APPENDIX. 565 



whole course. During his short life he had passed through ''stirring 

 times," and not the least of them in that portion of our State where he 

 had located, and which was then becoming settled by a wild and adven- 

 turous population. He was a good and useful citizen, and died in the 

 prime of life and in the midst of his usefulness, deeply regretted by the 

 community in which he lived. 



Cotemporaneous with the erection of Huntingdon county was the 

 framing of the Constitution of the United States, which was signed at 

 Philadelphia on the 17th day of September, 1787. Its adoption, as is 

 well known, met with much opposition in several of the States, and in 

 Huntingdon county became violent and riotous. The leader of the 

 opponents was General William McAlevy, who had acquired a military 

 title during the Revolutionary war, being mentioned as Colonel Mc- 

 Alevy in the records of that struggle, and in connection with the alarms 

 caused by the Tories and Indians. His residence was at McAlevy's 

 Fort, in Standing Stone valley, a place that still bears his name, and he 

 possessed much political influence among the people. The excitement 

 of the times led to attempts by large bodies of armed men to obstruct 

 the performance of public duty by the officials of the county, and to the 

 offering of the grossest indignities to them personally, of which Thomas 

 Duncan Smith came in for his share. Minute details of the events of 

 those days may be found in the " Colonial Records; " but to give some 

 idea of the feelings governing the people, I shall quote somewhat from 

 M. S. Lytle's "History of Huntingdon County: " 



" Colonel John Cannan, member of the Supreme Executive Council 

 from Huntingdon county, was the first against whom there was any 

 manifestation of enmity. On the first day of the court, in March, 17S8, 

 a number of men, bearing bludgeons and carrying an effigy of Colonel 

 Cannan, entered the town. Justices Phillips and Henderson left the 

 bench, the courts being then in session, and met the mob at the upper 

 end of Allegheny street, and endeavored to dissuade them from a dis- 

 turbance of the peace, which they seemed to have in contemplation. 

 This effort, however, was unsuccessful. They marched down the street 

 to the house in which the courts were sitting. There they made so 

 much noise that it was impossible to proceed with business, and, after 

 they had been several times warned to desist from this outrage, the 

 sheriff was directed to arrest the one who seemed the most turbulent, 

 and commit him to prison. When he had been taken into custody 

 a riot ensued, and he was rescued by those who were acting with him 

 in this violation of the law. An indictment was immediately drawn 

 against the principals, presented to the Grand Jury, returned a true 

 bill, and entered upon the records of the Court of Quarter Sessions ; 



