Francis Whiting Halsey

“ When the century had passed through its first quarter, Unadilla had become a thriving frontier settlement. Affording as it did a terminus for two great highways, the one to Catskill, the other to Ithaca, and with a navigable river giving an outlet to Southern markets for lumber and farm products, notable prosperity had been secured. As we have seen, two new bridges had been built across the river, a fine schoolhouse erected, and church societies established. There were thriving stores and hotels, woolen industries, blacksmith, cabinet and wagon shops, a hat factory, lawyers and physicians. ”

“ Such were the roads that established communication among the settlers—primitive highways the most of them, and greatly inferior to the turnpike that came in in 1800 as the model road for all this territory and which remained for many years the chief highway to many parts of central and southern New York. One of the earliest highways in the State west of the Hudson and south of the Mohawk was this one from Wattles’s Ferry to Catskill, and it stands as a historic landmark of that great turnpike era which began with the new century. ”

“ Howard was a citizen of the village for nearly sixty-five years: he came in 1827 and died in 1890. He was a native of Madison County, his father being Samuel Howard a native of Bridgewater, Massachusetts. He married Harriet Noble in 1837, their only surviving child being Dr. Frederick S. Howard of New York. Men and women can now recall the Fourth of July celebrations of their childhood to which Mr. Howard usually contributed the balloons made by him on his own premises. He was a man of bright and original mind, capable of varied and forceful wit, and had considerable knowledge of human nature. ”

“ How could that nation, which we have been told was the bulwark for that religion taught by the Prince of Peace, authorize such barbarity? How could that nation, which still wishes to lord itself over our minds and style itself the pattern of refinement, assist in those acts so revolting to human feelings? ”

“ When we say that in this inland New York village thrived for almost four score years a bit of New England transplanted in the west, we must add to the statement that it thrived in an isolation so complete that, what was best in New England culture, here came to florescence in full degree.
It is a common enough experience to find men and women showing a partial fondness for their early homes. Out of this isolation of Unadilla has sprung, I think, a very partial fondness for the place among those who knew it in the early forties, fifties and sixties. ”

“ The bay is a splendid one and the entrance puts me in mind of New York. The tide was going out and there was a terrible commotion of the water. The town is a small place yet but alive with persons. We are not discouraged about “the diggings” from what we hear. This is the windiest place I ever saw—worse than Unadilla Centre. We pitched our tents and remained here until Saturday 9th, when we left for the diggings intending to remain at Sacramento City a few days. We left Francisco about 5 o’clock and sailed up the bay about 30 miles and cast anchor for the night. ”

“ My first opportunity for treating a broken bone was the case of a young lady living two miles below Teedville, on Trout Creek, a sister of Mrs. H. B. Crooker of this village. On her return from a visit to her parents to resume her position in the woolen mill, then in operation at Crookerville, she was thrown from her carriage, breaking the bone between the knee and hip. In passing over the road to reach her I did not wonder at the accident; a worse road to be called a highway could not be found. I never had better success in all my experience in after practice. ”

“ Without intending in the least to detract from the fame of our own beautiful sisters of the north, I must in truth say that the handsomest, most queenly and dignified woman I ever saw was a full blooded Spanish lady, who entered the cathedral at Panama one morning, at early mass, followed by her female servant carrying a handsome piece of carpeting for her mistress to kneel upon during her devotional service. ”

“ One is not alone a native of his birthplace, but in some considerable degree a product. No fact is more familiar in biographies, whether of great or small lives, and for example in the life of Dickens. The fondness of Dickens for ships and salt water was life long because Dickens, like his own Copperfield, had been “born within sound of the sea and its eternal nevermore.” ”

“ Hayes was born in the house in which he died. Her home for some years was elsewhere, but Mr. Hayes spent all his days in this dwelling, which was part of his inheritance. Few lives have embraced so long a period of village history as these two. When this brother and sister first saw the light scarcely more than twenty houses were standing; the turnpike was still the main highway from the Hudson to this part of the state; lumbering was the chief industry and produce arks were making voyages down the Susquehanna. ”

“ John Woodruff, the fourth brother, spent some years as a clerk in the old brick store when a young man, but finally removed to Delhi where he became an eminent citizen and merchant.
More than sixty years ago, when the Masonic Hall stood on its original site, one of its occupants was Seleck H. Fancher, whose sudden death from heart failure in March, 1891, startled the community. He was found in his garden about eight o’clock in the morning with life extinct. He was a native of Connecticut and died at eighty-two years of age. Until the hour of his death, his life had been an active one. ”

“ Noah Gregory, whose son settled in that part of the town called Unadilla Centre, was a native of Norwalk, Connecticut, where he was born in 1796. He lived in Gilbertsville, and after him was named Gregory Hill. His son, Ebenezer Gregory, in 1823 married James Maxwell’s daughter and moved to a farm where he built the stone house that still stands in Unadilla Centre. He reared four sons and four daughters who have contributed for more than one generation familiar figures to the social and business life of the village. ”

“ Long will your country respect that valor which shielded her liberty from the attacks of an infuriated foe. May your country still reward you for those services performed a half century ago. Although the liberal intentions of our chief magistrate have been frustrated toward you for the present by the illiberality of a faction, yet I trust that the day is not far distant when you will acknowledge that republics are not always ungrateful. ”

“ Here stood the original village of Unadilla, a village of scattered farms, planted in 1772 and burned by the American soldiers under Colonel William Butler in 1778, when it had become a settlement of Indians, British Tories and runaway negroes who had driven out the original Scotch-Irish pioneers. To these lands came some of the first settlers who returned to the valley after the war, which was about 1784. On the paper mill site, saw and grist mills had been built within a few years and around them was gathered a thriving settlement. The mills were owned by Abimileck Arnold. ”

“ My father brought the first cooking stove into the town, and his house became as it were a hotel for many days, owing to the callers who came out of curiosity to see the wonderful “Jew’s Harp” cooking stove. Matches were unknown. Many and many a cold, stormy night, have I been called up to harness or unharness my father’s horse, and many a cold morning have I had to go to a neighbor’s forty or fifty rods away, for a shovel of live coals to start the morning fire.
My school days at Kortright were confined to the district school, and three years in a private school kept by the village clergyman. ”

“ On this corner in Roswell Wright’s store the business life of Samuel North in Unadilla was begun. His age was fourteen when he arrived in May, 1828, remaining in the store until he was twenty-one. The history of his family goes back to pioneer days in the valley of the Delaware. The Norths are of Long Island origin and of English ancestry. At Newtown the line comes down from Thomas to Benjamin and then to Robert, who in 1784, with twenty other persons, mostly from Long Island, set out for what is now the village of Walton by crossing the wilderness from Kingston to the Delaware. ”

“ They still exert their sway long after they have ceased to speak and toil.
The primary interest in these sketches now is, and must continue to be, local. And yet, in a sense, those quiet annals have wider value. Small as this village has remained, the charm of its site and the beauty of its streets have impressed all visitors. The place, moreover, stands otherwise apart, and stands with some eminence, as an example of a New York village at its best.
For three quarters of a century, Unadilla remained thoroughly isolated from the great world [10] beyond its borders. ”

“ The first child thus born was a son of Robert North. Mrs. North had wished to call him Samuel, and, in spite of the offer, the name Samuel was adopted. This boy went to Albany as a clerk in the Assembly, and afterwards became a lawyer, but died in early life. Long after this event Samuel’s brother Benjamin became the father of a son, in whom was revived the name of Samuel. This was Colonel North, who for many years was probably the most distinguished citizen of the village.
After leaving Unadilla when he became of age, Colonel North pursued his mercantile calling for a time in New York. ”