Ohio History Journal

BUILDING A COMMERCIAL SYSTEM.

FRANK P. GOODWIN.

It is the purpose of this paper to trace the commercial devel-

opment of the Miami Country1, from the date of settlement to

the beginning of the steamboat era in 1817. It is presented as

a representative study of commercial growth under economic

conditions that were colonial in character. The history of the

locality has been used to illustrate principles of early com-

mercial development common to the Ohio Valley.       Within

that region were five leading communities each of which was

economically a colonial unit during the early stages of its devel-

opment.   They were the Pittsburg District, the Blue Grass

Region, the Marietta District, the Scioto Valley, and the Miami

Country. Of the five, the Miami Country most nearly presented

all phases of the subject in its development. With the possible

exception of the Pittsburg District, each had its economic basis

in agriculture, each developed as a separate colonial unit, and in

each a chief town grew up that was the commercial center of the

region. In addition to these characteristics, the chief town of

the Miami Country, because of its more favorable location and

natural advantages, became later the metropolis of the entire

valley.  It would seem, therefore, that the Miami Country

would furnish the best view-point for the study of commer-

cial development in the Ohio Valley.

When the period of retarded development in the Miami

Country had come to an end in 1795 and settlers commenced to

occupy the land, there soon began the production of a surplus of

agricultural products for which they were anxious to find a

market. This surplus was the basis of the early commerce of the

The Miami Country includes the valleys of the Great Miami and

Little Miami Rivers. It has an area of about 5000 square miles, and em-

braces a large portion of southwestern Ohio and a small bit of Indiana.

(316)

Building a Commercial System.            317

Miami Country; and the improvement in means of transporta-

tion and the building of a commercial system to meet the situa-

tion were two most important questions that the pioneer farmers

and merchants had to meet.

Before taking up the commercial development that followed

as a result of the rapid settlement after 1795, some notice of the

beginnings of commerce during the Indian Wars should claim

our attention. In the extension of the frontier there have always

been a number of the well-to-do among the settlers who were

prepared to buy some of the conveniences of life even at frontier

prices. To accommodate such as these, traders followed closely

the advance line of settlement as the frontier was pushed

westward; therefore soon after the founding of Columbia and

Losantiville, there were merchants in the Miami Country who

were prepared to furnish to the army and to the settlers whiskey

and tobacco and some of the more necessary articles of eastern

and foreign production.

Although such commercial operations must have been limited

because of the small number of immigrants who were prepared

to indulge in the luxury of store goods, there were several

merchants advertising groceries and dry goods for sale in Cin-

cinnati before the time of Wayne's victory. One enterprising

tradesman even considered that this frontier community had so

far advanced in the scale of civilization as to be a market for

imported wines.² Another advertised that he would receive corn,

beef, pork, butter, cheese, potatoes, furs and skins at his store

in Columbia in exchange for merchandise, groceries, etc.3

Beyond the sale of a few commodities to the settlers under

the protection of the guns at Fort Washington, there was no

opportunity for an extension of commercial operations in the

Miami Country before the treaty of Greenville. The interior was

still a wilderness without inhabitants, either to furnish products

for exports or to demand imports. This initial trade was prob-

ably much stimulated by the rush of population to the Miami

Country following the treaty of Greenville, as most of the immi-

2Centinel of Northwest Territory, Nov. 29, 1793, Jan. 4, Feb. 22,

1794.

3Centinel of Northwest Territory, Nov. 30, 1793.

318       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

grants to that region landed at Cincinnati, and perhaps not a few

of them bought some necessaries before breaking into the wilder-

ness. It was also increased by the fact that Cincinnati became

the grand depot for stores that came down the Ohio bound for

the forts that were located near the Indian treaty line.⁴

These pioneer merchants were usually young men with

abundant energy and small capital. Such a one would purchase a

stock of goods in Philadelphia or Baltimore and transport it in

wagons over rough roads to Pittsburg at a cost of from $6.00

to $10.00 per hundredweight.  There he would buy a flat-boat

or a keel-boat, load his goods in it, and float them down the river.

He was usually unacquainted with the stream and if the water

was low he would be frequently in danger from sand bars, snags

and other obstructions. If fortunate he would reach Cincinnati

within fifteen or twenty days. Perhaps he would stop there, or

maybe hire a team and haul his goods to one of the inland

settlements then building.⁵

Having established himself, he would advertise that he had

just arrived (usually from Philadelphia) with a large assort-

ment of dry goods and groceries which he would sell on very

low terms for cash only.⁶ He usually found, however, that fron-

tier conditions were unfavorable to the maintenance of cash

sales; yet the general impression prevailed that these early

merchants made enormous profits and generally were able to in-

crease their stock as rapidly as the expanding business of the

country demanded. But this early trade of supplying eastern

goods to settlers admitted of little expansion, for any consider-

able commercial development must depend upon the production

of a surplus of agricultural products. As the Miami Country

was rich in agricultural possibilities, the energetic pioneer farm-

ers did not keep trade waiting long for those products that were

to furnish the basis of the early commerce of the upper Missis-

sippi Valley.

After the demands of the home were met, those farmers

who were near Cincinnati or some other center into which the

4 Baily; Journal of a Tour, p. 228.

5 McBride; Pioneer Biography of Butler County, I, p. 314.

6Centinel Northwest Territory, May 23, 1795.

Building a Commercial System..         319

settlers were moving, found a limited market among the new-

comers. A little later the surplus corn, wheat, pork, whiskey,

etc., began to demand a larger market, and no place in the Mis-

sissippi Valley could furnish such a market as the entire region

was agricultural in character. The long and expensive haul

prevented sending this surplus over the mountains to the East,

and so the only outlet was by flat-boat down the Ohio and Mis-

sissippi rivers to New Orleans, there to be reshipped to the

Eastern seaboard or to a foreign market.

Kentucky had already developed a trade of this character,

and by the close of the Revolution her traders and farmers were

loading flat-boats with produce and shiping it to New Orleans.

The attitude of Spanish officials toward this trade was un-

settled and wavering. Special privileges were granted to those

who knew how to get them, while others found themselves at

a disadvantage. High tariff rates for the privilege of deposit

and reshipment were the rule, and it was not uncommon for

whole cargoes to be confiscated.

Of all the Kentucky traders James Wilkinson was probably

the most unscrupulous and the most successful. His successes

in 1787 and 1788 gave the Kentucky trade a decided impetus, and

thereafter the westerners were ready for almost any political al-

liance that would insure them the free navigation of the Missis-

sippi. So strong had this feeling become when Genet came to

America as French minister in 1793 that George Rogers Clark

offered his services to lead an army under the banner of France

down the Mississippi to help drive out the Spanish. Clark's ac-

tion may have been prompted by personal and even disloyal

motives because the Federal government had not properly re-

warded him for past services, but the movement hardly could

have gained the headway that it did had not the free navigation

of the Mississippi been the paramount question to the Western-

ers. Clark's plan came to naught, but it probably influenced

our government to take more vigorous action and thus hastened

the Spanish treaty of October 27, 1795, which gave Americans

the free navigation of the Mississippi and allowed them to use

New Orleans as a place of deposit and reshipment.

The adjustment of this difficulty with Spain was of much

320       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

importance to the older settlements south of the Ohio, and it

came at an opportune moment for the Miami Country. Two

months before that event, the Treaty of Greenville had closed

the period of retarded development for that region, and settlers

rushed in who were soon producing a surplus that swelled the

volume of trade which drifted toward New Orleans.

The Miami Country, however, had problems for her own

people to solve concerning the marketing of her produce, that

were geographically nearer, though not more important than

the interference of Spanish officials. In the first place, there

were no roads over which produce might be transported; and in

the second, there was no commercial system for the handling of

exports. The influence of these two difficulties was to reduce

the price of the products of the Miami Country, in common with

the rest of the Ohio Valley, to so low a figure as in many in-

stances to prohibit their being sent to market.

Lack of good roads was no doubt the most serious difficulty

for those regions more remote from navigable streams. As

centers of population grew, trails were made which later were

developed into wagon routes, but it was many years before

any of these were passable for loaded wagons except in the most

favorable seasons. The forest must be cleared, improvements

on the farms must be made, and population must be increased

before highway construction could proceed on any considerable

scale. Before 1809 roads had been located connecting the prin-

cipal towns of this region, and four principal routes extended

from Cincinnati out through southwestern Ohio and one through

Kentucky to Lexington. One of these roads led up the Ohio

to Columbia and front there through Williamsburg, Newmarket

and Bainbridge to Chillicothe; another led clown the river to

Cleves. Two roads led to the north; one to Lebanon and the

other through Hamilton and Franklin to Dayton. Dayton was

also connected with Springfield, Urbana and Piqua. The road

to Hamilton followed the old military trail used by St. Clair

and Wayne. From Hamilton a road led northwest to Eaton

and another led eastward through Lebanon to Chillicothe. Those

highways connecting points in the Miami Country with Chilli-

cothe were of particular importance, as they connected some

Building a Commercial System.          321

miles east of that point with the main road to the East. This

was originally the trace located by Ebenezer Zane in 1795,

extending from Wheeling to Maysville via Zanesville, Lancaster

and Chillicothe.⁷

Mr. Archer B. Hulbert in speaking of Zane's Trace, has

pointed out that early in the history of western settlements there

was felt the need of a homeward track. The old Wilderness Road

by which the early Kentuckians came in answered that purpose

for the settlers from Virginia and the Carolinas. When the men

from Pennsylvania and New Jersey moved into Kentucky and

the Miami Country, they found easy access into the country down

the Ohio, but navigation up stream did not offer an expeditious

means of transportation back to the seaboard. During the In-

dian wars it was far safer, however, and land travel north of

the Ohio was not resorted to, although at that time travel was

sufficient between Cincinnati and Pittsburg to induce Jacob

Myers to put on a line of packet boats that made the trip every

two weeks between those points. He assured prospective pas-

sengers that no danger need be apprehended from the Indians,

as every person on board would be well under cover and made

proof against rifle or musket balls. Each boat was armed with

six pieces each carrying a pound ball, also a number of good

muskets and an ample supply of ammunition.⁸

No sooner were the Indian wars over than persons who went

East on business or pleasure began to resort to land travel, and

on September 26, 1795, about a month after the Treaty of Green-

ville was concluded, Israel Ludlow advertised that a party would

set out about the middle of the next month for Pittsburg.

They were to travel by way of Chillicothe on the Little Miami

and Darby's Town on the Scioto and would cross the Muskingum

at the mouth of White Woman's Creek or Fort Lawrence. The

public was assured that from the best information a road level

and pleasant could be had, which would greatly facilitate inter-

course by land with the Atlantic States.⁹

As immigrants came in, it is altogether probable that there

7Melish; Travels in the United States, II., p. 209.

8Centinel of the Northwest Territory, Nov. 23, 1793.

9Centinel of the Northwest Territory, Nov. 23, 1793.

Vol. XVI.-21.

322       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

was a rapid increase in the number of such parties traveling to

the East; and to facilitate travel between the western settlements

and the East, Congress, May 17, 1797, authorized Ebenezer Zane

to lay out a road between Wheeling and Maysville. Hulbert re-

marks that this little road was unique among American high-

ways in that it was demanded not by wars but by civilization,

not for exploration and settlement but by settlements that were

already made and in need of communion and commerce. That

it was of considerable importance in the early development of

the Miami Country can hardly be questioned.10

Although numerous roads had been laid out in southwestern

Ohio before the War of 1812, no effort had been made to im-

prove them, and they were impassable for a loaded wagon the

greater part of the year. This condition must have retarded the

agricultural development of the country, and during the war it so

seriously interfered with the movements of the northwestern

army as to bring about a proposal for a series of military roads.

When the rage for turnpikes spread over the East during the

latter part of the first decade of the nineteenth century, the West

was too new and too sparsely settled to be interested in it; but

when the great rush of population into Ohio began after the

war and an increasing agricultural product had to be marketed,

there had been an agitation for better roads, and several turnpike

companies were chartered to build roads connecting Cincinnati

with towns in the interior of the State.11. In the advertisements

of new town sites, it was not uncommon to see presented as one

of the advantages of the location that the new town was on a

proposed turnpike road. Dr. Drake remarked that the policy of

constructing from Cincinnati toward the sources of the Miamis

a great road which should at all times be equally passable, had

been for some time in agitation. He further said, "The benefits

which an execution of this plan would confer, cannot be fully

estimated, except by those who have traveled through the Miami

Country in the winter season and have studied the connections

in business between that district and Cincinnati. The salt, the

iron, the castings, the glass, the cotton and foreign merchandise

10 Hulbert; Historic Highways, II., p. 165.

11Cincinnati Directory for 1819, p. 76. Liberty Hall, Feb. 5, 1816.

Building a Commercial System.                                       323

of eight countries would be transported on this road."                                   But

those who hoped for immediate improvement in road construc-

tion in the West were doomed to disappointment as it was not

until early in the thirties that turnpike construction was seriously

undertaken in Ohio.

Although the enabling act permitting the formation of the

State of Ohio made a partial provision for the building of a road

between Ohio and the Atlantic headwaters, there seems to be no

evidence that the Miami Country took any particular interest in

such a highway until after the War of 1812. During the earlier

period the West was too much interested in battling with the wil-

derness, in clearing and planting and building cabins, and had

too little with which to buy imports, to be deeply interested in

transmontane road improvement.   The same conditions that

prevented the building of local roads prevented an interest

in road building of a more national character; but with

the rapid filling up of the Miami Country after the War of

1812, that section was impressed with the need of high-

way improvement both local and national; and although looking

forward to an immediate establishment of steamboat navigation

to New Orleans, the interest of that section in an improved road

to the East grew rapidly.12. Said a contributor to Liberty Hall:

"We     .  . . want no national or state aid in respect to

canals; but we do want good roads to connect us more closely

and bring us nearer to our Atlantic brethren, so they shall have

a more direct intercourse with us and learn to estimate correctly

the fertility, the wealth, and rapidly growing power of the West-

ern country. .  . .Give us good roads over the mountains

and we shall grow up to what is wanted of us.

We shall then settle our country faster, and convert the Eastern

federalists into democrats even faster than we do now, for the

bad roads prevent many from coming to us. . .  " 13

This lack of good roads combined with the long journey

to New Orleans made the cost of transporting goods to market

so high as practically to prevent shipment from a large part of

12Drake; National and Statistical View of Cincinnati in 1815, p.

148, 149.

13Liberty Hall. July 24, 1815.

324        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

the interior, thus precluding the development of a surplus that

would otherwise have swelled the volume of trade. It has been

estimated that in the early part of the century the average cost

of transportation by land was ten dollars per ton per hundred

miles, and that grain and flour could not stand the cost of trans-

portation more than 150 miles at such a rate.14   Taking into

consideration the cost of river transportation and the cost of

marketing, it is doubtful if such articles in the Miami Country

could have been hauled profitably more than fifty miles to the

place of export.

Fortunately, we have preserved for us in a few instances, a

record of what was actually charged for transportation. It ap-

pears that in 1795 goods for the army were being shipped from

Fort Washington to Fort Hamilton by water in private boats

and that the rate was $1.10 per barrel for flour, $1.30 per barrel

for whiskey, and 50 cents per hundredweight for corn.l⁵ In 1799

the cost of transportation from Cincinnati to Dayton was $2.50 per

hundredweight.16 In 1805 a four-horse stage coach furnished

weekly service between Cincinnati and Yellow Springs, in which

passengers were charged $5.00 per single trip. Way passengers

paid at the rate of six cents per mile. The line passed through

Hamilton, Franklin and Dayton, and two days were required to

make the trip.17

In consideration of the great difficulty of transportation, it

was not uncommon for corn and oats to sell as low as

10 and 12 cents per bushel, beef at $1.50 per hundredweight, and

pork at $1.00 to $2.00 per hundredweight.18 In 1806 one farmer,

Mr. Digby, well situated with an improved farm about forty

miles northeast of Cincinnati, stated that the price of produce

was so low and the price of labor so high that very little profit

attended the most laborious exercise of industry. Indian corn

carried so mean a value that he never offered to sell it, and

14 McMaster; History of the People of the U. S., III., p. 464.

15Centinel Northwest of the Territory, April 4, 1795.

16 Curwen; History of Dayton, p. 17.

17Western Spy, Aug. 21, 1805.

18 Burnet's Notes, pp. 396-400.

Building a Commercial System.               325

wheat made into flour sold for $3.00 per barrel. Our farmer

could not wait for roads to be built, and in consequence he was

about to abandon a system so little advantageous and take to

grazing cattle, breeding hogs, and rearing horses for distant

markets where money was to be obtained. In fact, he had al-

ready attempted one such venture, having sent his son with a

cargo of 200 live hogs to New Orleans. In the spring he pro-

posed taking a drove of cattle and horses over the mountains to

Philadelphia and Baltimore.¹⁹

What Mr. Digby did or proposed to do, other farmers were

doing. The prairies of the upper Miami Country and the Scioto

Valley furnished pasture for droves of cattle that were driven

over the mountains to Philadelphia or Baltimore, and the mast of

the woods furnished free food for hogs that were in some in-

stances driven northward to Detroit. It was not uncommon

for cattle to be driven from the west side of the mountains,

down into the Potomac Valley, there to be fattened for eastern

markets, just as the cattle from the Rocky Mountain region in

more recent years have been shipped to the plains of Kansas

and Nebraska to be prepared for the packing houses of Kansas

City and Chicago. In 1815 it was estimated that the prairies

of Champaign and Greene Counties furnished $100,000 worth of

cattle annually.²⁰  Other sections of the West were marketing

their live stock in the same way. In 1808 a traveler passed a

drove of 130 cows and oxen which were being driven from the

neighborhood of Lexington, Kentucky, to Baltimore.²¹. In 1817

Morris Birkbeck met a drove of very fat oxen on their way from

the banks of the Miami to Philadelphia;22 and as late as 1819

19 Ash; Travels in the United States, II., pp. 226, 226.

Ash's contemporaries speak most disparingly of his veracity, and

Thompson's Bibliography of Ohio calls him a literary imposter who was

the first to discover that a book abusing the people of the United States

would be profitable. Many of his statements in regard to economic con-

ditions are so in accord with those of more authoritative writers, how-

ever, that we feel safe in accepting them.

20 Drake; Natural and Statistical View of Cincinnati in 1815, p. 55.

21 Cuming's Tour, in Thwaite's Early Western Travels, IV., p. 228.

22 Birkbeck; Notes on a Journel, p. 63.

326       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

Jeremiah Butterfield of Butler County drove a large number of

hogs through the woods to Detroit to market.23

It was impracticable to feed all the surplus product of the

farm to live stock and send it to market on its own legs, and so

our farmers, in common with other frontier communities of the

time, solved the problem of reducing bulk and weight for pur-

poses of shipment by turning their grain into whiskey and their

fruit into brandy. During this early period a large number of

the well-to-do farmers each had his own small still and thus

turned his surplus fruit and sometimes grain into a marketable

product.²⁴  Larger distilleries began to be erected about the

time that water-power grist mills came into use and whiskey be-

came an important article of export.

The region bordering immediately on the Ohio and on the

Great Miami Rivers fared better. We shall reserve the story of

Ohio River transportation for another part of this paper but the

navigation of the Great Miami deserves mention in this connec-

tion. The first flat boat that navigated the Great Miami was built

by David Loury at Dayton in 1800 and sent to New Orleans

loaded with grain, pelts and 500 venison hams.²⁵ From that time

till the completion of the canal between Cincinnati and Dayton in

1829, flat boats continued to navigate the Great Miami River.

That stream was navigable during the greater part of the year,

but boats were usually built and launched with the spring floods

and loaded with flour, bacon, whiskey and other staple products,

bound for New Orleans. It was not uncommon for one of

the more prosperous farmers on the Ohio or Great Miami

to load a flat-boat with his own produce.²⁶ These boats fre-

quently carried as much as 300 or 400 barrels and were five to

six days in passing from Dayton to the Ohio River. In April,

1818, 1700 barrels of flour were shipped from Dayton to New

Orleans.²⁷

23 McBride; Pioneer Biography, II., p. 169.

24Beers; History of Montgomery County, p. 310.

25 Beers; History of Montgomery County, p. 555.

26 McBride; Pioneer Biography, II., p. 169.

27 Dana; Geographical Sketches of the Western Country, p. 21.

Cutler; Description of Ohio, p. 47. Curwen; History of Dayton, p. 19.

Building a Commercial System.           327

That the navigation of the Great Miami was not all that

could be desired appears from the narrative of Thomas Morrison.

He left Dayton with a boat load of produce, November 17,

1822, and on the evening of the second day his boat struck a

rock and upset near Franklin, but he was fortunate in saving the

cargo. The boat was repaired, but he did not feel safe in con-

tinuing down the river with the full cargo. Two wagon loads

were hauled to Cincinnati at a cost of $1.00 per hundredweight,

put on another flat-boat and floated to the mouth of the

Great Miami, while the balance was floated to the Ohio. The

boat from Cincinnati was then lashed to the one from Dayton

and they proceeded down the Ohio. In 1825 Mr. Morrison made

another trip to the South with a cargo of flour; but this time

he hauled his flour from Dayton to Cincinnati, floated his boat

empty down the Great Miami to its mouth, ran her up to Cincin-

nati, and loaded there. 28

It has been shown that during the earlier period of develop-

ment in the Miami Country disintegrating trade conditions existed

to a considerable extent. The movement of live stock over the

mountains or to Detroit and the transportation of produce down

the Great Miami cannot be regarded otherwise. But Cincinnati

was from the beginning the entrepot and natural metropolis of

the entire Miami Country. As the city grew and roads were im-

proved these disintegrating tendencies were gradually over-

come, and by 1829 the completion of the Miami Canal definitely

gave Cincinnati control of the entire trade of the Miami Country.

Of little less importance than the lack of roads was the

want of an organized commercial system. It has already been

noted that a few well-to-do farmers met this difficulty occasion-

ally by taking their own cargoes to New Orleans, but the greater

number did not produce in sufficient quantity to dispense with

the services of the middle man in finding a market. Probably

the earliest exporters of the products of the Miami Country were

the pioneer merchants before mentioned who followed in the

wake of the settlers. It would appear that Cincinnati did very

little exporting before 1800, when her merchants seemed to have

28 Unpublished MSS. of Thos. Morrison.

328       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

become active in the purchase of the products of the Miami Coun-

try. From that time advertisements similar to the following

appeared in increasing number: "Wanted: A quantity of good

merchantable pork." "Wanted: A quantity of corn-fed pork."²⁹

"Good flour will be taken by the barrel, whiskey and corn at

market prices." "The subscriber will pay cash for 100,000 weight

of good corn-fed pork." "Wanted: 5,000 bushels of wheat, at

50 cents per bushel."³⁰ Advertisements for contracts for future

delivery of wheat and pork were frequent. Trade was prin-

cipally by barter.  Store goods were exchanged for country

produce.³¹ This growing commercial spirit was also evidenced

by frequent quotations of Cincinnati and New Orleans prices in

the local papers.

The whole thing was new, the uncertainty and dangers of

the Mississippi trade were many and merchants and farmers were

looking for a more satisfactory way of handling the increasing

surplus of agricultural products. There was a want of compe-

tent information concerning the extent and demand of the New

Orleans market, of means of exportation by sea, and the best

destination of produce to be exported. Sometimes there were

unusual profits, but frequently there were heavy losses. It was

estimated that the Pittsburg district alone lost $60,000 in the

Mississippi trade in 1801. Many embarked in the trade who

were unacquainted with the navigation of the river. They were

strangers to the climate and the inhabitants, and were at a disad-

vantage because they were unfamiliar with the language, customs

and government. The changing attitude of Spanish officials was

another uncertain factor. When such adventurers arrived at

New Orleans they were obliged to sell for what was offered

them. On account of expense and risk of probable sickness,

they could not remain long to hold their produce for an advance

in prices, nor could they export on their own account.³²

Under such conditions the feeling grew that a union of in-

terests was important for the promotion of the Mississippi trade.

29 Liberty Hall, Nov. 10, 1807.

30 Liberty Hall, Aug. 6, 1808.

31 Ash; Travels in the United States, II., p. 176.

32 The Western Spy and Hamilton Gazette, Oct. 20, 1802.

Building a Commercial System.            329

The Kentuckians, with Wilkinson as their leader, had found

co-operation profitable as early as 1788. That was due, how-

ever, largely to the initiative of one man who had secured a dis-

honest advantage by bribing Spanish officials. Other places in

the Ohio Valley were now determined to try to protect and fos-

ter the Mississippi trade by means of co-operative exporting com-

panies, composed of merchants and farmers who were interested.

The idea seems to have originated in Pittsburg.

On August 31, 1802, John Wilkins, Jr., through the Pitts-

burg Gazette, issued an address to the farmers, millers, traders

and manufacturers of the western country, setting forth the dif-

ficulties of the Mississippi trade and proposing the organization

of an exporting company in order to more effectually meet

them.³³ The Pittsburg district soon acted upon the suggestion,

and in October a meeting of delegates from the various sections

of the upper Ohio country met at Pittsburg and organized such

an association known as the Ohio Company. Ebenezer Zane,

who laid out the first road through Ohio, was chairman of the

meeting.³⁴

Near the close of the winter the idea was taken up in Cin-

cinati, and Jesse Hunt, an experienced merchant and pioneer,

suggested the formation of an exporting company to handle the

entire exports of the Miami Country. The organization was to

be known as the Miami Exporting Company and was to be com-

posed of merchants and farmers of the territory contiguous to

Cincinnati. The new company was chartered to do an export-

ing and an importing business, and it also was privileged to

engage in business as a banking institution. The capital stock

was not to exceed 1,000 shares of $100 each. Members were to

pay $5.00 cash on each share, and the balance might be paid

in produce at prices agreed upon. A board of eleven directors

was elected by the members, and the directors elected a president

whose term of office was for one year. The president and direc-

tors received no pay for their services. The business of the

company was entirely under their control and it was their busi-

ness to build or purchase boats, employ superintendents and

33 Western Spy and Hamilton Gazette, Oct. 20, 1802.

34 Western Spy and Hamilton Gazette, Nov. 10, 1802.

330       Ohio Arch. and. Hist. Society Publications.

boatmen, transport to New Orleans, produce entrusted to them,

sell it and make returns to the owners. It was supposed that the

company would also attend to the importing business of its mem-

bers. That there was an effort to interest the entire Miami

Country in the enterprise, is shown by the fact that every im-

portant center of population in that region was represented on

the committee appointed to receive subscriptions. In 1807 it

ceased to engage in the exporting business but continued to do

business as a banking institution until 1822, when it was carried

down by the financial crisis that began in 1835. It is needless

to say that the exporting business continued to grow without the

assistance of a co-operative company and that commercial firms

continued to rise that met the demands of the rapidly increasing

trade of the Miami Country.

While the formation of the Miami Export Company was

doubtless suggested by the organization of the Pittsburg com-

pany, its organization may have been hastened by the closure of

the Mississippi by the Spanish intendant at New Orleans early in

November, 1802. At any rate, the Miami Country in common

with the rest of the eastern portion of the Mississippi valley was

angry and alarmed about it. On January 19, 1803, the West-

ern Spy published an extract from a New Orleans' letter dated

November 12, saying that the orders of the intendant were

rigidly enforced and that Americans had nothing to hope from

his clemency. That the Miamese were deeply interested in the

situation is shown by the fact that from that time until the

following July, when the Western Spy published in large type

the news of the purchase of Louisiana, nearly every edition of a

Cincinnati newspaper contained some communication on the

subject. An editorial spoke of the furious injury which those

states bordering on the Ohio and Mississippi must sustain by

such unwarrantable conduct.36    A  gentleman writing from

Natchez said, "The reptile Spaniards act in a most hostile man-

ner towards our citizens and commerce. .. . I trust 700,-

35 Burnet's Notes on the Northwest Territory, p. 397.

Western Spy, Feb. 23, 1903.

Ford; Cincinnati, p. 356.

36 Western Spy, Jan, 26, 1803.

Building a Commercial System.            331

ooo persons will not wait for Mr. Jefferson to go through all

the forms, ceremonies and etiquette of the courts of Spain and

Bonaparte, before they determine whether it will be best to drive

the miscreants from these waters or not."³⁷

Along with these impassioned appeals to violence were pub-

lished the more pacific communications of Jefferson and others to

the Westerners advising them to remain quiet and await the result

of negotiations then pending. They were probably more willing

to do so when it was learned that the right of deposit and re-

shipment was still open to those who would pay six per cent.

of the value of the goods for the right of deposit and an addi-

tional nine and a half per cent. for the right of re-shipment.³⁸

The whole thing was irritating, but trade was not entirely

stopped; as exporters continued to advertise for "corn-fed pork,"

"good flour," "good whiskey," "country linen," "sugar," and

"good merchantable wheat."³⁹

The opening of the Mississippi by the purchase of Louisi-

ana and the admission of Ohio to the Union doubtless greatly

accelerated immigration to the West and did much to increase

the volume of exports; and by 1805 it was estimated that 30,000

people a year were settling in Ohio.⁴⁰  We have no statistics

of exports from Cincinnati before 1815, but the following fig-

ures concerning the traffic on the Ohio River may give some

idea of the New Orleans trade from above the falls. From

November 24, 1810, to January 24, 1811, 197 flat boats and 14

keel boats descended the falls of the Ohio, carrying 18,611 bar-

rels flour, 520 barrels pork, 2,373 barrels whiskey, 3,759 barrels

applies, 1,085 barrels cider, 721 barrels royal cider, 43 barrels

wine, 323 barrels peach brandy, 46 barrels cherry bounce, 17

barrels vinegar, 143 barrels porter, 62 barrels beans, 67 barrels

onions, 200 pounds ginseng, 200 gross bottled porter, 260 gallons

Seneca oil, 7,526 pounds butter, 180 pounds tallow, 6,475 pounds

lard, 6,300 pounds beef, 4,435 pounds cheese 681,000 pounds

pork, 4,609 pounds bacon, 59 pounds soap, 300 pounds feathers,

37 Western Spy, March 2, 1803.

38 Western Spy, Jan. 26, 1803.

39 Western Spy, Jan. 12, 19; Feb. 23; March 9; July 6, 1803.

40 Espy; Memorandum of a Tour, p. 22.

332        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

400 pounds hemp, 1,484 pounds thread, 154,000 pounds rope

yarn, 20,784 pounds bale rope, 27,700 yards bagging, 4,619

yards tow cloth, 479 coils tarred rope, 500 bushels oats, 1,700

bushels corn, 216 bushels potatoes, 817 venison ham, 14,390 tame

fowls, 155 horses, 286 slaves 18,000 feet cherry plank, 279,309

feet pine plank.⁴¹ It is probable that almost the entire manu-

factured product as herein enumerated came from the Lexington

District. That region may have furnished the greater part

of the agricultural product, but the rapidly growing Miami

Country doubtless furnished a large proportion of the balance.

The development of the Miami Country and this growing

export business soon brought about a corresponding import busi-

ness, and very frequently both branches of commerce were car-

ried on by the same firm. By 1805 there were twenty-four

merchants and grocers doing business in Cincinnati, and in

1809 upwards of thirty merchants were selling from $200,000 to

$250,000 worth of imported goods.⁴² The prosperity of the region

and its advance in civilization is evidenced by the fact that its

citizens were demanding some of the luxuries of life. As early

as 1805, the merchants of this frontier metropolis were selling

fine coatings and cassimeres, white and colored satins, silk stock-

ings, silk and leather gloves, Irish linens, Morocco and kid

shoes, umbrellas and parasols, and fine wines.⁴³

The wholesale business of Cincinnati began not later than

1806. Dealers were then offering special inducements to coun-

try merchants, in order to divert their trade from Eastern markets

to Cincinnati.  A  credit of three and six months was of-

fered, at an advance of 12/2 per cent. on the Philadelphia price,

plus six cents per pound for carriage, by the dozen or package.44

Others were offering to take at New Orleans' market prices

three-fourths of the amount of the purchase price in produce de-

livered at that point, and the balance cash.⁴⁵

41 Melish; Travels in the U. S., II., p. 153.

42 Cincinnati Directory, 1819, p. 29. Melish. Travels in the U. S., II.,

p. 124.

43Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Mercury, Nov. 5, 1805.

44 Liberty Hall, Aug. 4, 1806.

45 Liberty Hall, Aug. 11, 1806.

Building a Commercial System.            333

The difficulties encountered by these early merchants can

little be appreciated by the merchants of to-day. In order to

sell their goods they were compelled to attend not only to the

ordinary duties of a merchant and to incur ordinary responsi-

bilities and risks, but also they were compelled to be the produce

merchants of the country as well. They must take the farmers'

produce and send or convey it to New Orleans, the only market

for the West. It was necessary for the Western merchant to

buy pork and pack it, to buy wheat and have it ground into flour,

to have barrels made to hold the flour, and then to build flat-

bottomed boats and with considerable expense and great risk,

float it down the Ohio and the Mississippi to New Orleans.

Having arrived at New Orleans and disposed of the cargo, the

dangers were not over, as there was the long journey home. In

returning there was a choice of routes. The merchant could

either return home by land, a distance of 1,1OO miles over the

Natchez trace, 500 miles of which were through the Indian

country, or go by sea to Philadelphia or Baltimore and thence

home by land. The latter route was frequently chosen when

the merchant wished to lay in a new stock of goods.

One merchant of the Miami Country made fourteen such

trips. On the first trip he had charge of five flat-boats loaded

with produce. Thirteen trips were made on flat-boats and one

on a barge. Eight times he traveled home by land and was

usually about thirty days in making the journey from New Or-

leans to Cincinnati. In the earlier period there were neither

ferries nor bridges over any water course from near Port Gib-

son in the present state of Mississippi to Colbert's Ferry on the

Tennessee.

A large part of the imports continued to come from Phila-

delphia or Baltimore until, and even after, the introduction of the

steamboat. Once or twice in the year the merchant would go

to Philadelphia or Baltimore to buy goods. If, after selling his

produce at New Orleans, he did not go by sea from that place,

he would start from his home and travel on horseback, a distance

of 600 miles, or go by keel-boat to Pittsburg and thence over

land to one of the coast cities. When the goods were purchased

he must engage wagons to haul them over a bad road to Pitts-

334        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

burg at a cost of from $6.00 to $10.00 per hundredweight; and

after a journey of from twenty to twenty-five days over the

mountains, he must buy flat-boats or keel-boats and employ

hands to take his goods to Cincinnati. The round trip from

Cincinnati to Pittsburg usually consumed about three months.⁴⁰

This growing business soon brought about the construction of

large warehouses near the river and storage and commission

firms began to appear.⁴⁷

This increasing demand for imported goods first led to at-

tempts to avoid the high freight rates across the mount-

ains by an improvement in the transportation of goods from

New Orleans, and later it led to an improved highway to the

West. This growing commerce called for something better

than the broad Kentucky boat or New Orleans' boat. Those

boats did very well for transportation with the current, but they

could not be used in bringing goods up stream. For this pur-

pose two classes of boats were used, the keel-boat and the barge.

The keel-boat was a long, narrow boat built on lines that adapted

it to navigation against the swift current of the western rivers.

The barge was built like the keel-boat but longer and broader.

It was from 75 to 100 feet long and from 15 to 20 feet wide,

with a capacity of from 60 to 100 tons. The crew consisted of

from thirty to sixty men with oars. Cordeling was resorted to

where possible, and setting poles came into play in shallow water.

A barge generally carried two masts, but occasionally it had

but one square sail. The introduction of sails was probably

the greatest improvement in western navigation before the intro-

duction of the steamboat. A small quarter deck covered a little

cabin for the captain and afforded a stand for the steersman,

while a small forecastle protected the sleeping berths of the crew.

These boats made from ten to fifteen miles per day against the

current and usually completed two trips to New Orleans each

year.⁴⁸ A traveler has left us an interesting account of the meet-

46 McBride. Pioneer History of Butler County, 1., pp. 316-319.

47 American Pioneer, I., p. 98.

48 American Pioneer, I., pp. 98, 99. Cist's Cincinnati Miscellany, I.,

pp. 125, 128.

Building a Commercial System.            335

ing of one of these boats at Limestone in 1817. It was loaded

with West Indian goods from New Orleans and had been nearly

three months on the way, the men having to pole up most of the

distance. The safe arrival being considered a fortunate circum-

stance, the owners and crew were manifesting their joy by firing

salutes from a small cannon and offering libations of their favor-

ite whiskey till a late hour.⁴⁹

The development of the barge and the introduction of sails

became effective about 1801 and greatly decreased the labor of

transporting freight from New Orleans to Cincinnati. These

improvements were important to the West, as the freight rate

was thereby reduced from $8 and $9 per ton to $5 and $6 per

ton, which was below the average charge for carrying freight

across the mountains. In 1807 two Cincinnati firms, Baum &

Perry, and Riddle, Bechtle & Co., put on lines of barges between

Cincinnati and New Orleans, which continued in commission till

1817. From that time, 1807, most of the groceries and heavy

freight came to Cincinnati from New Orleans instead of from

the Atlantic seaboard.50 Nor was that all. There began a move-

ment of products of the Mississippi Valley up the Ohio, such

as lead from Kaskaskia, cotton from Tennessee, furs from the

Upper Mississippi, and sugar from Louisiana.51  Thus was be-

gun that commercial communication between the northern and

southern parts of the Mississippi Valley that was to reach such

proportions after the coming of the steamboat.

There is little evidence showing the influence of the

War of 1812 on the commercial life of the Miami Country, but

it is probable that the demands of the northwestern army fully

compensated for any loss of the export trade. Wheat was worth

621/2 cents per bushel in October, 1812, and rose to $1.00 per

bushel by the middle of the following December.⁵²  John H.

Piatt, the principal western army contractor, had frequent ad-

49 Palmer; Journal of Travels in the U. S., p. 66.

50 Burnet's Notes, p. 400.

51 Cuming's Tour, in Thwaite's Early Western Travels, IV., p. 147

Melish; Travels in the U. S., II., p. 127.

52 Western Spy, October 24 and December 9, 1812.

336       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

vertisements in the Cincinnati papers for pack horses, beef,

cattle, hogs, flour and whiskey.53

After the War of 1812 the growing commerce of the West

is indicated by what appears to have been a great extension of

the flat-boat business. Under the head of Ship News, Cincin-

nati papers published the arrival and departure of barges. The

following are some of the typical notices of the time:

"Arrived on the 6th inst. the barge Cincinnati from New

Orleans. Cargo, sugar, cotton and molasses."⁵⁴

"Arrived June 1, the barge, Nonesuch, Captain M. Baum,

from New Orleans. Cargo, cotton and sugar. Also, two large

keel-boats, cargo same."⁵⁵

"Arrived on Wednesday last, the barge Fox, Capt. Palmer,

from New Orleans to Messrs. Marsh & Palmer; cargo, sugar

cotton and coffee."56

On the first anniversary of St. Jackson's Day, Liberty Hall

published the following:

"Sailed for New Orleans:

Barge Nonesuch, 100 tons flour and pork.

Barge Cincinnati, 115 tons flour and pork.

Barge Fox, 40 tons flour and pork.

10 to 12 flat boats, [each] carrying 300 to 400 barrels, have

sailed from Cincinnati within two months, loaded with pork, flour,

lard and other produce."⁵⁷

Some idea of the extent of the flat-boat traffic may be ob-

tained when we learn that in 1816 the steamboat Despatch passed

2,000 flat-boats in a voyage of 25 days from Natchez to Louis-

ville. No count was kept of any boats that passed in the night.

Timothy Flint is authority for the statement that it was not

uncommon to see as many as 100 boats rendezvoused at New

Madrid on a single evening. By 1817 it was estimated that 500

persons every summer passed down the Ohio from Cincinnati

53 Western Spy, September 12, November 15, 1812; February 20,

1813.

54 Liberty Hall, July 10, 1815.

55 Liberty Hall, June 5, 1815.

56 Liberty Hall, April 8, 1815.

57 Liberty Hall, January 8, 1816.

Building a Commercial System.            337

to New Orleans as traders and boatmen and returned on foot.58

Frequently several boats would join together and travel to New

Orleans as a fleet. James Flint records that in 181₉ he left

Cincinnati in a boat belonging to such a fleet.⁵⁹ Nor did the

coming of the steamboat put a stop to the flat-boat trade. While

the new method of transportation soon monopolized the up-

river traffic, a large part of the produce of the country continued

to be floated to New Orleans in flat-boats for many years after

the beginning of the steamboat era.

In 1817 this extensive flat-boat trade was carrying down

the river for export from  Cincinnati the surplus produce of

about 100,000 people situated in what was then probably the

richest and most productive agricultural section of the West.

Flour, pork and whiskey were the chief articles of export. Dr.

Drake assures us that in 1815 the city exported annually sev-

eral thousand barrels of flour to New Orleans. Richard Fos-

dick had given the Miami Country its first lessons in pork pack-

ing, and droves of swine were beginning to move toward Cin-

cinnati for slaughter and shipment down the river.⁶⁰ Nor did

the commercial basis continue to be entirely agricultural. Local

manufacturers were beginning to contribute their share to the

commercial development. Within the twenty-two years since

the treaty of Greenville, Cincinnati had increased from a village

of 500 inhabitants to a city with a population of about 7,000,

and a large proportion of the inhabitants were engaged in manu-

facturing. The prinicpal business of these artisans was to sup-

ply the local demand, but there had begun a limited export of

manufactured goods to regions farther west and south. Chief

among these were beer, porter, cheese, soap, candles, spun yarn,

lumber and cabinet furniture.⁶¹

With the beginning of the steamboat era in 1817, this study

ends. During the period under consideration, the development

58 Birkbeck; Notes on a Journey, p. 102.

⁵⁹ James Flint; Letters in Thwaite's Early Western Travels, IX., p.

156.

61 Ford; Cincinnati, p. 328.

61 Drake; A Natural and Statistical View of Cincinnati in 1815, p.

148.

Vol. XVI.- 22.

338       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

of Cincinnati was that of the chief town of a rich and rapidly

growing agricultural region under frontier conditions and prim-

itive means of transportation. Throughout the entire period

she was easily the chief town of that section, but she could be

no more. The coming of the steamboat brought about the oppor-

tunity to do business with the rest of the Mississippi Valley, and

Cincinnati soon held the proud distinction of being the metropo-

lis of the upper portion of that extensive region. In conclusion,

let us sum up what were the resources and opportunities at the

command of Cincinnati for the beginning of a new era.

She occupied a favorable site on a broad circular plain

surrounded by hills with lateral valleys situated so as to fur-

nish outlets both north and south, and about midway between

Pittsburg and the mouth of the Ohio. She was the metropolis

of the richest agricultural region of the Northwest, a region,

parts of which already had a population of nearly forty-five

inhabitants to the square mile.⁶² This population was growing

rapidly and would demand an increasing quantity of manufac-

tures and imported goods for which it would be ready to ex-

change a large surplus of farm products. It was a popula-

tion that was beginning to improve the highways and build

substantial brick and frame houses and discard the log cabins

of an earlier day. A newer West was growing rapidly on the

lower Ohio and on the upper Mississippi, and its inhabitants

would find Cincinnati a convenient market in which to make

their purchases; but already they were our competitors for the

sale of farm products. On the lower Mississippi was a rich

agricultural region into which they were soon to begin a great

rush of population; and it was in this region that Cincinnati

was soon to find her best market for her surplus flour, pork,

and whiskey, and also for her manufactures. New Orleans was

a convenient port from which to export the surplus which the

South did not take; and to New Orleans our merchants went

for a large part of their foreign goods. Raw material for

manufacturing purposes was convenient and transportation was

cheap.  In addition to these advantages, Cincinnati was an

62 McMaster; History of the People of the United States, IV., p.

523.