house, and the meetings were continued until the present organization was formed. The Maple Grove or Beighly church was erected four or five years before the Dickey building, but the latter was the earliest church organization.

Their speakers receive no salary, but if one should be a poor man devoting his time and talents to the spreading of their faith, they regard it as incumbent upon them to reward him by gifts.

JEROMEVILLE is a small village eight miles southeast of Ashland, on Jerome fork of Mohican, which has one Presbyterian, one Methodist, and one Disciples church, and in 1880 had 314 inhabitants. In that vicinity, about the year 1762, Mohican John, a noted chief of Connecticut Mohegans, to the number of about 200 it is supposed, emigrated to Ohio, and established a village upon the west side of Jerome fork, on the site of the farms of Rev. Elijah Yocum and Judge Edmund Ingmand. In the war of 1812 it was about the only settlement within the present limits of the county, and consisted of a few families, who erected pickets for their safety. There was at that time a Frenchman, named John Baptiste Jerome, who resided there and gave name to the locality. He had been an Indian trader, and had taken a squaw for a wife. The people of that nation always became more easily domesticated among the aborigines than the English. From very early times it was the policy of the French government not to allow their soldiers to take wives with them into the wilderness. Hence the soldiers and traders frequently married among the Indians, and were enabled to sustain themselves with far less difficulty. In 1812, when the Indians were removed, his wife went with them, and later he married a German woman. He removed to the mouth of Huron river, and died there. He began trading with the Indians when seventeen years of age, and was with them in Wayne's campaign. The Indian village consisted of about thirty bark huts or wigwams. The names of the heads of the families were Aweepsah, Opetete, Catotawa, Nesohawa, Buckandohee, Shias, Ground Squirrel, Buckwheat, Philip Canonicut, Billy Montour, and Thomas Jelloway.

Hill, in the "County History," says that Jerome was a brave and kindly man, small, wiry, and vivacious. Having been with the Indians at the battle of the "Fallen Timbers," he often related anecdotes of that battle, describing the amazement of the Indians at the rapidity and violence of the movements of Wayne's army, the Indians comparing him to a huge "black snake," and ascribing almost supernatural powers to him. He came like a huge anaconda, inclosed and crushed them in such a frightful manner that they abandoned all hope of resistance, and were glad to make peace. He asserted that for a very long time the very name of "Mad Anthony" sent a chill of horror through the body of an Indian.

The Delaware Indians had a settlement at or near Jeromeville, which they left at the beginning of the war of 1812. Their chief was old Capt. Pipe, who resided near the road to Mansfield, one mile south of Jeromeville. When young he was a great warrior, and the implacable foe of the whites. He was in St. Clair's defeat, where, according to his own account, he distinguished himself, and slaughtered white men until his arm was weary with the work. He had a daughter of great beauty. A young chief, of noble mien, became in love with her, and on his suit being rejected mortally poisoned himself with the May apple. A Capt. Pipe, whose Indian name was Tauhangecaupouye, removed to the small Delaware reserve, in the upper part of Marion county, and when his tribe sold out their Ohio possessions accompanied them to Kansas.

Helltown and Greentown were two Indian villages in the southern part of this county. Greentown was so named after Thomas Green, a Connecticut Tory, who, sympathizing with the British and Indians in the destruction of the valley of the Wyoming, fled to Ohio and joined the Delawares, acquiring great influence among them. Among the Greentown Indians was a very aged, full-blooded, ugly-looking savage, who was known to the early settlers as Tom Lyons. He was born in New Jersey, and was one of the friendly Delawares with the whites at the massacre of Wyoming in 1778. On a few occasions he related his achievements. He had

been in many battles on the border, and taken many scalps. He related some of his acts of extreme cruelty, and a few of his barbarities inflicted upon the wives and children of the border settlers. He was with the other Greentown and Jerometown Indians in the battle of the Fallen Timbers, and, as related in Hill's History of Ashland County," gave this graphic account. It was in reply to a question of Allen Oliver, who asked him what he thought of Wayne as a white chief:

66

"Wayne be great chief. He be one devil to fight. Me hear his dinner horn way over there go toot, toot; then over here it go toot, toot; then way over side it go toot, toot. Then his soldiers run forward-shoot, shoot; then run among logs and brush. Indians have got to get out and run. Then come Long Knives with pistols and shoot, shoot. Indians run; no stop; Old Tom see too much fight to be trap-he run into woods-he run like devilhe keep run till he clear out of danger.

Wayne great fight-brave white chief. He be one devil."

While going through the description of the fight, "Old Tom" gesticulated and grinned. as much as if in the midst of the battle. Terror was evinced in the whole of the minie battle he was then fighting over, and being about the ugliest-looking Indian the settlers had ever seen, the effect of his speech was to the highest degree expressive.

The exact location of the Indian village Helltown is not known, but it was sup posed to be on the south line of what is now Green township, on the banks of the Clear fork of the Mohican. It probably derived its name from a Pennsylvania: captive who spoke the German language, in which "Hell" signifies clear or transparent, so called after the stream on which it was situated.

When Col. Crawford in the spring of 1782 invaded the Indian settlements of the upper Sandusky the Helltown Indians fled thither for safety. The village was the home of a number of well-known Delaware chiefs, among others Thomas Armstrong; also the occasional residence of the noted Capt. Pipe, one of Col. Crawford's executioners. In 1783 Thomas Armstrong, with the original inhab itants of Helltown (that village having been abandoned) and a few Mingoes and Mohawks, established the village of Greentown, some three miles west of the present village of Perrysville. It was on a bluff extending to the north banks of Black fork, or "Armstrong's" creek, almost entirely surrounded by alder marshes, and a very strong position. The huts, numbering about 150, were constructed of poles covered with bark, and irregularly placed around a knoll, with a playground in the centre, at the west side of which was built the council house and cemetery in a grove.

Up to 1795 it was a station on the route for captives on the way to Detroit and other points in the Indian Territory.

Two tragedies in the autumn of 1812 were enacted by the Indians not far from the old Indian village of Greentown. These were the murder of Martin Ruffiner, Frederic Zimmer (or in English Frederic Seymour) and family, on the Black fork of the Mohican, and the tragedy at the cabin of Mr. James Copus. Hill's "History of Ashland County" gives very full details. We here first take the briefer history as published on pages 429-30 in the first edition of this work. In a note there we stated that our informant for the first tragedy was Mr. Henry Nail, from whose lips, now just forty-two years ago, we derived it; and for the second, wa

said:

accurate

"We have three different accounts of this affair: one from Wyatt Hutchinson, of Guernsey, then a lieutenant in the Guernsey militia; one from Henry Nail, whe was with some of the wounded men the night following; and the last from a gentleman living in Mansfield at the time. Each differs in some essential particulars Much experience has taught us that it is almost impossible to get perfectly verbal narratives of events that have taken place years since, and which live on in memory." And to this remark of ours made in that long ago we here add the additional reason for conflicting testimony, viz., the rarity of perfect accuracy observation and strength of memory, combined with the faculty of clearness

statement:

The Massacre of the Ruffner Family.— There was living at this time-said Mr. Nail on the Black Fork of the Mohican, about half a mile west of where Petersburgh now is [now Mifflin], a Mr. Martin Ruffner. Having removed his family for safety, no person was with him in his cabin, excepting a bound boy. About two miles southeast stood the cabin of the Seymours. This family consisted of the parents-both very old people -a maiden daughter Catharine, and her brother Philip, who was a bachelor.

One evening Mr. Ruffner sent out the lad to the creek bottom, to bring home the cows, when he discovered four Indians and ran. They called to him, saying that they would not harm him, but wished to speak to him. Having ascertained from him that the Seymours were at home, they left, and he hurried back and told Ruffner of the circumstance; upon which he took down his rifle and started for Seymour's. He arrived there, and was advising young Seymour to go to the cabin of a Mr. Copus, and get old Mr. Copus and his son to come up and help take the Indians prisoners, when the latter were seen approaching. Upon this young Seymour passed out of the back door and hurried to Copus's, while the Indians entered the front door, with their rifles in hand.

The Seymours received them with an apparent cordiality, and the daughter spread the table for them. The Indians, however, did not appear to be inclined to eat, but soon arose and commenced the attack. Ruffner, who was a powerful man, made a desperate resistance. He clubbed his rifle, and broke the stock to pieces; but he fell before superior numbers, and was afterwards found dead and scalped in the yard, with two rifle balls through him, and several fingers cut off by a tomahawk. The old people and daughter were found tomahawked and scalped in the house.

In an hour or so after dark, young Seymour returned with Mr. Copus and son, making their way through the woods by the light of a hickory bark torch. Approaching the cabin, they found all dark and silent within. Young Seymour attempted to open the door, when it flew back. Reaching forward, he touched the corpse of the old man, and exclaimed in tones of anguish, "here is the blood of my poor father!" Before they reached the place, they heard the Indians whistling on their powder chargers, upon which they put out the light and were not molested.

These murders, supposed to have been committed by some of the Greentown Indians, spread terror among the settlers, who immediately fortified their cabins and erected several block-houses. Among the block-houses erected was Nails', on the Clear fork of the Mohican; Beams', on the Rocky fork; one on the site of Ganges, and a picketed house on the Black Fork, owned by Thomas Coulter.

At

The Copus Tragedy.-Shortly after this, a party of twelve or fourteen militia from Guernsey county, who were out on a scout, without any authority burnt the Indian village of Greentown, at this time deserted. night they stopped at the cabin of Mr. Copus, on the Black Fork, about nine miles from Mansfield. The next morning, as four of them were at a spring washing, a few rods from the cabin, they were fired upon by a party of Indians in ambush. They all ran for the house, except Warnock, who retreated in another direction, and was afterwards found dead in the woods, about half a mile distant. His body was resting against a tree, with his handkerchief stuffed in a wound in his bowels. Two of the others, George Shipley and John Tedrick, were killed and scalped between the spring. and the house. The fourth man, Robert Dye, in passing between the shed and cabin, suddenly met a warrior with his uplifted tomahawk. He dodged and escaped into the house, carrying with him a bullet in his thigh.

Mr. Copus at the first alarm had opened the door, and was mortally wounded by a rifle ball in his breast. He was laid on the bed, and the Indians shortly attacked the cabin. "Fight and save my family," exclaimed he, "for I am a dead man. The attack was fiercely made, and several balls came through the door, upon which they pulled up the puncheons from the floor and placed them against it. Mrs. Copus and her daughter went up into the loft for safety, and the last was slightly wounded in the thigh, from a ball fired from a neighboring hill. One of the soldiers, George Launtz, was in the act of removing a chunk of wood to fire through, when a ball entered the hole and broke his arm. After this, he watched and saw an Indian put his head from behind a stump. He fired, and the fellow's brains were scattered over it. After about an hour the Indians, having suffered severe loss, retreated. Had they first attacked the house, it is probable an easy victory would have been gained by them.

We now give the incidents of these tragedies, and in an abridged form, as told in the "County History:"

Martin Ruffner and brother-in-law Richard Hughes erected cabins near each other in the spring of 1812, about half a mile northwest of the present site of Mifflin. Mr. Frederick Zimmer, Sr., put up a cabin two and a half les southeast of Mr. Martin Ruffner and cupied it with his wife, daughter Catherine, Zimmer's son Philip Zimmer, aged 19, and

Michael Ruffner, brother of Martin, whom he hired to assist him. Martin Ruffner and a bound boy, Levi Berkinhizer, occupied the Ruffner cabin.

One day in September Michael Ruffner met two well-armed Indians near the Zimmer cabin, and being suspicious of their intentions he mounted a fleet horse and rode rapidly

Two handsome monuments in Mifflin township now mark the resting-places of the victims of these tragedies. The Ruffiner-Zimmer monument is ten miles southerly from Ashland, and the Copus monument twelve miles. They are so alike in structure that the engraving annexed gives a correct idea of the other.

These monuments were erected, at an expense of nearly $500, near the sites of the Securrences they commemorate. The project had its inception with Dr. S. Riddle, historian of the Ashland Pioneer Society, who interested its members, and the necessary sum was raised by subscription in this and in Richland county. The history of their dedication is thus given by him: