TOWN OF BATH. 



161 



and another to cover yourself with.' I told hmi that I 

 thanked him kindly,, and would go along. We went up 

 through the woods to where St. Patrick's Square now is, 

 and there the Dutchman had a little log house. There was 

 no floor to it. I made a supper of mush and milk, and 

 laid down with my feet to the fire and slept soundly. The 

 Dutchman was traveling; throuo;h to the Genesee, but his 

 children were taken sick and he stopped there till they got 

 well." 



In McMaster's ^' History of the Settlement of Steuben 

 County" we find the following : " The trees had at this time 

 been cut away only to admit of the erection of cabins for the 

 accommodation of the few citizens, and to open a road through 

 the forest. In the spring of 1794, Mr. McElwee, under the 

 direction of Capt. Williamson, made the first clearing, being 

 the Pulteney Square and four acres behind the agent's house 

 for a garden, for the cultivation of which he afterwards 

 imported a gardener from England. The trees on the 

 square were chopped carefully close to the ground. A 

 single pine was left standing in front of the agency-house 

 for a liberty tree. It was trimmed so as to leave a tuft at 

 the top, and stood nodding defiance at despotism for several 

 years, when it was blown down in a storm." 



Gen. George McClure was one of the early settlers of 

 Bath. In 1850, while residing in Elgin, III., he prepared, 

 at the request of the publishers of McMaster's history, a 

 narrative of his personal recollections of the early men and 

 times of this locality. From this narrative we shall make 

 such extracts as are adapted to our purpose in the present 

 chapter. 



" Bev. James H. Hotchkin, in his ' History of the Pres- 

 byterian Church in Western New York,' makes some severe 

 strictures on the character of Capt. Williamson and his 

 settlers. He says, ' They were principally from Europe or 

 the States of Maryland and Virginia, with a sprinkling of 

 Yankees^ who came to make money. The state of society,' 

 he remarks, ' was very dissolute. The Sabbath was disre- 

 garded. Drinking, gambling, carousing, horse-racing, at- 

 tending the theatre, with other concomitant vices, were very 

 general, and numbers of those who moved in the high circle 

 were exceedingly depraved.' I do not know from what 

 source such information was obtained ; but this I know, 

 that the Sabbath was not desecrated in the village of Bath 

 in the manner that he represents. We had but two public- 

 houses in that village for many years. One was kept by 

 the Metcalfe fiimily, and the other by old Mr. Cruger, and 

 after him by Mr. Bull. Neither of those houses suffered 

 gambling or carousing on the Sabbath. Nor did I ever hear 

 of a horse-race on the Sabbath in Bath, nor of theatrical 

 amusements on that day. There were not more than four 

 or five families from Maryland and Virginia that settled in 

 Bath ]^ the other part of the population were at least one- 

 half Yankees, and the other half foreigners and Pennsyl- 

 vanians. Now I would say that instead of a ' spriakling of 

 Yankees ^^ we had a heavy shower of them. I do not be- 

 lieve, however, that they were a fair sample of the sons of 



* Major Presley Thornton, who was the first occupant of the great 

 Sprinrfjield House, a mile and a half below Bath, and Capt. AVilliam 

 Helm, two Virginians, were the principal Southern men who located 

 at Bath. 



21 



the Pilgrims, for a good many of them, to say the least, were 

 no better than they should be. I trust that nothing in my 

 remarks will be considered invidious. I do not intimate 

 by any means that Bev. Mr. Hotchkin would knowingly 

 state an untruth, but that he has not been correctly informed 

 in relation to the character of a large proportion of the 

 early settlers 



" Among the number of the most respectable Scotch emi- 

 grants were Charles Cameron and Dugald, his brother. 

 These two young men were first-rate specimens of the 

 Scotch character for intelligence and integrity, as well as 

 for other amiable qualities. Charles Cameron was a merchant, 

 and the first to open a store in Bath. He was also the first 

 postmaster by appointment of Capt. Williamson, who paid 

 all the expenses of transporting the mail once a week to 

 and from Northumberland. f Some fifteen or twenty years 

 after he obtained the appointment of sub-agent of the 

 Hornby estate, from John Greig, Esq., of Canandaigua, 

 the chief agent, and removed to the village of Greene, 

 Chenango Co. Few men possessed stronger intellectual 

 powers than Dugald Cameron. He was highly respected 

 by all classes of his neighbors and acquaintances. He was 

 a clerk in the land-office for some time, until he and Gen. 

 Haight were appointed sub-agents by Col. Troup. He was 

 a great favorite of the people of Steuben. In 1828 they 

 elected him as their representative in the Legislature of the 

 State, which office, with some reluctance, he accepted. 

 While at Albany attending to the duties of his station, he 

 was seized with a violent ailment, and after a short and 

 painful struggle departed this life, leaving a wife and a 

 numerous family of children, most of whom have since 

 died. His death was lamented by all his relations, friends, 

 and acquaintances." 



Andrew Smith, a trustworthy Scotchman, had the 

 charge of the farming operations of Col. Williamson, such 

 as the clearing of the land for cultivation, and other kinds 

 of labor. He had generally from thirty to fifty men, and 

 sometimes more, in his employ, while Gen. McClure had 

 nearly as many in the house-building department. Miickle 

 Andrew (as they called him, being a large man) and Gen. 

 McClure were great cronies. They were both single men, 

 and kept bachelors' hall. They generally met on Saturday 

 evenings, alternately, in each other's apartments. " We had 

 in those days," says Gen. McClure, " plenty of the joyful^ 

 but we seldom carried matters so far as to get decently 

 tipsy. We violated no pledge, for even ministers of the 

 gospel and deacons, in those days, kept on their sideboards 

 a full supply of the best Cognac, wine, and old whisky. 



" The first topic of conversation was the business of the 

 past week and what progress we had made in our respective 

 vocations. The next business in order was a drink, then a 

 story or a song. Andrew told the stories and I did the 

 singing. My songs were generally the productions of 

 Burns, such as Scots wha ha wi Wallace hied, Whall 

 be King hut Charlie^ and Aidd Lang Syne. The last 

 verse we always sung standing. My good friend Andrew 

 had one favorite standing toast, which was as follows : 



t An old Frenchman lived at the " block-house" on Laurel Rido-e. 

 sixty-five miles distant from Bath. Thomas Corbitt, the mail-rider 

 in 1794, went thither weekly for the Steuben County bag. 



