CHAPTER II - Indian War 1791 - 1795
Page 18
Beginning of the War - Farmers Castle built and occupied - A list of Families and Persons in Farmers Castle.

BEGINNING OF THE WAR

FARMERS CASTLE BUILT AND OCCUPIED

A LIST OF FAMILIES AND PERSONS IN FARMERS CASTLE

No. 1 - Colonel Ebenezer Battelle, wife, and four children: Cornelius, Ebenezer, Thomas and Louisa
No. 2 - Captain William James, wife, and ten children: Susan, Anna, Esther, Hannah, Abigal and Polly; William John, Thomas and Simeon.  Also Isaac Barker, wife, and eight children: Michael, Isaac, Joseph, William and Timothy; Anna, Rhoda, and Nancy.  Also Daniel Cogswell, wife and five children: John, Abigal, Peleg, Job and Daniel.
No. 3 - Captain Jonathan Stone wife and three children: Benjamin Franklin, Samuel, and Rufus Putnam.
No. 4 - Colonel Nathaniel Cushing, wife, and six children: Nathaniel, Henry, Varnum, Thomas, Sally and Elizabeth.  Also Captain Jonathan Devoll, wife, and six children: Henry, Charles, Barker, Francis, Sally and Nancy, with a nephew, Christopher Devoll.
No. 5 - Isaac Pierce, wife, and three children: Samuel, Joseph and Phebe.  Also Nathaniel Little, wife, and one child.  Also Joseph Barker, wife and one Child, Joseph, born in Belpre.
No. 6 - Maj. Nathan Goodale, wife, and seven children: Betsey, Cynthia, Sally, Susan, Henrietta, Timothy, and Lincoln.
No. 7 - In the South west corner of the garrison, A. W. Putnam, wife, and one child, William Pitt born in the garrison.  Also D. Loring, wife, and seven children: Israel, Rice and Jesse; Lulba, Bathsheba, Charlotte and Polly.  Major Oliver Rice lived in the family of Mr. Loring.  Also Captain Benjamin Miles, wife, and five children: Benjamin, Buckmaster and Hubbard, (twins), William, Tappan and Polly.
No. 8 - Griffin Green, Esq., wife, and four children, Richard, Philip, Griffn and Susan.
No. 9 - John Rouse, wife, and eight children: Michael, Bathsheba, Cynthia, Betsy, Ruth, Stephen, Robert and Barker, twins.  Also Maj. Robert Bradford wife and three or four children.  Several of these children died of scarlet fever, others were born after the war.
No. 10 - Captain John Leavens, wife, and six children: Joseph, and John, Nancy, Fanny, Esther and Matilda.  Also Captain William Dana, wife, and eight children: Luther, William, (young men) Edmond, Stephen, John, Charles and Augustus; Betsy Mary and Fanny.
     Between 10 and 11 there was a long low building, called the barracks in which a small detachment of United States troops were quartered.
No. 11 - Mrs. Dunham widow of Daniel Dunham, who died in 1791, one son and two daughters.  Also Captain Israel Stone, wife, and ten children: Sardine, a young man, Israel, Jasper, Augustus, B. Franklin, and Columbus; Betsy, Matilda, Lydia and Harriet, born in the Castle.
No. 12 - Benjamin Patterson, wife, and six children: three of the rangers, or spies who were single men, boarded with him, viz: John Shepherd, George Kerr, and Matthew Kerr. Patterson served as a spy three years for the settlement at Belpre and then moved down the river.  Also Benoni Hurlburt, wife, and four children.
No. 13 - Colonel Alexander Oliver, wife, and eleven children: Launcelot, a young man, Alexander, John and David, Lucretia, Betsy, Sally, Mehala, Electa, Mary.  Also Colonel Daniel Bent, wife and four children: Nathan, Daniel, Dorcas, and daughter who married Joel Oaks.  Also Silas Bent, Esq., oldest son of the Colonel, wife and two or three children.
     Several other families lived in Farmers Castle for a short time and then proceeded down the river but the above list contains nearly all the permanent and substantial heads of families who settled in Belpre in 1789 and 1790.
     Joshua Fleehart, wife, and four children, lived in a small cabin east of block house No. 3.  He was a noted hunter and supplied the garrison with fresh meat.  Soon after the war closed he removed nearer to the frontier where he could follow trapping and hunting to better advantage.  One of his hunting adventures will be related later.
     Unmarried men in Farmers Castle: Jonathan Waldo, Daniel Mayo, Jonathan Baldwin, Cornelius Delano, Joel Oaks, James Caldwell, Wanton Casey, Stephen Guthrie, Truman Guthrie, Captain Ingersol, Ezra Phillips, Stephen Smith, Howell Bull, Samuel Cushing, William and John Smith, Jonas Davis, Dr. Samuel Barnes.
     Within the walls of Farmers Castle there were assembled about two hundred and twenty souls, twenty-eight of these were heads of families.  A number of those enumerated as children were males above sixteen years and enrolled for military duty.  Others were young women from sixteen to twenty years of age.
     Among the inmates of the garrison the name of Christopher Putnam or Kitt as he was familiarly called, must not be forgotten.  He was a colored boy of sixteen or eighteen years of age, who had been the personal or body servant of General Israel Putnam, during the latter years of his life, and after his death lived with his son Col. Israel PUtnam.  In the fall of 1789, Colonel Putnam came out to Marietta with his son Aaron Waldo, and brought Kitt with him.  In the Autumn of 1790 the Colonel returned to Connecticut for his family.  That winter the war broke out and he did not move them until 1795.  Kitt remained at Belpre with Mr. Putnam in the garrison and was a great favorite with the boys.  He was their chosen leader in all their athletic sports, for his wonderful activity, and much beloved for his kind and cheerful disposition.  When abroad in the fields cultivating or planting their crops, he was one of their best hands, either for work or to stand as a sentry.  On these occasions he sometimes took his station in the lower branches of a tree where he could have a wider range of vision and give early notice of the approach of danger.  Under the watchful vigilance of Kitt,  all felt safe at their work.  After he was twenty-one years of age and became a free man he lived the Captain Devoll, on the Muskingum and assisting in tending the floating mill and clearing the land on the farm.  At the election for delegates, under the territory, to form a constitution for Ohio, Kitt was a voter and was probably the first and only black who ever exercised the elective franchise in Washington County as after the adoption of that article all colored men were disfranchised.  (Later they were allowed the franchise.)  He died about the year 1802 much lamented for his many personal good qualities and industrious habits.