Ohio History Journal

BOOK REVIEWS

 

The History of the State of Ohio. Edited .by Carl Wittke. Vol. I,

The Foundations of Ohio, By Beverley W. Bond, Jr. Vol. II,

The Frontier State, 1803-1825, By William T. Utter. Vol. III,

The Passing of the Frontier, 1825-1850, By Francis P.

Weisenburger. (Columbus, The Ohio State Archaeological

and Historical Society, 1941-2. Vol. I, xx+507p. Illustra-

tions and maps. Vol. II, xiv+454p. Illustrations, maps and

tables. Vol. III, xiv+524p. Illustrations and maps. $25.00

per set of 6 volumes.)

For the early history of the Northwest Territory, from which

Ohio was the first State to be carved, Dr. Bond speaks with the

authority of a recognized scholarship. His volume, moreover,

opens with a chapter on the geography and natural resources of

the State, which in many ways conditioned its later development.

His accounts of the early exploitation of these resources and of

the Indian trails which the white man later followed, anticipate

the developments of the historical period. First, the story of the

aboriginal population, "the all but mythical Mound-builders," and

of their culture is briefly told with authoritative finality--as it

seems to a layman in this field--in a chapter by Mr. Henry C.

Shetrone, director of the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical

Museum. The physical survivals and cultural remains of the

Mound-builders have an enduring fascination that charms many a

visitor to the excellent collections of the State Museum and Mr.

Shetrone's account has a similar lure through the medium of the

printed page.

Dr. Bond's narrative proper begins with the coming of the

French explorers operating from Canada, with LaSalle and his

party, meeting Jolliet in the extreme northeastern portion of the

State in September, 1669, and then working his way to the Al-

legheny and down the Ohio, which he followed at least to the

Falls at Louisville. LaSalle soon formulated vast schemes for

empire in the Great Valley, which were given the sanction of the

French Crown, but he found an obstacle in the domination by the

Iroquois over the western Indians and over the fur trade along

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the Ohio River. As a result he directed his efforts more par-

ticularly along the Maumee-Wabash route, with posts at key

points on Lake Erie. In the meantime English traders from

Pennsylvania and, later, traders from Virginia and Carolina be-

gan to operate along the Ohio River. The increasing number of

English trading posts made inevitable a final conflict for control,

which came to a head during the French and Indian War and

resulted in the final triumph of the British. This story, told with

some redundance and in a detail greater than the average reader

will appreciate, reflects the contributions of scholarly monographic

accounts which Dr. Bond has used along with the basic source ma-

terial.

British control over the Northwest, asserted in 1760, did not

prevent the savage attacks of an Indian uprising known as Pon-

tiac's Conspiracy, which was not suppressed until expeditions

were sent out in force. Even before the Indians acknowledged

the sovereignty of King George, the Royal Proclamation of 1763

undertook to restrain immigrants inclined to encroach upon In-

dian lands. Since the proclamation could not be enforced other

plans were attempted. The boundary of Indian lands was fixed

in the Treaty of Fort Stanwix. Various schemes were formu-

lated for colonies in the Ohio Country and the Indians were again

aroused by the advances of the settlers. Another clash came in

Dunmore's War in which the Indians were overawed.

In 1774, the Ohio Country was made a part of the Province

of Quebec, an arrangement no more popular among the settlers

than with the revolutionary forces gathering headway on the sea-

board. When the American Revolution broke out, some tempo-

rary success in Indian pacification, to offset the British policy of

utilizing Indian allies to hold the western country, combined with

the tenacious American control of Fort Pitt and cooperation with

such ventures as the successful campaign of George Rogers Clark,

held the Ohio Country for the new nation until it was duly recog-

nized in the treaty of peace.

Indian unrest and bloody massacres had long featured con-

ditions on the Ohio frontier. Nor did the situation change when

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the country passed into American control. With the western fur

trade at stake, the English retained their post at Detroit and con-

tinued to stir up the Indians. The Americans countered by es-

tablishing a post at Fort Harmar at the mouth of the Muskingum.

Congress set up agencies to regulate the Indian trade and treaties

were signed with the Indians. At length, forecasting the early

settlement of the territory and the beginnings of commonwealth-

building, the land claims of the eastern states were yielded to

Congress, a land ordinance was adopted with provisions for sur-

vey and sales, and, soon thereafter, under pressure of the inter-

ests of the Ohio Company, the famous Ordinance of 1787 was

adopted.

The speedy settlement of the Ohio Country now seemed a

matter of course. Land grants were made to various interests

which offered liberal terms to prospective settlers. The Marietta

settlement was promptly founded by the Ohio Company and the

pioneers went to work, with new arrivals swelling their number.

Other settlements were started and the interest of the volume

increases as these ventures in permanent home-building are re-

counted. Again the old menace of Indian attack was renewed.

Governor Arthur St. Clair tried to resolve the difficulty by nego-

tiation and later by a substantial show of force, only to be badly

defeated himself. It remained for General Anthony Wayne to

win the decisive battle of Fallen Timbers, after which the Indians,

notified of the British agreement in the Jay Treaty to withdraw

from the western posts, signed the famous treaty of Greenville,

which really resolved the Indian difficulty in the Ohio Country.

Settlement then spread with marked rapidity in the new territory

until 45,316 persons were recorded in the census of 1800. Gov-

ernmental developments and the currents of politics are recounted

in the later chapters and preparations for statehood were made as

a result of which the State of "Ohio emerged as the 'first fruits'

of the Ordinance of 1787."

There is plenty of romance in this story of early Ohio and,

under less pressure, the author might have brought out more of

it, but his narrative is adequate and reveals the complicating cur-

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376    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

rents of life in Ohio under three flags. A few matters could have

been clarified to advantage.  Most conspicuous to the present

reviewer was the failure to make clear in all cases, especially on

page 119, what he states on page 80, that Fort Miami was the

same as later Fort Wayne; only this reference, but not others on

pages 19 and 120, is listed in the index under Wayne, Fort, and

Fort Wayne is indexed only a single time on the basis of a refer-

ence to the modern community.

Dr. Utter contributes a very effective account of the pioneer

State with its rapidly growing population and importance in the

trans-Allegheny region. The coming into existence of the new

commonwealth was the result of a local Republican triumph that

paralleled the "political revolution of 1800" achieved in the na-

tional presidential election. President Jefferson removed the chief

obstacle by terminating the gubernatorial commission over the

territory of General Arthur St. Clair and replacing him by an

appointee who cooperated in the state-wide movement. The de-

feated Federalists, consisting mainly of New England settlers, had

their chief stronghold in the Marietta region.

The politics of the new State at first centered in the little

stone Capitol at Chillicothe, probably "the first stone building in

the Northwest Territory," and later in its successors at Zanesville

and Columbus. Political leadership was soon firmly placed in Re-

publican hands and this control continued, although sometimes

with the complication of Federalist support of Republicans of

New England origin checkmating the forces identified with the

Virginia brand of Jeffersonianism. The latter with only tem-

porary success waged a vigorous fight to penalize three Yankee

judges for applying the unpopular doctrine of judicial review to

state legislation. In the period from 181O to 1812 the dominant

group sought new strength in the organization of ritualistic Tam-

many societies to effect a more powerful political machine. When

the two Republican factors patched up their differences in favor

of the war program, the Federalists belatedly invoked the memory

of the first president and organized anti-war sentiment in the

secret oath-bound Washington Benevolent Societies.

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BOOK REVIEWS                     377

 

As to the forces making for the War of 1812, Dr. Utter re-

futes the theory that "Ohioans were eager to conquer Canada for

the sake of adding new lands for settlement" (p. 81). He finds

them more concerned about the defense of "national honor," with

the conquest of Canada as an incidental means of quieting the

Indian menace and humbling British "pride."  It is true that

United States Senator Thomas Worthington was one of the Sen-

ators who voted against the declaration of war, only to be elected

governor in 1814 when the conflict was still raging. The author

points to vigorous opposition within the State throughout the war,

but the anti-war forces are revealed to have been largely identified

with the waning Federalist cause. The chapter on Ohio and the

War of 1812 is full of interesting data, albeit the treatment might

well have been sparked up at various points. One might have

been more clearly led to the conclusion that the State's role in the

fracas could be summed up as having been "three-fourths politics

and one-fourth fighting." In a later chapter on the course of poli-

tics from 1816 to 1825 the author threads his way with some

skill through the maze of a period characterized by its transitional

character, finding main topics in Ohio's defiance of the second

Bank of the United States in the name of state sovereignty and in

the presidential campaign of 1824.

Politics, however, by no means furnish the main theme of

Dr. Utter's volume. Diligent use of old newspaper files and of

travel literature, as well as of collections of correspondence in

manuscript and in print, has enabled him to picture the develop-

ment of the many currents of life that came to flow in the new

state. Pioneer farming is shown to have evolved into a more

extensive and intensive agriculture with various specialty phases

and broad economic influences. The agencies of transportation

by water and by land are traced through their course of develop-

ment, with steamboats--although some were built to proceed by

way of the Mississippi to find their place in maritime trade--only

beginning to supersede the older use of flat-boats, keel-boats, and

barges and the slow introduction of roads and of improved ve-

hicles only gradually overcoming the difficulties of travel. Pioneer

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378     OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

industries--"asheries" for the production of pearlash and potash,

tanneries, coopers' shops, flour mills, distilleries, pork-packing es-

tablishments, salt-works, iron-works, and the like--are seen ex-

panding the field originally limited to an occasional saw- or

grist-mill in the wilderness. A chapter depicts the havoc wrought

by the Panic of 1819, partly the penalty for the unrestrained in-

flation that came when the State entered into a curious partnership

with the banks that it chartered, when the two Ohio branches of

the Bank of the United States temporarily offered additional en-

couragement to inflation, and when unauthorized institutions

added a flood of doubtful paper currency; belatedly the Bank of

the United States undertook currency stabilization but this only

precipitated wide-spread popular ruin and prosperity did not re-

turn until toward the end of this period.

Health conditions, the ills and complaints of pioneer folk, the

work of pioneer doctors and the attempts under the influence of

the distinguished Dr. Daniel Drake to train a local supply of

physicians and to set up a system of hospitals make an interest-

ing chapter. The moral reform of the community challenged the

interest of legislators and reformers as well as of preachers and

teachers and the young State struggled to make headway in edu-

cation and religion. At the end of two decades, with influences

working from within as well as the contributions that came from

the more settled East, frontier Ohio could look ahead to a matur-

ity of which many signs had already appeared on the horizon.

Dr. Utter's story has few gaps; scarcely a phase of life is

overlooked. The population forces at work in the new State are

not analyzed until the last chapter, and then all too briefly, with

little attention to the distribution of the elements that came from

New England, from Pennsylvania, from Virginia and the cultural

influences they exercised in well defined areas. One might also

wonder whether, from his own evidence, it is fair for the author to

characterize the small foreign-language groups, many early

"found . . . abandoning their mother tongue," as "elements which

could not be immediately absorbed into the body of the population"

(p. 394), whatever this means. One might, at times, wish that

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some of the actors could have been assigned larger roles. One

wonders, for instance, whether Bezaleel Wells, "Jefferson County's

leading citizen," might not have been given more notice than the

less than passing attention to his land speculations and town plan-

ning and to his pioneer work, with his partner, William R. Dick-

inson, in raising Merino sheep and in making the Steubenville-

Stark County district one of the great wool centers of the nation.

In a few cases the historical muse has dozed, if not slumbered.

There is no evidence in the story of the election of a United States

Senator in 1812 as to who finally won out (p. 95). One might

question whether the frigate Chesapeake was really "defenseless"

(p. 71) when attacked by the Leopard. The implication that Gov-

ernor Edward Tiffin was handsomely rewarded for following Jef-

ferson on the Burr Conspiracy is scarcely borne out by his election

to the United States Senate in a contest in which he would in-

evitably have had a large majority over an avowed Federalist op-

ponent (pp. 75-76). These are, however, minor matters. Dr.

Utter's narrative is generally adequate but the rhetorical machinery

creaks at spots where a greater finesse might have added to reader

appeal.

In the third volume of Ohio's new state history, Dr. Weisen-

burger has more than adequately discharged his obligations to the

best and most modern traditions of historical writing. Utilizing

the increasing monographic and biographical material and delving

into a wide array of travel accounts, old newspaper files and manu-

script collections, he has sketched the social, economic and politi-

cal growth of the commonwealth during the period when it was

rapidly passing from a frontier atmosphere to that of a state which

became in many ways as typical as any of what is called the Amer-

ican tradition. Agricultural life became diversified and industrial

activities developed. Transportation by modern highways, by a

net-work of canals, and by mail routes tied together the various

parts of the State. Life took on many aspects that reflected the

coming of leisure and a culture not known to the frontier, which,

to be sure, had many survivals.

Ohio was affected in a fairly typical way by the political cur-

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380    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

 

rents that ebbed and flowed; the dominance of Jacksonian democ-

racy, the rise of the Whig party and the increasing embarrassment

of the slavery issue in politics. While these currents are properly

considered in the background of national politics, the strength of

the antislavery movement in Ohio is shown to have been influ-

enced more by local conditions and by local leadership--the zeal

of Theodore D. Weld and his associates--than by the forces that

followed William Lloyd Garrison in New England and along the

Atlantic seaboard. It is to be regretted, however, that the facts

do not entirely fit the story, which is based upon Barnes, Anti-

slavery Impulse, the standard authority. It should be noted that

Professor Elizur Wright of Western Reserve College was mili-

tantly proclaiming--apparently under Garrisonian influence--the

iniquities of slavery in a long series of articles that appeared in

the Hudson Observer and Telegraph from July 12, 1832, to No-

vember of that year. In the issue of October II, Wright appended

a footnote acknowledging his indebtedness to a recent publication

by Garrison. Theodore Weld's work at Hudson began in October;

Wright could not, therefore, have been one of Weld's "converts"

as Mr. Weisenburger assumes on Mr. Barnes's authority. Nor is

it accurate to state, "During the summer of 1833, the first abolition

society in the Reserve was organized" (p. 367). A students'

"Abolition Society" had been organized in the college in October,

1832, and the Antislavery Society of Tallmadge, the home of

Elizur Wright, Sr., held an "annual meeting" on May 8, 1833, at

which it listened to an impassioned three-hour address by Presi-

dent Charles B. Storrs of Western Reserve College. The latter

had received a copy of Garrison's Liberator early in February,

1831, and presumably had been converted to the policy of im-

mediate emancipation by December 1, 1831.

Mr. Weisenburger's pictures of life in the State one hundred

years ago are kaleidoscopic in scope but, in general, well integrated

in their various phases. Politicians, frontier revivalists, reform-

ers and promoters pleaded their causes on the one hand; on the

other, yokels spat tobacco juice, sated their appetites for strong

drink and at huskings and frolics set the floors vibrating with

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their vigorous dancing, while in Cincinnati staid citizens visited

the library, the Western Museum, or the theatre and attended

balls or assemblies or--for a time--patronized the bazaar of Mrs.

Trollope, the English writer who tried to bring a more sophisti-

cated social life to the Queen City of the West--an episode not

covered by Mr. Weisenburger's account. Despite the general

adequacy of the volume an occasional gap is to be found. There

is no hint, except on the map, of the foreign born in Ohio in 1850,

of the importance of the immigrant element in Cuyahoga County.

where it totalled nearly fifteen thousand, over twice that of any

other county except Hamilton, which led with over sixty thousand.

A microfilm copy of the original census returns for Cuyahoga

County in the possession of Western Reserve University reveals

the exact distribution of the foreign-born groups and other sig-

nificant social and economic data.

The volume is well supplied with maps and illustrations; the

index is superior; the style is good, although more logic and

finesse could have been applied to many of the transitions.

In these three volumes the State of Ohio has belatedly begun

to achieve a publication of its history on a scale and in a character

that meet the dictates and expectations of modern historical schol-

arship. Cooperative work by specialists, under competent plan-

ning and editorial direction, has utilized the available sources and

the monographic writing of the last half century. The final result

will be a six-volume work in which the citizens of the State can

well take pride both for its soundness and for its excellent format.

It may perhaps seem unfortunate that it could not have been

brought out upon a better grade of unglazed paper; the reviewer

understands, however, that the grade used was found best adapted

to the general needs of the series. In other particulars, save per-

haps a tendency in the indexes to list long series of page numbers

without classification, the volumes live up to the best standards.

Each is well equipped with maps and well-selected illustrations.

Each is well documented with footnote citations; a formal bibliog-

raphy for the series will probably be provided in a supplementary

seventh volume.

Western Reserve University              Arthur C. Cole.

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My War with Japan. By Carroll Alcott. (Chicago, Henry Holt

and Company, ³⁶8p. $3.00.)

Carroll Alcott's My War with Japan will help the reader see

this conflict with Japan as his war. Japan's geopolitics, used for

several decades, has placed her in a position of power and if given

a chance to consolidate gains, her slogan "Asia for Asiatics" may

not be an idle philosophy. Formosa, in 1895, was the first of

Japan's acquisitions which now includes, in part, Manchuria, part

of China, Micronesia.

Alcott gives a vivid picture of how Japan prepares for oc-

cupation and how she wears down the morale of a people--

smuggling, white drug traffic, systematic plundering, and kid-

naping. Although the book revolves on Alcott's personal experi-

ences, he has tied several past events to current events. The

Treaty of Portsmouth was more portentous than most people

realized. Here the Japanese showed their bargaining ability by

asking for more than they expected to get. According to the

author "They asked for Vladivostok, Port Arthur, Dalny, the

evacuation of Manchuria by the Russians, the surrender of the

Russian railway in Manchuria, the cession of oil-rich Sakhalin

Island, Russian recognition of Korea as a Japanese protectorate,

and almost $750,000,000 in reparations." Most of these demands

were met in the settlement of the Russo-Japanese War at Ports-

mouth, New Hampshire, excepting the one for Vladivostok which

the Japanese were denied.

The last chapter entitled "Carthago Delenda Est" (Carthage

must be destroyed) gives a brief review of Japan's aggression

and the punishment she should receive. All in all this book is an

important addition to the large volume of material that is being

written on the perplexing character of the Japanese people.

Circleville, Ohio                  Maynard T. Campbell

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BOOK REVIEWS                     383

 

Pilotin' Comes Natural.  By Frederick Way, Jr.  Illustrated

by John O'Hara Cosgrave II. (New York, Farrar and Rine-

hart, Inc., 1943. 271p. $3.00.)

In his recent book, Frederick Way, Jr., reverts to his more

normal and natural style of writing after taking a boisterous,

rollicking voyage down The Allegheny--his contribution to the

Rivers of America series. Pilotin' Comes Natural is in calmer,

more subtle mood, more suitable to the La Belle River. The story

of the book concerns the author's experiences from the time when

he fell in love with the beautiful packet, Queen City, at the age

of IO until he became a full-fledged pilot. His experiences are

told with much humor and nostalgic detail, especially appealing

to those who have known the river in the days of the river queens.

It is essentially a story of the decadent period of Ohio River trade

--when the steamboat was passing from the scene and the era of

the Diesel boat was about to begin.

Pilot Way, we believe, must be sorry that he inserted the

very last statement in his book concerning his aversion to the

modern boats, for the passing of "the ancient steamboats" has

come about more rapidly than he probably anticipated. He is

at present piloting the Diesel Paul Blazer, doing his bit in

the war effort by moving great tows of gasoline, iron and other

war materials up and down the Ohio River. We believe that

pilotin' comes just as natural on the Diesel boats as it did on the

old steamers and that he is having just as much fun doing it.

A list of river terms appended to the book is indeed interest-

ing to the land-lubber for the river fraternity has a language all its

own. The illustrations by John O'Hara Cosgrove II are especially

well done.

J. R. L.

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384    OHIO ARCHAEOLOGICAL AND HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

Archceological Studies in Peru, 1941-1942.  By W. Duncan

Strong, Gordon R. Willey and John M. Corbett. (New York,

Columbia University Press, 1943. iii+222p. 21 plates, tables.

$4.75.)

This volume is No. 1 of Columbia Studies in Archceology and

History, and is the work of W. Duncan Strong, professor of

archaeology, Columbia University, and Director of the Ethno-

geographic Board of the National Research Council; Gor-

don R. Willey, instructor in anthropology, Columbia University;

and John M. Corbett, of the United States Army. The studies are

the result of a series of archaeological excavations in certain key

areas in Latin America made under the auspices of the Office of

the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs.

Four independent reports on the coastal area north and south

of the city of Lima make up the volume. The entire work con-

tributes toward a better understanding of the record of human

history in the region from the time of the earliest shell mound-

builders to the invasion of the Incas. The volume is well indexed

and illustrated.

H. L.

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