USA > Iowa > Appanoose County > The history of Appanoose County, Iowa, containing a history of the county, its cities, towns, &c., a biographical directory of citizens, war record of its volunteers in the late rebellion, general and local statistics, portraits of early settlers and prominent men > Part 38
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About 1865, Thomas Shoemaker, of Sharon Township, was bitten in the thumb by a rattlesnake while loading a grub on his wagon, the reptile having nested in the roots. The poor man died in two or three days, having suffered untold agony.
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
THE GEOLOGY.
The surface of Appanoose County is, generally speaking, a nearly level plain, lying on the water-shed dividing the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. The depressions for the river and creek beds are shallow, and it is probable that the extreme difference between the water-bed of Chariton River and the highest prairie summits will not exceed a hundred and fifty feet. The soil of the county is a brownish-gray loam, largely intermixed with clay, but yet tempered suffi- ciently with sand to be easily plowed and cultivated. It also absorbs the rain- fall rapidly, so that very muddy roads are rare. The surface soil is of ample depth and very fertile. The substratum is nearly pure clay, and with proper care any portion of the subsoil of this county can be made into excellent brick.
Both Prof. White and Mr. St. John visited Appanoose County in 1868, and the former gentleman records that it is now known that all three of the divis- ions of the coal-measure group occupy the surface beneath the drift ; the Lower occupying the northwestern portion, the Middle traversing it near the center, and the base of the Upper appearing as ledges of limestone along Cooper Creek, west of Centerville. In the valley of that stream, Mr. Talbot had opened a mine in a three-foot vein of good quality. This is regarded as the upper bed of the Middle coal-measures, and whatever other beds may exist within the county doubtless belong beneath it. Thus, the place of all the heavy beds of coal found elsewhere is at considerable depth here ; but they may be looked for nearer the surface in the northeastern part of the county. It is believed that a shaft sunk in the valley of the Chariton River near Centerville, would pass through all there is of the coal-bearing strata within three or four hundred feet. There are good reasons for believing, also, that one or more good beds of coal would be passed through at that or a less depth, besides the one worked by. Mr. Talbot.
W. P. Fox, the Geological Commissioner of Iowa at the Centennial Exhi- bition, visited Appanoose County in 1875, and made a statement, which is undoubtedly true, that a vein of coal exists beneath the one now being worked, and gave it as his opinion that it lies from thirty-five to fifty feet below the other. There is no reason to disbelieve his statement that the lower vein should be five or six feet in thickness. Mr. Fox claimed that the slate overlying the coal is suitable for roofing purposes ; but this was a blunder on his part, and pointed out the immense deposit of potter's and fire-clay overlying the shale.
Mr. Fox also visited the saline springs in the edge of Davis County, and describes them as being located in an outfield of the Onondaga salt group, which was certainly an egregious blunder on his part; for if that formation exists in Iowa at all, it must lie at least five hundred feet below the coal- beds. The saline character of the Davis County springs is owing undoubtedly to local peculiarities.
After the above paragraph had been written, the compiler had an opportu- nity to consult Owen's Survey of the Northwest, made in 1849. That dis- tinguished and reliable scientist visited several mineral springs in the eastern part of Davis County, and states, on page 111 of his report, that the chemical analysis showed the water to contain chloride of sodium, chloride of magnesia, bicarbonate of iron, bicarbonate of lime, sulphate of magnesia and sulphate of soda. The salt exists, it is true, but the other minerals mixed with the water would render it worthless as a commercial article. Fox must have been well aware of Owen's visit to this neighborhood, for he was himself an assistant in
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
Prof. Whitney's survey ten years later, and his assertion that the springs along Soap Creek have any value should be entirely disregarded.
THE ORIGIN OF COAL.
It is believed that a further discussion of the topic with reference to the coal-mines may not be out of place. This article of commerce is found in vari- ous places in the geologic series of formations, beginning with the Middle Car- boniferous, in which stratum belong the coal-seams found in this county, and ending with those much more recent in point of time, which are found in the Middle Tertiary. These latter beds are found best exposed in Wyoming Terri- tory, and are in all about thirty feet in thickness.
But the coal-field in Iowa belongs to the true Carboniferous system of the writers upon the subject, and is, moreover, the outfield of the vast coal-basin partly covering this State, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania. It is only in the Alleghanies that subterranean action has converted any part of the coal into anthracite. Everywhere else in the immense basin it is strictly bitu- minous, varying, however, from the article as first prepared by the economic forces of nature from the block coal of Indiana to the cannel coal found in sev- eral places in Iowa.
In the ancient history of the earth, the leading events of which have been slowly deciphered through the researches of scientific men, the earth's crust was much more plastic than at present, and the climate was more than tropical from pole to pole. The carbon now stored beneath many feet of soil and rocks, was mingled, in the form of carbonic-acid gas, with the atmosphere. The earth's crust lacked the stability it now possesses. A vast plain would gradu- ally thrust itself to the surface of the ocean, where vegetation would at once begin. Great forests would grow in the tropical heat, fanned by the damp sea- breezes, and stimulated by the carbon in the atmosphere. This vegetation was usually composed almost entirely of a species of palm and a variety of fern that grew to an enormous size. That this is true cannot be disputed ; for in many coal districts the stumps of immense trees are to be found in the clay underly- ing the coal, and often the trunks can be found only partially converted into coal. But what is more curious still, is the fact that in the Nova Scotia mines, when the vegetable mold that now forms the coal-bed was buried up, many trees were left standing. The lower portions of their trunks were in process of time converted into coal, but the upper sections, surrounded by sand, as that was con- verted into rock, became petrified, the bark taking the form of coal. This peculiarity is a source of danger to these mines ; for the petrified trunks, as the coal is mined away beneath them, are liable to slip from their brittle inclosures of ancient bark, and fall to the floor of the mine. More than one workman in these mines has been crushed to death by these silicified trees becoming detached and falling.
In explaining the cause of the freedom of coal from impurities of almost every description, Sir Charles Lyell gives a paragraph which has an important bearing on the above. He says :
The purity of the coal itself, or the absence in it of earthy particles and sand, throughout areas of vast extent, is a fact which appears very difficult to explain when we attribute each coal- seam to a vegetation growing in swamps. It has been asked how, during river inundations capa- ble of sweeping away the leaves of ferns and the stems and roots of Sigillaria and other trees, could the waters fail to transport some fine mnd into the swamps ? One generation after another of tall trees grew with their roots in mud, and their leaves and prostrate trunks formed layers of vegetable matter, which was afterward covered with mud since turned into shale. Yet the coal itself, or altered vegetable matter, remained all the while unsoiled by earthy particles. This enigma, however perplexing at first sight, may, I think, be solved by attending to what is now
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
taking place iu deltas. The dense growth of reeds and herbage which encompasses the margins of forest-covered swamps in the valley and delta of the Mississippi is such that the fluviatile waters, in passing through them, are filtered and made to clear themselves entirely before they reach the areas in which vegetable matter may accumulate for centuries, forming coal, if the cli- mate be favorable. There is no possibility of the least intermixture of earthy matter in such cases. Thus iu the large submerged tract called the "Sunk Country," near New Madrid, form- ing part of the western side of the valley of the Mississippi, erect trees have been standing ever since the year 1811-12, killed by the great earthquake of that date; lacustrine and swamp plants have been growing there in the shallows, and several rivers have annually inundated the whole space, and yet have been unable to carry in any sediment within the outer boundaries of the morass, so dense is the marginal belt of reeds and brushwood. It may be affirmed that gen- erally, in the " cypress swamps " of the Mississippi, no sediment mingles with the vegetable matter accumulated there from the decay of trees and semi-aquatic plants. As a singular proof of this fact, I may mention that whenever any part of a swamp in Louisiana is dried up during an unusually hot season, and the wood is set on fire, pits are burned into the ground many feet deep, or so far down as the fire can descend without meeting with water, and it is then found that scarcely any residuum or earthy matter is left. At the bottom of all these "cypress swamps " a bed of clay is found with roots of the tall cypress, just as the under clays of the coal are filled with Stigmaria.
Let a depression of the Lower Mississippi Valley take place, whereby the sea shall flow in and cover these " cypress swamps" during a long procession of years, and a coal-bed will result. It appears from the researches of Liebig and other eminent chemists, that when wood and vegetable matter are buried in the earth, exposed to moisture, and partially or entirely excluded from the air, they decompose slowly and evolve carbonic-acid gas, thus parting with a por- tion of their original oxygen. By this means, they become gradually converted into lignite, or wood-coal, such as is found in the Tertiary beds of Wyoming Territory, and which contains a larger proportion of hydrogen than wood does. A continuance of the decomposition changes this lignite into common or bituminous coal, chiefly by the discharge of carbureted hydrogen, or the gas by which we illuminate our cities and houses. The disengagement of all these grad- ually transforms ordinary or bituminous coal into the anthracite found in Penn- sylvania and Kentucky. The gases and water which are made to penetrate through the cracks in the rocks forming above the coal, are probably effective as metamorphic agents, by increased temperature derived from the interior. It is well known that at the present period thermal waters and hot vapors burst out from the earth during earthquakes, and these would not fail to promote the disengagement of volatile matter in the carboniferous rocks.
The whole subject is of absorbing interest, but the above outline must suf- fice, especially as enough has been said to account for the origin of the Middle Carboniferous bed, which is the sole matter in hand. It is enough to add that, in all about one hundred and fifty species of vegetable life have been discov- ered among the fossil remains in the various coal-fields of the world.
LOCAL OBSERVATIONS.
It is stated that the first coal-shaft ever sunk in the county was by B. F. Kindig, who found the coal-bed about sixteen feet below the limestone rock which crops out in the vicinity. This was in 1863 or 1864; but coal had been known to exist in the county long before, for it crops out in several places along Shoal Creek and its tributaries, and had been mined for several years for local uses.
The shaft of the Appanoose Coal Company, near the railway junction at Centerville, was sunk, it is said, twenty or thirty feet below where the coal was afterward found. An experienced miner suggested that a side-drift be made at a depth of one hundred and twenty feet. The experiment was tried, and the coal was found a few feet from the shaft. Other shafts have been sunk below
B
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
where the coal ought to lie, and trunks of trees, buried in clay, have been found,. indicating that the coal has, since its formation, been gashed and broken by some disturbing cause. This would seem to have been a local upheaval, for the reason that the limestone overlying the coal, lying west and south of Center- ville, has a positive dip toward the southwest of perhaps fifteen degrees, which. can be ascertained by visiting the mine owned by Mr. Kindig, and that worked. by Mr. McClard. Further, the coal-bed itself dips at the same angle. The bed probably does not possess this dip for any great distance; for, as stated. above, it appears near water-mark along Shoal Creek, and along the streams in the northwest part of the county. The line of disturbance or breakage then passes nearly north and south in the vicinity of Centerville.
The following is given as the order in which the rocks were found in sink- ing the shaft of Oliver, Phillips & Dargaval's Mine, in the eastern part of Cen- terville, about three years ago, after passing through the surface of soil and clay : Hard lime-rock, 8 feet; soapstone: hard sand-rock, 2 feet ; soapstone ; limestone, nearly 4 feet; soapstone; limestone, 1 foot; soapstone; " black rock," or shale, 2 feet; coal. The sand-rock appears between two layers of lime-rock, in the ledge near Talbot's mill, on Cooper Creek, but the soapstone is wanting, having apparently thinned out or been dissolved away by the action of water. The rock near Talbot's is filled with fossils from top to bottom, all apparently of the same species.
The shaft of the Watson Coal Company, a short distance south of the Rock Island Depot, is stated to show the following stratifications : Soil, clay and gravel, 80 feet ; hard lime-rock, lying in layers and broken by joints, 12 feet ; shale and soapstone, 8 feet ; fossil-bearing (mountain) limestone, 9 feet ; black slate, 15 feet ; lime-rock, 3 feet; shale, 16 feet; lime-rock, 3 feet; slate, 4 feet ; lime-rock, 6 feet; coal, 3 feet. It may be noticed as a curious circum- stance that the sand-bed in the Oliver Mine and at Talbot's Mill is wanting in the Watson Mine. However, as many layers are entirely wanting in the Iowa coal system which are noticed elsewhere, these local variations may be expected.
In some places in the western part of the county, a thin layer of coal or shale has been noticed, which goes to show that the Upper Carboniferous touches Appanoose on the west.
The group of rocks covering the coal belong to the " mountain limestone," as named by Dana and sanctioned by Lyell.
The present railway system of the county does not enable its people to util- ize this vast supply of fuel as it should be done ; still it is a very considerable- industry already ; and when an extension of the railway system is brought about, the coal mines of this county cannot fail to become an unfailing source of revenue to this community.
At the mine of the Appanoose Coal Company, the coal is mined in rooms, which are 40 feet wide and are run back to a distance of 250 feet, when a room worked from the opposite direction is reached. A body of coal sixteen feet in width is left between each room and is termed a pillar. Each room is operated by two men, who mine the coal, load it on the cars and deliver it at the bottom of the shaft, where it is received and hoisted, together with the car, by steam power, to the top of the shaft, and then emptied into railway cars waiting to receive it. The coal, which is about four feet in thickness, lies 120 feet below the surface. The car-tracks on the bottom of the mine are made of light-weight T rails.
The price to miners at the Watson Mine is now 33 cents a bushel, which is. the price paid at most of the mines. It is stated that miners can dig from fifty-five to eighty bushels a day.
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
STREAMS.
The Chariton River is the principal stream in Appanoose County. The main stream takes its rise in Lucas County, and enters Appanoose near the northwest corner. The south fork of the same stream rises in Clark and Deca- tur Counties, and discharges into the main stream on Section 14, Independence. The union of the two forms a considerable stream, which takes a southeastern direction through the county, passing into the State of Missouri between Cald- well and Wells Townships. There are several mill-sites along the river, which have been made available for many years. Thirty years ago, the river was regarded as sufficiently formidable to require the establishment of ferries. This stream empties into the Missouri River.
South Fox and Middle Fox rise in Washington Township, and the north fork of the same same stream rises in Udell. These flow eastward into Davis County and thence to the Mississippi.
South Soap rises in Taylor, and North Soap in Union. These are tributa- ries of Fox River.
Big Walnut Creek rises in Wayne County, and flows in a direction north of east, through Johns, Bellair and Walnut, and discharges into the Chiar- ito n.
Cooper Creek drains the southern part of Lincoln, flows through Bellair, the northern part of Center, receiving the water of Hickory Creek north of Centerville, and emptying into the Chariton in Sharon.
Shoal Creek originates in Wayne County, passes through the northern part of Franklin and Pleasant, and in the latter takes a southeastern direction, into Caldwell, and flows thence into Missouri.
There are numerous other small streams, and but few sections in Appanoose are destitute of running streams.
Appanoose thus lies on the water-shed separating the Missouri and Missis- sippi Rivers, the Chariton draining into the former great stream, and the Fox into the latter.
TIMBER.
This county enjoys, above most Iowa Counties, a very equal distribution of timbered and prairie land, almost every little stream being skirted with timber. Hence, the groves, which in other counties become distinctive features and land- marks to the pioneers, known by characteristic names, were not often so desig- nated in Appanoose, and localities were designated by the streams or by the names of pioneer settlers. "Packard's Grove," east of Chariton, was, how- ever, and still remains a well-known landmark.
CIVIL DIVISIONS.
In tracing the early settlements of this county, it may be well to insert here for reference the civil township divisions as they exist at present (1878). It should be stated before naming the townships that the boundary line between Missouri and Iowa, as adjudicated in the Supreme Court of the United States, begins at the mouth of the Des Moines River, thence up that stream to a point two miles south of Farmington in Van Buren County ; thence in a westerly direction to the Missouri River, the western terminus being three miles south of the initial point. Thus the boundary line divides Sections 19 to 24 in Wells, Caldwell, Pleasant and Franklin Townships. Wells Township includes the northern part of the Sections just referred to, lying on the boundary of the northern half of T. 67, R. 17, and the southern half of T. 68, R. 16; Cald-
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
well is made up by the same description, except that it lies in R. 17; Pleasant the same, but in R. 18 ; Franklin includes the divided Sections on the boundary line, the northern half of T. 67, R. 19, and the southern third of T. 68, R. 19; Lincoln, the northern two-thirds of T. 68, R. 19; Bellair, Sections 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, 18 in T. 68, R. 18, and Sections 19, 20, 21, 22, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, T. 69, R. 18; Center, Sections 1, 2, 11, 12, 13, 14, T. 68, R. 18; Sections 23, 24, 25, 26, 35, 36, T. 68, R. 18 ; Sections 19, 20, 29, 30, 31, 32, T. 69, R. 17; Sections 5, 6, 7, 8, 17, 18, T. 68, R. 17, and that part of T. 69, R. 17, lying west of Chariton River ; Sharon, Sections 1, 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, T. 68, R. 17, and Sections 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 33, 34, 35, 36, T. 69, R. 17; Washington, the northern half of T. 68, R. 16, and the southern half of T. 69, R. 17; Udell, the northern half of T. 69, R. 16, and a strip one and a half miles wide off T. 70, R. 17; Douglas, the six southern Sections of T. 70, R. 17, and the northern half of T. 69, R. 17, except that part lying west of Chariton River; Walnut, the northern two- thirds of T. 69, R. 18; Johns, T. 69, R. 19; Independence, T. 70, R. 18; Chariton, all of T. 70, R. 18, except the six southern Sections ; Taylor, all of T. 70, R. 17, except the six southern Sections ; Union, all of T. 70, R. 16, except a strip one and a half miles wide on the south.
SURVEYS.
The township and range lines of Appanoose County were run by William A. Burt, of Michigan, son of the inventor of " Burt's Solar Compass," in 1843. The four eastern townships of the county were subdivided by Lewis V. Davis, in November, 1844. Orson Lyon subdivided T. 67, R. 17, and T. 70, R. 17, in February, 1845; George L. Nightingale did the section work in T. 69, R. 17, and T. 68, R. 17 at the same time; John W. Ellis, T. 69, R. 19, in 1846 ; John G. Clark, T. 67, R. 18, in April, 1852, and T. 67, R. 19, in the follow- ing June. The rest of the subdivisional work was done by parties whose names are forgotten. Burt and Lyon were engaged in the public surveys in Iowa for many years, having begun work in the Territory in 1836.
ENTRIES.
The first entry of land made in Appanoose County was by Andrew Trus- sell, June 22, 1847, who located the northwestern quarter of the southeast quarter of Section 1, T. 70, R. 16, paying cash therefor, and receiving his patent February 1, 1848. Seven or eight other entries were made in this town- ship during 1847, and a considerable amount during 1848 and 1849. But the range in which this lies was the only one in Appanoose County open for entry until 1850. Here the boundary question again interfered, and the rest of the county, although surveyed for two or three years, was withheld from entry until the vexed question was settled. Various entries were made in Ranges 17, 18 and 19, during 1848 and 1849, and the first entries in the remainder of the county were made during January and February, 1850. The last scattering tracts were taken in 1860.
The first deed recorded runs from Jesse Wood, George W. Perkins and Albird Thompson, composing the Board of Commissioners, to James H. Shields, and conveys Lots 9 and 6, Range 4, Block 1, Centerville, for the sum of $30. The deed is dated February 12, 1850. As a matter of comparison it may be stated that the west half of Lot 1 in the same block and range recently sold for $600.
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HISTORY OF APPANOOSE COUNTY.
FIRST FLOURING-MILLS.
The very first flouring mill constructed in the county was that contrived by J. F. Stratton, probably in 1845. The lower frame consisted of a bee-gum, in which was fitted a small bowlder as a bedstone. Another bowlder was dressed to fit above, and a spindle attached, on the top of which was fastened a crank. A small box above served as a hopper. This ingenious and simple contrivance enabled the family to grind their wheat, corn and buckwheat quite well, and as Mr. Stratton took much pains in cleaning his grain, his flour and meal were of as good (or better) quality as the grists ground at Bonaparte or in the Missouri settlements. Several of Mr. Stratton's neighbors made use of his little mill, which, everything considered, in spite of its diminutiveness and slowness, was about as convenient as going to other counties to mill. This little mill has by no means been cast aside as useless, for it was sold to the pottery at Sharon, and is still at work, grinding up the materials for glazing crockery.
Col. James Wells got his flouring-mill running in Wells Township, some time in 1845, which enabled the pioneers to have their grain ground almost at home and the perilous winter trip to mill over an almost uninhabited course was no longer to be dreaded, or the more comfortable expedition in other seasons, when cattle were liable to go astray. Perhaps streams would have to be forded at the imminent risk of drowning, and very likely, when the mill was reached, a dozen others would be already waiting, and the poor fellow who had three or four days' travel to get home, would have to wait a day or two for his grist.
A corn-mill was set going in the saw-mill east of Centerville, some time in the fall of 1850.
In this connection it may be well to add that the pioneers had no means of threshing and cleaning their wheat save by flailing or by tramping with horses or cattle. In the latter process, which was comparatively expeditious, the bundles of grain were laid in a circle on the ground with the heads inward. After being tramped awhile, the straw was stirred, and so the process was con- tinued till the grain and chaff were freed from the straw, when the latter was removed, the grain shoveled into a pile, and fresh bundles laid down. The separation of the grain from the chaff was also a tedious process. This was either done by waving a sheet up and down to fan out the chaff as the grain was dropped before it, or by taking advantage of the strong winds in autumn, which were often brisk enough to blow off the chaff quite rapidly, and by frequently stirring the grain, a considerable quantity could be cleaned in a day.
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