VAU 'Itli-JI H'ilTY LIBBABV

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IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

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Books Written by W. H. Venable.

JUNE ON THE MIAMI, and Other Poems.
" ' June on the Miami ' is the title of an exquisite volume oi poems by
W. H. Venable. The poem from ¦which the volume takes its title is a
dreamy, delicious rhyme, "with tbe breath of a summer day in every line,
and a rhythmic ripple as of the stream itself." — Boston Post.
THE TEACHER'S DREAM. Fifteen Full-Page Illustrations. Price, $2.00.
" I have been particularly struck -with ' Tbe Teacher's Dream.' "
Henky W. Longfello-W-
" I was and am greatly pleased -with 'The Teacher's Dream.' . . The
teachers should thank the author for makiug their tasks lighter, and he
pupils should thank him for lifting the curtain of a bright possible future
for them."— Oliver Wendeli, Holmes.
MELODIES OF THE HEART, f and Other )
\ [ Price, $1.50.
SONGS OF FREEDOM, [ Poems. )
"It seems to me I have never yet read a book of verse which satisfied me
more, and I am sure I have read from no minor poet on either side of the
ocean so many satisfactory strains as are found in Venable's ' Melodies of
the Heart,' 'Songs of Freedom,' and other poems. . . Such equal
strength in love, patriotism, religion, and humor js rarely found."— A New
England Critic.
A SCHOOL HISTORY CF THE UNITED STATES.
With Maps and Illustrations. 256 Pages. Price, $125.
" We are inclined to pronounce Venable's History of the United Sla es,
on the whole, the best of its size and class."— The Nation.
THE SCHOOL STAGE. For Little Folks. Price, $1.25.
THE AMATEUR ACTOR. Choice Selections. Price, $1.50.
DRAMATIC SCENES. From the Best Writers. Price, $1.50.
ECLECTIC ACTING PLAYS. Illustrated by Farny, Price, $1.50.
FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS IN THE OHIO VALLEY. Price, $1.00.
EDUCATION AND CULTURE. (Not yet Published.)
LITERATURE OF THE OHIO VALLEY. (Not yet Published.)
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1788. Q 1888.
FOOTPRINTS

PIONHKRS

OHIO VALLEY

A CENTENNIAL SKETCH.

BY
W. H. VENABLE LL.D,

ALL SIGHTS RESERVED.

cincinnati, o.
Ohio Valley Press, Publishers.
1888

c

y\^

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:ABLE OF Si^ONTENTS.

CHAPTER FIRST.
FBANCE AND ENGLAND IN THE WESTERN WORLD. PAGE
America's Quadri-Centennial. — The Year 1888. — Discov
ery of the Great West. — Conquest of New France. —
Ohio Land Company of Virginia. — Settlement of Ken
tucky. — The Athens of the West  9
CHAPTER SECOND.
MASSACHtrSETTS COLONIZES THE OHIO COUNTRY.
The Ordinance of 1787. — The Ohio Land Company of Massa
chusetts. — The Planting of Marietta on the Muskin
gum. — First Fourth of July Celebration in Ohio. — Civil
Government Established  23
CHAPTER THIRD.
THE QUEEN CITY AND THE BUCKEYE STATE.
The Symmes Purchase. —Losantiville aud Filson. — Cincin
nati. — Society of the Cincinnati. — The State of Ohio. —
The Buckeye Tree  48
CHAPTER FOURTH.
WESTWARD BY HOOF, WHEEL, AND KEEL.
Traveling in the Days of Seventy-six. — Tracking Forest
Paths. — Pack-Saddle and Saddle-Bags. — First Wagon
Roads to the West.— Oar, Rudder, and Pole. — " To Mari
etta on the Ohio." — Down the River in 1792. — Harris's
Tour From Boston to Marietta in 1803. — First Rigged
Vessel Built on the Ohio  67
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b TABLE OF CONTENTS.
CHAPTER FIFTH.
westward by hoof, wheel, and keel — CONTINUED. PAGE
Chbistian Schultz's "Voyage'' to the West in 1807. — From
Salem to Cincinnati in 1815.— Timothy Flint.— The Wag
oner of the AUeghanies. — Boatmen on Western Rivers. —
River Craft in 1815. — Perils of River Navigation. — The
Cumberland Road. — A Torrent of Migration to the West. —
Thomas Corwin on The Great West  81
CHAPTER SIXTH.
RAPID SETTLEMENT OF THE CBNTBAL STATES.
The Song of the Pioneers. — A Century's Increase of Popula
tion and Growth of Settlements. — Growth of the States
Formed from the Northwestern Territory. — Population.—
"Go West, Young Man ! " — Pioneer's House aud Home. —
The Raising  100
CHAPTER SEVENTH.
LOG-CABIN LIFE IN THE OHIO VALLEY.
The Hoosier's Nest. — Costume and Furniture. — Light, Fire,
Food, and Water. — War on the Woods. — The Corn
Husking. — The Apple Cutting and the Frolic. — The Lux-
tiries of Nature. — The Old, Old Story in the New Coun
try. — Presto, Change. — The Primeval Forests of Ohio. . 112

JST OF Illustrations.

Westward the Course of Empire,
Daniel Boone,
Oldest House in Pittsburgh,
The Pioneer,
Rev. Manasseh Cutler,
Building the Log-House,
Rufus Putnam, .
Fort Harmar, in 1788,
John Cleves Symmes,
Cincinnati in 1793,
Fort Washington,
William Henry Harrison,
Tbaveling a Hundred Years Ago,
Mouth of the Licking in 1850,
Ohio River from Mt. Auburn,
The Pioneer Hunter,
Down the Beautiful River, .
The Stage-Coach,
Harrison's Home at North Bend,
W. D. Gallagher,
Governor Morrow's Mill on the Miami
School-Master on Snowy Road,
School- House in Winter,
June on the Miami,
The Movers, . ...
The Pioneer's Chimney,

PAItE 9
17
2225
28 32
37 4148 5157
62 69
7577
838995
99
101
106115119123126128

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OHAPTEE FIRST.
PRANCE AND ENGLAND IN THE WESTERN WORLD.

AMERICAS QUADRI-CENTENNIAL.

Westward the couese op Empire
takes its way ;
The first four acts already past,
A fifth shall close the drama with
the day;
Time's noblest offspring is the
last."

Tour centuries ago, lacking four, years, counting
from this present writing in 1888, Columbus discov
ered America. The world will celebrate the quadri-
centennial of that great event in 1892. But the white
foot did not get a firm hold on that part of the conti
nent now mapped the United States until after many
attempts and failures. When a hundred years had
(9)

10 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
elapsed, after Columbus first saw the border of the New
World, the only white settlement north of latitude
thirty degrees, in America, was a small colony of
Spaniards at Santa Pe, then within the province of
Mexico. If we consult the colonial records of census,
we learn that the sum total of the English-speaking
population' of this country, only two hundred years
ago, was not one-tenth so numerous as that of Ohio in
the present year. The city of Chicago contains about
half as many people as the colonies contained at the
close of the French and Indian War.
It is now but twelve years since the people of the
United States commemorated the founding of the
Nation, by holding at Philadelphia a grand centennial
exposition celebrating the hundredth anniversary of
Independence Year — 1776. In this year of our Lord,
1888, the citizens of Ohio and her neighbor States,
unite to celebrate, by several demonstrations in vari
ous localities, what may be not inappropriately called
the centennial anniversary of the birth of the great
Northwest. The whole history of civilization in the United
States is known. We know why, when, and how men
of Europe came to the western continent ; how they
made discoveries and fixed settlements ; how the En
glish colonies crowded out or swallowed up all other
nationalities, and founded powerful States; how these
States joined to cast off the rulership of Great Britain
and became a distinct nation — one great State compris
ing several smaller Commonwealths.
The history of the Republic, from its birth in 1776
to its present age of one hundred and twelve years, is
recorded in countless volumes. The life-story of Amer
ica is complex, being the annals of many in one ; the

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 11
career of each several State must be studied in order to
understand the history of the Union ; yet the great
features of general progress may be traced without
much difficulty. These great features should be fa
miliar to every man and woman who lives a subject
of our government. Teachers should teach and chil
dren learn how we came to have a Fourth of July ;
how the Nation born on the first Fourth of July
grew strong and great ; how it passed through several
wars; how slavery existed in the land and how it
ceased to exist ; how the population spread from east
to west, forcing the wild tribes from their hunting
grounds and changing the wilderness into farms and
towns ; how the manner of living altered as the country
became older ; how the many streams of foreign migra
tion have mixed and mingled in one vast ocean of
loyal Americanism ; how fortunate discoveries and
useful inventions have added constantly to the wealth
and convenience of the people; and how, to-day, mill
ions of citizens enjoy the blessings won by the bravery,
industry, patriotism and forethought of those who
lived before our time. The Year 1888.
The year 1888, regarded as an anniversary, is of
euch interest, both special and general, that its cele
bration is an important event in the world's history.
The Constitution of the United States was ratified just
a century ago. The vast territory northwest of the
Ohio River, now comprising five great States, was set
tled a hundred years ago within the limits of the pres
ent State of Ohio, which State, however, had no sepa
rate existence in 1788. Ohio being the eastern part of
the general domain called the Northwestern Territory,

12 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
was naturally the region first to be populated, and first
to be organized under a State government. She was
the first-born of the five sisters. This gives Ohio a
peculiar distinction, and entitles her to special privi
leges in the year's rejoicings. Therefore her own citi
zens, and those of Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and
Wisconsin, combine to do honor to the representative
Commonwealth, Ohio. Scarcely less is the interest
which other and older neighboring States share in the
memorable occasion. Pennsylvania, the Virginias,
Kentucky, and Tennessee — all the States of the Ohio
Valley — are united by ties commercial, social, and patri
otic. The whole Nation sympathizes with this demon
stration, as the body feels in its every member. North
and South here coalesce, for, as has been said eloquently
by William P. Cutler, a son of the founder of the Ohio
Company, " Massachusetts and Virginia joined holy
wedlock and Ohio was their first-born."
Discovery op the Great West.
The accurate and brilliant writings of Francis Park-
man have familiarized readers of history with the ro
mantic lives of Champlain, Marquette, and La Salle,
whose daring footsteps led a host of missionaries and
soldiers to New France, a name which once applied to
a large portion of North America. Imagination plainly
pictures the hardy adventurers of the seventeenth cen
tury, pushing their way westward, along the Great
Lakes, now bearing their canoes on their shoulders, now
launching in unknown waters, guided and assisted by
the bronzed natives of the forest. Two centuries and
a half ago Jean Nicollet, the French interpreter, who
lived with the Indians and like an Indian, discovered
the Wisconsin, and thought himself within three days'

in the OHIO VALLEY. 13
journey of the South Sea. La Salle discovered and
navigated the Ohio River in 1669 or 1670; in 1679
La Salle built and launched " The Griffin, " the first ves
sel that sailed the upper lakes, and in 1682 he floated
down the great " Messipi."
Thus was the " Great West " discovered. The ban
ner of France and Navarre ruled Louisiana, a region
that spread from the AUeghanies to the Rocky Mount
ains, and stretched from the Lakes to the Gulf of
Mexico. The name Louisiana was given in honor of Louis
the Fourteenth, the "Grand Monarch," who is remem
bered for, having said: " I am the State."
The circumstances attending this discovery of the
Beautiful River — la belle riviere, as the French named
the Ohio — are enveloped in mystery. But that Robert
Cavalier de La Salle is entitled to the glory of leading
tbe first exploration to its banks, there can be no doubt.
History accepts it as an established fact that early in
July, 1669, this bold adventurer left Montreal at the
head of an exploring party, and that he probably spent
the winter of 1669-70 in the Ohio country between
Lake Erie and the great stream which the Indi
ans called "Ohio," "Oligheny-sipu," or " Meesch-zebe."
Writers conjecture variously that he reached the Ohio
by following down either the Muskingum, the Scioto,
or the Big Miami. Having come to it by one or an
other of its tributaries, he floated upon its current, in
a canoe, as far down as the falls, opposite where Louis
ville now is.
The French Government claimed and held juris
diction over Louisiana, including, of course, the Ohio
Valley, for ninety-three years. The State authorities
at Paris, in their instructions to M. Du Quesne, in

14 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
1752, declared that " The Ohio, otherwise called the
Beautiful River, and its tributaries, belong, indisputa
bly, to France, by virtue of its discovery by the Sieur
de La Salle, and of the trading posts the French had
there since."
On the east side of the AUeghanies a rival standard
was displayed — the menacing colors of St. George.
Our girls and boys know from their school histories
how and when the British Lion came to Virginia and
to New England ; how, having devoured the Dutch Col
ony as his prey, he pounced upon and finally swal
lowed his- formidable rival New France.
Conquest of New France.
From the year 1534, when Cartier discovered the
St. Lawrence, and laid claim to North America for
France, the English nation, basing a prior right to the
continent by virtue of Cabot's discoveries in 1497, con
tested the rival claim. A series of intercolonial wars,
beginning in 1689 and closing in 1748, a period of
fifty-nine years, led up to the final struggle between
France and England for the possession of the inte
rior. This struggle began when, in 1754, some French
soldiers drove away a party of English who were build
ing a fort at the head of the Ohio. The French com
pleted the fort and named it Du Quesne. This precipi-
tatedthe war which was not terminated until September,
1760, when the Marquis de Vaudreuil capitulated
at Montreal, and surrendered New France to the Brit
ish Crown. In 1763, France formally ceded to England
her possessions lying east of the Mississippi, and to
Spain the territories west of that river. Spain also
ceded to England the whole of Florida. This treaty
of 1763 secured to Great Britain all that portion of

IN the OHIO VALLEY. 15
North America lying east of the Mississippi, and from
the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic Ocean.
Great Britain held these possessions twenty years,
or until the close of the Revolutionary War, 1783
when, by the Paris treaty of peace, British America,
was limited to the territory north of the Great Lakes
and the St. Lawrence, and the United States became
owner of the larger section bounded by Canada, the
Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf, and the Mississippi. The
immense area north of the Ohio, then claimed by Vir
ginia, was formed by that State into a territory called
Illinois, which, in 1784, was ceded to the Federal Gov
ernment, and was afterwards distinguished as the
Northwestern Territory. The land west of the Missis
sippi River was ceded by Spain to France, and re
mained in possession of the latter country until April,
1803, when it was sold by Napoleon Bonaparte to the
United States for the sum of $11,250,000.
The Ohio Land CoMpany op Virginia.
Long before the termination of the old French
War, the English recognized the importance of getting
permanent possession of the interior of the continent.
Bancroft says : " To secure Ohio for the English world,
Lawrence Washington, of Virginia, Augustus Wash
ington, and their associates, proposed a colony beyond
the AUeghanies. ' The country west of the great mount
ains is the center of the British dominions,' wrote
Halifax and his colleagues, who were influenced with
the hope of recovering it by some sort of occupation ;
and the favor of Henry Pelham, with the renewed as
sistance of the Board of Trade, obtained in March, 1749,
the King's instructions to the Governor of Virginia, to
grant to John Hanbury and his associates in Maryland

16 footprints op the pioneers
and Virginia five hundred thousand acres of land be
tween the Monongahela and the Kanawha, or on the
northern margin of the Ohio. The company were to
pay no quit-rent for ten years, within seven years to
colonize at least one hundred families, to select imme
diately two-fifths of the territory, and at their own cost
to build and garrison a fort. Thomas Lee, President
of the Council of Virginia, and Robert Dinwiddle, a
native of Scotland, Surgeon-General for the Southern
Colonies, were shareholders."
The Ohio Land Company of Virginia was thus or
ganized in 1748. Rewards were ofiered to hunters and
wood-wise scouts who should track the wilderness and
discover the most practicable routes.
In 1750 a path was discovered ..to the Ohio by Wil
lis Creek (Cumberland^, and traders carried goods to
that creek and there sold them. Christopher Gist, the
company's surveyor, made an expedition down the
Ohio, which La Salle had found and named eighty
years before. A French trading post had been erected
near the mouth of the Scioto, on the Ohio, before the
year 1740, about half a century earlier than the found
ing of Marietta. Gist carried the surveyor's chain to
within fifty miles of the Falls of the Ohio. He visited
various Indian tribes and villages, endeavoring to win
their allegiance to the English. Bancroft tells us that
he "gazed with rapture on the valley of the Great
Miami, ' the fairest meadows that ever can be.' "
It was under the auspices of the Ohio Company of
Virginia that the English began, in 1754, to erect the
first fort at the fork of the Ohio, where Pittsburgh now
stands. The French captured this fort and named it
Du Quesne. This precipitated the war which ended
in the conquest of New France.

i.\ the OHIO valley.

17

Migration to the Western Wilderness. — Settle
ment OF Kentucky .-vnd Tennessee.
After the French and Indian War (1760), English
settlers began to occupy lands along the Great Lakes
and the chain of lakes in Northern New York. They
made way, also, through passes in the Appalachians
and around the southern ranges, like water seeking

DANIEL BOONE.

the easiest channel, and came to rest in the valleys of
the Cumberland, Tennessee, and Ohio. But the stream
of pre-revolutionary migration was scant, and the war
checked its feeble current for seven years.
As when the discovery of America is mentioned
we immediately think of Columbus, so when the set
tlement of Kentucky is spoken of we recall Daniel
Boone. The association is very helpful to memory.
The student of history should always bear in mind the

18 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
true relation of events to the time when and the place
where they occurred. The cause, progress, and outcome
of occurrences can be understood only by conceiving
historical characters and events in the order of se
quence. It is useful, for example, to remember that,
in the later battles of the Revolutionary War, espe
cially in the fight at King's Mountain, many patriots
volunteered from the back-woods of Kentucky and
Tennessee. This fact makes the mind realize that a
white population had colonized regions west of the
mountains before the struggle for national independ
ence had ended, and long before the Father of his
Country became President. Boone made his first ex
ploration in Kentucky in 1769; and before Jefferson
penned the Declaration of Independence there were
settlements on the Holston River, Tennessee, and at
Harrodsburg, Boonesborough, and other stations in
Kentucky. Once fairly started, so rapidly did the cur
rent of migration flow westward that by the year 1790
Kentucky had a population of seventy-three thousand,
which, in 1800, had increased to two hundred and
twenty thousand. In the single year 1784, four years
before Ohio received her first colony at Marietta, thirty
thousand people came to Kentucky from Virginia and
North Carolina. They came, as the homely phrase is,
" by Shanks' mare. " They walked into the famous
Hunting Grounds, so often baptized in blood, and
bearing the sanguinary name " Caintuckee. "
They filed into the magnificent valley of the Ohio,
traveling through Cumberland Gap and along the fa
mous route marked out by the original pioneers, and
which is used to this day. The road was at first but a
trace. No wheels rolled through the westwood until
after the State Legislature, in 1795, took action to make

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 19
a wagon road. The Filson Society, of Louisville, pub
lished, in 1886, an interesting book, by Thomas Speed,
giving a history of the "Wilderness Road." The fol
lowing quotation is from Mr. Speed's careful volume.
" The distance from Philadelphia to the interior of
Kentucky, by way of Cumberland Gap, was nearly eight
hundred miles. The line of travel was through Lancas
ter, Yorktown, and Abbottstown to the Potomac River,
at Wadkin's Ferry ; thence through Martinsburg and
Winchester, up the Shenandoah Valley through Stan
ton, and following the great trough between the mount
ain ranges, it passed over the high ground known as
the ' Divide ; ' there it left the waters which ' run toward
sunrise,' and reached an important station at. the
waters of New River, which ran to the west. At that
point, another road which led out from Richmond,
through the central parts of Virginia, intersected or
rather came into the one just described. Thus were
brought together two tides of immigrants. Near the
forks of the road stood Fort Chissel, a rude block
house, built in 1758, by Colonel Bird, immediately after
the British and Americans captured Fort Du Quesne
from the French, and called it Fort Pitt. Fort Chissel
was intended as a menace to the Cherokee Indians ; it.
was an outpost in the wilderness of the West, yet from
the point where it stood to Cumberland Gap was
nearly two hundred miles. "
In the year 1774, Boone walked from the Clinch
River settlement to the Falls of the Ohio, following the
Wilderness Road. The distance was eight hundred miles,
and the journey consumed sixty-two days. Through
the rocky defiles of Cumberland Gap, Boone, in 1775,
conducted his own and five other families to fix the
Tphite man's habitation in the garden of the savage.

20 FOOTPRINTri Ob' THE PIONEEhS
Through the same stony gateway, and along the same.
forest-hidden path, did General George Rogers Clark,
the conqueror of the North-west, make his journey ii\
1775. By the old Wilderness Road came the Rev.
Lewis Craig, conducting his congregation of Baptists
from their home in Spottsylvania, Va., to find religious
liberty in the free wilds of Kentucky. Tramp, tramp,
tramp, moved men, women and children, over the
mountains from Carolina and the Old Dominion, to
establish a new dominion by dispersing the buffalo,
the catamount and the beaver. Literally they stood
upon their own feet. The law of the survival of the
fittest was never put to a severer test. Strong must
the constitution have been of him and her who walked
" Over stock, over stone.
Through bush, through briar,"
for hundreds of miles, in all weather, feeding on scanty
fare, or starving for want of food. Professor Shaler, in
his " Kentucky, " ascribes to the universal walking ex
ercise of the pioneers their lease of long life and ex
ceptional vigor and size.
" The Athens of the West."
Kentucky, a daughter of the Old Dominion, is her
self old in comparison with the other States added to
the Union since the Revolution. While the colonists
along the Atlantic borders were resisting the tax on
tea, Boone, the Columbus of the wilderness, was ex
ploring the new New World beyond the Cumberland
Mountains in the West. When the embattled farmers
at Concord Bridge stood
" And fired the shot heard round the world,"
tho startling report, borne on the wings of rumor,
came to a party of hunters encamped near the Ken-
f* ¦

IN THE OHIO A'ALI.EY. 21
tucky River. They were genuine "Long Knives,''
dressed in buck-skin pantaloons, deer-skin leggins,
a linsey hunting-shirt, bear-skin cap and moc"
casins, and armed each with rifle, tomahawk, and
scalping-knife, prepared to do in Kentucky as the na
tives did. By patriotic consent these rangers, one of
v.'hom was Simon Kenton, thrilled by the news of the
battle of Lexington, named their encampment Lexing
ton, and four j'ears later, in April, 1779, a village was
begun near the spot. Founded but five years after
Boone led the van -guard of immigration through Cum
berland Gap, and traced the old Wilderness Road
through primeval solitude, Lexington is only less an
cient than a few stations like Harrodsburg and Boones
borough. The town is historically interesting, as hav
ing been a center of travel and traffic in pioneer days.
It was an emporium when Cincinnati was founded,
and the early Cincinnati merchants went to Lexington
to buy goods.
A higher distinction belongs to this old Kentucky
town. Thither, from the East, with commerce went
culture. There was formed the first island of civiliza
tion in a vast savage ocean. Just outside the palisade
of the absolutely necessary fort, the settlers built, with
out delay, a school-house ; the stockade was a defense
against Indians, the school-house a protection to
knowledge and a redoubt against ignorance. John
McKinney was the school-master, or, as the Anglo-
Saxon word is, the " childherd, " who taught the hardy
flock of boys and girls who gathered in the first school-
hou,se of the West. One morning, John, waiting for
his pupils, was surprised by an unexpected visit from
a most unwelcome examiner, a monstrous wild-cat,
which came silently in at the open door, walked across

22

FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS

the floor and sprang at the pedagogical throat. The
unarmed man of letters, after a terrific combat, killed
the powerful beast by choking and crushing it upon
his desk ; and while its fierce teeth were locked in the
flesh of his side, he said, placidly, to a rescue party
who had just arrived : " Gentlemen, I have caught a
cat. " Theseus never performed an exploit more heroic
and apposite, though he did many more mythical-
The progress of civilization is well symbolized in the
picture of McKinney slaying the wild-cat and then in
structing the little children.

bouquet's REDOUBT.
OLDEST HOUSE IM PITTSBURGH.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 23
CHAPTER SEOOXTX
MASSACHUSETTS COLOXIZKS THE OHIO COUNTRY.

The Gre.\t 0rdim.\.\ce.
Cornwallis surrendered Yorktown to Washington
October 19, 1781. This surrender practically ended the
Revolutionary War, but a cessation of hostilities was
not proclaimed until April 19, 1783; and the peace
treaty was signed, at Paris, September 3, 1783. The
New Republic was born July 4, 1776. Twelve years
afterwards, in 1788, the present constitution was rati
fied, and on April 30, 1789, the first president of the
United States was inaugurated.
The Convention which formed the National Con
stitution first met in May, 1787. While that body
was in session, the Continental Congress was holding
its last meeting in New York. One of the last acts of
that old Congress was to pass what is known as the
"Ordinance of 'S7." This famous document was a
set of organic laws for the government of the Territory
of the United States northwest of the Ohio River.
The date of its enactment is July 13, 1787' The elo
quent statesman Daniel Webster said of it, in 1830;
" We are'accustomed to praise the law-givers of antiq
uity ; we help to perpetuate the fame of Solcjii and Ly-
curgus; but I doubt whether one single law of any
law-giver, ancient or modern, has produced effects of
more distinct, marked, and lasting character than the
Ordinance of 1787. We see its consequences at this

24 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
moment, and we shall never cease to see them, perhaps, ,
while the Ohio shall flow. "
The Ordinance of 1787 is a document of sufficient
length to cover about six printed pages of the size of
this. Its first half is concerned with provisions for
the temporary government of the North-western Ter
ritory, until such time as a general assembly or leg
islature should be organized. The duties of the gov
ernor, secretary, and judges are defined, and also the
tenure of their office and the mode of appointments.
A general assembly was to be formed when the number
of inhabitants reached five thousand. The evils of en
tail and primogenture were guarded against in the pro
vision that estates of proprietors dying intestate should
be distributed among their children, or next direct
heir, in equal parts. By far the most interesting and
important part of the great ordinance is that comprised
in the last half, or " Articles of compact between the
original States and the people and States in the Terri
tory." So vital are these "articles," and so directly
significant to the millions now living in the North
west, that they are here transcribed for convenient
reference. The Articles of Compact.
It ii hereby ordained and declared by the authority aforesaid, That
the following articles shall be considered as articles of compact
between the original States and the people and the States in the
said Territory, and forever remain unalterable unless by common
consent, to-vvit :
" Akticlb 1. No person demeaning himself in a peaceable
and orderly manner shall ever be molested on account of his mode
of worship or religious sentiments in the said Territory.
"Article 2. The inhabitants of said Territory shall always
be entitled to the benefits of the writ of habeas corpus and of trial
by jury; of a, proportionate representation of the people in the

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

25

26 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
legislature, and of judicial proceedings according to the courts of
the common law. All persons shall be bailable except for capi
tal oflfenses, where the proof shall be evident or the presumption
great. All fines shall be moderate, and no unusual or cruel pun
ishment shall be inflicted. No man shall be deprived of his lib
erty or property but by the judgment of his peers, or the law of the
land; and should the public exigencies make it necessary, for the
common preservation, to take away any person's property, or to
demand his particular service, full compensation sha'.l be made for
the same ; and in the just preservation of rights ar.d property it is
understood and declared that no law ought ever be made, or have
force in the said Territory, that shall in any manner whatever
interfere with or affect private contracts or engagements, bona fide
and without fraud, previously formed.
" Article 3. Religion, morality, and knowledge being neces
sary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools
and the means of education shall forever be encouraged. The
utmost good faith shall always be observed towards the Indians .
their lands and property shall never be taken from them without
their consent; and in their property, rights, and liberty they shall
never be invaded or disturbed, unless in just a,na lawful wars, au
thorized by Congress; but laws founded in justice and humanity
shall, from time to time, be made for preventing wrong being done
to them, and for preserving peace and friendship with them.
" Article 4. The said Territory, and the States which may
be formed therein, shall forever remain a part of this confederacy
of the United States of America, subject to the articles of confed
eration, and to such alterations therein as shall be constitutionally
made, and to all the acts and ordinances of the United States in
Congress assembled, conformable thereto. The inhabitants and
settlers iueaid Territory shall be subject to pay a part of the Fed
eral debts, contracted or to be contracted, and a proportional part
of the expenses of government, to be apportioned on them by Con
gress, according to the same common rule and measure by which
th3 apportionments thereof shall be made on the other States; and
the taxes for paying their proportion shall be laid and levied by
the authority and direction of the legislatures of the district or
districts, or new States, as in the original States, within the time
agreed upon by the United States in Congress assembled. The

I.V THE OHIO VALLEY. 27
legislatures of those district! or new States shall never interfere
with the primary disposal of the soil by th? United States in Con-
gross assembled, nor with any regulation Congress may find neces
sary for securing the title to such soil to bona fide purchasers. No
tax shall be imposed on lands, the property of the United States;
and in no case shall non-resident proprietors be taxed h'gher than
residents. The navigable waters leading into the Mississippi and
St. Lawrence, and the carrying places between the same, shall be
common highways, and forever free, as well to the inhabitants of
the said Territory as to the citizens of the United States, and those
of any other States that may be admitted into the confederacy,
without any tax, import, or duty therefor.
" Article 5. There shall be forraed in the said Territory not
less than three nor more than five States ; and the boundaries of
the States, as soon as Virginia shall al'.er her act of cession and
consent to the same, shall become fixed and established as follows,
to-wit : The western State in the said Te.-ritory shall be bounded
by the Mississippi, the Ohio, and Wabash Elvers ; a direct line
drawn from the Wabash and Port Vincent's due north to the terri
torial line between the United States and Canada ; and by the said
territorial line to the Lake of the Wicds ai.d Mississippi. The
middle State shall be bounded by the said direct line, the Wabash
from Port Vincent's to the Ohio, by (he Ohio, by a, direct line
drawn due north from the mouth of the Great Miami to the said
territorial line, and by the said territorial line. The eastern State
shall be bounded by the last mentioned direct line, the Ohio, Penn
sylvania, and the said territorial line ; provided, however, and it is
further understood and declared, that the boundaries of these three
States shall be subject so far to be altered that, if Congress should
hereafter find it expedient, they shall have authority to form one
or two States in that part of the Territory which lies north of an
east and west line, drawn through the southerly bend or extreme of
Lake Michigan. And whenever a'-y of the said States shall have
sixty thousand free inhabitants therein, such State shall be admit
ted by its delegates into the Congress cf the United States, on an
equal footing with the original States, in all respects whatever, and
shall be at liberty to form a permanent cor stitution and State gov
ernment ; provided the constitution and government so to be
formed shall be republican, and in conformity to the principles

28

FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS

contained in these articles; and so far as it can be consistent with
the general interest of the confederacy, such admission shall be
allowed at an earlier period and when there may be a less number
of free inh abitants in the State than sixty thousand.
" Article 6. There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary
servitude in the said Territory otherwise than in the punishment
of crimes, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted ; pro
vided, always, that any person escaping into the same from whom
labor or service is lawfully claimed in any one of the original
States, such fugitive may be lawfully reclaimed, and conveyed to
the person claiming his or her labor or service as aforesaid."

REV. MANASSEH CUTLER.
The members of Congress who voted for the ordi
nance on July 13, 1787, were as follow : Massachu
setts, Holten and Dane ; New York, Smith, Harring,
Yates ; New Jersey, Clark and Scheurman ; Delaware,
Kearney and Mitchell; Virginia, Grayson, Lee, and
Carrington; North Carolina, Blount and Hawkins;
South Carolina, Kean and Huger; Georgia, Few and
Pierce — eighteen in all. Of these the Virginia mem
bers, and Dane, of Massachusetts, were perhaps the most

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 29
prominent. There has been much discussion concern
ing the authorship of various sections of the ordinance.
Webster claimed that the part prohibiting slavery was
framed by Nathan Dane. The same has been claimed
for Thomas JeSerson, Rufus King, William Grayson,
and Richard Henry Lee. It is certain that Rev. Ma
nasseh Cutler had much to do with the composition
as well as the adoption of the great instrument, and,
although not a member of the Congress, he was invited
by the committee who had the ordinance in charge, to
appear before them and give the benefit of his advice,
which he did. Indeed, Cutler has been called the
"Father of the Ordinance of '87."
THE ORDINANCE OF EIGHTY-SEVEN.
Poem read before the Ohio Teachers' Association, at Aljron, O,, June 29, 1887.
I.
As a mighty heart in a giant's breast.
With rhythmic beat.
Sends marching from brain to feet
The crimson vigor of creative blood,
So in the bosom of the brawny West,
So in the breast of the Nation,
Throbs the great Ordinance —a heart,
A vital and organic part.
Propelling by its strong pulsation
The unremitting stream and flood
Of wholesome influences that give
Unto the body politic
The elements and virtues quick
Whereby States nobly live.
II.
Thanks to the law creators.
The revolutionary sages,
AVho made themselves testators,
Bequeathing to the ages

30 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Perpetual wealth, unbounded
Riches to posterity, compounded
By the multiplying years,
A fortune and a legacy prodigious.
For what are diamonds and gold
To the preciousness untold
Of human freedom, civil and religious?
Thanks to the venerable seers,
Grander than lords baronial.
Grander than kings— the colonial
Congressmen, who, having won
Freedom with sword and gun.
Wrote with a ranEomed pen
A Magna Charta new,
Not for a favored few,
But for all men.
Ruled and rulers too.
They wrote a later Independence Declaration,
Outlooking to the future, far discerning :
Their principles unfolded into powers,
As fruit expands from flowers.
And patriotic words that burned.
To energy of deeds were turned.
As furnace flames that leap and glow
Compel inert machines to go ;
To generation after generation
The Congress gave whatever, in just wars,
With sword, or pen, or tongue,
From tyrant force was wrung
By our brave ancestors.

A new star rose in freedom's sky
A hundred years ago;
It gleamed on Labor's wistful eye,
With bright, magnetic glow.
Hope and courage whispered, Go,
Ye who toil and ye who wait.
Opportune, in starlight, lo,
Open swings the people's gate I

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 31
Beyond the mountains and under the skies
Of the wonderful West your future lies.
On the banks of thu Beautiful River,
By the shores of the Lakes of the North,
There Fortune to each will deliver
His share of the teeming earth.
Jocund voices called from the dark
Hesperian solitude, saying. Hark !
Hearken, ye people ; come from the East,
Come frotn the marge of the Ocean, come !
Here in the wilderness spread a feast ;
This is the poor man's welcome home !
Hither, with ax and plow ;
(Carry the stripes and stars I)
Come with the faith and the vow
Of patriots wearing your scars
Like trophies upon the victorious breast ;
Noblemen, wend to the West.
Load your rude wagon with your scanty goods.
And drive to the plentiful woods ;
Your wheels as they rumble shall scare
The fleet-footed deer from the road,
And waken the sulky brown bear
In his long unmolested abode;
The red man shall gaze in dumb fear
At the wain of the strange pioneer ;
His barbarous eyes vainly spell
The capital letters which tell
That the white-foot is bound
For the hunter's green ground
Where the bufialoes dwell.
To the Ohio country, move on !
Bring your brain and your brawn ;
I Some books of the best,
Pack into the chest ;)
Bring your wives and your sons,
Your maidens and lisping ones ;

32

FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Your trust in God bring.
Choose a spot by a spring :
And build you a castle— a throne —
A palace of logs— but your own!

Happy the new-born child
Nursed in the greenwood wild.
Though his cradle be only trough.
Account him well oiT;
For born to the purple is he —
The proud royal robe of the free.
For the latest time is the best.
And the happiest place is the West,
Here man shall establish anew
Things excellent, beautiful, true.

With no uncertain sound,
But like a silver bugle clear and loud
That echoes all the world around.
The ordinance, oh, teacher, summons thee

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 33
To thy vocation proud,
Annointed guardian of liberty.
'Tis written in the charter of the West
That Government must on the bed-rock rest
Of Freedom, brotherhood, equality — nor less
On whatso makes for righteousness
And knowledge, wherefore, teacher.
With spirit reverential
Receive thy high credential.
Sacred, like that beitowed on Gospel preacher.
Go forth like one ordained and sent
To lay the bulwarks of sure government ;
As one to whom belongs
The final righting of persistent wrongs ;
The spokes of evolution thou canst turn.
For what is human progress but to learn?
His radical reformers God hath set
Amid young scholars in a teacher's chair.
And the millennium is coming yet
By way^the Knights of Learning shall prepare.
Whose shafts of truth are hurled
Into the dusky camp of Ignorance;
The shining banners of bold thought advance
In every land unfurled,
And still the pedagogue, with prescient care,
Conducts with faithful feet
Along love's school paths sweet
The meliorated children of the world.
Who shall establish firm and well
Lincoln's ideal government
Of the people for and by them,
That shall serve and not belie them ?
Who shall build the fabric stately,
Grand beyond all precedent,
By the fathers planned so greatly?
Build upon its vast foundation
Walls that will not craok or crumble?
Turrets that will never tumble?
Who shall build fhe people's Nation?

34 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Educators, ye shall build
As the founders willed ;
Informing and transforming girls and boys
With such foresight and afterthought
That they shall be completely taught
To master life with tranquil equipoise ;
Endowed with mental force and moral beauty.
Prepared for social and for civic duty ;
Each one a sovereign individual.
And yet a, subject for the good of all.

Well may five sister States rejoice
This glad memorial year.
Recounting with a grateful voice
The story of their proud career.
Ohio's conscious Stream partakes
The rapture of the Northern lakes.
And all the hills and vales between
Triumphant don their robes of green.
Five States rejoice ; let every State
Of the Bepublic celebrate.
For unto each of them and all.
The blessings of the charter fall.
More than the fathers planned
Was in the wise, potential ordinance ;
God took it in His hand.
Controlling so each gracious circumstance
That through the will of men His will was done.
And all the States were knitted into one.
What He hath joined let no man sever ;
The holy Union stands forever !
And aye the ordinance, a mighty heart,
A vital and organic part.
Throbs on, propelling by its strong pulsation
The wholesome stream and steady flood
Of vigorous creative blood
To every nerve and fiber of the Nation.

in the ohio valley. 35
The Ohio Land Company op Massachusetts.
Mr. William F. Poole, in an article published in the
North American Revieiv, in 1876, says: " The Ordinance
of 1787 and the Ohio purchase were parts of one and
the same transaction. The purchase would not have
been made without the ordinance, and the ordinance
would not have been enacted except as an essential
condition of the purchase."
In the autumn of 1785, General Benjamin Tupper,
authorized by Congress, went to the Ohio country as
surveyor. He was prevented from prosecuting his pro
posed work by the hostility of the Indians; but from
what he saw and heard of the ^Yest, he was enthusi
astically in favor of planting settlements there at as
early a date as practicable. In January, 1786, he
visited General Rufus Putnam, at Rutland, Massachu
setts, and the two veterans held a fireside conference,
which resulted in the determination to attempt the
formation of a company to purchase and colonize
Western lands on the Ohio. They prepared an ad
dress, which was circulated by means of newspapers,
giving information concerning the West and appoint
ing places of meeting in the various counties of Massa
chusetts, for the purpose of selecting delegates for a
general meeting to be held in Boston. Their joint
call, or circular, begins by announcing that : " The
subscribers take this method to inform all officers and
soldiers who have served in the late war, and who are,
by a late ordinance of the honorable Congress, to re
ceive certain tracts of land in the Ohio country, and
also all other good citizens who wish to become advent
urers in that delightful region, that from personal
inspection, together with other incfontestable evidences,

36 footprints of the pioneers
they are fully satisfied that the lands in that quarter
are of a much better quality than any other known to
New England people; that the climate, seasons, pro
ducts, etc., are in fact equal to the most flattering
accounts that have ever been published of them ; that
being determined to become purchasers and to prose
cute a settlement in that country, and desirous of
forming a general association with those who entertain
the same ideas, they beg leave to propose the following
plan, viz : That an association by the name of The
Ohio Company be formed of all such as wish to become
purchasers, etc., in that country, who reside in the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts only, or to extend to
the inhabitants of other States, as shall be agreed on."
This call, which bears the signature of both Put
nam and Tupper, was dated January 10, 1786. Its
suggestions were carried out. Delegates were selected
from the several counties, as follow : Manasseh Cut
ler, Essex; Winthrop Sargent and John Mills, Suffolk;
John Brooks and Thomas Cushing, Middlesex; Benja
min Tupper, Hampshire; Crocker Sampson, Ply
mouth ; Rufus Putnam, Worcester; Jelaliel Wood-
bridge and John Patterson, Berkshire, and Abraham
Williams, Barnstable. These assembled at the " Bunch
of Grapes" tavern, Boston, March 1, 1786 Rufus
Putnam was chosen chairman. The conference re
sulted in the appointment of a committee of five to
draft a plan of organization for the contemplated land
company, the committee consisting of Putnam, Cutler,
Brooks, Sargent, and Cushing. On March 3d, the com
mittee reported articles of agreement, which were'
adopted. The work of soliciting subscriptions for
stock was at once begun. By March, 1787, two hun
dred and fifty shares had been taken. The company

in the OHIO VALLEY.

37

chose Putnam, Cutler, and General Samuel H. Parsons
directors, and Parsons went to New York as agent of
the directors, to negotiate the purchase of lands from
Congress. Parsons returned to his home without
effecting a purchase, and Cutler was employed to press
the matter to a consummation. It was now that Cut
ler availed himself of the opportunity to present his

BUFUS PUTNAM.

views on the great ordinance, and to use his weighty
influence for the speedy passage of that instrument.
The ordinance was enacted, as we have stated, on
July 13th. Cutler's land purchase was completed
fourteen days later, namely, on July 27, 1787.
"Strange to say," writes Dr. B. A. Hinsdale, an emi
nent authority on all facts concerning the Northwest —
" Strange to say, the land purchase was attended by
more trouble than the ordinance of government; but.

38 footprints of the pioneers
July 27, Congress authorized the sale of five million
acres lying north of the Ohio, west of the seven ranges,
and east of the Scioto River, one million five hun
dred thousand for the Ohio Company, and 'the re
mainder,' to quote Dr. Cutler's diary, ' for a private
speculation in which many of the principal characters
of America are concerned.' The total price agreed
upon was three and a half millions of dollars, but as
the payments were made in public securities, worth
only twelve cents on the dollar, the real price was only
eight or nine cents per acre."
The actual settlement of the Ohio country was
coincident with the establishment of a governmental
administration for the Northwestern Territory. Ter
ritorial officers were elected by Congress, October 5,
1787, as follow: Arthur St. Clair, governor; James
M. Varnum, Samuel H. Parsons, John Cleves Symmes,
judges; Winthrop Sargent, secretary. The action and
interests of the first settlers at Marietta were largely
moulded by the government established for the pros
pective people of the Northwest.
First English Settlement in Ohio.
The footsteps of a hundred years
Have echoed since, o'er Braddock's Road,
Bold Putnam and the Pioneers
Led History the way they strode.
On wild Monongahela's stream
They launched the Mayflower of the West,
A perfect State their civic dream,
A new New World their pilgrim quest.
Wheu April robed the Buckeye trees,
Muskingum's bosky shore they trod ;
They pitched their tent, and to the breeze
Flung freedom's star-flag, thanking God.

IX THE OHIO VALLEY. 39
.\.s glides the Oyo's solemn Hood,
Their generation fleeted on :
Our veins are thrilling with their blood.
But they, the Pioneers, are gone.
Though storied tombs may not enshrine
The dust of our illustrious sires,
Behold, where monumental shine
Proud Marietta's votive spires.
Ohio carves and consecrates
In her own heart their every name ;
The founders of majestic States —
Their epitaph : immortal fame.
The directors of the Ohio Company held a meeting
at Bracket's tavern, Boston, November '2?>, 1787. They
appointed General Rufus Putnam superintendent of
their colony, and selected Ebenezer Sproat, Anselm
Tupper, R. J. Meigs, and John Matthews surveyors of
the newly purchased lands in the West. At the same
meeting, a number of workmen, including carpenters,
boat-builders, and blacksmiths, were employed to make
suitable preparations for journeying to the Ohio Val
ley. Tools, wagons, and horses were procured, and, in
December, the mechanics and others assembled at
Danvers, Massachusetts, from which village they pres
ently started for the Far West. They took their dreary
way over the AUeghanies, and by the old Indian path,
over Braddock's Road, and after about a month's jour
ney reached the Youghiogheny at a point called Sim-
rail's Ferry. General Putnam, with a smaller party
made up of the surveyors and other leading men, left
Hartford, in January, and pressed forward to the same
place of rendezvous.
And now the stalwart New England boat-builders
plied their sharp axes, and keen saws, and sounding

40 footprints of the pioneers
hammers in the construction of that renowned craft,
"The Mayflower," which was to carry these new Pil
grims to a new New World. This boat was the largest
that had ever descended the Ohio. In length it was
forty-five feet, and in width twelve feet ; and it was
capable of bearing a burden of fifty tons. The "May
flower" was rudely but strongly built, with sides proof
against the bullets of the red savages. She was placed
under command . of Captain Duval, a brave com
mander, who helped build the first ship launched on
the Ohio River.
On the afternoon of April 2, 1788, the " Mayflower,"
accompanied by a flat-boat and several canoes, was un
fastened from her moorings at Simrall's Ferry to float
down the Youghiogheny to the waters of the Monon
gahela, and onward to the Ohio. On the morning of
April 7th, the pioneers reached Kerr's Island, and at
noon, the same day, they reached their destination
and landed on the east bank of the Muskingum, about
four hundred yards above its mouth and nearly oppo
site to Fort Harmar.
The little company that disembarked on the bank
of the Muskingum, on .April 7, 1788, numbered forty-
eight souls. It was not until July 1st that they were
reinforced by other colonists.
The first shelter erected on Ohio soil by the found
ers was a tent in which General Putnam had his office
and transacted his business as superintendent. Above
this tent floated the stars and stripes. On the 9th of
April, the laws of the colony were read aloud by Ben
jamin Tupper, and a copy of these was posted on the
trunk of a tree.
The mouth of the Muskingum had been chosen as
a point for the location of a frontier military post by

IX THE OHIO VALLEY.

41

General Richard Butler as early as 1785. Major
Doughty was instructed to build a fort. Late in 1785,
Maj or Doughty arrived at the mouth of the ^Muskingum
with a detachment of soldiers, and began to erect Fort
Harmar, a work which he completed in the spring of
the next year. The following description of Fort Har
mar as it was in 1788, when the settlers arrived, is
from the pen of Alfred Mathews :

FoRT Harmar in 1788.
, " The fort stood very near the point on the western
side of the Muskingum, and upon the second terrace
above ordinary flood water. It was a regular pentagon
in shape, with bastions on each side, and its walls
enclosed but little more than three-quarters of an acre.
The main walls of defense, technically called " cur
tains," were each one hundred and twenty feet long,
and about twelve or fourteen feet high. They were

42 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
constructed of logs laid horizontally. The bastions
were of the same height as the other walls, but, unlike
them, were formed of palings or timbers set upright in
the ground. Large two-story log buildings were built
in the bastions for the accommodation of officers and
their families, and the barracks for the troops were
erected along the curtains, the roofs sloping toward tho
center of the enclosure. They were divided into four
rooms of thirty feet each, supplied with fire-places, and
were sufficient for the accommodatiou of a regiment of
men. From the roof of the barracks building toward
the Ohio River there arose a watch tower, surmounted
by the flag of the United States."
The settlement begun on April 7, 1788, was not
formally named until about three months old. It was
at first known simply as the "Muskingum" settle
ment. But on the 2d of July, the day after the arrival
of an accession of eighty-four colonists from the East,
the directors and agents of the company met on the
green banks of the Muskingum to give a name to their
town and its squares. The town was christened Mari
etta, in honor of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France,
the friend of La Payette, and of American liberty.
We read with a smile, that our martial and classical
forefathers named one of the squares of Marietta Cam
pus Martins, another Capitolium, and a third Cecilia;
and that they denominated the road through the
covert-way Sacra Vica.
Two days after the stately naming of Marietta and
its squares, on the Fourth of July, the twelfth an
niversary since independence was declared, the fifth
since the declaration of peace, and the last under the
old articles of confederation (for the constitution had
not yet gone into operation, and Washington was not

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 43
yet President) — the people of the new settlement,
some one hundred and thirty, and the soldiers from
Fort Harmar, held a memorable celebration.
Judge J. M. Varnum delivered an address abound
ing in balanced sentences and rhetorical phrases.
Anticipating the coming of His Excellency, Governor
Arthur St. Clair, the orator exclaimed : " May he soon
arrive ! Thou gently flowing Ohio, whose surface, as
conscious of thy unequaled majesty, reflecteth no
images but the impending Heaven, bear him, oh ! bear
him safel}' to this anxious spot ! And thou, beautiful,
transparent Muskingum, swell at the moment of his
approach, and reflect no objects but of pleasure and
delight ! "
Having thus glowingly apostrophized the absent
governor, the gallant general addressed his " fair audi
tors'' in still more ornate style : " Gentle zephyrs and
fanning breezes, wafting through the air, ambrosial
odors, receive you here. Hope no longer flutters upon
the wings of uncertainty  Amiable
in yourselves, amiable in your tender connections, you
will soon add to the felicity of others, who, emulous of
following your bright example, and having formed
their manners upon the elegance and simplicitj' of the
refinements of virtue, will be happy in living with
you in the bosom of friendship." Such was the fashion
of sentence-making iu the days of j'ore. According to
Dr. Hildreth, Judge Varnum was distinguished for his
"brilliant language and thundering eloquence."'
At the close of the oration a feast was served in a
spacious bower, constructed on the point of land at
the confluence of the Muskingum and the Ohio. From
the fourteen toasts ofi'ered I select the following : " The
United States," " The Congress," " His Most Christian

44 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Majesty," "The New Federal. Constitution," "Patriots
and Heroes," " Captain Pipe, Chief of the Delawares,"
" The Amiable Partners of our Delicate Pleasures."
The soldiers at Fort Harmar had commemorated
the great National day in 1786 by firing a salute of
thirteen guns, "after which," wrote Sergeant Joseph
Buel, in his diary, "the troops were served with extra
rations of liquor, and allowed to get drunk as much as
they pleased."
St. Clair reached Fort Harmar July 9th, and on the
15th he made his public entry, " at the bower, in the
city of Marietta," and another grand ceremony took
place. The Ordinance of 1787 was read, and appropri
ate words of welcome and response were spoken.
The governor's address, though formal and stately, was
warmed by a sincere eloquence evoked by the place
and purpose of the meeting. In the course of his
remarks he said : " The subduing a new country, not
withstanding its natural advantages, is alone an arduous
task ; a task, however, that patience and perseverance
will at last surmount, and these virtues, so necessary
in every situation, but peculiarly to yours, you must
resolve to exercise. Neither is reducing a country from a
state of nature to a state of civilization irksome_ as it
may appear from a slight or superficial view ; even very
sensible pleasures attend it; the gradual progress of
improvement fills the mind with delectable ideas; vast
forests converted into arable fields, and cities rising
from places which were lately the habitations of wild
beasts, give a pleasure something like that attendant
on creation. If we can form an idea of it, the imagi
nation is ravished, and a taste communicated, of even
the 'joy of God to see a happy world.' " General
Rufus Putnam responded to St. Clair's speech.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 45
The example set at INIarietta of celebrating the
"Glorious Fourth" was imitated in hundreds of other
settlements subsequently formed in the West. When
General Moses Cleveland, with a company of surveyors,
arrived on the Western Reserve, on July 4, 1796, a
patriotic demonstration was made, with speeches and
joyful noise. Doubtless the orators of the day reminded
their hearers that just twenty years had passed since
John Adams wrote from Philadelphia to his wife, in
Boston, that Independence T)ay " ought to be solemn
ized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports,
guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations from one end of
the continent to the other, from this time forward, for
evermore." With such warrant and exhortation, our
patriotic fathers made the most of the anniversary,
and " spread-eagle " eloquence was at a premium in
the forensic market.
Civil Government Established.
Soon after the arrival of General St. Clair, Governor
of the Northwestern Territory, he and the judges
organized a formal government in accordance with the
provisions of the Ordinance of 1787. Laws were issued,
courts established, and all necessary civil regulations
for the prosperity of the people went into efl'ect. In
due time other settlements were made, and counties
and other subdivisions of a prospective State were
determined. Emigration having once set toward the
West, was rapid and incessant.
The first white people who settled on the north side
of the Ohio — the " Indian side," as pioneers called it-
formed institutions, social and civil, after the New
England model, and strove to impress the stamp of
Puritan ideas on family, school, church, and govern-

46 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
ment. Their preliminary task was to cut trees, provide
shelter, kill Indians, and plant seeds.
Carlyle, in one of his picturesque letters to Emer
son, writes : " How beautiful to think of lean, tough
Yankee settlers, tough as gutta-percha, with most
occult, unsubduable fire in their belly, steering over
the Western mountains, to annihilate the jungle, and
bring bacon and corn out of it for the posterity of
Adam. The pigs in about a year eat up all the rattle
snakes for miles around; a most judicious function on
the part of the pigs. Behind comes Jonathan with
his all-conquering jilowshare — glory to him, too ! "
Jonathan brought all of himself along when he
steered over the mountains; brought brain to direct
muscle, brought principles with his plow, and while
speculation was in his eye, it did not blind him to dis
interested public duty. As Massachusetts began her
career with advantages not enjoyed in England, so
Ohio, the "Yankee State," or "New England of the
West," was organized under circumstances more
favorable than surrounded the colonists of the East.
The territory northwest of the Ohio was dedicated
to liberty without reserve — to complete liberty, civil
and religious.
The Ordinance of 1787 was a new mold, in which
were cast freer and better institutions than before had
been devised. Therefore the people of this region
escaped the blighting influence of imported crimes,
bigotries, and superstitions that afflicted the East and
the South.
No Roger Williams was condemned to banishment
from Ohio for liberty of speech; no innocent girl or
decrepit crone was scourged or slain for witchcraft ; no
Quaker was hanged; no black man was doomed to

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 47
servitude in the new Canaan of promise north of the
Beautiful Stream.
The Ordinance of 1787 places freedom, religion,
moralit}', and knowledge as the corner-stones of civili
zation. The third article declares that " religion, mo
rality, and knowledge being necessary to good govern
ment and the happiness of mankind, schools and
means of education shall forever be encouraged." The
Constitution of Ohio reiterates : " But religion, mo-
ralitj', and knowledge being essentially necessary to
good government and the happiness of mankind,
schools and means of instruction shall forever be
encouraged by legislative provisions, not inconsistent
with the rights of conscience."
To the practical men who built the first villages and
tilled the first farms on the north side of the Ohio,
this about education was not a mere flourish of words.
Fulfilling to the letter the spirit of the organic law.
Congress granting public lands, endowed Ohio Univer
sity, at Athens, Ohio. Says a historian of the college :
" It was the first example in the history of our country
of an establishment and endowment of an institution
of learning by the direct agency of the General Govern
ment." The honor of it belongs chiefly to Manasseh
Cutler, and in the next degree to Rufus Putnam.

48 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
CHAPTER THIKD.
THE QUEEN CITY AND THE BUCKEYE STATE.

JOHN CLEVES SYMMES.
The Miami Purchase of John Cleves Symmes.
The business relations of John Cleves Symmes to
Major Benjamin Stites were somewhat similar to those
of Rufus Putnam to Benjamin Tupper. Just as Tup-
per's inforcnation to Putnam, concerning the lands on
tho Muskingum, led to the formation of the Ohio Com
pany, so the reports that Stites gave Symmes resulted
in the purchase and settlement of the IMiami country.
Ill the spring of 1787, Major Benjamin Stites, a native

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 49
of New Jersey, but then living at Redstone, now
Brownsville, Pennsylvania, descended the Ohio River
in a flat-boat, laden with flour and whisky, which sta
ples he designed to dispose of at Limestone, or M.ays-
ville. At this point, or rather at Washington, Ken
tucky, Stites joined a party of pioneers and went in
pursuit of some Indian thieves. The excursion
brought the pursuers to a point opposite the mouth of
the Little Miami River. The party crossed the Ohio
on a rude raft, and continued to follow the trail of the
Indians to the vicinity of Old Chillicothe, somewhere
north of where Xenia now stands. Returning leisurely
from this wild expedition, Major Stites had an excel
lent opportunity to notice the fertility of the Miami
Valley, and the magnificence of its wooded scenery.
The idea at once entered his mind that here was the
garden spot of the Western wilderness — the most
desirable location in which to plant a colony.
With this thought uppermost, he went to New
Jersey, where he met, at Trenton, .Judge John Cleves
Symmes, then a member of Congress. Symmes had
himself visited the Miami country in 1786 or 1787, and
he was easily persuaded to undertake negotiations for
a purchase. He accordingly petitioned Congress,
August 29, 1787.
Congress granted the petition, and in October, 1787,
Symmes secured his contract. Symmes published a
pamphlet, announcing his purchase on the Miami, and
stating' the terms upon which lands would be sold.
He collected a company of thirty colonists, and these,
conveyed by eight wagons, each drawn by four horses,
proceeded from New Jersey across the mountains, and
arrived at Limestone, or Maysville, Kentucky, in the
latter part of September. Major Stites, with a consid-
4

50 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
erable number of followers from Pennsylvania, was
already at Limestone, and anxious to take possession
of lands which he had contracted for in the Symmes
purchase, at the mouth of the Little Miami. On the
16th of November, Major Stites, with a party of
twenty-six, four of whom were women, and two boys,
took boat and descended the river. They landed "a
little after sunrise on the morning of the 18th of
November, 1788," below the mouth of the Little Miami
River, within the present limits of Columbia, now a
part of the corporation of Cincinnati. According to
Rev. Ezra Ferris, " After making fast the boat, they
ascended the steep bank and cleared away the under
brush- in the midst of a pawpaw thicket, where the
women and children sat down. They next placed
sentinels at a small distance from the thicket, and,
having first united in a song of praise to Almighty
God, upon their knees they off'ered thanks for the past,
and prayer for future protection." Block-houses were
built, and log cabins erected, for the shelter and pro
tection of the little colony. Thus was founded the first
English settlement in the Miami region. Stites named
the town Columbia, a word which was associated not
only with the memory of the discoverer of America,
but which had also become a symbol of patriotism and
the poetical title of the Union. Of this Columbia set
tlement, James H. Perkins wrote, in his "Western
Annals," as follows : " The land at this point was so
fertile, that from nine acres were raised nine hundred
and sixty-three bushels of Indian corn. The Indians
came to them, and though the whites answered, as
Symmes says, 'in a blackguarding manner,' the sav
ages sued for peace. One, at whom a rifle was pre
sented, took off his cap, trailed his gun, and held out

Cincinnati in 1798,

52 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
his right hand, by which pacific gesture he induced
the Americans to consent to their entrance into the
block-houses. In a few days this good understanding
ripened into intimacy, the hunters frequently taking
shelter for the night at the Indian camps ; and the red
men and squaws spending whole days and nights at
Columbia, regaling themselves with whisky. This
friendly demeanor on the part of the Indians was
owing to the kind and just conduct of Symmes him
self; who, during the preceding September, when
examining the country about the Great Miami, had
prevented some Kentuekians, who were in his com
pany, from injuring a band of the savages that came
within their power.
The Columbia settlement was, however, upon land
that was under water during the high rise in January,
1789. "But one house escaped the deluge. The sol
diers were driven from the ground-floor of the block
house into the loft, and from the loft into the solitary
boat which the ice had spared them."
Mr. Perkins goes on to say that "This flood deserves
to be commemorated in an epic ; for, while it demon
strated the dangers to which the three chosen spots of
all Ohio — Marietta, Columbia, and the Point — must be
ever exposed, it also proved the safety, and led to the
rapid settlement, of Losantiville." If the flood of 1789
deserves commemoration in an epic, what manner of
poem would be adequate to describe that of 1884 ?
Losantiville, or Cincinnati.
The story of the founding of Losantiville, or Cincin
nati, the second settlement in Symmes' purchase, is
full of interest.
Matthias, Denman, a native of New Jersey, knowing

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 53
the projects of Symmes, took occasion to locate for
himself a tract of land on the Ohio River opposite the
mouth of the Licking, in January, 1788. In the fol
lowing summer he visited his purchase, meditating a
scheme of founding a station and establishing a ferry
there. Some time afterward he was with Robert Pat
terson at Maysville, and later with John Filson at Lex
ington, and having discussed his project with them,
proposed a partnership in the venture. The result of
these conferences was a contract or agreement among
the three parties, which is here transcribed :
A covenant and agreement, made and concluded this twenty-
fifth day of August, 1788, between Matthias Denman, of Essex
County, State of New Jersey, of the one part, and Eobert Patterson
and John Filson, of Lexington, Fayette County, Kentucky, of the
other part, witnesseth : That the aforesaid Matthias Denman, hav
ing made entry of a tract of land on the northwest side of the Ohio
Kiver, opposite the mouth of the Licking Eiver, in that district
in which Judge Symmes has purchased from Congress, and being
seized thereof by right of entry, to contain six hundred and forty
acres, and the fractional parts that may pertain, does grant, bar
gain, and sell the full two-thirds thereof by an equal, undivided
right, in partnership, unto the said Eobert Patterson and John
Filson, their heirs and assigns; and upon producing indisputable
testimony of his, the said Denman's, right and title to the said
premises, they, the said Patterson and Filson, shall pay the sum of
twenty pounds Virginia money, to the said Denman, or his heirs
or assigns, as a full remittance for moneys by him advanced in
payment of said lands, every other institution, determination, and
regulation respecting the laying-off of a town, and establishing a
ferry at and upon the premises, to the result of the united advice
and consent of the parties in covenant, as aforesaid ; and by these
presents the parties bind themselves, for the true performance of
these covenants, to each other, in the penal sum of one thousand
pounds, specie, hereunto affixing their hands and seals, the day
and year above mentioned.
Matthias Denman,
Signed, sealed, and delivered In the _ _
presence ol E- PATTERSON,
Henry Owen, John Filson.
Abr. McConnell.

54 footprints of the pioneers
A romantic interest attaches to the name of John
Filson, though his connection with the vicinity of Cin
cinnati is but slight. He is distinguished as being the
first historian of Kentucky, and the maker of an early
map of that State.
Very few copies of Filson's book and map are in ex
istence, and the little work has been sold for as much
as a hundred and twenty dollars. Next to nothing
was published or generally known about Filson until
quite recently, when Colonel R. T. Durret gathered to
gether the scattered memorials of the romantic pioneer,
and gave them to the world in a small volume issued
by the Filson Club, Louisville. From this volume
we learn that John Filson was born near Brandy-
wine, Pennsylvania, about the year 1747, and that he
came to Kentucky, probably in 1783, at the age of
thirty-six. He became acquainted with, and collected
information from, Daniel Boone, Levi Todd, James
Harrod, Christopher Greenup, John Cowan, William
Kennedy, and other pioneers. The adventures of
Boone were made public by Filson, who transcribed
the facts as they fell from the Colonel's lips. The first
historian of Kentucky is therefore the first biographer
of the famous backwoodsman. Having prepared his
manuscript and map, Filson returned to the East and
had them published. The next year he went from
his home to Pittsburgh in a Jersey wagon ; and from
Pittsburgh to the mouth of the Beargrass Creek, Ken
tucky, in a flat-boat. The entire journey lasted from
April 25, to June 27, 1785. In the summer of the same
year, he went in a canoe to Vincennes, on the Wabash,
and walked back. This journey, of four hundred and
fifty miles' length, he repeated in the fall, the objects of
both trips being to collect material for a history of the

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. .D-y
Illinois country. On the first of June, 1786, he set out
from Vincennes in a pirogue forthe Falls of the Ohio, ac
companied by three men. The party were attacked bv
Indians, and compelled to land and take to the woods.
Filson, after many dangers and suff"erings, found his
way back to Vincennes, almost dead from hunger and
wounds. After this adventure, he traveled back to
Philadelphia on horseback. In 1787, he returned again
to Kentucky, and proposed to start an academy in Lex
ington. In August, 17SS, he went into partnership
with Matthias Denman and Robert Patterson in the
purchase of a tract of land on the north side of the
Ohio River, opposite the mouth of the Licking, on
which it was proposed to lay out the town of Losanti
ville, now Cincinnati. Filson, who was a surveyor,
marked out a road from Lexington to the mouth of
the Licking, and, with his partners, arrived at their
purchase in September and began to lay out the town.
Before much progress had been made, Filson's life
came to a mysterious end. One day he set out alone
to explore the solitudes of the Miami woods, and
never returned. It is supposed that he was killed by
Indians. After his disappearance, his place was taken
in the partnership by Israel Ludlow. It was Filson
who gave to the town plat opposite the mouth of the
Licking River the name Losantiville. The street
in Cincinnati now called Plum was originally Filson
Avenue. The first actual settlers of "Losantiville" were
twenty-six (the same number that came to Columbia),
but they were all men. Here are their names :
Noah Badgeley, Samuel Blackburn, Thaddeus Bruen,
Robert Caldwell, Matthew Campbell, James Carpenter,
William Connell, Matthew Fowler, Thomas Gizzel (or

56 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Gissel), Francis Hardesty, Captain Henry, Luther
Kitchell, Henry Lindsey, Israel Ludlow, Elijah Mar
tin, William McMillan, Samuel Mooney, Robert Pat
terson, John Porter, Evan Shelby, Joseph Thornton,
Scott Traverse, Isaac Tuttle, John Vance, Sylvester
White, Joel Williams.
These were of the migrating assemblage that had
collected with Symmes at Maysville. They embarked
on the 24th of December, 1788, probably somewhat
late in the day. Strange as it may seem, the exact
date of their arrival at Cincinnati has not been defi
nitely determined. It was long held that the twenty-
sixth was the time of their arrival, and that date has
been celebrated as the true anniversary. ' But the day
now generally accepted as the date of Cincinnati's
founding is December 28, 1788. Their place of land
ing is stated to be "a little inlet at the foot of Syca
more Street, afterwards known as Yeatman's Cove."
These founders of a mighty city immediately began
the work of planning and building, and the town has
steadily grown from that day to this.
Fort Washington.
That same suggestively-named Major Doughty,
who, with his hardy command, erected the stout walls
of Fort Harmar, at the mouth of the Muskingum, in
1785-86, was dispatched from that post, in August, 1789,
to locate and build similar defensive works in the
Miami country, within the Symmes purchase. The
situation selected for the fort was a spot opposite the
mouth of the Licking River, and within the town site
of Losantiville. A company of seventy soldiers
arrived on the ground from Fort Harmar, and the
labor of building the new post was begun on or about

IX THE OHIO VALLEY.

57

the 20th of September, 1789— about ten months after
the landing of the first settlers of Cincinnati at Yeat
man's Cove. General Harmar, who for a time occu
pied this post as headquarters, wrote of it on January
14,1790: "This will be one of the most solid, substantial
wooden fortresses, when finished, of any in the Western

fort WASHINGTON.

Territory. It is built of hewn
timber, a perfect square, is two
stories high, with four block
houses at the angles.
The plan is Major Doughty's.
On account of its sujierior ex
cellence, I have thought proper to honor it with the
name of Fort Washington. The public ought to be
benefited by the sale of these buildings whenever we
evacuate them, although they will cost them but little."
Governor St. Clair came to Fort Washington, Jan
uary 2, 1790, and, having summoned Judge Symmes,
from North Bend, where the latter had planted a settle
ment, proceeded to issue a proclamation, erecting the

68 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Symmes purchase into the County of Hamilton. It
is generally accepted that, at the same time, St. Clair
wiped out the name of Losantiville, which Filson had
invented for the new ville opposite the river mouth,
and substituted the name Cincinnati. No doubt the
Revolutionary veteran, and trusted friend of Washing
ton, gave this old Roman designation to the rising
town out of respect to the
Society of the Cincinnati.
This societjr, which bore to the post-revolutionary
officers of Washington's army a relation much like
that which the Grand Army of the Republic bears to
the Union soldiers of to-day, is thus described by Irv
ing in his " Life of Washington : "
"Eight years of dangers and hardships, shared in
common and nobly sustained, had welded their hearts
together, and made it hard co rend them asunder.
Prompted by such feelings, General Knox, ever noted
for generous impulses, suggested as a mode of perpet
uating the friendships thus formed, and keeping alive
the brotherhood of the camp, the formation of a society
composed of the officers of the army. The suggestion
met with universal concurrence, and the hearty appro
bation of Washington.
" Meetings were held, at which the Baron Steuben,
as senior officer, presided. A plan was drafted by a
committee composed of Generals Knox, Hand, and
Huntington, and Captain Shaw; and the society was
organized at a meeting held on the 13th of May, at the
baron's quarters in the the old Verplanck House, near
Fishkill. " By its formula, the officers of the American army,
in the most solemn manner, combined themselves into

IX the OHIO V.\LLEV. 5',)
one society of friends; to endure as long as they
should endure, or any of their eldest male po.sterity,
and, in failure thereof, their collateral branches who
might be judged worthy of being its supporters and
members. In memory of the illustrious Roman,
Lucius Quintius C'incinnatus, who retired from war to
the peaceful duties of the citizen, it was to be called
' The'Society of the Cincinnati.' The objects proposed
by it were to preserve inviolate the rights and liberties
for which they had contended, to promote and cherish
national honor and union between the States, to
maintain brotherly kindness toward each other, and
extend relief to such officers and their families as
might stand in need of it.
" The society was to have an insignia called ' The
Order of the Cincinnati.' It was to be a golden Ameri
can eagle, bearing on its breast emblematical devices ;
this was to be suspended by a deep-blue ribbon, two
inches wide, edged with white, significative of the union
of America with France.
" Washington was chosen unanimously to officiate
as president of it, until the first general meeting, to
be held in May, 1784."
The State of Ohio.
The word Ohio, meaning " beautiful," is of Indian
origin. In 1669, the Senecas, a tribe of the Iroquois
family, told La Salle, the French explorer, " of a river
which they called the 'Oyo,' or 'Oheesah,' ris
ing in their country, and flowing to the sea, but at
such a distance that its mouth could only be reached
after a journey of eight or nine months."' They evi
dently meant to describe the long water-course, includ
ing the rivers Alleghany, Ohio, and Mississippi, to

60 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
which they applied the common name Oyo, or, some
times, Olygheny-sipu, "beautiful water." As we have
already related. La Salle discovered the Oyo, or Ohio.
The country to the north of the stream came to be
known as the Ohio country, or Ohio. This name
was finally appropriated to designate that more lim
ited political division, the State of Ohio.
A brief history of the organization of that State,
aud of its admission into the Union, is given below.
The Ordinance of 1787 provided that " so soon as
there shall be five thousand free male inhabitants, of
full age," in the Territory, they should " receive author
ity, with time and place, to elect representatives to
represent them in the general assembly." The first
election of territorial legislators was held Monday,
December 3, 1798. The General Assembly met at Cin
cinnati, September 16, 1799. They selected William
Henry Harrison, as delegate to the National Congress.
The seat of territorial government was changed from
Cincinnati to Chillicothe, May 7, 1800. On that same
day the Northwestern Territory was divided by act of
Congress, and Indiana Territory was created.
The ordinance says that "whenever any of the
said States shall have sixty thousand free inhabitants
therein, such State shall be admitted by its delegates
into the Congress of the United States, on an equal
footing with the original States, in all respects whatso-
soever; and shall be at liberty to form a permanent
constitution and State government."
The Territory having acquired by 1801 a sufficient
population to entitle it to secure a State government,
its people petitioned Congress to pass an act to enable
them to carry out the provisions of the law. Congress

IX THE OHIO VALLEY. 61
passed such an " enabling act " on April 30, 1802, and
adjourned November 29, 1802.
Pursuant to congressional action, an election was
held on the second Tuesday in October, 1802, for the
election of delegates to a constitutional convention.
The delegates so chosen met at Chillicothe, November
1, 1802; framed a constitution, which they adopted
and signed, November 29, 1802, and immediately for
warded it to Congress. It is therefore claimed by some
that Ohio became a State on November 29, 1802. But
since the ratification of Congress is necessary to the
formal admission of a State into the Union, many con
tend that Ohio did not actually become a State until
February 19, 1803, on which day the National Legisla
ture sanctioned the work of the Chillicothe conven
tion, and recognized Ohio as a State. The State elec
tion of governor and members of the legislature was
held in January, 1803, before the approval of the State
Constitution by Congress and the president had been
secured. The first legislature met March 1, 1803,
at Chillicothe, and the government went into opera
tion. The first governor, Edward Tiffin, was inaugu
rated March 3, 1803.
Ohio's E.mble.m — The Buckeye Tree.
Why is Ohio called the Buckeye State ? According
to Dr. S. P. Hildreth, the historian, of Marietta, the
Indian traders at Fort Harmar used to distinguish
Colonel Ebenezer Sproat, who was a very large man,
by naming him Hetuck, or Big Buckeye, The appli
cation of Hetuck, or Buckeye, was extended to other
white men, and finally to Ohioans in general.
Whether this be a true explanation or not, it is cer
tain that the term Buckeye became attached to Ohio

62

FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS

and its citizens at a very early period in the history of
the Northwestern Territory.
A memorable celebration, in which Dr. Daniel
Drake took a prominent part, was held on December
26, 1833, the forty-fifth anniversary of the settlement

Vi'ILUAM HENRY HARRISON.
of Cincinnati. The presiding officers were : Presi
dent, Major Daniel Gano; vice-presidents, William R.
Morris, Henry E. Spencer, and Moses Lyon. Rev. J.
B. Finley and Rev. William Burke officiated as chap
lains. The character of the celebration was purely
Western ; those who planned it were native citizens.
One hundred and sixty invited guests sat down at the

IX THE OHIO VALLEY. 63
table "in the Cincinnati Commercial Exchange, on
the river bank, near where the first cabin was erected
in 1788." The unique feature of the ceremonies was the
Buckeye Dinner, with accompanying speeches, poems,
and songs. The banquet itself was such as would
delight Mark Twain, so abundant and American it
was. Field, forest, and river contributed fruit, game,
and fish to the bounteous board. A pair of fat rac
coons were served up smoking. The favorite potation
of the feast was called '" sangaree," a sort of innocent
punch, which was dipped lavishly from four huge
bowls, carved from buckeye wood. There was also
plenty of wine, furnished by Nicholas Longworth, from
his vintage of Catawba gathered on the hills of the
Beautiful River. The formal exercises of the day con
sisted of an oration by Mr. Joseph Longworth, a poet
ical address by Peyton S. Symmes, and an ode by
Charles D. Drake, of Washington, D. C. In response
to the toast, " The Emigrants, whether from the sister
States or foreign climes," Edward King presented a
poem by Mrs. Lee Hentz, in which the fair bas bleu,
praised the " sires " who
" First raised this city's heavenward spires.
And based upon the unblessed sod
The temples of the living God.
The germs of science, genius, taste,
They laid in the uncultured waste.
And hallowed, with the Christian's prayer.
The wild beasts' then untrodden lair."
There was also an after-dinner speech by the vet
eran General Harrison, the hero by popular favor soon
to become President of the United States.
But the speech of the occasion was called out by the

64 FOOTPRliSITS OP THE PIONEERS
fifth regular toast, to " The Author of the Picture of
Cincinnati." The Doctor discoursed on the Buckeye
Tree. Happily the address has been preserved in
print, and one risks little in prophesying that it will
hold a permanent place in our literature on account of
lioth its subject and style. The speaker said:
" Being born in the East, I am not quite a native of
the Valley of the Ohio, and, therefore, am not a Buck
eye by birth. Still, I might claim to be a greater
Buckeye than most of you who were born in the city,
for my Buckeyeism belongs to the country, a better soil
for rearing Buckeyes than the town.
" My first remembrances are of a buckeye cabin,
in the depths of a canebrake, on one of the tributary
brooks of the Licking River ; for whose waters, as they
flow into the Ohio opposite our city, I feel some degree
of affection. At the date of these recollections, the
spot where we now are assembled was a beech and
buckeye grove ; no doubt altogether unconscious of
its approaching fate. Thus I am a Buckeye by engraft
ing, or rather by inoculation, being only in the bud
when I began to draw my nourishment from the
depths of a buckeye bowl.
" We are now assembled on a spot which is sur
rounded by vast warehouses, filled to overflowing
with the earthern and iron domestic utensils of China,
Birmingham, Sheffield, and, I should add, the great
Western manufacturing town at the head of our noble
river. The poorest and obscurest family in the land
may be, and are, in fact, adequately supplied. How
different was the condition of those early emigrants !
A journey of a thousand miles, over wild and rugged
mountains, permitted tho adventurous pioneer to bring
with him little more than the Indian or the Arab car-

IX THE OHIO VALLEY. 66
ried from place to place — his irife and children. Elegan
cies were unknown; even articles of pressing necessity
were few in number, and when lost or broken could
not be replaced. In that period of trying deprivation,
to what quarter did the first settlers turn their inquir
ing and anxious eyes ? To the buckeye ! Yes, gentle
men, to the buckeye tree; and it proved a friend
indeed, because in the simple and expressive language
of those times, it was a friend in need. Hats were
manufactured of its fibers, the tray for the delicious
'pone' and johnny-cake, the venison trencher, the
noggin, the spoon, and the huge, white family bowl
for mush and milk, were carved from its willing trunk;
and the finest 'boughten' vessels could not have
imparted a more delicious flavor, or left an impression
so enduring. He who has ever been concerned in the
petty brawls, the frolic and fun of a family of young
Buckeyes around the great wooden bowl, overflowing
with the ' milk of human kindness,' will carry the
sweet remembrance to the grave.
"Thus, beyond all trees of the land, the buckeye
was associated with the family circle, penetrating its
privacy, facilitating its operations, and augmenting its
enjoyments. Unlike many of its loftier associates, it
did not bow its head and wave its arms at a haughty
distance, but it might be said to have held out the
right hand of fellowship; for of all the trees of our
forest, it is the only one with five leaflets arranged
on one stem — an expressive symbol of the human
hand." At another pioneer celebration, which took place
December 26, 1838, the semi-centennial of the set
tlement of the Queen City, Doctor Drake was the
orator.

66 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIOl^EERB
THE BUCKEYE TREE.
When bluebirds glance the sunlit wing.
And pipe the praise of dancing spring.
Like some gay sylvan prince, and bold,.
The Buckeye dons his plumes of gold.
When truants angle in the run,
Or roam the woods with dog and gun.
Young squirrels frisk and robber-bees
Maraud the honeyed Buckeye trees.
When blustering autumn dashes down
The royal forest's summer crown,
Then seek in rustling leaves to find
The Buckeye nut in bronzen rind.
My little maiden, do you know
That in the backwoods, long ago.
Fond mothers rocked their babes to rest
In Buckeye trough, like bird in nest ?
Fair housewives swept their cabin rooms,
Their puncheon floors, with Buckeye brooms ;
The pioneers — heaven rest their souls !
Quafied sangaree from Buckeye bowls.
They said, the Buckeye leaves expand.
Five-fingered, as an open hand.
Of love and brotherhood the sign —
" Be welcome ! What is mine is thine I"
A century has gone, my dear,
Since those old days of pioneer.
When frontier scouts and hunters found
Our emblem tree on Western ground.
Still may the Buckeye spring and grow,
While planets roll and rivers flow !
Oh, may the Buckeye State, as long
Advance all right, oppose all wrong.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 67

CHAPTEE FOUETH.
WESTWARD BY HOOF, WHEEL, AND KEEL.

Traveling in the "Days of Seventy-six.
In the year 1775, Thomas Jefferson went in his car
riage, from Williamsburg, Virginia, to Philadelphia, a
journey which kept him on the road ten days. So
little known was the route that the distinguished
traveler was twice obliged to hire a guide to keep him
in the highway to the largest city on the continent.
Jefferson had a coach made after a model of his own
designing, and by his own workmen. It is stated, on
good authority, that in the time of the Revolution
there were but five coaches in New York City, and
those all of English make. The importation of car
riages from Great Britain was forbidden ; and by the
year 1786 three coach-factories were in operation in
the good city of Gotham. Public stages came into
use about the year 1800. The first omnibus was seen
in London in 1829. Buggies were invented two or
three years earlier. The heavy stage-coach of colonial
days, although it made a great show of speed when
dashing through a village, spent as many hours in
lumbering from New York to Boston as a modern ex
press train requires to thunder across the continent.
The journey from Baltimore to Pittsburgh consumed
twelve days, and was not only toilsome but also dan-

68 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
gerous, for hostile Indians lurked in the ravines of the
woods. The indefinite region west of the Alleghany Mount
ains used to be styled the "Wilderness." The Rocky
Mountains, or Stony Mountains, as the map named
them, were known to exist, but no white man had ex
plored them. Even within the present century the
belief was held that the Missouri River had water con
nected with the Pacific Ocean.
Tracking Forest Paths.
In speaking of the settlement of Kentucky, we
characterized the immigrants or pioneers as a walk
ing people. The Southern movers to the West were
not the only pioneers who were pedestrians. The
Yankees, the "Yorkers," and the Pennsylvanians
learned to walk. A recent sketch in a newspaper,
reporting the recollections of Mrs. Nancy Frost, who
came from Pennsylvania to Marietta, Ohio, in 1789,
and who was still living in January, 1887, records that
the old lady remembered "some of the incidents of
her journey over the mountains, and among them the
fact that her mother walked most of the way, leading
a cow.'' Our forefathers experienced their greatest difficult
ties, not in navigating lake and stream, but in reaching
navigable waters by untried and treacherous land
routes over mountains, across unbridged rivers, and
through dense, unbroken forests. The first roads in
the primeval wilderness were developed on the princi
ple of " natural selection," being the chosen paths of
wild deer or bison. In the West, such rudimentary
paths the hunters often called streets or buffalo roads.

in the OHIO VALLEY.

69

im Mm
ifff

70 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
The Indian name was " Alanantomamiowee." Mann
Butler is my authority for recording that, in pursuing
these buffalo roads, the traveler found that "the growth
of cane was so tall and so springy as often to lift both
horse and rider_ofF the ground, in passing over the
strong, elastic stalks." The next phase in evolution
after these brute-made tracks was the Indian trail.
The guides that led the white man's foot toward the
setting sun were the red men, the bearers of the bow
and tomahawk.
Now the civilized ax began its sharp warfare. The
trees were "blazed," girdled, or hewn down; and the
Indian "trail" became the white man's "trace." It
was long before the narrow foot-ways and bridle-paths
of the woody solitude were widened into practicable
highways for wheels.
Pack-Saddle and Saddle-Bags.
First on foot, then on horse-back, came the un
daunted pioneer. What the canoe was to the voy
ager on river and lake, the pack-horse was to him who
transported merchandise by land. Western travelers
of our own day have much to relate of the indispen
sable burro or mountain-donkey so much used in Col
orado. The pack-saddle of yore was the express car of
the back-woods, carrying passenger, freight, and mails.
Pack-horses were often driven in lines of ten and
twelve. Each horse was tied to the tail of the one
going before, so that one driver could manage a whole
line. The pack or burden of a single animal was of
about two hundred pounds' weight. I have met with
the following description of the primitive pack-saddle,
by an old man whose recollection goes back to pioneer
times : "A large, forked limb was obtained, and was cut

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 71
off just below the fork, and then each was cut off about
six inches from the crotch and trimmed down to the
required dimensions to accommodate the loads to be
carried upon it; then a flat, smooth board was strapped
on the horse's bacli, with a sheep-skin pad under it."
Mr. Speed relates an anecdote of a frontier preacher,
who, at an out-of-door service, paused in the midst of
his sermon to look up and point to a tree top, saying,
"Brethren, there is one of the best limbs for a pack-
saddle that ever grew. After meeting we will go and
cut it." The art or business of making pack-saddles
for sale became one of the profitable occupations of the
back-woods; it is mentioned by Colonel McBride, in
connection with the dressing of deer-skins for leathern
breeches, as among the vanished industries.
In military operations against the Indians, pack-
horse trains were the indispensable means of land
transportation. Captain Robert Benham held the im
portant position of "Conductor General" of pack-
horses in the expeditions of Harmar, St. Clair, Wil
kinson, and Wayne. Colonel Harmar wrote, in June,
1787, from Fort Harmar, that pack-horses could not be
hired for less than fifty cents a day.
John Filson rode from his old home in Pennsyl
vania, to Lexington, Kentucky, on horse-back. It was
no uticommon thing for men to make such long eques
trian journeys. 'Twas the day of Centaurs — man and
horse grew together. The saddle-bags contained the
rider's rations and means of defense. The wiry steed,
trained to frontier travel, climbed hills, leaped chasms,
bore his master across unfordable streams. In his
"Notes on the Northwestern Territory," Jacob Burnet
tells that as late as 1801, on his return from the gen
eral court at Marietta, to Cincinnati, he was obliged

I'A FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
frequently to swim his horse over streams that had
neither ferries nor bridges, the Little Miami being one
of these.
First Wagon Roads to the West.
Foot-paths and bridle-paths were widened by the
removal of bushes and trees, and were, by slow degrees,
made fit for M-heels. When Braddock led his troops
towards the French and Indians of Western Pennsyl
vania, he was obliged to cut down trees and construct
a passable way through the wilderness for his wagons
and ordnance. And Colonel Forbes, when he pushed
his march through the woods, on his way to capture
Fort Du Quesne, also improvised a practicable road.
The highways thus broken were naturally made use of
by the pioneer. Sections of the Braddock Road coin
cide with routes still traveled; other sections are aban
doned, and now form part of cultivated fields. We
have already described the Old Wilderness Road, by
which the Virginians wended their way to the " County
of Kentucky." That great Southern route of travel led
through Cumberland Gap. Its counterpart was the
famous Braddock Road just mentioned.
McMaster, in his chapter on " The State of America
in 1784," gives a general description of the first road
from the Atlantic States to the West. He says:
"From Philadelphia ran out the road to what was
then the Far West. Its course, after leaving the city,
lay through a broken, desolate, and almost uninhab
ited country; now thick with towns and cities, pene
trated with innumerable railways, and renowned for
great deposits of iron and inexhaustible mines of coal.
Thence it wound through the beautiful hills of West
ern Pennsylvania, and crossed the Alleghany Mount-

IX the OHIO VALLEY. 73
ains to the headwaters of the Ohio. By those, whom
pleasure or business had never led that way, it was
believed to be a turnpike. In reality it was merely
a passable road, broad and level in the lowlands,
narrow and dangerous in the passes of the mountains,
and beset with steep declivities. Yet it was the only
highway between the Mississippi River and the East,
and was constantly traveled in the summer months
by thousands of emigrants to the Western country,
and by long trains of wagons bringing the produce of
the little farms on the banks of the Ohio to the
markets of Philadelphia and Baltimore."
Oak, Rudder, axd Pole.
Water-courses are Nature's routes of travel; man
finds them ready made for his use. The Mississippi,
like a great main street of the continent, was navigated,
and settlements were made on its banks long before
the ¦ interior was explored on either side. I have
already alluded to the lake travel of the French
explorers, and of the occupancy by English pioneers
of lands adjoining the lakes of New York. Passen
gers and goods used to be conveyed from Albany to
Schenectady — fifteen miles — in wagons ; thence up the
Mohawk in batteaus of from four to ten tons' burden,
and about forty or fifty feet long, having small, mov
able masts. These boats were generally poled up the
stream. The process is thus described by a traveler :
"The men, after setting their poles against a rock,
bank, or bottom of the river, declining their heads
very low, place the poles against the shoulder, then
falling down upon their hands and toes, creep the
whole length of the gang-boards, and send the boat
forward with considerable speed. The first sight of

74 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
four men on each side of a boat, creeping along on
their hands and toes, apparently transfixed by a huge
pole, is no small curiosity. Nor was it until I had
observed their perseverance for two or three hundred
yards, that I became satisfied they were not playing
some pranks."
From Fort Stanwix, now Rome, goods were carried
across the country about a mile to Wood Creek, when
they were reloaded on boats and conveyed down
through Oswego Lake and River to Lake Ontario.
Further on I shall have more to say of this Northern
New York line of travel, with its wagons, portages,
and batteaus. "To Marietta on the Ohio."
At the close of the war for independence, migration
took a fresh start from Europe to America, and from the
Atlantic States to the West. The Ordinance of 1787
organized the Territory northwest of the Ohio River,
and the formation of the Ohio Company for Western
colonization, followed closely by the Symmes purchase,
opened the gates of travel and traffic. Ten thousand
emigrants went by the mouth of the Muskingum in
1788, seeking homes farther West. The astonishing
success of the Ohio Company in disposing of their
lands, and causing population to flow from New Eng
land to the Buckeye State, alarmed the wondering
conservatives who stayed at home. In Massachusetts,
whence General Rufus Putnam and Doctor Cutler led
their colony, it was thought, and said, and printed,
that the rush of people to the new Yankee State would
drain the old States of their best strength, and, at the
same time, ruin the fortunes of the deluded emigrants
themselves.

IX THE OHIO VALLEY.

75

o

76 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
Regardless of such solemn warnings and prophecies,
the movers continued to move westward to the land
of promise. The Ohio Company's big, ugly wagons,
with black canvas covers, showing to all eyes the large-
lettered inscription, "To Marietta on the Ohio," rolled
and rumbled onward over the mountains and through
the valleys, bearing families and household goods,
bringing axes, and spades, and guns — bringing civil
arts and the moral fruits of ages into the new world.
From Pittsburgh to St. Genevieve in 1792. —
Journey of H. M. Brackenridge.
H. M. Brackenridge records his recollections of a
journey by boat from Pittsburgh to St. Genevieve on
the Mississippi, as early as 1792 — only four years after
the settlement made at Marietta — when he was not
more than six years old. In ten days after starting
he reached the encampment of General Wayne, at a
place called Hopson's Choice, now a part of the city
of Cincinnati. He beheld only a woody wilderness
shut in to the water's edge, excepting the clearings
made for the camp. The return voyage was made in
1795. In ascending the Ohio, the travelers fre
quently suffered severely from want of provisions.
They met no boats going down; and excepting two
log cabins at Red Bank, there were no habitations until
they reached the Falls. Not far from the Wabash they
saw a small herd of buffaloes and secured a large calf for
their supper. Once, having encamped near a beautiful
grove of sugar trees, the party found that a flock of
turkeys had taken up their night's lodging over their
heads. Twelve or fourteen of these served them for
supper and breakfast. At another time the travelers

IX THE OHIO VALLEY.

77

had a "naval battle with a bear," which they attacked
as he was swimming across the Ohio River. After an
exciting fight, during which it for some time seemed
doubtful which side would prove victorious, they
dragged their valorous but vanquished foe into their
boat, and he proved to be of enormous size. The
fasting party encamped early in anticipation of a

OHIO RIVER FROM MT. AUBURN.
feast. "One of the paws fell to my share," says the
writer of these recollections, "and, being roasted in
the ashes, furnished a delicious repast."
The boat in which this journey up the river was
made had a small cabin in the stern, formed by canvas
stretched over hoops something like those of a covered
wagon. The space beneath this was too narrow to
protect more than four or five persons. The hull of
the boat was entirely filled with peltries. "One night.

78- FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
when it rained incessantly, so many crowded in that
I was fairly crowded out, and lay, until daylight, on
the running-board of the boat, exposed to the falling
torrents of rain, accompanied by thunder and light
ning." At the mouth of the Kaskaskia the heavy articles
were removed to the rocky shore and left in charge of
one man and this small child, while the proprietor
and his boatmen ascended that stream for more furs.
The little boy and his companion made themselves
soft beds of the wild pea-plant under the spreading
branches of the trees, whose vine-clad arms overhung
the stream. Flocks of screaming paroquets frequently
alighted over their heads, and humming birds, at
tracted by blossoming honey-suckle, flitted around
them and flashed away again. After two days and
nights spent here the boat returned, and the journey
was resumed.
From Boston to Marietta in 1803. — Tour of Rev.
Thaddeus Mason Harris.
In the spring of 1803, Rev. Thaddeus Mason Harris
made a tour from Boston to Marietta, of which he
published a journal, inscribed to Hon. Rufus Putnam.
Starting March 29, with a friend, he came in a private
carriage, by post road, first to New York, thence
through Philadelphia to Lancaster, and westward over
the mountains. At Bedford the road forked; the
northern branch being called the old Forbes Road,
and the southern the Glade Road. The two united
again twenty-eight miles from Pittsburgh. Harris
took the Glade Road, which he described as very
rugged and difficult, causing him to comment on the
arduous enterprise of General Braddock, by whom it

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 79
was cut. Braddock was a month marching one hun
dred miles over this road, which he made as he went
along. Mr. Harris and his traveling companion were
terrified by the raging fires in the mountain forests,
kindled by hunters to drive out moose, deer, and other
game. At one point on the road the carriage broke down.
The journey in the main was delightful, for the
weather was clement, the season beautiful, and the
scenery magnificent. The travelers were charmed
with bird songs and wild flowers by the wayside,
especially the laurel and the snowy puccoon. They
lodged at inns with quaint names, such as " The Black
Horse," "The Grand Turk," "The Indian Queen,"
finding the best accommodations at "Martins," on
the Juniata, where they enjoyed neat chambers, clean
beds and soft pillows, sweet water, and assiduous
attention. On approaching what the tourists call the
"Yokagany" or "Yok" River, they were enchanted
with the lovely view.
At Wheeling they left their carriage and embarked
on a keel-boat for Marietta. Multitudes of wild geese,
ducks, turkeys, partridges, and quails attracted their
attention, and herds of deer and other wild animals
could be seen darting through the thickets. Arriving
at Marietta, April 23d, Mr. Harris was entertained by
General Putnam, Avho was living in comfort, sur
rounded by fruit trees of his own planting. On May
4th and 5th, Harris saw the brig " Mary Avery," the
ship "Pittsburgh," and the schooners "The Dorcas
and Sally" and "Amity" pass Marietta on their way
to the Gulf of Mexico. The people of Marietta salu
ted these vessels with cheers, and salvos from a small
cannon.

80

FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS

First Rigged Vessel Built on the Ohio.
If Doctor Harris had visited Marietta just two
years earlier, he might have witnessed the launching
of the first rigged vessel ever built on the Ohio. This
was the St. Clair, which cleared from Marietta in May,
1801, and was conducted by Commodore Abraham
Whipple down the Ohio and the Mississippi to New
Orleans, reaching that city in July. On this occasion
Captain Jonathan Devol, a citizen' of Marietta, wrote
an ode beginning — "The Triton crieth,
'Who cometh now from shore?'
Neptune replieth,
' 'Tis the old commodore.' "
This same poetical Captain Devol built, in 1795, a
very elegantly finished canoe, forty feet long, from the
trunk of a large wild cherry tree, for carrying the mail
between Marietta and the French village of Gallipolis.
The boat was large enough to carry twenty men, and
made a round trip once every week, being rowed hy
two French oarsmen.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 81

CHAPTER FIFTH.
WESTWARD BY HOOF, WHEEL, AND KEEL.
(.CONTIXVED.)

Prom New York to Pittsburgh via Niagara Falls.
Journey of Christian Schultz in 1807-8.
Four or five years subsequent to Harris' tour, Mr.
Christian Schultz, of New York State, a young gentle
man of German origin, made what he called an inland
voyage from New York City to the West and South.
Schultz published a minute journal of his travels,
covering a part of the years 1807-8. Going up the
Hudson to Albany, he took the old route to the lakes.
The freight charge from Schenectady to Utica was
seventy-five cents a hundred weight, whether by water
or land. The wagoners on the Schenectady Road were
great rogues. From Fort Stanwix to Wood Creek a
canal with locks had been constructed, so that it was
no longer necessary to carry goods over the portage
as formerly. In passing down Wood Creek towards
Oneida Lake, the boat on which Schultz embarked
met with an accident of no unusual occurrence on
Western streams. A tree had fallen across the rapid
current, and, despite the efforts of the boatmen, some
of the boat's lading was swept overboard. From
Oswego the traveler took schooner for Niagara. Visit
ing the Falls, he found the margin of the river on the
6

82 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
American side so obstructed by trees and bushes that
it was difficult to get a view of the cataract, and he
resorted to the expedient of climbing a large oak.
Schultz was surprised that no public house had yet
been established, but he was told that Judge P. con
templated the erection of a "genteel tavern for the
accommodation of the curious." Being himself one
of the curious, our enterprising tourist determined to
explore Goat Island, though access to that wild para
dise was difficult and dangerous. Schultz reached it
safely by means of a canoe. In 1807 no road but an
obscure bridle-path connected Fort Schlosser (now
Niagara) with Lake Erie. Buffalo was a small village,
swarming with hilarious Indians.
Crossing Lake Erie to Presque Isle, Schultz resumed
his journey, going on horseback over a portage of
fourteen miles to Fort Le Boeuf, leaving his baggage
to be brought after him in a wagon, drawn by three
yoke of oxen. The road was indescribably bad — the
worst the tourist had ever seen. For a great part of the
way, mi-re was so deep that it came up to the rider's
knees as he sat in the saddle. It took from sunrise
until dark of an August day to flounder fourteen
miles. The ox-wagon, encountering a hidden stump,
was upset, and the trunks and other baggage were
baptized in mud. From Le Boeuf the journey was con
tinued by boat down French Creek to the Alleghany,
and thence to Pittsburgh. As the boat was floating
down the beautiful stream, the captain shot a bear
which was swimming the river, and Schultz, to his
delight, shot a deer on the water's edge.
Pittsburgh is mentioned in the " Journal " as the
"metropolis and emporium of this Western world."
The principal business of the place was boat-building

IX THE OHIO VALLEY.

83

and boat-selling. Schultz bought a keel-boat for one
hundred and thirty dollars, hired- a crew, and acted as
his own captain, floating down the Ohio to its mouth.
Speculating on the prospect of future traffic between
the East and the West, he concluded that New York

THE PIONEER HUNTER
could never send any goods to the
mouth of the Ohio in less than sixty days,
nor at a lower rate than six dollars a hun
dred pounds. Harman Blennerhassett, about the same
time, wrote to the "Ohio Gazette:" "It will forever
remain impracticable for shipping to perform a return
voyage against the currents of our great rivers."

84 footprints of the pioneers
From Salem to Cincinnati in 1815. — Adventures
OF Timothy Flint and His Family. '.
Timothy Flint was not quite eight years old when
his uncle accompanied Putnam and the other colonists
to Marietta. Putnam started from Salem. The house
of his father, Israel Putnam, " Old Put." is still stand
ing near the old town, and is still occupied by Put-
nams. Flint distinctly remembered, as he tells us in
the " Indian Wars of the West,' the " wagon that car
ried out a number of adventurers from the counties of
Essex and Middlesex, in Massachusetts, on the second
emigration to the woods of the Ohio." The wagon had
a black cover, on which was painted in large white
capital letters the words, " To Marietta, on the Ohio."
It was Flint's impression that about twenty persons
accompanied this wagon, under the direction of Dr.
Manasseh Cutler.
A ray of light is thrown upon the days and ways
of yore by Flint's gossiping remark that " Dr. Cutler, at
the time of his being engaged in the speculation of
the Ohio Company's purchase, had a feud — it is not
remembered whether literary, political, or religious —
with the late learned and eccentric Dr. Bentley, of
Salem. Dr. Bentley was then chief contributor to a
paper which he afterward edited. The writer (Flint)
still remembers and can repeat doggerel verses by Dr.
Bentley upon the departure of Dr. Cutler on his first
trip to explore his purchase on the Ohio."
The departure of the emigrant wagon, the leave-
taking, and the general talk about the backwoods, kin
dled the imagination of young Flint. Doubtless he
felt a strong desire to join the expedition and follow
the black wagon across the mountains. Most wonder-

in the OHIO VALLEY. 85
ful reports were spread abroad in New England-con
cerning the inland country far toward the Mississippi.
Romancing travelers told, with mock gravity, that
watermelons as big as houses grew in the clearings of
the West ; that the flax plant in the Ohio Valley bore
woven cloth on its branches ; that springs of brandy
and rum gushed from the fortunate hills of Kentucky.
But these blessings and delights were not unmixed
with evil. Stories were invented with added tenfold
horror to the usual dangers of the hunt and the Indian
fights ; stories of storm, disease, and starvation, and of
the frightful hoopsnakes, which, like a rapid wheel,
span through the swamps and brakes upon its victims,
its tail armed with a sting so venomous that a tree
pierced ever so slightly by it instantly withered and
died. The second war with England had just closed, and
the tide of migration was setting strongly toward the
West, when, on October 14, 1815, Timothy Flint, with
his wife and four or five children, took passage in a
heavy traveling coach, bound for Pittsburgh. They
started, as he had seen the emigrant wagon start nearly
thirty years before, from the ancient city of Salem.
Many tears were shed as the family bade their friends
good-by, for, at that tine, though many went West,
few came back. To the imagination the AUeghanies
seemed a " barrier almost as impassable as the grave "
to whomever had once crossed over.
The slow coach jostled on by the usual route, and
near the end of the month began to toil over the
mountains. The tavern signs, as if adapting them
selves to the wild regions in which they hung, bore
pictures of wolves and bears as emblems. High above
the Alleghany summits the bald eagle soared. The

86 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
road was difficult and dangerous. Frequently it became
necessary to lift the carriage across gullies washed out
by recent rains. Hundreds of " Pittsburgh wagons "
were seen on the way to or from Philadelphia. Many
of these had broken wheels and axles. Places were
pointed out where teams had plunged down the preci
pice to destruction. The W.iGONER of the Alleghanies.
The Wagoner of the Alleghanies is a character not
altogether of the past, but his tribe has diminished and
his habits have changed. The poet T. B. Read has
delineated in gusty rhyme one who, in anterevolu-
tionary clays, drove through the mountains that border
the Juniata and the Susquehanna :
" And even in his mildest mood
His voice was sudden, loud and rude,
As is the swollen mountain stream;
He spoke as to a restive team.
His team was of the wildest breed
That ever tested Wagoner's skill ;
Each was a fierce, unbroken steed.
Curbed only by his giant will ;
And every 'ostler quaked with fear
What time his loud bells jangled near.
On many a dangerous mountain track.
While oft the tempest burst its wrack :
When lightning, like his mad whip-lash.
Whirled round the team its crooked flash.
And horses reared iu fiery fright
When near them burst the thunder crash,
Then heard the gale his voice of might ;
The peasant from his window gazed.
And staring through the darkened air,
Saw, when the sudden lightning blazed,
The fearful vision plunging there."

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 87
Thi.s is the teamster and the team heroic 1 The
wagoner of romantic song ! '
The mountain teamsters seemed to the travelers of
1815 like a new species of man. They were " unique
in their appearance, language, and habits." Flint de
scribes them as being " more rude, profane, and selfish
than either sailors, boatmen, or hunters." He says :
"We found them addicted to drunkenness, and very
little disposed to help one another. We ivere told that
there were honorable exceptions, and even associations,
who, like the sacred band of Thebes, took a kind of
oath to stand by and befriend each other." The amia
ble missionary adds, with a touch of pious humor, that
he often dropped among them, as if by accident, that
impressive tract, " The Swearer's Prayer."
Among the traveling acquaintances of the Flints
were a young Connecticut printer with his pretty wife,
going to Kentucky to start a " Gazette," and a burly
Lutheran preacher, bound for the Big Miami, who,
with pipe in mouth, rode comfortably on his horse,
while his wife and young ones trudged beside their
wagon. When Flint's carriage approached the last range of
the Alleghanies, the passengers, gazing out, saw a great
drove of cattle and swine, which animals looked shaggy,
like wolves, and the chief drover was a being as wild
looking as Crusoe's man Friday. The droves were
destined for the Philadelphia market, and had been
driven from the valley of Mad River, in Ohio, a name
which suggested to our excited travelers the idea of a
savage land.
The long journey on slow wheels was at last ended,
but not without the usual disaster of an upset. Just
as tha coach was about to enter Pittsburgh, another car-

88 footprints of the pioneers
riage, coming rapidly out of town, collided with it, and
the next moment the Flint family were struggling and
shouting under a confusion of boxes, bundles, and
trunks, from which predicament they were released
uninjured. Righting the vehicle, they got in again,
and were soon lodged in a hotel, where the charges
were double the amount asked for the same accommo
dations in Boston.
Boatmen on Western Rivers.
Flint's " Recollections " furnish an exact and viva
cious account of how navigation was conducted on the
Ohio and Mississippi. He says : " You hear the boat
men extolling their powers in pushing a pole, and you
learn the received opinion that a ' Kentuck ' is the best
man at a pole and a Frenchman at the oar. A firm
push of the iron-pointed pole on a fixed log is termed
a ' reverend set.' You are told when you embark to
bring your 'plunder' aboard, and you hear about mov
ing ' fernent ' the stream, and you gradually become
acquainted with a copious vocabulary of this sort. The
manners of the boatmen are as strange as their lan
guage. Their peculiar way of life has given origin,
not only to an appropriate dialect, but to new modes
of enjoyment, riot, and fighting. Almost every boat,
while it lies in harbor, has one or more fiddles contin
ually scraping aboard, to which you often see the
boatmen dancing. There is no wonder that the way
of life which the boatmen lead — in turn extremely
indolent and extremely laborious; fOr days together
requiring little or no effort and attended with no dan
ger, and then, on a sudden, laborious and hazardous
beyond Atlantic navigation; generally plentiful as it

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

89

90 footprints of the pioneers
respects food, and always so as it regards whisky —
should prove irresistible to the young people who live
near the banks of the river. The boats float by their
dwellings on beautiful spring mornings, when the ver
dant forest, the mild, delicious temperature of the air,
the delightful azure of the sky of this country, the fine
bottom on the one hand and the romantic bluff ou the
other, the broad and smooth stream rolling calmly
down the forest and floating the boat gently forward —
all these circumstances harmonize in the excited youth
ful imagination. The boatmen are dancing to the
violin on the deck of their boat. They scatter their
wit among the girls on the shore who come down to
the water's edge to see the pageant pass. The boat
glides on until it disappears behind a point of wood.
At this moment, perhaps, the bugle, with which all the
boatmen are provided, strikes up its note in the distance
over the waters. These scenes, and these notes echoing
from the bluffs of the beautiful Ohio, have a charm for
the imagination ; although I have heard a thousand
times repeated, is even to me always new and always
delightful." This vivid and enthusiastic description recalls the
melodious lines of William 0. Butler, on " The Boat-
horn," contributed to the " Western Review," Lexing
ton, Kentucky, in 1821 :
" O, boatman ! wind that horn again.
For never did the listening air
Upon its lambent bosom bear
So wild, so soft, so sweet a strain !
What though thy notes are sad and few.
By every simple boatman blown.
Yet is each pulse to nature true.
And melody in every tone.

IX TIIE OHIO VALLEY. 91
How oft in boyhood's joyous days.
Unmindful of the lapsing hours,
I've loitered on my homeward way
By mild Ohio's bank of flowers ;
AVhile some lone boatman from the deck
Poured his soft numbers to the tide,
.\s if to charm from storm and wreck
The boat where all his fortunes ride !
Delighted Xature drank the sound,
Enchanted echo bore it round,
In whispers soft, and softer still,
From hill to plain, and plain to hill;
Till e'en the thoughtless frolic boy.
Elate with hope and wild with joy.
Who gamboled by the river side
.\ud sported with the fretting tide.
Feels something new pervade his breast.
Change his light step, repress bis jest.
Bends o'er the flood his eager ear
To catch the sounds far off, yet dear —
Drinks the sweet draft, but knows not why
The tear of rapture fills his eye."
For the sake of variety, let us place beside these
poetic and sentimental extracts a pen picture quite as
realistic, drawn by our traveling acquaintance. Chris
tian Schultz. For idiomatic force, local color, and
sublimity of slang, literature has scarcely a match for
this once famous anecdote: " On the levee at Natchez
two boatmen were engaged in a drunken quarrel, in
cited by the charms of a Choctaw inamorata. One
said, ' I am a man ; I am a horse ; I am a team ; I can
whip any man in all Kentucky, by  ! ' The other
replied, 'I am an alligator; half man, half horse; can
whip any man on the Mississippi, by  ! ' The first
one again, ' I am a man ; have the best horse, best dog,
best gun, arid handsomest wife in all Kentucky, by

92 footprints of the pioneers
 ! ' The other, ' I am a Mississippi snapping-turtle;

have bear's claws, alligator's teeth, and the devil's tail;
can whip any man, by  ! ' This was too much for
the first, and at it they went like two bulls, and con
tinued for half an hour, when the alligator was fairly
vanquished by the horse."
River Craft in 1815.
The simplest form of floating conveyance used on
the Ohio was, of course, the log canoe, or dug-out,
unless we regard the raft of logs as more primitive.
A larger sort of canoe, sometimes made of the trunks
of two big trees united, and of a capacity sufficient to
carry from ten to fifteen barrels of salt, was called a
pirogue, or periogue. Who does not remember Robin
son Crusoe's " very handsome periogue, big enough to
hold six and twenty men ? " Skiffs or batteaus were
constructed of all sizes.
"Kentuck boats," also called "broad horns" and
" arks," were strong, oblong structures, made of heavy,
square timber, about fifteen feet wide, and from fifty
to eighty feet long, covered with an arched roof. They
carried a burden of from two hundred to four hundred
barrels. Very large boats of the variety, intended for
use on the Mississippi, were known as " Orleans boats."
They were steered by a swing oar as long as the boat
itself The " keel-boat " was of a light build and more
graceful form — long, slender, and adapted to shallow
water. It was propelled by poles, aided at times by a
sail, or, in high water, pulled up stream hy " bush
whacking ; " that is, by catching hold of bushes and
limbs of trees overhanging the river's margin.
The most peculiar vessel in use on the fiver in early

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 93
times was the " barge," a craft that looked as if it
belonged to the sea. Barges were about the size of a,
Bmall schooner, and carried a movable mast amidships,
provided with square sails and topsails. The deck was
high, and is described as having an " outlandish "
appearance. The largest of these vessels carried as
much as a hundred tons of freight. Three or four
hands, besides the helmsman, were required to navi
gate the barge down stream, but to propel it against
the current twenty or thirty men were needed.
Perils of River Navigation.
The perils that beset navigation when trade and
migration began to penetrate ' the Ohio Valley were
formidable. The streams themselves were unknown,
treacherous, obstructed b}' rocks and "snags." The
sentinel trees, that bent threatening from the shore,
seemed hostile to inroading commerce, and with their
savage arms they arrested the passing boats or dragged
a share of the cargo into the waves. Behind the
unfriendly trees the prowling red man waited and
watched to kill the unwary voyager. Fleets of canoes
would appear suddenly from some concealed cove, and
a savage horde would attack some lone barge. The
last memorable river fight between white men and
Indians occurred between Marietta and Maysville, on
the 23d of March, 1791. Captain William Plubbell,
with eight men, three women, and eight children, was
coming from Pittsburgh to Limestone (Maysville) on a
flat-boat. The Indians, to the number of nearly a
hundred, assailed the boat from their canoes. A fight
with guns was kept up for many hours. All the white
men but two — Captain Hubbell and another — were
killed. The women and children were saved. One

94 FOOTPRINTS OP THE PIONEERS
little boy, who had been told to stay in a certain place
and keep still, whatever might happen, was shot in the
leg. He made no cry. When his plight was discov
ered and he was asked why he had not called for help,
the little hero said : " You told me to keep still, and
I did." The mail-boats that plied between Pittsburgh and
Cincinnati from 1794 to 1798 were rendered proof
against musket-balls, and were supplied with cannon,
muskets, and ammunition.
The lower course of the Ohio came to be infested
by gangs of outlaws, robbers, boat-wreckers, who had
their rendezvous in woods or caves. Readers of the
"Western Monthly Magazine" will recall a graphic
account of the exploits of the notorious " Colonel
Plug" in the vicinity of Fort Massac, the House of
Nature, and the mouth of Cache.
The Cumberland Road.
Por a good many years after the advent of the
steamboat, the greater part of the produce of the upper
country was transported down stream on flat-boats.
But the fittest survives, and the unfit degenerate and
perish. The helmsman of the keel-boat and barge
was destined to give place to the pilot in his quaint
wheel-house, and the dancing, drinking poleman was
superseded by the modern deck-hand or "roustabout,"
with his leather mittens and cotton-hook.
The Indians vanished from the woods; "Colonel
Plug" toppled from the unsteady deck of a floating
whisky barrel into the Mississippi and was drowned ;
Mike Fink, the " Last of the Boatmen," was shot to
the heart, and died in Missouri in the year 1822. At
that date the steamboat had been ten years going

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

<W

up and down the Ohio River. The employment of
thousands of keels on the great inland streams acceler
ated the travel on the old highways, and called new
roads and canals into existence. With the breaking
up of the Indian power in the Northwest, new routes
of travel were opened through Ohio. The United
States Government transformed the old Braddock Road
into an excellent macadamized pike, from Cumber-

THE STAGE-COACH.

-^'5| land, Maryland, to ^^^heel-
ing, West Virginia. This
great avenue of commerce,
called the National or Fed
eral Road, was extended by State legislation through
Ohio and Indiana. Hundreds and thousands of emi
grants journeyed over this road to what was still called
"The Wilderness." The heavy Conestoga covered
wagon, drawn by four or six horses, with bells, was as
picturesque an object as the barge, and was poetically
described as a mountain ship. The procession of vehi
cles was interminable. The taverns by the wayside
were crowded, and every night movers encamped like

96 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
gypsies or like an army of peace wherever the day's
march ended. Then came the emigrant :
" Over the mountains to this Western land,
A journey long and slow and perilous,
With many hardships, and the homesick look
Of wife and children backwards; chose his farm,
Builded his house, and cleared, by slow degrees,
Acres that years ago were meadows broad
Or wh"at fields roclfing in the summer heat." — Piatt,
The Flood of Migration in 1836. — Routes of
Western Travel.
Rapidly as the torrent of population poured over
the mountains and spread into Ohio, Kentucky, Indi
ana and Illinois, it was long before the people of the
East realized what was going on in these States. Wil
liam G. Eliot, writing from Boston, May 30, 1785, to a
friend in Louisville, says; "Everybody is now talk
ing of a Western tour. It is getting to be as common
to speak of visiting Cincinnati, Louisville, and even
St. Louis, as it was five years ago of visiting Niagara.
I know a great many who have gone this spring to the
Mississippi for the sole purpose of ' seeing the West.'
All these will return -w ith enlarged ideas, and will dif
fuse true notions of our land of promise."
Rev. James Freeman Clarke, in the " Western Mes
senger " for August, 1836, gives the following vivid de
scription of the travel and routes of that day. He says :
" The amount of travel, east and west, over the Alle-
f;;hany range is so great as to almost surpass belief
Notwithstanding the numerous routes, all are covered ;
notwithstanding the yearly additions to the number
of stages and canal-boats, all are crowded, crammed
packed, with the migratory public. The enormous and

in the OHIO valley. 97
thickly wedged flocks of pigeons which yearly cross the
Ohio in the upper element hardly exceed the human
multitude who are floated, dragged, driven, and steamed
along below, and their forest resting-places, stripped of
foliage and beech-nuts, and broken down by their in
numerable company, afford a happy analogy to the
hotels and inns, whose dinner-tables are swept clean,
and whose dormitories are crammed full with the ever-
swelling torrent of the traveling caravans. . . The
northern route, through New York State, is very beau
tiful. The scenery between Utica find Schenectady,
on the valley of the Mohawk, is inimitably tender —
the furious cataract of Trenton the exquisite lakes ;
Seneca, Caiuga, and Scaneateles ; the beautiful towns of
Rochester, Geneva, Canandaigua, Utica; the falls at
Rochester and Niagara — all make this a very interest
ing journey. All this, however, is too well known to
need any description. After leaving Buffalo, the West
ern traveler may either go to Pittsburgh by land, or go
to Ashtabula and cross to Wellsville ; or go to Cleve
land, and take the canal to Portsmouth or road to Co
lumbus and Cincinnati; or may go through the lakes,
Huron and Michigan, a most delightful passage to
Chicago, and thence to Peoria and down the Illinois.
"The southern route, through Virginia, is very sub
lime and picturesque. You may go to Fredericksburg
or Richmond, thence to Charlottesville, and from thence
across the Blue Ridge to the White Sulphur Springs in
Greenbrier County ; thence you may go to Lexington,
in Kentucky, by land or more pleasantly by the sub
lime scenery on the Kanawha to the Charleston Salines
and Guyandotte, on the Ohio. This is rather fatiguing,
but the lovely grandeur of the mountain scenery is
enough to repay you for it.
7

yS FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
" He who aims at uniting the greatest despatch
with economy and an easy route, will go from Balti
more to Wheeling on the mail route. This road is
excellent, and by this route one can go from Baltimore
to Cincinnati in four or five days.
" But an invalid, or one traveling with a family,
who wishes to make the journey without the least
fatigue, should choose the Philadelphia Canal. This
majestic work has been little spoken of, though it is
one of the great curiosities of the country, and, indeed,
of the world."
Thomas Corwin on The Great West.
We speak of the canoe, the pack-saddle, the Ken
tucky boat, the Conestoga wagon, as the writer of an
cient history might tell of the coracle of the wild
Briton, or the chariot of Homer's heroes. But the
stumps have scarcely rotted of the trees that furnished
our fathers with canoes. Our oldest roads are new. In ¦
the year 1838, just half a century after the first settle
ment in Ohio was made at Marietta, Thomas Corwin
made a speech, in the House of Representatives of the
United States, in favor of a bill making appropriations
for the continuance of the Cumberland Road through
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. In that speech the famous
orator made use of these words :
" Some gentlemen, (I speak it in no spirit of pride
or vain boasting), some gentlemen from the old States
might learn something new to them in the history of
civilization would they but visit that Western world of
which they often seem to me to know so little. They
might see there, in the very spot' where but yesterday
the wild beasts of the wilderness seized their prey by
night, and made their covert lair by day, on that same

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

99

spot to-day stands the common school-house, filled
alike with the children of the rich and the poor, those
children who are to be the future voters, officers, and
statesmen of the Republic. Over that vast region, so
lately red with the blood of savage war, the seed-
fields of knowledge are planted, and a smiling harvest
of civilization springs up, and there, too, may be seen
what a Christian statesman might well admire. The
schoolmaster is not alone. That holy religion, which
is at last the only sure basis of permanent social or
political improvement, has there its voices crying in
the wilderness. Upon the almost burning embers of
the war-fire, round which some barbarous chief but
yesterday recounted to his listening tribe, with horrid
exultation, his deeds of savage heroism, to-day is built
a temple dedicated to that religion which announces
' peace on earth and good will toward men.' "

HARRISON S HOME AT NORTH BEND.

100 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
CHAPTER SIXTH.
EAPID SETTLEMENT OF THE CENTRAL STATES.

THE .SONG OP THE PIONEERS.

BY WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER.

[Written nearly fifty years ago.]
A song for the Early Times Out West,
And our green old forest-home.
Whose pleasant memories freshly yet
Across the bosom come :
A song for the free and gladsome life
In those early days we led.
With a teeming soil beneath our feet.
And a smiling Heav'n o'erhead !
Oh, the waves wi life danced merrily,
And had a joyous flow,
In the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago !
The hunt, the shot, the glorious chase.
The captured elk, or deer ;
The camp, the big bright fire, and then
The rich and wholesome cheer :
The sweet sound sleep at dead of night.
By our camp-fires blazing high —
Unbroken by the wolf's long howl,
And the panther springing by.
Oh, merrily pass'd the time, despite
Our wily Indian foe,
In the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

101

WLLLIAM D. GALLAGHER.

102 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
We shunn'd not labor : when 't was due
We wrought with right good will,
And for the homes we made for them
Our children bless us still.
We lived not hermit lives, but oft
In social converse met ;
And fires of love were kindled there.
That burn ou warmly yet.
Oh, pleasantly the stream of life
Pursued its constant flow.
In the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago.

We felt that we were fellow-men ;
We felt we were a band
Sustain'd here in the wilderness
By Heaven's upholding hand.
And when the solemn Sabbath came.
Assembling in the wood.
We lifted up our hearts in prayer
To God the only Good.
Our temples then were earth and sky ;
None others did we know,
In the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago !
Our forest life was rough and rude.
And dangers closed us round ;
But here, amid the green old trees.
Freedom was sought and found.
Oft through our dwellings, wintry blasts
Would rush with shriek and moan ;
We cared not — though they were but frail.
We felt they were our own !
Oh, free and manly lives we led,
Mid verdure, or mid snow.
In the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago !

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 103
But now our course of life is short ;
.^nd as, from day to d.iy,
\Ve're walking on with weakening step,
And halting by the way,
Another Land, more bright than this.
To our dim sight appears,
And on our way to it we all
Are moving with the years.
Yet while we linger, we may still
Our backward glances throw.
To the days when we were Pioneers,
Fifty years ago I
A Century's Increase of Populatio.x and Growth
OF Settlement.
The census of 179U gave the population of the
largest six towns in the United States as follows:
Philadelphia, 40,000; New York, 30,000; Boston,
18,000; Charleston, 16,000; Baltimore, 13,000; and
Salem, 8,000.
George Washington had occupied the presidential
chair about six weeks when Major Doughty and his
men began to build Fort Washington at Cincinnati,
June, 1789. Three years later, Kentucky was admitted
to the Union, and four years after that, 1796, Tennessee
was admitted. Ohio became a State in 1803, and in
that year Jefferson's Louisiana purchase added to the
possessions of our country an extent of territory west
of the Mississippi greater than all that part of the
United States east of that river. When he had secured
Louisiana, Jefferson took measures for its exploration.
An expedition was fitted out to ascend the Missouri to
its source, to cross the Rocky Mountains, and to find, if
such existed, a river or rivers flowing into the Pacific.
A party of thirty men, led by Captains Lewis and

104 footprints of the PIONEERS
Clark, started, in May, 1804, from St. Louis, then the
extreme Western outpost, as Pittsburgh was before the
Revolution. The j^arty went up the Missouri, crossed
the mountains, and discovered the Columbia River,
being the first white men to traverse the continent by
following its water-courses, an enterprise that advent
urers had been attempting ever since Columbus
reached the New World.
Wayne's treaty with the Indians at Greenville, in
1795, gave security to white settlers, though the red
man's power was not destroyed until after the battle of
Tippecanoe, in 1811, and the war with the English and
their savage allies, in 1812-15.
The population of the United States at the time of
this second war with England was estimated at eight
millions. Few white men had yet ventured beyond
the Mississippi. There were no cities west of the Alle
ghanies. Buffalo had about one hundred buildings,
all but three of which were burned by the British.
Cincinnati had some two thousand inhabitants in
1810. St. Louis had a small floating population of
Yankee traders, backwoodsmen from Kentucky and
Tennessee, French Creoles, and prairie Indians. The
first brick house in the settlement was built in 1813.
Chicago existed as a fort and two or three dwellings,
but the soldiers who garrisoned the post, and the fami
lies who dwelt in the houses, were nearly all massacred
by the Indians in 1812, and the fort was destroyed by
fire. In the forty years that went by from the time
the colonies became independent to the end of the
War of 1812, only five new States were added to the
original thirteen, being an average of one in eight
years. The first six years after the war saw six new
States admitted, one each successive year.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

105

Growth of the States Formed from the
Northwestern Territory.
The five States formed from the territory northwest
of the Ohio River were admitted into the Union as fol
lows : Ohio, 1803 ; Indiana, 1816 ; lUinois, 1818; Mich
igan, 1837; Wisconsin, 1848. According to tabular
statements given by Dr. B. A. Hinsdale, in his "Address
on the Ordinance of 1787," the increase of population
in the entire region covered by these States and the
parts of Minnesota and Pennsylvania that were origin
ally included in the Northwestern Territory, an area
of 265,878 acres, has been marvelous.
Population Within the Limits of the Original
nokthwesteen territory.
1800  51,006
1810  272,324
1820  972,400
1830  1,470,018
1840  2,924,728
1850  4,523,260
1860  6,926,884
1870  9,121,917
1880  11,206,667
Population op the Five St.\tes, 1800, 1810, etc.

YEAR

OHIO.

INDIANA

ILLINOIS

MICHIGAN

WISC'NS'N

TOTAL.

POP. OF
WHOLE
COUNTRY.

1800

45,365
230,760
581,295937,903
1,519,467
1,980,3292,339,5112,665,2603,198.062

5,641
24,520
147,178343,031
685,866988,416
1,350,428 1,680,637
1,978,301

51,006
272,324792,400
1,470,0182,924,728
4,523,2606,926,884
9,121,917
11,206,667

5,308.4837,239,8819,633,822
12 866 020

1810

12,282
55,162
157,445
476,183 851,470
1,711,9512,539,8913,077,870

4,7628,765
31,639
212,267 397,654749,113
1,184,059 1,636,9.37

1820
1830
18401850 1860
1870
1B80
30,945
305,.391775,881
1,054,6701,315,497
17,069,453
23,191,87631,443,32138,558,37150,155,783
106

FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS

" Go West, Young Man !"
A.t the close of the Revolutionary War, migration.
moved from the trans- Appalachian States to the valley
of the Ohio. By pack-horse, by river craft, by slow
wheeled wagon, the movers came to settle on claims
already purchased, or to seek unsold farming lands.

li •

#"'^?^^

governor morrow's mill, on the little Miami eiveb.

Toilsome and tedious was -the journey to the wilder
ness ; the recollections of its hardships made the hope
of return fade to despair.
Untried difficulties we can face — we only half be
lieve in them and novelty stimulates ; but who wishes
to repeat weary tasks and privations once painfully
endured ? Having cast his lot in the " Ohio Country,"
the emigrant felt that the "Atlantic Country " was

IN THE OHIO VALLKY. 107
henceforth a sort of foreign land, albeit the place of
his birth. Rarely he made a trip back to Baltimore,
Philadelphia, New York or Boston, yet the West looked
to the East for manufactured articles, for news, books,
fashions, and (at first) even for opinions, very much
as the colonies once looked to England. Just as Eu
ropean colonists, English, Dutch or German, brought
their customs and hereditary traits to ^^irginia, New
York, and Massachusetts, so the emigrants from the
old States carried their characteristics, beliefs, habits,
and material possessions to the Western wilds, there to
be modified by new surroundings and the law of nat
ural selection. It would be curious and instructive to
study the influence of migration on the ideas, usages,
and institutions of men. We should expect that
Daniel Boone would bring to Kentucky the ways he had
learned in his native North Carolina, and that Rufus
Putnam would carry to Marietta the imprint of his
Massachusetts training. But change of circumstances
works change of habit, and the genius of the place
slowly makes men over.
The pioneers who journeyed down the Ohio and
penetrated the woods of the interior lands repeated
many of the experiences which their fathers and
even themselves had already tried east of the mount
ains. They cleared lands, built cabins, planted corn,
hunted wild game, and lived in half dread of the
scalping-knife. Every man was necessarily a scout
or a ranger. The wary settler who rode with his grist
to the lonely mill carried his gun in his hand; and
when he went to the log meeting-house to worship
God, he failed not to fetch along the same faithful
weapon.

108 footprints of the pioneers
The Pioneer's House and Home.
Emerson says every house is a quotation from the
woods. The cabin of the pioneer was a very direct and
simple quotation. The rude edifice was fashioned en
tirely of timber cut from the forest, and hewn or split
into shape. The ordinary dimensions were eighteen
by twenty feet. The walls were of shapely logs, the
roof of oaken clapboards held in their place by weight
poles ; the floor was of heavy planks called puncheons,
cleft from large tree-trunks and smoothed with the
broad-axe. The huge chimney, built on the outside
of the cabin, was of stone or of cross-sticks plastered
with mud. The single strong door had a wooden latch,
which could be lifted from without by a leather string
passing through a small hole, and called the latch-
string. This was pulled inside at nights or in times
of danger, somewhat after the principle of Crusoe's lad
der. The window was made by sawing out a section
of a log and inserting a rude frame, over which greased
paper was stretched as a substitute for glass. The
cabin loft, the guest-chamber of yore, was reached by
a movable ladder.
The habitation in Perry County, Indiana which
Thomas Lincoln built, in 1816, is described as " merely
a shed of poles, which defended the inmates on three
sides from the foul weather, but left them open to its
inclemency in front." In this " half-faced camp " the
family lived for a whole year, and then removed to
another, which the writer j ust quoted says " was like
that of other pioneers. A few three-legged stools ; a
bedstead made of poles standing between the logs in
the angle of the cabin, the outside corner supported by
a crotched stick driven into the ground; tho table, a

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 109
huge hewed log standing on four legs ; a pot, kettle,
and skillet, and a few tin and pewter dishes were all
the furniture. The boy Abraham Lincoln climbed
at night to his bed of leaves, by a ladder of wooden
pins driven into the logs."
" The Raising."
The professional architect did not bring his tracing
paper and India ink to the backwoods. Nor did a con
tractor make his bid according to plans and specifica
tions for the masonry, the wood-work, the plastering,
and the painting.
The civilization of the pioneers had not differenti
ated such a thing as a carpenter, much less a plumber.
The principle of cooperation prevailed, however, and
every man was a Jack-at-all-trades.
When Farmer Sturdy and his good wife had se
lected a site for their new house and home, the neigh
bors were notified within a circuit of eight or ten miles
to come to Sturdy's house-raising on such a Monday.
Each man came with axe and handspike. Suitable
logs, cut from the woods, were dragged to the building
spot by oxen or horses. Strong men, with some me
chanical skill, were stationed at the corners of the
house to notch the logs and fit them together deftly as
they were, one by one, lifted to their place.
The heavy work being done, the proprietor was left
to finish as he could. No one expected pay for help
at a raising. The circulating currency of these hospit
able days was work for work — exchange of muscular
energy. The farmers lent a hand literally.
An excellent description of the log-cabin, as it ap
peared in Northern Ohio about the year 1809, was given
by H. B. Curtis, in an address delivered in 1885 before

110 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
the Richland County Pioneer Society. Mr. Curtis
says : " After a few days spent in an improvised
shanty, or perhaps the interior of the covered wagon,
the pioneer sets himself seriously to work in the con
struction of his log-cabin. Having selected his spot,
the tall, straight young trees of the forest are to be
felled, measured, cut, and hauled to the place ; at the
same time properly distributed to form the several
prospective sides of the proposed structure. The
' skids ' are provided upon which to run up the logs.
The clapboards, rived from the cleanest white oak
blocks, rough and unshaved, are made ready for the
roof Whisky, then about twenty-five cents per gal
lon, is laid in, and due notice is given to such neigh
bors as can be reached of the day appointed for the
' raising, "When the time comes, and the forces collect togeth
er, a captain is appointed, and the men divided into
proper sections and assigned to their several duties.
Four men most skillful in the use of the axe are sev
erally assigned to each corner ; these are the ' corner
men,' whose duty it is to 'notch' and 'saddle' — as
it were, like a dovetail — the timbers at their connec
tion, and preserve the plumb, 'carrying up' the re
spective corners. Then there are the 'end men,' who,
with strong arms, and the aid of pikes, force the logs
up the ' skids ' and deliver them to the corner men.
In this way the building rises with wonderful rapidity ;
the beamers for the roof logs are adjusted ; the broad
clapboards laid with skill, the ' weight-poles ' placed
upon the successive courses, and the shell of the cabin
is completed. The frolic is ended and a good supper
crowns the day's work. Then follow the ' puncheon '
floor, made of heavy planks split from timber and

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. Ill
dressed on one side with an axe; the big log fire-place;
the beaten clay hearth ; the stick and clay chimney ;
the 'clinking' and 'daubing;' the paper windows,
and the door with wooden latch and hinges. And so
the log-cabin home is made ready, and the family
moves in with as much joy and delight as may fill their
hearts when, twenty years later, they enter their now
stately frame or brick mansion erected on the same
spot." The above is the primitive log-cabin ; but it was
subject to many modifications and degrees of advanced
pretensions. The cabin might be single or double,
with a gangway between, covered by a common roof.
It was made of hewed logs, or "scutched," which was
superficial hewing made after the building was up.
So, too, its elevation was suited to the condition of
the family; and sometimes the corners squared or
dressed down; and perchance the clapboards nailed
on, when so luxurious an article as nails could be
obtained, in heu of the " weight-poles."
Governor Reynolds recorded that the floors of the
first houses in Illinois were the natural earth beat
solid, or the earth with puncheons in the middle of
the room to cover the " potato-hole," or a complete sur
face of puncheons. The " potato-hole" was an impor
tant receptacle in the rude dwellings of the back
woodsman. An old gentleman of Leesburg, Highland
County, Ohio, told the writer of this sketch that he
remembered being deposited, with three other chil
dren, in the potato-hole of his mother's house near
Leesburg during a violent storm, which blew the roof
from the cabin and whirled the "long-string" clock
across the room. This was in 1826.

112 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS

CHAPTER SEVENTH.

LOG -CABIN LIFE IN THE VALLEY OF THE BEAUTI
FUL KIVER

"The Hoosier's Nest."
The pioneer's cabin of Indiana, with its furnish
ings and happy family, was graphically and amus
ingly pictured in words by John Finley, in lines
entitled "The Hoosier's Nest."
THE HOOSIEE'S NEST.
I'm told, in riding somewhere West,
A stranger found a Hoosier's nest.
In otiier words a Buckeye cabin.
Just big enough to hold Queen Mab in.
Its situation, low, but airy.
Was on the borders of a prairie ;
And fearing he might be benighted,
He hailed the house and then alighted.
The Hoosier met him at tlie door.
Their salutations soon were o'er.
He took the stranger's horse aside.
And to a sturdy sapling tied ;
Then, having stripped the f addle off,
He fed him in a sugar-trough.
The stranger stooped to enter in,
The entr.ance closing with a pin ;
.-\.nd manifested strong desire
To sit down by the log-heap fire.
Where half a dozen hoosieroons.
With mus'i aud milk, tin-cup3 and spoons.

in the OHIO VALLEY. ' 113
White bread, bare feet, and dirty faces,
Seemed much inclined to keep their places;
But madam, anxious to display
Her rough but undisputed sway.
Her offspring to the ladder led.
And cufled the youngsters up to bed.
Invited shortly to partake
Of venison, milk, and johnny-cake.
The stranger made a hearty meal.
And glances round the room would steal.
One side was lined with divers garments.
The other, spread with skins of varmints ;
Dried pumpkins overliead were strung,
Where venison hams in plenty hung ;
Two rifies placed above the door.
Three dogs lay stretched upon the floor —
In short, the domicile was rife
With specimens of Hoosier life.
The host, who center'd his affections
On game, and range and quarter sections^
Discoursed his weary guest for hours,
Till Somnus' all-composing powers.
Of sublunary cares bereft 'em ;
And then I came away and left 'em.
The subject is a favorite one with the Western
man. "The Cabin in the Clearing" is the title of a
volume by the Indiana poet Benjamin S. Parker. The
following is from Parker's realistic description of the
remembered pioneer home.
" And I mind the floor of puncheons
Eudely laid on joist and sill.
And the fire-place shaped and beaten
From the red clay on the hill ;
With the chimney standing outside.
Like a blind man asking alms.
Wrought of sticks and clay, and fashioned
By the builder's ready palms.

114 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
"Halfway up the flue, wide- throated.
Does the hickory cross-tree rest,
Whence depend the pot and kettle,
When the great fire blazes best.
Oh ! smell the savory venison,
Hear the hominy simmer low
As my Mary stirs the embers
That were ashes long ago.
" Now that cabin in the clearing
Is but dust, blown here and there,
Where the palpitating engines
Breathe their darkness on the air;
Where my forests towered in beauty,
Now a smoky village stands,
And the rows of factories cluster
Grimly on my fertile lands."
Costume and Furniture.
The comparative newness of all the material
changes called by the general name of " improve
ments," in the Central West, may be brought vividly
to the imagination by considering how recently the
site of the great city of Cincinnati was in the thick
woods. Timothy Flint tells us that in 1790 (not a
century ago) " twenty acres in different parts of the
town were planted in corn. The grinding was done
with hand mills. Flour and bacon, now in such
abundance, were then imported from the older settle
ments. The tables were of split planks, and the dishes
were of wood. The men wore hunting-shirts of do
mestic fabric. The dress was bound with a belt, or
girdle, in which were a knife and a tomahawk. The
lower part of the dress was of deer-skin, and after the
Indian fashion ; in fact, the dress of the backwoods
people of Illinois and Missouri at the present day."

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

115

¦£ r

SCHOOL-MASTEK ON SNOWY BOAD.

116 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
This was written in 1832, only fifty-six years ago.
Another chronicler of old customs informs his readers
that the early settlers of Illinois wore " mawkawsins"
on their feet, and covered the head with the red skin
of the prairie wolf; that buffalo hides were cut into
strips for ropes and traces, and that the skins of the
buffalo, bear, and elk were used for beds.
The cramped limits of the ordinary log house for
bade much ceremony, by compelling the members of
the family to share promiscuously in miscellaneous
duties. Necessities were provided for, but amenities
were not. Social life, under such circumstances, suf
fered many inconveniences. But families learned to
accommodate their wants to their means.
For toilet purposes a small looking-glass was placed
at an angle above the paste-board comb-case. The men
and boys always went out into the yard to wash their
faces. Usually a spinning-wheel and a flax distaff formed
part of the house furniture.
Of course the historic buckeye broom or its hickory
rival kept the cabin clean ; and of course the neces
sary rifle, with accompanying powder-horn and bullet-
pouch, hung upon wooden hooks against the wall.
Light, Fire, Food, and Water.
Pine-knots, tallow candles, and lard-oil lamps fur
nished light. The embers in the fire-place were seldom
suffered to burn out, but when the last coal chanced to
expire the flre was rekindled by striking a spark from
the flint into a piece of tinder. The tinder-box was to
our ancestors what the match-box is to us. Sometimes,
when the fire went out, a burning brand was borrowed
from the hearth of a neiiihbor.

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 117
Bread was baked in " Dutch ovens," or '' bake
pans," set over beds of live coals raked upon the
hearth, and meats and vegetables were boiled in pots
hung by hooks upon a strong piece of green timber
called the " lug-pole," which was placed across the wide
chimney-flue, ju.'^t above the blaze. In time the lug-
pole gave place to the iron crane. There was invented
also a cooking utensil of tin called a reflector, by means
of which biscuits were baked.
The flesh of the deer and the wild turkey furnished
a staple of food in the backwoods. Beans, pumpkin
butter, and dried fruits were much used. Corn-meal
was the common bread-stuff, and, mills being few, the
corn was often ground by means of a pestle in a wood
en mortar. Corn bread was often prepared in the form
of a johnny-cake — a corruption of journey-cake — a loaf
baked upon a "johnny" board, about two feet long
and eight inches wide, on which the dough was spread
and then exposed to the fire. In Kentucky, the slaves
used to bake similar loaves on a hoe, and called them
hoe-cakes. The early settler sought to locate his cabin near a
spring or a running stream. When he dug a well,
the water was drawn by means of the old oaken buck
et, hung by a grape-vine from the "sweep," or by a
windlass. W.\R ON THE Woods.
Food, clothing, shelter, are the undowithoutables.
A venison steak in the skillet, a suit of buckskin, a
hut to shed the rain, and the man is comfortable.
Starting with these essentials, he sets about gaining
the superfluities. He begins the aggressive struggle
for power and possession.

118 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
The trees are the backwoodman's enemy, for they
occupy his ground. They will not run away, like the
buffalo and the Indian, so they must be hewn down
and cremated.
The labor of clearing, like that of building, was
lightened for each by the union of all in the war upon
the woods. " Choppings," and " log-rollings," were
among the toilsome pleasures of the settlers.
A small army of stalwart men, with strong muscles
and sharp axes, soon cut away a regiment of trees, and
let daylight upon a i^lot of ground large enough for a
" patch " for planting corn, beans, and pumpkins. The
trees were felled, their branches were lopped off, their
trunks were cut into lengths of from twelve to twenty
feet. Then came the log-rolling. Ox-teams and hand
spikes dragged and rolled the slaiii giants of the forest
into high piles, which, when dry, were burnt to ashes.
When the task of the day was ended, such games as
racing, wrestling, and boxing were in order.
The Corn-Husking.
By slow encroachment on the woods, the . tillable
flelds were widened. Barns to garner the harvests rose
when the necessity for them was felt.
Then the custom of holding " husking bees " pre
vailed in the Ohio Valley, as it had prevailed long
before in the East. But the mode of conducting the
husking was changed. Doctor Daniel Drake gives a
vivid description of corn-husking in Kentucky about
the year 1800. He says :
" When the crop was drawn in, the ears were heaped
into a long pile or rick, a night fixed upon, and the
neighbors notified rather than invited, for it was an
affair of mutual assistance. As they assembled at

in THE OHIO VALLEY.

119

night-fall, the green glass quart whisky bottle, stopped
with a cob, was handed to every one, man and boy, as
they arrived, to take a drink. A sufficient number to
constitute a sort of quorum having arrived, two men,
or more commonly two boys, constituted themselves,
or were by acclamation declared, captains. They paced
the rick, and estimated its contractions and expansions

SCHOOL-HO0SE.

with the eye, until they were able to fix the spot on
which the end of the dividing rail should be. The
choice depended on the tossing of a chip, one side of
which had been spit upon. The first choice of men
was decided in the same way, and in a few minutes
the rick was charged upon by the rival forces. As
others arrived, as soon as the owner had given each

120 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
the bottle, he fell in according to the end he be
longed to.
" The captains planted themselves on each side of
the rail, sustained by their most active operations.
Here, at the beginning, was the great contest, for it was
lawful to cause the rail to slide or fall toward your
own end, shortening it and lengthening the other.
Before I was twelve years old, I had stood many times
near the rail, either as captain or private ; and although
fifty years have rolled away, I have never seen a more
anxious rivalry, nor a fiercer struggle. It was here I
first learned that competition is the mother of cheating,
falsehood, and broils. Corn might be thrown over
unhusked, the rail might be pulled toward you by the
hand dexterously applied underneath, your feet might
push corn to the other side of the rail, your husked
corn might be so short a distance as to bury up the
base of the pile on the other side. If charged with any
of those tricks, you of course denied it, and there the
matter sometihies rested ; and at other times the charge
was reaffirmed, and then rebutted with ' you lie,' etc.,
and then a fight at the moment, or at the end, settled
the question of veracity.
" The heap cut in two, the parties turn their backs
upon one another, and then, making their hands keep
time to a peculiar sort of tune, the chorus of voices in
a still night might be heard a mile. The oft replen
ished whisky bottle meanwhile circulated freely, and
at the close the victorious captain, mounted on the
shoulders of some of the stoutest men, with the bottle
in one hand and his hat in the other, was carried in
triumph around the vanquished party, amidst the
shouts of victory which rent the air.
" Then came the supper in which the women had

I.V THE OHIO VALLEY. 121
been busily employed, and which always included a
pot-pie. Either before or after eating the fighting took
place; and by midnight the sober were found assisting
the drunken home. Such was one of my autumnal
schools from the age of nine to fifteen years."
The Apple -Cutting and the "Frolic"
When, in the course of years, orchards yielded
their annual fruitage, cider flowed from the creaking
press, and was stored in the cellar for liberal potation
by the winter hearth.
The old-time apple-cutting was an occasion of un
bounded mirth. The middle-aged and the young of a
whole neighborhood assembled at some spacious farm
house to peel and pare great heaps of apples for dry
ing, or make into "butter" by stewing in boiled cider.
The love-fortunes of men and maids were deter
mined by the counting of apple-seeds ; and whoever
removed the entire skin of a pippin in one long rib
bon, whirled the lucky streamer thrice around his head
and let it fall behind him on the floor, and in the form
it took a quick fancy read the monogram of his or her
intended mate.
After the apples were cut, and the cider boiled, the
floor was cleared for a " frolic," technically so called,
and merry were the dancers and loud the songs with
which our fathers and mothers regaled the flying
hours. The fiddler was a man of importance, and
when, after midnight, he called the '-Virginia Reel,"
such shouting, such laughter, such clatter of hilarious
feet upon the sanded puncheon floor, startled the
screech-owl out of doors, and waked the baljy from its
sweet slumber in the sugar trough. I will not deny
that Tom Wilkins, who came to the frolic dressed in a

122 footprints of the pioneers
green hunting-shirt and deer-skin trousers, drank
something stronger than hard cider, and was bolder
than he should have been in his gallant attentions to
Susan. But let by-gones be by-gones. The apple-cut
ting was fifty years ago, and Tom and Susan have
danced the dance of life, and their tomb-stones are
decorous enough. The Luxuries of Nature'.
We often speak of the hardships of pioneer life, and
do not overrate them ; but life has compensations, and
the woods, with all its drawbacks, has its advantages
too. Think of the lavish natural luxuries that the
primeval forest and the new fields afforded. Money was
scarce, prices were higher, and artificial luxuries were
unobtainable; but the teeming soil, the woods, the
stream, the very air, were exuberant with supplies to
satisfy man's wants. The rich mold of the " truck-
patch" needed no fertilizing; the corn, beans, pump
kins, grew like magical plants. To go fishing was to
catch all the fish you wanted. An hour in the woods
loaded the hunter with game. Wild game was a pest,
so plenty it was — armies of squirrels, innumerable
pigeons. Nuts showered from the hickory and walnut trees,
and the boys gathered them by the bushel — by the
wagon load — to crack by the cabin hearth of winter
nights. A humming music in the air, like Ariel's
choir, told the wood-wanderer of swarming bees, and
the hollow trunk of a great tree yielded honey by the
tubful and barrel. Bee-trees were sought and robbed,
in the swarming season, much in the manner
that Irving has described. Men would climb to the
hollow in which the sweet hoard was concealed, and

IN THE OHIO VALLEY.

123

124 FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS
smoke the bees; or else the tree was chopped down and
the honey secured. If the tree stood on forbidden
ground, the marauding honey-robbers bored it down
in silence, with a big auger.
The Old, Old Story in the New Country.
What if the rustic went clad in hoine-spun ! What
if silken gowns were unknown to the country girls in
gingham or linsey, who milked the cows and churned
the cream of other days !
The boys went a-courting all the same, and the
damsels in linsey were angels as white as cream, and
as full of sweetness as young maples in sugar-making
time. For social pastime, perhaps, the swain took his
sweetheart behind him on his gallant roan, and bon-
nily rode they away in the twilight to the party,
where no piano tinkled, but where merry games con
sumed the hours and hearts were lost and won. The
love-smitten rustic did not buy a valentine, but wrote
one with a goose-quill on coarse paper, dried the ink
from the "sand-box," folded the tender missive in a
quaint fashion, and sealed it with sealing-wax as red
as his heart's blood, or else with a wafer as tenacious
as love. When meeting-houses were established, and on
evenings of revival, the good old-fashioned preacher
preached and prayed loud, and the gifted elders
"exhorted" there, you may be sure, came the belles
and beaux ; and when the benediction was spoken,
those bashful beaux lurked sheepishly about the door,
with heart in mouth, ready, if courage held, each to
sidle up to his favorite lass and ask to accompany her
home. Perhaps Angelina (for there were coquettes in
those innocent days), perhaps Angelina had encour-

IN THE OHIO VALLEY. 125
aged more than one bold suitor, and, as custom always
considers two company and three "a crowd," there was
rivalry at the very church portal, and the lucky escort
might pay the penalty of his triumph by a fight with
the other fellow to-morrow, for the tender passion
makes our noble sex very tough on such occasions.
Presto ! Change !
The solidity and splendor of new-sprung cities in
the West; the importation from all the countries of
the world of all inventions and thoughts, to the States
that not many generations ago were unsurveyed and
unnamed ; make young regions seem like old, and
confuse our conceptions of historical sequence. To the
European traveler it appears incredible or miraculous
that so many changes, and changes so great, could have
occurred in so brief a period. Mr. Matthew Arnold,
when he lectured in' the West, spoke with wonder of
this. After addressing a large and cultured audience
of appreciative listeners at Indianapolis, he remarked,
" What a responsive assemblage ! And to think how
rapidly the city must have grown. Indianapolis!
The city of Indians ! And, in fact, not a century ago,
the Indians were running about here in the woods!"
The transformation is indeed astonishing. There
are men yet living who have witnessed almost the
whole series of changes in general modes of living from
the first invasion of white men upon the Ohio woods
until now. The cities and towns, of course, from the
beginning, adopted the fashions of the older places;
but country life, more self-dependent, held longer to
its primitive modes. Look on the farms, and in the
log-cabins, for good old-fashioned ways. There still
are standing, thousands of log dwelling-houses in the

126

FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS

Ohio Valley. True, they are not built on the earliest
model, but they are essentially the cabin of the back
woods. Even the stack chimney, plastered with mud,
is seen now and then. But these structures are now
occupied, with few exceptions, by the poorer and less

-.^^^^':

I / r

**.'

THE MOVERS.

enterprising class. Go back fifty, forty, thirty years
ago, and these Central States were thickly dotted with
log houses, occupied by the best of families. Read the
biography of the middle-aged and old men of to-day,
and note how many of them were born in such rude
and primitive houses.

in the ohio valley. 1:^7
The Primeval Forests of Ohio.
If asked to tell in what respect the physical aspect
of Ohio and Indiana has been most altered within the
range of his recollection, the " oldest inhabitant " of
any given county in those States — or in Kentucky —
would probably answer the greatest change is that
caused by cutting away the natural forest. The Crea
tor never planted on any other portion of His globe a
forest more magnificent than that which clad the pri
meval hills and valleys of the Ohio basin. A pioneer
poet, writing forty j'ears ago, from the very bosom of the
Miami woods, sang in noble words worthy of the
impressive theme :
" Around me here rise up majestic trees
That centuries have nurtured ; graceful elms,
Which interlock their limbs among the clouds ;
Dark-columned walnuts, from whose liberal store
The nut-brown Indian maids their baskets filled
Ere the first Pilgrims knelt on Plymouth Eock ;
Gigantic sycamores, whose mighty arms
Sheltered the red man in his wigwam prone.
What time the Norseman roamed our chartless seas ;
And towering oaks, that from the subject plain
Sprang when the builders of the tumuli
First disappeared."
The same hand which thus pictured the forest also
chronicled the progress which destroyed the glory of
the scene : " The glory of the woods
Faded and fell where migratory man
Spied out the land, and chose his new abode ;
The quiet of the sylvan solitude
Was broken by unusual sounds, that woke
New echoes in its depths, as through them rushed.

128

FOOTPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS.

With arrowy speed, careering Power, that dragged
The freighted car, along whose raighty track
The monarchs of the forest disappeared ;
Where the rude cabin of the pioneer
Lay like a shadow on the grassy plain,
Or, on the wooded slope.
The trellised cottage with its crown of flowers
Appealed, and statelier mansions rose anon;
The hand of civilization touched eacli scene.
And changed it ; even our last retreats were not
Exempt, but into far pecluded haunts,
Whose natural beauty art could only mar.
The axe, the compass, and the chain were borne,
Kviding and despoiling ; onward came
The multitude who people now these plains
And hills, not a calm-careering stream.
But like a rushing torrent." — Gallagher.

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