THE  HISTORY  OF  ONE  FRONTIER  FAMILY  

By  Benjamin  Stites  Terry,  Professor  of  History  University  of  Chicago.  

 

A  Transcription  of  an  Address  before  the  Baptist  

State  Convention,  at  Fargo,  North  Dakota  October  4,  1923  

 

(Transcription  of  photocopy  by  Thomas  Martin  –  March  2012)  

   

You  have  seen  the  “movie”  called  “The  Covered  Wagon”.    You  saw  there  a  

whole  community  moving  out  into  the  west.    The  long  pro-­‐  cession  of  

canvas  covered  wagons  streaming  away  into  the  far  distance  impressed  you.    

Here  was  an  entire  community,  several  thousand  souls  moving  out  to  settle  

in  the  mysterious  frontier  country.    Now  this  sort  of  thing  has  not  be  

peculiar  to  one  period  of  American  history,  nor  to  America.    But  I  am  

inclined  to  think  that  this  way  of  pulling  up  stakes  of  a  whole  community  

and  moving  the  community  bodily  into  the  new  world  has  not  been  the  rule.    

The  far  greater  and  more  important  movement  was  that  of  the  single  family  

–  the  two  or  three  families  –  the  unconscious  but  constant  drifting  of  

population  towards  the  west.    It  is  of  one  such  family,  not  because  it  stands  

out  unique  among  frontier  families,  but  rather  the  contrary.    It  is  a  type  of  

that  other  and  far  more  extensive  migration  of  the  thousands  of  

unnumbered  and  unknown  who  have  ever  been  pushing  westward,  and  

because  moving  in  such  small  numbers,  facing  the  more  certain  perils  and  

the  greater  hardships,  from  which  the  larger  community  was  protected  by  

its  numbers.  

The  war  of  the  American  Revolution  had  ended.    The  territory  west  of  

the  mountains  had  been  ceded  to  the  colonists.    Into  this  territory,  out  of  the  

mountains  of  western  Pennsylvania,  flowed  the  Ohio  –  the  great  artery  from  

the  east  westward.    The  western  mountain  slopes  of  Virginia  and  the  

Carolinas  were  already  occupied  by  a  hardy  race  of  pioneers  and  Indian  

fighters,  -­‐  the  descendants  of  the  indentured  servants,  the  victims  of  the  

religious  and  political  struggles  of  the  England  of  the  seventeenth  century.    

The  region  north  of  the  Ohio  had  not  yet  been  occupied.    The  country  was  

help  by  fierce  and  warlike  Indian  tribes  who  did  not  take  kindly  to  the  

appearance  of  the  white  settlers.    The  people  of  eastern  Pennsylvania  were  

a  peaceful  people  of  Quaker  type  who  had  no  desire  to  enter  into  endless  

strife  with  the  red  men.    The  people  along  the  Hudson  in  New  York  had  

their  own  vast  unoccupied  fields  along  the  reaches  of  the  Mohawk  and  the  

Genesee,  and  most  naturally  to  this  region  they  were  giving  their  first  

attention.      The  New  England  colonies  also  were  expanding  toward  their  

own  immediate  hinterland,  the  highlands  of  Vermont,  New  Hampshire,  and  

Maine.    Only  the  little  colonies  of  Delaware  and  New  Jersey  –  the  English  in  

Delaware  and  the  Dutch  in  New  Jersey  –  found  themselves  shut  in  without  

any  hinterland  of  their  own,  and  naturally  from  these  communities  settlers  

began  to  cast  longing  eyes  beyond  the  mountains  to  the  rich  country  north  

of  the  Ohio.  

And  now  that  the  revolution  had  been  fought  and  won,  settlement  of  this  

country  became  the  great  problem  of  the  young  American  government.    

Here  were  vast  assets  of  the  new  firm  but  they  could  hardly  be  called  

“liquid  assets”;  in  fact  to  many  they  seemed  to  be  no  assets  at  all,  but  a  

burdensome  liability.    President  Monroe  could  later  talk  about  this  trans-­‐

Allegheny  country  pretty  much  as  some  of  our  wise  men  today  talk  about  

the  Philippines.    It  was  a  country  so  remote  from  the  seat  of  government  

that  it  could  not  be  administered  efficiently,  and  could  be  retained  at  all  

only  at  great  and  constantly  increasing  expense.  

There  was,  moreover,  another  doubtful  asset  which  had  also  fallen  to  the  

young  government  as  a  result  of  the  war,  in  the  thousands  of  men  who  

served  through  the  war  and  were  now  foot-­‐loose  and  to  be  absorbed  again  

into  the  great  social  and  economic  machine.    Further,  officers  and  men  had  

served  without  pay,  not  theoretically,  but  practically;  for  the  government  

was  without  funds  and  although  these  men  had  served  on  patiently,  

heroically,  patriotically,  many  of  them,  from  the  Commander-­‐in-­‐Chief  down,  

at  their  own  expense,  still  there  must  be  a  limit  to  such  patience.    Good  stuff  

there  was  in  these  young  men  out  of  which  to  build  an  empire.    They  were  

men  long  familiar  with  the  rough  life  of  camps;  they  knew  the  smell  of  

gunpowder;  they  were  used  to  the  grim  sites  of  carnage.  Veteran  soldiers  

they  were,  but  they  were  not  old  men,  nor  broken  men.    They  were  in  the  

prime  of  hardy  manhood  and  they  had  been  fighting  Englishman.    They  had  

faced  the  best  soldiers  of  Europe  and  they  had  won;  they  were  not  afraid  to  

fight  Indians  now.    They  had  fought  England  for  a  great  principle;  they  

would  fight  the  wilderness  now  for  homes,  for  the  opportunity  of  a  new  

start  in  life.    This  was  the  second  asset  of  the  new  government.    But  the  

government  was  bankrupt,  and  all  history  had  taught  that  such  an  army  

under  such  conditions,  however  patriotic  had  been  their  original  

inspiration,  might  become  a  very  dangerous  liability.  

The  young  government  solved  its  double  problem.    It  set  liability  against  

liability.    It  began  paying  it  soldiers  debts  by  prodigal  grants  of  land  in  the  

west,  beyond  the  Ohio.  

Among  the  earliest  of  theses  grantees  was  a  young  officer  who  in  the  war  

just  ended  had  won  the  rank  of  Captain  –  Captain  Benjamin  Stites,  or  

Stuytes,  as  the  name  was  originally  spelled  and  is  still  in  Holland.    He  was  of  

an  old  Dutch  family  of  Elizabethtown,  New  Jersey,  of  which  his  father,  John  

Stites,  had  been  mayor  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war.    After  the  war  Captain  

Stites  sees  still  to  have  remained  in  the  service  of  the  government  and  with  

his  headquarters  at  Redstone,  Pennsylvania,  was  fully  occupied  with  Indian  

fighting  and  safe  guarding  convoys  to  military  stations  and  settlements  on  

the  south  bank  of  the  Ohio.    His  service  was  subsequently  recognized  by  the  

government  by  promotion  to  the  rank  of  Major.    Later  when  a  son  appeared  

and  like  his  father  took  to  soldiering,  and  rose  to  the  rank  of  Major  in  the  

war  of  1812,  the  two  men  were  long  distinguished  as  “Old  Major  Benjamin”  

and  “Young  Major  Benjamin”.    In  one  of  these  expeditions  to  the  south  bank  

of  the  Ohio,  when  Major  Stites,  Sr.,  reached  the  little  settlement  of  

Washington,  Kentucky,  he  found  the  people  stirred  up  by  a  recent  raid  of  

the  Miamis  from  over  the  Ohio.    These  Miamis  had  stolen  all  the  horses  of  

the  settlement.      It  was  a  calamity,  for  without  horses,  the  pioneer’s  work  

was  impossible.    Major  Stites  offered  his  services  to  the  young  settlement,  

and  with  recruits  from  the  civilian  ranks  started  out  upon  the  trail  of  the  

marauders.    He  followed  them  across  the  Ohio  and  into  the  Miami  country;  

but  making  up  his  mind  that  the  Indians  were  too  strong  for  his  little  force  

to  attack  he  retired  again  without  the  horses.    Yet  the  expedition  was  not  

without  fruit.    As  Major  Stites  passed  along  he  had  used  his  eyes.    He  

discovered  the  wonderful  fertility  of  the  country,  and  in  vision  saw  the  

possibilities  of  the  future  of  this  region  beyond  the  Ohio.    It  overwhelmed  

him  like  a  revelation.    To  put  in  in  the  modern  vernacular,  he  “fell  in  love”  

with  the  country.  

The  American  government  had  already  entered  upon  its  new  policy  and  

had  already  made  a  first  grant  of  land  in  the  Ohio  country.    In  the  autumn  of  

1787  a  small  group  of  covered  wagons  were  working  their  way  slowly  and  

tediously  from  Buffalo  down  across  Pennsylvania.    It  took  them  eight  weeks  

to  reach  the  head  waters  of  the  Ohio  and  here  they  waited  until  spring.    In  

the  new  year,  the  early  summer  of  1788,  these  first  settlers  at  last  reached  

their  new  homes  and  began  the  founding  of  what  we  know  today  as  

Marietta,  Ohio.      In  the  autumn  of  the  same  year,  Major  Stistes  had  also  not  

only  secured  a  grant  of  ten  thousand  acres  along  the  Little  Miami  where  its  

waters  flow  into  the  Ohio,  but  he  had  brought  with  him  nine  families,  with  a  

brother  named  Elijah  and  a  sister,  Rhoda.      Major  Benjamin  at  the  time  

apparently  was  not  yet  married.    The  nine  families  settled  at  a  point  about  a  

quarter  of  a  mile  below  the  place  where  the  Little  Miami  joins  the  Ohio,  and  

here  they  spend  the  autumn  and  the  early  winter,  in  “rushing  up”  the  

inevitable  log  cabins  and  clearing  away  such  land  as  they  could  for  the  

spring  planting.      So  the  little  town  of  Columbia  appeared.  

Thrifty,  far-­‐sighted  people  were  these,  but  there  was  only  one  thing  that  

they  did  not  for  see,  the  treachery  of  the  inconstant  Ohio,  and  on  January  

1st  the  rising  waters  swept  away  their  little  town,  leaving  only  one  house  

standing.    They  were  not  discouraged  but  moved  further  down  the  river  and  

on  higher  ground  began  their  hard  task  all  over  again.      

In  the  meantime  an  old  friend  of  major  Benjamin,  Judge  Symmes,  also  of  

Elizabethtown,  in  January  of  the  new  year  came  with  14  families  to  settle  at  

North  Bend,  so-­‐called,  some  fifteen  miles  below;  while  Mathias  Denman  

another  New  Jersey  man,  friend  and  associate  of  Symmes  and  Stites,  had  

already  in  December,  1788,  settled  with  five  families  at  the  mouth  of  the  

Great  Miami  -­‐  nearer  to  the  original  Stites  settlement.    This  settlement  was  

first  named  Losantiville,  but  soon  after  under  a  new  christening  appears  as  

Cincinnati.    Both  settlements  have  long  since  merged  into  the  great  

metropolis  of  the  Ohio  country.    

Now  why  should  you  Baptists  up  here  in  North  Dakota  be  interested  in  

the  history  of  the  settlement;  and  why  on  this  occasion  when  you  have  

come  together  to  honor  the  memory  of  Elijah  Stites  Terry,  your  martyred  

missionary,  should  you  be  interested  in  this  one  frontier  family?    This  is  the  

reason.    The  Stites  family  were  all  Baptists  and  apparently  were  of  some  

influence  in  the  young  nomination.    One  sister  of  Captain  Benjamin  Stites,  

Elizabeth,  was  married  to  Stephen  Gano,  “the  fighting  parson  of  the  

Revolution”,  the  personal  friend  of  Washington,  and  the  first  pastor  of  the  

first  Baptist  Church  of  New  York  City;  another  sister,  probably  Rhoda  (see  

below),  was  married  to  Dr.  Manning,  for  twenty  years  President  of  Brown  

University;  while  a  nephew,  John  S.  Gano,  was  destined  to  be  for  many  years  

the  pastor  of  the  old  First  Church  of  Providence,  Rhode  Island.  

Again,  on  Saturday,  January  20,  at  the  house  of  Benjamin  Davis  at  

Columbia,  was  organized  not  only  the  first  Baptist  church,  but  the  first  

Protestant  church  in  the  Northwest  territory.    Of  the  twenty-­‐six  people  who  

had  settled  in  the  new  community  nine  were  Baptist.    The  next  day  this  

little  church  of  nine  members  held  its  first  public  service  and  there  were  

baptized  into  the  new  church  Elijah  Stites,  Rhoda  Stites,  and  Sarah  Ferris.    It  

was  a  vigorous  church  from  the  start,  and  the  next  year  erected  its  first  

house  of  worship  upon  land  given  to  them  by  Major  Benjamin.  

The  colonies  in  the  meantime,  in  spite  of  many  discouragements,  

continued  to  grow.    Wayne’s  famous  victory  of  1794,  and  the  Treaty  of  

Greenville  in  the  next  year  allayed  the  Indian  troubles  of  the  new  

community.      Indians  had  been  a  constant  menace.      Religious  meetings  had  

to  be  guarded  by  armed  men;  men  accompanied  their  families  to  church  

with  loaded  guns  ready  at  hand.      They  bowed  their  heads  in  prayer,  but  

with  ears  alert  to  catch  the  whistle  of  the  first  arrow  that  came  hurtling  out  

of  the  shadows  of  the  forest.  

This  constant  menace  undoubtedly  deterred  many  at  first  from  joining  

the  new  settlements,  but  after  the  reduction  of  the  Miamis  and  the  

establishment  of  a  permanent  peach  many  from  the  south  bank  of  the  river  

began  to  join  those  who  had  settled  on  the  north  bank.    But  there  was  

another  reason  for  this  movement.    Slavery  had  already  entered  the  

Kentucky  and  Tennessee  communities.    Many  of  the  settlers  had  come  from  

New  England  and  New  York.    Both  by  instinct  and  by  training  they  were  

“free  soldiers”.    To  them  it  seemed  inconsistent  that  Christian  men  should  

keep  their  fellows  in  bondage.    Slavery  was  to  them  an  accursed  thing.    And  

the  feeling  soon  manifested  itself  upon  the  church  records  of  the  little  

communities  along  the  Ohio.      There  could  be  no  fellowship  with  churches  

made  up  of  people  who  held  slaves.  

It  was  in  this  drift  up  from  Kentucky,  the  coming  in  of  the  earliest  “free  

soldiers”,  that  one  John  Terry  came  with  his  young  family  to  settle  on  the  

north  bank.  

The  Terrys  were  an  old  New  England  family.    The  first  Terrys,  Robert,  

Richard,  and  Thomas  had  left  England  in  1635,  during  the  great  English  

migration  into  the  new  world  that  took  place  during  the  twelve  Parliament-­‐

less  years  of  Charles  I.    It  was  a  protest  in  the  name  of  liberty  against  the  

tyranny  of  the  Stuart  government  and  the  Stuart  church.      The  Terry  

brothers  settled  for  a  short  time  at  Springfield  Massachussets,  and  from  

Springfield  moved  on  to  Hartford  where  a  part  of  the  family  remained  

permanently.    Of  this  branch  later  was  General  Alfred  Terry,  a  name  well  

known  here  and  in  the  west  and  after  whom,  in  three  western  states  at  least,  

towns  have  been  named.      His  gifted  sister,  Rose  Terry  Cook,  was  also  well  

known  to  the  past  generation.  

About  1772  two  members  of  the  Hartford  Terrys,  another  Thomas  and  

another  Richard,  moved  across  the  Sound  and  settled  at  Southold  on  

eastern  Long  Island.      Here  the  family  apparently  did  not  prosper.    At  all  

events  Southold  did  not  seem  to  hold  them  long.      Some  of  the  younger  

members  of  the  family  moved  in  to  Brooklyn,  where  they  are  still  

represented  by  descendants  today.      Another  member  of  the  new  

generation,  one  John  Terry,  born  in  Southold,  took  his  young  family  and  

moved  first  into  Kentucky,  and  now  joined  the  drift  to  the  north  bank  of  the  

Ohio.      Two  sons,  Daniel  and  Robert,  had  been  born  in  Southold,  Robert  in  

1796.      Six  other  sons  and  one  daughter  were  born  in  the  Ohio  country.      The  

same  year  that  Robert  was  born  in  Southold,  appeared  Rhoda  Stites,  the  

youngest  daughter  of  Major  Benjamin.      The  Terrys,  like  the  Stites,  were  

Baptists,  and  with  the  young  people  growing  up  together  and  interested  in  

the  activities  of  the  young  church,  Robert  and  Rhoda  were  very  naturally  

drawn  together,  and  were  married  January  11,  1822.  

Rhoda  Stites  was  a  woman  of  high  character  and  deep  imaginative  

spiritual  nature,  generous  and  kindly,  whose  one  thought  in  life  was  to  help  

somebody  who  was  in  trouble.  

The  first  son  was  born  in  1824.    To  this  son  was  given  the  name  John,  the  

name  borne  by  his  grandfather  and  great-­‐grandfather.    There  was  a  middle  

name,  Carlos,  although  what  it  meant  or  where  it  came  from,  I  have  never  

been  able  to  find  out.      I  do  not  think  that  John  Carlos  himself  ever  knew  

where  it  came  from.    This  John  Carlos,  or  has  he  always  signed  himself,  J.C.  

Terry,  was  for  nearly  sixty  years  a  well  know  figure  in  St.  Paul.      When  the  

second  son  appeared  four  years  later,  he  was  named  Elijah  Stites  Terry,  

bearing  the  name  of  the  uncle  who  was  the  first  man  to  be  baptized  into  the  

young  church  at  Columbia.      Elijah  Stites  Terry,  whose  memory  we  honor  

tonight  was  born  in  1828,  February  22,  at  Lebanon,  Ohio.    Still  a  third  son,  

to  whom  the  mother  gave  the  honored  father’s  name,  Benjamin  Stites  Terry,  

was  born  in  1832.    Then  again  the  trek  of  the  new  generation  was  taken  

westward.    An  accident  brought  the  young  J.C.  Terry  to  St.  Paul  in  1850.    He  

had  been  an  attachee  in  the  army  of  Zachary  Taylor  in  the  recent  Mexican  

war,  had  ridden  from  the  northern  battlefields  of  Mexico  to  California,  

ostensibly  as  a  reporter  for  northern  news-­‐papers,  but  after  a  few  months  

he  had  returned  to  “the  States”,  as  they  called  the  east  in  those  days,  to  

organize  a  prospecting  expedition  of  his  own  and  had  returned  as  far  as  

Council  Bluffs.      This  was  in  the  fall  of  ’49.    Then  the  government  hung  out  

the  danger  signal.    The  Apaches  were  on  the  warpath  and  all  prospectors  

were  warned  not  to  attempt  the  land  route  until  peace  could  be  restored.    

Weeks  of  weary  waiting  passed  into  months.    The  little  band  of  prospectors  

one  by  one  had  dropped  out  and  given  up  the  quest.    It  was  at  this  time  that  

the  east  began  to  hear  of  St.  Paul  and  the  new  settlements  about  the  

headwaters  of  the  Mississippi,  and  the  young  Terry,  who  still  seems  to  have  

kept  his  connection  with  the  newspapers,  was  sent  up  there  to  investigate  

and  report.    He  arrived  in  the  spring  of  1850,  just  in  time  to  take  part  in  the  

founding  and  building  up  of  another  First  Baptist  Church  of  a  frontier  

settlement.    Here  he  met  Emily  Wakefield,  a  daughter  of  Judge  John  A.  

Wakefield,  and  was  married  and  permanently  settled,  opening  a  printing  

office  of  his  own  and  publishing  the  old  “Minnesotian”,  which  was  

subsequently  merged  in  “The  Pioneer”,  and  finally  became  “The  Pioneer  

Press  of  St.  Paul.      The  first  volume  of  law  reports  of  the  state  was  published  

by  Mr.  Terry,  and  bears  his  name  today.  

Elijah  Stites  Terry  joined  his  older  brother  in  St.  Paul  shortly  after  the  

new  family  was  established  there  and  from  the  young  First  Baptist  Church  

was  sent  out  to  his  mission  filed  among  the  Dakotas.    His  life  story  and  the  

tragedy  of  his  taking  off,  I  will  leave  for  another  to  tell.    Benjamin  Stites  

Terry,  the  youngest  brother,  also  joined  the  new  family  at  St.  Paul  later  in  

the  ‘50s.    He  was  also  destined  to  give  his  life  in  the  conquest  of  the  frontier,  

not  as  a  missionary,  but  as  a  soldier  like  his  grandfather.    He  had  enlisted  in  

the  Sixth  Minnesota  to  go  south  but  before  his  regiment  could  be  sent  away  

occurred  the  Sioux  uprising  and  the  massacre  of  1863.    The  Sixth  Minnesota  

was  sent  to  the  Indian  country  and  Benjamin  Stites  Terry  was  killed  in  

battle  at  Birch  Cooley  in  1863.  

Here  you  have  the  history  of  one  frontier  family.    I  have  brought  it  to  you  

not  because  it  is  unique  among  frontier  stories,  but  because  it  is  not.    It  may  

be  taken  as  a  typical  family  history.    Thousands  of  such  families  have  been  

streaming  into  the  west  from  the  east  for  the  last  two  hundred  years.    They  

have  produced  our  missionaries,  our  soldiers,  our  journalists,  our  

statesmen,  and  our  educators.    In  a  word,  they  are  the  men  and  women  –  

and  we  must  not  forget  the  women,  because  if  possible  the  hardships  and  

the  dangers  they  had  to  face  were  more  severe  than  those  faced  by  their  

husbands  and  brothers  –  who  have  founded  and  built  up  our  American  

civilization.    All  honor  to  the  name  of  Elijah  Stites  Terry,  and  those  who,  like  

him,  have  gone  out  into  an  unknown  country  in  the  name  of  Liberty  and  

Christianity.