V.

LATER MEN OF MARK.

1804-1815.

Important additions to the population soon followed the coming of Curtis Noble and Isaac Hayes. They included men who for a long period were to remain foremost citizens. One was Stephen Benton, who came from Sheffield, Massachusetts, and from Peter Betts of Bainbridge in 1804 purchased his farm of 115 acres. Guido L. Bissell in July 1805 charged Mr. Benton with “three day’s work at harvest 18 shillings”, “to making drag 10 shillings”, and “to putting up partition 6 shillings.” Two years later Mr. Bissell charged against him “to making of bedstead 17 shillings”, and “to making table 6 shillings.” In 1810, when work was going forward on St. Matthew’s Church, Mr. Bissell charged for “5½ days work on Church, £2, 6s.”

[Illustration: THE BENTON AND FELLOWS STORE.]

Mr. Benton opened a store on the northwest corner of Main and Clifton Streets. Across the street may still be seen the building in which on the former site he and his son Albert long did business: it has the date 1816 still upon the pediment. From Sheffield Mr. Benton in 1816 secured as clerk a young man then fourteen years old named Christopher D. Fellows. Mr. Fellows came to Unadilla over the Catskill turnpike, and in 1823 became a partner in the store with Albert Benton. He thus was launched upon a business career that was to last nearly eighty years, his span of life extending to his ninety-third year.

Major Fellows’s share in building up the village was large. He became an active and intelligent force in nearly all that advanced its interests. A feature of the Benton and Fellows business was a distillery. Like Noble and Hayes this firm suffered from a surplus of grain. There was no other way by which the stock could be disposed of. A merit of this whiskey, however, was its purity. Much of the product was consumed by men engaged in lumbering. So great was the demand for it, that a hogshead was sometimes sold at retail in one day. Large quantities in casks were shipped down the river every year.

The Benton distillery stood in the rear of the present residence of Milo B. Gregory. This house dates from 1823, and was erected by Major Fellows and Albert Benton after an earlier house, built by Stephen Benton, had been destroyed by fire. Stephen Benton died in April 1840 at the age of sixty-six. The wife of Major Fellows was his daughter. Major Fellows was elected to the Assembly in 1845 when John A. Dix and Daniel S. Dickinson were chosen United States Senators. In 1894, almost fifty years after that event, Major Fellows went to Albany and was invited to sit in the speaker’s chair.[12]

Contemporary with the coming of Stephen Benton was the coming of Sherman Page, a native of Cheshire, Connecticut, where he was born in 1779. His father was Jared Page, who settled in what is now the town of Greene, Chenango County, at a place still known as Page Brook, on a stream that flows into the Chenango River a few miles above Port Crane. About 1799 Sherman Page went over into the adjoining town of Coventry and there taught the first school in the place. He read law about this time and went to Unadilla to open an office, being the first man in the village to practice that profession regularly.

He was here as early as 1805 and in 1807 was elected a path master. With his father he had come into the country by way of Wattles’s Ferry of which he must have retained the vivid recollections of youth. Into most enterprises, Mr. Page’s energies appear to have entered, whether these were social, religious or commercial. He was supervisor in 1826 and in three other years, a member of Assembly in 1827, and a member of Congress from 1833 to 1837. He was also county judge. He built and long occupied the house where now lives Mr. George W. Hardy, but later on his home was in the stone house across the street. His wife was a niece of Sampson Crooker, and he had five children,—Robert who was a lawyer in Flint, Michigan, Vincent who also went West and long afterwards died in Unadilla, Elizabeth who became the wife of George H. Noble, and long survived as the widow of her second husband, Arthur Yates of Waverley, Mary who was the first wife of William H. Emory, and Maria, the first wife of Frederick A. Sands. Judge Page died in September, 1853.

Mr. Emory was a native of Maryland and was born in 1811. He came to Unadilla about sixty years ago and was all his life engaged in the dry goods trade, at one time in the building that now adjoins White’s store on the west, but which then stood on the lot opposite J. Fred. Sands’s residence, later at the corner of Main and Clifton Streets, in the brick building that was destroyed in the fire of 1878, and still later in the old brick store uptown. He was an active member of the Methodist Church and his home was the westerly one of the two stone houses, its builder having been Frederick A. Sands.

As early as 1805 had come the first of four brothers who were to leave a distinct mark on the growth of the village,—Dr. Adanijah Cone. His first home was the original hotel that stood at Main and Clifton Streets which he built, and of which for several years he was the proprietor. He then built the rear portion of the house that was afterwards the home of his son, Lewis G. Cone, and in which now lives his grandson, Frederick L. Cone. In 1808, his two brothers, Daniel and Gilbert, followed him, and in 1815, the fourth brother, Gardner. Daniel and Gilbert first lived in an old house on the south side of the road about one hundred rods from the present James White house. The White house was built by them in 1815. These brothers Cone came from Hebron, Connecticut. Their varied interests comprised farm lands, a fulling mill, a store, a hotel and the practice of medicine.

Daniel and Gilbert Cone in 1808 bought 300 acres of land from Mr. Sliter and in 1811 Lot 92 of the Wallace Patent from the Lansings of Albany. They did a large business in fulling and dressing cloth, people coming from far and near with the cloth they had woven at home. Theodore Hanford and Erastus Kingsley at one time were employed by them. Gardner Cone settled on the farm afterwards the home of Salmon G. Cone, who was his nephew. Gardner Cone’s wife was Sarah Robertson, a sister of Niel Robertson. Daniel married Margaret Hull, a sister of Mrs. Calvin Gates, and for second wife married Hannah Taylor, a sister of Lydia Taylor, the wife of Dr. Cone. Lydia Taylor had a niece also named Lydia Taylor who became the wife of Erastus Kingsley. Hannah Taylor Cone, after her husband’s death, removed to Connecticut, where on January 8, 1894, she died at the age of ninety-four.

Dr. Cone died in 1862 at the age of eighty-four. His widow when she died was past ninety. Their son Lewis G. Cone was for a great number of years one of the best known citizens of the village. With his brother-in-law Frederick A. Bolles, he was long engaged in business. Captain Bolles came to the village in 1838 and remained here until his death in June, 1891. He arrived from Oxford, to which place he had gone from his native town of Vernon, Oneida County. He purchased the hotel at Main and Bridge Streets and conducted it for several years when he sold the property to Colonel Thomas Heath. He married Julia A. Cone in 1839, and afterwards went into the hardware trade with Lewis G. Cone. For almost forty years the two were partners. On the death of Mr. Cone in 1878, the partnership was continued with Mr. Cone’s only son, Frederick L. Cone.

Captain Bolles in 1845 was captain of a company which went out from this village during the anti-rent difficulties in Delaware County. It was a company of light infantry from the 151st Regiment, described by Jay Gould as “composed mostly of young men who with a little drilling made excellent soldiers”. Colonel Samuel North, who afterwards came to Unadilla where the remainder of his life was spent, commanded the regiment. His orders were to hold it “in readiness to answer any call that may be made for additional force should it be deemed necessary”. At the funeral of the murdered Deputy Sheriff Steele in Delhi on August 10, the Rev. Norman H. Adams from Unadilla assisted in the services. Captain Bolles was supervisor of Unadilla in 1851 and in 1861 was a member of Assembly. His first wife died in 1868, and in 1871 he married Mrs. W. S. Bryant of Guilford.

Following Captain Bolles came his brother, Frank G. Bolles, who spent the remainder of his life almost entirely in this village. He was long associated with his brother and Lewis G. Cone in the hardware business, at one time as employe, at another as partner. He was prominently identified with Free Masonry in this part of the State, and was Postmaster under President Cleveland, and saw service in the Civil War. He was all his life one of the most agreeable personalities in the village, his gift of humor being marked and its manifestations incessant. He knew everybody and everybody knew him. His death did more than any other event in a long period of years to eclipse the gaiety of life in public places. Fare-you-well, friend of us all.

Of those four brothers Cone, Dr. Cone’s grandson, Frederick L. Cone, now alone in the male line survives on village soil to preserve the family name. To this family belonged the late Salmon G. Cone, but neither of the four brothers was his ancestor. They were his uncles. His father was Zachariah Cone, who remained in Connecticut where Salmon G. was born and grew up. Salmon taught school in Connecticut, afterwards in Sag Harbor on Long Island and in Kentucky. He came to Unadilla in 1843, and thenceforth until his death few men in this part of the upper Susquehanna valley were better known. He had often been elected supervisor and always by an unusually large majority. The energies of his nature were mainly directed to private enterprises extending much beyond the limits of the village. One who knew him well for the most of his life thus wrote of him after his death:

“He was a bold and outspoken advocate of any cause which he espoused. While this sometimes made his conduct seem rash and injudicious, no one who knew him could fail to have respect for his character, which seemed to be above the use of means to which men ordinarily resort. He could do nothing by indirection. His antagonisms were open as the day, and he was the most firm and steadfast of friends. Mr. Cone’s early training, habits and proverbial industry and thoughtfulness would have made him successful anywhere. He saw all his projects thrive. From small investments he watched his fortune grow to imposing proportions and he was proud in the contemplation that it was all the work of his hands. He lived a great, generous, liberal, manly life and he was in accord with whatever was brave and manly in the community, as he understood it.”

Mr. Cone died in April, 1890, in his seventy-eighth year. He lies buried on the outer edge of that elevated plain where a new cemetery has been opened, overlooking the peaceful village from the Sidney shore of the Susquehanna.

In those first years of the century came other settlers of note,—William Wilmot in 1800, Niel Robertson and John Eells in 1811, and David Finch in 1814. William Wilmot was the first cabinet maker. A memorandum made by Guido L. Bissell in April, 1800, reads, “Wilmot and Hayes began to board with me”, and another “Hayes left of the 12th of December.” Mr. Wilmot was born in Danbury, Connecticut, in 1780, and died in 1849. Near the home of the late A. P. Gray still stands the building where he did business. The house in which his son Daniel W. Wilmot long lived was built by him. Mr. Wilmot married Rachel Wattles, a relative of Nathaniel Wattles. She died in 1812, and he then married her sister Octavia, who was the mother of Daniel. Mr. Wilmot’s third wife was Nancy Cleveland. Later he married Ann Smith. He and they all lie buried in the village churchyard. His business was continued until quite recent times by his son, with whom was associated Colonel Thomas Heath.

Colonel Heath from 1844 until 1858 kept the hotel at Main and Bridge Streets and at one time was Sheriff of the county. He was afterwards proprietor of the Oquaga House in Deposit which got its name from the ancient and historic Susquehanna town, Oghwaga. From the doorway of this hotel many persons, born in Unadilla, first saw a railway train. After the opening of the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad, Colonel Heath returned to Unadilla. Here he died in 1889. He was born in Walton in 1812 and was the father of George W. Heath.

Niel Robertson came from the same place as the Cones,—Hebron. He bought from them his Unadilla land in 1814 and thereon built the house which still stands under the hill at the extreme lower end of the village. Elsewhere he survived to a very old age. His wife died from a lightning stroke. When Mr. Robertson came to Unadilla he brought a child five years old who was afterwards married to the Rev. Lyman Sperry. Another daughter became the wife of A. P. Gray.

Mr. Sperry, who was the father of Watson R. Sperry, for many years managing editor of The New York Evening Post, and who afterwards went to Persia as the United States Minister under President Harrison, was born in Alford, Massachusetts, in 1808, and was a son of Nathan Sperry, whose family had settled originally in Hartford, Connecticut. He became a minister of the Methodist Episcopal church and at one time was Presiding Elder of the Otsego district. Mr. Sperry died in 1892. I recall him best in his old age, when the stoop of senility was upon him, and the kindly, almost eager, interest he always took in anything I chose to say to him. I cannot forget those conversations, each summer for many years in vacation time, on sidewalks and in dooryards, with this beautiful old man.

Mr. Gray was a native of Durham, Greene County. He was born in 1811 and came to Unadilla in 1832. He was an old friend of the Rev. Norman H. Adams who had lived at the neighboring town of Oak Hill. Mr. Gray engaged in harness making in Mechanic’s Hall, and later in carriage trimming. After marriage he lived in the house that Sampson Crooker owned on the L. B. Woodruff site. Late in life he was employed in a responsible place by the Albany and Susquehanna Railroad Company. In the rear of his house on land of his, once existed a brickyard where were made the bricks used in constructing the store destroyed in the fire of 1878. Mr. Gray died in November, 1886.

John Eells came from Walton. He followed marked trees to find the way. He was a shoemaker and tanner, and near the residence of the late John Van Cott opened the first tannery in the village. For a time he lived in the Priest house. The rear portion of Elizabeth Clark’s home was built by him as a shoe shop on lower Main Street. He died in 1870 at the age of eighty-four. His son Horace Eells survived in Unadilla until about three years ago. For a long period he continued the business of tanning and was actively identified with the Presbyterian church.

David Finch was a son of Daniel Finch, an Englishman who settled in Litchfield, Connecticut, before the Revolution. David Finch was one of four children. He married Ruth Mallery of Cornwall, Connecticut, whose father, like his own, had come from England to America before the war. After his marriage David Finch lived for some years in Oxford, Connecticut, where he engaged in manufacturing woolen cloth and where four children were born. His business declined after the War of 1812, and in 1814 he set out for Unadilla where he engaged in building.

His first home in the village was in the western end beyond the Wilmot house. He afterwards bought a farm in Sidney, opposite the old fulling mill, but some years afterward returned to the village and lived in the Masonic Hall, while it occupied the old Brick Store lot. In 1820 he acquired the house afterwards removed to its present site by Horace Eells. It was then an unfinished building which had been begun by Thomas Noble. Mr. Finch, assisted by William J. Thompson, completed it and made it his home.

His first considerable work as a builder was the Roswell Wright house, afterwards the residence of Senator David P. Loomis, which was erected in 1823 or 1824. The panel lumber used for it cost only five dollars per thousand. Mr. Finch built the Edson house below the Presbyterian church about the same time, and in company with Lord and Bottom did work on St. Matthew’s church. Of him William J. Thompson learned his trade. Mr. Finch was born in 1782 and died in 1841. His son, William T. Finch, who died a few years ago in Chicago was long a citizen of Unadilla. A daughter was the wife of Rufus G. Mead.

Mr. Thompson was born in Saratoga in 1805 and came with his father to Otego in 1808, and to Unadilla as an apprentice to Mr. Finch in 1824. He and Mr. Finch were afterwards partners and together reared many structures still standing in Unadilla village, as well as in other places, including Meredith Square and Coventry. Mr. Thompson was a member of St. Matthew’s Church for sixty years or more. He died in Savannah, Georgia, in January, 1895, and his body was brought to the old churchyard for burial. In the Masonic Hall, while an apprentice, Mr. Thompson found his first Unadilla home, scarcely dreaming that he would live to move the edifice to its present place as his own residence for nearly fifty years—the house now the summer home of his son-in-law Lester T. Hubbell.

A friend of Curtis Noble and Isaac Hayes who soon followed them to Unadilla, was Melancthon B. Jarvis who was born in Norwalk, Connecticut, in June, 1775, where he had known Josiah Thatcher. He settled on the Timothy Beach farm near the mouth of the Ouleout, but later moved to the village and occupied part of the house Sheldon Griswold long lived in. He died in 1856.

Captain Josiah Thatcher about the same time settled on a neighboring farm, part of which has since been known as the Sternberg place. He had served in the Revolution three years. In the house which still stands on the place he lived until he died in 1856 at the age of eighty-six. His wife was Anna Reed, and his children were Polly, George, Esther, Harriet, Nancy, Amelia and Frances. His ancestor was an Englishman from Kent, who on arrival in America was shipwrecked off Cape Cod, where a lighthouse was afterwards set up and named after him.