The Harmar Bones

The Daily Register (Marietta), December 10, 1897:

Two Skeletons Found by the Workmen on the Storm Water Sewer on Maple Street

Bill Muncey, one of the men working on the Wilking job on Maple Street, digging a trench for a storm water sewer, was somewhat surprised in the middle of the forenoon today, to see exposed after an unusually deep thrust of his shovel, the bones of a human leg.  He had not been hired to dig up a graveyard. Handling his shovel more carefully, he presently brought out a whole skeleton. It had been lying four feet below the surface, with its head toward the river. It was pronounced by those who saw and were familiar with skeletons to be probably that of a woman. 

An hour later another skeleton, the bones of which were larger than those of the first one, was found ten feet farther up the street, lying in the same position and at the same depth, but with its feet toward the river. The second skeleton was probably that of a man. Dark streaks of earth, below, above and on either side the skeleton indicated where the coffins had been and rotted away, and in those dark streaks were found many old fashioned home-made nails, rusty with age.

Whose the bodies were and who buried them can only be conjectured as no one seen by the reporter had any recollection of a burial place having ever been as near as that to old Fort Harmar.

The bones were found at a point about a hundred feet from the riverbank, on the lower end of Maple Street. Mr. Wilking has preserved the bones and will keep them until he knows where they will be the most appreciated.  

Marietta Daily Leader, December 11, 1897:

A Pair of Skeletons

Friday forenoon workmen engaged in digging a sewer trench on Maple Street, West Side, unearthed two human skeletons at a point about 40 yards from the riverbank. From the difference in structure it is assumed that the bones belonged to a man and a woman. They were found about four feet underground and a distance of eight feet apart. No articles were found which would give a clue to the identity of the persons whose remains were thus ruthlessly disturbed by the march of public improvement.

The skeletons were taken possession of by Dr. Hardy and if they prove on investigation to be of any historical value, will be turned over to the proper persons for preservation.  The skull of the larger skeleton was found to be in fairly good condition, with the teeth still in place and nearly all the principal bones were also sound. The find created considerable excitement for a short time. 

The Daily Register (Marietta), December 11, 1897:

Another skeleton was found this morning by the workmen engaged on the Maple Street storm water sewer. This makes three complete skeletons that have been dug out. The last one brought out was of a man who had a badly broken leg, but it had healed together. The end of another coffin was exposed by the workmen, but it has not been taken out yet.

A Grand Army button, dated 1866, was found near one of the skeletons, but it is a mystery how it came there.

The Daily Register (Marietta), December 13, 1897:

A Very Old Burying Ground

No Record on the Map of 1796

Another skeleton was unearthed this morning in the Maple Street work, and the workmen are now fully satisfied that it is a genuine grave-yard they are going through, in laying the storm water sewer. The oldest inhabitants remember nothing of any burying ground there and a mystery surrounds the finding of the old coffins and remains.

This morning the Register reporter called on Mrs. Jefferson Heston on Gilman Street and from her learned that her mother, Mrs. Fearing, spoke several times that Mrs. Heston remembers distinctly, of the fact that a burying ground had existed in the early days at the foot of what is now Maple Street, but extending rather to the northward. The people living on those lots have never known of its existence, but the findings of the last few days go to confirm what Mrs. Fearing said.

In the County Recorder's office there is a map, made April 20th, 1802 (the original copy). It bears these words, "I certify that the foregoing plan descriptions are just and true. April 20, 1802, Rufus Putnam, Superintendent of the Company's surveys." This inscription is followed by others, attesting to the genuineness of the paper, which is yellow with age. The curious thing about this map is that is shows the street now known as Maple Street, but then as Middle Street, and the adjoining lots on either side, and a considerable distance up the Muskingum is the old Harmar "Burying Ground." In another book, made since that date, but purporting to be a true copy of older books, is a plat dated January 21st, 1796, showing exactly the same streets and lots, just as they exist today in that part of town, and the burying ground located up the Muskingum, where it now is.

In a resolution bearing date of January 21st, 1796, the "Harmar Burying Ground," was set aside for public use, and also other portions of the Ohio Company's purchase, but no reference is made in the 1796 resolution or map to a burying ground in Harmar other than the one up the Muskingum, where it now is. This makes the mystery of these old graves greater than ever. It is probable that it is one of the oldest burying grounds in the State, having been used by the very first settlement here and discarded in 1796.

The Daily Register (Marietta), December 15, 1897:

Remains of the Dead Found in Harmar

The solution of the question as to whose bones are being disinterred by the digging now being done in Harmar does not seem to me difficult, but to compress into a half column newspaper article the reasons for this belief that will meet the present inquiry may be more difficult.

In 1785, under the direction of General Harmar of the United States army, the building of a fortified place was commenced on the west bank of the Muskingum near the confluence of that stream with the Ohio River. This fortified place occupied about three quarters of an acre of ground, in the center of which was the well now under the bank of the Ohio River, the location of which is marked by an immense mill stone, recently placed over its mouth.

The fort was completed in the year 1787, and soldiers under the command of Major Doughty were stationed therein.  The number of soldiers occupying the fort varied much during the next six succeeding years, sometimes numbering five hundred, at other times they were reduced to fifty.

It, perhaps, would be well here to say that during the Indian war, many families lived in and near Fort Harmar. It is frequently mentioned by Dr. Hildreth that at the various festivities at Campus Martius and the Bowery, the officers were accompanied by their wives. The presence of ladies at Fort Harmar will account for the skeleton of the woman lately disintererd.

Immediately adjoining this fortified camp, garden lots extended back some distance and up the Muskingum bank near where the old Muskingum River locks were. These gardens were planted with trees of various kinds and much of the ground faithfully worked each year, the soldiers thus raising vegetables and fruit for their own consumption. Within the pickets, which enclosed several acres, on eligible sites, were built two large hewed log cabins for the artizans, one of which was used by Gov. St. Clair to hold the treaty with the Indians, which was concluded January 9, 1789.

The writer knows of no record of deaths or burials during the ten years of the occupancy of these grounds, but it is presumable that many deaths occurred and, as danger attended any outside movements, that interments took place within the picketed enclosure, which embraced the ground where the remains of the dead are being unearthed on Maple Street.

Most happy would I be in a much fuller manner to give my views on this subject to any enquirer that would favor me with a call.

George Morgan Woodbridge.