A Few Historical Facts

In our researching of the Forbes-Bouquet Trail that passed through Bedford County we found many interesting facts of history that are little known. They are entered in our school histories which are taught today. We will state a few of them here.

First of all Bedford County, after it was formed out of Cumberland furnished the first Assembly list for the townships of Southwestern part of the State. The list was for the year 1773. This indicates that the assessment list had to be made the previous year. Most of the western townships were formed from Springhill. (now in Fayette County) .

In this tax list made a month or two before the erection of and formation of Westmoreland County (1773) are many names who moved into the area by means of Braddock's road from Virginia, thus they naturally maintained allegiance to that state, and insisted on maintaining this allegiance to the new Virginia territory when the courts of Westmoreland were established.

Bedford County was one of the nine counties involved in a boundary dispute between the state of Maryland and Pennsylvania. Maryland tried to claim an additional twenty miles above the present line and Pennsylvania thought the border extended south to include the areas which are now Baltimore, Frederick, Hagerstown and Cumberland.

In 1767 Virginia and Pennsylvania agreed to accept the Mason-Dixon line, but it was not fully established and accepted until 1784. Those who want to delve into this phase of history may find this in the Pennsylvania Archives-Second Series, Volume XVI.

In addition to the Braddock road and Nemacolin trail, hundreds of families came by the northern route. This was the Forbes road and later the Bouquet trail. The tax list for the period of 1773 contained many prominent names. One of them was Captain Wendall Oury. This is the man who built the rocking-horse bridge over the Juniata river (at Wolfsburg) about 1756. The bridge was destroyed in 1762 by a great flood.

In looking over these old lists of Bedford County, (Transcript of Taxables; Returns of Property, Supply Tax and Returns of Lands) in 1775, there were ten Townships twelve in 1776 and in 1783 there were sixteen.

It is not unusual to find the same name family name spelled in many ways. In fact we found one name written nine different ways. We are positive this was due to the lack of or very little educational training by the assessors and-or tax collectors. It seems they spelled a name as it sounded to them. Even many of these settlers did not know how to spell their own names.

The dozens of families who moved above the 40th parallel line discovered they could not obtain a deed from Maryland or Virginia. Many then moved westward. In 1683 a law was enacted whereby all deeds for lands sold or bought had to be recorded to be legal. Also in 1706 a law was passed that all counties had to keep records of all deeds in fair legible hand writing. In looking through the first entries of deeds and wills we found that the writing was rather large. We found, too, that the recorders were paid one cent per line in these books.

Sometime ago we wrote a story on the Whiskey Rebellion and how it affected the settlers of the Southwestern section of the State, and that a number of local citizens in this county were arrested and paid fines for erecting a flag sympathizing with this action. What we did not show at that time was that certain ministers were not disturbed by the liquor question. We found references that a minister accepted quantities of whiskey from members of his congregation as payment of his salary. Also another minister who had served his church for thirty years, had taken an active part in the Rebellion. Furthermore, the minutes of that church indicated that one member was expelled from the church for not paying his pastor with whiskey. I'm wondering how many ministers today would remain in the pulpit if they were still paid their salary in this way, even at the current high price of this commodity?

The very early settlers who settled in these townships and counties represented the cornerstone and foundation of our present and future generation. They came here carrying a Bible, an ax, a rifle and a high determination to live, work, love and die on their lands.