USA > Iowa > Johnson County > History of Johnson County, Iowa, containing a history of the county, and its townships, cities and villages from 1836 to 1882 > Part 52
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY.
in the door of the middle room, and fell'on his back, dead. He had proba- bly prepared himself with a dose of Prussic acid, and with it ended where he should have begun.
A moment after, we saw them. She lay, as she had fallen. The clouds were clearing away. The sun kissed the flowers that had been her latest care, and passing them lighted up her crown of rich hair, and her blood that besprinkled and stained its glory glistened like jewels. In the front room as he fell lay the damned butcher, who, without cause, excuse or provocation, had rewarded her confidence with abuse, repaid her kindness with beatings, had betrayed the privacies of her life, reduced her fortune, preyed upon her peace and finally murdered her.
Weeping and wandering around were her little girl and boy; sunny memories of happier days were they; heartache and tears only could make answer to their pitiful loneliness.
The murderer's body was taken away, and finally was given over to the Medical Department for a post mortem, to learn if possible the poison that killed him.
The little girl and boy have since died. The mother-in-law is still liv- ing, having fully recovered from her frightful wound in the throat, but not without some ugly scars.
EXCURSION TO DES MOINES-1SS2.
December 6, 1882, the Iowa City Republican led an excursion of citi- zens of Johnson county on a trip to Des Moines. The State Register reported that there were near 700 of the excursionists. The C., R. I. & P. railroad furnished the train; and it was accompanied by the University band and the West Liberty band. At Des Moines the visitors were escorted from the depot to Moore's Opera House, and here speeches of welcome were made by Capt. P. V. Carey, Mayor of Des Moines; Hon. B. R. Sherman, Governor of Iowa, and U. S. Senator Geo. G. Wright. Responses were made on behalf of Iowa City by Dr. E. F. Clapp, and on behalf of Johnson county by ex-State senator S. H. Fairall. Hon. James Wilson, congressman elect from the Fifth district (which includes Johnson county) was also present and made a speech.
After dinner a train of carriages was provided by the Des Moines city council, and many of the excursionists visited the magnificent new capitol building, of which every loyal Iowan feels justly proud. During the excursion day a severe snow storm,occurred, and culminated in setting the thermometer down to 17ยบ below zero at the U. S. signal station in Des Moines.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY.
CHAPTER VII .- PART 2.
PROMINENT CITIZENS DECEASED.
Governor Lucas .- John Gilbert .- Joseph T. Fales .- Capt. F. M. Irish .- Dr. Wm. Vogt,- Hon. Rush Clark.
ROBERT LUCAS, THE FIRST GOVERNOR OF IOWA.
Robert Lucas, the subject of this sketch, was the fourth son and ninth child of William and Susannah Lucas, and was born April 1, 1781, in Jef- ferson county, Virginia, a few miles from Harper's Ferry, where his ances- tors settled more than a hundred years ago. His father, who was descended from William Penn, was born January 18, 1743, and his mother, of Scotch extraction, October 8, 1745. They were married about the year 1760, and reared a family of six sons and six daughters. His father, who had served as a captain in the Continental army during the revolution- ary war, and had distinguished himself at the battle of Bloody Run, emi- grated with his family to Scioto county, Ohio, at the very beginning of the present century. In leaving the slave state of Virginia for the free embryo commonwealth of Ohio, which had not as yet been admitted into the Union, the elder Lucas performed one of those noble and generous acts so characteristic of the better class of those who were bred under the patriarchal system in the olden time. He freed every one of his adult slaves who wished to remain in Virginia, and provided for the younger ones, most of whom he took with him to Ohio, till they became of legal age and able to support themselves.
The early education of Gov. Lucas was obtained chiefly before leaving Virginia from an old Scotch schoolmaster named McMullen, who taught him mathematics and surveying, the latter affording him remunerative employment immediately upon his entrance into the new and unchained country of Ohio.
On the 3d day of April, 1810, Gov. Lucas was married at Portsmouth, the county seat of Scioto county, to Elizabeth Brown, who died Oct. 18, 1812, leaving an infant daughter, the late Mrs. Minerva E. B. Sumner, of West Liberty, Muscatine county, Iowa. On March 7, 1816, he formed a second matrimonial alliance; this time with Friendly A. Sumner, a young lady of twenty years, a native of Vermont, but who had recently immi- grated to Ohio with her father's family from Haverhill, Coos county, New Hampshire. Of this marriage, there were four sons and three daughters. Edward W. Lucas, lieutenant colonel of the 14th Iowa volunteers, was taken prisoner with his regiment by the Confederates, at the battle of Shiloh.
The first public office held by Gov. Lucas was that of county surveyor of Scioto county, the commission from Gov. Edward Tiffin, of Ohio, appointing him such being dated December 26, 1803, when Gov. Lucas
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was in his twenty-third year. The certificate of the associate judge of the court of common pleas is signed by Joseph Lucas, an elder brother, is dtaed January 3, 1804, and shows that more than one member of the Lucas family were people of standing there in that day. On the 16th day of December, 1805, Gov. Lucas was commissioned by Gov. Tiffin a justice of the peace for Union township, Scioto county, for three years.
His first military appointment was that of lieutenant, also from Gov. Tiffin, and dated at the then capital of Ohio, Chillicothe, Nov. 14, 1803, authorizing him to raise twenty men to assist in filling Ohio's quota of five hundred volunteers called for by the president to meet an expected emergency in the anticipated refusal of the Spanish officers at New Orleans to give up to the United States the country of Louisiana, ceded to them by the French republic, and which congress had authorized the president to take possession of. His commission, issued subsequently, was a lieutenant of the third company of militia in the county of Scioto, first brigade, second division, and was dated the 24th of May, 1804. He was subsequently promoted through all the military grades to major-gen- eral of Ohio militia, which latter promition was conferred on him in 1818.
The breaking out of the war of 1812 found Robert Lucas a brigadier- general of Ohio militia, and as such he had much to do in raising troops and encouraging enlistments for Gen. Hull's northwestern army, then organizing for its disastrous march to Detroit and Canada. About the same time he received notice of his appointment as captain in the regular army, and afterwards (July 6, 1812,) was commissioned and assigned to the nineteenth infantry; but before orders or assignment reached him from Washington, he had obeyed the command of Gov. Meigs, of Ohio, to turn out of his brigade twelve hundred men to march to Detroit, and for himself, with a company of men, to repair to Greenville to watch the movements of the Indians, and subsequently to visit Detroit previous to the army marching. Having volunteered his services in the dangerous capacity of a scout, he started with minute instructions from Gov. Meigs and Gen. Hull, or. the 25th of May, 1812, for Detroit, where he arrived on the 3d of June, and returning, met the army in the wilderness, to pilot it back to Detroit. Gov. Lucas' elder brother, Joseph, whom we have before noticed as figuring as an associate judge, was captain of company I, in Col. McArthur's regiment, which formed a part of Hull's army, and Gov. Lucas was enrolled as a member of this company, although he was a captain, unassigned, in the regular army. But his chief employment
was that of a spy, though we find him acting during the campaign in various capacities, scouting, spying, carrying a musket, heading the rang- ers, making assaults, reconnoitering, bringing up trains, piloting the army, etc. On the 12th of July, 1812, the main part of Hull's army, with Col. Lewis Cass at their head, crossed the Detroit river into Canada, opposite Detroit, and with them Gov. Lucas, who was one of the first of the
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invading army to land on the enemy's soil. From July 16 to July 21, there was a constant skirmishing between the American and British forces, especially at a bridge over the river Canaan, five miles from Malden, Canada, where a lively fight occurred, and much confusion taking place in the American ranks, many of the men called on Gov. Lucas to take command, which he was obliged to decline, as their own officers were present.
The civil employments to which Gov. Lucas was called by the execu- tive or the people of the State of Ohio were many, and some of them the highest in the gift of the commonwealth. At the time of his second mar- riage, in 1816, he was, and had been for some time, a member of the Ohio legislature, serving successively for nineteen years in one or the other branch of Ohio's general assembly, and in the course of his legislative career presiding over first one and then the other branch. In 1820, and again 1828, he was elected one of the presidential electors of Ohio. In May, 1832, at Baltimore, Maryland, he presided over the first demo- cratic national convention,-that which nominated Andrew Jackson for his second term as president, and Martin VanBuren for vice president. In 1832 he was elected governor of Ohio, and re-elected in 1834, (defeat- ing Darius Lyman, who ran on the anti-masonic ticket), and declined a third nomination for the same office.
It was while he filled the executive chair that the perplexing and angry controversy arose between Ohio and Michigan concerning the boundary line between these states; and it is a singular coincidence that during Gov. Lucas' administration as governor of Iowa, the very same contro- versy should have arisen between Iowa and Missouri, to be settled finally, as was that between Ohio and Michigan, according to the claims and views of Gov. Lucas.
Gov. Lucas' early residence, as we have before mentioned, was at Portsmouth, Scioto county. From here, in 1816, he removed to Piketon, Pike county, which continued to be his home till his removal to Iowa in 1838.
Under an act of congess "to divide the territory of Wisconsin and to establish the territorial government of Iowa," approved June 12, 1838, the subject of our sketch was appointed by President Van Buren, governor of the territory of Iowa, -- a position which carried with it ex-officio the duties and responsibilities, in addition to those of executive, of superin- tendent of Indian affairs. His commission, transmitted to him by John Forsyth, then secretary of state of the United States, bore date the 7th of July, 1838, and reached him at his residence, Pike county, Ohio, ten days afterwards.
His appointment was effected through the instrumentality of Thomas L. Harner, of Brown county, Ohio, afterwards a distinguished field and general officer in the Mexican war, but then a member of congress from
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Ohio, and to whom President Grant was indebted for his cadetship at West Point, an appointment which, however, had been first offered to Gov. Lucas's son, Edward W. Lucas, but declined.
A journey from the interior of Ohio to the banks of the upper Missis- sippi was then a matter of weeks, and not of hours, as now. So that, although Gov. Lucas set out from his home on the 25th of July, delaying on his route only a few days at Cincinnati, to make arrangements for the selection of the books of the territorial library, for which congress had appropriated five thousand dollars, it was not till nearly the middle of August [August 13,] that he reached Burlington (then the temporary seat of the territorial government), whose citizens received him with the honor of a public dinner.
His family remained at their home in Ohio, and did not all join him in Iowa for more than a year after his appointment, but he was accompanied from Cincinnati to Burlington by'Jesse Williams, as clerk in the Indian department, and by Theodore S. Parvin, as his private secretary.
GOVERNOR LUCAS' COMMISSION.
The original document which commissioned Robert Lucas as governor of Iowa, was presented by his daughter, Mrs. Smith, to Col. S. C. Trow- bridge, and by him placed in the State Historical Society's collection. The following is an accurate copy of it:
MARTIN VAN BUREN, President of the United States .- To all that shall see these presents, greeting :
Know ye, that reposing special trust and confidence in the integrity and abilities of Robert Lucas, of Ohio, I have nominated and by and with the advice and consent of the senate, do appoint him governor of the territory of Iowa, and do authorize and empower him to execute and fulfill the duties of that office according to law, and to have and to hold the said office with all the powers, privileges and emoluments thereunto of right appertaining unto him the said Robert Lucas, for the term of three years from the day of the date hereof, unless the president of the United States for the time being should be pleased sooner to revoke and determine this commission.
SEAL. In testimony whereof, I have caused these letters to be made patent, and the seal of the United States to be hereto affixed.
Given under my hand at the City of Washington, the seventh day of July, in the year of our Lord one thousand, eight hundred and thirty-eight, and of the independence of the United States of America the sixty-third. By the President, M. VAN BUREN. JOHN FORSYTH, Secretary of State.
The State of Ohio: Personally appeared before me the undersigned, one of the justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, Robert Lucas, who was duly sworn to support the constitution of the United States, and that he will faithfully, to the best of his abilities, discharge the duties of governor of the territory of Iowa.
In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this 20th of July, 1838.
JOIIN MCLEAN.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY.
Gov. Lucas' first official act, as executive of Iowa, was to issue a pro- clamation, dated August 13, 1838, dividing the territory into eight repre- sentative districts, apportioning the members of the council and house of representatives among the nineteen counties then composing the territory, and appointing the second Monday in September ensuing, for the election of members of the legislative assembly and a delegate to congress.
His first message to the legislative assembly, after its organization, was dated November 12, 1838.
Gov. Lucas announced in his message of November 5, 1839, to the legislative assembly, that the territory of Iowa had advanced since its organization in improvement, wealth and population (which latter was estimated at fifty thousand) without a parallel in history, and recom- mended the necessary legislation preparatory to the formation of a state government. The governor's recommendation was followed by the legis- lature, but the proposition to form a state government for Iowa was over- ruled by the people, and only consummated in 1846.
Among the latest of Governor Lucas' official acts in his capacity of executive, was a proclamation, dated the 30th of April, 1841, calling the legislature to assemble, for the first time, at Iowa City, the new capital, on the first Monday of December succeeding, in accordance with a legis- lative act passed at the previous session.
The democratic administration of Van Buren having given place to the whig government of Harrison, on the 25th of March, 1851, John Cham- bers was appointed territorial governor of Iowa to succeed Governor Lucas, whose term would have at any rate come to a close by limitation on the 4th of July succeeding.
After retiring from the office of governor of Iowa, Governor Lucas removed to the land, adjoining Iowa City on the southeast, which he had purchased from the government when it was first brought into market, where he spent the most of his remaining days in the management of his farm, the care of his family, and the education of his children. From these grateful employments he was to some extent withdrawn for a time by the people of Johnson and Iowa counties, who elected him as one of their members of the first state constitutional convention; Hon. S. H. McCrory and Hon. Henry Felkner, being his colleagues from this district. He was also a member of the first board of trustees of the State University.
From early youth, Governor Lucas had been a member of the Meth- odist Episcopal Church, and devoted much time to the composition of hymns and verses of a religious character, many of which are by no means destitute of true poetical merit.
He predicted, on account of slavery, the civil war, which since his death has steeped the land in blood. He was warmly attached to the political party whose principles he had espoused in youth; yet he did not hesitate to sever his connection with it when he considered its course reprehensible,
29
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY.
as he did when he withdrew his support from the presidential nominee of his party (Franklin Pierce) in 1852.
In person, Governor Lucas was tall, being six feet in stature, active and wiry. His complexion presented that combination of colors rarely blended-black hair, a fair skin, and blue eyes. His aquiline nose was long and thin. Though stern in camp and council, in private life he was exceedingly gentle, pleasant and kind, the companion of children and the friend of boys, though his daughters contend that he loved his girls the best, while all agree that he was the best of play-fellows. It is therefore unnecessary to add that he was an indulgent father as well as an affec- tionate husband. All men who knew him, even those who differed from him on questions of public polity, accord to him native ability of a high order, incorruptible honesty of purpose, and unswerving patriotism.
Governor Lucas abstained from alcohol in all its forms, from hard cider to modern whisky, and was a member of the first temperance society organized in the United States. Though not rich in humor or wit, he was an exceedingly eloquent and popular stump speaker. Leaving the field of anecdote and pleasantry to others, he dealt in sledge-hammer facts and arguments, presented in a fluent and earnest manner, which carried the crowd.
His death was not the result of disease, but from exhaustation and the weight of years. His physicians, Drs. M. J. Morsman and Henry Mur- ray of Iowa City, were assiduous in their attentions to him, but without avail. On the 7th of February, 1853, full of years and honors, gray-haired and venerable, in the presence of all the members of his family save one, without regrets, struggles, or objections, he quietly passed earth's bound- ary line, to the confines of immortality.
His death occurred just as the Sabbath night had worn into the morn of Monday. Charles Cartwright and Col Trowbridge composed his body for the grave. His funeral took place the succeeding Tuesday, and was numerously attended-the religious services being conducted at the Methodist church, on the corner of Dubuque and Jefferson streets, by the pastor, the Rev. Thomas E. Corkhill, and at the grave by the Masonic order, of which he was a member of high rank, under the superintendence of Hon. Ezekiel Clark and Col. S. C. Trowbridge.
Gov. Lucas' tombstone is one of the historic monuments pointed out to visitors at Oakland cemetery in Iowa City, from which this historian copied the following inscription in July, 1882:
ROBERT LUCAS Died Feb. 7, 1853, Aged 71 ys. 10 ms. and 6 ds.
He served his country in the war of 1812, was elected twice Governor of Ohio, and was the organic Governor of Iowa territory.
I am the resurection and the life; He that believeth in me, though he be dead, yet shall he live.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY.
On another face of the monument is this inscription:
" FRIENDLY A.,
Wife of Robert Lucas, and daughter of Capt. E. C. Sumner. Born in Vermont, May 25, 1796. Died Dec. 18, 1873; aged 78."
Mrs. Lucas was a relative of the distinguished senator and statesman, Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts.
JOHN GILBERT,
is supposed to have been the first white man who ever set foot upon the soil of Johnson county, and his name is identified with many historic inci- dents of the first settlement, from the arrival of Eli Myers and Philip Clark, in 1836, till Gilbert's death in March, 1839. [See article headed "Early Trading Houses;" also, diagram on page 207.] The following sketch of Gilbert's life is from the recollections of Col. S. C. Trowbridge:
"John Gilbert-the trader among this tribe [Musquaka Indians] at this time-I knew well; made his acquaintance soon after my arrival, in 1837; became intimate with him, and to a great extent, shared his confidence. His real name was John W. Prentice, a cousin of George D. Prentice, of the Louisville fournal. He was a remarkable man for the position he occupied. A fine scholar and an excellent business man; far above the average of men in scholarly acquirements and business capacity. Was a native of the State of New York. Lost heavily in canal contracts. That, together with a train of other serious troubles, induced him to abandon his home at Lockport, N. Y., and make a change of name and business. He entered the service of the Green Bay Trading Company at some point in Michigan (then a territory). Learned the Indian language; secured the confidence of the company by his capacity, faithfulness and integrity; was sent to various points among the Indians to establish branch posts; in that capacity came among the Foxes on the Iowa. Died in March, 1839. A few years afterwards his remains were disinterred from their first rest- ing place near his old trading house, by a few of his old friends, among whom were Eli Myers, S. H. McCrory, Philip Clark, Henry Felkner, A. D. Stephens and others, and transferred to the village grave-yard. It was our intention then, and for a long time afterwards, to erect a suitable monument at his grave; but it was neglected from year to year, and was never done. Finally, some miscreant, for some purpose, perhaps for fire- wood, removed the wooden slabs from his grave; and then, among the rapidly multiplying graves of the city cemetery, his was lost. No one can now tell the exact spot where rests the ashes of the first white man that trod the soil of Johnson county."
Capt. F. M. Irish, in his reminiscences, wrote thus about the subject of this sketch:
"It is due to the memory of Mr. John Gilbert to say that the universal testi- mony of those who knew him, attributes all the noble traits that make a
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man. Of fine business qualifications, kind and hospitable, possessing a consummate knowledge of the Indian character and language, he rendered important service to the early settlers, and for the kindness of this gentle- man and that of Mr. Wheaton Chase, they acknowledge themselves deeply indebted."
REMINISCENCES OF JOSEPH T. FALES.
Mr. Fales was for many years a resident of Iowa City, and well known to the early settlers. He was the first State Auditor of Iowa. In the autograph roll of members of the old Iowa City "Far West" Sons of Temperance organization, his name appears plain and distinct. A writer in the STATE JOURNAL, of Des Moines, in February, 1875, gives some reminiscences of early Iowa history, in which Mr. Fales is incidentally mentioned-thus:
In 1835, what is now called Wisconsin, then sometimes spelled Ouiskon- san and later Wiskonsin-Minnesota, Iowa, and all the territory west thereof to the Pacific Ocean, was called Wisconsin territory. Belmont, not very far northeast of Dubuque, was the first capital. That point had been selected by the governor, but at this session Burlington went into the moving business, and succeeded in having the capital removed to Bur- lington. At the first session in Burlington, friend Fales was chosen door- keeper of the house. In July, 1838, all west of the Mississippi and north of the Missouri, was organized as Iowa territory, and the first legislature of Iowa was held in November. Mr. Fales was chosen chief clerk of the house, which contained twenty-five members, the council (now senate) thirteen. He was re-elected in 1839-40-41-42-43-44, thus holding the office longer than any other person. Mr. F. was a democrat, and when- ever he was elected clerk of the house, B. P. Wallace, a whig, was chosen secretary of the council (senate). One time they went to Iowa City and found the politics of the two houses reversed. Now do you suppose that these faithful clerks "flopped over?" Not a bit of it. Their services however were indispensible; 30 the democratic council elected Fales as its secretary, and the whig house chose the whig Wallace as its clerk. No dead lock about that.
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