FirstSettlers

As writen in Centennial History of the City of Newark and Licking County Ohio
                                  by E. M. Brister 1909
                                     volume one
   In 1787 John H. Philipps and his two younger brother, Thomas and Erasmus, sons of Thomas Philipps, a Welshman of a large fortune, were students at a college in Wales. John H. was the reputed author of some seditious or treasonable literature, and , to avoid arrest and punishment, he decided to emigrate to America. Accordingly he sailed for Philadelphia, accompanied by his brothers, who were more or less implicated with him, arriving in the in the above named year. They soon went to live in a Welsh settlement in chester county, in the vicinity of Philadelphia. Here they met with Chaplain Jones, a Welsh minister. Gerrald Anthony Wayne was also a resident of Chester county, and when he organized the expedition against the Indians in the northwest territory in 1792, through the influence of Captain Jones he appointed John H. Philipps a member of his staff. These sons of Thomas Philipps succeeded, after much persuasion in obtaining the consent of their father, who was a man of wealth, to close his business affairs and follow them to America.
    Theophilus Rees, a neighbor and friend of Thomas Philipps, both residents of Carmarthenshire, in South Wales, who likewise was a man of liberal means, after a full consideration of the subject, also decided to try his fortune in the new world, and forthwith proceeded to make arrangements to that end. They accordingly closed up their business and , when that was accomplished, they bade adieu to their native hills in "Wild Walia" and sailed in the ship Amphion, Captain Williams, April 1, 1795 (some say 1794), for the United States, where they arrived after a passage of nine weeks.
   Many of their old Welsh neighbors, by arrangement, through the kind generosity of Rees and Philipps, came as emigrants in the same ship with them though many of them were unable to pay their passage, but agreeing to do so upon earning money enough after their arrival here.
    In October after their arrival, most of this colony removed to the Big Valley, in Chester county, Pennsylvania, where there was a Welsh settlement. Rees and Phillips resided some time in or near Philadelphia: but both removed to the Welsh settlement in Chester county, Pennsylvania. Here, however, they did not remain long, but soon, probably in 1797, together with others who had crossed the Atlantic with them , removed to Bulah, Cambria county, Pennsylvania, where they formed a portion of a considerable Welsh settlement. In this community Philipps' son, Thomas, who came over in 1787, died in 1801. The other son, Erasmus, died in Philadelphia some years later.
    In 1801, or earlier, when all this county constituted Licking township, Fairfield county, Thomas Philipps and Theophilus Rees purchased two thousand acres of land situated in what is now the northeast quarter of Granville township. It bordered on the McKean township line and extended almost to Newark township. They purchased this land of Sampson Davis, a Welshman of Philadelphia, who was then an extensive dealer in western lands. The purchase was made upon condition that the land prove as represented, the purchasers not having seen it. Chaplain Jones, Morgan Rees, and Simon James were selected to view the land. They accepted the commission, discharged the duty assigned them, and upon their report, the contract was ratified. Rees and his son-in-law, David Lewis, visited this purchase in 1801.
   In 1801 David Lewis and David Thomas left Bulah, Pennslyvania, to settle on the Welsh hills. On arriving at Marietta the found stonemasons work and remained until the spring of 1802, when they came up the Muskingum and during said year built cabins on the Welsh Hills. In the same year Theophilus Rees with his family , and Simon James without his family, left their homes in Bulah, Cambria county, Pennsylvania, for the purpose of permanently occupying and improving the Welsh hills purchase.
    James was to build a cabin on the Philipps tract, clear some land, then return to Cambria which he did. He, however removed with his family, to the Welsh hills settlement in 1804.
    Upon the arrival of this colony of emigrants at or near Wheeling, they fell in with a frontiersman, hunter, scout, and Indian Fighter named Jimmy Johnson, who felt quite willing to be transferred to regions further west, as his business had become very dull in that section.
    Rees thinking that as expert in those occupations and a man of such diversified genius and talent might be useful to him in his wilderness home, engaged him to accompany him, agreeing to sell him one hundred acres of land, to be paid for in such services as he might be bale to render. David Thomas stopped in Newark, and lived in a cabin on the Park House lot until he could build a cabin on is land, when late in the same year, or early in 1803, he removed to the Welsh hills and occupied his cabin.
    David Lewis, also, stopped in Newark and worked as a stonemason, but his father-in-law, Theophilus Rees, having given him one hundred acres of his land, Lewis soon took measures to occupy it, and with the help of Patrick Cunningham and his sons, erected a cabin upon it. This cabin was probably erected in 1802. But Theophilus Rees, Simon James, and Jimmy Johnson established themselves on the hills in 1802: Rees most likely temporarily occupying with a portion of his family and laborers, until a better one could be erected; and Johnson, Thomas, and Lewis constructing cabins for themselves and families: Simon James' occupancy, however, in accordance with the original intention, was only temporary. Theophilus Rees, David Lewis, David Thomas, Simon James, and Jimmy Johnson were the Welsh Hill pioneers. Thomas was afterward known as "Big Davy Thomas" to distinguish him from a smaller man of the same name, who was also a son-in-law of Theophilus Rees, and who, in 1810, settled on the purchase of Rees, he having been presented with one hundred acres of it.
    Theophilus Rees, the patriarch of the Welsh Hills, was a gentlemen and a scholar: a man of integrity and great usefulness to his countrymen and his church. He spoke the English language imperfectly, but after the arrival of the Granville colony in 1805, he was a regular attendant upon the services of the church in Granville until the organization of the Welsh hills church in 1808.
    John H. Philipps, the youthful seditious writer, who left his country to secure his own safety, arrived for the first time on the Welsh hills in 1803, or the year after, but remained only a short time. He returned to Chester County, where his family lived, and superintended the construction of a bridge over the Schuylkill near Philadelphia. In 1806 he returned to the Welsh Hills, where he taught school, and made himself generally useful for eight years, when he removed to Cincinnati where he died in 1832. He was one of the earliest teachers in the Welsh hills, and a man of fair abilities, good scholarship, and made his mark wherever he went. He held some official positions in Cincinnati, and was highly esteemed there.
    Thomas Philipps was largely engaged in business in Cambria county, Pennsylvania, and moving on his land immediately was found impracticable. He, however, visited it in 1804, accompanied by his wife ( Mary sister of Erasmus of the Kings court of the castle of Picton), whose adaptation to frontier life some time, business capacity, energy and force of character were proverbial. They remained some time and then returned to Cambria county , with a determination to bring their business affairs there to a close. This was accomplished in two years; and in 1806 Thomas Philipps and family returned to the Welsh hills where he lived until his death, which occurred May 26, 1813. Mrs. Philipps died some years before in Philadelphia, whither she had gone on business.
    Philipps, Like his neighbor and friend, Deacon Rees, was a well educated gentleman of large experience and extensive information and reading.
    In 1803 James Evans, James James, and Mr. Sadwick, who however was not a Welshman, settled on the Welsh hills.
    Thomas Cramer, son-in-law of Jimmy Johnson, and his brother, Peter Cramer came from West Virginia in 1804, as did also Simon James, who , two years before accompanied the Rees colony. During the years 1805 and 1806, John Price, Benjamin Jones, John H. Philipps, and Thomas Powell were added to the list of Welshmen in the Welsh hills' settlement.
    Samuel J. Philipps and Thomas Owens were among the Welsh settlers in 1807 and 1808; Jacob Reily and a Mr. McLane, not Welshmen, were immigrants of the same year. Morris Morris, David James and Joseph Evans, father of Joseph and Lewis, of Newark , came in 1809; and "little" David Thomas, son-in-law of Theophilus Rees, and Samuel White, Sr.,came in 1810. White was a son-in-law of of Thomas Philipps, and though not a Welshman, albeit his wife was a native of Wales, he yet became very closely identified with the history of the Welsh hills settlement. He was born March 4, 1762, in Peterborough, near Boston, In Massachusetts, and entered college upon reaching manhood; but before the completions of his college course, he commenced a sea-faring career which he pursued for twelve years. He visited the four quarters of the globe while a seaman, and during the time was shipwrecked near Cape Horn. He thereupon resolved to abandon the life of a sailor, and returning to Philadelphia, entered the service of Thomas Philipps as a teamster, in 1797. Philipps was running a wagon line between Philadelphia and Cambria county. White, in the same year, married the daughter of his employer, and in 1810 removed to the Welsh Hills. Soon after his arrival the large-hearted settlers of the "hill" met in force and welcomed the newcomer by building him a cabin. These pioneers spent their Christmas of 1810 in this delightful and hospitable way, finishing the cabin ready for it's occupant the same day.
    White was a man of more the ordinary intellegence and education; possessing an inquisitive mind, and an independent, frank, upright character. He was the father of a number of sons, and died September 13, 1851, at the ripe age of eighty-nine.
    Jonathan White, son of the foregoing, was born in Cambria county in 1800, and came to the Welsh hills with is father in 1810. He became a good scholar under the teaching of Rev. Thomas D. Baird, of Newark, and was a young man of very fine talents, excelling in oratory. He died in 1827, in Stark county, Ohio. where he engaged as canal contractor.
    Samuel White, jr., was born in the Welsh hills settlement, March 3, 1812. He was the first student on the list on the first day of the first term of Granville college, He remained there some time, but difficulties, growing out the discussion of the slavery question, led him to complete his education at Oberlin.    Leaving college in 1836, he entered the law office of the late Colonel Mathiot, and was admitted to the bar in 1837. In 1843 he was a successful candidate for the State Legislature and became a leader in the body. In 1844 he received the nomination of the Whig Party for congress in the district composed of the counties of Knox, Licking and Franklin, in opposition to Colonel C.J. McNulty, one of the most able and accomplished stump speakers and political campaigners in Ohio. They conducted the canvas with extraordinary vigor ,and it is generally conceded that it was owing to the herculean labors of White during this campaign that he contracted a fever which so utterly prostrated him as to end in his death, which occurred July 20, 1844. Columbus Delano took his place on the ticket, and was elected by a majority of twelve votes.
    Samuel White, jr., for some time edited, in part, the Newark Gazette; but in this vocation it can not be said that he exhibited extraordinary ability. He was not remarkable as a writer. He made the reception speech in 1843, on the occasion of the arrival of John Quincy Adams in Newark, which was universally conceded to have been a preeminent success. He was a man of remarkable force and power as a public speaker. It is undoubtedly true that his equal as an orator, before the promiscuous assembly, and in case of a certain kind before a jury, has never been produced in this county. His sarcasm was withering; his invective powerful.
    Samuel White was fearless, independent, outspoken, frank, honest, never uttering opinions he not believe, and always gave expression to thoughts he entertained, without "fear, favor of affection." In the famous crusades of this times against slavery and intemperance, he was always in the front rank, playing well the part of Richard, the lion-hearted.
A Welshman, who passed current on the "hills" as Dr. Thomas, settled there about the year 1834. He derived most of this consequence from the fact that he placed five sons in the Baptist ministry, who were all more of less distinguished. They were named David, John, Benjamin, Daniel, and Evan, and all entered the pulpit very young. David, the eldest, was, for a number of years pastor of the church in Newark, as was also Benjamin. David was a man of wonderful volubility in the pulpit, and stood in the first class of the school known as "revival orators." His brother, also, had similar gifts, and all were liberally endowed with talents as public speakers. They were remarkable men, whose fame spread abroad and who made considerable stir in the world as pulpit orators of more then average natural powers. They never enjoyed superior educational advantages, nor attained to any distinction in scholarship.
    From the foregoing it will be seen that the purchase of Rees and Philipps formed the nucleus of the Welsh settlement in this county. Theophilus Rees settled on is half of the purchase and surrounded himself by his sons, Theophilus and John, and his son-in-law, the two David Thomases, and David Lewis, and his hunter, "Jimmy Johnson", giving to each of them about one hundred acres of his land.
    Thomas Philipps settled upon his portion of the purchase, and like wise surrounded himself by his sons, John H. and Samuel J., and his sons-in-law Thomas Owens, Samuel White, William Morrison and John Evans. To all of them he gave one hundred acres of land, but the two last named sons-in-law did not occupy their land. Morrison lived on land in the vicinity, but Evans never came to Licking county. To a grandaughter Philipps gave two hundred acres of land, but she never occupied it.
    It is impracticable to give the names of the imigrants from Wales who settled in this county subsequent to 1810. Additions were made to their number from year to year, so that, notwithstanding the numerous deaths and removals, the number of Welsh inhabitants in Licking county, including those who are in whole or in part of Welsh parentage, can not less then twenty-five hundred at the present time. They lived principally in the Welsh hills settlement, and in the city of Newark, and village of Granville. (and McKean township) .
    Of those immigrants from Wales, who settled in the hills subsequent to 1810, there were Daniel Griffith(1812) Walter and Nicodemus Griffith (1815) David Pittford (1816) and Hugh Jones (1819). Edward Price and Edward Glenn came in 1821, and Rev. Thomas Hughes in 1822.
    Of those members of the families of Rees and Philipps, who came from Wales in 1795, Mrs. Elizabeth Thomas, wife of "little" David Thomas, and daughter of Theophilus Rees,   was the last survivor, she died May 3, 1855, after a residence in America of sixty years.