mill, and enlarged and improved it, until woolen blankets of excellent quality, and even fine dress goods, satinets, etc., were made.

In 1805 Jacob Larich sunk tan vats and established a tannery immediately south of Adelphi, in "Brimstone Hollow." This tannery flourished a few years, till Mr. Larich went to Tarlton, Pickaway County, and established himself permanently.

In 1807 Aaron Jones established a tannery in the neighborhood of Hallsville. It was not very extensive and ceased to exist about 1815.

Everybody drank whiskey. The surplus crop of corn was invariably reduced to liquid form-a form in which it would keep without spoiling. No harvest could be gathered, no barn or house "rolled together," no public gathering held, without a supply of the "invigorator."

To Jacob Karshner, who came from Berks County, Pennsylvania, and settled in Colerain in 1807, is conceded the erection of the first distillery. He brought his still (a small copper one) with him from Pennsylvania and made some whiskey the following year. It was not many years thereafter, however, before stills were nearly as numerous as the farms. It was a staple in trade, and even the ministers of the Gospel took it as part of their pay.

ONLY ONE GUNPOWDER FACTORY

Once, and we believe only once, an attempt was made to manufacture gunpowder. To the east of Adelphi a few miles were caves or rocks, which dripped water containing a small percentage of saltpetre. This saltpetre was extracted by an enterprising man by the name of Myers, and duly mixed with the other ingredients necessary for the compound. The mixture was then placed in Mrs. Jacob Karshner's brick oven to dry. While watching the drying process he discovered a spark of fire in the bag. He spat on his fingers and reached out to extinguish the spark, but too late. The result was disastrous to the oven, the man, and the trade.

CHAPTER XVIII

TOWNSHIPS AND MINOR TOWNS

DEERFIELD TOWNSHIP AND CLARKSBURG-TWIN TOWNSHIP AND BOURNEVILLE OLD BOURNEVILLE CEMETERY SPRINGFIELD TOWNSHIP AND HOPETOWN-UNION TOWNSHIP-LIBERTY TOWNSHIP AND LONDONDERRY-OLD BURIAL PLACES BUCKSKIN TOWNSHIP-SOUTH SALEM-SALEM PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH AND ACADEMY-LYNDON-PISGAH PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH JEFFER SON TOWNSHIP AND RICHMONDALE-FRANKLIN TOWNSHIP-THE HERMIT OF THE SCIOTO-HUNTINGTON AND HARRISON TOWNSHIPS.

In addition to the villages mentioned separately and included in the histories of the townships, Ross County has a number which are worthy of being grouped, and classified as of more or less promise. Several of them, such as Clarksburg and Bourneville, are incorporated; others are of interest from events associated with them, such as South Salem and Londonderry, and still others are little more than railway stations, the future of which is uncertain.

There are also not a few events outside of all existing centers of population, large and small, and also persons of prominence whose activities and influence have been exerted in the rural districts both events and individuals entitled to a representation in a history which is designed to cover, in its essentials, all features and forces which constitute elements in the development of the county. This chapter has been reserved, in a word, to fairly round out the history of Ross County.

DEERFIELD TOWNSHIP AND CLARKSBURG

This township was erected in July, 1804, from a portion of Pickaway County and parts of Union and Concord townships, Ross County. It had an early reputation, in common with other sections of the old Military district, of being well watered and fertile. That reputation was fairly earned and most of the early settlers who were drawn thither by the game and fertile tracts associated with Deer Creek remained in the township. They also found an abundance of oak, walnut and maple, as well as level stretches of bottom lands easy to cultivate and fertile in character. The town

ship, in fact, occupies the borderland between the fertile prairies of the Pickaway country and the more diversified areas of Ross, Highland and Pike.

The continuous history of both the township and Clarksburg, its only village, commences with the coming of White Brown, with his relatives and slaves, from Delaware. In 1799 his reduced circumstances prompted him to enter at the Chillicothe land office a large tract of land on Deer Creek for settlement. As he disapproved of slavery, like several other prominent emigrants he contemplated a transfer of his establishment to these new lands northwest of the Ohio with the expressed purpose of freeing his black bondsmen, forty in number, after they had assisted him to transfer his establishment to this frontier region of the Northwest Territory.

In the year 1801, under these circumstances, White Brown came to Ross County with his older sons and purchased at $2.00 an acre 500 acres of the McArthur and Massie survey included in the farm owned years afterward by his grandson, Austin H. Brown. It was on this tract that the camp of Massie's surveyors was located when they were attacked, in 1790, by a war party of Shawnee Indians. A clump of black walnut trees near a mill on Deer Creek long marked the site of the camp.

When White Brown came to that locality in 1801, it was still unbroken forest, and, pending the time when it should be cleared, Mr. Brown's sons and the negro servants raised a crop of corn on the ground now occupied by the Ross County infirmary. The family reached the Deer Creek farm on the thirteenth of August, 1802, and camped there for three weeks, while a log house was building. Steven Timmons, whose name afterward was a prominent one in Deerfield, and who married Mr. Brown's oldest daughter, came out with them and assisted in the work of clearing the farm and building the house. This house, so built, was one of the earliest in the township.

During the year 1803, the balance of Mr. Brown's family, coming out from Delaware, joined him. In that year was built, near the house, a log barn, which stood until a comparatively recent date; and it possessed an interest, apart from its age, as it was the cradle of religion in that whole region. Within its walls, from 1803 to 1818, were held the services of the pioneer Methodist Episcopal Church in Deerfield.

Steven Timmons, the son-in-law of Mr. Brown, above mentioned, was probably the first to gather the scattered settlers of the new country to hear, in this rude sanctuary, the preaching of the word of God. After Timmons, the log walls echoed the eloquence of such men as Bishops Francis Asbury, Whatcoat and McKendry, as well as George and L. R. Dow and the Finleys, father and son. An

organization of the church was effected, and, in 1818, a house of worship was erected where the new and ornamental Brown chapel is now situated.

Previous to the removal to the new site, Mr. Brown's farm had offered hospitality to the living and the dead alike, for there was established, about 1805, the first cemetery in Deerfield. This was situated on the hill, back of the old house, and it is estimated that fully two hundred interments were made before the establishment of the new cemetery at the chapel.

The class was organized on Christmas, in the year 1802, John Sale preaching the sermon. Mr. Brown and his wife, and five colored people, were original members of the class. During the year 1803, a revival occurred at a campmeeting held on the Brown farm, and sixty persons were converted to Christianity and united with the new church. After that time, for thirty-four consecutive years, campmeetings were held at the same place, with the result of making the neighborhood a stronghold of Methodism. In the year 1818, as has been stated, a church building was erected at a point on the Brown farm, some distance from the old barn. Later, in 1835, a frame church building was erected on the same site, and in 1871 it was, in turn, replaced by a larger brick structure. In 1805, White Brown erected on his farm a sawmill, having made a very primitive dam over Deer Creek by cutting a tree so that it fell across the stream, and then piling brush across above it. This was the first mill of any kind in Deerfield. In 1815 Mr. Brown built a grist-mill adjoining the sawmill, and from that time controlled the business of the neighborhood for some years. Previously the settlers had been obliged to go, first to Portsmouth, and later to the falls of the Paint to have their grinding done. Both of these buildings stood for years, being owned by William Brown, son, and Austin H. Brown, grandson of the builder. It is curious to note the increased volume of Deer Creek, indicated by the fact that the present dam is three hundred and forty-five feet long, probably five times the length of the one built seventy-five years ago in the same place. This is partly due, no doubt, to the fact that the damming of the water has widened the channel, but it also shows the influence of climatic changes and increased surface drainage. Hall's mill, three-fourths of a mile below Brown's, was erected previous to 1830.

Col. Peter Jackson was one of the very first settlers in Deerfield. He came in the year 1801 or 1802 to Deer Creek, and built him a cabin within 100 yards of the spot where Brown's mill was afterward erected. For some time the community was comprised of the Jackson, Brown, Timmons and Clark families, and the colored people who accompanied Mr. Brown. John F. Fulton was one of the

Vol. I-29