XXXIV
MERCER COUNTY
FORMED March 12, 1800; named for General Hugh Mercer of the Revolutionary War, who was killed in the Battle of Princeton; rolling land, well watered with springs and creeks; coal underlying one-fourth of land in the county; chief industries are iron, steel, and agriculture; early settlers were Scotch-Irish. In 1812, Mercer County people were frequently called upon to aid in defense of Erie; the whole county would be aroused in a day by runners; in a few hours most of the men, whether militia or volunteers, would be on the march; one call came on Sunday, while service was being held in the courthouse; the sermon was suspended, news announced, benediction given, and immediate preparation for march commenced; at another time, news of threatened invasion came in the middle of grain harvest; the response was immediate, only one old man was left in the town.
Mercer, county seat, population 1932; was once an Indian village of seventy lodges; no settlement was made here until after Wayne’s victory over the Indians in 1795; it was laid out in 1803, on two hundred acres of land given by John Hoge of Washington County. The courthouse, built, 1909, colonial; brick, stone, and concrete; is in center of the public square of three acres; interior finished in white marble; mural painting in dome by Edward Everett Simmons, represents Power, Innocence, Guilt, and Justice; in the courtrooms
Mercer County
MURAL PAINTING IN THE DOME OF MERCER COUNTY COURT HOUSE
Painted by Edward Everett Simmons
on second floor are symbolic mural paintings, “Criminal Law,” by Vincent Aderente, and “Civil Law,” by Arthur Foringer, made in 1911; panels 11 by 12 feet; in the judges’ chambers is a portrait of Honorable Henry Baldwin, former member of the Mercer County bar, and Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1830-44. On courthouse grounds is the monument, granite and bronze, to soldiers of Mercer County in the war of 1861-65.