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James O'Hara, 6th Quartermaster General
Facts and Events
Records of Indenture
- 1795 - Pittsburgh - Fifteen-year-old Comfort Tunnel is indentured to James O’Hara. 3
- 1802 - Pittsburgh - O’Hara sells Tunnel to Steele Semple for the sum of $80 in June 1802. 3
References
- ↑ Family Recorded, in Leach, Frank Willing, and North American (Newspaper : Philadelphia). Old Philadelphia families: a series of articles contributed to the Philadelphia North American. (Salt Lake City, Utah: Genealogical Society of Utah, 1965, 1967).
Old Philadelphia Families LXVII-CARSON
Philadelphia North American
Date: Sunday 13 SEP 1908
... Mrs. FEBIGER's only sister, Mary CARSON, the third child of William and Mary CARSON to marry, was born February 19, 1761. Like her sister, she, too, had a romantic meeting with her future husband at the old Harp and Crown Inn, where he was a guest during the Revolution. In her case, also, it was a soldier who fell in love with the proprietor's daughter, and a brilliant soldier, too. This was Colonel James O'HARA, afterward General James O'HARA, one of the bravest, most renowned officers of the United States Army.
James O'HARA was a native of Ireland. Coming to America before the Revolution, he settled at Fort Pitt, the Pittsburg of today. This was about 1773. Here in this almost absolute wilderness, he spent the remainder of his life, being a leading, if not the chief, character in the development and transformation of that remarkable country.
His life has never adequately been portrayed. When it shall be, it will prove as romantic, as picturesque and as full of absorbing interest as that of Daniel BOONE, of Davy CROCKETT or any of the characters in the Leather Stocking Romances of COOPER. Throughout the Revolution, mainly in command of a company of Continental Rangers, he led in the continuous battles with the Indians of that wild region. At times he acted as a courier, carrying dispatches to General WASHINGTON in the East-it being on one of those trips that he first met his future wife, pretty Molly CARSON, at the Harp and Crown.
After the Revolution the struggles with the Indians continued, more or less uninterruptedly; indeed, until WAYNE's great victory at Fallen Timbers, August 20, 1794. O'HARA, having been promoted to the rank of Colonel, not only participated personally in the conflicts with the savages, but advanced considerable sums of money toward the provisioning of the troops in the field, the Supreme Executive Council, acting under resolution of January 10, 1788, having reimbursed him to the extent of $7,000 for provisions supplied by him to the Army in Western Pennsylvania and Ohio.
Having been commissioned Quartermaster General in the U.S. Army, April 19, 1792, he aided in the suppression of the Whisky Insurrection in 1794 and was with WAYNE in Ohio until the peace with the Indians was signed in the following year. He resigned from the Army May 1, 1796.
In the following year, in partnership with Major Isaac CRAIG, he erected the first Pittsburgh glass works. In after years this note was found among his papers. "Today we made the first bottle at a cost of 30,000."
He became immensely wealthy in his various enterprises. As a trader, contractor and manufacturer and eventually in conjunction with his sons-in-law became the owner of vast sections of the city of Pittsburg and certain of his descendants today own literally square miles of valuable real estate in that municipality.
In 1804 General O'HARA was one of the organizers and a director of the branch of the Bank of Pennsylvania established in Pittsburg.
He died at his home on the banks of the Monongahela in December 1819. Of him a writer has said:
"A patriotic soldier, an enterprising business man and a charitable Christian. The tears of the poor and rich alike were shed at his grave and mingled with the clods that fell upon his coffin. Pittsburg owes him a debt of gratitude and his memory should be cherished and held sacred."
Four children were born to James and Mary (nee CARSON) O'HARA who reached maturity, namely, Mary, Elizabeth, another daughter whose Christian name is unknown to the writer, and James, all of whom married, as will hereafter appear. ...
- ↑ 8 Apr 1777 – Letter from James O'Hara in Pittsburgh, PA to Devereux Smith, in Hannaha’s Town, PA – Box 1, Folder 1 – Darlington Family Papers, 1753-1921, DAR.1925.01, Darlington Collection, Special Collections Department, University of Pittsburgh.
Dear Sir,
I arrived here yesterday evening from the Indian Country and must say that I have great reason to suspect that numbers of the Savages are determined to annoy our Frontier as much as they dare. On the 2nd day of this month as I was preparing to start with my horses from the Moravian Town, there were three runners arrived from the Tuscarawas, about thirteen short miles off, with intelligence that there were a Party of Eighteen, consisting of fifteen Mingoes, two Shawnee and one Windot at that place on their way to war and that they intended to come for the Ministers and other White People who live with the Moravians upon which all the White people of the Upper Town fled that night to the principle Delaware Town. However, I stayed till next morning and got two of the Moravian Indians to go meet the warriors and find out if possible what they intended to do. We got for answer that they looked on themselves as free men that had no King nor Chief. Therefore, would do as they pleased and that in the first place they would visit the neighborhood of Fort Pitt. They then set off from Tuscarawas and as I knew that I certainly must have fallen in with them if I following my course. I thought best to send my horses by the Delawares and came home myself and man by way of the Mingos Town on the Ohio. I was informed by good Authority that a Party of Sixty Four who had gone some time ago to the Kentucky have returned to ?(Pekowee, Pekowi, Piqua Town) they have brought only one ?(Prisoner) and have lost a Shawny Man. They have again held a Council of War and Seventy have turned out to visit the Big River. The Munsee have in general turned off from the Delawares and are much melined to listen to the Mingoes. The Shawnee’s are divided about one half of them have joined the Mingoes. The Wiandots seem more inclined for peace. I have nothing further material to communicate at present but that I have lost one of your Buckles. Please make my best compliments to Mrs. Smith, Miss Polly and the rest of your family.
I am Sir your Humble Servant,
James O'Hara
- Comfort Tunnel [1], in University of Pittsburgh. Free At Last? - Slavery In Pittsburgh in the 18th and 19th Centuries.
[Summary: This indenture includes several transactions. Fifteen-year-old Comfort Tunnel is indentured to James O’Hara in 1795. O’Hara sells Tunnel to Steele Semple for the sum of $80 in June 1802. Semple then sells Tunnel for $80 to Thomas Dobbins in July 1802. Within three weeks, Dobbins sells Comfort to William Gazzam for the sum of $62. Gazzam frees Tunnel upon the completion of her indenture.]
- James O'Hara (quartermaster), in Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
Last retrieved Feb 2016.
James O'Hara (1752?–1819) was an American military officer, businessman, and captain of early industry in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. ...
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