Craft Masonry in Oneida County, New York - Onondaga and ...

one of whom was Sylvester P. Pierce, b. 19 Sep 1814, who though orphaned at an early age, moved to Syracuse and founded
Pierce, Butler & Pierce Manufacturing.
Dr. Amos G. Hull was the pioneer physician of Paris Hill. He was a fine physician and one of the best surgeons in the country. He
removed to New Hartford, in 1796, and was that year made a Mason in old Amicable Lodge, and was the first physician there. On
the organization of the Oneida. County Medical Society, in 1806, he was elected its first president. He removed to Utica in 1811. He
was the pioneer manufacturer of uthor trusses in 1817. He was a second time president of the Oneida County Medical Society in
1820, and a permanent member of the State Medical Society. About the year 1821, he removed to New York, and died about 1835,
while on a visit in Connecticut.
Asa Shepard, one of the pioneers of Paris, and a large landholder.
Three Young Paris Pioneers:
In the spring of 1789, Jared Shepard and Eli Butler, of Middletown, Ct., came to the Sauquoit valley, and purchased a tract of
land jointly (lots 8, 9, 24 and 25 of Coxe’s Patent, and part of lot 72, Bayard’s Patent.) for their sons, and then returned to
Connecticut. In the winter of 1789-90, their sons, John and Sylvester Butler and Asa Shepard, came on together and took
possession of their fathers’ purchase.
A few rods west of where Charles K. Garlick now resides, and on the south side of the “Pioneer road” leading to Paris Hill, a
spring gushes out, forming a little rivulet flowing north across the road and down the hillside into the “gulf,” where it joins the Butler
or Tucker Creek. Near this spring, rearing its mighty head, towering aloft, stands a giant elm, like a lone sentinel—the Pioneer’s tree.
On the banks of the little rivulet, beneath the shade of this historic tree, the “boys” dug a cellar and there felled the first tree cut by
man on the slope of the western hillside, and erected a substantial log- cabin, and commenced clearing oft’ the land.
Asa Shepard having his portion of the purchase set oft’ to him, and the Butler brothers clearing the residue jointly, all lived
together in the cabin. Asa was born in Middletown, Ct., in 1770, being at the time he settled here nineteen years of age. Two years
later, having arrived at his majority, and having erected a house on his farm in the meantime, he went back to Middletown, Ct., and
married a Miss Polly Smith, who returned with him to his wilderness home, where two daughters were born to them, Patty and
Nancy. The old orchard on his place was the first that was set out in that section. He was a man of prodigious strength, and brought
the young trees in a bundle on his back from Whitestown, through the woods by the “trail,” before the road was cut out up the valley.
About the year 1800, his wife and eldest daughter died, when he sold the pioneer farm to his brother, Lemuel Shepard, and
bought the land now the farm of M. M. Gray, at West Sauquoit, which he proceeded to clear off, when, in 1803, he sold it by contract
to George Graham, father of Lorenzo Graham, and deeded it to him, January 18, 1808. The old log farm-house stood some twenty
rods south of the present house. He soon after married the widow of Titus Gilbert, and took charge of her property, which consisted
of the grist mill and a saw mill at the foot of the hill at South Sauquoit, near what is now Graham’s upper paper mill, and her land
extended up the hill west to the Marsh place. They lived in a little house near the creek. Near the mill he built a distillery and malt
house, and then, about 1813, built the house, top of the mill hill on the main road, (the Reed place,) where two of the widow Gilbert’s
boys, Hiram and Andrus, set out the two elm trees, now full sized and so much admired.
Some years later he became bankrupt, and his uncle, “Joe” Shepard, put him in jail. In the meantime his father, Jared Shepard,
came into the country and bought the “Priest Coe farm,” adjoining on the west the farm of Judge Sanger, in New Hartford. After his
father’s death, Asa went on to this farm, buying out the heirs, where he remained five or six years, when he sold out to Judge
Sanger and “Priest” Coe, and bought the Henry Crane farm, east of Chadwick’s, on the south line of New Hartford, lately the Cloyes
farm—the scene of the mysterious Quinn murder.
Here he lived several years, bringing up his own and the widow Gilbert’s boys, when he exchanged the farm with Abner Brownell
for a farm in Volney, now Schroeppel, Oswego County, to which he removed. Again misfortune overtook him. During the building of
the Erie Canal, he contracted to excavate a considerable section, and had brought together his gang of laborers and built a
storehouse, filled with flour, pork, grain and supplies, to carry on the work, which caught fire and all was destroyed without a dollar of
insurance. To add to his misfortune, the excavation which he had contracted, supposing it to be earth simply, turned out to be
mostly rock beneath the surface, requiring to be blasted at great expense, and he was again bankrupted.
Previous to going to Volney, he built a furnace at Westmoreland, at the raising of which he was injured by a timber falling on
him—an Indian also on the timber. He was a stirring business man, owning at different times many farms in Paris, and was much
respected for his strict integrity. He was an active Free-Mason, “made” in old Amicable Lodge, No. 25, in 1801, under the
Mastership of Judge Sanger. The family which he brought up consisted of the widow Gilbert’s four boys, Hiram, Andrus, Grove and
Titus, Jr., and his own children, Patty, Nancy, Asa, Ira, Jared, William, Martha and Frederick.
Of the Gilbert boys, Andrus alone survives; of his own children, Ira, William, Martha and Frederick. Ira resides at Wampsville,
and Frederick lives on the old place in Oswego County, where his father, Asa Shepard, one of the “three boy pioneers,” passed
away, in 1850, at the advanced age of 80 years. Sylvester Butler was the first of the trio to go, dying in 1805, aged 38. John Butler,
the last of the “three boy pioneers,” survived his old companion of the first log-cabin (Asa Shepard) about one year, and went to his
rest in 1851.
Joseph Farwell, the first settler of Bridgewater.
http://history.rays-place.com/ny/onei-bridgewater.htm
The first settlement was commenced in 1788, by Joseph Farwell, at a place known as “Farwell’s Hill.” In March, 1789, Mr. Farwell, in
company with Ephraim and Nathan Waldo, removed their families from Mansfield, Conn., to Farwell Hill. They came via Albany and
the Mohawk Valley to Whitesboro, thence to Paris Hill. From Paris Hill they were obliged to make their own road, following a line of
marked trees. Their team consisted of two yoke of oxen and a horse, and their vehicle an ox sled. On their arrival, March 4, the
snow was about one and a half feet deep, but soon increased to four feet. Their team, with their two Cows, subsisted on browse
until the spring opened. Their house consisted of four crotches set in the ground, with a roof of split slabs and hemlock boughs, and
siding of blankets. These families lived in this shanty till midsummer. About three years after this Mr. Farwell built the first frame
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