OHIO STATEWIDE FILES OH-FOOTSTEPS Mailing List Issue 15 ************************************************************************ USGENWEB ARCHIVES(tm) NOTICE Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgenwebarchives.org ************************************************************************** OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest Volume 05 : Issue 15 Today's Topics: #1 Fw: Tid Bits -- Part 4 ["Ohio Archives EV1" To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <0eb001c51703$ade64fe0$0300a8c0@margaret> Subject: Fw: Tid Bits -- Part 4 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ----- Original Message ----- From: "Darlene & Kathi kelley" To: Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 2:52 AM Subject: Tid Bits -- Part 4 Contributed for use in USGenWeb archives by Darlene E. Kelley http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00026.html#0006374 Jan 30, 2005. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Historical Collections of Ohio And Then They Went West S.L. Kelly diaries Series of Articles by Darlene E. Kelley Tid Bits -- part 4. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Lake Erie Islands Scattered across the Western Basin, the Lake Erie Islands carry some unusual names; Snake Island -- historians argue about its namesake for this 85 acre island. Some say it was named because the island was covered with rattlesnakes. Others say the island was named because the two tiny islands of its western tip look like rattles. This island is located 2 miles northwest of Put-in-Bay, past Gibraltar Island. This island is privately owned. West Sister Island-- Looking in a westerly direction, 15 miles distant, is West Sister Island. It is currently a National Wildlife Refuge and a haven for many species of shore birds. It is near West Sister that the Battle of Lake Erie came to an end, and the American control of Michigan, northern Ohio, and the Old Northwest was assured. The East Sister Island and Middle Sister Islands as well as the Hen and Chicken Islands are all in Canadian waters. The Middle sister was used by Perry as a stop over when transporting General Henry Harrison's army prior to the capture of Fort Malden and the Battle of the Thames on Canadian mainland. Starve Island -- sometimes called Gull Island, is a tiny 2 acre island off the southern shore of South Bass. Is a site where a sailor once starved to death after having been shipwrecked and stranded there. How and when this occurred though is unknown. Starve is also is known as Gull Island as it is a favorite nesting ground for the local species of Sea Gull. Ballast Island -- During the Battle of Lake Erie, Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry was said to have stopped to collect stones along the shoreline to use as ballast. Gibralter Island -- named because it resembles the famous British fortress at the west entrance of the Mediterranean Sea. This Island has its own castle. [Owned by the Ohio State University] The castle was built in 1865 by a Civil War financier, Jay Cooke. Cooke entertained frequently while visiting the island from his estate in Philadelphia. Some of the names on the guest lists include Presidents Rutherford B. Hayes, Grover Cleveland and Benjamin Harris. [ The island is now used as a research laboratory and classroom setting for the university. They are consistantly restoring and renovating the castle back to its original grandeur.] Bass Islands -- are collectively known as the Bass Islands, Middle Bass, South Bass, and North Bass, so named because the waters surrounding them are teeming with bass. [ more on these islands will be in another article.] Mouse Island -- just off the tip of Catawba and the east of the ferrydock. Mouse Island is named because of its petite size, It once beonged to President Rutherford B. Hayes. It now belongs to a private corporation. More Islands-- To the left, just off the western tip of South Bass, is Green Island. Lighthouses on Green have guided vessels through the islands for decades. Green Island is owned by the State of Ohio. Inside Sandusky Bay, off the south shore off Marblehead is Johnson's Island. In October 1861, Johnson's Island was designated a Confederate prisoner of war camp and by 1863, when in full operation, as many as 2,600 Confederate officers and men were imprisoned there. Pelee Island, just 10 miles from Kelley's Island to the Northeast is also in Canadian waters. It is a 36 square mile island and by far the largest in Lake Erie. Pelee is primarily farming land, but also a famous fishing resort, having been patronized by Presidents Cleveland, Harding and Taft. I have just about given you a complete cycle with a capsule history and a birde-eye view of the Lake Erie Island's. Many changes, some good and some bad, have taken place since the days the Indians first visited and Oliver Hazard Perry's fleet navigated these waters. They are part of Ohio's important history. Further history will appear in further articles. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Puddin Bay Located in the shallow western end of Lake Erie is a group of 20 or more islands. One of these, Put-in-Bay or South Bass, served as a base of operations for Oliver Hazard Perry. It was from the harbor called Put-in-Bay that Perry sailed to defeat the British fleet under Robert H. Barclay during the war of1812. The American victory in the battle of Lake Erie gave the country and the United States Navy a memorable slogan of positive accomplishments, " We have met the enemy and they are ours.... " [ today there stands at Put-in-Bay a beautiful Greek Boric column, the Perry's Victory and International Memorial.] The 3,987 mile boundary between the United States and Canada is the longest unguarded international frontier in the world. Historians are not sure of the origins of the name, the lone villiage on South Bass Island may have received its name from ship captains who " put into bay " for a safe harbor from Lake Erie storms. Another idea is that the shape of the bay resembles an early pudding bag, thus the name became Puddin Bay, later shortened to Put-in-Bay. Regardless of its origins, one thing is for certain, the island has had a long, fascinating, colorful history. The earliest visitors were the American Indians. Many Indian arrowheads, stone axes, and other impliments of blue and white flints were turned up during construction. Indians visited Put-in-Bay when ice conditions allowed the crossing to hunt raccoons and other animals. The French explorer an fur trader Louis Jolliet was the first white man to travel on Lake Erie. An unidentified group of explorers sailed among the islands in July of 1784. They made charts of the islands, naming one of them Pudding Bay because of the shape of the harbor, claiming it resembled a pudding bag. Other log books referred to the harbor as Puden Bay. The Lake Erie Islands were included in the tract of land claimed by Connecticut and became known as the Western Reserve. The earliest white inhabitants known to have occupied the islands were French. Seth Done brought a number of laborers who cleared over 100 acres of land and planted wheat in the summer and fall of 1811. He also imported 400 sheep and 150 hogs to graze on the acorn and hickory nuts which were abundant on the island. The first effort to settle on Put-in-Bay ended with the coming of the war of 1812. The workers were busy threshing grain when the British soldiers drove them off in the fall of 1812 and destroyed the remainder of the crop. Put-in-Bay Harbor was used by Perry as a base of operations. From the Bass Islands he could quickly sail to Sandusky Bay for conferences with Harrison or scout the British forces at Fort Malden (Amherstburg, Ontario ), in the Detroit River. When the men and ships were not so engaged , there were training duties such as preparing the ships for actions and gunnery practice. The American fleet had sailed from Erie, Pennsylvania on 12 August 1813 and arrived off Sandusky Bay on the sixteenth. Perry conferred with Generals Harrison and Lewis Cass regarding the next step to take in prosecuting the campaign. The British fleet under Captain Robert H. Barclay was sighted by a lookout in the masthead of Perry's flagship, the brig Lawrence at 5:00 a.m., Friday, 10 September 1813. The Battle of Lake Erie began at 11:45 a.m. and ended a few minutes after 3:00 p.m.. British supremacy on the lake came to an end with the capture of the entire enemy fleet of six vessels. The conflict began eight miles northwest of Put-in-Bay and reached its climax at West Sister Island fourteen miles away. The triumphant American Captain dashed off a short note on the back of an old letter to Willam Henry Harrison. After the war of 1812, Aschell ( Shell ) Johnson lived on Put-in-Bay for three years. The next settlers were Henry and Sally Hyde who came in 1818. The Hydes brought 500 head of sheep to the Island. A.P. Edwards then began to develop Put-in-Bay bringing laborers to erect the necessary buildings. John Pierpoint built a dock in the harbor and another one known as the West Dock. The first permanent settler to come to Put-in-Bay was Philip Vroman in 1843. He settled on the island and remained until his death 68 years later. In 1845, Gibralter Island in the harbor was occupied by a group of government surveyors and engineers who were engaged in makng charts of the lake. They found it necessary to cut a strip 45 feet wide running through the woods of Put-in-Bay so they could site their instruments properly. The strip was used as a road by the islanders and they called it " Sight Road." In 1854 a Spanish merchant named Joseph de Rivera bought South Bass, Middle Bass, Sugar, Gibralter, Ballast, and Starve Islands for a price of $ 44,000. He began to develop the islands, building a saw mill and at Starve Island a mill in the fall of 1854. He had the county engineer survey the area in 10 acre lots. In the first ten years, de Rivera sold 42 parcels of land in South and Middle Bass. He sold a quarter acre of land to the South Bass Board of Education for a dollar. Hence the growth of Puddin Bay. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Johnson Island Johnson's Island was origionally named Bull's Island and was a part of a tract of land owned by Epaproditus Bull. He and his family left Connecticut and settled on the Marblehead peninsula in May of 1809. In 1812, Bull and his family fled to Cleveland, Ohio because of Indian attacks. In the autumn of 1812, Bull died there, a victim of disease. His family then returned to the penninsula and retained ownership of Johnson Island until 1852. Leonard B. Johnson purchased the island in 1852 and renamed it Johnson's Island. He cleared several acres of the Island for farming. In the fall of 1816, the U.S. Army leased 40 acres of the island from Johnson to establish a Prisoner of War Depot. The Island itself is one mile long and one and a half miles wide and is located at the mouth of Sandusky Bay near Sandusky, Ohio. Reasons for this site selecion by the U.S. Army included a relatively wooded land, and the proximity to Sandusky, Ohio for labor and supplies, which allowed for an early completion date. The camp, thirteen barracks, was completed in February 1862 at a cost of $30,000. Twelve of the barracks were used as living quarters by the Prisoners and one acted as a hospital. William Pierson, lawyer and mayor of Sandusky, was selected as the first commanding officer of the camp and was given the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He was replaced by Brigadier General H.D. Terry on January 14,1864, who in turn was replaced by Charles W.Hill inMay 1865. The history of the camp can be divided into two periods During the first period, lasting until December 1863 food and money were plentiful and the camp was not crowded. The second period, ending with the disbandment of the camp in August 1865, saw a great influx of prisoners with resulting crowded living conditions, scarcity of food, and the enactment and enforcement of stricter regulations. The prisoners were allowed to earn money and/or have money sent to them. However, the money and a record of it was kept by the camp commander and transferred when necessary. The prisoners used this money to buy supplies from camp sutler ( seller of provisions ) who also kept an account of all transactions. The last prisoner left the camp in August 1865. The island cemetery accounts for the 201 soldiers who died there. The folowing year, the Army auctioned off all of the surplus equipment and materials, the buildings, and the stockade walls. Most of the lumber was salvaged, and some of the smaller buildings were moved across Sandusky Bay to Marblehead when the Bay was completely frozen with thick ice. ( More later about the Civil War episode to come later.) >From 1866 to 1894, the island was primarily used for agricultural purposes. Fruit trees were planted along with general crops. The site of the Prisoner of War Depot was plowed under to raise crops. A small number of private lots were sold to individuals during this period. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ continued in tid bits -- part 5 ______________________________ ------------------------------ X-Message: #2 Date: Sat, 19 Feb 2005 23:24:31 -0500 From: "Ohio Archives EV1" To: OH-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <0ebe01c51704$132ecf30$0300a8c0@margaret> Subject: Fw: Tid Bits -- part 5 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit ----- Original Message ----- From: "Darlene & Kathi kelley" To: Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2005 12:09 AM Subject: Tid Bits -- part 5 File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Darlene E. Kelley http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00026.html#0006374 Feb. 1, 2005 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Historical Collections of Ohio And Then They Went West S. L. Kelly Series of Articles by Darlene E. Kelley Tid Bits -- part 5. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Lake Erie Conspiracy Without a doubt the most notable event involving the Johnson Island Confederate Prison history was the infamous " Lake Erie Conspiracy." In August 1864, Charles H. Cole, a captain in the Confederate Army and later a lieutenant in the Navy, checked into a Sandusky hotel, posing as an oil company employee from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He was soon joined by John Yeats Beall, also in the Confederate Navy. Together they planned and organized a mass prisoner escape from Johnson's Island. Cole remained in Sandusky to coordinate the event while Beall traveled to Windsor to locate men, secure arms, and set the operation in motion. The escape plan was put into action on the morning of September 19, 1864. A portion of the conspirators, led by Beall, boarded the small steamer " Philo Parsons " at Detroit, Michigan as it prepared for its regular journey to Sandusky via the Lake Erie Islands. Several more of Beall's men boarded the steamer, after Beall persuaded the steamer's captain to make an unscheduled stop at Amherstburg, on the Canadian side of the Detroit River. Altogether, Beall had managed to slip 30 men on board the little sidewheeler. From Amherstburg the ship made its regular stops at North, South, and Middle Bass Islands, and also at Kelley's Island. Just after leaving Kelley's Island the conspirators overpowered the crew and took control of the " Philo Parsons." As per the plan, the steamer remained on course for Sandusky Bay until. at 5:00 P.M., the conspirators observed the U.S. Gunboat " Michigan," 14 guns, anchored near Johnson's Island. The stratagem now called for the " Michigan " to be boarded and captured, and the prisoners on the island to be released. Here is where the plot went awry. Beall was informed that there was insuffient fuel to carry out the plan, so he decided to return to Middle Bass Island to take on more wood to feed the burners. Approaching Middle Bass, the conspirators encountered another vessel. the small steamer " Island Queen." The " Island Queen " was seized and her stunned passengers and crew were put ashore on Middle Bass Island. After filling the " Philo Parson's " wood bunkers, Beall and his cohorts again set out for Sandusky, towing the " Island Queen " astern. About half way to Kelley's Island, Beall opened the " Island Queen's " sea valve and sent the captured vessel adrift. The " Island Queen " eventually settled to the bottom near Chicanolee Reef, just south of Pelee Island. As the " Philo Parsons " steamed towards the entrance to Sandusky Bay. the escape plan was once again aborted. The reasons are still unknown; perhaps some additional information that Beall was hoping to receive did not arrive, or possibly a signal that he was expecting from Sandusky was never sent, or the crew and passengers that he set ashore at Middle Bass, got a message through. Whatever the case, the conspirators became suspicious and abandoned the attempt. As it turned out Beall made a wise decision. A few days earlier a Confederate deserter had informed the military commander at Detroit about the plot, and this officer notified Johnson's Island and the " Michigan's " captain. The eventual outcome, had Beall actually sailed into Sandusky Bay, can only be a matter for speclation, but with the " Michigan's" crew ready and waiting and the Island's defenses placed on alert, Beall's plot would have little likelihood of success. After turning back, Beall set a course for Canada, where the conspirators scattered after making landfall at Sandwich on September 20. Charles H. Cole, his bags packed for a trip to Toronto, was arrested the same day in Sandusky. Tried and convicted for conspiracy, Cole spent a little over a year in prison before being released on February 10, 1866. John Yeats Beall was captured near Niagara Falls, New York on December 16,1864 after a failed attempt to derail a train near Buffalo. Tried for piracy and spying, he was convicted and sentenced to hang. Beall was executed at Governor's Island, New York on March 24, 1865. The Civil War ended on April 9, 1865, and the government ordered that Johnson's Island be abandoned on June 8, 1865. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Symmes Purchase John Cleves Symmes, born on July 21, 1742, grew up in New York, the son of a minister. Prior to the American Revolution, he served as a school teacher. In 1770, he moved to the colony of New Jersey, taking part in both New Jersey's political and military contributions to the Revolution. John Symmes held a number of important political positions both during and after the Revolutionary War, including justice on the New Jersey Supreme Court, member of the State's Constitutional Convention, and deligate to Congress. While serving in Congress in the 1780's, he became interested in western expansion into the Ohio Country. So he created a company with several of his friends to buy land in the Northwest Territory between the Great Miami and the Little Miami Rivers. Symmes and his associates requested one million acres of land from Congress, but in the end they were only allowed to purchase about 330,000 acres. President George Washington approved the land patent in 1794. Symmes and his partners paid approximately 67 cents per acre. They were required to follow the same basic requirements as the Ohio Company of Associates; land had to be set aside for a school, for religion, and for the government's use. In addition, a large piece of land was to be put aside for a University, although Symmes ignored this requirement. This Symmes Purchase was also known as the Miami Purchase. Although the population in the region grew rapidly, Symmes and his associates also faced some controversy. The investors chose not to follow the government's survey system, resulting in confusion over property boundaries and land ownership. As in the case of the town of Dayton, not all of the land sold was actually part of the land grant authorized by Congress. In 1788, Symmes became a judge within the Northwest Territory. As judge, he often disagreed with the policies of the territorial governor, Arthur St.Clair. He and the other territorial judges, Samuel Holden Parsons and James Varnum, felt that St.Clair overextended his power as governor. In particular, they disagreed with the governor about what laws should be adopted for the newly organized creation of Maxwell's Code, the series of laws put into effect in the Northwest Territory in 1795. The judge also sided with the other members of the Democratic Republican Party against St. Clair on the issue of Ohio statehood. On a personal level, Symmes was difficult to get along with and was often sued in court. Some of the people who ued him had ben forced to pay for their land twice when they discovered that he had sod them land that was not part of the Symmes Purchase. When he died on February 26, 1814, Symmes left almost nothing in his estate because of the impact of his ongoing legal difficulties. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Camp Chase Camp Chase , named after the Secretary and former Ohio Governor, Salmon P. Chase, was a training camp for Union volunteers. It housed a few political and military prisoners from Kentucky and western Virginia. Built on the western outskirts of Columbus, Ohio, the camp received its first large influx of captured Confederates from western campaigns, including enlisted men, officers, and a few of the latter's black servants. At first, on oath of honor, the Confederate officers were permitted to wander through Columbus, register in hotels, and receive gifts of money and food; a few attended sessions of the state senate. The public paid for Camp tours, and Chase became a tourist attraction. Complaints over such lax discipline and the camp's state administration provoked investigation, and the situation changed. Food supplies of poor quality resulted in the commissary officer's dismissal from service. After an influx of captured officers from Island No 10, officers' privileges were cut, then officers were transferred to the Johnson's Island prison on lake Erie. Then the camp's state volunteers and the camp Commander were found to have " scant acquaintance " with military practice and were transferred, the camp passing into Federal government control. Under this new administration, rules tightened, visitors prohibited, and mail censored. Prisoners were allowed limited amounts of money to suppliment supplies with purchases from approved vendors and sutlers, the latter further restricted when they were discovered to be smuggling liquor to the inmates. As the war wore on, conditions became worse. Shoddy barracks, low muddy ground, open latrines, aboveground open cisterns, and a brief smallpox outbreak excited the U.S. Sanitary Commission agents who were already demanding reform. Original facilities for about 4,000 men were jammed with close to 7,000. Since parole strictures prohibited service against the Confederacy, many Federals had surrendered believing they would be paroled and sent home. Some parolees, assigned to guard duty at Federal prison camps, were bitter, and rumors increased of maltreatment of prisoners at Camp Chase and elsewhere. Before the end of hostilities, Union parolee guards were transfered to service in the Indian Wars, some sewage modifications were made, and prisoners were put to work improving barracks and facilities. Prisoner laborers also built larger, stronger fences for their own confinement, a questionable assignment under international law governing prisoners of war. Barracks rebuilt for 7,000 soon again overflowed and there crowding and health condtions were never resolved. It is said that as many as 10,000 prisoners were reputedly confined there by the time of the Confederate surrender. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ continued in part 6. -------------------------------- End of OH-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest V05 Issue #15 ******************************************