Dayton City (part 2 of 50)

Banking Law - Dayton branch of the State Bank=The Dayton Bank - The Crowbar Law - The City Bank - The Farmers' Bank - The Miami Valley Bank - The Exchange Bank - 'The Dayton National Bank - National Banking Law - First National Bank - Second National Bank - Third National Bank - Merchants' National Bank - Fourth National Bank--Union Safe Deposit and Trust Company -

The Bench and Bar of Dayton - LEarly Legislation Mstablishing Courts - First Courts Held in Dayton - J urisdiction - Mnglish Common Law - Roman Civil Law - Early American and English Lawyers - Conimon Pleas Court - Jadges - Superior Court - Judges SEN SOMMED OL UNG MDE WUOIM ISAke Malco sts uemstious esis iocisenecacemecasin ciecsiteethiatestiorssensgyns vod sseetsce 4

Dr. W. Thomas - Dr. W. ti. Grundy, deceased - The Montgomery County Homeopathic Medical Socicty - The Mad River Dental Society - Early Dentistry and Dentists--Later Dentists - The Cholera in Dayton in 1819 ee eee tee eet etree o20

Chapter Xxiv

City Graveyard - Woodland Cemetery - St. Henry's Cemetery - Calvary Cemetery - lle bran, Wemeter yi. } ms 11 Semomacsea ea ca intent «den eacop aria dene Meee wiibe «cies ccs faaeiecbiaeteus eaecce sgeee., HOLD

Chapter Axyv

CHAPTER AXYV. Transportation Interests - The Miami and Erie Canal - The Railroads - The Street PRAT POAGS 3. o Peis he dete he enc eC tas Mle eit Cle Sues ata ala giaaltia Snes ote Nemes a Beeubalttata seis Matisc tlct 650

Chapter 2X Vi

Insurance - Karly History of Insurance - First Company Organized in Dayton - Montgomery County Mutual Fire Insurance Company- - Dayton Insurance Company - Large Number of Conipanies Organized - Central Insurance Company - Miami Valley Insurance Companyv - Farmers' and Merchants' Fire and Marine Insurance Compan y - Ohio Insurance Company - Other Companies - Geneval Reimarks............ 659

Chapter Xxvhi

CHAPTER XXVHI. Public Institutions - St. Elizabeth Hospital - Dayton Asylum for the Insane - Widows' FLOMIC - Omi CGS: LOM! wreommentcr st) duaniides bie souditenececlauticneuaiet «scooseee'er oe ecesejedaveassete: veaeee OOO

Chapter Xxviii

A he GIR LATA NTN OP A Rie NINN, eee): A a Tip oy Retin a - --cioloane iggy i. . ff} UCAS aiph daley: Tah WAR es See aun kis Lek ely 'eri AHR 4 RCW 4) SHAH Ray aa niga

Indian History - Mound Builders - Dayton EKarthworks - French and Knglish Claim the Chio Valley - Indian.- Titles Ixtinguished - Ohio One of the Greatest of the Indian Battlefields - Indian Trails - Dayton in the Indian Hunting Grownd - Wild Animals and Birds - The Twightwee or Miami Villages - Shawnee Towns- - Pickaway Piains - The Miamis Head of a Confederacy - Gist Visits the Miamis in 1751 - Visits the Shawnees - Obio Land Compsany - Ceicron de Bienville Claims the Ohio Valley for the French - Ascends the Big Miami - The French Destroy Pickawillany - French Build Posts at Erie and Venango - Fort Duquesne--English do not Assist the Indians - The Miamis Allies of the French in 1763 - Ths English Destroy the Miami Villages - Miamis Remove to Fort Wayne - France Cedes the! Northwest to England - Pontiac's War - Captain Bullitt Visits Chillicothe in 1773 - Lord Dunmore's War - Daniel Boone a Captive at Chillicothe - Colonel Bowman's Jixpedition from Wentucky Against Chillicothe - Byrd's Force of British and Indians Invade Kentucky - Rogers Clarke's Expedition to Ohio - Four Thousand Shawnees Rendered Homeless- - Broadhead Defeats the Delawares - Crawford's Expedition - -Clarke's Second Expedition - -Skirmish on Site of Dayton- - Logan's Campaign in 1786- - Second Skirmish on Site of Dayton - Gratitude Due to General Clarke - Symmes Visits Upper Miami Valley - Harmar's Defeat - Scott and Wilkinson's Raid - St. Clair's Defeat - General Wayne's Campaign - Treaty of Peaco---British Vacate Western Forts in 179¢ - Tecumseh - Friendly Indians at Pique in 1812 - Fidelity of Logan--Blaek Hoof - Tribes all Removed from Ohio ° before 1843, 7

'Hh vast and fertile region known as the Northwest Territory was 'b the home of a race of people of whom the origin and destiny is unknown, and the theories concerning whom, at the most, can only be called conjecture. The Indians who occupied that portion of the territory now known as Ohio, when it was first visited by the whites, manifested no curiosity concerning the history of this people, and had no traditions

Notre. - In the preparation of the part of the History or Dayron (from the beginning down to 1840, inclusive) assigned to me, indebtedness is acknowledged to the '* History of Dayton," by M. E. Curwen, and to that part of the ' History of Montyomery County" reiating to Dayton, written by Ashley Brown. Use has been made of manuscript letters and papers, particularly of the manuscript journal of Benjamin Van Cleve, kindly loaned to me by his great-grandson, R. Fay Dover. 'The volumes of Dayton newspapers from 1808 to 1841, in the Public Library, have been thoroughly searched, and a large part of the information embodied in the history obtained from them. The following authorities have been consulted: Bancroft's '' History of the United States," J. P. McLean's 'Mound Builders," "The American Pioneer Magazine," Howe's 'Ohio Historical Collections," Prof. Orton's '* Report on the Geology of Montgomery County," Black's 'Story of Ohio," and King's "* History of Ohio." in regard to them. They were called Mound Builders, because of the numerous mounds found in different parts of the country, but principally along the river valleys. Many of the mounds lave been excavated, but no articles have been found that indicate a ligh degree of civilization, and it may be that their builders were not very different from the Indians and had been driven from their homes by more powerful tribes who invaded the country. The earthworks built by them were of two kinds - mounds and enclosures. The mounds were located at points commanding a wide view of the surrounding country, and it is supposed were used for purposes of observation or burial. The enclosures, many of which were of great extent, may have been intended for defense, or for places of worship. There are more than ten thousand of these carthworks in Ohio, and, in addition to many smaller ones, three of considerable size in Montgomery County - an enclosure on a commanding bluff in Twin Creek valley, two miles south of Germantown; a large mound near Miamisburg, and an enclosure now included in Calvary Cemetery, just south of Dayton. J. P. McLean, in his work "The Mound Builders," thus describes the latter two: "The great mound at Miamisburg has been assigned to the class rile d mounds of observation. It is situated on a high hill just east of the Great Miami River, and has a commanding view of the broad valley of the river. It is sixty-eight feet in perpendieular height, and eight hundred and fifty-two in circumference at its base, and contains three hundred and eleven thousand three hundred ana fifty-three cubic feet." "South of Dayton on a hill one hundred and sixty feet high is a fort, enclosing twenty-four acres. The gateway on the south is covered in the interior by a ditch twenty feet wide and seven hundred feet long. On the northern lne of embankment is a small mound, from the top of which a full view of the country for a long distance up and down the river may be obtained."

When the first white men penetrated the forests that covered the Ohio valley, the country was Inhabited by various tribes of Indians. But while the Indians were the possessors of the land, the ownership of it was claimed by three great nations, France, England, and Spain. Spain. was content to have her claim settled on other battle-fields, but France and

The French asserted that the discovery of the Ohio in 1669 by their countryman, La Salle, gave the valley watered by the river and its tributaries to France; but the Kuglish resisted the pretensions of the French, and insisted that the discovery and oceypation of the Atlantic coast gave them possession of the continent, and that before the French began their explorations, the lands granted by Great Britain to colonists were described as stretching from sea to sea. The Hnglish, however, took the precaution of strengthening their title by Indian treaties and purchases of lands, for which they received legally executed deeds. By the treaty with the Iroquois or Six Nations in 1684, it was claimed that the country of the Indians beyond the mountains, of which the powerful Eastern Confederacy was regarded as the conqueror and ruler, became subject to the English. The protests of the western Indians, who declared that they were not subject to the Iroquois, were not heeded, but modern research scems to prove that the Six Nations ceded lands over which they had no authority.

Tn..0701, a, -treaty oF peace was signed between the French and Iroquois, which enabled France to keep the mastery of the Great Lakes, though England shared he trade with the western Indians. The Iroquois wished to be regarded as neutrals in the strife between the two European nations, and asserted their independence of both. In 1726 the English made a new Indian treaty, which they explained as confirming the grant of land made in 1684 and renewed, as they claimed, in 1701. ue 1744, at Lancaster, the English made another treaty with the Iroquois, purchasing from them for about four hundred pounds the Ohio basin, and also protection for their northern frontier. This treaty was confirmed at Logstown im 1752, but French and Indian hostilities prevented them from enforcing their title. The Revolutionary War intervened, and at its close, Great Britain, in 1783, by the treaty of Versailles, which secured the independence of the United States, relinquished her claim to the possession of the Ohio valley. In 1784 the title of Virginia to the territory northw est of the Ohio, which she claimed by purchase from the Indians, was ceded to the United States. By treaties between the United States and the Six Nations at Fort Stanwix 'in 1784, and the W yandots, Chippewas, Delawares, and Ottawas at Fort McIntosh in 1785, the Indian title to a great part of the Ohio valley was extinguished and the boundaries of their reservations fixed.

_ From an early period the country which now forms the State of Ohio was one of the greatest of the Indian battlefields. During many years annually up and down the Ohio and its larger tributaries silently glided the canoes of the terrible Northern Confederacy of the Six Nations, bringing captivity or death to numbers of the inhabitants and destruction to their property. Reaching a convenient landing, the invaders, par their fleet with a sufficient guard, made expeditions against villages in the interior.

trails Miami. The trail east of the Little Miami led from the Macachack and the Piqua towns, on Mad River, and Chillicothe, near Nenia, to the Ohio. The otber trail Jed from the portage, at Laramie (though also branching from there to the villages north and west), past the Piqua towns, on the Great Miami, through Greenville and Fort Jeflerson, east of Haton and west of Hamilton to the Ohio below the mouth of the Great Miami. From the trails, over which passed for generations the moccasined feet of countless bands of Indian braves, resplendent in war-paint and feathers, arrows and other relics of the red man used often to be picked up, and even now are sometimes found. The hunting grounds between the trails furnished war parties as well as villages with food, and when the braves were on the war-path, hunters were always sent into this preserve to collect game and fish. ,

Long before the Miami valley was visited by white men, the country between the Great and Little Miami rivers, and bounded on the south by 'the Ohio and on the north by Mad River, was used only as a hunting ground. No Indians have lived on this land since 1700. Probably for a century before Dayton was laid out, no wigwam was built on the site selected by the original proprietors. The town lay just within this immense game preserve, and was, previous to the invasion of the whites, the home of buffaloes, elks, deer, bears, wild cats, wolves, panthers, foxes, and all the animals and birds of the temperate zone, which Hterally swarmed in the forests.

Before the middle of the eighteenth century, villages were built on the outer river banks west of the Great Miami and east of the Little Miami, Care was taken to select sites above the danger of floods, though in positions where the villagers could easily land from their canoes, where the squaws could, without difficulty, have access to the water, and which were free from timber. Round the villages spread hundreds of acres of land, cultivated by the squaws. Trom these fertile bottom lands they annually gathered an abundant harvest of Indian corn, beans, pumpkins, and tobacco. Junters, trappers, and fishermen furnished them with plenty of animal food, and with skins to exchange for powder, lead, blankets, and other necessaries. |

The Indian towns, as we have said, lay outside of the hunting grounds. West of the Great Miami and near the present town of Piqua were situated, till 1763, the Miami or Twightwee villages. After the Miamis left Ohio, the Shawnees occupied their old home, calling their town Upper Piqua. About sixteen miles from where Siduey now stands was_ the Laramie settlement. At the head-waters of Mad River, Logan County, were the Macachack towns. Chillicothe, near Xenia, and Piqua, near Springfield, were important villages. <All but the Twightwee villages were the homes of Shawnees. Aiong the most important of their settlements were Old Chillicothe and Grenadier Squawtown, on the Pickaway Plains, three and a half miles south of Circleville. To this place a large number of the prisoners taken by the war parties were brought for safe-keeping, as its situation rendered escape difficult, and no enemy could, in the daytime, approach the villages unseen. From a high hill, called Black Mountain, the Indians commanded a wide and unintercepted view of the country for miles, as they yearly burned the forests and kept down the undergrowth. On the Pickaway Plains many a white captive "suffered to the death all the tortures that savage ingenuity could invent."

The Indians hving in the Miami valley, when the first white men visited it, were the Twightwee or Miami tribes. The word Miami is said to mean mother in the Ottawa language. 'The Miamis belonged to the Algonquin family. , They came here from Michigan. '"'My forefather, _said the Miami orator, Little Turtle, at Greenville, 'kindled the first fire at Detroit; from thence he extended his lines to the head waters of Scioto; from thence to its mouth; from thence down the Ohio to the mouth of the Wabash; and from thence to Chicago and Lake Michigan. These are the boundaries within which the prints of my ancestor's houses are everywhere to 'be seen;' and the early French narratives confirm his words." 'The Miamis were a people noted for intelligence and force of character, and were at the head of a powerful confederacy, which consisted - of the Miamis, Wyandots, Pottawatomies, Ottawas, and Shawnees. The Weas, Kel River Indians, Kickapoos, Munsees, and other Wabash tribes, and also the Delawares and Chippewas, often united with the Miamis against the Troquois. Still other tribes joined them when the wars against the whites began, as, for instance, the Seven Nations of Canada, the Indians of the Upper Lake tribes, and the Ilinois Indians. The Western Indian' were long the allies of the French, whose assistance they needed against the Iroquois. |

The principal Miami or Twightwee village was situated on the Great Miami, near Piqua, as already stated. Gist gave the following account of it, when he visited it in 1751: 'This town is situated on the Big Miami, about one hundred and fifty miles from the mouth thereof. It consists of about four hundred families, and is daily increasing. It is accounted one of the strongest Indian towns upon this part of the continent. The Twightwees are a very numerous people, consisting of many different tribes under the same form of government. Each tribe has a particular chief, one of which is chosen indifferently out of any tribe to rule the whole nation, and is invested with greater anthority than any of the others. They are accounted the most powerful nation west of the English settlement, and much superior to the Six Nations, with whom they are now in amity."

Next in importance to the Miamis, and after their removal to Indiana, the only tribe in this valley were the Shawnees. "They were called 'the Spartans of the West, and though not the equals of the Miamis, they were a brave, though exceedingly cruel race, and were remarkably successful hunters. They emigrated to this region about 1740, having originally lived in Florida and Alabama, from wheuce they were driven by their enemies. 'The Shawnee chief, Black Hoof, who lived to be one hundred and five years old, remembered bathing in the sea on the Florida coast when a boy. |

Shawnee or Shawnoese means "people from the South." Soon after they came north, lands in the Miami Confederacy were granted them. They built their first towns near the mouth of the Scioto. When the emigrant boats began to appear on the Ohio, they moved further up the Scioto; afterward they built towns in Greene, Clarke, Logan, Shelby, and Miami counties, from whence they were driven by the Kentuckians to Mercer and Logan counties. At their town of Piqua, five miles from Springfield, was born the great chief, Tecumseh, whose first experience of war is said to have been gained on the site of Dayton. Gist visited the Shawnee town at the mouth of the Scioto in 1751, and described it as containing about three hundred men and forty houses built on both sides of the Ohio. In the town was a kind of state house, ninety feet long, and with a'tight cover of bark, in which they held their conneils. He describes them as now reconciled with the Six Nations, with whom they were formerly at variance. They were also at this time great friends of the English, to whom they were grateful for protection against the vengeance of the Iroquois. !

In 1748 a treaty with the Six Nations and the Miamis was made by the English at Albany. The next year the Iroquois, hearing that the French were making preparations against their Ohio allies, appealed to New York and Pennsylvania for assistance, but the assembhes refused to do anything to confirm their Indian alliances. The Virginians were wiser, and endeavored to sceure the fidelity of the Miamis. In 1749 a party of Virginians formed the Ohio Land Company for purposes of trade and with the intention of sending a colony beyond the Alleghenies. They received a grant of five hundred thousand aeres of land, to be located either on the northern bank of the Ohio or between the Monongalela and the Kanawha. The French, hearing of the preparations which the

Indian History

Kneglish were making to take possession of the Ohio country, resolved to anticipate England, and at once, in 1749, they sent out Celoron de Bienville with three hundred soldiers to trace the boundaries of the Ohio valley and oceupy it. He was furnished with lead plates, on which was engraved the inserption, that "fromthe farthest ridge whence water trickled towards the Ohio the country belonged to France." These plates he was directed to bury in the Indian mounds and along the banks of the Ohio and its tributaries. In token of possession, the Lihes of France

He forbade the tribes to trade with the English, and told the Indians at Logstown, seventeen miles below Pittsburgh: "Fam going down the river to scourge home my children, the Miamis and the Wyandots." Accordingly, he ascended the Great Miami 'in boats to the Twightwee villages, though the ascent in August must have been made with difficulty, unless the season was unusually rainy. But the Indians, unmoved by his threats, replied that the Jands were theirs, and that they had a right to freedom of trade. They understood well the ceremony of burying the lead plates, and murmured: "We know it is done to steal our country from us." Instead of being cowed into submission, they appealed to the Six Nations and the English for protection. Yet the Ohio Indians were jealous of the English also, and threatened the agent of the Ohio Company when he reached Logstown. " You are come," they cried, "to settle the Indians'

In 1750 the' Ohio Land Company built their trading post at Wills' Creek, now Cumberland, Maryland. They did not themselves venture into the Indian country, but their goods were purchased by strolling traders, who had no settled homes, but wandered among the tribes who lived as far west as the Miamis. In February, 1751, however, as already mentioned, Christopher Gist, the agent of the company, who was sent out to examine western lands, visited the Miami Confederacy. With the assistance of presents and the persuasions of Croghan and Montour, who accompanied hima and had great influence with the tribes, he induced the representatives of the confederacy, assembled in council at the Twightwee village, to make a treaty with the English. The Ottawa agents of the Canadians, who had also brought presents, in vain endeavored to induce the Indians to renew their alliance with the French. Their tears, and howls, and prophecies of woe to the Miamis were without effect, and they departed in a rage. After they were gone, the French colors were taken down, and the council house became a scene of wild revelry. The Indians danced the feather dance, pausing at intervals at the signal of a war chief to hear the recital of his brave exploits. Having exhausted his eloquence, he threw presents lavishly to the musicians and dancers, when the turmoil began again. On the first of March, Gist departed. Later in the same year Croghan again visited the Ohio Indians, and obtained from them permission to build a trading post. The Indians also urged the English to build a fort at the forks of the Monongahela, now Pittsburg.

In May, 1762, the English and Ohio Indians met at Logstown, and 'atified the treaty made at Lancaster in 1744. The chiefs of the Six Nations declined to appear at this council, as it "did not suit their customs to treat of affairs in the woods and weeds." The Miamis had promised Gist that they would never give heed to the words of the French, and that their friendship with the English should "stand like the loftiest mountains,' and for some time they kept their promise. The Knglish about the time of Gist's visit; had built a fortified trading house, ealled Pickawillany, sixteen miles northwest of the present sen of Sidney. Early in the year 1752, the' 'French hea wring of this post, sent an armed body of men against the Miamis. The Indians were informed given up to their meu. The Miamis refused to obey, and the French, with the assistance of some Ottawas and Chippewas, attacked and destroyed the place after a severe battle. A number of Indians were wounded and fourteen were killed. The king of the Piankeshaws, who was chief of the whole Miami Confederacy, was taken captive, and sacrificed and eaten by the Indian allies of the French.

William Trent, the messenger of Virginia, went from Logstown to Pickawillany shortly after this battle, and found it deserted. THe took down the French flag, which was floating over the ruins, and substituted the Hnglish colors. He theu returned to Logstown to meet the representatives of the stricken confederacy, who had assembled there for "condolence and concert in revenge." They sent messengers to the - English and the Six Nations, soliciting protection and vengeance against the French. Pennsylvania presented the Miamis two hundred pounds for their courageous defense of her traders. After the destruction of Pickawilany, no English settlement was made in Ohio till it passed into the possession of the United States. 7

In 1753 a French army of twelve hundred men marched from Canada to take possession of Ohio. The Six Nations warned the English and the western Toainne of the projected invasion. The tribes on the Ohio sent envoys in April to meet the French at Niagara and endeavor to persuade them to turn back, but were received with contempt and derision. In September representatives of the Mingos, Shawnees, W yandots, Delawares, and Miamis met Franklin and his colleagues at Carlisle. The Indians promised, with the assistance of the Enghsh, to repel the French, who had established posts at Erie, Waterford, and Venango. In 1754 the fort, which the Hnglish had begun at the forks of the Monongahela, was taken by the French and renamed Duquesne, but was retaken by Washington in 1758 and called Pitt. Some of the western Indians became allies of the French, and were so tenderly attached to them that, as Colonel Johnston relates, fifty years later they. would burst into tears when speaking of the time when their French fathers had dominion over them. One of the cliefs, a report of whose speech is given in the "American Pioneer," said to the Hnghsh when they made the treaty of peace with the Indians at Easton in 1758: 'Brethren, the cause why the Indians at Ohio left you was owing to yourselves. When we heard of the French coming there, we desired the governors of Virginia and Pennsylvania to supply us with implements and necessaries for war, and we would defend our Jands; but these governors disregarded our message; the French came to us, traded with our people, used them kindly, and gained their affections. The governor of Virginia settled on our lands for his own benefit, but when we wanted his assistance, forsook us. ... You deal hardly with us; you claim all the wild creatures, and will not Jet us come on your lands so much as to hunt after them; you will not let us peel asingle tree. Surely this is hard. You take of us what lands you please, and the cattle you raise on them are your own; but those that are wild are still ours, and should be cominon to beth; for our nephews, when they sold the land, did not propose to deprive themselves of hunting the wild deer, or using a stick of wood." ,

About 1763 a battle was fought at the Twightwee villages, on the Great Miami, between French and English traders, assisted by Indians. The English had for alhes the Delawares, Shawnees, Munsees, part of the Senecas from Pennsylvania, the Cherokees, and Catawbas, while the Miamis were on the side of the French. The fort was besieged by the English and their Indian allies for more than a week, but could not be taken. The assailants met with severe losses. A number of the besieged were killed, and all their unprotected property was destroyed. It was said that after the battle baskets full of bullets could have been gathered from the ground. Shortly after this the Miamis removed to Miami of the Lakes, near Hort Wayne. ; to the British; but the Indians denied the right of France to transfer their lands to Great Britain, and they resolved "since the French must go, no other nation should take their place." If the Englhsh had Kept their promises to the tribes instead of, for nearly a century, habitually breaking them, and had conciliated instead of aggravating them, they might have been spared Pontiac's cruel war, which began in May, 1763. In this conspiracy were engaged all the western tribes to the banks of the Mississippi. Nine British posts fell, and the savages drank from their clasped hands the blood of many Englishmen; but in August, 1763, the Indians were routed, and made peace with the English.

One day in the year 1773, the Shawnees at Chillicothe, near Xenia, saw, with wonder and amazement, a solitary white man, carrying a flag of truce, boldly entering their village. This was the intrepid Captain Bullitt, one of a party of surveyors from Virginia, who were. on their way down the Ohio. He had come alone to Chillicothe from the river to ask the friendship of the Indians and their consent to make a settlement in Kentucky. Won by his courage and his wit, the Shawnees granted his request, and he set off on his dangerous return journey through the wilderness to rejoin his companions at Maysville. This amicable powwow was the prelude to years of war.

In the eighteenth century this valley, now so peaceful and prosperous, and teeming with people noted for intelligence, refinement, and benevolence, was the gloomy abode of cruelty and death. The wild animals which roamed through the woods were scarcely more brutal and fierce than the inhabitants of the infrequent villages scattered along the borders of the Miami hunting grounds, for this was the terrible "Indian country," which the imagination of trembling women in far-distant block houses invested with all the horrors of a veritable hell on earth.

The pioneers of Kentucky looked with jealous and longing eyes on the great Indian game preserve across the Ohio. The wily and suspicious savages used their best endeavors to exclude them; but though they ventured over here at the risk of being burned, they frequently came. Lord Dunmore's war against the towns on the Scioto ended in 1774 with a treaty of peace, concluded near the Pickaway Plains, in which the Indians agreed to make the Ohio their boundary, and the people of Virginia, of which Kentucky was a part, promised not to pass beyond that river; but, as usual, neither party kept their word.

J*rom the time of the first settlement of Kentucky small parties of Shawnees and their warm friends, the W yandots, were constantly slipping across the Olio to surprise the Kentucky settlements, and then hastening back through the Miami valley with booty and prisoners to their secluded villages. The pioneers never knew when these terrible foes would appear. They slept with loaded guns at their bedsides, and when they went into the fields to plant their corn, part of the men stood on guard, while the rest hurriedly performed the labor. ess sad was the fate of settlers whose scalps were carried home as trophies, than that of the captives who were dragged through the Miami woods to Chillicothe, there to endure all the indignitics and excruciating agonies which the malice of pitiless savages could inflict.

Once the Indians, during the Revolution, brought Daniel Boone back with them, and kept him as an honored guest, rather than as a captive, at Chillicothe, near Xenia. They took a great fancy to him, "fondly earessed him," and adopted him into a family. In vain Governor Hamilton, of Detroit, who had also taken a great fancy to the fascinating Itentuckian, offered the Indians a considerable sum of money if they would release him. They refused to part with him. But discovering, after he had been at Chillicothe for several months, that a party of one hundred and fifty warriors were about starting for Boonesborough, Boone managed to make his escape from the town, and, by hard traveling, arrived at home in time "to foil the plans of the enemy, and not only saved the borough which he had ge a but poe all the frontier parts of Kentucky from devastation.'

For a time there was no concerted action in Kentucky against the Indians, who, as emigration increased, stirred up by the English, by whom they were told that the frontiersmen were trespassing on Indian lands, became more and more jealous, restless, and revengeful. Retaliation was left to single families or individuals who had suffered from Indian raids, and the pioneers fought, each man for himself, without consultation or combination. Often a solitary frontiersman, burning to revenge the loss of property or friends, and carrying only his gun anda bag of parched corn, fearlessly, though cautiously, made his way into the Indian country, and slyly creeping near a village, killed at least one of his detested foes, stole off with one or more ponies, and got safely home to Kentucky.

In the summer of 1779, the first military expedition from Kentucky against the Ohio Indians crossed the river. Colonel Bowman marched with one hundred and sixty volunteers to Chillicothe, on the Little Miami, and burned the town, but was then forced to retreat. The Indians retallated in October by attacking one hundred men under command of Colonel Rogers and Captain Benham, who were passing up the river in two boats. Nearly all the men, after a brave fight, were tomahawked and sealped.

organized at Detroit, and, under the command of Colonel Byrd, invaded Kentucky and sacked Ruddell's and Martin's stations. Byrd could not contro! the savages, who were guilty of their usual atrocities. . After taking the stations, Byrd retreated to the forks of the Licking, over the road which he had cut from the Ohio through the woods on his advance. When he reached his camp, the Indians immediately made off for Chillicothe and' Piqua. -He had come down the Great Miami to the Ohio in bateaux, bringing, it 1s said, six pieces of artillery with him. But 'the Miami was now so low, that he was obliged to return by land, leaving his cannon in the woods to be, perhaps, brought on later by Indians.

in the summer of 1780, soom aiter, Byrd's invasion of Kentucky, General George Rogers Clarke led an expedition of experienced Indian fighters to Ohio. Among the officers who held command under Clarke was Captain Robert Patterson, one of the founders of Lexington and Cincinnati, and from 1804 till 1827 a citizen of Dayton. When Clarke reached Chillicothe, near Nenia, he found it deserted and in flames, kindled by the Indians. After destroying several hundred acres of corn, he proceeded to the Piqua towns, near Springfield and about twelve miles from Chillicothe. The Shawnees were defeated. Clarke burned the houses, cut down the growing corn and vegetables, and then returned to Chillicothe and destroyed a field which he had saved to feed his horses, after which the expedition set out for home. By this victory of Clarke the homes, crops, and other property of about four thousand Shawnees were destroyed, and for some time they were wholly engaged in rebuilding their wigwans, and in hunting and fishing to obtain food for their families.

In March, 1781, Colonel Broadhead made a successful expedition from Wheeling against the Delawares on the Upper Muskingum. In July of the same year the Indians attacked a party of one hundred and six American soldiers, who were descending the river, killed forty-one, and captured the rest. Enraged by constant attacks from the savages, the settlers were not careful to distinguish friends from foes, and in March, 1782, occurred the disgraceful massacre of friendly and non-resistant Moravian Indians, in the Tuscarawas valley, by a force of one hundred Virginians and Pennsylvanians. In June, 1782, Colonel Crawford made a second expedition against the Moravians and the Wyandots, in what is now Wyandot County. It was utterly routed, and the commander was horribly tortured and burned at the stake. In July of this year the British at Detroit sent a force of six hundred men against Bryant's Station, near Lexington. A number of Shawnees, Wyandots, Miamis, and Delawares assembled at Chillicothe, near Nenia, and joined the expedition. The Indians, after heavy losses, retreated from Bryant's Station; but a party of one Aniidieed ae aay Kentuckians, who pursued them, were diairn into an ambush near the Blue Licks and sixty of them killed and seven captured.

Finding that the Indians were recovering from their defeat in 1780, Clarke, in the fall of 1782, led a second expedition of one thousand Kentuckians to Ohio. They met with no resistance till they reached the mouth of Mad River, on the ninth of November, where they found a small party of Indians stationed to prevent their crossing the stream. A skirmish on the site of Dayton followed, in which the Jxentuckians were victorious. They spent the night here, and then proceeded to Upper Piqua, on the Great Miami, which the Shawnees had built after the destruction of their villages in 1780. On the road to Piqua they rescued _ a captive Kentucky woman, a Mrs. McFall, from a party of Indians. She accompanied thei when they returned home.

Having destroyed Upper Piqua, Clarke went on to the trading station which had been built about 1775 by a Frenchman named Laramie, on the site of Pickawillany. They plundered and burnt the store, and destroyed the Indians' wigwams and crops. Soon after this Laramie, who was a favorite with the Indians, emigrated with a large number of Shawnees to the Spanish territory, and there the remainder of their race gradually gathered. Some of the Shawnees, after the destruction of Upper Piqua, built towns-at St. Mary's and Wapakoneta, and here they were living when Dayton was settled. The Delawares were in the same neighborhood.«

For some time after the peace with Great Britain in 1783, the Indians, who had met with many reverses and losses during the Revolution, did not trouble the settlements as much as formerly, but about 1785 they recommenced hostilities. It became necessary in. 1786 to send a force against the Wabash and Mad River villages. The 'atter expedition was under command of Colonel Logan. It was divided into brigades, commanded by Colonel Robert Patterson and Colonel Thomas Kennedy, who took different directions. They harried and ruined the Indian country, destroying houses, crops, and vegetables, taking a large number of horses, and leaving the Indians in a state of destitution and starvation, from which it took them nearly a year to recover.

Eight large towns, called Macachack, situated in what 1s now Logan County, were destroyed, seventy or cighty prisoners taken, and twenty warriors, one of them a chief, killed. Among the captives was an Indian Jad whom the delete! of the foree carried with him to his Kentucky home, where he lived for some time. Colonel Logan became much attached to the boy, who took his name, and was for life the staunch friend of the whites. After a few years he was allowed to return mortally wounded during the War of 1812, while, by command of General Ifarrison, engaged in service against some Indian allies of the British. The more famous orator, Logan, was also named for a white man, James Logan, secretary of the colony of Pennsylvania.

The Kentuckians returned to the Ohio by way of the Mad River valley, and, as in 1782, at the mouth of the river found a party of Indians on guard. With them was Tecumseh, at this time about fourteen years old. Having, after some sheht resistance, beaten the Indians, and driven them up Mad River, and gained the second battle or skirmish fought on the site of Dayton, they camped for the night. . Being well supplied with provisions from the captured towns, they remained here for two or three days examining Jand, with a view to recommending a settlement in this neighborhood. The Indians, driven across the Scioto by Logan, did not immediately return to the Miami valley, and when the Kentuckians departed they left an uninhabited country behind them.

These successful raids were a necessary preparation for the settlement of this region, for till the powerful Shawnees were driven out; no white town could be built in the Miami valley. The Indians were the allies of the British, so that Clarke's expeditions to Ohio were really as much a part of the Revolutionary War as his Indiana and Illinois campaigns. To this brave patriot and military genius we are indebted, not only for victories over the savages, but for the possession of the Northwest, which, but for his foresight and efforts, might have remained a part of the British dominions.

of guarding emigrants down the Ohio, and also to y revent squatters from encroaching on Jndian lands, for the United States Government was anxious to prevent all pretext for Indian hostilities. The first regiment sent west was raised principally for the purpose of driving the whites off of the reservation. The fort at North Bend was named for Captain Finney, of the First Infantry, which, with the exception of two companies, constituted the whole of the United States Army. In January, 1786, General George Rogers Clarke, Colonel Richard Butler, and Saniuel H. Parsons were commissioned by the government to make a treaty of peace with the Mad River and Wabash Indians. The commissioners met representatives of the tribes at Fort Finney, but would have failed to accomplish their object but for the determination, coolness, and intrepidity of Clarke. FUs firm and undaunted manner overawed the Indians, who, instead of murdering the commissioners and proclaiming war, as was their probable intention when they arrived at Fort Finney, made a treaty, giving both the Miami valleys to the United States. The Indians, however, continued to resent the intrusion of the whites. Symmes treated the Indians with consideration. The surveying party, which he led in 1787, met a party forty miles from Cincinnati. Je protected them from the Pale of the Kentuckians, and his clemency so offended the latter that they abandoned the company and returned home. Yet Filson, another member of the party, who started back to the Ohio from the northern boundary line of Hamilton County, was killed by the implacable savages. In April, 1788, a party of six surveyors, camped near Mad River, were surprised. and two of them killed. In the summer of 1789, Major Doughty, of the United States Army, built Fort Washington in the center of Losanteville, now Cincinnati. Stations and block houses, surrounded by cabins of settlers, were built at distances of five, nine, and twelve miles from the fort, aud were able to successfully defend themselves.

In September, 1790, General Harmar, with an army of fourteen hundred and fifty men, three hundred and twenty of whom were United States troops, marched from Fort Washington up the Miami valley, past. the destroyed towns of Chillicothe, Piqua, and Laramie, to the Indian settlements, near the present city of Fort Wayne. Though he burnt seven villages and twenty thousand bushels of corn, yet, as few of the enemy were killed, and he was obliged to retreat to Cincinnati, the Indians did not consider themselves conquered. Nevertheless, the loss of their houses and provisions hampered them, and but for this check the sufterings of the settlers from their depredations would have been much greater. During the whole of the winter of 1790-1791, numerous parties of Indians were organizing in the Miami valley to attack weak block houses. Dayton was one of their favorite rendezvous. Parties came down the Miami in canoes, and, having formed a camp of supplies at the mouth of Mad River, in charge of squaws, and sent out hunters, started on their raids. Four hundred warriors attacked Dunlap's Station, on the Great Miami; ' wounded two and murdered Abner Hunt, but were repulsed. For months they were very daring, skulking about the streets of Cincinnati, and keeping the people in a constant state of terror, yet they did not succeed in destroying the settlements 6 on the Upper one and between the Miamis, eight in all, which had been begun in 1788.

In May and August, 1791, General Scott and Colonel Wilkinson made successful raids on the Wabash towns. These expeditions were followed in the fall by St. Clair's campaign against the Indians. Le had a force of twenty-three hundred regular soldiers and six hundred militia.

They Jeft Fort Washington September 17th, reached a point on the site of Fort Recovery, Darke County, November 3d, and at daylight, November 4th, were attacked by the Indians, among whom were a number of painted Canadians. After three hours of hard fighting, the whites were totally defeated. St. Clair's defeat and his heavy losses, amounting almost to the destruction of his army, which was the strongest and most completely equipped ,military foree that had ever been seen in the West, filled the whole Ohio valley with consternation. The Indians, encouraged by victory, kept up constant hostilities against the whites, who, however, as a rule, shut up in strong block houses guarded by experienced rane. tionary soldiers and Indian fighters, passed safely through this period of anxiety and danger.) A few, weeks after St. Clair's defeat General Wilkinson led an expedition to the battlefield, to bury the dead and collect abandoned government property. Forts Hamilton, Jefferson, and St. Clair, which were built in the winter of 1791-1792, ane garrisoned by soldiers from Fort Washington, were frequently attacked by the victorious Indians. November 6, 1792, Major Adair and a party of one hundred Kentuckians defeated two hundred and fifty Indians near Port St. Clair, one mie west of Eaton.

; In the spring of 1793, General Wayne was made commander of the Western Army, which consisted of thirty-six hundred men. Ue marched into the Indian country in the fall, but no important engagement occurred during the winter, which was spent in drill and preparation for the coming campaign. Fort Piqua was built on the site of the old Indian town of that name, as a place of deposit for army stores, which were brought up the Great Miami in boats. , To Fort Piqua were also brought, for burial, many who fell in Wayne's battles, Once, in 1794, a boat of supplies was attacked in sight of the fort by Indians, and the captain and twenty-three men who guarded it were massacred.

On June 30 and 31, 1794, Wayne defeated an army of fifteen hundred Jndians. August 30th he fought and gained the battle of Fallen Timbers, which ended the four years of Indian war. August 8, 1795, after seven months of effort on the part of Wayne, a treaty of peace was concluded at Greenville, eleven hundred and thirty Indians being in attendance. Hostilities were to cease, and all prisoners to be restored. Wayne's victory secured the peace and safety of the Ohio valley, and immediately after the treaty was signed, colonies began to move out into the wilderness. Seventeen days from the time of the meeting of Wayne and the tribes at Greenville, arrangements were made for the settlement of Dayton.

of trade, to retain their old influence over the tribes, resented American rule in the West, and their emissaries excited the Indians, by false representations, to continue their hostilities against the pioneers. The British refused, till 1796, to give up the forts south of the Great Lakes, and this encouraged the Indians to hope that, by the assistance of their English friends, they would be able to drive their common enemy out of the West, and regain their former unhmited power. The Indians who fought against St. Clair and Wayne were supplied by the British officers with provisions, muskets, cannon, and ammunition, and large numbers of painted Canadians accompanied them to the battlefield.

The evil influence of the British did not cease till after the War of 1812. The great chief, Tecumseh, and his brother, the Prophet, no doubt received encour pean 'trom the English, when they began to form their league, which was similar in purpose to the earlier conspiracy of Pontiac. The eloquent Tecumseh, in 1805, traveled through the Northwest and South, endeavoring to excite the pride and patriotism of the tribes. His object in forming the league was to 'resolutely oppose the further intrusion of the whites upon the Indian lands." He complained that the Thirteen Fires, which was the Indian name for the United States, had cheated aud imposed upon the tribes; and his reason for joining the British Army in 1812 was, that the English General Porter promised that he would certainly get the Indian lands back, which the Americans had stolen from them.

In 1810 the British, prolably a in anticipation of hostilities with the United States, began to furnish Tecumsel's followers with ammunition. In November, 1811, before the plans of 'T'ecumseh were fully matured, his followers, domaenaled by the Prophet, were conquered at the battle of Pippecanoe by General Harrison. From:,the beginning of the War of 4812 tll his death, at the battle of the Thames, October 6, 1813, Tecumseh and his Indians served with the British against the United States. This celebrated chief was as noted for his humanity as for' his courage, intelligence, and eloquence.

The government refused to employ Indians against the British in the War of 1812. Those who remained friendly to us claimed and received protection from the United States. They were gathered at Piqua under the care of Colonel Jolinston, United States Indian agent. About six thousand Indians were, at one time, at Piqua, and their presence insured the safety of.the frontier. These Indians gave many proofs of their fidelity. On one occasion it was necessary to bring a large number of women and children from Fort Wayne to Piqua. Colonel Johnston this helpless party to Ohio. Logan instantly offered his services, and, accompanied by a party of volunteers on horseback, started at once for Fort Wayne, and soon brought his charges safely through the wilderness, swarming with hostile savages, to Piqua. "The women spoke in the ductors." But for the influence of the Shawnee chief, Black Hoof, many of these six thousand friendly Indians would probably have been allies of the British. Black oof was born in Florida, but fought in all the wars in Ohio from 1755 till Wayne's treaty in 1795. He remained faithful to the stipulations of the treaty. Tecumseh in vain endeavored to persuade him to join his league, and Black Hoof's prudence and influence also kept the greater part of his tribe out of it.

| Wayne's treaty secured the Miami valley and, indeed, the whole of southern Ohio to the Americans, as the Indian reservation, whose boundary was settled at Greenville, did not reach further south than the portage at the site of the old Laramie trading post, in Shelby County. The Indians in the Western Reserve sold their Jands to the United States in 1805. In 1817 the United States Commissioners bought nearly the whole of northwestern Ohio from the tribes. The Delawares ceded their reservation in 1829; the Shawnees and the Senecas sold their land in 1882, and in 1842: the government bought the reservation of the Wyandots, the only Indians left in the State. The tribes were all removed to lands reserved for them in Indian Territory. :

Natural Advantaces - Fertility and Beauty of the Miami Valley - Kentuckians Long to Dispossess the Indians - Gist's Visit in 17o1 - Valuable Timber - Well Watered - Wild Animals - Natural Meadows - 'A Most Delightful Country ' - Kentuckians Visit it with Clarke and Logan- - Describe the Country as an Jcarthly Paradise - Major Stites Surveys Symmes' Purchase in 1787 - Wishes to Buy Land in Miami and Mad River Valleys - Syimm:s Explores the Valleys - Indians Camped on Site of Dayton - Land Worth One Dollar an Acre - Tropical Luxuriance of Vegetation--Kentuckians Come to View the Country in 1795 - Land Concealed by Vines and Weeds - Kentuckians Discouraged and Turn Back - RHich Farming Lands Near Dayton - Fortunate Location of

Town - Confluence of Four Rivers - Value of J'armm Products - Four River Valleys Afford Facilities for Construction of Railroads - Dayton Center of Ten Railroads - Superabundance of Game and Fish - Natural Fruits, Nuts, aud Wild Honey - Mr. Forrer's Account of Hunting in 1818 - Abundance of Wild Animals and Fish in 1830 and 1840- - -Flights of Pigeons - Migrations of Squirrels - Fish Baskets - Wagon Loads of Fish - Temperate Climate - Mean Temperature of the Year - A Healthy City - Four Streams Furnish Water Power - Value of the Rivers to Manufacturers--Timber - Fuel - Hard Woods - Building Stone - Prof. Orton Deseribes the Quarries - ExcelJleut Lime - Brick Clay - Sand - Abundance of Granitic Gravel--Prof. Orton on the Value of Gravel - Excellent Turnpikes and Streets due to Gravel - Natural Drainage - Pure Water - Inexhaustible Wells.

ONG before any permanent settlement was made in the Miami valley, fs its beauty and fertility were known by the inhabitants of Kentucky and the people beyond the Alleghanies, and repeated efforts were made to get possession of it. These efforts led to retaliation on the part of the Indians, who resented the attempt to dispossess them of their lands, and the continuous vaids back and forth across the Ohio River, to gain or keep possession of this beautiful valley, caused it to be called, until the close of the eighteenth century, the " Miami slanghter house."

The report of the French Major Celoron de Bienville, who, in August, 1749, ascended the La Roche or Big Miami River in bateaux to visit the Twightwee villages at Piqua, has been preserved, but Gist, the agent of the Virginians, who formed the Ohio Land Company, was probably the first person who wrote a description in English of the region surrounding Dayton. Gist visited the Twightwee or Miami villages in 1751. He was delighted with the fertile and well-watered land, with its large oak, walnut, maple, ash, wild cherry, and other trees. The country, he says, abounded "with turkeys, deer, elk, and most sorts of game, particularly buffaloes, thirty or forty of which are frequently seen feeding in one meadow; in short, it wants nothing but cultivation to make it a most dehghtful ofan: The land upon the Great Miami River is very rich, level, and well timbered, some of the finest meadows that can be. The grass here grows to a great height on the clear fields, of which there are a great number, and the bottoms are full'of white clover, wild rye, and blue grass.' A number of traders were living at the Miami villages, and in one of their houses Gist lodged during his visit. It is stated by pioneer writers that the buttalo and elk disappeared from Olio about the year 1795. ) .

The Kentuckians who accompanied the expeditions of Clarke and Logan against the Indians in 1780, 1782, and 1786, carried back the most rare ft reports of the value of the land at the mouth of Mad River. They deseribed the valley as an earthly paradise, and longed to drive out the "Indian fends" who excluded them from its fair fields and groves In the fall of 1787, Major Stites, one of the surveyors of the Symmes purchase, visited the valley of the Miami and Mad rivers, and was so delighted with it, that he began,-on his return, negotiations for its purchase. John Cleves Symmes, inspired by the account given by Major Stites, was curious to see the land, and anxious to learn its real value before setting a price on it. Accompanied by an armed escort, he examined the land on the Miami and in the Stillwater and Mad River valleys without molestation from the Indians. White visitors to the mouth of Mad River seem always to have found a party of Indians encamped there. Those that Symmes encountered proved friendly, and they took supper together. Symmes' party reported, when they got back to Cincinnati, that some of the land tyey examined was worth one dollar an acre, which was considered a large price for unimproved land in the Indian country

On the rich bottom lands vegetation grew with almost tropical luxuriance. Benjamin Van Cleve records in his journal of September 28, 1795, that "some men from Kentucky, who had come with Mr. Cooper to view the country, went up the Miami bottom a mile or two above' the mouth of Mad liver, and found the vines and weeds so thick that they could not see the land, and became discouraged and returned to Kentucky." Such a proof of the fatness of the land was a strange reason for discouragement.

it surpasses, if it equals, the region immediately surrounding Dayton. Lhe "Mad Iiver country," as this region was called by the first pioncers, was the synonym for all that was desirable in farming lands.

Natural Advantages

Dayton is fortunate in its location at the confluence of four important streams - the Miami, Mad River, Stillwater, and Wolf Creek. Each of these streams has its valley of great beauty aud fertility, and these valleys produce large and profitable crops of every variety. As reported in the United States census report of 1880, the total value of farm products in Montgomery County in 1879 was three million, two hundred and eighty-eight thousand, four hundred and forty-nine dollars, a greater amount than was produced by any other county in Ohio... The rich neighboring farming community contributes largely to the growth and prosperity of the city. Dayton is noted for its excellent markets. 'The river valleys furnish the warm soil needed for market gardens, and the elevated ground is adapted to fruit of all kinds. An incidental advantage, resulting from the four river valleys, is the facilities they afford for the construction of railroads, which, through them, may reach Dayton on easy 'grades, and at comparatively small cost. No doubt to this cause may _be partly attributed. the fact that, with Dayton as a center, ten railroads radiate in every direction.

Now that the forests have been nearly swept away, the game almost exterminated, and the rivers cleared of all fine fish, it 1s difficult, even in imagination, to realize the magnificence of the forests and the superabundance of the game and fish, when this region was In its natural state. The products of the forest and the river, the game and fish, the peltry, the wild honey, the natural fruit and nuts, were not unimportant elements in the prosperity of Dayton at its founding. Mr. Samuel Forrer, so prominent in the early history of Ohio and of Dayton, in some reminiscences of a visit to Dayton as late as 1818, published in the Dayton Journal in 1863, says: "T remember that I killed three pheasants on the present site of Mr. Van Ausdal's house in Dayton View. Quails, rabbits, ete., were found in plenty in 'Buck Pasture,' immediately east of the eanal basin, between First and Second streets. Wild ducks came in large flocks to the ponds within the present city limits, but which have since been mainly wiped out by drainage. And the fox hunters had a great time on oceasion by visiting the 'Brash Prairie, within two miles of the court house. Deer, wild turkeys, and other game were killed in the neighborhood, and venison and wild meat were easily obtainable in Dayton."

Within the writer's recollection, between 1830 and 1840, game and fish were still abundant. An oceasional deer could be found, and wild turkeys and pheasants were often shot by hunters. Squirrels and quails were thick in the woods and fields, and in the fall immense flights of wild pigeons alighted in the woods to feed on the mast. At irregular intervals one of these strange migrations of squirrels would occur, for which no satifactory cause has been given by naturalists. Starting trom the remote northwest, they would come in countless numbers, and nothing could turn them from their course. Rivers were no impediment to them, and boys would stand on the shore of the Miami and kill them with elubs, as they emerged from the water. |

The rivers were still full of fish. No more delicious table fish could be found Tee ies ie the bass, when taken from the pure, clear water of the Miami and Mad River of that day. On the mill race, which has since been converted into the Dayton View Hydraulic, stood a saw mill, which only ran in the daytime. At meht the water was passed through a fish basket, and cach morning, during the fish season, it was found filled with bass of the largest size. In 1835, one Saturday afternoon a seine was drawn in the Miami, between the Main Strect and Bridge Street bridges, and two large wagon loads of fine fish caught. Tlis may suffice to show the great abundance of fish as late as 1835. Whatever hardships the pioneers of Dayton may have endured, they were in the enjoyment of luxuries that would have tickled the palate of an epicure.

Climate exerts a decided influence on the character and prosperity of a community. In its chmate Dayton is fortunate, as its people are not exposed to the extreme rigor of the North, nor the ecnervating heat of the South. M. E. Curwen makes this statement in his "Ilistory of Dayton,' published in 1850. " Dayton is in latitude 39° 47', and in longitude west from Washington 7° 6'. This parallel of latitude passes through the center of Spain, southern Italy, northern Greece, and Asia Minor. In regard to climatology, there are yet no sufficient data to form a correct estimate. The mean temperature of the year may, however, be set down as not far from 53.78° Fahrenheit. The mean temperature of spring at §4.14°: of summer at 72.86°; of autumn at 54.86°; and of winter at 32.90°. The mean temperature of the warmest months does not probably exceed 74.30°, nor does that of the coldest months fall below 380.20°. This corresponds very nearly with the chmate of the Lombardo-Venetian Kingdom." The following table, taken from the records of the Ohio Meteorological Bureau, differs somewhat from the above, but it may be that if a series of years were taken, instead of a single one, the oe: would not be great. The mean temperature of the year 1887 was 58° 5 of the year 1888, 52° 1'... The mean temperature of spring, 1888, 50° 6'; of 'of 'autamines 90! Mor av imter 50° 6. That the 'chmate of Dayton is favorable to health is shown by the reports of the board of health. Statistics prove Dayton to be one of the healthiest cities in the United States. The four streams that converge at Dayton furnish a large amount of water power to propel mills and factories. This is especially true of Mad River. It was the water power that gave the greatest impulse of growth to the town, and Dayton at an early day became a manufacturing point of considerable importance. Although the needs of our factories have now outgrown the water power, and steam has to be resorted to, it still remains an important factor in the prosperity of the city. The manufacturer esteems himself fortunate who possesses this reliable and comparatively inexpensive power.

For many years the town was dependent on the forests in the vicinity for. timber for building purpeses and for fuel, and it was furnished in abundance and of the greatest excellence. The cheapness and excellent quality of the hard woods led at an early day to the establishment here of factories that use wood for material. Now that the forests have largely disappeared from the surrounding country, the canal and railroads bring the hard woods of northern Ohio and the pine of Michigan cheaply and abundantly to our builders and manufacturers. The comparative proxunity of these lumber regions is of no small advantage.

One of nature's chief gifts to Dayton is the building stone that underlies a large part of Montgomery County. Of especial value is the Niagara or, as it is commonly called, the Dayton stone. So extensive are the beds of this stone, that Prof. Orton, the State geologist, pronounces it inexhaustible. Prof. Orton describes the different kinds of stone found in this region as follows: "The blue limestone affords in numberless exposures a building stone that is accessible, easily quarried, even bedded, of convement thickness, and very durable. It possesses, however, but little susceptibility of ornamentation. The thinness of its beds, its hardness and brittleness, stand in the way of its improvement by dressing, and its color is too dark to please the eye when it is exposed in large surfaces of masonry. The Clinton rock in all its beds - but especially in its upper ones- - affords a building stone that would be higbly valued, were it not for the close proximity, in most instances, of the quarries. of the, Niagara group. <A similar statement may be made in regard to the products of the blue limestone quarries of the county. When the Ciinton stone is first raised from the quarry, it is frequently so soft as to be easily worked; but when the water has escaped from it, it becomes a measurably firm and enduring stone. Some of its beds, indeed, are crystalline or semi-crystalline in structure, and leave nothing to be desired so far as durability is concerned. The Clinton group exhibits a great variety of colors, and some of these shades are very pleasing to the eye - a fact which makes this stone susceptible of fine architectural effects. The greatest objection to this series is that it is not generally even bedded.

The lower strata are very seldom so. 'The Niagara group, however, furnishes the best building stone, not only in Montgomery County, but of the whole Miami valley as well. Indeed, for many purposes it is inferior to none. Occurring as it does in even-bedded layers of from four to twenty inches in thickness, it is adapted to the purpose of both Nght and heavy masonry. It is homogeneous in structure, has a beautiful color, takes ornamentation quite kindly, and is durable to any required degree. The value that is attached to it can be Judged from the fact that in some of the quarries nearest Dayton the stone sells in the ground for $17.50 per rod or $2,800 per acre, the title to the land not being alienated." These quarries have been a mine of wealth to their owners and to Dayton. : These stones may all be burned into excellent hme, and lime is indispensable, as it is "the great cement employed alike in nature and by human art." The building stones produce a lime that slakes easily, and in slaking evolves a great degree of heat, and is called hot or fiery lime. It sets or hardens very soon, and for this reason is not liked by masons. A. stone is found at Wilson's quarries, north of Dayton, from which a lime is obtained that is free from these objections, and from this source Dayton is largely supphed. Excellent brick clay exists In many locahties, and nearly all the brick used in Dayton is burned in the immediate vicinity. Sand in unhmited quantity may be found in the river bed, and an abundance of superior quality in many of the surrounding hills. Thus these essential articles are easily and cheaply obtained, and help to constitute the sum of things that make Dayton what it is. Another article, which at first thought may be considered of little value, is of the greatest importance. Gravel is so abundant and so cheap that we seldom reflect what an important part it has played in the development of the country. Prof. Orton says: "It is no; easy to set a proper estimate upon the beds of sand and gravel of Montgomery County, until a comparison is instituted between a region well supphed with sueh accumulations and another that is destitute of them. The gravel knolls and ridges with which, in the southern and eastern portions of the county, almost every farm abounds, afford very desirable building sites, and are generally selected for such purposes. Sand of the best quality for mortar, cement, and brick-making is everywhere within easy access. An inexhaustible supply of excellent materials for road-making - -what is frequently designated the lime stone gravel, though in reality largely composed of granitic pebbles - is found in the drift deposits, from which hundreds of miles of turnpikes have been already constructed in the county, thus affording free communication between farm and market at all seasons of the year. 'The smaller bowlders of Canadian origin are selected from the gravel banks for paving stones and transported to the neighboring cities. In regions where stone suitable for macadamized pikes can be obtained, good roads ean be had, even though gravel is wanting, but at largely increased expense above that of gravel turnpikes. The districts which are supphed with neither can certainly never Eoaupete in desirability with these gravel-strewn regions.'

In 1838 the legislature passed an act extending state aid in the construction of turnpikes. Dayton promptly availed itself of the benefit to be derived from sie! law, and on account of the abundance and cheapness of gravel soon had several turnpikes under way. So manifest was the advantage gained by sections of the State having cheap material for the construction of roads over other portions less foe that the legislature hastened in 1840 to repeal the law. Before its repeal, however, Dayton had reaped substantial and great benefits from the aid extended by the State. Dayton is also indebted to the gravel beds for the beauty and cleanliness of the streets of which for many years the citizens were so justly proud. It is true that of late the careless digging of trenches for gas and water, and the use of broken limestone instead of gravel for repairs, has put them in bad condition, but there ean be no doubt that except on our most travelled business thoroughfares, pure gravel, such as may be obtained from the surrounding hills, if properly applied, would make perfectly satisfactory streets.

But not the least of the advantages derived from the gravelly subsoil. that underlies Dayton, is the drainage it affords. It almost obviates the necessity of sewerage, and but for it we should certainly have been visited with the evil consequences that have fallen on other cities which have failed to provide means for carrying off refuse matter. Underneath the city, at a depth of a few feet, runs a constant stream. of water, removing 'impurities of all kinds and preventing disease. In the less densely populous parts of the city it acts as an admirable filter, and carries into wells pure.and cold water for drinking and culinary purposes. Now that in parts of the city well water is no longer considered wholesome, the city is indebted to this same gravelly subsoil for the wells at the water works. Probably no city in the country is more highly favored than Dayton with an abundant supply of pure and delicious water. The wells are practically inexhaustible and have borne the drafts made upon them by large fires» without a sign of failure. Subjected to the test of chemical analysis, the. water has been pronounced free from all impurities, and no citizen of Dayton need be told how cold, sparkling, and refreshing it is as a beverage. Certainly no greater boon ean be conferred on a city than an abundant supply of good water.

Sattleoment of Dayton- - -Venice on Site of Dayton Laid Out in 1789- - Major Stites - Venice Abandoned- - Daneger of Visiting Site of Dayton Before 1794 - -Hostile Indians - Treaty of Greenville Secures Safety of Settlers - Site of Dayton Purchased from Symmes - Original Proprietors of Dayton - Symmes Requires Three Seltlements to be Made -

Road Out of the Brush - Hardships Endured by Surveyors - Tield Notes Kept on Tables of Wood - Dayton Laid Out and Named- - -Lottery Held on Site of Town, November 4th--Lots and In-lots Donated to Settlers Drawn - Settlers Permitted to Purchase One Hundred and Sixty Acres at a French Crown Per Acre - Ilorty-six Persons Agree to Settle at Dayton - Only Nineteen Eventually Avail Themselves of Donations and Become Settlors - Van Cleve's Account of Settlements in the Purchase - Names of Original Settlers of Dayton - Three Parties Leave Cincinnati in March, 1796 - Hamev's Party Travel in Two-horse Wagon - Newcoim's Party Make the Journey on Horseback - Difficulties of the Journey to Dayton by Land - Thomp<on's Party Ascend the Miami in a Pirogue - Description of the Voyage - Poling Up Stream - Beauty of the Landscape - Supper in the Miami Woods - Names of the Passengers in the Pirogue - -fTen Days from Cincinnati to Dayton - Mrs. Thompson the Virst to Land - Indians Encamped at Dayton - Land at Head of St. Clair Street - The Uninhabited Forest All that Welcomed Them - Encouraging Indications - Biographies of Original Settlers - Daniel C. Cooper.

IX years before Dayton was projected Major Benjamin Stites, John S Stites Gano and William Goforth formed plans for a settlement to be called Venice, at the mouth of the Tiber, as they named Mad River.

The site of this proposed city lay within the seventh range of townships, which, on June 15, 1789, they agreed to purchase from John Cleves Symmes for eighty-three cents an acre. The contract was signed "at the block houses near Columbia, commanded dy the above-named Benjamin Stites.' One of the stipulations made by the purchasers was that a road should be at once cut through the woods to Mad River. The deed was executed and recorded, but Symmes' misunderstanding with the government and the Indian troubles forced them to abandon their "project, and "we eseaped being Venetians." But before their plan was frustrated, the town of Venice, with its two principal streets crossing each other at right angles in the center, was laid out on paper. In each of the four quarters outlined by the streets the position of houses and squares was indicated. The projectors were Baptists, and a whole square was set aside as a gift to the first church of that denomination organized by Venetians. A. half-acre lot was promised to "each denomination of pious and well and religiously disposed people, who worship the God of Israel, found in the town within two years after the founding of the settlement." Phe lots w ae shes town ees halt an acre, and were valued at four dollars each. 'Three of them were donated as sites for a eapitol, court house, and jail. The out-lots were to contain five acres, and the price for each was twenty-five dollars. 1634427 |

From the time that Major Stites and his colleagues eee their bargain with Judge Symmes till 1794 the Indians were constantly on the war-path. White men who ascended the Miami from Cincinnati to the site of Dayton made the journey at the risk of their lives. A spy and a hunter always accompanied them, and one was as necessary as the other. Surveyors were obliged to be continually on the watch while on the march or in camp. Part always stood on guard, while the rest eooked, and for fear of attracting the attention of wandering bands of savages, it was necessary to extinguish their fire at bedtime, and to keep a sharp lookout when they rekindled it before daybreak. Previous to Wayne's victory, it would have been foolhardy to attempt a settlement in the heart of the enemy's country, and expose helpless women and children to the raids of the pitiless savages.

The treaty of Greenville was regarded as securing the. safety of settlers in the Indian country. August 20, 1795, less than three weeks after the treaty was signed, a party of gentlemen contracted for the purchase from John Cleves Symmes of the seventh and eighth ranges between Mad River and the Little Miami. The purchasers were General Arthur St. Clair, governor of the Northwest Territory; General Jonathan Dayton, afterward senator from New Jersey; General James Wilkinson, of Wayne's army, and Colonel Israel Ludlow, from Long Hill, Morris at the

County, New Jersey. They proposed to make three settlements, mouth of Mad luver; on the Little Miami, in the seventh range; and on Mad River, above the mouth. This was one of the conditions of their contract with Judge Symmes. Benjamin Van Cleve, one of the original settlers of Dayton, gives in) his 'journal an xfeemestin account of the survey of this purchase in the autumn of 1795: "Two parties of surveyors set off on the 21st of September, Mr. Daniel C. Cooper: to survey and mark a road and eut out some of the brush, and Captain John Dunlap to run the boundaries of the purchase. I went with Dumwap. There were at this time several stations on Mill Creck - Ludlow's, White's, Tucker's, Voorhees', and Cunningham's. We came to Voorhees' and encamped.

afterward called Bedell's Station, and lay a few miles west of where Lebanon now is. On the 23d we reached the line between the third and fourth ranges of townships, which had been run by Dunlap in 1788. On the 24th and 25th run north eighteen miles to the south boundary of the seventh range, and then run west to the Miami, running nearly south. The next morning our horse was missing. We hunted for him all day, but never found him. He had been well secured. 'The Indians probably

Mad River. , About thirty rods from the mouth we found a camp of about six Wyandot Indians. We were a little alarmed at each other at first, but became very friendly. They gave us some venison jerk and we in the request of one of them, I exchanged kuives with him, giving him a very large one, scabbard and belt that I had carried for several years, for his, which was not so valuable, with a worsted belt and a deer skin to boot. We had not been here long until Mr. Cooper and his party arrived.

"On the 28th, Mr. Cooper returned to make some alterations in his road. We continued engaged in our survey till the 4th of October. We established the northern and southern boundaries of the purchase, and meandered Mad River and the Miami from the northern line of the eighth range to the southern line of the seventh, when we returned to Cincinnati." 7

Mr. Van Cleve records many hardships and dangers. On the morning of the Ist of October, they sent their hunter and packhorseman, Wilham Gahagan and Jonathan Mercer, forward to cook at the mouth of Muddy Run; but their surveying occupied more time than they anticipated, and it was evening before, after a day of fasting, they reached the rendezvous. "When we found, them,' he says, "some Indians had robbed them of the most of our provisions and menaced their lives." Soon after they fasted for thirty-four hours, working and walking most.of the time. ..''October, 8d..; 1t rained.very hard, and the surveyor got lis paper alll wet, and was about stopping. We had about a pound of meat, and though we had nearly done our business, were thinking of setting off for home. I undertook to keep the field notes, and fell on the expedient of taking them down on tables of wood with the point of my knife, so that I could understand them and take them off again on paper." "On the Ist of November went again to Mad liver. On the 4th, Israel Ludlow laid off the town at the mouth of Mad River, and ealled it Dayton, after one of the proprictors. A lottery was held, and I drew lots for myself and several others, and engaged to become a settler in the ensuing spring."

Each a the original settlers received a donation of an in-lot aa an out-lot, which he or his representatives drew at the lottery held at the mouth of Mad River November 4th. In addition, each of them had the privilege of purchasing one hundred and sixty acres at a French crown, or about one dollar and thirteen cents per acre. She proprietors hoped, by offering these inducements, to attract settlers to the place. Forty-six persons had agreed to remove froin Cincinnati to Dayton, but only fifteen fulfilled their engagement. Four others however came, so that the number of settlers who had entitled themselves to the donations and other privileges offered by the propnmetors was nineteen. Two or three prospectors came up during the winter, but feturned for their families. Benjamin Van Cleve says in his journal, under date of April 1, 1796: "During the preecding winter two or three settlers had arrived here; several families had settled at Hole's Station, where Miamisburg now is; a few,persons had settled at the Big Prairie on Clear Creek (below Middletown); two had established themselves at Clear Creek and several were scattered about the country lower down. This. spring a settlement was made by Jonathan Mercer eight miles up Mad River; another was made at the forks, called Chribb's Station; another at the mouth of Honey Creck, and another at the old Piqua, on the Miami." But for several years Dayton was considered the frontier. One of the settlements begun this year was Franklin.

The original settlers of Dayton were the following persons and their families: William Hamer, Solomon Hamer, Thomas Hamer, George Neweom, Wiliam Newcom, Abraham Grassmire, John Davis, John Dorough, Wilham Chenowith, James Morris, Daniel Ferrell, Saniuel Thompson, Benjamin Van Cleve, James McClure, John McClure, Thomas MeClure, Wilham Gahagan, William Van Cleve.

In March, 1796, they left Cincinnati in three parties, led by William Hamer, George Neweom, and Samuel Thompson. Hamer's party was the first to start; the other two companics left on Monday, March 2ist, one by land, the other by water. Jamer's party came in a two-horse wagon over the road begun, but only partially cut through the woods, by Cooper in the fall of 1795. The company consisted of: Mr. and Mrs. William Hamer and their children, Solomon, Thomas, Nancy, Elizabeth, Sarah, and Polly, and Jonathan and Edward Mercer. They were delayed and had a long, cold and uncomfortable journey. In the other party that traveled by land were Mr. and Mrs. George Newcom and their brother Wilham, James Morris, John Dorough and family, Daniel Ferrell and family, Solomon Goss and family, John Davis and Abraham Grassmire. William Van Cleve, instead of going with his relatives in the pirogue, accompanied this party to avs e Mr. Thompson's cow, which was with the cattle belonging to the Newcom division of the colonists. They were two weeks on the road. The sixty miles from Cincinnati to Mad River was a tedious and exhausting journey. The road was merely a rough, narrow, unbroken path through the woods and brush, except that part of it which led to Fort Hamilton, which, as it was used by the army, was kept in tolerably good condition. They suffercd from cold and dampness in camp, as it had rained and was spitting snow.

Their furmiture, stoves, clothes, provisions, cooking utensils and agricultural implements and other property, as well as children too small to walk, were carried on horses. in creels malts of hickory withes and suspended from each side of pack saddles. It was a difficult matter to ford the creeks without ectting the freight and women and children wet. Trees were cut down to build foot bridges across the smaller streams. Rafts were constructed to carry the contents of the creels and the women and elildren over Jarge creeks, while the horses and cattle swam. Their rifles furnished them with plenty of game and their cows with milk at meals. They were obliged to stop for a time at the Big Prairic, near Middletown, and made a second halt at Hole's Creek, now Miamisburg. They reached here in less than a week after the other parties arrived.

Thompson's party came in a large pirogue down the Ohio to the Miami and up that stream to the mouth of Mad River. A pirogue was a long, narrow boat of light draft and partly enclosed and roofed. One man steered while the others poled. The Miami in 1796 wound through an almost uninhabited wilderness. Such a journey, looking back from this safe and prosaic age when steam cars whirl us up ae Cincinnati in two hours, must have been full of danger and of exciting adventures, and yet not without its pleasures. It required much skill lind muscular strength to pole a boat up stream for many miles. In an article on "arly Recollections of the West," contributed to the American Pioneer, a description of this mode of navigation 1s given. The writer says the boats were 'provided with running boards, extending from bow to stern, on each side of the boat. . . . Each man was provided with a pole with a heavy socket. The crew, divided equally on each side, set their poles near the head of the boat, and bringing the end of the pole to their shoulders, with their bodies bent, walked slowly down the running board to the stern, returning at a quick pace to the bow for a new set." Imagination invests this little band of adventurers, laboriously poling their boat load of women and children up the Indian-named river and valley to a frontier home in the ancient Miami hunting grounds, with an atmosphere of romance. On the borders of their ancestral corn fields and game preserve, lurked jealous and revengeful savages, gazing with envious and homesick eyes on the rich lands of which the pioneers had dispossessed them. The Indian reign of terror lasted till after 1799, but travelers on the river were probably in less danger of surprise in early spring than when the fohlage was in full leaf, and the Indians could consequently more easily conceal themselves.

owever unpropitious the season may be, there are always occasional sunshiny days in early spring in Ohio. Though the woods in 1796 were wet from recent showers, the rain seems to have been over before the pirogue began its voyage, and no donbt part of the time the weather was mild and bright. The banks of the Miami were thickly wooded, the flowers and foliage of the trees were Just beginning to unfold, and the ground was covered with grass fresh with the greenness of spring. Along the lower part of the river the follage was more advanced and the earlier varieties of wild flowers were coming into bloom.

For miles on either side of the Miami extended a fertile and beautiful country, diversified beyond the rich bottom lands by low hills and pleasant little valleys, dense forests of ornamental trees and the most valuable timber and occasional small level prairies (natural fields and meadows awaiting the farmers plow and cattle), the whole watered by cool, delicious springs and limpid streanis. : of wild fowls for which the hunger of travelers was a piquant and sufficient sauce. No doubt their food, as described by other pioneers, was cooked after this fashion: Meat was fastencd on a sharpened stick, stuck in the ground before the fire, and frequently turned. Dough for wheat bread was sometimes wound sround a stick and baked in the same way. Corn bread was baked under the hot ashes. "Sweeter roast meat," exclaims an enthusiastic pioneer writer, "than such as is prepared in this manner, no epicure of Kurope ever tasted." "Scarce any one who has not tried it can imagine the sweetness and gusto of such a meal, in such a place, at such a time."

No doubt the travelers by water had a more comfortable trip than those who came by land, though to hardy pioneer tamilies a journey on horseback or In a wagon through the Miann woods, even if undertaken in early spring, had its compensating enjoyments, which were sometimes remembered after its hardships were forgotten. 7

Thompson's son, Benjamin Van Cleve, then about twenty-five, and her daughter, auhany Van Cleve, nine years of age; the widow McClure and her sons and daughters, James, John, Thomas, Kate, and Ann; and Wilham Gahagan, a young Inshman. The passage from Cincinnati to Dayton occupied ten days. Mrs. Thompson was the first to step ashore, and the first white woman, except, perhaps, the captive Mrs. McFall, rescued by Kentuckians in 1782, to set her foot on Dayton soi. Two small camps of Indians were here when the pirogue touched the Miami bank, but they proved friendly, and were persuaded to leave in a day or two. The pirogue landed at the head of St. Clair Street Friday, April Ist. The following brief entry is the only allusion Benjamin Van Cleve makes in his journal to this important event in the history of Dayton: "April 1,,1796.,,Wanded iat: Dayton; after\a passageof 'ten 'days, Wilham Gahagan and myself having come with Thompson's and McClure''s s families in a large pirogue."

We can easily imagine the loneliness and dreariness of the uninhabited wilderness, which confronted these homeless families. There were three women and four children - one an infant - in the party. "The

The spring was late and cold, but though at first the landscape looked bare and desolate, before many days the air was sweet with the blossoms of the wild grape, and plum, and cherry, and the woods beautiful with the contrasting red and white of the red bud and dogwood and the fresh green of young leaves. The woods and prairies were full of wild fruits and flowers. These wild fruits and the hickory nuts and walnuts, which were very abundant in the fall, would be a welcome their lot. The thick growth of weeds and flowers was a proof of the richness of the soil. 'The experienced pioncers discovered encouraging indications wherever their eyes rested.

The first settlers of Dayton passed through many thrilling and romantic adventures, and the story of their lives, if we had it in full, would be exciting and entertaining. The few biographical incidents that have been preserved are interesting to students of our early history.

The Thompson party was the first to arrive here. Samuel Thompson was a native of Pennsylvania and removed to Cincinnati soon after its settlement. He marricd the widow of John Van Cleve. Mr. 'Thompson was drowned in Mad River in 1817 and Mrs. Thompson died at Dayton,

Benjamin Van Cleve was a typical man, and as a good representative of the best pioneer character, is worthy of especial notice. He kept a journal which might well be called an autobiography, and from which the incidents inentioned in the following sketch have been mainly drawn. Hic was the oldest son of John and Catharine Benham Van Cleve and was born in Monmouth County, New Jersey, February 24, 17738. He had three brothers and five sisters. His ancestors came from Holland in the seventeenth century. , |

His earliest recollection was the battle of Monmouth, which oceurred when he was five years old. Je remembered the confusion and the flight of the women and children to the pine swamps and the destruction of his father's house, stock, and blacksmith shop by the British. The refugees in ' the pine woods could hear the firing, and "when our army was retreating many of the men melted to tears; when it was advancing there was every demonstration of joy and exultation." Jlis father served with the New Jersey militia during nearly the whole of the Revolution. He emigrated in 1785 from New Jersey to Pennsylvania, where he hved ona farm near Washington. Je removed to Cincinnati in 1789, coming down the river in a boat and arriving January 8, 1790.

Benjamin Van Cleve, who was now seventcen, settled on the east bank of the Licking, where Major Leech, in order to form a settlement, and have a farm opened for himself, offered a hundred acres for clearing each ten acre field, with the use of the cleared land for three years. John Van Cleve intended to assist his sou in this work, but was killed by the Indians on the ist of June, while working in his out-lots near Cincinnati. He was stabbed in five places and sealped.

Benjamin Van Cleve, by hard work as a day laborer, paid John Van Cleve's sinall debts, finished, for the benefit of his mother, work which his father had engaged to do, settled his books and sold his blacksmith's tools to the quartermaster general. He returned after the funeral to his land at Leech's Station to plant his corn, but was obliged to spend the greater part of Ins time in Cincinnati working to support his mother and young brother and sisters. He tried to the best of his ability, though a mere boy, to fill his father's place. |

Much of the time from 1791 till 1794 he was employed in -the quartermaster's department, whose headquarters were at Fort Washington. Te branded and herded government horses and cattle, brought up boat loads of salt and provisions from Kentucky, accompanied brigades of loaded pack-horses to the headquarters of St. Clair's army in the Indian country; carried orders, kept accounts, acted as hostler for his snow, slush and mud, earning his wages of fifteen dollars a month by hard, rough work. We was young and inexperienced, but poverty and the thought of his helpless family sobered and restrained him, and he had no inclination to fall into idle or dissipated habits. It is remarkable that he had sufficient fortitude and resolution to resist temptation, forced as he was for several years to associate with discharged soldiers and the most profane and dissolute followers of the army.

He was present at St. Clair's defeat, and gives in his journal a thrilling account of the rout and retreat of the army and his own escape and safe return to Cincinnati. He lost his horse and his clothing, for "having sometimes to be with the officers and sometimes in the mud,' when employed by the quartermaster's department, he carried all the clothes he owned with him.

In the spring of 1792 he was sent off from Cincinnati at midnight, at a mioment's notice, by the quartermaster gencral to carry dispatches to the War Department at Philadelphia. At that day such a journey was a long and weary one, and although the authorities were satisfied with his services and accounts, they did not pay him until March, 1793, which subjected him to great inconvenience. In connection with this visit to Philadelphia, he mentions drawing a plan of the President's new house, reading " Barclay's Apology," and a number of other Quaker works, and purchasing twenty-five books, which he read through on the voyage from Pittsburg to Cincinnati, entries which are all very characteristic of the man.

In the spring of 1794 he went with Hugh Wilson, commissary, William Gahagan, and others down the Ohio to Fort Massac in charge of two contractors' boats, loaded with provisions and accompanied by a detachment of troops. 'There were twelve boats in their fleet. They were constantly apprehending attacks from the Indians. Ue describes himself on this voyage as dressed in hunting froelk, breech cloth, leg and moccasins, and carrying a gun, and tomahawk, and a knife eighteen inches long suspended from his belt.

In the fall of 1795 he accompanied Captain Dunlap's party to make the survey for the Dayton settlement. When not surveying, he wrote in the recorder's oflice. ,

April 10, 1796, he arrived in Dayton with the first party of settlers that came. This year he raised a good crop of corn at' Dayton and sold out his possessions in Cincinnati, but sunk the price of his lots. Most of his corn was destroyed and he was about $40.00 in debt. He gave "6 $80.00 for a yoke of oxen and one of them was shot, and $20.00 for a cow and she died." ,

In the fall of the year he went with Israel Ludlow and William C. Schenck to survey the United States military lands between the Scioto and Muskingum Rivers. "We had deep snow," he says, "covered with erust; the weather was cold and still, so that we could kill but little game and were twenty-nine days without bread and nearly all that time without salt and sometimes very httle to eat. We were five days, seven Mm company, on,four) meals, iand they, except: the last, scanty.... They consisted of a turkey, two young raccoons, and the last day some rabbits and venison, which we got from some Indians." :

From this.time until 1802 he farmed in summer, and in winter went out surveying, kept books, wrote in the recorder's office at Cincinnati, where one winter he also studied surveying; Ohio legislature, or made out the list of taxable persons and their property. August 28, 1800, he married Mary Whitten, daughter of John and Phebe Whitten, who lived in Wayne township. This year, he was appointed surveyor of Dayton township. Jie had been forced.to sell his preémption rights to out-lots, but in 1801, when land offices were opened and commissioners to examine claims were appointed, he suececeded in getting certificates for 160 acres and for some lots in Dayton, which he afterwards got patented. He built a cabin on his quarter section, and as far as his health would permit, devoted himself' to farming. This quarter section 1s now incleded within the corporation of Dayton and has proved 2 valuable property to his descendants.