Bart Ridgeley: A Story of Northern OhioRiddle, A. G. (Albert Gallatin)
General
Bart Ridgeley: A Story of Northern Ohio
Riddle, A. G. (Albert Gallatin)
Ohio -- Fiction
He then proved that Cole left Massachusetts early in the spring of
1817, but failed to show when he reached Ohio, whether in 1817, or
1818. One man remembered to have seen Hiram Fowler at work for him
on a tree fence, along the back line of it, during the summer of his
arrival on the land. He also made proof, that at a very early day,
tree fences were about at least three sides of the land, thus forming
a cattle range, and evidencing possession and occupancy. He then
called McConough, of Bainbridge, and men bent eagerly forward to
gaze at the old Indian hunter, who had been a sharp-shooter on the
ill-fated "Lawrence," in Perry's sea fight, off Put-in-Bay, and who
was also with Gen. Harrison at the Thames; a quiet, compact, athletic,
swarthy man, a little dull and taciturn. He said he was first on the
ground in 1810 or 1811, and found a man by the name of Basil Windsor,
who lived in a small cabin by the spring, near which he had then two
small apple trees. He was there again, with John Harrington, in 1816.
They drove a herd of elk through an opening, into and through Basil's
yard, at the south side, and back into the woods north, until they
came to a tree fence, when they turned east, and were headed off by
another hedge, and the elk were too tired to get over; and there
in the angle they killed two or three, when it came on dark. That
Harrington lit a fire, staid by the slaughtered elk through the night,
to keep the wolves from devouring them, and that he, McConough, went
and staid with Basil. That Basil was a sort of hermit, who lived in
the woods and kept two or three cows. That on their way to Court a few
days ago, he and Harrington went to the premises of Cole, and found
his house near the old Basil spring, and that one of the apple trees
was still standing there. The other had been recently cut down.
Harrington, a still more celebrated hunter and pioneer, and who
furnished a good idea of old Leatherstocking, and who was with
Winchester at the battle of River Raisin, from which he escaped,
and was one of Harrison's scouts, had been often at Basil Windsor's.
Hunters often found shelter there. He was there both before and after
the war; and he fully corroborated McConough.
Old Bullock was then called, a heavy-framed, sluggish giant, of that
strong, old-fashioned type of head and face, now nearly out of date.
He, too, had served in the army, and was a famous hunter and trapper.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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