[Pg. 49]

1800

CLARK

     If the testimony of one Gilman Bryant has been properly quoted, David Clark was here in 1798 in company with Major Spafford.  They were living in the surveyors’ cabin on Superior Street.  Spafford was driving stakes and finishing the laying out of streets, while Clark was building a log-house on Water Street—No. 9.  It was on the west side of the street, about four rods from Superior, and here he died eight years later.  The two men had once lived in the same place—Dorset, Rutland Co., Vermont—therefore, old neighbors and friends.  Although they then made all preparations for the shelter of their families, two years elapsed before their wives and children arrived here.
     The family of David Clark included his wife, two daughters, and four sons.  There had been another child when they started from Dorset, but at some stage of the journey it met its death by drowning.  The fate of this child indicates that the family came part of the way, at least, by water.  Perhaps the Clarks and Spaffords made the whole journey by boat, as did the White family four years later.
     Mr. Clark evidently was not in very easy circumstances, as correspondence concerning the sale of city lots at that time shows that he was able to pay but little down on those he wished to purchase.

     The children of David and Margaret Branch Clark:

Margaret Clark,      m. Elisha Norton Lucy Clark,      m. Seth Doan Rufus Clark,      m. Dimarus Billings Mason Clark,      m.

Martin Clark,      m. Laura Lee David Jarvis Clark,      b. 1797;      m. Ruth Smith

[Pg. 50]
formation concerning her brothers, or of her sister, Mrs. Norton, although one of her grandsons was named “Norton” Doan.
     The widow Clark removed—sometime between the death of her husband and the year 1812—either on Broadway, or to Woodland Hills Avenue, not far from Broadway, for at the latter date she and her four sons are included in a list of residents of that locality.
     The marriages of three of these sons and the subsequent history of two of them have been secured, but what became of Mason and Martin, whether they died in this city or removed to some Western state, cannot be learned.  But probably one of them lived for a time in Mesopotamia, Trumbull Co.
     David Jarvis Clark, b. 1797, or “Jarvis,” as he was called, married Ruth Smith, of East Cleveland, in 1817.  In 1834 they moved to a new township, organized in Indiana, and called “Cleveland.”  A number of other families from this vicinity accompanied them.  But in 1851 several of these families moved again, this time to Elkhart, Ind.
     Ruth Smith Clark was born in Chatham, Conn., in 1801.  She had three children: Lucy, who died in Cleveland, Asa Branch, and James Clark.
     Jarvis Clark died in Elkhart in 1889, at the age of 92.  He often spoke of Gau Chee, a little Indian playmate of his in the earliest years of his Cleveland life.  Gau Chee was the son of a Mohawk chief, whose tribe lived part of each year under the hill between the present viaduct and the Columbus Street bridge.  Jarvis Clark is remembered as full of fun, and fond of society.
     Martin Clark married Laura Lee, of East Cleveland, in 1820. As has been stated, no further trace of him can be found.
     Rufus Clark married Dimarus Billings, of a Newburgh family, in 1827, Job Doan, as justice of the peace, officiating at the ceremony.  He was inclined to wander about, and after removing to two or three Western towns, which included Elkhart, Ind., he finally reached California, where he died about 1870.
     Dimarus Billings Clark died, leaving one son, Mason, who went to Washington, to some place on Puget Sound.  Rufus Clark married again, and had other children born to him.  It is said that as a young man he was very gay and loved to dance.  No dancing party was thought to be a success unless Rufus Clark was there to start the fun and keep it going.  But during a religious revival he joined an East Cleveland church, which barred him out from further enjoyment of that amusement.

--------------------

1800

HAMILTON

     The name of Hamilton became familiar to the residents of Newburgh through two men, Samuel and James, erroneously supposed to be brothers.  The relationship, if any existed, was no nearer than cousins.  Samuel Hamilton was descended from an old New England family of Pelham,

[Page 51]

Mass.  His father, Robert Hamilton, was born in 1759, married Elizabeth Kidd, and moved to Chesterfield.  Their oldest daughter, Elizabeth Hamilton, married a Mr. Cochran, moved to, and died in Independence, this county, at the age of 90.
     Samuel Hamilton, born in Chesterfield, 1761, married Susannah Hamilton of another family, of Chester, Mass.  Together with their six children they started in the fall of 1800 for Newburgh.  On arriving in Buffalo, they found nothing but an Indian trail between that place and Cleveland.  As it was too late in the season to go by way of the lake, the family remained in Buffalo for the winter, while the father and second son Justus, then a lad of nine years of age, started on horseback for Newburgh.
     One night, in Ashtabula County, they arrived cold and very hungry at the cabin of a former resident of Chesterfield, who welcomed them joyously, eager for news of the old home in the East, and to see familiar faces once more.  A haunch of venison was cut in slices and cooked before the fire, and the hungry travelers ate it with keen relish. Justus Hamilton used to declare that nothing afterwards tasted so good to him as that late supper in the wilderness.
     In the spring of 1801, the rest of the family came on in an open boat, beaching it every night, cooking their meals and sleeping on shore.  There was scarcely any one in Newburg when they reached there but Indians.  On returning from a business trip to Massachusetts, in 1804, Samuel Hamilton was drowned in Buffalo Creek, leaving his wife a widow with six children, in a wilderness far from parents, brothers, sisters, or other kin to whom she could turn in emergencies for help and comfort.  Her oldest son, Chester Hamilton, was then about 14 years old, Justus 12, and Samuel, the babe of the family, 4 years.  She raised all her children to honorable and useful maturity, giving each a good education for the times.  She was an expert at weaving, and earned many a dollar, or its equivalent, in that way.  Once when her house and nearly everything in it belonging to herself was burned, she saved a neighbor’s cloth she had woven by hastily cutting it from her loom.  Their home was on Woodland Hills Avenue, near the Carter homestead, where she died in 1820, having sustained the relation of both parents to her children for 16 years.
     It seems then, that one of the very first women to live in Newburgh was one of the noblest type of wife and mother, living, and working, and sacrificing for her children, and keeping their family name honored and respected.
     Her oldest child, Electa Hamilton, married Richard Blinn, lived many years in Newburgh, then removed to Perrysburg, and died there.
     Chester Hamilton married Lydia Warner, of a pioneer family, resided here for a while, and went West.
     Lyma Hamilton became Mrs. Samuel Miles, and lived in Strongsville, this county.
     Julia Hamilton married Edmond Rathbun in 1819, with whom she lived 63 years, both dying in 1881, just six months apart.  Their three daughters who married three Brooks brothers are still living in Newburgh.
     Justus Hamilton married Selinda Cochran, daughter of Amos and

[Page 52]
Rachel Brainard, pioneers of an early day.  Selinda Brainard was born in Middletown, Conn.  When very young, she was married to Richard Bailey.  Every thread of her wedding outfit was spun, woven, and made by her own hands.  She was early left a widow with two sons, Sherman and Richard Bailey,¹ and eventually married Amos Cochran, who lived but a short time, and by whom she had an infant daughter, Rachel Cochran.  Their residence at that time was in Avon, New York.  Mean while, her parents had settled in Newburgh, whither she came with her three children, shortly after the sad death of her father, who was killed by a falling tree.  In 1826, Mrs. Cochran married Justus Hamilton, and her family in time increased by three sons and a daughter, Augustus, Albert, Edwin T., the eminent jurist, and Delia Cleveland Hamilton.
     Justus Hamilton was a dignified, brusk, magisterial sort of man, but kind-hearted and just.  His neighbors were wont to seek his advice, and he was frequently chosen arbiter in the smoothing out of difficulties and quarrels.  He had a contract for the building of a part of the Ohio Canal, and while it was in the process of construction he hired Mrs. Garfield—the mother of James A. Garfield—to board the men he had employed on the canal.  It is said that every article of household goods the Garfields possessed was brought to the scene in a small conveyance, drawn by one horse, and that the money thus earned made the first payment on the little farm in Orange Township.
     Mrs. Justus Hamilton was sweet-tempered and a valuable woman to the community in which she lived.  Gifted as a nurse, constant demands were made upon her in this direction, which she never refused, thus laying the foundation for many life-long and intimate friendships with families scattered all over the township.  Her knowledge of medicinal herbs also proved invaluable to her neighbors, as her stores of wormwood, tansy, camomile, and rue, ever kept replenished, were freely offered when elsewhere needed.  A Christian woman in all that the name should Imply.

     Children of Justus and Selinda Cochran Hamilton:
 

Augustus Harvey Hamilton, b. 1827, in Newburgh;      m. Eliza Coffin.  He removed to Iowa in 1854 - a lawyer and newspaper man. Delia Hamilton, b. 1828; d. unmarried. Judge Edwain T. Hamilton, B. 1830;

m. Mary Jones (served four years of the Civil War). Albert Justus Hamilton, b. 1833;      m. Imogene Brooke.  He served three years in the Civil war, afterward removed to Parkville, Mo.

     The most prominent member of this family was its second son, Edwin Timothy Hamilton, judge of Common Pleas Court from 1875 to
1894.  He was a man of fine mental attainments, and no jurist in Cuyahoga County was more respected and admired for his legal ability, honesty, sense of justice, scholarly address, and gentle dignity. His refined,

---------------
     ¹.  Sherman H. Bailey, son of Richard and Selinda Bailey, b. 1810, m. Susan Shattuck.  He died in 1890.
         John Richard Bailey, brother of above, m. Mary Philip.  He died in Chillicothe, O.

[Page 53]
intellectual face was one that would ever win a second glance from a stranger.
     He died, some years ago, at his last residence on East 89th Street, leaving a widow and two children - Walter Hamilton, a Cleveland attorney, and Florence Hamilton.

---------------

1800

GAYLORD

     Captain Allen Gaylord was born in Goshen, Conn., 1778.  He came to Ohio in 1800, going first to Hudson, where he remained two years.  He then returned to Goshen, and some months later again set out for Cleveland, bringing with him his parents, Timothy and Phebe Gaylord, his brother Timothy, and his sisters, Roxana and Phebe Gaylord.  They came all the way in an ox-team, and were six weeks on the road.  The girls had never seen black walnut trees, and when they reached the Western Reserve and saw the green nuts hanging in abundance, they imagined they had struck an orange grove, and eagerly gathered aprons full of those found lying on the ground.  They were much chagrined at their brother’s hearty laughter at their mistake.
     Timothy Gaylord and Phebe, the parents, settled in Zanesville, Ohio.  Roxana Gaylord married Joseph Ryder, and settled in Painesville.  Ryder is said to have built the first house in that place in 1803.  Phebe Gaylord married a Lowry.  Allen Gaylord bought a farm on what is now Woodland Hills Road and Miles Ave., where his parents died.  It contained 50 acres and cost $200.
     Capt. Gaylord was a prominent man of Cleveland and Newburgh, taking an active part in all public affairs.  He organized and commanded a company of militia during the War of 1812, and announced to the terror stricken residents, after Hull’s surrender, that the boats coming down the lake and sighted off Huron, were not filled with Indians, but with our own troops.
     Philena Gun, daughter of Elijah and Anna Sartwell Gun, married Capt. Allen Gaylord, May 7, 1809, a hundred and four years ago.  The ceremony was performed by a justice of the peace, either Nathaniel Doan or Amos Spafford.  Anna was about sixteen years old when she came to Cleveland with her parents in 1796, and therefore married at the age of twenty-eight.  A not unusual thing at the present time, but at that day she must have been considered quite an old maid.  Mrs. Gaylord was energetic and persevering, well fitted for pioneer life.  Her over-taxed feet seldom rested, and her hands were never idle.  She bore privations and hardships with patience, and was a faithful wife, mother, and friend.
     Her wedding gown was a calico dress made in very primitive style, scant, with big sleeves.  Mr. Gaylord’s wedding vest was of buff and white gingham.

[Page 54]

     The music of the spinning-wheel filled their cabin all hours of the day.  She made the thread with which she did all her sewing, from flax grown on the farm, and spun and colored the wool that went into the garments worn in the family, and the blankets that covered them at night.  Mrs. Gaylord was obliged to go some distance for all the water she used - at a neighbor's well.  One morning, while absent on this errand, the Indians came into the house begging, as they often did.   She had left her little son and daughter alone there, and whether through evil design or only in a spirit of mischief - to give her a scare - one of the Indians took her boy on his back and made for the dense forest behind the house.  Mrs. Gaylord was returning, and within sight of her home, when she caught a glimpse what was going on, and dropping her pail, she ran, screaming at the Indian to bring back her child.  He returned, laughing, and, handling over the little fellow, said,
     "White squaw 'fraid Injun going to carry off papoose!"
     Capt. Allen Gaylord lived to be 90 years old, outliving his wife twenty-two years.  Mrs. Gaylord died in 1845, aged 64.  They remained on their farm all their married lives.

     The children of Capt. Allen and Philena Gaylord:

Henry Chrystopher Gaylord,      m. Harriet Parshall, daughter of John John Sartwell Gaylord, d. young. Ann Gaylord,      m. Willard Leach, of Lockport, N. Y. Minerva Gaylord,      m. Noah Graves,

formerly from Springfield, Mass.  Settled in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, 1832. Caroline Gaylord,      m. Erastus G. Thompson, of Conneaut, Ohio. Desdemona Gaylord.  The youngest child of the family and the only surviving one.

---------------

1801

HAMILTON

     James Hamilton, the head of the other Newburgh family of that name, came in the spring of 1801.  Soon after his arrival, he married Phenie Miner, a widow with one son.  He brought them and their belongings from the East on horseback, and commenced housekeeping not far from the Carters on Woodhill Road.  Mrs. Hamilton was always called "Aunt Phenie, a term of endearment given because of her great sympathy and fondness for young people who enjoyed her company and frequently visited her.  She had at least two sons and three daughters.

[Pg. 55]

     Julia Hamilton, the youngest daughter, took excellent care of her parents in their old age.  She also administered to a brother whose mind was long mentally unbalanced.  Another, and older, brother died, leaving an invalid wife and six children.  Julia carried for them all until the widow's death, and looked after the children until enabled to provide for themselves.  Her beautiful record of unselfishness has scarcely been equalled.  One of her brother's children, Lydia Hamilton, long a valuable nurse, died about six years ago, the last member of the family.
     It is a source of regret that so little of the James Hamilton family could be secured.  Mr. Hamilton appears on accessible records as late as 1812.  He seems to have been a good citizen, who was often entrusted with local public matters in Newburgh.  Only one of the sons married.

---------------

1801

GILBERT

     Augustus Gilbert, Sr., was another Newburgh pioneer, who came west, expecting to settle in Cleveland, but changed his plans when he found its malarious condition.
     The exact year in which he reached this locality cannot be learned, but family tradition places it within a year or two following that of 1800.
     At that date the family was living in New York State, whither it had removed from some place of Vermont.  The only son, Augustus Gilbert, Jr., was born in New York in 1800.
     According to old family letters, two brothers and a sister of Augustus, Sr., Daniel - Elias and Olive - where residing in or near Gaines, N. Y., as late as 1838.  Another brother, Stephen Gilbert, who came to Cleveland in 1798, was drowned in Lake Erie, off Rocky River, Apr. 19, 1808.
     Augustus Gilbert, Sr., born 1753, was the oldest child of Joseph Gilbert III, and Elizabeth Breck Gilbert, of Hartford, Conn., and was the great-grandson of Capt. John Gilbert, one of the earliest settlers of Hartford.  The Newburgh pioneer married Olive Parmely of Weybridge, Vt., in 1790.  He was then 27 years of age.
     Augustus Gilbert lived in Newburgh about 10 years, dying in 1813, aged 50.
     During his short residence here he became well known in the Western Reserve as an associate judge of this district.  Evidently he was a man of note, both in the Vermont town from which he removed and in this, his later residence, and highly respected for his superior education and natural talent.  He left an unusual library for that early day and crude environment, for when he died Newburgh was yet a hamlet of log-houses standing in a wilderness.
     At the death of his wife, Olive, April, 1807, he was left in sad domestic straits, a large family of motherless children on his hands, the eldest one

[Pg. 56]
being too young to assume the responsibility and the burden attending its charge.
     He was obliged, therefore, to again take upon himself marital relations within a year of his wife's death.
     He married Irene Burke, daughter of Sylvanus Burke, of Newburgh, a noble woman, who, in the seven years of the life remaining to Mr. Gilbert, gage to his motherless children the measure of care and affection they so sorely needed, and which, alone, he was unable to bestow.
     Two more little ones were added to the family - Louise and Irene - the latter a posthumous child, born several months after her father's death.
     Augustus and Olive Gilbert were buried in the old Newburgh Cemetery, eventually destroyed at the behest of Commerce, the few bodies permissible of removal being reinterred in Harvard Grove Cemetery.

     The children of Augustus and Olive Gilbert:
 

Dotia Gilbert, b. 1791; d. 1846;      m. Erastus Goodwin. Harriet Gilbert, b. 1792; d. 1839,      unmarried Maria Gilbert, b. 1796; d. 1817;      m. Elias Osborn, 1813. Emily Gilbert, b. 1805; d. 1822,      unmarried

Lovice Gilbert, b. 1798; d. 1841;      m. Jacob Van Duser. Augustus Gilbert, Jr.,b. 1800; d. 1853;      m. Mercy A. Jackson, 1829. Althea Gilbert, b. 1802; d. 1836;      m. Oliver J. Brooke of Warren.

     These children must have lacked vigorous constitutions, as it will be noticed that the one who survived the longest was only 55 years of age.

     The daughters born to Augustus and Irene Gilbert:
 

Louise Gilbert, b. 1810; d. in Cincinnati, 1849;      m. James S. Bangs, of Akron, O., and later  of Newburgh.

Irene Gilbert, b. 1813; m. Rev. A. P. Jones.  He was associate editor of the Cleveland Plain Dealer in the 30's.

     Mr. Jones’ parents were Richard and Hester Van Bibber Jones, of Poughkeepsie, N. Y.  His father was a soldier of the Revolutionary War, who removed to Euclid, O., and died there in 1820.
     His mother had a half-brother named Marselliot-French-Canadian voyageurs.
     Augustus Gilbert, Jr., the only son of the family, lived many years in Geauga County, near Chardon, O.  His children were:
 

James H. Gilbert,      m. Harriet Barnes. Maria Gilbert,      m. W. G. Welsh. Lawson A. Gilbert,      m. Althea Brooke. Harrison W. Gilbert,      unmarried.  Killed at Chickamauga, in the Civil War.

Julia Gilbert,      m. M. B. Crofts. Eliza Gilbert,      unmarried Arthur Gilbert,      m. Lavina Glendenning Newton G. Gilbert,      m. Emma Robinson Wallace B. Gilbert,      m. Anna Aura.

[Pg. 57]

1801

WARNER

     Darius Warner, Sr., of some Eastern state, unknown, had a son and two daughters living in Newburgh as early as 1801.
     The son, Darius Warner, Jr., married Delilah J. Wells of Virginia.
     Lydia Warner, m. Chester Hamilton.
     Esther Warner, m. Lyman Hammond.

     The daughters of Darius Warner, Jr., were:

Lydia S. Warner,      m. James Skinner, of Foxborough, Mass.

Sarah L. Warner,      m. Sherburn H. Wightman.

     The marriages are given in court records of
 

Spencer Warner and Sarah Culver,      of Newburgh.

Marian Warner and James Wolker Norman Warner and Mary Chase.

     Any or all of whom may have been members of the Darius Warner family.

--------------------

1801

HUNTINGTON

     In 1801, Samuel Huntington, Cleveland's first distinguished citizen, appeared upon the scene.  He was the one man who, for many a day, came with money in his pocket.  Back of him, in Norwich, Conn., where he was born, were wealth, position, and influence, and we suspect this plunge into the wilderness with wife and family was but part of a plan of future public life mapped out for himself and successfully followed.  For, before fairly settled in Cleveland, honors began to flow in upon him, and within seven years he was governeor of the state.  Meanwhile he had left the hamlet, and Painesville possesses all the glory of this part of his career.
     However, we can still claim what Samuel Huntington left to us, a few years’ residence here, and the fact that in that time he was made chief justice of the state, which office he held until assuming a higher one.  The story of his life and public services have been so often printed and repeated that all detail at this time would be superfluous.
     The Huntington family first went to Youngstown, Ohio, from Norwich, and but a few months later—May, 1801—arrived in Cleveland.  Perhaps they were but tarrying awhile until Amos Spafford had finished the double log-house he was building under orders from Mr. Huntington.  It stood back of the American House, once numbered 42, but today 802 Superior Street.  It was on the edge of a bluff that commanded a view of the Cuyahoga Valley, the river, and the distant hills of Newburgh.  A charming spot, but, alas! one where life was made miserable by mosquitoes and malaria.
     Mrs. Huntington’s experiences while living here, her efforts to forget the luxuries of her Eastern home, even its commonest comforts or necessities, and conform to the privation, dreariness, and constant ill-health of her present one, must have been an interesting story to those so fortunate

[Pg. 58]
as to hear it in after years.  She had but two neighbors, Mrs. Spafford and Mrs. Carter, both of whom were almost as unfitted—save in loyalty, courage, and patience—as herself for such a life.
     Mrs. Spafford, who was 14 years her senior, lived just west of her, and Mrs. Carter, about her own age, was far away, on the river at the foot of St. Clair, or rather what was to be St. Clair Street.  There were yet no defined highways, even Superior Street was but partly cleared, trees yet standing, and stumps everywhere, Water Street but an irregular path.
     Mrs. Huntington did not change her name in marriage.  She was a Miss Hannah Huntington, daughter of Judge Andrew Huntington and Lucy Coit, the latter a daughter of Dr. Joseph Lahrop Coit, of New London, Conn.  Mr. Huntington was married in Norwich, and all her children were born there.  She was 31 years old when she came to Cleveland, and she brought with her six children, the oldest but eight years, and the youngest less than a year old.  With her came a young friend and companion, Miss Margaret Cobb, who remained here for a time, and then returned East.
     Samuel Dodge built a frame-barn for Mr. Huntington, which stood on the same lot as the house, and years afterward it was used for a school house, and pronounced by a pupil to be quite unsuitable for the purpose, the wind and snow coming in through the cracks between the boards.  Mr. Huntington’s Cleveland property included much of what, until recent years, has been extremely valuable real estate.  He owned the original lots on Lake Street near Water Street, four lots on the latter street, the lots on the Public Square where the Society for Savings Bank building stands, many lots on the south side of Superior Street, and all land adjoining and including what is now Michigan and Champlain Streets, and probably many outstanding ten-acre lots.  It is claimed that there were, in all, 300 acres.
     In 1805, he exchanged this for property at the mouth of Grand River, now Fairport, belonging to John Walworth, removed to Newburgh, and lived there a few months, then went to Grand River, where he died eleven years afterward, June, 1817, and a year later Mrs. Huntington followed him.  They were laid away in a beautiful spot near the house and overlooking Grand River, one chosen by them for the purpose.   Fifty years afterward, the river had so encroached upon the spot that their two sons, Julian and Colbert, had the remains of their parents removed to Evergreen Cemetery in Painesville, and a monument marks their resting-place.

     The children of Governor and Mrs. Huntinton:
 

Francis Huntington, b. 1793;      m. Sally White, 1821; d. 1822. Martha D. Huntington, b. 1795;      m. John H. Mathews, M. D., of Painesville. Julian C. Huntington, b. 1796;      m. Adaline Parkman, of Parkman, Ohio

Colbert Huntington, b. 1797;      m. Eleanor Paine, of Chardon, O. Samuel Huntington, b. 1799 Dr. Robert G. Huntington, b. 1800;      m. Mary L. Fitch. He d. in Ellsworth, Ohio.

[Pg. 59]

     The fifth child of the Huntingtons, little Samuel, who, had he lived to manhood, would have been Samuel Huntington 4th, died in Cleveland at five years of age, and was buried here in 1804.
     The Governor Huntington homestead was 11/2 miles north of Painesville.  The property was considered one of the most naturally beautiful estates in northern Ohio.  It was purchased recently by a Chardon woman, and includes a large house, two barns, and 17 acres of rich farm land.

---------------

1801

THORP

     The case of Joel Thorp, quite common a hundred or more years ago, was that of a man well born and living in the heart of New England civilization, taking not only himself, but wife and little children out of safety and comfort, to plunge with them into a wilderness of which he had no previous knowledge.
     Joel Thorp was a son of Yale Thorp, of New Haven, Conn.  He married Miss Sarah Dayton about 1792, and in May, 1799, he put his wife and three young children into an ox-cart, and started for Ohio.  Their long, slow travel ended in Ashtabula County, 20 miles from any other white family.
     He was a millwright by trade, and this occupation took him away long distances from home, so that in the four years they spent in that locality, Mrs. Thorp was left much alone.  What inevitably happened to her is so similar to the terrible experience of Mrs. James Kingsbury, two years previous in Conneaut, but a few miles east of the Thorps, that it reads like the same story.
     In the absence of the husband a child was born with not a physician or white neighbor within call.  A friendly squaw came to her aid, else mother and child would have perished.
     Again when Mr. Thorp was called away from home, this time on a trip to Pittsburgh, for household supplies, the family, but for a lucky find, would have starved.  Successive rains had swollen the many streams he encountered, and there were no bridges to cross them, thus making his homeward progress slow and difficult.  Again and again he was detained on the way.  Meanwhile the cupboard in the log-hut in the wilder ness became absolutely bare.  In her extremity, Mrs. Thorp emptied the straw tick of her bed in search of the few grains of wheat that clung to the filling.  These she boiled and fed to the children.
     Still the father did not appear, and one can imagine the anxiety and agony of suspense, and her feelings when her little ones pleaded vainly for food.  At this crisis, almost a miracle happened.  A wild turkey lighted on a stump near the cabin.  Mrs. Thorp loaded her husband’s musket with the only charge at hand, and creeping out cautiously, and under cover of brush and logs, she gained a position near enough to fire.

[Pg. 60]

     Her shot brought down the turkey, and it is to be hoped that it was young and tender so that the starving family had not long to wait for their dinner.
     In 1801, Joel Thorp removed to Cleveland, and lived in a log-house on Lake Street, near Water—West 9th.  He probably found but little work at his trade, for here he built houses mostly.  The tavern for Lorenzo Carter, corner of Superior and Water streets—burned before occupied, was erected by Joel Thorp, and he built Judge Kingsbury’s house on Woodhill Road, at its junction with Kinsman.
     He lived in the log-house on Lake Street until 1804, and then removed to Newburgh.  We find his name with others that year, signed to a protest against the election of Lorenzo Carter to head the little company of Cleveland and Newburgh militia, organized at that time.
     In 1809, he built the schooner “Sally” of from six to eight tons, and he may have used her to take his family and household goods to Buffalo, to which place he removed a year or two later.
     In the War of 1812 that broke out soon after, he commanded a company of sharpshooters and was killed at Lundy’s Lane.
     When the British and Indians burned Buffalo, the widow and her seven children lost everything but the clothes they were wearing and a set of silver teaspoons that Mrs. Thorp had concealed in the bosom of her dress.
     The family managed to get back to Newburgh.  How this was accomplished without money for the journey, and stripped of the necessities of bedding and cooking utensils, cannot be imagined.  The Newburgh people were very kind to the Thorps.  Judge Kingsbury and Israel Hubbard gave the boys employment and shelter.  Mrs. Thorp in time married again.
     Her second husband was Peter Gardinor, who, it is said, met with sudden death.  Mrs. Thorp lost her own mother in childhood and an only brother,  Bezaleel Dayton, and herself, were raised by a step-mother.
     Mrs. Thorp died at the residence of her youngest son in Orange this county.  Two sons and a daughter removed to Michigan.

     Children of Joel Y. and Sarah Dayton Thorp:
 

Julia Thorp,      m. Jason Ticknor; lived in Buffalo, N. Y. Bezaleel Thorp,      m. 1832, Pollly (Mary) Brown, dau. of Nathan and Mary Clark Brown. Lewis Thorp, b. 1798; d. 1859;      m. Ana Preston in 1822;      2nd, Elvaritta Sadler, 1847.

Warren Thorp,      m. Hannah Burnside Dayton Thorp,      m., 1825, Catherine Countryside. Diantha Thorp,      m. Isaac Lafler; lived in Detroit, Mich. Ferris Thorp,      m. Mary Bell.

     Children of Bezaleel and Polly Thorp:    
 

Caroline Thorp,      m. Orvill T. Palmer. Mary Adaline Thorp,      Thomas C. Bleasdale. (Mrs. M. A. Thorp - a widow - is living in Collinwood,

at the age of 83, a wonderfully preserved and intelligent woman.) Milon Thorp,      m. Cornelia La Rue.

[Pg. 61]

     Children of Warren and Hannah Thorp:
 

Jane B. Thorp,      m. Henry Clark. Harriet Thorp,      m. Lewis Harrington James Thorp,      m. Catherine Weeks;      2nd, _______.

Alpheus Thorp,      m. 1st, _____________;      2nd, Cynthia Barber Joseph Thorp,      m. Melissa Norris Maria Thorp,      m. Daniel Gardner Wesley Thorp,      m. Malinda

---------------

THORP

     A family of Thorps came to East Cleveland from Pennsylvania in 1811.
     The head of it was Benjamin, aged 42 yeras, and his wife, Auronche Polson Thorp, a year younger than himself.  They brought with them at least four children.  To these may ahve been added others who were Ohio born.

     Eleazaer Thorp - who may have been of the same family - was married, in 1819, by Rev. Thomas Barr to Abraham Norris.
     This family is buried in the cemetery adjoining the Congregational Church on Euclid Ave. in East Cleveland.
     In 1825 Ezekiel Thorp married Esther Bemis.

---------------

1800

     In winter of 1800-1801, LORENZO CARTER's family was the only one remaining in Cleveland Hamlet.  All other pioneers had removed to Newburgh or "Doan's Corners."
     The mail came always by way of Pittsburgh, reaching this locality once in two weeks; continued west on an Indian trail to Huron, O.

---------------

1800

AXTELL STREET CEMETERY

     In this spot was laid away the dead of Newburgh, beginning with the year 1801 and ending in 1880.  Over 3,000 bodies are said to have been buried there.  The cemetery was located north of Broadway, on what is now East 78th Street, and comprised about eight acres.  After the de-

[Pg. 62]
struction of Cleveland's first burial place on Ontario Street, the Axtell Cemetery was claimed to be the oldest one in the county.
     It was sold by the city in 1880 to the Conotton Railroad, and within a few months following the sale of grewsome task of removing the bodies began.  "Ashes to ashes," through 50 to 80 years of burial, and beloved forms - the falling clod upon their coffins yet haunting the bereaved, so recent was the interment - all carted away.
     All?  Not so.  Only a short time since an excavating machine was at work on the site of the cemetery, and teh big craane swinging to dump the earth, emptied on the frightened, foreign workmen the skeleton of a man.  It had been scooped up entire - not a bone displaced.  To whom did it once belong?  No one could answer.
     Many descendants of Newburgh pioneers refused to reinter their dead in Harvard Grove Cemetery - recently oaid out - but brought the bodies to Erie Street Cemetery - then a beautiful "God's acre" yet reverenced by the community - or, to Woodland Cemetery, two miles nearer.  Both of these belong to the city.  The first one is marked for destruction, and the last one awaits the certain greed of real estate dealers and an easily coerced city council.

     Inscriptions in Harvard Grove Cemetery, indicating a few of the graves that had been removed from Axtell Cemetery:

     "Polly, wife if Israel Lacey, died in 1812, aged 15 years 7 mo. 2 da.'
     "Suckey, daughter of Parker and Betsey Shattuck, in 1811."
     "Dortha Thomas, wife of George Thomas, died 1812, aged 39 years."
     "Oliver Seely died March, 1817, aged 50 years."
     "James Payne died 1819, aged 73 years."
     "Mary Anne, wife of Samuel Dille, died 1818" (almost obliterated)
     "Sarah Camp Baldwin, died 1818, aged 36 years."
     "Samuel Smith Baldwin, d. 1826, aged 66."
     "John M. Gould, d. 1826, aged 66."
     (Several other Gould Family graves.)

[Pg. 63]

1802

CAPT. TIMOTHY DOAN

     Timothy Doan, of Middle Haddam, Conn., and, later, of East Cleveland, was an elder brother of Nathaniel Doan, of Doan’s Corners.  Like his father, Seth Doan, he was a sailor, and by the time he was 30 years of age owned his vessel, and carried his own cargoes between this country and the West Indies.
     His last voyage of this kind was a disastrous one, for he suffered shipwreck and lost his boat and the load of sugar and molasses with
which it was freighted.
     Meanwhile, he had married Mary Carey, aged 20 years, who was born on Long Island in 1763.
     When he returned to his wife and home with the news that he had lost nearly all his worldly possessions, she received it calmly, and assured him that she would much rather have him home penniless and in safety than to endure the life of loneliness and anxiety she had led while he was away and prosperous.
     They then left Haddam for Herkimer Co., N. Y., that Mecca toward which, at that time, many faces were set.  But a few years’ sojourn there showed that little was to be gained by the move, and in 1802 they set out to join Capt. Doan’s brother Nathaniel and their son Seth, who had gone to Cleveland four years previously.
     The family consisted of Capt. Timothy Doan, aged 43, Mrs. Doan, 39 years old, and five children, the oldest being a daughter aged 18, and the youngest aged 3 years.
     They traveled in a two-horse sleigh, accompanied by a large sled drawn by oxen, and took with them a cow, some sheep, etc., which members of the party took turns in driving.
     When they reached Buffalo, a disappointment awaited them.  It was in the middle of winter, and they had expected to find Lake Erie frozen
over so that the journey from Buffalo to Cleveland could be made on the ice close to the shore.  But the weather was unusually mild for the sea son, and nothing but open water stretched as far as the eye could reach.
     It was then concluded that the wisest course would be to have Capt. Doan and son Timothy go on with the horses, oxen, and cattle, leaving the rest of the family to follow when it seemed expedient.  The experience of the father and son in driving their animals through the wilderness, often swimming ice-cold streams backward and forward—once thirteen times—before persuading all the animals to cross over, was one of almost incredible hardship, while the women fared alike, though not in degree, when they undertook the journey a month later.  The latter started in an open boat, accompanied by two white men and an Indian, and kept close to shore so as to camp on it at night.  When off Fairport, a storm swept suddenly down upon them, and before they could land the boat was swamped, and everything in it received a soaking—bedding, clothing, tent, and provisions.
     There were several occupants of the boat who openly rejoiced at the accident—a crate of tame geese destined to be the first progenitors of their kind in the county.  They were carried far out into the lake, made, their escape from the crate, and swam gleefully back to shore, only to find themselves again in captivity.
     Judge Walworth, who had not as yet traded his farm with Samuel

[Pg. 64]
Huntington for Cleveland property, was watching the approaching storm, chanced to espy the boat, and hastened to the beach to be of assistance.  Nathaniel and Timothy Doan were also there, having come on to meet the party.  Mrs. Doan concluded not to risk the safety of herself and younger children any longer upon the lake, but to finish the journey, accompanied by Nathaniel, on horseback.  It proved like jumping from the frying-pan into the fire, for not many miles farther on she had to cross a dangerously swollen river in a frail canoe that persisted in landing its occupant a quarter of a mile from the landing.
     The family arrived in Cleveland in April, 1801, and remained with Nathaniel Doan at Doan’s Corners until their own log-house was ready for occupancy.  It was located in a hickory grove on Euclid Avenue, six miles from the Public Square, and on a farm of 320 acres, which Mr. Doan purchased for about a dollar an acre.  Food was very scarce and difficult to obtain that first winter, and the hickory nuts lying thickly on the ground about their cabin proved valuable adjuncts to their bill of fare.  Their nearest neighbors were a tribe of Indians encamped close by, and soon (the children of the white man and the red were playmates and close friends.
     Timothy Doan was soon made a justice of the peace, and associate judge when Cuyahoga County was organized in 1810.  He assisted in the organization of Trinity Church, and was chosen for one of its first vestry men.
     He died in 1828, aged 69 years.
     Mrs. Doan died in 1848, aged 85 years.
     It will be observed that Sarah Adams Doan and Mary Carey Doan, in spite of their frequent motherhood and great hardship, lived to be very aged women, and outlived their husbands, one for 20, and the other 40 years.  They were exceptionally fine, New England women, who bore more upon their shoulders than their share of life’s vicissitudes.  Both had to see their children, at times, go hungry, or ill, with no physician to turn to for help or encouragement. And both trod alone the long years of widowhood.  Miss Mary A. C. Clark gives a beautiful pen-picture of Mrs. Timothy Doan in her sketch of East Cleveland women in the second volume of “The Memorial to the Pioneer Women of the Western Reserve,” of which this work is but a continuance.

     The children of Timothy and Mary Carey Doan:
 

Nancy Doan, b. 1783; m. Samuel Dodge. Seth Doan, b. 1785;      m. Lucy Clark;      2nd, Joanna Wickham Timothy Doan Jr. b. 1787;      m. Polly Pritchard;      2nd, Mrs. Nancy Russell

Mary Doan, b. 1789;      m. Daniel Brownson, of Columbia, Lorain Co. Deborah Doan, b. 1796;      m. Jeddiah Davis Crocker John Doan, b. 1798;      m. Ann Olivia Baldwin;      2nd, Sophia Taylor

     Seth and Timothy, on account of the persistent mispronunciation of their surname, making it two syllables—Do-ane—dropped the final “e,” and thenceforth wrote their name Doan.

[Pg. 65]

     Major Seth Doan came to Cleveland with his uncle Nathaniel three years in advance of his parents.  He was the 13-year-old boy who played the part of hero in the first months of his residence in the hamlet when his uncle’s entire family were ill with malaria, and their only food unground corn.  He seems to have remained with and near his uncle after his parents’ arrival, and, in 1812, was living at Doan’s Corners.  He was evidently a man of affairs, although no mention of his business is given.  He was a director in the first bank in Cleveland—the Commercial Bank of Lake Erie—organized in 1816. In 1836 he was living at 35 Prospect Street.  His wife, Lucy Clark, whom he married in 1808, was the daughter of David Clark, the pioneer.  She died in 1828, leaving three children. Joanna Wickham, whom he married four years later, may have been the daughter of the Wickham whose worn headstone is to be found near the main entrance of Erie Street Cemetery.  None of the Seth Doan posterity seem to have saved any record of her.  She was 33 years of age at her marriage.  She died in 1859, twelve years after the death of Seth Doan.  The latter and both wives rest in Erie Street Cemetery at the left of the main drive.

     The children of Lucy and Seth Clark Doan:
 

David Clark Doan,      m. Catherine Lucy Roberts. Margaret Adeline Doan,      m. Alonzo

Sherwin Gardner. Seth Carey Doan,      m. Rebecca Bell McKnight.

     David Clark Doan was a business man.  He died in 1861.  His wife was the daughter of Hon. Clark H. Roberts, of Connecticut, a prominent man of that state.  She was born at the old homestead near Robertsville, in 1816, and was married at 18 years of age.  She was an active member of the Cleveland Dorcas Society, and exceedingly kind-hearted and generous.  She died in 1893.
     Alonzo S. Gardner, as A. S. Gardner and Co., was in the grocery business at 66 Superior Street in 1836.  He changed his business and was best known as a crockery merchant.  He bequeathed to his children the reputation of being a scrupulously honest man.  He died in 1891.
     Mrs. Rebecca Doan, born in 1822, left a personal record to be envied by her sex.  She was one of those women that people instinctively turned to when in mental trouble or in physical suffering, certain of sympathy, wise advice, or immediate help.  She was a blessing to all the newly-made mothers of her acquaintance, and when death came to a household, she was there to comfort and assist.
     Timothy Doan, Jr., married, in 1809, Polly Pritchard, daughter of Jared Pritchard, of East Cleveland, who was a pioneer from Connecticut.  Her sisters Anna and Sally married Horace Gunn and Samuel Potter.  They had an only brother, Baird Pritchard, who married Julia Pardee.  Polly was very pretty, and considered quite a belle.  She had six children, and died of consumption while comparatively young.
     Timothy Doan, Jr., married 2nd, Nancy Calkins, widow of Alanson Russell.  She had two daughters, who were very fine women, and a son, George Russell.  After Mr. Doan’s death she married William Custead,

[Pg. 66]
living on Euclid Avenue, on the corner of a street bearing his name, which was changed to Genesee Avenue, and now is known as East 82nd Street.

     The children of Timothy and Polly Doan:
 

Jared Pritchard Doan,      m. Mary R. Lewis. Mary Ann Doan,      m. Darius Adams.

Samantha Doan,      m. Edward W. Slade. Seth Doan,      m. Jane E. Waring. Norton Doan,      m. Lucy Ann Sawtell.

     It is said that J. P. Doan lived part of his life, at least, in Columbia, Lorain Co.
     Darius Adams was a well-known East Cleveland citizen.  He and his wife lived to celebrate their golden wedding.
     Mr. and Mrs. E. W. Slade, in 1837, were living in the city at 16 Bank Street.  He was a painter and glazier.  Their children had fine minds.  One was a brilliant young lawyer.
     George and Nathan Doan lived and died on sections of the original Doan farm.  The latter was named for Elisha Norton, first postmaster of Cleveland, and a connection of the family.
     Joan Doane, the youngest child of the pioneer, did not drop the final “e” of his name, but retained it through life.  He always lived within the limits of the old farm on Euclid Avenue.  While still very young, he was sent to school at Newburgh, his teacher being a Spafford, either Mrs. Craw or Mrs. Stephen Gilbert.  As it was miles from home, he boarded there through the week. He became lonesome and frightened because the wolves howled so at night.
     There is a fine picture of John Doane in Kennedy’s History of Cleveland.  The face is gentle and refined-looking.  He was born in 1789, and lived to see Cleveland’s centennial year.  He was a genial man, much loved by his kin, and respected by his neighbors.  He was called “Uncle John” by all the community, irrespective of relationship.  He always at tended the annual meetings of the Old Settlers’ Association.  If his face was an index of the man, he must have been a lovable character.  He was a constant reader of newspapers in his old age, and was so blessed as to have received the gift of second sight.  He was thus enabled to discard his spectacles forever and read without them.  He died in 1896.  His first wife was a daughter of Seth C. Baldwin, who lived in the Doan tavern for a time.  She died young, leaving no children.  Her half-brother, Dudley Baldwin, was a well-known citizen.

     Children of John and Sophia Taylor Doane:
 

Mary Doane, b. 1823;      m. late in life, George P. Smith. Abigail Doane, b. 1825;      m. Lafayette Pelton. Edward B. Doane, b. 1828;      m. Augusta Chapman.

Ann Olivia Doane, b. 1829 Hannah Sophia Doane, b. 1831. John Willis Doane,      m. 1833; m. Margaret Marshall.

[Pg. 67]

1802

BRONSON, OR BROWNSON

     Samuel Bronson married Mary Doan, of Connecticut, daughter of Timothy Doan  She was born in 1789, and lived in East Cleveland.  Samuel Bronson was one of the early settlers of Columbia Township, now Lorain.  Mrs. Brownson died in Elkhart, Ind., probably at the residence of a daughter.

     Children of Samuel and Mary Bronson:
 

Maria Bronson, b. 1806;      m. George Whitney Amanda Bronson, b. 1809;      m. Alanson Whitney Nancy Bronson, b. 1811;      m. _________ Lay

Lucy Bronson, b. 1813;      m. Amzi Morgan Mercy Bronson, b. 1817;      m. S. M. Comstock. Martha Bronson, b. 1819

---------------

1803

ELISHA NORTON

FIRST POSTMASTER OF CLEVELAND.

     Elisha Norton, who, in 1803, married Margaret Clark, daughter of David Clark, was born in Goshen, Conn., and was the son of Aaron and Martha Foote Norton, who removed with their family of twelve children to East Bloomfield, N. Y.  Elisha came to Cleveland, and his brother Aaron and sister Betsey settled somewhere in the Western Reserve.  Betsey married Roswell Humphrey.  Elisha was 22 years old when he married Margaret Clark.
     David Clark carried on a trade with the Indians, and probably kept a limited stock of merchandise in his dwelling, and this was transferred across the street to larger quarters after Elisha Norton married his daughter and began to assist him in his business.  For, early the following winter, Elisha bought lots 40, 50 and 51 on the corner of Superior and Water streets for the sum of $80.  There had been a house on hits property built and occupied by Ezekiel Hawley, who had gone out on Broadway to live.  Whether the purchase price included this dwelling or it had been removed to Hawley is not known.
     On this site was established our first post-office, April, 1805, as young Elisha Norton was honored by receiving from Washington, D. C., his appointment, of that date, as Cleveland's first postmaster.  This fact makes him and his subsequent life of historical interest and value to the city.  In May, 1807, the Nortons are found living in Painesville, as is evidenced in a deed given by them for property they sold on the west side of the Cuyahoga River.  It has been erroneously stated that they removed to Portage County when they left Cleveland.  No trace of them can be found in the probate courts of that county, while several transactions show that for several years Elisha was living in Geauga County, of which at that time Painesville was a part.

[Page 68] -

     It is possible that the removal of Gov. Samuel Huntington to that town in 1806 may have had some bearing on Norton's own charge of residence and business ventures.
     In 1814, in conjunctions with Jacob French, he bought two hundred acres of land in what is now Farmington, Trumbull County, which was sold by sheriff's sale on an execution to Jacob French, nearly three years later.  Elisha Norton may have died about that time as this in the last record of him obtainable.
     In 1825, his widow, Margaret Clark Norton, united with the Stone Church on the Square.  She possessed property in the city, and her home was No. 42 Bank Street, afterward the site of the old Academy of Music.  Here she died of consumption in 8143, aged fifty-eight, and her funeral services were held in the Stone Church.
     Her will directed that a lot be purchased for her interment in Erie Street Cemetery, and that her grave and that of her mother in Mesopotamia be marked with headstones.  The bills for all this are deposited with the deed, showing that her wishes had been respected.  Her mother's headstone is still in excellent preservation, but that of Mrs. Norton disappeared many years ago, the grave is leveled, and there is nothing to show one had once been there.
     She evidently left valuable property, f which her daughter, Mrs. Wetmore, seems to have been chief beneficiary.
     Mr. and Mrs. Elisha Norton had no sons.  Their two daughters lived most of their lives in Cleveland.  They were:
     Lucy Norton, who married Robert Cather, son of Matthew Thompson Cather.  He was a tinsmith and conducted his business at No. 91 Superior Street.  They lived the first house north of Mrs. Norton.  Mrs. Cather was a very capable woman.  She died of consumption in 1850, aged forty-eight.
     Harriet Norton, who married Butler Dockstader.  He died, and she married (2nd) Edward Wetmore.  She died in Cincinnati, O.

< CLICK HERE TO RETURN TO TABLE OF CONTENTS >