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862
HISTORY OF
DES MOINES COUNTY IOWA
AND ITS PEOPLE
By AUGUSTINE M. ANTROBUS .
ILLUSTRATED
VOLUME I
CHICAGO THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY 1915
THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY 7731363 ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS R
1916 L
PREFACE
In presenting this volume to the people of Des Moines County, the author has this to say. It was with some reluctance he undertook the task of writing a history of the county and its people. He felt such a history ought to be written, but would have preferred that its writing would have fallen to a more competent person. He does not claim that the work presented is a complete history of the county in every respect, nor that it is free from error. To write such a history would be impossible. It is the best that could be produced under the circumstances and withinthe allotted time for its writing. The writer has lived in the county for fifty-nine years and knew many of the pioneers and early settlers of the county while many of the incidents of which he has written, are from memory.
He is under many obligations to the Hon. J. L. Waite, editor of the Burlington Ilawkeye; Hon. Arthur Springer of Wapello, Louisa County; Mrs. A. T. Hay, the oldest living native resident of Des Moines County; Ilon. Daniel Matson of Mediapolis; the Hon. J. H. Dodds and H. C. Springer of Danville ; and to Miss Miriam B. Wharton, the efficient librarian of the Free Public Library of Burlington, for valuable assistance in procuring proper material for the work ; and he is especially under obligation to Hon. Thomas Merrill of Mediap- olis for permission to obtain information from the valuable history of Yellow Springs and Huron Townships written by his father, J. W. Merrill, now deceased.
A. M. ANTROBUS.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
PAGE
INTRODUCTION
I
CHAPTER II
THE LOUISIANA PURCHASE
CHAPTER III
PIKE'S EXPEDITION IO . .
CHAPTER IV
ORGANIZATIONS OF THE DIFFERENT TERRITORIES OUT OF WHICH DES MOINES COUNTY, IOWA, CAME INTO EXISTENCE. . . . .
12
CHAPTER V
INDIAN OCCUPATION
18
CHAPTER VI
BLACK HAWK PURCHASE
. 22
CHAPTER VH
26
TOPOGRAPITY OF DES MOINES COUNTY, IOWA.
CHAPTER VIII
GEOLOGY OF DES MOINES COUNTY.
31
CHAPTER IX
PIONEERS OF OLD AND NEW DES MOINES COUNTY. . .
CHAPTER X
BURLINGTON, ITS FOUNDATION AND GROWTII. . 05
CHAPTER XI
HISTORY OF BURLINGTON, CONTINUED
.. . . . IIO
vi
CONTENTS CHAPTER XII
IIAWKEYE PIONEER ASSOCIATION.
. . .... 119
CHAPTER XIII
EXTENSION OF THE CITY LIMITS
147
CHAPTER XIV
TRIAL, SENTENCE AND EXECUTION OF WILLIAM AND STEPIIEN HODGES. . . 150
CHAPTER XV
IIOTELS OF BURLINGTON I 57
CHAPTER XVI
PUBLIC AND OTHER SCHOOLS OF BURLINGTON
162
CHAPTER XVII
WAR WITHI MISSOURI
181
CHAPTER XVIII
JUDICIAL DISTRICTS AND JUDGES AND OTIIER OFFICES. .. .331
CHAPTER XIX
PUBLIC HIGHWAYS 348
CHAPTER XX
SUBSCRIPTIONS FOR STOCK IN B. M. R. R. CO.
CHAPTER XXI
BANKS AND BANKING .357
CHAPTER XXII
THIE SEMI-CENTENNIAL IN IOW.1.
. 364
CHAPTER XXIII
POLITICS AND POLITICIANS. .387
CHAPTER XXIV
398
CHAPTER XXV
SOME OF THE PIONEER MINISTERS OF DES MOINES COUNTY. . . 412
CHAPTER XXVI
MEDICAL PROFESSION
.. . .424
353
MEMBERS OF THE DES MOINES COUNTY BAR.
PAGE
V'11
CONTENTS CHAPTER XXVII
PAGE
THE PRESS OF DES MOINES COUNTY .
. . . . .. 431
CHAPTER XXVIII
RAILWAY'S AND THEIR BUILDERS. . . . . 445
CHAPTER XXIX
DRAINAGE DISTRICTS
.. 460
CHAPTER XXX
. . 462
HAWKEYE NATIVES. CHAPTER XXXI
CHURCHES OF BURLINGTON
.465
CHAPTER XXXII
YOUNG MEN'S AND YOUNG WOMEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS OF BURLINGTON . . 487
CHAPTER XXXIII
FREE PUBLIC LIBRARY OF BURLINGTON. . ..... 492
CHAPTER XXXIV
CRAPO AND OTHER PARKS OF BURLINGTON
498
CHAPTER XXXV
POSTOFFICE AND POSTMASTERS AT BURLINGTON. . 500
CHAPTER XXXVI
COMMERCIAL EXCHANGE
503
CHAPTER XXXVII
BURLINGTON, AAUGUSTA, UNION, BENTON, FLINT RIVER, JACKSON, TAMA AND CON- CORDIA TOWNSHIPS .504
CHLAPTER XXXVIII
.518
YELLOW SPRINGS AND HURON TOWNSHIPS.
CHAPTER XXXIX
DANVILLE, PLEASANT GROVE, FRANKLIN AND WASHINGTON TOWNSHIPS. . . . . ... 537
AUGUSTINE M. ANTROBUS
History of Des Moines County
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A county is an integral part of a state, and a state, of a nation composed of states. In writing a history of a county, one of necessity must write concerning the activities taken by its people in the affairs of the state or nation, as well as those of its own domestic concerns. The people of a county are not only citizens of the state to which the county belongs, but of the nation of which the state is a part. The people comprising the states at the formation of the Federal Con- stitution were the fathers of the republic. In the preamble of that Constitution they caused to be written, "We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, etc., do ordain and establish this Constitu- tion for the United States of America," thereby declaring they were citizens of the republic as contradistinguished from their citizenship to state or any other municipal body. They recognized as binding upon them as individuals the Federal Constitution which they had created. From the premises thus laid down it will be seen that in writing a history of a county one must take into consideration all those things with which it is directly connected in so far as its material welfare is concerned, as well as the mental and moral development of its people. To write a complete history of a county one must go back of its organization as a municipal body and discover the condition of things before it came into existence. We want to know who discovered the country of which it is a part ; when dis- covered, and trace in a chronological order, the successive events which have taken place in past times. In 1492 Columbus gave to Castile and Arragon a new world. From this event we now have a white race of people inhabiting the country in which we live. Before this discovery, west of that narrow strait which sep- arates Europe from Africa, was an Ultima Thule, an unknown region, a bound- less ocean, in whose fathomless depths lay slumbering the fabulous but lost Atlantas. For one hundred years and more after the discovery of the new world. bold navigators of Spain, Portugal, France and England skirted along the coast of the two Americas, going into bays and up great rivers, seeking to find an open- ing whereby they could reach Cathay, which Marco Polo had in the latter part of the thirteenth century made known to the world. A century and more had passed before any attempts had been made towards a permanent settlement in this country. The discovery of rich mines of gold and silver in South America and Mexico had fired the imagination of men to such an extent that expeditions had been fitted out to explore the vast territories lying between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. While on one of these expeditions, Fernando De Soto found his Val. T 1
1
2
HISTORY OF DES MOINES COUNTY
grave in the waters of- the great river which washes the shores of Des Moines County. In 1640 Coronado and companions, lured by the call of the wild and the seven fabled cities of Civola amidst the mountains, in which they were told were rich mines of gold and silver, started from the Spanish settlement on the shores of the Pacific, fought their way over mountains, passed by the cliff dwellers of Arizona, thence proceeded cast over deserts of sand on which grew the thorny cactus, then over the great plains on which roamed unmolested the bison, and came to the Missouri River. Where, worn and weary, there they halted; then retraced their steps to the place from which they had departed. During, and after these times of adventures on land, pirates and buccaneers infested the seas, prey- ing on ships laden with the products of the mines of Peru and Mexico and rich cargoes of spices and fruits. In 1607, 115 years after the discovery of Colum- bus. the first permanent settlement was made at Jamestown, Va. In 1620 the Pilgrim Fathers made a settlement in what was subsequently called New Eng- land.' In 1626 Peter Minuit bought from the Indians Manhattan Island for the equivalent of $24. Between 1607 and 1680 permanent settlements had been made along the Atlantic Coast from Maine to Georgia. This is the time during which is called the "Swarming of the English." Canada was discovered by Henry Cabot in 1497. The first settlement, made in 1544 by the French, was at St. Croix Harbor, and the country discovered became known as New France. In the near future the French founded Quebec and Montreal. Through the St. Lawrence, the then New France, they had communication with the great lakes, and to all that uninhabited part of the country west of Pennsylvania, and lying south of lakes Erie, Huron, Michigan and Superior, and by portage. from the Fox River to the Wisconsin, thence to the Mississippi River, and thence to the Gulf of Mexico. What was to be the destiny of this country, lay between two peoples ; one the Anglo-Saxon, the other Celtic. Neither had a primary right to the soil, it belonged to the Indians, the first discoverers and settlers. Why the people of Des Moines County are not French instead of English in nationality, has been determined by what was done in succeeding times. The French held the vantage points of this vast territory. The English colonists had a long line of settlements along the coast of the Atlantic, a feathery edge of battle line, without the means of entering into this land except over mountains and through dense forests. The struggle was to be for a land more beautiful and fruitful than the one which the eyes of Moses, when dimmed with age, saw from the top of Nebo. France laid claim to this land by right of discovery. The English claimed it, because of the discovery of the coast line. The French voyagers and missionaries went together ; one to discover and claim for his King the land discovered, the other, to claim what was discovered for Christ, and where one set up the standard of his King, the other, near by, erected the Cross of Calvary ; established a mission, and made known to the wild savage there dwelling. the name of the Redeemer of Mankind. There were no obstacles, which were permitted to retard their progress, no dan- gers they would not face. Silently and alone, they paddled their frail barks along the margins of the great lakes, and at vantage points erected their several stand- ards ; there to mark the place for the erection of a fort, there also to be built a church of logs, on which was to be placed a bell, whose solemn sound penetrating the dense forests would call their wild dwellers to prayer. Where the discoverer designated, the military power of France came, built a fort which was mounted
3
HISTORY OF DES MOINES COUNTY
with a few pieces of rusty cannon. There it erected log houses for soldiers' quar- ters surrounded by stakes driven in the ground and pointed at their tops. To guard this vast extent of territory a line of such forts had been established at vantage points, commencing at Fort Du Quesne at the confluence of the Monon- gahela and Ohio rivers. Due north from this fort, another was erected on the shore of Lake Erie. These were the strategic points to bar the invasions of the English ; especially Fort Du Quesne. Another had been erected at what is now called Detroit, to guard there, that narrow neck of water, to prevent entrance from Lake Erie to Lake St. Clair, Lake Huron, Lake Superior and Michigan. Another was erected at St. Ignace at the Straits of Mackinac, to guard the entrance to Lake Michigan. The occupation of the French was a military occu- pation, with little, if any, effort, to make homes for a people, who had come to till the soil, to conquer a wilderness and make it administer to their outward wants. The missionary came with the discoverer to convert the inhabitants, not to con- quer the red skinned Canaanites who dwelt in this land. Ile came to point them the way to Heaven and God, instead of digging in the ground, "to dress the earth and keep it." Contemporary with the French discoverer and missionary, came the "Coner Des Boies," the trapper and hunter. Ile was the pioneer of trade; was the familiar of the Indian; lived in his wigwam, dipped his dirty wooden spoon into the same bowl of succotash with the Indian; squatted around his camp fire, learned his speech, engaged in his chats; wooed and won the dark skinned maiden of the forest, who gave birth to his child; but always faithful to the one to whom he had plighted his love. During the long cold winters, he set his traps amidst the woods and along the margins of rivers and lakes, and daily plodded from one to the other, and when night came, skinned the animals caught, pre- served their pelts to await the coming of spring time; then, loading them in canoes, commenced his long journey along the edges of the lakes, then through the St. Lawrence to Montreal and Quebec, which were his only markets. When there in glowing tones described the country from which he came, arousing others to follow his course. Such was the character of the men and the condi- tions which existed at those times, and continued to exist for more than a cen- tury, in the territory out of which has been carved the states of Michigan, Wis- consin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, and the states west of the Mississippi River. A young lad of twenty-one years of age, named George Washington, with a small band, was directed by the governor of Virginia, in the winter of 1754, to proceed and warn the French to leave what was called the Ohio Country. In midwinter, through dense forests and over frozen rivers Washington carried out his commission. Having arrived at Fort Du Quesne he was hospitably entertained, but given to understand his majesty the King of France was ruler of all the territory lying to the west, and they were there to guard it. On May 28, 1854, on his homeward journey, George Wash- ington had the temerity to attack a French scouting party, whose commander was killed. On the 3d of July of the same year, he fought with the French what is called the battle of the "Great Meadows." The action taken by George Wash- ington in these attacks, precipitated what is known in history in this country as the "French and Indian War," and in Europe, as the "Seven Years' War." When Gen. James Wolfe lay dying on the Plains of Abraham, and British red coats and American militia were thundering at the gates of Quebec. all the claim of right
4
HISTORY OF DES MOINES COUNTY
of the French to what is called Canada, and that portion to which it laid claim east of the Mississippi, passed away, and England became the owner and master of the land extending from the long line of Atlantic coast to the Mississippi. In 1763 peace was declared by which England acquired this territory. But such was the decree of fate, to hold it only for a short period, for in 1775 England engaged in war with its North American colonies and lost them at the termination of the Revolutionary war.
The treaty of peace between the United States and Great Britain was con- cluded at Paris on the 30th of November, 1782. This treaty fixed the boundaries of the United States. That portion pertaining to its western boundary set out in substance, "The line on the north was to pass through the middle of Lake Ontario, to the Niagara River; thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie; thence through the middle of said lake, until it arrives at the water communication between that lake and Lake Superior; thence through Lake Superior north and to the Isles Royal and Philipeaux, to the Long Lake ; thence through the middle of said Long Lake and the water of communication between it and the Lake of the Woods; thence through said lake to the north- western point thereof ; and, from thence on a due west course to the Mississippi River; thence by a line to be drawn along the middle of said Mississippi until it intersects the northern-most of the thirty-first degree of north latitude. South, by a line to be drawn due east from the determination of the line last mentioned, in the latitude of thirty-one degrees north of the equator to the middle of the River Apachicola or Chatahouche; thence along the middle thereof to its junction with the Flint River, thence straight to the head of St. Mary's River ; thence down the middle of the St. Mary's River to the Atlantic Ocean." It will be seen from the above described boundaries what is now called Lake Huron was called Lake Superior ; and what is now known as Lake Superior was called Long Lake in the Treaty of Paris. By the treaty the southern boundary line was sixty miles and more north of the City of New Orleans, thus preventing the United States from having the free navigation of the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico, which subsequently caused so much "inquietude" to the people of the United States as expressed by President Jefferson, and which led to the acquisition of the territory known as the District of Louisiana.
In 1762 France ceded to Spain all her possessions west of the Mississippi which extended to the Rocky Mountains. This territory was subsequently trans- ferred by Spain to France, and acquired by the United States in 1803, and is known in history as the Louisiana Purchase. So it is, the source of title which the inhabitants of this county hold to their lands comes from France. In 1668, Marquette, a Jesuit priest, founded a mission at St. Mary's Falls, and two years later established one at Point St. Ignace. While at St. Ignace, Marquette learned from the Indians the existence of a great river far away to the west. It was pictured to him in glowing terms, its waters deep and wide, and smooth, and as flowing through the most beautiful of lands. That upon its shores dwelt tribes of red men who fished in its waters, hunted the deer in the woods bordering its banks, and the big bison that roamed the prairies beyond the woods. These stories excited his imagination and inflamed the zeal of this disciple of Loyola to make known to the natives of this land the name of the Redeemer, and to strengthen and extend the name and fame of the Holy Catholic Church. On the
5
HISTORY OF DES MOINES COUNTY
other hand, M. Tolon, the governor-general of Canada, was just as anxious to extend the dominions of his king, as Marquette was to extend the knowledge of the Gospel to the benighted heathen inhabiting this far away land, and to find out whether that great river flowed into the Pacific Ocean, or the Gulf of Mexico. One Joliet, under the direction of the governor-general, was to be the commander of the expedition which consisted of himself, Marquette and five French-Cana- dians. On the 18th of May, 1673, they started from Mackinac on their perilous journey of discovery and of converting the heathen whom they might find. The bell of the church at St. Ignace called to prayers the denizens of the forests, after which they were to witness the departure of these bold adventurers. No attempts of persuasion could induce them to forego their perilous journey. Marquette said to them "he was willing to encounter all dangers of the unknown regions, even to lay down his life, for the salvation of the souls of these children in the far away unknown regions who dwelt along the great river." The paddles of the canoes all day long kept striking the water, as silently they coasted along the north side of Lake Michigan until they came to the smooth waters of Green Bay : then they passed up into the Fox River and Lake Winnebago, and came to a village of Miamis and Kickapoos. A mission had been established at this place the previous year. Marquette caused to be assembled the chiefs of those tribes, and addressed them. Among the things he said to them was, "My friend here with me (pointing to Joliet) has been sent forth by his king, to discover new countries, and I am an ambassador of God going with him, to make known to the people the truths of the Gospel." At this place two Miami guides were furnished to pilot them to the Wisconsin River. On the roth of June, with all the inhabit- ants of the village present, they took their departure into a region where the foot of white men had never trod. Under the direction of their guides they made the portage from the Fox to the Wisconsin River ; their guides returning, they procceded down the Wisconsin with its gloomy forests on both sides, when on the 17th day of June their canoes shot out on the broad white waters of the Great Mississippi at a point more than eleven hundred miles north of where one hundred and thirty-two years before Ferdinando De Soto had discovered the lower Mis- sissippi. It was then, the veil of mystery which had hid from the view of white men this unknown land was lifted. Rapidly drifting with the current of the great river, they pursued their course, not knowing whether they would enter the Gulf of Mexico, or their barks glide out on the smooth waters of the Pacific. They saw great herds of Buffalo standing on the banks of the river, and many deer which came to its margins, there to slake their thirst. On the 24th of June they passed the high bluff which is the castern border of Crapo Park in Burling- ton, where on the 23d of August, 1805, Lieut. Zebulon M. Pike, a son of a hero of the Revolutionary war, unfurled the stars and stripes 132 years after- wards. From the time they departed from the village of the Miamis and Kicka- poos on the Fox River, they had been unable to detect the trace of a human foot, until on the 25th of June they stopped at a place where they found some traces of human beings, and a path which led out to a prairie to the west. Following the path for several miles, they saw in the distance, a strip of woodland extending in a southwest direction and smoke coming from amidst the woods. Eagerly they sought this a human habitation, and arriving there, found a village of wigwams. On the banks of another river which flowed in an easterly direction, they found
6
HISTORY OF DES MOINES COUNTY
also two other villages a few miles away from the one first discovered. Here our voyagers stayed for several days, Marquette preaching to them, while Joliet made known to them the Great Father, the King of France. A dispute exists as to the place where they landed and saw the foot prints. We will not take sides in this controversy. We quote from the history of Iowa by Gue: "The exact location of the point on the Mississippi where Marquette and his party landed is not known; but from the meager description that was given, nearly all investi- gators agree, that it must have been near where the Town of Montrose stands. in Lee County, at the head of the lower rapids. The village at which the explorers were entertained was called by the Indians Mon-in-go-na. Whether the same name was given to the river along which their villages were built is not certain." Nicolet gives the following version of the matter and of the origin and meaning of the name "Des Moines" which was given to the river by the earliest white settlers in its valley. Ile writes: "The name which they gave to their settlement was Moningonas or Moningona (as laid down in the ancient maps of the country ) and is a corruption of the Algonquin word Mikonang, signifying at the road. The Indians by their customary elliptical manner of designating localities, alluding in this instance to the well known road in this section of the country, which they used to follow as a communication between the head of the lower rapids and their settlement on the river that empties itself into the Missis- sippi; to avoid the rapids. This is still the practice of the present inhabitants of the country." Prof. Laneas Gifford Weld in a well considered article pub- lished in the lowa Journal of History and Politics in January, 1905, contends with force and reason, that the place where these voyagers landed and discovered the human foot prints and the villages of Indians was on the Mississippi near Port Louisa in Louisa County, Iowa, sixty miles or more north of the site of Montrose. Professor Weld's contention, as we understand it, is based on an error of Marquette as to the latitude of the place where they landed. That if the correct latitude be taken, it places their stoppage near Port Louisa. Marquette says, after they had reached the mouth of the Wisconsin, "Proceeding south and southwest we find ourselves at 40° north ; then at 40° and some minutes, partly southwest after having advanced more than sixty leagues since entering the river, without discovering anything. At last, on the 25th of June, 1673, we saw foot prints of men by the water's edge and a beaten path leading to several Indian vil- lages, and we resolved to reconnoiter ; we accordingly left our two canoes in charge of our people, cantioning them strictly to beware of surprises." Mr. Weld con- tends that the latitudes given on Marquette's map are about one degree too far soutlı. We will not go farther into this contention but will leave the subject for those who desire a fuller understanding to investigate for themselves. The natives found were a part of the Indian tribe which belonged to the Algonquin family with whose dialect Marquette was familiar. When the parting time came, more than six hundred accompanied them to the Mississippi, whom with the best of wishes our voyagers bade adieu. They proceeded on their course of explora- tion without seeing any more traces of human habitations until they came near the mouth of the Arkansas River, where they found a part of a tribe and a vil- lage which they called Ak-an-sea. From those dwellers they learned that the Mississippi flowed into the Gulf of Mexico. One of the purposes for which the expedition had been undertaken had been accomplished, when they retraced their
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