Part 5

After closing up the old business, he posted books or turned his hand to whatever employment presented itself. Inactivity and despondency formed no part of his character. About 1827, there was a temporary business connection between himself and Thos. M. Kelly, after which he started again alone, adding the auction and commission business to that of a merchant.

Mr. Cutter, in November, 1832, was married to Miss Hilliard, sister of the late Richard Hilliard. Of this marriage there are seven children now living, most of them settled in the city. William L. is cashier of the Merchants National Bank; Edwin succeeded his father two years since at the old auction store in Bank street, and R. H. is the principal partner of Cutter & Co., upholsterers.

Going east in the Fall of 1821, Mr. Cutter, on his return, preferred the staunch steamer Walk-in-the-Water, to the Wasps, Fire Flies and Franklins, on board of which he had experienced so many buffetings. George Williams and John S. Strong were also of the same mind. These three old settlers, and about seventy others, went on board at Black Rock, in the afternoon. Eight yoke of oxen were required to assist the engines in getting her over the rapids into the open lake. In the night a furious gale arose, Capt. Rogers put back, but not being able to get into Buffalo Creek, came to anchor near its mouth. Being awfully sea sick, Mr. Cutter lay below, little caring where the Walk-in-the-Water went to. Her anchor, however, parted before morning, and she went ashore sidewise, on an easy sand beach, without loss of life.

This year completes his semi-centennial as a citizen of Cleveland, yet he is still hale and vigorous. He has gone through revulsions, and has enjoyed prosperity with equal equanimity, never indulging in idleness or ease, and has now come to a ripe old age possessed of an ample competence.

Peter Martin Weddell.

One of the most noted historical and topographical landmarks of Cleveland is the Weddell House. Its builder was one of the most valuable citizens of the Forest City.

Mr. P. M. Weddell was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, in 1788. His father died before his birth, and his mother, marrying again, removed to Paris, Bourbon county, Kentucky, the State at that time deserving its sobriquet of the "dark and bloody ground," as the contest with the native savages was carried on with relentless fury on both sides. Under such circumstances it may well be supposed that he grew up with few educational or other advantages, and that his youth was one of vicissitudes and hardships.

At the age of fourteen he applied at a store for employment, what surplus clothing and effects he then possessed being carelessly flung over his shoulders. He promised to do any work they were pleased to set him at, and he thought he could satisfy them. This broad pledge was so well kept that at the age of nineteen he was made a partner. This partnership was soon closed by the death of the old member.

Young Weddell, with a vigorous body, good habits, a clear judgment, and some money, removed to Newark, Ohio, during the war of 1812. While he was successfully trading there, Miss Sophia Perry, of Cleveland, was sent to her friends at Newark for greater safety, and to acquire an education. She was but little past fifteen when she consented to be Mrs. Weddell, and they were married in November, 1815.

In 1820, Mr. Weddell removed from Newark to Cleveland and established himself in business on Superior street, taking a stand at once among the leading merchants of the place, a position he retained as long as he continued in business.

In 1823, Mrs. Weddell died, leaving three children, of whom H. P. Weddell is the only survivor. A portrait of her, by Peale, still remains in the family house, which confirms the remembrances of her friends that she possessed many charms both of person and of disposition. In the following year Mr. Weddell married Mrs. Eliza A. Bell, of Newark, who is still living, and whom every old citizen of Cleveland well knows and sincerely respects.

In 1825, he formed a partnership with Mr. Edmund Clade, from Buffalo, and retired from active participation in business. In 1828, the partnership was dissolved. Three years afterwards he took into partnership with him his two clerks, Greenup C. Woods, his half brother, and Dudley Baldwin, the firm name being P. M. Weddell & Co. The firm lasted but four years, when Mr. Woods established himself in Newark, and Messrs. Weddell and Baldwin continued the business together until 1845.

When Mr. Weddell commenced his mercantile life it was no child's play. At that time there were no canals or railroads to facilitate commerce--scarcely were there any roads at all--specie was the only currency west of the mountains, and that had to be carried across the mountains from Pittsburgh on the backs of mules, and the merchandise returned in the same way. Long after, when traveling over the Alleghanies with a friend, Mr. Weddell frequently pointed to places on the road which he remembered, and of which he related interesting anecdotes. Several merchants would travel together and sometimes they would have guards, as the lonely uninhabited mountains were not altogether safe even in those days.

In 1823, Mr. Weddell built what was regarded as a princely brick residence and store on the corner of Superior and Bank streets, afterwards the site of the Weddell House. His surplus funds were invested in real estate, which soon began to increase in value at an astonishing rate, as the city grew in population and importance. On one of his lots upon Euclid street he built the stone cottage which he designed as a country retreat, and after his taking his clerks into partnership, he left the store mainly to their management, devoting his attention to the purchase and improvement of real estate, being generally regarded as a gentleman of wealth.

In the Spring of 1845 he began work upon the Weddell House, tearing away the store and mansion, where his fortune had been made. It was finished in two years. He then made a journey to New York to purchase furniture. On the way home he was attacked by typhoid fever, and in three weeks was in his grave.

As a merchant, Mr. Weddell had few superiors. His urbanity, industry, and care made him popular, successful, and safe, while his integrity and his liberality were well known to his correspondents and to all the religious and benevolent institutions of the times.

He was always willing and ready to aid and assist his young men; when he found one correct and capable he never refused a helping hand. Very few of his day were so liberal in this respect, or could point to so many who became prominent merchants by their aid as could Mr. Weddell.

At his death, Mr. Weddell was a man of such personal energy and business capacity, that he had promise of twenty more years of active life. Soon after the Rev. S. G. Aiken became pastor of the old Stone Church, Mr. Weddell became a communicant, and he died in the Christian faith. He bequeathed to the American Board of Foreign Missions the sum of five thousand dollars; to the Home Missionary Society five thousand dollars, and several other bequests amounting to some thousands to other benevolent institutions.

Dudley Baldwin

In 1819, Dudley Baldwin came to Cleveland from Ballston, New York, having as his principal capital a fair common school education. In course of time be found employment in the mercantile store of Mr. Weddell, and became one of his trusted clerks, being, after a few years, taken into partnership. The death of Mr. Weddell in 1847, terminated a connection that had existed pleasantly for over twenty years.

For the next few years Mr. Baldwin was chiefly engaged in closing up the affairs of Mr. Weddell, after which he engaged for a time in the manufacture of agricultural implements, until, from ill heath, he was compelled to relinquish business and seek restoration of health by travel and in quiet retirement.

Mr. Baldwin was identified with the Cleveland and Mahoning Railroad from its inception, and during the darkest days of the undertaking he stood firmly by it, in connection with the other directors, never losing faith in its ultimate success--a success he has lived to see perfected. He has also, for a number of years, been a director of the Commercial Bank of Cleveland.

In religious principles Mr. Baldwin is a Presbyterian, and has long been connected with the Euclid street Presbyterian Church. He is known to all his acquaintances as a man of quiet unassuming manners, and of sterling worth.

Norman C. Baldwin.

Very many of those who settled on the Western Reserve, in the early days of its history, came from Connecticut, and the fact of so many Connecticut families being already here induced considerable emigration from that State long after the first rush was over. Among others of Connecticut birth who found their way eventually to Cleveland, was Norman C. Baldwin, born at Litchfield, July 29th, 1802, and spending his early years in the struggles which so many of the New England families of limited resources had to pass through in the early portion of the present century.

Whilst yet but a mere child he assisted his father in the work of the farm, but being left fatherless at the age of eight, he was sent two years afterwards to work in his cousin's store, where he remained four years. In his fourteenth year he left Litchfield for New Haven, where he found employment for a year with a provision packer.

At that time his mother joined the stream of emigration setting towards the Ohio, and with her came her children. Stopping at Hudson, Summit county, young Baldwin commenced trading on his own account, and built up a good business, which he managed alone for eighteen months and then formed a partnership with two of his brothers, the partnership lasting eight years. Then the firm was dissolved and Norman C. came to Cleveland, where he formed a partnership with Noble H. Merwin in the general produce business.

In 1830, the firm of Giddings, Baldwin & Co., which had succeeded that of Merwin & Baldwin, contained seven partners, of whom Mr. Baldwin is the only survivor. The business was mainly forwarding and commission, the forwarding being mostly by canal. The firm was one of the most important on the lakes, owning a line of boats, the Troy and Erie, from Portsmouth, on the Ohio river, to New York In those days the canal lines carried passengers as well as freight, the boats usually taking about thirty passengers and one thousand bushels of wheat. For emigrants, of whom many were pouring into the West, special boats were fitted up with accommodations, such as they were, for about a hundred and fifty passengers. In 1836, Mr. Baldwin left the mercantile business altogether, and thereafter devoted his attention to operations in real estate.

As illustrating the growth of the city and the consequent increasing value of city property, Mr. Baldwin relates having purchased in 1833 three parcels of land, neither of which cost over two thousand dollars, which are now estimated to be worth half a million of dollars each. In 1831, he was offered, in the course of his operations, a strip of land fronting on Superior street and running back to the canal, with a comfortable frame house thereon, for one thousand dollars. The price looked high and Mr. Baldwin, distrusting his own judgment, consulted 'Squire Cowles, then a prominent attorney. Mr. Cowles hesitated, thought the investment somewhat risky, although they might live to see the land worth thirty dollars a foot front. Heeding his own fears, which were not abated by the doubtful opinion of his adviser, Mr. Baldwin refused to purchase. That same land is worth now not merely thirty dollars a foot, but equivalent to three or four thousand dollars a foot front.

As showing the condition of the roads around Cleveland, and the mode of traveling in the early days of its history, it is narrated by Mr. Baldwin, that when living in Hudson he was fond of good horses and kept a team of which he was proud. The distance between Hudson and Cleveland was but twenty-four miles, but that distance had never been done in one day by any team. Mr. Baldwin thought the time had come for performing the feat, and accordingly set out on the journey. Just at tea time he drew rein in front of Merwin's tavern, at the corner of Superior street and Vineyard lane, and shouted to the landlord. The guests had just seated themselves to tea when Mr. Merwin rushed into the room in a state of great excitement, exclaiming, "For God's sake, gentlemen, come out and see a team that has been driven from Hudson to-day!" The guests left the table in a hurry and rushed to the door, scarcely crediting their own eyes.

Mr. Baldwin was married in 1829, and lost his wife in the Spring of 1867. Of this marriage there are now six children living and three dead. One son, Norman A., is engaged in agriculture in the neighborhood of the city.

Leverett Alcott.

Leverett Alcott was born in Walcott, New Haven county, Connecticut, in 1820. From early boyhood his taste was for mercantile pursuits. At the age of seventeen he obtained a position in an extensive country store at Bristol Basin, on the Farmington Canal, (now Plainville.) By diligence and perseverance, he was soon promoted from the duties of errand boy to a responsible position, and in course of time stood at the head of all the clerks in the establishment.

For the benefit of neophytes in commercial life, it may not be uninteresting to state how boys were made merchants in those days, and the remuneration they received for services. They were not (as is too often the case at the present time) transformed in a few months from crude green boys to merchants, but were obliged to learn the business by actual experience. An arrangement was made in this case for three years, on the following conditions: fifty dollars for the first year, seventy-five dollars for the second year, and one hundred dollars for the third and last year, with board in his employer's family. With this modest salary it required the utmost care and rigid economy to clothe and keep himself; but where there's a will there's a way, and the economy thus practiced in early life was no detriment in laying the foundation for a sound business career in after life. After having fulfilled his engagement with his employer, he spent some three years of mercantile life at the South, but the customs of the country, and the barbarous system of slavery were so repulsive to his feelings that he abandoned that field for the more congenial and prospectively profitable activities of the West, and in December, 1842, landed at Medina, in this State. In the Spring of 1845, a mercantile copartnership was formed with Mr. Augustus W. North, under the firm name of North & Alcott. During the subsequent Fall he married Miss Mary A. Williams, with the view of permanently settling at that place, but the mercantile prospects, and the growth of the town not appearing satisfactory to his views, the firm of North & Alcott was dissolved and the business discontinued, to be reconstructed and opened in a wider field and on a broader basis. Accordingly, in the Spring of 1849, (just twenty years ago,) a business arrangement was entered into with his present partner, Mr. Burrett W. Horton, a former school mate, under the firm name of Alcott & Horton. The business was to be the retailing of dry goods, and located at 177 Superior street, in Harrington's Block. The beginning was a moderate one, with a very limited capital, but what was lacking in capital was made up in energy, industry and perseverance. At first a retail trade only was contemplated, which was continued some four years, when the rapid growth of the city and increase of business induced them to open a wholesale department in the lofts of their store. Subsequently they closed their retail business and occupied the whole building for their jobbing trade; but their apartments were soon found to be too strait for their rapidly growing trade, and in August, 1855, they removed to the large new store, No. 141, in Clark's Block.

Mr. Alcott has a knowledge of human nature that imparts a keen perception of the character and motives of men, and hence, almost instinctively knows whom to trust. He is also quick in forming his judgment, ready in the adaptation of means to secure an end, vigorously prosecutes his plans, and seldom fails of a successful issue.

In a young and vigorous country like the United States, where so many opportunities are offered to ambition and laudable enterprise, and where too often, everything else but gold is lost sight of, it is refreshing to find some among our heaviest merchants, who recognize the fact, that man "cannot live by bread alone." Mr. Alcott, through all his active life has found time to attend to his religious duties. He has been for a long time connected with the Second Presbyterian Church, and for many years one of its elders. He was formerly President of the Young Men's Christian Association; actively engaged in missionary Sunday School work in the city--taking a lively interest in all Christian labor; a ready and willing giver toward public improvements, and all benevolent enterprises.

Richard Winslow.

On the evening of Sunday, August 9th, 1857, died, at nearly the ripe age of eighty-eight, Richard Winslow, the father of the Winslow family that have filled so important a place in the commercial and shipping history of Cleveland.

Mr. Winslow was born in Falmouth, Maine, September 6th, 1769, being descended in a direct line from Knelm Winslow, brother of Governor Edward Winslow, who played so important a part in the early history of Plymouth colony. In 1812, Mr. Winslow removed to North Carolina, where he lived for fourteen years, at Ocracoke, becoming largely interested in commerce, both internal and marine. Soon after his removal to that State, he married Miss Mary Nash Grandy, of Camden, N. C., who became the mother of eleven children, of whom but four, N. C., H. J., R. K., and Edward, are now alive. Mrs. Winslow died October, 1858, having survived her husband a little over one year.

In 1830, he decided to leave North Carolina and try his fortune in the West. A preliminary tour of observation brought him to Cleveland, then lively with business, and more lively still with expectancy of business to come from the completion of the canal, then in partial operation. Like many who preceded, and more who followed him, Mr. Winslow was struck with the natural advantages of Cleveland and concluded to try his fortunes here. The site of what is now known as the "Winslow warehouse," on the river, was owned by C. M. Giddings and Captain Belden, and a building was then in course of erection on it. Mr. Winslow purchased the property. He had strong faith in the growth of the city, but others did not have it to the same extent, and he was strongly urged not to attempt business so far down the river, where it was impossible that trade would ever reach him.

Immediately on concluding his purchase, he went to the eastern cities, where he purchased a large stock of teas and groceries, which he sent with his son, N. C., to Cleveland in the Fall. The stock arrived in December and was at once opened on Superior street, opposite Union lane. In the following May, Mr. Winslow followed with his family, purchased a lot on the south-east corner of the Public Square, and contracted with Levi Johnson for the erection of the house that was occupied by the Winslow family until the death of Mr. Winslow.

Unlike most of the early settlers in Cleveland, Mr. Winslow came with capital to invest at once in business, and by prudent management and far seeing enterprise that capital rapidly increased. He soon became agent for a line of vessels between Buffalo and Cleveland, and also of a line of canal boats. The first step toward his own shipping interests here, which subsequently assumed such proportions, was commenced by building the brig North Carolina. A few years later he was interested in building the steamer Bunker Hill, of 456 tons, which at that time was considered a very large size. To these were added, by himself and his sons, so many other lake craft that the family ranked among the foremost, if not the very foremost ship-owners on the chain of lakes, their sail vessels, propellers and steam-tugs being found everywhere on the western lake waters.

In 1854, Mr. Winslow retired from business, leaving his interest to be carried on by his sons, who inherited their father's business qualities. In his retirement, as in his active business life, he enjoyed the friendship of a very large social circle, to whom his frank, generous manners, warm attachments, and spotless honor commended him. He was a favorable specimen of the old school gentleman, warm and impulsive in his nature, quick to conceive and prompt to act, cordial in his greeting, strong in his attachments, and courteous to all.

His death was accelerated by an accident which seriously injured a leg he had badly injured several years before. To the last he preserved his faculties and his cheerfulness, and but for the injuries he had received would probably have lived for many years longer.

He was no politician, never sought office, but at the same time took a keen interest in public affairs, and did not neglect his duties or privileges as a citizen.

The three brothers in active conduct of the large marine interests known as the Winslows', are distributed as follows: N. C. at Buffalo, H. J. at New York, and R. K. at Cleveland, all of whom have been eminently successful.

Richard Hilliard.

Amongst Cleveland's earliest merchants who have already passed away, none deserve more honorable mention than Richard Hilliard. Like nearly all our men of mark, in early life he was obliged to sail against wind and tide. He was born at Chatham, New York, July 3, 1797. His father, David Hilliard, died when Richard was 14 years of age, he being at the time serving an apprenticeship with a hatter named Dore, at Albany. He was a lad of superior organization, and so, although obedient and obliging, had an extreme distaste for drudgery. A son of Mr. Dore one day threw down a pair of boots, saying, "Clean those boots Dick," when the lad concluded he would not do it, and at once prepared to leave for parts unknown. None of his friends knew of his whereabouts for several months, but at length learned he was at Skaneateles, with an older brother. Here he remained until he was about 18 years of age, being employed at clerking and school teaching, and ever mindful of his widowed mother and fatherless sisters.

From Skaneateles he removed to Black Rock and engaged himself as clerk to Mr. John Daly, a general merchant at that place. The young man soon gained the confidence of his employer and was admitted as a partner without capital. After a year or two, the firm moved to Cleveland, as a place of greater promise for trade. This occurred in 1824. They at once commenced business in the same line here on the site of the present Atwater Block, in a frame building of two compartments, one of which was used for dry goods, and the other for groceries. Mr. Daly was not an active partner in the business here, having given the entire management to Mr. Hilliard.

In 1827, Mr. Hilliard purchased Mr. Daly's entire interest, and continued alone for several years, till at length the demands of trade making it desirable to have a resident partner in New York to make purchases, he associated with himself Mr. William Hays, of that city. This partnership existed till the close of Mr. Hilliard's life.