USA > Iowa > Polk County > Des Moines > Des Moines, the pioneer of municipal progress and reform of the middle West, together with the history of Polk County, Iowa, the largest, most populous and most prosperous county in the state of Iowa; Volume I > Part 5
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By the terms of this treaty2 the Sacs and Foxes were, on or before the Ist day of May, 1843, to remove beyond a boundary line running north and south from the painted or red rocks on the White Breast fork of the Des Moines, about eight miles below the junction of the White Breast river with the Des Moines.3 They were guaranteed government protection in their temporary oc- cupancy of the land. Thence, in three years from the date of the treaty, the Indians were to remove westward to a suitable and convenient point beyond the Missouri to be designated by the government, which was to be their permanent and perpetual residence. In compensation therefor, they were to receive an- nually five per centum interest on the sum of $800,000.00. Their debts amount- ing to $258,566.34, were to be paid. Minor provisions of the treaty were: the erection and maintenance of blacksmith and gunsmith shops on the reservation and the employment of workmen for them; ample supplies of provisions for both removals, the cost to be deducted from moneys payable from the govern- ment; each principal chief to receive an annuity of $500 out of the annuity to be paid his tribe, to be used as he might choose, with the approbation of the agent ; the sum of $30,000 to be retained at each annual payment, to be expended by the chiefs, with the approbation of the agent, "for national and charitable purposes among their people,-such as the support of their poor, burying their dead, employing physicians for the sick, procuring provisions, in cases of necessity, and such other purposes of general utility as the chiefs may think proper, and the agency may approve."
A final clause in the treaty contained a generous provision for the widow of the late General Joseph M. Street, Indian Agent, who had been buried side by side with Chief Wapello, on the Des Moines river at Agency City, near Ot- tumwa, Iowa.
1 Parish-Life of John Chambers, Iowa Biographical Series, State Historical Soc., pp. 180-89.
2 Farrell's Indian Affairs, Laws and Treaties, v. 2, p. 546.
3 A point in the northern part of Marion county.
PASH-E-PA-HO "THE STABBER"
A chief of the Sac tribe who in 1841 was in camp on the site of the present capital of Iowa.
BOOK I. THE DES MOINES RIVER.
PART II. GOVERNMENT'S COSTLY ATTEMPT TO MAKE THE DES MOINES NAVIGABLE.
CHAPTER I.
THE NAVIGATION OF THE DES MOINES-THE INCEPTION OF THE PLAN-THE STATE'S INITIATIVE-THE GENEROUS RESPONSE OF CONGRESS.
The history of the Des Moines river would be incomplete without at least a review in outline of the movement begun in the Forties, continuing in the Fif- ties and Sixties and ending in a series of long-drawn-out legal complica- tions haunting every Governor and General Assembly and vexing every Attorney- General, State and National, from the failure of the enterprise in the Sixties down to the long-deferred decision of 'the Supreme Court of the United States in 1902.
The movement, in its inception, was nothing less than one to make the prin- cipal river of interior Iowa navigable from its mouth to its junction with the Raccoon. The success of the gigantic enterprise would have speedily trans- formed the little community at "the Forks" into a great 'metropolitan city, and would have made Polk county prosperous beyond the wildest dreams of the most optimistic settler. It would have given to the farmers of the Des Moines valley a home market readily turning into gold the rich products of their fields and pastures.
Governor Clarke, in his first annual message, December 3, 1845,1 officially inaugurated the movement having for its object a land grant for the improve- ment of the Des Moines in these alluring terms :
"The improvement, by slackwater or otherwise, of that most beautiful of all rivers, the Desmoines, is a subject in which 'deep interest is felt by our fellow citizens, residing in the Western and Southern counties. Coursing, as it does, through a very fertile and densely populated portion of the Territory, this stream once rendered susceptible of steam navigation, would soon become the thorough- fare for a vast amount of inland trade. The practicability of so improving it is generally conceded; but being destitute ourselves of the means necessary to its accomplishment, the question at once presents itself, 'how, and at whose expense, is the work to be done?' At present, we have but one resource to turn to, and that is the general government. Grants of lands have been made in several in- stances by Congress to works of infinitely less importance; and for any reason- able donation of this kind to the improvement in question the government might safely calculate upon being speedily reimbursed, in the increase of its receipts from the lands lying contiguous to the river. A memorial to Congress, setting forth the subject in its proper light, might possibly receive a favorable reception at the hands of that body."
The message of Governor Clarke, a year later,2 officially informs the General Assembly of the speedy action of Congress in response to the memorial of the Territorial legislature,-an act, approved August 8, 1846, granting lands to aid in the improvement of the navigation of the Des Moines river, from its mouth to the Raccoon fork.
The Governor doubted not that the new State would accept this "extensive grant." "The Des Moines," he says, "is known to present fewer obstacles to navigation than any other river within our limits, and its improvement has ever
1 Messages and Proclamations, v. I, pp. 324-25.
2 Messages and Proclamations, v. I, pp. 343-44.
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CITY OF DES MOINES AND POLK COUNTY
been regarded as an object of the first importance. The practicability of so improving it by locks and dams, as to enable reasonably sized steamboats to pass as high as the Raccoon Fork, a distance of one hundred and fifty miles, has been affirmed by engineers of experience; nor, from the regularity of the river, its high banks, rock bottom, and extremely favorable character generally, is it be- lieved the work would be attended with any very heavy expenditure of money [!]. It is an improvement in which nearly one-half of the people of Iowa are directly interested, as furnishing them with an easy, safe and cheap mode of transit for their vast and increasing surplus productions, and one which, when completed, will greatly add to the population and wealth of the State."
Congress had been persuaded to make an extremely liberal grant for the pur- pose of aiding the territory to improve the navigation of the river-not "to make the river navigable" 3-conveying every alternate section of public land on each side and within the limits of five miles from the river. The grant was to become the property of the State of Iowa as soon as the State was admitted into the Union, and was to be devoted to the improvement of the river from its mouth to the Raccoon Fork. The lands thus granted and accepted by the State, upon the conditions imposed by Congress, were to be selected by agents to be appointed by the Governor and could only be disposed of as the work of improvement of the river progressed. Governor Clarke appointed three commissioners to select the lands. But it afterward appeared that it was not expected that they should proceed in the discharge of the task assigned them until further advised. It re- mained for the First General Assembly of the State to take such action as might be found necessary to make the donation available.
Governor Clarke estimated that at least two-thirds of the entire donation was occupied and claimed by settlers, many of whom, under the expectation of obtaining a title to their lands at the minimum price, had made extensive im- provements. In his judgment a change of proprietorship should not be per- mitted to place these claimants in a worse condition than they were at the time, either by increasing the price or by shortening the period allowed for payment. He recommended that the State should enact a special preemption law, giving the claimants the privilege of entering their homes at $1.25 an acre, and should prescribe the arrangement and execution of the work in every detail.4
Iowa legislation in furtherance of "the Des Moines River Improvement," as it was officially termed, began with an act passed during the first session of the last Territorial Assembly, creating a Board of Public Works and empowering the Governor to appoint three commissioners to serve on such Board. The first report of the commission elected by the voters of the State, dated December I, 1848, detailed their organization for work, their hard task to be no less than to make the Des Moines river accessible for steamboats to the Raccoon Forks.
The Board was fortunate in procuring the services of Samuel R. Curtis5 as chief engineer, with Messrs. Wells, Jacobs and Hayden as his assistants. Curtis commenced the survey of the river December 16, 1847. Contracts for the build- ing of locks and dams were let, and the work was vigorously begun.
The first day of March, 1851, was set as the day for final estimates, when all the contracts were to be delivered up in a manner acceptable to the Chief Engineer.
U. S. Commissioner Young, in a letter to Charles Corkery, secretary of the Board, dated February 23, 1848, noting a question having arisen as to the extent of the land grant made to Iowa, by the act of August 8, 1846, gives his opinion that the grant-an "equal moiety, in alternate sections, of the public lands remaining unsold and not otherwise disposed of, within a strip
3 A point made by Colonel Gatch, an attorney in the case. See Annals of Iowa, v. I, P. 355.
4 Messages and Proclamations, v. I, pp. 342-45.
" Afterwards a member of Congress from the first Iowa district, and a major-general in the Civil War.
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CITY OF DES MOINES AND POLK COUNTY
five miles in width on each side of said river, to be selected within said Territory -- entitled the State to the alternate sections within five miles of the Des Moines river, throughout the whole extent of the river, within the limits of Iowa." 6
This opinion seemed to the Board to remove "all ground of cavil as to the extent of the grant." The same literal construction seemed also to extend the grant beyond the new limits of Iowa, for the language of the act, "within said Territory" covered a region extending from sixty to ninety miles north of the State line subsequently designated by Congress. But, after this construction, Commissioner Young advertised a part of those same State lands for sale! The Board called the Commissioner's attention to the "error;" but the sale went on, and portions of the State lands were sold by the Commissioner. The Board, called the attention of the legislature to this inconsistency and urged im- mediate action, since the success of the improvement depended on the extent of the grant. It was recommended that Congress empower the selection of other lands in lieu of the State lands sold by the Government land officers.
The Board represented that the country was "well settled in the vicinity of the river for some twenty miles above the Raccoon Forks, and sparsely settled as high up as the Boone Forks," adding, "it will not be many years before that country will be inhabited by an enterprising people who will demand that the im- provement shall be continued into this region." 7 Farther on the report reads :
"Already the neighborhood of the Forks and all the country east of it, is anxiously desiring the completion of the improvement in order to send off accu- mulating stores of corn, wheat, pork and other commodities. These demands have induced the board to anticipate the proceeds of sales, and the contracts already let are so constituted as to progress, though the payments must await the sale of the lands; but with abundant means which, with the aid of the State, can be obtained in advance of a sale of lands, these contracts can be sooner ac- complished, and others put in progress."8 The Board recommended the issuance of bonds, believing that the Improvement so expedited, would enhance the value of the unsold lands of the State, and so warrant the issue.
Here, almost at the outset, was laid the basis for well-nigh interminable law- suits,-these varying interpretations making all the difference between about 300,000 and 1,300,000 acres.
6 Senate Journal, 2nd G. A. Appendix C-Report of Board of Public works, p. 349.
7 Senate Journal, 2nd G. A. Appendix C-Report of Board of Public works, p. . 51.
8 Senate Journal, 2nd G. A. Appendix C, p. 359.
-
CHAPTER II.
THE WORK IN PROGRESS-THE HAPPENING OF THE UNEXPECTED.
Engineer Curtis, during his three years' service as chief engineer of the Des Moines River Improvement, made three able reports, the prophetic part of, which, though delightfully optimistic in tone, might all have been realized but for the happening of the unexpected which so often defeats the best-laid schemes.
The "Engineer's Report, No. 1"1 is chiefly a report on surveys along the lower Des Moines from Ottumwa to the Mississippi, and specific recommenda- tions as to locks and dams.
It is remarkable that the present-day arguments for making the Des Moines river navigable by means of locks and dams should so closely repeat the argu- ments of Engineer Curtis.
In his second report2 (March 20, 1848) the engineer maintains that freight between St. Louis and Council Bluffs via the Des Moines would be at a saving of 92 cents per hundred pounds over the Missouri river route, with a corres- ponding saving in time and insurance. His figures are as follows :
Freight, per hundred, St. Louis to St. Joseph, via the Missouri, as quoted in the papers 1.50
From St. Joseph to Council Bluffs, .50
$2.00
Freight, per hundred, St. Louis to Keokuk, via the Mississippi, as quoted : .12 Add freight on the Des Moines, Keokuk to the Forks of the Des Moines,. . .15 Add freight by wagon from the Forks to Council Bluffs, at rate paid Keokuk to Eddyville 71/2 cents a mile. .80
$1.07
The report continues : "By extending this improvement up the Raccoon river, as far as possible, and adopting a rail plank road, or other means to cheapen the transit across the Forks to Council Bluffs, the difference will be more in favor of this route, and must secure the trade of that point."
"No other river can compete with the Des Moines in susceptibility of per- manent improvement in this region, and in competition with this design. Neither can a railroad injure our prospects. Transportation on water, where large crafts, such as flatboats, keel boats, and steamboats, can easily float ; will always be much cheaper than on railroads. The heavy products of a count [r]y, such as the agricultural and mineral, will always pursue the channels of rivers when large boats can navigate them; and such is the character of the Des Moines improvement that flatboats, and even rafts may pass down.
"I would not discourage the progress of railroads. On the contrary I re- gard them of equal if not greater importance than canals. They will carry travel and light transportation, even in competition with the best steamboat navigation. They are especially applicable to a populous country on great lines
1 Senate Journal, 2nd G. A. Appendix C, p. 367.
2 Senate Journal, 2nd G. A. Appendix C, pp. 398-99.
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No 395 Somaville, Sonra, May 14 th 1853
Lett
This CERTIFICATE will entitle Graham or order to The Shares in the Stock of the DES MOINES STEAM BOAT COMPANY, at Twenty- five Dollars per share.
Al Dudok Bousquet PRESIDENT.
SECRETARY. 19-
CERTIFICATE OF STOCK, DES MOINES RIVER STEAMBOAT COMPANY
BY Thattenden The Guardian
ON BOARD
Steamboat DEMOINE BELLE,
Grant Hill
is Master,
Marks.
now in the fall of Rwhich and bound for --
"
2/4.
6 Roch Reabrets
"
10 lacks Tooffer
11
6 Margebende Suques 100 Barelli Salt
11
Bring in good Shiffring order, and marked and numbered as in the margin, and to be delivered in like order and condition, ( damages of l Bliver excepted, Junto Said Consignes. This Is mart Den or to their assignees, he or they fraying Freight and Charges Herem.
In Witness whereof, the Master of said Steamboat huth affirmant to Llevo Bill of Lading, all of this tenor and date, one of which being accomplished, the others to stand voit.
May 1st 1861.
BILL OF LADING-DEMOINE BELLE
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CITY OF DES MOINES AND POLK COUNTY
of thoroughfare. But most of the heavy agricultural and mineral products will float down the channel of our rivers when railroads have intersected them with a thousand lines."
Engineer Curtis's third and last report3 (September 1, 1849) goes over in detail the subject matter of the Report of the Board, bringing out certain mat- ters of interest in this connection.
His observations were as follows: "Racoon Forks are in latitude 41 degrees 24 minutes, 44 seconds-and longitude 93 degrees 37 minutes 7 seconds. These observations show that Fort Des Moines is 12412 miles West, and 73 miles North of the mouth of the Desmoines, and the straight line from the mouth to Racoon Forks is therefore 144 miles; which determines the difference between the straight line and the line of our improvement to be 30 miles. The road usu- ally traveled varies almost the same, and a railroad which may be located on the ridge parallel to the river, would not save much in the distance, compared with the river improvement. The time therefore which will be required to pass this improvement, will be sufficiently reduced to compete with stage travel by road, and the business and travel of the Upper Des Moines country will justify the employment of a line of packet boats between St. Louis and Fort Des Moines, as soon as the improvement can be completed. Steam boats of 500 ton burthen run on the Muskingum improvement where the locks are much smaller than those we are constructing on the Des Moines. Transportation of freight will therefore be cheaper, even if it is made to pay the same exorbitant tolls."4
The engineer proceeds to illustrate the gain to be derived from the improve- ment, giving estimates which are of melancholy interest to those who know the heart-breaking outcome of it all. He estimates the freight on a barrel of flour from "Racoon Forks" to the mouth of the Des Moines at 25 cents, and on a bushel of wheat at 8 cents. "By flatboats it would cost about one-half that sum." "Go up to Racoon Forks," he says, "and it is certainly fair to say this improve- ment, with its milling and manufacturing power and other inducements, will draw in the trade within 60 miles of Racoon Forks." He sees no prospect of a rival, and "cannot doubt the reasonable prospect of this point being the center of busi- ness for a country one hundred miles West and North-west of it."
Referring to "the Desmoines coal field" Engineer Curtis speaks of finding coal "in many places in bluff banks, where it can be wheeled directly from the mine into the boat." Even with the then present inconveniences, it was "deliv- ered at the mouth of the coal bank at Fort Desmoines at 212 cents per bushel." This was a five foot bank belonging to a "Mr. Van." He "found the strata of coal in different places to vary from two to eight feet in thickness." He found gypsum near Fort Des Moines "in large cliffs of inexhaustible masses," and building stone at "Red Rock" and other points below the Fort. He eloquently pictures these "noted landmarks that have stood for ages as silent and gloomy
sentinels, guarding the clear bright river that flows at its base," as in the near future "rent by the blast and broken by the workmen; and their fragments removed and erected into mansions which will adorn the cities of the Mississippi, and the valleys and hills of the surrounding country."
With this pleasing bit of optimism, Engineer Curtis disappears from the his- tory of the Des Moines River Improvement.
The documents relating to "this proposed improvement" published in 1850 are full of interest to the reader who would follow the after-complica- tions of the case. The Board of Public Works, Messrs. William Patterson, Jesse Williams and George Gillaspy, took ground5 that the grant of land to the State, in aid of the Des Moines River Improvement was expressly from the mouth to
3 Senate Journal, 3d G. A. Appendix D, p. 86.
4 Senate Journal, 3d G. A. Appendix D, v. I, p. 113.
Senate Journal, 3d G. A. Vol. I-3
Appendix D, pp. 43-44.
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CITY OF DES MOINES AND POLK COUNTY
the source of the river, extending from forty to sixty miles into Minnesota, a position based upon the decision of Robert J. Walker, Secretary of the Treasury. Later, the Department of the Interior decided that the grant did not extend above "Racoon Forks." Meantime land above the Forks had been "located" by actual settlers.
This unexpected decision, coming at a time when the Board was looking to the sale of lands above the Forks to supply the means with which to progress the improvements, proved disastrous, the sale of lands below the Forks having fallen off, chiefly because of the extraordinary emigration to California. The survey had been made from sixty to eighty miles above Fort Des Moines, and settlements had been made more than a hundred miles above.
An appeal was made to the President by the Iowa delegation in Congress. The President promptly referred the whole matter to the Attorney-General, Rev- erdy Johnson, who sustained the decision made by Secretary Walker, under which the State had acted. Meantime President Taylor died, having taken no action on the opinion of the Attorney-General, and the changes in the Interior Department following his death indefinitely postponed any action on the opinion. It was therefore deemed expedient to suspend operations on the "steamboat canal" for about ten miles above the mouth of the river. There was then an indebted- ness of $30,000, for work done below Farmington, with only $10,000 in the treas- ury. Certificates of indebtedness were issued to the contractors. For the lands sold by the government above the Forks, conflicting with the original grant, the Board recommended that Congress be asked to allow the State to select other lands in lieu of those above the Forks which legally belonged to the State, thus preventing injustice to innocent purchasers.
"The lands sold," says the report, "situated as they are immediately above the prosperous and rapidly advancing young city of Fort Des Moines, are in- trinsically at the present time worth from four to ten dollars per acre, while a similar quantity selected in lieu of them, would never realize to the State over one dollar and a quarter per acre."
The report describes at length the destructive freshets of the late winter and early spring of 1849, the river having risen higher than it had ever before been known to rise. These, with the prevalence of cholera, and the advance of 50 to 75 per cent for labor, occasioned much loss and a vexatious delay. These con- ditions compelled the then Chief Engineer to make many changes in contractors and terms of contract. The Board advised a loan on the improvements, to raise money necessary to vigorous action, assuring the General Assembly that "when the difficulties shall have been overcome in this portion of the river by slack- water and the canal, a continuous steamboat navigation will have been accom- plished to Fort Desmoines, for from two to four months each year, which will be productive of vast benefits."
1143122
CHAPTER III.
NEW COMPLICATIONS.
The State, through Commissioner Gillaspy and Register Antwerp, made a contract with Bangs Brothers & Company of New York for the vigorous pros- ecution and speedy completion of the improvement. The firm failed, both in pushing the work toward completion and in remitting for work done. The State drew on the firm and its paper went to protest. The contract was de- clared forfeited. An attempt was then made to interest other eastern capital in the enterprise; but the passage of the Homestead act at this time, deterred timid capital from investing in lands which might be brought into ruinous com- petition with cheap government lands.
The handwriting on the wall-the cabalistic word "Railroads"-was clearly seen by the public in 1852, thereby adding to the perplexities of the commis- sioner. The report takes up the question: "Will the railroads entirely supercede the canals, or lead to the abandonment of any of our important rivers as chan- nels for transportation?" Without underrating the railroads, the report makes a strong argument for the canalization of rivers.
In 1852 Commissioner Gillaspy presented to the State the alternative of a twenty-five-year contract, with the deeding of all the land remaining under the grant, to Messrs. Page & Bacon, St. Louis bankers, or the issuance of bonds by the State in violation of its non-debt-creating policy. The State accepted neither horn of the dilemma: it appointed an investigating committee, and sat down to wait results !
The report would be incomplete without a bit of reassuring prophecy : "Rail- roads may be built, and will be built rapidly," it says, "when once commenced- which will be ere long; and by the score in after years-probably within the 19th century ; and, when so built, they will be of noble benefits to the people, and advance, with giant strides, the wealth and power of the State. Yet, build as many railroads as we may, the Desmoines River Improvement, once finished, from the mouth of the river to Fort Desmoines, will, we repeat, remain forever Iowa's great work, occupying the position which the great Hudson and Erie Canal does to New York, and the Baltimore and Ohio railroad to Maryland."
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