Stillwater Meeting-House

Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1999 15:16:00 -0500
From: Gary Wade [email protected]
Subject: Stillwater Meeting-House

"Friends' Stillwater Meeting-House" by Jonathan Schofield Taken from "History of Belmont and Jefferson Counties"

About one-half of the eastern part of Warren township was originally settled almost exclusively by Friends, commonly called Quakers. They came chiefly from the southern states, many of the pioneers being the heads of young and growing families, were stimulated to the movement by a desire to remove without the blighting influence of human slavery, against which their religious principles required them to bear a consistent testimony, and being unwillng that their children should grow up in the midst of its corrupting influences, they left, in many instances good lands in a genial clime, to set themselves down to a life of privations and hardships incident to pioneer life in the forest north of the Ohio river. Robert Plummer and family were probably the first Friends who settled here, about the year 1801. They came from Frederick county, Maryland; and family tradition tells us that five day's time was necessarily occupied by them in making their way through from the open road where Morristown now is to this neighborhood. There was no road, and a way had to be made as they progressed. From the lips of Robert Hodgin, now of Barnesville, seventy-four years of age, we get the following tradition: That his father and William Patten, in company, left their homes in Georgia and came prospecting in 1802; that they crossed the Ohio river at Cincinnati and looked over the Miami country, but did not like it, thinking that it would be sickly. They therefore came on to Belmont and Jefferson counties, and determined this to be the locality for their future homes; therefore they made arrangements with Jonathan Taylor, a Friend, of Mt. Pleasant township, Jefferson county, to secure them a section of land from the government, as no less than a section was then subject to entry, and they returned home to make preparation for moving the next season. They had to swim their horses through all the unfordable streams this side of Cincinnati. The next season (in 1803) came the Hodgins' that is, Robert's father, William and his brother Stephen, the Pattens, the Todds and Bailey Hays, with their families. (The Hayses were not Friends, and Deborah Stubbs, a young woman, emigrated, and Joseph Stubbs, Deborah's father, came along prospecting). Their route lay through Virginia, and their vehicles of conveyance were the well-known southern one-horse carts. They camped of nights on their journey. Within the next five years, from 1803 to 1808, they came in companies-the Williams', part of the Millhouses Childrees, Sidwells, Thomases and Vernons, from Georgia; the Starbucks, but recently from Nantucket; the Pattersons, Bundys, Stantons, Edgertons, Doudnas, Boswells, Coxes, Brocks, Outlands, Halls, Colliers, Middletons and Hausons, from North Carolina; the Baileys, Davies, some of the Vernons, and Hickses, from Southeastern Virginia, and the Clendennens, Strahls, Smiths and Whites, from Pennsylvania. The exact dates of the arrival of the various families before 1808 is difficult now to ascertain. For after additions we extract from minutes of the Stillwater monthly meeting: In Fifth Month, 1808, certificates of membership were received for William Patterson and wife Elizabeth, the latter a minister in unity, with their five minor children, from Short Creek. In the Sixth Month, from same meeting, Joseph Patterson Sr., wife and three children, Mary Edgerton, Elizabeth and Jemima Patterson. Seventh Month, Stephen Bailey, from Dinwiddie county, Virginia, and Mary Hicks with five sons and daughter from Sussex county, Virginia. Eighth Month, Richard Kerney, eastern Pennsylvania, Tenth and Eleventh Months, from Short Creek, Benjamin Patterson, Jr., Joel Patterson and John Patterson. Twelfth Month, John Beck, wife and seven children, from Gleason county, Va., and in the First Month of 1809, Hannah and Ann Rogers, from Cecil county, Md. Also in 1809, John Purvis and Hezekiah Starbuck, from North Carolina, James Brock and wife, Peter Sears and Benjamin Watkins, from Dinwiddie county, Va.; William Blocksom, wife and six children from Plainfield monthly meeting; Henry Barnes, from Concord, and Jacob Parker and wife, Benjah Parker and George Parker, from Short Creek. In 1810, Sarah Williams with five sons and three daughters, and Henry Ballenger, from Pipe creek monthly meeting; Philip Strahl, wife, five sons and three daughters, Rachel Pickering and Ann Edgerton, from Short creek; Titus Shotwell, wife, three sons and two daughters, Ann Taylor, Joel Gilbert and wife, Abel Gilbert, wife and two daughters, and Sarah Cox, from Plainfield; Jeremiah Cook, wife and two daughters, William Satterthwaite, Jacob Pickering, from Concord. In 1811, Anderson and Thomas Arnold, Joel Judkins, wife and daughter, Carolus Judkins, wife, five sons and one daughter, Edward Thornboro, Jacob Crew, wife, three sons and one daughter, Isaac Crew, wife and daughter, from North Carolina; Hugh Wilson, Richard Fawcett and daughter, John Gilbert, wife, one son and two daughters, from Plainfield; Thos. Webster, from Little Britain, Pa.; Mary Taylor, from Exeter, Pa.; Samuel Yocum, wife, one daughter and six sons, from Short creek monthly meeting; Jesse Bailey, wife, two sons and four daughters, Reuben Watkins, wife and five sons, Sarah Bailey, one son and two daughters, from Dinwiddie county, Va.; Joseph Garretson, wife, two sons and one daughter, from Concord.

Enjoy!

Gary

Here is some more on Stillwater...

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