Fishing creek--Apathy of relatives for a dying man--Long
reach--Charles Wells’s--Remarkable petrifaction--Squire
Green’s--Little Muskingum river--Marietta--Muskingum river--
Ingenuous mode of ferrying--Vestiges of Indian fortification.
At half past four on Wednesday 22d July, we loosed from the bank, and
drifted down the stream: The banks on both sides low, and the bottoms
very extensive.
At eight we were abreast of Fishing creek on the left seven miles below
Wells’s. It is about the size of Fish creek, and has a saw mill on it,
and at its mouth, one Morgan has a farm beautifully situated.
{102} At half past eight we overtook Frazey’s boat which we had passed
on the 18th, and which had floated past us during the night. The sick
man had had fits yesterday, yet neither his wife, his son, nor his
brother seemed much affected with his situation, but spoke of it very
carelessly, though they did not expect him to live twenty-four hours
longer. He had been some years in a declining state, and perhaps they
thought that his death would be convenient both to them and to himself.
Three miles and a half below Fishing creek, we left Peyton’s island on
the left. It is about a mile and a half long, and is cultivated and
inhabited.--From hence, the Long reach in its whole length of eighteen
miles, the islands on the left, the projecting points on the right,
and the forest covered and unequal hills on each side, form a most
beautiful coup d’œil.
Four miles and a half lower, we had passed Williamson’s island, which
is above two miles long, and we stopped just below it on the left bank,
at Charles Wells’s, the sign of the buck. He is father to John Wells,
at whose house we had supped last night: He has a fine farm, good
buildings and a large tract of land which he bought from a Mr. Caldwell
two or three years ago. We here got a good dinner, the charge was
reasonable, and the family obliging.
Mr. Wells shewed us a remarkable petrifaction of part of a beech tree,
found about twenty miles from his house, at the other side of the river
in the state of Ohio, in a northerly direction. The tree was found torn
up by the root, which with part of the trunk, was covered by a pool of
stagnate water, and completely petrified, while the part of the trunk
and the limbs which were out of the water, were still in their original
state of wood, but dry, and partly rotten. We wished to purchase this
petrification from Mr. Wells, but he was too much of a naturalist
himself to part {103} with such a curiosity for a sum which would have
been a temptation to a person of a different taste.[82]
Passing Pursley’s, Wilson’s and Williamson’s islands, none of them
exceeding a mile in length, we came to the end of Long reach, eleven
miles below Wells’s, where in a charming situation on the left, is
{104} a fine settlement, commanding a view of the reach and its islands
upwards.[83]
Little and Rat islands joined by a sand bar, are only half a mile
long each, and just below them, and three miles from Long reach, is
the beginning of Middle island, which is two miles and a half long,
with three families settled on it. Middle island creek, after running
some distance from its source in Virginia, turns some mills and falls
into the Ohio at the back of the island. We went to the right of those
islands, and two miles below Middle island, we landed at squire Green’s
tavern on the right, and got supper and beds.
The squire who derives his title from being a magistrate, came here
from Rhode Island about nine years ago. He has a fine farm, on an
extensive bottom, and he has two sons settled about a mile back from
the river, where they have a horse-mill and a distillery. Two younger
sons and a daughter, a sensible pleasing young woman, live at home
with their parents. One of the sons was suffering under a fever and
ague, the first time it had been known in the family--a proof of the
salubrity of the situation, the bottoms and flats throughout this
country being generally subject to this harassing and enfeebling
disorder, which however diminishes in proportion as the lands are
cleared. I recommended a plentiful use of calomel occasionally, and a
strong decoction of Peruvian bark, snake root and ginseng, during all
the intermissions.
On Thursday 23d July, we proceeded down the river at five A. M. passing
three small islands called the Three Brothers, between a mile and two
miles and a half below squire Green’s, the two first of which are
rather low, but the third is partly cultivated.--The river, its banks
and islands are very beautiful hereabouts; the hills having gradually
lessened from the south end of the Long reach, there are none but {105}
very moderate risings to be seen from the river, at twelve miles below
squire Green’s, where I observed on the left a saw for ship plank. Two
miles further, at half past nine, we passed Little Muskingum river
on the right. It is about twenty-five yards wide, and has a handsome
Chinese bridge over it. Dewal’s island extends from hence two miles and
a half to Marietta, where we landed on the right at eleven o’clock.
This town is finely situated on both banks of the Muskingum, at the
confluence of that river with the Ohio. It is principally built on
the left bank, where there are ninety-seven houses, including a
court-house, a market-house, an academy, and a post-office. There are
about thirty houses on the opposite bank, the former scite of Fort
Harmar, which was a United States’ garrison during the Indian wars, but
of which no vestige now remains. Some of the houses are of brick, some
of stone, but they are chiefly of wood, many of them large, and having
a certain air of taste. There are two rope-walks, and there were on the
stocks two ships, two brigs, and a schooner. A bank is established
here, which began to issue notes on the 20th inst. Its capital is one
hundred thousand dollars, in one thousand shares: Mr. Rufus Putnam is
the president.[84]
The land on which Marietta is built, was purchased during the Indian
war, from the United States, by some New England land speculators, who
named themselves the Ohio Company. They chose the land facing the Ohio,
with a depth from the river of only from twenty to thirty miles to the
northward, thinking the proximity of the river would add to its value,
but since the state of Ohio has began to be generally settled, the rich
levels in the interior have been preferred, but not before the company
had made large sales, particularly to settlers from New England,
notwithstanding the greatest part of the tract {106} was broken and
hilly, and the hills mostly poor, compared with those farther to the
westward, on both sides of the river.
Marietta is principally inhabited by New Englanders, which accounts for
the neat and handsome style of building displayed in it.
The Muskingum is about two hundred yards wide, and has a rapid current
of from three to four miles an hour, by which a ferry-boat is carried
across in something more than a minute, by a very simple but ingenious
piece of machinery. A rope of five or six inches in circumference is
extended across from bank to bank, and hove taught by a windlass:
two rollers play on it fixed in a box to each end of which the ends
of two smaller ropes are fastened, whose other ends are led to the
two extremities of the ferry flat, and taken round winches with iron
cranks, on which the rope at the end of the flat which is to be
foremost being wound up, presents the side of the flat to the current
at an angle of about thirty degrees. It is then pushed off--the
current acts upon it, and it arrives at the opposite side in the time
above mentioned.
There is a good road from Marietta, twelve miles up the bank of the
Muskingum to Waterford, which is a good settlement with some mills,
from whence it is continued northerly, parallel to the general course
of the river, to Zanesville,[85] and the interiour of the state.
About half a mile from Marietta, on the bank of the Muskingum, are some
curious vestiges of Indian fortification. A parallelogram of seven
hundred by five hundred yards is surrounded by a raised bank of two
or three feet high, and ten or twelve feet broad, with four entrances
opposite to each other on the two longest sides, and opposite to the
two oblong platforms at diagonal corners of the parallelogram which
are raised four or five feet above the surface of the natural plain. A
causeway forty yards wide, and from ten to twelve feet high, rounded
like a turnpike {107} road, leads from it to the river. Three hundred
yards nearer the town is a mount resembling the monument at Grave creek
and about half its height and size, surrounded by a ditch four feet
deep, through which are two entrances.
We got a good dinner at Monsall’s tavern, where major Joseph
Lincoln,[86] to whom I had a letter of introduction, politely called on
us, conversed with us, and gave us much information; and regretted that
our determination to descend the river directly after dinner prevented
his being favoured with our company at his house.
Two block houses still remain in Marietta, out of which it was very
unsafe to go singly previous to Wayne’s treaty, as the Indians were
always lurking about, on the watch to shoot and scalp, when such
opportunities were given them, and in which they were frequently but
too successful.
FOOTNOTES:
[82] The following account of uncommon petrifactions from Georgia and
Kentucky, we copy from the New York Medical Repository, vol. ii, page
415.
“Two rare extraneous fossils have been discovered, one in Georgia and
the other in Kentucky. They have both been presented to Dr Mitchill.
The former was brought by general David Meriwether, from a spring
not very distant from the high shoals of the river Apalachy. It is
rather above the size and thickness of a Spanish dollar, except that
it is somewhat gibbous or convex on the upper side. From the centre
proceed five bars, of four rays each, in the direction of radial lines,
but connected by curves before they reach the circumference. On the
under side are five grooves or creases, corresponding with the five
radial bars above, one crease below to four rays above. At the centre
beneath is a considerable concavity, corresponding with the convexity
on the outside. There is reason to believe that it is an _echinus_,
or _sea-urchin_ of which the species are very numerous, some of them
nearly flat, and many are found buried in the earth at great distances
from the ocean.--From the place where this was found, it was computed
there were enough, by estimation, to fill a bushel. And what was very
remarkable, they were so nearly alike that they seemed to have been
fashioned in the same mould, and have not been discovered in any other
place.
“The latter of these rarities is from Kentucky. One of them had been
received several years ago from Dr. S. Brown, of Lexington, now of
Orleans; and several others since from Professor Woodhouse. They have
a remote resemblance to a small acorn. At the larger end is a small
projection resembling a broken foot-stock. At the smaller extremity are
six indentations, or orifices, which may be imagined to be the decayed
pistils or stigmata of a former blossom. And on the sides are figured
fine sharp-pointed surfaces, having a similitude to the quinquepartite
calyx of a plant. It may be doubted whether this is of animal or
vegetable origin. It also may be reasonably supposed to be a species of
_echinus_.
“Both the specimens are silicious and insoluble in acids.”--CRAMER.
[83] This settlement failed to develop into a permanent town, as there
is now no important settlement at this point on the West Virginia side
of the river.--ED.
[84] For sketch of Rufus Putnam, see Harris’s _Journal_, vol. iii of
this series, p. 311, note 1.--ED.
[85] Zanesville on the Muskingum was laid out (1799) by Jonathan Zane
(brother of the founder of Wheeling) and John McIntyre. In 1809, the
seat of the Ohio government was transferred thither, and Zanesville
grew rapidly until the state capitol was removed to Columbus, when it
declined slowly, being now a place of little importance.--ED.
[86] Major Joseph Lincoln was a Revolutionary soldier of note, who came
out with Putnam’s first colony to found Marietta. During the Indian
wars he lived at Farmer’s Castle; but about 1795 engaged in business at
Marietta, in which he was quite successful, erecting in 1807 the finest
building in the town. His death occurred soon after Cuming’s visit.--ED.