Ohio History Journal

TERRY A. BARNHART

James McBride: Historian and

Archaeologist of the Miami Valley

James McBride of Hamilton, Ohio, was a man of many parts. At various

junctures of his busy life, McBride's multifarious activities embraced mer-

chandising, architecture, banking, civil engineering, and several avenues of

public service. As respectable as those attainments were, however, his most

enduring contributions were made as an amateur historian and archaeologist.

McBride is a prime example of the antiquarian chronicler, of which the nine-

teenth century provides so numerous and significant an offering. Those dili-

gent investigators dedicated themselves to the collection of original historical

and archaeological materials with an enthusiasm and single-mindedness of

purpose that command respect and admiration. As a chronicler of early set-

tlement in the Miami Valley and a surveyor and mapper of prehistoric Indian

sites, McBride made significant contributions to Ohio history and archaeol-

ogy. Indeed, the value of his researches in these fields led several of his con-

temporaries and successors to lament that he has received less recognition

than is his due.¹

Those contributions were both numerous and significant. Excerpts from

McBride's manuscripts relating to the early history of the Miami Valley were

published in Henry Howe's Historical Collections of Ohio (1847), and his ar-

chaeological surveys, field notes, and drawings of artifacts form a conspicuous

feature of Ephraim George Squier and Edwin Hamilton Davis's Ancient

Monuments of the Mississippi Valley (1848).       McBride's extensive

manuscript materials also resulted in the posthumous publication of his two-

volume Pioneer Biography (1869, 1871) and his brief Notes on Hamilton

(1898). A charter member of the Historical and Philosophical Society of

Ohio, his career closely parallels the local history movement of the 1830s and

Terry A. Barnhart is a curator of history with the Ohio Historical Society and an adjunct

faculty member in the history department at Otterbein College.

1. Francis Richard Gilmore, "James McBride" (M.A. thesis, Miami University, 1952), 85;

John Ewing Bradford, ed., "The James McBride Manuscripts: Selections Relating to the Miami

University," Quarterly Publication of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, 4

(January-March, 1909), 4; A History and Biographical Cyclopeadia of Butler County, Ohio

(Cincinnati, 1882), 170; and Laura McBride Stembel, "James McBride" in James McBride,

Pioneer Biography: Sketches of the Lives of Some of the Early Settlers of Butler County, Ohio, 1

(Cincinnati, 1869), ix.

24                                                        OHIO HISTORY

'40s. McBride's original contributions on the early settlement of the Miami

Valley, the history of Miami University, and his zealous activities as a sur-

veyor and mapper of prehistoric earthworks gave full expression to the mis-

sion of that movement. Moreover, his mass of manuscript histories of

Hamilton, Oxford, and Miami University have been the grist for numerous

works of local history, including A History and Biographical Cyclopeadia of

Butler County, Ohio (1882). Certainly the depth and range of McBride's in-

vestigations into the history and archaeology of the Miami Valley are worthy

of remembrance in their own right.²

James McBride was born of Scottish ancestry on November 2, 1788, on a

farm near Conococheaque Creek some three miles from Greencastle,

Pennsylvania. His father, James Sr., was a surveyor, land speculator, and

gristmill owner with landholdings in Pennsylvania and Kentucky. James Sr.

was killed during an Indian raid at Dry Ridge, Kentucky, in 1789 or '90.

That untoward occurrence set in motion the train of events that ultimately

brought James Jr. to Ohio. The death of James McBride Sr. left his year-old

son and wife, Margaret McRoberts McBride (1771-1808), without an estate,

since James's out-of-date will passed on his land holdings to his brothers and

sisters. Thus denied a patrimony, James Jr. resided with his mother and ma-

ternal grandfather, James McRoberts (1718-1805), on the family farm near

Conococheaque Creek. Had McBride come into possession of his father's

property, his adult life may well have been spent in Pennsylvania or

Kentucky instead of Hamilton, Ohio.³

The frugality of life on the family farm denied McBride the opportunity of

acquiring a formal education. Undoubtedly, this accounts for the persistent

pursuit of self-culture (a trait he exemplified throughout his life) that enabled

him to develop his literary and antiquarian interests into respectable attain-

ments as a scholar. Like many self-educated and self-sufficient men of his

generation, McBride also received practical training as a land surveyor during

his early years in Pennsylvania. That skill would serve him well in laying

out county roads, turnpikes, and in the mapping of prehistoric Indian mounds.

Such were the humble origins that led McBride, in his eighteenth year, to

leave the family farm in Pennsylvania and seek his fortune in Hamilton,

2. The significance of McBride's contributions to local history and his own importance

within the history of Hamilton have long-been noted. See Daniel Preston, "Market and Mill

Town: Hamilton, Ohio, 1795-1860" (Ph.D dissertation, University of Maryland, 1987);

Gilmore, "James McBride," loc cit; Alta Harvey Heiser, Hamilton in the Making (Oxford,

Ohio, 1941); Stephen D. Cone, Biographical and Historical Sketches: A Narrative of Hamilton

and Its Residents from 1792 to 1896 (Hamilton, 1896); and A Concise History of Hamilton, Ohio

(Middletown, 1901).

3. McBride, Pioneer Biography Vol. 1 (Cincinnati, 1869), 205-06; Stembel, "James

McBride," Ibid., vii-xi; A History and Biographical Cyclopaedia of Butler County, Ohio, 169;

"Family Record," McBride Papers, Typescript, Cincinnati Historical Society, 5; and Gilmore,

"James McBride", 1-4, 7.

26                                                         OHIO HISTORY

diers, and civilian contractors who remained at the site after the Wayne cam-

paign of 1794 and the abandonment of Fort Hamilton in June 1797.6

McBride observed that those first residents of Hamilton lacked "energy and en-

terprise," and in many cases were "dissipated and immoral." They were cer-

tainly "not the class of citizens best calculated to promote the rapid improve-

ment of the place."⁷

McBride's first known employment in Hamilton was as an assistant to

John Reily, the Butler County Clerk of Courts and Postmaster. McBride's

early association with Reily was well met. He was the clerk of the House of

Representatives in the territorial legislature prior to Ohio statehood, a delegate

to the Ohio Constitutional Convention of 1802, and a trustee of Miami

University. The capabilities of the youthful and hardworking McBride made

an immediate impression on Reily, thus earning him the trust of an influen-

tial local official. It is likely that it was Reily who also arranged for McBride

to apply his knowledge of surveying in laying out the first county roads in

Oxford Township between 1809 and 1811, thus beginning what would be a

long association with Oxford and Miami University. McBride's relationship

with Reily was his entree into local society.

But it was McBride's partnership with Hamilton merchant Joseph Hough

(1783-1852) that firmly established him in his adopted community. Between

1811 and 1815, McBride and Hough shipped locally produced flour, pork, and

whiskey by flatboat to New Orleans. The great demand for this produce made

the New Orleans trade a lucrative, if a laborious and risky business.⁸

McBride's position as a community leader in Hamilton was a direct result of

his successful mercantile partnership with Hough and the prudent investments

that followed immediately from it. He became the architect and proprietor of

the Hamilton House in 1812, a concern he owned until his death, and was

elected county sheriff between 1813 and 1817. The profits from McBride's

mercantile business also enabled him to purchase the printing press and type

used to issue the Miami Intellegencer on June 22, 1814, the first newspaper

published in Hamilton. McBride's social standing was further solidified on

6. McBride, Pioneer Biography 1:47. For an account of Fort Hamilton and its importance in

the establishment of Hamilton, see David A. Simmons, "Fort Hamilton, Ohio, 1791-1797: Its

Life and Architecture" (M.A. thesis, Miami University, 1975).

7. McBride, Pioneer Biography 1:47.

8. For an account of McBride's activities in the New Orleans trade, see McBride to [Mary

McRoberts], Mississippi River, April 1, 1812 in "Brief Accounts of Journeys in the Western

Country, 1809-1812," Quarterly Publication of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio,

5(January-March, 1910); 27-31. See also Thomas Rentschler, ed., "A Brief Account of Mr.

Hough's Life Written by Himself in 1852," Cincinnati Historical Society Bulletin, 24(0ctober,

1966); 302-12; R. Pierce Beaver, "Joseph Hough, an Early Miami Merchant," Ohio State

Archaeological and Historical Quarterly, 45(January, 1936), 37-45; A History and Biographical

Cyclopeadia of Bulter County, Ohio, 166-68. See also James McBride, "Joseph Hough,"

Pioneer Biography, 1:311-26.

James McBride                                                     27

September 1, 1814, when he married Hannah Lytle, a daughter of Judge

Robert Lytle. The marriage of Hannah and James resulted in three sons and

two daughters. Hannah remained his wife for forty-five years until her death

of typhoid fever on September 23, 1859. James would survive her for only

ten days.

By the conclusion of his partnership with Hough, McBride had become a

man of substantial means and standing within local society. Over the next

four decades, the versatile McBride played many roles in the economic and

cultural development of Hamilton and the Miami Valley. He was the archi-

tect of the Miami Bridge, the Butler County Infirmary, and the Hamilton and

Rossville Female Academy. At other times he was cashier of the Bank of

Hamilton, mayor of Hamilton, claims commissioner for the Miami Canal,

surveyor of turnpike roads, chief clerk of public works in Ohio, member of

the Ohio House of Representatives, and throughout much of his life an officer

and trustee of Miami University. This record of achievement resulted in a

collection of correspondence, journals, and reports that are of inestimable

value to local historians. But it is his own work as an historian that concerns

us here.

McBride began to gather the isolated threads of local history soon after his

arrival at Hamilton. His historical proclivities and keen powers of observa-

tion are evident even in his earliest correspondence to friends and relatives in

Pennsylvania.⁹ Through his many associations with the early settlers of the

community, he obtained reminiscences and anecdotes relating to the military

campaigns of Harmar, St. Clair, and Wayne, and the circumstances surround-

ing the establishment of the first settlements of the Miami Valley. His

method was to solicit information through written inquiries, verify them with

other sources, and submit the resulting manuscripts to the scrutiny of his in-

formants.¹⁰ Those acquainted with these materials have lauded McBride's

meticulous attention to detail and the trustworthiness of his documentation.

McBride's researches epitomize the local history movement of the 1830s

and '40s. It was then that amateur historians began to chronicle the settle-

ment period of Ohio's history and to preserve the documents of that history

for posterity. Their efforts came at a time when recollections of those events

were fast fading from memory. Working with a decided sense of urgency,

they gathered and compiled every conceivable scrap of information about local

figures and events into well-crafted narratives. The result of this movement

9. See, for example, his comments on the Shakers at Union Village in James McBride to

Mary McRoberts, Hamilton, Ohio, July 14, 1811. This letter has been published as "The

Shakers of Ohio: An Early Nineteenth-Century Account," The Cincinnati Historical Society

Bulletin, 29(Summer, 1971), 127-37.

10. McBride's correspondence provides many examples of his methodology as a

local historian. See, for instance, James McBride to Thomas Irwin, Hamilton, September 5,

1844, McBride Papers Vol. 9, Cincinnati Historical Society.

28                                                     OHIO HISTORY

was the familiar pioneer-life genre of local history, which provided a nostalgic

look at Ohio's origins and the Promethean accomplishments of the "venerable

pioneers." Those "olden-times," little more than a generation removed from

the events being recalled, were lauded as heroic days of pioneer adventure.

McBride shared much in common with these early annalists in both his tech-

nique and approach to local history. Like them, he tirelessly labored to col-

lect and preserve accounts of "a comparatively recent but nevertheless fast fad-

ing past.^"11

McBride's historical bent naturally led him to become a founding member

of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio in 1831. His interests

and activities mirrored the purposes of the society, and he did as much as any

one in the state to further its objects. The first attempt to form a state histor-

ical society was made on February 12, 1822, when the state legislature incor-

porated the first Ohio Historical Society. That society was still-born and is

not known to have ever met as a body. On February 11, 1831, the Ohio

General Assembly passed another act of incorporation establishing the

Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio. The society's members were

drawn from all sections of the state, including such early promoters of local

history as Benjamin Tappan, Joseph Sullivant, Samuel P. Hildreth, Timothy

Flint, and the ever-assiduous James McBride. Their mission was to "collect

the materials of history, a copious store, from which some future Tacitus or

Gibbon may weave the strong and elegant web of historic narrative."¹²

McBride was certainly no Tacitus nor a Gibbon. But he was among that ad-

vance cadre of Ohio historians who began the process of collecting research

materials and of writing the first historical narratives.

The interpretive approach of these early histories might well be called the

"what-the-pioneers-hath-wrought" school of historiography. They were con-

ceived as odes to progress and were written in the most triumphant tones of

whiggish history. The first of these annalists was Nahum Ward, author of

the very rare Brief Sketch of the State of Ohio (1822). Ward's work was fol-

lowed by Salmon Portland Chase's "Preliminary Sketch of the History of

Ohio," appearing in his Statutes of Ohio and of the Northwest Territory

(1833). Chase's sketch has been referred to, with perhaps some hyperbole, as

"the first systematic presentation of Ohio's history."¹³ Far more significant

was Caleb Atwater's History of the State of Ohio (1838). Atwater's forays

into history and archaeology make him the first major figure in the intellec-

tual and cultural history of Ohio.

11. W.H. Venable, Beginnings of Literary Culture in the Ohio Valley (Cincinnati, 1891), 34n.

12. Benjamin Tappan, "Address Delivered Before the Society, December 22, 1832,"

Journal of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, Part I, Volume 1 (1838), 18.

13. W.H. Venable, "Some Early Travelers and Annalists of the Ohio Valley," Ohio

Archaeological and Historical Publications, I(June 1887-March 1888), 236.

30                                                       OHIO HISTORY

McBride's greatest contribution to this historical genre was his two-volume

Pioneer Biography, posthumously published at Cincinnati as the fourth num-

ber of Robert Clarke's "Ohio Valley Historical Series" in 1869 and 1871.

These volumes were based on the memoranda, letters, and journals of early

settlers in Butler County, which are preserved among McBride's valuable col-

lection of manuscripts. He had partially prepared these materials for publica-

tion before his death in 1859, using them in anonymous contributions to

Charles Cist's Western General Advertiser and for anonymous obituaries of

early settlers submitted to local newspapers. Especially useful are McBride's

sketches of his long-time associates John Reily and Joseph Hough, which

have been frequently drawn upon by other writers. Portions of McBride's

sketch of Reily, for example, were published verbatim in Burnet's Notes on

the Early Settlement of the North-Western Territory, but with no attribution

of its source.¹⁶ In their final form, these materials chronicle the lives of

twenty early settlers and refer to many more. Each sketch is a tribute to

McBride's industry as a local historian.

McBride's Pioneer Biography is typical of other nineteenth-century writings

which venerated the character and fortitude of frontier settlers. His work cele-

brated their transformation of the wilderness and provided their descendants

with an heroic past and a legitimizing mythology about their origins.

The generation of hardy men, who first settled the western country, who encoun-

tered the perils of Indian warfare and wrested the beautiful country we now enjoy in

peace from the possession of the savages, who encountered and endured all the

dangers and privations of a frontier life, have now nearly all passed away. These

men should not be forgotten, who subdued the dense forest and made the wilderness

to blossom as the rose; who, rifle in hand, cleared up the broad acres, which now

yield to their descendants bountiful harvests of golden grain, to gladden the heart

and swell the fortunes of their favored sons. The story of their sufferings and

achievements should not be allowed to sink into oblivion.¹⁷

This interpretation puts much distance between McBride's Pioneer Biography

and the concerns of later historians. But it is unfair to simply dismiss this

work as mere panegyric. It was an earnest attempt to preserve the names and

to record the accomplishments of ordinary people whose lives were not the

usual stuff of history. Without question, he preserved much information

about the settlement of the Miami Valley that otherwise would have been

lost.

1857.

16. Jacob Burnet, Notes on the Early Settlement of the North-Western Territory (Cincinnati,

1847), Ch. 26, "Mr. John Reily," 469-78; "Publishers' Notice" in McBride, Pioneer Biography

l:i-iii, and Jacob Burnet to McBride, Cincinnati, June 1, 1843, Appendix A, Ibid., 73-82.

Burnet's letter to McBride originally appeared in the Cincinnati Gazette (October 28, 1843).

17. McBride, Pioneer Biography l:xiii-xiv.

James McBride                                                          31

McBride also compiled many materials relating to the history of Miami

University. No one took a more direct interest in documenting the universi-

ty's origins or in fostering its development than did McBride. Indeed, his

long association with Miami eminently qualified him to become the institu-

tion's first historian. It was he who surveyed the first county road through

what is now Oxford Township in 1808, when Oxford and its would-be uni-

versity were nothing more than a stand of blazed trees and a flowing spring of

water.¹⁸ After Miami was incorporated in 1809, he served as secretary pro

tempore from 1810 to 1820. The university then existed only as a corporate

entity, but secretary McBride dutifully recorded all transactions relating to the

board of trustees and prepared annual reports to the Ohio legislature from

1815-1818. Undoubtedly, it was McBride's own lack of a formal education

and his persistent pursuit of self-culture that led him to cherish his long asso-

ciation with Miami. He did much during his tenure as secretary to ensure that

the much-maligned institution eventually became a reality.

McBride's position as secretary made him the logical choice to lead the

fight against removing the seat of the university from Oxford Township to

Cincinnati. He assured the inhabitants of the college lands in 1814 that the

university had been irrevocably planted "on the banks of the Four Mile,"

where it would remain "till time shall be no longer."¹⁹ McBride's eloquent

resolve ultimately carried the day. As a member of the Ohio House of

Representatives in 1822-23, he mustered enough votes to defeat the bill that

would have removed Miami from Oxford Township. With agitation over the

site of Miami at an end, the first classes were commenced on November 2,

1824. As a trustee, McBride's stewardship of the infant institution continued

as it increased in respectability and size. He was directly involved in planning

and supervising the construction of new buildings in the 1820s and '30s,

worked on various other committees between 1821 and 1852, and further

served as president of the board from 1852 to 1859. Significantly, those

many years of service resulted in an extensive collection of correspondence,

documents, and manuscripts relating to the history of Oxford and Miami

University.²⁰

18. McBride's work in laying out the first county road in Oxford Township was recalled in

James McBride to Unknown Party, Hamilton, December 7, 1857, McBride Papers Vol. 15,

Cincinnati Historical Society.

19. Cited in Walter Havighurst, The Miami Years, 1809-1969 (New York, 1969), 21. See

also James McBride, "A Speech for the General Assembly of the State of Ohio, on the Bill to

Remove the Site of the Miami University from Oxford," Quarterly Publication of the Historical

and Philosophical Society of Ohio, 4(April-June, 1909), 45-79, and McBride to John Reily,

Columbus, January 6, 1823, James McBride Manuscripts, Covington Collection, Miami

University Library.

20. Bradford, ed., "The James McBride Manuscripts: Selections Relating to the Miami

Unviersity," Quarterly Publication of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio,

4(January-March, 1909), 4; Ibid., (April-June), 41-44; "Publishers' Notice" to McBride,

32                                                          OHIO HISTORY

Apart from McBride's impassioned interest in history and biography, he

also made lasting contributions to archaeology. No subject was of more in-

terest to him than the prehistoric Indian mounds and earthworks of the Miami

Valley, yet no aspect of his many-sided life has received less attention from

historians. McBride expended much time, money, and effort in surveying

these works and in collecting a valuable cabinet of associated artifacts. These

remains had been the subject of admiration and speculation since the begin-

ning of Euro-American settlement in the Ohio Valley, but their origin and

purposes remained shrouded in obscurity. One of the leading objectives of the

Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, consequently, was to collect all

that was known about "the labors of a race now extinct." It sought to pro-

mote a more systematic approach to the subject by encouraging those who

lived near these remains to make accurate diagrams and full descriptions of

them on its behalf.²¹ Only then could a more connected view of the subject

be obtained. Few members of the society were more favorably situated to

achieve this end than McBride.

The Miami Valley presented him with a rich field for archaeological inves-

tigations. Archaeologists have recorded the sites of at least 221 mounds in

Butler County alone, besides 30 other earthworks and aboriginal sites of vari-

ous descriptions.²² Only Ross County in the Scioto Valley has a greater

number of mounds and earthen enclosures. The Great Miami meanders widely

through Butler County from the northeast to the southwest, dividing the

county into two unequal sections. Most of the county lies west of the river,

which is drained by the numerous creeks that run in a southeasterly direction

to the Miami. It is here, on the alluvial river terraces or "bottom" lands, that

the mounds and enclosures of Butler County are most numerous. The largest

of these works occur at the broadest extent of these bottoms, often at the con-

fluence of streams. The soil at these junctions is among the most fertile and

easily cultivated in the Miami Valley. McBride knew these sites well and

fully understood how precarious were the chances of their continued survival.

Pioneer Biography, Vol. 1, iii; Laws Establishing the Miami Univeristy and the Ordinances of

the President and Trustees (Hamilton, 1814); James McBride, ed., Laws Relating to the Miami

University, Together with the Ordinances of the President and Trustees (Cincinnati, 1833);

James McBride, "A Sketch of the Topography, Statistics, and History of Oxford, and the Miami

University," Journal of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, Part I, Volume I

(1838), 85-103; and "The Miami University and the Miami College Lands," MS, n.d., McBride

Papers, Cincinnati Historical Society, 53-54.

21. Benjamin Tappan, "Address Delivered Before the Society, December 22, 1832,"

Journal of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, Part I, Volume 1 (1838), 19-20.

22. William C. Mills, Archaeological Atlas of Ohio (Columnus, 1914), 9. John Patterson

MacLean placed the number at 250 mounds and seventeen enclosures. J. P. MacLean,

"Aboriginal History of Butler County," Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, 1

(June 1887-March 1888), 64. When MacLean revisited these sites in the 1870s and '80s, he

found that continual cultivation had further damaged the walls of some of the enclosures and

that some embankments were altogether leveled. MacLean, Ibid., 65.

James McBride                                                    33

When McBride first arrived at Hamilton in 1807, most of the mounds and

earthworks of the Miami Valley were yet undisturbed. They were covered

with mature trees of the same size, species, and age as those found in the sur-

rounding woodlands. Moreover, on the very summits of these works were the

remains of large trees which had already fallen and decayed, suggesting an

even remoter antiquity. But when McBride began to survey these works in the

1830s, the land on which many them were located had been cleared and

brought under cultivation. The effect of plowing along the sides of these em-

bankments greatly reduced their original dimensions. There was also abun-

dant evidence that several of the mounds had been recently excavated by local

inhabitants. McBride lamented that a more conscious effort was not being

made to preserve these remains precisely as they had been found. The demoli-

tion of a small mound within the University Square at Oxford, for example,

elicited a typical response.

It is to be regretted that this was done; it [the mound] ought to have been preserved

entire, with the natural forest-trees which grew on it, as a shady grove, in which

the students might retire to study, or ruminate on the existence of that race by

whom these ancient works were constructed.²³

McBride bears the distinction of being the first investigator to undertake the

systematic surveying and mapping of the prehistoric remains of the Miami

Valley while many of them still existed. His accomplishments in this regard

are truly remarkable.

McBride made his first known archaeological survey in 1828. Although he

occasionally excavated mounds, it is surveying that constitutes his greatest

contribution to archaeology. His early surveys were published in the first

volume of the Journal of the Ohio Historical and Philosophical Society in

1838. McBride resumed this fieldwork in 1836, with the assistance of John

W. Erwin. Erwin was recognized as the most experienced surveyor in Ohio.

He was an assistant engineer on the National Road at Richmond, Indiana, be-

tween 1825 and 1835, laid out numerous turnpike roads in Ohio during the

1830s, and became an engineer on the Miami Canal in 1842. Erwin shared

McBride's interest in preserving accurate information about the mounds and

earthworks which were everywhere being threatened with destruction: "the

only memorial[s] of a former people, now only known by those remains of

their skill and industry."²⁴ The McBride and McBride-Erwin surveys made be-

23. James McBride, "A Sketch of the Topography, Statistics, and History of Oxford, and the

Miami University," Journal of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, Part I, Volume

I(1838), 89.

24. McBride to Charles Whittlesey, Hamilton, December 9, 1840, McBride Papers,

Cincinnati Historical Society.

34                                                            OHIO HISTORY

tween 1836 and 1847 are among the most accurate archaeological surveys

made in the nineteenth century.²⁵

With compass, chain, and level, McBride and Erwin recorded the dimen-

sions of local works and noted their relationship to the topography of the sur-

rounding countryside. McBride had completed about twenty-five survey maps

based on this fieldwork by 1845. He then thought it would take at least two

or three more years to complete the survey of all known works in the Miami

Valley. His intention was to compile this data into an archaeological map of

the Miami Valley, and present it to a learned society for publication. His

first preference was the Ohio Historical and Philosophical Society, of which

he was a charter member and through which he had already published some of

his surveys.²⁶ McBride meticulously recorded these surveys into bound note-

books, which were greatly sought after by those who wished to make copies

of their contents. The originality and value of these materials firmly estab-

lished McBride's reputation as an archaeological investigator, earning him

election as a corresponding member of the American Ethnological Society in

1846.27

Besides making surveys, McBride collected an outstanding cabinet of ar-

chaeological and ethnological artifacts. Most of the collection was given him

by friends and acquaintances who knew his taste for collecting. Very few ar-

chaeological materials were obtained by mound excavations. Some were re-

covered from sites destroyed during the construction of the Miami Canal,

while others were found on the surface during McBride's surveys or given to

him by local farmers. The collection also included a small number of historic

calumets, trade goods, and ethnological specimens acquired from Indian

groups residing west of the Mississippi. When McBride obtained a contract

in 1826 to supply provisions to the army at Cantonment Gibson in the

Arkansas Territory, he made arrangements with local merchants to obtain sev-

25. McBride's field work has rightly earned him recognition as a pioneer archaeologist. See

Thomas Gilbert Tax, "The Development of American Archaeology, 1800-1879" (Ph.D.

dissertation, University of Chicago, 1973), 100, 104, and 108. The accuracy of at least one of

his surveys has, however, been criticized. See R.W. McFarland, "Ancient Work Near Oxford,

Ohio," Ohio Archaeological and Historical Publications, 1(June 1887-March 1888), 261-67.

26. James McBride, "Survey and Description of Ancient Fortifications Situated in Butler

County, Ohio," Journal of the Historical and Philosophical Society of Ohio, Part 1, Volume

1(1838), 104-11. McBride's bound volumes of surveys, field notes, and watercolor drawings

of his archaeological and ethnological collections are on permanent loan to the Ohio Historical

Society from the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. See James McBride Papers,

circa 1828 to 1858, MS 24, Archives-Library Division, Ohio Historical Society.

27. John R. Bartlett to McBride, New York, July 5, 1846 and McBride to Bartlett, Columbus,

July 16, 1846, McBride Papers, Cincinnati Historical Society. Further evidence of McBride's

reputation as an archaeologist is found in [Wills De] Hass to McBride, Wellsburg, Va.,

September 12, 1845; McBride to De Hass, Columbus, October 18, 1845; De Hass to McBride,

Wellsburg, October 25, 1845, Ibid.

James McBride                                                           35

eral items from the Osage and Cherokee Indians who traded there.²⁸ McBride

made watercolor drawings, pencil sketches, and descriptions of the contents of

his collection. The drawings were usually made to the size and color of the

originals, and their place of origin, when known, faithfully recorded.²⁹

But the publication of McBride's archaeological materials, like much of his

historical research, was a task left to others. His surveys, field notes, and

drawings came to the attention of Ephraim George Squier and Edwin

Hamilton Davis in 1846. Squier and Davis were then conducting archaeolog-

ical explorations and surveys in the Scioto Valley, and wanted to compare

their findings to those of McBride. Typical of McBride's generosity, he gave

the investigators unrestricted access to his materials. He lent his bound vol-

umes of surveys and drawings to Squier in January of 1846, who presented

them before the American Ethnological Society along with the surveys and

drawings he had made with Davis. After receiving McBride's consent, Squier

incorporated several of his surveys and drawings into the manuscript that he

was preparing for publication. Davis later cautioned Squier to be sure that

McBride's name was placed on all his surveys being prepared for publication,

understanding that he had expressed concern over receiving due credit for his

contributions.³⁰

Davis's concern proved well-founded. The question of whether McBride

would receive sufficient recognition for his original contributions did, in fact,

become a matter of contention. The McBride controversy centered on the

publication of Squier's preliminary account of the Squier-Davis researches,

which appeared in a pamphlet published by the American Ethnological

Society in 1847.31 In a stinging letter to the editors of the Cincinnati

Gazette, John W. Erwin charged Squier with appropriating the credit due to

McBride for his years of original research. Erwin, who had assisted McBride

in making many of his contributed surveys, accused Squier of failing to prop-

erly credit McBride for his survey of an earthwork located on the Great Miami

28. McBride to Irwin and Whiteman, February 12, 1826, McBride Papers Vol. 5 and

McBride to William Thorton, Hamilton, December 28, 1825, October 2, 1826, and August 25,

1828, McBride Papers Vol. 9, Cincinnati Historical Society. McBride's efforts at collecting

"Indian curiosities" for his cabinet can be traced in McBride to M.P. White, Carthage, March

2, 1827; McBride to Col. Nicks, Cincinnati, March 5, 1827, Ibid., Vol. 5; A.P. Chouteau to

McBride, Arkansas, February 23, 1830; Creek Agency, April 11, 1830; and McBride to A.P.

Chouteau, Hamilton, January 8, 1832, Ibid., Vol. 6.

29. James McBride, "Drawings and Description of Antiquities in the Cabinet of James

McBride, Hamilton, Ohio," Archives-Library Division, MS 24, Ohio Historical Society.

30. Davis to Squier, Chillicothe, June 14, 1846; July 3, 1846; and June 27, 1847, Ephraim

George Squier Papers, Library of Congress; and Squier and Davis to McBride, Chillicothe,

September 10, 1846 and Davis to McBride (same date), McBride Papers, Cincinnati Historical

Society.

31. See E.G. Squier, Observations on the Aboriginal Monuments of the Mississippi Valley,

"Fortified Hill, Butler, County, Ohio, J MCBRIDE 1836," Plate 2, facing page 18, and

Transactions of the American Ethnological Society, 2(1848), Plate 2, facing page 146.

36                                                    OHIO HISTORY

River in Butler County. "Had I not been acquainted with this work, I should

have taken it for granted that it was among the number of one hundred or

more which Mr. Squier had surveyed at his expense." Although Squier had

dated the survey and placed McBride's name upon it, Erwin complained the

credit was so small and indistinct that it required the "aid of good glasses" to

find it.³²

According to Erwin, when McBride generously placed his bound volumes

of surveys and drawings in Squier's hands, it was with "an express understand-

ing" that he would receive full recognition for his original investigations.

"This would have been done by a noble minded man without such an under-

standing, but some men have no other way to bring themselves into notice

than upon the labor of others." As a long-time associate of McBride, he

knew how much time and money had been involved in collecting the materi-

als lent to Squier, and how anxious McBride was that they someday be pub-

lished. "Those who know Mr. M. are satisfied that he would scorn to appro-

priate to himself credit which justly belonged to another, and that he has no

desire to acquire fame at the expense of others, without giving due credit

therefor." Erwin hoped that the situation would be rectified in the larger work

forthcoming from the recently-founded Smithsonian Institution.

The charges made in Erwin's letter were understandably troubling to George

Perkins Marsh, a regent of the Smithsonian and a promoter of the Squier-

Davis researches. If McBride had made his surveys independent of Squier, said

Marsh, then he had every right to expect that his name should appear as delin-

eator as well as surveyor. McBride eased tensions by graciously assuring

Squier that he had full confidence in his integrity. He claimed not to have

read Erwin's letter and denied having ever doubted that he would receive any-

thing but his full due. Although McBride did later request that his son-in-law

call on Squier while he was in New York in order to inspect the engravings

made from his materials, it does not appear that McBride himself ever ex-

pressed concern in the matter until after it became an open issue. Indeed, one

must conclude that Erwin's animus was motivated more by his own

anonymity at Squier's hands-his name had not appeared anywhere within the

pamphlet-than by any alleged ill-use of his friend McBride. Squier had, in

fact, placed McBride's name on the survey in question, albeit in a manner un-

acceptable to Erwin.³³

The McBride controversy was finally put to rest with the publication of

Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley in the fall of 1848.³⁴

32. J.W.E. to the editor, Cincinnati Gazette (December 30, 1847), no pagination. This and

the following paragraph are based on Erwin's letter to the editor.

33. McBride to Squier, Hamilton, January 25 and 27, 1848 and Marsh to Squier, Washington,

January 7, 1848, Squier Papers, Library of Congress.

34. E.G. Squier, A.M., and E.H. Davis, M.D., "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley:

Comprising the Results of Extensive Original Surveys and Explorations," Smithsonian

James McBride                                                          37

Therein, Squier and Davis duly acknowledged their debt to McBride. The au-

thors called attention to the "minute fidelity" and primary importance of the

McBride-Erwin surveys, McBride's years of investigations in the Miami

Valley, and the "generous liberality" with which he gave them the unrestricted

use of his materials. His name distinctly appears on all maps based on his

surveys. Moreover, where McBride's notes were quoted verbatim they were

set off from the rest of the text and clearly identified as being taken "From the

Surveys and Notes of James McBride." Erwin's irate letter had served its pur-

pose. Yet despite such acknowledgment, many in the Miami Valley remained

unsatisfied. McBride's daughter, Laura McBride Stembell, still charged Squier

and Davis with having failed, "either through negligence or design," to give

him due credit for his contributions.³⁵ That opinion persists on the part of

many to this day.

Such were the fruits of a lifetime of research into local history and archae-

ology. At McBride's death in 1859, he left some 3,000 manuscript pages re-

lating to these subjects. Among them are several unfinished manuscript his-

tories that have been repeatedly drawn on in later works of local history. He

also collected a choice library of some 2,500 volumes of theological, legal,

scientific, literary, and historical works, including complete files of several

national and local newspapers compiled between 1814 and 1856.36 McBride's

private collection was later described as the largest and rarest of its kind then

in Ohio, "probably the richest in the incunabula of the West."³⁷ Regrettably,

this collection was broken-up after McBride's death. While some of his auto-

graphed books and pamphlets were sold to individual collectors, most of his

newspapers files and rare pamphlets were sold to a paper mill and converted to

pulp--a mindless act that Henry Howe decried as "an irreparable loss" to his-

tory. A few of McBride's newspapers were, fortunately, spared the paper mill

and sent to the Ohio State Library. These files were transferred to the

Archives-Library of the Ohio Historical Society in 1927.38

McBride's historical manuscript collections and bound volumes of corre-

spondence met a kinder fate. They appropriately went to the Ohio Historical

and Philosophical Society (the Cincinnati Historical Society since 1963), an

organization he helped charter in 1831 and whose objectives he so ably em-

Contributions to Knowlege, l(Washington, D.C., 1848). There are eight McBride and twenty

McBride-Erwin surveys present in this volume.

35. Laura McBride Stembel in James McBride, Pioneer Biography, ix.

36. McBride's library and cabinet were sold at Hamilton on April 1, 1860, by John P.P. Peck,

administrator. Catalogue of the M'Bride Library and Cabinet (Hamilton,1860). T.L. Cole,

"James McBride," Ex Libris, l(October, 1896), 67-68.

37. The Biographical Cyclopaedia and Portrait Gallery, 3(Cincinnati, 1884), 782.

38. Henry Howe, Historical Collections of Ohio , l(Columbus, 1889), 356. Inventory of

Newspapers Transferred to the Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society by the State

Library Board, December 6, 1927, Typescript, Office Files, Archives-Library Division, Ohio

Historical Society.

38                                                       OHIO HISTORY

bodied as an amateur historian and archaeologist. Happily, his archaeological

surveys, field notes, and artifacts also survive. They were sold at public auc-

tion to William S. Vaux of Philadelphia in 1859. McBride's will empowered

the executors of his estate to sell this collection, requiring only that it be sold

as a whole and not divided. It was his stated wish that the collection be

placed with a public institution in Ohio, but there was no stipulation that it

was to remain in the state as was later claimed by those who lamented its

sale.³⁹ Vaux respected McBride's wish that the collection not be dispersed.

He willed the bound-volumes of surveys, field notes, drawings, and artifacts

from McBride's cabinet to the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia.

These materials have been on indefinite loan to the Ohio Historical Society

since 1960.

In assessing McBride's contributions as an historian and archaeologist, it

must be noted that he was neither a great historian nor a great archaeologist.

His work possesses none of the analytical and synthesizing attributes that are

associated with greatness in historical and archaeological scholarship. But

judged by the intellectual and cultural context in which he worked, McBride is

no worse for the comparison. His mission was to gather the original materi-

als of the past, faithfully translate them into narratives and survey maps, and

ensure that both were passed on to posterity. He did so, moreover, in a pre-

professional era of history and archaeology, when the only incentives for such

research were intellectual curiosity and a personal sense and appreciation of

the past. These McBride possessed in ample measure. What has been referred

to as his only intellectual "aberration or eccentricity" was his belief in the

theory of concentric spheres developed by John Cleves Symmes.⁴⁰ This the-

ory held that the earth was hollow, inhabitable within, and open at the poles.

McBride promoted this theory in an anonymously published book.⁴¹

McBride's historical significance and personal qualities as a scholar, how-

ever, were best appraised by Ohio's roving historian, Henry Howe. Howe,

who first met McBride in May of 1846 during his first historical tour of the

state, made much use of McBride's manuscripts in the original edition of his

Historical Collections of Ohio.⁴² Of the many fine characters Howe had met

in his myriad travels, none made a deeper impression on him than James

McBride of Hamilton, Ohio. As Howe respectfully recalled of McBride,

39. Will of James McBride, May 27, 1859, "Will Record," Volume 1, 336-41, Office of the

Probate Court, Butler County Courthouse, Hamilton, Ohio.

40. T.L. Cole, Ex Libris, 1(October, 1896), 67.

41. [James McBride], Symmes' Theory of Concentric Spheres (Cincinnati, 1826). For an

account of the Symmes-McBride connection, see John Weld Peck, "Symmes' Theory," Ohio

Archaeological and Historical Publications, 18(Annual, 1909), 28-42.

42. Henry Howe, Historical Collections of Ohio (1847), 74, 141-42, 422-23. Henry Howe to

McBride, Springfield, November 26, 1846, and McBride to Howe, November 30, 1846,

McBride Papers Vol. 12, Cincinnati Historical Society.

James McBride                                                            39

I can never forget how in my personal interview I was impressed by the beautiful

modesty of the man, and the guileless, trustful expression of his face as he looked

up at me from his writing . . . and then unreservedly put in my possession the mass

of his materials, the gathered fruits of a lifetime of loving industry. The State, I

am sure, had not a single man who had done so much for its local history as he un-

less possibly it was Dr. S. P. Hildreth, of Marietta, whom I well knew, and who re-

sembled him in that quiet modesty and self-abnegation that is so winning to our

best instincts.⁴³

McBride and Hildreth were, indeed, similar in many ways. Both men were

archetypes of the antiquarian chronicler who made significant contributions to

the history and archaeology of Ohio.⁴⁴ Those who have succeeded them in

these fields remain conspicuously in their debt.

Something of the essence of McBride's main contribution to history was

once suggested by Jacob Burnet, author of Notes on the Early Settlement of

the North-Western Territory. As Burnet observed to McBride in 1843, the

historian's role was too serve as a counterfoil to those who received state-

ments about the past in an overly zealous and careless manner.

Those persons, then, who labor faithfully, and cautiously to preserve authentic

historical knowledge, entitle themselves to the gratitude of the world. It should,

however, be born in mind, that the office of the historian is one of immense re-

sponsibility, that it always tells for good or for evil, and that its compiler will be

held responsible for the consequences of a want of fidelity.⁴⁵

Such is a fitting epitaph for McBride's persevering efforts as a scribe. He

labored faithfully and cautiously to verify the authenticity and fidelity of the

many original materials he gathered and passed on to future generations. He

was known to contemporaries to be a man of precise and valuable information

as a consequence of those efforts. As fellow antiquary John Locke once ob-

served, "It is fortunate for the history and science of the west that a few ama-

teurs like Mr. McBride have preserved from oblivion many unique and valu-

able specimens."⁴⁶ The passage of time has not changed that verdict. This is

the legacy of James McBride, historian and archaeologist of the Miami

Valley. His localized activities were a significant part of a much larger

43. Henry Howe, Historical Collections of Ohio, 1(1889), 356.

44. Samuel Prescott Hildreth, Pioneer Biography: Being An Account of the First

Examinations of the Ohio Valley and the Early Settlement of the Northwest Territory (Cincinnati

and New York, 1848); Biographical and Historical Memoirs of the Early Pioneer Settlers of

Ohio (Cincinnati, 1852); and Contributions to the Early History of the North-west, Including the

Moravian Missions in Ohio (Cincinnati, 1864). Hildreth also wrote several historical and

archaeological pieces for the American Pioneer (1842-1843). See Original Contributions to

the American Pioneer by Dr. Samuel Prescott Hidlreth (Cincinnati, 1844).

45. Jacob Burnet to McBride, Cincinnati, June 1, 1843, Appendix A of McBride's Pioneer

Biography, 1:82.

46. John Locke, "Dr. Locke's Report" in W.W. Mather, Second Annual Report on the

Geological Survey of the State of Ohio (Columbus, 1838), 274.

40                                                               OHIO HISTORY

movement,⁴⁷ what David Russo has called the great "antiquarian

enterprise."⁴⁸ It was that grassroots movement of gifted amateurs that

produced the first historical writing in the United States, and established a yet

flourishing network of state and local historical societies, research collections,

and journals that have made original contributions to knowledge.⁴⁹ Those

amateurs wrote histories that reflected what ordinary people thought was

important about their past and present, "namely the personal and close-to-

home."⁵⁰ The historiographical distance that separates us from those

historically-minded researchers should not lessen our appreciation of their

truly remarkable accomplishments.

47. The origins of this national movement have been traced in David D. Van Tassel's

Recording America's Past: An Interpretation of the Development of Historical Studies in

America, 1607-1884 (Chicago, 1960), Chap. 10, "Historical Societies: Bastions of Localism,

1815-60," 95-102, and Chapter 10, "Documania: A National Obsession, Locally Inspired,

1815-50," 103-10.

48. David J. Russo, Keepers of Our Past: Local Historical Writing in the United States, 1820s-

1930s (New York, 1988), xii.

49. Kathleen Neils Conzen, "Community Studies, Urban History, and American Local

History" in Michael Kammen, ed., The Past Before Us: Contemporary Historical Writing in the

United States (Ithaca and London, 1980), 270.

50. Russo, Keepers of Our Past, xii.