________________________________________
 

The First Survey Through Hal's Lake Swamp                                                                   Page 5

---

north for the summer and in the great fire of Mobile lost all his
possessions.  He is said to have surveyed Spring Hill in 182617 and
lived there in 1828.18  Along with Henry Hitchcock (Ethan Allen's
grandson and Mobile's first millionaire) Dinsmoor was a major
contributor to the building of Barton Academy in Mobile, which
still stands as a monument to those two men.

        In the early to mid 1830's Dinsmoor moved to Cincinnati, then
bought a farm at Bellevue, Kentucky, where he died on Jun 17, 1847
at age 81, and is buried, his grandson reported in 1910, "on a
beautiful hilltop commanding a distant view of the Ohio River".19

Levin Wailes.  The journal lists both Dinsmoor and Wailes as
"agents of the United States"20 in the survey under the Treaty of
Mt. Dexter.  Wailes kept most of the journal, seems to have the
most actual surveying knowledge, and wrote with the clarity and
pithiness and directness of Julius Caesar.  Those who have most
recently read the Journal have come away feeling almost a personal
friendship with Wailes, though he never once makes a personal
observation in the Journal.

        Levin Wailes was born on March 9, 1768, in Prince George's
County, MD, to a captain in the Revolutionary Army.  When he
was seventeen he embarked at sea with a relative, and made two
voyages to England, which "taught him something about mathematics
and about those instruments by which man charts his course whether
on sea or land".21  Upon returning to shore, Levin became chief
clerk to his brother Edward Lloyd Wailes, Sheriff of Prince
George's County, helping to conduct the first presidential
election.  He read law.22

_____________

        17Id. at 553.  Perhaps this was the Robertson Map, recorded in
Mobile County (it was not the official survey of 1820 of T4S, R2W).

        18Hamilton at 553.

        19Id. at 553.

        20Journal at p. 1.

        21SYDNOR at 32.  This work on Levin Wailes' son was written
simpley becuase the son -- "a forgotten man of the old south, id.
at vii" -- had left a diary of 36 volumes.  Sydnor's work casts the
penumbra upon Levin Wailes' life.

        22Id.

---

Next / Previous
Return to Introduction
Return to Adams Co, MSGenWeb
 

Copyright Carolyn Switzer 2002-2009 - All Rights Reserved