USA > Iowa > Boone County > History of Boone County, Iowa, Volume I > Part 6
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It cannot be thought for a moment that the crevices between these upper stones in the excavation represented burial vaults, for they certainly did not. There were no outer walls around the square, as some have reported, except at the southeast corner, where a very few stones stood up edgewise. The four logs mentioned are so rotten that they are now good soil.
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INDIAN MOUND UNCOVERED IN BOONE COUNTY FOUR MILES SOUTHWEST OF BOONE
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This mound was built exclusively for burial purposes, and it is this class of mounds in which the relics are found. Those classes of mounds which were built for fortifications and those that were built for sacred purposes contain few relics.
In none of the excavations thus far made has any inscription been found to show who the Mound Builders were or in what age they lived. The Union Historical Society thinks it probable that these people were overpowered by the Indians who came down from the North. A remnant of the Mound Builders was driven into Mexico and their descendants were found there when Cortes invaded that country and conquered it.
Prof. S. Ellis, in his standard history of the United States, Vol. 1, page 28, says : "At first the belief obtained that the Mound Builders were a distinct race from the Indians, but it is now generally supposed that they were simply the ancestors of those people." Pro- fessor Ellis does not say how it was that the Indians annihilated their ancestors and took their country from them, which is a strange treat- ment for a people to administer to their forebears.
The Encyclopedia Britannica, in a sketch of the Mound Builders, advances the idea that they were an agricultural people and derived the main part of their sustenance from that source. That in time a part of their race ceased to be agriculturists and became hunters. Finally trouble arose between the two branches, and this trouble led to war, in which the Mound Builders were overcome and extin- guished by the hunters, who were the better warriors. In the Indians we have the descendants of the hunters, who were the offshoot of the Mound Builders.
All of these conclusions are based more or less upon conjecture, having no solid foundation on which to rest. The time may come when some light will be thrown upon this inquiry ; but until then, the question as to who the Mound Builders were, or when they lived, will remain an unsolved problem. At present we simply have the traces showing that they were once herc, but from whence they came and where and why they went, has not yet been answered. The chances are it never will be.
CHAPTER IV
THE INDIANS
According to Quaife, in his book entitled "Chicago and the Old Northwest," the Sac and Fox Indians had a village of fifty-five lodges on the west bank of the Des Moines River, sixty leagues from its mouth. This, Mr. Quaife thinks, would locate the village about where Des Moines, the capital city, now stands. He says a battle was fought here between a company of French soldiers under the command of De Noyelles, aided by some Indian allies, in which the Sac and Fox warriors came out victorious. The date of this battle, he says, was the year 1734. He further says that the Sac and Fox Indians had just come from Wisconsin into Iowa at that date. If he is correct in his statement and his dates, his is the only definite date of the location of the Sac and Fox Indians in Iowa. That of most other writers is based on conjecture.
The other writers convey the idea that the Sacs and Foxes never lived in Iowa until Black Hawk and Keokuk were in the prime of life and when both of them were chiefs of great influence. Black Hawk was born in 1767, thirty-three years after the date of the battle at the Raccoon Fork as set forth in Mr. Quaife's book. Keokuk was born in 1780, which is forty-six years later than the battle of the Raccoon Fork.
At the time of the treaty of 1825, the Sac and Fox Indians owned about all of the land in the present State of Iowa. If they did not locate in Iowa until the time of Black Hawk and Keokuk, it is plain that they did not come until about the year 1810. If this were true it would have been impossible for them to have possessed all of this beautiful land in the short space of fifteen years. This is a good proof of the claim of Mr. Quaife that the Sac and Fox Indians came to Iowa as early as 1734. Mr. Quaife, it will be seen, has given us the only definite date of the coming to Iowa of the Sac and Fox Indians, the location of their first village, and the first great battle fought by them within the bounds of the state. It seems strange indeed that, after becoming masters and owners of all the beautiful
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Territory of Iowa, they should so soon have relinquished their right and title to it. There was nothing to compel them to sell their lands if they had not chosen to do so, except in the case of the Black Hawk Purchase, which was a forced relinquishment, to pay the expense of the Black Hawk war. This purchase was made in 1832, and con- sisted of a strip of land fifty miles wide and extending from the neutral ground to the north boundary line of the State of Missouri. October 11, 1845, thirteen years from the date of the Black Hawk Purchase, the last vestige of title to the beautiful Territory of Iowa passed to the United States.
Their cessions were made as follows: In 1830 two cessions were made. One of these was the neutral strip, twenty miles wide, which was bought from the Sac and Fox tribes in that year ( 1830) by the Government to be added to a similar strip purchased from the Sioux Indians, making in all a strip forty miles wide, owned and policed by the United States for the purpose of keeping these hostile tribes apart, thus preventing their almost constant warfare with each other. This strip extended from the Mississippi River on the east to the Des Moines River on the west. The other one was the cession of all their right, title and interest in their lands west of the divide between the Des Moines and Missouri rivers. The next cession was the Black Hawk Purchase in 1832. Then came the cession of Keokuk's Reserve, of 400 sections of land on the lower lowa River, in 1836. The next was the cession of 1,250,000 acres of land west of the Black Hawk Purchase, in 1837. The last cession covered all the remaining lands of the Sac and Fox Indians in lowa. This treaty was dated October 11, 1842. By its terms the Indians were to remain on the lands until October 11, 1845. At this date they were to move west of the Mis- souri River. Fort Des Moines was built at the Raccoon Fork May 9, 1843. As soon as the fort was established Keokuk moved his village from Agency City, and located five miles southeast of the fort, on what was called for many years Keokuk's Prairie. While camped here these Indians made many hunting tours in quest of game. The game was found to be more plentiful in and along the belt of timber skirting the Des Moines River than any other place. It is evident that at least three hunting tours were made up the river and into Boone County during their stay near Fort Des Moines.
Tradition has come down from these Indians that a great battle was fought at Pilot Mound between the Sac and Fox Indians, com- manded by Keokuk, and a band of Sioux Indians, commanded by Wamsapasia, a wandering Sioux chief, in which Keokuk was vic-
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torious. There is no date given on which this battle was fought, but it must have been prior to the Black Hawk war. The number of Indian bones found about there is good evidence that a battle was actually fought. This battle and the hunting tours up the river, already mentioned, prove that the great chief Keokuk, his expert hunters and brave warriors, were often on the soil of Boone County years before the coming of the first settlers.
As before mentioned, the first village of the Sac and Fox Indians was built at or near where Des Moines, the capital city of Iowa, now stands. It is indeed a strange coincidence that the last village built by these same Indians, in the state, was also built near the present capital city. The first one was built in 1734, and the last one in 1843. From the time of the building of the first one to that of the last was 109 years. Add to this the three years' time given them in the treaty of 1842, to remain in the territory, and we have 112 years as the full time that the Sac and Fox tribes lived and hunted on Iowa soil. Thus, for more than a century their dominion extended over what is now Boone County, in common with the other parts of their possessions. When they came to Iowa they found the country in a state of nature. They built no houses, fenced no land and made no farms, except for the primitive fields which were tilled by the women of the tribes. They left the country almost exactly as they found it. Had it not been for the records which white men kept of them during their 112 years' stay in Iowa, their history during that period would have been a blank.
When the treaty of 1842 expired, October 11, 1845, with many regrets, wails and sobs, Keokuk and his Sac hunters and warriors took their departure for their new home west of the Missouri River. After a long, weary journey they reached their destination with their wives and children and located near the site of the present City of Ottawa, Kansas. There another village was built, and life in the new home commenced. In 1847, two years after locating there, the great Chief Keokuk died, at the age of sixty-seven years.
About two hundred of the Fox Indians refused to obey the terms of the treaty, and refused to go west with Keokuk. They escaped, went up the river and encamped on and around the two large mounds in the southeast part of Cass Township, in Boone County, where they went to fishing and hunting for a living. Captain Allen, upon learning of their new location, sent Lieut. R. S. Granger, with a com- pany of dragoons, after them. When he returned it was too late to take them to the new home in Kansas, so they were kept at Fort
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Des Moines until the next spring, when they were sent West. A few years ago a stone tablet, now in the collection of the Madrid Historical Association, was found near the largest of the mounds already mentioned, which has attracted much attention. It con- tained the following inscription: "December 10, 1845, Found Two Hundred Indians Hid on and Around This Mound. They cried, 'No Go, No Go,' but took them to Fort D., Lt. R. S. Granger." Fort D. meant Fort Des Moines.
Some of these Indians returned after going to Kansas and, uniting with a band of Pottawattomie Indians, they located on the Iowa River in Tama County. There they purchased a body of land, and they or their descendants are still living in the Tama County Colony. They draw an annuity of about twenty thousand dollars from the Government. This is their part of the price paid for their Iowa lands.
It has been estimated that the average price per acre which the Indians received for their lowa lands was 14 cents. When we con- sider the fact that they subsisted mainly upon the spontaneous prod- ucts of the soil, we are inclined to believe that 14 cents per acre was about as near its value then as $150 per acre is now, under the costly improvements and high cultivation of the present time.
Keokuk was the last of the Indian chiefs who held sway and dominion over the territory of which Boone County is now a part. In many respects he was the greatest of all the rulers in any of the Indian tribes. He was at all times the friend of the white people. He never lifted a finger against them in any Indian war. His valor and prestige as a warrior were won in battle with other Indian tribes. He was always ready to obey the terms of every treaty into which he entered, and that without dispute or protest. When the time of his stay in Iowa expired he took his departure for the country beyond the "Big Muddy." At that time, what is now Boone County, began to be settled by white people, who commenced to build houses, plow the soil, and make farms. In other words, the Indians, who subsisted practically upon the spontaneous products of the earth, gave place to those who would more thoroughly till the soil and live upon its better and more nutritious products.
The Indian graves in Boone County were not so numerous as in those parts of the country where the larger and more permanent villages were located, but some of them have been found in the county. In the vicinity of the mouth of Honey Creek a number of them have been found. On being opened, skeletons, or parts of
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skeletons, pipes, flints, guns and powder-horns were found. In a grave opened in the west part of Worth Township by B. F. Hull and Joseph Vontress, beside the bones of an Indian, a pipe, some pieces of pottery and the bit of a copper ax were found.
The pioneer settlers are often asked by the members of the rising generation if any depredations were ever committed by the Indians in Boone County. Those who ask this have heard and read of many outrages committed by the Indians, and they wonder why so little of the kind ever transpired in Boone County. There were two reasons for this. One is that the Sac and Fox Indians never com- mitted outrages upon the white people of Iowa. The other is that they had gone west before the first settler located in this county. There were no Indians claiming the country during the settlement of Boone County.
Although the Sac and Fox Indians were gone before any settler came to this county, the people had two Indian scares after the settlement of the county began. One of these scares occurred in the latter part of the year of the first settlement (1846) when there were but few people in the county. This is fully described in the account of the Milton Lott tragedy, which will be found farther on in this chapter. The other occurred in the spring of 1857, eleven years after the first settler had located in the county. This one was a genuine Indian scare. March 8, 1857, was the date of this, the Spirit Lake Massacre.
Ink-pa-du-tah, and his band of outcasts from the main body of the Sioux Indians, came up the Little Sioux River from the Mis- souri River. He and his inhuman band entered the little settle- ment of Spirit Lake and, after being treated in the most friendly manner, went to work and murdered the whole settlement, except four women, whom they took with them as prisoners. Two of these were brutally murdered and the other two were ransomed and returned to their relatives. The two who were murdered, after being taken prisoners, were Mrs. Noble and Mrs. Thatcher. Those ransomed were Mrs. Marble and Miss Gardener. The latter, about two years after her release, was married to a man named Sharp, and under the name of Abbie Gardener Sharp, she wrote a book, which contained a full account of the massacre, the hardships of the four women prisoners, the murder of two of them, and many other things. It is a very interesting hook. The news of this mas- sacre did not reach Boone County until the ist of April, about a
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month after it occurred. Many settlers left there homes and fled in terror toward the more populous part of the state. As they passed they asserted that Ink-pa-du-tah and his band had murdered all of the settlers north of Fort Dodge and Webster City, and had both of these towns surrounded. This news reached Boonesboro on or about the 6th of April, 1857. A meeting was immediately called and a company of 100 men organized. Judge C. J. McFarland was chosen superior officer ; S. B. McCall was chosen captain ; E. B. Redmon, first lieutenant; J. H. Upton, second lieutenant; Doctor De Tarr, surgeon; and John A. Hull, commissary. Hon. Cornelius Beal locked his house, took his wife behind him on his pony to her father's house on the west side of the river, and started north on his own responsibility, recruiting and gathering up guns as he went. Great indeed was the excitement. Every gun and all the ammuni- tion that could be found was pressed into the service. A ton of flour was confiscated from the store of John Grether, about the same amount of bacon from Clark Luther, all the oats that William Pilcher had, and all the firewater in town. The company was ready to march by 2.30 P. M. Although it was late when the company set out on its march, Hook's Point was reached before going into camp. On the march to Hook's Point many settlers were met, who had abandoned their homes, and were fleeing to a place of safety. They related frightful stories of the depredations of the Sioux Indians under their leader, Ink-pa-du-tah, and they insisted that these murderous demons were coming south, sweeping everything before them. Four large log heaps were built and set on fire, and the men circled around them to keep warm. Pickets were stationed in all directions, with strict orders to keep wide awake and to main- tain a very careful outlook lest the camp should be surprised by the cunning foc, who might be expected at any hour; but the foe did not come, and the wild yell of the murderous savages was not heard.
After a hurried breakfast next morning, the company started for Webster City, about fifteen miles away. They reached that place about 2 o'clock in the afternoon, where they met with a very wel- come reception. The freedom of the city was given them, and they were welcomed into the homes of the citizens. A meeting was called and a vote of thanks was extended to the company for the assistance it had offered and the good will it had manifested. Responses were made by John A. Hull, 1. J. Mitchell, J. H. Upton, and Doctor De Tarr. Evidence was received here that Ink-pa-du-tah and his band were not in the state at that time. The next day the company
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returned home without the loss of a man, the burden of fear was off, and all minds were free again.
THE MILTON LOTT TRAGEDY
Of all the men who acted a part in the settlement of the Des Moines Valley, there is no name around which clusters more of thrilling history than that of Henry Lott. Much has been written about him and his troubles and conflicts with the Sioux Indians, and the death of his wife and son. Many of the statements are misleading. The following is the true story, as nearly as possible to obtain it:
Henry Lott was born in the State of Pennsylvania, grew to man- hood and was married there. His wife was a widow named Hunt- ington and was the mother of a son by her first husband. This son acted a very prominent part in the subsequent history of the Lott family. By her second marriage a second son was born, whose untimely death and the facts and circumstances surrounding it, form the chief theme of this story.
We first hear of Lott in Iowa in the spring of 1843, at which time he was in business as an Indian trader at Red Rock, in what is now Marion County, Iowa. It is said that he did a thriving business there, until October 11, 1845, at which date, according to the treaty of 1842, the Sac and Fox Indians bid adieu to Iowa and moved west beyond the Missouri River.
So well pleased was Lott with his success as an Indian trader, that in the summer of 1846, he moved north from Red Rock and located on the north bank of Boone River, near its mouth. Here he expected to carry on a thriving trade with the Sioux Indians, but for some reason he did not get along with them as well as he had with the Sacs and Foxes at Red Rock. Three reasons are advanced as the origin of the trouble between Lott and Si-dom-i-na- do-tah and his band of Sioux. The author of the "Historic Atlas," in his sketch of Humboldt County, states that the Sioux chief informed Lott that he was an intruder, as he had settled on the Sioux hunting grounds, and he gave him a certain time to leave. His refusal to leave by the time set caused the Indians to make a raid upon his family and stock. The Union Historical Company, in their sketch of the Indian chiefs of Iowa, make the same statement.
When the Sioux chief told Lott that he was an intruder on the Indian hunting grounds, he either uttered a falsehood, or was mis-
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informed himself, as Lott had not located upon the Sioux hunting grounds. According to the map issued by W. S. Tanner, in 1838, the Sioux hunting grounds did not extend farther than the upper fork of the Des Moines River, and this was at least thirty miles north of the place where Lott had located.
Ex-Lieut. Gov. B. F. Gue, in his "Historic Sketch of Iowa," says that Lott's cabin was the headquarters of a band of horse thieves, who stole horses from the settlers in the valley below the mouth of Boone River, and ponies from the Indians above it, then running them east to the Mississippi River and selling them. Mr. Gue thinks it was the stealing of the Indian ponies which brought the wrath of Si-dom-i-na-do-tah and his warriors down upon Lott and his family. There is another story to the effect that Lott had sold whisky to the Indians, and that it was while they were drunk, as a result of this, that they destroyed his property and were the cause of the death of two innocent members of his family.
Among these conflicting statements it is impossible to arrive at the exact cause of the trouble. However, it is certain that the attack was made and by a band of Sioux Indians, who were miles beyond the borders of their hunting grounds, being themselves intruders upon territory already ceded to the United States by the Sac and Fox tribes, and then open to settlement. As to the nature of the attack, it is safe to conclude that the Indians were painted in their usual hideous manner, and that as they surrounded the cabin they gave the blood-curdling war-whoop, which was their custom, and which always struck terror to their intended victims. Lott told Doras Eslick, who settled near the scene of this horror, that he con- cealed himself across the river and watched the Indians destroy his property. Then, as he could do nothing in the way of defending his family or property against the whole band of Indians, he and his stepson, a boy of about sixteen years of age, started for the nearest settlement to obtain help. This left the wife and twelve-year-old son alone. The Indian chief ordered this boy, Milton Lott, to catch all the horses on the place and deliver them over, on penalty of death in case of his failure to do so. This so frightened the poor boy that he fled terror-stricken down the Des Moines River, and was never again seen alive. This left his mother alone, at the mercy of the savages. Some say she fled into the thick timber to escape the toma- hawk, and others that she remained in the cabin and plead for mercy. However, her life was spared, but the nervous shock, together with
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the grief and exposure which she suffered, were the cause of her death a week or so later.
It was three days before Lott returned from the settlements, with seven white men and twenty-six friendly Indians, belonging to Johnny Green's band of Musquawkies and Pottawattamies, then camped on the river below Elk Rapids. The names of the settlers who accom- panied him were: Doctor Spears, who lived on a claim near where the Rees coal shaft is situated; John Pea and Jacob Pea, his son; James Hull and William Hull, of Pea's Point; John M. Crooks and William Crooks, who lived on the Myers Farm, south of Boone.
When these settlers and the friendly Indians, led by Henry Lott, reached the mouth of Boone River, they found that Si-dom-i-na-do- tah, after plundering the cabin and killing and wounding some of Lott's cattle, had retreated up the valley with his plunder and all the horses he could lay hands on, and was now at a safe distance. They found Mrs. Lott in a sorrowful condition, more dead than alive. She had been left alone three days in that wild country, as it was at that time, not knowing what had become of the other mem- bers of her family, nor at what moment the Indians might return to the cabin. We, at this day, surrounded by all the safeguards of civilization, can never realize the crushing grief and sorrow that fell to the lot of this poor woman during those three lonely days and nights, with no one to minister to her wants, or speak a word of cheer. In a short time death came to her relief, and she was laid to rest on the Boone River Bluff, where her grave may still be seen.
Finding that their services were not needed, the friendly Indians and the settlers, except John Pea, returned home. He remained behind to assist Lott and his stepson in caring for the sick wife and mother, and in finding Milton Lott, the twelve-year-old son, who had fled down the river.
It was the middle of December, 1846, when the raid was made upon the family, the weather was cold and the river was frozen over. There was snow both upon the ice and on the ground, so they could follow the boy's tracks. He was thinly clad when he left home, and without doubt suffered with cold from the start. Henry Lott, the father, and John Pea followed his tracks until they reached a point about forty rods below the mouth of a little creek, which comes into the Des Moines River a short distance below the Village of Center- ville, where they found the dead body of the unfortunate boy, stiff and still in the embrace of the piercing frost. At this place he had attempted to climb the bench that separates the lower and upper
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