USA > Iowa > Jackson County > Annals of Jackson county, Iowa, Vol 1-2 > Part 21
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others of that settlement, I do not believe they would have allowed An- drew Farley to go to Bellevue alone if they had known of the call.
The desperate character of the conflict and the high grade of marksman- ship displayed by the squirrel hunters on both sides, is well shown by the large number of casualties, especially on the part of the assailants. They received nearly as many bullet wounds in all as the number of Brown's forces. The statement of Henry that there were no more than ten men with Brown in the hotel is manifestly an error. There were three killed and thirteen captured, and Warren says that "Negro Brown and six others made their escape."
Capt. Warren wrote at least three accounts of the Bellevue War. The first was published in 1865 in the "Loyal West" by Henry Howe in Cincinnati .. Extracts from it are given in a paper by F. Snyder then editor of the Jack- son Sentinel, printed in the Annals of Iowa for April, 1869. Another very long account was published in the Bellevue Leader in 1875, and this is large- ly quoted, and partly condensed by the compilers of the Jackson County His- tory published in 1879. Then in the same history is printed a communica- tion from Capt. Warren written in the fall of 1879 in reply to one sigued "Old Settler" of which Mr. Seeley makes mention. All of these were evi- dently written mainly from memory, and contain some discrepancies in de- tails as Farmer Buckhorn points out.
We trust that this renewed discussion of that notable event in the his- tory of lowa Territory may bring out more light upon its obscure details. The Jackson County Historical Society will be glad to receive communica- tions from any one knowing of facts regarding it.
Notes-On farther investigation I find enrolled as soldiers in Galena companies during the Black Hawk war, the names of Thomas Sublett, Wil- liam Vance, James Beaty and John Stuckey, all of whom are named by War- ren as participants in the attack on Brown's Hotel. William Vance was badly wounded, being shot in the thigh. Thos, Sublett and Vincent Smith are supposed to be the two whose bullets killed Brown, and it is a curious coincidence that they were comrades in Capt. Enoch Duncan's company of Colonel Henry Dodge's regiment in the Black Hawk war. J. L. Kirkpatrick was a lieutenant in the same company, John Foley a sergeant, and William Vance and William Jonas, privates. Another private was Loring Wheeler. afterwards an Iowa lawmaker from Dubuque and later from De Witt.
My authority for the names of those enrolled in the war is the "Record of the Services of Illinois Soldiers in the Black Hawk War," compiled by Adjutant General Isaac H. Elliott in 1832. The book was secured by the Boardman Library recently from a second hand book store in Chicago.
The Hon. Ebenezer Brigham, mentioned on page 63 and again on page 72 of Mr. Secley's article, was a former Sangamon county friend and political associate of Colonel Cox. He had removed to the lead mines in 1427, and at the time of his visit to Bellevue was a resident of Blue Mounds, Dane coun- ty, Wisconsin Territory, and was a member of the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature. Capt. Warren was mistaken in supposing that Brigham and
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Cox were in the legislature together. They were both territorial lawmakers but in different territories. The insinuation that Brigham "turned up at the right moment" to help Cox "fix up political fences" is hardly consis- tent with the good Farmer Buckhorn's usual fairness.
Warren, in writing from memory, must have been somewhat muddled on the date when the caucus was held in which Brown beat Cox out of the leg- islative nomination. It is hardly supposable that it was while the river was frozen over, since the election would not take place until August. Then Buckhorn's conjecture (Page 63) that the election occurred after Brown's death, does not accord with the statements of both Warren, and the writer signing himself "A Pioneer," (supposed to be the late William Y. Earle), in the Jackson County History, who both say that Cox ran as an independent candidate against Brown and beat him badly. It is very much to be regret- ted that no records exist of the votes cast in Jackson county earlier than 1857. We would much like to know who were the opposing candidates and what their votes at all of those early elections.
James C. Mitchell, the homicide, went to Council Bluffs at the time of the great California emigration in 1849 and became owner of two stores there, accumulating quite a fortune. We have the testimony of Warren's 1865 account, and again of the one written in 1879, corroborated by the let- ter of "A Pioneer, " and by the memory of N. B. Butterworth, that Hen- derson Palmer was the first man killed in the fight; that he was shot down in the charge before the hotel was reached, and before Brown was shot. Warren's 1875 history reads as though the episode of Brown being called upon to surrender opened the battle, but he makes no mention of how Pal- mer met his death, so we must conclude that firing began fiom the hotel, as all of the other accounts state.
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Early Post Offices in Jackson County.
(Written for the Jackson County Historical Society by Harvey Reid.)
Among matters pertaining to the welfare of their budding common- wealth, there was nothing that the members of the early territorial legisla- tures took greater interest in than the establishment of post offices and post routes by the General Government. So every member at some time during each session would press the adoption by the legislature of memorials to Congress asking the establishment of new post offices and new post routes. These requests would generally be consolidated into one memorial on each subject and would always pass.
In a memorial adopted by the Second Territorial Assembly for the es- tablishment of post routes we find this clause:
"From Charleston by Goodenoe's mills, by Burliston's settlement, by Elk ford to the point on the Territorial road where the said road crosses the Wabsepinica river and thence to the county seat of Linu county."
But evidently the memorial was not granted so far as that particular route was concerned, for we find that at the next session, that of 1840-1, an- other memorial was adopted asking for post routes which included:
"From Savannah, Ilhnois, via Charleston and Goodence's mills and Burriston's settlement, to Edinburgh, the county seat of Jones county."
Note the odd spelling of the names and that Maquoketa had not yet be- come Springfield even. It was known as Goodenow's Mills. and Shade Burle- son had not started his Buckhorn Tavern to give a name to his settlement.
Another memorial in the Third General Assembly was for the establish- ment of new post offices, and one clause in that reads:
"One on the military road in Jones county, where the said road crosses the Makoketa river, to be called the Makokela post office and that Wm. Clarke be appointed postmaster.'
The location thus specified would be near the north east corner of Jones county. Curiosity to know whether a postoffice in Jowa ever did bear the name of Makoketa, prompted the writer to address an inquiry to the post office department at Washington, through our good friend Congressman Dawson, asking as to that fact, and also for a list of the first postoffices in Jackson county. A prompt reply was received from Hon. P. V. DeGraw, 4th Asst. P. M. Genera!, who says:
"We can find no record of a post office named Makoketa in Iowa, Jones county, neither can we locate the Mill Rock office. "
Followng is the list of names and dates given, some of which are very surprising :
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Belleview, Jo Daviess County, Illinois, established March 17, 1836; John Bell, Postmaster. Office changed into Dubuque County, Wis., and changed into Jackson County, Iowa, Nov. 1, 1839, James K. Moss., Postmaster.
Silsbee established April 11, 1840, Obadiah Sawtell, Postmaster. Name changed to Andrew, October 26, 1841, Nathaniel Butterworth, Postmaster.
Fulton established June 19, 1851; William Marden, Postmaster.
Waterford established March 2, 1855. Fayette Mallard, Postmaster. Higginsport established October 31, 1851; John G. Smith, Postmaster. Sterling established June 3, 1852; C. S. Ferguson, Postmaster.
Springfield, Jackson County, established June 4, 1840, John E. Goode- now, Postmaster; J. B. Doane, July 2, 1841; J. E. Goodenow, Oct. 13. 1842; name changed to Maquoketa, March 13, 1844.
Bridgeport, established May 1, 1850, R. S. Dyas, Postmaster; W. C. Grant, Oct. 30, 1851.
It would be interesting to know where the ridiculous error was made of recording Belleview as in Jo Daviess county, Illinois, in 1836. And did anybody know before that Andrew was not established as a new postoffice, but was removed from Sawtell's, in Richland township, and its name changed from Silsbee to Andrew? Inquiry as to Charleston brought particulars of an office of that name in some other part of the state established in 1850, instead of old Charleston, now Sabula. The first posimaster of our Charles- ton was Wm. H. Brown, appointed in the latter part of 1836 or early in 1837. The name was changed to Sabula in 1846.
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A. H. Wilson on the Bellevue War.
(Written by J. W. Ellis for the Jackson County Historical Society.)
Anson H. Wilson, a pioneer of Maquoketa who came here in the spring of 1839 and the only person living who came here in the thirties, as a full grown man, is still hale and hearty though past ninety and is full of remin- iscences of early days in the Maquoketa valley, In a conversation with him on the 23rd day of April, 1906, the writer asked him for his opinion of W. W. Brown, the principial victim of the Bellevue mob in April, 1840. Mr. Wilson said: "I knew Brown and his wife, well, I stopped at their hotel frequently on my trips to and from Galena. I helped build several mills and frequenity went to Galena for supplies. Brown was a fine looking man, tall, well built, dark complected, of genial, pleasant manners, and a perfect gentleman in every way Mrs. Brown was a small woman of neat appear- ance, with a winning way, that made her very popular, and a suitable help- mate for her husband. Brown was an all round hustler. conducted the best hotel in the country, some said on the Mississippi river, had a wood yard, a general store, and was interested in a meal market. He trusted everybody and gave everybody work that needed it. He employed a great many men to cut wood in the winter season, which he sold to the steamboat companies in the summer. I never heard that Brown was accused of committing any crime himself. The worst said about him was that he had a tough set of men about his hotel. I never knew of any oue getting bad money at any of Brown's places of business. Brown always said if any one got bad money at his house or store he would make it good.
"Some time in February or March, 1840, Col. Cox came through this part of the county trying to get the people to turn out and drive Brown and his gang, as he called them, out of the country, but he got no help from these parts." Mr. Wilson says he told Cox that he would have nothing to do with such an undertaking and that he thought Brown would be a fool to surrender to a mob. He said Cox threatened him that he might to the next victim after Brown. He also thinks that the mob was quite largely made up of men from the lead mines near Galena. He says that Tom Welch. the young man mentioned by Joseph Henri who worked for Brown as stable boy, who was badly wounded in the fight on the Ist of April, 1840, and who Charley Kilgore tried to finish by emptying all the barrels of his pepper box pistol into Tom while standing over him, and was saved at the intercession of Warren and Kirkpatrick and sent to friends in the forks, and afterwards lived with Mr. Wilson and gave him many particulars of the confiter.
Mr. Wilson says the talk about so much crime being committed in the county at that time was.greatly exaggerated There were no horses stolen
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in this county, and if Brown and his boarders were banded together to rob, steal horses, and pass counterfeit money they must have done their work in some other locality. Mr. Wilson was a warm friend to Col. Warren, but blamed him for his action in mobbing Brown, who considered Warren a true friend to him to the last. Mr. Wilson was quite familiar with the trials and troubles his neighbor, Shade Burleson, had in trying to settle the Brown estate, especially in his efforts to collect on notes and accounts. The probate judge had been Brown's worst enemy while living, and had been a leader in the mob that killed Brown, aud nearly every man that was sued demanded a jury which was always largely composed of members of the mob and in every case a verdict was given for defendant. Mr. Wilson said, "I once asked Burleson why it was that he could not get a verdict against men of whom he held their promissory note? Burleson's answer was characteris- tic of the man. He said, 'If you sue the devil and have the trial in hell what show have you got for a favorable verdict?' "
Mr. Wilson says that the people of this side of the county were never friendly to Col. Cox. after the killing of Brown. That he never was invited nor attended any of the fourth of July celebrations or other public functions in this locality. He describes Col. Cox as being over 6 foot high, splendidly proportioned and alltogether one of the finest specimens of physical man- hood he ever met. Mr. Wilson said that when the capital was established at Iowa City through Col Cox's influence, a Mr. Ball of this county got a job of cutting the stone for ornamenting the new capitol, and his work was so well appreciated that Gov. Lncas secured him a job to work on an addition that was being built to the National capitol. The same Mr. Ball cut the stones to mark the graves of Mr. Wilson's first wife and daughter in Maquo- keta cemetery.
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Jackson County Historical Society.
OFFICERS FOR 1905-06.
GEORGE L. MITCHELL, ..... President
O. S. LITTELL, .. Vice-President
JAMES W. ELLIS, Secretary and Curator
HARVEY REID, 'Treasurer
DIRECTORS.
D. A FLETCHER. W. C. GREGORY. DR. GEO., M. JOHNSON R. F. HAYES. JAS. FAIRBROTHER.
The Annals of Jackson County, Iowa, will be published a er- vals of about three months. Copies for sale by J. W. EHis, tary, at twenty-five cents each.
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