Part I Finney & Mead Families 1770-1824
David Mead (1752-1816) was among the first settlers to the Meadville area in 1789. Robert Finney (1744-1827) came there a little later, in 1793. This is the story of the early beginnings of these two men and their families.
David Mead's first home in Meadville.
Fort Franklin, 20 mi. south of Meadville
The Kennedy Bridge over French Creek, built in 1802
Contents of Part One
1.1- Meadville
2,1 David Mead: The Man and the Myth
2.2 David Mead's Financial Entanglement with Thomas Wilson
2.3 The State of David Mead's Finances at the time of his death
2.4 David Mead's Family at the Time of his Death in 1816
2.5 The Northwest Bank of Pennsylvania
2.6 Community & Family Relationships
2.7 Extensive Litigation over David Mead's Finances, 1816-1840
2.8 David Mead's Alcoholism
2.9 The Mead Family at the Time of Jennet Mead's Death in 1823
3.1 Robert Finney
3.2 James Finney
3.3 James' Disappearance, 1820
3.4 The Construction of the Erie Canal, 1817-1827
3.5 James Finney's Work on the Erie Canal. 1820-1827
4.1 Family Intrigue
4.2 The Two Robert Finney Wills
1.1- Meadville
Meadville is situated in the NW corner of Pennsylvania about 50 miles south of Erie and 80 miles north of Pittsburgh. Settlers led primarily by David Mead came to the location of the town in about 1788. Mead was attracted to the site due to its natural beauty created by the valley of French Creek which flowed from the north to its confluence with the Allegheny River at Franklin, PA. Aside from the cultivation of crops by the Indians on Cussewago Island, across the river from the Meadville site, the whole area was wilderness.
During the first five or six years of the early settlement, the families had to often travel and stay at the U.S. fort in Franklin for months at a time due to the threat of attack by hostile Indian tribes. During this time, David Mead’s father, Darius, was killed by Indian raiders while he was cultivating his crops close to the town. With the Battle of Fallen Timbers in 1794 and with the Treaty of Greenville with the Indians of the region in 1795, the threat of Indian hostilities ended in the NW territory of Pennsylvania.
Five years later, the State of Pennsylvania created the counties of Crawford, Erie and Mercer out of what was previously known as part of Allegheny County. Meadville became the county seat at that time. The population of the town was about 250. The majority of the buildings were of log cabin construction. David Mead’s home which was built in 1797 was one of the first clapboard houses. A one-room log cabin was the jail. Prior to 1814, the Crawford County Court was held in the upper floor of a residence on Water Street and Cherry Avenue. Then, a log cabin courthouse was erected and used until a new brick courthouse was built in 1824.
The new courthouse was a long brick building with a Doric temple front consisting of four pillars and was surmounted with a circular cupola or belfry. It was a one-story building in the interior; the county offices being in the front part and the courtroom in the rear of the offices. It served the County until the present courthouse was built in 1867.
At the time of the 1827 Finney will dispute, the population of Meadville was about 900 persons. The business district of the town was along Water Street which was next to French Creek. The town had eight taverns and two churches, Presbyterian and Methodist Episcopal.
Meadville proudly possessed its own college, Allegheny College. The main building, Bently Hall, had been built and the college had been in operation for several years by this time. Bently Hall is a beautiful and stately building that still stands in the center of the campus. Allegheny College is known as the oldest college west of the Allegheny Mountains. It presently has 1,800 students enrolled. Many of the characters of our story had significant connections to the college. Robert Finney donated 10 acres of his land to the college in 1820. The two lawyers of the 1827 Finney trial, David Derickson and Fox Alden, were the first two graduates of the college in 1823. Fox Alden was the son of Timothy Alden, the founder of the college. In 1839, six of the principals of the Finney will dispute served on the Allegheny College Board of Trustees. They were: David Derickson, Secretary, Honorable Henry Shippen, John Reynolds, Esq., James Hamilton, Esq., Dr. Daniel Bemus and James Doughty.
2.1- David Mead, the Man and the Myth
David Mead was a large man; many historians state that he was 6’4” tall and of commanding stature. He was born on January 17, 1752 to Darius Mead (1728-1791) and Ruth Custis (1734-1794) and grew to maturity in Hudson, Columbia County, New York. He was in his mid-20s when the Revolutionary War began and served as an ensign with the Seventh Company of the First Battalion of the Northumberland County Militia in 1776. He was 24 years old and had only just married Agnes Eliza Wilson (1755-1795) two years prior to this. It is not known what military action he may have received during the war.
At this time, David and Agnes were living in Sunbury, Northumberland County, Pennsylvania where he operated an inn and a distillery. This was the first of many distilleries owned and operated by him during his lifetime. The Meads lived in Sunbury for the next ten years and three of their five children were born there. Their first-born child, Margaret, was born in 1781, William in 1782, followed by Elizabeth in 1786. During this time, David became a land surveyor and was named a justice of the peace. He served well in this capacity during turbulent times in northeastern Pennsylvania involving highly contentious disputes over rightful ownership of lands. This was also a time of ongoing hostility and aggression by native Americans.
Eventually, David Mead’s position in Sunbury became untenable. Large groups of armed men who represented the opposing side in the land dispute were threatening great harm to him and his family. Somehow, the State of Pennsylvania was unable to send armed militia to restore order. To ensure the safety of his family, Mead decided to move to an undeveloped area of northwest Pennsylvania and went there in 1788 to determine the feasibility of such a move. He would have been 36 years old at the time.
In April, 1788, he and ten other men from Northumberland County traveled to a valley formed by French Creek about 20 miles above where the Creek joins the Allegheny River. His brothers, John and Joseph were part of this advance party. Each of the members of this group selected sites to stake their property claims in the area that became known ten years later as Meadville, named after David Mead. The first projects of these early settlers were the planting of corn, initial crude dwellings and the erection of a “blockhouse” where the settlers could defend themselves against Indian attacks.
This was still a time of great unrest and hostility by the Indians. Major tribes in the area were determined to drive the white settlers back where they came from and deadly raids of settlements were not uncommon. This state continued until 1795 following the battle of Fallen Timbers at the present site of Maumee, Ohio in which General “Mad” Anthony Wayne defeated a large contingent of Shawnee Indians.
In 1789 David Mead and others went back to Northumberland County to collect their families and bring them to their new home in the wilderness. Also returning to Meadville was David Mead’s father, Darius, 61, and mother, Ruth 55, and probably other family members. At this time, David Mead’s immediate family members were his wife Agnes Wilson Mead, 34, his two daughters, Margaret, 8, Elizabeth, 2, and a son, William, 1. Their next daughter, Sarah, was the first child born in the early settlement on French Creek. Their last child, Darius, was born two years later in 1791.
In addition to providing for his own family, David Mead took on many indispensable roles in the community. He did most of the land surveys in preparation for new settlers. He became a liaison between the local friendly Indian tribes and the federal troops stationed at Fort Franklin 20 miles to the south at the fork of the Allegheny River and French Creek. He also built and maintained a saw and a grist mill. Because of his experiences as a justice of the peace in Northumberland, he was appointed a justice of the peace in Mead Township in 1796. As time went on, he spent more and more time in land speculation, surveying and buying/selling of prime property in the immediate and outlying areas.
Family tragedy befell Mead in the early 1790s: his father, Darius, 63 was killed by Indians in 1791 and his wife, Agnes, died in 1795 at the age of 40. His children at that time ranged in ages: Darius, 4 years old to Margaret, 14 years old. Mead was married the next year to Jennet Finney, the 20-year-old daughter of one of our story’s major protagonists, Robert Finney (1744-1827). David was married to Jennet for the next 20 years until his death in 1816. They had six children: David (1798-1812), Robert (1800-1848), Catherine (1801-1879), Jane (1803-1869), Maria (1805-1881) and Alexander (1807-1880).
In 1800, he was appointed as the first associate justice of the newly created Crawford County by the then governor, Thomas McKean, who was a son of Jennet’s grand aunt, Letitia Finney (1709-1742). Mead served in this capacity until his death in 1816. Later in 1807, McKean also appointed Mead as a major general of the 16th Pennsylvania Division of Militia. McKean was not his only ally in national politics; a brother-in-law, Thomas C. Wilson (1772-1824), son-in-law, Patrick Farrelly (1770-1826), and later, a grandson, John Wilson Farrelly (1809-60), were members of Congress.
Mead was very much a political animal himself. He tried numerous times to be elected to state and national office. Four times he unsuccessfully ran for office: three times for the Pennsylvania General Assembly and one time for Congress. While he always did well garnering the vote in Meadville, he was outvoted in the rest of the county. Nonetheless, he was active and influential behind the scenes in other local and state politics throughout the first decade of the 19th century.
That General Mead was a “drinking man” is probably a given. He had owned and operated distilleries in Sunbury and Meadville. As a highly social man of business and politics, he likely frequented the tavern known as the Crossed Keyes operated by Henry Hurst. Both Hurst and Mead were ardent Democrat Republicans and the local meetings were held for years at the Hurst tavern. In 1820 there were six taverns in a three block stretch of the village’s oldest street, Water Street. They were the Traveler’s Rest, the White Inn, the Sign of the Stag, the Golden Eagle, the Lion and the Crossed Keyes. All were a short walk from the Mead home at the north end of Water Street. Historians state that drinking whiskey distilled from corn was so wide-spread and common in the United States that the consumption per person was 7 gallons of pure alcohol per year. Under the customs of alcohol use at the time, drunkenness and alcoholism flourished.
At the beginning of the War of 1812 with Great Britain, David Mead was given command of all of the Pennsylvania army organized to defend Erie located sixty miles north of Meadville on Lake Erie against an expected invasion by the British. While the British never mounted a land attack at Erie, the American army commanded by Mead was most helpful to Commodore Perry’s efforts there. In 1814, one year prior to the end of the war, Mead was suddenly replaced by the new governor, Simon Snyder. It is not known why; we can only speculate.
His death was unexpected and the illness leading up to it was brief. Only a short notice was put in the local paper, the Crawford Messenger, announcing his death and stating that he was “one of Meadville’s most useful citizens.” At a minimum, this snub by the Messenger’s editor, Thomas Atkinson, can be attributed to large political differences between the two men or to a darker side to General Mead. There will be more discussion on this in a later chapter.
2.2- David Mead’s Financial Entanglement with Thomas Wilson
David Mead’s first wife was Agnes Eliza Wilson (1755-1795). It is likely that the Wilson family was in Sunbury, Pennsylvania when the Meads moved there in 1776. They were married about that time. She would have been 21 at the time; he 24. Agnes had two brothers who migrated to northwest Pennsylvania about the same time as David Mead. Both were enterprising and shrewd in their business dealings. The oldest, William Wilson (1756-1797), was well known as a successful storekeeper in Franklin, Pennsylvania in the 1790s. At the time David Mead brought his family to the French Creek valley, Fort Franklin was the only relatively safe place for settlers in Northwest Pennsylvania. Numerous times in the 1790s, the settlers in Meadville had to flee Indian predations by removing to the Fort and staying there for months at a time. William Wilson also entered into various business enterprises with David Mead, his brother-in-law, transporting lumber from David Mead’s sawmill downstream to Pittsburgh.
At the time of William’s death in 1797, David Mead was one of the most frequent customers of William’s store. According to Robert Ilisevich, a David Mead biographer, “he was a constant borrower of cash and a huge purchaser on credit. To pay off some of his debts in 1793, he gave up a Cussewago tract valued at 400 dollars. When William died, an inventory of his goods and accounts disclosed that Mead’s unpaid balance of 718 pounds sterling was, by far, the largest on the books. It was not until January 1806, that he paid off the unsettled balance to the estate.”(1) In spite of obvious conflicts of interest, David Mead and William’s brother, Thomas (1772-1824), were named the executors of William’s estate. This was apparently changed a few years later, as we find in the court records a lawsuit by Robert Finney and Sally Mead (David Mead and Agnes Wilson Mead’s daughter) in 1809 who had been named the executors to the William Wilson estate. One would hope that David Mead withdrew from that executorship on the basis of the obvious conflicts of interest.
It is likely that Jane, one of the daughters of William Wilson, married James Finney, who is the chief character in our story. This seems likely, as their second-born son was named William Wilson Finney (1811-1865) and the name Wilson, continues in the naming of children from this family line. Their first-born son was named Robert after his grandfather, Robert Finney. Jane died in 1820; we do not know her age at the time, but James was 33 years old. We can assume that James and Jane were married sometime around 1803, as their first child, Sally Jane, was born in 1804.
Agnes Wilson’s other brother, Thomas C. Wilson (1772-1824) also figures prominently in our story. As a state politician from Erie, Pennsylvania, he was considered “brilliant” by historian Russell Ferguson (“Early Western Pennsylvania Politics”, page 213). As an enterprising businessman, he established ongoing contracts with the federal government to supply the various military forces in the area before and during the War of 1812. He was also a well-known ship builder (100+ ton sloops). He was known to have defaulted on a number of contracts which led to lawsuits, some of which he lost and some he won. In 1804 his creditors demanded financial guarantees by a solvent third party. This led him to approach his land-wealthy brother-in-law, David Mead, to co-sign on mortgages of $17,000 and notes of $31,750. These financial obligations came due in 1810 and were defaulted by Wilson.
Another indication of the strained financial relationships in the extended family during this period is a strange lawsuit in 1809 naming the plaintiffs, Robert Finney and Sally Mead, who were trustees for the heirs of William Wilson vs. David Mead for $9,000. A judgment of $6,000 was awarded to the plaintiffs by the court in 1810. The Sally in the case must be David Mead’s daughter, Sarah, (Sally is commonly known as the diminutive of Sarah) who would have been 21 years old at the time of the judgment. It is not at all clear how Robert Finney became involved in this suit, unless it was on behalf of his daughter-in-law, Jane Wilson. The suit was successful and David Mead was ordered by the court to pay the plaintiffs $6,000 in 1810, a huge sum of money for those times. Robert’s son, James, would have been 23 years old and he and his wife, Jane, have had their first three children; Sally Jane was born in 1804, Robert born 1806 and Sarah Jane born in 1808. The 1810 census shows the James Finney family living with his father, Robert, presumably on the “Rocky Spring” tract less than a mile north of the village.
2.3- The State of David Mead’s Finances at the Time of his Death
We have to wonder what effect the above lawsuits may have had on the Mead, Wilson & Finney family constellation. David Mead would die only six years later and the very complicated estate left by him which was further complicated by the accidental death of his wife, Jennet, just seven years after; the court cases would take another twenty years to be settled in the courts.
Jennet Mead did not fare as well through all of the above probate wrangling. Even though she evidently had provided for her children and her estate was inventoried at $640 when she died, her situation was compromised by the fact that with her husband’s death, the family’s income ended. Her two sons were too young in 1816 (the oldest boy was Robert at 16 years of age) to help with this dilemma. Perhaps, the saw and grist mills founded by David Mead continued to operate and provide some income for the family. Jennet was known to be an assertive and capable woman; she may have run them herself. In 1820, the Mead family dynamics were further changed by Jennet’s father, Robert, coming to live with them. He was 76 years old at the time and in failing health, no longer to fully care for himself.
Thomas Wilson, David Mead’s brother-in-law and Henry Hurst were the administrators of the David Mead estate. How this came about is not certain, but it was undeniably controversial. David Mead co-signed on a huge debt of $6,000 owed by Thomas Wilson sometime before Mead’s death. At the time of his death, the debt had not been paid, and in fact was not paid by the time of Wilson’s death in 1824. Henry Hurst was of the first settlers of Meadville in the late 1790s. He was one of the first tavern operators of Meadville and was the County sheriff from 1806-09 and 1812-15. He was also a brigadier general in the War of 1812 and one of the first directors of the Northwest Bank of Pennsylvania which was founded in 1814.
Henry Hurst died a year before Thomas Wilson. Jennet Mead was killed from the burns received in a kitchen fire in 1823, as well. Shortly after Wilson’s death in 1824, Dr. Daniel Bemus was named the executor of the David Mead estate. The estate must have been “a hot mess,” as the litigation between Mead’s creditors and the estate went on until the 1840s.
2.4- David Mead’s Family in 1816
It does appear from the historical record that David Mead’s death was not expected as the account states that the illness began only one week prior to his demise. At the time of his death, Jennet was 50 years old, her oldest child, Robert would have been 16; the other children: Catherine- 15, Jane- 13, Maria- 11 and Alexander- 9 years old. Jennet’s stress level must have been consistently high with a young family of five children, an invalid father to care for and extensive financial difficulties and demands. She must have also worked to keep the Mead mills and distillery in operation, as that would be the family’s only means of income. The kitchen accident that led to her death may have been caused by the distraction of constant stress and conflict.
Sometime after David Mead’s death, she borrowed $600 from the Northwest Bank. By the time of her death, this debt was still outstanding. Due to various difficulties in the local economy, the bank closed its doors in 1822. The bank still worked to collect on its outstanding loans and we can guess that they put considerable pressure on Jennet to pay her debt to the bank. Court records for its August, 1824 term show that the bank brought suit against Daniel Bemus, Robert Mead and Catherine Mead for the outstanding loan. There is no record of the court ruling in favor of the bank and the overdue loan was continued forward and was still in effect at the time of the 1827 Robert Finney will dispute.
2.5- The Northwest Bank of Pennsylvania
With the growth of the village and the increase of industry there was difficulty in keeping enough specie for the convenience of trade and the citizens determined to establish a bank. In the winter of 1813, the Legislature granted a charter to the North Western Bank of Pennsylvania with an authorized capital of $200,000 and 4,000 shares of stock. Of this stock, Erie, Crawford, Mercer, and Warren Counties were each to be awarded 1,000 shares. The bank was to be located in Meadville.
The books were opened for subscription at Meadville on May 4, 1814, by Thomas Atkinson, Henry Hurst, John Brooks, and Samuel Torbett, Commissioners. The first board of directors—William Clark, John Brooks, Roger Alden, Samuel B. Magaw, Henry Hurst, Jacob Shryock, Patrick Farrelly, Eliphalet Betts, John Reynolds, James Herriott, Wilson Smith, and Rufus Reed of Erie, and William Connelly of Franklin—held their first meeting on October 31, 1814. Samuel B. Magaw was elected president and also treasurer protem. Joseph Morrison of Philadelphia was elected cashier with a salary of $900 per year, which afterward was raised to $1,400, provided he should pay his clerk hire and provide stationery, firewood, and candles.
The commissioners succeeded in obtaining the entire stock subscription, but a very considerable portion was never paid in full. There were in all 369 subscribers, and the actual amount of stock paid for totaled $63,138. The bank issued $1,000 in fractional notes of 50, 25, 12Y2, and 64 cents, also denominations of $20, $10, $5, $2, and $1. There were about $200,000 of notes actually engraved, but there is no record of the actual amount placed in circulation, which in 1821 was $57,000.
The unusual scarcity of specie in the middle of the 1820's, together with the demand for the redemption of notes in gold and silver, placed the bank in straightened condition and, while in 1818 its discounts were between $80,000 and $90,000, the specie reserve dropped to fourteen cents. Under these conditions it became necessary to close its doors in 1822 and to go into liquidation. John Reynolds was appointed receiver by the court. It required many years to liquidate the affairs of the bank. The last meeting of the officers was held on March 6, 1838, when the bank notes on hand were counted and burned. Stockholders were reimbursed in full for the stock paid in, and all notes of the institution were redeemed. So ended the North Western Bank of Pennsylvania, one of the first and one of the very few banks in all the great west.
Meadville had a population of 400 or 500 in 1814, and Crawford County 5,000. The North Western Bank of Pennsylvania was not only profitable to the stockholders, but it also gave banking facilities to this part of the state and aided greatly in public enterprises, such as the building of the Susquehanna and Waterford Turnpike, the Mercer Turnpike, and helped the agricultural community in establishing a profitable wool industry in northwestern Pennsylvania.
Following Jennet Mead’s death in 1823, the Northwestern Bank began legal proceedings to collect outstanding debts presumably going back to David Mead’s estate at the time of his death. The resolution of the bank’s complicated finances took many years until March 6, 1838, when the officers held their last meeting.
The first directors and board members of the bank were:
Thomas Atkinson (1781-1837) was the founder and editor of the Crawford Messenger, Meadville’s first newspaper from 1805 to his retirement in the mid-1830s. As might be guessed, he played many important political, economic and social roles in the community and served three terms in the Pennsylvania legislature. He also served as a colonel in the Pennsylvania Militia under General William Dick during the war of 1812. In Robert Finney’s first will in 1820, Atkinson is named as one of the administrators.
Henry Hurst was a revolutionary war veteran who established and operated one of Meadville’s taverns, just walking distance from David Mead’s home. His tavern was the official meeting place of the local chapter of Democratic Republicans, the party of which Mead was a member. We can safely assume that David Mead rubbed elbows with Hurst during many drinking meetings. Serving through the War of 1812, he returned with the rank of brigadier general. He was also a commissioner, postmaster and sheriff of Meadville. Henry Hurst and Thomas C. Wilson were named the administrators of David Mead’s will.
John Brooks was one of the first settlers coming to the Meadville area at the same time as Robert Finney. He and David Mead were the first justices of peace for Meadville and during the War of 1812 he was appointed aide to General Mead with the rank of major. He was a judge of the Meadville Court of Common Pleas where James Finney’s suit against the Meads was heard.
Roger Alden, a major in the Revolutionary War and cousin to Timothy Alden, the founder of Allegheny College in Meadville, was also a cousin to T. J. Fox Alden (son of Timothy Alden) who was the attorney representing James Finney in the 1827 will dispute. Timothy Alden was a witness to the signing of Robert Finney’s 1st will.
Eliphalet Betts (1771-1858) built a log house across the street south of the Hurst Tavern on Water Street. A tailor by trade, he was a public-spirited man and took an interest in all affairs that promoted the welfare of the community.
James Herriot (-1842) had been a successful merchant in Meadville since the beginning of the century. He was known in the community as having closed his store and having entered the military service during the War of 1812. He returned at the end of the war with the rank of major and honorable mention. At one time he was extensively interested in river traffic on the Ohio and Mississippi. Later financial reverses ended his business career.
Patrick Farrelly (1770-1826) married David Mead’s & Agnes Wilson’s daughter, Elizabeth. An immigrant from Ireland just prior to coming to Meadville in the 1790, he rose to prominence in the community and the state. He is known as “brilliant” in law and politics by at least one well known historian. After his first wife died, he then married Martha Wright Alden, a daughter of Timothy Alden, the founder of Allegheny College.
John Reynolds (1783-1871) was a witness in the court hearing on the Robert Finney will dispute. Reynolds and his brother, E.A. Reynolds came to Meadville area as young men in the late 1790s. They came with family money that enabled both of them to begin acquiring land which they did with great profit well into the mid-century. Both also held public office and were prominent in civic and economic activities in the community.
2.6- Community & Family Inter-Relationships
Further complicating family alignments in the village were the issues arising from neighbors who lived close or next to land held by the Meads and the Finneys. According to a map of Meadville and surrounding areas in the early 1800s, the following people who figure later in our story are shown as having significant land holdings immediately adjacent to David/Jennet Mead and Robert Finney in Mead Township immediately north of Meadville.
Daniel Bemus (1784-1866) was one of the earliest physicians of Meadville, beginning his practice there around 1810. In politics he was first a Whig and then a Republican. During the war of 1812, he was the chief surgeon of the division commanded by Maj. Gen. Mead. About 1828 he built extensive woolen, flour, lumber and oil mills on French Creek about two miles above Meadville, that local becoming known as Bemustown for many years afterward. As a businessman, he was successful, accumulating a handsome fortune, and at his death was possessed of considerable property. In 1835 he married Jane Brooks (1802-1893), daughter of John Brooks who was one of the judges of the Court of Common Pleas where the Finney/Mead legal dispute was heard in 1827. Bemus was named the administrator of David Mead’s estate in 1817 and to Robert Finney’s second will in 1824. He withdrew his name from that role in 1827 due to numerous conflicts of interest which will be discussed later in our story. Robert Mead brought suit against Bemus in 1826 for damages to his property that were caused by the construction of the Bemus Mills on French Creek. Numerous land parcels owned by Daniel Bemus and later to Jane Bemus in Mead Township were adjacent to the land owned by Robert Finney (probably the “Rocky Spring” tract which figured so prominently in the 1827 will dispute.)
William Gill (1758-1845) purchased land in Meadville as early as 1793. As Scottish immigrants, he and his wife Catherine, came to the area at the same time as several other principal characters in our story: Robert & Jennet Finney, John Brooks. A rather well-known story about Jennet Finney was that she took over his claim and rough cabin while he was gone for the winter. The law at the time supported this action as a way of preventing settlers from making claims that they did not truly inhabit. The story asserts that when he returned in the spring and found her in the cabin he had built, she shooed him off the land while brandishing a rifle. Ironically, the land once again became the Gill family possession when William Gill, Jr. married Maria Mead, the daughter of Jennet and David Mead, in 1833.
James R. Dick (1801- 1875) was a brother of John Dick, who had singular prominence in the community as a general in the Pennsylvania militia, associate judge of Crawford County and an elected member to congress for three successive terms. The brothers came to Meadville as children in the 1790s from Pittsburgh. Both were highly successful in business, land speculation and finance. Both were involved in the establishment and operation of the private banking house of J.R. Dick & Company which was in business through most of the 19th Century in Meadville. Another brother, David, purchased 75 acres from the Mead family in 1834. (Could this be the Robert Finney 75 acres?)
James Doughty (1779-1863) and wife Nancy (1791-1878) were neighbors as well as friends of the Finney family. In 1821 James Doughty became the guardian and custodian of James Finney’s son, Joseph. He also gave testimony at the 1827 will dispute hearings.
John Frew (1735-1812) John Frew is shown in the 1800 & 1810 census as living in St. Clair Township, Allegheny County. His son, Thomas (1779-1858) was a farmer in Mead Township; all of his siblings lived in the same township in Allegheny County as the parents did. Even though the name shown on the Mead Township map from the early 19th century states that it is John Frew, it must be land actually farmed by Thomas. He also gave testimony at the 1827 will dispute hearings.
Samuel Lord (1769-1840) One of the first settlers of Meadville. He married Rebecca Dunham (1789-1852), another example of intermarriage between principal families in our story. Samuel Lord had substantial property holdings next to Robert Finney. His son, Enoch (1799-1846) also had significant land holdings in the area as of 1827.
William McArthur (1760-1822) was born in Ireland and came to America about the close of the Revolutionary War, taught school in York County, PA and studied surveying with the family of his future wife. When Pennsylvania lands came into market, he came in 1794 to Meadville and laid out the town for General David Mead. He was named District Surveyor, and in 1800 was selected State Senator for the district composed of Crawford, Erie, Venango, Warren and Mercer Counties, his opponent being General Mead. He served two terms in the legislature (the capital was then in Lancaster) and he rode back and forth spring and fall on horseback over the mountains during legislative terms. While he was a state senator, he was appointed by the Governor, Simon Snyder, Prothonotary of Crawford County and also Register and Recorder, which positions he filled until his decease in 1822. He married Rebecca McClean in 1805. He died in 1822 in Meadville, Pennsylvania, at the age of 62. One year before his death, he was a witness to the first Robert Finney will.
2.7- Extensive Litigation over David Mead’s Finances, 1816-1840
When Mead died in 1816, he was a wealthy man on paper--the inventory of his estate showed assets worth over $5,000.00, and when the estate was settled eight years later there was a balance of $7,000.00. Mead's executors in 1819 reached an agreement with a Philadelphia creditors' syndicate, allowing them to enter a judgment for $12,700.00 and sell Mead's real estate in an attempt to pay it. The committee agreed to buy the land itself if it were sold for bargain prices, and to release the General's personal goods, up to the value of $2,000.00 for the use of Jennet and their five children. After the liens were paid, the creditors also agreed to return one 408-acre tract in Venango County to Mead's children by his first wife, and an additional 422 acre tract to the heirs of William Wilson. Mead's holdings--consisting of 2,522 acres in Crawford County, 2,061 acres in Venango County, 1,683 acres in Mercer County, and 100 acres in Erie County-- were then sold by the Venango County Sheriff. The financial matters were finally settled in 1829, when Mead's administrator, Dr. Daniel Bemus, was given the 830 acres of land in Sugar Creek Township, Venango County, according to the agreement. These lands were sold to benefit Mead's heirs by his first wife, as they were the sole heirs of William Wilson also.
To understand all of this, we can draw on the large number of lawsuits against David Mead and the William Wilson, David Mead, Thomas Wilson, Jennet Mead estates from 1807-1840. The trouble evidently began as early as 1807 when a group of investors (James Smith, Jr., James Boggs & George Thompson) from Philadelphia sued for $12,700.00 for money owed to them by David Mead and Thomas Wilson. Both refused to pay this sum awarded to the plaintiffs during their lifetimes (Mead died in 1816 and Thomas Wilson in 1824). The case was brought up again in 1820 by James Smith, Jr. et al. and certain tracts of David Mead land were awarded by the court to the plaintiffs. The case shows up in court again in 1829 with the plaintiff being a John J. Smith, presumably a relation of the previously named James Smith, Jr. with the outstanding debt listed as $8,000.
About the same time, another suit in 1828 was brought by the heirs of William Wilson against the estate of David Mead. The amount listed as owed by the David Mead estate was $2,400.00 and the settlement included the transfer of Mead property to Jered Shattuck. It is almost certain that this transaction included the transfer of the David Mead residence on Randolph Street to Shattuck. Shattuck was one of Meadville’s earliest settlers and operated one of its first general stores. He was also a land speculator. He was known to have bought 90,000 acres for $16,000 in the late 1790s in Crawford County. At first, he appeared to do well when his initial sales to incoming settlers soared, but his debts also climbed. So destitute were his purchasers that he could hardly collect enough cash from them to pay for the taxes on his remaining tracts. When interest on his debts alone was $50,000, Shattuck realized that it was time to bail out.
After Jered Shattuck acquired the Mead property and family home on Randolph, he built a new store adjacent to the old Mead home and lived in the home. He died in 1837 and the home and property was transferred to his son, Leon D.V. Shattuck who lived in it for the next 25 years. The 1830 census for Robert Mead shows him living in Mead Township with his two sisters, Maria and Jane, who are not yet married and three other family members, one male 5-9 years old, one female 10-14 yrs. old, one female 40-49 yrs. old and one female 80-89 years old; the last four not being identifiable. It is likely that the Mead family was still living in the Mead homestead at that time. As Robert is next shown in the 1840 census as living by himself in Sadsbury Township and Maria and Jane were married in 1833 and 1838, we can assume that the Mead property in Meadville had been turned over to Jered Shattuck sometime by the mid-1830s.
Showing further how complicated David Mead’s finances and estate were, we can point to additional court cases. In 1808, the heirs of William Wilson, David Mead’s brother-in-law, sued and were awarded by the court for $2,790.00 of which only $340 was paid in David Mead’s lifetime. Presumably, this was for outstanding charges made at the Wilson store in Franklin in the 1790s. The Wilson heirs filed a new suit in 1828 in which they moved to collect the outstanding amount from the David Mead estate.
In 1810 Robert Finney and Sally Mead, a daughter from David Mead’s first family, as trustees for the William Wilson estate sued David Mead for $6,000.00. Unfortunately, the court papers on this case do not enlighten us as to what this might have been about. In an interesting turn-around after David Mead’s death, Thomas Wilson & Henry Hurst, administrators of the David Mead estate brought suit in 1818 against Robert Finney & Jennet Mead for $4,445.00. Patrick Farrelly was the attorney for the defendants. At the time Patrick Farrelly was married to David Mead’s daughter, Elizabeth (from Mead’s first family), from 1806 to her death in 1811. The $4,445 debt was not paid for the next fourteen years, as Daniel Bemus, the later administrator of the David Mead estate brought suit for that amount in 1832 against Robert Mead, Lot & Catherine Dunham as the administrators of the Robert Finney estate and Robert Mead, Alexander Mead, Lot Dunham and Catherine, Jane Mead, Maria Mead, heirs of Jennet Mead.
In a final lawsuit in 1841 in which William Mead (David Mead’s nephew) brought suit against Daniel Bemus, the administrator of the David Mead estate (note that this is 25 years after David Mead’s death in 1816.) for $666.00. A statement made by David M. Farrelly (David Farrelly was a well-respected attorney and a son of Patrick Farrelly and his wife Elizabeth Mead) who was evidently representing the defendant in the case was that “the estate of David Mead was largely in debt beyond all help and debts of this grade were barely worth a trifle.” Thus, ended any further record of litigation on the David Mead estate.
2.8- David Mead’s Alcoholism
There is every indication that David Mead was a life-time alcoholic. That he was a high functioning alcoholic in early life is also clear. It is in his later years that the negative effects of this illness became evident. We do know that the drinking of alcohol was prevalent in early 18th century America. It is seen by some historians as being an epidemic. There was great availability of corn liquor as this was the only means by which the western Pennsylvanians could get their crops to the eastern seaboard markets. Most farmers had distilleries to enable them to convert their corn crops to alcohol. Also, alcohol was widely used with all meals, as it was the only consistently safe beverage available. Water from the streams and wells could often be contaminated. According to historian, John Earle Reynolds (2), "As an act of hospitality in private homes, visitors were usually offered a glass of wine or spirits, and for this purpose a decanter and glasses were kept on the sideboard. It was also a custom in every store to have a decanter of whiskey, a pitcher of water and glasses on the counter that customers might refresh themselves. Although this privilege was sometimes abused, yet on the table of the moderator at meetings of the Presbyterian Synod there was always a decanter of whiskey and glasses of water."
As a “drinking society,” the conditions were ripe for latent alcoholism to be triggered and to flourish in those predisposed by their genetic makeup. According to historians, this period in America was a peak time in alcohol consumption which is estimated to be almost three times the amount of the present day. Meadville with a population of 600 souls had ten public drinking places: The Reichard Tavern, the Sign of the Golden Eagle, the Hurst Tavern, Captain Richard Patch’s tavern, the Crossed Keys Tavern, the Sign of the Stag, the Guilded Lion, the Barton House and Crawford House. David Mead probably did his drinking at Henry Hurst’s tavern as it was the meeting place for the Democrats in town; Hurst was also an administrator of David Mead’s estate.
There were also a number of indications of David Mead’s alcoholism in late life. While successful in many business enterprises, he also engaged in a number of disastrous financial dealings, from excessive credit with his brother-in-law, William Wilson, to co-signing on questionable business dealings with his other brother-in-law, Thomas Wilson. It is also fair to say that David Mead did not protect his family against the collapse of his business/land empire upon his death. Extremely poor judgment is often a characteristic of chronic and late stage alcoholism.
In 1813, before the end of the war of 1812, David Mead was suddenly relieved of his command of the militia forces in NW Pennsylvania. It may be supposed that this could be due to drunkenness while on duty and the attendant poor judgment related to this state.
Another curious fact of Mead’s life was the very short notice of his passing given him by Thomas Atkinson, the editor of the Crawford Messenger which only stated tersely that “he was one of Meadville’s most useful members.” Thomas Atkinson was an officer during the first year of the war of 1812 and probably knew of Mead’s deterioration while in command. As Meadville’s most informed community member, Atkinson would know of other lapses in judgment and questionable behavior related to General Mead’s alcoholism.
Lastly, Mead died fairly suddenly of an undisclosed illness relatively early in life. He was only 64 years old. Strangely, he was buried the next day and with no headstone. After just a few years, no one seemed to know the location of his grave in the old Meadville graveyard. How could a person be so completely forgotten and neglected after his death, unless he left a mixed legacy clouded by late stage alcoholism and/or scandalous business dealings? One of the ironies of this sad event was that the land for Meadville’s first public cemetery was donated by Mead decades before his own burial there.
2.9- The Mead Family at the Time of Jennet Mead’s Death
Jennet’s death in 1823 was a major setback for the Mead family. It is presumed that the responsibility of the care of the family fell to the oldest son, Robert, who was only 23 years old at the time. Her father, Robert Finney, was in early senility at the time and was to die in 1827. We also know that the death of David Mead in 1816 led to extensive financial and legal problems for the family that lasted for the next twenty years or more. Jennet was known as a dominant personality, quite capable of providing for the family and negotiating the many financial and legal difficulties following the death of her husband. Her unexpected death had to greatly unbalance the state of the family. Jennet’s daughters were Catherine, 22, Jane, 20 and Maria, 18. The youngest child was Alexander, 16. The first daughter to marry was Catherine, who married Lott Dunham in 1825. The Dunhams were a well-established and prosperous farm family within the Meadville community. Lott and Catherine are shown as living in Vernon Township from the 1830 census on. This must have been on established Dunham farmland. It seems likely that the care of Robert Finney who had two years of life left fell to them. It was Robert Mead along with Lott and Catherine that were named as executors of Robert Finney’s estate in Robert’s final will.
Maria Mead married William Gill in 1833; Alexander Mead married Fannie Rich in 1837 and Jane Mead did not marry William Hutchinson until 1838. Robert Mead’s marital status is a mystery. The 1830 census for Mead Township (Rocky Spring Finney property?) indicates the possibility of a wife and two children, but there is no other record of such either before or after and he is shown as living alone in the 1840 census. It does appear that at the time of Robert Finney’s death, his Mead grandchildren (Robert, 27, Jane, 24, Maria, 22 and Alexander, 20), with the exception of Catherine were likely to be still living in the Mead home on Randolph Street.
What the source of the family income was at the time of Jennet’s death is not clear. They were not farm people. While David Mead did practice some farming during the life of his first family; he did not during the life of his second. It is possible that one or more of David Mead’s businesses (grist mill, sawmill, distillery) were carried on after David’s and Jennet’s deaths. The family may also have attempted to live off the income from the large land holdings of David Mead. However, much of these land holdings were under legal attack by creditors for many years following David Mead’s demise.
Also, at this time it is not clear who continued to live in the Mead home following the marriage of the daughters. Robert is shown in the 1830 census as living in Mead Township with what might be a wife (20-29 yrs. of age), a son (5-9 yrs. of age) and a daughter (10-14 yrs. of age). In the 1840 census, he is shown as living alone in Sadisbury Township (Conneaut Lake area). Sometime prior to 1850 both Robert and Alexander moved to Whiteside County, Illinois. Robert died there in 1848 and Alexander and his family of wife and six children are shown there in the 1850 census.
The old Mead property on Randolph Street apparently changed hands many times after the land and house were turned over to the Jered Shattuck family in the middle of the 1830s as part of one of the many lawsuits against the Mead family. Other owners were George Selden, in (?), Rev. Marrison Byllesby in 1868, Dr. Ellis in 1875(?) George DeArment in 1908(?) DeArment made extensive changes to the original dwelling.
3.1- Robert Finney
Robert Finney (1744-1827) was the eighth of eleven children born to William Finney and Jean Stephenson who lived on the family estate known as “Thunder Hill” in New London, Pennsylvania. William was known to have made his living as a carpenter. As William's will was probated in New London, we assume that William and Jean Finney lived there all their lives. In 1767 his son, Walter, is known to have purchased the family farm of 150 acres for 100 pounds. William died a young man, about 46 years of age. There is no record of Jean remarrying, in spite of the youth and size of her family. The ages of the children living in the home at the time of William's death were Lazarus at 13 years, Martha at 11 years, Robert at 9 years, John at 6 years, Walter at 4 years and Jean at 2 years of age. William and Jean are buried in the Thunder Hill Cemetery just outside of New London.
Three of William and Jean's sons are known to have served in the Revolutionary War: Walter, Archibald and Robert. Archibald served as a second lieutenant, and Robert as a private. Walter Finney served with considerable distinction (Lieutenant-1776, Captain-1779, Major-1783), was severely wounded at the Battle of Brandywine) and later served in the frontier Indian wars. Fort Finney in Ohio is named after Walter whose infantry company built it in 1786. A famous treaty with Shawnee Indians was signed there on January 31, 1786. It was known as the Treaty of Fort Finney. The location of the fort is next to the "Falls of the Ohio River" and one mile from the mouth of the Miami River near present day Louisville, Kentucky. After his military service, Walter Finney returned to Chester County where he served as a local judge.
Robert and his cousin, Lazarus (1751-1826), are both officially recorded as taking Oaths of Allegiance to the Continental Congress in New London on June 27, 1777. Robert again took the oath on August 24, 1778 and both served as private soldiers in the Second Battalion of the Chester County Associators. As the of Battle of Brandywine took place only 10 miles east of New London on September 11, 1777, Robert was likely to have seen action then. Robert Finney's first wife's maiden name is known to be Jane Loughead (1750-1792). Two children, Jennett (1776) and James (1787), were born into this marriage.
Six Finney family members patented land in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania in 1784 (John Sr.- 300 acres, John Jr.- 400 acres, Walter- 300 acres, William- 350 acres, James- 150 acres and Robert Jr.- 300 acres). It is safe to assume that this is our Robert Finney and the other persons are family relations. The Wilson family (which figures prominently in the David Mead and Robert Mead family histories), members of the Loughead family and the Finney’s all lived within 20 miles of each other in the “Forks of Yough”area (the juncture of the Allegheny and Youghiogheny Rivers). In 1784 Robert Finney would have been 40 years old, Jane, 35 yrs., Jennet, 8 yrs.; James would not be born for another three years. As Robert, Jennet and James do not relocate to Meadville until 1794, the family will have resided in Westmoreland County for about ten years. As Jane is not recorded in the 1790 census, she died sometime shortly after James’ birth in 1787. After her mother’s death, Jennet must have been the primary caretaker of her little brother, James, at least until the move to Meadville in 1793.
It had to be very hard on this little family to lose Jane at this crucial juncture. SW Pennsylvania was still a wilderness and the Indian wars were to continue until the mid-1790s. To our knowledge, Robert did not remarry and remained a bachelor for the rest of his life. If it were not for the care of his older sister, the child, James, may have not survived. The loss of his mother at such a young age would be emotionally crippling enough. It is a mystery as to why Robert relocated his family to Meadville which was an even more primitive community. To do so would be to leave family and friends that were developed over the preceding ten years in Westmoreland County. We know that he possessed 300 acres of land at the time, so for him to move to acquire more land does not make sense. He apparently did sell the Westmoreland land, as he was able to buy valuable land in Mead Township when he arrived there and added to his land holdings substantially within the next twenty years. His largest purchase was the “Rocky Spring” 297 acre tract which he bought from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in 1801.
The next challenge for Robert and James was the marriage of Jennet to David Mead in 1796, just three years after their move to Meadville. At that time Jennet would have been 20 years old, James, 9 yrs., and Robert 52 yrs. It is certain that James would have been expected to take up the farm work of an adult. One can visualize James and his father working alongside each other day to day in the fields and with the livestock. This arrangement evidently lasted for about ten years until James married Jane Wilson in 1803.
3.2- James Finney
Robert and Jane and their daughter, Jennet, moved from New London on the east side of Pennsylvania to Westmoreland County in the west of the state in 1784. At the time Robert was 40 years old and Jennet was eight years old. So little is known about the history of Jane, her age at the time is unknown. James Finney was born three years later in 1787. The 395 acre land that they farmed was purchased in 1784 and was described in a survey as “Situated on the west side of Crooked Creek five miles from the mouth known by the name of Walnut Hill, bounded on the west by lands of Robert Hooper and on the south by Crooked Creek in Westmoreland County.” This section of Pennsylvania is now in Allegheny County. Living close by was Robert’s brother, James. James lived in Elizabeth Township for his whole life. Other family relations also lived in that area. William Loughead, presumably a relation of James Finney’s mother, Jane, and his family patented land there in 1786. All of this took place in the area straddled by the Allegheny and Youghoheny Rivers six to ten miles below the “Forks of Yough” where the two rivers come together.
Pittsburgh, about 15 miles to the north, had a population of less than 400 people. The area between the two rivers known as the "Forks of Yough" was particularly attractive to the early settlers, as in 1790 it had 11,000 of the county’s total population of 13,500.
Jane must have died not too long after giving birth to James, as she does not appear in the 1790 census taken in “Washington, Allegheny County, PA. The family relocated to Meadville in 1793, when Jennet was 17 and James was 6. Jennet married David Mead in 1796. James would have been 9 at the time.
What must all of this been like for the very young James? The only maternal figure that he had was his sister who was eleven years older than he. When she married, his only parent was his father. Fortunately, he was at an old enough age to work with his father in the fields and on the farm. He was subject to significant emotional loss at an early age: his mother when he was an infant or toddler and his sister at the age of nine. His father was the only constant. He and his father continued to work the Rocky Spring tract until James married his first wife, Jane Wilson in 1803 when he was a mere 16 years old. They had their first child, Sally Jane, the next year. The young family continued to live on the Finney farm, either in the same house as Robert Finney or in a separate domicile. The 1810 census suggests that they certainly lived close by if not in the same household. This must have been a happy time for the Finney family. Robert now had the benefit of having his son’s family involved in his daily life and continuing to have his son as a daily work mate.
We have to assume that the little family continued regular and favorable contact with Jennet’s family. All must have gone well until death struck both families within the span of four years. David Mead died suddenly in 1816 and James wife died in childbirth in 1820.
3.3- James Finney’s Disappearance, 1821
Thus begins a six year absence by James Finney. We must assume that he left the county and possibly the state, presumably to find a wife and/or work. His disappearance seems to correspond to the guardianship of Joseph by James Doughty and Robert’s move to his daughter’s home in 1821.
This was the time of canal development in New York and Pennsylvania. Construction on the Erie Canal began in 1817 and was completed in 1827. Its 300 miles of waterway connected Albany to Buffalo. About the same time, Pennsylvania began construction of its canal system in 1824. By 1834, the canal from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh was completed and in full operation. Directly affecting the NW part of Pennsylvania, a canal known as the “Erie & Beaver Canal” connecting Erie to Pittsburgh was begun in 1827 and completed in 1838. Also, a feeder canal from Meadville to the Erie & Beaver Canal was also constructed at this time.
As construction on the Erie Canal was begun three years before James’ disappearance, it seems likely to me that he may have traveled to New York State to join up with the thousands of laborers who were showing up to work on the Erie Canal. By traveling on foot or horseback the 40 miles to Erie, a boat trip on Erie Lake would only be 100 nautical miles to Buffalo which was the westernmost terminus of the to be constructed canal. Certain features beyond good pay lured workers to the construction camps: three square meals a day and a much-advertised bonus. Also advertised was a “tot of whiskey every two hours” (a tot may be synonymous with a "dram" or a "shot"). Canal workers were also exempt from militia duty.
While this is a plausible scenario explaining his absence for five to six years, it does not explain why he did not write letters to his family during this time. It seems to me that a concurrent scenario of his alcoholism could fit here with considerable explanatory power. While both scenarios are purely speculative, they do lend themselves to some kind of narrative filling in the substantial gap in James’ history. Alcoholism does run in families. We do know that a grandson, Joseph Robert Finney (1840-1899) was an alcoholic based on the Meadville Court records regarding his divorce in 1873. We also know that active alcoholics are well-known for irresponsible behavior (such as abandoning one’s family and refusal to maintain correspondence for long periods of time with loved ones.)
Another aspect of the James’ story calls out for additional fictional treatment. As will be revealed in the coming factual narrative, we will find that James becomes a more responsible person not too long after the will dispute in 1827. He does remove to another part of the county and marries his second wife, Mary Sarah Meyers (1806-1880) in 1830. He is 43 years old and Mary Sarah is 24. They are man and wife until his death in 1870; during this time they have ten children. Even though he and his second family live in Tuscarawas, County from 1836 on, we do have the copy of a letter that he sent to his first family in Meadville, strongly indicating that he maintained a loving communication with his family there. All of this leads me to believe that he had a religious conversion sometime either just before or following closely on the aftermath of the 1827 will dispute. I also want to offer that this conversion led to his abstinence from alcohol for the rest of his life. It seems to me that this could be an appealing and even likely story of conversion and redemption.
3.4- Construction of the Erie Canal, 1817-1827
The Erie Canal construction was begun in New York State in 1817. The first ground was broken in Rome, N.Y. which was a midpoint between the eastern terminus of Albany (100 miles) and the western terminus of Buffalo (265 miles). Rome was chosen because of its high point in elevation. It was essentially downhill from there going either east or west. Most of the contractors were well-to-do farmers who built short sections. Laborers were to receive wages as high as 80 cents a day. First of all, axe men had to clear a 60-foot swath through the forest. Then came the building of the ditch, which was actually a channel dug down between two mounded banks. On one side was the “berm,” which was often a kind of dike between the canal and the nearby river. On the other side was the 10-foot towpath.
3500 men were soon at work. Though local farmhands filled the contractors needs in the beginning, recruiters were eventually engaged to bring in additional men. They succeeded in finding unemployed immigrants and ex-slaves. In the beginning decade of the work, foreign workers tended to be British or German. Later, they were joined by Irish immigrants who eventually made up one-quarter of the work force.
The camps to which they came consisted of little more than two frame buildings plus a latrine area, banged together in a rude clearing somewhere along the route of the imagined canal. One of the buildings was a barracks for sleeping, the other a shack for cooking and eating. Management provided no mattresses for the two-tiered bunks. Nor were doors and windows screened.
In the typical work camp, the cook served breakfast soon after wake-up call at half an hour before sunrise. Fried mush with maple syrup or mush and milk was the first meal of the day. Many breakfasts also provided eggs, steak, sausage, corn bread, potatoes, and washed down by coffee, tea or buttermilk. At midday the kitchen crew carried out lunch in wagons to the work site. Like breakfast, this meal featured quantities of meat and bread. Supper, laid out on the table shortly before sundown, was another hearty feast, from the best that the land had to offer.
The basic model for the canal’s cross section was a waterway that measured 40 feet across at the surface and 28 feet at the bottom; the standard depth would be 4 feet. While work on the individual segments of the waterway would be the responsibility of the respective contractors, the state would take responsibility for the eighty-three locks that would be needed along the canal’s entire 636-mile length. Each of the eighty-three locks was to carry a boat up or down an 8-foot step. To keep the water flowing in the canal, engineers had to construct an elaborate system of feeders for the different segments. These feeders reached far into the mountainous regions on either side of the route, tapping high lakes and dammed streams.
The first section to be completed in the canal was for the 96 miles between Syracuse and Utica in 1820. One of the most difficult sections of the Canal which went up and over the Niagara Escarpment and on to Lake Erie was begun in 1822. The majority of this construction took place in Lockport, about 20 miles north of Buffalo. A two-mile-long channel had to be cut out of a 75-foot-high limestone face of the escarpment. The design for the locks called for two sets of locks each, one set for upward (westbound), the other for downward (eastbound) traffic; each lock lifted a boat an unprecedented 12 feet vertically—nearly half again as high as the canal’s standard locks. In the summer of 1825, it became apparent that the joining of the waters of the east and west would be completed by Governor De Witt Clinton’s promised date of October 24th. The section between Syracuse and Albany was completed in 1823. De Witt Clinton had just a few more years of life in which to enjoy the fruits of his labors. Like so many other successful canal builders before him, he died exhausted, of a heart attack in 1828, soon after the first commercial barges began to make their ways up and down the waterway. He was fifty-nine.
Because of his age, education and intelligence, we can assume that James Finney rose to a supervisory position early on with the first of the excavation contractors that he worked for. At the time that he showed up for work in 1821, construction was in full swing on both the western and eastern sections of the canal. As noted above, the eastern section was completed in 1822 and the western section two years later. Even though traffic the full length of the canal was begun in 1826, major improvements to poorly constructed or engineered sections were ongoing until the end of the decade. It would be most likely that James would have been employed in the western half, possibly in the Lockport construction.
4.1- Family Intrigue
After Jennet Mead’s death in 1823, the Mead family dynamics and challenges were greatly changed and amplified. Jennet Mead was known as a forceful and dominant person with considerable standing in her church and the community. With her sudden and totally unexpected death at age 47, the responsibility for the Mead family finances had to be transferred to the oldest son, Robert Mead, who was only 23 years old. The oldest two sisters, Catherine, 22, and Jane, 20, were unmarried and the youngest, Alexander, was 14.
We do know from the historical record that the complex legal and financial problems of David Mead following his death in 1816 continued well beyond his death and that of Jennet’s in 1823. Legal disputes related to these entrenched difficulties continued even well into the 1830s. We also know from later family developments that Robert was a flawed character. It seems obvious that the family circumstances at the time required desperate measures by this young family leader.
Other Mead family members were heavily invested in the outcome of all of the legal challenges facing the family. William Mead (1784-1852), a nephew of David Mead, was a frequent litigant throughout the 1830s suing and being sued by various creditors to the David Mead estate. He was certainly advising Robert Mead in the Robert Finney estate matters with an overall strategy for protecting the Mead interests. Robert Mead was only 27 years old at the time of the Finney trial and much in need of the guiding hand of an older person. William was 43 at the time of the trial. Darius Mead (1791-1871), a son of David Mead from his first marriage, was also named in several suites regarding the David Mead estate and was a likely advisor to Robert Mead.
E.A. Reynolds (1797-1876), who was appointed by the Court to be the administrator of the Robert Finney estate following the November, 1827 trial, was the husband of Maria Dunham, sister-in-law to Catherine Mead.
4.2- The Two Robert Finney Wills
Two years prior to Jennet’s death, Robert Finney had his first will prepared. In it he states “it is my will that five hundred dollars be paid to my daughter, Jennet Mead, widow of the late General Mead and that five hundred dollars be paid to my son James Finney and the residue, after paying these legacies and all my lawful debts, be put at interest and so kept for the sole benefit of my eleven grandchildren, viz. The children of my daughter Jennet Mead, viz. Robert, Catherine, Jane, Alexander and Maria, and the children of my son James Finney, viz. Jane, Robert, Wilson, Joseph, Sarah and David Mead, and that the due an exact proportion be paid to these my grandchildren as they come of age.” And “it is my pretentious desire that my son James Finney would vest the legacy of five hundred dollars to him bequeathed in some real estate, there he may with prudence be comfortable and have a home for himself and his children should they find it convenient to live with their father.” Lastly, he names, “my daughter, the widow Jennet Mead of the township of Mead, Thomas Atkinson (Colonel) and William MacArthur, Esquires, of Meadville, my sole administrators.” The signing of the will was witnessed by Timothy Alden (1771-1839), Elder Hutchinson (1780-1837) and his wife, Rebecca Hutchinson (1771-1863).
At the time of the signing of the Robert Finney will, Thomas Atkinson (1771-1837) had been the sole editor of the Crawford Messenger for 15 years. He was a county commissioner from 1810-1813, County treasurer from 1820-22 and state senator from 1826-27. He also served in the Pennsylvania Militia during the War of 1812, during which he was promoted to Colonel.
William McArthur (1760-1822) was a state senator and also Prothonotary and Register/Recorder of Crawford County. He was born in 1760 in Ireland and came to America about the close of the Revolutionary War, taught school in York County, PA and studied surveying with the family of his future wife, Rebecca McClean. He came in 1794 to Meadville and laid out the town for General David Mead. He was named District Surveyor, and in 1800 was selected State Senator for the district composed of Crawford, Erie, Venango, Warren and Mercer Counties, his opponent being General Mead. He served two terms in the legislature (the capital was then in Lancaster) and he rode back and forth spring and fall on horseback over the mountains during legislative terms. He died one year after signing the Finney will.
The first stated witness of the will was Timothy Alden (1771-1839), best known for the founding of Allegheny College in 1817. He was the president of the college from then to his retirement in 1831. In 1820, Robert Finney deeded 10 acres of land to the College. Ironically, Timothy Alden’s son, T.J. Fox Alden was the attorney representing James Finney in the 1827 will contest.
Elder Hutchinson (1773-1837) was one of the earliest pioneers of Athens Township. The Hutchinson family homestead was north of the town of Little Cooley which is about 15 miles northwest of Meadville. He was a life-long farmer and a Presbyterian. The connection between Elder Hutchinson and Robert Finney may have been through the Wilson family as Elder’s mother was a Margaret Wilson.
This first will seems to be a standard and fair allocation of funds and property to all of the descendants of Robert. It can be inferred by the language of the will that James is close by, but that he is not presently with his children, who following the death of his wife sometime prior to 1820, were likely to be cared for by other family members such as the Wilson family. We can assume that James was living and farming the Rocky Spring tract at that time.
Following the death of Jennet on December 21, 1823, things change dramatically. A second will is prepared and signed by Robert Finney only two months later on February 2, 1824. The executors of the will are changed to Daniel Bemus, Catherine Mead and Robert Mead. The new will then goes on to state: “I do hereby and by these presents give, divide and bequeath to my said executors all my property real personal and mixed to sell; they shall divide the proceeds as follows: 1st pay to the North Western Bank of Pennsylvania the amount lately due by my daughter Jennet Mead now deceased or by her legal representatives, they will then divide the surplus that may remain after all just expenses having paid into two moieties or half parts one of which shall be paid to the heirs or legal representatives of the said Jennett Mead deceased or to the survivor or survivors of them or either of them in equal parts each to each, the other shall be paid to heirs or legal representatives of my son James Finney by his wife now deceased or to the survivor or survivors of them or either of them in equal parts each to each.
This second will was witnessed by Simeon Dunham (1798-1850) and Thomas Frew (1779-1858). Surprisingly, Simeon Dunham was only 26 years old at the time and was the brother of Lott Dunham, who was to marry Catherine Mead one year later on October 27, 1825. This will appears to give almost unlimited authority to the executors to liquidate property and disburse funds as they deem necessary. The amount owed to the Northwest Bank must have been the $600 debt from before David Mead’s death in 1816. Even though the Bank went out of business in 1822, it undertook many years of effort to collect from its debtors.
Less than one month later on February 24th, a petition for legal guardianship is recorded in the court. This document now identifies what appears to be the 200 acre “Rocky Spring” tract and now states the NW Bank debt as being $600 and “whereas I myself am also indebted to several persons in diverse sums of money.” Most importantly, Robert’s grandson, Robert Mead is named as his “true and lawful attorney, giving him full power and authority to execute and deliver all such deed or deeds for the absolute sale of such land.” The document was signed by Robert Finney and witnessed by James White and B.C. Osburn.
Robert Finney dies April 17, 1827. Two weeks prior to his death on April 5, 1827 a “Sheriff Sale” is announced on the front page of the Crawford Messenger. The Rocky Spring tract is indicated as being “Seized and taken in execution as the property of Robert Finney.”
Biographical Notes:
Bates, Samuel P., History of Crawford County, 1885
Bernstein, Peter L., The Wedding of the Waters, 2006
Bourne, Russell, Floating West: The Erie & Other Canals, 1992
Ferguson, Russell J., Early Western Pennsylvania Politics. 1938
Ilisevich, Robert D., David Mead: Pennsylvania's Last Frontiersman, 1988
Kelly, Jack, Heaven's Ditch. 2017
Reynolds, James Earle, In French Creek Valley, 1938
Struthers, Maurine E., Finney 1720, 1996