of three hundred families, and the log cabins were being replaced by frame houses.

Two other small settlements were formed in the Symmes Purchase in 1788 and 1789. Major Benjamin Stites purchased a tract of ten thousand acres at the mouth of Little Miami River, and landed here in November with a small company. They built a log fort and laid out a town which they called Columbia. For several years this was the most flourishing of the villages in the Miami Purchase, and seemed destined to become a great business centre, but the location of the garrison at Cincinnati, and also its choice as the county seat, gave that city a great advantage.

The other settlement was attempted under the direct supervision of Symmes. The place selected for the city was North Bend, so called because it is the most northern bend in the river in its southwestern portion. A landing was made here about the 1st of February, 1789. The city, as laid out on paper, was a very large one called Symmes, but the city never materialized. It continued to be the little village of North Bend. At first there was an inducement for the settlers to select this place, because a detachment of troops had been stationed here through the influence of Judge Symmes, but the soldiers remained only a short time and then went to Cincinnati, thus making the latter place much safer for the inhabitants, and settling the question of the supremacy in the three settlements.

These three settlements had much in common with Marietta and the villages in the Ohio Company's Purchase. The land regulations were much the same and there was the same desire to build cities. As a rule the settlers were from the Central States and many of them were Revolutionary soldiers; most of them proved to be good material for pioneers.

When Connecticut ceded its claims to western lands to the general government, it retained a tract in the northeastern part of Ohio, known as The Western Reserve. In 1792, the Connecticut government gave a strip of land

of five hundred thousand acres in extent, lying across the western end of the Reserve to recompense the people who had suffered losses on account of British raids during the Revolution. These were called the "Fire Lands." The next year the remainder of the Reserve was offered for sale, but did not find a purchaser for several years. There were several reasons for this delay. It was considered a long way in the wilderness, and this section of the territory was little known. A second reason was that the title of Connecticut to the land was not altogether clear. In 1795 this tract was sold to a company of five persons for $1,200,000. This money became the Connecticut School Fund. There had been no survey of the land but it was supposed to contain four million acres, which was found to be about a million acres more than it really contained. This company constituted the Connecticut Land Company. The State transferred any right which it had in the lands to this Company, but gave only a quit claim deed, leaving the work of extinguishing the Indian titles to the Company.

The first group of settlers from Connecticut to enter this wilderness was led by Moses Cleaveland, of Canterbury, Connecticut. It consisted of a total of fifty persons, some few taking their families with the intention of settling. They met the Indians at Buffalo and purchased their title to the land. The sum paid was £500 York currency, part in cash and part in goods. In the list of goods was included one hundred gallons of whiskey. But the pioneers had some left, for on July 4, 1796, they celebrated the national holiday at Conneaut Creek with "several pails of grog," and what is more astonishing they "supped and retired in good order." Surveying was begun and carried on through the season, and in the summer, at the mouth of the Cuyahoga, the foundation of a future city was laid and named Cleaveland in honor of their leader.

Serious complications arose over questions of jurisdiction; the settlers did not know whether they were self-governing, under the control of Connecticut, or under the direct

jurisdiction of the United States. If the Ordinance of 1787 extended to them, then the United States had control and the State of Connecticut had no right to sell the land, so that their titles were of no use. These matters were settled in 1800, when the title of Connecticut to the soil was confirmed and jurisdiction was given to the United States. During this period when there was no established law, there was little trouble, because the settlers had been trained in Connecticut habits and customs. In several cases a township government had been organized before a body of emigrants left home. Another reason for the tranquillity of the Western Reserve was the small number of settlers in the great wilderness, for there was little inducement for emigrants to come where land titles were uncertain. In 1798 there were but fifteen families on the Reserve. The largest settlement was at Youngstown; Cleaveland had only three families. By the end of 1800, however, the Reserve had a population of thirteen hundred and grew very rapidly from that time. Governor St. Clair, September 22, 1800, issued a proclamation establishing the Western Reserve as the County of Trumbull, and it became a part of the Northwest Territory.

CHAPTER VII

THE ORGANIZATION AND ADMISSION OF THE FIRST NEW STATES TO THE UNION

KENTUCKY grew very rapidly in population in the closing years of the century. The land was fertile and could be reached with comparative ease by way of the Ohio. Very important also was the security from the Indians compared with the conditions existing on the northern banks after 1787. In 1784, there were probably thirty thousand settlers, in more than fifty settlements, in Kentucky. By 1787, when settlements began in Ohio, Kentucky had a population of about eighty thousand. But this rapidly increasing population was not satisfied with the government it had. When the early settlements were established they had no separate government, but were regarded as a part of Fincastle County, Virginia. In 1776, Kentucky County was set off from this and Harrodsburg made the county seat. this way Virginia recognized the existence of the western people. With the increase in population, one county was found too large for proper administration, therefore, in 1781 the "District of Kentucky" was divided into three counties by Act of the Virginia Legislature. Jefferson County stretched along Ohio River for two hundred miles between Kentucky and Green Rivers; Fayette County along the Ohio from the Kentucky to the Big Sandy Rivers. Lincoln County comprised the southeastern portions of the present State of Kentucky. These were organized with a civil and military government like the other Virginian counties. Each

county had a colonel, lieutenant-colonel, and surveyor. The three colonels were justices of their respective counties. But the political conditions remained unsatisfactory. Some of the settlements were five hundred miles from the capital of Virginia and action upon any administrative matters which had to be referred to the home government was greatly delayed. The Virginian government was so far away that the needs of the Kentucky settlers, from the nature of the case, were not understood and appreciated. It often took months before an answer was obtained from the capitol concerning some question of importance in the civil or military administration. The conviction was forced on Kentuckians that they were an isolated colony, with interests in many cases different from those of the home State. During the Revolutionary period Kentucky had received very little aid from Virginia, because the latter was not able to give it; and yet the Kentucky military operations were greatly hampered by the necessity of receiving orders from Virginia. For these reasons, as Kentucky emerged into the condition of a settled country, there was, among its inhabitants, a strong feeling that it ought to become a separate State, and that only as a separate State could it be free from the delays. and irritations caused by its dependence upon the Virginian government.

With the increase of its population Kentucky took on the habits of a civilized community and its productions exceeded the amount required for its own needs. It wished to export its wheat and other products and the natural channel of commerce was Mississippi River. But the river, below the thirty-first degree of latitude, was held by Spain, which was unfriendly to the United States and therefore held in its own hands the commerce of the river. This question of the navigation of the Mississippi was the most important matter in the politics of Kentucky. If the river was closed to the people of that territory there was no possibility of its growth, for the eastern market was too far away and the journey was too difficult. The bond