Israel Donalson

Who was Israel Donalson?

Israel Donalson was an early settler in the Northwest Territory, and helped write the first Ohio Constitution.

Israel Donalson was born February 2, 1767 at Hunterdon County, New Jersey, and soon was moved to Cumberland County, New Jersey. In the fall of 1787 he moved to Ohio County, Virginia, where he farmed, taught school, and served in the militia. In May, 1790, he took a flatboat down the Ohio River to Limestone, Kentucky, where he taught school, and he met Nathaniel Massie. He went with Massie to Massie's Station Northwest Territory early in 1791 to help survey lands in the Virginia Military District, where he was captured by Indians, and held for a number of days before a harrowing escaping.

Donalson took up teaching in Manchester, and also some surveying, which he had studied in the East, and continued for much of his life. He was in Mad Anthony Wayne's Campaign in 1794 in the Northwest Indian War. He married Miss Annie Pennyweight on November 15, 1798, and traveled to Kentucky for that purpose, as there was no authority to do it in that part of the territory at that time.