May 1991

History of Bath

for the First Fifty Years

by

Ansel J. McCall

Historical Address, June 6, 1893

Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII

Part VII

Bath was bounded on the north by the county line, east by Lake Keuka and Frederickstown, south by Painted Post and Middletown, and west by Dansville…

Bath was now the capital town of Steuben County. Captain Williamson determined to make it all the name implies. His first move was to establish a newspaper. William Kersey, the newly appointed Judge, an attaché of the land office, was dispatched by him in the spring to Pennsylvania to procure the necessary material…James Edie, of Northumberland, a practical printer, was engaged to bring on the press and material, which he did early in the summer, and formed a partnership with the Judge, under the style of "Kersey & Edie," and set up their press in a log building on the south-west corner of St. Patrick Square, where now stands General Averell's residence. It was there, on October 19, 1796, that was issued the first number of the "Bath Gazette and Genesee Advertiser, published by William Kersey and James Edie, Bath, Steuben county, N. Y., $2.00 per year." This was the first newspaper printed in the State west of Oneida county. It was printed as a small folio sheet, fifteen inches by nine, with three broad columns, and was fairly done…

[Williamson] erected this year a frame building on the north-west corner of Pulteney Square for school purposes. It was there the late Colonel W. H. Bull used to say that he attended school and received his preliminary education…

Weld, an English traveler, who visited the town in the fall of 1796, writes: "Bath is a post and principal town in the western part of the State of New York. Though laid out only three years ago, yet it contains about thirty houses; it is increasing very fast. Among the houses are several stores and shops, well furnished with goods, and a tavern that would not be thought meanly of in any part of America. The town of Bath stands on a plain, surrounded on three sides by hills of moderate height. The plain is almost wholly divested of trees, but the hills are still uncleared and have a very pleasing appearance from the town. At the foot of the hills runs a stream of pure water over a bed of gravel, which is called Conhocton Creek. There is a very considerable fall in the creek just above the town, which affords the finest seats for mills possible. Extensive saw and flour mills have already been erected upon it."…

The Court House was a wooden structure, a story and a half high, with a portico, flanked by wings, and located on the east side of Pulteney Square. It was built at Pulteney's expense. It was a neat and commodious structure, and well fitted for the purposes for which it was intended. The first record we have of its occupancy by the court was at the June term in 1798. One of the wings of the old one, when the new Court House was built in 1827, was moved to the lower part of Morris street and fitted up for a dwelling on the property of the late Matthew Shannon, where it stood till a few years ago…

A splendid regiment of militia was organized, and Captain Williamson was appointed its Lieutenant-Colonel. He was ever afterward styled Colonel Williamson. To give notoriety to his new metropolis he built a theatre at the junction of Steuben and Morris streets, where now stands Major Stocum's residence. In the Bath Gazette of December 2, 1797, a flaming programme appears of a tragedy, comedy and songs to be given on January 1, 1798. "Doors to be opened at half-past five; tickets to be had of Captain George McClure and Andrew Smith. Pit, six shillings; gallery, eight shillings." The town continued to improve in appearance and population. The annual fairs and races were held, but with less pomp and circumstance…

In the early settlement of a wooded country, the roads, as we all know, are exceedingly bad and difficult to travel. One hundred years ago no other mode of transportation than that by natural water ways was regarded with favor…In the spring (1798) Bartles started from Mud Creek two rafts of boards, which in a very brief time and at a very small cost were landed safely in Baltimore. This settled the question of navigation for that species of craft…

In March, 1800, Messrs. Swing and Patterson built an ark eighty feet in length by twenty in width, at White's saw-mill, on the Conhocton, five miles below the village of Bath, loaded it with wheat and lumber, and on the fourteenth of that month started for Baltimore, which port they reached in due time with their freight. Two others with like freight, in the month of April, followed from Bartles' mills on Mud Creek, and met with similar success. They were the first ventures of the kind, and created quite a sensation throughout the country. This species of craft was the invention of a Mr. Kryder, who, in 1792, built one at Standing Stone, on the Juniata, loaded it with wheat and whiskey, and ran it down the Susquehanna to Baltimore…

Captain Williamson was greatly elated at these ventures; rafting and ark building became a lively business upon all the streams in the springtime. Bath was now boomed all over the country. It was at the head of navigation and the shipping point to market for grain, lumber and other products…

Storehouses were built at convenient places for storage. Two stood near Davenport's office, and three at the foot of Ark street. During the winter, loaded sleighs came crowding in from Geneva and Genesee with produce to be shipped, and business was lively in the village. When the spring freshets came, the arks were floated to the storehouses, the grain was poured into them in bulk, and the pilots, with their jolly helpers, cut loose the cables and began their returnless voyage to Chesapeake Bay. Their course was down the Conhocton and Chemung to the Susquehanna, and down that noble river to tide-water. These frail vessels did not always reach their destination. About one in ten emptied its contents into the river, as it was dashed upon some unknown obstruction, or was stranded on the shore. Thousands upon thousands of bushels of grain found their way to market through this precarious channel. A quarter of a century later, when Bath was on the eve of realizing Williamson's expectations, the canals were constructed; and lo! its glory departed. The ark of the Conhocton passed into history; the rats took possession of the storehouses; the roofs caved in; the beams rotted away, and what was left of them tumbled into ruins…

The Legislature of New York, having passed an act authorizing aliens for three years to take the title to real estate, in 1801, Colonel Williamson conveyed the unsold Genesee lands to his principals, and resigned his trust. Colonel Robert Troup was appointed his successor. The resignation of Colonel Williamson was a sad blow to Bath, and was deeply deplored by all the settlers in the country. He was greatly loved and respected. He promoted education and the establishment of religious societies, and was earnest in pushing improvements that promised benefit to struggling humanity. When he gave up the agency, many of his old friends and associates sought homes in other places. The Bath Gazette suspended publication; the theatrical company disbanded and the old theatre fell into ruins; the famous race-course, for a time, was abandoned, and pines and scrub oaks covered its track.

Colonel Williamson had commenced building, in 1799, a grand country seat on his Springfield Farm, so-called, a mile and a half below the village, near Lake Salubria. It was the largest private dwelling in Western New York, and calculated to dispense hospitality on a princely scale. Although constructed of wood, it was considered magnificent, with its spacious parlors, broad halls and grand assembly room, with their high ceilings and heavy mouldings, all finished and furnished exquisitely after the latest style. It was flanked by two wings, each as large as an ordinary dwelling house, set off with piazzas and porticoes. The grounds about were artistically laid out and graced with ornamental trees and shrubs, and the then rare Lombardy poplars. On its completion, in 1801, he placed it in charge of Major Presley Thornton, a kinsman of Washington and an officer in the Revolution, who had just come from Virginia with a young wife of rare wit and beauty. She was known at "The Madam," from her graceful and commanding ways. The Colonel made his home with them after he retired from the agency, maintained the establishment, and dispensed its hospitality with a generous hand. The place became famous for its brilliant assemblies. For there gathered on such occasions all the beauty and aristocracy from all the Genesee country, and even the distant Susquehanna.

The Major died in 1806, and the Colonel soon after left for Europe and never returned. The Springfield Farm, with the appurtenances, passed into other hands. The purchaser failed and it fell to his creditors, and soon the famous mansion, with its gardens and walks, showed signs of decay and became a picture of desolation—the abode of the owl and the bat and other uncanny things. Thirty odd years ago it was taken down to give place to the present farm house of Mrs. R. B. Wilkes…

Owing to the large amount of business transacted at the Land Office, the long and frequent sessions of the Courts, and the better cultivation and improvement of the lands in the vicinity, Bath was enabled to hold its own during the commercial depression of the first ten years of the nineteenth century.

In 1804, William H. Bull came, with his father, Howell Bull, from Painted Post, and has furnished the memoranda from which has been made a bird's-eye view of Bath in that year. He may have omitted some dwellings, but of those given there are now standing only three, viz: the residences of Mrs. James Lyon, Miss Jennie Wilkes and Mrs. Samuel Balcom…

Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI, Part VII, Part VIII

CLR Blog | Site Map | Contact CLR