page_title: Columbus, Ohio
section_title: 19th century: statehood, city establishment, and development
hierarchical_section_title: Columbus, Ohio / History / 19th century: statehood, city establishment, and development
caption_attribution_description: Birds eye view of Columbus, Ohio / drawn by H.H. &amp; O.H. Bailey. Bailey, H. H. 1836-1878. (Howard Heston), [Milwaukee, Wis.?]&#160;: Fowler &amp; Bailey, 1872 (Cincinnati, O.&#160;: Strobridge &amp; Co. Lith.)
context_page_description: Columbus is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a population of 898,553 as of 2019 estimates, it is the 14th-most populous city in the United States, the second-most populous city in the Midwest after Chicago, Illinois, and the third-most populous state capital after Phoenix, Arizona and Austin, Texas. It is the core city of the Columbus, OH Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses ten counties. With a population of 2,106,541, it is Ohio's second-largest metropolitan area.
  Columbus is the county seat of Franklin County. The municipality has also annexed portions of adjoining Delaware and Fairfield counties. Columbus originated as numerous Native American settlements on the banks of the Scioto River. Franklinton, now a city neighborhood, was the first white settlement, laid out in 1797. The city was founded in 1812, at the confluence of the Scioto and Olentangy rivers. It was named for explorer Christopher Columbus. The city assumed the function of state capital in 1816 and county seat in 1824.
context_section_description: After Ohio achieved statehood in 1803, political infighting among prominent Ohio leaders led to the state capital moving from Chillicothe to Zanesville and back again. Desiring to settle on a location, the state legislature considered Franklinton, Dublin, Worthington, and Delaware before compromising on a plan to build a new city in the state's center, near major transportation routes, primarily rivers. As well, Franklinton landowners had donated two 10-acre (4.0 ha) plots in an effort to convince the state to move its capitol there. The two spaces were set to become Capitol Square (for the Ohio Statehouse) and the Ohio Penitentiary. Named in honor of Christopher Columbus, the city was founded on February 14, 1812, on the "High Banks opposite Franklinton at the Forks of the Scioto most known as Wolf's Ridge." At the time, this area was a dense forestland, used only as a hunting ground.
  The city was incorporated as a borough on February 10, 1816. Nine people were elected to fill the municipality's various positions of mayor, treasurer, and several others. In 1816-1817, Jarvis W. Pike would serve as the first mayor. Although the recent War of 1812 had brought prosperity to the area, the subsequent recession and conflicting claims to the land threatened the new town's success. Early conditions were abysmal with frequent bouts of fevers, attributed to malaria from the flooding rivers, and an outbreak of cholera in 1833. It led Columbus to appoint the Board of Health, now part of the Columbus Public Health department. The outbreak, which remained in the city from July to September 1833, killed 100 people.
  Columbus was without direct river or trail connections to other Ohio cities, leading to slow initial growth. The National Road reached Columbus from Baltimore in 1831, which complemented the city's new link to the Ohio and Erie Canal, both of which facilitated a population boom. A wave of European immigrants led to the creation of two ethnic enclaves on the city's outskirts. A large Irish population settled in the north along Naghten Street (presently Nationwide Boulevard), while the Germans took advantage of the cheap land to the south, creating a community that came to be known as the Das Alte Südende (The Old South End). Columbus's German population constructed numerous breweries, Trinity Lutheran Seminary, and Capital University.
  With a population of 3,500, Columbus was officially chartered as a city on March 3, 1834. On that day the legislature carried out a special act, which granted legislative authority to the city council and judicial authority to the mayor. Elections were held in April of that year, with voters choosing one John Brooks as the first mayor. Columbus annexed the then-separate city of Franklinton in 1837.
  In 1850, the Columbus and Xenia Railroad became the first railroad into the city, followed by the Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Railroad in 1851. The two railroads built a joint Union Station on the east side of High Street just north of Naghten (then called North Public Lane). Rail traffic into Columbus increased—by 1875, eight railroads served Columbus, and the rail companies built a new, more elaborate station. Another cholera outbreak hit Columbus in 1849, prompting the opening of the city's Green Lawn Cemetery.
  On January 7, 1857, the Ohio Statehouse finally opened after 18 years of construction. Site construction continued until 1861.
  Before the abolition of slavery in the South in 1863, the Underground Railroad was active in Columbus; led, in part, by James Preston Poindexter. Poindexter arrived in Columbus in the 1830s and became a Baptist preacher and leader in the city's African-American community until the turn of the century.
  During the Civil War, Columbus was a major base for the volunteer Union Army. It housed 26,000 troops and held up to 9,000 Confederate prisoners of war at Camp Chase, at what is now the Hilltop neighborhood of west Columbus. Over 2,000 Confederate soldiers remain buried at the site, making it one of the North's largest Confederate cemeteries. North of Columbus, a
caption: Bird's eye view map of Columbus in 1872
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