Ashland City (part 33 of 57)

Under date, Jeromeville, Ohio, April 10, 1846, appears the following court entry. In pursuance of an act of the general assembly of the state of Ohio entitled ''An act to erect the county of Ashland'' passed February 24, 1846, the associate judges of Ashland county, Ohio, met in George H. Cake's hotel in the town of Jeromeville, Ohio, in said county of Ashland, on the date above named, and in obedience to the sixth section of the aforesaid act, the poll books from the several townships having been returned agreeably to said act, the clerk of the court of common pleas, in the presence and by the assistance of the associate judges aforesaid, proceeded to canvass said votes in regard to the location of the county seat as specified in said sixth section of the aforesaid act. Whereupon it appeared that there has been polled in the said county of Ashland for seat of justice at Ashland, two thousand six hundred and eighty-two votes ; and for the seat of justice at Tayesville two thousand and two votes.

The first term of the court of the common pleas in the court house at Ashland was held May 7, 1846, there being present the Honorable Jacob Parker, presiding judge, associate judges John P. Reznor, Edmund Ingmand, and George IIT. Stewart, Sheriff James Doty, and clerk pro tem, Daniel W. Brown.

The next term of court held in Ashland was the March term, 1847. One of the orders of the court at this session was that by which Jacob O. Jennings, of Jeromeyille, was appointed clerk of said court for the term of seven years.

The simple tastes, habits and wants of the first settlers of Ashland county may excite the patronizing sympathy of the residents of the present day, who perhaps may ignore our obligations to the pioneers and congratulate ourselves that our lot has been cast in a more advaneed era of mental and moral culture. We may pride ourselves upon the developments and advancements which have been made in science and in the arts, and that the utilities of the present age are far more advanced than had been conceived of when Ashland county was first settled. If the people of the olden time cared less for costly apparel and ostentatious display, they cared more for their fellowmen and had that broader charity and fraternal love which make life seem to be more worth the living. The type of the christianity of that period will not suffer by comparison with that of our own day. The vain and thoughtless may jeer at the unpretending manner, customs and costumes of the pioneers and they doubtless had their faults, but they were men of strong minds, in strong bodies made so, albeit, by their compulsory self-denial and their very privations and toil. It was the mission of many of them to aid in the formation of our noble commonwealth, and wisely and well was that mission performed. Had their descendants been faithful to their teachings, there would have been harmony now where violence and discord reign. In those days our mountains and our valleys could say, ''We nurse a race who ne'er hath bowed the knee to aught but God.'' They were the men to found and maintain an empire. They realized the beau ideal of the poet : -

The Town Of Ashland

Ashland was originally known as Uniontown, and was laid out July 28, 1815, by William Montgomery. It retained the name of Uniontown until the establishment of a postoffice in 1822. There was another Uniontown in the state and the name given the postoffice was Ashland, and the town was changed to the same name.

The following were among the first familhes which located there: William Montgomery, Jacob Shaffer, Elias Slocum, George W. Palmer, Alanson Andrews, Samuel Urie, Joseph Sheets, David Markley, Amos Antibus, Joel Luther, and Mr. Nightingale. Jacob Shaffer, above named, was a shoemaker and a revolutionary soldier, and lived in a small dwelling upon the lot later occupied by the store of Judge Wick.

Daniel Carter, from Butler county, Pennsylvania, raised the first cabin in the place about the year 1811, which stood where the store of William Granger was later in Ashland. Robert Newell, three miles east, and Mr. Fry, one and one-half miles north of the village, raised cabins about the same time. In 1817 the first store was opened by Joseph Sheets.

The first tinner was John Croft, who was secured by the late George Swineford, on the lot where the agricultural works of Whitney & Company now are. The next, the late Hugh Davis, at the east end of town.

First carding-machine, stood where Smith's mill now is in Vermillion township, built by Andrew Newman; the next by the late Andrew and Uriah Drumb, in Ashland.

The first tannery stood where Whiting's agricultural works now stand, built by John Croft, and subsequently owned by the late George Swineford.

Ashland will go steadily forward in the inerease of her population, in wealth, and number of valuable improvements. It is surrounded by a fine, produetive country, and can sustain a much greater population.

""Ashland - A 20th Century Inland City,'' a ehapter on the Ashland of today, will be found elsewhere in this work, written by William A. Duff, a promising young writer who was born and reared in Ashland.

Franeis Graham, who was for many years a prominent citizen of Ashland county, eame to Uniontown (now Ashland) in 1821, and brought with him from Sandusky City a small stock of dry-goods and groceries. Uniontown at that time was a small village, containing about fourteen or fifteen families; a small tannery, two distilleries, a sawmill, a wheelwright shop, a blacksmith shop, and there was one physician there at that time - Dr. Joel Luther. Mr. Graham stated that previous to this, David Murphy, in 1818, had brought to Uniontown a small stock of goods, but did not replenish his stock. Mr. Graham upon his arrival, found Uniontown without a store, without a church, without a tavern and without a postoffice. Mr. Graham said: ''Upon my arrival with my stoek I rented a room for my goods from Mr. Sheets, and engaged board with him at one dollar a week. Said Sheets entertained travelers when they called, there being no tavern in the place. In 1822, John Hull, the wheelwright, opened a tavern in a small building, which was some years after moved back to give place for what was afterward the Slocum House. I found goods in demand, but no money in the country to buy them. They would go off like hot cakes if I would sell on credit, but that would be a dangerous course for me to pursue, as my means were quite limited, and if my goods were sold without getting in exchange for them something that would buy more, it would place me in a critieal situation; but I saw no alternative, and trust I must; at the same time I would take in exchange for my goods anything I could turn into money, or considered better than goods, and in pursuing that course, I found some hard bargains on my hands before the year came round.

The products of the country brought low prices at any time, from the fact that there was no market or demand for them beyond home consumption. It was very difficult for people to raise money to pay their taxes. Wheat might have been had for twenty-five cents a bushel, cash, but no one wanted it only for family use; consequently there were no large quantities of that article raised. Oats traded off at twelve to fifteen cents a bushel; corn was in better demand, and brought in store goods from fifteen to twenty cents per bushel, and became almost a lawful tender, because it could be converted into whiskey.

The farmers sold their corn to the merchant for goods or to the distiller for whiskey, and sometimes took it west myself. lorses, cattle, and hogs were sought for to some extent by trading men.

Salt - at lake, per barrel, twenty-five dollars; Coffee - fifty cents per pound; Calico - fifty to seventy-five cents per yard; Powder - per pound, two dollars ; Lead - per pound, fifty cents.

Cows - four dollars to six dollars ;Wheat - per bushel, average twenty cents ; Corn - per bushel, average five to eight cents; Oats - per bushel, average six cents; Ginseng, (dried) - per pound, twenty-five cents; Deerskin, (dried) - per pound, twelve and one-half cents. No money, but "'trade.''

The article of maple sugar was an important item of trade in Ashland county, and gave material aid to the community, not from the high prices it commanded, for it was worth but from five to six and a fourth cents per pound, according to quality; but from the large quantity made. It was not unusual in good seasons for sugar, for many of the farmers who had large crops, or sugar orchards, to.make in one season from eighteen hundred to twenty-five hundred pounds of sugar. I will here name a few of the most noted sugar makers of those days in the vicinity of Uniontown, viz., Jonas Crouse, Andrew Proudfit, Abraham Ifuffman, and Elisha Chilcote, as some of the individuals who .made for several years after I came to Uniontown about the quantities of sugar above named; even the poor man who had but a small crop, if he made but three or four hundred pounds, it enabled him to get many necessaries that he could not have otherwise paid for. During the spring and summer months, I took at my store large quanties of maple sugar; I generally put it into new flour barrels, which would contain, when filled, from two hundred and twenty to two hundred and fifty pounds; very dry sugar being lighter than damp. I took of that article one year forty-two barrels. Sugar could not readily be sold for cash, but could be bartered for salt, white fish, iron nails, windowglass, and castings at the furnace, in Licking county, or at Vermillion, now in Erie county, Ohio. I have already said there was no market in Uniontown for wheat, nor for some years after, beyond home consumption. About the year 1825, John Stewart, an early settler of Richland county, and a very worthy man, and for many years surveyor of Richland county, built a flouring mill on the Rockyfork, say three miles southeast of Mansfield. When his mill was completed, he put a notice in James Purdy's seven by nine paper, then published in Mansfield, saying his mill is now in running order, and he wished to purehase wheat, and would pay thirty-one and a fourth cents, cash, for good merchantable wheat delivered at his mill. The farmers about Uniontown were mueh elated with the idea of getting cash for wheat, and a number of them loaded their wagons with wheat, and earried it to Stewart's market for thirtyone and a fourth cents a bushel. I well recollect one of them who sold Stewart wheat was my neighbor Henry Gamble, who is yet living and ean speak for himself."'

Mr. Graham further stated: ''I have said there was no postoffice in Uniontown, when I came to it in 1821. In 1822, I got up a petition to the Postmaster- Yeneral for a postoffice at Uniontown, Riehland county, Ohio, by the name of Umontown, praying that Francis Graham be made postmaster, and forwarded it to the Hon. John Sloan, then our Representative in Congress from the Riechland and Wayne county district, asking him to do me the favor to present the petition to the Postmaster-General, and use his influence for the establishment of the office and my appointment as postmaster. Mr. Sloan in due time responded to my call, saving he had presented my petition, that the Postmaster-General dechned granting us a postoffice at Uniontown, by that name, as there were already two Uniontown postoftices in the state, and there should be but one. Mr. Sloan then made choice of the name of Ashland, their being no postoftice in Ohio by that name. The papers came in due time, and Francis Graham was postmaster. '

'"'T have already related how we obtained a postoffice at Uniontown. Well, the postofficee was Ashland, and the village Uniontown, and eontinued so for two or three years after the postoffiee was established, when the citizens petitioned the legislature, praying that the name of Uniontown be changed to that of Ashland, and Uniontown became extinct.

'T have said in the fore part of this epistle there was no chureh in Uniontown. When I came to it in 1821, the good people of Uniontown and vicinity who possessed morality enough to appreciate the preaching of the gospel, had built a log meetinghouse in the country, one mile west of the village, on the road to New Haven. Tlere, I must say, the location of said meetinghouse did not comport with my views of church matters; but directly viee versa - for I say build your chuch where there are people. It is more natural and more convenient for the country people to go to town than it is for the citizens of the town to go to the country to meeting. But the wise heads who had the responsible duty to discharge of locating said meetinghouse, had said that was the place for it, and the citizens of the village could go out there to meeting. The Rev. William Matthews, a Presbyterian divine, and a very worthy man, preached in said house, every third Sabbath, and some of the citizens did go to hear him; but not near as many as should have gone.

""Mr. Matthews preached in said house for a few years after my arrival at Uniontown, and was then succeeded by the Rev. Robert Lee, from Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, who purchased and lived on the farm for mauy __-years, now owned by Peter Vantilburg, on the Olivesburg road. Mr. Lee preached in said meetinghouse for a number of years and then removed to Leesville, in Crawford county. Mr. Lee was succeeded by the Rev. William Robinson, an elderly gentleman, who resided for a time in Ashland, and removed from there to Orange, then in Richland county. I think I am not mistaken in saying the old man was killed in Wayne or Stark county, while riding in his carriage by the fall of a tree. In the year 1834, the Presbyterians purchased a lot of John Smith, who owned a farm and lived where Christopher Mykrant's brick house now stands, on Cottage street, and erected thereon the Topewell church. From that time the country mecting-honse place was vacated as a place of public worship, and the trustees sold the building to the widow Haggerty for a dwelling house a few years after. About the year 1824 or 1825, the Methodist Episcopals of Uniontown and vicinity organized a society, and for some time held their meetings in a log building, occupied as a schoolhouse, which stood on Main street.

Features Of Pioneer Life

Young men did not go far away from home to get wives then. They courted and married girls of their own neighborhood. The marriage usually took place at the home of the bride and the wedding festivities continued for two days. After the marriage service, congratulations were extended, followed by a dance or '"'hoedown'' in the evening. The first day was called the bride's day, the day following was the groom 's day or in-fair, upon which the company of the previous day would re-assemble and ride on horseback in procession to the home of the groom's parents. The post of honor was to race for the bottle, for which two persons were selected. Generally men were chosen for this office, but sometimes the honor was conferred upon a gentleman and a Jady, as many women were expert riders in those days. The racers rode at the head of the procession and when the cavaleade got within a mile of the groom's home, a signal was given and off the racers went at Pegasean speed, often taking short cuts through fields, the horses vaulting logs and fences, if any were in their way. The groom's father would be standing at the door with the bottle in his outstretched hand, the winner would catch the same and hold it proudly aloft as he returned to meet the company, and then a halt would be called, the bottle passed around and the health of the bride and groom drank. They would then proceed to the house where the in-fair dinner would be served.

As April was moving time, the spring was the favorite season in which to marry, and apple blossoms were the favorite flowers used for bridal wreaths and their beauty for that purpose has never been excelled.

In contrasting the morals of the past and present, speakers and writers frequently refer to the fact that there were distillers in the early days, trying thereby to create the impression that the pioneers were a dissipated people, but such was not the ease, for early settlers were at least as moral and temperate as are the people of today. The conditions of the country were different then. There was no market for grain, except for local consumption. Distilleries were erected, whiskey made, hauled to the lake and shipped to Detroit and other markets, and money was thus obtained to pay taxes, ete. Corn was converted into whiskey, because that product was a more marketable commodity, and sold for cash. <A certain quantity of whiskey was drunk by the pioneers, perhaps, but whiskey was their only beverage, beer being a later production. The "*still-house'' of the past was an important factor in commercial circles, in the early years of our country history, as whiskey, maple sugar, ginseng, beeswax and potash were the only exportable commodities of that period. Then, too, the whiskey of those days was not adulterated and could be drank by the hardworking pioneers with apparent immunity from deleterious results.

The pioneers were a people of heroic virtues. The situation forbade much devotion to literature. The actual life of the men who made eivilization possible had no time for the literary pursuits. They made history, but did not write it. The flourishing condition of our country today is the result of the labors of the pioneers - the men who toiled for our betterment, not knowing whether succeeding generations would even be informed of the names of those who had hewn down the forests and eultivated the land.

In The Early Settlement

In the early settlement of Ashland county it required from fifteen to fifty days to make the journey from the east to this part of Ohio, as the early settlers made the trip with ox teams and pack horses, sometimes on foot. Where vehicles were used, aged persons and young children were permitted to ride others frequently had to walk. Many of these early settlers were poor ata 'came to the "'Garden Spot of the World'' as Ohio was then called, to seek thay' fortunes amid new environments. In making the journey, streams had fre- quently to be forded. It was not unusual for horses to give out on the long journey, which would cause delay of weeks or even months. The roads then were little more than blazed trails and the axe had frequently to be used to cut away timber that teams might pass.

It would require a volume to tell of the habits and customs of the pioneers ; of their trapping and hunting; of their solitary lives in the great woods, surrounded by wild animals and savage Indians; of their cabins and furniture, and of the long winter evenings by the log-heap fires.

When the pioneer had erected his cabin home, it was not only a home and shelter for the pioneer and his family, but for every stranger who passed that way, "'without money and without price.'' The latch string was always out, for these pioneers were great hearted people, and no man was turned away empty. Their cabins, often not more than fifteen or twenty feet square, made of rough beech logs, with the bark still adhering to them, were frequently occupied by a dozen, or even a score, of people for the night, and no complaints made for want of room; genuine hospitality always finds room enough, and never apologizes for lack of more.

The cabins which the pioneers built and in which they lived have been often described; their form and proportions, and general appearance have been repeatedly impressed upon the mind of the student of history. They were built of round logs with the bark on, and side chimneys of mud and sticks, puncheon floors, clapboard roof, with and without a loft or second floor, and all put together without a nail or particle of iron from top to bottom. These buildings stood many a year after the original inhabitants moved into better quarters. They served for stables, sheep-pens, hay-houses, pig-pens, smith-shops, henhouses, loom-shops, schoolhouses, ete. Some of them are yet standing in this county, and occupied, to some extent, in some portions of the county as dwellings.

A second grade of log cabin, built later, was quite an improvement on the first, being made of hewn logs with sawed lumber for doors and window frames and floors. Glass also took the place of paper windows of the old cabin; nails were also sparingly used in these better cabins. It was sometimes built near the old one and connected with it by a covered porch. When nails were first used, for a few years a pound of them was exchanged for a bushel of wheat. They were a precious article, and were made by hand on a blacksmith's anvil, out of odds and ends of old wornout sickles, scythes, broken clevis-pins, links of chains, broken horseshoes, etc., all welded together to eke out the nail-rods from which they were forged. The first cabins were often erected, ready for occupation, in a single day. In an emergency, the pioneers collected together, often going eight or ten miles to a eabin-raising, and, in the great woods where not a tree had been felled or a stone turned, began with dawn the erection of a cabin. Three or four wise builders would set the cornerstones, lay with the square and level the first round of logs; two men with axes would cut the trees and logs; one with his team of oxen, a ''lizzard'' and a log-chain would ''snake'' them in; two more, with axes, cross-cut saw and frow, would make the clapboards; two more, with axes, cross-cut saw and broad-axe would hew out the puncheons and flatten the upper side of the sleepers and joists. Four skillful axemen would carry up the corners, and the remainder, with skids and forks or handspikes, would roll up the logs. As soon as the joists were laid on, the cross-cut saw was brought from the woods, and the two men went to work cutting out the door and chimney place; and while the corner men were building up the attic and putting on the roof, the carpenters and masons of the day were putting down the puncheons, laying the hearth and building the chimney. high enough to keep out the beasts, wild or tame. In one corner, at a distance of six feet from one wall and four from the other, the bedpost was placed - only one being needed. A hole was bored in the puncheon floor for the purpose of setting this post in, which was usually a stick with a crotch or fork in the upper end; or, if an augur is not at hand, a hole is cut in the puncheon floor, and the fork sharpened and driven into the ground beneath; rails were laid from this fork to the wall, and, usually, nice, straight, hickory poles formed the bottom, upon which straw or leaves were | placed and the blanket put on. This made a comfortable spring bed, and was easily changed and kept clean. Often the chinking and daubing of the walls, putting in windows and hanging the door were left until fall or some leisure time after the corn crop and the eontents of the truck patch were secured. Often the pioneers did not erect a cabin at all until a crop was secured - living, meanwhile, in their covered wagons, and cooking beside a log in the open air, or erecting a ''pole eabin,'' or ''brush cabin,'' mere temporary affairs, to shelter the family until time could be had for erecting a permanent one. | The saving of the crop was of more importance during the summer season than shelter ; but when the first frost came, a sure indication of approaching winter, active preparations were made for the permanent cabin, and the work was: pushed forward until a snug cabin stood in the midst of the forest, with a clearing around it, made principally by cutting down trees for the building. Every erack was chinked and daubed, and when completed, and a fire of hickory logs in the great fireplace, the cold did not seriously disturb the inmates. The heavy door was hung on wooden hinges, and all that was necessary to lock it at night was to pull the latch-string inside, and the strong wooden latch against wild animals and storms. | But the lateh-string was seldom pulled in, for it was a serious offense for the Indians to not find the string out.. The writer's mother frequently told of awakening at night and seeing Indians sitting before the blazing fire, or at the cupboard eating a lunch, and that she could not sleep again until after they had taken their leave. Many of these pioneer cabins had no loft or second floor, but when this was added it was used as a sleeping room for the vounger members of the family.

\ What to eat, drink and wear, were questions not, perhaps, diffieult of solution in those days. The forest was full of game, the streams full of fish, and wild fruits were abundant. To get bread required both patience and labor ; the staff of life was one the articles that must be earned ''by the sweat of the brow;'' it could not be gathered from the bushes, fished from the streams. or brought down with the rifle. Every backwoodsman once a year added oe, clearing, at least, a "truck pateh.'' This was the hope and stay of the family; the receptacle of corn, beans, melons, potatoes, squashes, pumpkins, turnips, ete.. Sein rol ee aecett een e s planted in May brought roasting ears and succotash in August. Potatoes came with corn, and the cellar, built in the side of a eon- venient hill, and filled with the contents of the truck patch, secured the family against want. When the corn grew too hard for roasting ears, and was yet too soft to grind in the mill, it was reduced to meal by a grater, and whether stirred into mush or baked into johnnycake, it made, for people with keen appetites and good stomachs, excellent food. Place before one of those brawny backwoodsmen a square foot of johnnycake and a venison steak broiled on hickory coals, and no art of civilization could produce a more satisfactory meal.

Next to the grater comes the hominy block, an article in common use among the pioneers. It consisted simply of a block of wood - a section of a tree, perhaps - with a hole burned, or dug, into it a foot deep, in which corn was pulveried with a pestle. Sometimes this block was inside the cabin, where it served as a seat ; sometimes a convenient stump in front of the cabin door was prepared for, and made one of the best of hominy blocks.

Hominy blocks did not last long, for mills came quite early and superseded them, yet these mills were often so far apart that in stormy weather, or for want. of transportation, the pioneer was compelled to resort to his hominy block, or go without bread. In winter, the mills were frozen up nearly all the time, and when a thaw came and the ice broke, if the mill was not swept away entirely by the floods, it was so thronged with pioneers, each with his sack of corn, that some of them were often compelled to camp out near the mill and wait several days for their turn. When the grist was ground, if they were so fortunate as to possess an ox, a horse, or mule, for the purpose of transportation, they were happy. It was not unusual to go from ten to twenty miles to mill, through the pathless, unbroken forest, and to be benighted on the journey, and chased, or treed by wolves. A majority of the pioneers, however, settled in the vicinity of a stream, upon which mills were rapidly erected. These mills were very primitive affairs - mere ''eorn crackers'' - but they were an improvement on the hominy block. They merely ground the corn, the pioneer must do his own bolting. A wire sieve was then one of the most important articles of household furniture. - It always hung in its place, on a wooden peg, just under the ladder that reached to the loft. The meal was sifted and the finest used for bread. - How delicious was that ''Indian pone,'' baked in a large deep skillet, which was placed upon coals raked from the fireplace to the hearth. Fresh coals were continually placed under it and upon the iron lid until the loaf, five or six inches thick, was done through. This was a different thing from johnnycake; it was better, and could not always be had, for to make it good, a little wheat flour was needed, and wheat flour was a precious thing in those very early days.

A road cut through the forest to the mill, and a wagon for hauling the grist, - were great advantages, the latter especially was often a seven day's wonder to the children of a neighborhood, and the happy owner of one often did, for years, the milling for a whole neighborhood. - About once a month this good neighbor, who was in exceptionally good circumstances, because able to own a wagon, would go about through the neighborhood, gather up the grists and take them to mill, often spending several days in the operation, and never thinking of chareing for his time and trouble.

'Cooking, in pioneer times, was an interesting operation. The trammel and hooks were found among the well-to-do families, as time progressed. - Previous to this, the lug-pole, across the inside of the chimney, about even with the chamber floor, answered for a trammel. A chain was suspended from it, and hooks were attached, and from this hung the mush-pot or teakettle. If a chain was not available, a wooden hook was in reach of the humblest and poorest. When a meal was not in preparation, and the hook was endangered by fire, it was shoved aside to one end of the lug-pole for safety. Iron ware was very scarce in those days. Instances are related where the one pot served at a meal to boil water for mint tea or crust coffee, to bake the bread, boil the potatoes, and fry the meat. By fine management this was accomplished. Frequently the kettle had no lid, and a flat stone, heated, and handled with the tongs, was used instead of one, when a loaf or pone or pumpkin pie was baked. A shortcake could be baked by heating the kettle moderately, putting in the cake, and tipping it up sidewise before the glowing fire. Bannock, or boardcake, was made by mixing the cornmeal up with warm water, a pinch of salt and a trifle of lard, into a thick dough, spreading it on a clean, sweet-smelling clapboard, patting it with the cleanest of hands, and standing it slanting before the fire, propped into the right position by a flatiron behind it. Baked hastily, this made a delicious cake, sweet and nutty and fresh, and the pretty stamp of the mother's dear, unselfish, loving fingers was plainly detected in the crisp crust.

'Kicking frolies'' were in vogue in those early times. This was after wool was more plenty, and it was carded, spun and wove into cloth. Half a dozen young men, and an equal number of young women (for the ''fun of the thing'' it was always necessary to preserve a balance of this kind), were invited to the kicking frolic. The cabin floor was cleared for action and a half dozen chairs, or stools, placed in a cirele in the center and connected by a eord to prevent recoil. On these the six young men seated themselves with boots and stockings off, and pants rolled up to the knee. Just think of making love in that shape! The cloth was placed in the center, wet with soap suds, and then the kicking commenced by measured steps, driving the bundle of cloth round and round the elderly lady with gourd in hand pouring on more soap suds, and every Rie and then, with spectacles on nose and yard stick in hand, measuring the goods until they were shrunk to the desired width, and then calling the lads to a dead halt. Then, while the lads put on hose and boots, the lasses, with sleeves rolled up above the elbow, rung out the cloth and put it on the garden fence to dry. When this was done, the cabin floor was again cleared and the supper spread, after which, with their numbers increased somewhat, perhaps, they danced the happy hours of the night away until midnight, to the musie of a violin and the commands of some amateur cotillion caller, and were ready to attend another such frolic the following night.

The costume of the woman deserves a passing notice. The pioneers proper of course, brought with them something to wear like that in use where they oe from; but this could not last always, and new apparel, such as the new counter afforded, had to be provided. Besides, the little girls sprang up into womanhood with the rapidity of the native butterweed, and they must be made both decent and attractive, and what is more, they were willing to aid in makine themselves so. The flax patch, therefore, became a thing of as prime mane as the truck patch. ;

Clothes for Sunday wear were made of linen copperas and white checked or striped and when bleached was very pretty. Very few could afford to wear it made all of flax; for every day wear, the warp was of flax and the filling tow. What was known as linsey-woolsey was wool and cotton mixed in the weaving, the chain being cotton and the filling wool. The dye stuff in those days was within the reach of all - butternut or walnut hulls colored brown; oak bark and copperas dyed black; hickory bark or the blossoms of golden rod colored yellow; madder, red; indigo, blue; green was obtained by first coloring yellow, and then dipping it into the blue dye. Stocking yarn was dyed black, brown or blue. If the clothes of the pioneers were poor, they made up. in brain and heart.

Hunting occupied a portion of the time of the pioneers. Nearly all were good hunters, and not a few lived almost entirely for a few years on the results of the chase. The woods supplied them with the greater amount of their subsistence, and often the whole of it; it was no uncommon thing for families to ive several months without a mouthful of bread of any kind. It frequently happened that the family went without breakfast until it could be obtained from the woods.

The fall and early part of winter was the season for hunting deer, and the whole of the winter, including part of the spring, for bears and furbearing animals. It was a customary saying that fur was good during every month in the name of which the letter r occurred.

As soon as the leaves were pretty well down, and the weather became rainy, accompanied with light snow, the pioneer hunter, who had probably worked pretty faithfully on his clearing during the summer, began to feel uneasy about his eabin home; he longed to be off hunting in the great woods. His cabin was too warm; his feather-bed too soft; his mind was wholly occupied with the camp and the chase. Hunting was not a mere ramble in pursuit of game, in which there was nothing of skill and calculation; on the contrary, the hunter, before setting out in the morning, was informed by the state of the weather in what situation he might reasonably expect to find his game; whether on the bottoms, on the hillsides or hilltops. In stormy weather the deer always seek the most sheltered places, and the leeward sides of the hills; in rainy weather, when there was not much wind, they kept in the open woods, on high ground. - In the early morning, if pleasant, they were abroad, feeding in edges of the prairie swamp ; at noon they were hiding in the thickets. In every situation, it was requisite for the hunter to ascertain the course of the wind, so as to get to leeward of the game; this he often ascertained by placing his finger in his mouth, holding it there until it became warm, then holding it above his head, and the side that first cooled indicated the direction of the wind.

These hunters needed no compass; the trees, the sun and stars took its place. The bark of an aged tree is much thicker and rougher on the north side than on the south; and the same may be said of the moss; it is much thicker and stronger. on the north than the south side of the tree; hence he could walk freely and carelessly through the woods and always strike the exact point intended, while any but a woodsman would become bewildered and lost.

The Early Settlers

The early settlers of this region were largely from Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, with quite a ''sprinkling"' from the New England states. They were generally revolutionary stock, and this may be the reason why Ohio has taken such a prominent position in the nation, politically and socially. The sub-stratum of its population was composed of Revolutionary - s whose seven years of struggle and privation had made them men - giants they might be called. From such stock and from veterans of the War of 1812, the people of this county largely trace their ancestry. It was fortunate for Ohio that her territory was upon the frontier at the close of the Revolution. The old soldiers, without money, but with land warrants in their pockets, sought the wilderness beyond the Ohio for their future homes. This state caught the larger share of these most desirable emigrants, for the reason that it was the most. promising territory then open to settlement in the west. A treaty with the Indians had been made by the government which opened the larger part of the state to white settlement and a considerable portion of the state was especially reserved for the soldiers, and was known as United States military lands. These lands amounted to two million six hundred and fifty thousand acres.

The War of 1812 checked immigration somewhat, but after it ended the tide began to flow in greater volume than ever. The passage of troops during the war had served to make new roads and widen the old ones, and the war also introduced to the new country hundreds of men who would not otherwise have known its beauty and advantages, and who when at lbetry to do so, returned and settled in it. The country no doubt settled far more rapidly than it would have done had there been no War of 1812.

Where no roads existed numerous ''blazed'' trails led off through the woods in every direction to the cabin of the solitary settler. The most important of the early roads in this section was the one leading north to the lake. This was the great outlet for grain and other produce. Freight wagons did most of the carrying trade for the country. The merchant who wished to purchase goods in the east sent his order and received his goods by these wagons, and in order to pay for the same often intrusted large sums of money to the teamsters. ~The products of the country, received by the merchant in exchange for goods, consisting mostly of wheat, whiskey, furs, ete., were also shipped by these wagons, going, generally, to the lake, where they were sold or shipped on a vessel for some point east, and months would often elapse before returns could be received.

Another source of outlet for the produce of the country was by the watercourses, which were then untrammelled by mills or bridges; and, by reason of the swampy condition of the country and consequent abundance of water, were navigable for small boats to points which would seem incredible at this time. Flat-boats were built, carrying from twenty to fifty tons. These were loaded with pork, flour, whiskey, the products of the chase, ete., and taken down the Mohican to the Muskingum to the Ohio and Mississippi river to New Orleans, where the cargoes were disposed of, after which the shippers returned home by way of New York city.

The fact that Perrysville was on the old surrey maps as Freeport was owing to the fact that flatboats were built there, loaded and floated for the markets at New Orleans. The Blackfork was a larger stream then than it is uow making the town of Perrysville quite a town for flatboats. Larger boats however, were built at Loudonville, one of which left there with a cargo of sixty tons. The tonnage of the flatboats differed, usually ranging from twenty tons upward.

About forty years elapsed from the time of the first settlement of Ashlan«. county before these means of transportation were superseded by that great civilizer - the railroad.

The products of the country, for want of a market brought very low prices, the average for wheat being thirty-five cents per bushel; oats twelve cents; corn twenty cents; whiskey fifteen cents per gallon; pork one dollar and fifty cents per hundred weight; cows eight to ten dollars each, and horses from thirty to forty dollars each. Coffee brought from seventy-five cents to one dollar per pound; salt from four to six dollars per barrel; calicoes from fifty cents to one dollar per yard, etc. Money was the exception, traffic and trade the rule. The great wagons carried the produce to Portland (now Sandusky city) and returned with salt, fish, ete.

Cabins for the purpose of trade and traffic sprang up all along the new roads, and were occupied by some pioneer family, who procured a living partly by hunting, partly by working the ''truck patch,'' partly by trading whiskey, tobacco, knives, blankets, tomahawks and trinkets with the Indians and settlers, and as travel on the roads increased, by keeping travellers over night, finally converted the cabin into a tavern. Frequently these taverns were the means of starting a town, which grew and prospered, or became extinct, according to circumstances. Establishing a town was like investing in a lottery ticket, which might draw a prize or a blank.

Settlements And Improvements

The spring of 1812 saw the tide of emigration on the increase. At that period a war was impending between Great Britain and the United States. This checked the influx of the pioneers, for it was evident the Indians of the northwest would be invited to assist the enemy. In fact, it had been observed for nearly two years, that the Greentown and Jerometown or Mohican Johnstown Indians had been in the habit of making frequent visits to Upper Sandusky, and always returned with new blankets, tomabawks and ammunition in abundance. Indeed, it was suspected that British agents were busily at work sowing the seeds of disaffection among the northern Ohio Indians.

These settlers: commenced improvements along the Black fork, the Clear fork, and the Rocky fork of the Mohican, each erecting a small cabin, and elearing a few acres of ground for corn. The majority of these settlers were of German descent, and had come directly from the western counties of Pennsylvania. Virginia, Maryland and the eastern part of Ohio; and had found the way al ? oS ? . to their new homes up the branches of the Mohican, and by Indian trails.

These settlers erected new homes along the Blackfork; Alexander Finley and Thomas Eagle, James Loudon Priest, Nathan Odell, Joshua Oram, Benjamin Emmons, John Baptiste Jerome, Ezra Warner, Elisha Chileoat, Benjamin Bunn, James Conley, Amos Norris, William Metcalf, John Newell, Westel Ridgely, Vatchell Metcalf, Josiah Crawford, and John Shinnabarger. The Odells, Orams, Priests and Metcalfs, settled in the present limits of Lake township. Mr. Emmons settled in Perry, and Mr. Warner in the lower part of Vermillion. These settlers were mostly from the border states, and from Jefferson county, Ohio. They had found their way to their new homes like the settlers on the Blackfork, and commenced the erection of cabins, and clearings, in the same way. Corn was generally purchased and ground, the first year, in Knox county; and the new settlers either packed it on horses, or descended the Mohican in canoes, and transported it in that way. The hominy block was in universal requisition among the early settlers; and jonacake, or journey-cake, pork, and wild game.

Surrounded by dangers and enured to hardships, the pioneer learned to think for themselves, and acquired courage to accomplish the task they had undertaken. It was no place for faint hearts or irresolution. Their limited means, dangers, and dependence upon each other, had the effect to cement the . friendship.

At that time two shillings a day, and twenty-five cents a hundred for cutting and splitting twelve foot rails, in trade, was the customary price. He often traveled five miles on foot, to help roll logs or raise a cabin, and was really glad to assist in this manner all new settlers. There were no improved roads; all was new, and no road fund to repair highways. The willing hands and stout arms of the resolute pioneer had it all to do, and right cheerfully did they perform the task.

At the time of the first settlement on the Blackfork there was not a white man in Montgomery, Milton, Clear Creek, Orange, Jackson, and the three northern townships. The number of the cabins in the lower part of Vermillion, in Lake and Perry, as well as all over Mohican, was rapidly on the increase; and the prospect for a large influx of settlers in 1812 was fair. The pioneers were keenly alive to their interests, and traveled far and near to aid each other in raising cabins, felling the forest, rolling logs and fencing new fields. | Many hardships were encountered the first year or two, by reason of unripe grain, and the great distance to be traveled in reaching mills. Still, those difficulties were met with fortitude and soon overcome.

In the early settlement of the territory now constituting Ashland county, the system of education adopted by the pioneers were very ineffective. The schools of that period were supported almost exclusively by individual subscriptions, the only aid being a nominal sum received in each township, from leases on section 16. Teachers were employed for low wages, or it would have been impossible for the sparse settlers to have maintained or supported any schools. At first, a few pupils were collected in a cabin of one of the pioneers, for instruction, by a volunteer teacher, deemed capable of imparting a knowledge of the elementary branches.

Atom Am The Narrows

The course of instruction in those days was generally limited to elementary branches, such as spelling, reading, writing, arithmetic, to the rule of three.

The earlier teachers were from Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland and the New England states. Sometimes an educated Irishman sought and obtained employment as a teacher. In a general way, good order, in school hours, was rigidly enforced; and if a ready compliance, on the part of the pupil, was not yielded an application of birch readily induced the recreant scholar to comply. The theory of moral suasion was not so popular then as now. The commands of the teacher were obeyed, much as those of the military officer, where no argument, as to the right or wrong of a command, is permitted.

The forest abounded in an abundance of game, and these early pioneers could easily supply their families with a sufficient quantity of flesh, though salt to cure and preserve it was a rare article.

Making sugar was rare sport for the young people. Small camp houses of poles were erected and covered with clapboards or bark, and a furnace of stones, cemented with yellow clay, and sufficiently long to receive eight or ten large iron kettles, in which the sugar water was speedily evaporated, and prepared for granulation. When large iron kettles could not be obtained, iron pots, brass kettles and other cooking utensils were brought into requisition. |The large iron kettles were generally purchased at Zanesville, Pittsburg, and Portland. Large troughs, dug-outs of white ash, holding two or three hogsheads, were made for the surplus water in a good run. The usual mode of tapping, sugar trees being abundant, was to notch, and bore a hole so as to intersect the inner part of the notch, which sloped down and back, so as to fit in a spile of elder or alder to convey the water into a trough or other vessel. The troughs were generally made of black and white ash, dug out, and would hold two or three gallons each. It was not uncommon for a pioneer to tap from three hundred to six hundred trees, and make from one thousand to one thousand five

Settling In The Wilderness

The following is taken from statements made to Dr. P. Il. Clark by the late Daniel Carter. Mr. Carter says: 'My father settled in the wilderness one mile northeast of where Ashland

(being born May 23, 1802) just the age for such events as then ocveurred to make a deep and lasting impression on my memory. My father's place was six miles bevond the then frontier settler. That spring Benjamin Cuppy, Jacob Fry, Mrs. Save and family and Stephen Trickel moved into the neighborhood, all built cabins, cleared Jand. planted corn and potatoes and all went well The Indjans were livmg at their villages, Jerometown and Sometimes there were forty or Father for some time. Greentown and came frequently to our house. fifty of them at a time, but they were always peaceable and friendly. and mother always tried to treat them kindly; fed them when they came hungry, lodged them as best they could, w hich had its effect when they made their raid on the frontiers. The British were trying to influence all the tribes of Indians to join them and fight the Americans. A chief of some tribe visited Chief Pipe at Jerometown and Armstrong, the chief of Greentown, and used his best endeavors to persuade them to join the British in the war against America. The Indians agreed to call a council and decide on the course they would pursue. The council was held and they decided to remain neutral. I was sent to Odell's mill with a sack of corn and had to go through Jerometown as there was no other trail. When I returned in the evening they were holding their war dance. They wanted me to stay and see the performance. I hitched my horse and staid till the dance was over, then rode home, a distance of nine miles through the wilderness, arriving at home about two o'clock in the morning.

'This chief visited all the states and territories. Where he could get their consent to join the British he would give them a red stick in token of blood. Consequently he was known as the chief red-stick. This council at Jerometown was held about the last of June, 1812. But after Hull's surrender August 16, 1812, the government thought best to remove them; not so much for fear of their making trouble, but to keep them from harboring unfriendly Indians.

'When Captain Douglas informed them that he came with orders to remove them they. were much excited and would not consent to go. Captain Douglas called on Mr. Copus to go with him and use his influence to obtain their consent. Mr. Copus replied that he and the Indians were on friendly terms and they would not think it kind in him to persuade them to leave against their wills. But Douglas threatened to arrest him as a traitor if he refused. He consented on condition that their town and property should be respected. As they could not talk with them Mr. Copus was prevailed upon to go as an interpreter. He told them that if they would consent to go their property should be taken care of and that the offieer had authorized him to say so, on the strength of this promise they reluctantly consented to go. They packed up what they could take with them and started. They had not gone more than two miles when looking back they saw their village on fire, some of Douglas' soldiers having lingered behind and applied the fatal toreh.

"They were greatly excited in viewing the smoky ruins of their village and property when they had the pledge of soldiers and friends that their property should be taken eare of. They were removed immediately after Hull's surrender and taken to Urbana. They were not kept very long for they had asked the privilege of going to their friends at or near Sandusky, on the pledges that they were to remain peaceable and quiet they were permitted to go. On the 10th of September, 1812, a band of about forty-five of them returned, no doubt, with the intention of avenging the wrongs done them, and at this time Martin Ruffner, Fredrick Zeimer, his wife and daughter Kate were inhumanly murdered in cold blood. Five days after this, on the 15th, oceurred the massacre of James Copus and three soldiers.

"Immediately after the attack and repulse at the Copus place, they came over into the Jerome Fork valley and burned Robert Newell's house, situated three and a half miles southeast of the present site of the village of Ashland. Previous to these Indian raids Captain Murray came with a company of soldiers to where Jeromeville now stands, as a guard to the frontier settlers and built a blockhouse. When we got the news of the Zeimer family murder, all excepting father's family fled to the blockhouse. In about five days after the Copus family were attacked the news reached Captain Murray, when he immediately dispatched thirty soldiers for our relief. The news came to Captain Murray the morning after the Copus murder. At the same time Absolom Newell volunteered to go on foot to give us notice to flee, but when he got in sight of his father's house in flames, he ran back to the blockhouse. Father had just got in with his horses from the woods. David Noggle mounted a horse, took his rifle and rode as fast as he could to give us notice to flee to the blockhouse. Father and Noggle threw the harness on the horses and hitched to the wagon while mother and us boys threw some bedding in the wagon and tumbled in. Father with gun in hand mounted one of the horses and drove as fast ag he could while Noggle on horseback rode ahead.

""When the Indians were told that they had to leave they told father to remain right where he was, that they would not harm him, that he had been their friend, and had always used them well. Their passing within eighty yards of the house when we were there on their revenging raid shows that they had kept their pledge in good faith. In about a week father with a guard of soldiers returned for the balance of our goods. JI went along with them. We counted the tracks of thirty-seven Indians who had passed through our corn field going in. the direction of Cuppy's which indicated a loss of eight killed and wounded at the Copus battle. They had passed before we left and before soldiers got there. The soldiers found Cuppy's house on fire and saw the Indians run out of the corn field into the woods and a little further up found Fry's house on fire. I have no doubt that had Newell, Cuppy and Fry been at home they would all have been murdered, as it was known that they had not treated the Indians well. Newell, although a good neighbor, would not allow the Indians around him, neither would he feed or harbor them, but drove them away when they came about his premises. Cuppy, when they came hungry and asked for anything to eat, would order them away without giving them a bite. Fry, although a preacher, would not allow them around him.

''After getting the balance of his goods father concluded to go back to Canton; got as far as Massillon and met William Rhodes, an old acquaintance, who invited him to come and stay with him as he had an empty house and could give us work to do so that we could earn ourselves a living, where we remained until about the 10th of February, 1813. As there was no disturbance along the frontier we found our corn all standing in the field excepting what the turkeys had eaten. We then opened our sugar camp and commenced making sugar when the news came that the Indians had made their appearance at Colonel Colyer's about four miles below the blockhouse. | We had almost two kettles of syrup almost ready to sugar when we received the news to flee. We set the kettles off the fire, covered them and fled to the blockhouse about the 5th of March. Colonel Colyer was living on the Muddy Fork of the Mohican. Three Indians nade their. appearance at the coor and asked for something to eat. Colyer told them that if they would give up their guns and tomahawks to him that he would give them something to eat. They handed him their guns and tomahawks, when he set them back in the house where he could stand between them and their guns and told Mrs. Colyer to set on the table what meat and bread she had, calculating that when they got seated at the table that he would arrange to shoot two of them at one shot and kill the other with the breech of his gun. Mrs. Colyer was a weak woman and was nearly scared to death, and when he raised his gun Mrs. Colyer sereamed, fainted and fell to the floor. This alarmed the Indians; they sprang to their feet, held up their hands and begged him not to shoot as they were friendly Indians and meant no harm; that they were on their way to their friends in Goshen, in the Tuscarawas valley. Colyer told them to go out and come around to the window, and if they would promise to go off he would hand out their guns and tomahawks and what they were to eat: Colyer then raised his wife and put her on the bed, then took out the flints from the guns threw out the priming, plugged the vents and handed them out together with their food and told them to leave and not be seen again around there or they would be killed. . Colyer and his wife started to the eagle blovkhouse as soon as the Indians were out of sight. Colonel James Colyer was astout, resolute man, who scarcely knew fear by that name unless the odds were too great.

'All around and about the blockhouse took shelter. There were eight families in all who took shelter at the Jerome blockhouse. We were almost without food or raiment. There were about fifteen acres belonging to Mr. Carr and Warner of Cleveland. We all joined in plowing, planting and working that to corn and potatoes. Some worked while others were posted as sentinels. In this way we got some corn and potatoes and in the spring of 1814 we all left the blockhouse. Some of these families had sold their lands and began again in the woods.

'As I had frequently seen Captain Pipe, chief of the Jerometown Indians, perhaps it would not be amiss to give a short description of him. He was about six feet in height, straight and well proportioned, rather round features, slightly pale face with a grave countenance and to appearance was about fifty years of age and I should judge had perhaps one-fourth white blood in his veins.

"T have also seen Armstrong, the chief of the Greentown Indians, and think he had a mixture of white blood in him. I will give the location of those towns for the satisfaction of those who were not here until the last traces of them were wiped out.

''Jerometown was situated one and one-fourth miles a little southwest from Jeromeville, on the state road from Wooster to Mansfield. Greentown was in the Black Fork valley about five miles southeast of Petersburg.

"'IT saw Captain Lyon, one of the Jerometown Indians shortly after the war was over. He knew me and asked if we had seen them when they went up to burn Cuppy and Fry's houses. J answered 'no.' He then asked if we had seen their tracks in the corn field? I replied 'yes.' He then said, 'we saw you and would have gone to the house and got something to eat but we were afraid you would be frightened ; we did not wish to scare your?

Stage Lines, Taverns And Flatboats

Before taking up the history of townships, there are matters of a general character that should be given a separate chapter, and one of these is the state and other leading roads of the county and the travel and traffic over them.

no roads within its borders, except the Crawford route (if that could be called a road) and some blazed trails. The first road that could be called by that "name was from Wooster by way of Greentown to the Newman settlement. thence to Mansfield. The next road was from Mt. Vernon north through the MeCluer settlement (Bellville) to Mansfield and on to Huron on Lake Erie. History states that a road from Wooster to Mansfield was opened in 1810. Some claim it was at an earlier day. Beall's trail opened up the country in northwest Ohio in 1812, and General Crook's army opened a road from Mansfield west to Upper Sandusky the same year. The road from Mansfield to Ashland was cut through the forest in 1813, at a cost of nine dollars per mile. One of the most important and most used of the early roads was the one from Mt. Vernon through Mansfield to Lake Erie. This later became a state road, and the greatest stage and freight route between central Ohio and Lake Erie. Portland (now called Sandusky) was the great mart upon the lake for Ohio trade and traffic.

From Mansfield the state road ran directly north to Brubaker's creek, thence to the northwest through Ganges to Planktown, where it struck the Beall trail - the stage road running through Ashland to Tiffin. From Planktown there were two roads to the lake, one through Paris (now called Plymouth) to Sandusky, the other north to Huron.

Prior to the opening of the New York and Erie canal there was but little market for the farm products of this part of Ohio. Wheat sold at twenty-five cents a bushel, with other cereals proportionately low - too low to pay for transportation. The principal commodities at that time for shipment were ginseng, beeswax, feathers and maple sugar. Merchants then bought their goods in the eastern cities, usually in Baltimore, and the same were hauled through to Ohio in wagons. The wagons then used were generally of the style called ''Pennsylvania wagons'' or freighters. These wagons had long, deep beds, set on wooden bolsters without springs. Wooden bows surmounted the beds, and these were covered with canvas. The bed of the Pennsylvania wagon was a frame work mortized together, the slats both horizontal and perpendicular, conformed in curve to their respective body pieces and made the top of the bed longer than the bottom and curved upward. The poles of these wagons were known as "¢stiff-tongue'' and were not supported by neck yokes, as the Ashland county wagons are today. The poles were used to guide the wagon and to hold the same back when going down hill, for which purposes breast-chains were attached from the hames to the end of the pole. Teams of from four to six horses were attached to these wagons and the driver used but a single line in driving them. The line was attached to the bridle rein of the near lead horse, and might be called the signal rein, for whenever the driver wanted the team to turn to the left, he called ont ''haw,'' and gist on the line, and if he wanted the team to turn to the right, he called out ''gee,'' and gave the line two or three jerks. A trained leader obeyed these signals. There was a saddle on the near wheelhorse and the driver could ride or walk at will. The route of these freighters was along the National road, after it was completed, and it took weeks to make the trip from the seaboard to Ohio. The first transportation line established through Mansfield was by Barney & Marsh, and its purpose was to carry freight between Mt. Vernon and intermediate points to the lake. After a lake market had been made by the opening of the Erie canal many farmers hauled their own products to the lake, and after harvest as high as two hundred teams have been known to pass through Mansfield in one day, hauling grain from the central part of the state to Huron and Sandusky.

The old Portage road deserves special mention. It was cut through the wilderness in 1812, by General Harrison's army. This road enters Worthington township in the south part of Richland county, and runs diagonally through the same from the southwest to the northeast and crosses Gold Run valley in the vicinity of the Butler oil region, thence through to Bunker Hill, the Davis settlement and Ashland county, to its terminal at Old Portage on the Western Reserve. It was called the ''Portage'' road from the fact that it terminated at Portage, on the divide between the Tuscarawas and Cuyahoga rivers. Old Portage, on the Cuyahoga side of the divide, was an old trading post for both whites and Indians, and in the war of 1812, it was a rendezvous for troops. New Portage, on the Tuscarawas side of the divide, was in the vicinity of the present town of Barberton.

The old Portage path, between the Tuscarawas and Cuyahoga rivers, in Summit county, was one of the most important trails for its length (eight miles) in the state. This path was defined as a portion of the western boundary of the United States in the treaties of Fort McIntosh, in 1785, and Fort Harmar, in 1789, and thus this Portage path became a noted land mark, and when General Harrison opened a military road across Ohio from the southwest to the northeast it took its name Portage road from the Portage path.

Since the opening of the Portage road no other period of equal length in the world's history is fraught with so many marvelous, industrial and scientifie achievements as are crowded into the years since this part of Ohio was settled. Railroads have been made since then to span the continent; wires have been strung to carry tidings of the world's affairs around the earth and under the waters of the sea; the human voice to steal swiftly over the mountains and across the plains to convey to distant ears messages of comfort and of love. and the dark places of the earth have been made luminious by electric lights and trolley cars are being propelled by electricity along our roads and through our streets.

Tn referring to the early transportation facilities, it should here be stated that flatboats were built at different times at Perrysville and Loudonville and sent down the Mohican to the Ohio river and thence to New Orleans. where the cargoes found a money market. The volume of water in the streams of the county at that time was larger than it is now. There were no dams in the

Mohican nor its tributaries at that time. One or more flatboats were built at Newville, loaded and sent down to the Cresent city. One boat built at Loudonville carried a cargo of fifty tons. How to get grain and other products to market was a perplexing question with the pioneers. To relieve the situation, the National road was built and canals were made. As early as 1816, the Hon. Jeremiah Morrow was placed at the head of a committee of the United States senate, to whom was referred so much of the president's message as related to roads and canals, and on the 6th of February of that year, he presented a report recommending a general system of internal improvements. When Mr. Morrow's term in the senate expired, in 1819, he declined a reelection and returned to private life. But public sentiment was against his retirement and he was appointed a canal commissioner in 1820 and again in 1822. Having, however, been elected governor in this latter year, he declined to act. as commissioner. But during the four years he occupied the gubernatorial chair, he was industriously encouraging the construction of roads and promoting the great enterprise of connecting the Ohio river with Lake Erie by means of a canal - the success of which had a remarkable influence over the future character of the population of Ohio, and of advancing the grade of the state in the Union.

The two laws of 1821 and 1825 for the construction of the Ohio and Erie canal were secured by a coalition of the ''school party'' and the ''eanal party'' as certain factions in the Ohio legislature were then called, and neither of which could secure an enactment without the aid of the other. The school party wanted a free school system and the eanal party wanted canals constructed as waterways for commerce. The two parties worked together and won both schools and eanals.

On the 4th of July. 1825, ground was broken for the Ohio and Erie canal by DeWitt Clinton, then governor of New York, and Governor Morrow of Ohio. But it required years of work hefore the eanal was ready for business. The first. passenger packet to reach Massillon was on August 21, 1828, and it was ealled the ''Monticello.'' The completion of the eanal was hailed with great joy by the people, especially by the farming community, for with its opening the price of wheat advanced from twenty-five cents to seventy-five cents a bushel. | The canal extends from Cleveland on the lake to Portsmouth on the Ohio river, a distanve-of three hundred and six miles.

In 1842 the Walhonding canal was projected, which was to extend from Coshoeton up the Mohican to Ganges, Richland county, but at that time the building of railroads began and the eanal was never finished farther than to Rochester, a distance of twenty-five miles. The legislature had previously passed a law declaring the Blackfork of the Mohican a navigable stream up as far as Ganges.

This reference to the Ohio and Erie canal is given to show the great value of the canal, as it opened nearer and competitive markets for farm products. IIlad the eanal been completed to Ganges and the old conditions continued Yanees would have been the metropolis of the part of Ohio lying between the ccHivide"' and Lake Erie. Doubtless large warehouses would have been erected at Ganges and the water power of the Blaekfork been utilized to operate mills and factories, and by the schemes for new counties prevalent at that time, Richland would probably have been divided from east to west instead of from north to south, and Ganges would probably have been the county seat of a new county to the north, but things went the other way, and Ganges barely holds its place on the map today. And pleasure seekers and other transient persons hurrying through the old village today neither know nor care about the history of the little place that was named after the famons river of the Hindus,

The people of today doubtless know very little of the blockhouses of the pioneer period. They were usually constructed of hewn logs, closely fitted together, were two stories high, the length and width of the building being about twenty feet. The logs resting on each other, prevented balls from the enemies guns from entering cracks or crevices, which would otherwise have been between the logs. The doors were made of thick planks or puncheons, hung on strong hinges and bolted on the inside. A door was sufficiently thick to prevent ordinary musket balls from passing through it. The first story of these blockhouses was generally about eight or nine feet high. Sometimes the floor consisted of well packed earth. The second story projected over the lower story about three feet on the sides and end. This over-jet rested upon logs or joists, which were allowed to project over the lower story. The second story was about seven or eight feet high, and was perforated by numerous port-holes, pointing in every direction, so as to guard against the approach of an enemy. The floor of this story was thick and strong, and had port-holes pointing downward, so that if an enemy came under the projection, to set fire to the building, he could be shot from above. There were also port-holes in the lower story, from which the savages could be seen and cut off before they reached the building. The roof was of clapboards, supported by logs. These bloeckhouses were generally erected in an open space upon some slight elevation of ground, so as to prevent the approach of the savages without being seen by the inmates. Another point to be considered in the location of a blockhouse, was to be near a.spring of water. The blockhouse at Jeromeville had a well of water within it. In such a blockhouse, twenty or thirty families could be accommodated, by spreading their beds upon the floors. During the day the inmates could pass in and out most of the time and attend to their duties without being molested by the Indians; their raids being only semi-oceasionally and very unexpectedly. Dr. Hill says in his history that there were only two blockhouses in the county which were surrounded by stockades.

Life in blockhouses was extremely irksome and monotonous, and the inmates were always pleased when assured they could return to their deserted cabins with safety.

Seek Refuge In The Blockhouses

The pioneers along the different branches of the Mohican creek were almost panic-stricken upon hearing of the murders of Martin Ruffner and the Zeimer family by the Indians, and immediately sought refuge in the blockhouses.

Pack-horses, wagons and carts were in demand - in fact, every means of conveyance was put into speedy requisition; and such articles of bedding and wearing apparel as could not be dispensed with, were put in packs and conveyed along with the fugitives. As near as can be remembered, the following families fled to Clinton: Ebenezer Rice and family, Joseph Jones and family, Calvin Hill and family, Moses Adzit and family, Abraham Baughman and family, Allen Oliver and family, and J. L. Hill and family. There were in all about thirty persors, and they made their way, as rapidly as possible, along the paths leading through the forests to the village of Clinton, near the present site of Mt. Vernon, then a sort of depot for supplies for the army.

The upper settlement on the Blackfork hastened to the blockhouse on the Clearfork, owned by Samuel Lewis. At that time, some twenty or thirty soldiers, under Lieutenant Barkdall, were there as a guard. Those seeking refuge there were Peter Kinney and family, James Cunningham and family, Andrew Craig and family, David Davis and family, John Davis, William Slater and family, John Wilson and family, Peter Zimmerman and family, Harvey ITill and family, Henry McCart and family, and Henry Nail and family. Most of these families made a temporary stay at the blockhouse, returning to their cabins frequently, during the fall months, to keep watch over such household goods as were left in them, and to take care of their abandoned stock.

The next day after the flight to the Lewis blockhouse, Harvey Till and John Coulter, who aided the fugitives in driving along most of their cattle, returned ; and by the aid of the Tannahills and others, whose names are not now remembered, the roof of the cabin of Thomas Coulter was thrown off, and a second story put on, and the cabin thereby became ''Coulter's blockhouse.'' The Coulter cabin was perhaps sixteen or eighteen feet, built for their first dwelling in the fall of 1810, the overjutting part being put on as referred to above. - It stood at the base of a bold bluff, on the bank of the Blackfork, near where the mill-dam now is, about half a mile southeast of the village of Perryville, and furnished a safe retreat for the neighbors of Mr. Coulter, when endangered by the savages. As soon as this blockhouse was completed, the following persons occupied it: Thomas Coulter and family, Allen Oliver and family, Melzer Tannahill and family, Jeremiah Conine and family, and George Crawford and family. When the foregoing families had gathered in, Thomas Coulter and Biarvey Hill volunteered to go to Wooster, through the forest, to secure soldiers to defend the settlement against Indian incursions. They succeeded in obtaining a guard of eleven soldiers, nnder the command of Lieutenant Winterringer, of the Tuscarawas militia, of the army of General Beall, then collecting at Wooster, for an expedition to Upper Sandusky. The guard accompanied them home, and in the daytime skirmished about the hills, and up and down the valleys for Indian signs, and then stood guard at night to prevent an attack by the Indians.

While a resident of the blockhouse, the wife of Jeremiah Conine died and was buried in the cemetery at Perryville. She was the second person interred in that ground, the first being Mr. Samuel Hill who died the preceding June.

The settlers along the Jeromefork and its branches were also greatly excited and alarmed over the murder of Ruffner and the Zeimers. Thomas Eagle hastened to Wooster for assistance. The blockhouse at Wooster, then a mere village, was under the command of Captain Stidger, whose company constituted a part of the army of General Beall. The company of Captain Nicholas Murray, composed of about sixty soldiers, immediately hastened to the relief of the Jerome settlement.

A blockhouse was erected by his men, a short distance northeast of the present site of the mill, on a gentle rise of ground, where the settlers commenced at once to concentrate. Mr. Eagle also conducted a guard of eight or ten men to protect a small blockhouse or cabin at the Finley and Collyer settlement, about five miles down the Jeromefork, near where Tylertown now. stands.

In the meantime, Robert Newell and family, George Eckley and family, Jonathan Palmer and family, James Wallace and family, Christopher Trickle and family, James Bryan and family, Ezra Warner and family, and David Noggle and others, not now remembered, gathered at the new blockhouse. The families of Benjamin Cuppy and Jacob Fry did not remain at the fort, but passed on east. It was noticed, when all had gathered in, that Daniel Carter and family were missing. Much uneasiness was evinced concerning the safety of Mr. Carter and family. He resided up the stream, about nine miles from the blockhouse, and one mile northeast of the present site of Ashland. Absolom Newell, the eldest son of Robert Newell, volunteered to go and inform Mr. Carter and family of the danger that threatened them. Being an active young man, he soon reached the cabin of his father, some five miles up the Jeromefork which he found almost consumed by fire. Supposing Indians had set it on fire and were concealed in the vicinity, he hastened back and related the circumstance to the company at the blockhouse. David Noggle, a warm friend of Mr. Carter, at once offered to undertake the hazardous task of reaching him on horseback. Thirty soldiers were detailed for the expedition. Mr. Noggle and the soldiers followed a trail cut through the forest by Mr. Carter when he removed his family to his new cabin, which passed south of Newell's, thence over lands more recently owned by Mr. Smucker, Samuel Swinford, and the late farm of Daniel Carter, Jr., and so on to his cabin. Mr. Noggle reached the cabin sometime before the soldiers and found Mr. Carter at work with his team, alli safe. From circumstances afterwards developed, it appears that a body of Indians had that very morning passed through the cornfield near the cabin, but had offered no harm to Mr. Carter and his family.

Mr. Carter hastily placed such clothing and bedding on his wagon as he could conveniently remove, and taking his family, accompanied Mr. Noggle. They had gone but a-short distance when they met the guard. The soldiers continued in the direction of the deserted cabins of Cuppy and Fry, and on approaching the former, found it yet burning, and some of the soldiers discovered the rear guard of the Indians skulking in a cornfield. On looking towards the cabin of Mr. Fry, a half-mile west, they could see the smoke ascending from it. They then turned about, and retraced their steps to the blockhouse at Jerome's place, where Mr. Carter and family had arrived a short time before. Mr. Carter and family did not remain at the blockhouse; but passed on through Wooster to New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county, where he and his family remained until February, 1813.

The band of Indians that burned the cabins of Newell, Cuppy and Fry was undoubtedly the same that the day before made assault on the Copus cabin.

At this time there were six or eight families in the Vachel-Metealf settlement, some two and a half miles southeast of the fort on Jerome's place, among whom were those of William Bryan, James Conley, Elisha Chilcote, Benjamin Bunn, James Slater and James Bryan. These met and constructed a fort two stories high, the walls of the second story projecting beyond the first on all sides. The floor and sides of the second story were pierced with port-holes. The pioneers with ox teams, axes and strong arms soon erected the fort. The lower story had strong doors securely fastened, and were occupied by the women and children, while the men with their rifles occupied the second story in hours of danger and alarm. A patch of ground was cleared around the fort and enclosed by a palisade twelve feet high, with a strong gate, which enclosed about one fourth of an acre, and all the families of the neighborhood gathered into this fort, while their horses and cattle were placed within the palisade. The settlers remained in this fort during the winter of 1812-13, and a part of the summer of 1813, while cultivating, by occasional visits, small patches of corn and vegetables with pickets to prevent surprise by the Indians.

Hill's History of Ashland county says that the Priest fort was erected near the banks of the Mohican, not far from the point where the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad crosses that stream at Loudonville. The fort was surrounded by a picket of heavy split timber about twelve feet high and enclosed about one-fourth acre of ground. It had a strong gate hung on wooden hinges. In cases of necessity the horses and cattle were brought within the enclosure.

Adventures And Life In The Blockhouses

General Crook's command, which passed through the southern part of Ashland county and moved to the northwest in the fall of 1812, saw very hard service after leaving Upper Sandusky. The command was ordered to Fort Meigs, with an artillery train and stores, which were dragged through the rain and mud by the soldiers. The command endured great hardships and suffered severe exposures, part of the time wading through mud and water two or three feet deep and being compelled to cut brush and logs to lift them above the water when they encaraped at night. General Winchester had advanced with his army, about one thousand strong, to within eighteen miles of Malden, where he was surprised by General Proctor, with his British and Indians, and a battle ensuing on the twenty-second of January, 1813, Winchester was defeated with great slaughter. The loss of the Americans was about four hundred in wounded, killed and missing, being fully one-third of all the force engaged in the battle! General Winchester was taken prisoner in the commencement of the engagement; and many of his soldiers, after having surrendered, were butchered by the savages in the most wanton manner, without the interference of the British commander to prevent it. This misfortune disconcerted all the plans of General Harrison for the spring campaign; and compeiled him to fall back to Fort Meigs, until the troops ordered into the field by Governor Meigs, should arrive. While these bloody scenes were transpiring, the people of Richland, Wayne, Knox and what is now Ashland counties were again compelled to seek safety in the blockhouses, not knowing what moment the infuriated savages, led on by Tecumseh, might appear in their midst. Along the Blackfork and Clearfork the fugitives that found safety at Clinton, the fall before, had returned to their homes in the vicinity of Coulter's blockhouse and that of Samuel Lewis, on the Clearfork; though they had spent most of the winter at their own cabins. Their corn crops, though small, had been secured and safely stored; their cattle and swine were under their control. The mills in Knox county, and below Wooster, had been visited and a stock of corn meal laid in for the winter, so that they had an abundance of cornbread and meat; and by the aid of hominyblocks, there was no imminent danger of starvation, though the situation was rather exciting.

Along the Jeromefork, the majority of the fugitives remained in the blockhouses during the winter. In the fall of 1812, when Captain Nicholas Murray, with a company of sixty men, was ordered by General Beall to advance to Jerome's place, to build a blockhouse, just after he had crossed the Killbuck, he met the fugitive families of John Carr, Christopher Trickle, Matthew Wilhams, Robert Newell, Ezra Warner, Daniel Carter, Jacob Fry, and Benjamin Cuppy. Captain Murray offered all these families protection, and they all returned with him to Jerome's place, except Mr. Carter and family, who continued their flight to New Philadelphia, Tuscarawas county. These families remained in and around the blockhouse all winter. About the middle of February, 1813, Daniel Carter and family returned from New Philadelphia, and again occupied his old cabin, one mile northeast of the present site of Ashland, where he found everything as he had left it the fall before. His corn was yet standing in the field undisturbed, except what had been devoured by deer, wild turkeys and small animals.

''About the first of March, 1813, in the morning four strange Indians appeared at the'cabin of James Collyer, then residing about two miles above the junction of the Jerome and Muddy forks of Mohican, a short distance from Findley's bridge, and asked for something to eat. They appeared to be well armed, and his suspicions were excited. There had not been an Indian seen in that neighborhood for several months, the last of the Mohican John Indians having been sent away by order of General Beall, when he cut his trail the fall before. Putting on an air of confidence and calmness, he invited them into his cabin, entering which, they leaned their guns against the wall near the door, and were seated. Mr. Collyer told his wife, who was much alarmed, to set some cold victuals on the table for them to eat. She did so putting on a lot of meat, cornbread and such other articles as she had at hand. Mr. Collyer motioned for them to sit down and eat. They went to the table and were seated, and began to eat heartily of the food. While they were eating Collyer moved cautiously to the point where he kept his gun, which was always loaded, and securing it, placed himself, unobserved, between the Indians and the door, and carefully raising his gun so as to get a range on two of them, prepared to fire, seeing which, Mrs. Collyer shrieked out, and fainting, fell to the floor. This alarmed the Indians, and they sprang to their feet; but seeing the threatening attitude of Collyer, raised their hands and begged him to spare their lives, saying, 'me Goshen Injun, me no harm you.' Thereupon Collyer withheld his fire, still keeping his gun pointed at them - his intention having been after killing or wounding two of them at the table, to club it over the other two, and thus secure them all - he being a powerful man and having had a good deal of experience as a hunter, and in Indian warfare. They continued to protest their innocence of any intended harm to him or his family, when he told them he would spare them on condition of retiring from the cabin and leaving their guns within, when he would remove the flints and priming, and hand them the balance of the food on the table, out at the window, when they should immediately leave the neighborhood and never return again. They accepted these conditions, and retired at once from the cabin. After securing the door, Mr. Collyer placed his wife on a bed, and proceeded to remove the priming and flints from the guns of the Indians, and having done which, he passed them out at a small window; after doing so, he handed them the balance of the food, and they disappeared in the forest. After waiting until he was satisfied they were gone and were not intending to attack him, he took his wife and such valuables as he possessed and hastened to the 'Eagle' blockhouse, a strong cabin prepared by Thomas Eagle for himself and neighbors.''

The news of this exploit soon reached the blockhouse at Jerome's place, and word of it being sent to Daniel Carter, he again took leave of his cabin, never to return to it, for he was compelled to remain at the blockhouse until the spring of 1814. A few days after this, a number of Indians appeared in view of Eagle fort, and made some hostile demonstrations, but owing to the strength of Eagle's force, they retired in the direction of Jerome's place, killing a number of hogs on their way, and finally disappeared from the neighborhood without doing further mischief. This added to the excitement produced by Winchester's defeat, the particulars of which were now understood at the blockhouse.

On the approach of the season for planting corn, a few fields were put out by the pioneers of the blockhouse. John Carr had about twenty acres cleared ; Ezra Warner had about the same number of acres ready; and Jerome had some thirty acres, on the bottom beyond the blockhouse. Mr. Carter had four or five acres near the old Indian village, across the Jerome fork. These fields were plowed, and the planting was done, by the residents of the blockhouse, as a community. While part of them planted and cultivated the corn, during the summer, the others patroled the forests in the vicinity of the fort, to prevent surprise and capture by the Indians. When the corn had become sufficiently matured for use, the same vigilance prevailed in and about the neighborhood, to prevent surprise. When the crop was gathered it proved to be quite large.

The summer months in this way seemed to pass slowly. The inmates could rarely get news from the frontiers. The defense of Fort Meigs by General Harrison, and his victory of the 5th of May, 1818, sent joy to the blockhouse along both forks of the Mohican. Harrison and his army had endured, in the most heroic manner, the fierce assault and cannonading of the British army, and finally compelled them to march down the Maumee river. In August, the monotony of the blockhouse was again removed by the reception of the intelligence of the splendid defence of Fort Stevenson (Lower Sandusky) by the heroic Major Crogham and his men. The signal repulse of the British under Proctor, and their hasty retreat from the locality, gave renewed hope and confidence. On the tenth of September, Commodore Perry captured the whole British fleet on Lake Erie, and by that great achievement the territory of Michigan passed into the possession of the American forces.

In the month of June, Mrs. Anna Carter, the wife of Daniel Carter, and his son James, a lad of six years of age, died in the blockhouse at Jerome place, and were buried in the Carr cemetery near the fort. In September, Christopher Trickle also died in the blockhouse, and was buried in the same cemetery. These deaths were occasioned from malaria and want of proper medical attendance, there being no physician within the present limits of the county, at that time.

Upon the recurrence of autumn, the pioneers along the Black fork, the Cedar fork, the Lake fork and the Jerome fork, busied themselves in storing their meagre crops for winter. Stibbs' mill, and one or two other mills on the Vernon river, each running one set of buhrs, some of which were ''nigger head,'' were visited by pioneers with pack horses and small canoes, loaded with shelled corn, to be converted into meal. Their food consisted of cornbread, johnnycake, mush and milk, potatoes, vegetables, and principally wild meat, cattle and swine being very scarce. ''Store tea'' arid coffee, were exceedingly rare and very costly. 'Store goods'' were a thing of note; and the calicoes of that day were a luxury few could afford. Homespun and wove linseywoolsey, and fiax or linen garments were the best to be seen; and many a daring, whole-souled pioneer felt proud, clothed in such garments. Salt and flour were luxuries that few could use profusely. Salt was purchased at Zanesville and Pittsburg, and from its price had to be used-sparingly. Ammunition, such as lead and powder, was obtained from the supplies furnished the soldiers left to guard the blockhouses. So far, then, as food was concerned, the inmates of the blockhouses 'fared sumptuously'' - to use an expression of an old gentleman who was quartered in one about two years. Nothing happened in the fall of 1813 to materially disturb the quiet of the pioneers of this region.