Transcription contributed by Martie Callihan 28 Oct 2004

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The early immigrants to Warren County may be described as a bold and resolute, rather than a cultivated people. It has been laid down as a general truth that a population made up of immigrants will contain the hardy and vigorous elements of character in a far greater proportion than the same number of persons born upon the soil and accustomed to tread in the footsteps of their fathers. It required enterprise and resolution to sever the ties which bound them to the place of their birth, and, upon their arrival in the new country, the stern face of nature and the necessities of their condition, made them bold and energetic. Individuality was fostered by the absence of old familiar customs, family alliances and the restraints of old social organizations. The early settlers of Warren County were plain men and women of good sense, without the refinements which luxury brings and with great contempt for all shams and mere pretense.

A majority of the early settlers belonged to the middle class. Few were, by affluence placed above the necessity of labor with their hands, and few were so poor that they could not become the owners of small farms. The mass of the settlers were the owners in fee simple of at least a quarter of a section of land, or 160 acres. Many possessed a half section or a section. After the settlements were begun, few persons owned land in large tracts of two or more thousand of acres; while the poorest immigrant, if industrious and thrifty, could lease land on such terms that he would soon become the owner of a small farm in five or six years.

A large majority of the pioneers were anti-slavery in their sentiments. Although many of them were from slave-holding States, they fled from the evils of slavery and were the strongest opponents of the slave system. Many had manumitted their slaves before emigrating to the Northwest Territory. As a consequence, that form of pride which looks upon labor as degrading never had a foothold in Warren County. Rev. James Smith, the ancestor of many families in Warren County, noted this fact on his first visit to the Northwest Territory. He had been reared in Virginia, but had a great abhorrence of every form of human bondage. In his journal he says: "Here the industrious farmer cultivates his farm with his own hands, eats the bread of cheerfulness and rests contented on his pillow at night. The mother instructs her daughters in the useful and pleasing accomplishments of the distaff and the needle, with all things else necessary to constitute them provident mothers and good housewives. The young man, instead of the cow-skin, or some other instrument of torture, takes hold of an ax or follows the plow. The ruddy damsel thinks it no disgrace to wash her clothes or milk her cows or dress the food of the family. In a word, it is here no disgrace to engage in any of the honest occupations of life, and the consequence is *the people live free from want, free from the perplexity and free from the guilt of keeping slaves."

The Backwoods Age Was Not A Golden Age

The backwoods age was not a golden age. However pleasing it may be to contemplate the industry and frugality, the hospitality and general sociability of the pioneer times, it would be improper to overlook the less pleasing features of the picture. Hard toil made men old before their time. The means of culture and intellectual improvement were inferior. In the absence of the refinements of literature, music and the drama, men engaged in rude, coarse and sometimes brutal amusements. Public gatherings were often marred by scenes of drunken disorder and fighting. The dockets of the courts show a

large proportion of cases of assault and battery and affray. While some of the settlers had books and studied them, the mass of the people had little time for study. Post roads and post offices were, few, and the scattered inhabitants rarely saw a newspaper or read a letter from their former homes. Their knowledge of politics was obtained from the bitter discussions of opposing aspirants for office. The traveling preacher was their most cultivated teacher. The traveler from a foreign country or from one of the older States was compelled to admit that life in the backwoods was not favorable to amenity of manners. One of these travelers wrote of the Western people in 1802: "Their Generals distill whisky, their Colonels keep taverns and their Statesmen feed pigs."

Josiah Espy Quoted

Josiah Espy, author of " Memorandums of a Tour in Ohio and Kentucky in 1805," traveled through Warren County. He landed at Columbia July 25, 1805, after a voyage of ten days from Wheeling in the keel-boat "Mary." He visited his brothers, Thomas and David Espy, in Deerfield Township, Warren County, and afterward, his mother, who resided in Greene County, and whom he had not seen for seventeen years. He thus recorded in his journal his impressions :

" The emigration to the State of Ohio at this time is truly astonishing. From my own personal observations, compared with the opinion of some gentlemen I have consulted, I have good reason to conclude that during the present year from twenty thousand to thirty thousand souls have entered that State for the purpose of making it their future residence. These are chiefly from Pennsylvania, Virginia, New Jersey, Maryland, Kentucky and Tennessee, but, on inquiry, you will find some from every State in the Union, including many foreigners. The inhabitants of the State of Ohio being so lately collected from all the States, have, as yet, obtained no national character. The state of society, however, for some years to come, cannot be very pleasant—the great body of the people being not only poor, but rather illiterate. Their necessities will, however, give them habits of industry and labor and have a tendency to increase the morals of the rising generation. This, with that respect for the Christian religion which generally prevails among that class of people now emigrating to the State, will lay the best foundation for their future national character. It is to be regretted, however, that at present few of them have a rational and expanded view of the beauty, excellency and order of that Christian system, the essence of which is Divine wisdom. The great body of the people will, therefore, it is to be feared, be a party for some years to priestcraft, fanaticism and religious enthusiasm."