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Vera Cruz
Mexico Point
MEMORIES
THE MEXICO STORY TOLD IN EXCERPTS FROM Mexico Independent Centennial Issue 1861 to 1961
The following was written by G. H. Goodwin, Esq. and published in the Independent in August 1807. Death has spared but few of the contemporaries of the earliest events of this town, and whatever of their recollections is worthy of preservation must be recorded soon, or left to vague and unreliable tradition. But two or three persons living in this town prior to the year 1800 are now alive, and less than a dozen who lived here before 1812 are left.
Lake Tragedy the Disasters or 1799-Probably nothing occurred in the earlier days of the town which created as much consternation and sorrow as the lake disasters in 1799. The drowning of so large a proportion of the settlers of the Infant settlement discouraged the survivors, and kept away a large number who intended to come the same year. The accounts of these calamities in the Gazetteers of the present day are very conflicting and erroneous. In 1799 Vera Cruz (which included Mexico Point and Texas) was quite a promising place. At the mouth of the creek Mr. Scriba had put up a hotel, store and about six houses, the cellars of which are still discernible. Up the creek and a few rods south of Texas Hotel stood the grist and saw mill. The last remnant of the old dam went off in a flood many years ago and no ruins are now seen upon the site of the old mills. Further down and near a point Mr. Scriba had selected for a park for the future city, Capt. Geerman had a shipyard, and had constructed a small schooner and other boats. About this time there was a great scarcity of food in town and Capt. Geerman and Welcome Spencer started in the schooner for Canada after provisions. They did not return and after a few weeks great alarm was felt for their safety. Lights were reported to have been seen on Stony Island, and it was thought they might have been driven there in the gale. A conference was held at Vera Cruz, and it was concluded to send a party in pursuit. Mr. Spencer (father of Welcome), who lived at the time on the John Tiffany place, Mr. Wheaton Green Clark and Mr. Doolittle, all of whom lived near the Lamb schoolhouse, and Nathaniel R. Rood, who lived just east of Richard Hamilton's present residence, were the persons selected to go. Their search was fruitless, and on their return they encountered a great storm and were driven towards Port Ontario.
All Hands Lost. A man on the beach saw the boat coming and when within a few rods of the shore it upset and all were drowned. Wheaton was a very active man and hung to the boat for some time and it was thought he would save himself but no aid could reach him and a heavy wave finally washed him off. Clarkâs body was afterwards found on the shore near Sandy Creek. Capt. Geerman and Welcome Spencer were never heard from. It was supposed the schooner must have capsized, as some of its contents were reported to have been found floating near Sacketts Harbor. It is not true, as was reported in some of the papers of that day, as well as in nearly all the Gazetteers of the present day, that but a single male inhabitant, Benj Winch, was left in the settlement. Calvin Tiffany, Col. Parkhurst, Phineas Davis, Col. Hamilton, Mr. Fairfield and others survived. No similar calamity occurred in 1804 as stated. Our authority for the above statement is Mrs. Sarah Davis of this village, who was living here at the time. The victims, except Geerman, were her nearest neighbors, and her memory of all the particulars is most perfect and vivid. She says the feelings produced in this vicinity cannot be expressed. Those left were faced in a wild wilderness with a long cold winter ahead of them, and famine staring them in the face.
Sherman Hosmer came as early as 1806 and others came so early that they heard these events related many times by those who were here when they occurred; and all agree substantially in the account given above.
Fever Strikes,The Sickly Season-About forty years ago (i.e. 18271 a most memorable time of sickness occurred among the people living in the northern part of this town. Their sufferings were most heartrending. It was a sort pf pestilential fever which prevailed along the shore of the lake from Mexico Point to Cape Vincent. The atmosphere in the sick district seemed charged with miasmatic air and in some neighborhoods almost all the members of every family were reported as sick. On Evarts Street, Lake Street, and near Port Ontario, there were not well people enough to take care of the unwell. Almost every house was a hospital, and in many of them the effluvia of invalids and dead bodies was terrible. Famine, too, had to be fought as well as disease. Committees were appointed in this village and Prattville, which daily visited a portion of the infected district with provisions and aid. They cared for the living and buried the dead. Much aid was rendered to the sick by the people from the surrounding country, yet, so extended was the field of labor that, in some instances, eight or ten would be assigned to the charge of a single person. Farther north some died for want of care and attention. Thus, for months disease reigned along the shore and Death knocked at the door of almost every house. Doctors Sardius Brewster and Fred Smith are represented as having performed a heroic part during this fearful period. Persons now living in this vicinity, who stood at the fevered couch by night and day, are still remembered by the sick ones of that time with the most lively gratitude.