Smith, Oliver Hampton, (23 Oct 1794 – 19 Mar 1859) Smith founded the village of “York Town” in Delaware County in 1837 and there built a saw mill, grist mill, and fulling mill.
You’ve all seen his name…the main street through the town is called “Smith Street” after Oliver Hampton Smith, the founder of our town. I tried to combine all of the relevant information I could find about Mr. Smith into this one article.
Born on Smith’s Island, near Trenton, New Jersey on the 24th of October 1794, Oliver Hampton Smith was the son of Thomas and Letitia Smith and the grandson of William Smith, all Quakers.
His grandfather, William Smith settled in Wrightstown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania in 1684. He built a log cabin in 1686 and a field stone addition to the cabin in 1690. It is one of the oldest standing homes in the United States. Oliver was born and raised in this house. The house is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Oliver’s father died in 1813 when he was 19 years old. The family property was sold, and the money was divided among 9 children. Oliver moved west, eventually settling in Lawrenceburg, Indiana in 1818, just two years after Indiana became a state. He had attended the common (public) schools and he studied law. Smith was admitted to the bar in 1820, setting up his law practice in Connersville, Indiana.
In 1822, he was elected to the Indiana House of Representatives serving two years. During his tenure, he served as the chairman of the Judiciary Committee ending his time in the House of Representatives with an appointment by the governor as the prosecuting attorney for the third judicial district in Indiana. He rode his horse around the 3rd judicial district from 1824-1825 going from trial to trial.
Of note: Smith was the prosecuting attorney against four men who massacred nine native Americans–two men, three women, two boys, and two girls in nearby Madison County. The native Americans had been peacefully trading with the frontier people in the area. They were known to be friendly. According to Wikipedia, “It [the trial] was the first documented case in which white Americans were convicted, sentenced to capital punishment, and executed for the murder of Native Americans under U.S. law.” Of course, the precedent didn’t last.
Smith later wrote and published a book about his experiences on the court circuit in Early Indiana Trials and Sketches published in 1858. You can read more about the massacre of Fall Creek HERE. A book was also written about the massacre titled, The Massacre at Fall Creek, (1975) by Jessamyn West.
Senator Smith RODE his horse to Washington, D.C.
Smith served in the United States House of Representatives from 1827 to 1829, riding his horse to Washington, DC to sit for the 20th Congress. He was a member of the Committee of Indian Affairs and vigorously, pleaded for an Indian policy “marked with justice, humanity, and magnanimity of purpose that will atone, as far as possible, for the great injustice we have done to them”. As a Whig, Smith was elected to one term in the United States Senate, 1837-1843.
Smith served on the Committee on Engrossed Bills (Twenty-sixth Congress) and the Committee on Public Lands (Twenty-seventh Congress). An unsuccessful candidate for reelection, he moved to Indianapolis and resumed the practice of law.
Beginning in 1836, Smith began to purchase land. In 1837 alone, he purchased thousands of acres in Mt. Pleasant Township. Most of the property was part of the “first public sale” of lands purchased from Native Americans covering the central third of the new state of Indiana.
But Smith wanted one choice piece of property that set at the confluence of the White River and Buck Creek in north half of section 22. That land, however, was a reserve for Samuel Cassman, a Native American who may have lived on the land before 1818 when the Treaties at St. Marys (Ohio) were signed and land was set aside for Cassman.
According to Ellis, Our History: This was rich and desirable land. It is described as having the “White river crossing the northwest part and Buck creek the center, in a northwesterly course, furnishing excellent water power for mill sites, which were in later years was utilized
Goldsmith Gilbert, a founder of nearby Munceytown, had tried to purchase that same 320 acres since 1830. The disagreement over the land “sale” was not resolved until 27 July 1836 when Gilbert paid Cassman $1200 for the land. Oliver Hampton Smith was able to purchase the Cassman Reserve months later for $1500 on 29 Oct 1836.
Smith platted “York Town” in the northwest quarter of section 22 of Mt. Pleasant Township, Delaware County in 1837. Smith named the town “York Town” for the Native Americans who were living along the White River. They had been pushed west from New York to settle here sometime between 1795-1799.
In the last decade and a half of his life, Smith lived in Indianapolis. There he was interested in railroads, especially the Indianapolis and Bellefontaine Railroad and the construction of the first Union Station. He became president of the Belllefontaine Railroad, known as the “Bee Line” and later the CCC & I. He worked tirelessly to ensure that major rail lines passed through Mt. Pleasant Township to Indianapolis and Cincinnati to add value to his investments. The trains arrived in the 1850’s much to the benefit of the area.
Of Smith’s family: Smith married Mary Brumfield on 8 Nov 1821 and had three children, of whom one, Marcus Camillus Smith, (b. 11 Apr 1825) was a state representative and later mayor of Muncie, Indiana for 10 years. He was a Muncie native and was is buried in Beech Grove Cemetery.
Letitia Smith, the oldest daughter, (b. 30 Sep 1822) m. Thomas L. Sullivan. The youngest child, Mary Francenia Smith (b. 28 Feb 1829) m. John Love. Oliver Hampton Smith died in Indianapolis on 19 March 1859 and was interned in Crown Hill Cemetery.
~Julie Musick
Sources for this article.
- Appletons’ Cyclopedia of American Biography, 1600-1889, p. 582 (2016);
- Oliver Hampton Smith; Muscatine Journal (Muscatine, Iowa), 27 June 1900 p.2;
- Obituary of Marcus C Smith;
- Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1774-2005;
- Biographies of Notable Americans, 1904, Vol. IX;
- Indiana Wills and Probate, 30 Mar 1859, OH Smith will was probated in Marion County, Indiana;
- Quaker Meeting Records, 1681-1935, Birth: October 23, 1794, parents;
- Census Records,
- Newspaper clippings;
- Our County: Its History and Early Settlement by Townships, John S. Ellis, p. 152,
- Many Pennsylvania and Buck County, PA records: Wills and probate, Church and town records
- Anatomy of the 1818 Treaties of St. Marys; Their Impact on the Delaware, New York Tribes, and Indiana, (2011), Olsen III, A. Andrew