Washington County, Ohio - Chapter 4: Affairs in the West from 1785 to 1788, 1881

First Ordinance for the Government of the Northwest Territory - It Proves Practically Inoperative - Ordinance of May 20, 1785, for Survey of Western Lands - The Plan Prescribed - Surveyors Appointed by Congress - One from Each State - ''Squatter" Settlers on Ohio Soil - Illegality of Their. Position - A Proclamation of Warning Addressed to Them - General Richard Butler Disperses Them in 178s, While on His Way to the Miami - Extracts from His Journal - Butler Chooses Location for a Fort at the Mouth of the Muskingum - Hon, James Monroe, of Virginia, descends the Ohio with Baxter - Major Doughty Builds Fort Harmar - Description of the Work - The Gardens - Memento for Doughty in the Name of a Peach - Joseph Buell's Experience in the West - Daily Life at Fort Harmar - Depredations by Roving Bands of Indians - Scarcity of Provisions - Company Ordered out to Protect the Surveyors - The ''Seven Ranges'' - General Benjamin Tupper - Journal of John Mathews - Indians Harass the Men Engaged at Surveying - Narrow Escape from Destruction - Seeking Safety at Wheeling - Mathews Meets General Putnam at Sumrill's Ferry.

for the establishment and maintenance of government in the Northwest Territory. It contained an article prohibiting slavery after the year 1800. This clause, was stricken out, however, before the ordinance came to its passage upon the twenty-third of April. This measure of 1784, although it remained nominally in force until repealed by the Ordinance of 1787, was really inoperative - a dead letter. Repeated though unsuccessful efforts were made to so improve the bill as to render possible the development of the west under it. Something, however, was accomplished by the Ordinance of 1784. It paved the way, however imperfectly, for a subsequent act of national legislation. This, the first step tending directly toward the sale and settlement of the lands northwest of the Ohio was taken by Congress in 178s. On the twentieth of May the ordinance for ascertaining the mode of disposal of these lands was passed and as soon as possible thereafter put into practical action. By this ordinance it was provided that a surveyor should be appointed from each State, who should take an oath before the geographer of the United States for the faithful discharge of his duty. The surveyors were to be under the general direction of the geographer, and as soon as qualified were to proceed with their work of dividing the territory "into townships of six miles square by lines running due north and south and others crossing these at right angles as near as may be, unless where the boundaries of the late Indian purchases may render the same impracticable." Each surveyor was to be allowed pay for his services at the rate of two dollars for every mile in length he should run, including wages of chain carriers, markers, and all expenses. It was prescribed that the first line running north and south as aforesaid should begin on the river Ohio at a point due north from the western termination of a line which had been run at the southern boundary of Pennsylvania, and that the first line running east should begin at the same point and extend throughout the whole territory. The ordinance instructed the geographer to designate the townships or fractional parts of townships by numbers, progressivley from south to north; beginning each range with number 1; and to designate the ranges by progressive numbers to the westward, the first rangs extending trom the Ohio to Lake Erie being marked number 1. The geographer was personally to attend to the running of the' first east and west line and the latitudes of the extremes of the first north and south line and of the mouths of the principal rivers. The surveyors were also charged with the duty of carefully noting on the plats to be made of the lands, all mines, salt licks or springs, mill seats, mountains, water courses, and the nature of the soil. The plats of townships were to be marked in subdivisions of a mile square by lines running in the same direction as the external lines. It was further provided that as soon as several of the townships had been surveyed the geographer should transmit plats of the same to the board of treasury, who should record the same with the report in well bound books, to which the Secretary of War should have access. This official was to take by lot a number of townships and fractional parts of townships, both of those to be sold entire and those to be sold in lots, such as would be equal to one-seventh part of the whole seven ranges, for the use of the Continental army. The board of treasury, it was provided, should from time to time cause the remaining number to be drawn for in the name of the thirteen States. The board of treasury was to sell (for not less than one dollar per acre) at public vendue, after proper notification, the lands not distributed to the several States, the plan prescribed being that township 1 should be sold entire, and township number 2 in the same range in lots; and thus in alternate order through the whole of the first range, and in the second range the same alternation should be observed, though beginning the reverse of the first range. The United States reserved out of every township the four lots 8, 11, 26, and 29, for future sale. Lot number 16 in every township was to be reserved for the maintenance of public schools in the township, and one-third of all gold, silver, lead, or copper mines to be sold as Congress should in the future direct. Further than the provisions stated the ordinance reserved the towns of Gnadenhutten, Schoenbrunn, and Salem, on the Muskingum, and lands surrounding them, for the use of the Christian Indians formerly settled there.

Congress elected six days after the passage of the ordinance the surveyors whose duty it should be to run the first line with glass and chain, northwest of the Ohio. Nathaniel Adams was chosen for New Hampshire; Rufus Putnam for Massachusetts; Caleb Harris for Rhode Island; William Morris for New York; Adam Hoops for Pennsylvania; James Sampson for Maryland; Alexander Parker for Virginia; Absalom Tatum for North Carolina ; William Tate for South Carolina ; and, nearly two months later, Isaac Sherman for Connecticut. At the time these appointments were made General Putnam was engaged in surveying for Massachusetts certain lands which she possessed in Maine, and therefore General Benjamin Tupper was appointed to serve in his place. Caleb Harris and Nathaniel Harris resigned and Colonel Ebenezer Sproat and Winthrop Sargent were respectively chosen to fill their places.*

Even as early as the Revolution a few hunters, trappers, and traders had located along the west bank of the Ohio, and it was apprehended that after the treaty of Fort McIntosh squatter settlers and speculators would throng those portions of the territory adjacent to Pennsylvania and Virginia and that evil results would follow this intrusion and exercise of "squatter sovereignty." A few irresponsible men had already made temporary homes along the river, and there was every reason to believe that the number who would do so, unless prevented by immediate and strong measures, would be sufficiently large to be productive of serious evil. Congress foreseeing this movement and its possible results, on the fifteenth of June, 1785, authorized the Indian commissioners to publish the following proclamation and circulate it in the territory:

*General Benjamin Tupper, Colonel Ebenezer Sproat, and Winthrop Sargent, as will appear in subsequent chapters, were among the early settlers at Marietta and prominent citizens of the State of Ohio.

Whereas, it has been represented to the United States, in Congress assembled, that several disorderly persons have crossed the Ohio and settled upon their unappropriated lards; and whereas it is their intention, as soon as it shall be surveyed, to open offices for the sale of a considerable part thereof, in such proportions and under such other regulations as may suit the convenience of all the citizens of the United States, and others who may wish to become purchasers of the same - and as such conduct tends to defeat the object they have in view, is in direct opposition to the ordinances and resolutions of Congress, and highly disrespectful to the Federal authority, they have, therefcre, thought fit, and do hereby issue this their proclamation, forbidding all such unwarrantable intrusions, and enjoining all those who have settled thereon to depart with their families and effects without loss of time, as they shall answer the same at their peril.

In the autumn of 1785 General Richard Butler passed down the Ohio on his way to attend the treaty with the Indians at the mouth of the Little Miami. He has left, in the form of a diary or journal, an account of his journey which throws much light on the then condition of the country. He makes several entries relating to the squatter inhabitants on the Ohio shore:

* Friday October 1, 1785. Passed Yellow Creek, and found improvements on. both sides of the river. Put in'at one Jesse Pennimans on the north side five miles below Yellow creek. Warned him off; called on one Pry who I warned off also; this appears to be a shrewd, sensible man.

I told him as well as the others, that Congress was determined to put all of the people off of the lands, and that none would be allowed to settle but the purchasers, and that these and these only would be protected; that troops would be down next week, who have orders to destroy every house and improvement on the north side of the river, and that garrisons will be placed at Muskingum and elsewhere, and that if any person or persons attempted to oppose Government, they may depend on being treated with the greatest rigor. He seems not well pleased, though he promised submission.

Passed on to the Mingoe towns, where we found a faces of ES among whom one Ross seemed to be the principal man of the settlers on the north side of that place. I conyersed with him, and warned him and the others away. A ° A

Sunday, October 2nd. Called at the settlement of Charles Morris, whose house has been pulled down and he has rebuilt it. At this place found one Walter Kean, who seemed but a middling character and rather of the dissentious cast; warned all of these off, and requested they would inform their neighbors, which they promised to do. Colonel Monroe spoke to them also, which had weight, as I informed them of his character.+ Called at the settlement of Captain Hoglan, who we also warned off, his house had also been thrown down and rebuilt. We informed him of the impropriety of his conduct, which he acknowledged, and seemed very submissive, and promised to remove and to warn his neighbors off also.

'Tuesday, October 4th. I directed one corporal aoa eas deltiins to stay at Zanes till Captain O'Hara would send a good boat from Fort McIntosh. I wrote to Colonel Harmar for three other men to join these as an escort to the Miami, and to give Major Dougherty (Doughty) orders to pull down every house on his way to Muskingum, that is on the north side of the Ohio. r

Wednesday, October sth. . 3 Met some of the inhabitants from Fishing creek, one of whom had made a settlement on the north side of the Ohio, warned him off and gave him two of the proclamations of Congress.

Three days later General Butler notes in his journal that "there is good improvement on the north side" nearly opposite the Little Kanawha. He also found settlements on the head of the first island below the Little Hockhocking, and also on the Ohio shore further down the river. To the people on the island who "seemed to be very reasonable people," and where the writer of the journal saw several women who appeared clean and decently dressed," he sent some proclamations, but sterner

*General Butler's Journal in Craig's "Olden Time" - October and November, 1847. + This was Colonel James Monroe, member of Congress from Virginia.

General Butler's journal also gives information in regard to many other matters of interest, among them the location of Fort Harmar. In Virginia and Kentucky measures had been taken for what would have been really, an irresponsible invasion of the Indian country. This action, which threatened to precipitate a disastrous war hastened in all probability the action of the confederation in taking measures for the effectual strengthening of the frontier. Ii was determined to establish several posts northwest of the Ohio. Fort Laurens had been built in 1778 upon the Tuscarawas, near the old Indian town of Tuscarawas and one mile south of the site of the present village of Bolivar. It was injudiciously located, and was abandoned one year after its erection. General Butler while on his journey in 1785 chose the site for Fort Harmar. Before leaving Fort McIntosh he had prepared and left with Colonel Harmar, the commandant of the post, a paper in which he expressed the opinion that "the mouth of the Muskingum would be a proper place for a post to cover the frontier inhabitants, prevent intruding settlers on the land of the United States, and secure the surveyors." In his journal under date of Saturday, October 8th, he writes:

Went on very well to the mouth of the Muskingum and found it low. I went on shore to examine the ground most proper to establish a post on, find it too low, but the most eligible is in the point on the Ohio side. Wrote to Major Doughty and recommended this place with my opinion of the kind of work most proper. Left the letter, which contained , other remarks on the fort, fixed to a locust tree.

A few days later the general instructed a man whom he met ascending the Ohio to take the letter from the mouth of the Muskingum to Major Doughty.

A short time later Major Doughty, with a detachment of United States troops under his command, arrived at the mouth of the Muskingum, and began the erection of a post which was not fully completed until the spring of 1786.

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 defence, technically called '"'curtains," were each one hundred and twenty feet long and about twelve or fourteen feet high. They were 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 the officers and their families, and the barracks for the troops were erected along the curtains, the roofs sloping toward the centre of the enclosure. 'Fhey were divided into four rooms of thirty feet each, supplied with fireplaces, and were sufficient for the accommodation of a regiment of men,* a larger number, by the way, than was ever quartered in the fort. From the roof of the barracks building towards the Ohio river there arose a watch tower, surmounted by the flag of the United States. This tower was also used as a guard-house. There were other buildings within the enclosure - an arsenal, a storehouse, and several smaller structures. The main gate was toward the river with a sally-port on the side fronting on the hills. A well was dug near the centre of the enclosure to supply the garrison with water in case of siege, but, happily, it was never needed, and we are told that ordinary water was brought from the river. The timber used in the construction of the fort was that of the heavy forest which covered its site and several acres of land round about. The area cleared was nearly all utilized for gardening purposes under the direction of Major Doughty, who seems to have had a remarkable fondness for tilling the soil and considerable taste and knowledge as a horticulturist.* Fort Harmar was named after General (then Colonel) Harmar, who was the commander of the regiment to which Major Doughty was attached, and for some time commandant of the fort at the mouth of the Muskingum.

Joseph Buell (afterward one of the prominent early settlers at Marietta) was on the frontier for nearly a period of three years, dating from the latter part of December, 1785, and he spent a considerable portion of his time at Fort Harmar. His journalt affords some interesting glimpses of lite in the garrison and affairs in the western country during the years immediately preceding its settlement. Much is said in the beginning of the hardships of army life, the depravity of the troops, and the severity of the punishments inflicted for various offences. Drunkenness and desertion were prevalent evils. The punishment for the former and other venal misdemeanors was not infrequently flogging to the extent of one hundred or even two hundred lashes, and the death penalty, without the process of court-martial, was inflicted upon deserters. _ Buell relates that three men, the finest soldiers in the company, deserted at Fort McIntosh, and being captured were shot by order of Major Wyllis, who commanded the fort - an act which the chronicler characterizes as the most inhuman that he ever saw. 'The pay of the soldiers at that time guarding the frontier was only three dollars per month.

March 12, 1786, Buell (still at Fort McIntosh) notes that ''Generals Parsons and Butler," the latter the author of the journal from which we have made extracts in this chapter, "arrived here from the treaty at Miami."

*A portion of the cleared ground was planted with peaches, and the second or third year after, fine fruit was obtained from this orchard, probably the first in Ohio. One variety has been quite largely cultivated in Marietta and its vicinity, and named after its originator 'the Doughty peach."

+The journal of Joseph Buell has been in part published in '' Pioneer History of Ohio," by S. P. Hildreth. We make some extracts from it, both in this and subsequent chapters. Buell had the position of orderly in Captain Strong's company of Colonel Harmar's regiment.

On the 4th of May, 1786, Captain Zeigler's and Strong's companies, embarked for Muskingum; and from this date forward the entries in the journal relate to occurrences at Fort Harmar.

1oth. Captain Zeigler's company embarked for the Miami, and our company moved into the garrison, where we were engaged several days in making ourselves comfortable.

June gth. Two boats arrived from Miami, and report that the Indians had murdered several inhabitants this spring. Weare getting short of meat for the troops.

1gth. News arrived here that the Indians had killed four or five women and children at lish creek, about thirty miles northeast from this garrison,

July 4th. 'The great day of American independence was commemorated by the discharge of thirteen guns, after which the troops were served with extra rations of liquor, and allowed to get as drunk as they pleased.

8th. Weare brought down to half-rations, and have sent outa party of mento hunt. 'They returned without much success, although game is plenty in the woods.

16th. We were visited by a party of Indians, who encamped at a little distance from the garrison, ancLappeared to be very friendly. 'They were treated kindly by the officers, who gave them some wine, and the best the garrison afforded.

17th. Our men took up a stray canoe on the river. It contained a pair of shocs, two axes and some corn. We suppose the owners were killed by the Indians. Same day Licutenant Kingsbury returned with only a supply of food for six or seven days.

19th. This day buried the fifer to Captain Hart's company. Our funerals are conducted in the following manner. The men are all paraded without arms, and march by files in the rear of the corpse. The guard, with arms, march in front, with their pieces reversed; and the music in the rear of the guard, just in front of the coffin, playing some mournful tune. After the dead is buricd they return in the same order, playing some lively march.

zgth. 'Three hunters came into the fort and informed us that they had secn a party of Indians lying in the woods. We sent out some men, but discovered nothing.

August 2d. Our garrison was alarmed. Captain Hart was walking on the bank of the river, and said he saw Indians on the other side of the Ohio, and saw them shoot one of our men who was out hunting, and beheld him fall. Colonel Harmar immediately sent the captain with a party of men after them. 'They crossed the river and found one man asleep on the ground, and another had been shooting at a mark. They had seen no Indians.

September 1st. Captain Tunis, the Indian, came to the fort and reported the Indians designed to attack our garrison, and that they were bent on mischief. We were all hands employed in making preparations to receive them, lining the bastions, clearing away all the weeds and brush within a hundred yards of the fort. We likewise cut up all our corn and broke down the bean poles, to prevent their having any shelter within rifle shot distance.

Ensign Kingsbury was ordered to take a party of men into the commandant's house, and put it in the best order for defence, and to zemain there during the night.

27th. Lieutenant Smith embarked in quest of provisions. We are on short allowance, and expect the Indians every day to attack us. Our men are very uneasy, laying various plans to desert, but are so closely watched that it is very difficult for them to escape.

November 3rd. Captain Tunis and a number of Indians with two squads, came into the garrison. At night they got very drunk and threatened the guard with their tomahawks and knives.

25th. Captain Hart's and McCurdy's companies came in from the survey of the seven ranges. They hada cold, wearisome time; their clothes and shoes wore out, and some of their feet badly frozen.

Our rations now consist of a little venison, without any bread; as a substitute we have Some corn and potatoes. The weather is very cold and the river full of ice,

3th. Lieutenant Pratt embarked in a boat for Flinn's Station (now Belleville) distant thirty miles below the garrison, for a load of corn and potatoes. The troops arein great distress for provisions. About twelve miles below they landed on account of the storm and their boat was carried off by the ice with a considerable amount of goods in it.

24th. We drew for our station about a peck of frozen potatoes. As Christmas is so near we are making all the preparations in our power to celebrate it.

January 31, 1787. Hamilton Kerr, our hunter, began to build a house on the island a little above the mouth of the Muskingum, and some of our men were ordered out as a fatigue party to assist him, under the command of Lieutenant Pratt.

24th. Isaac Williams arrived with his family to settle on the opposite shore of the river. Several others have joined him, which makes our situation in the wilderness much more agreeable.

27th. Major Hamtramck arrived from Fort Steuben in order to muster the troops. The same day some of the hunters brought in a buffalo, which was eighteen hands high and weighed one thousand pounds.

gth. Ensign Kingsbury went on command with a party to bring in one of the hunters, fifty miles up the Muskingum, for fear of the Indians, who, we hear, are bent on mischief.

May 1st. This is St. Tammany's day, and was kept with the festivities usual to the frontiers. All the sergeaats in the garrison crossed the Ohio to Mr. Williams and partook of an excellent dinner.

7th. Twenty-one boats passed on their way to the lower country, Kentucky. They had on board five hundred and nine souls, with many wagons, goods, etc.

14th. John Stockley, a fifer in Captain Strong's company, deserted. He was pursued and overtaken twelve miles from the garrison, brought back, and ordered to run the gauntlet eleven times, through the troops of the garrison, stripped of his Continental clothing, and drummed out of the fort, with a halter around his neck, all of which was punctually executed.

21st. This evening I sent a young man, who cooked for me on Kerr's island, about half a mile above the fort after some milk; he was seen to jump into the river near the shore, when about a third of a mile from the garrison. We supposed some of the people were playing in the water. He did not return that evening, which led me to fear he had lost his course. In the morning a party was sent after him. They discovered fresh signs of Indians, and found his hat. They followed the trail, but did not find them. We afterwards heard that they had killed and scalped him. The Indians were a party of Ottawas.

The writer of the journal on the twentieth of May started down the Ohio with Captain Strong's company, and did not return to Fort Harmar until the twenty-first of November, having spent the interim at the Miami garrison, Fort Finney, Port Vincent, and other frontier localities in the lower Ohio country. During the period after his return, and prior to the landing of the Ohio company's colony, the journal contains no important entries, and we here leave it, to resume a survey of its pages in subsequent chapters.

While the various incidents of frontier army life above narrated or referred to were occurring at Fort Harmar, the eastern part of what is now Washington county, and the country north of it, was. the theatre of a different kind of action. The surveyors mentioned in the first part of this chapter were traversing the country which was to be divided into "the seven ranges."

General Butler records the fact that he met the surveyors and the United States geographer at the west line of Pennsylvania, on the thirtieth of September, and dined with them. There was some discord among the members of the party, and Captain Hutchins was apprehensive of the safety of his company, unless the Indian chiefs should personally assure him of their good-will. A beginning had been made in the survey, but it was very soon abandoned.

General Benjamin Tupper, soon after the passage of the ordinance of May 20, 1785, providing for the survey and sale of the western lands, had gone as far as Pittsburgh with the idea of beginning the work which had been assigned to him. The Indians, however, who were dissatisfied with the terms of the treaty of Fort McIntosh, and alleged that they had been imposed upon, assumed a very hostile attitude, and threatened with death any persons who should engage in surveying the lands northwest of the Ohio. The risk was so great that common prudence dictated delay until further conference with the disaffected tribes and an amicable adjustment of their relations with the United States should be effected. General Tupper returned to New Fingland.* The treaty of Fort Finney was negotiated in January, 1786, and temporary peace, at least, being promised the surveyors (General Tupper among them), made their way west in the following June, and began their labors. These men (in one sense the pioneers - the advance guard of the great army of occupation which was to cross the Ohio) - led a career of adventure and danger, and accomplished the work to which they had been appointed only by overcoming many difficulties. Some idea ot the sufferings they experienced has already been suggested by extracts from Joseph Buell's journal describing the condition of the soldiers who had been sent to guard them on their return to Fort Harmar. A more definite and a very interesting account of the progress of the survey is given in the journal of John Mathews.+ He arrived at Pittsburgh July 29, 1786, and finding that the surveyors had gone down the Ohio to Little Beaver creek, followed and overtook them. After the troops who were to guard them had arrived from Fort Steuben, the work of the suveyors was begun, and Mathews went out with Captain Adam Hoops, the surveyor from Pennsylvania, to run the lines in the second range of townships. They remained out from the middle of August to the first of September, and then returned to the camp at Little Beaver, which they found deserted except by General Tupper, Captain Morris, and an assistant. Mr. Mathews made arrangements to go out with General Tupper on the survey of the seventh range, and started on the seventh of September. On the evening of the gth they camped at the end of the fourth range. The next entry in the journal we quote: Sunday, roth. Camped near the end of the fifth range. Major Sargent, who surveys the fifth range, came to our camp and informed us that one of his hands had left him, which much embarrassed the progress of his work. General Tupper not being ready to begin work, as the geographer had not yet completed the sixth range, I went with Major Sargent to assist him for a few days, and General Tupper proposed to send his son Anselem, t-who had gone to the geographer's camp, also, the next day: to assist us, vd - hy

*We pause here briefly to note, the fact elsewhere to be enlarged upon, that it was during this first visit to the west that General Tupper became favorably and even enthusiastically possessed of the idea of making a New [england settlement in the Ohio country; and it was during his visit to Massachusetts in the winter of 1785-86 that the first direct movement was made toward the formation of a company for the purpose of colonization. General Tupper visited General Putnam; they spent nearly a whole night in talking over the scheme of immigration, and the result of their earnest conference was seen in the public prints of the State on the twenty-fifth of January, 1786, in the form of an advertisement headed ''Information," signed by the generals, and designed to test the spirit of the people in regard to the formation of The Ohio company.

*+John Mathews, of New Braintree, Massachusetts, was a nephew of General Rufus Putnam. He came to the western country before he had arrived at his majority, with the view of obtaining employment in the survey of the seven ranges, and to gain knowledge concerning the country. He was afterwards one of the Ohio company's surveyors, and settled in 1796 in Muskingum county.

15th. Decamped and moved to the westward six miles, where we joined the geographer's camp on Sandy creck, a large branch of the 'Tuscarawas.

It was eighty rods above They were about eight in number, men and women, They had rum with them, and had a drunken frolic the night before, but appeared decent and friendly.

18th. General Tupper began his range, and our camp moved to the west about three miles to a large branch of the Tuscarawas, called Nine Shilling. After running on the line about three-fourths of a mile an express arrived from Major Ilamtramck's camp at Little Beaver, with word that the Indians were assembling at the Shawnecs towns and intended making a general attack upon the surveyors. Captain Hutchins and General 'Tupper thought it unsafe to proceed any further. Notice was immediately sent to Captain Morris, who had gone about one mile and a half on the west boundary of the seventh range, and we all returned to the ground we left this morning and passed the night.

roth. At nine A. M. decamped and marched for Little Beaver. Our party consisted of about fifty men, thirty-six of whom were troops under the command of Lieutenant Percy. Incamped at night near the first mile post of the sixth range.

The party continued their march, being met on the third day by Major Hamtramck and the whole of his command, and on the twenty-third of September reached Hamtramck's station, on the Ohio, five miles below Little Beaver. By the fourth of October, the feeling of alarm having partially subsided, the surveyors determined to go on with their work; and, on the eleventh, having made the necessary preparations, they again started into the wilderness. Mr. Mathews went with Major Sargent, who was to survey the fifth range. They proceeded westward on "'Crawford's old trail" until they reached the place where they were to begin work. After carrying on the survey for about two weeks their pack horses were stolen by the Indians, who they discovered had been lying near their camp (within eighty rods of it the journal says), and had probably been watching them for several days. The journal relates that

'When the commander of the escort, Captain Hart, was informed of the loss of our horses, he immediately commenced building a blockhouse on the most advantageous ground in the vicinity of our camp."

'3st. We this morning dispatched a man for Major Hamtramck's camp, on Wheeling rivulet, informing him of our situation and requesting more horses, so that we might proceed on our range. Although we were apprehensive of danger, we finished the west boundary of the seventh township this day. On our return to camp we found the blockhouses in such a state as to afford a good shelter in case of an attack from the Indians."

Soon after the company returned to Wheeling, General Tupper started for Massachusetts on the twenty-second of November, and early in the following month Colonel Ebenezer Sproat and some others of the surveyors left for their homes. Captain Hutchins, the United States geographer, departed for New York on the twenty-seventh of January, 1787. The survey was suspended for the season. Mathews who went to Fort Steuben to take charge of the commissary department for the winter, notes that the surveyors again took up their work in the woods during April. With ranging degrees of success it was carried slowly and tediously on, during the spring and early summer, without the occurrence of any important incidents. Some of the surveyors who had recommenced work early in the season, came into Wheeling on the fifth of May, considerably alarmed, as they had heard through one of the Zanes of the murder of a family on Fishing creek, by the Indians. Early in June the surveyors had all arrived at the mouth of Indian Wheeling creek on the Ohio, and being met there by the troops sent from Fort Harmar to act as escort, went out into the wilderness to their respective ranges. It was the policy of Congress to continue the surveys if it was possible to do so. There were indications that the summer would be a troublous time. The surveyors were several times obliged to leave their work and seek safety at Wheeling or other points along the river. One party of Indians, supposed to be Chippewas, who hovered about the locality mentioned, were followed and attacked by the whites who killed one of them, and wounded twmore. Several other skirmishes took place.

The author of the journal from which we have given extracts, had but little to do with the survey after the spring of 1787, but was in the country all of the time acting in various capacities, and travelling about from Fort Steuben, Pittsburgh and Wheeling to Fort Harmar and other points. In the later entries of his journal (from November, 1787, to April 7, 1788), is found mention of several characters who were among the pioneers of the Ohio company. In November, 1787, he met Colonel Return J. Meigs at Pittsburgh, and at Washington (Pennsylvania) he met Anselem Tupper (in January, 1788), with whom he remained some time, completing plats of surveys. On the second of February he came across Major Hoffield White "with twenty-two men from New England," and on the seventeenth at Sumrill's ferry, he makes the following entry in the journal: