USA > Iowa > Madison County > History of Madison County, Iowa, and its people, Volume I > Part 3
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There was an Indian village on North River located about the center of the south half of section 6, in Union Township, on lands now or recently owned by J. H. Weidner. This location is about a mile down the river, on the north side, from the North River Bridge on the road due north of Winterset leading to De Soto. As with all other such villages there was a big spring close by and also fine timber and some grass land. This village was occupied probably until the spring of 1845.
Close to the site of this village there was in cultivation perhaps the largest acreage in the county. The Indians at this place bad about sixty acres they planted and cultivated at least for many years up to the summer of 1844. It was unusual for them to grow so large a field to crops. Usually a few acres was the limit and at some of their villages it appears no ground was cultivated. There were several fields on lower Clanton Creek and elsewhere, but nowhere else, so far as is known, was there then in this county as large a farm cultivated by the Indians as at the village above described. These abandoned fields were a great convenience to some of the pioneer settlers who came here, during the first two years.
To the Guye family this large field of cultivated land was of the greatest advantage. This family arrived during the first days of May, 1846, about the same time as the Clanton colony, and shortly after the arrival of Hurst, on sec- tion 36, Crawford Township. The first Guye house was built on the south side of North River, in the bottom, in the very heavy timber near the center of the north half of section 7. and directly south of this large Indian field. This field was used by them during the season of 1846 and they cultivated some thirty acres of it, growing an abundance of corn and other crops. They farmed this
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
land afterward and improved land upon the hill to the south of their first loca- tion on the bottom and where they afterward resided.
The methods of agriculture practiced by these Indians were of the most primitive character and yet usually their crops were abundant. Corn, beans and tobacco were the chief crops planted. A heavy sort of iron hoe was their chief instrument-a type of what used to be known as "nigger hoe." Occasion- ally they had rude instruments made of hard wood, fashioned into a faint resemblance of something that answered the purpose of a plow, to which some- times was attached a pony by thongs of rawhide, but usually pulled by squaws. There were also in general use sharpened sticks, with which they dug up or cultivated the ground. The weeds were disposed of by pulling them up by hand. As the soil was exceedingly rich and loose, comparatively little work was needed in making ready the ground for planting, and after planting, little cultivation was necessary. The main work was to keep down the weeds and as above stated, this was done mostly by pulling them up by hand.
"Women's rights," as known among the Indians since immemorial times, con- sisted in doing all the work about the village or camps. They took care of the meats brought in by their braves, planted, cultivated and harvested the crops and prepared the food for eating. But the latter was a simple process. Some food was eaten raw and what was cooked, was boiled in kettles- great messes of food boiled together. However, sometimes they roasted or baked their green corn, potatoes and even meats, but always the preparation of food was a limited affair. The squaws also gathered most of the wood used for cooking, or for warming their bark huts and tepees in winter. Theirs was the "simple life" indeed; so much so that, after all, their daily toil was not what at first thought it would seem to have been-very little garment making, no sweeping, no house- keeping worth the mention.
The Sac and Fox Indians were among the most civilized of the northern Indians when they left Jowa in 1845. They had been in constant contact with the French and English and Americans for more than a hundred years. Naturally, they were of a milder and less ferocious disposition than most other nations of the American aborigines. Thus they were no match for the Sioux in battle and could not migrate northward. The unmerciful cupidity of the white man forced him on and on toward the setting sun. He had none of the qualities that fitted him for life on the arid Great Plains, and beyond them were the mountain ranges in which he could not dwell. The white man already occupied Missouri on the south. His race was ended-the white man's prisoner henceforth he became, is now and forever must be until the last one has paid the penalty for having existed.
The cemetery for this Indian village (on Cedar) was located near the middle of the north line of the southwest quarter of section 16, in Union Township. This was diagonally about a mile northeast of the village, upon the prairie. As late as 1872 there were occasional reminders found by those cultivating the ground that once Indian burials were made there. It is likely burials were made else- where in the vicinity of the village.
It was learned from a fur trader that about 1840 there was a much used Indian trail leading from this village northeasterly on the long sloping ridge
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
on the east half of the southwest quarter of section 21, on past the Indian ceme- tery and northeasterly toward the old Indian village near the junction of North River and North Branch. This trail followed the divide around North Elm Creek and down to North River in the depression west and north of the present Farris schoolhouse.
There was comparatively little hazel or other small underbrush in that portion of the county. The woodlands were open and the prairie fires kept down the brush that later on grew abundantly, as no doubt it had long before grown.
There still remains a grove that was much larger, on the northeast quarter of the southeast quarter of section 15. in Union Township, now owned by James 11. Farris, a pioneer settler. At this grove there was at different times a small Indian village, or camp. probably there because of the big spring. Some burials were made on land later owned by .A. J. Hoisington, near the southwest corner of the tract previously described.
In Crawford Township, at different periods up to 1845, there were Indian villages and favorite camping places. One was near Patterson, one at the old time Bell grove and spring on section 26, opposite where the railroad curves northeasterly toward Bevington, and another near the west line of section 36, near where Iliram Hurst, the first permanent settler in Madison County, took his claim. There was a band of Indians located there as late as 1845. This vicinity was a favorite place for them both in summer and winter. At the june- tion of Cedar and North River, occasionally small bands of Indians made their winter quarters, but this did not seem to be a favorite point with them for some reason. However, trapping was good in its season.
At the four corners of Ice. Jefferson, Union and Crawford townships occa- sionally fur buyers found a small band of Indians in the winter time.
In Lee Township it is not remembered there were any villages or camps save at Badger Grove, on section 14. This did not seem an attractive point for them, though during the '30s and 'Jos small bands were camped there. White men seldom came that way because of its isolation from larger streams and bodies of timber.
In Jefferson Township the center of Indian interest from about the year 1800 to 1845, and certainly for a long period before that century, was around the junction of North Branch with North River. Occasionally a small band was found temporarily camped in the grove on the old time Waymire Branch, now known as Spring Branch, on section 25, Jefferson Township.
The junction neighborhood of North Branch and North River afforded all the natural advantages required for the high enjoyment and prosperity of these dlusky sons and daughters of Nature. The wilder and more nomadic Sioux found here a winter retreat against the Arctic storm, though in summer time he loved the open on the prairies. In the early years of the century he fought the Algonquin tribes in this region, partly because he loved fighting for its own sake and partly for the keeping of those hunting grounds and winter resting places. And that junction of the streams was one of his favorites. Periodically he fell upon the Sacs and Foxes and many a "brave" on either side hastily departed for the "happy hunting ground" thereabouts in those bloody encounters. Even after the agreement by treaty between the ever warring nations in the
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
early part of the century had given the Sacs and Foxes this region, the bloody Sioux would sometimes swoop down from the northwest prairies to steal the ponies and take the scalps of the more peaceful tribes.
At the junction of those streams there was abundant timber, water, fish. wild footed game and furred animals. Indian life at that point was a surfeit of ease. Up to the year 1845. when the Indians gave possession, always one or more villages existed in the vicinity of the junction of those streams. It was most of the time the lieadquarters of some sub-chief and frequently considerable bands made it their winter quarters, many of the squaws, pappooses and old men remaining all the summers.
Some forty rods north and a little west of the southeast corner of the west half of section 35 there always was a large spring, near which William Schoen settled in the early '50s. This is at the very foot of the divide between the two streams. From this spring westerly the ground slopes up and was originally covered with forest trees. Eastward from the spring there was a small open space covered with grass without a single shrub or tree-about five or six acres in extent. It was densely wooded all around and in those times without under- brush. A short distance north was the branch and but a little way southeast was the river. The streams united about a half mile northeast of the spring. It was an ideal place for winter existence. Since time immemorial there were Indians to be found there, in both summer and winter. Indian fur traders always made this a point to reach and to lay over if necessary. At times there were five hundred or more Indians living thereabouts.
Within the radius of a mile of the big spring, at one time or another, were villages more or less temporarily occupied. One of the most productive points for the finding of Indian stone axes, arrowheads and the like is near and soutli of a strong flowing spring almost on top of the hill on the northwest quarter of the southeast quarter of section 34, in the garden of Charles Addy, and else- where on his place. A short distance east of the spring is a round top hill, the highest in that neighborhood, overlooking many miles up and down the valley. Since the settlement of the country there have been many finds of old time Indian property within a mile of the old spring.
Some tales of Indian times, more or less legendary, or perhaps exaggerated by the ready tongue of the pioneers who carly trapped or hunted or traded among the tribes, have come sifting down to those who later came to till the soil on which they trod.
During the period of the Sac and Fox exclusive occupancy of this portion of Iowa mostly, they buried their dead in the ground and had preferences for particular places of interment. In thus disposing from sight their departed ones. they adopted somewhat the universal custom of the white man with whom they liad been acquainted a long while before migrating here in a body. Occasionally, when one of their number died remote from their burial places, they placed their dead up in a tree top near a stream, fastening the body as securely as possible by use of thongs cut from the tanned skins of wild animals. Convenient to the corpse was also fastened on the tree some food and a vessel containing water. Thus the pioneer Clanton Colony in 1846 found the remains of an Indian on a tree close to the bank of Clanton Creek. An old iron vessel attached Vol. 1-2
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
to the tree soon after disappeared. The earlier settlers occasionally found Indian remains on trees in several localities during the first year of the settlement of the county 1846. But whether the bodies thus disposed of were Saes or Foxes, or belonged to other tribes whose members may have been traveling across this county, the pioneer settlers could not know, as all dead Indians looked alike to them.
The graves of the Sacs and Foxes were not dug to any great depth, and a little bark from a tree was made to answer the purpose of a coffin. The body was usually carried to the grave by old women who howled most piteously as intervals during the ceremony. Before closing the grave, one of the Indians present would wave a stick or war chib called "puc-ca-waw-gun." saying in audible voice in his own language what means in English, "I have killed many men in war and I give their spirits to my dead friend who lies here to serve as slaves in the other world." After this the grave was filled with earth and in a day or two a rude cabin or shed of rough bark was made over it. If the deceased was a brave, a post was planted at the head of the grave, on which in a rude manner the number of scalps and prisoners he had taken in war was represented by red paint. Upon the death of an adult, his property was usually distributed among his relatives, and his widow returned to her own family or nearest kinsfolk. The widow was the principal mourner for the deceased and her grief seemed sincere; her countenance became dejected, she seldom smiled, clothed herself in rags and with disheveled hair and spots of black paint on her face, wandered about in a pensive mood, seldom shedding tears except when alone in the woods. Generally they ceased mourning on the suggestion of some friend, upon which occasion they washed, painted themselves red and put on their best clothes and such ornaments as they might have.
Some of the Sacs and Foxes entertained the opinion that the spirit of the deceased hovers about the village or lodge for a few days and then takes its flight to the happy hunting ground. On its way they supposed it passed over an extensive prairie beyond which the woods appear like a blue cloud. Between this woodland and the prairie there is a deep and rapid stream of water across which there is a pole that is kept in continual motion by the force of the current. This stream the spirit must cross on the pole and if it belonged to a good person it got over safely and found all its good relations that had gone on before it. In this woodland is game of all kinds and very abundant, and there the spirits of the good lived in everlasting happiness. But if on the contrary, the spirit belonged to a bad Indian in its world life, it would fall off the pole into the stream and the current swept it down to the land of evil spirits, where it forever remained in poverty and misery.
They believed in one great and good spirit, who controlled and governed all things, and they believed in supernatural agents, who were permitted to inter- fere in their earthly concerns. They also believed there was a bad spirit but subordinate to the Great Spirit-Monotah they called the latter. The bad spirit was permitted to annoy and perplex the Indians by means of bad medicine, poisonous reptiles, killing ponies, sinking canoes and such like doings. All their misfortunes were attributed to the influence of this bad spirit. And yet they had some vague idea that in part the doings of the evil spirit were permitted
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
by the good spirit as a punishment for bad deeds. They believed in ghosts and when they thought they had seen one, the friends of the deceased gave a feast and hung up some clothing as an offering to appease the troubled spirit.
In a sort of way the Sacs and Foxes may be considered a religious people. They rarely passed anything extraordinary in nature -- like a cave, immense rock, sharp high hill, or the like-without leaving behind them some tobacco for the use of the spirit who they supposed resided there.
During the autumn of the year large numbers of the tribes were accustomed to make daily feasts, some to the great good spirit, others to the bad spirit, to pacify him. Their great chief. Black Hawk, left on record some of his beliefs, among which has been found: "I am of the opinion that, so far as we have a right to use it, determining what is right or wrong and we should always pursue that path which we believe to be right."
Again he says: "We thank the Great Spirit for all the good he has con- ferred on us. For myself I never take a drink of water from a spring without being mindful of his goodness."
And again : "We can only judge of what is proper and right by our own standard of what is right and wrong. * * The whites may do wrong all their lives and then if they are sorry for it when they die all is well, but with us it is different. We must continue to do good throughout our lives."
These Indians believed that corn was a special and mysterious gift from the Great Spirit. The Sacs held a rich and highly poetic traditional belief concerning it, which their greatest modern chief, Black Hawk, thus narrates: "According to tradition handed down to our people, a beautiful woman was seen to descend from the clouds and alight upon the earth by two of our ancestors, who had killed a deer and were sitting by the fire roasting a part of it to eat. They were astonished at seeing her and concluded that she was hungry and had smelled the meat. They immediately went to her, taking with them a piece of the roasted venison. They presented it to her. She ate it, telling them to return to the spot where she was sitting at the end of one year and they would find a reward for their kindness and generosity. She then ascended to the clouds and disappeared. The men returned to their village and explained to the tribe what they had seen, done and heard, but were laughed at by their people. When the period had arrived for them to visit this consecrated ground, where they were to find a reward for their attention to the beautiful woman of the clouds, they went with a large party and found where her right hand had rested on the ground, corn growing : where the left had rested, beans; and immediately where she had been seated, tobacco."
CHAPTER INI
MADISON'S ADVANCE GUARD OF CIVILIZATION
The Indian title to the land, of which Madison County is a part, was extinguished in the year 1845. By treaty, the Government had secured a large area of country, suitable for cultivation and the bounteous production of grain. grasses and other of the various food stuffs indigenous to this latitude. Strange to say. however, almost a year was permitted to elapse before the white man came and claimed "his own." It is not known that any person, white, red or black, stepped foot into Madison County before the year 1846, for other pur- poses than of exploration, hunting or trapping. Here were thousands of acres of rich prairie lands and other thousands covered by luxuriant growths of valuable timber. Three beautiful rivers traversed and watered the fertile soil. aided by many tributaries, and fruits and honey were to be found in vast quan- tities. Nature had provided lavishly and beckoned, with eager and welcoming hand to the countless thousands of men and women of the Eastern states, to come and settle upon this land, whose every feature and attribute was a glow- ing and substantial promise of bounteous harvests and consequent prosperity.
To lliram Hurst is given the distinction of being the first person to settle within the confines of this splendid domain, designated as Madison County. This advance guard of the splendid host of men who peopled the county and made it fructify so amazingly, migrated from Buchanan County, Missouri, early in the year 1846 and, as near as any one can compute the time, found his way into that part of Madison County now known as Crawford Township, on April 1, 1846. The country looked good to him. The three requisites of the home buildler were here in all their fullness and graciousness: Salubrious climate. abundance of pure, limpid water and a supply of timber, which seemed at the time almost inexhaustible. He had his ax and a superabundance of energy. strength and ambition, all salient attributes of the frontiersman. Nor was he lacking in ambition to carve out a home and habitation for himself and a large family dependent upon him. Ilere he was, an Ishmael in the wilderness; an involuntary absentee from his former haunts. For it is part of the tradition surrounding this historically interesting character that he was compelled to leave Missouri; or, in other words, he was a fugitive from justice. As reputa- tions go, when bandied hither and you by the evil minded or credulous, Hurst was credited with having killed his man. Another one had it that he burned a neighbor's property in a spirit of vengeance, and again, the story was rife in the early days that the pioneer settler of Madison County was a petty thief, in that he had stolen a bunch of Missouri hogs. These were the idle and harmful tales extant among those who followed Hurst into the wilderness, but the real char-
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HIRAM HURST
First white settler in Madison County. Came from Missouri about April 15, 1846. First claim in see- tion 36 of the (now) Crawford Town- ship, near the present home of Joseph H. Duff. Left in 1854 for Nebraska, where he died in 1889.
GEORGE W. GUYE
Came to Madison County, May 3, 1846. Voted on the adoption of the Constitution, August, 1846, at Fort Des Moines, and has voted at all principal elections since. Entered the first piece of land in Madison County in January, 1850.
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HISTORY OF MADISON COUNTY
acter of the man and the place he attained in the confidence of his new neighbors are not consistent with moral turpitude and wrong doing.
Hurst built a little "shack" in the timber, and cultivated a small patch of corn in the spring and summer of 1846. In the fall of that year he returned to his old home in Buchanan County, Missouri, where his friends settled the difficulties facing him. He then packed up his household belongings and other chattels and with wife and children came back to his lowa home, where he installed his family and goods in the humble habitation provided for them. Hiram Hurst remained on this place, situate on section 36, in Crawford Township, until July, 1847, when he sold his claim to Thomas Cason, who settled in Crawford about that time. Hurst then took a claim in section 29 in South Township, living there until the fall of 1851, when he sold to N. S. Allcock and moved to Scott Town- ship. In 1854 Hurst secured a tract of land on section 26, Scott Township, of E. M. Greenway, an eastern speculator, for which he paid $68, and in the fall of the same year sold land in section 20, South Township, to John Creger. Before the end of the year he was with his family in Otoe County, Nebraska, and was one of that community's first settlers.
No stain remains upon the name of Madison County's first settler. As will be seen, in a reminiscent article prepared by Samuel Fife, who worked for Ilurst in 1851, an honest and unbiased tribute is paid the first settler's character. Mr. Fife portrays him as "a very quiet man, of good judgment, and had a fine family. His family here was composed of a wife and four little boys. I have worked for him several times and always found him a gentleman and his wife a perfect lady."
The final chapter in the life of Hiram Hurst is furnished by his son, John, in a letter of date March 5, 1906, to Herman Mueller, in answer to a written inquiry relative to certain data concerning Hiram Hurst. The letter speaks for itself and it is to be trusted the memory of the writer, John Hurst, is of a reliable character :
"Wymore, Nebraska, March 5, 1906. "Mr. H. A. Mueller, St. Charles, Iowa.
"Dear Sir: Your letter of February 12th received. Have been waiting for some time to get the ages of my father and mother, Hiram and Elizabeth Hurst, which were recorded in the old family Bible, now in the hands of one of my brothers.
"I assure you I am more than pleased to have the name of my father asso- ciated with the first settlers of Madison County, Iowa, and will state right here that my brother William was the first white child born in the county-was born in camp on the third day after arriving in same on the Middle River Bottom which was afterward sold to Mr. Cason .*
"Iliram Hurst was born in Washington County, Virginia, March 1, 1821, was married to Elizabeth Todd December 20, 1840. Moved from Virginia to Tennessee and then to Kentucky and from there to Missouri. Then to Madison County, Jowa, April 1, 1846. Moved from there to Nebraska in the fall of
* In this statement Mr. Hurst is mistaken as his father returned to Missouri for his fam- ily and did not reappear here until early in the following year. William Hurst told me he was born in 1845 .- Editor.
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