1737. History of Washington Co, New York. Illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men, etc

Front matter

COURT HOUSE , SALEM ,N. Y. ~l737- -OF— WASHINGTON CO., NEW YORK. '_<==»WITH^-J> Illt.8fn.ti0.is ami Igiogr^Iucjtl Jp.kefclu.$ <_<?== OF*^ SOME OF ITS PROMINENT MEN AND PIONEERS PHILADELPHIA BTERTS Sc EHSIG 3sT. -1878. PRESS OF J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., PHILADELPHIA. CONTENTS HISTORICAL. CHAPTER PAI*E XXIV.— Agricultural Societies 103 XXV.— The Press of Washington County .... 106 XXVI.— Washington County Civil List Ill HISTORY OF THE VILLAGES AND TOWNS OF WASHINGTON COUNTY. Salem 121 Granville 10* Argyle • 230 Cambridge ■ 252 Dresden . 283 Easton 290 Fort Ann 301 Fort Edward . . . 314 Greenwich 334 Hampton 362 Hartford 372 Hebron 385 Jackson . 405 Kingsbury 420 Putnam 448 White Creek 455 Whitehall 473 Patrons' Record axd Directory 492-504 HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY. CHAPTER PAGE I. — Introductory ........ 9 II.— The Advent of the White Man 10 III.— The Situation 12 IV.— 1609 to 1700 13 V. — Queen Anne's War 15 VI.— The First Settlement, etc 16 VII.— The War of 1744 18 VIII.— First Part of the " Old French War" ... 20 IX.— Latter Part of the Old French War .... 27 X. — From the French War to the Revolution ... 32 XI.— 1775 and 1776 40 XII.— 1777 44 XIII. — Remainder of the Revolution ..... 58 XIV.— The Era of Development 63 XV. — A General View 69 XVI.— 1800 to 1861 70 XVII. — Regiments Raised in 1861 75 XVIII.— The One Hundred and Twenty-third Infantry . . 80 XIX. — Other Regiments 85 XX. — Present Condition of the County .... 86 XXI. — Geology of Washington County .... 89 XXII. — Freemasonry in Washington County ... 95 XXIII.— The Medical Society of Washington County . . 97 ILZLTTST^^TIOItTS.

PAGE View of Court-House, Salem .... facing title-page. Map of Washington County between 8, 9 The " Post" Building 110 SALEM. United Presbyterian Church ..... facing 121 Residence of William Law ..... " 121 Portrait of Judge C. L. Allen "125 Residence of L. S. Sherman (with portraits) . . " 126 Portraits of J. B. Stevenson and Wife . . between 128, 129 Property of Thomas S. Stevenson (with portraits) " 128, 129 Portraits of Isaac Bininger and Wife . . . facing 133 Residence of Clinton F. Wilson (with portraits) . " 134 Portrait of S. Beaty between 136, 137 Residence of Wm. J. Beaty (with portraits) . " 136,137 " John Cleveland " . . facing 13S Portrait of Bernard Blair "140 " Dr. George Allen "142 Residence of the late David Hawley . . . between 144, 145 Portraits of David Hawley and Wife . .

" 144, 145 Portrait of J. A. McFarland facing 148 Residence of the late Hiram Walker (with portraits) " 152 Portraits of Wm. McKie and Wife .... "156 Farm Residenco of J. M. Thompson (with portraits) " 160 Residence of Sarah Fairley (with portraits) . . " 164 National Bauk of Salem ...... " 169 Residence of B. F. Bancroft "169 The Old Meeting-House in Salem 169 Portrait of Gen. John W illiams (steel) . . . facing 178 " Hon. James Gibson (steel) ... " 180 " Benjamin F. Bancroft (steel) ... " 183 PAGE Portrait of Asa Fitch 185 " D. V. T. Qua 187 Residence of Mary A. Steele and Son (with portraits) facing 190 View of Salem, N. Y., in 1793 "194 GRAJ.V_J___E. Residence of G. L. Bulkley facing 194 " Mrs. Leonard C. Thorne ... " 197 Portraits of David and Hannah Rogers . . between 198, 199 " Stephen Dillingham, Sr., and Wife " 200, 201 Residence of " " 2d (with portraits) " 200, 201 " Edwin B. Temple (with portraits) " 202, 203 " Truman Temple " " " 202, 203 " L. R. Temple " " . . facing 204 Granville Military Academy, North Granville . .

Chapter I

'July, 1758, had stood on the northernmost peaks of Putnam would have known by the terrifle cannonade that a desperate battle was being fought five miles northward, around the ramparts of Ticonderoga. In the Revolution, the famous fields of battle were still closer. The sentries on the southern line of the town of White Creek, in August, 1777, would have seen close before them, in the valley of the Walloomsac, the rude farmers of New England and New York driving in disastrous rout the disciplined mercenaries of Brunswick and Hesse ; those who, a month later, had stood where the western border of Easton is washed by the placid Hudson, might have watched the red-coated battalions of England on the other shore recoiling before the terrible fire of the Continentals in the first battle of Saratoga ; while those who had stood there on the 12th day of October would have seen those same proud battalions, English and Hessians alike, fleeing before their despised antagonists to the shelter of their intrenehments, and the fate of America decided in favor of independence.

INTRODUCTORY. The .War-Path of America — The Great Battles on its Borders — The Design of this History — Its Arrangement — Books Consulted — Acknowledgments to Individuals. Washington county is the war-path of America. Though other portions of the continent have been the scenes of more terrible conflicts, no other of equal size has been crossed by as many hostile expeditions as the one which is the subject of this history. Occupying as it does the territory between the Hudson and the northern lakes, it has been the ground over which Hurons and Iro quois, Canadians, New Yorkers, and New Englanders, French and English, Continentals and Hessians, have suc cessively passed on their missions of attack and defense, of destruction and of vengeance. Curiously enough, while Washington county is thus emphatically the " war-path" of America, it is not to any considerable extent a battle-ground.

Fortune has so ordered that, while many minor conflicts have taken place within the present limits of the county in question, all the great battles which have made this region famous were fought outside — - but barely outside — of its boundaries. From every one of those battles the roar of cannon could be heard in what is now the county of Washington, and several of them were fought within sight of its territory. To give the public a lull and, so far as possible, an accu rate history of a county which has played so important a part in the history of America is the design of this work. We propose, in the first place, to present a general view of the county's history from the earliest accounts to the pres ent time, showing all the events of general importance or especial interest, following closely the chronological order, confining ourselves to the territory now included in Wash ington county and to the acts of the citizens of that ter ritory, and mentioning outside matters only when necessary to make manifest the connection of those which are especially our theme.

This will be followed by sketches of various societies and other subjects pertaining to the county at large; the whole, thus far, constituting the general history. Had a cordon of sentries been patrolling the boundaries of the county during the eventful quarter of a century which succeeded the great French and English war, some of them would have learned, by eye or ear, of the occurrence of all the important contests for the mastery of this great strategic locality while they were being fought. Those who, in the autumn of 1755, had been guarding the western line of the present towns of Fort Ann and Kingsbury would have heard the thunder of General Johnson's artillery, as he repulsed the columns of Dieskau from the rude breastworks on the shore of Lake George, only four miles to the westward ; those who occupied the same posts two years later might often have stayed their course to listen to the roar of Montcalm's guns, and the more feeble replies of the ill-fated Fort William Henry ; while they who, in While this covers all the time down to the present year, yet it will treat most opiously of the early history, and of the action of Washington county regiments in the recent war, leaving the details and minor circumstances occurring since the era of settlement to be specified in the separate town-histories.

These latter follow the general record, and will portray the ordinary course of events in the various localities — events which the dignified Muse of History has too often neglected, but which are always interesting to McDonald, Hon. Ebenezer MeMurray, and Colonel Solo mon W. Russell, Jr., of Salem; General James C. Rogers, General Thomas J. Strong, Major William H. Kincaid, Major James McCarty, Captain M. S. Teller, and Hon. U. G. Paris, of Sandy Hill ; Mr. Henry McFarland, of Fort Edward ; Colonel Antoine Renois and Mr. L. K. Pierce, of Whitehall; Mr. Lewis R. Harsha, of Argyle; and Mr. William Ladd, of Salem. those who participated in them and to their descendants, and which may be made to contribute to the true knowledge of a nation's life, at least as much as the more sono rous record of stricken battle and legislative conflict.

Interspersed among these town-annals will be found numerous separate sketches of the men and women of the county, both dead and living, while the monotony of the print is broken by portraits, views of residences, public buildings, etc. Certainly no reasonable person can com plain of the amount of information furnished. As to the manner of its presentation, we must leave others to judge. In dealing with the events of two hundred and sixty mo mentous years the compiler has found a difficult task, and if any have expected perfection they will doubtless be dis appointed. To those who can appreciate the labor involved in compiling such a volume — the consultation of books, the harmonizing of conflicting authorities, and the still more difficult task of obtaining the town-histories from the lips of residents — we commend the work for their favorable consideration, and trust it will not be found entirely unsat isfactory.

Thanks, too, are due to the many others, too numerous to be named here, who have furnished aid to the town-his torians in the compilation of their part of the work. The record which has thus been produced from all these numer ous sources, and arranged and embellished with the best skill of the writers and artists, be the same more or less, is now respectfully submitted to the public.

Chapter II. The Advent Op The White Man

Samuel Champlain discovers Lake Champlain — His Companions — Meeting of the Iroquois — Location of the Meeting — Taunts of the Savages — The Battle — Defeat of the Iroquois — Disastrous Results to Canada. The principal books consulted have been Parkman's " Life of Champlain," Smith's " History of New York," Gordon's and Botta's " Histories of the American Revolu tion," the " Documentary and Colonial Histories of New York," Bancroft's " History of the United States," Stone's " Life and Times of Sir William Johnson," Pouchot's " Memoir of the War of 1754," Lossing's " Life of Schuy ler," Sparks' "Lives of Putnam, Stark, and Arnold," Ma dame Riedesel's " Letters," " Memoirs of General Riedesel," " The Sexagenary," Neilson's " Campaign of Burgoyne," Stone's " Campaign of Burgoyne," Mrs. Bonney's " Legacy of Historical Gleanings," Hough's "Northern Invasions," Butler's " Lake George and Lake Champlain," French's " New York Gazetteer," Corey's " Gazetteer of Washing ton County," Childs' " Directory of Washington County," besides numerous manuals, registers, pamphlets, etc. ; and last, not least, Dr. Asa Fitch's " Survey of Washington County, ".published in the " Transactions of the State Agri cultural Society for 1848-49."

As near as can be ascertained, the very first white men who ever entered the territory of the State of New York found their way into the present county of Washington, and within the limits of that county was fought the first combat on New York soil iu which men of Caucasian blood took part. On the fourth day of July, 1609, Samuel Champlain, the adventurous Frenchman who had founded the colony of Canada, discovered and entered the lake which still bears his name. He was accompanied by two Frenchmen and by sixty Huron Indians, whose cause he had espoused, and with whom he was on his way to attack their ancient enemies, the Iroquok. The little army occupied twenty-four canoes, and with these they pushed on swiftly up the lake during the fourth and fifth days of July. Being now arrived in the vicinity of the locality where the Hurons expected to find their foes, the former adopted especial precautions, apparently with a view to surprise the enemy.

They paddled on during the whole night of the fifth, but lay concealed on the shore all day of the sixth. At dusk they again set forth, and at ten o'clock at night discovered a war-party of Iroquois, also in canoes, near the western shore of the lake. The latter immediately went on shore, and with their stone axes began to hew down trees for a fortification, while Champlain and his Hurons remained on the lake. For aid in the task of compiling the general history we are especially indebted to Hon. James Gibson, of Salem, who has devoted much time and attention to the annals of this, his native county, whose pen has been often employed in elucidating its history, and from whom we trust the public may yet receive some permanent historical contribu tion. Scarcely less is our obligation to the ladies in possession of the papers of their distinguished ancestor, Gen eral John Williams, for the privilege of examining those valuable documents, which, admirably arranged in six pon derous volumes, throw more light on the internal, home history of Washington county in early days than can be obtained from any other source.

The courtesy of Mr. Mc- Farland, principal of Salem Academy, in affording the writer frequent and convenient access to the library of that institution, is thankfully remembered. The location of the point of meeting is somewhat doubtful, but the weight of evidence is that it was in what is now the town of Putnam, in the county of Washington. It is true a map made to illustrate Champlain's travels, but not drawn by him, represents the meeting and subsequent conflict to have taken place just north of Ticonderoga, but this is contradicted by Champlain's own account, which says that he saw the waterfall of Ticonderoga and the out let of Lake George. The time, too, that the Indians spent on Lake Champlain, aud the great length which the narra- We also beg leave to acknowledge the aid given to the general history through special contributions and personal reminiscences by Dr. Asa Fitch and Dr. John Lambert, of Salem; Rev. Seth C. Carey, of Massachusetts ; Hon. John tor assigns it (one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and fifty miles), both go to. show that the invaders were brought to a halt considerably south, rather than north, of Ticonderoga.

At all events it would not do to ignore so important an event, which might have taken place in Wash ington county. balls ; the chiefs of the enemy had been pointed out to him, and he was expected to take the brunt of the fighting. Suddenly the line of Hurons divided in the middle, and the bold Frenchman, arquebuse in hand, advanced into the view of the astonished Iroqnois. The latter halted, the chiefs clustered together, and all gazed iu wonder at the white face, dark beard, flashing armor and curious weapons of their new foe. The Huron line closed up in the rear, and Champlain continued his onward course until he stopped within thirty paces of the Iroqnois chiefs. Then, at length, the latter started from their stupor and fitted their arrows to their bows, determined to test the prowess of the strange intruders.

Seeing this movement, Champlain at once lifted his arquebuse, aimed at one of the chiefs, and fired. Not only the warrior at whom he aimed but one of the other chiefs fell dead before the shot, and one of the Iroqnois in the rear was mortally wouuded. The Hurons remained on the lake, according to Cham plain's narrative, while the Iroqnois built their rude barri cade of trees, the former keeping their canoes alongside each other, and fastened to poles, so that they could all fight together if they should be attacked. When all was ready they sent two canoes towards the shore, whose occu pants hailed the enemy and asked them if they wished to fight. The latter promptly replied in the affirmative, but advised a postponement of the conflict until daylight. The Hurons agreed, and the remainder of the night was spent by both parties in singing, dancing, and abusing each other.

In the latter amusement both parties were great proficients. This was, so far as known, the first time that the sound of firearms was heard within the present limits of the State of New York ; the first time that blood was shed by a white man within those boundaries. Nay, if we except the doubtful account of the entry of Jean Verrazzani into the harbor of New York city in 1523, Champlain and his com panions were the very first Europeans to set foot within the Empire State. They were the pioneers of civilization, though probably the Iroqnois did not look on them in that " You Huron dogs are cowards," the Iroqnois would shout from their barricade of logs ; " how dare you come against the Hedonosaunee ? Have we not whipped you often before?" " We will show you Mingo squaws what we are," the Hurons would reply.

" You have beaten us sometimes when you had two to one, but you dare not fight us man to man ; and now we will whip you, even if you have the most." light. " The scalps of the Hurons hang thick in our lodges ; our squaws and children play with them every day. Soon they will play with yours ; you cannot stand before our The Hurons, when they saw the execution done by their foreign champion, rent the skies with their exultant yells, and sent volley aster volley of arrows among their foes. The latter were appalled by the apparently supernatural flash and report, and the fearful death of their leaders ; but for a few moments they kept their places and responded vigorously to the arrows of the Hurons. Many were wounded on both sides by these feeble weapons, but none were killed. Ere Champlain could reload his arquebuse one of his companions, who had crept up in the bushes, fired another shot, and another of the Iroqnois warriors fell dead in his tracks.

Then the braves of the Hedonosaunee, who had triumphed over half the native tribes of America, lost their courage in presence of these incomprehensible disasters and fled into the forest, the French and Hurons pursuing them with shouts and yells, inflicting death upon sev eral of the fugitives and capturing ten or twelve prisoners. arms." " Oh, ho !" would scream an indiscreet Huron, " your arms will be worthless before those which we have. We have weapons you have never seen before. You will fall before them as if the Great Spirit had stricken you with his lightning." And thus with boasts and taunts, with shouts and screams, with plentiful repetitions of the epithets " dog," " coward," " slave," and " squaw," the summer night passed swiftly away. At daylight on the seventh Champlain's party went ashore, the French being clad in light coats of mail and armed with arquebuses, while their Huron allies were re splendent in war-paint and feathers, and were equipped with bows, arrows, and tomahawks ; some of the latter being of stone and some of iron, fashioned in the forges of France.

The wounded Iroqnois were carried off by their compan ions. Fifteen or sixteen of the Hurons were also wounded by the arrows of their enemies ; but their injuries appear to have been very slight, for Champlain says they were " promptly cured." Aster the victory the Hurons seized on the abandoned provisions and arms of the Iroqnois, de voted three hours to singing, dancing, and feasting in honor of their triumph, and then, in company with their French friends, turned the prows of their canoes toward their northern homes. Seeing the apparent weakness of the invaders, the Iro qnois lest their barricade, two hundred strong, and advanced slowly in line toward the foe, their bows and arrows in their hands, their faces hideously painted, their heads adorned with crests of gaudy feathers, and the bodies of at least a portion of them protected with arrow-proof armor, made of strips of wood fastened together with cotton thread.

In front of them marched three chiefs, whose rank was denoted by the exceeding loftiness of their plumes, and the greater hideousness (if that were possible) of their war-paint, but who were in other lespects attired and armed like their followers. Champlain's French companions and a few of the Hurons went into the bushes, while the main body marched rapidly in line toward the Iroqnois, with their white leader. The latter had loaded his arquebuse with four Such was the first meeting of the French and the Iro quois. It reads more like murder than does ordinary war. The taking part by the French in an aggressive movement in which they had no concern, the slaughter of the unsus pecting Iroqnois with weapons to them unknown and inviu cible, the needless destruction of the frightened fugitives, part of Lake Champlain, and on the west by Lake George, that sparkling, island-gemmed, mountain-bound sheet of water, the beauty of which is renowned throughout the continent.

The mountain range which occupies the pen insula — and of which the highest peak (Black mountain) is two thousand eight hundred and seventy-eight feet above tide-water — is separated from the rest of the county by a remarkable depression, through most of which Wood creek runs, and which extends southwesterly from the head of Lake Champlain to the banks of the Hudson, at Fort Ed ward, forming a natural pathway for the armies which successively marched to the north and the south on their missions of invasion. all give to this exploit a character of peculiar and revolting ruthlessness. And most disastrous was it to the French. They had made enemies of the most powerful native confederation this side of Mexico. Attacks on both sides soon deepened and fixed their hatred, and for a hundred and fifty years the people of Canada, by the sight of their blazing dwellings, by the shrieks of their slaughtered women, by the sound of the savage war-whoop, by the death-shots falling thick and fast among their devoted soldiery, were taught to rue the cruel rashness of the brilliant adventurer who devoted the colony he had founded to the vengeance of the Hedonosaunee.

Nay, it is not improbable that the power of the Iroquois, by retarding the settlement of Canada, turned the scale between the French and the English, and that the final expulsion of the former power from this part of Amer ica was indirectly due to the raid of Champlain into Wash ington county in July, 1C09. Where this depression spreads out into the broad plain around Fort Edward and Sandy Hill, the Hudson comes rippling down from its source in the Adirondack wilds, turns something more than a right angle, and runs thence nearly due south along all the rest of the western border of the county. East of this are no less than three ranges of hills, all running northeast and southwest, with parallel valleys between. The first consists of the highlands of the present towns of Easton, Greenwich, Argyle, Hartford, Granville, Hampton, and the eastern part of Whitehall.

Through this breaks the Batten Kill ; its branches, the White creek and Black creek, dividing the first from the second ridge. The latter constitutes the high ground of Cambridge, west Jack son, and the eastern part of Salem and Hebron. This again is separated by the Owl Kill from the third range, only a small part of. which is in Washington county, where it occupies the eastern part of the towns of White Creek and Jackson. Poultney and Pawlet rivers, flowing from the highlands of Vermont into Lake Champlain, drain the northeastern part of the county, and the Hoosic, on its way to the Hudson, forms a part of its southern boundary.

Chapter III. The Situation

The Era of our History's OpeniDg — The Territory which is our Subject — Its Location — Its Geographical Features— -Its Trees and Animals— Its Owners in 1609 — -Prehistoric Traditions. At the time our history opens (July, 1609), America had been discovered but a hundred and seventeen years. It Was seventy-five years since Cartier had sailed up the great river St. Lawrence, but it was only six since Champlain had planted a permanent colony on its shores ; and it was but three years since the colonists of Jamestown had founded the first settlement in the United States. It was not till two months later that Henry Hudson, with his crew of Dutch and English, sailed up the river which still perpetuates his memory, and, as is generally but incorrectly sup posed, became the pioneer discoverer of the Empire State ; and it was eleven years later ere the Pilgrim Fathers landed on the rock-bound coast of Plymouth.

All these ridges and valleys were at the beginning of our history covered with a heavy growth of oak, ash, elm, beech, maple, and other common American trees, while occasional groves of lofty pine shaded some of the streams with their evergreen verdure. Here, the deer, the bear, the wolf, and the panther all had their lairs, while the deadly rattlesnake coiled among the rocks beneath, and the screaming eagle soared high in air over lake and river, vale and mountain peak. The geology and natural history of the county will be treated in separate chapters, by a gentleman especially qualified for the task, and we do not desire to trench upon his province. We merely wish to give a rough idea of the territory where we are, in imagination, to dwell for two hun dred and seventy years. As it is the territory now forming the county of Wash ington which is to be the theme of our story, a brief delinea tion of its boundaries and description of its surface will aid in giving the necessary distinctness and individuality to the subject, especially during the long period between the first appearance of the white man and the formation of the actual county of Washington.

The district under consideration extends from latitude forty-two degrees and fifty-four minutes north to latitude forty-three degrees and forty-seven minutes, — a distance of no less than sixty-one miles. It lies between longitude three degrees and ten minutes and longitude three degrees and twenty-one minutes east from Washington, its width for forty miles from its southern boundary being almost ex actly eighteen miles. The remainder of the county dimin ishes northward from nine to four miles in width. The area of the whole is eight hundred and thirty square miles. The narrow northern section just mentioned, comprising the present towns of Putnam and Dresden, is composed mostly of a high rocky ridge, bordered on the east by a Ion", narrow stretch of water and marsh, now called the southern That territory was undoubtedly, in 1609, under the con trol of the easternmost tribe of the Iroquois, the fierce and restless Mohawlcs.

They never have had a permanent res idence there since the country became known to the white man, and there is no reason to suppose they ever had. They may have employed it as a hunting-ground, or they may, as in later years, have abandoned it to the use of their tributaries, the Mohicans of western Massachusetts. Such was the situation in 1609. Of the prehistoric a«-e little need be said, for nothing is known, and there is hardly any ground even for reasonable inference. Dim tradition asserts that the Iroquois were driven out of the territory now called Canada by the Hurons; that they located in central New York, and by means of their pecu liar federation became stronger than their conquerors, with whom they waged ceaseless war. The only certainty is that when Champlain came to Canada, in 1603, he found a bitter feud in existence between the Hurons and their southern rivals, and was informed that such had been the case as far back as Indian knowledge ran.

Doubtless the glades and hillsides of Washington county had many a time and oft resounded with the fierce war-whoop of Huron and Mohawk, and its soil was stained with the blood of these savage foemen, as they met on the great natural war-path which is the subject of our history. But they left no memorial of their deeds, and we turn without regret from the shadowy domain of tradition to the historic path way beginning in 1609, at first dim, but gradually growing plainer and broader as it is successively trodden by hunters, soldiers, pioneers, farmers, mechanics, merchants, by busy citizens of all classes and occupations, and sweeps onward down to this year of grace, eighteen hundred and seventy eight. Netherlands were conquered by the English, and granted by King Charles the Second to his brother, the Duke of York (from whom the province was called New York), the Iroqnois transferred their friendship to the new owners of the province, and still continued their warfare against the French.

In January, 1666, a French officer, Monsieur de Cour celles, set forth with four hundred French troops and two hundred Canadians, designing to iuflict a severe blow on the Iroqnois. Shod with snow-shoes and muffled with furs, every officer and man carrying thirty pounds of biscuit, be sides his arms and ammunition, and accompanied by sledges loaded with supplies and drawn by dogs, the little army made its toilsome way on the ice to the head of Lake Champlain, and thence trudged through the forest to the vicinity of Schenectady, suffering terrible hardships from the excessive cold. There a part of the force was am bushed by the Mohawks, and about the middle of February all the remainder came hastening back to Lake Champlain, down which, half frozen and starved, they made their pain ful way back to Canada.