed to establish hydraulic works or other manufactories, it being in the heart of a rich and fertile country, and the supply of water is inexhaustible. If more land should be required it can be furnished by the subscriber, particularly a tract supposed to contain iron ore, situate within four miles from the falls.
(Signed) " W. Mtnderse & Co."
The Bayard Company having dissolved, the prosperity of Seneca Falls began and continues. In other localities such companies have amassed wealth, and enriched a multitude besides ; but when the partners met at Seneca Falls, in 1825, and each had drawn by lot his several share of proceeds, as divided by their Com- missioners Bogart and Larzelere, they found that during the thirty years' associ- ation each share had advanced $13,281, and the dividend was but 88000, there being a share loss of $35,281, and a company loss of $176,405. Eager in the early day as now to amass riches, fortune was fickle, and while some schemers failed others unconsciously grew rich. Old residents, from different- stand-points, tell the story of the early day, and the following, from the pen of Caleb Fairchilds, bears on the primitive condition of Waterloo :
" Elisha Williams and Reuben Swift were the proprietors of the village of Waterloo, and, having mapped and staked,off a plat, themselves and families and. several friends with their families settled down and commenced improvements in an unbroken forest save the turnpike, the tavern, and toll-gates near either end of the street. About this time the improvement of boat navigation was begun by. the Seneca Lock Company. A canal was opened having a width of forty feet, and a depth of three to four, with locks, the remains of which may be seen near thp woolen factory. This ditch, with a fall of fifUen to eighteen feet, made a good water-power, on which was built tho large mills of Reuben Swift & Co. ; A large hotel stood nearly opposite the mills, and was later known as the Americaii. House. It was burned years ago. The large stone house of Charles Swift,'
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
afterwards used as a meeting-house, was built, besides a few shops and dwellings. Digging the canal and making the locks gave an impetus to business and collected a population of several hundred energetic mechanics and business men. Main Street, from the court-house to the mills, comprised the village. Williams Street was opened from Virginia to Inslee Street, with a few cross streets, but no business house. A thick forest, within a few rods, skirted the whole north line, and 'the winding canal was the south boundary. The cluster of buildings named formed a business point at the east end of the street, the old Eagle Tavern, the bank hou-se just finished by Martin Kendig, Esq., as a dwelling, a store-house, lately moved to make way for the Academy of Music, with some smaller shops and dwellings, made the centre, while about equal progress was made at the west end, where the court-house, a store, and several shops were in process of con-, struotion. There were, therefore, three distinct, distant, and somewhat rival localities, so far separated that no two could be seen from the same point, and tending to detract from the activity of smaller and more compact towns. In the year 1818 there were ten or twelve public houses in the vicinity and place, and all did a lively business. The Erie Canal was surveyed and started just north of the village through the.forest about the line of North Street. There was a good prospect of its being worked through, but unfortunately it was carried some twelve miles north and its advantages lost. From 1816 to 1822 JIain Street, about a mile in length, contained the whole town. There were some few good buildings, and along the street were many temporary board shanties. The street was graded only as the turnpike laborers had rounded up about a rod in the centre, with a deep ditch on each side. Three gulches were crossed by log or plank crossways, barely wide enough for one team at a time to pass in safety. Near the Yost House was a sand hill where big teams had to splice or hitch two teams to one wagon to drag up a gully extended between the Eagle Tavern and the old man- sion, where, to run off the narrow crossing, would take a team over head ; and a second gully, near Fatzinger's brick storehouse, where the small culvert in a wet time was gorged with water, and a pond formed across the road only to be crossed by ferry. Sidewalks were made of single slabs, and gulch&s crossed by foot-bridges. Two or three chuiches were organized early, and meetings were held in the old academy, the court-house, and in private dwellings. Lawyers were numerous and eminent iu their profession. Land titles, disputed claims, boundaries, and mort- gage sales gave work to all. Well-read and skillful physicians there were; but new-comers from older settled tracts had to undergo acclimation, and were subject to ague and bilious attacks, which, in time, passed off and left the settler free to labor and imjirove his stat^.' Merchandising and shopkceping was extensively engaged in, and each store, not limited as now to a specialty, was crowded with articles for sale, from dry-goods, hardware, crockery, and groceries to a good assortment of liquors and wines, freely offered to friend and customer. Improve- ments were carried forward with energy; illustrative of which is the fact that the Central Buildings, a block of nine, were put up all at once and finished in ninety days, 'and an opposite block of four in the same time.
CHAPTEK VIL
A NEW COUNTRrr-^KINDS OF TKEES, GAME, HOUSES, AND. FORNITUBE — CLIMATE A^^) DRESS — CHARACTER OF SETTLER— MANNERS AND CUSTOMS, AND .CONTRAST. WITH THE PRESENT DAT.
Prior to, the close of the War of 1812, and particularly before the War for Independence, the colonists clung to the coast, or' ventured out into the foresfe with caution ; but the raid of Sullivan and the victories of Wayne and Harrison crushed the siivage power, and men went boldly and alone far out into the woods and.indepcndently chose and improved such spots as met their fancy. In Seneca there WHS a deiise and almost unbroken forest ; beneath was a tangled mass of brier and brush. In Tyre and Varick are extended areas of swamp, rich in ele- ments of production, useless, from their location, until drained. Upon the ridge .between the; lakes houses were raised, commanding views obtained, and clear- ings made down (he slopes. The oak, whitewood, beach, maple,' basswood, white- ash, hickory, and other kinds .of timber existed in profusion, and trees were regarded as an incubus to tillage rather than as a valuable adjuAct of a farm. .The woods are leveled now, and their screens of trees but veil the fields beyond. In early times Seneca gave fine opportunity to enjoy the pleasures of the chase ; these were the never-failing hunting-grounds of the Iroquois. These lands gave paltiotic pride' to them, aiid.wh.en compelled to yield them to the dominant race they. lost their sense of ownership with a pain'at lieart. ' Often and often had they thought what the poet 'has put in Iverse: ■" This is Biy own, my native land ;"
and when the spirit of the Seneca had departed and the rapacious borderer envied him the ownership of a few acres. Red Jacket thus vividly and feelingly com-, miserates the condition of his tribe ; " We stand, a small island in the bosom of the great waters, — we are encircled, we are encompassed. The Evil Spirit rides upon the blast, and the waters are disturbed. They rise, they press upon us, and the waves once settled over us we disappear forever. Who then lives to mourn us? None. What marks our extinction ? Nothing. We are mingled with the common elements."
Submitting to the inevitable, they yielded to the frontiersmen, but partially exercised their rights to hunting, and then abandoned their forests forever. The settler often found the deer feeding with his cattle, and venison contributed largely to the comforts of the table. It was customary among the hunters when a deer was killed to flay and dress the body and .hang it in a tree, and then con- tinue the pursuit of others until they had obtained as much as all the party could carry to their homes. Rights of ownership were scrupulously regarded, and no resentment was more fierce than that which arose from eontroverey as to rights; the carcass on the tree was as safe from theft as are notes and- bonds within a time-set safe with combination lock attached to-day. The wolf ranged the woods, and woe to the flock found unprotected ! Their mangled, half-eaten bodies would meet the eye of the settler in search of them.' It is related of a farmer that one night," aroused by a battering at his door, he rose and opened it, and income a bleating wether, as' though he said, " Thy flock were quietly resting" in umbrageous woods, when fierce and hungry wolves set on and tore them, and I alone escaped to tell thee." For in the morning the entire flock, save the saga- cious wether, was found destroyed. It is not known that man has been attacked by them. The animal is by nature cowardly, and becomes formidable only when a.ssembled in packs and urged on by hunger. That the settlers found their pres- ence damaging and much desired their extermination is shown by an order given by the town oflicials of Junius, in 1804, that a bounty of five dollars be paid for the scalp of every wolf slain in the County.
The bear, too, true to his instincts, was ever ready to help himself to a share of the settler's corn and swine ; and often the squealing of a hog called out the farmer with musket, club, and even armed with stones, to drive away the assailant. The bear in making an attack seized the hog by the back of the neck, and, hold- ing his victim fast, gnawed away until his prey was dead. A man named Alex- ander is reported to have gained the mastery of an enormous bear by pounding his nose with a club ; and such was his delight in troubling these shaggy natives of the forest, that he would steal their cubs and carry them about with him for the entertainment of children. It was wont to happen that when most needed the old family musket was not available. It' was loaned to a neighbor, or the fife- lock was just then in a disabled condition. In an emergency, however, our fathei-s had a way of their own to discharge a gun that would not go off in the ordinary way, as a single incident will show. A bear, accompanied with four cubs, was detected laying waste with lawless aggression a corn-field on or near the farm of John T. Demarest, and on close pursuit was obliged to ascend a large tree in the neighborhood. The best available gun had either a disabled lock or
was destitute of any; but while
holding the barrel leveled it at bruin,
other, with a coal of fire, touched it off. This light artillery practice waA i tinued iintil three of the cubs were secured against further aggression. It is re- lated by Mr. Gridley that, on one occasion, while the wife of John Knox and two companions were returning home from Geneva on horseback, a huge bear emerging from the woods appeared in front of them, and halted in the centre of ■the path. " The Ladies, as was quite natural, drew up abruptly. It was a mutual surprise, and each party, while reconnoitering the other, reflected upon the possi- bility'of effecting a retreat. Soon," however, like the bachelor under the gaze of beauty, bruin's heart failed him, and he hastened to hide his discomfiture in the recesses of the forest.
The first consideration of the early settler was a shelter for himself and family, andrfurniture was often the work of his own hands. The farm-house was built somewhat in this wise : its walls'werc of logs, notched, and the openings between chinked and plastered with mud ; its chimney of rudely-piled stones ; its "floors of split logs, with flat side up ; its apartments formed by blankets suspended from the ceiling; its doors hung on wooden hinges, and its windows formed of white, paper to let in light, and well saturated with grease in order to shed rain. Cephas Shekell, of Waterioo; advertises in the Wuta-ho Gazelle of July 16, 1817, that "having made an arrangement with the proprietors of the Ontario Glass Factory, he will always have on hand an extensive supply of that article of various sizes, to be disposed of by wholesale and retail, at the factory prices, free of trnnspoftii- tion." Hence we may infer that about this date glass was introduced for windows. Nor was the village' residence ii stately martsion. The shop or ofiice, the parlor, the kitchen, and the sleeping-room were often one and inseparable, and this, too, without carpet, and without papered or even plastered walls. In 1803, a resident
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HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK..
25
of Seneca, living on a farm a mile west of Seauyes, thus describes his father's dwelling at that date ; " We had," says he, " a two-story house, that is to say two stories on the ground ; first, the kitchen, built of round logs about ten inches in: diameter, properly notched together at the comers, and well chinked and plastered up with clay mortar, with front and back door; bass-wood logs, split in two, flat side up, made a very substantial floor ; the fire-place reached nearly across one end ; a stoue wall from the foundation was carried up about six feet, two sticks of the proper crook rested one on either end of the wall and against a beam .overhead, forming the jambs, and upon these rested the chimney, made of sticks and clay mortar, very wide at the bottom and tapering to the top, serving the purpose of both chimney and smoke-house ; the hearth was of flat stones about twelve feet by six. When a fire was to be built in winter, a horse was hitched to a log six or eight feet long, two or three feet in diameter, and snaked into the house, the horse passing through and out at the back door, and the log rolled on the fire- place ; this was called the back-log : next came a somewhat smaller log, which was placed on top and called the back-stick ; then came two round sticks from six to eight inches diameter and three feet long, the greenest and least combustible that could be found ; these were placed endwise against the back-log and served in place of the more modern andirons ; upon them was laid the fore-stick, and between this and the back-log dry limbs were piled in and a few pine knots, and the fire applied, and, when fairly started, an indefinite quantity of dry limbs from the fallen trees around. The fire thus buUt, which was usually done about four o'clock in the afternoon, would last a whole day with little attention, keeping the family and visitors, clad in good warm homespun, comfortably warm. The second story was somewhat aristocratic in finish and furniture. It stood some ten or twelve feet east of the first, and was constructed of hewed logs, without fire-place, and supplied with a Philadelphia ten-plate oven stove that would admit wood four feet long and maintain a heat of over eighty degrees in extreme cold weather."
In the year 1815 a house owned by Cornelius I. Smith stood in Waterloo on a corner lot now the property of Edward Fatzinger; it was moved in 1817 to the corner of William and Back, now Swift Street, and is the building known as the Grove Hotel. This edifice was two stories high, with a lean-to on the north used as a kitchen, dining-room, sitting-room, parlor, and bar-room. The west side of the house was a hall, having a floor one board in width. The house was sided to a point just above the lower story; the floor was of loose boards. Oliver Gustin occupied the room adjoining the addition, and Charles Swift lived in the front room. Partition walls were made by hanging up blankets and coverlids, and cooking was done either at Smith's fire in his parlor, or by one in the open air, the house having but a single chimney ; washing was done at the river bank. To reach the upper story, a ladder was made by nailing board strips across the studding of the wall. . The floor of the chamber was sufficiently wide for a bed in each corner. These beds were made upon the floor, and reached by a narrow board extending from the ladder to the bed.' The furniture was an after consideration. At the fire-place were hooks and trammel, the bake-pan and the kettle; at the side of the room and about it stood a plain deal table and flag-bottomed chairs, and the easy high backed rocker. Upon the shelf were spoons of pewter, blue-edged plates, cups and saucers, black earthen tea-pot ; in one corner stood the tall Dutch clock, in another the old- fashioned high-post and corded bedstead, covered with quilts, a curiosity of patch- work and laborious sewing each of them ; then the ubiquitous spinning-wheel, and not unfrequently a loom.
The climate of Seneca has shown extremes, but the vicinity of the lakes, owing to the equalizing influence of water upon the adjacent lands, tends to produce uni- formity. In Fayette, located in latitude 42° 50' and at an elevation of four hundred and sixty feet, the mean temperature has been noted as 48.38. The highest tem- perature of the atmosphere for five oontinuous years was 90°, and the lowest 2°, —a result exhibiting a freedom from those extremes which try the constitution in other localities, and tend to protract existence. There are many aged persons now residents of the County, who may attribute their preservation to this health- ful mean temperature, and whose longevity thus practically attests the salubrity of the climate. There is at present living near Magee's Corners, in the town of Tyre, a venerable man named Aaron Easton, who, born at Morristown, New Jersey, oo February 6, 1775, and moving hither many years ago, has reached the age of full one hundred and one years. What but the excellent climate and invigorating life of the farmer have protracted his life beyond the common lot? The clothing worn in early days was generally the same in all seasons, and shocks to the system elsewhere, owing to unprepared-for extremes, were here unknown. The farmers of the olden time generally clothed themselves in garments made in their own families, both as a matter of necessity and economy. The matrons and maidens of long ago found pleasant music in the buzz of the spiuning-wheel atid in the double shake of the loom; .The long web unfurled like a carpet, bleached in the sun under their care and supervision, and, with no foreign aid save that of carding and fulling mills, the wool of their own sheep was manufactured into
clothing called home-made, and worn common. Sabbath and holidays were occa- sions when " boughten clothes" were used, although it was not infrequent that, Sabbath-day suits made by mother, wife, or daughter, were worn with laudable, pride. British goods were worn in large towns, and discreet matrons hazarded the remark, with reference to the gay attire of the city belles, that " They had better wear more clothes for comfort, and less for mere ornament." There was fashion in those days, but it was less exacting than now, and the same style had a more permanent existence. The calico dress made by the hands of the wearer, and often a common and generally improved pattern, served both for parlor at home and the party abroad ; since it remained new two or three years, a lady seldom excused herself from a social gathering with the plea of " nothing to wear." There are old ladies living in Seneca who wrought three or four weeks at the spinning-wheel to obtain means to purchase a pair of shoes, which lasted as many years. The girls used to .go out to spin at six shillings per week, or do house-work for a dollar. There was little factitious distinction, and many warm and generous fricndshij)s. The love of liberty and the maintenance of lofty senti- ments are cherished by industry, and no dignity of character is more precious than that derived fi-om conscious worth. ■ Young and old had their amusements, partaken of with hearty zest. There were huskings and quiltings, wood-chop- pings and apple-parings, and the knitting societies for the benefit of the poor, and each was a joyous gathering. There was profit in the work, and th»-life and zest of social enjoyment. Visits deserved the name : several went together ; cards and calls were unknown, and if the visited chanced to be absent, it served as a reason to call again. The sleigh-ride was full of life and freshness, and the woods rang with the merry laugh and the chorused song. The lumber sleigh was deep and roomy, the horses fleet of foot, the bells of respectable circumference, and their music kept time to the stroke of nimble hoof. Horseback riding, for busi- ness and pleasure, was common to both sexes, since horses could pass where trees and stumps forbade the use of wheeled vehicles. It seems that there was music, too, as, for example, a lady found herself in the following dilemma when urging her way on horseback from " The Kingdom" to the village of Seauyes. On setting out, her husband had furnished her a stick for a.switch, to use in quickening the movements of her steed, since being timid a speedy journey was desirable. The stroke of the rod was answered by an echo ; the louder the echo, the greater the alarm of the rider. Alarm merged into terror, quicker and heavier fell the blows, and the forest seemed, to resound with dreadful noise of wild beast and savage men in hot pursuit. Assisted from the saddle at the house of a relative, the lad;^ expressed belief that she had not breathed since leaving home.
Now all is changed in party, work, in dress, and modes of travel. There is more form and less enjoyment. The spinning-wheel and loom are in the garret, displaced by melodeon, cabinet^organ, or piano. No need of thimble or sewing- bird where rattles the sewing-machine. Store clothes monopolize the market, and the former journey of a month is accomplished in a day.
CHAPTER VIIL
CLEARING LANDS — PRODDCTS — RESORTS — TAVERN-KEEPINO — TRADE — A SET- TLER'S RECOLLECTIONS.
Memories throw a mellowed radiance over the deeds of the past as the tale of Washington at Trenton enlivens the gloomy close of 1775. To-day, aside from speedy transit and neighbors near, the work of clearing is continued, and nearly every State has territory in its natural condition. The work of clearing lands vasjilain, hard labor; and they who survive at this late day, when asked for early history, can only tell what we have outlined in this and previous chap- ters, varied only by differing dates and names and place of settlement.
Just prior to 1804, the people, recovering from the prostration of the Kcvo- lution, with few exceptions were poor. The Continental currency was worthless, there was a lack of confidence in any paper money, and, with little specie, pay- ments were made by offsets of goods and labor. Pioneers came on and bought a piece of land, for which they paid a part and trusted to time and crops to meet the balance. When these failed the lots were sold by default and foreclosure. Volume I., No. 6, of the Waterloo Gazette of 1817, has six of its sixteen col- umns occupied by mortgage sales, defaults, and notices of insolvency, and Martin Van Buren, Attorney-General at the time, had advertised the sale of many mort- gaged lots in the Cayuga Reservation. There is a talk of hardships borne, but when a settler, perliaps with sickness in his family and obliged to work outside and cook within, had toiled early and late to clear some ground of heavy timber and then had lost his land and labor, that was in truth a pitiable case.
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
Go back a period of seventy years and see, in the spring of 1806, David Grif- fin at work on , land inclosed by Cotton, Eber Barons on the farm of Nicholas Thompson, and Albert Wyckofif on the meadow of the Trask fai-m, and from the firat pages of Mynderse's methodical book of contracts read the following : "October 7, 1S05. Agreed with David Griffin to clear a piece of land inclosed by W. Cotton, in the following manner and On the following conditions, viz. : To' clear off all the timber and brush of every description, — to grub it, to plow it three' times, tbe first plowing to be in the spring, .to harrow it four times, to inclose the whole in good fences of oak or ash rails, at least eight fails high and locked, and to furnish what rails shall be necessary to do the same, and to have the work completed by October 20, 1806. I am to pay him ninety-five dollars for ten acres, to furnish a hand to work at grubbing one week, to furnish the necessary teams, drags, plows, and grubbing-hoes, said Griffin to be at the expense of boarding himself and hands." Then, travel from day to day through the woods, and every now and then approach a clearing where sprouting, logging, and burning heaps of brush is going on, and there before you is the settler's history, — his work at clearing.
Chopping was done by system. The uniform rate was five .dollars per acre. Three trees were to be left standing on each' acre ; " roil-bodies" — the bodies of large trees, against which log heaps were to be made — were to be provided to the number of five. The choicest oak and white-wood were cut in logging lengths of about sixteen feet and burned on the ground. Should a settler, falling sick, get behindhand, a day was set when neighbors came, with axes and yokes of oxen, to help him up. Ox-teams were everywhere employed. It was common for a farmer who had no yoke of cattle of his own, to go and help his neighbors get the log-heaps in place for burning, and, when ready, they would come and give him a log-rolling. Often the settlei-, having spent the day at a logging-bee, has passed the night in kindling up and keeping his log-heaps burning. It was customary to chop a- piece in winter to plant in corn ; then, when dry in spring, fire would be set and tb'e brush burned where it lay. If the fire swept the field the ground was in good condition for a crop. The matted roots of vegetation and decaying leaves contributed .by their ashes to fertilize the ground. In those
rid fires by night gave
sprm
1 the woods were often dark with smoke
to the scene a weird aspect. Here, a dead and hollow tree blazed like a furnace from the top, and on the clearing could be seen a freshly-kindled heap in lively flame, and others smouldering in red coals with scorching heat. If the season, far advanced, did not admit full clearing, the various crops of corn, pumpkins, turnips, and potatoes were planted irregularly amidst the blackened logs. ^ There was no hoeing needed, but it was necessary to go through and pull up or cut down the fire-weed, which, from a questionable germ, sprang up numerous and rank on new cleared lands. It was soon exterminated with a few successive crops. By some, wheat and rye were sown after corn, but in general a special piece was cleared, sowed, and harrowed in. Husbandry was in a crude state, and hoes and drags were the implements for putting in the crop. The drag was made by the settler himself. Two round or hewed sticks were joined at one end and braced apart by a cross-piece forming an "A." Seven heavy teeth were put in, four on one side and three on the other. There were many instances of harrows with wooden teeth. Fields were tilled three years before plowing, to allow time for the roots to decay. Clumsy plows were used, with wooden mold-board, home- made, and plow-shared from the east.
The lands of Seneca have.ever been most productive of wheat, but the absence- of transportation in an early day made prices low. Williamson, of Geneva, in 1792, cut a road by way of 'Williamsport, Pennsylvania, to Baltimore, and wheat which brought a dollar at Bath was only sixty cents at Geneva, owing to .lack of good roads. In 1816 a bushel of wheat was wo'rth in tbe towns of Seneca but two shillings and sixpence per bushel, and a pound of tobacco brought the same price. . Many farmers raised their own tobacco, since merchants would exchange goods for wheat, but tobacco was cash. Corn and. oats; known as coarse grains, were consumed at home, or sold to tavern-keepers for the stage-horses and for teams (engaged in drawing goods from Albany to Bufl'alo and points between. AVheat, flour, and potash were transported east. Beef and pork were worth from (wo to two and a half doUius per hundred pounds. Ashes was the only article that at one period (1816) would. bring a fair price, and with it tea and spices were purchased.
James B. Darrow says, " In 1818, we (father and family) went to Phelps, Ontario County, on a visit to an uncle, and were told by him that one day a large cight-borsc wagnn from Albany was in Geneva, and the proprietor was endeavor- ing til contract with a merchant for a load of wheat at three shillings a bushel, but the latter could not make out a full load. Darrow told tho teamster to go with him homo four miles distant and he would, load him up for two shillings and sixpence per bushel. The offer was accepted, provided Darrow would keep pur- chaser and. iia teams over night without charge. The wagon was loaded with
two hundred biisheh and took its departure." Potatoes, corn-bread, pork, and maple-sugar were food. , It is said that in one corner of many a fire-place was a porridge-pot and adye-pot in the other. Mush and milk, when milk could be had, were, quite a luxury. Large quantities of whisky were distilled from rye. Nearly every farmer had a portion of bis grain worked into whisky. by the small log- built distilleries that abounded along the banks of Seneca Kiver. Old residents affirm that without the stimulus of ardent spirits the toil and privation would have been unendurable, while others ever regarded its influence as highly pernicious.
In 1810.. the population of Seneca, then embracing a much greater area than at present, was sixteen thousand six hundred and nine, and in this County there were twenty-six distilleries, whose product for that year was fifty -one thousand two hundred and twenty gallons, the average price per gallon being eighty cents, and the total value forty thousand nine hundred and seventy-six dollars. The dis- tillery is cotemporary with the grist-mill, and both were often found combined.. Martin Kendig, Jr., came to Scauyes in 1794, and carried on distilling in a building a little northeast of the log mill earlier described, and made the real copper-distilled rye whisky. Samuel Bear had a small affair which was kept con- stantly running; and two brothei-s, Ezra and Stephen Baldwin, ran a still at the upper end of what was known as the Island. On the commencement of business at the old Red Mill in Seneca, distilling went with it. : These stills consisted of two small copper stills, and the "mash" was stirred by band. In those days drinking was general, and every job of raising, log-rolling, running the rapids, muster and training, and celebration of any kind, was a sober affair without liquor.
On the occasion of rsusing the first store in 'Waterloo, a builder, standing on the ridge-pole of the new frame in honor of Elisha 'Williams, of Hudson, de- clared the building "The Flower of New Hudson," and Went through the cere- mony of sending a bottle of whisky to the ground. "Uncle Larre," the pilot of the rapids, while attempting- their ascent, would toil with his hardy crew for hours, gaining foot by foot, when suddenly the craft would cease to advance, reel off right or left, and speed down to the foot of the rapids. Then '\''an Cleef 's order rang out, "Ashore with the painter, and make fast;" followed by " Stand by to splice the main brace,'.' — ^that is, " Take a drink of whisky all around." This having been done with hearty good will, the boat pushed off and renewed the attempt.
The favorite resorts of the convivially inclined were the taverns, some of which obtained a local celebrity. Among these were heard the names of Whisky Hill, The Kingdom, the Globe at Seneca, and tho Eagle of 'Waterloo. 'While some public houses were well worthy the name, there were scores whose chief aim was the sale of liquor by those who were averse to honest industry as applied to bard labor. With the completion, later, of the Erie Canal, the taverns found their occupation gone as the great heavy wagons disappeared from tbe turnpike road. The toll-gates were taken away, the keepers discharged, and the western emigrants went bag and baggage by canal. The old road seemed deserted, the signs of " Cakes and Beer sold here" were taken down, the house became a dwelling where some remained, while others sold and elsewhere resumed their calling. " The Kingdom" was a small place midway between Scauyes and Mynderse's Mills. There lived Pontius, Hooper, Lewis Birdsjdl, and John Knox, — men of celebrity in their day, and there occurred various incidents of which but few remain to us. A single well-known instance will suffice. H. F. Gustin, and several other boys of that day, had taken' their fish-poles and gone down the riyer one Sunday to fish. The day was hot, the fish were shy. Reach- ing " The Kingdom," the thirsty boys went to Mr. Hooper's for a drink of water. Setting their poles against the house, the boys went in, and Mr. Hooper, at the bar in his shirt slegves, waiting on his customers, gave the water asked for. Just then several young men- who had been out hunting came in, set their guns against the bar, and called for " drinks.". Meanwhile Charley Stuart, a preacher of those days, was exhorting to an .audience of from, fifteen to twenty-five persons, seated about the bar-room. While expatiating upon the ill effects of breaking tbe Sab- bath, and advbing more exemplary behavior on that day, he startled his hearers and administered a rebuke that will live while every one who was present sur- vives. With heavy stroke of clinched fist he struck tho desk, and thus ex- pressed himself: " Brethren, ye'U tak yure. fishing tackle an' go down tha stream for fish upon the Sabbath,^ye'll not find the Lord there. 'Ye tak ycr guns upon ycr shoulder an' gang to the woods a hunting, — ye'll nae find the Lord there. Ye'U go to auld Tom McCurdy's cock-fighting on Sabbath, and ye'll nae find the Lord THERE. But just come up to auld Stuart's church, and there ye'U find the Lord upon tho spot."
Stuart became chaplain to a regiment which went out in 1812, and made him- self conspicuous at the battle of Queenstown, where, after using all his powera of persuasion to induce the soldiers to cross the river, he went over himself and was soon engaged in the hottest of the fight.
ILATIE" "Tin
mSTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
Illastrative of the subjects treated in this chapter, we give an abbreviated sketch of an Old settler's recollections. James B. Darrow was born one mile east from Aurora, Cayuga County. In June, 1809, the family, consisting of parents, two sisters, and himself, he led by his mother, left their home and walked to Aurora. There taking boat, the family crossed the Seneca and landed in this County at the habitation of John Sinclair, near the present residence of Aaron Christopher, in the town of Romulus. Thence proceeding west, along the highest ground, they followed winding footpaths to'Romulusyille, then a cluster of a few log houses. Darkness came on, and the little party stopping by the way at the house of James jMonroe, father of Stephen and grandfather of John Monroe, a torch of hickory bark was procured to light the path; another mile, and " home" was before them, but incomplete. But half the roof was on, and the floor of split bass-wood logs was but partly laid ; but these were soon put in place. The children gathered wild gooseberries, whortleberries, and, later in the season, cran- berries. They strolled along the Cayuga shore, and gathered abundance of wild plums. The father had made maple-sugar and syrup in the spring, and stored the latter in rude vessels made of white-wood, and this forest sweet enhanced the enjoyment of many meals. Mr. Darrow, Sen., was a carpenter, and in the fall of 1808 had taken the contract with Captain Marvin to build tltf old Presby- terian church, which stood just west of Romulusville, upon a site now used for a cemetery. Darrow was a carpenter, his wife a weaver. The former, working at his trade, had bought one hundred acres, and hired the clearing done. In lieu of oil, or even tallow, hickory bark gathered during the day was burned at night. The children kept up the light, which usually burned dimly. The family suffered several summers with the fever and ague. The mother carded her wool with hand cards, and colored it with butternut bark. Summer clothing was made from the fibre of flax. Darrow moved in 1812 to Auburn, Cayuga County. While he followed his trade, the mother boarded army officers. Money called shinplasters was very plenty with them and the teamsters. The paper was issued by many parties, and, for lack of better, continued to pass. Army wagons, loaded with stores, with four to six span of horses and a leader attached, continually passed and repassed. The tires of the wagon-wheels, which were very high, were six to eight inches in width. The opprobrious term of " Blue- Light Federalist" was applied in •those days to those who sought to escape the draft. Three years elapsed, and Darrow returned to Romulus. Old neighbors were there, and many new ones had moved in. The roads were straightened, new houses erected, and at Canoga Spring a clothiery and fulling works had been built by Archibald Packard. Church was attended in an ox-sled, with a bundle of rye for a seat, and an ox-chain on the stakes to lean upon. Tlie family acquired a horse, and the parents went on horseback to church or visiting, the mother riding behind and holding fast to her husband. Kev. Charles Mosher was then the minister, soon succeeded by Moses Young, from Phelps. During the pastorate of Mr. Mosher, a Mr. Fuller was appointed to take charge of the boys, who were made to sit together, and at Sabbath-school recite portions of the " Old Assembly Catechism." Rev. Young permitted the boys to sit with their parents. Schools taught in log houses by Eastern teachers became com- mon. Money became worthless, and three dollars were paid per bushel for wheat. Crops failed in 1816. Frosts occurring every month, destroyed corn — the staple crop. People could not get money, and they dare not run in debt. The person of a debtor could be taken and confined in jail according to a law repealed in 1821. The people were poor, and a "fellow-feeling made them won- drous kind." A bond of friendship was then in force, which in these later days has become extinct.
Darrow's father built a house ; the owner could sell nothing to..pay for the work. He confessed judgment, and turned out some cows for sale to pay the debt. The cattle were bid ofl' to Darrow at eight dollars per head, and he felt
poorer
with than without the stock, for
was injured by the falling of a brace at a ra widow endeavored to hold the farm and f and fatted them ; one was given'to Dr. Ma per hundred. Then the farm was rented.
Iiad no use for them. Mr. Darrow 5ing, and soon afterwards- died. His ly the debts. She owned two hogs, ■vin, on a claim, at thirteen shillings James was dressed in new clothing.
and apprenticed to a wagon-maker. The first job was the wood-work of a lumber wagon, for which seventy-five pounds of maple-sugar and four gallons of molasses were to be paid. The second job was the making of a wagon, for which a three- year-old steer was given in payment ; this a drover took oflf their hands for thirteen dollars.
CHAPTER IX.
EAULT PREACHERS AND
SCHOOLS AND TEACHERS — MARRIAGES,
AND CEMETERIES.
Wherever the smoke of the settler's cabin rose, there soon came the circuit rider, bound on his mission of good. Traversing swamp, trail, and forest path, he'fbund cordial welcome everywhere. Arousing strong opposition, he had power in the truths of the gospel, expressed in plain speech, and illustrated from the boundless volume of nature. The first ministers who visited this region of country were Methodists. Upon mules or horses they went upon their extended circuit, preaching day and evening. The early circuit embraced a journey of four himdred miles. Private house and school-house were used wherever the people could be called together.
The first of these pioneers was James Smith, in 1793 ; then came Alward White; after him followed Joseph Whitby and John Lockby, in 1795; Hamilton Jefferson and Anning Owen, in 1796. Johnson Denham comes with Owen next year; then James Stokes and Richard Lyon in 1798, and Jonathan Bateman in 1799. Daniel Dunham and Benjamin Bidlack trod this sparsely settled region in 1800; David James and Joseph Williamson in 1801; Smith Weeks and John Billings in 1802; Griffin Sweet and Sharon Booth in 1803; and Roger, Benton, and Sylvester Hill in 1804. The memories of these men are unknown to few, if any, living. But what a life was theirs ! A pair of saddlebags contained their wardrobe and their library. Often their sleep was in the woods ; reckless of the wolf, they laid them down, and, rising, journeyed on to preach in school-house, barn, or wood. It was not till 1807 that other churches made their appearance by the organization of societies, although local preaching had occurred. . Mean- while, two by two changed each year. The following fulfilled their mission here from 1805 to 1809: Thomas Smith and Charles Giles, William Hill and Wil- liam Smith, Benjamin Bidlack and Lawrence Riley, then Bidlack and Clement Hickman. All honor bo these men! Though they have gone from us, their memories are preserved in the ennobling influences created and fostered by their honest teachings.
The first Methodist church was built at Taunton, now Townsendville, some time in 1809 or 1810, while Isaac Teller and Amos Jenks, or John Rhodes and Daniel Baines were on that circuit. The first Church formed in Seneca County was organized by the Baptists in 1805; a second in Tyre by Baptists, s,ameyear, by Elder Don Ralph. The exercises were conducted by Elder Thomas, at the house of Bassler King, a settler in Ovid, in 1793, from Dutchess County, New York. About this time a log house was built about three-quartere of a mile southwest of Lodi village, near Halsey's grist-mill. It was a rude affair, not used in winter, and taken down after some ten years' service. It was a Union Church, since Rev. Clark held service for the Presbyterians, and Rev. Wisner for the Baptists. In 1807 or 1808, the Baptists put up a small frame hou.se, about a mile and a quarter west of Lodi. The hou.se was inclosed, but never finished. The members living south caused a removal of the site, and the erection of a new house some four miles south of the old one. The old building has long since passed out of exi.st- euce. It is probable that the first church in the County was a structure built at the Thomas's settlement, about three miles north of Truniansburg. Under the ministration of Elder Thomas, a revival occurred in the winter of 1809-10. Twenty-two persons were baptized by the Elder, in Cayuga Lake, before leaving the water. The first frame church finished in the town of Ovid was constructed by the Dutch Reformed denomination. Four or five miles southeast of Ovid village was quite a settlement of New Jersey people, whose pastor came out with them. Their house was put up by John J. Covert, between the years 1807-8 ; Rev. Brokaw was the preacher, and Joshua Covert the chorister. In front of the pulpit was a small platform, about two steps high, upon which the chorister would stand. Before him was a shelf to hold his books. The pitch was given by the aid of a little box containing a slide; time was beat by the swing of his right arm, and the entire congregation joined in singing. At that time there were no arrangements for heating the churches, and each sat out the sermon as best he could, and the "in conclusion" were welcome words, especially to the younger portion of the congregation. Some old ladies carried with them to church what was called a "foot-stove," whose use is indicated by its name, and a sample of which is placed in the Historical Rooms at Waterloo. Winter's attendance upon divine service was a kind of penance, although not intended as such. A Presby- terian society was organized in Junius, August 10, 1807, by Rev. Jedediah Chapman. The assembly met in the large and commodious frame barn owned by Colonel Daniel Sayre, and was known as the " Fir.^Jt Presbyterian Church of Junius." The barn stood north of the turnpike, on the hill, a short distance west of the old Cayuga bridge. David Lum, Peter Miller, Stephen Crane, and John Pierson were ordained ruling elders ; David Lum and Peter Miller were ordained
HISTOEY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
deacons ; and Peter Miller and his wife, Sophia, David Lum and Charity, his wife, Stephen Crane, John Pierson, John Church and wife, James Hunter and wife, Nicholas Squires and Thomas Armstrong and their wives, Thomas Neal, Mrs. Lambert Van Aelstyne, and Anna Smith, seventeen persons in all, were admitted to membership. Eev. Charles Stuart was installed pastor August 20, 1808, at this barn, and served till 1812. Occasional services were held by Rev. C. Mosier till 1814, when Kev. Shipley Wells regularly supplied the pulpit a year, after -which, from time to time, various others succeeded till the building of a church at Seneca Falls. Town and city histories will continue the record of those given, and that of others of which these are but examples.
It has been asserted that education is hereditary. The educated seek to confer the advantages of the schools upon their children. If this be true, then the- pioneers of Seneca County were not an illiterate people. No sooner had a few settlers got their cabins raised and &xed so that they could live in them than a school was talked of. There w^as no law regulating schools, no school districts, no law requiring qualified teachers, and no grammar and geography taught in those schools. The school-books of the day were "Webster's Speller," the New Tes- tament, the "American Preceptor," the "English Reader," "Dillworth and Pike," and the " Federal Educator." Few advanced far in arithmetic, and those who studied Murray, later, were thought "full high advanced." In any locality, whenever sufficient families were near enough to form a school, all would turn out with axes, handspikes, and oxen, and chop and draw logs to a chosen site, and put up a school-house. While some put up logs, split clap-boards for the roof, and drew stone for the fire-place, others prepared sticks and mud for the chimney, and if any of the settlers owned a wagon it was his lot to go to the saw-mill for a load of boards and slabs. The floor being laid, next came the writing-tables and seats. Holes were bored in the logs and sticks driven in, boards laid on for the former, and holes bored in the slabs and legs put in for the latter. The hotise built, a teacher was wanted. It was customary for the person desiring to keep school to visit the different families within reach of the school-building and can- vass for scholars. If sufficient were secured to insure him ten dollars to twelve dollars per month, a school was opened. The customary rate was one dollar and fifty cents per scholar for thii-teen weeks. Simple rudiments did not seem to require high-priced schoolmaster?. Summer schools were rare. Of early schools, a few are noticed here. During the year 1795, the first school in Ovid was taught by Benjamin Hunger. The first school taught within the bounds of Seneca County was presided over by Hon. Lewis Cass, later United States Senator from Michigan. At this school, John B. Karr, of Varick, was a pupil. Mr. Karr, now seventy-three years of age, and born near Ludlow school-house, has distinct reoollectious of the early instructions of Cass as a schoolmaster. On June 16, 1801, a log school-house was constructed upon the bank of the mill-race, near the later residence of Mrs. Day, at Seneca Falls. This house combined the twin agen- cies of culture of the mind and heart, and on December 10, 1803, was temporarily occupied by a man named MuUer, together with his family, pending the building of a tavern of which he was the intended landlord. The first teacher in this school was Alexander Wilson ; Nancy Osman taught the first school in that part of Junius now called Tyre. The school-house was built in 1 804, and was much used for wor- ship. John Burton, later a lawyer at Waterloo, taught a school in what was eupho- niously named the Cranetown Academy, a log school-house in Tyre. The academy fell a prey to the devouring element in 1812, and improved houses replaced the loss. Isaac Gorham, son of the pioneer Jabez Gorham, was first to sway the ferule in the kingdom of letters in the village of Waterloo. The school of earliest date in that locality occupied a shanty vacated by a squatter, standing near what is now William Street, in the vicinity of the residence of the late Pet«r Smith. Later, Mr. Gorham was found teaching in a log building on or near the lot occu- pied by the residence of Dr. Gardine Welles, and previously used as a blacksmith's shop. H. F. Gustin and D. L. Kendig were pupils under Gorham's adminis- tration.
A second teacher in Waterloo pf that day was named Morrison, whose school was opened in a rude building which occupied the site of the present Gerart Fac- tory. On the south side of tht river, a little west of the cemetery lot, stood a building wherein II. Baker taught, and a choice of instructors was thereby offered and taken. Preparations for school, especially in autumn, were scarcely less exciting than the discipline succeeding. The shoemaker and the tailoress went from house to house to complete the outfit. Whatever the weather, no pupil suffered in health by want of ventilation in the school-room, nor was com- plaint made that the wood was too long for the stove. Samuel Bear, a pupil in a school taught by Master McCrate, gives the following programme of exercises : Calling school, by voice, or raps with ferule upon a window-sash. Alphabet cla.ss, arranged in semicircle about the chair, naming- letters indicated by the blade-point of a penknife. Writing: this exercise called on McCrate to set copies, write sample lines, and mend goose-quill pens. Arithmetic: tables and
rules recited, jind hard examples worked by the niaster;' Reading ; each read a paragraph or sentence, and the class dismissed. Spelling: studied, and class called. A miss-spell sent the unlucky wight to the, foot. The best speller rewarded by a merit. Roll-call : each replying " present" when named, proceeding to the door, turning, and bowing or dropping a " curchey," as the pupil chanced to be master or miss, bade the teacher " goqd-aftcrnoon." The" methods of teaching and discipline tended not less to physical than to mental development. There were no gymnasiums in those days, yet while Webster and Murray admin- istered to the inner man, the tingling birch and smarting ferule took good care of the oute): Moreover, the construction of the furniture gave the body exercise despite intention, for, as Dr. Gridley expresses it, —
*' The scats in use were slabs, with legs, in number, four. And so these quadrupeds sustained some ten or more. The desks were slabs at angle, cut and carved and maimed, And not by birch or ferule could jack-knives be restrained.
With naught to rest the back, too high to rest their feet; Turning, twisting, pinching, busy in keeping still, Grinding! Grinding!! Grinding!!! in Isaac Gorham's mill."
No inconsiderable portion of early history is that which speaks of i births, deaths, and funeral rites. The arrival of a new family, by boat or Penn- sylvania wagon, occasioned eager inquiry by young men as to whether any Marys or Betseys were"of the number. The demand was in excess of the supply. The same maiden had sometimes several suitors, which involved the delicate matter of rejection as well as choice. Sometimes the girls were betrothed before leaving home, and a knowledge of this fact caused disappointment. Whole families of daughters were rapidly disposed of. Probably the first marriages in Seneca took place in the southern part of the County. Three couples, in 1793, walking together to Seneca Lake, crossed over in a boat, and on the other shore found Justice Parker, who performed the ceremony of marriage. These peraons were Joseph Wilson and Anna Wyckoff, A. A. Covert and Catharine Covert, and Enoch Stewart and Jane Covert. Abraham A. Covert, the last survivor of this triple marriage, lately passed away, at the good old age of ninety-eight years. An early marriage at Scauyes was that of Job Smith to Miriam Gorham, in the year 1799. In 1809, John Knox wedded Mrs. Lueinda Winans, formerly Miss Keeler ; then John Watkins took to wife her sister May, and later, Caleb Loring made sure of her sister Betsey. Old citizens remember how Samuel Birdsall wedded Ann Eliza Kendig; Job White, Margaret Stebbins; Richard Bailey, Harriet Swift ; and Theopliilus Church, Temperance Den. Do they not recall that Content Standish was content to Jceeji company with Horace Shekel ; that Joshua Merrill went to see Sophia Custiss ; that David J. Baker paid attention to Sarah Fairchild ; and that everybody said that Caleb Fairchild was ffoinif to have Aurelia Maltby ? Weddings were free from formality and stiffness. Sim- plicity and hilarity were, the rules. On the occasion of the marriage of Job While, at the residence of Mrs. Quartus Knight, provision was made, not alone for invited guests, but for the neighbors in general. Most marriages were solemn- ized according to law by the Esquire. The parson did not object, since, while the former got most weddings, the latter got most fees. Squire Martin Kendig had joined a seeming happy couple at one time, and the next day the groom appeared and wished " to dissolve the bands," which the Justice declared uncon- stitutional, and therefore impossible.
Among the early white natives of Seneca County, were the following : Mi-s. Jane Goodwin, daughter of L. Van Cleef, born November 29, 1790, and the first born at Seneca Falls. A son to James McKnight was born in 1791, at Beary- town, now Fayette Post-office, in Varick. A daughter to George Faussett, in Lodi, claimed the first whito child born in this County. David Dunlap, son of Andrew, was born on February 2, 1793, upon lot No. 8, in the northwest part of the town of Ovid. First birth in Tyre, in 1794, was of Daniel, son of Ezekiel Crane, and that of John S. Bear, in 1797, was the first at Scauyes. Decay treads closely upon growth, and death came first in Seneca to George Dunlap, brother to Andrew, on September 24, 1791. In 1793, died the wife of Job Smith, followed, in 1802, by the decease of Mrs. Submit Southwick. On August 26, 1803, J. Disbrow died at Seneca Falls, while at Tyre the now dilapidated cemetery there was commenced by the interment therein of Sarah Traver, mother of Nicholas Traver. Two Revolutionary soldiers, John Gregory and James Hull, who had lived on Lot 97, in a rude house by the Outlet, near the residence of Alonzo Towsley, were the first persons buried on the north side at Waterloo, in ground now occupied by the residence of Isaac Thome.
The burial customs of seventy years ago differed much from those of the present day. When a death occurred, neighbors would call in, take the measure of the body, and get a plain coffin at a cost of rarely more than five dollars. A neigh- bor possessed of a team would bring the coffin to the house, and carry the body
HISTOEY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
to ttie grave. The charges of the sexton wore two dollars, and grave-stones were cheap. William Sutton early followed the trade of stone engraving. The stones were dark cobWe-stone, and were taken from the west side of Seneca Lake. Hun- dreds of these monuments may be seen in the cemeteries to-day. The headstones and coffins of the rich were of the same material as were those of the poor, dif- fering only in the size of the stone. Marble tombstones were introduced when the Erie Canal was finished, about the year 1824.
We close by an extract from the record of a town-meeting held at Ovid, April 1, 1800, referring to Lot No. 80, known as the "gospel and school lot," and as the burial place of Joshua Covert, iu 1799. *' Voted that the land appropriated to this town by Silas Halsey for a burying-ground is a burying for the town. Also a certain piece of ground on Lot No. 3, containing one acre, granted by John Seeley. Also voted tliat there be a burying-ground on Lot No. 24. Also voted that there shall be a sexton for each burying-ground. Jacob Striker, for No. 30 ; Enoch Manning, No. 45 ; Stephen Miller, No. 98 ; and William Brown for No. 3. Also voted that each sexton, for every grave he shall dig, shall have one dollar." In the cemetery, on Lot No. 30, originally containing an acre, now much more from additions, are buried most of the early settlers, and move soldiers of the Revolution than any other in the County. Here lie the remains of Van Doren, Bodine, Stull, Ballard, the Huffs, and Brokaw, a few named of the many.
CHAPTER X.
THE BOYS OF
To the boys of ISOO books were scarce, and newspapers among the gifts of the future. Whoever was the owner of a book loaned it to his neighbor ; it was care- fully read and promptly returned. A book was valuable, and a nice sense of honor forbade the return of a borrowed volume in worse condition th^n when loaned. Long miles the boys went for a book, then, prone upon the floor before the fire, they gathered the contents, oblivious of time or presence. One pamphlet, which found its way into many a cabin, was entitled " The Confession of John Ryan." Sheriff Hutchison arrested Ryan at the card-table fur debt. Ryan shot the sheriff dead and escaped. Traversing Seneca County, he reached and crossed Cayuga Lake in a stolen boat. Sinking the boat, he continued his flight. Finally returning, he was captured, tried, and executed. The wretched man attributed his crime to cards and whisky, and the influence of his confession was salutary.
The following is intended for the boys of 1876, and was originally penned by one who wrote from life. A boat-load of young men went to hunt deer upon Crusoe Island. The boat left them, to return in a week. Wolves, numerous and hungry, had driven off the deer. One of the youths went out alone in quest of game. A large black bear was seen upon a chestnut-tree, but disappeared before the hunter reached the spot. He .shot and dressed a squirrel, and then set out for camp. It grew dark, and the silence was broken by the prolonged howl of a distant wolf. Here and there an echoing howl replied, and soon a pack bad gathered where he had killed the squirrel, and then he knew they were following on his track. He reached and passed a spot where " Indian John" had battled with just such a pack all night. With clubbed rifle he had struck the nearest as their white fangs snapped at him. Morning had come, and the Indian, with torn arms, shattered gun, and dead wolves around him, had seen the pack leave with infinite relief; yet here the white boy was hurrying on and looking for a tree to climb, when the report of a signal gun from camp renewed his courage. The wolves came nearer, and at the discharge of his rifle stopped silent for a moment. Reloading, he hastened on, and again cheeked pursuit by firing ; a third shot was delivered close to camp, the wolves upon his heels. Driven off, the pack continued howling around the fires until daybreak dispersed them in the woods.
Cayuga Lake was a famous resort of large black ducks, which gathered there to feed upon the lily-pods. At what is known as the Mud Lock, at the foot of the lake, John Story mounted a gun that would carry nearly a pound of shot upon the bow of his boat, and when a discharge of the piece was made into a large flock of these ducks as many as forty were killed at a time.
Squirrels were so numerous, and depredated so upon the crops, that the set- tlers formed in companies, headed by their best marksmen, and gave a day to hunting them. Two thousand squirrels were slain at a single hunt. After the sport, came supper and spirits at some log tavern, the bill being paid by the .side
having least scalps. Black squirrels preceded, and gray followed, the advent of the white race. In the year 1805, or thereabouts, a boy of sixteen, living nearly two miles south of Cayuga, heard his dog barking in the woods about half a mile distant, and purposed to go and see what he had there. It was about nine o'clock and the night was very dark ; the mother objected to his going, as her husband was away at the time. The boy gained his point and set off with gun and axe, accom- panied by his younger brother, carrying a lighted torch of hickory-bark. The dog barked louder as the light drew near. Pushing their way through a thicket, they found there was something concealed in the thick leaves and branches of a large tree-top. While the younger boy held the torch, the elder, creeping under the top from the opposite side, groped his way up to some animal which turned towards . him, and then to the dog which had come closer. The glimmer of the li;:ht gave to- il a white appearance, and the boys, concluding it was a stray .slice;]!, called off the dog and went home. The father discredited the idea of a sheep, and next day saw signs of some animal and tracks of the dog, but no sheep. One day, some weeks later, father and son were seated upon a log, resting from their work of getting out timber, and eating their luncheon, part of which was roast venison, when their dog, growling, crouched at their feet. Set on, he bounded forward with a bark, and the back and tail of an animal were seen as it leaped away through the brush. The father, turning pale, exclaimed, " My God ! what a painter!" The panther prowled about the house all night. The father being called away on a journey, the boy determined to try a shot at the wild beast during his absence. The gun was cleaned and loaded with two balls, and John Updike and brother invited to come over and help " top" turnips, and bring along their " bear" dog. Night came; the dog was left out-doors, a torch made ready to light, and turnip-fopping began. Presently the large dog in the house began to growl, and the dog outside was heard loudly barking. The torch was lighted, the boy stole out, and some eight rods off saw the panther's glaring eves fixed upon the house. Gun in hand at the corner of the house, the boy could presently see tlie dark form outlined by the torchlight held by John Updike, while by him his brother Wil- liam held their dog. The gun was aimed between the panther's eyes, the trigger pulled, and the gun flashed. The torch fell, the dogs sprang out and seized the animal as he bounded upon his assailant. The Updike boys rushed into the house and closed the door. The panther's paw struck close to the youth as the dogs caught and held him. Successive blows laid out the wounded animals, and the fierce panther escaped to the woods and troubled them no more.
A farmer named Weyburn lived near Kidder's Ferry some time about 1800. Finding signs of a bear, he armed himself with pitchfork and hatchet, and with his son, a boy of ten or twelve, set out to find it. Presently the bear w.is seen in a ravine under a projecting cliff, and not far below was a basin or pool of water. Weyburn, pitchfork in hand, .advanced to the charge from below. When six to eight feet distant, instead of a lunge with the fork-tines at the bear, the latter threw his paws about the farmer and sunk his teeth in his left arm. In the struf^le bear and man rolled over and over towards the pool. Weyburn managed to thrust his right hand and arm partly down the bear's throat to strangle him, and together they rolled into the water. By a desperate effort tliu man forced the head of the bear under water, and, his son reaching him the hatchet, he sank it in the bear's skull and dispatched it. Weyburn dearly earned the four hundred pounds of bear-meat, as his arms were badly injured and his breast severely torn.
Adventures with the deer were numerous and exciting. One morning two brothers were sent into the " sugar-bush" for an iron pot which had been used in " sugaring off." The vessel secured, the boys were returning Indian-file, when suddenly from a thicket out dashed a herd of deer. A buck leaping a rotten log slipped, and, turning a somersault, fell upon his back with heels in air. One boy was for running in to cut his throat, but in a moment the deer was up and lunging forward, with lowered head and risen hair ; the boys ran behind trees, hotly pursued. At once, the buck stopped ; his tongue hung from a frothing mouth, his bloodshot eyes with malicious cunning watched a chance to rush upon the boy behind the tree. The latter caught a club and struck the deer upon the nose, and stunned him, so he i'ell, his neck between a sapling and the tree. A moment, and the boys had bent the sapling down upon his neck, and held him fast. The hoofs flew like drum-sticks in the air, but soon the jack- knife severed the jugular, and the exultant boys hastened homo to tell their parents, " We have killed a deer." The Cayuga and Seneca were frequent resorts for deer when pursued by men or dogs. One day the baying of some hounds, each moment sounding louder, told a parly which stood below the high bank on the west shore of Cayuga that game was heading towards them ; presently a deer sprang from the bank above, upon the ice, out fi-om the shore. The impetus carried him forward several rods, and then he rose to run. The ice gave way ; the luckless deer, in trying to regain a footing, broke both forelegs, sank back exhausted, and drowned.
HISTORY OF SENECA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
Among the reptiles of the early day, rattlesnakes were lu They lived in dens among the rocks in winter, and in the spring days crawled out to bask amid the sunshine. Of their resorts were the rocks near Cayuga Lake, in Ovid, a den lialf a mile west of C.iuoga Spring, the present site of the Courier office at Seneca Falls, and the Reslvale Cemetery. A Mrs. Conner, a widow, died from the result of a hite received near the " Old Red Mill," at Seneca Falls. The power of imagination is shown hy the following in this connection : A pioneer was engaged in cutting some whortleberry hu.<lies with a shai-p bush- hook. As he strack among tlie brakes with haii.l l.iw duwn, a huge rattlesnake sprang out and struck his arm above the elliow. The settler fell back, aud, groaning with pain, called to his .son near by that he was bitten by a snake. And so he seemed to be, with blood upon his shirt-sleeve. The boy, looking at the writhing serpent, saw that the head was .severed from the body, and hung by a shred of skin, and that the bloody stump had struck the sleeve. The father seeing this forgot his pain, and charged his sou with silence.
Among the many casualties upon Cayuga Lake, in early days, a few are noted. Dr. Jonas C. Baldwin, of Ovid, bought at Baileytowu, on east side of Seneca, an old pirogue, and brought it round to Sheldrake Point for a ferry-boat. The ferry was discontinued, and the boat sold to Captain Robert White, who used it for transportation purposes. One morning, about nine, the boat ran out from Kidder's Ferry, and, about a mile away, was struck by a squall and overset. Spectators on the shore saw the boat's side rise on the swell, and a man clinging to the lee-board. A boat was manned, and White, the only occupant of the wreck, was rescued, and taken to the house of Joseph DeWitt, where he soon recovered. A son of Colonel Humphrey expected his father's arrival home across the lake, and, seeing a signal on the opposite shore, importuned DeWitt, the ferryman, to cross and bring the traveler, the colonel, over. A thunder-storm came up, the boat went like an arrow before the wind, the sail fell, and the fall- ing rain hid the scene from sight. Those on shore were filled with liveliest apprehension, but the wind lulled, the rain ceased, and at sunset the colonel met his family, and all rejoiced so much the more, — their sorrow changed to joy. In 1808 or 1809, a man named Beldon fell overboard from a ferry-boat when opposite Levanna, and was drowned. In 1811, Richard Britten, of Sheldrake or Ovid, was drowned in a like manner. The legends and authentic incidents con- nected with the lakes of Seneca and Cayug:i would fill a volume full of romance and narratives of adventure.
We have seen Tryon formed from Albany, in 1772: Tryou changed to Mont- gomery, and Herkimer taken therefrom, in 1791 ; Onondaga erected from Herki- mer, in 1794; Cayuga from Onondaga, in 179!l, and Sen.ca from Cayug.i. on March 20, 1804. At this date, Seneca County w:,s iM.iuid.d. north, by Lake Ontario ; east, by Cayuga County ; south, by Tioga County, and west, by Steuben and Ontario Counties. Lying between Cayuga and Senna Lakes, it extended to Lake Ontario, and was a strij) of territory some sixty-three miles long by an average width of eleven miles ; its area was seven hundred and forty-four miles, or somewhat less than half a million acres. The capital of