USA > Iowa > Louisa County > History of Louisa County, Iowa, from its earliest settlement to 1912, Volume I > Part 32
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John Hale enjoyed to a remarkable extent the respect and confidence of neigh- bors and acquaintances. He was a school teacher, township clerk, justice of the peace, assessor, school director and secretary of the school board. In 1856 he was elected clerk of the district court and held that office for fourteen consecutive years. He was admitted to the bar while he was still clerk and soon after became a member of the firm of Hurley & Hale, long known as one of the leading firms of the county. Later he became a member of the firm of Hale & Hale, having taken his worthy son Oscar into partnership with him, and he was a member of that firm at the time of his death.
In early life Mr. Hale was a whig in politics and was an active member of the republican party from the time of its organization. It is safe to say that no man who ever lived in the county was ever better informed than Mr. Hale in regard to its early history, and that no one has ever done more to preserve that history and to keep alive the old settlers' organizations than Mr. Hale. He was also a man possessing a keen sense of humor, a good story teller and a good writer of machine poetry on any occasion or any subject. He was also a sincere lover of nature and knew all the wild and tame flowers and shrubs that grow in this vicinity, and always had plenty of flowers about his own premises.
It was the melancholy pleasure of the writer to deliver the address at the funeral of this worthy pioneer, and to pay him the following tribute of respect :
"Friends : We are here to mourn. We are here also to rejoice. We mourn the loss of John Hale, the husband, the father, the brother, the friend, the com- panion, the lawyer, the citizen, the man. But we rejoice that his long and useful life was spent among us, and that we were permitted to know him, and to love him, and to be known and loved by him. We rejoice that in commemorating him, his virtues and character permit us to give full rein to the promptings of our hearts, knowing that we can say nothing true of him that is not good, and nothing good that is not also true. When asked to take part in this service I turned instinctively to the precious paper, now in my possession, written by Mr. Hale concerning my own father. Its first sentences
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are so expressive and appropriate, and tell so plainly why he would not have us unduly mourn for him, that I cannot help applying them to him: 'In the fullness of years he has laid down the burdens of life, and while we cannot but have a natural feeling of regret that we will no more meet him in his accustomed place, yet our better reason tells us that we should feel glad that we have been favored so long by his presence. A life spent as his has been, and spared so long, and ended only when his labors seemed complete, leaves no cause for rational sorrow at its close.'
"And so, in the presence of death, let us think of his life. Let us remember, as he would have us, that life and death are equally certain, and equally common to us all. It is not my purpose at this time to attempt to review the life of our beloved friend. His history is familiar to practically all who are here. And why should it not be? He was the oldest Mason in the county. He was the oldest Odd Fellow in the county. He was the oldest lawyer in the county. He was the oldest man in the county who ever held an important county office, and he held that office as long, I think, as any other man. The universal testimony of those who knew him, is that, in every walk of life, his walk was upright. In every relation of life he was honest, sincere, kind and true. In a time when most people have gone money mad, he neither worshiped the 'almighty dollar.' nor the things for which it stands. But he has left to his family, and to us, a heritage far above wealth or riches. He has left the memory of a man faithful to every trust, and true to every friend, and has exemplified, in a life of over eighty years, the defini- tion of pure religion which we find in the good book: 'Pure religion and unde- filed, before God and the Father, is this, to visit the widow and the fatherless in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.'
"As a lawyer. Mr. Hale worked for his clients rather than for himself. He believed in the peaceful settlement, rather than in the strife and war of litiga- tion. He applied to the work of his noble profession the sentiment of the great orator who said: "As the cedars of Lebanon are higher than the grass of the valley ; as the heavens are higher than the earth ; as man is higher than the beasts ; as he that ruleth his spirit is greater than he that taketh a city; so are the virtues and victories of peace greater than the virtues and victories of war.'
"His activities in the profession have long since been taken over by his worthy son and partner, but to the old settlers of the county, and to all who take an interest in their history, his death is a loss which cannot be repaired. His was the life, more than any other one, which linked the present of the county with its past. Thus another pioneer has gone. Another of our state builders has ceased his work. But what a work they have left behind them !
"'They built the state more glorious than they thought. Those simple carvers of an earlier time. Though rude the tools, and few, with which they wrought. The passing years have made their work sublime.'
"But what of those pioneers who have gone before? Are they building an- other state? Are they plowing in other fields, or practicing in other courts? The
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unanswered question of the centuries comes back to us, as it came to the patriarch of old, 'If a man die, shall he live again?'
"Today we can at least make answer in the heautiful words of the poet :
"'To live in hearts we leave behind, Is not to die.'"
The story of Louisa county would not be complete without a sketch of Francis Springer, and it might not be considered appropriate for the editor of this his- tory to write it. We take the following from Mr. George Frazee's pamphlet, en- titled "Our Judges," which was published at Burlington in 1895 :
"Judge Springer was born in Maine. April 15, 1811. His father, Nathaniel Springer, was a shipbuilder at Bath, of Swedish descent, ruined financially by the embargo. His mother, Mary Clark, was a daughter of Captain John Clark, said to have been a member of the 'Boston Tea Party' of December 18, 1773. subsequently engaged in navigation, and a sufferer from French spoilation prior to 1800, claims for part or all of which were at last allowed and paid to his heirs in 1891.
"At the age of eleven years Francis became a member of a farmer's family in Strafford county, New Hampshire, where he made his home for the next ten years, working on the farm and getting such education as was attainable in dis- trict schools, where 'reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic' were taught during the win- ter, in the intervals some instruction from friends, and in his eighteenth year a full term at the Rochester Academy, at the close of which his preceptor certified that he was qualified to teach school. That winter he taught a country school for the enormous compensation of ten dollars a month and board among his family patrons, and the next year attended another term at the academy and taught another country school, and the two succeeding years he taught village schools-one at Rochester and the other at Farmington-pursuing his studies him- self. In 1833 he returned to Maine and the following year commenced the study of law in the office of William Goodenow, at Portland, at odd times acted as assistant editor of the Portland Courier-then owned and edited by Seba Smith, author of the celebrated 'Jack Downing Letters,'-and was admitted to the bar in 1838; and, being attacked by the western fever, in October of that year, in company with his friend, Edward H. Thomas, who had studied law in the office of Stephen Longfellow, father of Henry W., the poet, and was two years his senior at the bar, started for the unknown but attractive 'far west.' The two came by steamer to Boston, thence by rail and steamer to New York, by rail to Harrisburg, by canal boat to Pittsburg, crossing the mountains by the aid of a stationary engine, by steamer from Pittsburg to St. Louis, by stage to Jackson- ville and thence in open wagon to Burlington. The two pilgrims were seven weeks on the way, including their stoppages for a day or two at the several points mentioned, where they met and conversed with some of the most prominent pub- lic men of those days, to whom they had letters of introduction. They had in- tended to locate in Illinois, but at Cincinnati, upon the advice of Judge Storer,
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they changed their destination to Iowa, reaching Burlington on Sunday, the 21st day of December, and on that night had a jolly time with the members of the bar, who speedily discovered the musical and social talents of Mr. Thomas, the meeting being followed by an illumination, caused by the burning of a new build- ing in which it was held-ignited, as was supposed, by the accidental dropping of a cigar among the shavings.
"The legislature was then sitting, and they remained in Burlington about a week, making acquaintances with many prominent men of the territory. As a result of their inquiries, they decided to locate in Louisa county. On December 27th they started for Wapello on foot; passed the night in a two-roomed log cabin, ventilated by such openings between the logs as enabled them to watch the stars from their beds, and in the afternoon of Sunday reached Wapello and met there an 'old settlers' welcome.'
"Louisa county then contained about 1,200 inhabitants. The courts were held in a log cabin, and the grand jury deliberated in an adjacent ravine. Messrs. Springer and Thomas were the first lawyers located there, and at the first term of the court (April, 1839) were retained in forty cases, contested by such attor- neys as Alfred Rich, Hugh T. Reid and Philip Veile, of Lee ; David Rorer, M. D. Browning, W. W. Chapman, James W. Woods, James W. Grimes, and Henry WV. Starr, of Des Moines ; Stephen Whicher, Ralph P. Lowe, William G. Wood- ward and Jacob Butler, of Muscatine-all of whom are now deceased.
"In 1840 Judge Springer was elected a member of the legislative council from the district composed of Louisa and Washington counties and the country west of them, for the third and fourth general assemblies-the third meeting at Burlington, November 2, 1840, and the fourth at Iowa City, convening Decem- ber 2. 1841, and adjourning February 18, 1842. At the general election, in 1842, he was elected from the same district a member of the fifth and sixth general assemblies, the last of which adjourned February 16. 1844. The first state elec- tion was held October 26, 1846, at which Judge Springer was chosen state sena- tor, and served as such in the first and second general assemblies, the last of which adjourned January 15, 1849. In the summer of 1849, and again in 1850, he was appointed special agent of the postoffice department to visit the postoffices in Wisconsin and collect government moneys and transfer them to St. Louis. In May, 1851, he was appointed by President Fillmore, register of the land office at Fairfield, which office he held until May. 1853. Returning to Wapello, he re- mained there a few weeks and then removed to Columbus City for the purpose of improving his health and improve some farm lands he owned near that place. In 1854 he was elected prosecuting attorney for Louisa county, became ex-officio county judge upon the death of the former occupant, and was elected to that position in 1855. In 1856 he was a delegate to the first national convention of the republican party, which convened at Philadelphia, June 17th of that year, and nominated Fremont for the presidency, and where he met Henry Wilson, of Massachusetts (afterwards senator and vice-president of the United States), who professed that he had been his pupil at Farmington. In the same year he was nominated and elected a member of the constitutional convention which was held at Iowa City in January, 1857, was unanimously nominated by the republican members as their candidate for the presidency of that body, and was duly elected over Judge Hall, the democratic choice. In 1858 he was elected judge of the dis-
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trict court for this judicial district, was re-elected in 1862, and again in 1866, and served until November, 1869, when he resigned to take the office of collector of internal revenue for the first Iowa collection district, made vacant by the resigna- tion of General Belknap, who became secretary of war under President Grant, and in this office he remained until 1876.
"Judge Springer was married in December, 1842, to Miss Nancy R. Colman, daughter of Hon. John M. Colman, of Iowa City, a native of Kentucky. She was born in Terre Haute, Indiana, January 8, 1825, and died of pneumonia, at Cimarron, New Mexico, November 12, 1874, while visiting her son Frank. Six sons and two daughters were the fruits of their union. Two of the sons died in infancy and one of the daughters in her second year. Of the sons, Frank, the third, has acquired a high reputation in New Mexico, as a lawyer of great ability ; Warren C. was drowned while bathing in the Iowa river, in 1872; Arthur, the fifth son, is an able lawyer residing at Wapello: and Charles, the youngest son, has resided in New Mexico since 1881, engaged in the stock and ranch business. The only surviving daughter, Nellie, is the wife of Hilton M. Letts, and resides at Columbus Junction.
"In person, Judge Springer is somewhat above medium height, rather slender than stout. In his manner invariably courteous and affable, and in temper and disposition agreeable and kind. As a judge he honored the bench by its occu- pancy ; able, conscientious, impartial, prompt, considerate ; his three successive elections sufficiently assure us that he was as popular with the public as he proved himself satisfactory to the bar. At this writing (May, 1895) he still lives, at the age of eighty-four years, to enjoy the blessing of a well spent life, the love and reverence of his numerous descendants and sincere affection and esteem of the community in which he has lived so long and served so faithfully."
On Monday afternoon, April 11, 1911, a committee of the Des Moines County Bar Association presented to the district court then in session, a portrait of Judge Springer, which had been donated by his son, Frank Springer, of Las Vegas, New Mexico, in response to a previous request of the bar association. A number of speeches were made on that occasion, and we take the following quotation from the remarks made by Judge J. C. Power :
"Judge Springer's claim to honor does not depend upon anything that we may say here. Peculiar circumstances may for a moment bring those who are very unworthy of recognition into places of power and influence, but without worth they disappear as speedily as they came into view ; but Judge Springer's reputation is built upon a more enduring foundation. On that December day when he and his future associate in practice, Mr. Thomas, started to walk from Burlington to Wapello, with the view of finding a permanent location, he was practically unknown in Iowa; and yet in a year from that time he had been called by the people of the community in which he had cast his lot, to represent them in an important capacity, and for nearly forty years thereafter, possibly without single interruption, and without at any time ever having met a sugges- tion that he was an office seeker or a mere politician, Judge Springer was called upon to fill positions of continually increasing importance, and discharged all of the duties incident to such responsibilities in such a way as to reflect great
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honor to himself. and to the satisfaction of the people at large. This fact is a more eloquent tribute to his worth and ability than can be expressed in words."
We take the following extract from the remarks made by Judge W. S. Withrow :
"Francis Springer, whose portrait, with others, we here today accept, was one of the men who gave freely of ability and strength in the constructive days of our statehood. As has been said by Mr. Blake, he was the president of the constitutional convention of 1857, which prepared and submitted to the people of the young state for their adoption, the constitution which is yet our fundamental law. So well was that work done by Judge Springer and his less than two score associates, that after more than half a century of growth and achievement under it, with but few amendments, that instrument meets in full measure the needs of this commonwealth. The men who did that work built for the future of a virile, hopeful and peaceloving people, safeguarding the rights of the living and of generations then unborn, as does the master engineer in a material way build for the needs and comforts of tomorrow. Judge Springer thus stands in history as the head of that pioneer body of lawmakers who constructed enduringly and well for his chosen state. It was fitting that upon the conclusion of that work he should assume the duties of the bench, and in the old first judicial district, of which Des Moines county was a part, en- force the laws which were based upon that constitution, and uphold the rights guaranteed under it. And this for ten years, as we are told, he did with dignity. ability and impartiality, at all times seeking to do exact justice under the law."
Francis Springer died at Columbus Junction, October 2, 1898.
One of the pioneers of whom personal mention should be made was William P. Brown, who was born in Kentucky, October 25, 1793, and was married in Jefferson county, Indiana, to Miss Alice Crawford, who was a native of Virginia. Mr. Brown came to Louisa county in a very early day in 1837, or 1838, and entered a claim in Morning Sun township. It is said that his first trip out here was on horse back, and that he came again in 1838 and built his log cabin, the first one built in that part of the county. To raise this log cabin, it took the united efforts of all the settlers living within a radius of ten miles, and also two gallons of whiskey. Mr. Brown came here with his family in 1839. He died January 28, 1865. He was one of the most active and influential men in his part of the county and was always ready to do his part toward the promotion of any public enterprise. He tried to have the Burlington and Louisa county plank road, which extended as far north as Dodgeville, continued as far as Morning Sun, and he built a bridge across Honey creek for this purpose. He was many times elected a justice of the peace. He was also the first postmaster in Morning Sun, having been appointed at the time that office was established, on June 19, 1851.
Damon Noble Sprague was born at Exeter. near Cooperstown, New York,
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March 21, 1832. Mr. Sprague's ancestors settled in Rhode Island early in the eighteenth century and many of them took part in the Colonial or Revolutionary war. Mr. Sprague's father, Jenks S. Sprague, was quite a noted physician in his day and was at one time president of the New York State Medical Society. Mr. Sprague received his education at the common schools and at the age of seventeen began teaching and boarding around among the scholars, and in this way he earned money to pay his way through college. Ile attended the Hlart- wick Seminary and the Delaware Collegiate Institute and a little later began studying law in the office of Spencer & Kernan, at Utica, New York. Roscoe Conkling was at the same time connected with this law office. Mr. Sprague was admitted to the bar in 1854, and in April of the following year located at Wapello. In 1856 he formed a law partnership with Colonel John Bird, which continued until 1860. Mr. Sprague was elected representative from the "Alotorial" district of Des Moines and Louisa counties in 1857. defeating General Fitz Henry Warren in the two counties by sixteen majority. Mr. Sprague was elected district attorney of the old first judicial district composed of the counties of Louisa, Lee, Des Moines and Henry, and was re-elected in 1874, defeated by T. A. Bereman in 1878, and again elected in 1882. After his first election as district attorney. Mr. Sprague moved to Keokuk, where he made his home until 1886, returning then to Wapello. Mr. Sprague was always a democrat in poli- tics, but was a strong supporter of the Union during the Civil war and made the first Union speech in Louisa county. He was an active member of the society known as the Sons of the American Revolution, and was president of the Iowa State Society in 1900. During his service as district attorney, Mr. Sprague tried a great many important criminal cases and was accounted one of the most successful prosecutors in the state. Mr. Sprague also took a great interest in the history of the county and was for a number of years president of the Old Settlers' Society.
Mr. Sprague was married, June 25, 1863, to Miss Mary O. Isett, a daughter of E. B. Isett, and a most charming and lovable woman. Mrs. Sprague died in 1899. Her death left Mr. Sprague practically alone in the world and his health and strength declined quite rapidly. He died August 12, 1902, at Richfield Springs, New York, while on a visit there, and was buried in the Wapello cemetery beside his wife and little daughter, Helen.
Mark Davison was born near Hull, England, May 7, 1815, and came to this country when but three years old, the family settling in Washington county. Pennsylvania, on a farm. He was married there, in June, 1838, to Miss Eliza Linton, and the marriage ceremony was performed by Ephraim Blaine, justice of the peace, and the father of the late James G. Blaine.
Mr. Davison removed to Iowa in 1840, accompanied by his brother-in-law, Nathan Linton, and both resided in the southern part of the county. Mr. Davison began business as a merchant in Wapello in 1847. and for the remaining fifty years of his life he was closely identified with the business interests of the community and with the public affairs of the county, and deservedly ranks
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as one of the most prominent and successful of our early settlers. He dealt in nearly all kinds of merchandise, bought and fed cattle and hogs, bought grain and had a large warehouse, or packing house, where he stored the grain and packed pork. His first warehouse or packing house was between Van Buren and Mechanic streets, fronting on the alley not far from the back part of D. C. Thomas' store. In the early days the most of the hog meat brought in was already dressed, as there was very little slaughtering then done in Wapello. Later, about 1859 or 1860, Mr. Davison did some business in the old Isett packing house down near where Lou Bourn now lives. Probably few people know that in the early days before corn shellers came into use, the shelling of corn was done by the corn being spread out on the floor of the warehouse and boys riding around over the corn on ponies. Our friend E. H. Thomas, of Ottumwa, says that he operated one of these pony corn shellers in Mr. Davison's warehouse years ago.
About 1869 there seemed to be a good opening in Wapello for a banking institution, and Mark Davison and George Jamison decided to start one. In a week or two, however, Mr. Jamison decided that he did not care to go into it but Mr. Davison did, and he sold out his mercantile establishment to his son H. B., and opened a private bank. The bank thus started by Mr. Davison con- tinues to this day and is now known as the Commercial Bank and is one of the strong financial institutions of the county. It is owned and conducted by Mr. Davison's son Joiner, and his grandson, R. D. Mccullough. Besides his mer- cantile business and banking business, Mr. Davison at one time operated a saw- mill over about Port Louisa.
He also owned and operated several good farms. Mr. Davison died in 1897, leaving surviving him three sons: H. B. Davison, who is now president of the Citizens Bank of Wapello; John Austin Davison, who is a prominent banker in Wichita, Kansas; and Joiner Davison, who is president of the Com- mercial Bank of Wapello. He left also one daughter, Mary, who was at the time the wife of J. B. Mccullough, but who died in 1901. Mr. Davison's two older sons, Frank and H. B., were in the army, where Frank died.
MRS. JANE MINCHER
The following article is taken from Mr. Jamison's historical articles in the Columbus Junction Gazette; it was written while Mrs. Mincher was alive, but it describes so well pioneer experiences, that we have made no change in it :
"One of the interesting characters in the history of Louisa county is Mrs. Jane Mincher, who still lives in Wapello, at the age of a little over eighty years. Since a girl of twelve or thirteen she has been identified with the county ; dur- ing the most of that time in Wapello township, though the first several years in Marshall township. Her father, George Key, was an Indian trader some years before he moved his family to Iowa ; was in Burlington about two years. His home was in Crawfordsville, Indiana. He shipped his supplies by flatboat down the Wabash to the Ohio, down the Ohio to Cairo, thence up the Mississippi by steamer to Burlington. These goods were consigned to John S. David, long
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