CHAPTER XI: DAYTON IN THE CIVIL WAR
THE Opening of the War – Fall of Sumter – Recruiting – Dayton Light Guards – Light Artillery – Lafayette Guards – Departure of Troops – Anderson Guards – Dayton Riflemen – Zouave Rangers – Buckeye Guard – State Guard – Camp Corwin – Camp Dayton – Families of Soldiers Cared For – Advancing Kirby Smith – R. C. Schenck Elected to Congress – Union League Formed – Arrest of Vallandigham – Journal Office Mobbed – Procession of Wood-Wagons – Women’s Work for the Soldiers – The Home-Guard – Return of Companies A and E – Another Call for Troops – Last Draft of the War – Lee’s Surrender – Assassination of Lincoln – Admiral Schenck – Rear-Admiral Greer – Paymaster McDaniel – National Military Home – Soldier’s Monument.
THE War of the Rebellion did not come upon the country like a sudden summer shower. The great clouds gathered slowly, and hung dark and menacing long before the storm broke. There were enough men of both parties in Dayton who had accepted the decision of the people in the election of Mr. Lincoln to make a city sternly loyal and practically helpful to the Government, yet there were also many firm in their devotion to States’ rights and bitter in their opposition to the war; and the Third Ohio District was represented by a man who had proclaimed as his position that “if any one or more of the States of The Union should at any time secede, for reasons of the sufficiency and justice of which before God and the great tribunal of history they alone may judge, much as I should deplore it, I never would, as a Representative in Congress, vote one dollar of money whereby one drop of American blood should be shed in a civil war.” So there was a season of suspense; the people waited with bated breath; men eyed one another with grave distrust. With Southern confidence at its height, and Northern courage at its lowest point, Mr. Lincoln began his journey to Washington. The people, waiting for a sign, watched the quiet progress, read the tender words to the South, the strong and temperate inaugural, and of the refusal to recognize the Southern commissioners. They also read events, and began to see the patience and self-control, the grand courage and wisdom, of their leader, who, as is now clear, “came as one appointed to a great duty, not with rashness, not with weakness, not with bravado, nor shrinking, but in the perfect confidence of a just cause, and with the stainless conscience of a good man.”
When Sumter fell, the excitement in Dayton was painful in its intensity. The people were full of just wrath, and eager to avenge the insult to the flag. If there was a citizen who had not heard the news, he read it in the morning paper with the proclamation calling for seventy-five thousand men beside it. Recruiting was begun at once. Four days later three companies were starting for Columbus – the Dayton Light Guards, Captain Pease; Light Artillery, Captain Childs, and the Lafayette Guards, Captain Deister, marching to the train through great, cheering crows, anxious to show that for once all were united to defend the country. The men who had been loyal by reason of intelligence, judgment, and expediency experienced a new feeling as the hot wave of enthusiasm swept over the land. On the 18th of April Colonel E. A. King was appointed to take charge of the camp at Columbus. On the same day the Anderson Guards opened recruiting lists. By the next night sixty-four men had enrolled and the company organized and left the next morning. The streets were crowded with people, singing “The Star-Spangled Banner,” cheering and waving handkerchiefs and flags; and it must be confessed there were tears among the women as they took up their heavy task of watching and waiting and working. The men filed out of the armory through the shouting crowd, and soon another hundred had gone, making almost five hundred men (four hundred and eighty-five) in answer to the first call for three months’ volunteers.
Upon their arrival at Columbus, the first three Dayton companies were assigned to the First Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry. This regiment was ordered and started to Washington April 19, had its first fight at Vienna, and covered itself with glory at Bull Run. The Dayton Riflemen and Anderson Guards were ordered to Camp Jackson, and later assigned to the Eleventh Ohio Volunteer Infantry and sent to help construct Camp Dennison, where they were kept drilling for six or seven weeks.
In June Company A (the Riflemen) reënlisted for three years. Part of Company G reënlisted and part returned to Dayton.
These were busy, unselfish days for those at home. The doctors offered their services free to families of volunteers, and the druggists offered to fill prescriptions without charge. The sum of five thousand dollars was quickly raised for immediate wants. The Board of County of Commissioners and the City Council each appropriated ten thousand dollars for the soldier’s families. Other large sums of money were constantly coming in. All sorts of donations were made. The ladies’ societies went to work with a will. No one was too old or too young to work in some way.
The Zouave Rangers tendered their services as a home-guard, were accepted, and serve for three months. The Buckeye Guard was in camp at Hamilton for a few weeks, came back to fill up their regiment for three years’ service, and returned within ten days. Captain Gunckel raised a company, which was ordered to Camp Dennison May 19. On the 22nd of April, at Harrisburg, Lieutenant A. McD. McCook, of the Regular Army, was elected colonel of the First Ohio Regiment, E. A. Parrott lieutenant-colonel, and Captain J. S. Hughes major. On the evening of May 11 the people were listening to the farewell concert of the Regimental Band, who were to be thereafter musicians of the First Ohio Regiment.
Immediately after the departure of the three months’ troops in April, militia companies were formed. Each ward had its company of home-guards. There was also the State Guard, composed of men over forty-five years of age.
Through the summer of 1861 Dayton was full of soldiers. Little else was thought of. Camp Corwin was located two and a half miles east of the city. On the 23d of August the first three companies of the First Ohio, - Dayton men, - and a little later the Dayton Cavalry, were ordered there. On August 20 a company marched in from the northern part of the county and camped in the Fair Grounds. In October the Government gave notice that it could not furnish blankets for the First Ohio. In a week they had been provided by the citizens of Dayton and the regiment was on its way to join General McCook’s brigade and Camp Corwin was abandoned. During the month of August there were fourteen recruiting offices opened in Dayton. By the 29th of the month Dayton had sent one thousand two hundred and sixty-nine men to the front, out of an enrollment of three thousand one hundred and seventeen.
It is not possible in a few pages to follow all the Dayton soldiers through the war. Wherever brave men were needed they went gladly, and saw their share of service in Kentucky, Tennessee, and later on in the Shenandoah Valley and mountains of Virginia, with Grant before Richmond, with Thomas at Nashville, and marching through Georgia with Sherman.
The year 1862 was a dark one for the national cause. Recruiting for the Ninety-third began in July of that year. In it were four Dayton companies. Charles Anderson became the colonel and Hiram Strong lieutenant-colonel. Great interest was felt in this regiment in Dayton. Ten thousand dollars were raised at one meeting of the citizens in July was a fund for the families of volunteers. The rendezvous for the Ninety-third was Camp Dayton, afterwards located at the Fair Grounds. The regiment was ordered to Lexington, Kentucky, and left Dayton August 23. In September the camp rapidly filled up, and it was again necessary to supply the soldiers with blankets and clothing. There were also at that time five hundred families of volunteers dependent partly or entirely upon the public for means of support.
The advance of Kirby Smith towards Cincinnati thoroughly aroused Dayton. The Governor called out the militia of the river counties. All armed men who could be in readiness by the 4th of September would be accepted by General Wallace. Dayton was urged to send to Cincinnati by that day every man who could get away. In answer to these appeals, each ward raised at least one company for the defense of the State. Men came from all parts of the State, with all kinds of arms, and in all sorts of dress, so that they were called the “Squirrel-Hunters.” Kirby Smith retreated southward, and these soldiers never knew what they might have done. One effect of this rush of citizen soldiers to the front was the postponement of the draft which had been ordered, first to the middle of September, then to the 1st of October, by which time Dayton had been able to fill up her quota.
The next excitement was over the election to Congress of General Robert C. Schenck from the Third Ohio District.
A Union League was formed in Dayton in March, 1863. Much had been done in Dayton since the war began for the support of the families of the soldiers. All sorts of entertainments were given and money was raised in every possible way. The various ladies’ aid societies did noble work through the winters of 1862 and 1863. In April, 1863, there was an immense procession into Dayton of farm wagons loaded with wood and provisions brought by the farmers as their donation to the relief committee for the soldier’s families.
On the 5th of May, 1863, Mr. Vallandigham was arrested by order of General Burnside and taken to Cincinnati to be tried by a military commission for violation of “General Order No. 38,” in which occurred this statement: “The habit of declaring sympathy for the enemy will no longer be tolerated in this department. Persons committing such offenses will at once be arrested with a view to being tried as above stated, or sent beyond our lines into the lines of their friends. It must be distinctly understood that treason, expressed or implied, will not be tolerated in this department.” The arrest of Mr. Vallandigham ensued, and it was followed the next night by the burning of the Journal office by a mob. Dayton was at once placed under martial law by order of General Burnside, and remained so until the 21st of June.
If there was a man in Dayton who had not felt a personal interest in the war, he must have come to his senses when told on July 13 that General Morgan was within a day’s march of the city. Martial law was at once proclaimed by the Mayor. All of the original militia was called out by the Governor and ordered to Camp Dennison. Dayton sent two companies. Major Keith started at midnight for Hamilton with two companies of infantry. Such other citizens as had horses and guns organized as scouts to patrol the roads. The six months’ cavalry recruits went in pursuit of and captured fifteen of the raiders. The men at home threw out pickets and patroled the surrounding country. As it happened, Morgan’s men did not come near Dayton until the 27th of the month, when six car-loads of them passed through the city as prisoners.
Colonel King, a gallant soldier of two wars, who was killed while commanding a brigade in the second day’s battle of Chickamauga, and whose body, lashed to a caisson, had been brought from the field by his soldiers, was buried from his home in Dayton with military honors on the last day of January, 1864.
During the early months of 1864 most of the regiments in which Dayton men had enlisted reënlisted for three years longer and were at home on furloughs. An incident about this time was the mobbing of the Empire office by a few soldiers at home on leave. On the 11th of May another draft occurred. Dayton had filled her quota excepting in one ward. Before the men were ordered to report, that ward also secured the requisite number of recruits.
There was another grand procession of wood-wagons in October, 1863. They brought in three hundred and twenty-five loads of wood and fifty-six wagons of farm produce. The boys of Dayton organized companies to saw and split the wood for the soldier’s families. In the fall of 1863 preparations began for a grand soldier’s fair by all the ladies’ aid societies. It was opened the night before Christmas, and was a brilliant success, artistically, socially, and financially. The total receipts amounted to almost twenty thousand dollars.
In the first days of the war the women took up their task with cheerful enthusiasm. They were proud and smiling when the soldiers marched away carrying the banners they had fashioned. They made shirts and pretty pin-cushions, held fairs and bazaars, fed the hungry troops as the passed through the city, and unconsciously made out of the early days of impatient waiting and drilling in Camp Dayton bright memories for camp-fires and lonely marches. They learned to do without many a dear face and many a helping hand. But when the call came to be for bandages and lint – when the talk was more of hospital than of camp – the work went on, but it was often done in the shadow of great terror, with brave, trembling hands. And when one soldier after another came home to die, or limping back on crutches, or with an empty sleeve, - when “killed” was written after names like Strong, King, Bruen, Forrer, and Birch, the tragedy of war stood revealed.
The professional and business men, who had organized as a home-guard, were surprised one fine morning in April (the 25th), 1864, to find themselves under orders from Governor Brough to take the field for one hundred days. Colonel Lowe at once summoned his regiment – the Second – to rendezvous at the Fair Grounds. The Twelfth Regiment was called to the same place. They left Dayton on the 11th and 12th of May for Camp Chase, where the two regiments were consolidated under Colonel Lowe and ordered to Baltimore for garrison duty in the United States forts near that city. After three months of faithful service they were ordered back to Camp Chase, and mustered out on August 25.
The first veterans to return to Dayton after three years’ service were Company A, Eleventh Ohio, and Company E, Twenty-four Ohio regiments. They came June 27, 1864, - a handful of men, but their welcome home was an ovation. In July the President called for five hundred thousand volunteers. On the 20th of the month Governor Brough called for twenty new regiments from the State of Ohio. It thus again became the duty of Dayton to raise her quota. Large bounties were offered, and every effort made to avoid a draft; still four wards failed to secure their proportion. After the draft (September 21), money was raised and substitutes enlisted. On the 19th of December the President called for three hundred thousand more men. The bounties offered were very high, and enlistments quite brisk from this time. The quota of some of the wards not being quite full, the last draft of the war was made March 30, 1865.
Those who had watched through dark days and long, stormy nights, swathe clouds beginning to break and the tide of victory setting in. With Farragut in Mobile Bay, Sherman in Atlanta, Grant before Richmond, and Sheridan dashing through the Shenandoah Valley, the country could but join in the “high hope for the future” which Mr. Lincoln guardedly expressed in his second in augural address. It had been long years since Dayton had dared to be so happy as on the night of April 9, when the news of Lee’s surrender was shouted through the streets by eager voices, and carried on the air as far as roaring cannon and ringing bells could take it. The war was over. Governor Brough set aside the 14th of the month as a day of thanksgiving. This was grandly celebrated in Dayton by services in the churches, a procession containing veterans with their tattered flags, and by fireworks and illuminations. The next morning brought the news that Lincoln was shot. The people were dumb with grief; the flags that had flaunted so proudly the day before now hung at half-mast, and festoons of black took the place of gay devices on public and private buildings. On the 19th of the month religious services were held in honor of the dead President.
Dayton enlisted very few men for the navy, but she has some names in the register that cannot be forgotten. Admiral James F. Schenck – “the old Admiral,” as he came to be called – was a unique character. He entered the United States Navy as midshipman in 1825. He came to Dayton in 1836, and bought a house for his family on the corner of First and Ludlow streets, an old-fashioned, comfortable home, where the children came to play in the shady garden, rolling down the hill at the side, or lying idle in the long grass, always undisturbed and quite welcome. When the owner came from a cruise in the West Indies, in the Mediterranean, or to the Sandwich Islands, the coast of Africa, china, Japan, or Brazil, the little front yard was scarcely large enough for the friends who loved to gather between the wide-open door and the gate that never shut and listen through long summer evenings to tales of other lands and people, seen with shrewd eyes and told with dry, caustic with in original and characteristic language. In 1845 Lieutenant Schenck joined the Congress, on which he served at the capture of Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and San Pedro, California. He also participated in the capture of Guaymas and Mazatlan, Mexico, and was command of the frigate St. Lawrence, and joined the blockading squadron at Key West. In 1864 Commodore Schenck hoisted his flag on board the Powhatan and led a division of the squadron at the bombardment of Fort Fisher. He was made rear-admiral in 1868, and placed upon the retired list in the following year. Admiral Schenck died at his home in Dayton on the 21st of December, 1882.
Rear-Admiral Greer, who retired at the head of the navy in February, 1895, was a Dayton man who sailed in many waters and saw many lands, from Africa to Greenland, from China to the Mediterranean. He fought through the war, assisting in the removal of Mason and Slidell from the Trent, commanding two ironclads and leading a division from Admiral Porter’s squadron past Vicksburg, and also serving on the Red River expedition.
Paymaster Charles A. McDaniel died in Dayton in February, 1894. He left college to enter the army, in which he served through the early years of the war. Later he entered the navy, in which he had made an honorable record and many friends, when in the prime of life he faced suffering and death with the patience and quiet courage of a brave man.
At the close of the war there were hospitals in many of the large cities where wounded soldiers received the tenderest and most skilled care. That these might be continued on a broader, more enduring basis, the soldiers’ homes were devised and incorporated under an act of Congress. The committee appointed by the Board of Managers to select a site for the Central Branch reported April 11, 1867, recommended that offered by Dayton. Dayton was decided upon and four hundred acres bought about two miles west, on high ground overlooking the city, the citizens contributing twenty thousand dollars to the purchase. By December, 1867, the place was ready for occupation. General Ingraham being detailed as acting governor, and during the first year one thousand two hundred and fifty disabled soldiers were cared for. The first gift to the new home was that of a fine library and pictures given by Mrs. Mary Lowell Putnam in memory of her son, who fell at Ball’s Bluff. After the barracks the first necessity was a hospital. Year by year handsome buildings were added, new land was bought, and the grounds artistically laid out, until now the Home is not only fulfilling its mission of grateful and loving protection of disabled soldiers, but has also become one of the most beautiful spots in the country. It is connected with Dayton by pleasant drives and by steam and electric roads. The Home was visited last year by over three hundred fifty thousand people. The number of men cared for in the past year was six thousand seven hundred and thirty-nine.
The Home has been fortunate in its governors – Colonel Brown, whose occasional visits are hailed with delighted by the men who were under his care for years; General Patrick, who died at his post, like the grand old soldier he was; and Colonel Thomas, whose administration is making its own record of wise and careful management.
The homes contain more inmates and are more needed every year, as the soldiers of thirty years ago grow to be old men; but the death-rate also increases, the ratio of deaths per thousand of number cared for being, in the past year, 47.65, and the sentinel on the beautiful monument in the cemetery watches over long rows of head-boards that must represent regiments.
Before the close of the war a monument in Dayton to her fallen heroes was talked of. Several committees were appointed but it was not until after the organization of the Old Guard that much could be accomplished. This organization of veterans mad a valiant effort. Finally, it was suggested that a law, raising the money by taxation, might be secured through the Legislature, subject to the approval of the people. General T. J. Wood, who was himself one of the bravest of soldiers, and had led his men through many bloody battles, who felt an interest in all soldiers and in his adopted city, was chairman of the trustees. He, assisted by Mr. D. B. Corwin, drafted a bill which, made more general, became a law on the 8th of April, 1881. This law was endorsed at the following October election. The contract was awarded in June, 1883, and the beautiful monument at the corner of Main and Water streets (now Monument Avenue) was dedicated with ceremony on the occasion of the soldiers’ and sailors’ reunion on the last day of July, 1884, as “the memorial of Montgomery County to her soldiers.”
COLONEL ISRAEL LUDLOW ¹
ISRAEL LUDLOW was born at Long Hill, Morris County, New Jersey, in 1766. He was the youngest son of Cornelius Ludlow, who was a lieutenant-colonel in a New Jersey troop in the War of the Revolution. The family was of English descent, the ancestor coming from Hill Deverill, in Wilshire, England, to this country in the seventeenth century.
In 1787, when Mr. Ludlow was twenty-one or twenty-two years of age, he received the following letter from the Surveyor-General of the United States:
“To Israel Ludlow, Esq.
“DEAR SIR: I enclose to you an ordinance of Congress of the 20th inst., by which you will observe they have agreed to the sale of a large tract of land which the New Jersey Society have contracted to purchases. As it will be necessary to survey the boundary of this tract with all the convenient speed, that the United States may receive the payment for the same, I propose to appoint you for that purpose, being assured of your abilities, diligence, and integrity. I hope you will accept it, and desire that you will furnish me with an estimate of the expense, and inform me what moneys will be necessary to advance to you to enable you to execute the same.
“I am, my dear sir,
“Yours,
“THO. HUTCHINS
“Surveyor-General, U. S.”
He accepted his appointment, and received his instructions and an order on the frontier post for a sufficient escort to enable him to prosecute the survey; but the extreme weakness of the military force then in the northwest, and the dangerous duty upon which he was employed, caused General Harmar to write that he regretted to be unable to comply with the directions, on account of the small force at his command; and, further, that if he were able to furnish to guards, it would be imprudent for Colonel Ludlow to go into the country which he was survey, as at that time there were large numbers of Indians hunting there at that season, and that the survey would have be deferred until the result of a treaty which was then being made was known. This reply was sent from Fort Harmar, August 28, 1788.
“The surveys prescribed by the instructions of Hutchins in 1787 were prosecuted notwithstanding the hostility of the savages and the deficiency of escort, but with the inevitable delay attending the movements of small parties where precautions from danger so materially engross the attention.”
The following letter to General Hamilton explains the slow progress of the survey, and presents in a striking manner scenes of pioneer exposure and hardship:
“PHILADELPHIA, May 5, 1792.
“SIR: The unexpected delays that have attended my executing the surveys of the Ohio and Miami companies, together with your letters which I have received from time to time, urging my speedy exertions to effect the business, induces me to explain to you the cause of the delay.
“In November, 1790, I was honored with your letter of instruction at this place. I proceeded immediately to Fort Harmar, being possessed of General Knox’s letter or order to the commandant for an escort. On my way, at Fort Pitt, I saw Major Doughty, who, after becoming acquainted with my business, informed me that there was no doubt but that an escort would be
¹ Most of the material for the following sketch is taken from a memoir of Charlotte Chambers (Mrs. Israel Ludlow), written by her grandson Louis Garrard in 1856, and has been kindly furnished by Mr. William S. Ludlow, of Cincinnati, Ohio, a grandson of Colonel Ludlow. The greatest portion of “Early Dayton” being already in type when the information was received, the insertion of this sketch near the end of the volume was made necessary. The prominence of Colonel Ludlow in the early history of the Miami region as well as in the founding of Dayton, renders the account here given especially valuable. It is regretted that no portrait of the Colonel is in existence.
furnished on my arrival at Fort Harmar, upon which I supplied myself with chain-carriers and other hands necessary, packhorses, corn, provision, and camp equipage for the approaching cold season.
“On my arrival at Fort Harmar I found that no escort could be obtained. Major Zeigler, who commanded, gave me his answer in writing, which was that he did not consider the troops then under his command more than sufficient to guard the settlement of Marietta, the Indians having shortly before that defeated and broken up one of their frontier stations. Of course he could not comply with the order of General Knox and my request. (A copy of that letter I inclosed to you.) Upon that information, from necessity I gave up the pursuit at that time, and proceeded to Fort Washington, supposing I could execute the Miami survey.
“Discharging my hired men and packhorses, I applied to General Harmar who then commanded, for protection while surveying the Miami tract. He informed me he did not consider his whole command a sufficient escort for my purpose. (A copy of his answer I forwarded to you.) On the arrival of General St. Clair in May following, I made an official application for fifteen men or more, should it be convenient, to accompany me as an escort while surveying the Miami and Ohio tracts. He assured me that he considered the execution of this survey a matter of the highest interest and importance to the United States, and that he would make every effort to assist me with a sufficient guard, but that it was then impracticable. (His letter I will forward to you.) Thus the business was again put off until the 20th of October following, when I was favored with the services of fifteen men, commanded by a sergeant, with whom I proceeded to execute the Ohio Company’s survey. I succeeded, and returned to Fort Washington, but with the loss of six of the escort, and leaving in the woods all my packhorses and their equipage, and being obliged to make a raft of logs to descend the Ohio as far as Limestone from opposite the mouth of the Great Sandy River.
“On my arrival at Fort Washington I again applied for protection to proceed in the Miami survey. That assistance was refused by Major Zeigler, who then commanded. (His letter I will produce.) My reputation, as well as the public good, being in some measure affected by the delay of the business, I was constrained to have recourse to an effort which my instruction did not advise, viz.: to attempt making the survey by the aid of three active woodsmen – to assist as spies and five notice of any approaching danger. My attempts proved unsuccessful. After extending the western boundary more than one hundred miles up the Miami River, the deep snows and cold weather rendered our situation too distressing, by reason of my men having their feet frozen and unfit to furnish game for supplies. In consequence, we returned to Fort Washington. The cold weather abating, I made another attempt, extending the east boundary as far as the line intersected the Little Miami River, where we discovered signs of the near approach of Indians, and having but three armed men in company, induced me to return again to Fort Washington, which I found commanded by General Wilkinson, to whom I applied for an escort, which was denied me. (His letter I have the honor to inclose to you with the others.)
“I now have the satisfaction to present to you the whole of the survey of the Ohio and part of the Miami purchases, executed agreeable to instructions. Any further information that my be required respecting the causes of delay of the above business, I presume may be had from Generals St. Clair and Harmar, who are now here present.
“I am, sir, yours respectfully,
“ISRAEL LUDLOW.
“HON, ALEX. HAMILTON, Secretary of the Treasury.”
In the winter of 1789 he became associated with Matthias Denham and Robert Patterson in the proprietorship of the future Cincinnati to the extent of one-third interest, and proceeded to lay out the town. In September, 1794, he surveyed the plat of a town adjacent to Fort Hamilton, and was sole owner. In August, 1795, Generals St. Clair, Wilkinson, and Dayton, and Colonel Ludlow purchased from John Cleves Symmes the seventh and eighth ranges of land between the two Miamis, including the site of Dayton, and in November of the same year Colonel Ludlow laid out the town of Dayton, naming it after one of his associates. He was also the owner of a large extent of land in the vicinity, on the banks of Mad and Miami rivers. He was commissioned to fix the boundary lines between the United States and the Indians in accordance with the treaty of Greenville, made by General Wayne in 1795. This was done in 1797.
Colonel Ludlow was married in 1796, at Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, to Charlotte, daughter of General James Chambers. His death occurred at his residence, at that time a short distance outside of Cincinnati, but now included in the city, January 20, 1804, when he was but thirty-eight years of age. He was buried in the Presbyterian burying-ground at Public Square, Cincinnati, which was bounded by Fourth, Fifth, Main, and Walnut streets. Twice his remains were removed for the second and last time in November, 1895, and were then interred in Spring Grove Cemetery, which had once been a part of his country residence.
“The shock created by the announcement of his death could be understood only in the new district, where the sparseness of population and community of interests and friendship rendered conspicuous a valuable man, and his loss deep-seated and seemingly irreparable. The inhabitants joined the Masonic Fraternity in paying a closing tribute of respect to his memory. An oration was pronounced by the Hon. T. Symmes.”
Mr. Ludlow was not permitted to witness the wonderful results of the enterprise to the forwarding of which his untiring industry was directed. That he had a prescience of its importance is shown by his large entries of land, now noted for its great fertility and value. The selection of town sites when the territory was an unbroken forest, and where intimate knowledge of soil, timber, and natural outlet of country Is necessary to eminent success, entitles him to no little credit for sound judgment and discriminating foresight. Modesty was a well-known trait of his character. With an eye quick to discern, and energy to have applied, every measure conducting to the prosperity of the territory and city whose early progress was the adumbration of speedy greatness, he was himself indifferent to his own political advancement, and willing to wait at least until the fulfillment of his present plans. Thus it is that, without legislative record of the facts, his name is not known in a manner commensurate with his services to the infant colony and the youthful State. His is not an anomalous case. The unwritten history of every community illustrates the point that the most valuable men are not always, and indeed but seldom, in office. Israel Ludlow was not a politician in the clamourous sense of the term. He was a man for the times in which he lived, and possessed a peculiar fitness for the extended sphere of his influence. The absence of such men in the necessitous condition of a struggling settlement explains the cause of premature decay and failure: their presence constitutes the mainspring of progress, the encouraging support of first puny effort, until accumulated strength affords the power of self-propulsion. He lived in a day when a citizen found in the extension of aid to the impoverished emigrant and his suffering family ample scope for the exercise of the most generous heart-impulses. To him they could turn as a safe adviser and a substantial friend without fear of neglect. His life was illustrated by a series of practical benevolences, free from ostentation and the laudation of scarcely other than the recipients of his disinterested kindness.
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