Filed under: Benedict, Blanchard, Boalt, Bradford, Buckingham, Christian, Connecticut, Converse, Deaver, Farrar, French, Hassell, Lovewell, New England, Norwalk, Ohio, Ohio, Prescott, Preston, Sawyer, Talcott, Taylor, Wanton, Wickham, Winthrop | Tags: Benedict Genealogy, Blanchard Genealgy, Bradford Genealogy, Buckingham Genealogy, Christian Genealogy, Connecticut History, Converse Genealogy, Deaver Genealogy, Farrar Genealogy, French Genealogy, Hassell Genealogy, Huron County History, Lovewell Genealogy, New England History, Norwalk Ohio History, Ohio History, Preston Genealogy, Talcott Genealogy, Taylor Genealogy, Wanton, Wickham Genealogy, Winthrop
“Sufferers’ Land.”
The “Firelands.”
These evocative and descriptive phrases refer to a region in Northern Ohio set aside by the state of Connecticut for “Sufferers” who were burned out of their homes by the British in the Revolution. Part of the Western Reserve, it covers present-day Huron and Erie counties.
After the War of 1812, a flood of emigration erupted out of crowded New England, the result of a pent up desire for new land that had been held in check by the threat of Native Americans defending their homes and the spur of economic hardship engendered by the catastrophic “Year without Summer” of 1816. Most of these pioneers were bound for the Firelands.
Thus began one of the great migrations of American history; a flood of humanity that poured out of New England and settled lands stretching along the southern shores of the Great Lakes from upstate New York to Illinois and across the Mississippi River into Iowa.
These settlers greatly impacted the history of the United States. In the 1850’s, some of them entered Kansas and clashed with the leading edge of another great migration that had settled the South — a tragic foreshadowing of the Civil War. The grandchildren of the settlers of the Old Northwest formed the backbone of the Union Army of the West during that war and made possible the Republican majority that ruled the nation the remainder of the century.
This website presents histories of the Firelands and genealogies of families that settled there.
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The Sufferers’ Land is a history of the settlement of the Firelands from the founding of the town of Norwalk in 1817 by Platt Benedict to the final Pioneers Reunion and founding of The Firelands Historical Society in 1857. This story may be read from the beginning starting at the Prologue, or by selecting any of the 53 episodes in the Index of Posts.
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A genealogy of families who settled in the Firelands is also included on this website. These include the Benedict, Wickham, Preston, Taylor, Buckingham, Christian, DeForest, Deaver, Walker, Shaon, Smith, Bradford, Talcott, Farrar, French, Lovewell, Hassell, Converse, Blanchard, Wanton, Winthrop, Dudley, and Sutton families.
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Little Doctor on the Black Horse is a memoir of Doctor David DeForest Benedict of Norwalk, Ohio, a Union Surgeon during the Civil War. It was written by his granddaughter Harriott Benedict Wickham, who included in the story excerpts of letters he wrote to his wife from the field and from Libby Prison, where he was a prisoner of war. An episode of the story is posted every Monday, with the most recent installment immediately below this post. See the Index of Posts to read the entire memoir.
I would appreciate any comment you may have about this post. Please click on the comments button below, or contact me by email at dawbarton@aol.com. Thank you.
© 2009 by David W. Barton. All rights reserved
Filed under: Buckingham, Norwalk, Ohio, Ohio, Taylor, Wickham | Tags: Buckingham Genealogy, Norwalk Ohio History, Ohio History, Preston Genealogy, Taylor Genealogy, Wickham Genealogy
In 1850, the Wickham household on East Main was bulging at the seams with fourteen people living under its roof. Fredrick and Lucy now had seven children: Charles, age thirteen; Catharine, eleven; William, nine; Fredrick, seven; Mary, five; Sarah, three; and the baby, one-year-old Lucy. Also living in the house were Lucy’s brother Charles Preston, their father Samuel Preston, age seventy-two, and their grandfather Timothy Taylor who was ninety-five.
Lucy was a devoted Presbyterian. She insisted that her children attend Sunday school and that they went properly attired. They each carried two handkerchiefs, one a “shower” and the other a “blower.”
Frederick, who had grown up an Episcopalian, never attended church with the rest of his family, but went to the Universalist Church across the street. He could not accept the Presbyterian doctrine of predestination and damnation. As he explained, he “could not condemn one of his children to Hell, and he didn’t believe the Lord could either.” [1]
Henry Buckingham, son of George Buckingham, also lived with the Wickhams and worked at the newspaper. Like Caroline Benedict, Lucy had help taking care of her family, two German women, Julia Berbach, age twenty-two, and Teresa Beecher, age eighteen. [2]
Running such a large household was undoubtedly a great burden for Lucy. In addition to rearing seven children, she had to care for her brother, father, and grandfather. By 1850, her grandfather, “Grandsire” Timothy Taylor, had lived a long eventful life, serving as a soldier in the Revolution, raising a family and moving west at an advanced age to start a new life on the frontier.
In spite of his age, Grandsire Taylor still possessed clear and sound judgment, and his mental faculties were unimpaired. He was universally esteemed by his neighbors and acquaintances for the integrity of his character, for the kindness of his heart, and for the sociability and cheerfulness which enlivened his intercourse with all, during his long and useful life of almost a century.
However, Grandsire Taylor could not live forever. He died in his bed at Lucy’s home on Wednesday, February 26, 1851, at the age of ninety-seven. [3]
The following year there were two more deaths, one each in the Wickham and the Benedict households. Although the death at the Benedict home was expected, the one at the Wickham home was an unforeseen tragedy.
I would appreciate any comment you may have about this post. Please click on the comments button below or email me at dawbarton@aol.com. Thank you.
GO TO NEXT Post – End of an Era
Footnotes:
[1] These stories about Frederick & Lucy’s religious beliefs are from undated notes by Harriott Wickham Barton in the possession of the author.
[2] Information about Frederick & Lucy’s household is from The 1850 Huron County Census, page number 1b
[3] From the obituary of Timothy Taylor in The Firelands Pioneer, December 1918, pp. 2196-7.
© 2009 by David W. Barton. All rights reserved
