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OHIO 
 Archaeological and Historical 
 
 PUBLICATIONS. 
 
 BIG BOTTOM AND ITS HISTORY. 
 
 CLEMENT L. MARTZOLFF. 
 
 The history of Big Bottom has no claim on being unique, 
 unless the recent action of Mr. 
 Obadiah Brokaw, in erecting a 
 monument at his own expense 
 to mark the site of the block- 
 house can demand such dis- 
 tinction. The events con- 
 nected with this historic 
 ground are decidedly type 
 studies. Its early history is 
 but representative of and 
 part of that general conflict 
 between the Indian and the 
 white man. Its later history 
 typifies what ought to be done 
 with all the similar sites in 
 Ohio. 
 
 The history of Big Bottom 
 can therefore be divided into 
 two distinct periods, separated 
 by an interval of one hundred 
 and fifteen years. The first 
 story of Big Bottom is a 
 chapter in the narrative of the 
 conquest of America. It 
 forms one step in the onward 
 march of the intrepid Anglo- 
 Saxon as he pushed toward the setting sun 
 Vol. XV— 1. (1) 
 
 MONUMENT ON SITE OF BIG BOTTOM 
 M.'KSS.A.CRE. 
 
 It also exemplifies 
 

 2 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 how that step was arrested and where the conquerer was for the 
 time the conquered. 
 
 As an historical factor, one Indian battle or massacre is about 
 as important as another. They all tell to the student of history 
 the same truth. We only repeat it that men may see its uni- 
 versality and "lest we forget." 
 
 It was indeed fortunate for our Ohio "Forefathers" that 
 when the "Second ^Mayflower" came to the mouth of the Mus- 
 kingum, Fort Harmar was already there and that from behind her 
 walls, would belch forth in the name of the new nation, the edict, 
 that here the conquest of the continent would be made under the 
 dignity of civic law. But this good fortune was not for long. 
 The settlement at Marietta was made in 1788. It was not a great 
 while until the inhabitants began to cast about for suitable loca- 
 tions for settlement in the vicinity. The virgin woods of Ohio 
 called loud to these pioneers. The river that ran between them 
 and Fort Harmar and which joined its blue waters with the amber 
 Ohio at the foot of their village, urged a constant invitation to 
 follow its winding course. There were large stretches of bottom 
 lands on both sides of the stream. It was the natural highway 
 that led up into a vast territory fitted for settlement and coloni- 
 zation. 
 
 But it had not been left for the Mariettians to discover for 
 themselves the qualities obtaining along the banks of the Elk Eye. 
 Already in 1785, General Parsons, afterward one of the judges 
 of the territory north of the Ohio, while on an inspection tour in 
 the interests of the proposed Ohio Company, made a trip up the 
 Muskingum River. At the Saltlick, Duncan's Falls, he met Jon- 
 athan Zane, who was there making salt. He questioned him about 
 the Ohio country. Zane knew all about the territory drained by 
 the river, and he advised General Parsons, and later Dr. Cutler, 
 to make his proposed settlement on the Muskingum, north of the 
 Licking.^ It is no wonder then that the people at Marietta had 
 predilections for going up the river and "spying out the land." 
 Within two and a half years from the coming of the "Mayflower," 
 Marietta consisted of about eighty houses within a distance of a 
 mile. There were scattering houses three miles up the river. 
 
 ' Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, Vol. 13. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 3 
 
 There was a set of mills on Duck Creek four miies distant, and 
 another mill two miles up the Muskingum. At Waterford, 
 twenty-two miles further up stream was a settlement of twenty 
 families. Two miles from Waterford, on Wolf Creek, was a set 
 of mills and five families. Below Marietta, and opposite the Lit- 
 tle Kanawha, was the Belpre settlement with houses extending 
 along the river front a distance of twelve miles and consisting of 
 some thirty or forty families.- 
 
 This was the situation of affairs in the autumn of 1790. 
 These scattered settlements were practically helpless to ward off 
 an Indian invasion. It is true that after St. Clair's treaty with 
 the Indians at Fort Harmar in January, 1789, there was 
 among the colonists a fancied security. But the Miamis would 
 not be bound by any existing agreements and refused to yield 
 their Ohio lands. The approaching storm was not unheralded. 
 The premonitions of an Indian uprising were many. To these 
 signs the people of Marietta were not altogether oblivious. Dur- 
 ing the summer General Harmar had withdrawn from his fort 
 on the Muskingum nearly all of his troops to aid in his Miami 
 campaign. His subsequent defeat only irritated the savages and 
 their usual career of slaughter followed. Returning hunters told 
 of various attacks made by the Indians and boats passing the new 
 settlement would tell the same story. With the frequent coming" 
 of such ill-boding news and with but a handful of soldiers at 
 Fort Harmar. it is no wonder that the JNlariettians were uneasy. 
 
 Yet in spite of the unsettled condition of the western country 
 and in spite of the warning given by "older heads" at Marietta 
 a company of thirty-six men began the settlement at Big Bottom. 
 
 Big Bottom, while not possessed of a very euphonious title,, 
 was well named. It is about thirty miles from the mouth of the 
 Muskingum, and consists of a fine stretch of level land extending 
 on the east side of the river a distance of over four miles. The 
 most of it is situated upon a terrace. Between the river bank 
 and this terrace, at the northern end of the "Bottom" is where the 
 ill-fated blockhouse was built in the late autumn of 1790. To 
 be specific, the location is one and a half miles southeast of the 
 
 * Gen. Putman's Letter to President Washington after Big Bottom 
 Massacre. 
 
4 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 village of Stockport, in the township of Windsor, Morgan county, 
 Ohio. 
 
 The subsequent occurrences at the block-house we quote 
 from Dr. S. P. Hildreth's "Pioneer History." Dr. Hildreth was 
 a resident of Marietta and his account is the only authentic record 
 we have of the massacre : 
 
 "A few yards above the block house, was a small drain put down from 
 the plain into the river, forming a shallow ravine. A small opening had 
 been cleared about the building, on the river side, surrounded by the 
 adjacent forest. The associates were chiefly young, unmarried men, but 
 little acquainted with Indian warfare or military rules. 
 
 "Those most familiar- with the Indians, had little doubt of their 
 hostility, and strongly opposed the settlers going out that fall, and 
 advised them to remain until spring, by which time the question of 
 war or peace would probably be decided. But the j^oung men were 
 impatient of delay, and confident in their own ability to protect them- 
 selves. They went ; put up a block house, which might accommodate 
 the whole of them on an emergency. It was built of large beech 
 logs, rather open, and not well filled in between them. This job was 
 left for a rainy day, or some more convenient time. They had also 
 neglected to inclose their house with palisades, and ceasing to complete 
 the work, the general interest was lost in that of the convenience of 
 each individual. Another error was the neglect of any regular system 
 of defense, and the omission of setting sentries. Their guns were lying 
 in different corners of the house, without order. About 20 men usually 
 slept in the building, a part of whom were absent at the time of attack. 
 At one end of the house was a large, open fire-place, and when the 
 day closed, all came in, and built a large fire and commenced cooking 
 and eating their supplies." (MSS. of Colonel Barker.) 
 
 "The weather, for some time previous to the attack, had been 
 quite cold, and the Muskingum river frozen over since the 22nd of 
 December, so as to be passable on the ice. On Sunday, the 2nd day of 
 January, ]791, it thawed a little, with the ground partially covered with 
 snow. In the depth of winter, it was not customary for the Indians 
 to go out on war parties, and the early borderers had formerly thought 
 themselves safe from their depredations during the winter months. About 
 20 rods above the block house, and a little back from the river, two 
 men, Francis and Isaac Choate, members of the association, had erected 
 a cabin, and commenced clearing their lots. Thomas Shaw, a hired 
 laborer, and James Batten, another of the company, lived with them. 
 About the same distance below the garrison was an old clearing and 
 a small cabin, made several years before, under the laws of Virginia, 
 which two men, Asa and Eleazar Bullard, had fitted up, and now occu- 
 pied. The Indian war path, from Sandusky to the mouth of the Mus- 
 kingum, passed along on the opposite ridge, in sight of the river. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 5 
 
 The Indians, who had been hunting and loitering about the settle- 
 ments during the summer, were well acquainted with the approaches to 
 the white settlements and with the manner in which they lived, each 
 family in their own cabin, not apprehensive of danger. With the knowl- 
 edge of these circumstances, they planned and fitted out a war party 
 for the destruction of the Waterford settlement. It is supposed they 
 were not aware of there being a station at Big Bottom, until they came 
 in sight of it from the high ground on the west side of the river, in 
 the afternoon of the 2nd of January. a From the ridge they had a 
 view of all that oart of the bottom, and could see how the men were 
 
 MUSKINGUM RIDGE. 
 
 occupied, and the defenseless condition of the block house. After com- 
 pleting their reconnoisance and holding a council as to the mode of 
 attack, they crossed the river on the ice a little above, and divided their 
 warriors into two divisions; the larger one to assault the block house, 
 
 a This ridge is the route of the famous Monongehela Indian Trail, 
 which was the war path from the Indian towns in Ohio to frontier settle- 
 ments of Southwestern Pennsylvania. See Hulbert's Article "Indian 
 Thoroughfares in Ohio," Vol. 8, Historical Publications. 
 
6 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 and the smaller one to make prisoners of the men in the upper cabin 
 without alarming those below. The plan was skillfully arranged and 
 promptly executed. Cautiously approaching the cabin they found the 
 inmates at supper ; a portion of them enter£d the door, while others 
 stood without, and spoke to the men in a friendly manner. Suspect- 
 ing no harm they offered them food, of which they partook. The In- 
 dians seeing some leather thongs in a corner of the room, took the 
 whites by the arms, making signs that they were prisoners and bound 
 them. Finding it useless to resist against superior numbers, they sub- 
 mitted to their fate. While this was transacting at Choate's cabin, the 
 other party had reached the block house unobserved; even the dogs gave 
 no notice of their approach by barking, as they usually do, the reason 
 of which probably was that they were also within by the fire, instead 
 of being on the watch for their masters' safety. The door was thrown 
 open by a large, resolute Indian, who stepped in and stood by its side 
 to keep it unclosed, while his comrades without shot down the white 
 men around the fire. Zebulon Throop, from Massachusetts, who had 
 just returned from the mills with a bag of meal, was frying meat, and 
 fell dead into the fire; several others fell at this discharge. The In- 
 dians now rushed in and killed all that were left with the tomahawk. 
 No effectual resistance seems to have been offered, so sudden and unex- 
 pected was the attack, by any of the men, but a stout, resolute, back- 
 woods Virginia woman, the wife of Isaac Meeks, who was employed as 
 their hunter, seized an axe and made a blow at the head of the Indian 
 who opened the door; a slight turn of the head saved his skull, and the 
 axe passed down through his cheek into the shoulder, leaving a huge 
 gash that severed nearly half his face. She was instantly killed with 
 the tomahawk of one of the other Indians, before she could repeat the 
 blow. This was the only injury received by the savages, as the men 
 were all killed before they had time to seize their arms, which were 
 standing in the corners of the room. While the slaughter was going 
 on, John Stacey, a young man in the prime of life, the son of Colonel 
 William Stacey, sprang up the ladder into the upper story and from 
 thence on to the roof of the house, hoping to escape that way, while 
 his brother Philip, a lad of 16 years, secreted himself under some bed- 
 ding in one corner of the room. The Indians on the outside watching 
 that none escaped, soon discovered John on the roof and shot him, 
 while he was in the act of begging them "for God's sake to spare his 
 life, as he was the only one left." His appeal to the Indians was heard 
 by the two Bullards, who alarmed by the firing at the block house, had 
 run out of their cabin to learn the cause. Discovering the Indians 
 around the house, they sprung back to the hut, seized their rifles and 
 put out into the woods, in a direction to be hid by the cabin from the 
 sight of the Indians. They had barely escaped when they heard their 
 door burst open by the savages. They did not pursue them, although 
 
Big B otto 1)1 and Its History. 7 
 
 they knew they had just fled, as there was a brisk fire in the chimney, 
 and their food for supper smoking hot on the table. 
 
 "After the slaughter was over, and the scalps secured, one of the 
 most important acts in the warfare of the American Indians, they pro- 
 ceeded to collect the plunder. In removing the bedding, the lad Philip 
 Stacey was discovered. Their tomahawks were instantly raised for his 
 destruction, when he threw himself at the feet of one of their leading 
 warriors, begging him to protect him. The savage either took compassion 
 on his youth, or else his revenge being satisfied with the slaughter already 
 made, interposed his authority and saved his life. After removing every- 
 thing they thought valuable, they tore up the floor, piled it over the 
 dead bodies, and set it on fire, thinking to consume the block house 
 with the carcasses of their enemies. The structure being made of green 
 beech logs, would not readily burn, and the fire only destroyed the floors 
 and roof, leaving the walls still standing. A curious fact, showing the 
 prejudices of the Indians, is related by William Smith, who was one 
 of the associates, but providentially absent at the time of the attack. 
 He was at the place the second day after, and says, the Indians carried 
 out the meal, beans, etc., which they found in the house before setting 
 it on fire, and laid them in small heaps by the stumps of trees, a few 
 paces distant. They probably thought it sacrilege to destroy food, or 
 that it would give offense to the Great Spirit to do so, for which he 
 would in some way punish them. No people were ever more influenced 
 in their actions by auguries and omens, than the savages of North 
 America. 
 
 "There were 12 persons killed in this attack, viz : John Stacey, 
 Ezra Putnam, son of Major Putnam, of Marietta; John Camp, and 
 Zebulon Throop. from Massachusetts ; Jonathan Farewell, and James 
 Couch, New Hampshire; William James, Connecticut; John Clark, 
 Rhode Island; Isaac Meeks, wife, and two children, from Virginia. 
 These men were well armed, and no doubt could have defended them- 
 selves against the Indians, had they taken proper precautions. But they 
 had no veteran revolutionary officers with them to plan and direct their 
 operations, as they had at all the other stations. If they had picketed 
 their house and kept a regular guard, the Indians probably would not 
 have ventured an attack; but seeing the naked block house, they were 
 encouraged to attempt its capture. Colonel Stacey, an old soldier, fam- 
 iliar with Indian warfare in Cherry Valley, where he formerly lived, 
 visited the post on the Saturday previous, and seeing its insecure con- 
 dition, gave them a strict charge to keep a regular guard, and prepare 
 immediately strong bars to the door, to be shut every night at sunset. 
 They, however, apprehending no danger, did not profit by his advice. 
 
 "The two Bullards after effecting their escape traveled rapidly 
 down the river about 4 miles to Samuel Mitchel's hunting camp. Cap- 
 tain Rogers, a soldier of the revolution, a fine hunter, and afterwards 
 
8 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 a ranger for the garrison at Marietta, was living with him, and a Mo- 
 hican Indian, from Connecticut, by the name of Dick Layton. Mitchel 
 was absent at the mills; Rogers and Dick were lying wrapped up in 
 their blankets sleeping by the fire. They were awakened and made 
 acquainted with the cause of their untimely visit, and the probable 
 fate of the people at the block house. Seizing their weapons without 
 delay, they crossed the river on the ice, and shaped their course through 
 the woods for Wolf Creek Mills, distant about G miles, and reached 
 there by l6 o'clock that evening. 
 
 "On announcing the news of the attack on Big Bottom, and the 
 probable approach of the Indians to the Mills, great was the consterna- 
 tion and alarm of the helpless women and children. Several additional 
 families had joined this station since the year 1789, but a number of the 
 leading men were absent to attend the court of quarter sessions, which 
 was to set at Marietta on Monday. This rendered their condition still 
 more desperate, in case of an attack, which they had every reason to 
 expect before daylight in the morning. The gloom of night greatly added 
 to their distress, and gave energy to their fears. Under the direction of 
 Captain Rogers, who had been familiar with similar events, the inhabit- 
 ants, amounting to about 30 souls, principally women and children, were 
 all collected into the largest and strongest cabin, which belonged to 
 Colonel Oliver, and was the one standing nearest to the Wolf Creek 
 mills. The people at Millsburgh had neglected to erect a block house, 
 as they were instructed to do. and now felt the need of one. Into this 
 cabin they brought a few of their most valuable goods, with all the tubs, 
 kettles and pails they could muster, which Captain Rogers directed to 
 be filled with water from the creek, for the purpose of extinguishing 
 fire, should the Indians attempt to burn the house, which was one of 
 their most common modes of attack. The door was strongly barred, 
 and windows made fast ; the men, seven in number, were posted in the 
 loft, who by removing a few chunks between the logs, with here and 
 there a shingle from the roof, soon made port holes from which to lire 
 upon the enemy. Like a prudent soldier, their leader posted one man 
 as a sentry on the outside of the house, under cover of a fence to give 
 timely notice of their approach. It was a long and weary night, never 
 to be forgotten by the mothers and children, who occupied the rootn 
 below, and thought they should be first sacrificed if the Indians entered 
 the house. Just before daylight the sentinel gave notice of their approach. 
 Several were obscurely seen, through the gloom of night, near the saw 
 mill, and their movements distinctly heard as they stepped on some loose 
 boards. Their tracks were also seen the next morning in some patches 
 of snow. Finding the people awake, and on the lookout for an attack, 
 they did nothing more than reconnoitre the place, and made their retreat 
 at day dawn, to the great relief of the inhabitants. 
 
 "Samuel Mitchel was dispatched early in the night to give the 
 alarm to the people at Waterford, and two runners were sent to Marietta. 
 
Big BottO)n and Its History. 9 
 
 Nothing could better demonstrate the courage and humanity of Captain 
 Rogers, than his conduct in this affair, thus to weaken his own means 
 of defense by parting with some of his most active and brave men 
 to notifjf the sleeping settlers of their danger, when he had every reason 
 to expect an attack from an overwhelming force in a few hours. Mitchel 
 on his way to the river called at the cabin of Harry Maxen, near the 
 mouth of the creek. He was gone to Marietta, but his wife, and Major 
 Tyler, who lived with him, crossed over with Mitchel on the ice, to 
 awaken and notify the people of the danger that awaited them. They 
 first called at the dwelling of the Widow Convers, whose husband had 
 died of smallpox the year before ; it stood near the center of the present 
 town of Beverly. She was the mother of 8 children ; the two oldest 
 were sons; James, a young man, and Daniel, a lad of 15, who was shortly 
 after taken by the Indians. In one hour from the time the alarm was 
 given by Mitchel, these two young fellows had visited every cabin in 
 the settlement, extending for two miles up and down the river. With 
 all the haste the emergency required, and with as little noise as possible, 
 the inhabitants assembled in their only block house, which was quite 
 small, and stood near the lower part of the donation lots. 
 
 "The terror of the women and children, hurried out of their beds 
 at midnight, was not much less than that of those at the mills; but it 
 so happened they had a larger number of old soldiers among them, as 
 but few were absent at the court. The block house was about 15 feet 
 square, and sheltered that night 12 heads of families, with their wives 
 and children, amounting in all to 67 souls. No alarm took place that 
 gloomy night, save the noise of the watch dogs, which were left out of 
 doors to give notice by their barking of the approach of the savages. 
 Early in the morning, scouts of the most active men were sent out to 
 reconnoitre and search for signs of the enemy. None however were 
 seen. In the course of the day they visited their deserted houses for 
 food, which they had no time to take with them in the hurry of the pre- 
 ceding night. The escape of the two Bullards was a merciful and provi- 
 dential event for the settlers of Waterford. If these men had been killed, 
 or captured, the Indians would that night have fallen on the unsuspect- 
 ing inhabitants in their sleep, who were far less able to resist than the 
 people at Big Bottom, nearly all of them living detached in their log 
 cabins. It is morally certain this would have been their fate, as the 
 Indians fitted out the war party with, the express object of destroying 
 these two settlements, and had said that before the leaves again covered 
 the trees, they would not leave a smoke of the white man on this side 
 of the Ohio river. 
 
 "The next day, or the 4th of January, Captain Rogers led a party 
 of men over to Big Bottom. It was a melancholy sight to the poor 
 borderers, as they knew not how soon the same fate might befall them- 
 selves. The action of the fire, although it did not entirely consume, had 
 so blackened and disfigured the dead bodies, that few of them could be 
 
10 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Puhlications. 
 
 recognized. That of William James, was known by his great size, being 
 ■6 feet and 4 inches in height,- and stoutly made. As the earth was frozen 
 on the- outside, a hole was dug within the walls of the house, and the 
 bodies consigned to one grave. No further attempt was made at a 
 settlement here, until after the peace. 
 
 "The party of warriors from the mills having joined their com- 
 panions early in the day, and then, preparation was made for their home^ 
 ward march. They knew from the escape of the men from the deserted 
 cabin, and their observations at the mills, that the settlement below was 
 aware of their vicinity, and that further attempts at that time would be 
 useless. 
 
 "The Indians engaged in this massacre were Delawares and Wyan- 
 dots, and from the best information subsequently collected from the 
 prisoners, were about 25 in number. Before departing, they left a war 
 club in a conspicuous place, which is their mode of letting their enemies 
 know that war is begun, and is equivalent to a written declaration among 
 civilized powers. As it was quite uncertain, whether the wounded Indian 
 would live or die, lots were cast on the prisoners for one to be sacrificed 
 as an offering to his spirit, and to fulfill their law of revenge. The lot 
 fell on Isaac Choate. He was directly stripped of his own comfortable 
 dress, and habited in that of the wounded Indian, all clotted and soaked 
 with blood, and loaded with a part of the plunder; while his own cloth- 
 ing was put on his disabled enemy. As he was now a devoted victim, 
 he was not suffered to travel in company with the others, but placed under 
 the charge of two warriors who kept him a considerable distance in the 
 rear, but generally in sight of the main body. 
 
 "By careful attention to their wounded comrade (no civilized people 
 being more kind than the Indians to their disabled fellows), he finally 
 recovered, and Choate's life was spared. Had he died, his fatal doom 
 was inevitable. As soon as the distance and the short days of winter 
 would permit, the party reached the British post at the rapids of the 
 Maumee river; soon after which Colonel McKee, the Indian agent, re- 
 deemed Francis Choate from his captors. It is said that he was in- 
 duced to this kind act from motives of humanity, and on account of his 
 being a member of the brotherhood of Free Masons. In a few days he 
 was sent to Detroit, and, embarking in a sloop, went down the lake to 
 Niagara ; and from thence through the state of New York to his home 
 in Leicester, Massachusetts. 
 
 "His brother, Isaac, was taken to Detroit by the Indians at the 
 same time, and falling in with a citizen of that place who traded with 
 them, pursuaded him to advance the ransom demanded; promising to 
 remain there and work at his trade, as a cooper, until he could repay 
 the money. By his diligence and activity, in a few months, he earned 
 the sum required, repaid the debt, and returned down the lake to his 
 home in the same way. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 11 
 
 "Thomas Shaw was kept by the Indians at the rapids for some 
 months, when he was redeemed by the noted Colonel Brandt, without 
 any expectation of it being refunded to him again. He soon after went 
 to Detroit and worked for a French farmer, near that place. Colonel 
 Brandt met with him at that place, and, finding him an expert axeman 
 and familiar with clearing land, pursuaded him to go down and live 
 with a brother-in-law, a physician, living on a farm, a few miles out 
 from the fort, at Niagara. 
 
 "Young Philip Stacey died of sickness, at the rapids. 
 
 "James Patten, a middle aged man, was adopted into the family, 
 and retained until the peace of 1795." 
 
 We have seen what effect the receipt of the news had 
 upon the various settlements. It was not until the forenoon 
 of Monday, the third, that the messengers, having lost their way, 
 brought the direful tidings to Marietta. The court of quarter 
 sessions had just opened, but it immediately adjourned that those 
 in attendance might return to their homes. There were dreadful 
 forebodings among them as they departed homeward. Realizing 
 their unprotected condition, they had much reason to anticipate 
 the probable result. 
 
 On the same day, the 3d, the agents and proprietors of the 
 Ohio Company held a meieting. On the 5th they met again and 
 continued to assemble daily until the loth. At these meetings 
 the state of the colony was discussed and resolutions were passed 
 looking to the security and the protection of the settlements. 
 Governor St. Clair being absent, the judges of the court were 
 ■addressed and asked to represent to the general government the 
 condition of the country. On the 7th of January the court ap- 
 pointed Charles Green as an express to carry their views to Phil- 
 adelphia.^ 
 
 The situation at Marietta was indeed alarming. The news 
 of the disastrous Harmar campaign only tended to increase their 
 apprehensions. They were sufficiently acquainted with the Indian 
 to believe that unless immediate relief could come to them that 
 the settlements north of the Ohio were doomed. The Indians 
 Tiad said that before the trees would again put forth their leaves, 
 not a single smoke of the white man should remain on this side 
 of the river. 
 
 •MSS of Prof. M. R. Andrews. 
 
12 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 At Fort Harmar there was but one small detachment of 
 troops, about twenty men, under command of Captain Ziegler. 
 Because of the governor's absence,, no militia from adjoining 
 states could be called. At this juncture the old veterans, schooled 
 in the Revolution, look the initiative, and proceeded at once to 
 put the colony into as good a state of defense as possible. The 
 outlying districts were ordered abandoned and the people cen- 
 tered at Marietta, Belpre, and Waterford. The Ohio Company 
 provided for systematic defense. New block-houses were built 
 at these places and the local militia was detailed to do garrison 
 duty. Spies and scouts were employed to scour the woods to 
 prevent sudden attacks by the savages. Campus Martins was 
 also repaired and made better by an outer wall or palisade. The 
 expenses incurred, amounting to about eleven thousand dollars, 
 were met by the Ohio Company. It was expected that Congress 
 would reimburse the company, but the expectations were never 
 realized, and the entire amount was a dead loss.* 
 
 General Putnam was most active in representing to the gov- 
 ernment the true condition of the settlements. On January 6th 
 he addressed a letter to Caleb Strong and Fisher Ames, members 
 of Congress. He likened the position of the settlers to that of 
 children who have been invited by their parents to gather plums 
 under a hornet's nest, and then have the nest beat over them 
 without having been given notice to get out of the way or being 
 covered while the hornets were provoked.^ 
 
 Two days later General Putnam wrote to President Wash- 
 ington a full account of the recent attack. He went over the 
 affair with minuteness, and in conclusion implored protection 
 from the government. On the same day he dispatched a similar 
 message to Secretary of War Knox.® 
 
 We know that the efforts of the Mariettians for relief were 
 successful, for the following summer a company of United States 
 troop was stationed at Fort Harmar. Everything was placed 
 in readiness for an Indian attack, which fortunately never came. 
 The disastrous campaign of St. Clair had no direct results on the 
 
 * Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, Vol. 2, page 230.. 
 " Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, Vol. 2. 
 'MSS of Prof. Andrews. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 13 
 
 Muskingum, while the very successful expedition of Mad An- 
 thony Wayne served as the grand finale of that chapter in Ohio 
 history of which Big Bottom is a part. 
 
 Again from behind the frontier palisades issued forth the 
 intrepid pioneer. Up the beautiful little river and its winding 
 creeks went that army of the "Heroes of the Forest." Where, on 
 that winter's eve the war whoop of the savage was heard, there 
 was now the merry song of the axe. The cabin was built. The 
 clearing grew apace. Primitive boats laden with the first fruits 
 of the great west floated down the silvery current of the "Elk 
 Eye." Later came the whistle of the steamboat, echoing from 
 the high hills on either side. Prosperous farms and villages dot- 
 ted the fair valley and over it all breathed the benediction of "well 
 done." 
 
 The old block-house and its unfortunate occupants passed 
 into a memory. In the march of progress its decaying logs had 
 been cleared away. The pioneer plow turned its furrow over the 
 graves where unhappy victims of the massacre were sleeping. 
 Seed time and harvest, summer and winter passed in their tireless 
 cycles, until three generations of sons and daughters had been 
 born. Then began the second chapter of the history of Big Bot- 
 tom.' 
 
 When in 1865, Mr. Qbadiah Brokaw^ purchased the farm 
 
 '' James Ball Naylor, the poet and novelist has given us an interest- 
 ing historical novel based upon the Big Bottom Massacre, "In the Days 
 of St. Clair." 
 
 ° Obadiah Brokaw was born near Flushing, Belmont County, Ohio, 
 May 16, 1822. His father was Benjamin Brokaw who came to Belmont 
 County from New Jersey. His mother was Mary Smith. They were 
 both of Dutch descent. About 1830 they moved to Morgan County, 
 settling near New Castle in Meigsville Township. Mr. Brokaw yet re- 
 members the great Muskingum flood of 1832 when White's Mill near 
 his home was carried away. Mr. Brokaw attended the rude school of that 
 pioneer day. The school at which he was a pupil was taught by Timothy 
 Eastman, who later became citizen of Athens County. An abandoned 
 dwelling built by a Frenchman named LeFord was utilized as a school 
 building. 
 
 Living all his life except the first eight years upon the Muskingum, 
 Mr. Brokaw has seen the gradual evolution of that stream from a pioneer 
 highway for flat and keel boats until it has become a part of a great 
 
14 
 
 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 on which Big Bottom Block House stood, tradition alone had 
 marked the site of the massacre. In cultivat- 
 ing the ground, the owner noticed a difference 
 in the soil at certain spots, and he determined 
 in his own mind that the location of the block 
 house as popularly recognized was incorrect. 
 He proceeded at once to make excavations, 
 ^^B ^WaJ ^"d soon discovered charred wood, ashes and 
 
 ^^^ ^("^Nli other remains of the destroyed building. Be- 
 ^^^^ ^^1 neath it all he exhumed the bones of some of 
 ^Jjj^^^Jm those whose lives had been lost in the Indian 
 attack. Thus convinced, Mr. Brokaw has dur- 
 
 MR. BROKAW. . ^, j- ,, j iU 
 
 mg these many years careiully preserved the 
 exact site. Realizing from his advanced years that soon the land 
 would pass into other hands, he felt a desire to have the place prop- 
 erly marked that those of the future generations might read a les- 
 son from the pages of pioneer history. Without financial aid from 
 any one he at once contracted with the Jones Monumental Works 
 of McConnelsville, Ohio, to erect for him a fitting monument. The 
 work of placing the monument was personally supervised by Mr. 
 C. L. Bozman, of Beverly, Ohio, on Friday, May 28, 1905. It 
 consists of a marble shaft whose apex is twelve feet above the 
 
 system of internal navigation. He tells of the riffle in the river at Big 
 Ludlow, where the flooded mill stood. A sand-bar was in the center of 
 the stream. In order that boats might pass over the riffle the United 
 States government at an early date built a dam on one side of the bar 
 that the water might be thrown into the one channel. In Cleveland's 
 administration when it was desired to secure sopie testimony concerning 
 the early government work on the Muskingum, Mr. Brokaw and Captain 
 I. N. Hook were the only two living witnesses who could testify to this 
 first federal work. 
 
 At McConnellsville, Robert McConnell had built a similar dam. It 
 was impossible to get canoes through with the strength of four men. 
 Mr. McConnell built a set of locks at his own expense. When the gov- 
 ernment took charge of the Muskingum improvement, these private locks 
 were destroyed. Many iron rods had been used in their construction. 
 Mr. Brokaw then in his teens and a blacksmith's apprentice, helped to 
 get this iron from the water. Their method was to make long handled 
 chisels with which they could reach beneath the water and cut the iron 
 bars. He also helped build the government dam at Stockport. 
 
 At the age of seventeen Mr. Brokaw was apprenticed to Amos 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 1& 
 
 ground. The shaft proper, is an octagon seven and a half feet 
 high. On one of the faces are inscribed these words : "Erected 
 BY Obadiah Brokaw, 1905." The shaft stands on a hmestone 
 base which in turn rests on another base of concrete. On the 
 front of the hmestone base is carved, "Site of Big Bottom Mas- 
 sacre, Winter of 1790." On the two sides are to be found 
 the names of those killed, as follows : "James Couch, Wm. 
 Jones, Joseph -Clark, Isaac Meeks, his wife and two chil- 
 dren, John Stagey, Zebulon Throop, Ezra Putnam, John 
 Camp and Jonathan Farewell." On the rear of the base are 
 the names of those escaped : Asa Bullard, Eleazer Bullard^ 
 and Philip Stagey. The monument displays excellent work- 
 manship. It stands in a beautiful meadow near the public road 
 and only a few rods from the bank of the river. It is plainly 
 visible to passengers on the passing boats. 
 
 On the day after the erection of the monument, the writer 
 happening in the neighborhood and learning of Mr. Brokaw's 
 patriotic act, visited him at his home. During the conversation 
 that ensued the idea of transferring the monument and site of 
 the block house to the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Society 
 
 Conoway, a blacksmith. Here he learned the art of making edged tools 
 at which he soon became a master and at which he has worked for over 
 sixty years. It was in the days before the machine made product was 
 in the market. The result was that the demand for his handiwork was 
 immense. The axes, mattocks, butcher-knives and corn cutters made 
 on his anvil are almost without number. Even to-day he is kept as busy 
 as he cares to be at his trade for the people will not allow him to stop. 
 
 In 1843, Mr. Brokaw was married to Miss Czarina Fletcher of 
 Meigs County. The six children born to them are yet living. In 1905, 
 some time after the decease of his first wife, Mr. Brokaw was again 
 married to Mrs. Lydia Daugherty Ellis. 
 
 The farm upon which Big Bottom Blockhouse stood and where 
 Mr. Brokaw has lived for forty years was purchased by him in 1865. 
 It is said that the original purchaser of the land made enough maple 
 from it to more than pay for its cost. Near the block house the settlers 
 of the community for a numbers of years buried their dead. This old 
 cemetery now containing but one rude gravestone is located on the land 
 now possessed by the Historical Society. Robert Henry, an old settler in 
 the vicinity, told Mr. Brokaw that on the sight of the blockhouse a 
 second growth of young timber grew before the surrounding land finally 
 cleared. 
 
16 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 was suggested to Mr. Brokaw. Subsequently, on August 17th, 
 Secretary Randall, Mr. C. L. Bozman and the writer visited Mr. 
 Brokaw, who offered to transfer to the Society the monument 
 and two acres of surrounding land, on the condition that Mr. 
 Brokaw be elected a life member of the same, and further, that 
 the Society provide for the proper care of the monument and 
 land transferred as an historic park and monument, keeping said 
 property securely enclosed and protected from destruction and 
 injury by the public and maintain the same as a free public park. 
 These negotiations were approved and accepted by the Executive 
 Committee of the Society on August 28th, 1905. 
 
 Steps were at once taken for the proper dedicatory exercises 
 that should mark the formal transfer of the property to the Soci- 
 ety. A committee on arrangements, consisting of Secretary Ran- 
 dall and the writer was appointed to arrange a program for the 
 occasion. The latter being designated as chairman of this com- 
 mittee, appointed a sub-committee of citizens of the Muskingum 
 Valley, consisting of Superintendent of Schools Richardson, of 
 McConnelsville, Superintendent of Schools Brown, of Stockport, 
 and Mr. C. L. Bozman, of Beverly. The day selected for the 
 commemoration was Saturday, September 30th. The event 
 brought out a vast concourse of people, estimated at about four 
 thousand. It was a good-natured crowd, and everybody seemed 
 to enter into the spirit of the occasion. Mr. Brokaw, the generous 
 donor of the historic site, was the recipient of many congratula- 
 tions from his fellow citizens. 
 
 The program proved to be of great interest to the people. 
 It was begun by the writer, who after a short address, introduced 
 Secretary Randall, the presiding officer of the day. The Stock- 
 port band, which had been secured, interspersed the program 
 with musical selections. The addresses which follow were given 
 in the order named: Secretary Randall, President Brinkerhoflf, 
 Judge William B. Crew, of the Supreme Court, Trustee W. H. 
 Hunter, of Chillicothe, Trustee M. R. Andrews, of Marietta, Hon. 
 Tod B. Galloway, Secretary to the Governor, and Trustee D. J. 
 Ryan, Columbus. James Ball Naylor, the poet and novelist, 
 closed the exercises with an original poem written for the occa- 
 sion. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 
 
 17 
 
 L. MARTZOI^FF. 
 
 ADDRESS OF C. L. MARTZOLFF. 
 It is said that a minister's text is but a peg upon which to 
 hang his sermon. If I were a minister the peg upon which I 
 would hang this speech would be found 
 among the jewels of the wonderful mines 
 of King Solomon — The Book of Proverbs. 
 "Remove not the ancient landmark, which 
 thy fathers have set." 
 
 Man has ever been a monument builder. 
 When the Israelites fought with the hosts 
 of Amalek, when the hands of Moses were 
 stayed by Aaron and Hur until the going 
 down of the sun and the Amalekites had 
 been put to the sword, then it was that 
 Moses builded an altar as a memorial of the 
 great victory. 
 
 When David the warrior king sent forth his mighty Joab to 
 wage war upon the Edomites, he celebrated his success by a mon- 
 ument of triumph, an inscribed tablet carved on the rocks of 
 Edom after the manner of eastern kings. 
 
 But centuries before the Hebrews built their rude memori- 
 als among the hills of Palestine, the monarchs of the Orient had 
 erected upon the banks of the Euphrates and the Nile, monu- 
 ments to commemorate their achievements in war, or to extol 
 the glories of royalty. 
 
 We are told that at the portals of the sculptured palaces of 
 Nineveh, there were colossal figures of men and beasts carved 
 from white alabaster ; that within the interior stretching for miles 
 and miles, the builder of the palace ranged the illustrated record 
 of his exploits. There cut in the walls were represented vast pro- 
 cessions of warriors, and satraps, and eunuchs, and tributary 
 kings winding and winding throueh the corridors until the mind 
 grows dizzy with the regal splendor and the heart grows sick at 
 the vanity of kings. 
 
 To-day the antiquarian digs down beneath the accumulated 
 dust of the centuries and from the broken pieces of potterv and. 
 the ruined columns he reads its history. 
 Vol. XV — 2. 
 
18 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 We cross the borders of Asia and along the banks of the 
 Nile we tread the soil of the Pharaohs. We look about us and 
 see the wonderful pyramids erected by Egyptian kings to glorify 
 their names while living and to cover their poor carcasses when 
 dead. We can still see the millions of tribes wearing away their 
 lives to satisfy the caprice of princes. Here in this land of plenty, 
 capable of sustaining in comfort its entire population, amid all 
 this wealth there is hunger and misery and woe among the people, 
 that those above them may live in luxury. Even yet to-day the 
 Egyptian peasant knows only to suffer and to die. 
 
 A Roman Titus may build an Arch of Triumph to commem- 
 orate the destruction of Jerusalem. He may show upon it how 
 he led the Hebrews captive bearing upon their shoulders the 
 golden candlestick, the trumpet of Jubilee and other treasures 
 from the Temple on Mount Zion. 
 
 A Napoleon in imitation of the Roman Caesars, builds two 
 triumphal arches to celebrate his victories and to proclaim his 
 mighty genius. But such is the irony of fate that at the foot of 
 the grandest of these arches in 1814 the allied armies met to re- 
 joice over the downfall of its builder; and here again in 1871 the 
 victorious arms of Prussia emphasized their victory over the last 
 of the Napoleons. 
 
 Fortunate is he whose words have become flesh and dwell 
 among men. No need for him to erect marble tablet or obelisk- 
 to tell the world what he hath wrought. But deep in the souls 
 of men is it inscribed in letters of fire that shine out with no 
 uncertain light in their daily lives. 
 
 To the "Father of his Country" there needed not be built 
 a monument of his works. The patriots at Bunker Hill need not 
 the shaft to tell men that they fought and died there. The 
 heroes of Gettysburg, where they wore the Blue or the Gray, 
 need neither tablet nor cenotaph to show that they bled there. Far 
 more imperishable than marble or bronze is kept the testimony 
 of their patriotism among the sons of men. 
 
 In olden times kings erected monuments in their own honor. 
 All this has changed. We now erect in honor of others. It is 
 the people who live afterward, who have inherited the patrimony 
 and who appreciate that heritage, that now erect memorials and 
 
Big BottoDi and Its History. 19 
 
 preserve the "landmarks of their fathers." We do not erect 
 monuments to the departed simply to show what they did, but 
 rather what we are doing with the memories and inheritance 
 which they left us. We erect monuments not so much to show 
 the character of the patriotism of the past, but rather the quality 
 of our own. The monuments we erect typify our aspiration and 
 our labor. 
 
 As long as people erect monuments in honor of the deeds of 
 their fathers so long is that people tolerably safe from drifting 
 into the shallows of anarchy and personal and class aggrandize- 
 ment, where many nations and people in times past have been 
 wrecked and gone to ruin and decay and their wrecks are strewn 
 along time's fretful stream. 
 
 Monuments are the expression of the thoughts of the peo- 
 ple. They show what the people are thinking about. When peo- 
 ple complain about setting up memorials in honor of their fathers, 
 or when they cease to erect them, it is a premonition that they 
 believe in no longer and appreciate no more the sacrifices and 
 labors of their sires. It means that they are ready to cut away 
 from old moorings and venture upon new seas, with neither com- 
 pass nor chart. 
 
 While it was justified to no little extent, such was the con- 
 dition in France in the Revolution of 1789. A spirit of iconoclasm 
 and anarchy swept over that fair land caring nothing for 
 their historic heroes and kings because they represented to 
 them tyranny and oppression. And yet in that boiling sea of 
 rebellion the memory of men that had been an honor to France 
 was allowed to go down into the universal maelstrom. 
 
 But here in America it is different. Here monuments are 
 the free, voluntary declaration of a free people. Here monu- 
 ments tell us who our heroes are. And if you would know the 
 character of a people, learn the character of its heroes. 
 
 It is certainly a matter of congratulation that in this age of 
 extreme commercialism, when the hero, or rather the heroine 
 of most men is the Goddess of Liberty stamped on the dollar 
 and the portraits of our national heroes have no better place in 
 our lives than to adorn our bank notes, that men and women are 
 
20 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 yet to be found who do not want to "remove the landmarks of 
 the fathers," but are wilhng to preserve and remark them. 
 
 The erection of this monument is not only appropriate but 
 opportune. We erect memorials to our national military heroes 
 and to our presidents and statesmen. And why not to the Amer- 
 ican pioneer? While we build to commemorate the achievements 
 of the battlefield, why not, too, to the heroes of the forest ? When 
 we send up a shaft to mark the site where men fell when fighting 
 under the impelling stress of battle, why not to the men who laid 
 down the axe to take up the rifle and defend wife and little ones ? 
 
 Heroes of the war there may be, but every man who came to 
 the woods of Ohio to make for himself and his children a home 
 is no less a hero. To this man there was not the shrill voice of 
 the fife, nor the rattle of the drum to call him to arms. There 
 was not the sight of flying colors to beckon him to do and dare. 
 There were no comrades keeping step to the martial music nor 
 officers to tell him what to do. Rut instead he fought in the king- 
 dom of the woods. In the days of the reign of the axe, he walked 
 his domain as a knight errant of old. In this kingdom of the forest 
 he stood the king. 
 
 The heroes of a thousand battlefields do not appeal to me as 
 do tliese heroes of the forest. The chronicles of a Csesar or a 
 Napoleon telling us how men strive for the vain bauble of an 
 imperial diadem, do not mean to me so much as do the simple 
 annals of the poor, where we learn how brave men and women 
 fought with the forces of untamed nature, wild animals and 
 wilder men, in order that they might become kings and queens 
 whose palace is the home. 
 
 The men and women, therefore, who went to their death 
 here, amid the cries of the blood-curdling war whoop, are rep- 
 resentative of that noble army of pioneers that came to the woods 
 of Ohio, not for adventure, but for the best of God-given insti- 
 tutions — home. They are types of that migrating instinct that 
 has been the genius of progress in the Anglo-Saxon-Teutonic 
 race, from the time when from its home in Asia it spread its suc- 
 cessive ways over Low Europe and established the world powers 
 in modern history. Then beyond the Atlantic, Puritan and Cava- 
 lier separately established the genesis of a new nation. Then from 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 
 
 21 
 
 the rocky fortresses of the Appalachians. Puritan and CavaHer 
 looked down together upon the fair valley of the Ohio. To them 
 it was as the revelation to the prophet on Pisgah — the Promised 
 Land. They were permitted to enter. But to hold it they fought 
 with stubborn tenacity. Every foot was contested. But forward 
 went this army across the prairies of Indiana and Illinois until 
 the smoke curled from the settler's cabin on the banks of the 
 Father of Waters. Then pressing on it swept across the western 
 plains. The Rocky ■Mountains were no barrier and on their west- 
 ern slopes and in the valleys of sunny California and where "rolls 
 the Oregon" went the pathfinders of civilization. And now 
 through the portals of the Golden Gate we send forth our ships 
 to that new old land in which the world seeking Genoese dreamed 
 lay his El Dorado. 
 
 To this hero of the forest — hunter, scout, pathfinder, trail- 
 maker, home7maker — we dedicate to-day this monument as a 
 memorial to his sacrifices and services and bravery, with the firm 
 and confident hope that the new generations now reaping the 
 fruition of that toil will husband the splendid inheritance left us 
 by such men as fell beneath the tomahawk of the ruthless savage 
 on the banks of the ]\Iuskingum on that winter evening over a 
 century ago. 
 
 ADDRESS OF E. O. RANDALL. 
 
 This is a red letter day for the Ohio State Archaeological 
 
 and Historical Society. For many years it has been the custodian 
 
 of Fort Ancient, the most extensive and 
 
 majestic earth enclosure of the Mound 
 
 Builders in this country and for a somewhat 
 
 less time has been the owner of Serpent 
 
 Mound, the most mysterious religious relic 
 
 left by that vanished and wonder-exciting 
 
 race. Through the praiseworthy sentiment 
 
 and generous disposition of Mr. Brokaw the 
 
 Society becomes the proud possessor of this 
 
 historic ground, the site of one of the most 
 
 E o RANDALT. memorablc events in the pioneer period of 
 
 our state. The story of the birth of the 
 
 American Republic and its sturdy strife for independent exis- 
 
22 Ohio Arcli. and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 tence is unique and powerful. The little nation born of the 
 colonies that fringed the Atlantic coast looked longingly to 
 the west for opportunities of expansion and growth. Neither 
 Athenian annals nor Roman records present pages so fraught 
 with recitals of perilous adventure, strange incident, indom- 
 itable courage, persistent progress, unflinching patriotism and 
 matchless heroism as are revealed in the accounts of the daunt- 
 less discoverers and intrepid pathfinders who pentetrated 
 their way across streams and swamps and through the forest 
 fastnesses of the untrodden west. Then follows the soul-stirring 
 story of the settlement of the Ohio Valley, and the transforma- 
 tion, almost in a generation, of a "howling wilderness" into the 
 peaceful and prosperous garden spot of civilization — the Buckeye 
 commonwealth. Tlie poetic classic that tells of the search of the 
 Argonauts for the Golden Fleece is not comparable to the simple 
 but splendid prose epic describing the journey of the little band 
 of Revolutionary veterans which organized in the "Bunch of 
 Grapes Tavern," journeyed over the snow-clad mountains, where 
 the foot of the white man had never trod before, to Simrall's Ferry 
 on the Youhiogheny and thence in the "Galley Adventure" floated 
 down the Beautiful River and made landing and lodgment at the 
 mouth of the Muskingum, upon whose picturesque and peaceful 
 banks we are now assembled. The details of that settlement and 
 the pushing out of the more venturesome members to the location 
 of this spot will be told by other speakers. My personal interest 
 and ancestral pride rests in another section of the state. I am a 
 Western Reserver — a descendant of the Yankee section of the 
 New England emigration to Ohio. My forebears were in the 
 frontier settlement business. My grandfatlier and grandmother 
 on my mother's side were in the party of David Hudson which left 
 the Nutmeg State in the year 1800 and proceeded overland in ox- 
 teams to the shores of Lake Ontario — thence in flat-boats to the 
 Niagara River, drawing their floats around the mightv cataract 
 and pulling along the shore of Lake Erie to the Cuvahoga, up 
 which they ascended, finally founding the town of Hudson. 
 
 'Many an hour in my early boyhood days have I sat spell- 
 bound while listening to the tales which my mother told of the 
 trials and adventures which grandfather and grandmother related 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 23 
 
 to her. Real adventures in the Wild West. One in particula r 
 indelibly impressed my youthful mind. The incident is that one t 
 upon a time the larder of the little log cabin in which they livi: d 
 gave out and the cupboard was bare. Grandmother in the emer- 
 gency repaired some two or three miles to a neighbor's cabin for 
 the loan of provisions. She started back with the basket of pioneer 
 edibles, chief among which were numerous chunks of "jerked" 
 venison. She was overtaken by some wolves which frightened 
 her into greatest possible speed for her cabin. It was one of those 
 occasions when "be it ever so humble, there's no place like home." 
 As her hungry and fierce pursuers gained upon her she deftly 
 threw out a chunk of the venison, a sort of a sop to Cerebus, over 
 which they would stop to wrangle ; during their contest and delay 
 grandmother was sprightly sprinting for the home goal ; the 
 bait having been fought over and devoured, another dash of the 
 wolves would again bring them close upon the heels of their flee- 
 ing victim. Another chunk of venison was thrown out as the sec- 
 ond prize for their competition. This perilous act was encored 
 several times until the last piece was hurled at the pack just as 
 grandmother breathlessly reached the cabin door. As grand- 
 mother encountered this thrilling experience some years before 
 the birth of my mother, it follows that had not that stock of 
 "jerked" venison held out, I would not be here to-day to regale 
 you with its faithful recital. You can believe me that in recogni- 
 tion of that preservation, venison has ever since been "deer" meat 
 in our family. 
 
 We are here to-day to commemorate, by the dedication of this 
 simple and substantial shaft, a tragedy in our western pioneer 
 history that reminds us most forcibly of the unparalleled perils, 
 sufferings and sacrifices of the Ohio pioneers. Truly the corner- 
 stone of this state was laid in blood. Our New England fore- 
 fathers fought the British soldiers and the despised ally, the Hes- 
 sians. But it was civilized warfare. The Ohio pioneers fought 
 the British and his ally, the cruel, bloodthirsty savage. Immortal 
 history was written on the banks of the Maumee, the Miamis, the 
 Sandusky, the Scioto, the Muskingum and the Tuscarawas, a his- 
 tory of more lasting benefit to mankind than that written on the 
 banks of the Tiber, the Danube, the Rhine, the Seine, or the 
 
24 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 Thames. It was upon the hills and amid the valleys of the Ohio 
 rivers that the final struggle ensued between the Saxon and the 
 savage. It was here the Redman, child of the forest, took his 
 stand and defiantly and desperately declared he would retreat no 
 further, but instead would drive the pale face intruder back over 
 the Ohio and beyond the Alleghanies. It was the most bitterly 
 contested racial war in the annals of man. It opened with the 
 Conspiracy of Pontiac (1763) and continued with varying degrees 
 of fierceness for fifty years until the Confederacy of Tecumseh, 
 the greatest warrior of his race who yielded not till defeat and 
 death overtook him at the Battle of the Thames (1813). Ohio 
 was the rallying ground of the great Indian nations — here were 
 born and here fought the most illustrious chiefs, Pontiac, Corn- 
 stock, Logan, Little Turtle, Tarhe, Tecumseh and a score of 
 others renowned in war, in the chase, and in oratory. Within the 
 boundaries of our state, moreover, were enacted some of the most 
 eventful scenes of the American Revolution. The British western 
 headquarters were at Detroit, the American western headquarters 
 were at Fort Pitt. The sparsely located settlers of Ohio and 
 Kentucky were between the two. The war w'as that of infuriated 
 savages, spurred on by unscrupulous, treacherous and shrewd 
 British soldiers and officers. Their weapons were not merely the 
 flint lock but the tomahawk and the scalping knife. The Eastern 
 Colonists knew little of the horrors of warfare endured by the 
 western frontiersman — a warfare continued for twenty years, 
 from the Battle of Point Pleasant on the banks of the Ohio (1774) 
 to the Battle of Fallen Timbers on the banks of the Maumee 
 (1794). It is a tragic and unprecedented history. 
 
 It is difficult, almost impossible, for us who are assembled 
 here to-day, gathered from hundreds of homes of comfort and lux- 
 ury, to realize that this spot, now the center of a picturesque and 
 peaceful landscape, with its flowing river, tree-clad hills, grain- 
 enriched fields and thriving village was little more than a century 
 ago the scene of a horrible, blood-curdling massacre, a fiendish 
 slaughter in which the darkness of the forest was illumined by the 
 flames of the burning hut, and the stillness of the valley was 
 broken by the gruesome war cries of the savages and the shrieks 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 25 
 
 •of their defenseless victims. As with the magic of a wizard's 
 wand, civiHzation has changed the picture. 
 
 Daniel Webster in his resplendent oration at the dedication 
 of the Bunker Hill Monument in 1825 began with these words: 
 "We live in a most extraordinary age. Events so various and so 
 important that they might crowd and distinguish centuries, are in 
 •our times compressed within the compass of a single life." He 
 then in magnificent rhetoric described the progress of American 
 history during the fifty years beginning with the Battle of Bunker 
 Hill and ending with the date of the dedication of the monument 
 "before which he stood. If it were possible, how much more elo- 
 quent might have been Mr. Webster's words were he here to-day 
 to compare the incredible progress of American life in the three- 
 quarters of a century following the date of the dedication at- 
 Bunker Hill? At that time the population of this country was 
 Ijut twelve million and the western movement had scarcely crossed 
 the Mississippi. To-day we number eighty millions of people 
 and our vast republic reaches with almost evenly distributed enter- 
 prise from the Great Lakes to the Gulf and from the Atlantic to 
 the Pacific. Mr. Webster closed his speech wishing "By the bless- 
 ing of God may this country become a vast and splendid monu- 
 ment, not of oppression and terror, but of wisdom, of peace and 
 of liberty, upon which the world may gaze with admiration for- 
 ever." We have more than fulfilled the optimistic faith of the 
 great orator. The plucky and persevering pioneers who fought 
 and bled and died in the conflict with the relentless savages for the 
 conquest of this fair Ohio Valley, builded better than they knew. 
 The Ohio Valley, particularly that portion between the Great 
 Lakes and the River, the Alleghany Mountains and the Wabash, 
 has given to the Union one of the brightest gems in the jeweled 
 orown of states. The survivors of the Revolution, wearied and 
 worn, homeless and poverty stricken, sought this fair country for 
 homes in their declining years and for a heritage to their children 
 and their children's children. The soil of Ohio was made sacred 
 by the dust of the three thousand Revolutionary soldiers who were 
 buried beneath its sod, and that precious patriotic seed brought 
 forth loval fruit an hundred fold, for it was Ohio that furnished 
 
26 
 
 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 three hundred thousand soldiers in the great Civil War that was 
 to cement and weld into one indissoluble federation the nation the 
 forefathers made independent. With filial reverence we erect 
 monuments of marble and tablets of brass upon the sites most 
 memorable in the storm and stress of the earl}- pioneer days. But 
 greater than all the memorials of art to noble founders are the 
 products of industry, progress, prosperity and humanity, which 
 their sons have reared upon the firm foundation laid by their an- 
 cestors. Beneath the floor in the crypt of St. Paul's, London, lie 
 the remains of Sir Christopher Wren, the great genius who 
 built that temple, a spacious altar scarcely second to any reared 
 to a Christian faith. On the little bronze plate that so modestly 
 marks the last resting place of the great architect, are these 
 words: "Si momiuicntiiin rcquiris, circumspice." (If you seek 
 his monument, look about you.) And so we say to-day, if you 
 seek for the monument of the patriotic pioneers, look about you 
 and behold our grand and stately commonwealth, with its crowded 
 cities, its teeming villages, its freight-laden thoroughfares, its 
 marvelous, unrivalled and world-inspiring civilization. 
 
 ADDRESS OF GEN. R. BRINKERHOFF. 
 As President of the Ohio Archaeological and Historical Soci- 
 ety it is not incumbent upon me to make 
 an extended address but simply to accept 
 the obligation imposed upon us by the state 
 to properly care for, in the future, the 
 monument, which we are here to-day to 
 dedicate. 
 
 We are here also to remember, and com- 
 memorate the event which this monument 
 perpetuates. 
 
 We are here also to remember gratefully 
 the many other sacrifices made by the early 
 settlers of Ohio in building up the civiliza- 
 tion we now enjoy. 
 
 At this place where we are now gathered, in the late autumn 
 of the year 1790, one hundred and fifteen years ago, twelve set- 
 tlers were slaughtered by the Indians. 
 
 GEN. K. HKINKKKHOl- I- 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 27 
 
 This was the first massacre and the principal one, during the 
 Indian war then just opening. 
 
 Marietta had been settled two years before, and Big Bot- 
 tom, as this place was then known, was an overflow from that 
 place and comprised altogether thirty-six persons. 
 
 The year before several other settlements were established 
 from Marietta, but thus far this was the most remote. 
 
 No state in the Union was settled by a more worthy or en- 
 terprising class of citizens. They were largely the soldiers or 
 sons of soldiers of the Revolutionary War. Many were college 
 graduates, and practically all of them were well educated, and 
 they brought to the west the very best civilization of the east. 
 
 Ohio at that time was an unbroken wilderness filled with 
 wild animals and wilder men, and to conquer it the highest cour- 
 age and ability were required. The result was the founding of 
 a state which in all the requirements of a high civilization has 
 no superior. Even in wealth and population to-day there is 
 no state in the Union that equals it if we leave out the great cities 
 of New York, Chicago and Philadelphia, which are mainly for- 
 eign and not native. 
 
 The men or women, therefore, who founded this state and 
 gave their lives to its development and established the institutions 
 we now enjoy, are well worthy of remembrance and honor by 
 those who come after them and now enjoy the fruits of their 
 labors and sacrifices. 
 
 What these labors and sacrifices were, will be indicated in 
 the address of the distinguished speakers who are here to-day 
 and to whom I now give opportunity to be heard. 
 
 ADDRESS OF JUDGE W. B. CREW. 
 
 When I look over this audience and see here this afternoon 
 so many friendly and familiar faces, I feel that I need hardly 
 assure this company that I am glad to be with you on this occa- 
 sion. It is always a very great pleasure to me, upon any 
 occasion, to meet and greet my friends and neighbors of good 
 old Morgan, the county of my birth. And I think I may be 
 pardoned for saying that on this occasion the pleasure is doubled 
 
28 
 
 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Puhlications. 
 
 by reason of the fact that I find myself in such distinguished 
 company. And I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and through 
 you, the society under whose auspices these exercises are held, 
 for the courtesy which has afforded me the opportunity of 
 being with you on this interesting occasion. If I remember rightly, 
 it was Isaak Walton who said in his "Angler," that Dr. Botelier 
 was accustomed to remark, "that doubtless God might have 
 made a better berry than the strawberry, but doubtless He never 
 did," and I suppose that I but voice the sentiments of this com- 
 pany, and assert a truth, when I say, that doubtless there might 
 have been a better place to be born in than 
 Morgan county, but doubtless no such place 
 exists. And those of us who are to the 
 manor born, but whose business has for a 
 season called us into other fields, are, I 
 assure you, always glad to get back home. 
 My friends, I came here to-day at the 
 kind invitation of my friend, Mr. Randall, 
 not as one of the orators of this occasion, 
 and not expecting or intending to make a 
 speech, but I came, doubtless as most of 
 you have come, only that 1 might, as a 
 citizen of Morgan county, testify by my presence my appreciation 
 and approval of what has been done by one of our patriotic, 
 public-spirited fellow-citizens, Mr. Brokaw, in erecting, at his 
 own expense, this beautiful monument, which he has generously 
 donated to The Archaeological and Historical Society of Ohio, 
 to the end that there may be preserved and perpetuated the 
 memory of one of the greatest, if not the greatest historic event 
 in the pioneer history of Morgan county. This upon his part 
 was certainly a most generous and gracious act, and I want here 
 and now, for myself and for you, as citizens of Morgan county, — 
 for whom I think I may assume to speak on this occasion, — to 
 thus publicly thank Mr. Brokaw for his generous gift. 
 
 As we have been so eloquently told by Prof. Martzolff, this 
 custom of erecting monuments or tablets to commemorate great 
 happenings or events of public interest, is a custom of great 
 antiquity ; as old perhaps as the centuries themselves. And when 
 
 W. B. CRKW. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 
 
 29 
 
 we consider that but for this custom and the preservation of 
 these monuments and tablets, much that we now recognize and 
 accept as historic truths would have been lost to us and all future 
 generations, it is matter of earnest congratulation upon our part, 
 that this monument, which we are met here to-day to dedicate, 
 has been donated to, and has been formally accepted by the 
 Archaeological and Historical Society of Ohio. For we feel and 
 know that its acceptance by this Society gives abundant assurance 
 that with such a custodian, it will be so cared for and preserved 
 that in the years to come it will remain in place to tell its sad 
 historic story. That this may be so, and that many years of 
 health and happiness may yet remain to its generous donor, is, I 
 am sure, the earnest, heartfelt wish of each and all of us. 
 
 ADDRESS OF W. H. HUNTER. 
 
 I am a Presbyterian and believe in destiny as did Mr. Bro- 
 kaw, whose ancestor I surmise, was Abraham Brokaw who set- 
 tled in what is now Nottingham township, 
 Harrison county, in 1798, and who with 
 others organized the Nottingham Presbyte- 
 rian Church in 1802. He believed in des- 
 tiny ; that the pioneer followed at the right 
 hand of God and nothing was done not 
 directed by Divine power. I can see des- 
 
 tiny in the horrid massacre of the pioneers 
 
 ^■h on this spot and which we commemorate 
 ^j//^Kt to-day. It pointed the way to the achieve- 
 ment which is the great state of Ohio, 
 w. H. HUNTER. j^^^ massacre called the attention of the 
 
 authorities at Philadelphia to the need of a strong arm ; it called 
 attention to the fact that there really were settlers beyond the 
 Alleghanies. 
 
 But you may ask why did not Harmar and St. Clair, when 
 they took up arms save the hour? Had they succeeded the 
 treaties would have made the English line at the Ohio .river in- 
 stead of at the lakes. Their defeats only jiointed the way for the 
 intrepid Anthony \\'ayne, whose victory at Fallen Timbers and 
 whose treatv at Greenville ended the Revolutionarv War as the 
 
30 
 
 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 Battle of Point Pleasant Treaty twenty years before was its be- 
 ginning. Had the pioneers been successful in that conflict the 
 Americans would not have rebelled. It would have shown the 
 impossibility of success. 
 
 But Colonel Lewis was successful, and Anthony Wayne was 
 successful. The Revolution culminated in independence, but not 
 for Ohio until Wayne fought the last battle that gave our people 
 instead of England the land upon which we now stand. 
 
 England could not be induced to accept the provisions of the 
 Treaty of Paris as it related to the Northwest, whose conquest 
 was made by George Rogers Clark, and she persisted in her 
 claim to the land northwest of the river Ohio, and she persisted 
 in sending her savage allies into the settlements hoping to thus 
 make xA.merican settlement impossible. 
 
 The incursion that massacred the settlers at the place known 
 in history as Big Bottom, called attention to England's intention 
 as God directed, and Harmar, St. Clair and Wayne, under the 
 same powerful Director, made it possible for us to dedicate this 
 monument. 
 
 ADDRESS Or PROF. M. R. ANDREWS. 
 
 The young men who came to this spot a hundred and fifteen 
 years ago formed the extreme outpost of the New England 
 settlement that had been made at Marietta 
 two years earlier. It is almost impossible 
 for us now to realize the difficulties and 
 dangers which beset those struggling colo- 
 nies. I doubt if there were more than two 
 thousand actual settlers on this side of the 
 Ohio, from the Muskingum to the Miami, 
 when the little band of pioneers were mas- 
 sacred at this place. On the edge of this 
 great territory small parties of bold men 
 watched and toiled, waiting for the time 
 when British agents would cease to send the 
 savage on his errands of murder. The first seven years of 
 the settlement along this border was, as has already been 
 said, a continuation of the Revolutionary War, which began at 
 
 M. R. ANDRKWS. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 31 
 
 Point Pleasant and ended at Fallen Timbers. After Wayne had 
 made a treaty with the Indians, and Jay with the British, the 
 occupation of the savage was gone, and the settlements began 
 to extend beyond the banks of the rivers. 
 
 Yet long before this consummation, even within the period 
 of border warfare, these pioneers from New England, officers 
 and soldiers of the Revolution, began to make arrangements 
 for the education of their children. They were determined 
 that "religion, morality and knowledge" should "be encouraged" 
 from the very beginning. In the first winter Major Anselm 
 Tupper taught a school in the Marietta block-house, and in the 
 first summer Manasseh Cutler had suggested Harmar Hill as 
 a suitable place for a university. The rapid settlement of the 
 Scioto country so changed the center of population that a few 
 years later General Rufus Putnam found it expedient to choose 
 another site — Chandler's Hill — where Ohio University now 
 stands. Ere this was done the citizens of Marietta had taken 
 steps towards having an institution for higher education in their 
 own town. Within a year after the close of the Indian War 
 they began Muskingum Academy, from which grew Marietta 
 College. The first body of emigrants to this valley, those from 
 New England, have left us, then, two worthy monuments of 
 their zeal in behalf of higher education, Ohio University and 
 Marietta College. 
 
 When peace had been established the Western Reserve was 
 opened for settlement, and from that time New England sent 
 comparatively few to "Muskingum," as this whole valley was 
 then called. The hardy yeomen of Virginia came across the 
 country and occupied the land north of the Marietta settlements. 
 Their path is marked by the names of Monroe and Morgan 
 counties, commemorating two of Virginia's distinguished sons. 
 North of these and mingling with them came the Scotch-Irish 
 from Pennsylvania, building Presbyterian churches and acade- 
 mies and preaching "righteousness, temperance and judgment 
 to come." Some of those academies have grown to Colleges, 
 and one of them, Muskingum College, though little among the 
 tribes of Israel, has sent out many a Saul to lead the people. A 
 college that has given us the Finlevs, the Stevensons and such 
 
32 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 university presidents as Dr. Thompson and Dr. Harper deserves 
 grateful remembrance from the whole people. 
 
 North of the Scotch-Irish zone there came from Pennsyl- 
 vania to the Muskingum, as the Tuscarawas was then called, 
 the Moravians .to occupy the land where their disciples, the 
 Christian Indians had been murdered. John Heckewelder, the 
 pioneer of this movement, had visited this valley as early as 1762. 
 A group of Moravian churches in Tuscarawas county remains 
 as a fitting memorial of his Christian labors. 
 
 Early in the nineteenth century immigrants from Ger- 
 many and Ireland came in considerable numbers to this valley. 
 Their settlements are marked by Lutheran and Catholic churches. 
 
 The blending of all these elements could not be accomplished 
 at once. Even the native Americans had little acquaintance 
 with their neighbors from other states, and there were differ- 
 ences in faith and in customs which for a time kept the little 
 groups asunder. I have often heard a tradition of a New Eng- 
 land family that was surrounded by Virginians. A girl from 
 this family had gone on some errand to the cabin of a neighbor. 
 While she was there a child exclaimed, "Mother, give her a 
 piece of bread. I want to see how a Yankee eats." There were 
 also differences and mutual prejudices between Americans and 
 foreigners, but comradeship in battling with the wilderness 
 changed these feelings into sympathy and respect. The Amer- 
 ican soon learned that the Irishman or the German was as handy 
 at a log-rolling or a raising as any other man, and these learned 
 in their turn that the Yankee or the Virginian was not unwilling 
 to be neighborly. Whatever traces of old differences remained 
 were obliterated by the storm of Civil War. The strife which, 
 for a time, divided the nation united the section. In the regiment 
 to which I had the honor to belong, as well as in others raised 
 in this valley, there were worthy descendants of all these classes. 
 Cavalier and Puritan, Catholic and Protestant, German, Irish, 
 and American, were all united in defending a common country, 
 and thus in the fiery trial of war all the elements were fused into 
 a united people. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 
 
 33 
 
 TOD B. GALLOWAY. 
 
 ADDRESS OF TOD B. GALLOWAY. 
 
 If I were to ask you what I should talk about. I suppose 
 you would auswer me as the small boy did in Sunday School 
 one day when a man got up and said, "Now, 
 children, what shall I talk about?" and the 
 bright boy said, "about one minute." I am 
 somewhat like an old Scotch preacher I once 
 heard of : A man went to church one day, 
 and he noticed that the preacher was crying 
 a great deal during the delivery of his ser- 
 mon. Finally the stranger turned to an old 
 lady who was sitting near him. "What makes 
 your preacher cry so much?" he asked her. 
 She answered, "Hoot mon. if you dinna have 
 more to say than he has, you would crv too."' 
 So if you see great streams of tears running down my face before 
 I finish talking you will know the reason of it. It happened to be 
 my good fortune to be sent with other gentlemen representing the 
 commission appointed by the Ohio Legislature to investigate the 
 State Hospitals erected for the care of those afflicted with tuber- 
 culosis ; one of the places we visited was the town of Rutland, 
 Mass. After we were through our investigation of the splendid 
 hospital at that place. I happened to wander through the old 
 town of Rutland, and soon found myself standing before the 
 historical Putnam house, and by a strange coincidence I stood 
 there on the anniversary day on which that band had started 
 out from that home, and it struck me with peculiar force that 
 we were from Ohio endeavoring to carry out a splendid purpose, 
 that of erecting a hospital for the care of those unfortunately 
 afflicted with disease, just as our forefathers had left the little 
 town of Rutland, Mass., to aid others of their nationality to pro- 
 cure homes in this wilderness. 
 
 Little did I think on that April morning as I stood there 
 that I would be privileged to be here on this occasion, at the 
 dedication of this monument, erected to commemorate the mas- 
 sacre of the sons of that splendid band of pioneers who set out 
 to people this valley. My friends, we of Ohio do not have to 
 Vol. XV — 3. 
 
34 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 search history other than that of our own state for noble ideas. 
 The story of the foundation of our state and its progress is hke 
 a romance. 
 
 Well did Washington say in the dark days of the Revolution 
 when he was questioned as to what he would do if he met defeat, 
 that he would come out here and settle in the valley of the ]\Ius- 
 kingum. Several years ago a friend of mine, a lady of Ohio, 
 met an English woman whose whole idea of x\merica was based 
 upon a winter spent on a ranch in Colorado, and she said to this 
 lady: "What do you raise in Oao?" "We call it Ohio, and we 
 raise chiefly great men and women." And that was a very apt 
 reply, my friends, because that is what we have done in this state 
 from its foundation. We have, from the days of the passage of 
 the ordinance of 1787 down to the present time, been in history. 
 It is useless for me to try to explain to you what Ohio has done 
 for this Union ; you already know. I merely want to say that a 
 day like to-day marks a patriotic epoch ; and also, that it is par- 
 ticularly gratifying to me to see so many children here, because 
 they learn by precept, and a day like this is a wonderful object 
 lesson to the citizens of the future. You know in former times 
 it used to be the custom when they wanted to mark boundary 
 lines between two places they would take the children out and 
 Avhip them and the children remembered where they were whipped, 
 and in that way the record of the boundaries was preserved. I 
 think this is on the same principle. 
 
 ADDRESS OF D. J. RYAN. 
 
 I congratulate Morgan county and I congratulate our society 
 on this occasion in doing honor to itself and credit to the people 
 of this county in remembering in the manner that they have the 
 noble pioneers who went before them, of a century ago, and T 
 congratulate Mr. Brokaw on living to see the day when his 
 judgment and patriotism inspired him to contribute something 
 that will bear in the mind and keep the memory green of the 
 vounger generation, of those men and women who laid the foun- 
 dation of this commonwealth. The greatest thing that Ohio has 
 are its plain men and women who live among the hills and on 
 the plains, and that consecrate their lives to the dignity and 
 
Bi^ Bottom and Its History. 
 
 35 
 
 nobility of the home. It is greater than all the wealth and 
 all the power and all the fame that is won on any field, be it 
 the field of commerce, the field of finance, or the field of war ; 
 greater than the greatest money magnate of to-day ; more loved 
 in the memory of the people of Ohio is the memory of these peo- 
 ple who lived a century ago, and who gave up their lives and 
 became martyrs to the progress of the state of Ohio in order 
 that its great foundation might be built like unto that of a stone. 
 The stdte of Ohio is great ; this state of Ohio has taken the 
 position that it has in history because the best blood, the best 
 brawn, and the best brains of America contributed to lay the foun- 
 dation of Ohio, and we assembling here to- 
 day do more honor to ourselves than even 
 we do to their memory ; nothing that we 
 can do or say to-day can consecrate this 
 ground any more than it was consecrated 
 when the wonderful act was performed bv 
 which this people were made martyrs to the 
 development of Ohio. 
 
 I do not think Mr. Randall has said as 
 much as he ought to have said about our 
 society; it was founded in 1885 by General 
 Brinkerhofif, Allen Thurman, Rutherford B. 
 Hayes and Mr. Sessions. The object of this society is, in 
 the midst of all this rush and bustle to turn backward 
 and to perpetuate by monument, by speech, and by writings 
 the deeds and acts of our forefathers. It is good for 
 the people to be reminded that there was a great solid race 
 that preceded them ; it is well that in this age when men 
 think of nothing but chasing the almighty dollar that some organ- 
 ization be formed for the purpose of preserving the memory of 
 the deeds of our forefathers in order that their sons may not for- 
 gfet them entirely. We are not here to-day to share in this honor ; 
 we are here simply as your agents, believing that we meet the 
 •expectations of your patriotism. Whenever and wherever this 
 society can do anything to make the memory of Ohio greater. or 
 to perpetuate the memory of her former sons, she does it with the 
 ■approval of the people of Ohio. 
 
36 
 
 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Socictx Publications. 
 
 This state was the thoroughfare for all the races and all the 
 people in their strug-gle to reach the west. Its foundations were 
 laid by the vefy best brains of this country, when that great Amer- 
 ican stream of settlers founded this composite Ohio. 
 
 Wherever you look you will find the Ohio man ; and as long 
 as we have The Ohio Archaeological and Historical Society to per- 
 petuate the greatness of the Ohioan, and mark the places where 
 they have accomplished their great acts, Ohio will live long in 
 the history of the country. 
 
 DR. NAYLOR'S POEM -"THE HARDY PIONEER." 
 
 When the century old was dying 
 
 And the new was waking to birth, 
 When the shortening days were flying 
 
 Like the shadows across the earth ; 
 When the speeding months were a-shiver 
 
 In the fall of the fading year, 
 To the banks of the bonny river 
 
 Came the hardy pioneer. 
 
 No castle secure and massy, 
 
 No orchard or field of grain, 
 No meadowland smooth and grassy 
 
 J. B. NAYLOR. 
 
 Found he in his vast domain ; 
 For the earth in its pristine glory 
 
 Knew naught of the tiller's ban — 
 And the solitude lisped the story 
 Of a land unspoiled by man. 
 
 But the woods were his for the asking. 
 
 And the streams at his door, and the fish 
 While the game on the hillsides basking 
 
 Was the fruitful fact of his wish. 
 And the nuts, in a fit of vagrance. 
 
 Dropped into his waiting hand — 
 And the fall flow'rs shed their fragrance • 
 
 Over all the bounteous land. 
 
Big Bottom and Its History. 37 
 
 His home was a log-built cottage, 
 
 His hearth was a bed of clay ; 
 And a pone and a mess of pottage 
 
 Were his at the close of day. 
 No longer had he to stifle — 
 
 His domain was the trackless wild ; 
 And his dogs and his flintlock rifle 
 
 Stood next to his wife and child. 
 
 The sun, in its midday splendor, 
 
 Lent cheer with its kindly light, 
 And the moon, wan-faced and tender, 
 
 Smiled down on his cot at night. 
 But his heart was a-dread with the vastness, 
 
 And a-chill with the Frost King's breath — 
 And afar in the forest fastness 
 
 Lurked the skeleton shade of Death ! 
 
 The old year died — and was shrouded 
 
 In a mantle of spotless white, 
 And the pall of his bier beclouded 
 
 The moon and the stars from sight ; 
 But the settler, safe in his shelter — 
 
 Where the flames on his hearth leaped high. 
 Cared naught for the fearsome skelter 
 
 Of the North Wind moaning by. 
 
 But is that the voice of the mourner 
 
 A-wail through the leafless trees, 
 That brings the gaunt hound from his corner — 
 
 And the child to his father's knees? 
 Ah, no ! 'Tis no night wind benignant 
 
 That the poor settler knows so well ; 
 'Tis the sound of the awful, malignant. 
 
 And devilish Indian yell ! 
 
 Small need is there now for reciting — ■ 
 
 Meager need for the poet to tell 
 
38 Ohio Arch, and Hist. Society Publications. 
 
 How the brave pioneer fell fighting. 
 How his dauntless wife fought and fell. 
 
 Let the autumn breeze whisper the story, 
 Till the rustling" reeds quiver and wave — 
 
 Till the goldenrod showers its glory 
 O'er the pioneer's lowly grave. 
 
 As for us — when the spring flowVs are peeping 
 
 From the frost-freed mould beneath, 
 And the ice-freed river is leaping 
 
 Like a flashing blade from its sheath, 
 Let us gather the first wild beauty 
 
 We can find on the brown earth's breast, 
 And place it here — as a duty — 
 
 Where the pioneer lies at rest. 
 
 And again — when the summer is dying. 
 
 And the year is growing old. 
 When the russet leaves falling and flying 
 
 Fetch a message of coming cold, 
 Let us deem it a noble pleasure 
 
 Once more to assemble here 
 And bring a late autumn treasure 
 
 To the hardy old pioneer. 
 
 Thus in the "falling of the year" almost one hundred and 
 fifteen years after the first scenes were enacted at Big Bottom, 
 a patriotic people assemble, and with music, speech and poetry 
 do honor to the noble army of pioneers, who gained for them 
 the land they now hold, and to the venerable man who has given 
 over to his fellow citizens, a perpetual memorial to the ''winning 
 of the west" and to his own generous spirit. 
 
 The Ohio Archaeological and Historical Society willingly 
 accepts the guardianship of this historic site. It feels that as a 
 state institution, organized for the purpose of furthering interest 
 in our state's history, that it can do nothing better than to aid in 
 preserving for the coming generations, the "land inarks of the 
 fathers." 
 
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