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THE
HISTORY "1
OF
APPANOOSE COUNTY,
IOWA,
CONTAINING
A history of the County, its Cities, Gowns, &t.
A Biographical Directory of Citizens, War Record of its Vol- unteers in the late Rebellion, General and Local Statistics, Portraits of Early Settlers and Prominent Men, His- tory of the Northwest, History of Iowa, Map of Appanoose County, Constitution of the United States, Miscellaneous Matters, &c.
ILLUSTRATED.
.
CHICAGO : WESTERN HISTORICAL COMPANY. 1878.
.ACHO
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1878, by
THE WESTERN HISTORICAL COMPANY
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
321169 23
24-11012
PREFACE.
L ESS than half a century has rolled into eternity since the Indian title to any portion of the soil of Iowa was extinguished, and the Black Hawk Purchase permitted the resistless tide of emigration westward to flow across the Mississippi ; and only thirty-three years ago the Sac and Fox Indians reluctantly left their beautiful hunting-grounds, a por- tion of which was the southern part of Appanoose County. Only forty years have elapsed since the adventurous KIRBY and WELLS built the first rude cabins in the southern part of the county, followed a few years after by the brave and hardy pioneers who settled in the edges of the beautiful groves that deck the expanses of prairie within its borders But these fleeting years have been replete with eventful changes-of history that it has been the purpose of this work to gather, arrange and preserve for transmission to posterity as one of the almost countless chapters in the annals of this great country.
In some respects, the task has been an arduous and delicately responsible one. It has been a fortunate circumstance for the compiler that the early official records were not only made with care and judgment, but they have been preserved with sedulous care. The principal events gathered from the memories of the pioneer settlers have been nar- rated with honesty of intention and freedom from local prejudice. Great care has been taken to give them in substance as they have been related, and in the more important circumstances several have been consulted, in order that the details might be preserved as nearly as possible. Scarcely anything has heretofore been done to preserve the tra- ditional history of Appanoose County, and only a short time would have elapsed ere the details would have disappeared forever. One or two matters have been purposely omitted, in the sincere belief that every citizen in the county will agree with the com- piler that they should be forgotten by all as speedily as possible.
In the absence of written records, it has often occurred that different individuals have given sincere and honest, but, nevertheless, somewhat conflicting, versions of the same events, and'it has been a matter of great delicacy to harmonize these conflicting statements. This work has been done with care and discrimination, with the sole pur- pose of arriving at the truth. How well this task has been performed the intelligent reader must judge. It will be strange, indeed, if in the multiplicity of names, dates and events, no errors or omissions shall be detected. The compiler does not dare hope that,
PREFACE.
in all its numerous and varied details, this work is absolutely correct, nor is it to be expected that it is beyond criticism; but it is hoped and believed that it will be found measurably correct and generally accurate and reliable. Unwearied and studious care has been constantly exercised in its preparation in the hope of making a standard work of reference, as well as a volume of interest to the general reader.
Such as it shall be found, however, our work is done, our offering completed, and it remains for us to tender our grateful acknowledgments to the people of Appanoose County for the patronage that has enabled us to present them with this volume, and for the courtesy and kindness, almost without exception, extended to our representatives, to whom has been intrusted the work of collecting and arranging the historical record herein preserved to that posterity, who, in the not far distant future, are to take the places of the fathers and mothers of to-day, so many of whose names are honorably recorded in the following pages.
Particularly do we desire to express our warmest thanks to the PIONEER SETTLERS, without whose help and anxious care, we could not have succeeded. To all of these-to the county officers who have so courteously and kindly aided us and placed the official records of the county at our disposal-to the publishers of the county who have gener- ously afforded us so free access to their files-to the official representatives of churches, lodges and societies, as well as many civil officers, this paragraph is a tribute of thanks for favors willingly bestowed. The writer would gladly linger to cultivate the pleasant acquaintance obtained in Appanoose County, whose annals he has conned with so much pleasure. Hail and farewell !
In conclusion we may be permitted to express the earnest hope that before another generation shall have passed, some other and abler pen will have gathered and recorded the historic events that are to follow the close of this offering to the people of Appanoose County, that its history may be preserved from generation to generation ; and to this end public records, private journals and newspaper files should be carefully preserved.
DECEMBER, 1878.
THE PUBLISHERS.
CONTENTS.
HISTORY NORTHWEST AND STATE OF IOWA.
PAGE.
History Northwest Territory. 19
Geographical Position .. 19 Early Explorations. 20 Discovery of the Ohio .. 33
English Explorations and Set- tlements. 35
American Settlements 60
Division of the Northwest Ter- ritory .. 66
Tecumseh and the War of 1812 70
Black Hawk and the Black
Hawk War ....
74
Other Indian Troubles.
79
Present Condition of the North- west 86
Chicago .. 95 Illinois 257 Indiana 259 lowa ... .260
Michigan
263
Wisconsin.
264
Minnesota
266
Nebraska 267
History of Iowa :
Geographical Situation 109
Topography .. 109
Drainage System.
110
PAGE.
PAGE.
History of Iowa:
Rivers 111
Lakes
118
Springs
119
Prairies
120
Geology
.120
Climatology
137
Discovery and Occupation 139
Territory
147
Indians
147
Pike's Expedition 151
Indian Wars.
152
Public Schools
218
Black Hawk War. 157
Political Record. 223
War Record.
223
Infantry. 233
Cavalry.
244
Artillery.
247
Miscellaneous ...
.248
Boundary Question 177
State Organization. 181
Growth and Progress 185
Agricultural College and Farm.186
State University
187
State Historical Society
193
Penitentiaries.
194
Agricultural Statistics
320
HISTORY APPANOOSE COUNTY.
PAGE.
Early History .......
323
Official History :
Old Settlers' Association
395
First Bridge .. .351
Agricultural Society. 396
Independence 351 Patrons of Husbandry. 398
County Judge .. 353 + Educational 399
First Court Record. .353
County Officers. 401
Mormon Emigration
325
Indian Occupants. 326 Early Marriages .358 Press 431
Pioneer Jurisprudence. .359 Jail
Early School Matters. .360 Poor-Farm 433
Incidents of Pioneer Life .. 361 Centerville 433
First'Store- Keeping Christmas.361 Amusements .362
Municipal 437
Fire Department. 438
Mormon Removal .362 Educational 438
Claim Society ..
An Infare ... 366
Raging Chariton .367
Fourth of July .367
Flushı Times .368
The Great Smash. .368 Game, etc.
Liquor Case .369
Geology .337 Hanging 370
The Underground Route 371
Moravia 464 Origin of Coal 338 Local Observations. .339 Border Thieving. 375 Walnut City. 466 Timber 341 Lynching 378 Hibbsville 468
Streams 341 Murphy Case. 377 Civil Divisions 341 Foster Case. 379 Surveys .342
Entries .342 First Flouring-Mills 343 Religious . 344 First Physicians 344 345
Official History.
County Organized. .345
Name Changed.
.347
Commissioners' Doings.
.347
Murder of Capt. Bashore. .. 387 Serions Accident. 388 Big Snake, etc ... 388
Eclipse, 1869. .. 388
Assessment, 1878. 483
Recent Events. 392 Tax Lery, 1878. 184
Death of a Pioneer. .. 393
Vote, 1878
485
Vote, 1877
48€
.445
Moulton .. 445
Cincinnati 451 456
Bellair and Numa ..
Iconium. 460
Unionville ..
46]
Dean and Hilltown 470
Robt. Low and Marion Wright. .. 381 Orleans. 471
Stage Robbery .. .381 Albany 472
Ancient Elections 382 Exline.
The Williamsons .383 New Hope.
473
Book of Judges. 383 Caldwell
Board of Supervisors. .384 Sedan. 474
Milledgeville.
475
Johns Township.
476
A Parting Word ...
477
Missing Book Found. 477
First Pay-Roll .. .348 First Treasurer's Report. .. 348 Chaldea 349 Precincts . .349
First Court House
.. 350
Townships Established. 350 Railroads .393
PAGE.
PAGE.
Probate Matters. .357
War History. 403
Treaties. 328 First Permanent Settlement ... 329 Boundary Question. .331 Further Settlement. .332 Horse-Thieving 333 Found Dead 334
Appanoose Created-First Elec- tion .334 Roads and Mail-Routes. .. 334 First Marriage .335 Early Births. 335
Indians and Whites 335 .335
.364 Religious 439
Masons
.442
Odd Fellows ..
443
Red Ribbon Club.
473
Double Murder. 384 Court House. .385 Sharon 474
History of Iowa:
Insane Hospitals 195
College for the Blind .. 197 Deaf and Dumb Institution .... 199 Soldiers' Orphans' Homes ... 199 State Normal School. .201
Asylum for Feeble Minded Children. 201
Reform School
202
Fish Hatching Establishment .. 203
Public Lands
204
Indian Purchase, Reserves and
Treaties .
159
Spanish Grants 163 Half-Breed Tract .. 164 Early Settlements. 166 Territorial History. 173
Promotions from Iowa Reg-
iments.
249
Number Casualties-Officers.250
Number Casualties-Enlist-
ed Men .
252
Number Volunteers.
254
Population ...
255
433
Dragoon Trail .. 323 Bee Trace. .. 323 First Cabin. 324 First White Child 324
CONTENTS.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE.
Mouth of the Mississippi. 21 Source of the Mississippi 21
Wild Prairie 23
La Salle Landing on the Shore of Green Bay 25
Big Eagle .. 80 Buffalo Hunt 27
83
Hunting 32| Kinzie House 85
Iroquois Chief 34
Pontiac, the Ottawa Chieftain 43
Indians Attacking Frontiersmen .. 56
A Prairie Storm 59
PAGE. A Pioneer Dwelling. 61
Breaking Prairie .. 63
Tecumseh, the Shawanoe Chieftain 69 Indians Attacking a Stockade ....... 72 Davenport, Iowa .. 91
Black Hawk, the Sac Chieftain ..... 75 Chicago in 1833. 95
Old Fort Dearborn, 1830
98
Present Site Lake Street Bridge, Chicago, 1833. 98
Hunting Prairie Wolves 268
APPANOOSE COUNTY VOLUNTEERS.
Infantry:
PAGE.
Infantry :
PAGE.
Cavalry : PAGE.
Eighth 419
Southern Border Brigade ..
421
Seventh
408
Eighteenth .409
Thirty-sixth . 410
Thirty-seventh. 416
Seventh 419
Miscellaneous
426
BIOGRAPHICAL TOWNSHIP DIRECTORY.
PAGE.
.539
Indepenendce ..
.584
Union 618
Udell
520
Chariton. 544
Lincoln. 611
Walnut.
560
Caldwell
568 ' Pleasant. 592
Washington.
504
Douglas
623
Sharon .. 542
Wells
556
Franklin. 530 | Taylor
603
LITHOGRAPHIC PORTRAITS.
Udell, Nathan
355
Maring, J. B ..
423
Johnson, W. S. . ....
... 389
Worthington, J. H ... .457
ABSTRACT OF IOWA STATE LAWS.
PAGE.
Adoption of Children. .. 303
Forms :
Chattel Mortgage .. .. 314
Confession of Judgment ...
.. 306
Landlord and Tenant. ... .304
Married Women. 298
Mortgages. .310 Marks and Brands .300
Notice to Quit. .309 Mechanics' Liens. .301 Notes. 306,313 Roads and Bridges 302 Orders. 306 Surveyors and Surveys .. .303
Suggestions to Persons Purchasing Books by Subscription .319
Support of Poor
.303
Taxes.
.295
Wills and Estates.
293
Weights and Measures 305
Wolf Scalps
300
MISCELLANEOUS.
PAGE.
Surveyor's Measure 288
of the United States. .291 How to Keep Accounts .288 Interest Table. .289
Population and Area of the United
States
292
Miscellaneous Table.
289
Names of the States of the Union
and their Significations 290 Population of the United States ..... 201
PAGE.
Population of Fifty Principal Cities
Map of Appanoose County ........ Front. Constitution of United States ......... 269
Vote for President, Governor and Congressmen. 283
Practical Rules for Every-Day Use .. 284
United States Government Land
Measure .. .287
Jurors 297
Limitation of Actions
297
Notes .293
Commercial Terms 305
Lease ... .312
Capital Punishment 298
Charitable, Scientific and Religious Associations. 316
Descent 293
Damages from Trespass ... .300
Exemptions from Execution 298
Wills and Codicils 309 Estrays 299 Forms : Warranty Deed. 314 Articles of Agreement .. 377 Fences 300
Bills of Sale .308
Bond for Deed ... .315
Bills of Purchase .306
Jurisdiction of Courts
297
PAGE.
Bills of Exchange and Promissory
PAGE.
PAGE.
PAGE
Bellair
Sixth ... 406
Forty-sixth 416
Forty-seventh 416
Cavalry:
Missouri Regiments
.422
Kansas Regiments
422
Third 417
A Representative Pioneer.
86
Ruins of Chicago.
104
View of the City of Chicago.
IOG
Lincoln Monument. 87
A Pioneer School House. 88
PAGE.
Pioneers' First Winter ...
94 Great Iron Bridge of C., R. I. & P. R. R., Crossing the Mississippi at.
.....
Quit Claim Deed .315
Receipts 306
Interest. 293
Intoxicating Liquors.
317
Population of the Principal Coun-
tries in the World
292
PAGE.
PAGE.
PAGE
575
Center. 487 Johns
Captain Jack, the Modoc Chieftain
Trapping 29
-
MAP OF APPAN MO NR
ICONIUM
2
12
MILLIDGEV
Wart
18
15
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INDEPENDENCE
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Little Walnuts
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CENTREVILL
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BIELA
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CINCINNATI
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LIVINGSTON P.D.
7
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18
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SEPARE & S.R.A
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Kirk wood
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P.O.
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A
-
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION.
When the Northwestern Territory was ceded to the United States by Virginia in 1784, it embraced only the territory lying between the Ohio and the Mississippi Rivers, and north to the northern limits of the United States. It coincided with the area now embraced in the States of Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, and that portion of Minnesota lying on the east side of the Mississippi River. The United States itself at that period extended no farther west than the Mississippi River; but by the purchase of Louisiana in 1803, the western boundary of the United States was extended to the Rocky Mountains and the Northern Pacific Ocean. The new territory thus added to the National domain, and subsequently opened to settlement, has been called the "New Northwest," in contradistinction from the old "Northwestern Territory."
In comparison with the old Northwest this is a territory of vast magnitude. It includes an area of 1,887,850 square miles ; being greater in extent than the united areas of all the Middle and Southern States, including Texas. Out of this magnificent territory have been erected eleven sovereign States and eight Territories, with an aggregate popula- tion, at the present time, of 13,000,000 inhabitants, or nearly one third of the entire population of the United States.
Its lakes are fresh-water seas, and the larger rivers of the continent flow for a thousand miles through its rich alluvial valleys and far- stretching prairies, more acres of which are arable and productive of the highest percentage of the cereals than of any other area of like extent on the globe.
For the last twenty years the increase of population in the North- west has been about as three to one in any other portion of the United States.
(19)
20
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
EARLY EXPLORATIONS.
In the year 1541, DeSoto first saw the Great West in the New World. He, however, penetrated no farther north than the 35th parallel of latitude. The expedition resulted in his death and that of more than half his army, the remainder of whom found their way to Cuba, thence to Spain, in a famished and demoralized condition. DeSoto founded no settlements, produced no results, and left no traces, unless it were that he awakened the hostility of the red man against the white man, and disheartened such as might desire to follow up the career of discovery for better purposes. The French nation were eager and ready to seize upon any news from this extensive domain, and were the first to profit by DeSoto's defeat. Yet it was more than a century before any adventurer took advantage of these discoveries.
In 1616, four years before the pilgrims " moored their bark on the wild New England shore," Le Caron, a French Franciscan, had pene- trated through the Iroquois and Wyandots (Hurons) to the streams which run into Lake Huron ; and in 1634, two Jesuit missionaries founded the first mission among the lake tribes. It was just one hundred years from the discovery of the Mississippi by DeSoto (1541) until the Canadian envoys met the savage nations of the Northwest at the Falls of St. Mary, below the outlet of Lake Superior. This visit led to no permanent result ; yet it was not until 1659 that any of the adventurous fur traders attempted to spend a Winter in the frozen wilds about the great lakes, nor was it until 1660 that a station was established upon their borders by Mesnard, who perished in the woods a few months after. In 1665, Claude Allouez built the earliest lasting habitation of the white man among the Indians of the Northwest. In 1668, Claude Dablon and James Marquette founded the mission of Sault Ste. Marie at the Falls of St. Mary, and two years afterward, Nicholas Perrot, as agent for M. Talon, Governor Gen- eral of Canada, explored Lake Illinois (Michigan) as far south as the present City of Chicago, and invited the Indian nations to meet him at a grand council at Sault Ste. Marie the following Spring, where they were taken under the protection of the king, and formal possession was taken of the Northwest. This same year Marquette established a mission at Point St. Ignatius, where was founded the old town of Michillimackinac.
During M. Talon's explorations and Marquette's residence at St. Ignatius, they learned of a great river away to the west, and fancied -as all others did then-that upon its fertile banks whole tribes of God's children resided, to whom the sound of the Gospel had never come. Filled with a wish to go and preach to them, and in compliance with a
21
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
BRIGHAM
MOUTH OF THE MISSISSIPPI.
.
SOURCE OF THE MISSISSIPPI.
-
22
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
request of M. Talon, who earnestly desired to extend the domain of his king, and to ascertain whether the river flowed into the Gulf of Mexico or the Pacific Ocean, Marquette with Joliet, as commander of the expe- dition, prepared for the undertaking.
On the 13th of May, 1673, the explorers, accompanied by five assist- ant French Canadians, set out from Mackinaw on their daring voyage of discovery. The Indians, who gathered to witness their departure, were astonished at the boldness of the undertaking, and endeavored to dissuade them from their purpose by representing the tribes on the Mississippi as exceedingly savage and cruel, and the river itself as full of all sorts of frightful monsters ready to swallow them and their canoes together. But, nothing daunted by these terrific descriptions, Marquette told them he was willing not only to encounter all the perils of the unknown region they were about to explore, but to lay down his life in a cause in which the salvation of souls was involved ; and having prayed together they separated. Coasting along the northern shore of Lake Michigan, the adventurers entered Green Bay, and passed thence up the Fox River and Lake Winnebago to a village of the Miamis and Kickapoos. Here Mar- quette was delighted to find a beautiful cross planted in the middle of the town ornamented with white skins, red girdles and bows and arrows, which these good people had offered to the Great Manitou, or God, to thank him for the pity he had bestowed on them during the Winter in giving them an abundant " chase." This was the farthest outpost to which Dablon and Allouez had extended their missionary labors the year previous. Here Marquette drank mineral waters and was instructed in the secret of a root which cures the bite of the venomous rattlesnake. He assembled the chiefs and old men of the village, and, pointing to Joliet, said : " My friend is an envoy of France, to discover new coun- tries, and I am an ambassador from God to enlighten them with the truths of the Gospel." Two Miami guides were here furnished to conduct them to the Wisconsin River, and they set out from the Indian village on the 10th of June, amidst a great crowd of natives who had assembled to witness their departure into a region where no white man had ever yet ventured. The guides, having conducted them across the portage,
returned. The explorers launched their canoes upon the Wisconsin, which they descended to the Mississippi and proceeded down its unknown waters. What emotions must have swelled their breasts as they struck out into the broadening current and became conscious that they were now upon the bosom of the Father of Waters. The mystery was about to be lifted from the long-sought river. The scenery in that locality is beautiful, and on that delightful seventeenth of June must have been clad in all its primeval loveliness as it had been adorned by the hand of
23
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
Nature. Drifting rapidly, it is said that the bold bluffs on either hand "reminded them of the castled shores of their own beautiful rivers of France." By-and-by, as they drifted along, great herds of buffalo appeared on the banks. On going to the heads of the valley they could see a country of the greatest beauty and fertility, apparently destitute of inhab- itants yet presenting the appearance of extensive manors, under the fas- tidious cultivation of lordly proprietors.
THE WILD PRAIRIE.
On June 25, they went ashore and found some fresh traces of men upon the sand, and a path which led to the prairie. The men remained in the boat, and Marquette and Joliet followed the path till they discovered a village on the banks of a river, and two other villages on a hill, within a half league of the first, inhabited by Indians. They were received most hospitably by these natives, who had never before seen a white person. After remaining a few days they re-embarked and descended the river to about latitude 33°, where they found a village of the Arkansas, and being satisfied that the river flowed into the Gulf of Mexico, turned their course
24
THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY.
up the river, and ascending the stream to the mouth of the Illinois, rowed up that stream to its source, and procured guides from that point to the lakes. "Nowhere on this journey," says Marquette, "did we see such grounds, meadows, woods, stags, buffaloes, deer, wildcats, bustards, swans, ducks, parroquets, and even beavers, as on the Illinois River." The party, without loss or injury, reached Green Bay in September, and reported their discovery-one of the most important of the age, but of which no record was preserved save Marquette's, Joliet losing his by the upsetting of his canoe on his way to Quebec. Afterward Marquette returned to the Illinois Indians by their request, and ministered to them until 1675. On the 18th of May, in that year, as he was passing the mouth of a stream-going with his boatmen up Lake Michigan-he asked to land at its mouth and celebrate Mass. Leaving his men with the canoe, he retired a short distance and began his devotions. As much time passed and he did not return, his men went in search of him, and found him upon his knees, dead. He had peacefully passed away while at prayer. He was buried at this spot. Charlevoix, who visited the place fifty years after, found the waters had retreated from the grave, leaving the beloved missionary to repose in peace. The river has since been called Marquette.
While Marquette and his companions were pursuing their labors in the West, two men, differing widely from him and each other, were pre- paring to follow in his footsteps and perfect the discoveries so well begun by him. These were Robert de La Salle and Louis Hennepin.
After La Salle's return from the discovery of the Ohio River (see the narrative elsewhere), he established himself again among the French trading posts in Canada. Here he mused long upon the pet project of those ages-a short way to China and the East, and was busily planning an expedition up the great lakes, and so across the continent to the Pacific, when Marquette returned from the Mississippi. At once the vigorous mind of LaSalle received from his and his companions' stories the idea that by fol- lowing the Great River northward, or by turning up some of the numerous western tributaries, the object could easily be gained. He applied to Frontenac, Governor General of Canada, and laid before him the plan, dim but gigantic. Frontenac entered warmly into his plans. and saw that LaSalle's idea to connect the great lakes by a chain of forts with the Gulf of Mexico would bind the country so wonderfully together, give un- measured power to France, and glory to himself, under whose adminis- tration he earnestly hoped all would be realized.
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