Ohio History Journal

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JOHN HENRI KAGI

JOHN HENRI KAGI

 

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

 

 

BY C. B. GALBREATH

A traveler northward bound on a Pennsylvania lo-

cal passenger train, if he is interested in the smaller

stations between Warren and Ashtabula, will hear the

conductor call out, "Bristolville". To the ninety and

nine who hear this call the name will suggest nothing.

To possibly one out of a thousand it will start a train

of thought that will carry him back to the eventful

years before the Civil War, when hostility to the insti-

tution of slavery ran high in this section of the West-

ern Reserve.

Here, in the early part of the last century, two waves

of migration met in sympathetic phase on the question

that divided our country into a north and a south. It

is trite to say that the Reserve was settled chiefly by

New Englanders. To the south were the counties of

Columbiana, Jefferson and Belmont, first settled by

pioneers among whom was a numerous representation

of Quakers from the two Carolinas, Virginia and Penn-

sylvania. These two elements agreed in their hostility

to slavery. It became the first article in their religious

and political creed. They differed in the methods by

which they proposed to emancipate the colored race.

Opposed to war and the use of "carnal weapons" the

Quakers proposed to conquer by "the sword of the

spirit"; to demonstrate to the master the injustice and

(263)