Smith Family Photos
Artemas and Mary Smith are buried in the Greendale Cemetery in Meadville, Pennsylvania.
Artemas Smith died so long before my day that little of tradition concerning him is retained by me [Albert Williams]. I have a sort of indefinite picture of him, as a handsome, care-free sort of chap, an indulgent, improvident parent, and somewhat dashing personality, but of his wife, Mary Carpenter-Smith, or Grandma Polly, as she always was to me, I retain a bright and tender memory. She was a member of her daughter Eliza's family in her later years, and a dearly cherished friend of my mother and father. She was about five feet four in height, of very erect carriage, never used a rocking chair, and never leaned against the back of any chair. She was neat and attractive in dress and appearance; she used to wear a wig, which presumably may be taken to indicate that her hair, then snow white, was originally a very dark brown. The only possession of hers which I retain is her snuff box, a relic of her early practice; she had ceased to take snuff long before my day, for Grandma was an up-to-date woman, and when snuff taking went out of style, she gave it up. As I recall her, she was always busy with her patchwork or mending if not engaged in the more pressing household chores. She was a great spinner, dyer, and knitter, and many a pair of wool stockings and mittens she made for my small hands and feet.
Dear old Grandma, how wonderfully sweet and dear is your memory!
I omitted to record another very precious possession which descended from Grandma Polly, the drop-leaf cherry and maple stand with two drawers.
In my father's notes, which I am copying, he had a few memoranda concerning early life at Andover Ohio set down under the caption of Grandma's brother, Jahaziel, where it rightfully belongs, but I will include them here.
The following is copied from an article published in an Andover local paper:---
Deacon Jahaziel Carpenter had a reunion of his children and grandchildren on Nov. 6, 1872, it being the fifty-ninth anniversary of his arrival in this county, and the fifty-fifth of his marriage. Just before sitting down to the repast, he and his wife were presented with some valuable presents in gold and silver. After supper the Deacon told of some of his experiences in journeying to this place in 1813, just after Perry's victory on Lake Erie, in ox wagons, through the woods and swamps.
One night in the Cattaraugus woods, when it was raining and blowing, he sat all night upon a log holding an umbrella over his mother, who held in her arms his infant brother, Sydney. From Buffalo west, the only road in that time was along the beach of Lake Erie, and it was particularly dangerous when at times, they had to negotiate points of rock projecting out into the lake. At times a pilot was employed, who stood on the neap between the hind yoke of oxen, and drove the teams.
At Conneaut they left the lake shore and turned south through Monroe (Monroe what? It is now Ashtabula County). Not being able to get through with their wagons, they turned their cattle loose, and went on foot to spend the night at a vacant hut. The next morning they went back and collected their teams, but when night came they had made so little progress that again they turned loose the cattle and went back to spend the night at the hut.
They arrived at Andover Saturday, Nov. 6, 1813, having been forty-five days on the way from Chester, Mass. His mother spent most of the next day, her first Sabbath in Andover, in the wagon, attending to her baby; while the men rustled up some rude pole shelters to serve them until a log house could be built.
One of his exploits was to kill a bear with a bayonet just about where his dwelling now stands. Another he caught in a trap after it had killed a yearly steer. He and Rufus Houghton, Jr. once hired a man to go to Austinburg with sixteen bushels of wheat which just sufficed to pay for a barrel of salt.
Just four years after arriving in the town of Andover he married Demaris, the daughter of Rufus Houghton, Sr. all the people of the town being invited to the wedding, the second wedding to be held in the town. He was enjoying good health, and managing the same farm that he commenced on fifty-nine years ago.
In addition to the foregoing stories about Uncle Jahaziel is one that I received from Mother via Grandma Polly. Jahaziel started for the West the proud possessor of a watch, a fact which, in that day of scant possessions, put him in a class of opulence quite apart from the rest of his kind. On the way they chanced to meet some fellows on horseback, who inquired the time o'day. Jahaziel proudly produced his timepiece, when one of them grabbed it and galloped away, turning around at a safe distance to twiddle his fingers at him, and then rode on.
From the same source comes another story of that first Sunday spent in the new home. In spite of their stress they held a religious service, one of their number reading a sermon from some book of sermons, and each in turn offering a prayer or leading in the singing of a hymn. I reprobate myself for having forgotten the hymn that Grandma sang on that eventful day.
Most of the stories of pioneer days that were so dear to me, and which were so generously told by Grandmas Polly and Smith, as I used to designate them, pertained to Andover. Their houses were of logs, with earthen floors, and roofed with thatch, although the thatch soon gave way to shakes, thin pieces split from four foot bolts, and applied something like shingles. These houses were built without a nail in them. For windows they used oiled paper. Their hinges were of wood, as were their latches. Of course that was before the day of stoves, and each house had its great stone fireplace running up into a wide chimney. These houses were low, no more than sufficient clearance for a tall man under the poles laid across the top of the walls to make a storage place and sleeping quarters for some of the older children. This, of course, was the first house to be built after the rough lean-to that made a shelter for their beds before even it could be built. It was not long however before a front with two extra rooms was built on, and as soon as a sawmill was set up they had floors, and casings, and plank doors.
This pioneer life was particularly hard on the women, who were constantly worried for their men and children; the two greatest sources of dread being Indians and wolves. I have often heard about the 'sugar bush' which was half a mile or more from the house, and how the wolves would circle the fire when they were out there sugaring off. Then when the work was over, Grandfather Artemas would take a birch bark torch and his gun and precede the family procession, waving the torch to keep away the wolves, while the family, bringing home the sugar kettle, strung in the middle of a pole, brought up the rear.
It was four miles to school, and there was but a few months of school, and that in the dead of winter. As soon as it was daylight the children would start, the oldest boy in the lead, breaking a path through the snow for the others, with the littlest girl bringing up the rear. They were seldom warmly dressed; underclothes were unknown to them; drawers were unthought of by women and girls. I have often heard Grandma Smith tell how the snow when light and feathery would work up her legs and wet her shirts. At the schoolhouse was a rousing fire in the great fireplace, around which the girls would cluster until their clothes were dried out. With all their sturdy independence these pioneers were such slaves to convention that never on any occasion did a woman or girl venture to put on the more efficient garb of the men.
Indians often came to their house, and I have often been told of the time when a hunting party came there one night when Grandma Polly was alone with her little brood; her husband being away with the ox team and the gun on a trip to whatever was the nearest trading point, probably Conneaut or Ashtabula. There were none of them who could speak English, but by signs they indicated that they wanted to spend the night. They laid down on the floor around the fire, while Grandma climbed the ladder to where the children had scuttled. There was no danger, but she didn't know it; so she sat all night long with the ax beside her, resolving to work such havoc as she might if they should offer violence. Along before daylight they aroused, produced some dried meat and began to look for other provisions. She then climbed down, and made them a breakfast of pancakes, fried salt pork, and coffee. The Indians were very fond of coffee, which they drank, boiling hot, out of the spout of the pot. When ready to leave the leader of the party patted Grandma on the back and said, "Good squaw!"
One time Artemas lost his way in the woods, and night came on. It was summer, but it was very dark. He had his flint and steel; so he managed to start a fire to stave off the wolves that were howling around, and spent the whole night in the woods. When daylight came he found that he was almost within sight of his own house; and that Grandma had spent a night of sleepless terror; first was his failure to return and then the light of that nearby fire where, she imagined the 'redskins' were roasting him.
A hundred year from that time saw all that country laced with concrete roads, and their descendents spinning over them in their autos. Oh what a stirring movie the development of America has been! I well remember Uncle Jahaziel and Aunt Demaris, whom I have visited in their home in the hamlet of West Andover. The little flat, round hickory basket that is now among our treasures was given to Mother as a keepsake shortly after Uncle Jahaziel's death; it was one that was made by him or someone of the Carpenter family, and had been used by him for many years in gathering eggs.