My Valley
His principal business was that of merchant, as stated in the Sullivan Co. Directory published in 1872. In 1811 he purchased land in Bethel township at White Lake and erected a store and in 1812 his family joined him there. Although Bethel township was erected (according to the terminology of the times) in 1809, it was known to early settlers soon after the Revolutionary War, when hunters and trappers made their way by blazed trees, following Indian trails.
Mongaup, the name of my Valley, like many other names of places in Sullivan County, came from the Indians. Likely they caught the spirit of the wilderness valley in the splashing and gurgling of the waters over rocky beds for Mongaup means "Dancing Feather", and indeed is a very good description as the water flowed over the stones, and, during the summer, I, with other Valley children were accustomed to wade in it. Cows coming home from the pasture forded it and came up dripping into the barn yard which, with the big red barn was on the opposite side of the turnpike from the old house I called home. This farm house had been an inn in stage coach days, a tavern where whiskey flowed and hunters assembled to boast of their prowess in killing bears I and wild cats or escaping from Indians. There is a tale of one hunter who brought in two bear cubs and turned them loose. But one night as the cubs were gamboling about in the bar room, they rolled over and over each other until they rolled into the great fireplace where a blazing fixe burned and they came to their end.
In later years, my Aunt Mary Tillotson, former Mary
Gillespie, oldest daughter of William II, lived there and the old tavern became a home.
The barroom, scene of many a carouse, was converted into a kitchen, where the family,
together with the hired men and women worked and ate and the old fireplace with its stone
floor and huge crane with Dutch oven at one side became the recess for the kitchen cook
stove in the summer time. This was a most desirable feature as heat from the stove escaped
up the wide chimney instead of exuding into the room. In the winter, the fireplace was
boarded up and the stove set entirely out into the kitchen. Standing on four high legs,
underneath it afforded a lovely place for my several cats and the dog Pilot, whichever got
there first.
The trail into the Valley became a turnpike, and for many years the Newburg and Cochecton Turnpike was the only road from this section to the outside world. Settlements grew up along it; toll gates were properly spaced to collect fees from the traveler; nothing if he were afoot; a few cents for a single rig-slightly more for a double, regardless of the load; to the inhabitant of the Valley, even a less toll, because he was not a "through". traveler. The turnpike was also properly spaced as to milestones. I recall one old and very quaint looking one which told the traveler he was "40 miles from Newburg" roughly engraved on its face, standing exactly in front of my Grandfather's home. Within the past forty years, I can recall one of these toll gates still in operation kept by one George Peck between White Lake and Mongaup Valley and my father-in-law, J. P. Royce, paid regularly half fare or the sum of two cents, because of coming onto the turnpike from his farm on a cross road within two miles of the toll gate.
Across the streams were wooden covered bridges; and dams
to furnish water power for the saw mills; the grist mills and the tanneries; and, of
course, the mill ponds which produced fish for family consumption and of great value to
the children and young people for boating in summer and skating in winter. One of these
bridges was near my home over the Mongaup Creek, dividing the townships of Bethel and
Thompson. There were other bridges of same construction but not in the immediate
neighborhood.
We did not travel much in those days. To go to Monticello, the County seat five miles distant, was a full day's journey by means of the old white horse harnessed to a buckboard wagon, which was a one-seated carry-all with the seat holding two or possibly three if the third were a child. This seat was placed midway on an open rack made of hickory staves with room in the front for one's feet and protruding to the back some two or two and one-half feet. Here could be carried bags of feed by a farmer going to mill or other packages from a store. After spending the day in "the Village" running about to the milliner's, the dress maker's, the drug store, the bookstore, the bank and perhaps down to the depot to pick up some freight or express, we came home when the day was done mighty glad to eat supper and to go early to bed.
The old Inn, the red barn across the road, and a farm of some 200 acres, had belonged to John C. Tillotson of New York City, who also owned some 10,000 acres of wild land in Sullivan Co. and who was active in timbering large tracts of forest land adjacent to the Delaware River. It took a lot of logging to change the forests to farms. The trees were felled in winter, trimmed and lashed together into huge log rafts that were left near the banks of the streams. During the spring when the snows melted, and streams in flood, the fleet of rafts was alerted and experienced river-men stood by to jump aboard day or night, when the procession showed signs of taking off, destination Philadelphia. The cargoes were highly valuable, and river channels uncharted as to swirls and eddys. The Delaware resounded to names that still remain - Long Eddy - Pond Eddy - Pike Eddy.
Old John C. Tillotson had two sons: Howard,
the older, who as a young man, came over the turnpike from New York City each spring to
oversee the logging and marketing of his father's timber; Robert, the younger a lawyer,
married my Aunt Mary. Howard had married but his wife died very young and he later came to
the Valley to live with his brother and Aunt Mary. Uncle Robert died of yellow fever in
the Civil War and Aunt Mary was left a widow with one son.
I came to live with Aunt Mary when I was just past three, because my own mother was an invalid. I remember Uncle Howard from the very first (he wasn't really my uncle) as a good, kindly God-fearing man, part lumberman, part farmer, part miller, part philosopher. Early mornings when I crawled out of bed to dress by the fire, he sat waiting for breakfast reading by kerosene lamp his Bible, especially bound and extra large print. Evenings, he would take me on his knee and tell his rare stories and sometimes read from his treasured Bible. On Uncle Howard's knee I learned much about the Valley, came to see through his eyes the things that were done, learned to know about its people, and gradually to understand that we were not too isolated from the outside world, but in many ways a part of all that was happening.
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