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Note: ril 1874. During all that time I have been an actual resident, except about 8 months in 1821. I was born in Fayette county, Pa., on the 13th day of December, 1800-consequently, I am past my 74th birthday. My father's name was Joseph Lewis; my mothers Rachel Richardson. He was born in 1772 and she in 1774. They had nine children viz: John, Ruth, Benjamin, Silas, David, Rebecca. Eliza, Rachel, and Joseph-five boys and four girls. The first five were born in Pennsylvania, and four in Ohio. My father was forty-four years of age when he came to Ohio. My grandfather Lewis, whose given name was David had preceded us, and was a renter on William Barnes' farm, now owned and operated by Judge J.R. Hibbens. Of my grandfathers children I can name Joseph, Thomas, Ruth, Margaret and Isabel, David, Samuel, Elizabeth, Jesse and John. They all came to Ohio with him except my father, uncle Thomas, and aunts Margaret and Isabel, and they followed in after years, with the possible exception of Thomas. Aunt Isabel married John Jones in Pennsylvania, and they moved into Guernsey county. Aunt Margaret married Jacob Kauffman. They settled in Zanesville. Nearly all of my uncles and aunts married and raised children, and their descendants are scattered far and wide over our extended country. To follow the history of each and their posterity only as far as I know them would be tedious, and would make this narrative much more lengthy than it is. I will give some account of my mother. She was born at Duck Creek X Roads, in Maryland. Her father's name was Benjamin. for whom I was named. Both her father and mother died when she was 6 years of age in 1780, leaving a certain amount of ready money on the settlement of the estate to each of the six children, though my mother never received a cent of her share. She was indentured to a man by the name of Pratt, who misused her, and instead of treating her as a ward abused her badly as any slave-driver did his plantation slaves. He at one time beat her till she was supposed to be dead and laid out upon a cooling board, but she revived, and he was thereafter more cautious. In England, the indenture system is still in vogue, while in this country, though we inherited the system from her, it has gone into almost universal disuse, and just because too many "masters" cruelly oppresses this apprentices. But the system, not abused, is a most excellent one, for it turns out competent workmen of the various trades. We in the United States greatly lack in this respect. As we have no regular apprentice system our young men are not trained. They only obtain an inkling of the trade or profession they choose to follow, and too soon leave their apprenticeship for finished journeymen, whereas they are only bunglers. At least her time was out with Pratt, and she then worked in the families of John Nolind, father to Hosea Nolind, James Goodin, father of the late John Goodin, and James Sappington, in Pennsylvania. All these families preceded my father's family as emigrants into Pike county, and we found them here when we came in 1812. Indeed, we camped within half a mile of Mr. Sappington's whose farm I believe is now owned by A.P. Miller, in Scioto township. But we had unhitched our horses when my mother was informed by Joseph Sewell that we were in such close proximity to the farm of her former employer. But as they lived on a hill, entirely out of sight, we passed them by the next morning, and I am of the opinion that we never met any of the Sappingtons though we were afterwards very intimate with the Goodins and Nolinds. My father was a boat builder, and followed that business all his life. He built flat boats and when the canal was made his boatyard was the property now owned and occupied by Charles F. Smith, in Waverly. It was in a boat built by my father in which a family by the name of James , Evan James was the head of the family, grandfather to Charles Evans James, now on the Clough farm came from Fayette county, Pa. to Portsmouth. We started in at two miles above Brownsville, on the Monogahela river, and came into and down the Ohio river. We were probably two weeks or more descending the two rivers. We remained at Portsmouth several weeks, why so long I cannot account for. I went up into Portsmouth , which then may have been half the size of Sharonville or Jasper in our own county, and among the courier things to my eyes was the whipping post; or at any rate what I was informed was a whipping post; It was a wooden post hewed about twelve inches thick, eighteen inches wide, some three feet high, and painted red. Word was sent to grandfather Lewis that we were waiting for conveyance to our new home, and in time, Uncle John came down and took the two families up in an old Virginia wagon. My father, Mr. James and a hired man or two poled the boat up as far as the Scioto river bridge. He purposely built it as a ferry boat, for possible use on the Scioto river. He readily sold it to Col. Guthrie, for a ferry boat, and it used as such between Piketon and the Prairie. Piketon was not then named, not till 1815. It, and the county, which was set off from Ross, Scioto and Adams counties was named in honor of Gen. Zebulon Montgomery Pike, who was blown up in a fort in Canada by the British in 1814. He and five hundred brave Americans lost their lives by that sad catastrophe. My father received in part payment, from Col.Guthrie, for the boat, a sword, scabbard, belt, tomahawk and butcher knife, which he wore during the Revolutionary war, and a horse. What became of the accoutrement's I do not know. We often hear old folks talking of the difficulties of going to mill. When we first came to this county we went to the mill south of Sunfish. There was one about a mile above its mouth owned by Frank Adams, where my father and I used to make flat boats for old John Barnes (Father to Thomas and I.N. who now reside in Scioto township) and another alcove owned by a Mr. Moore, now owned by Stewart Alexander, though the mill has several times been rebuilt, but was washed away some years ago. The nearest mill was the one at Sharonville. It was known as a wet weather mill,and could only be used when the ranch was up, and was run only a small part of the year. Next, we used to go to the mills near the present guard locks, about twelve miles above Waverly. One was owned by Ritenhour and the other by Samuel Wilson. Then Bourneville and over to Beaver, to what was called Brown's mill. Of course, we were not so badly put to it, for mill privileges, as were the first settlers, who came to the forests twenty years previous to the time I am speaking of, say 1812-15. Yet we used the hominy block and pestle to crack our corn. I used to go old Tommy Bias' to grind corn by hand. He lived near Dr. Ray's place in the glades in Jackson township. He came from Pennsylvania and used to reside in Fayette of an adjourning county. Tommy Bias was a colored man. I used to help my father with his boat building in Pennsylvania and after we came to Ohio about three months each year till I was past fifteen years of age. My father rented ground on the bottoms, and I as the farmer while he was the boat builder. After I was fifteen I worked for the wages till I was twenty-two years old. In March 1821, I went to Sandusky to work on the farm of Daniel Hodges, for whom I had labored two years while he lived on what is now known as the Prather place. He purchased a half section of land some ten miles north-west of Upper Sandusky and wanted me to go with him, which I did. There were two log cabins on the farm, one of which we found empty, and occupied it; the other was occupied by a family by the name of Lake. Besides the Lakes we only found one white family in all that region, for many miles. There was no white family then in Upper Sandusky and only one Indian family. Old Billy Walker could read, and he was a postmaster. Thomas Hodges, nephew to Daniel, Thomas Holenbach and James Bark, uncle to "Billy Bark" were also employed and went along with us. We arrived there on the 17th of March and immediately commenced mauling rails for the fencing of the farm, which employed "amused" us till plowing time, when we put in the plows and afterwards the corn. We planted from twenty to twenty-five acres. After the corn was in Hollenbach and Bark returned home, leaving young Hodges and myself to help Daniel Hodges. We found on plowing a quantity of brass kettles, guns, butcher knives and horseshoes. We were told that this was battle ground where Crawford fought, was defeated, and burnt by the Indians in the was with England in 1812-15. In Oct., I left and returned home leaving as good a crop of corn as ever was raised there probably, for the ground was very rich. On the 19th day of May 1822, I was married to Nancy Gabriel. Her folks were pennsylvanians and came to Ohio and settled in Zanesville. Uncle Kauffman moved from Zanesville to Waverly, and my wife was living with Aunt Margaret and came with her. I worked, during the season of 1822, for Reese McNeil, while my wife lived at my fathers. In the fall we kept the house on one Collins, while he went to Virginia to visit his folks. Then I built a cabin where William Lancaster resides, now known as the Downing place. We commenced housekeeping in our humble way, having one straw bed and appurtenances. The floor was puncheon. Holes were bored through the puncheon into which I crotched sticks and pound them into the ground. On these sticks were placed long poles for the rails and they were crossed with other poles on which was placed our straw bed. Our other furniture was scant, but in keeping with the bedstead. In 1823 I rented some land on the McNeil farm, now owned by Major Andrew Kilgore, and put in half an acre of flax. There are many acres on the same farm in flax. in 1824 I put an addition on my cabin, and a loom into it, with which my wife wove the flax I raised, as well as for others. I used to pull, thread, rot, break, swingel, and making it into garments. In 1825, I think it was, my wife was sick, and I had to get a person to weave for us. I employed Patty Chenoweth, now Davis, and it was while she was weaving for us that the noted earthquake occurred. It shook the cabin in which we lived. Patty was weaving at the time, and she was so "shocked" that she ran into the other room, and that evening went home. No persuasion would induce her to go back into the looming-house. In 1826 I leased land on the David Emmitt farm and also for that year rented land of John Barnes, now owned by Newton S. Moore. In 1829 I sold out my lease and rented a house on the Williams Barnes farm, now owned by Judge J.R. Hibbens, then under lease to him. In 1833 I took a lease of three acres on the old infirmary farm, then owned by William McCorkle, who afterwards sold to Joseph Wolf. I built a cabin on the spot now occupied by Sylvester Jennings, very near the bridge over the turnpike, between the infirmary and the Lindsay farms. The bottom along the PeePee creek was, in those days, very prolific. The soil is still good, but under the present system of farming, too much of the once rich bottom land in Pike county is deteriorating year by year, whereas, rightly served, its original fertility might have been kept up. Joseph Wolf, in 1835, I think it was, sowed twelve or more acres of bottom land, now owned by Jonathan Jennings, to oats. They were black oats. He sold off one acre to his brother-in-law, Hiram Smith, who, out of curiosity, had the oats off that one acre measured carefully, and it turned out sixty-two bushels. I lived in the cabin I built on the Jennings farm till 1836, when I moved on to the William Barnes upland farm, now cut up into several small farms and owned by different parties. The two story log house I moved into was on that part now owned by James McGowan. I remained there till the fall of 1837, then moved on to the place now known as the George Nye place, adjoining my present farm. Remained there till February, 1838 when I purchased one hundred acres "more or less". Where I now live, about one and a half miles from Waverly court house. Here I have lived ever since. There were seven or eight acres of cleared land on the place, two cabins and a stable. I have since cleared the farm so that there are probably about one hundred acres in tillage and pasture, the land over running that measurement some forty acres. I have set out orchards, and am enjoying the fruits thereof, and in 1847, built the framed house in which I now reside. When I purchased the farm it was the first rod of land ever owned. I have since owned other land, but was never greedy to add farm to farm and would even now dispose of my present possessions for a fair consideration. I raised eleven children by my wife Nancy. Their names were Caroline, Susan, James, William, Elizabeth and Elias, twins Rachel and Benjamin Richardson, Edwin Gabriel, Nancy and Henry. These children grew to man and woman's estate, and all married except Nancy. Caroline married John Hughes. The latter live in Waverly. Caroline died in 1865, leaving one child, Emma. She had given birth to others, but they preceded her to the grave. Emma is still alive. Susan married John Bridenbach, and died last May, leaving five children. Four died before she deceased. Her living children are Fidelia who Married Abram Smith, and have one son, named Edwin; Angeline, Henry, George Edwin and Mary. They all reside at home. James married Jane Stains, by whom he had Rufus, Marietta, James, Charles, Nancy and Newton. He died May 23, 1870. His widow has since married Joseph Hess. James' children are all with their mother. William married Rebecca Jane Frey and had by her five children, of whom four are living. Their names are Loretta, Phebe, Ernest A., and Anna. William and his wife are dead. Elizabeth married Oliver P. Downing, by whom she had five children, all living. They are Henrietta, Eldridge, Elmer, Benjamin and Oliver. She died January 9, 1868. Mr. Downing has since married Maria Huggins. Elias married Roseann Branson, by whom he has had eight children, Carlton, Louemma, Charles B., Mary Ellen, William H., Martin A., Maurice B., Edwin D. Carton and William H. are dead. They live near Flora, Clay county, Illinois. Rachel married Porter Clifford. They had six children but I am not just able to recall to memory their names. Porter Clifford died in August, 1873. Rachel resides in Wayne county, Illinois. Benjamin R. married Henrietta Moats. They have two children. Clara and another. They reside in Flora, Clay county, Illinois. Edwin G. married Laura Hance by whom he has had four children: but two are only living. They reside in Bourneville, Ross county, Ohio. Nancy died in February, 1864, aged 24 years. She was not married. Henry married Sarah Chenoweth. They have two children and reside in Bourneville, Ross county, Ohio. James, William, Benjamin R. Edwin G. and Henry were carpenters; Elias is a farmer. On the 20th of June, 1856 my wife died, and my daughter Nancy kept house for me till her death in 1864. Then I broke up housekeeping till November 24, 1864, when I married Sophie Jane Watkins, nee Smith, widow of John H. Watkins. We have one son, Harry M. and he is the only one of my twelve living with me.
Note: On January 7th & 14th, 1875 the Waverly News had an Old Timers interview section. Benjamin Lewis's interview follows: I have been a resident of Pike county for sixty-two years ending on the 17th of Ap
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