Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume II, Part 43

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913; Cunningham, Joseph O. (Joseph Oscar), 1830-1917
Publication date: 1905
Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 632

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The Commissioners looked at the location about two miles east of Urbana in Section 15, where Matthew Busey then lived, and, admir- ing the lay of the land, solicited from him an offer of land for public purposes. The sug- gestion was repelled by Mr. Busey, upon whose vision the thought of profits, from the sale of corner lots and town sites, does not seem to have made any impression. He de- clared that he had purchased this land for a farm and a home 'and was determined to use it as such, which he did to the day of his death, thirty years afterwards. The Commis-

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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

sioners also looked at a very pretty town-site upon the land of John Brownfield near the creek in the Big Grove, believed to have been the geographical center of the county. So, also, the town of "Lancaster," laid out but a year before, as has been told on a previous page, was a candidate for the favor, and not without friends. Noah Bixler, the proprietor, was not a man to remain silent when such an opportunity offered to aid his town. It had many things to recommend its claims. The land there and near by was entirely suitable for á town, and the location was not more than two miles from the geographical center of the new county. Possibly its name was against it, for the law said, "The seat of jus- tice of said county shall be called and known by the name of 'Urbana.'"

The controversy narrowed down to the two points-north of the grove and south of the grove. The former was championed by Stan- ford, Heater, Brownfield, Rinehart, Light and many other dwellers along the Fort Clark road, who could claim for their settlement age, numbers, the postoffice and only public road through the county, and as being at the front; while the south side was without any of these advantages, and was an out of the way place with no advantages whatever. In fact the south side had nothing to recommend it as a county-seat. It had no roads but bridle- paths and Indian trails. It had no population except the families of Isaac Busey, Jacob Smith, and the Webbers, and it is still told by those who then noted the controversy, that it had no vegetation but the hazel brush, which grew in great abundance and to a wondrous height.

Under these circumstances the contest seemed likely to be easily won by those favor- ing Stanford's farm as the place. It is re- lated now that the Commissioners had fully agreed upon that point, and that all that was wanting to make that the future "Urbana"- the seat of justice for a large county-was the act of driving the stake, which had then been cut, sharpened and ready for the final blow. Just then the weaker party, repre- sented by Isaac Busey, interfered. He is said to have addressed the Commissioners famil- iarly thus-using a favorite expletive of his own: "Dod, boys, don't drive so late in the evening. Come, go home with me and stay all night." This remark and invitation was

fatal to the north side and fixed elsewhere, forever, the capital of the new county. The invitation of Uncle Isaac to accept the hospi- talities of his cabin was accepted, and this- or some other influence-settled the question before the rising of another sun; for, it is told that, at day-break next morning, in a little opening in the hazel brush where the court house now stands, the stake was driven and the die cast.(1)

It was long afterwards darkly insinuated to the writer, by men on the north side who had taken part, that influences akin to those in use in these later years, where official favors are sought, now known as "grafting," were made use of in the Busey cabin that night to aid in the final determination of the Commis- sioners. Official investigation was not in- voked by the defeated majority; so this part of the story has only surmises-which long since died away in the distance-to recom- mend it for a place in this historical sketch.

(1) The record of this proceeding made by Mr. Webber, Clerk of the Board of County Commis- sioners, in the proceeding for June 21, 1833, is as follows:

"This day came Stephen B. Shelledy and John F. Richardson, a majority of the Commissioners appointed to locate the permanent seat of jus- tice for the county of Champaign, appeared in court and made the following report, which is ordered to be committed to record and filed in the Clerk's office:

"We, the undersigned commissioners, ap- 1 pointed to locate the seat of justice in and for Champaign County, do certify that agreebly to 'An act creating Champaign County,' approved January 20th, 1833, we met at the house of Philip Stanford in said county, and after being duly sworn, faithfully and impartially to take into view the conveniences of the people, the situa- tion of the present settlement, with a strict view to the population and settlement which will hereafter be made, and eligibility of the place, proceeded to explore and carefully ex- amine the country, and have selected a site and obtained donation of forty-three acres of land, titles to thirty acres of which we have procured to be executed to the County Commis- sioners' Court of Champaign County, 19 50-100 of which lies in the northeast quarter of sec- tion 17. Town 19 North, Range 9 East, and ten and a half acres in the west half of the south- east quarter of Section 8, Town 19 North, Range 9 East; the metes and bounds of which are particularly described in the deed executed by Isaac Busey and wife; also ten acres in the east half of the southeast quarter of Section 8 and the east half of the northeast quarter of Section 17, Town 19 North, Range 9 East; the metes and bounds of which are particularly de- scribed in a bond for a deed. under penalty of $10,000, executed by T. R. Webber and M. W. Busey; also three acres described in a bond for a deed executed by M. W. Busey and T. R. Webber.

"Given under our hands and seals at the house of Isaac Busey, in said county, this 21st day of June A. D. 1833.

"JOHN F. RICHARDSON (Seal) "S. B. SHELLEDY. (Seal)."

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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

This being the extent of the evidence in favor of the charge of "grafting," it will be proper to give the legal presumptions in favor of in- nocence their full force. (1)

Two hickory trees, of the bitter variety, now standing on the Public Square, south of the court house, are the only remaining living witnesses of the location of the county-seat. and also the only survivors of the forest that then covered the ground.

At the time of this official act, which was destined to change the waste of hazel brush and rosin-weed into the city and county me- tropolis of today, there was little on the site save the aforesaid stake to give a hint of the future. Long use of the ground near the creek and along the line of Elm Street as a camping ground for Indians, had left it bare of under- brush, the only thing left being an occasional lone tree. Further to the east, about where Market Street is located, the timber and hazel brush stretched southward two blocks. (2) Isaac Busey lived in the cabin purchased by him from Tompkins, about two hundred feet north of the stone bridge and William T. Webber had another situated on the site of the George Webber home, east Main Street, in which the family of his son, Thomson R. Web- ber, lived. But few acres of prairie had been broken and the Big Grove presented a dense mass of unbroken timber, pierced only by trails. There were no settlements west of Isaac Busey's cabin until the Sangamon tim- ber was reached; and not more than twenty families were to be found there, Jonathan Maxwell, the first to erect his cabin there, be- ing one of them.

To the east, and not far away, were Jacob Smith, father of Merv. Smith, living on the

(1)"The settlements on the north side of the Big Grove were made a little before those on the south side and a sharp controversy occurred between the two points as to the location of the county-seat of the new County of Cham- paign. The north settlement claimed it on the ground of the larger numbers of inhabitants, but the commissioners appointed to locate the county-seat decided in favor of the present lo- cation for reasons best known to themselves." -Thomson R. Webber, in an interview in 1854. (2)"It was agreed among the neighbors around the south side of the Big Grove that if we won, and the county-seat was located on our side, we should have a big Fourth of July. Accordingly the hazel brush was cleared away from a plat about where the northeast corner of Race and Water streets, in Urbana, now is. a large floor was laid, the fiddler was called and they danced, sang and had a merry. time, you may be sure."-Fountain J. Busey, in "Mathews & McLain's Pioneers of Champaign County." page 99.

same place, Gabriel Rice, Matthew Busey, Mijamin Byers and John G. Robinson, in the Big Grove; and further on, in and about the Salt Fork timber, were Cyrus Strong, Jacob Bartley, William Peters, John Swearingen, David Swearingen, Joseph Stayton, Joseph Thomas, Moses Thomas, William Nox, Robert Prather, John Bailey, Isaac Burris and their families. Those to the north have been men- tioned before, while in the southern part of the county, besides Henry Sadorus on the Okaw, Davis and Bouse were at Linn Grove and on the Ambraw. Aside from these named families, and a few who are not named, Cham- paign County at its birth was an unoccupied and uncultivated expanse of prairie, and tim- ber. Its roads were only trails and, as to the settled portion of the State, it was wholly an out of the way place, a trackless wilderness of hazel brush and rosin-weed. And so we leave it for a consideration of its progress in the years which have since elapsed, to which future chapters will be devoted.

CHAPTER XIX.

COUNTY BUSINESS AND BUILDINGS.

INAUGURATION OF COUNTY BUSINESS-FIRST OFFI- CERS-CIRCUIT COURTS-FIRST CASES-FIRST AT- TORNEYS-JUDGES OF CIRCUIT COURT - COURT HOUSES-CONTESTS OVER BUILDING-JAILS-POOR FARMS-PAST AND PRESENT COUNTY OFFICERS.

The county having been legally established and its administrative officers chosen, as shown in the preceding chapter, the student of local history will be interested in a brief review of the manner in which these pioneers, mostly wholly unlearned in the forms of pro- cedure to be observed in applying the author- ity which follows the creation of an organized municipality, made use of their newly ac- quired authority.

As before shown, our pioneers were from the fields and the woods, and not from estab- lished governmental offices. They well knew woodcraft and were thoroughly versed in the practical science of wringing a subsistence from Nature's rude gifts; but in the task then before them, of carrying on the detail work of one of the government municipalities employed by our system, they were unlearned.

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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

How they met and discharged these responsi- bilities is shown by the brief, but often quaint and crude county records of that day. A com- parison of the work then done with that done years thereafter by the same persons, show marked improvement and a strict conformity to recognized forms in use in such proceed- ings and a conscientious discharge of every duty.

At the meeting of the County Commission- ers referred to in the last chapter, the Board adjourned to meet at the call of the Clerk of the Board, to receive the report of the com- missioners appointed to locate the seat of justice. This meeting was held at the house of Philip M. Stanford on June 3, 1833.

The called meeting was held at the same place on June 21, when Messrs. Shelledy and Richardson, two of the lawful commissioners, met with the County Board and effected the location of the county-seat as shown already. The session of the County Board was ad- journed on the 21st without transacting any business, "to the county-seat as designated by the Commissioners to locate the same." The record of the meeting of the following day shows the meeting to have been held "at the house of Isaac Busey." This place must have been the primitive cabin built by Tompkins on the bank of the Bone Yard Creek, and here is where the report of the action of the county-seat commissioners was made. At this session Mr. Shelledy was, by the County Board, allowed $16.00 and Mr. Richardson $20.00 for their services. As there were then no funds in the treasury, these gentlemen must have consented to receive and hold the county's orders in satisfaction of the paltry allowances made them. This meeting of the County Board was adjourned back to the Stan- ford house, where it and the next meetings were held.

The second meeting, held June 3, 1833, be- fore referred to, is distinguished from all succeeding meetings as being the first in this county when the subject of revenue occupied the attention of the Board. It was then de- termined to raise by taxation, to meet liabili- ties already incurred and to be incurred, the sum of $71.37 47-100, this being the amount due as shown by the computation of Moses Thomas, Treasurer.

It only remained for the same Board, at its September meeting, to order the Sheriff, John

Salisbury, to collect this sum, which he seems to have done; for a subsequent report from him shows the application of this sum to liabilities, leaving $50.99 unprovided for.

The contrast of conditions in the affairs of the county then and now, is nowhere so plain- ly shown as by an inspection of these records, made seventy years since.(1) The financial budget for the next year, when the sum of $88.91 only was ordered to be assessed and collected, showed little advance. Sums equal to these are now paid individually by a large proportion of the tax-payers of the county, while hundreds pay these sums many times multiplied. -

At the end of the first year's service the County Clerk, for his year's compensation, was allowed $21.50.

The first license to a merchant issued by the Board was to I. H. Alexander, who was the first to offer for sale such goods as the set- tlers needed. His store was kept in a log house situated on the lot where the First Na- tional Bank now stands. It was but a small building and he was the pioneer of those many splendid institutions in the various towns of the county which now supply the people.

In default of rooms at the new county-seat, it must be presumed, the Board, at its Septem- ber meeting, 1833, adjourned to meet at the house of Matthew Busey, two miles east of the nascent town of "Urbanna"-as the early rec- ords spell the name of the county-seat. Here the meetings were held until March, 1835, when they were adjourned to the house of I. H. Alexander, in Urbana, presumably at the store of that gentleman. (2)

The first grand and petit jurors were named at the session of the Board held March 3, 1834.

At the March meeting, 1834, the Board or- dered that a sale of lots in "Urbana" take place on the last Wednesday in April follow- ing, and subsequently fixed the prices of the lots as follows: Corner lots on the public

(1)At the September meeting (1834) of the Board, this appears among other orders then made:

"Thomas S. Freeman having bidden off the office of Assessor and Treasurer at $12.50, he is hereby appointed to that office, and thereupon gave bond and security according to law."

(2)Mr. Alexander was a resident of Danville. The store owned by him was operated by T. R. Webber, and was also his office as Clerk of the county.

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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

square, $30; corner lots elsewhere, $20; lots, not corner lots, $20; back lots, $10; out lots, $15. It is probable that the sale of lots held as above, did not meet the expectations of the promoters of the city of great expectations, for another sale was ordered at a subsequent meeting of the Board, to take place on July 4, 1835.

No greater interest can attach to any part of the early history of the county than that which the average citizen will feel in the record of the first few sessions of the Circuit Court-then the only court in this State hav- ing a general common law, chancery and crim- inal jurisdiction.

For some years before 1835 the mother county, Vermilion, was within the Fourth Ju- dicial Circuit. The act creating the county of Champaign was silent as to the relations judicially which it should sustain; but a law "regulating the terms of holding the Circuit Courts in this State," approved March 2, 1833, supplied the necessary provision. This law provided that, "when the counties of Iroquois and Champaign shall be organized under the provisions of the acts of this Legislature, then the Judge of the Fourth Judicial Circuit shall have power to change the time of holding courts in the county of Coles, so as to suit the time of holding courts in the said counties of Champaign and Iroquois."(1)

At that time there was no "Judge of the Fourth Judicial Circuit," properly so called, for by law the Judges of the Supreme Court (four in number), with one Circuit Judge, Richard M. Young of the Fifth Circuit-which included all that part of the State lying north and west of the Illinois River-held the Cir- cuit Courts. By law Judge William Wilson of the Supreme Court was required to hold the courts in the Fourth Circuit, which he did not do. On January 19, 1835, Justice Harlan, of Clark County, was commissioned Judge of the Fourth Circuit, under a new law, and, presumably by previous notice, and under the statute above quoted, on April 6, 1835, opened the first term of the Circuit Court of Cham- paign County "at the house of Isaac H. Alex- ander."(2) With the Judge appeared Andrew Stevenson, Sheriff, who had been chosen to succeeed John Salisbury, the first Sheriff. No

Clerk having previously been chosen-because no court had been held-the Court, under its constitutional authority, appointed Thomson R. Webber to the position, which office Mr. Web- ber held, under like appointment until the adoption of the Constitution of 1848, and after that by election by the people, continuing in said office until succeeded in 1857 by William H. Somers.

A Grand Jury was impanelled and sworn, consisting of Jacob Bartley, foreman, with Samuel Wilson, James Copeland, Jonathan Maxwell, William Jackson, James Osborn, John Bryan, Benjamin Dulemy, John Baily, Sr., John Jayne, Larkin Deer, George Bartley, Isaac Busey, Charles Busey, Charles Hapstonstall, Joshua Trickle, Matthew Busey and Joshua Taylor as members. No petit jury was called.

The official bonds of the Sheriff, Clerk and the Coroner, Adam Yeazel, were approved.

Only two cases-that of McDonald Osborn vs. William Phillips, action on the case for slander, and the same plaintiff vs. Nathaniel Hanline for the same offense, appear in the record. Both cases were continued for want of service.

On the same day of the convening of the court the Grand Jurors reported that they had no presentments to make, whereupon they were discharged and the court adjourned until court in course.

The second term was convened "at the house of Israel Knapp," which means the same place as before, Alexander having vacated the mercantile business in favor of Knapp, on October 10, 1835. Judge Alexander F. Grant, of Shawneetown, Judge of the Third Circuit, appeared and held this term, which occupied two days. Juries were called, Mijamin Byers being sworn as foreman of the grand jury. (1)

(1) Revised Laws of Illinois, 1833, nage 165. (2) Justin Harlan was an uncle of the late United States Senator James Harlan, of Iowa.

(1)"The building now occupied by James Munhall, as a cabinet shop, was once used as a room for the Circuit Court. On account of its small dimensions it could not afford room enough for the Grand Jury. In lieu of a suit- able room a small patch of hazel brush in close proximity was used as a grand jury room." -T. R. Webber, in an interview, 1854.

The early terms of the Circuit Court were held, in default of a court house, at private. houses, as has been seen. No jails or other buildings for the detention of persons charged with crime were in existence. It is related that, on one occasion, a prisoner, having been tried and while awaiting the verdict of the jury then considering his case in a nearby thicket of hazel brush was detained by the Sheriff in this manner: "His hands were tied behind him. and his feet were tied together; a small sapling

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HISTORY OF CHAMPAIGN COUNTY.

At this term the first jury trial of the coun- ty was held. It occurred on this date in the case of Osborn vs. Phillips, already noted. After the overruling of a demurrer, the first in the judicial history of the county, the trial proceeded, resulting in a verdict for the de- fendant.

The names appearing on the list of petit jurors were: Jacob Heater, John Jayne, Nelson Powell, William Corray, James Copeland, John Baily, Sr., Hiram Rankin, Frederick Bouse, Garret Moore, Isaac Burris, William Galliher and Hiram Johnson.

What would have been the next term in course-April, 1836-seems not to have been held.

Judge Harlan appeared at his post at the October term, 1836, and this term witnessed the first judgment by default in the history of the court. It was rendered against Isaiah Corray and in favor of one Chesnut, for. $265.

Col. M. W. Busey, then but a few months a resident of the county, for the first time appears on the court records as foreman of the Grand Jury. One indictment was returned into court at this term, the first in the crim- inal history of the county. This indictment was written by State's Attorney Aaron Shaw, and charged one John H. Busey with having disturbed the peace.

A capias was ordered by the court, the defendant brought in at a subsequent term and the cause "laid over until tomorrow morn- ing," after which, at the April term, 1837, the indictment was quashed by order of the court.

The record shows the October term, 1836, and the April term, 1837, to have been held "at the court house in Urbana," whereas, all prior terms were held at private houses. This court house was the temporary court house ordered by the County Commissioners here- inafter referred to. It seems to have accom- modated only two terms of the court, for the September term, 1837, is shown to have been convened at the house of Isaac Busey, which was the log house recently removed to Crys- tal Lake Park from Main Street, Urbana, long known as the "Wilkinson House."

The first attorney shown by these interest-

ing records to have participated in the doings of the court, was Samuel McRoberts, (1) who, at the October term, 1835 (the second term), made a motion to quash the recognizance of a client. The motion was sustained. Mr. Mc- Roberts, with his partner, Cravens, brought the first suits, those of McDonald Osborn above noted.

Other early attorneys whose names appear as practitioners in the Circuit Court of this county were G. B. Shelledy, Aaron Shaw, of Clark County; O. B. Ficklin, of Charleston; John J. Brown, of Danville; Augustus C. French (afterwards Governor of the State), and Matthew Van Deveer. (2)

(1) Samuel McRoberts was at this time a citi- zen of Danville and the Receiver of the Danville land office. He was afterwards, in 1841, elected to the Senate of the United States, where he served acceptably until his death in 1843. He served as one of the Circuit Judges of the State from 1825 until 1827. He then resided in Monroe County.

(2) The records of the Circuit Court of Cham- paign County, from which these bits of its early history have been gleaned, afford a most interesting study for the historian and anti- quarian. The records were originally written. not in a book, but, as it would seem, upon loose sheets of paper such as was in use gen- erally at that date. No ruling appears upon the sheets as manufactured, the lines followed having been made by a ruler and lead plummet. The paper is rough and coarse, and has appar- ently been since bound into book form, with subsequent records.

The record of the first term is in the hand writing of Judge Harlan briefly written, but generally in the approved forms of judicial records. The record of the second term is largely in the handwriting of Judge Grant. Sub- sequent records are partly in the handwriting of the Clerk, Mr. Webber, and partly the work of others, presumably of the judges or lawyers for some years, but finally wholly the work of the Clerk. Judge Treat wrote much of the record of terms held by him in his well known strong hand. With this Judge in 1841 came a bound book of a better quality of paper, ruled . in the manufacture. There came also the use of forms in the record which more nearly con- form to those in use in later years.

During the first twenty years of the life of the county a singular repetition of the same names in the juries calied appears-they being mostly the names given in previous chapters of this sketch, as those who came early to the county. New names keep dropping in every year. Each day's record is duly signed by the presiding Judge, and as the terms usually lastea but two days, the record must have been act- ually written up as the business of the court proceeded.

The last work done by Judge Harlan in fin- ishing up his long term of service in the coun- ty, was the writing of a decree of divorce of nine lines, whereby he forever divorced Robert Prather, the owner of "Prather's Ford," from his wife, Letitia. According to modern lights on the divorce question the merest tyro in law forms would hold that, for all of this decree, Robert and Letitia, long since dead, died in the bonds of holy wedlock.

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Historical encyclopedia of Illinois, Volume II, Part 43

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913; Cunningham, Joseph O. (Joseph Oscar), 1830-1917 Publication date: 1905 Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 632

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913; Cunningham, Joseph O. (Joseph Oscar), 1830-1917
Publication date: 1905
Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 632