USA > Iowa > Jackson County > Annals of Jackson county, Iowa, Vol 1-6 > Part 33
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Now if I should attempt to write anything like a historical fact of these early settlers, it would be too long to read on this occasion, besides, I should get my name in the papers and become a great historian. I will only on this occasion speak of two-Dennis Collins and Bart Corwin. Dennis Col- lins was beaten almost to death and made to give up the little money he had, by two men. The men were tracked to Bellevue, and Mr. Collins was put in a bed, he being unable to sit up in consequence of the beating he had received, and taken to Bellevue with an ox team, and positively identified the tow men, who were arrested and tried. Some three of that good man Brown's friends swore positively that they had played cards with the prison- ers all night the night of the robbery. Mr. Collins had to return home without his money, and the robbers went unpunished.
Mr. Corwin had a family of little children and a sick wife, who died a few months after his arrival. He had no money, but had a good team of horses. A couple of men came along and he sold them his horses so he could buy some of the necessaries of life, and they paid him every penny in coun- terfeit money. He followed them to Bellevue and found his horses in Brown's stable, and Brown refused to give them up, and told him to hike out or he would get into trouble claiming other people's horses-that they
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were not and never had been his. So he had to go home to his motherless children without horses or one penny in money, and right here permit me to say as a citizen of Jackson who has lived a long life among you and know of these things, that it grieves me to think that any writer will write any- thing that reflects upon the good name of Captain Warren for the part he played in ridding Jackson county of that good man Brown and his gang.
One other of the early settlers created quite a sensation, which it will perhaps be well for me to mention, and that is John Jonas. He took up a claim where the stone comes to the top of the ground in places and there is iron ore among the stone. Jonas made it known to the world that he had great copper diggings. He went to St. Louis and induced a number of fam- ilies to come to his copper mines, built quite a house and rigged some kind of smelting works, got some expert smelters, and when he found he could not get any copper he salted it with copper. The place was known for miles as The Copper Diggings. Copper creek was named for it. The result was when the people came to know how they had been humbugged, Jonas was gone, and some of the families were so poor they could not get away, and settled and made good homes, and in after years their curses of Jonas were turned to praises.
But if I don't stop right here I shall get my name in the papers as a writer of ancient history. At another time I told my political history about Bill Dunlap naming his famous bull, Sir Charles, and what a fellow he was to bellow. And now in conclusion, permit me to say something about the present. I am like the young man who went the first time to see his girl. He was invited into the parlor and he took a seat in the opposite corner from where the girl sat, and after some twenty minutes, said, "I am glad I am here." After some time the girl said, "I am glad you are here." My friends, I am glad I am here today, and I beleive that there are some here that are glad I am here, for as the years pass the old settlers keep dropping out. and the ties of friendship grow stronger with us that are left, and these gatherings are oases in the desert of life. We come here and we leave at home our nationality, our politics, the sectarian part of our religion, forget for a time our business perplexities. We meet as a band of brothers. The object is to have a good time, to renew acquaintances, to talk over old times, and there is something in these meetings that will teach the young to remember us after we have passed over the river, and when I look over an assembly of people made up of old and young, meeting in this beautiful city, surrounded by so many beautiful homes, and remember that God has saved my life and permitted me to see it all brought about by the energy of the early settlers who by their untiring efforts have transformed this once wilderness, one which the wild man roamed, to one of the best culti- vated and productive parts of earth, peopled by loving and happy people, it. is a happy thought for me to know that although it is little I have done, I have been present while these things have been brought about, and that I am in good health and am permitted to be present at this meeting, and I hope that these gatherings will continue. They are of lasting benetit to the country. They help such men as Harvey Reid, J. W. Ellis and Farmer Buckhorn write and prepare history to be handed down to future genera-
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tions. They help us to forget our trials and troubles. They make us for- get that we are old. and make us feel young and for a time live over our lives. They help to break downcast. They help to drive away malice, hatred and ill will toward one another. They help us to use charity, love, virtue, patience, temperance, Godliness and brotherly kindness for the poss- ession of which an abundant entrance is promised us into the everlasting kingdom.
Keep up these social gatherings, and let us all do our part to cultivate the spirit of charity or love, which is the golden ladder that reaches from earth to heaven. When this spirit of love becomes the ruling spirit of mankind, wars will cease, the sectarian walls that divide christian world will crumble to dust, envy, hatred and malice will recede, and happiness before unknown will be man's crowning glory, and earth become heaven and hell a fable.
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OUR TERRITORIAL PIONEERS.
An Old Trail and the Part It Played in Early Jackson County Settlement. .
(Written by Farmer Buckhorn for the Jackson County Historical Society.)
When the Black Hawk purchase was opened for settlement June 1, 1833, Benjamin W. Clark, who settled at Rock Island in 1827 or 28, crossed over into Missouri territory and staked a claim where Buffalo, Iowa, is now sit- uated. With an eye on the future he claimed about two thousand acres of land lying up and down the Mississippi river and early in 1834 established the only ferry across the river between Dubuque and Flint Hills, now Bur- lington. As the location for a future town was at that point one of the best along the river, it was Clark's dream to see one of the best river towns in the territory at that place. With that end in view, he opened up a road south forty miles to Monmouth, Illinois, to induce the tide of immigration to trend toward his ferry. In the same year-1834-he got one John Shook to take a claim at the Wapsipinicon river and establish a crossing there. He made arrangements with Allen Wallace Pence and his brother, Solomon, to blaze out a trail north to Dubuuqe and establish a crossing at the Maquo- keta river. It was Clark's idea to open up a road through the best part of the Black Hawk purchase and thereby lead settlers that way to people the most beautiful and the most fertile country in God's domain and make the Cedar, Wapsie and Maquoketa vallies tributary to the city of his dreams.
In 1835, he, in company"with two others, Captain E. A. Mix and a Dr. Pillsbury of Buffalo, N. Y., platted and laid out a town and named the town Buffalo, after Dr. Pillsbury's home town. On account of the opposi- tion of strong forces working in the interest of Davenport he failed to make of Buffalo what he had hoped. But his north and south road did bring many settlers into the country tributary to it, and a good many to western Jackson county, the first of whom were Wallace, Solomon and Gabriel Pence, who became acquainted with the locality while in the interest of Clark's road in 1834 and settled here in April of the year 1836.
The Pence men were sons of Judge John Pence who came from Shenan- doah Valley,, Va., to Monmouth, Ill., and later-1828-to Rock Island, then in 1829 to Henderson county, Illinois, near where the town of Aquaka now is. It was from this point the Pence brothers first came into what is now Iowa. This old road or trail crossed the Wapsie north of Allen's Grove,
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Bear Creek, near where Mill Rock is situated and the South Fork of the Maquoketa about a mile above the present Cheneworth bridge. Along or near this old trail in after years sprung up Mill Rock, Fremont ( Baldwin), Canton, Emeline (first called the "Four Corners") and Iron Hills in Jack- son county. By that road came several families in 1836.
The point where this old Dubuque and Buffalo road crossed the South Fork was, atfer the country began to be settled, known as "Dodge's Ford", so called after one who is said to have been an eccentric, mysterious old hermit who settled near there in an early day-about 1837 or 38-and had a little clearing where he raised a small crop each year. According to old settlers, he had as little to do with his fellow mortals as possible, and no amount of inquisitiveness on their part led to any light as to where he came from or, as to his past life. It was believed by many he was one of those individuals that are often met with on the frontier, who are either keeping dark to evade the law, or are self appointed exiles from an older civilization that they have become estranged from.
Those who came into Jackson county in 1836 by the way of Clark's ferry at Buffalo and followed the Clark trail north, with two exceptions, settled in what became Monmouth township. Those two, James Redden and Thom- as Wood, settled along what became the west line of South Fork township, Redden on the northwest quarter of section nineteen, near where the pres- ent house of D. F. Scheib is situated. He was a brother-in-law of Samuel Scheib, and I believe, came from Pennsylvania. His children were James, John, Steven, Larkin and Anna Redden-Cook. Thomas Wood settled on the southwest quarter of the same section on the east side of quarter section line, east of the west line, and about twenty rods south of where now is the Maquoketa and Anamosa road. There he built his first cabin. He built later where the Allison house is now. He was a native of Kentucky and came to Iowa, then Michigan territory, from southern Indiana. Here he lived, raised six children-John, Joseph, Manurvey, Anna, Mary and one 1 have forgotten-and died at old age and always respected. He came here single and on a trip back to Indiana became acquainted with a young girl who was wholly depending upon herself for support. Wood told her he had a cabin and a claim out in the western wilds and if she would marry him he would give her a home such as it was. The offer was accepted and a pioneer life commenced. They were always known in later years as, "Aunt Sophia and Uncle Tommy."
Wallace Pence and two of his brothers, Solomon and Gabriel, as afore- mentioned, settled in what became Monmouth township, in the spring of 1836, and were the first settlers in the Maquoketa valley. Wallace built his first cabin on the northeast quarter of section twenty-three just west of the present Bear Creek bridge, and in what is now the southeast corner of Wm. Pence's field at the three corners of the road. Solomon settled on what be- came the northwest quarter of section twenty-three (then unsurveyed) and built just south of where the present highway is near the foot of a low hill about one-fourth of a mile east of Bear Creek. In later years in that old log house, several times he entertained U. S. Grant, then of Galena, but in
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after years Lieutenant General of the Federal army during the Civil war and later twice President of the United States.
Gabriel Pence settled a little further west nearer where Baldwin is (don't know the exact numbers) these three Pence's gave to Iowa the fol- lowing increase: Of the Wallace Pence family, seven-Elvira, Robert, Mar- tha, Mary, William Harriet and Napoleon B. Of the Solomon Pence family, there were eight-Lucinda, Curtis, Phoebe, Susan, Malissa, Montana, Jos- eph and Solomon J; and of the Gabriel Pence family there were ten-Eliza- beth, John, Rachael, George, Allen, Hanna, Eliza, Mary, Liddie and Gab- riel, Jr. Twenty-five all told, many of whom have kept the Pence blood flowing and have brought forth-if not "an hundred fold"-nearly as many as "Dad and Mam."
Joseph Skinner was a native of Virginia and came to what is now Jack- son county, Iowa, in July of 1836, staked a claim and built his cabin near the banks of Bear Creek a few rods southwest of where the Midland depot at Baldwin now is, on the northwest quarter of section 22 Monmouth town- ship, and resided thereon many years. He married Jane Beer, who bore him the following family: James, who was a soldier in the Civil war in an Illi- nois regiment, John, Leon, Margaret Skinner-Watson, Julia Skinner-Wiven- ious and Lena, who never married.
I do not know the native state of the Perkins family. or the names of children they reared, or the numbers of the land they claimed on coming here in 1836, but it was north of the South Fork of the Maquoketa river somewhere in section thirteen Monmouth township. There were at least three of the Perkins at man's estate-Calvin, Zen Perkins and Xenophon. It was Xenophon Perkins who was murdered in 1842 by Joseph Jackson, who had a claim on the south bank of the Maquoketa river near the mouth of Beer Creek.
Joshua Beer, another 1836 settler, claimed land in what became Mon- mouth township and erected his log cabin about eighty rods due west of the present Main street of Baldwin in the northwest quarter of section twenty-one. The first school house in Monmouth township was built on his land I believe. It was situated just south of the present limits of Baldwin and was called "Shake Rag Schoolhouse." Beer Creek was named after Joshua Beer. He was an enthusiastic hunter and while on a hunting ex- pedition with David Scott they discovered Burt's caves in the Forks of the Maquoketa. In Joshua Beer's family there were six children-James, John, Hanna who became Solomon Pence's second, wife, Jane, wife of Joseph Skinner, Margaret married Elijah Nichols who died in the army, and Mary wed William Lane. All Beer owned, besides his children when he got here, was an ox cart and a yoke of cattle. I believe he came here a widower. Understand the family are now all dead
David Scott came from Kentucky to what is now Monmouth township, Jackson county, Iowa, in 1836, in company with James Redden, Joshua Beer, Joseph Skinner, Calvin Perkins, Z. and Xenophon Perkins, Thomas Wood and a family of Pingrys, I can't learn anything about. They crossed the Wapsipinicon on a raft July 4th, 1836, and that evening camped on the south bank of the Maquoketa near what has always been known as More-
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head's Ford. They had been directed to this locality by the three Pence brothers who met them between here and Clark's ferry. The Pences were going back to Illinois after their families, having staked claims, built cabins and broken land earlier in the season. David Scott first claimed land north of the river and built a log house on what is now the northwest quarter of section thirteen (as near as I can learn) and lived there some years. But according to Dr. Scott's information, Scott not fulfilling all requirements had his claim taken from him by some process or other by Calvin Teeple. Scott was illiterate and did not have a proper knowledge of the land rules. Scott was not only Scott by name but Scott by pedigree, and loosing his claim quickened his Scotch blood and he made some threats of "mopping the earth" with Teeple's anatomy. At a raising Scott went up to Teeple and put his arms around him saying, "Cal, how I love you, " and gave him a mighty hug that caused Teeple to be small in the waist. Teeple had Scott put under bonds to keep the peace as to Teeple, which was a safe thing to do as Scott was a powerful man and might have given him another hug some time that would have made him look like twins. After that Scott got a claim south of where Baldwin is, and built near the south bank of Beer Creek. That land I believe is still in the Scott family.
The wife of Scott was only fourteen years of age when she married, and before she was fifteen was mother to a little girl (Edith). This girl was a young woman when they came west. She married Calvin Perkins in 1838. They were the first whites in Monmouth township to wed. The course of true love didn't run smooth in their case as Scott did not like the Perkins and put an embargo on the proceedings, but Cupid was the same irrepressi- ble little cuss in the earliest days of Jackson county as now, and loves young dream was just as much of a nightmare and called for the same heroic treatment, so an elopement followed and a wedding at some "Gretna Green." After Calvin Perkins and Edith Scott were married they left this county and settled farther north on Turkey river, where they lived some years until Perkins died.
David Scott was married to Miss Holly Skinner who bore him ten chil- dren-Joseph, Marion, David, Jr., William, John, Edith, Scott-Perkins, Emily Scott-Gibson, Malinda Scott-Douglas, Amanda Scott-Atherton and Rosa, who was an epileptic and never married. Two of this family were Civil war soldiers. William enlisted in Company H, 16th Iowa Infantry. I am told that one week from the day he was mustered in he was in the battle of Shiloh. David Scott, Jr. not having consent or being of legal age to enlist without, left home with another youth, James Skinner. They rapidly grew older between Iowa and Illinois and enlisted in an Illinois company of a hundred day men. Anyone who were here during the rebellion and knew the stress and felt the thrill, knows full well anyone could lie a mile, or clear to Illinois for that matter, to get into the Union army with- out breaking any of the Ten Commandments The descendents of David Scott Sr., are numerous in Iowa today, and it can be truthfully said he left in his children and grand children a good legacy to the country. One gen- eration of seven of these families, the three Pence's, Scott. Beer, Skinner and Wood, who became lifelong residents increased our population 53. And all, I think, were worthy citizens and many added very materially to the wealth of the country.
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Old Settlers' Obituary Report 1906.
John Hiram Littell, born in Montgomery county, N. Y., June 18th, 1842, came to Iowa, December, 1865; died July 6th, 1905.
Mrs. Permelia Jenkins Wright, born in Warren county, N. Y., Feb. 26, 1839; came to Maquoketa, December, 1860; died July 31, 1905.
Mrs. Caroline Henry Wilcox, born in Maquoketa, Feb. 16, 1857; died Sept. 19, 1905.
James Shattuck born in Reading, Vt., Dec. 4, 1833; came to Maquoke- ta in 1853; died Oct. 1, 1905.
Miss Philena Rebecca Reel born in Canaan, Ohio; came to Iowa 1857; died Oct. 7, 1905.
Isaac McPeak born in Magoupin, Ill., July 1, 1837; came to Iowa 1846; died Oct. 10, 1905.
Mrs. Sarah Haight Hamley born in Maquoketa, Sept. 20, 1856; died Oct. 18, 1905.
Mrs. Mary Newby DeGrush born at Little Falls, N. Y., April 30, 1846; came to Maquoketa 1856; died Oct. 25, 1905.
Mrs. Mary Jane Simpson Jenkins born in Queensbury, N. Y., May 4, 1834; came to Iowa 1856; died Oct. 28, 1905.
Carl Romer born in Germany, Dec. 20, 1837; came to Iowa 1866; died Nov. 17, 1905.
Mrs. Inez Collins Harrington born in Bellevue, Iowa, April 30, 1864; died Dec. 11, 1905.
John J. Smola born Bohemia, Austria, May 5, 1838; came to Iowa 1854; died Dec. 15, 1905.
Mrs. Lydia A. Wagoner Sinkey born in Madison, Pa., March 16, 1833: came to Iowa 1855; died Dec. 31, 1905.
Mrs. Vashti Blakely Summers born in Wayne county, N. Y., Oct. 12, 1819; came to Iowa 1833; died Jan. 20, 1906.
M. J. Hammond born in Ticonderoga, N. Y., Nov. 2, 1818; came to Jackson county, Iowa, 1856; died Jan. 20, 1906.
H A. Sisler born in Barre, Pa., April 4, 1829; came to Iowa 1850; died January, 1906.
Mrs. Martha Elizabeth Parnell Hicks born near Elwood, Iowa, May 30, 1859; died Jan. 29, 1906.
Mrs. Julia Ann Call Atherton born in Brandon, Vt., Dec. 11, 1833; came to Iowa 1869; died Jan. 31, 1906.
Mrs. Emma E. Anderson Woods, born near Maquoketa, Io a, May 13, 1861; died Feb. 8, 1906.
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Mrs. Sarah Vine Bennett born in Ticonderoga, N. Y., in 1833; came to Iowa 1849; died Feb. 17, 1906.
Chas. R. Bell born in Kasota, Minn., 1858; came to Iowa 1863; died Feb. 28, 1906.
Mrs. Margaret Rachel Jones Hute born Feb. 28, 1834, in Mercer county, Pa. ; came to Iowa 1852; died March 3, 1906.
Susanna Buchner Martin born Ontario Province, Canada, July 26, 1819; came to Iowa 1838; deid March 1906.
John H. Crane born in N. H., March 8, 1844; came to Iowa 1856; died March 24, 1906; veteran of the civil war.
Emma P. Sisler Miller born near Andrew, March 18, 1854; died March 30, 1906.
Mrs. Lydia S. Towner Waugh born in Essix county, N. Y., March 9, 1839; came to Iowa in 1854; died May 13, 1906.
Jacob Van Meter born in Lancaster, Ohio, Aug. 27, 1819; came to Iowa 1857; died April 2, 1906.
Mary Jane Twiss born in Luray, Ohio, Dec. 27, 1827; came to Iowa 1856; died April 3, 1906.
Mary E. Ames Rigby born in Park county, Indiana, Sept. 22, 1841 ; came to Iowa 1846: died June 13, 1906. Pioneer.
Ebenezer H. Battles born in Orange county, N. Y., Oct. 23, 1824; came to Iowa 1840; died April 14, 1906. Pioneer.
Thomas McMurray born in Dehli, N. Y., April 25, 1824; came to Iowa in 1845; died June, 1906. Pioneer.
James D. Schell born in Fleetwood, Pa., Oct. 16. 1825: came to Iowa 1854; died June 6, 1906.
Chas. Burleson Sr. born in Troy, N. Y., March 18, 1831; came to Iowa ' 1837; died June 9, 1906. Pioneer and veteran of the Civil War.
Hillion Webb born Mariah, N. Y., Aug. 11, 1826; came to Iowa 1851; died June 12, 1906. Pioneer.
Mrs. Frances Tower Brown born Oct. 6, 1838; came to Maquoketa in 1853; died June 20, 1906.
Alexander Organ born Mercer county, Pean., March 25, 1835; came to Iowa when a boy; died June 26, 1906. Pioneer and veteran of the Civil War.
Ellen Mckinney Ogden Jaynes born April 24, 1832; came to Iowa 1844; died June 28, 1906.
Carlos B. Prosser born in New York State 1841; came to Iowa 1851; died July 2, 1906. Pioneer.
Miss Elmira E. Goodenow born in French Mountain, N. Y., April 22, 1834; came to Iowa 1847; died July 5, 1906.
Lavina Listen Roush born in Percy county, Ohio, Feb. 24, 1833; came to Iowa 1851; died July 31, 1906.
Prof. C. C. Dudley born in Connecticut in 1841; came to Iowa in 1876: died Auguts 16, 1906.
Isabell Tracy Snodgrass born in Fayette county, Penn., in 1831: came to lowa in 1846; died August 12, 1906.
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Part 4
Early Local History.
The Last of the Red Men in Jackson County.
(Written by J. W. Ellis for the Jackson County Historical Society.)
There has been some controversy about the date of breaking up of the last permanent Indian Village in Jackson County, but it probably occurred in 1849. Although bands of remnants of the once powerful tribes of Sacs and Foxes straggled back to the Big Forest in the forks of the Maquoketa River until after the Civil War.
When the first white settlers came to Jackson County in 1836, there were several Indian Villages in the Maquoketa Valley. When Shadrach Burleson settled in what is now the western part of South Fork Township in the Spring of 1837 he found unmistakable evidence of a large Indian Vil- lage on his claim that had been recently abandoned. Lodge poles were still standing and a camp kettle was still hanging over ashes where cooking had been recently done. Anson H. Wilson who at this writing, September 1906, is still living and who came to the Maquoketa Valley in 1839, says that a short time after he had built his first cabin, an Indian came to his cabin ·one morning and wanted him to go with him. Mr. Wilson took his rifle and accompanied the Indian They crossed Mill Creek above the site of the Old McCoy mill and going in an easterly direction crossed it again near where Willey's mill was afterwards built. When they gained the high ground east of the creek, the Indian led Mr. Wilson to a particular point and told him as well as he could with his limited English and sign language to stand there. He then walked off something like 100 yards and motioned to Wilson to join him, which he did. The Indian then pointed to the entrails of a deer that he explained that he had shot the day before from where Mr. Wilson had stood. From there they made their way to an Indian village containing about 200 people situated on the banks of the Maquoketa below Bridgeport. The Indians were very friendly and offered Mr. Wilson share of the dog soup which they were about to serve, but he declined that part of their bill of fare, but accepted some jerked venison and some corn bread which the Indians had got from some of the settlers and one of the Indians brought him some water in a ladel and he made out a pretty good dinner. He says the Indians were pretty well provided with food, had plenty of venison and had large quantities of corn stored up, this they burried in the ground un- til they wanted to use it, dug holes and put the corn in and covered it up which made it soft and in good condition for use.
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