Sandy and Beaver Canal.—Fort Lawrence. 57 
county of rolling uplands, cultivated bie an industrious population 
of German descent. It contains at present about twenty thousand 
inhabitants, and is nearly thirty miles square. Soon after entering 
the borders of this county, we passed the village of Bolivar. It isa 
town of considerable importance, and fast rising into notice, as the 
point where the Sandy and Beaver canal will unite with the Ohio 
canal, 
Sandy and Beaver Canal.—This canal will be seventy six miles 
in length, and is now under contract. Bolivar is forty two miles 
south of Akron. ‘The canal terminates on the Ohio River, at the 
mouth of Little Beaver, fourteen miles below Big Beaver, and will 
be continued to the Pennsylvania and Ohio canal, and thence to 
Pittsburgh, opening a new route from the eastern cities to the most 
fertile and productive portion of Ohio. This canal is also owned 
by a joint stock company. ‘The water for its supply will be fur- 
nished by Sandy Creek and Little Beaver. 
Fort Lawrence.——A few miles south of Belitér, the oun 
passes through the earthen walls of old Fort Lawrence, once the 
scene of border warfare, and of bloodshed. ‘The parapet walls 
are now ‘four or five feet high, and were crowned with pickets made 
of the split trunks of trees. The ditch is nearly filled up. The 
walls enclose about an acre of ground, and stand on the west bank 
of the Tuscarawas. Fort Lawrence was erected in the fall of the 
year 1778, by a detachment of one thousand men from Fort Pitt, 
under the command of Gen. McIntosh. After its completion, a 
garrison of one hundred and fifty men was placed in it, and left in 
the charge of Col. John Gibson, while the rest of the army returned to 
Fort Pitt. It was established at this early day in the country of the 
Indians, seventy miles west of Fort McIntosh, with an expectation 
that it would act as a salutary check on their incursions into the 
white settlements south of the Ohio River. The usual approach to 
it from Fort McIntosh, the nearest military station, was from the 
mouth of Yellow Creek, and down the Sandy, which latter stream 
heads with the former, and puts into the Tuscarawas just above the 
fort. So unexpected and rapid were the movements of General 
McIntosh, that the Indians were not aware of his presence in their 
country, until the fort was completed. Early in January, 1779, the 
Indians mustered their warriors with such secrecy, that the fort was 
invested before the garrison had notice of their approach. From 
the manuscript notes ecu Esq., who was an actor in this, 
Vol. XXXI.—No. 1 ' 
