Ohio History Journal

Mound Builders' Fort within Toledo's Limits.   381

 

 

MOUND BUILDERS' FORT WITHIN TOLEDO'S

LIMITS.

 

BY S. S. KNABENSHUE, TOLEDO, OHIO.

It will probably surprise most of the readers of the Quar-

terly to be told that there once existed an ancient defensive earth-

work on the banks of the Maumee, within the present city limits.

The writer was unaware of the fact until some time ago, when he

found a reference to it in a somewhat rare book-the first volume

of the Smithsonian Contributions to Knowledge, printed in 1848.

It is a copy of "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley,"

by Squier and Davis. In the chapter devoted to works of de-

fence, is a section on such ancient forts in Northern Ohio, writ-

ten by Hon Charles Whittlesey, of Cleveland, whose archaeolog-

ical researches were both extensive and accurate. The follow-

ing is Mr. Whittlesey's account of the Toledo work:

"This work is situated on the right bank of the Maumee

river, two miles above Toledo, in Wood county, Ohio."  (It is

now in Lucas county, and within the city limits. The writer does

not know whether Mr. Whittlesey was in error in placing the

work in Wood county, or whether the county line has been changed

since his account was written.) The water of the river is here

deep and still, and of the lake level; the bluff is about 35 feet

high. Since the work was built, the current has undermined a

portion, and parts of the embankments are to be seen on the slips

a, a. The country for miles in all directions is flat and wet,

though heavily timbered, as is the space in and around this enclo-

sure. The walls, measuring from the bottoms of the ditches,

are from three to four feet high. They are not of uniform

dimensions throughout their extent; and as there is no ditch on

the southwest side, while there is a double wall and ditch else-

where, it is presumable that the work was abandoned before it

was finished."

The site of this ancient work is on the East Side, a little

above the end of Fassett street bridge, and directly back of the

C., H. & D. elevator. The greater part is an unfenced common,

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382      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.   directly north of the present residence of Mrs. Charles A. Crane, to whom the site belongs. There is not a vestige of the old em- bankment remaining. After the ground was cleared of trees, it was cultivated, and the plow soon reduced the works to an uniform level. The only reminder of the work is the name of Fort street- a short thoroughfare running east from the Ohio Central tracks to Crescent street. If extended through westward to the river, it would cut the center of the site. When it was laid out, the

work was still in existence. and the name given in conse- quence. Mr. Elias Fassett, who lives in the next house south of the Crane residence, has a vivid remembrance of the old mound builders' fort as it appeared more than a half century ago. He says the northern end reached the river only a few yards south of the end of Fassett street bridge, and the embankment on the southwestern side, where there was no ditch, crossed the present street just at the corner of the Crane front fence.  When

the Fassett family settled where he now lives, the site of the fort was covered with huge sugar maple trees. This grove of maples extended some distance north of the three acres covered by the works, and embraced about 200 trees. These were the only sugar trees in that vicinity. This would point to the site having been cleared of the primitive forest by the people who built the fort; for it is a well known fact that where an area is denuded of its original forest growth, and afterward allowed to reforest itself, the new growth is always of a different species. It would ap- pear that the soil becomes exhausted of the materials for that

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Mound Builders' Fort within Toledo's Limits.  383

 

particular kind of tree, and others spring up for which it con-

tains appropriate nourishment.

Directly where the river road now runs, in front of the Fas-

set residence-or Miami street, to give it the official name-there

was originally an elevation, probably an artificial mound, of the

same date as the fort. A small oak tree, on the edge of the bluff,

marks its position. This mound was of nearly pure sand, and it

was used to level up the lot. In digging it down a half dozen

human skeletons were unearthed, all in perfect preservation, but

all buried face downward-a most unusual thing. These were

probably the remains of Indians of a later date, and not of the

race that erected the work itself. The mound builders usually

burned their dead; and the writer, in exploring their burial

mounds in Southern Ohio, has frequently found later Indian inter-

ments in these ancient mounds. They are easily distinguished,

for the mound builders deposited their burned remains of their

dead on the ground, and then raised a mound over them, the

relics being always found at the natural level, and in the center

of the mound; while the Indian interments were made anywhere

on the elevation that suited the fancy of the burial party.

Mr. Whittlesey, in the chapter referred to above, describes

eight ancient works, of which the Toledo one is the most west-

erly, and all in Northern Ohio. Of them he says:

"Nothing can be more plain that that most of the remains

in Northern Ohio are military works. They have not yet been

found any remnants of the timber in the walls; yet it is very safe

to presume that pallisades were planted on them, and that wooden

posts and gates were erected at the passages left in the embank-

ments and ditches.

"All the positions are contiguous to water; and none of them

have higher land in their vicinity, from which they might in an

degree be commanded. Of the works bordering on the shore of

Lake Erie, through the state of Ohio, there the none but may

have been intended for defence; although in some of them the

design is not perfectly manifest. They form a line from Con-

neaut to Toledo, at a distance of from three to five miles from the

lake; and all stand upon or near the principal rivers." * * * *

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384      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

"The most natural inference with respect to the northern

cordon of works is, that they formed a well-occupied line, con-

structed either to protect the advance of a nation landing from the

lake and moving southward for conquest; or, a line of resistance

for people inhabiting these shores and pressed upon by their

southern neighbors. The scarcity of mounds, the absence of

pyramids of earth, which are so common on the Ohio, the want

of rectangular or any other regular works, at the north-all

these differences tend to the conclusion that the northern part

of Ohio was occupied by a distinct people."

According to Mr. Whittlesey, this work on the Maumee is

the most westerly of the defensive cordon of these ancient forts.

The absence of mounds, of which he speaks, points to a short

occupation, or to a very small population; for the isolated mounds

were tumuli, or burial mounds. The writer knows of but three

in this vicinity. Two are on the road to Maumee, a short distance

this side of the Halfway House-one in a pear orchard, some

fifty yards west of the road, and and the other in the woods a few

hundred yards south. The third is in Ottawa Park, marked by

a clump of trees, on the crest of the hill west of the lower bridge.

The writer would like to be informed of the location of any others

in this vicinity.

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