Pittsburgh: A Sketch of its Early Social Life
9781465682673
213 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Until all fear of Indian troubles had ceased, there was practically no social life in American pioneer communities. As long as marauding bands of Indians appeared on the outskirts of the settlements, the laws were but a loose net with large meshes, thrown out from the longer-settled country whence they emanated. In the numerous interstices the laws were ineffective. In this Pittsburgh was no exception. The nominal reign of the law had been inaugurated among the settlers in Western Pennsylvania as far back as 1750, when the Western country was no man’s land, and the rival claims set up by France and England were being subjected to the arbitrament of the sword. In that year Cumberland County was formed. It was the sixth county in the province, and comprised all the territory west of the Susquehanna River, and north and west of York County—limitless in its westerly extent—between the province of New York on one side, and the colony of Virginia and the province of Maryland on the other. The first county seat was at Shippinsburg, but the next year, when Carlisle was laid out, that place became the seat of justice. After the conclusion of the French and Indian War, and the establishment of English supremacy, a further attempt was made to govern Western Pennsylvania by lawful methods, and in 1771 Bedford County was formed out of Cumberland County. It included nearly all of the western half of the province. With Bedford, the new county seat, almost a hundred miles away, the law had little force in and about Pittsburgh. To bring the law nearer home, Westmoreland County was formed in 1773, from Bedford County, and embraced all of the province west of “Laurel Hill.” The county seat was at Hannastown, three miles northeast of the present borough of Greensburg. But with Virginia and Pennsylvania each claiming jurisdiction over the territory an uncertainty prevailed which caused more disregard for the law. The Revolutionary War came on, with its attendant Indian troubles; and in 1794 the western counties revolted against the national government on account of the imposition of an excise on whisky. It was only after the last uprising had been suppressed that the laws became effective and society entered upon the formative stage.
