History of
by Samuel P. Bates,
Submitted by Gaylene Kerr Banister
|
The Pioneers |
The first known American citizens who located permanently within the bounds of
1796 -- Washington Township, Alexander Hamilton and William Culbertson;
Erie, Capt. Daniel Dobbins; Mill Creek, Benjamin Russell, Thomas P. Miller,
David Dewey, Anthony Saltsman and John McFarland;
Greenfield, Judah Colt, Elisha and Enoch Marvin,
Cyrus Robinson, Charles Allen, Joseph Berry, John Wilson, James Moore, Joseph
Webster, Philo Barker, Timothy Tuttle, Silas and William Smith, Joseph
Shattuck, John Daggett, John Andrews and Leverett Bissell; McKean, Thomas
and Oliver Dunn; Fairview, Francis Scott, Summit, George W. Reed; North East,
William Wilson, George and Henry Hurst, and Henry and Dyer Loomis; Springfield,
Samuel Holliday, John Devore, John Mershom, William
McIntyre and Patrick Ager; Venango,
Adam and James Reed, Burrill and Zalmon
Tracy; Waterford, John Lytle, Robert Brotherton, John
Lennox and Thomas Skinner.
1797 -- Waterford, John Vincent and Wilson Smith; Wayne, Joseph Hall and
____ Prosser; Union, Hugh Wilson, Andrew Thompson, Matthew Gray, Francis B. and
Robert Smith; Elk Creek, Eli Colton; Venango, Thomas,
John and David Phillips; Springfield, Oliver Cross; Fairview, Thomas Forster,
Jacob Weiss, George Nicholson, John Kelso, Richard Swan, Patrick Vance, Patrick
and John McKee, Jeremiah and William Sturgeon and William Haggerty; Le Boeuf, Francis Isherwood, James,
Robert and Adam Pollock; Conneaut, Col. Dunning McNair; Mill Creek, John
Nicholson, the McKees and Boe
Bladen; Washington, Job Reeder, Samuel Galloway,
Simeon Dunn, John and James Campbell, Matthias Sipps,
Phineas McLenethan, Matthew
Hamilton, John McWilliams, James, John, Andrew and Samuel Culbertson, and Mrs.
Jane Campbell (widow); North East, Thomas Robinson, Joseph McCord, James
McMahon, Margaret Lowry (widow), James Duncan, Francis Brawley and Abram and
Arnold Custard; Harbor Creek, William Saltsman, Amasa Prindle and Andrew Elliott.
1798 -- Erie, William Wallace; Wayne, William Smith and David Findley;
Union, Jacob Shephard, John Welsh, John Fagan and
John Wilson; Elk Creek, George Hayberger and John
Dietz; Venango, William Allison and wife;
Springfield, Nicholas LeBarger; Fairview, John Dempsey;
Conneaut, Abiathar and Elihu
Crane; Washington, Peter Kline; Girard, Abraham and William Silverthorn;
North East, Thomas Crawford, Lemuel Brown, Henry and
Matthew Taylor, William Allison, Henry Burget, John,
James and Matthew Greer; Waterford, Aaron Himrod.
1799 --
It is not claimed that the above is a complete list of the settlers up to 1800,
but it is as nearly full as can now be obtained. Emigration was slow the first
five years in consequence of the land troubles. After 1800, the county
commenced to fill up more rapidly, and to attempt to give a roll of the
settlers would exceed the limits of a work like this.
Where the People Came From
The early settlers were mainly New Englanders and New Yorkers, interspersed
with some Irish from the southern counties of
The first settlers were a hardy, adventurous race of men, and their wives were
brave, loving and dutiful women. It was to their superior intelligence and
determined energy that we owe the fact that the county is now far ahead of many
others in the State in schools, churches and all that goes to make up the
comforts and afford the consolations of life.
Marriages, Births and Deaths
The earliest marriage was that of Charles J. Reed, of Walnut Creek (Kearsarge), to Miss Rachel Miller, which occurred on
December 27, 1797. The second was that of William Smith to Miss Elizabeth Wilson,
In Union Township, in 1799; the third, that of Job Reeder to Miss Nancy
Campbell, in Washington Township, in 1800; and the fourth, that of Thomas King
to Sarah Wilson, in Union, the same year.
The earliest recorded births were as follows:
John R., son of William Black, in Fort Le Boeuf,
August 29, 1795.
Mr. Boardman, of
Jane, daughter of William Culbertson, Edinboro, fall
of 1797.
David M. Dewey,
Matilda Reed,
Elizabeth Holliday,
Hannah Talmadge, McKean,
1798.
William Dunn,
Henry Wood, Conneaut, 1798.
Elizabeth and Ruth, daughters of the brothers Abiathar
and Elihu Crane, Conneaut (both in the same house and
on the same day), April 20, 1799.
William E. McNair, Mill Creek, 1799.
Robert, son of William Allison, Venango 1799.
William Bladen, Mill Creek, 1800.
Edwin J. Kelso, Mill Creek, 1800.
Sarah, daughter of Amasa Prindle,
Harbor Creek, 1799.
Katharine, daughter of Aaron Himrod,
Joseph Brindle,
Mrs. George A. Elliot, Girard, 1800.
William Nicholson,
Martha, daughter of Hugh Wilson,
John W., son of William Smith,
John A. Culbertson, Washington, 1800.
The earliest known deaths occurred in the years below:
Ralph Rutledge, killed by the Indians at
Gen. Anthony Wayne, in the block house at
Col. Seth Reed,
John Wilson,
Mrs. Thomas Alexander, Conneaut, 1801.
Mrs. William Culbertson, Washington, 1804.
Adam Reed, Venango, 1805.
John Gordon,
Condition of the People, Etc.
Most of the people were in moderate circumstances, and were content to live in a
very cheap way. A majority had to depend mainly on the produce of their little
clearings, which consisted to a large extent of potatoes and corn. Mush, corn
bread and potatoes were the principal food. There was not meat except game, and
often this had to be eaten without salt. Pork, flour, sugar and other groceries
sold at high prices, and were looked upon as luxuries. In 1798-99, wheat
brought $2.50 per bushel; flour, $18 a barrel; corn, $2 per bushel; oats,
$1.50; and potatoes, $1.50. Prices were still higher in 1813-14, corn being $4
per bushel and oats, $3. The mills were far apart, the roads scarcely more than
pathways through the woods, and the grists had to be
carried in small quantities on the backs of men or horses. Few families had
stoves, and the cooking was done almost entirely over open fires. The beds were
without springs and were made up in general by laying coarse blankets upon
boxes or rude frames. All clothing was home made. Every house had a spinning
wheel, and many were provided with looms. Liquor was in common use, and there
was seldom a family without its bottle for the comfort of the husband and the
entertainment of his guests.
The first buildings were low cabins constructed of unhewn
logs laid one upon another with the crevices filled up with mud. These gave
way, as the condition of the people improved, to more artistic structures of
hewn timber in which mortar was substituted for mud. Hardly any were plastered.
Many were without window glass, and wall paper was unknown. As saw mills increased,
frame buildings of a better character were substituted for the log cabins, and
occasionally a brick or stone structure was erected, which was talked about in
all the country round as a marvel of architecture. The people were separated by
long distances; for years there were few clearings that joined. In every house
there was an immense fire-place, in which tremendous amounts of wood were
consumed. When a new residence or barn was to be erected, the neighbors were
invariably invited to the raising. On such occasions, liquor or cider was
expected to be freely dispensed, and it was rarely the case that the
invitations were declined. These raisings were the merry-making events of the
day, and generally brought together twenty-five to fifty of the settlers, who
worked hard, drank freely, and flattered themselves when they were through that
they had experienced a jolly good time. A writer on one of the local papers
says:
"Eighty years ago not a pound of coal or a cubic foot of illuminating gas
had been burned in the country. All the cooking and warming in town as well as
in the country were done by the aid of a fire kindled on the brick hearth or in
the brick ovens. Pine knows or tallow candles furnished the light for the long
winter nights, and sanded floors supplied the place of rugs and carpets. The
water used for household purposes was drawn from deep wells by the creaking
sweep. No form of pump was used in this country, so far as we can learn, until
after the commencement of the present century. There were no friction matches
in those early days, by the aid of which a fire could be easily kindled, and if
the fire went out upon the hearth over night, and the tinder was damp, so that
the spark would not catch, the alternative remained of wading through the snow
a mile or so to borrow a brand from a neighbor. Only one room in any house was
warm, unless some member of the family was ill; in all the rest the temperature
was at zero during many nights in winter. The men and women undressed and went
to their beds in a temperature colder than our barns and woodsheds, and they
never complained."
Churches and schoolhouses wee sparsely located, and of the most primitive
character. One pastor served a number of congregations; and salaries were so
low that the preachers had to take part in working their farms to procure
support for their families. The people went to religious service on foot or
horseback, and the children often walked two or three miles through the woods
to school. There were no fires in the churches for a number of years. When they
were finally introduced they were at first built in holes out in the floors,
and the smoke found its way out through openings in the roofs. The seats were
of unsmoothed slabs, the ends and centers of which
were laid upon blocks, and the pulpits were little better. Worship was held
once or twice a month, consisting usually of two services, one in the forenoon
and one immediately after noon, the people remaining during the interval and
spending the time in social intercourse. It is much to be feared that if
religious worship were attended with the same discomforts now as it was eighty
to ninety years ago, the excuses for keeping away from the house of God would
be many times multiplied.
Game, Etc.
When the county was opened to settlement, it was covered with a dense forest,
which abounded with deer, bears, wolves, rabbits, foxes, raccoons, squirrel,
opossums, minks and martens. This was a fortunate circumstance for the people,
as the flesh of the wild beasts afforded them the only fresh meat many could
obtain. Every man kept a gun and went into the woods in pursuit of game
whenever the supply of food in his household ran short. Deer were abundant for
years. There were numerous deer-licks, where the animals resorted to find salt
water, at which the hunters lay in wait and shot them down without mercy. Bears
were quite numerous, and did serious mischief to the corn fields. Wolves wee
also plenty, and committed much havoc. Packs of these animals often surrounded
the cabins and kept their inmates awake with their howling. A bounty was long
paid for their scalps, varying in amount from $10 to $12 per head. Accounts are
given of sheep being killed by wolves as late as 1813. Occasionally a panther
or wild cat terrified whole neighborhoods by its screaming. The last panther
was shot at
Besides the animals, the country was full of pigeons, ducks, geese, partridges
and turkeys, in their season, all of which were more tame than now, and fell
easy victims to the guns or traps of the pioneers. The lake, of course,
contained plenty of fish, and most of the small streams abounded in trout. The
rivulets emptying into French Creek were particularly famous for this favorite
fish, and the stories told of their size and readiness to leap into the
sportsman's hands are enough to drive an angler wild with enthusiasm. It does
not appear that the county was ever much troubled with poisonous snakes. There
were some massassaugies and copperheads on the
peninsula, but the interior seems to have been remarkably free from dangerous
reptiles.
Taken altogether, while they had to endure many privations and hardships, it is
doubtful whether the pioneers of any part of
|
Samuel P.
Bates, History of |
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last updated on Tuesday,
September 12, 2000.
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