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THE PIONEER FAMILIES OF CLEVELAND

1796

STILES
 

     When, early in the month of June, 1796, a party sent out by the Connecticut Land Company to survey the Western Reserve, met with disaster in their open boats on Lake Ontario and were cast ashore at Sodus Bay, there were two women sharing in all the stress and danger of the expedition.
     One was a bride of but a few months, the other carried a young child.  The former, bearing the fantastic Biblical name of "Talitha Cumi," was a Miss Elderkin of Hartford, Conn., when in the previous November she had married Job P. Stiles.
     The latter was Mrs. Elijah Gun.
     Neither the name of Job P. Stiles nor that of Elijah Gunn appears in the official list of surveyors and helpers composing the party.  How or why they were included in it can only be conjectured.  A good-natured assent to the appeal of the two men to be allowed in the part with their families as possible settlers may explain their presence there, or, possibly a recognition of the valuable service the women might render in the commissary department of the expedition may have influence its leader in the matter.
     Job Phelps Stiles - born in Granville, Mass, 1769 - was the son of Job and Lydia Phelps Stiles, of two well-known New England families.  The first American ancestor of the Stiles was Robert, who came to Rowley, Mass., from Yorkshire, Eng., with Rev. Ezekiel Rogers.  The tombstone of Mrs. Lydia Stiles still stands in the Granville Cemetery.  She died in 1779, aged 40 years.
     Mrs. Talitha Stiles was equally well born.  The Elderkin family has furnished to the American commonwealth many of the name who were noted for their statesmanship, scholarship, and patriotism.  Mrs. Stiles was 17 years of age when she came to Cleveland.
     The young couple were well educated for the times.  Both had been school teachers.  They were married in Vermont or removed to that state soon after their wedding, and lived for a time in a locality form which came, a year or two later, several of the earliest Cleveland settlers.
     They were present at that first and memorable celebration of the Fourth of July on the Western Reserve soon after the surveyors had reached its north-eastern limit - now known as Conneaut, O.
     Here the company divided its forces, part remaining to define the eastern line of the promised land, while the others pushed on in boats to lay out its north-western one, which, at that time, began at the mouth of the Cuyahoga - the Indian claims beyond that point not having been settled.  This part of the expedition was considered of more importance, and it included Moses Cleveland, its leader and the most skillful of its surveyors.
     With them came Mr. and Mrs. Stiles - the Guns remaining in Conneaut.  A cabin was erected for the former on lot 53, north-east corner of

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Superior and Bank streets.  This lot contained two acres of land and extended from Superior to what is now St. Clair Street.  The cabin, if yet standing, would be on Bank Street, near Frankfort.  It must be borne in mind, however, that there were no streets then, except on paper, and their limits only defined by an occasional stake left by the surveyors.  Here, in the following February, was born a little son to Mr. and Mrs. Stiles.  Squaws belonging to a tribe of Seneca Indians encamped on the river south of the present central viaduct attended to the needs of the young mother and child.
     The Stiles family, in common with every other transient or permanent settler in Cleveland, suffered from the malaria that existed in all the lower portions of the hamlet.  Marsh lands and stagnant water bred swarms of mosquitoes that, through lack of proper precautions, inoculated the inhabitants with their deadly poison.  Fever and ague, typhoid and typhus fever, and many other like ailments yearly decimated the ranks of the young and old exposed to the attacks of the insects.  Children especially would be swept away by some form of malaria then prevalent.
     The Stiles family moved their few household effects to the heights south-east of the city and settled upon the 100-acre tract of land situated on what is now known as the south-west corner of Woodhill Road and Union Street.  Here they remained for a time, but for how long a period cannot be determined.  Authorities conflict in statements regarding it.  Probably not long before the war of 1812, Mr. and Mrs. Stiles returned to Vermont by way of Canada.  What conduced to this seemingly backward movement of their fortunes has never been explained.  They may not have succeeded in attempts to farm the land, or Mrs. Stiles may have succumbed to homesickness and a longing for her parents and friends.
     The long, weary journey back to Vermont must have been filled with regret and discouragement.  The return to the eastern state did not prove fortunate in a material way, for the family never acquired much means.
     It frequently has been stated as an historical fact that the Connecticut Land Company made a valuable gift of land to Mrs. Stiles as the first woman settler of Cleveland.  That such a promise was made there can be little doubt.  The land - as itemized - consisted of the two-acre town lot on Superior Street, upon which the family first settled, a ten-acre lot, No. 133, on St. Clair Street, extending back to the lake - a line drawn northward from E. 18th Street would pass through this property - and a 100-acre lot, No. 448 - situated on Woodhill Road corner of Union Street.  The depth of the latter extended south half-way to Harvard Street, and its width now includes wholly, or partially, the great Newburgh Rolling Mills.
     But the promise of this property was never fulfilled.  The Connecticut Land Company furnished no deed of it to Mrs. Stiles.  In 1841, John Ives and John Wilde - residence unknown - called upon her where she was living in Brandon, Vt., and sercured a quit deed to the three parcels of Cleveland land.  It has been stated that the equivalent for them was sheep and cattle.  However, Messrs. Ives and Wilde were unable to take possession.  The Connecticut Land Company had previously conveyed the property to other persons than the Stiles.

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     Job Stiles died in Branford, Vt., in 1849, aged 80 years.  His wife, Talitha Elderkin Stiles, outlived him 10 years.  Their Cleveland-born son- Charles Pheles Stiles - married Laura Irish, widow of Mr. Wetmore, raised a family of children and removed to Beaver, Iroquois Co., Illinois, where he died in 1882, aged 85 years.
     His youngest son, the only male descendant of Job Stiles - born 1839 - is a widower with two daughters.  With his death the name of his branch of the Stiles family will cease.

FIRST CHILD BORN IN CLEVELAND.

     The snow was falling lightly upon Cuyahoga's ice-locked river.  The small trees and undergrowth covering its eastern bank were bending under the weight of that already fallen.  Stretching away on the western side or cattail plumes indicating the swamp beneath.
     It was early in the afternoon, and a gray light yet outlined the river, but far out on the frozen shores of the lake Erie, the ragged hummocks of ice were growing dim, while the narrow zigzag trail that led up the steep bank was lost in the dense forest into which premature night had fallen.
     A few minutes' walk in it from the river stood a small cabin built of rough-hewn logs, so overshadowed by the great trees pressing in upon it that they seemed a menace - as if Nature would gladly crush out this intrusion upon its primeval solitude.  The narrow, crude door of the hut swung on leathern hinges, and the one other opening on a line with it and intended for a window was covered with greased paper, thus made transparent and rainproof, but through which daylight entered only when the sun hung high and skies were unclouded.

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NOTES:
¹. Joseph Langdon
². The Rockefeller Building
³. A trolley car.

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     But the one roomed interior needed no other light than that from the fireplace of mud and stone, which filled one end of its entire width, and in which big chunks of wood backed by a flaming log were brightly burning.
     A bedstead of saplings, nailed crosswise and close together, supported by four posts, still covered with bark, stood in a corner near the window.  A wide, smooth-hewed slab of wood resting upon rough logs served as a table, upon which stood the few pieces of crockery the household contained.  A log stretching the length of one side of the room was used as a settle, while a low slab, fashioned like the table and capable of seating three people, stood before the fire.  A rude ladder of sticks fastened to the wall led to a small opening overhead leading to a loft, in which no adult evidently could stand upright.
     Down this ladder, with much stooping and wriggling, backed a young man, who then walked to the fire with a pretence of poking and replenishing it, meanwhile stealing embarrassed glances at the very young woman, who was either lying upon the bed or getting up and moving restlessly about the room.
     Frequently she sighed, occasionally moaned softly, and every few minutes opened the door and peered anxiously out into the gloom beyond.  Once she gave a quick gasp, as if stricken with mortal pain, and, sinking down upon the settle, turned frightened, beseeching eyes upon the other occupant of the cabin.
     "I don't see why Job stays so long - seems as if I couldn't wait another minute for him.  You better go to meet him, Joe,¹ and hurry him up."
     "Yes, I will so, Tabitha.  But you known Indians are slow as molasses.  It's hard to get one started.  They seem to need so much time to turn things over in their minds.  I wouldn't worry if I were you.  The Senecas are still down under the hill by the river, for I was there only yesterday, and AuGee's squaw signed to ask me how you were, real kind.  But I'll go and see if there's anything hindering."
     And taking a coonskin cap and a tippet from a peg in the wall he hastened out.  The young woman, as if unwilling to remain alone in the cabin, put a shawl about her shoulders, and following him to the door, stood leaning against the casing and looking up into the tall trees, where daylight faintly lingered, outlining their topmost branches, where glistened bunches of dead leaves encrusted in snow.
     "On, Mother, Mother!"  she exclaimed aloud, voicing the longing that had possessed her for hours, "I want you, I need you, I am so alone."
     As she gazed upward, her tremulous speech breaking in upon the utter stillness of the forest, the tree trunks receded.  Suddenly a band of close-set lights brilliant beyond imagination and higher than the tallest trees hung suspended in the darkness.  Soon similar ones sprang out beneath them, rows above rows of lights dazzlings, innumerable, rose from the ground to the dizzy heights that crowned the whole.²
     With their appearance came strange sounds, unlike anything she had ever heard, rending the air, a continuous roar mingled with noises like clashings of steel upon steel.³  Looking down at her feet, behold, a wide

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NOTES:
¹. Bank Street
². Superior

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stone walk covered the leaves of the forest before her door, and beyond it a paved street, along which swiftly moved a horseless vehicle ablaze with light.⁴  A little way to the left, it turned at right angles and eastward, and joined a procession of like vehicles passing and repassing in endless procession.
     The other street⁵ upon which it turned, and of which teh cabin furnished but a glimpse, wwas also bordered with tall buildings that would have seemed of wonderful proportions, but for the tremendous structure - a veritable tower of Babel - across the way.
     And as Talitha Stiles gazed spellbound, forgetting time, space, and even her dire forebodings, a voice whispered in her ear.
     "The little child you are soon to enclose in your arms will lead the list of thousands of the Cleveland born who will make reality what is to you now but a dream."
     And then, above the roar of traffic and commerce, sounded the faraway bay of a wolf, and nearer the gutteral voices of an aboriginal tongue.   Suddenly all other sounds ceased.  The lights went out, the great building opposite broke up into innumerable tree trunks, and through the dusk appeared Job Stiles, her husband, followed by two squaws; one with white locks and wise old eyes bearing in her arms bunches of herbs, the other younger and spryer, carrying a warm blanket made of furs.
     Talitha turned slowly bank into the cabin.  Had she fallen asleep, while leaning against the doorjamb?  Or was it a heavenly vision that had come to comfort her?  For surely in no earthly land could such things be!
     Early in the morning of the following day, Jan. 23, 1797, the stork that  had been hovering for hours over the little log cabin, spread its wings for flight, leaving within a boy babe, the first child born in Cleveland, Ohio.
                    Charles Phelps Stiles
 

1796
LANDON

     One of the employees of both the first and second surveying parties that laid out the streets of Cleveland was a young man named Joseph Landon.  He was given the choice of a town lot to purchase, and selected No. 77 on the south side of Superior Street, directly opposite that occupied by the Stiles.  He remained in Cleveland some time after the surveyors had left, which was Oct. 18, 1796.  when he also returned East is doubtful.  One authority states that it was in the month of February; another that it was at an earlier date.  when remaining here, he lived with the Siles in their log cabin.  In the spring of 1797, he returned to Cleveland with the surveyors and with the help of Stephen Gilbert - who became permanent settler. - he cleared his lot and planted it to wheat.  This is the last mention made in any Cleveland records of Joseph Landon.

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1797

THE SECOND FAMILY TO ARRIVE IN CLEVELAND.

     The most careful research has failed to throw authentic light upon the answer to this question.
     (1)  It is claimed that Lorenzo Carter and his family were the earliest on the ground in the spring of 1797, but no proof of this has been furnished.
     (2)  The Hawley descendants say that the Carters were accompanied by Ezekial Hawley  his wife, and child.
     (3)  Furthermore, the second surveying party of the Connecticut Land Company, on their way to Cleveland, reached Conneaut, Ohio, May 26, 1797.  Elijah Gun and his wife had been left there the previous fall in charge of the company's stores.
     "We found that Gun and his wife had gone on to Cleveland,"  is the testimony of one of the surveyors who kept a journal of the expedition.
     It is very probable that the Carters and Hawleystook the journey from Vermont together.  Mrs. Carter had three small children when she started, and, while wintering in Canada, another child was born, Dec. 13, 1796; namely, Henry Carter started on such a long and eventful trip into the wilderness unaccompanied by some one of her own sex.  Mrs. Ezekial Hawley was her sister-in-law, and it is reasonable, therefore, to rest upon the word of the Hawley family - that they all came on together.
     No record has been left of the journey from Buffalo to Cleveland, whether it was made by water or land.  If by the former route, they naturally would hug the shore all the way, beaching their boat at night-fall, and camping out until morning.  As Conneaut was a station of the Connecticut Land Company and occupied by a family, the pioneer party would scarcely go by the spot without stopping.
     On the other hand, if the trip was by land, the party would pass through Conneaut.  In either event, unless the Guns already had started for Cleveland, the three families would meet there in April or early May.
     It is the opinion of the writer that the Carters, Hawleys, and Guns all came on together from Conneaut, and were established here by the time the second surveying party reached Cleveland.
     It is much to be regretted that accurate data concerning the earliest events in the history of Cleveland has not been preserved.  No authoritative statements can be made regarding many things that would be of great interest and value in any history of the city.  There remains, therefore, no recourse but to compare traditions handed down in pioneer families with the meager historical facts available, and accept that which seems most probable.

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1797

GUN

     As stated previously, Elijah Gun and his wife, accompanied the surveyors of the Connecticut Land Company from some point in the East to Conneaut, Ohio.  He was in the employ of the surveyors, and Mrs. Gun cooked for the party.
     When the surveyors left Conneaut late in October, 1796, on their return to the East, the Guns were left in charge of the storehouse - dubbed "Castle Stow" - a large, low structure of unhewn logs, and thatched with wild grasses and sod.
     This spot was on the north-easterly boundary of the Western Reserve.  The following May the Guns left - a month before the surveyors' return - and proceeded to Cleveland, whether by boat or on foot, no record can be found.  They occupied the company's cabin on the river bank north of Superior Street, then built one of their own on River Street.  The prevalence of malaria and mosquitoes drove them finally to a farm out on Broadway, afterward called the "Rhodes Farm."
     The family consisted of Mr. Elijah Gun, his wife, Anna Sartwell Gun, connection with their sojourn in Conneaut or arrival here is made in any history of the city, but, nevertheless, one of the daughters was sixteen years of age at the time, and she was not the oldest child.
     Elijah Gun seems to have been a valuable citizen while in Cleveland, for we find his name among those serving the community by holding small and unremunerative offices.
     He was born in Deerfield, Mass., 1759, and died in Defiance, O., at the age of 96.  One or more of his sons were living there, at the time, and he had been making his home with him for several years.  Whether Mrs. Gun also died there cannot be learned, nor the date of her death.
     Mrs. Anna Sartwell Gun, wife of Christopher Gun, was given 100 acres of land by the Connecticut Land Company as a recognition of her services rendered it.  It was valued at $150.  The deed was recorded in 1803, as

"100 acre lot number 457."

In 1804, she sold 50 acres of it to George Kilbourne, and in 1805, the other half to Samuel Huntington.  See map on page....
     During her residence in Cleveland and Newburgh, she was best known as a competent nurse, who went in and out of fever stricken homes, ministering to the needs of the sick and dying, attending to the dire necessity of young mothers and their little ones, or relieving the bereaved of the last sad offices of their dead.  And all of this freely bestowed without money and without price.
     Mrs. Gun had a large family of her own, and many household duties while thus holding herself in readiness, by day or night, to respond to the call of duty or mercy.
     It is to be hoped that this good woman and a far easier life in her declining years than accorded her in her younger days.  she was 38 years old when she came to Cleveland.

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     The children of Elijah and Anna Sartwell Gun:

     Christopher Gun lived near the foot of Superior Street, and ran the ferry between the east and west side of the river.  Residents of the hamlet facetiously dubbed him Christopher Pistol, then docked the name to "Pistol" - one that clung to him the rest of his life.  He lived on a farm in Nottingham for some years, and afterward removed to Toledo, Ohio.
     At least three children, were born to Christopher and Ruth Hickox Gun.  They were Orsena, Hannah, and Solon Gun.  Probably there were others.
     Charles Gun, who married Betsey Mattox, removed to Maumee, O.  His death occurred only three weeks after that of his wife.
     The children, so far as can be learned, were Lucien, Elliott, Edward, and Minerva Gun.
     Christopher and Charles Gun were twins.  After Charles died at his home in Maumee, Christopher visited his late brother's children in that town, and so closely did he resembel his twin brother that the Indians in that locality fled at his approach, thinking it was the ghost of Charles Gun.
     Horace Gun, who married Anna Pritchard, daughter of Jared and Anna Baird Pritchard, lived in Cleveland the most of his life.  He moved to a farm in Brunswick, O., for a time, but returned and died here.  His children were:

     Mrs. Gun was never a strong woman; at last she succumbed to her large family and many cares, dying in 1843.
     Horace Gun married, secondly, Mrs. Jane Germain Draper.
     Elijah Gun, Jr., and Elenor Grant Gun lived in Maumee, Ohio.
     They had at least four children - Catherine, Lucretia, Henry, and Julia Gun.
     It is claimed by some of the Gun descendants that after the death of Eleanor Grant Gun, Elijah Gun, Jr., married Mrs. Dorcas Hickox Watterman, widow of Eleazur Watterman; but members of the Hickox family think this to be a mistake.
     The Gun family records remaining in Cleveland are very incomplete, and it was with much difficulty that the above data - a partial one - was secured.

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