Madison County History
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Farming large yields of grains and potatoes
This section was at one time the seat of the Oneida Indians, of the famed Iroquois Confederacy. The Oneida Castle site was chosen with true Indian sagacity as their village. It rested at the foot of one of the largest valleys, occupied by the Chenango River. The area in general was characterized by rolling highland, with exceptionally steep slopes, subsiding into flat, swampy land. The Oneidas thus had abundant opportunities for crude agriculture in rich soil and for unexampled fishing. The Oneidas were invaluable friends to the English and helped to check French expansion on this continent. Eventually, the Oneidas moved west. President James Madison is memorialized by the county’s name.
During the Revolution, Madison County was untouched by conflict. This was due to the fact that there were no settlers. There were only a few fur traders and the Missionary Samuel Kirkland, who frequented the Castle. It was mainly his influence which kept the Oneidas neutral and even helpful to the colonists.
In 1790 the first improvement in Madison County was the result of the passing through of James and William Wadsworth, bound for Genesee Country. They cut a road along the Great Indian Trail which ran from the Great Ford at Utica, Oneida County, to the Castle and to the west. This immediately became instrumental in opening all of western New York.
Farming in early Madison County was mostly tillage and large yields of grains and potatoes were possible. Flax was grown, rotted, and woven after treatment by hetchel and swingle. The first hop farm was started in 1808 by John Cooledge in Madison. The steep Madison hills induced sheep raising early. Woolen goods at first were of home manufacture and soon factories were built, the number being unusual for this part of the state. Even after the War of 1812, purchase of cloth was not great, and homemade materials prevailed. 1816 was the year which brought the famous “Eighteen Hundred and Froze to Death,” the likes of which has not been seen before or since. Frost occurred and snow fell in every month of the year, virtually ruining the crops.
Rivalry over the location of the county seat existed from the earliest days. In February, 1810, Cazenovia was incorporated as a village and the county seat was set up there. In 1817, it was transferred to the more centrally located Morrisville. As the upper part of the county gained in population and influence a plan was made to move it to Canastota or Oneida. In the end a compromise was made with a new courthouse built between them at the scattering of houses called Wampsville.
The most distinctive religious sect was the “Perfectionists.” John Humphrey Noyes in 1848 gathered his colony of those seeking salvation via the communistic route, into Oneida Community, four miles south of Oneida. There they practiced a species of eugenical free love that Noyes dubbed “complex marriage.” The community achieved the renown of becoming the most successful of 62 communistic experiments ever tried in the United States. Industry was joined with their agricultural activity when animal traps were made and used for 70 years by the Hudson Bay Company. Then the Colony turned to Silver smithy. In 1872, the prosperous communists completely reorganized; each member reserving stock in what is now Oneida Community, Ltd., vendors of silverware throughout the world.
The most famous Madisonian was Gerrit Smith, the abolitionist. His father, an early partner of John Jacob Astor in the fur trade, while one of the first merchants in Utica, acquired 1,000,000 acres in central New York and founded Peterboro, Town if Smithfield. Smith’s activities included writings which were largely influential in turning the north to anti-slavery. He was a congressman in 1852, and a close friend of that John Brown “whose soul goes marching on.”
Thirteen men said 13 prayers, gave $13 and 13 books and founded Colgate University at Hamilton, according to tradition. The institution thus launched in 1817 was the Baptist Education Society which established the Hamilton Library and Theological Seminary. This was incorporated as Madison University in 1846 and has since become Colgate University.