Benjamin Franklin Stickney and the Toledo Wars
- westmohney
- Mar 11, 2025
- 11 min read
Updated: Mar 13, 2025
After Major Stickney's services at Fort Wayne were ended, the family removed to a tract of land within the present Toledo which was then located in Michigan. ~ J. B. Griswold
In this post, we continue and finally complete the amazing story of our cousin Benjamin Franklin Stickney (5C6X).
Benjamin's final days at Fort Wayne
With the the treaties of Meigs and St. Mary's, the Native threat had been largely taken care of in Indiana and Ohio. In early 1819, Fort Wayne was discontinued as a fort. The buildings, "now came under the control of the civil authorities, represented by the Indian agent Major Stickney. . ." Benjamin, in his capacity as sub-agent, leased the former soldier quarters to people moving into the area. "Even at this period, the shelter of the stockade brought a feeling of security, and the fort was not without its convenient firearms and supply of ammunition."
Benjamin's days at the former fort, however, were coming to an end. According to J.B. Griswold:
. . .there appears to have developed a degree of friction between the sub-agent and his superiors. Governor Lewis Cass, of Michigan, writing in January, 1819, to John C. Calhoun, secretary of war, concerning the situation at Fort Wayne, said: "I consider him [Major Stickney] a very zealous and honest agent. But circumstances have occurred at Fort Wayne which have had a tendency to injure the usefulness of Mr. Stickney there."
Cass, who had defended Benjamin in the past, remained a faithful supporter of the beleaguered sub-agent and managed to get him an appointment at Upper Sandusky in the Michigan Territory:
Major Benjamin F. Stickney was transferred to a post on the lower Maumee and Dr. William Turner was named to succeed him. Major Stickney had served with credit during nine strenuous years, and had suffered, as many another efficient officer has done, from the intrigues of enemies among the Indians and the whites.
Benjamin harbored a special dislike for William Turner, one of the men who had preferred charges against him, so that particular turn of events must have been hard for him to swallow. But, as we shall see, old, incompatible Ben would have bigger fish to fry.
better prospects
In March of 1818, Benjamin found himself transferred to a post at Fort Miami in the Lower Maumee Valley. Fort Miami lay on the banks of the Maumee River, about thirteen miles southwest of the present town of Toledo, OH.
B. J. Griswold, in his Pictorial History of Fort Wayne, Indiana, had this to say about the move:
Much has been written concerning the life and activities of Major Stickney, especially during the period following his service at Fort Wayne. A suggestion of his eccentric character is found in the choice of names for his children. The sons were styled One, Two and Three, and the daughters bore the names of states of the union. After Major Stickney's services at Fort Wayne were ended, the family removed to a tract of land within the present Toledo which was then located in Michigan. With the building of the Wabash and Erie canal came also the "Toledo war" which resulted in the change of location of the state boundaries which placed Toledo forever in the state of Ohio. Major Stickney was a leader in the fight which brought about this result. His written arguments on the subject form an interesting story of the time.
Note: I can find no evidence that Benjamin had a son named Three.
George Tanber in his article "Benjamin Stickney: His remarkable life and times" for the Toledo Blade pointed out that Benjamin had other talents worth noting:
Perhaps Mr. Stickney's most significant achievement at Fort Wayne had nothing to do with his job. In 1818, in an article published in Western Spy, Mr. Stickney claimed that by flooding a seven-mile low-land prairie between the Wabash and Maumee rivers, it would be possible to sail from the St. Lawrence River through the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River and into the Gulf of Mexico.
Griswold expounded on the significance of Ben's claim:
Benjamin F. Stickney, the Indian agent at Fort Wayne, through a letter to DeWitt Clinton, of New York, giving convincing facts with reference to the proposed waterway, brought an enthusiastic response from Clinton — considered as the "father" of the Erie canal — who said: "I have found a way to get into Lake Erie [by the construction of a canal between the Hudson river and Lake Erie], and you have shown me how to get out of it. * * * You have extended my project six hundred miles."
in the Maumee Valley
At Fort Miami, Benjamin continued his work with Native Americans still living in the area. Over the years, he had mastered 20 Native dialects and even authored dictionaries in the Ottawa and Wyandote languages. Below is the first page of an English to Ottowa dictionary that has been credited to Ben.
Benjamin also wrote a history of the Ottawa which is now housed at the Massachusetts Historical Society.
In between his agent duties, Benjamin began purchasing real estate in a small settlement called Port Lawrence, also on the banks of the Maumee River. Then, In 1823, he sold his Port Lawrence property and, along with another man, founded the nearby town of Vistula. In a decade's time, Port Lawrence and Vistula would merge to become the city of Toledo. The entire Toledo area was part of the Michigan territory until 1836 when it was finally ceded to Ohio. Michigan was made a state the next year, 1837.
Below is a marker in the Vistula Historic District of Toledo commemorating Benjamin's part in founding the town:
Benjamin's extensive property extended nearly a mile along the river. He and Molly, along with their four children, "lived for many years in a log house upon his farm." Later, he built a brick house, "quite a pretentious structure--situated about the northeast corner of Summit and Bush streets." The brick house stood until Benjamin's death in 1852, "when it also gave way to a more modern building, erected by the Hon. D.O. Morton."
Some of the bricks from Benjamin's demolished home were put into a structure called Stickney Hall which was "for many years the only regular place for theatrical amusements in Toledo." That building has also long since been torn down.
a small strip of land causes problems
In 1818, Benjamin had a small hand in the planning of the Wabash and Erie Canal which would link the Great Lakes to the Ohio River. Though construction on the canal wouldn't begin for another fourteen years, both the state of Ohio and the Michigan territory began to jockey for position.
The battle for the five to eight mile strip of land that included Toledo intensified around the time Benjamin settled in the area. Because of the shipping possibilities, both the state of Ohio and the Michigan Territory laid claim to the 428 square mile piece of land that included the mouth of the Maumee River at Lake Erie.
Below is a rendering of the disputed strip:
The navigable Maumee River, where Benjamin had his property, ran to Fort Wayne where the canal would begin. The waterway would end in Evansville where it would link with the Ohio River. The Ohio empties into the Mississippi River which empties into the Gulf of Mexico.
When construction on the canal began in 1832, the Toledo area technically belonged to the Michigan Territory. Folks in Ohio, however, had always believed that area belonged to them. That belief only became stronger when they realized what a financial boon the project would be for their state. Thus began what became known as the Toledo Wars.
Benjamin gets involved
Since his property on the Maumee was a direct link in the proposed canal, Benjamin became a major supporter of the project. In fact, he later called it “the great object of my life.” Originally, Benjamin threw his hat into the ring for Michigan. His main reason was an aversion to paying Ohio State taxes. From the Toledo Blade article:
But Mr. Stickney, who had considerable influence over the people in his then-Swan Creek neighborhood. . .concocted a scenario that determined that Toledo and everything west of the city on a straight line to the southern end of Lake Michigan was actually in the Michigan territory, where they would not have to pay any taxes.
Mr. Stickney sold the idea to his Port Lawrence neighbors, who agreed to unofficially secede from Ohio in 1821. He then had himself named a Michigan justice of peace over the newly seceded territory, which covered 468 square miles.
In a few years time, however, when Benjamin realized that Ohians truly believed that land was theirs and weren't about to give it up, he changed his tune.
By 1823, however, Mr. Stickney began to change his mind. He had envisioned Toledo becoming the key port in southeastern Michigan, but he discovered that the citizens of Monroe had no intention of letting that happen. Then he found out canal officials, peeved at the rebels for snubbing the state, had decided to built the terminus at Perrysburg.
Perrysburg was 10 miles downriver from Toledo. Since Benjamin's property was in Toledo, that plan would have spelled disaster for him
Mr. Stickney, a man with considerable panache, asked Port Lawrence residents to change their mind and return to Ohio or lose the canal and all the revenue it would bring. The resulting aye vote ticked off the Michigan territory authorities and launched a squabble that lasted 13 years. The bickering intensified in the mid-1830s as the canal construction neared.
The Toledo War
Benjamins's wife, Molly Stark Stickney, died in 1828 at age 55. He married again in 1835 to Mary Way. In February of that same year, tempers flared when Ohio passed legislation that set up county governments in the contested strip. Michigan's "young and hot-headed" governor Stevens Mason responded with the Pains and Penalties Act which made it a criminal offense for Ohioans to carry out government actions in "the strip." When both sides began to call in their milita, the Toledo War had officially begun.
While no actual fighting between the two militias would ever take place, the "pesky Michigan militia made life miserable for Toledoans beginning in summer, 1835." During the melee, Benjamin and his strangely named sons, One (6C5X) and Two Stickney (6C5X), were in the thick of the action. From an article titled "Monroe history: The Stickneys and the Toledo war" by David L. Eby:
As tensions mounted Monroe County Sheriff Joseph Wood arrested anyone in the Ohio strip who was promoting Toledo going to Ohio. One of those arrested was Major Stickney. He was less than cooperative and was literally tied to his horse and brought in, according to the 1890 Monroe County history book. According to the 1890 book “History of Monroe County,” This enraged Two Stickney and he got in a fight with the sheriff and his deputies. He stabbed the sheriff in his side with a pen knife and then escaped to (Columbus) Ohio. The sheriff’s wound was slight and not life-threatening. Michigan requested that Two Stickney be extradited to face charges, but the Ohio governor refused.
Enter President Andrew Jackson. Since Ohio was a crucial swing state and elections were coming up, Jackson favored giving Toledo to Ohio. But Jackson's Attorney General pointed out that without action from Congress, the strip still belonged to Michigan. The bickering continued until June 15, 1836, when Jackson offered Michigan statehood and a swath of land, now known as the Upper Peninsula, in return for giving up the strip.
Because of the perceived worthlessness of the Upper Peninsula's remote wilderness, the people of Michigan initially refused the offer. But hard financial times for a territory that desperately needed to become a state eventually changed their minds. The people of Michigan accepted the offer and on January 26, 1837, Michigan was admitted to the Union as the 26th state.
We'll leave the last word on the Toledo Wars to David L. Eby:
The next time you are crossing the Mackinac Bridge to enter the Upper Peninsula give a shout out and a thank you to Two Stickney (Thanks Two!) for his role in the U.P. being part of Michigan. I believe most people in Michigan today would choose the U.P. over Toledo if they had it to do again. I would anyway.
life goes on
By the time Congress ruled in favor of Ohio getting the strip, Benjamin and his new wife were living Washington, only returning to Toledo in the summers. His land holdings in Toledo had made him a wealthy man. And, only a short time after his canal adventure, Benjamin realized that the future now lay in the railroads. He increased his fortune by investing in the Lake Erie and Kalamazoo Railway.
On one of his trips back to Toledo, it appears that Benjamin also had a hand in founding the Toledo Blade newspaper. He and a group of businessmen met to discuss starting a rival newspaper to the Toledo Gazette. The men agreed to financial support for the endeavor and the newly chosen editor came as no surprise. It was George Way, son of Benjamin's second wife, Mary Way.
By 1850, two short years before his death, Benjamin had become highly critical of the U.S. Army's "brutal treatment of the Native Americans." In an article he wrote for the Toledo Blade, he took a page from Jonathan Swift's satyrical essay "A Modest Proposal" in which Swift suggests the use cannabalism to get rid of unwanted Irish children. In his Blade article, Benjamin suggested that"if the government wanted to get rid of the Indians it would be better to start feeding them enormous quantities of rich food and whiskey." He was evidently "widely criticized" for those comments.
In January of 1852, Benjamin died at age 77 "of an apparent heart attack on the front porch of a North Toledo business." Possibly because of his comments about the treatment of the Natives, the Blade devoted only three paragraphs to his passing. Two Stickney died in 1862 at age 52 and One in 1883 at age 80. All three were all buried on the Stickney farm in an area that is now Forest Cemetery on Stickney Street in Toledo.
In his will, Benjamin left his estate to his wife, his youngest daughter Indiana (6C5X) and his two sisters. One and Two, along with their sister Mary (6C5X) contested the will but, in the end, were denied. And, in a bizarre twist, this from the Monroe News article by David Eby.
One Stickney died in 1883. . . but just months after his death his body was dug up at night and stolen by grave robbers. One or two local doctors in Toledo who conveyed the body to the Toledo medical college were charged with grave robbing. How that ended is unknown. Apparently Toledo was not a safe place to be in 1883 even if you were already dead.
One of the perpetrators of the grave robbery wasn't apprehended until three years later. Below is a newspaper article from 1886 reporting the incident. It says:
Several genuine sensations were developed to-day by the arrest of additional parties indicted by the Grand Jury. Among these is Dr. W. G. Gardiner, who is charged with having robbed a grave in the Oregon Township Cemetery in 1883. The body taken was that of One Stickney, who came from a peculiar family. . .Gardiner has been mixed up in one or two sensational affairs here, and is not the possessor of a particularly good reputation.
Ken Dickson's book
The Toledo Blade article by George Tanbor that we've quoted extensively from featured a man who spent many years researching the life of Benjamin Franklin Stickney. From the article:
Ken Dickson wants to set the record straight. He's five years into writing a biography of Mr. Stickney. For Mr. Dickson, a 53-year old history buff, such an effort is a no-brainer. “This guy was phenomenal. . .Stickney has always been interesting to me,” he explains. “I wanted to know more about the man. What I always heard about him was couched in negative terms. [But] I get suspicious when someone always quotes the same source. The more I found, I learned he was a fascinating person.”
Although Mr. Stickney was a prolific writer who often penned five to six letters a day to various friends and fellow intellectuals, much of his writings are scattered. His early and later work cannot be found. This has made Mr. Dickson's task a difficult one and explains, in part, why it has become a lengthy effort. Nevertheless, it hasn't diminished his effort.
The work is important, he believes, because the Stickney name has been disappearing from the cityscape over time. Stickney Elementary School closed years ago. Stickney Hall, formerly a downtown landmark, has vanished, too. Even Stickney Avenue, one of the city's oldest roads, has been shortened; Damlier Chrysler is changing the name of a section of the street which now serves as a feeder to the new Jeep plant.
“As each succeeding generation gathers new landmarks to celebrate their achievements, the footprints of past pioneers rapidly disappear,” Mr. Dickson says. “Before the sands of time completely eliminate Stickney's footprints from the Maumee Valley, his story needs to be documented and told.”
Nine years after the Toledo Blade article, Ken Dickson finally finished and published his book, Benjamin Franklin Stickney and the maumee valley. You can find it on Amazon for $24.90.
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