USA > Iowa > Calhoun County > Past and present of Calhoun County, Iowa, a record of settlement, organization, progress, and achievement, Volume I > Part 6
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The lands so ceded were not opened to white settlement, the treaty expressly stipulating that "The lands ceded and relinquished by this treaty are to be assigned and allotted under the direction of the President of the United States to the tribes now living thereon, or to such other tribes as the President may locate thereon for hunting and other purposes."
TREATY OF 1832
While Black Hawk and his two sons were confined at Fortress Monroe, Va., the United States negotiated the treaty of September 21. 1832, with the Sae and Fox chief's under the leadership of Keo- kuk. in which the allied tribes ceded to the United States "all lands to which said tribes have any title or claim included within the fol- lowing boundaries, to-wit:
"Beginning on the Mississippi River at the point where the Sae and Fox northern boundary line, as established by article 2 of the treaty of July 15, 1830. strikes said river: thence up said boundary line to a point fifty miles from the Mississippi, measured on said line; thence in a right line to the nearest point on the Red Cedar of Ioway, forty miles from the Mississippi: thence in a right line to a point in Vol. 1-4
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the northern boundary line of the State of Missouri fifty miles, meas- ured on said line, from the Mississippi River: thence by the last men- tioned boundary to the Mississippi River, and by the western shore of said river to the place of beginning."
The territory included within these bounds embraces about six million aeres. It was taken by the United States as an indemnity for the expenses of the Black Hawk war, and for that reason was called the "Black Hawk Purchase." The cession inchided the present counties of Dubuque, Delaware, Jackson, Jones, Clinton, Cedar, Muscatine, Scott, Louisa, Henry, Des Moines and Lee, and portions of Clayton, Fayette, Buchanan, Linn, Johnson, Washington, Jeff'er- son and Van Buren. The Black Hawk Purchase was the first land obtained from the Indians in Iowa for white settlement.
TREATY OF 1842
The irregular boundary of the Black Hawk Purchase on the west soon led to disputes between the settlers and the Indians. To settle these difficulties some of the Sac and Fox chiefs were persuaded to visit the Great Father at Washington, where on October 21, 1837, they ceded to the United States an additional tract of 1,250,000 acres for the purpose of straightening the western boundary. When the survey was made it was discovered that the cession was not sufficient to make a straight line, and it was not long until the Indians again accused the white settlers of encroaching upon their lands. Negoti- ations were commenced for additional land to straighten the bound- ary. Some of the wiser chiefs saw that it was only a question of time until the Indians would have to relinquish all their lands in Iowa to the white men. Keokuk, Wapello and Poweshiek advised a treaty peaceably ceding the lands to the Government. rather than to wait until they should be taken by force. Through their influence a council was called to meet at the Sac and Fox Agency (now Agency City) in what is now Wapello County.
John Chambers, then governor of lowa Territory, was appointed commissioner on behalf of the United States to negotiate the treaty. A large tent was set up near the agency for the council. On one side of the tent was a platform, upon which sat Governor Chambers, John Beach, then Indian agent; Lieut. C. F. Ruff of the First United States Dragoons, and the interpreters, Antoine Le Claire and Josiah Swart. The Indians arranged themselves around the tent, leaving an open space in the center.
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Governor Chambers, wearing the uniform of an army officer, made a short speech stating the purpose for which the council was assembled. Keokuk, elad in all his native finery and decked with ornaments and trinkets, responded. After that there was "mueh talk." as nearly every chief present had something to say. On Oeto- ber 11, 1842, a treaty was coneluded by which the Saes and Foxes agreed to cede all their remaining lands in Iowa to the United States, but reserved the right to occupy for three years from the date of signing the treaty "all that part of the land above ceded which lies west of a line running due north and south from the Painted or Red Rocks on the White Breast fork of the Des Moines River, which rocks will be found about eight miles in a straight line from the junction of the White Breast and Des Moines."
The red sandstone eliff's, ealled by the Indians the Painted Rocks, are situated on the Des Moines River in the northern part of Marion County, near the town ealled Red Roek. The line deseribed in the treaty forms the boundary between Appanoose and Wayne counties, on the southern border of the state, and passes thence northward between Lucas and Monroe, through Marion, Jasper. Marshall and Ilardin counties to the northern limit of the grant. East of the line the land was opened for white occupation on May 1, 1843, and west of the line on October 11, 1845.
Fearing the opposition and perhaps the hostility of the Sioux and Pottawatomi, who still held lands on the north and west, the Government sent Captain Allen of the First Dragoons to select a site on the Des Moines River for a fort. Allen selected the site where the City of Des Moines now stands and in his report gives his reasons for such selection as follows:
"It will be far enough up the river to protect these Indians against the Sioux, and is in the heart of the best part of the country, where the greatest effort of the squatters will be made to get in. The soil is rich; wood, stone, water and grass are all abundant: all the Saes have determined to make their villages on a large prairie bottom about two miles below, and the traders have selected sites there also. It will be about the head of keel-boat navigation on the Des Moines. I think it will be better than any point farther up, because it will be harder to get supplies farther up, and no point or post that may be established on this river need be kept up for more than three years, or until these Indians leave. . . One of their agents has told me that the American Fur Company would send a steamboat up to
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the Raccoon on the early spring rise. If they do it would be a good time to send up army supplies."
In the spring of 1843 the little steamer lone brought up a detaeh- ment of troops-Lieut. JJohn H. King's company of infantry and Lieut. William N. Grier's company of cavalry-and a store of sup- plies, and Fort Des Moines was established upon a military reserva- tion one mile square. Captain Allen gave the post the name of Fort Raccoon, but General Scott disliked that name and gave it the name of Fort Des Moines. The settlement that grew up about the post has grown into the capital of the State of Iowa. For several years it was the principal trading point and postoffice for the early settlers of Calhoun County. In the fall of 1845 most of the Sac and Fox Indians removed from the state and the rest followed in the spring of 1846.
THE LAST TREATIES
By the treaties of June 3 and 17, 1846. the Pottawatomi, Chip- pewa and Ottawa tribes relinquished "all the lands to which they have claim of any kind whatsoever, and especially the tracts or par- cels of land eeded to them by the treaty of Chicago, and subsequent thereto, and now in whole or in part possessed by their people. lying and being north and east of the River Missouri and embraced in the limits of the Territory of Iowa."
With the conclusion of these last treaties and the departure of the tribes therein mentioned, the great State of Iowa became the undisputed possession of the pale-face. The period of preparation for a civilized people- a period which began more than two centuries before-was now completed, and what were once the Indian hunting grounds became the cultivated fields of the white man. The Indian trail has been broadened into the highway or the railroad. Instead of the war-whoop of the savage and the howl of the wolf is heard the shriek of the factory whistle. Halls of legislation have sup- planted the tribal council: the modern residence occupies the site of the Indian tepee: news is borne by the telegraph or telephone instead of signal fires upon the hilltops, and the church spire rises where once the totem pole stood as an object of veneration. Indian villages have disappeared and in their places have come cities with paved streets. electric lights, stately school buildings, newspapers, libraries and all the evidences of modern progress.
But after all there is a sort of grim pathos in the story of how the red man was persuaded to relinquish his lands to a superior race
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and retire step by step toward the setting sun. Less than a century ago the Indian roamed at will over the broad prairies or through the forests of Iowa. Like Robinson Crusoe on his lonely island, he was "monarch of all he surveyed." Then came the prond Caucasian. with his superior intelligence and superior cunning, and all was changed. About all that is left of the departed race are the names taken from their language and conferred upon some of the counties, towns and streams in the country once inhabited by the red man. And all this change has come about within the memory of persons yet living. To tell the story of these years of progress and develop- ment is the province of the subsequent chapters of this history.
CHAPTER IV SETTLEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
PROGRESS OF WHITE SETTLEMENTS IN IOWA-FORT DES MOINES-FIRST COUNTIES-CALHOUN ORIGINALLY A PART OF DUBUQUE COUNTY- THE ORGANIC ACT-CHANGING THE NAME-FIRST SETTLERS-FIRST LAND ENTRIES-BRIEF MENTION OF LEADING PIONEERS-THE FIRST MILL-PIONEER LIFE AND CUSTOMS-AMUSEMENTS AND PAS- TIMES-THE FIRST ELECTION-LOCATING THE COUNTY SEAT- REMOVAL OF TILE COUNTY SEAT TO ROCKWELL CITY.
As stated in the preceding chapter, the first white men to hehold the State of Iowa, or to set foot upon her soil, were Marquette and Joliet, who visited some Indian villages in the southeastern part in the summer of 1673. The first white settlement within the present borders of the state was founded by Julian Dubuque in 1788, where the city bearing his name now stands. Eight years later Louis Honore Tesson received from the Spanish authorities of Louisiana a grant of land at the head of the Des Moines Rapids of the Mississippi, in what is now Lee County. A few French traders established posts along the Mississippi and Des Moines rivers about the beginning of the nineteenth century, and in 1808 Fort Madison was built by order of the Government where the city of that name is now located. A trading house was built and a small settlement was made upon the site of the present City of Keokuk in the early '20s, and Burlington was founded in the fall of 1832, soon after the lands of the Black Hawk Purchase were ceded to the United States. During the next fifteen years the settlements extended rapidly westward and in 1843 Fort Des Moines was built upon the site now occupied by the city of that name.
The first counties-Dubuque and Des Moines-were authorized by an aet of the Michigan Legislature in September, 1834. Dubuque County included all that portion of the present State of Iowa lying north of a line drawn due westward from the foot of Rock Island,
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Des Moines County lying south of that line. The present County of Calhoun was therefore originally a part of Dubuque County.
In many of the older eounties of the state settlements were made before the boundaries of the county were defined or a name adopted. Not so with Calhoun. When the state was admitted into the Union in December, 1846, there were but few organized counties west of the Red Rock line established by the treaty of October 11, 1842.
THE ORGANIC ACT
On January 15, 1851, Gov. Stephen Hempstead approved an aet of the Iowa Legislature creating fifty new counties in the unorgan- ized territory in the western part of the state. Section 20 of that aet is as follows:
"That the following shall be the boundaries of a new county which shall be called Fox, to-wit: Beginning at the northwest corner of Township 89 north, range 30 west; thence west on the line dividing townships 89 and 90 to the northwest corner of township 89 north, range 34 west: thence south on the line dividing ranges 34 and 35 to the southwest eorner of township 86 north, range 34 west; thence east on the line between townships 85 and 86 to the southwest corner of township 86 north, range 30 west ; thenee north on the line between ranges 30 and 31 to the place of beginning."
The boundaries as thus defined are identical with the present boundaries of Calhoun County. Immediately west of Fox County was erected the County of Sae, the two being named for the allied tribes of Indians that onee inhabited the country, and directly east of Fox was the County of Risley.
CHANGING THE NAME
When the legislature of 1853 assembled, several of the members expressed their dissatisfaction with some of the names adopted by the preceding assembly for the new counties. One member, who was an ardent admirer of John C. Calhoun, of South Carolina, proposed to change the name of Fox County to Calhoun. There was some opposition to the proposition, but it was finally accepted, on condition that the name of the county on the east should be changed to Web- ster. in honor of Daniel Webster, who was a politieal opponent of Calhoun. Consequently, section 4 of an act approved by Governor Hempstead on January 12, 1853, provided :
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"That the name of the County of Wahkaw shall be changed to Woodbury, the name of the County of Risley shall be changed to Webster, and the name of the County of Fox to the County of Calhoun."
The act of January 12, 1853, also contained the following provi- sions for the organization of the new counties:
"Whenever the citizens of any unorganized county desire to have the same organized, they may make application by petition in writing, signed by a majority of the legal voters of said county, to the county judge of the county to which such unorganized county is attached; whereupon the said county judge shall order an election for county officers in such unorganized county.
"That a majority of the citizens of any county, after becoming so organized, may petition the distriet judge in whose judicial dis- trict the same is situated. during the vacation of the general assembly, whose duty it shall be to appoint three commissioners from three different adjoining counties, who shall proceed to locate the county seat for such county, according to the provisions of this act."
THE FIRST SETTLERS
At the time the above mentioned act was passed by the legislature, there was not a single white man living within the confines of Cal- houn County who eould rightfully be ealled an actual settler. The distinction of being the first white man to establish a domicile in Calhoun belongs to Ebenezer Comstoek, who brought his family to the Coon River Valley in April, 1854. and located a claim in section 12, township 86, range 34, near the western limits of the present Town of Lake City. There he built his log cabin and for several weeks he and his family were the only inhabitants of the county.
Some time in the following summer, William Impson, John Con- dron and J. C. M. Smith settled in the southwestern part of the county, not far from Comstock. William Impson was the first blaek- smith in the county and the second man to "stiek a plow into the soil." He and Condron settled in section 28, township 86, range 34. south of the Coon River, and J. C. M. Smith located in section 9 of the same township and range, north of the river.
Early in the fall of 1854 two brothers, Peter and Christian Smith, living in Polk County, learned from a trapper named Crumley that there was an abundance of big game on the upper waters of Coon River and some of its tributary branches, and decided to go on a
A PIONEER SOD HOUSE
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hunting expedition. On September 27, 1834, the two Smiths, Allen McCoy, Jesse Marmon and the two Crumleys assembled at Mr. Comstoek's cabin for an elk hunt. They eneamped on Lake Creek, a short distance northeast of where Lake City now stands, and after killing three elk Marmon and the two Smiths decided to locate claims in the county. Peter Smith bought the claim of Mr. Comstock. Christian selected land in section 13, township 86, range 34, and Marmon selected the southwest quarter of section 5, township 86, range 33.
Prior to March. 1833, there was no land office west of Iowa City. Western lowa was then divided into two land districts and offiees were opened at Des Moines and Council Bluffs. The eastern three- fourths of Calhoun County lay in the Des Moines district and the western fourth- range 34-was in the Council Bluffs district. In the summer of 1854 the land offiee at Des Moines was ordered elosed until the first Monday in October. When Jesse Marmon and the two Smiths decided to settle in the county they abandoned their elk hunting and hurried to Des Moines to be present at the reopening of the land office. The tract selected by Mr. Marmon, being in range 33, was subject to entry at Des Moines and was the first land entered in the county. Peter Smith also entered a tract that was afterward laid out as Smith's Addition to Lake City. The Comstock claim bought by Peter Smith and the land selected by his brother Christian were in range 34 and the brothers had to make a trip to Couneil Bluff's to secure their title.
Later in the year 1854 the little colony in the southwestern part of the county was augmented by the arrival of William Oxenford, James Reanis, Joel Golden, Levi D. Tharp, Alford White and Rich- ard Bunting, all of whom came from Cass County, Mich., and John Smith, who came from Missouri.
Jesse Marmon built a log house on his land soon after entering it, and Peter Smith built a house of basswood logs. It was a story and a half high and was at that time the most pretentious Iowa residence north of Jefferson and west of Fort Dodge. In constructing this house wooden pins were used instead of nails; the only floor for a time was "mother earth," though a puncheon floor was later added. Mr. Smith also built a sod chimney, probably the first in this part of Iowa. Other settlers, who came late in the season, erected cabins that afforded but meager protection against severe weather, but for- tunately for these pioneers the winter of 1854-55 was a mild one and they managed to get through without serious inconvenienee.
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Allen McCoy, who was one of the elk hunters in the fall of 1854, entered land in the county and became a resident the following spring. He had formerly lived in Michigan and was a famous hunter. In 1858 he moved west of the Missouri River and settled near the line between Kansas and Nebraska.
Charles Amy came from Cass County, Mich., in the fall of 1855. He was a man of good education, a bookkeeper, and possessed exeel- lent business qualifieations. He was born in Ohio, removed to Cass County, Mich., in 1846, and taught sehool there several terms before coming to Calhoun County, where he was joined by his family in 1856. When the county seat was established at Lake City in the spring of that year, Mr. Amy was the surveyor that platted the town. He was one of the contractors that built the first courthouse in Cal- houn County: was elected treasurer and reeorder in August, 1857: afterward held the offices of county surveyor and justice of the peaee. and served for about fifteen years as postmaster of Lake City. His death ocenrred on Angust 24, 1872.
Other early settlers were Josiah Lumpkin and his sons-John, Mortimer and Ezekiel: Jesse Hutchinson and his two sons and two daughters-Norman, Henry, Olive and Estelle: Moses Sherman. William Ripley, Roma Maranville, George Gray and Rev. Sylvester MeGeorge and their families. Olive Hutchinson beeame the wife of James Reynolds, who died at Bird's Point, Mo., in 1862, while serving as a soldier in the Tenth Iowa Infantry, and her sister Estelle became the wife of Mortimer Lumpkin. Jesse IIntehinson was a native of Vermont, where he was born in 1806. From that state he went to New York, thence to Michigan, and in 1857 settled in Cal- houn County. Ia., where he passed the remainder of his life, his death occurring in 1880.
Still others who came during the '50s were Jonathan II. Manlove. Lneins C. Morey, P. G. IFull, John U. Skinner, E. M. Reynolds, Greenlee Scott and his two sons-James B. and Hiram. Jonathan H. Manlove married a danghter of Alford White and was the second county judge of Calhoun County. Ineius C. Morey was the first man in the county to hold the office of county supervisor. The first white child born in the county was Renben D. Smith, a son of Chris- tian Smith. He was born late in the year 1855 or early in 1856, and at last aeeounts was still living in the City of Des Moines. A further account of many of the pioneers will be found in the chapters on Township History.
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In the spring of 1855 Henry W. Smith, a brother to Peter and Christian Smith, built a mill on the Coon River, about four miles west of Lake City. Before coming to Calhoun County he had been engaged in the mercantile business at Cassopolis, Mich. The frame timbers of the mill and the material for the water-wheel were hewn from the native timber, but the machinery was hauled from Des Moines with ox teams. In 1858 Mr. Smith sold the mill to William Oxenford and Christian Smith and a little later the latter sold his interest to John Oxenford, a brother of William. This was the first mill in the county and for a number of years it furnished the only milling facilities for the settlers over a wide territory. A sawmill was afterward added to the equipment and the lumber for the first frame house in the county was made at Oxenford's Mill. In the big flood of 1866 the mill and about one thousand bushels of wheat were carried away. It was rebuilt the same summer, and in hanling the new machinery from Glidden the wagon bearing the water-wheel got swamped in a slough and remained there for about six weeks v before the ground became firm enough to extrieate it from its pre- dicament.
PIONEER LIFE AND CUSTOMS
Looking back over a period of a little more than three score years, to the time when Ebenezer Comstock built his lonely cabin in Lake Creek Grove, it occurs to the writer that the young people of the present generation might be interested in knowing how the first set- tlers in a new country managed to exist. Imagine a vast, unbroken tract of rolling prairie, stretching away in all directions beyond the range of human vision, with little groves of timber here and there along the water courses. Such was Calhoun County when the first white men came to establish their homes within its borders. All over the broad prairie were swamps and ponds, where muskrats and water- fowl abounded. The Indian had departed and the only denizens of the country were the wild animals. Big game was plentiful. espe- cially the elk : a few lynx and wild cats were to be found in the little forests; beaver, otter, mink and some other fur-bearing animals inhabited some localities; prairie wolves were numerous and their howling at night sometimes caused little children to shudder with fear, as they cuddled together in their beds, wishing that daylight would come. There was also a small animal called a "swift." because of its fleetness of foot. In appearance it resembled a fox, but was
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smaller and not so cunning. As the country settled up this swift became such a pest that the county authorities offered bounties upon swift sealps.
It was into this wild, desolate region that the first settlers eame, determined to conquer all obstacles, and it is to this determination that the population of the present day is indebted for the manifold comforts and conveniences of modern civilization.
One of the first things necessary for the pioneer was shelter of some sort for himself and family. The carly settlers located con- venient to the timber along the Coon River and Lake Creek, and the first houses they erceted were log cabins. Sometimes, when two or more families came into a neighborhood at the same time, one cabin would be built, in which all would live together until each settler could build a dwelling of his own. The first settler in a community, who had to build his cabin without assistance, selected small logs that he could raise to the walls, but after a number came larger logs were used and the "house raising" was a social as well as an industrial event. After the logs were cut and dragged to the site of the pro- posed eabin, the settler would send out invitations to his neighbors, some of whom probably lived several miles away, to attend the "raising."
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