Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 5.djvu/203

 JAMES PATTEN. 177

��JAMES PATTEN.

��BY REV. C. W. WALLACE, D. D.

HON. Matthew Patten was born in Ireland in 17 19, and came with his father's family to this country in 1728, settling in Londonderry. Ten years later he removed to that part of Souhegan East, afterwards incorporated as the town of Piedford, N. H. He was a man of distinction, filling many important offices. He married Elisabeth McMurphy of Londonderry, and they had eleven children, the fifth being James, the subject of this sketch. He was born in Bedford, about 1753.

Of his early life little is known. From that little, however, it appears that he was very unlike his honored father. He was an easy-going sort of a man, who did not like hard work. Yet united with his indolent disposition, was a remarkable spirit of adventure. He scorned to walk in. beaten paths, was ever allured by a bright future, and although, like the rainbow it fled at his approach, he pursued it still.

Some incidents in his career, as they illustrate the trials of the early pioneer life, may be worthy of record. A call signed by Gen. Rufus Putnam, who was a native of Sutton, Mass., was issued early in 1786, inviting all those interested in establishing a colony in Ohio, to send delegates to Boston. The convention met in that town the first of March, the same year, and what was known as the Ohio Company was organized. Subsequently, an application was made to Congress for the purchase of 1,500,000 acres of land, and nearly 1,000,000 was procured at 66^ cents per acre.

On the 7th of April, 1788, the first company of emigrants from New Eng- land arrived at the mouth of the Muskingum, and there where its waters mingle with those of the Ohio, they laid out the city of Marietta, naming it in honor of Marie Antoinette. This was the first European settlement in what is now the great State of Ohio.

In that company were several families from Bedford and its neighborhood, and among them was James Patten. He was then about thirty-five years of age and unmarried, which bachelor condition remained through life.

How he made that long journey from New Hampshire to Ohio, we are not informed. It is fair to presume, however, that it was on horseback. At any rate many years after, when he returned to visit the home of his childhood, he made the journey both ways in that manner. How much has steam accom- plished to annihilate time and space !

How the pioneer occupied his time for a year or two after his settlement on the Muskingum, we are not informed. He evidently was a very delinquent correspondent. In a letter dated June 13, 1789, addressed to James Patter- son, one of the company at Marietta, his father says : " I have earnestly expected a letter from James before this time." *

December i, 1790, the father acknowledges the receipt of a letter from his son, and in his reply gives him many items of information, which, no doubt, would be of great interest to one so far from home. He informs hmi that at the last March meeting, "We voted to use Dr. Watts's Psalms and Hymns in public worship," and that " Rev. Mr. Pickles read the psalm or hymn before the singing." This marks the periotl of the change from lining the hymn to e.i luig ic. Hj also writes: " Ensign Patterson informs me that he thought

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