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Gc 977.3 H83 359242
PUBLIC LIBRARY ORT WAYNE & ALLEN CO., IND.
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 00839 1929
ILLINOIS THE STORY OF THE PRAIRIE STATE
1
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
ILLINOIS 1
THE STORY OF THE PRAIRIE STATE
By GRACE HUMPHREY
Illustrated with Photographs
INDIANAPOLIS THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY PUBLISHERS
r
COPYRIGHT 1917 THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY
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1
FT. WAYNE PRINTING CO. FT. WAYNE, IND.
4 1938
JUN
359242
To MY FATHER Who gave me, when a child, my first interest in the story of Illinois
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I
THE GEOGRAPHY OF ILLINOIS
1
II
BEFORE THE FRENCH CAME .
4
III THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER 8
IV LA SALLE AND TONTY
16
V UNDER THE FRENCH FLAG 26
VI THE BRIEF RULE OF ENGLAND
33
VII THE AMERICAN CONQUEST 37
VIII
TERRITORIAL YEARS
56
IX THE WAR OF 1812 63
X ILLINOIS BECOMES A STATE 70
XI
EARLY YEARS OF STATEHOOD
75
XII
SLAVE OR FREE?
84
XIII A DISTINGUISHED GUEST 93
XIV
THE CRAZE FOR IMPROVEMENTS
102
XV THE BLACK HAWK WAR 110
XVI A PERMANENT CAPITAL
120
XVII THE ALTON TRAGEDY 127
XVIII
RELIGION MIXED WITH POLITICS
134
XIX
ILLINOIS IN THE MEXICAN WAR
145
XX
THE CODE OF HONOR
149
XXI
REAL IMPROVEMENTS
157
CONTENTS-Continued
CHAPTER PAGE
XXII
THE GROWTH OF A PARTY
169
XXIII
RALLY ROUND THE FLAG!
187
XXIV A SAD HOME-COMING
199
XXV THE CITY BY THE LAKE
202
XXVI
EDUCATION, YESTERDAY AND TO-DAY
214
XXVII GREATNESS OF THE STATE 223
EPILOGUE
230
QUESTIONS
239
NOTES
247
MAPS
257
INDEX
261
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ILLINOIS
THE STORY OF THE PRAIRIE STATE
ILLINOIS
. The Story of the Prairie State I
THE GEOGRAPHY OF ILLINOIS
B EFORE you begin reading the story of Illinois, make a picture in your mind of how the land lies, with reference to the rest of the United States. Perhaps you will need your geography to help you. Very well, study the maps carefully. For it is im- possible to read history without having geography for your foundation.
You will find, then, that Illinois has a remarka- ble location, more than almost any other state in the Union. About half-way between the two oceans, it is also half-way between north and south. Far enough north to escape the enervating southern heat, far enough south to escape the very severe northern winter, its four seasons offer a variety of climate.
You will notice, too, how many waterways Illi-
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ILLINOIS
nois has-the rivers that flow across it, plus those forming its boundary lines, plus the great lake on the northeast. Find on your map a state that has no waterways on its boundary, find some that have fewer than Illinois; can you find one that has more? Notice how the rivers all flow southwest, but how the land slopes so gradually that there are no rapids.
And see how nature made it easy to reach Illi- nois, joining her to Virginia and the south by the Ohio River, and by the Illinois, the link between the lakes and the Mississippi, making easy connection with the French settlements in Canada. From north and east and south have come her people, giving richness and variety to her story. Through all the years, but especially in the early days, Illinois's many waterways have been an important factor in her de- velopment. You will find this, over and over, as you read, so keep it well in mind.
Now, look at a map showing mines, and see where Illinois stands. No gold and silver, but coal! More than three-fourths of the state has strata of this black "imprisoned sunshine," made, the wise men say, by forests of trees and tall ferns which for centuries crystallized the sunbeams into stores of future energy. The first coal found in the New World was in Illinois, the first use made of it was in Tonty's forge in the fort at Starved Rock.1 Its discovery was second in importance only to the find-
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GEOGRAPHY
ing of the Mississippi Valley. Yet those early seek- ers for mines were disappointed !
And over the coal, from ten to two hundred feet deep, is the rich soil of the prairies. Treeless, level or slightly rolling, extremely fertile, the surface of Illinois has made its contribution to her greatness.
Rich, varied, unusual as are nature's gifts to the state, they are equaled only by the romance of her history. No other state in the Union has such a background of color and adventure. No other has given more to the story of the nation. Claimed by Spain, explored and occupied by France, held by England, conquered by the American forces, the record is full of variety and interest. And it is not a story merely-the wonderful thing is that it is all true !
II
BEFORE THE FRENCH CAME
L ONG after the voyages of Columbus, long after Spain and France and England and Holland had planted their colonies in America, the valley of the Mississippi was an unknown region. Although DeSoto's journey to the "father of waters" gave Spain a claim to the Illinois country, and though this claim was confirmed by the Pope, the Spanish did nothing to explore or colonize it. Not until 1673, when the first of the French arrived, does Illinois history really begin.
But back of that, so far back that they are lost in the dim past, stretch slender threads of her story. For when the French came, they found here traces of a vanished people. We call them the "mound builders," from the peculiar mounds they raised. Were they forts, or altars, or sites of towns, or cemeteries, or signal stations? No one can answer.
The mounds are scattered over Illinois, along the principal waterways. By the shore of Lake Mich- igan, along the bluffs of the Mississippi, near the Ohio and Rock and Wabash Rivers, you can see to-
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BEFORE THE FRENCH CAME
day the remnants of their building.1 And curious they are-some as large as seven hundred feet, some made of soil brought from miles away, so numerous they hint at an enormous number of workmen em- ployed.
The very little we know of these people we learn from the mounds themselves, and from the things found in them-flint spades and hoes, pottery, woven cloth, polished stone implements, and others of thin, hammered copper, silver, or iron, all show- ing a higher stage of development than the Indians had reached, yet far behind the civilization of Cen- tral America.2
But it is all so long ago that we can but guess at their history, and only geological words go far enough back to tell it.
Beside these traces of a prehistoric people, the first comers found Indians here, belonging to the Algonquin family. The Illinois were five tribes in a federation-Tamaroas, Michigamies, Kaskaskias, Cahokias and Peorias-like the famous Five Na- tions in New York State, but not so well organized.3 The name of state and river comes from "Illini," as they called themselves, with a French ending.
The Indians wandered over the prairies, living by hunting and fishing and a most primitive agriculture. Without knowing the use of iron, without domestic animals, without a written language, they were sav-
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ILLINOIS
ages, and fighting was their principal occupation. For all the years they lived here, their story is con- stant warfare-war that was cruel and cowardly and causeless, in which men and women and children alike perished.
And if you argue that the Europeans had no right to take away the Indians' land, expelling the red men from their hunting grounds, for their own selfish advancement, the answer is contained in just those words. For the Indians, they were hunting grounds and nothing more. For the white men they are per- manent fields of grain, sites for great cities, for manufacturing and mining, providing a livelihood for thousands and even millions of people, where only a few hundred Indians could live. They make a higher civilization possible, a greater blessing to humanity, a greater good to the greatest number.
And whatever you may say of the white man's unfairness and injustice to the red, not an incident in their history relates such treatment as one Indian tribe frequently gave to another. La Salle tells of an Iroquois invasion into Illinois, and the cruel death of hundreds of the Illinois tribes. And the French accounts show that in fifty-seven years their fighting men were reduced from twelve thousand to only six hundred warriors. 4
Our Indian history is picture after picture of savage war between the Illinois federation and the
Cahokia, or "Monk's Mound," Madison Co., I11.
South end of the great Cahokia Mound
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BEFORE THE FRENCH CAME
other tribes living in the state. It is a story of deso- lation and extermination, for their aim was always to waste and destroy, not to build up. Nearly two hundred years passed, after the coming of the French, before the Indians were finally banished from Illinois.
III
THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER
Y OU have learned, in your study of United States history, of the coming of the French to America; how they based their claim on the voyage of Verrazani, how Cartier started a first settlement in Canada, how Champlain founded Quebec and made journeys of discovery to the south and west for a thousand miles. Their first knowledge of Illinois was when Champlain heard from the Lake Huron Indians of a people living still farther west, "a nation where there is a quantity of buffalo," and so he described the prairie country on his map.1
The French settlements reached out toward the southwest, up the St. Lawrence and along the Great Lakes. Little by little they learned the geography of this country. Traders and priests frequently sent back Indian reports of a great water beyond, hinting of an ocean not far away, or a river running into some western sea. It was to settle this question that the governor in Montreal sent Marquette and Joliet on a trip of exploration, whose chief object,
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THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER
wrote the Jesuit superior-general in Canada, "was to know in what sea emptied the great river of which the Indians tell so many stories."2 Their aim was the very same that had sent Columbus, nearly two centuries before, across the Atlantic-to find a water route to India. Their journey was, like his, unsuc- cessful, but they did find something fully as impor- tant.
Born in Quebec, Louis Joliet was a fur-trader. In a trip to the copper mines near Lake Superior, he had won a reputation for courage and skill. He had the prudence necessary for a dangerous voyage, the courage to fear nothing where there was every- thing to fear. He had enterprise, boldness, deter- mination. He knew several Indian languages. There was not a man in Canada better fitted to un- dertake a great discovery.3
Joliet was already acquainted with the good priest, Jacques Marquette, who for five years had been a missionary on the lakes. The Illinois tribes had vis- ited his mission station in 1670, telling of the rich- ness of their country, making him eager to visit it, to open the way for Christianity.
Marquette, with face thin and careworn, eyes deep set, dressed in a rusty black robe, with crucifix and rosary, was a religious enthusiast, fired with zeal. Joliet, broad-shouldered, alert, with intelligent face and energetic gesture, was a great contrast. The
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Jesuit's one thought, the salvation of souls; the trader's ambition, to win glory for himself and for France-they made a good team, one supplementing the other.4
"My companion," said Marquette to the Indians, "is an envoy of France to discover new countries, and I am an ambassador from God to enlighten them with the gospel."
The winter of 1672 Joliet spent in the mission station at Mackinac, and the two friends completed their plans for the journey.
"As we were going to seek unknown countries," wrote the priest, in a report to his superior, "we took all possible precautions that, if our enterprise was hazardous, it should not be foolhardy ; for this rea- son we gathered all possible information from In- dians who had frequented those parts, and even from their accounts traced a map of all the new country, marking down the rivers on which we were to sail, the names of the nations and places through which we were to pass, the course of the great river, and what direction we should take when we got to it.
"We were not long in preparing our outfit, al- though we were embarking on a voyage the duration of which we could not foresee. Indian corn, with some dried meat, was our whole stock of provisions. With this we set out in two bark canoes, M. Jollyet, myself, and five men, firmly resolved to do all and suffer all for so glorious an enterprise."5
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THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER
Starting in May, crossing the narrow portage from the Fox River, they paddled down the Wiscon- sin and "safely entered the Mississippi on the 17th of June, with a joy that I can not express." Hoist- ing the sails on their canoes, they floated down the "father of waters," between the "broad plains of Illinois and Iowa, all garlanded with majestic for- ests and chequered with illimitable prairies and island groves."
"At last, on the 25th of June, we perceived foot- prints of men by the water-side, and a beaten path entering a beautiful prairie. We stopped to examine it, and concluding that it was a path lead- ing to some Indian village, we resolved to go and. reconnoitre. M. Jollyet and I fol- lowed the little path in silence, and having advanced about two leagues, we discovered a village on the banks of the river. Then, indeed, we recom- mended ourselves to God, with all our hearts; and, having implored His help, we passed on undiscov- ered, and came so near that we even heard the Indians talking. We then deemed it time to an- nounce ourselves, as we did by a cry. The . Indians rushed out of their cabins, and having probably recognized us as French, especially seeing a black gown, they deputed four old men
to come and speak with us. . I asked them who they were; they answered that they were Ilini, and, in token of peace, they presented their pipes to smoke."
J
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ILLINOIS
Marquette's report goes on to tell of their enter- tainment in that village, and how the chief
"begged us, on behalf of his whole nation, not to proceed further, on account of the great dangers to which we exposed ourselves.
"I replied that I did not fear death, and that I esteemed no happiness greater than that of losing my life for the glory of Him who made all. But this those poor people could not understand."
Before they left the Indians
"made us a present, an all-mysterious calumet, than which there is nothing among them more mys- terious or more esteemed. Men do not pay to the crowns and sceptres of kings the honor they pay to it; it seems to be the god of peace and war. Carry it about you and show it, and you can march fearlessly amid enemies. . Hence the Ilinois gave me one, to serve as my safeguard amid all the nations that I had to pass on my voyage."
South they went, past the painted bird of Piasa, past the dangerous sweep of the Missouri, where it joins its yellow stream to the Mississippi, the peace pipe about Marquette's neck probably giving them more protection than his cross. And after a month's journey down the Mississippi, satisfied from Indian accounts and their own observations that it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico, and fearing they might
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THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER
fall into the hands of the Spaniards if they reached the sea, they decided to return.
The priest became ill and lay helpless in the bot- tom of the canoe for weeks, while the little party slowly made their way against the current. Of spe- cial interest is their route north, for they left the Mississippi and went up the quiet Illinois, the In- dians telling them this was a shorter route and would bring them on their way with little trouble.
"We had seen nothing like this river," writes Marquette, "for the fertility of the land, its prairies, woods, wild cattle, stag, deer, · ducks, par- rots, and even beaver; its many lakes and rivers."
By way of Chicago and Lake Michigan, they re- turned to Green Bay in September, without losing a man or receiving any hurt or injury whatever. Joliet, returning to Canada the next spring, was within sight of Montreal when his canoe was upset in the rapids, and his carefully drawn map and full report, telling all that was curious and interesting in their voyage, was lost. Marquette thus becomes the historian of the French discovery of the Mississippi, and the report he wrote from the mission station in Wisconsin is Illinois's first historic document. He was more interested in converting the savages than in explorations, so that his journal is brief, but cor- rect and reliable.6
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The French were astonished at the magnitude of their discoveries-the soil and its products, the buf- falo, the beauty of the country. And we are equally astonished at this journey-a four months' trip in frail canoes, covering twenty-five hundred miles, discovering the greatest valley in the world.
Marquette remained at the Green Bay mission for a year, regaining his strength after so many hardships, and then started south, to keep his prom- ise and establish a mission among the Illinois tribes. His party arrived at the site of Chicago early in December, describing it as "a snow-covered prairie and an ice-bound river."" The priest being ill again, they determined to spend the winter there, and built a rude hut. Though it was cold and bleak, game was plentiful, and some friendly Indians were en- camped near by.
By the last of March Marquette was able to travel to Kaskaskia, where he was received as an angel from Heaven. Five hundred chiefs and old men and fifteen hundred youths came to the great council where he said mass and took possession of the land in the name of Christ. He named the mission "the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin," re- deeming his vow at the beginning of his voyage with Joliet. The mission kept this name, even when the village was moved south nearly to the mouth of the Kaskaskia River. And the little church and
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THE PRIEST AND THE TRADER
parish in New Kaskaskia are to-day called Immacu- late Conception.8
Very ill, Marquette had to leave in a few months, and died on the way to Canada. His was a lovely character, and his self-sacrifice endeared him to every one. He gave himself up entirely to the most severe and dangerous service, not with complaints, but with the greatest pleasure. Among all the de- vout missionaries he has no equal for piety, for holi- ness of purpose, for the great tasks he performed.
If you would know more about him, read his life, by Thwaites, or chapter five in Parkman's Discov- ery of the Great West. Read Marquette's own re- ports, which you will find translated in Breese's Early History of Illinois, and in Shea's Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley; part of Shea's translation is reprinted in the first volume of the collections of the Illinois State Historical Library. You will like especially Marquette's de- scription of the buffalo, of their stay in the Illinois village, and his unfinished letter telling of his last visit to these tribes, the end of the story written by one of the French priests who accompanied him.
IV
LA SALLE AND TONTY
T HE news of this discovery set all Canada on fire, and France, too, caught the fever. Most important of the men suddenly enthusiastic for western enterprise was Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle. The son of wealthy Rouen parents, he had joined a brother in Montreal and become a fur- trader. He was the first to see how important Mar- quette's discovery was, and to make the French gov- ernment realize it and give him authority to carry out his plan. This was no less than to extend the French empire in America into the southwest, to explore the Mississippi, open the country to French trade, and make the river a highway for the world's commerce.1
Something of La Salle's difficulties you already know : how the king gave him a title, a grant of land, command of the forts which he might erect, but no funds at all; how, when Fort Frontenac was fin- ished, he built a vessel of forty tons, with great white sails and the figurehead of a griffin; how from his trading-post at Mackinac he sent the Griffin east
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LA SALLE AND TONTY
across Lake Ontario, with a rich cargo of furs; and how then his little party started south.
Thirty men and three priests-it was certainly not a military expedition ! The religious leader was the ambitious Father Hennepin, more explorer than priest. The lieutenant was Henri de Tonty, an Italian, who had lost one hand in a battle in Sicily, and was called by the Indians "the man with the iron hand." They might well have named the leader, La Salle, him of the iron will; for his courage was never daunted, no matter what disasters and mis- fortunes came to him. Only such a character could have made his achievements possible.
Without waiting for news of the boat's safe ar- rival, they went up the St. Joe, crossed the portage, down the Kankakee and into Illinois. It was now December, and their provisions were very low. Reaching an Indian village near Ottawa, they were disheartened to find it deserted, the red men away on their winter hunt. But they did find some corn, stored for seed in the spring, and took what they needed.
Farther down the river they overtook the Illinois tribes, paid for the corn with axes, and received permission to build a fort, promising help against the Iroquois. The fort was named Crevecœur, in English "broken heart." And many writers have thought La Salle chose it because of his disappoint-
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ments and difficulties. Indeed, Father Hennepin says :
"We named it the fort of Crevecœur, because of the desertion of our men, and the other difficulties we labored under had almost broke our hearts."2
And certainly La Salle had every reason to be heavy-hearted. For his little group was far in ad- vance of any of the French settlements; the Indians were at best uncertain friends; two of his carpen- ters had deserted; his men threatened to mutiny, and had tried to poison him; most of all, if the Griffin were really lost, it meant financial ruin.
Yet, if La Salle were utterly discouraged and heart-broken, would he have told his men? What they needed was encouragement. Crevecoeur may sound romantic, but there must be some explana- tion; and recent study has perhaps supplied it. A few years before, the army of Louis XIV had cap- tured a fort in the Netherlands called Crevecœur, and the name may have been a compliment to the king. This is the more credible, since we know now that Tonty, who was for years a French soldier, had taken part in the capture of the Dutch fort.3
The American Crevecœur was nearly finished, as was the boat they were building, when La Salle divided his men. Father Hennepin, who could,
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LA SALLE AND TONTY
thought the leader, do more good by exploring than by preaching, was sent down the Illinois to its mouth, and then up the Mississippi, in the hope that it led west to India. The whole country seemed so fine and pleasant that the priest says one might justly call it "the delight of America."
At the falls of St. Anthony he and his two men were taken prisoners by the Sioux Indians, detained several months, and finally reached Canada. Like Marquette, Hennepin wrote about his adventures, but some of his accounts are not altogether reliable, though they reached over twenty editions, in six languages. "He writes of what he saw in places where he never was," says a contemporary; "the name of honor they gave him there (in Canada) is the great liar."4
The second division was to return to Canada.
"All the wood had been prepared to finish the bark, but we had neither rigging nor sails nor iron enough," writes Tonty. "La Salle determined in this extremity not to wait longer, but to proceed on foot to Fort Frontenac, five hundred leagues away, for the necessary equipment. The ground was still covered with snow. His outfit must contain a blan- ket, a kettle, an axe, a gun, powder and lead and dressed skins for shoes (our French shoes being of no use in these western countries). He must push through bushes, walk in marshes and melting snow, .
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sometimes waist high for whole days, sometimes even with nothing to eat, because he must needs de- pend for subsistence on what he might shoot and drink only the water he might find on the way. Besides this he was constantly exposed to four or five Indian nations making war on each other."
And later Tonty wrote, from his own experience :
"There is no pleasure in meeting warriors on one's road, especially when they have been unsuc- cessful."5
In spite of the severe weather, in spite of storm and famine and sickness, they arrived safely. The Griffin had not been heard from. La Salle straight- ened out his financial affairs, got a new outfit to- gether, enlisted twenty-five men, and again set out for Illinois.
Meantime Tonty, left at Crevecœur with "three honest men and a dozen plotting knaves," was hav- ing serious troubles. Ten of his followers deserted, looted the magazine, took what food they could carry, and cast the rest into the river. Thrown on the charity of the Indians, Tonty's little party took refuge in their village for six months. Here the Illinois Indians were attacked by their old enemy, the Iroquois. The French tried their best to make a truce between them, the Illinois tribes retreated
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