CHAPTER VI
FROM THE PURCHASE OF 1784 TO THE SETTLEMENT OF THE COUNTY
The Purchase – Pickering & Co.- Small Warrantees – The Fox Estate – Lewis and Peters The Holland Land Company – The Bingham Lands – Mifflin Warrants Franklin College Northumberland and Lycoming – David Mead – The State Commissioners.
TRUE to the principles of equity pursued by Penn in his dealings with the natives, the government of Pennsylvania extinguished the last claim of the Indians by purchasing all the remaining territory in the original limits of the State which had not been included in the treaty of 1768. That treaty made the northwest bounds of possession as follows: The Ohio and Allegheny from the Ohio line to Kittanning, thence by a straight line to Upper Canoe place, on the head waters of the Susquehanna, now Cherrytree, in Clearfield county, thence by that river to the mouth of Pine Creek, below Lockhaven, thence north by Pine Creek to the New York line.
At a treaty held at Fort Stanwix (now Rome, N.Y.), the chiefs of the Six Nations, by deed dated October 23, 1784, conveyed to this Commonwealth all the residue of the State lying north and northwest of this line. This treaty was confirmed at Fort McIntosh (Beaver) by the Delawares and Wyandots, who claimed the southern part of the included territory, and a deed was executed by them January 21, 1785. The new acquisition covered the northwestern third of the State, and of course the present Clarion county. It was called the “Late Purchase,” or “New Purchase.”
April 8, 1785, the Assembly incorporated with Allegheny and Westmoreland all the territory within the New Purchase not previously assigned to any county. All west of the Allegheny and Conewango Creek, with Westmoreland, and all on the east, including therefore Clarion county, with Northumberland.
Individual property in Clarion county dates from the opening of the land office, May 1, 1785. A rush ensued for warrants in the New Purchase. Their area at first was limited to 400 acres each, with the privilege of ten per cent excess; soon after the limit was widened to 1,000 acres and allowance. The consideration money at first was £30 for 100 acres, or 80 cents per acre, and the surveyor’s fees. From the 1st of March, 1789, to the 3d of April, 1792, £20 ($53.33+) per 100 acres, exclusive of surveyor’s fees; from April 3, 1792, to September 1, 1817, £5 ($13.33+); after that date £10, or $26.66 2/3.
By an act passed in 1792, to encourage colonization on the extreme frontier -actual settlement was required to gain a title for land west of the Allegheny, “unless prevented by enemies of the United States.” The determination of the validity of titles under this proviso was a much vexed question, and gave rise to general and almost endless litigation. Happily Clarion county escaped this by reason of its geographical position; for by the time a similar act went into effect east of the Allegheny, most of the land here had been warranted, the Indians were no longer a constant menace, and the frontier was comparatively secure. At the same time the absence of the settlement proviso for warrants east of the Allegheny and Conewango, together with the fact that the greater portion of the land was in the hands of a few, retarded development of this country for fifteen years, and accounts for the paradox that Northern Armstrong, Clarion, Jefferson, Forest, and part of Warren county remained in primitive savagery till 1800, while in 1790 Butler, western Venango, and Crawford counties were comparatively populous.
The deterrent effects of intermittent Indian warfare are also to be taken into consideration; but this extended equally to the east and west of the Allegheny. In 1795 the law requiring applicants to make actual settlement was extended to the new purchase lying east of that river, and remained in force till 1817. Among the first to take out warrants in Clarion county were
PICKERING & Co.
These consisted of Timothy Pickering, Tench Coxe, Samuel Hogdon, Duncan Ingraham, jr., Andrew Craiger, and Morris Fisher. Colonel Pickering was a native of Massachusetts, but was then a resident of Philadelphia. He had been commander of a Pennsylvania regiment in the Revolution, and became secretary of war during the same period. He bore a prominent part in Indian difficulties and treaties concerning this State, and afterwards became postmaster-general and secretary of State of the general government. Throughout all he displayed executive ability. An article of agreement was drawn up by the company, April 6, 1785, stating that they were desirous of purchasing considerable quantities of land in the New Purchase, on the opening of the land office on the first of the succeeding month, and appointing Pickering, Coxe, Hogdon, and Ingraham a committee to procure warrants and manage the affairs of the company. It was likewise stipulated that the members of the company should be joint tenants, that the lands purchased by their committee should be conveyed to them as such in fee, and that a contract should be made with General James Potter, of Centre county, to select their warrants, show them to the surveyors, and see the proper returns made to the surveyor-general’s office. Of the 68,000 acres to be purchased by the company, Potter was to receive one-fourth for his services. This agreement was carried out. The warrants were taken early in May, 1785, and surveyed late in October of the same year, and in the spring of 1786. Those in Clarion county are scattered; two of them, 185 and 441 – the latter containing 1,137 acres-cover respectively New Bethlehem, Fairmount, and West Millville and vicinity. * The vicinity of Brinkerton was included. Taking in one in the northwestern corner of Porter township, Pickering territory extends for its full length, and on each side of the north and south dividing line between Piney and Monroe, and then veers off to the right, along Brush Run to its head.
General Potter having died, Pickering et al. conveyed this share, 17,000 acres, March 3, 1795, to his sons-in-law and executors, Andrew Gregg and James Poe, for the use of his heirs.
From the year 1785 to 1789 inclusive, a considerable number of four and five hundred acre tracts were taken up by various small holders, mostly residing in Philadelphia.
In 1785 a tract of 300 acres called “Troy,” No. 559, situated on “Lick Creek,” i.e., Licking, “a branch of Toby’s Creek,” was granted to David McKeechan, of Philadelphia, who conveyed it in 1796 to John Wilson, also of Philadelphia. This warrant is now largely the property of Mr. E. Over, of Licking township. John Wilson, the purchaser, was a banker, and bought out about the same period a number of the smaller owners; he also purchased a number of warrants from the Holland Company, but forfeited them by breach of conditions. In 1785 warrant 382-now covered by the farms of Wilson McKee and H. Henry-was drawn by Captain Miles, of Warren, and one in Piney, on the Licking township line, No. 404, was warranted to John Taylor. Patrick Moore in the same year purchased two warrants in eastern Licking, 323 and 327, now occupied in part by Michael Over; these were sold by the sheriff of Lycoming county, and bought by Charles Huston, to whom they were patented. The valley of Licking Creek and its tributaries seems to have been a favorite territory for the smaller speculators. In 1785 one tract on Lycamahoning Creek (Redbank) was warranted to Elias and Peter Miller, of Bedford county; conveyed to James Coulter. Warrants 723 and 725 were conveyed in 1785 to Colonel Andrew Porter, afterward surveyor-general.
Among other warrantees in Perry, Licking, and Piney townships are John Buchanan, deputy surveyor; James Hamilton, John Grier, and Philip and Joseph Creigh, the latter on Cherry Run. William Amberson, James Amberson, and Henry Reid warranted considerable land in Perry, Porter, and Redbank townships. In Perry township the Amberson tracts lie chiefly along the Allegheny, north of the Bingham lands. In 1786 two tracts in Richland township on Turkey Run were surveyed to Walter McFarland and conveyed by him to John Range, of Mt. Pleasant township, Adams county; in 1787 one tract in Clarion township was issued to William Todd and by him conveyed to Joseph Baldridge; 1787 Robert McLenahan conveyed tract 287, “Elliot’s Vale,” to William Elliot; it was situate at “the first fork of Lick Creek” and includes the site of Callensburg; 1787 one tract was warranted to John Sloan, afterward sheriff of Armstrong county.
In 1788 James Reed became owner of one tract in this county; and several patents were issued to Isaac Mason, John Cross and Cornelia Cross, executors of Robert Cross, merchant of Philadelphia. A few were granted to Edward, Price, merchant of the same city, for lands near Licking Creek. About the same period John Duncan warranted several tracts in eastern Licking, and John Clark one on the Clarion River, on the southern side, about one mile from its mouth; sold by him in 1792 to Thomas Hamilton, of Kittanning.
THE FOX ESTATE.
May 18, 1785, the brothers, George and Samuel Fox, and Leonard Dorsey entered into partnership for the purpose of buying land in the New Purchase. John Kelly, of Northumberland, afterward Union county, was to locate and supervise the surveying of the warrants and for this was to receive one-third interest in the property. Between the years 1785 and ’89 a number of small warrants were granted to them; two in Perry township, along the Allegheny, south of the junction of the Clarion, Nos. 184 and 139; one, 198, forming the northwest corner of Salem township; some along the Clarion in Licking township, and two, Nos. 424 and 434, covering the corner common to Licking, Toby and Piney townships. Of these, in 1790, Kelly received one-third. About 1795 the Foxes took out eight one-thousand acre warrants in this region; of these seven lie along the Allegheny, north of the Clarion, and are connected; the eighth, No. 5731, lies in northern apex of Toby township. These were patented in 1796 and became the sole property of Samuel Fox. The Fox estate was much enlarged by the purchase of the Millcreek Mifflin lands in 1798, and those farther south in 1816.
FRANKLIN COLLEGE WARRANTS.
In 1787 the State appropriated large bodies of land in the west to Dickinson and Franklin Colleges-the latter of Lancaster. About the western half of Salem township and the corner of Ashland left out by the Holland line, are covered by these warrants, numbering twelve in all, 805 to 816 inclusive.
Next in order, in 1789, come the
BRODHEAD AND THOMAS LANDS.
They were warranted-except the Beaver-Salem tracts-to Joseph Thomas, in trust for Thomas and Daniel Brodhead, then surveyor-general, and embrace land in Redbank, Porter, Monroe, Beaver, and Salem townships. The Beaver-Salem tracts were purchased by Thomas and Brodhead from John Barron, the warrantee; these consist of nine four- and five-hundred-acre warrants, 3840- 3848; the first two in the western part of Beaver township, south of the Holland Company’s line; the balance forming a tier in eastern Salem, embracing about one-third of the township. The southern lands were warranted at a later date; there are seventeen tracts of 1,000 acres each, numbered 5581-5592, and from 5596 to 5601. The Brodhead-Thomas territory in Clarion county covered an area of 27,300 acres. The latter tracts cover nearly the entire eastern half of Porter and western half of Redbank townships; the Pickering territory invades it in the vicinity of New Bethlehem and West Millville, and forms a hiatus about Brinkerton. In 1796 the territory was patented and divided, Brodhead receiving the Beaver-Salem section (which he conveyed the same year, with the exception of warrant 3,841, to Robert Brown, of Kittanning); and warrants 5592, 5593, 5594, 5595, 5596, 5597 in Redbank and Porter; and Thomas the remainder. Tracts 5601 and 5602 seem to have been previously sold.
Next in the order of taking out warrants is
THE HOLLAND COMPANY.
This was an unincorporated syndicate of wealthy citizens of Amsterdam, with whom Robert Morris had, about 1781, negotiated a large loan far the use of the colonies, to enable them to carry on the struggle for independence, and for which he assumed personally a partial responsibility. In consequence he assigned an immense body of land in western New York to the agents of the company. It is said that the State of Pennsylvania had contracted a debt to this company, which it liquidated by land; but there is some mystery in this regard. Holland was at that time distracted by the vicissitudes consequent on the French Revolution, and her capitalists may have sought investrnents in the distant and youthful republic, deeming them the safest. However this may be, on December 12 and 13, 1792, the Commonwealth granted 1180 warrants of 990 acres and allowance each in the New Purchase, and lying east of the Allegheny River and Conewango Creek, to Wilhem Willink, Nicolaas Van Staphorst, Christiaan Van Eeghen, Hendrick Vollenhoven and Rutger Jan Schimmelpeninck. Subsequently, Pieter Stadnitzki was added to the company. This was under the law of 1789, enabling aliens, under certain conditions, to hold and sell land in this State for a limited time; a law which seems have been specially devised, for the Holland Company. They held the land in joint tenancy with the right of survivorship. About the same time they purchased a large number of West Allegheny warrants, and in order to secure them made vigorous efforts to introduce settlers upon them; a fact which accounts for the priority of colonization in that section. Previously all warrants, from the manner of drawing the numbers, were styled “lottery warrants,” but in the case of extensive purchasers-the Holland Company, Bingham, and others-the system was changed to adapt it to their demands. Some of the Holland warrants were issued to Le Roy and Lincklaen, their New York agents. Their first Pennsylvania agent was Paul Busti, an Italian, who resided at Blockley’s Retreat, the present site of the Philadelphia almshouse. Busti had general super intendence of the property (the Hollanders never became citizens or exercised personal supervision), with power of conveyance and contract. Busti not only bought and sold lands for the company, but also acquired an individual title to much, as did Huidekoper, their local agent for the west Allegheny. Prior to 1811 Robert Beatty, of Armstrong county, was the sub-agent in this vicinity.
The Holland Company’s warrants east of the Allegheny were located in McKean, Warren, Forest, Clarion, Jefferson, and Armstrong counties. Most of the Clarion county tracts were surveyed in June and July, 1793. The line enters the county at the north on the Washington-Farmington boundary, and after following that down to its extremity passes through Knox township due south, takes up the Paint-Highland line, pursues that, and crosses the river about one mile above the county seat. Then it turns due west, truncates Clarion borough, crosses the river again a little below the Pike bridge, and continues due west till it reaches a point, one and one-half miles southwest of Shippenville. There it turns south to the Clarion River, a little below the mouth of Deer Creek; thence west again to a point a short distance southwest of Blair’s Corners; thence north to Monroeville, where it retires eastward, forming a recess for two of Barron’s warrants, and an irregular one of Fox’s intervening. A broken line, generally parallel to the northwestern line of Beaver township, carries it into Ashland in a due north course, where, a mile and a half east from Mt. Pleasant village, it turns westward till on a line with the western boundary of Ashland, into which it merges. From there the boundary of the Holland Company’s land in Clarion county is continuous with the county line to the place of beginning.
It will be seen that these lines include fully one-fourth the surface of the county, comprising all of Washington and all but a fraction of Elk township, five-sixths of Ashland, four-fifths of Paint, three-fourths of Beaver, two-thirds of Knox, and a small section of Clarion township. They embrace seventy-four warrants representing over 74,000 acres.
In the southern part of the county the territory of the company comprised about 10,000 acres, divided as follows: One section in southern Madison, bordering on the Redbank, consisting of all the territory south of the Bingham line, which runs through the center of the township west of Mifflin’s warrant 5086, which extends centrally from the Redbank till it intersects the Bingham line on the J. Mortimer farm, and east of a broken line running north of Van Buren Furnace. Further east a Holland tier crosses Redbank Creek into Porter township, adjoining Mifflin’s, and extending up the length of three 1,000 acre warrants. From the most southern of these three another one offsets eastwardly. Both of these are interfered with by several narrow strips running east and west. The last section of the Holland Company’s land lies in southern and eastern Redbank township, Nos. 3058-3063, including all south of the east and west line running through Shannondale and east of the Thomas and Brodhead line, except a few parcels in the southeastern corner.
In 1804 145 warrants in the purchase were seized by United States marshal Smith for unpaid national taxes. They were purchased by Busti, as agent for the company; but the former owners, or their heirs – Jesse Waln, Isaac Wharton, Samuel M. Fox, David Lewis, and John Adlum resisted its title. Accordingly Smith filed a bill of interpleader to determine in whom was the equitable ownership, in which the Holland Company and Le Roy and Bayard (who had succeeded Lincklaen) were complainants, and the parties above mentioned defendants. The decree of the Circuit Court (October 31, 1807)) decided in favor of Waln, Wharton, and the others, and ordered a conveyance in proportionate shares. The lands in this county involved in this contest were chiefly those of Samuel M. Fox. In 1805 Harm Jan Huidekoper was sent out by the syndicate as “general superintending agent” in a local sense. Busti still retained his former relations with the company. Huidekoper took up his residence at Meadville, and in the same year, March 19, purchased from the company twenty-three of its east Allegheny tracts. This purchase covered all its possessions in Beaver township, southern Ashland, southwestern Elk, and two warrants 2801 and 2795, in central Washington, about Fryburg. By that time Stadnitzki, Van Eeghen, and Van Staphorst had died.
THE BINGHAM LANDS.
Close upon the heels of those to Willink and company came the Bingham warrants. They were issued December 14, 1792, to Robert Gilmor and Thomas Willing, but patented and conveyed to William Bingham October 30, 1794. Willing was Bingham’s father-in-law, a leading merchant of Philadelphia, and partner of Robert Morris. Robert Gilmor, of Baltimore, was a correspondent of Bingham’s and Willing’s, and ranked high in the early social and commercial world. He was co-partner of an American commercial house established at Amsterdam, and resided there as agent. With the wealthy bankers Wilhem and Jan Willink, he had intimate business relations, and this, taken in connection with the almost identical period of the Holland and Bingham purchases, points to some connection between the two companies. William Bingham was a man of wealth and aristocratic connections, resident in the Quaker City. He was speaker of the first Pennsylvania House from 1791 to 1793, and afterward filled the chair in the Senate in 1795. By a rather odd coincidence two of the largest holders of land in Clarion county, William Bingham and Richard Peters, filled the highest positions respectively in the first House and Senate of Pennsylvania.
The Bingham estate in northern Clarion county consisted of thirty-three full 1000 acre warrants and eight halves of tracts cut by the Clarion-Jefferson line, embracing about 46,000 acres in Farmington, Highland, Millcreek, and Clarion townships. The boundary of the connected warrants begins on the Forest county line about one mile southeast of the junction of Walley’s Run and Coon Creek. It is identical with the line between the P. Haskell and the Ford and Lacy property, and continues due north and south, bisecting Farmington township to its southern boundary. It follows this line westward to the offset from Highland township, having the Peters land on the north here, and enters Knox. Near Mr. S.W. Wilson’s saw-mill it again takes a southern course, and penetrates Highland to a point a little below the cross-roads at Miola Post-office, thence leads east the length of one warrant into Millcreek township, thence north to the mouth of Blyson Run, where it turns due east, cutting Millcreek township into two sections, in the northern of which the Mifflin warrants lie and intervene between the Bingham lands in Farmington and those in Millcreek. Arrived at the Clarion and Jefferson county line, the Bingham boundary turns south on it to a point one-fourth mile north of Little Millcreek, where it turns due west to the mouth of that stream, then, jogs south, west, and north in an irregular line, coming up again to the northwest corner of the borough of Strattanville, then turning west to include warrant 3389, which covers the bend in the Clarion at Clugh’s Riffle, and is isolated on the north and east by Harrison’s warrants. In Farmington township the county line forms the limit to the Bingham territory on the east. All the tracts, except a few along the river, have due north and south lines.
The Bingham tracts were surveyed in August and September, 1793. The south Clarion Bingham. territory occupies connectedly parts of Perry, Madison, and Toby townships, covering, roughly speaking, the southern half of Perry, the northern half of Madison, the western third of Toby, and a section in the southeast on the Madison line, taking in Rimersburg; twenty-two warrants, all of 1,000 acres, except two of 500 in Perry township. The line is so zig-zag, 50 broken by gaps and interferences (i.e., previous warrant rights), that it is impossible to describe it except by projection. Its continuous boundaries are the Allegheny from near the mouth of Troutman’s Run to a point a little below Monterey, and the well-known line in Madison township extending from a point a little north of the junction of Mortimer and Catfish Runs, due east to Wild Cat Run.
William Bingham removed to England in the latter part of the last century, and died there toward the close of 1804. His will, dated January 10, 1804, devised all his realty to five executors in perpetual trust for his son William Bingham, and his daughters, Anna, wife of Alex. Baring, and Maria Matilda, wedded to Henry Baring. These trustees were Alexander and Henry Baring, of the great London banking house of Baring Brothers; Robert Gilmor, Thomas Mayne Willing, and Charles Willing Hare, of Philadelphia. The devisees had authority to dispose of portions of his property, and among them the warrants in the Late Purchase. Alex. Baring in 1842 became Lord Ashburton, and, having extensive commercial and landed interests in North America, was selected as Great Britain’s representative to perfect by treaty a settlement of the northeast boundary between the United States and the British Possessions (1842).
The alien Bingham devisees and Gilmor, resident in Amsterdam, appointed as their attorneys in fact Thomas Mayne Willing and Charles W. Hare.
THE HARRISON LANDS
Were warranted to George Harrison December 26, 1792, and surveyed in the early part of July, 1794. They consist in Clarion county, of a strip a mile, or a warrant, in width, extending north and south in Knox and Highland townships; and two offsetting to the east. The strip contains two oblong one-thousand-acre warrants, lying between the Bingham and Holland tracts, with the Peters on the north, and reaches down to tract 3389 of the Bingham. Here a jog eastward occurs, occupying two warrants which cover the mouth of Millcreek and extend into Millcreek and Clarion townships.
LEWIS AND PETERS.
This was a partnership composed of William Lewis and Richard Peters, of Philadelphia. The latter was a distinguished citizen of the early Commonwealth; he had served in the Revolution as a captain and as secretary of the board of war. Later he was elected speaker of the first Senate, and in 1792 was appointed judge of the United States District Court, occupying the bench till his death. His residence was at Belmont, a beautiful villa, now a charming spot in Fairmount Park. On January 26, 1793, Messrs. Lewis and Peters took out a large number of the largest warrants, which were surveyed late in July of the same year. In the northern part of the county they occupy all the area not covered by Willink and Company, Bingham and Harrison, viz. – the two tiers between the Bingham and Holland lines, comprising the western half of Farmington (except Biddle warrant, No. 5502, in the upper edge); the northeastern corner of Knox, and the northern neck in Highland, though concerning the latter there was a dispute, arising from an alleged overlapping of the Bingham purchase. In these tiers there are 16,500 acres. On June 20, 1794, Lewis and Peters conveyed all these warrants and several more in Forest county to Peter Benson and wife, who the same day deeded them to Richard Peters, Francis Johnston, and David Kennedy, and they became finally vested in Peters alone. The Dallas and Ingersoll warrants did not become a part of the Peters estate till after 1820.
THE MIFFLIN WARRANTS.
In 1786 Jonathan Mifflin, of Philadelphia, and Colonel Francis Johnston, of Revolutionary fame, living at Blockley Retreat, and then receiver-general of the land office, bought ten small tracts in the vicinity of “Lick Creek.” In 1794 surveys were made to Mifflin and Johnston for a number of large tracts-in Madison and Toby, and in, Millcreek townships. Those in Madison and Toby numbering 5081-5088, extend on the eastern line-lapping over it slightly – the width of the two townships; the northernmost one is interfered with considerably on the north. No. 5086, offsetting, embraces Lawsonham and vicinity. The Millcreek warrants contain the half of the township north of the Bingham line. In 1798 Mifflin (having bought out Johnston) sold some of the Millcreek lands to George and Samuel Fox, and in 1799 the remainder to the Bank of Pennsylvania.
In 1795 Charles Cist, of Philadelphia, took out warrants for two tracts on Toby’s Creek.
The first surveyors in this region were the skirmish line of civilization, the first white men to leave the beaten paths and penetrate the interior. Their work bore a large share in the development of the wilderness and formed the basis of the later subdivision lines in our county. The surveyors, therefore, and their methods merit our attention in a historical work of this kind.
Clarion county belonged to surveyor’s districts Nos. 6 and 7. All east of the north and south boundary line common to Madison, Porter, Toby, Piney, and Monroe townships, and a continuation of it to the river, and north of a line thence due west, belonged to No.6; all south and west of it, to No. 7. The first deputy-surveyor assigned to No. 6 was Samuel Johnston, who was succeeded in 1786 by George Woods. Johnston and Woods surveyed the Pickering tracts. In 1789, on the accession of Colonel Brodhead to the surveyor-generalship, Ennion Williams was appointed. Williams had been commander of a battalion of riflemen during the Revolution, and, like a great many military men, when his services were no longer required on the line of battle, was selected for a position only second in its arduous and hazardous character to the life of a soldier. Williams acted till 1794 and was replaced by John Brodhead, a relative of the general’s. Williams therefore surveyed the greater part of the Holland and all of the Harrison and Peters warrants, and Brodhead the upper Bingham and Mifflin tracts.
The first, and, until about 1800, apparently the only surveyor of District No. 7, was John Buchanan, of Philadelphia. Occasionally the deputy-surveyors sub-deputed others to do work.
The rugged and unexplored nature of the country in those days required surveying to be carried on in campaign style. Each surveyor was accompanied by a party, generally numbering a dozen, consisting of assistants, ax-men, and drivers, who brought up the rear with the pack-horses bearing provisions, tents, etc. The corps was always armed for danger was ever possible, either from wild beasts or Indians. Surveying was extremely hazardous between 1790 and 1793, owing to the Indian outbreaks and the war which culminated in the defeat of St. Clair; and very little of it was done. The severe punishment inflicted by General Wayne, in Ohio, awed the western tribes, and thenceforth the work of both subdivision and settlement advanced with comparative security. Yet, notwithstanding, there were continual alarms among the inhabitants of the frontier, owing to threatening hostilities arising from the dissatisfaction of the Indians with the treaties; militia-men were consequently picketed along the Allegheny. Cornplanter, the well known Seneca chief, cautioned the surveyors to leave the woods, as they might expect attack after the 13th of December, 1794. However, nothing serious transpired.
The surveyors went in advance of the slow provision-train, blazing their route as they went along, to enable the packmen to follow. In after times these lines were sometimes mistaken for warrant lines, and caused confusion. When the corps at work on a line arrived at a place, almost impassably dense or rough-a rugged ravine, for instance-instead of maintaining their straight line, they would turn to the right or left at right angles till a practicable course was found, and, on arriving at the bottom or opening, would return to a spot on a line with the break-off. These breaks were ignored in the returns, but were puzzling to future land litigants; the courts decided that the ground, and not the air lines, controlled.
In laying out a “block” or tier of warrants, the surveyors by no means ran all the warrant lines by actual measurement. They would measure lines for two or three sides of a block of warrants, deduce the remaining side or sides, and then project imaginary lines of division across the parallelogram, splitting it into tracts of equal area. The corners along the actual line would be specifically designated as by “a white oak,” “a gum,” etc.; the imaginary corners were indicated by imaginary “posts.”
Most of the larger warrants were regular rectangles with lines running true to the cardinal points; the exceptions ,were where previous warrants, overlapping, made irregularity of outline necessary, and along the Allegheny, across which warrants could not extend on account of the difference of tenure. Each tract had a name, generally fanciful or imitative, as “Troy,” 559; “Busti Farm,” 2710; sometimes incidental or descriptive, as 3675 on Knapp’s Run, in Northwestern Farmington, called ” Hickory Dale”; the adjoining warrant south, “Sawmill Run”; “Wild Cherrytree Plain” (5081), in Madison township, east of the junction of Wildcat and Fiddler’s Runs; “Han o yought,” “where the stream is crooked” (5629).
There is scarcely any data for determining the value of warrant lands in the earliest days. Conveyances were usually made only from warrantees to patentees, and in case of small tracts the consideration, nominal, was five shillings per tract.
In 1788 David and John Mead, the Randolph brothers, Stophel Seiverling, James Miller, and Cornelius Van Horn passed through Clarion county on the Susquehanna trail. They had come from the far distant Wyoming valley, where they had been driven from their possessions by the contentions of the Connecticut claimants. From Venango they ascended French Creek to the mouth of the Cussewago, and erected cabins in that fertile vale-the future city of Meadville.
In 1790 the Supreme Executive Council appointed a commission to survey the Upper Allegheny and its tributaries and examine the capabilities of the “Late Purchase.” It consisted of Colonel Timothy Matlack, Samue1 Maclay, and John Adlum. Matlack had been with General James Potter, a member of the State Resolutionary Committee of the Frame of Government, and was subsequently secretary of the Commonwealth and master of rolls. Maclay, the grandfather of Hon. David Maclay, of Sligo, was a veteran surveyor of Eastern and Central Pennsylvania, and was president of the State Senate from 1802 to 1804. John Adlum was a State commissioner, resident in Centre county, who afterwards removed to Maryland. He had some interest in Clarion county property. One of the objects of their expedition was to explore a route for a wagon road through the Purchase to the head waters of the Allegheny. They left Lebanon May 1, 1790, their intention being to ascend the “West Branch as high as it will admit canoes and then examine what kind of communication the country will admit of between it and Toby’s Creek.” ** On June 18 they (Matlack and Maclay) crossed from the Sinnemahoning to Little Toby in Jefferson county; Adlum had previously left with a party of ax-men to run a line to the head-waters of the “Alegina,” near Warren, and construct canoes. This point his colleagues reached from the Sinnemahoning by a circuitous northern route. From hence, after passing up Conewango to Lake “Chadokin,” they descended the river in canoes, stopping to explore several affluents for some distance up, on their way. August 5 Mr. Maclay writes: “Started the surveying party “-from Fort Franklin- “early in the morning, as we were obliged to remain awhile to bake some bread. As soon as that was done we followed and overtook them and gave them some provisions, and then made the best of our way for Toby’s Creek. At one o’clock we had a heavy shower. After it was over we proceeded down the river and came to the mouth of Toby’s Creek about five o’clock, and before we had time to pitch our tent we had another heavy shower, followed by a rainy night.”
“Friday, August 6. The morning showery, and continued until twelve o’clock, when it cleared up a little, but does not yet promise fair weather. Our surveying party has not yet reached us, although it is now past four o’clock. The surveying party came in before night, and after them John Ria ***and Frederick Bawm came to our camp. It was therefore agreed that Bawm and Ria should be taken into pay for four days, and that I, with one hand in addition, should survey the river down to the Kishcaminitas, while the other commissioners were to be employed in exploring the Toby’s Creek.”
Unfortunately no record of this exploration exists. The commissioners must have ascended the stream for a considerable distance; for almost a week elapsed before they returned to Maclay, at his camp on the Kiskiminetas.
The line known to the earliest settlers as “Adlum’s line ” was one made on their overland return to the Allegheny. Mr. Maclay evidently thought that at the junction of Toby’s Creek the “Alegina” becomes the “Ohia,” for above that he mentions the stream by the first, and below, by the latter name.
We take up his diary again: “August 7.-Started with my party and surveyed nine miles and one half, and took up our quarters.
“August 8, Continued our survey eleven miles further down the river.” So he continued down to the Kiskiminetas.
On April 13, 1795, the western part of Northumberland, including, of course, the present Clarion county, was erected into Lycoming. There was no township organization here; but the western frontier was mentioned as “that part of Lycoming county lying in the New Purchase.”
As a tardy result of the exploration by the commissioners, an act of March 21, 1798, declared public highways the Allegheny and several of its tributaries, including “Toby’s Creek from the mouth up to the second fork,” and “Sandy Lick or Redbank Creek from the mouth up to the second fork.”
March 12, 1800, all of Clarion county lying north of the river was taken from Lycoming to form part of the new county, of Venango, and all south of the river was likewise cut off from Lycoming and annexed to the new county of Armstrong. There was no township organization of these sections till 1801 for Armstrong county, and 1806 for Venango.
* See map.
** Diary of Samuel Maclay.
*** Probably Baum and Rhea is the correct version of these names.
SOURCE: Page(s) 63-75, History of Clarion County, A.J. Davis, A.J.; Syracuse, N.Y.: D. Mason & Co. 1887
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