Monday, December 8, 2014

DECEMBER 6, 1814

On Tuesday December 6, 1814, Josiah Meigs as Commissioner of the US General Land Office issued deeds to eight settlers of Washington County, Indiana Territory in the name of President James Madison.  These pioneers were: Ezekiel Blanchard, the Bullitt Brothers, Charles Coulter, Jeremiah Lamb, Joseph Sires, George Short, Richard Wall and Noah Wright.

EZEKIEL BLANCHARD perfected his land claim on this date for the southeast quarter of Section 31, T2N, R3E.  He had purchased the rights to this claim from William Ervin of whom nothing is known.  Blanchard’s land today lies west of the intersection of SR 56 and West Washington School Road. This tract was highly prized in late autumn as it was a prime flatwoods wetland replete with migratory birds.  Ducks and geese had been harvested here in abundance in the pre settlement days.  Wetlands such as this one were found where the slight southwest tilt of the Mitchell Karst Plain  butts  up against the outlying ridge of the Crawford Upland thereby ponding the surface water of the area. The northeast corner of this tract was crossed by the road that led from the Poplar Cabin store of Abraham Reiff to Beck’s Mill.  This road also forked east to Salem just east of Blanchard. 

Ezekiel Blanchard was born near Rutland, Vermont in 1779.  He may have been the only Green Mountain state native to settle in Washington County when Indiana was still a US Territory.  He was a bachelor when he purchased his land.  He married Elizabeth Colglazier in 1819.  She was born in Clermont County, Ohio in
1794 and had come to the Indiana Uplands with her parents, David William and Christena May Colglazier. The Colglaziers were living in 1819 on a land claim where Goose Creek enters Mill Creek on the new road to Salem.  Fifteen years later Ezekiel and Elizabeth Blanchard moved to Des Moines County, Iowa Territory where they purchased 520 acres from the US.  Their time in Washington County, Indiana must have been productive for them.

CUTHBERT AND THOMAS BULLITT purchased the northeast quarter of Section 20, T2N, R4E, on this date.  This real estate bounded the William Lindley farm on the east with Royse’s Fork of Blue River flowing through the northern part of it.  The land was on the road that went from Salem to the Falls of the Ohio. Some of the Roscoe C. Morris Additions to Salem are located within this tract. This is where John DePauw was living while serving as the commander of the local militia unit and while acting as the agent for the establishment of Salem.  DePauw sold this claim to the Bullitt brothers who he was aggressively cultivating as investors in the nascent Washington County seat of government.  John DePauw continued to rent from the Bullitt Brothers until he selected a site south of the Brewer Blockhouse for his home in his second addition to Salem in 1824. The Bullitt family was one of the founders of Louisville, Kentucky and was a major holder of land in the Louisville, Kentucky area.  They were active in land speculation throughout Indiana once it became a state in 1816.  This purchase of the DePauw claim was the beginning of their extensive Indiana land dealings. Bullitt descendants are still involved in the Oxmoor complex of properties in Louisville, Kentucky today.

CHARLES COULTER selected the southwest quarter of Section 21, T1N, R2E, as his land claim.  This 160 tract is presently located in Madison Township between Locust Grove Road and the Orange County line in a north facing valley surrounded on three sides by hills on the east face of the Crawford Upland. Coulter lived in Henry County, Kentucky at the time he registered his land claim.  Shortly after starting to clear the land on his claim his wife died in 1813 making him a widower with seven minor children.  He was remarried in 1818 to Elizabeth Fisher of Orange County.  They had three children together. Many of Charles Coulter’s descendants still live in western
Washington County.

JEREMIAH LAMB completed his payments for the northwest quarter of Section 6, T2N, R4E, in order to receive his deed on this date 200 years ago today.  Lamb’s acreage is found now at the southeast corner of the intersection of Water Tower Road and Highland Road.  This land had access to the trail between the ford on White River and Royes’s Lick where his father, Simeon Lamb, owned the trading post from about 1804 to 1814.  Jeremiah Lamb married Rachel Hoggatt in Clark County, Indiana in 1810 as that was then the nearest public office for the registration of the marriage. Lamb registered a second land claim in this neighborhood for the northeast quarter of Section 1, T2N, R3E. This claim was sold to Adam Cauble on January 4, 1830 when the families of Jeremiah and Simeon Lamb moved to Crittenden County, Kentucky on the Ohio River downstream from Shawneetown, Illinois.  This second land claim of Lamb was where the Washington County Landfill is located today. The Lambs were Quakers from Guilford County, North Carolina. Simeon Lamb was the only physician in the early days of settlement in this area and was of considerable influence as he was appointed by Governor Thomas Posey to be one of the first three judges of the Washington Circuit Court.  The failure of Simeon Lamb’s commercial ventures with Jacob Mendenhall left him in an impecunious state.  One of Washington County’s founding fathers moved to Kentucky with his son’s family to leave his creditors behind. The Lambs must have had a saline imperative as the former operator of the locality’s only store at Royse’s Lick moved to a location on the Ohio River near to the productive salt springs of Gallatin County, Illinois.

JOSEPH  SEIRS took title to land located in a fractional part of Section 15, T5N. R4E, in Driftwood Township of Washington County, Indiana Territory.  This tract laid along the Grouseland Treaty line.  A full section could not be surveyed at this location because of the northeast/southwest bearing of the 1804 treaty line.  Seirs’ claim was located on a consolidated sand dune that gently sloped west toward the Driftwood Fork of White River.  This homestead was located on what the early settlers called the “dead line”.  This name came from the fact that the area to the northwest of the Grouseland Treaty line was still under the control of the Indians that were free to occupy the area.  Many of the deaths of early settlers at the hand of Indians taking exception to their presence occurred within a few miles of this treaty line. The Seirs homestead is located today at the southwest edge of Brownstown at the US 50/SR 135 intersection.  Joseph Seirs was born in Hampshire County, Virginia.  He married Elizabeth McDade in Greenbrier County, Virginian in 1787.  They settled in Dearborn County, Indiana Territory in 1806, served in the Indiana Militia  and lived in Franklin County, Indiana Territory when they registered their claim on the “dead line”.  The Seirs would have come to this northern part of Harrison/Washington County along the Cincinnati Road that ran from Vincennes to Cincinnati along Kibbey’s Trace. Their trip to Jeffersonville to enroll their claim and make their land payments would have followed a trail that skirted the Knobs along the general route of SR 39 in northeastern Washington County and Old Bloomington Road in Scott County.  Joseph Seirs did not live to enjoy the fruits of his trailblazing as he died on May 2, 1816.  There are several variants of the spelling of his last name in various records.  These include Sires, Sawyers and Cyrus.  Given regional accents and illiteracy, many pioneer names took alternate forms.

GEORGE SHORT perfected his claim to the southwest quarter of Section 14, T2N, R4E, which was immediately east of the saline reserve where Royse’s Lick was located.  Short’s claim was in the center of the most heavily settled part of the county.  The two tributaries of the Harristown Branch of Royse’s Fork of Blue River flow meet as they flow through this land.  George Short married Catherine Monical in 1809 in Nicholas County Kentucky.  The Shorts sold their land next to Royse’s Lick to Peter Simpson of Jessamine County, Kentucky on April 10, 1818 for $980.  The proceeds from this sale were used to make final payments  two claims for 320 acres  in the east half of Section 35, T2N, R4E.  This land lies today on both sides of the Middle Fork of Blue River east of the SR 60 bridge. George Washington Short was born in Botetourt County, Virginia to Jacob and Eva Gottschalk Short.  The Short name was derived from the German name Schwartz.  Family research of George Washington Short is somewhat confusing as there were at least four different members of this family with this name in Washington County, Indiana.

RICHARD WALL who was born in Pennsylvania in 1777 obtained his first title in the Indiana Territory on this date to the northwest quarter of Section 10, T2N, R2E, on the north bank of Lost River where Claysville is located. Wall bought the adjoining northeast quarter on September 30, 1818 and sold his unperfected claim to the east half of the southeast quarter of Section 3 to Joseph Bates.  Richard and Theodocia Wall came to this area from Shelby County, Kentucky.  They didn’t put down roots in Lost River Township as they patented three different parcels totaling 160 acres in Bartholomew County, Indiana in 1821 through 1823.  This Bartholomew county land was located on the west bank of the Driftwood Fork of White River upstream from the inflow of Sand Creek east of present day Jonesville, Indiana.  This was about a mile north from where Nagonin and his band of impoverished Delaware Indians had camped seven years before. The Walls sold their Washington County holdings shortly thereafter.  Richard Wall apparently decided that he didn’t want to dedicate years to the development of the swampy bottoms of the Driftwood as he moved north to Tippecanoe County, Indiana after it was established in 1826.  The Walls took out four different land patents there totaling 160 acres in the 1830s.  They lived in the Clark’s Hill area for the duration of their lives.  Richard Wall died in Laurimie Township, Tippecanoe County, Indiana on March 30, 1861.

NOAH WRIGHT began building his Indiana domain on this date with the acquisition of the southeast quarter of Section 25, T2N, R4E, which was well drained land located north of the Middle Fork of Blue River.  The farm was a short wagon ride southeast of Royse’s Lick and is seen today on the east side of County Farm Road south of SR 160.  Wright had first come to Clark County, Indiana in 1803 from Randolph County, NC.   He manufactured brick and then farmed for the Isaac Holman Estate near Charlestown, Indiana. He then served in the Indiana Militia.  He later worked clearing land for Arthur Parr and married Susannah Parr on July 28, 1814.  His brother, Levi Wright, came to Indiana with him and took out a land patent nearby.  Noah Wright became Washington County’s second sheriff in 1816 and was elected to the first state legislature when Indiana became a state that year.  There apparently was no prohibition at that time from holding multiple public.  The office of Sheriff was often lucrative as the collection of taxes provided for a percentage of the revenues collected. Wright apparently did well as he started investing in 15 land patents in Lawrence, Bartholomew, Marion and Hamilton Counties.  In 1831, Washington County determined that a poor farm/asylum was needed.  The county bought Wright’s farm for the sum of $1000 that year.  Noah and Susannah Parr Wright moved to one of their properties in Perry Township, Marion County, Indiana where they lived out their lives.  Noah Wright’s financial success in serving as Washington County Sheriff caused Levi Wright also to be interested in public service.  He followed his brother in this office while acquiring 12 different land patents in Washington, Harrison, Putnam and Marion Counties, Indiana.  It would appear that the office of Sheriff in Indiana in the 19th century was quite a political plum.

                                                    KARST FLATWOODS EXAMPLE
                                                    EZEKIEL BLANCHARD CLAIM


                                                      BULLITT FAMILY HOME
                                                            OXMOOR FARM


                                                     CHARLES COULTER 1814
                                               CRAWFORD UPLAND/MITCHELL PLAIN

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