Maps Of the Ohio Country -- Scioto County Cartography And Local History

 

                                      1755 Map of the Country About the Mississippi.

It has been said when Ohio was settled, the trees were so thick a squirrel could climb up a tree at Marietta and travel all the way to Lake Erie without ever touching the ground.

Ohio was the edge of the wilderness in those days. Early explorers described the area as a "gloomy and fearsome place.” Trees in the rich bottom lands were reported in huge proportions – Francois Michaux measured a sycamore at 47 feet in circumference four feet up on the stump.

John James Audubon wrote of flocks of now extinct passenger pigeons so large that the sky would go dark when they passed overhead.

– United States Forest Service

If you like to read early history like me, you sometimes stumble upon something that peaks your interest and stimulates your imagination. When that history is close to home, it always grabs both my heart and mind.

Since I was a kid growing up on Scioto Trail, I have wondered what Scioto County and Ohio would have been like in the earliest pioneer days. Living here in a cradle of Native American civilization, I like to shut my eyes and envision just what my home may have been like in those days. Any description or visual aid helps my voyage into the past.

Back to that particular find. Surfing the Web for information, I was fortunate to discover Eli Allen's Wandering Appalachia site and his entry about the “1755 Map of the Country About the Mississippi.” Access it by clicking here: (December 19, 2021 ) https://www.wanderingappalachia.org/2021/12/19/1755-map-of-the-country-about-the-mississippi/.

I found this annotated map to be just the ticket for further exploration of my Ohio home. We tred on very sacred ground here in the Scioto River Valley. I'd like to share with you today some of what I learned and encourage you to read more at Wandering Appalachia. You will be greatly enriched through your efforts.

The original map is part of the American Treasures of the Library of Congress exhibition (https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/), an unprecedented permanent exhibition of the rarest, most interesting or significant items relating to America’s past, “drawn from every corner of the world’s largest library.

Originally on display in the Jefferson Building Treasures Gallery in Washington, D.C., the American Treasures exhibition presents more than 250 items arranged in the manner of Thomas Jefferson’s own library, the seed from which the present collections grew: Memory (History); Reason (Philosophy, including Law, Science and Geography); and Imagination (Fine Arts, including Architecture, Music, Literature and Sports)."

In this online exhibition the Library of Congress has several items of relevance to Ohio and the Great Lakes' history, among them the “1775 Map of the Country About the Mississippi.” (https://www.loc.gov/item/74695023/)

 

The Map

The map of the country about the Mississippi is said to be drawn by Chegeree, Native American living at the time, who says he has “travelled through the country.” It is not known who Chegeree was, but he appears to have made the map for an anonymous British official early in the French and Indian War, 1755.

A handwritten note on the back of this manuscript pen-and-ink map from around 1755 states: “Map of the country about the Mississippi. Drawn by *Chegeree (the Indian) who says he has travelled through the country.” The map and accompanying notes portray the extent of French forces and troop strengths in the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys at the outset of the war. Such information, outlining the French presence in the region, was vital to British forces as France and Britain fought for control of the North American interior.

* Or Jagrea (alternatively spelled Cherigea and Zigerea)

The map covers the area from Lake Erie to the mouth of the Ohio River. It shows the Ohio River, Indian settlements, distances, a “French Fort” (i.e., Fort Duquesne, at the confluence of the Monongahela and Allegheny Rivers in what is now downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania), the “Falls of Ohio,” and the confluence of the Ohio River with the Mississippi River. The map is oriented with north toward the upper right.

Some Native History

Thanks to George Michael Ironstack's thesis “From the Ashes” we can gain important background about the map.

“From the Ashes” explores one chapter in the life of the Miami Indian village of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki, which was located along the banks Great Miami River near the current city of Piqua, Ohio. The village was settled in 1747 and purportedly depopulated in 1752, by centering the analysis on the local level. Ironstack's work hopes to transform our knowledge of the world of Miami-Illinois speaking peoples and the larger region of the Great Lakes in the eighteenth century.

Please access the entire thesis here: https://etd.ohiolink.edu/apexprod/rws_etd/send_file/send?accession=miami1153744897&disposition=inline

(George Michael Ironstack. “From the Ashes: One Story Of the Village of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki.” Thesis: Miami University Master of Arts. Department of History. Oxford, Ohio. 2006.)

Concerning times and maps as accessed in “From the Ashes” …

“Following the beginning of Miami migration to Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki in 1747, the Miami developed stronger relationships with the Delaware, Shawnee, and Iroquois communities of the Ohio River Valley. The Shawnee and the Delaware had been connected to the Miami in alliances that reached back to a period before the Beaver Wars, but these two were not a part of the system of relationships that were developed during the refugee period of the Beaver Wars.

“Unlike the Miami’s elder brothers, the Shawnee, and their grandfathers, the Delaware, the Iroquois had been considered historic enemies of the Miami-Illinois speaking peoples of the Wabash River Valley. This status changed following the peace of 1701, and only minor raiding had taken place between the Miami and the Five Nations as most of the hostilities subsided.

“When explorer Christopher Gist traveled down the Kaanseeseepiiwi in 1750, he reported numerous Delaware, Shawnee, and Mingo (Iroquois) villages along the banks of the river.2

“One of the advantages of dwelling at Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki was increased access to the indigenous peoples to the east and to the British traders that were becoming more numerous in the 1750s. But those living in the village did not turn their backs on their relatives living to the north and west.

“Two maps produced directly by indigenous peoples, or through indigenous-European cooperation, demonstrate the degree to which Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki was at the center of an interconnected landscape.

“The first map was produced in 1755 shortly after the start of the Seven Years War in North America. As a part of the war effort, British settlers sought to gain as much information as possible about the French and their allies. One such effort produced a map, which combined indigenous drawing with British text.

“Jagrea (alternatively spelled Cherigea and Zigerea) was possibly the primary author of this map. Jagrea was the son-in-law of Scaroyady, a prominent Iroquois who served as a 'go-between' in the Ohio Country.

“As ambassadors and messengers, such men moved through the Ohio regularly
during this period, and they would have been able to provide much of the information required for this map. The fact that Jagrea spent most of his time near the Shawnee villages on the Kaanseeseepiiwi would also explain the incomplete rendering of the Waapaahšiki Siipiiwi.

“Jagrea was in Philadelphia in 1756, and it seems possible that he could have provided the intelligence for this map during that visit. This map was probably not produced by a Miami man, as the historical cartographer Mark Warhus has suggested, but it is still a useful source for examining how the indigenous peoples living in the eastern Ohio River Valley perceived the connections in the landscape.”

(George Michael Ironstack. “From the Ashes: One Story Of the Village of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki.” Thesis: Miami University Master of Arts. Department of History. Oxford, Ohio. 2006.)

“There are reasons why the Ohio River Valley depicted on this map might appear “empty” despite the presence of numerous villages. Jagrea’s British interrogators were not overly concerned with the central Ohio River Valley. They were interested in the locations of French forts and the numbers and locations of those indigenous peoples allied to the French.

“The Shawnee, Delaware, and Mingo Iroquois occupying this territory were either neutral or closely allied to the British and therefore not of as great a military concern. Because of this focus, it is possible that they neglected to posit elaborate questions regarding the central valley (the center of the map).

“Jagrea’s map is a testament to the way in which any village near to the Kaanseeseepiiwi would easily become connected with both the indigenous peoples of the east and the British. Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki provided the Miami with access to the east in a way that Kiihkayonki, which was only eighty miles away, could not.

“Jagrea’s map remains somewhat of a puzzle that will require many more hours of what Helen Tanner calls “meditating over,” but the map is invaluable to the process of understanding how the indigenous peoples of this place and time perceived their interconnected landscape.

“The people of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki recognized the value of the eastward link the Kaanseeseepiiwi (Ohio River) provided, but its value did not outweigh the linkage between Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki and Kiihkayonki, which was the previous home of many of the residents of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki.

“The strength of the connection between Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki and Kiihkayonki was embodied within the eighty-mile trail that connected the villages. A two-day journey by foot was all it took to move between these two villages. This ease of travel makes it easy to see how the bond between these two places would have remained strong despite the increase in connections with those living to the east.”

(George Michael Ironstack. “From the Ashes: One Story Of the Village of Pinkwi Mihtohseeniaki.” Thesis: Miami University Master of Arts. Department of History. Oxford, Ohio. 2006.)

Maps In Early U.S. History

European concepts of territory and political boundaries did not coincide with First
Nation/American Indian views, resulting in the mistaken view that Natives did not have formal concepts of their territories. And Tribes/First Nations with cross-border territory have special jurisdictional problems.

Many Native residents were very spatially aware of their own lands, as well as neighboring nations’ lands, overlaps between groups, hunting territories, populations, and trade networks.

(Daniel G. Cole and E. Richard Hart. "The Importance of Indigenous Cartography and Toponymy to Historical Land Tenure and Contributions to Euro/American/Canadian Cartography." International Journal of Geo-Information. April 2021.)

Despite differences of interpretation, from the start, European mapmakers relied on Native informants, as can be seen in Samuel de Champlain’s map of New France (1612) and John Smith’s map (1624) of the Virginia and Chesapeake region, which contain spatial data beyond their explorations.

Hermann and Pearce (2008) mapped out Champlain’s travels from the Gulf of St Lawrence to Georgian Bay with notes from Champlain, imagined notes from Native voices, and the cartographers’ notes. The title, They Would Not Take Me There, is indicative of Champlain’s desire to find a route to James Bay.

On Smith’s map, crosses are placed to indicate the limits of his travels, and beyond those crosses were named Indian territories and towns provided by his Native informants.

During the French and Indian War, an unidentified Indian scout provided help to John Montrésor, creating a sketch map of the battlefield at the Monongahela.

Red Head (Onondaga) created a sketch map in 1759 of the area from Lake Ontario to Montreal.

As Lewis (2004: 15) notes, the map provided “valuable intelligence not the least for its relatively detailed representation of Chaumont and Black River Bays at the eastern extremity of Lake Ontario and possible routes from there to La Galette (Oswegatchie on the 'draft') that avoided the treacherous Thousands Islands reach of the main river.”

The strategic intelligence on the map included the locations of Indian settlements, French forts, carrying places (portages) around rapids and Indian footpaths. 

 

The Land

One thing all early inhabitants of the Scioto Valley have in common is that all of the groups wanting to settle here knew this land was invaluable real estate. Bloody conflicts, battles, and wars were fought to control it. Native Americans and Ohio’s early European settlers employed the rivers for transportation, planted crops in the rich soil, and hunted the abundant game. Considered the First West, the bountiful Ohio country was mapped as prime settlement by all.

If you don't believe me about the great resource of Ohio, ask George … George Washington, that is.

C.B. Galbreath (1858-1934) – writer, historian, educator, and State Librarian at the State Library of Ohio – relates how much the Father of Our Country loved the Buckeye State in the following account:

On October 5, 1770, Washington set out on his journey to this valley. At this time the territory northwest of the Ohio River was an unsettled and unorganized wilderness. This journey was commenced almost four years and seven months before the opening battles

of the Revolution and five years and nine months before the Declaration of Independence.

British authority was then supreme in the Colonies and George Washington was a British subject. His purpose in this western journey was to get first-hand information in regard to lands along the Ohio, which he was to view for the first time, although he had heard and read of them. He reached Fort Pitt October 17.

His journey down the Ohio and return is described in the preceding contribution by Dr. Guy-Harold Smith with special reference to encampment sites. Dr. Smith,

Department of Geography in the Ohio State University, has devoted time and scholarly care to the map and the text. Every known source of information has been consulted. The result is highly satisfactory and strictly reliable.

This journey left a lasting impression on the mind of Washington. The exigencies of the Revolution, its trials and its triumphs, did not change his high estimate of the Ohio country. In 1784, one year after the signing of the Definitive Treaty of Peace with Great Britain, he made the following entry in his diary:

“Into this river (Ohio) Big Beaver Creek, Muskingum, Hockhocking, Scioto and the two Miamis, in its upper region and many others in the lower pour themselves from the westward through one of the most fertile countries of the globe.”

(C.B. Galbreath. “George Washington's Interest In the Ohio Country. Ohio History Connection. 2021.)

After the organization of the Northwest Territory, the establishment of the first permanent settlement at Marietta and the election of Washington as President of the United States, he found frequent occasion to express his abiding faith in the future of the region that he had explored in his earlier years.

Of the settlement at Marietta, Washington said:

“No colony in America was ever settled under such favorable auspices as that which has just commenced at the Muskingum. Information, property, and strength will be its characteristics. I know many of the settlers personally, and there were never men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a community.”

To the end of his days George Washington watched with sympathetic interest the development of the Northwest Territory and especially that portion which has become our home state of Ohio.

(C.B. Galbreath. “George Washington's Interest In the Ohio Country. Ohio History Connection. 2021.)

And yet we must never forget the prophetic words of the first people. In 1811, Tecumseh warned of the fate the American Indians would suffer unless they united to resist the white man:

“Look abroad over their once beautiful country, and what see you now? Naught but the ravages of the pale face destroyers meet our eyes. So it will be with you Choctaws and Chickasaws!”

“Soon your mighty forest trees under the shade of whose wide spreading branches you have played in infancy, sported in boyhood, and now rest your wearied limbs after the fatigue of the chase, will be cut down to fence in the land which the white intruders dare to call their own.”

“Soon their broad roads will pass over the graves of your fathers, and the place o f their rest will b e blotted out forever. The annihilation of our race is at hand unless we unite in one common cause against the com mon danger, and thus escape the common fate.”

“Your people, too, will soon be as falling leaves and scattering clouds before their blighting breath. You, too, will be driven away from your native land and ancient domains as leaves are driven before the wintry storms.”

“Ohio was the original ‘Indian territory’ of the U.S. in the 1790s. We had reservations, for a brief time,” Dr. Barbara Mann, author and professor at the University of Toledo

Mann shares this …




“Along with the formation and gradual expansion of the United States came the strategies of creating oftentimes-dishonest “Indian treaties” to claim Ohio for settlers. Such treaties include the Fort Stanwix Treaty, Fort McIntosh Treaty, the Mouth of the Great Miami Treaty and the Fort Harmar Treaty, which applied pressure to the Union of Ohio Natives, which allowed Indigenous peoples to call Ohio their territory.

“The Greenville Treaty, however, granted a collective of European settlers permission to claim Ohio as farmland. Amidst turmoil and expansion with the succession of wars and the American Revolution from 1747 to 1794, many settlers took the opportunity to obtain cheap and available land, seeking after their own prosperity. From that point on, the Indigenous communities in Ohio either left or remained unrecognized.”

(Jessie Walton. The Forgotten History of Ohio’s Indigenous Peoples.” Midstory. July 16, 2020.)

Maps never tell the whole story about the land they portray. The complete history of the people cannot be adequately represented in such a cold and diagrammatic representation. But, I hope you employ maps like the 1775 one described above to understand accurately the history of the United States. Tools such as these lead us to a much greater understanding of our history and all of the implications for honoring the land.

“Our land is more valuable than your money. It will last forever. It will not even perish by the flames of fire. As long as the sun shines and the waters flow, this land will be here to give life to men and animals. We cannot sell the lives of men and animals; therefore we cannot sell this land. It was put here for us by the Great Spirit and we cannot sell it because it does not belong to us. You can count your money and burn it within the nod of a buffalo's head, but only the great Spirit can count the grains of sand and the blades of grass of these plains. As a present to you, we will give you anything we have that you can take with you, but the land, never.”

– Crowfoot, chief of the Blackfeet, circa 1885