Firelands History Website

In his fortieth year, Platt Benedict left his home in Danbury, Connecticut and traveled to the Ohio wilderness in search of a new home for his family. It was September 1815 and the war with the British had ended a few months earlier, re-opening the frontier for settlement. [1]

An energetic man, Platt had a stern and businesslike visage, and, to judge from his writing, he spoke in a businesslike manner as well. Born in March 1775, only a month before the battles of Lexington and Concord ignited the Revolutionary War, his early experiences were of that war — he was eight years old when it ended.

He came from a distinguished family, a descendant of Thomas Benedict, who settled in New England in 1638 and established a clan of American Benedicts that number in the thousands today. A respected member of the Danbury community, Platt’s father Jonas Benedict served as the town’s representative to the General Assembly of Connecticut in 1809. Platt was also active in the town. From 1812 to 1817, he was collector of the port of Danbury. [2] He was active in the Masons, becoming associated with that fraternity in 1811. [3]

Platt was not what we typically think of as a pioneer, nothing like Daniel Boone or Davy Crockett. He did not own a rifle or any other weapon. Like many New Englanders of the time, he was a man of business and a farmer. His weapons against the wilds of the frontier were the axe and saw, the hoe and plow. With these, he and his fellow Yankees would clear the forests and till the fields, changing the landscape of Northern Ohio from wilderness to productive farmland.

Although he had been a successful man in Danbury, Platt wanted more than what was available to him in New England. In the west lay the opportunity to begin a new life — and establish a new town. No doubt, he considered the possibility for years, but the War of 1812 put a hiatus on westward emigration, stymieing his plans. At the war’s end, he took decisive action.

He was bound for the “Firelands” or “Sufferer’s Land,” a part of the Connecticut Western Reserve that had been set aside for nineteen-hundred residents of coastal Connecticut towns that lost their homes and property because of British raids during the Revolution. The settlers would use the names of those Connecticut towns — Greenwich, Norwalk, Fairfield, Danbury, New Haven, East Haven, New London, Ridgefield and Groton — to name the townships and villages of the Firelands. [4]

The Firelands was not large, only five-hundred-thousand acres, roughly consisting of what are now Erie and Huron Counties. The frontier was ending in Ohio and, except for the swamps of the northwest corner, the Firelands would be the last area settled in the state.

Platt did not go directly to the Firelands. He stopped first in Canfield, Ohio, a town founded by Connecticut Yankees years before. His cousin Eli Boughton introduced him to a leader of the Canfield community named Elisha Whittlesey, who had moved to Canfield from Danbury, Connecticut in 1806. [5]

A leader in state politics, Elisha served as Prosecuting Attorney for the Court of Common Pleas in Warren. [6] He also saw opportunity in the Firelands and had organized an expedition to investigate the possibilities. Recognizing Platt’s potential and desire, he invited him along.

They traveled to Avery, Ohio, two miles north of where the town of Milan is today. The earliest settlers to the region had recently chosen Avery, one of the few settlements in the Firelands, as the county seat of newly founded Huron County, which included present day Erie County. [7] Platt and Elisha stayed at the home of David Abbott, who had first come to the Firelands before the War of 1812 from Chagrin, Ohio, where he had settled in 1802. He was of the first wave of settlers of the Firelands who had experienced war, famine and hardship. [8]

The first County Court convened in David Abbott’s home soon after Platt and Elisha arrived, with about forty men attending. David Abbott served County Clerk, and one of the Associate Judges of the court was another early settler named Almon Ruggles. He owned land along the lake and had surveyed the Firelands several years earlier.

Many of the men attending voiced their dissatisfaction with Avery as County Seat. They favored a sand ridge south of town, but were concerned that water might be lacking. After the Court adjourned, Platt and Elisha went to the home of Abijah Comstock in Norwalk Township and asked him to guide them to the sand ridge. [9]

Abijah was from New Canaan, Connecticut. His father had received a claim from some of the original “sufferers” of Norwalk, Connecticut who had been burned out of their homes during the Revolution. Abijah’s brother settled in Norwalk Township in 1809, but returned to Connecticut because of bad health. He turned his homestead over to Abijah, who came to the township in the summer of 1810. [10]

He guided Platt and Elisha to the sand ridge. They were pleased to find sufficient water, and a large meadow where nearby residents grazed their cattle. An Indian trail and several wagon tracks crossed the ridge. [11] It was covered with a few oaks, being what was then termed an oak opening — a sand ridge, with an undergrowth of whortleberry bushes. [12]

Elisha knew that the owners of the land — a man named Colonel Taylor and a woman named Polly Bull, both living in Connecticut — were willing to sell. The men agreed that Platt should start immediately for Connecticut to make them an offer. Time was short. The opportunity was now, and the men were determined not to lose it.

Platt traveled by horse, spending many hours each day in the saddle. He reached Danbury in eleven days, an amazing feat for that time, and went immediately to Colonel Taylor’s home in New Milford, sixteen miles away. Colonel Taylor owned five hundred and sixty acres on the sand ridge and he agreed to sell it to Platt for $2.25 an acre.

Platt next visited Polly Bull, a widow who owned eight hundred and sixty acres near the ridge. She and her husband settled in the Firelands in 1811, but they fled to Cleveland at the beginning of the War of 1812. After her husband’s death in October 1812, Polly returned with her children to their home in New Milford. She did not intend to return to the Firelands, and agreed to sell her land for $2.00 per acre.

The following spring, Platt paid Colonel Taylor and Polly for their lands and sent the deeds to Elisha in Canfield. Elisha returned to the Firelands and contracted Judge Almon Ruggles to survey a town plat with forty-eight lots. They named the town Norwalk. [13]

Platt prepared to move to the Firelands, arranging for the sale of his house and belongings and divesting himself of his businesses. However, something was about to happen in New England that would delay his plans, and change the lives of many in the region.

* * *

In June, the weather turned cold and it snowed. The winter of 1815-1816 was normal, but that changed in late spring. The year 1816 became “the year without summer.” Through June and July — even into August — cold temperatures and heavy snows were the norm. In most cases, farmers were not able to get a crop into the ground, let alone harvest. People became desperate. No one knew what to do. Conditions outside of New England were not as bad, but the primitive transportation system of the day could not move food easily from one region to another. Farmers ate whatever they could get out of the ground, not putting aside seed for the following year.

No one knew the reason for this sudden change in climate, although many theories circulated among the population. Some people thought a star had passed between the sun and earth, cutting off the light. Others attributed the change in climate to sunspots.

Today, scientists believe the cold summer of 1816 was the result of the eruption the previous year of Mount Tamboro, in what is now Indonesia. This massive eruption, estimated by some scientists to be the largest in ten-thousand years, added to dust already in the atmosphere from two earlier volcanic eruptions, one in the West Indies in 1812 and another in the Philippines in 1814. [14]

No matter what caused this abrupt climate change, the people of New England began to look for a way out of their dire situation. Rumors circulated about the rich lands of Ohio, and people took notice.

* * *

In January of 1817, Platt again started for The Firelands, traveling in a one-horse wagon. He stopped in New York, where his sister lived with her husband Samuel Darling. Samuel accompanied his brother-in-law west, driving a second wagon.

The two men traveled through driving snow to the Great Bend of the Susquehanna River, where they found a sleigh that belonged to a man by the name of Holley, who had left it there on his move to Florence Township in the Firelands. Leaving one wagon, they loaded the other on the sleigh and set out in extremely cold weather, traveling north and then west, bound for Erie, Pennsylvania.

A foot of snow covered the ground, excellent conditions for sleighing. In Erie, they left the wagon and headed south in the sleigh to Meadville, Pennsylvania. Here their luck changed for the worse. It began to rain heavily, melting most of the snow. They continued on to Canfield, Ohio in the sleigh, but upon arriving there decided to exchange it for another wagon.

They reached Norwalk Township in early March and boarded with the Gibbs and Lockwood families, who had arrived in the township in April of the previous year after a horrific journey, during which each family lost a son. Other settlers had arrived in the neighborhood the past couple years, and Platt set about recruiting them to help erect a cabin on the sand ridge. [15]

He had no trouble finding willing helpers; most settlers looked forward to assisting new neighbors. In later days, one of them would recall – When the pioneer had been swinging his axe for weeks, and maybe for months, together, it is often cheering to hear that there is to be a log raising in the neighborhood. He anticipates at once the pleasure that is to be derived from meeting his neighbors, and having with them a little social chat, or the exchange of a few sprightly jokes. [16]

On the appointed day, the settlers assembled on the ridge. Snow began to fall and Platt suggested postponing the work to another day. However, Levi Cole, who lived in nearby Ridgefield Township, said that the snow would not hurt them, and the men pitched into their work. [17]

The meadow along the ridge had few trees, so the men went to a nearby lowland area to cut logs for the cabin. They stood in ankle-deep water while they worked — a miserable experience that begged for the relief of a libation. Usually the owner of a cabin being raised treated his helpers with whiskey, but Platt gave Jamaican Rum instead, which his new neighbors greatly appreciated.

They worked until mid-day when they broke for dinner, pork and potatoes prepared by Major David Underhill’s wife Mary that morning and brought to the site from their homestead on the border of Norwalk and Ridgefield Townships. It is easy to imagine the men clustered around the unfinished cabin in the snow, steam rising from their plates. [18]

After dinner, the men continued to erect the cabin, following a familiar pattern. Logs were cut, rolled up, and their corners notched together in a square form to a suitable height. For a roof, the gable ends were carried up to a peak, with logs or poles, from one end to the other, at suitable distances apart. — Their staves were then made, and layed (sic) upon the poles, each layer being well secured with heavy poles upon them. [19]

They finished building the cabin that evening. Although it was a rude structure, it would provide shelter for Platt’s family when they arrived. Satisfied with his progress so far, he made final preparations prior to returning to Connecticut to fetch them.

He hired a Mr. Stewart to stay in the cabin during his absence and clear and fence four acres of land on the flats south of the ridge for ten dollars per acre. Because Mr. Stewart had no provisions, Platt purchased a barrel of pork and a barrel of flour for him.

Platt also arranged for Lewis Keeler to fence an acre of land around the cabin and plant potatoes, corn, and other vegetables so they would be ready to harvest when he returned with his family. [20] Lewis had traveled to the Firelands in 1816 as teamster for David Gibbs and Henry Lockwood in order to prepare a homestead in advance of the arrival of others of the Keeler clan. [21]

Before he departed for Connecticut, Platt met Captain John Boalt, who also wanted to settle in Norwalk Township, and sold to him one hundred acres of his land on Old State Road, about a mile southeast of the center of the proposed village of Norwalk.

Saturday, the fourth of April, Platt started for Connecticut in the same wagon he had brought to Norwalk. En-route he contracted dysentery, which made travel difficult. It took him a month to make the trip. As soon as he arrived in Danbury, he began preparations to move his family to their new home. [22]

Chapter 2: Sally Benedict and the Trek West

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Footnotes:

[1] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 16. & The Firelands Pioneer, October 1896, p. 108.

[2] Family History: Wickham, Benedict, Preston & Deaver, by Agnes & Harriott Wickham, edited by Dave Barton, 2006, pp. 4-6.

[3] The Genealogy of the Benedicts in America, Vol. I, by Henry Marvin Benedict, 1870, p. 381.

[4] From the speech of the Honorable John Sherman, printed in The Firelands Pioneer, November 1858, p. 11.

[5] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, pp. 16-17

[6] Elisha Whittlesey’s story is from “Elisha Whittlesey,” by A. Newton, The Firelands Pioneer, June 1864, pp. 10-18.

[7] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk” by Samuel B. Lewis, The Firelands Pioneer, June 1858, p. 33

[8] Story of David Abbott is in “Scattered Sheaves – No. 1 – By Ruth, The Firelands Pioneer, November 1859, pp. 21-26.

[9] Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 17.

[10] The story of the settlement of Norwalk Township by the Comstock family is from “Early Settlers of Norwalk,” by Philo Comstock, The Firelands Pioneer, June 1868, pp. 105-108.

[11] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 17.

[12] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Henry Lockwood, Esq., The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, pp. 27-28.

[13] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 17

[14] Description of the summer of 1816 is from Wikipedia article: Year Without Summer and “The Year Without Summer,” by Dr. F.E. Weeks, The Firelands Pioneer, April, 1925, pp. 416-419.

[15] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 17.

[16] This description of how a cabin raising was a diversion to the early settlers is from “Memoirs of Townships – Clarksfield”, by Benjamin Benson, The Firelands Pioneer, November 1858, p. 21.

[17] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk”, by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 17.

[18] The story of the raising of Platt Benedict’s cabin is from “Scattered Sheaves – No. 4, By Ruth, Maj. Underhill”, The Firelands Pioneer, Sept. 1860, p. 42

[19] Memoirs of Townships – Fitchville” by J.C. Curtis, Esq., The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, pp.31-32.

[20] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk,” by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, pp. 17-18

[21] “Obituary of Lewis Keeler,” The Firelands Pioneer, 1882, p. 158.

[22] “Memoirs of Townships – Norwalk,” by Platt Benedict, The Firelands Pioneer, May 1859, p. 18

Chapter 2: Sally Benedict and the Trek West

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