Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/83

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Part Taken by Women in American History

RUHAMA GREENE.

Ruhama Greene was born in Jefferson County, Virginia, and married Charles Builderback and they were among the first settlers on the Ohio near Wheeling. In an attack made by the Indians, in 1789, on this settlement, Mrs. Builderback and her husband were taken prisoners. She remained a prisoner about nine months, being condemned to the hardest labor in working for the squaws and their brutal masters. She was finally released by the commandant at Fort Washington, and restored to her family. After her husband's death, she married a Mr. John Greene, and removed to a settlement near Lancaster, where she resided at the time of her death in 1842.

REBECCA ROUSE.

Among the settlers to remove from New England, in 1788, to Ohio, we find the names of John Rouse and Jonathan Duvall. John Rouse's family consisted of a wife and eight children. Mrs. Duvall was the sister of Mrs. Rouse, and he was the "noble architect of the Mayflower," which conveyed the first detachment from Simrels Ferry, on the Yohoghany to the mouth of Muskingum and was among the first settlers to land on the 7th of April, 1788, in the state of Ohio. The large covered wagons which the settlers used in those days for conveying their families across the country were called schooners and frequently received nautical names. Teams of oxen were frequently preferred to horses by these Nw England emigrants and pioneers, they being more familiar with their use and, too, they were less likely to be captured by the Indians, as, owing to the slowness of their gait they were not considered desirable possessions by these warrior inhabitants. Thus outfitted, this little band of emigrants made their way from New England through New York, Pennsylvania, and over the mountain ranges to Ohio. As they approached the mountains the rains of November had set in and their progress was filled with the greatest difficulties and hardships particularly to the women and children, who were obliged to walk most of the way over the