Landmarks of Steuben County, New York

Preface

In the preparation of this historical and biographical record earlier works bearing on the history of this section of the State have been consulted, and also many original sources of information. A careful review of the work, from beginning to end, disclose? the fact that more than two thousand persons have been interviewed in the quest of authentic data, hence it cannot be assumed that the present volume is a mere compilation from previous jiuhlications. 'i'he work is now ])la(jed before the people of the county, and the editor, writers and ])ublishers have no apology to make, believing none is needed. At the same time they have not the temerity to claim this to be a faultless volume, but assert for it reasonable and substantial accuracy. The arrangement of the subject of the county's history will be found novel, yet convenient and interesting.

The editor and the writers take this opportunity to express thanks for generous as.sistance on the part of the best informed men of the region, and the publishers also acknowledge a debt of gratitude to the public spirited citizens of the county at large for the hearty support that has made the work possible.

Chapter I

County Organizations — Albany — Tryou — Montgomery — Ontario — Steuben- Claims to Pre-historic Occupation — Early Discoveries and Explorations- The French— The Dutch— The English

CHAPTKR II.

French and English Rivalry — The Indian Occupation — Iroquois Confederacy — The Senecas — The Jesuit Fathers among the Indians — Events Precedingand During the French and English Wars — Overthrow of French Power in America — The Delaware Village near Canisteo i]

Chapter III

Events Preceding the Revolution — Pontiac's League — Action of the Senecas — The Revolutionary War — Sullivan's Campaign — Brief Reference to the Indian History and Antiquities of Steuben County.. _ 14

CHAPTER I\'.

After the Revolution — An Era of Peace — Controversy between Massachusetts and New York — The Hartford Convention — The Phelps and Gorham Purchase — The Lessee Companies — Settlement of Difficulties — The Surveys — Sale to Robert Morris — The Pulteney Association — Charles Williamson — Foundation of Land Titles in Steuben County — The Anti-Rent Conflict. . . •i(\

Chapter V

Division of Montgomery County — Creation of Ontario and Steuben Counties — Brief Allusion to Baron Steuben — His Life and Services — The Original Territory of Steuben County Divided into Towns — First County Officers — County Buildinys — Second Jury District — Steuben County Civil List M vi CONTENTS.

BIOGRAPHICAL.

Part III. Indexes

Historical

Biojjraphies

l-'aniily Sketches.

Portraits

CONTKNTS. vii

CHAPTER XVIl.

Cities, Villages and Hamlets. .,4;;

CIl.\I''|-i:i< .Will.

Cities, Villages and Hamlets. . q()o

CHAPTER XIX.

Cities, Villagesand Hamlets .j.,.^

CHAPTER XX.

Cities, Villages and Hamlets

ClIAl'TER XXI.

1-70

507 514 515 529

LANDMARKS

OF

STEUBEN COUNTY.

Chapter I

County Organizations— Albany— Tyron — Montgomery — Ontario — Steuben — Claims to Pre-historic Occupation — Early Discoveries and Exjjlorations — The French — The Dutch— The English.

The State of New York, for the purpose of more conveniently administrating the affairs of local government, is divided by law into counties, and the latter are further subdivided into towns. Municipal governments, Hkewise, are provided for cities and villages, securing to them separate officers and tribunals for the management of their peculiar affairs, and other privileges, varying with their respective charters. Under the Dutch dominion the only divisions were the city and towns. Counties were erected, for the first time, by the act of 1683, and were twelve in number, Albany being farthest west in the colony of New York and in its jurisdiction extending over the region now of Steuben county, although no civilized occupancy was then known in this part of the province.

Tryon county was erected in '1772, from Albany, and comprised the country west of a north and south line extending from St. Regis to the west bounds of the town of Schenectady; thence running irregularly southwest to the head of the Mohawk branch of the Delaware, and along the same to the southwest bounds of the present county of Broome; thence in a northwesterly direction to Fort Bull, on Wood Creek, near the present village of Rome. All the region west of the 1 line last mentioned was Indian territory, unoccupied by the wiiites, except incidentally, and not subject to county jurisdiction.

On the 27th day of Januarj-, 1789 (after the close of the Revolution, and after the settlement of the controversy between the States of Massachusetts and New York, growing out of conflicting grants and charters by the cfown), the county of Tyron, then known, however, as Montgomery, was divided, and that part of the State which had been ceded to IMassaciiusetts, so far as the pre-emption right was concerned, was erected into a separate county by the name of Ontario; and from the latter, on March S, 1796, the count} of Steuben was formed and thereafter duly organized.

The history of Steuben county properly begins with the time of its creation, and a narrative of the events of the territory within its boundaries, previous to such erection, must be associated with the history of the older counties of whicli it once formed a part. In fact the aboriginal occupation of this region is inseparably connected with that of the whole Phelps and Gorham purchase, and is auxiliary to though not co-extensive with it.

The claim has been made on the part of many well-informed persons that there have been found in various localities in Steuben county evidences of a pre- historic occupation; that there have been discovered certain relics and implements of peculiar construction the like of which are now unknown, and that they must have been left by a race of people different from the red sons of the forest, the period of whose occupancy long antedated the coming of the ancestors of the famed Iroquois. Tins claim, in the writer's view, is a mistaken one True, there have been unearthed tools and utensils which were never in common use among the Indians, but we must remember that the Jesuits and their followers traversed this region more than a century and a half before any civilized white settlement was made; and we must also remember that the crude and to us unaccountable implements were then in the hands of comparative ancients, and were the product of a period in which was known but little of the mechanical arts as we see and understand and use them at the present time. None of the Indian tribes had a tratlition that run to the time of the Mound builders, and while there may be ill-dcfined outline possibilities of such a presence from which the student of arcluuology may theorize on this subject, we see nothing

EARLY DISCOVERIES. 3

in the claim referred to wliich is inconsistent with the modern theory of continuous Indian occupation.

Four hundred years ago the first Spanish adventurers landed on the shores of the American continent. S;iih'ng under the patronage of Spain, Cliristopher Columbus, the Genoese, in 1492 made his wonderful discoveries, an event generally designated as the discovery of America, although the first Europeans to visit the western hemisphere were Scandinavians, who colonized Iceland in A. D. 875, Greenland in 983, and about the year 1000 had cruised soutluvard as far as the Massachusetts coast.

During the ages tliat preceded these events, no grander country in every point of view ever waited the approach of civilization. With climate and soil diversified between the most remote extremes ; w ith thousands of miles of ocean shores indented by magnificent harbors to welcome the world's commerce ; with many of the largest river.s of the globe draining its territory and forming natural highways for commerce ; with a system of lakes so immense in area as to entitle them to the name of inland seas; with mountains, hills and valleys laden with the richest minerals and almost exhaustless fuel ; and with scenery unsurpassed for grandeur, it needed only the Caucasian to transform a wilderness inhabited only by savages into the free, enlightened republic, which is to day the wonder and glory of the civilized world.

Following close upon the discoveries of Columbus and other earl)' explorers, various foreign powers fitted out fleets and commissioned navigators to establish colonies in the vast but unknown continent. These events, however, will be briefly treated in this work, and only those will be mentioned which had at least an indirect bearing upon our subject.

In I 508, Aubert discovered tile St. Lawrence Rivei, and 1524, Francis I, king of France, sent Jean Verrazzani on a voyage of expl(, ration to the new world. He entered a harbor, supposed to have been that of New York, where he remained fifteen daj's ; and it is believed that his crew were the first Europeans to land on the soil of what is now the State of New York. The Gallic explorer cruised along the coast about 2,100 miles, sailing as far north as Labrador, and giving to the whole region the name of " New France " — a name by which the French possessions in America were ever known during the dominion of that power. In 1534 the same king sent Jacques Cartier to the country, and he made two voyages, on the second bein<^ accompanied with a number of French nobihty, all of whom were filled with high hopes. and bearing the blessings of the church. This party was determined upon the colonization of the country, but, after passing a severe winter at the Isle of Orleans, abandoned their scheme and returned to France. As a beginning of the long list of needless and shameful betrayals, treacheries and other abuses to which the too confiding natives were subjected, Cartier inveigled into his vessel an Indian chief who had been his generous host, and bore him with several others into hopeless captivity and final death.

Cartier again visited New France in 1540, but no further attempts in the same direction were made until about 1589, when the region, particularly its Canadian portion, was made a place of banishment for French convicts; but even thii scheme failed, and it remained for private enterprise to make the first successful effort toward the permanent occupation of the country. The real discoverer and founder of a permanent colony in New France was Samuel de Champlain, a man born with that uncontrollable instinct of investigation and desire for knowledge of distant regions which has always so strongly characterized all great explorers. His earlier adventures in this country have no connection with this work, and it is therefore sufficient to merely mention that in 1608 he was sent to the country and founded Quebec.

To satisfy his love for exploration, Champlain united with the Canadian Indians and marched into the unknown country to the southward, and the result was the discovery of the lake that bears his name. The party also invaded the land of the Mohawks, in the country of the Iroquois, and a conflict followed between the Algonquins, aided by Champlain, and a portion of the Iroquois, in which the latter were defeated with the loss of two of their chiefs, who fell by the hands of Champlain himself.

Thus was signalized the first hostile meeting between the white man and the Indian. Low as the latter was found in the scale of intelligence and humanity, and terrible as were many of the subsequent deeds of the Iroquois, it cannot be denied that their early treatment could foster in the savage breast any other feeling than that of bitterest hostility. It seems like a pathetic page of romance to read Champlain's statement

CONFLICTING GRANTS. r,

that "The Iroquois are greatly astonished, seeing two men killed so instantaneouslj'," one of whom was their chief; wliile the ingenuous acknowledgment of the Frenchman, " I had put four balls into my arquebus," is a vivid testimony of how little mercy the Iroquois nation were to expect from their northern enemies and the pale-faced race which was eventually to drive them from their domain. It was an age, however, in which inii^ht was appealed to as right more frequently than in later years, and the planting of the lowly banner of the Cross was frequently preceded by bloody conquests. It is in the light of the prevailing custom of the old world in Champlain's time that we must view his ready hostility to the Indian.

Let us also turn briefly to other events which have had an indirect bearing on the settlement of this part of the country. A few weeks after the battle between Champlain and the Indians, Henry Hudson, a navigator in the service of the Dutch East India Company, anchored his ship (The Half-moon) at the mouth of the river which now bears his name. This took place September 5, 1609. He met the savages and was hospitably received by them ; but before his departure he subjected them to an experimental knowledge of the effects of intoxicating liquor — an experiment perhaps more baneful in its results than that inflicted by Champlain with his new and murderous weai)()n. Hudson ascended the river to a point within less than a hundred miles of that reached by Champlain, then returned to Europe, and, through the information he had gained, soon afterward established a Dutch colony, for which a charter was granted in 1614, naming the region "New Netherlands."

The Dutch dominion, however, was of brief duration. Indian hostilities were provoked through the illatlvised action of Governor Kieft, whose official career continued for about ten years, being superseded by Peter Stuyvesant in May, 1647. The latter was the last of the Dutch governors, and his firm and equitable policy had the effect of harmonizing the discontent existing among the Indians. On the 12th of March, 1664. however, Charles II of England granted by letters patent to his brother James, the Duke of York, all the country from the River St. Croix to the Kennebec in Maine, together with all the land from the west bank of the Connecticut River to the east side of Delaware Bay. The duke sent an English squadron to secure the

6 LANDMARKS OP' STEUBEN COUNTY.

gift, and on the 8th of September following, Governor Stuyvesant capitulated, being constrained to that course by the Dutch colonists, who preferred peace, with the same privileges and liberties accorded to the English colonists, rather than a prolonged and perhaps uncertain contest. The English changed the name of New Amsterdam to New York, and thus ended the Dutch dominion in America.

Meanwhile, in 1607, the English had made tlicir first permanent settlement at Jamestown, Va., and in 1620 planted their liistoric colony at Plymouth Rock. These two colonies became the successful rivals of all others in that strife which finally left them masters of the country.

On the discoveries and colonizations thus brief!)- noted, three great European powers based claims to a part of the territory embraced in the State of New York; first, England, by the reason of the discovery of John Cabot, who sailed under commission from Henry VII, and on the 24th of June, 1 497, reached the coast of Labrador, also that made in the following year by his son Sebastian, who explored the same coast from New Foundland to Florida, claiming a territory eleven degrees in width and indefinitely extending westward; second, France, from the discoveries of Verrazzani, claiming a portion of the Atlantic coast, and also (under the title of New France) an almost boundless region westivard ; tiiird, Holland, which based on Hudson's discoveries a claim to the entire country from Cape Cod to the southern shore of Delaware Bay.

CHAPTER n.

French and English Rivalry — The Indian Occupation — Iroquois Confederacy — The Senecas- The Jesuit Fathers Among the Indians— Events Preceding and During the French and English Wars— Overthrow of French Power in America — The Delaware Village near Canisteo.

After the final overthrow of the Dutch in the New Netherlands, the region now included within the State of New York was still held and claimed by three powers — one native and two foreign The main colonies of the French (one of the powers referred to) were in the Canadas, but through the zeal of the Jesuit missionaries their line of

INDIAN OCCUPATION. 7

possessions had been extended south and west of the St. Lawrence, and some attempts at colonization had been made, but as yet witli onlypartial success. Indeed, as early as 1620, the Jesuit fathers labored among the Senecas in this re<^ion. and evidences are not wanting to show that missionaries carried the banner of the Cross into what is now Steuben county. In the southern and eastern portion of the province granted to the Uuke of York were the English, who with steady yet sure advances were pressing settlement and civilization westward, gradually neariiig the French possessions.

The French and luiglish were at this time, and also for many years afterwards, conflicting [)Owers, each studying for the mastery on both sides of the Atlantic ; and with each succeeding outbreak of war in the mother countries, so tiiere were renewed hostilities between their American colonies. Directly between the possessions of the French and the territory of the English lay the lands of the famous Iroquois Confederacy then more commonly known as the Five Nations. By the French they were called " Iroquois," but by the Dutch they were known as " Maquas," while the English called them "Mingoes;" but however variously they may have been designated, they were a race of savages whose peculiar organization, prowess on the field of battle, loyalty to friends, as well as barbarous revenge upon enemies, together with eloquent speech and stoical endurance of torture, have surprised all who are conversant with their history.

When, during the latter part of the fifteenth and early part of the sixteenth centur\-, the foreign navigators visited the American continent, they found it in possession of two formidable races of savages, between whom there was no unity ; and yet while open hostility was suppressed, they were nevertheless in a constant state of disquiet, each being jealous of the other and at the same time doubtful of its own strength and fearful of the results of a general war. One of the nations occupied the region of the larger rivers of Pennsylvania, and also that on the south and west To the Europeans they were known as the " Delaware?," but styled themselves " Lenni Lenapes," meaning " Original People." The other nation occupied, principall)-, the territory which afterwards formed the State of New York, and is known in history as the " Iroquois Confederac)'," or the hive (and subsequentlj ) the Six Nations.

The confederacy originally comprised five nations, which were located from east to west across the territory which now forms our State, beginning with the Mohawks on the extreme east, the Oneidas next, and the Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas following in the order named. Each of the nations was divided into five tribes, and all were united in common league. The Senecas occupied the territory west of the lake named from them, and were the guardians of the western door of the "Long House," from which we correctly infer that they were the most numerous and likewise most formidable in battle of any of the confederates.

The government of this remarkable confederacy was exercised through councils, and in the peculiar blending of their individual, tribal and national interests lay the secret of the immense power which for more than a century resisted the hostile efforts of the French, which caused them for nearly a century to be alike courted and feared by the contending French and English colonies, and which enabled them to subdue the neighboring Indian tribes, until they became really the dictators of the continent, gaining indeed the title of "The Romans of the New World." There is, however, a difference in the opinions of writers as to the true military status of the Iroquois. In the forest they were a terrible foe, while in the open country they could not successfully contend with disciplined soldiery ; but they made up for this deficiency, in a large degree, by their self-confidence, vindictiveness and insaitable desire for ascendency and triumph.

While the Iroquois were undoubtedly superior in mental capacity and more provident than their Canadian enemies, and other tribes, there is little indication that they were inclined to improve the condition in which they were found by the Europeans. They, and especially the Senecas, were closely attached to their warrior and hunter life, and devoted their energies to the lower, if not the lowest forms of enjoyment and gratification. Their dwellings, even among the more stationary tribes, were rude, their food coarse and poor, and their domestic habits and surroundings unclean and barbarous. Their women were degraded into mere beasts of burden, and while they believed in a Supreme Being, they were powerfully swayed by superstition, by incantations, by medicine men, dreams and visions, and their feasts were exhibitions of debauchery and gluttony.

^ffra^i/y^^iJ^

THE JESUITS. 9

Such, according to the writer's sincere belief, were some of the more prominent characteristics of the race encountered by Champlain when he came into the Iroquois country nearly three centuries ago, and welcomed them with the first volley of bullets, a policy that was pursued by all his civilized successors. It is not denied that the Indians possessed a few redeeming traits, but they were so strongly dominated by their barbarous manner of life, that years of faithful missionary labor by the Jesuits and others were productive of but very little real benefit. It may be added that whatever is true of any one of the Five Nations, or (as they became in 17 12) the Si.x Nations, is equally true of all others. The Senecas occupied the region of Western New York, and it is with them that we have particularly to deal in this narrative. They were, perhaps, as peaceful and domestic as some others of the confederacy, yet all the early efforts for their civilization and conversion to Christianity were unsatisfactory and discouraging. No strong, controlling influence for good was ever obtained among them previous to the time of Sir William Johnson, and even then it is doubtful whether they were not moved more by the power of purchase than by love of right.

When Champlain opened the way for French dominion in America the task of planting Christianity among the Indians was assigned to the Jesuits, a name derived from the Societ)- of Jesus, founded by Ignatius Loyola in 1539; but while their primary object was to spread the gospel, their secondary and scarcely less important purpose was to extend the French dominion. In 1736 Canada was restored to F"rance, and within three years from that date there were fifteen Jesuits in the province. They increased rapidly and extended their influence to a large number of Indian nations in the far west, but more particularly to the Mohawks and Senecas, they being the more powerful tribes of the Iroquois, and holding positions of influence in the confederacy. Still, energetic as they were, the French carefully avoided for a longtime any close contact with the Senecas, and while the Jesuits came to the region about 1620, it was not until 1640 that Fathers Breboeuf and Chaumonot succeeded in establishing a foothold among them. In 1667 Wentworth Greenhalgh, an Englishman, visited the Indians, counted their villages and inhabitants. He reported the Senecas as having one thousand warriors, and the confederacy [^about twenty- si.x hundred. 2

10 LANDMARKS 01 STEUBEN COUNTY.

However, in 1669, under the influence of La Salle, the Seneca country was thoroughly explored, and in 1678 the same adventurous Frenchman was commissioned by Louis XIV to discover and occupy the western part of New France, to build forts and defenses, though at his own expense, being granted in return the right to trade in furs and skins. Under La Salle's authority, Father Hennepin, the famous priest and historian, visited the Seneca country, and from his record has come the greater portion of all that has been written by later authorities on the subject of Seneca history and tradition.

For a period of nearly half a century after the discoveries of La Salle the French maintained a nominal though not substantial ascendency in this region of country. They gained favor with a few of the Senecas, but the great body of the tribe, true to their league, were little inclined to forget, much less to forgive, the wrongs done by Champlain, and every movement of the French was watched with suspicious interest During this period the Iroquois invaded Canada and plundered Montreal, and in retaliation Denonville visited vengeance upon the Seneca country in 1687, burned the villages and destroyed much property. This victory was a great achievement for the French, for it gave them a strong foo>- hold in the lake region and made them for the time masters of the country, and the Indians concentrated their population in the eastern part of their domain. This advantage, however, was only temporary, and upon the withdrawal of the French troops the Senecas repossessed their former territory.

Repeated invasions by the French and Canadian Indians at last awakened the English colonists to the conviction that they must unite in an effort against the enemy, and accordingly a convention was held in New York in 1600, at which it was resolved to combine their strength for the subjugation of Canada; but through lack of efficient organization the expedition for the first year was a failure. During this period, known as the English revolution, the Iroquois continued their incursions against the French and were perhaps more dreaded than the English. The Jesuits were driven from the Seneca country and for many years abandoned the field through fear of the thoroughly maddened Indians.

The war was terminated bj' the treaty of Ryswick, in 1697, and while it established a peace between the French and English, it practically

GROWTH OF FRENCH INFLUENCE. U

left unsettled the status of the Iroquois, and there were no certain provisions concerning the land of the Seiiecas, which were directly in dispute between the contending nations. Both claimed sovereignty over the whole Iroquois country, and treaty indentures were offered in support of the claims of each ; but the Iroquois themselves repudiated alike the claims of Yonondio and Corlear, as they denominated the respective governors of Canada and New York. When France disputed the claims of luiglatid and appealed to the council at Onondaga, a stern, savage orator exclaimed: "We have ceded our lands to no one; we hold them of heaven alone." Thus the powers wrangled over the country which was but a little time before the undisputed domain of the Iroquois.

Whether much importance should attach to the treaties in which these untutored savages were pitted against the intelligent Europeans, either French or Englisii, is questionable, and especially so when we consider the methods often adopted in later years to induce the Indians to sign away their domain. Be this as it may, it is now generally believed that in the intrusion of France upon the possessions of the Iroquois, " at the sacrifice of so much blood and treasure, justice and the restraints and faith of the treaties were subordinate to the lust of power and expediency." (Watson.)

On the accession of Anne to the British throne as successor to King William, in March, 1702, what was known as Queen Anne's War was soon begun. It continued until the treaty of Utrecht, April 11, 1713, but though felt in the colonies, the province of New York fortunately escaped its bloody consequences. During this conflict, the Iroquois maintained a strict neutrality, thus gaining the respect of the contending governments. The French, however, profited by this neutrality, and were given an opportunity to strengthen their line of positions and fortifications. Moreover, being at peace with the Iroquois, their missionaries and political leaders visited the Indians in safety, and the result was a friendly relation between them and the Senecas and a portion of the Cayugas. So firmly indeed did the wily F"rench emissaries ingratiate themselves into the Seneca confidence that the latter were nearly persuaded to take u[) arms against the English, and only the wonderful power of the bond of union existing in the confederacy restrained them.

Tlie encroachments by the French upon the territory of the Enghsh and their alHes (the Iroquois), was one of the chief causes of the so-called French and Indian War. As early as the year 173 i, the surveyorgeneral of the Canadas made extensive surveys of the region claimed to be New France, and on the early French maps were shown some of the important streams and localities now within the county of Steuben. The territory was divided into vast tracts, and granted as " seigniories'' to various proprietors, as rewards for service to the crown, or for other consideration.

While the French were in possession of New France their influence over all the Indians within its limits became paramount, and they at last disputed with the English the alliance of the latter with the Iroquois. WHether due to the influence of Joncaire, or to some other cause, is not fully known, but the French succeeded in lodging themselves firmly in the affections of the Senecas, and while they were poor colonizers their missionaries possessed the peculiar faculty of ready assimilation with the savage and half-civilized races, thus gaining an influence over them. The efforts of Joncaire were materially aided by his half-breed sons. Chabert and Clauzonne.

Among the earlier Jesuits and French emissaries among the Iroquois, some of whom visited the Seneca country, were Fathers Breboeuf, Chaumonot, who have been mentioned, and also Fathers Bablon, Isaac Jogues, Simon Le Moyne, Francis Joseph Bressani, Julien Garnier, Jacques Fremin, Jean Perron, Francis Boniface, Father Hennepin and Francis Vaillant de Gueslis. These were followed in later years by such noble and wholly unselfish workers as Talbot, Henry Barclay, John Oglivie, Spencer, Timothy Woodbridge, Gideon Hawley, Eleazer Wheelock, Samuel Kirkland, Bishop Hobart, Eleazer Williams, Dan Barnes (Methodist), and others of less distinction, all of whom labored faithfully for the conversion of the Indians. All, however, were forced to admit that their efforts as a whole were unsatisfactorj- and discouraging ; and even subsequent eftbrts to establish education and Christianity among the Indians, while yielding perhaps sufficient results to justify their prosecution, have constantly met with discouraging obstacles.