Historical encyclopedia of Illinois and history of St. Clair County, Volume I, Part 49

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897. ed. cn; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913. jt. ed. cn; Wilderman, Alonzo St. Clair, 1839-1904, ed; Wilderman, Augusta A., jt. ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 698

USA > Illinois > St Clair County > Historical encyclopedia of Illinois and history of St. Clair County, Volume I > Part 49

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Extending through five and one-half degrees of latitude, Illinois has a great variety of climate. Though subject at times to sudden alternations of temperature, these occasions have been rare since the country has been thoroughly settled. Its mean average for a series of years has been 48° in the northern part of the State and 56° in the southern, differing little from other States upon the same latitude. The mean winter temper- ature has ranged from 25° in the north to 34° in the south, and the summer mean from 67° in the north to 78° in the south. The extreme winter temperature has seldom fallen below 20° below zero in the northern portion, while the highest summer temperature ranges from 95° to 102°. The average difference in temperature between the northern and southern portions of the State is about 10°, and the difference in the progress of the seasons for the same sections, from four to six weeks. Such a wide variety of climate is favor- able to the production of nearly all the grains and fruits peculiar to the temperate zone.

CONTEST FOR OCCUPATION. - Three powers early became contestants for the supremacy on the North American Continent. The first of these was Spain, claiming possession on the ground of the discovery by Columbus; England, basing her claim upon the discoveries of the Cabots, and France, maintaining her right to a considerable part of the continent by virtue of the discovery and exploration by Jacques Cartier of the Gulf and River St. Lawrence, in 1534-35, and the settlement of Quebec by Champlain seventy-four years later. The claim of Spain was general, extending to both North and South America; and, while she early established her colonies in Mexico, the West Indies and Peru, the country was too vast and her agents too busy seeking for gold to interfere materially with her competitors. The Dutch, Swedes and Germans established small, though flourishing colonies, but they were not colonizers nor were they numeric- ally as strong as their neighbors, and their settle- ments were ultimately absorbed by the latter. Both the Spaniards and the French were zealous

in proselyting the aborigines, but while the former did not hesitate to torture their victims in order to extort their gold while claiming to save their souls, the latter were more gentle and beneficent in their policy, and, by their kindness, succeeded in winning and retaining the friend- ship of the Indians in a remarkable degree. They were traders as well as missionaries, and this fact and the readiness with which they adapted them- selves to the habits of those whom they found in possession of the soil, enabled them to make the most extensive explorations in small numbers and at little cost, and even to remain for un- limited periods among their aboriginal friends. On the other hand, the English were artisans and tillers of the soil with a due proportion engaged in commerce or upon the sea; and, while they were later in planting their colonies in Virginia and New England, and less aggressive in the work of exploration, they maintained a surer foothold on the soil when they had once estab- lished themselves. To this fact is due the per- manence and steady growth of the English colonies in the New World, and the virtual domi- nance of the Anglo-Saxon race over more than five-sevenths of the North American Continent- a result which has been illustrated in the history of every people that has made agriculture, manu- factures and legitimate commerce the basis of their prosperity.

EARLY EXPLORATIONS .- The French explorers were the first Europeans to visit the "Country of the Illinois," and, for nearly a century, they and their successors and descendants held undisputed possession of the country, as well as the greater part of the Mississippi Valley. It is true that Spain put in a feeble and indefinite claim to this whole region, but she was kept too busy else- where to make her claim good, and, in 1763, she relinquished it entirely as to the Mississippi Valley and west to the Pacific Ocean, in order to strengthen lierself elsewhere.

There is a peculiar coincidence in the fact that, while the English colonists who settled about Massachusetts Bay named that region "New England," the French gave to their possessions, from the St. Lawrence to the mouth of the Mis- sissippi, the name of "New France," and the Spaniards called all the region claimed by them, extending from Panama to Puget Sound, "New Spain." The boundaries of each were very indefi- nite and often conflicting, but were settled by the treaty of 1763.

As early as 1634, Jean Nicolet, coming by way of Canada, discovered Lake Michigan - then

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called by the French, "Lac des Illinois"-entered Green Bay and visited some of the tribes of Indians in that region. In 1641 zealous mission- aries had reached the Falls of St. Mary (called by the French "Sault Ste. Marie"), and, in 1658, two French fur-traders are alleged to have penetrated as far west as "La Pointe" on Lake Superior, where they opened up a trade with the Sioux Indians and wintered in the neighborhood of the Apostle Islands near where the towns of Ashland and Bayfield, Wis., now stand. A few years later (1665), Fathers Allouez and Dablon, French mis- sionaries, visited the Chippewas on the southern shore of Lake Superior, and missions were estab- lished at Green Bay, Ste. Marie and La Pointe. About the same time the mission of St. Ignace was established on the north shore of the Straits of Mackinaw (spelled by the French "Michilli- macinac"). It is also claimed that the French traveler, Radisson, during the year of 1658-59, reached the upper Mississippi, antedating the claims of Joliet and Marquette as its discoverers by fourteen years. Nicholas Perrot, an intelli- gent chronicler who left a manuscript account of his travels, is said to have made extensive explor- ations about the head of the great lakes as far south as the Fox River of Wisconsin, between 1670 and 1690, and to have held an important conference with representatives of numerous tribes of Indians at Sault Ste. Marie in June, 1671. Perrot is also said to have made the first discovery of lead mines in the West.

Up to this time, however, no white man appears to have reached the "Illinois Country," though much had been heard of its beauty and its wealth in game. On May 17, 1673, Louis Joliet, an enter- prising explorer who had already visited the Lake Superior region in search of copper mines, under a commission from the Governor of Canada, in company with Father Jacques Marquette and five voyageurs, with a meager stock of provisions and a few trinkets for trading with the natives, set out in two birch-bark canoes from St. Ignace on a tour of exploration southward. Coasting along the west shore of Lake Michigan and Green Bay and through Lake Winnebago, they reached the country of the Mascoutins on Fox River, ascended that stream to the portage to the Wis- consin, then descended the latter to the Mis- sissippi, which they discovered on June 17. Descending the Mississippi, which they named "Rio de la Conception," they passed the mouth of the Des Moines, where they are supposed to have encountered the first Indians of the Illinois tribes, by whom they were hospitably enter-

tained. Later they discovered a rude painting upon the rocks on the east side of the river, which, from the description, is supposed to have been the famous "Piasa Bird," which was still to be seen, a short distance above Alton, within the present generation. (See Piasa Bird, The Legend of.) Passing the mouth of the Missouri River and the present site of the city of St. Louis, and continuing past the mouth of the Ohio, they finally reached what Marquette called the village of the Akanseas, which has been assumed to be identical with the mouth of the Arkansas, though it has been questioned whether they proceeded so far south. Convinced that the Mississippi "had its mouth in Florida or the Gulf of Mexico, " and fearing capture by the Spaniards, they started on their return. Reaching the mouth of the Illinois, they entered that stream and ascended past the village of the Peorias and the "Illinois town of the Kaskaskias" -- the latter being about where the town of Utica, La Salle County, now stands-at each of which they made a brief stay. Escorted by guides from the Kaskaskias, they crossed the portage to Lake Michigan where Chicago now stands, and re- turned to Green Bay, which they reached in the latter part of September. (See Joliet and Mar- quette. )

The next and most important expedition to Illi- nois -- important because it led to the first per- manent settlements-was undertaken by Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, in 1679. This eager and intelligent, but finally unfortunate, discov- erer had spent several years in exploration in the lake region and among the streams south of the lakes and west of the Alleghenies. It has been claimed that, during this tour, he descended the Ohio to its junction with the Mississippi; also that he reached the Illinois by way of the head of Lake Michigan and the Chicago portage, and even descended the Mississippi to the 36th parallel, antedating Marquette's first visit to that stream by two years. The chief authority for this claim is La Salle's biographer, Pierre Margry, who bases his statement on alleged con- versations with La Salle and letters of his friends. The absence of any allusion to these discoveries in La Salle's own papers, of a later date, addressed to the King, is regarded as fatal to this claim. However this may have been, there is conclusive evidence that, during this period, he met with Joliet while the latter was returning from one of his trips to the Lake Superior country. With an imagination fired by what he then learned, he made a visit to his native country, receiving a

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liberal grant from the French Government which enabled him to carry out his plans. With the aid of Henry de Tonty, an Italian who afterward accompanied him in his most important expedi- tions, and who proved a most valuable and effi- cient co-laborer, under the auspices of Frontenac, then Governor of Canada, he constructed a small vessel at the foot of Lake Erie, in which, with a company of thirty-four persons, he set sail on the seventh of August, 1679, for the West. This vessel (named the "Griffon") is believed to have been the first sailing-vessel that ever navigated the lakes. His object was to reach the Illinois, and he carried with him material for a boat which he intended to put together on that stream. Arriving in Green Bay early in Septem- ber, by way of Lake Huron and the straits of Mackinaw, he disembarked his stores, and, load- ing the Griffon with furs, started it on its return with instructions, after discharging its cargo at the starting point, to join him at the head of Lake Michigan. With a force of seventeen men and three missionaries in four canoes, he started southward, following the western shore of Lake Michigan past the mouth of the Chicago River, on Nov. 1, 1679, and reached the mouth of the St. Joseph River, at the southeast corner of the lake, which had been selected as a rendez- vous. Here he was joined by Tonty, three weeks later, with a force of twenty Frenchmen who had come by the eastern shore, but the Griffon never was heard from again, and is supposed to have been lost on the return voyage. While waiting for Tonty he erected a fort, afterward called Fort Miami. The two parties here united, and, leaving four men in charge of the fort, with the remaining thirty-three, he resumed his journey on the third of December. Ascending the St. Joseph to about where South Bend, Ind., now stands, he made a portage with his canoes and stores across to the headwaters of the Kan- kakee, which he descended to the Illinois. On the first of January he arrived at the great Indian town of the Kaskaskias, which Marquette had left for the last time nearly five years before, but found it deserted, the Indians being absent on a hunting expedition. Proceeding down the Illi- nois, on Jan. 4, 1680, he passed through Peoria Lake and the next morning reached the Indian village of that name at the foot of the lake, and established friendly relations with its people. Having determined to set up his vessel here, he constructed a rude fort on the eastern bank of the river about four miles south of the village. With the exception of the cabin built for Mar-

quette on the South Branch of the Chicago River in the winter of 1674-75, this was probably the first structure erected by white men in Illinois. This received the name "Creve-Cœur-"Broken Heart"-which, from its subsequent history, proved exceedingly appropriate. Having dis- patched Father Louis Hennepin with two com- panions to the Upper Mississippi, by way of the mouth of the Illinois, on an expedition which resulted in the discovery of the Falls of St. Anthony, La Salle started on his return to Canada for additional assistance and the stores which he had failed to receive in consequence of the loss of the Griffon. Soon after his depar- ture, a majority of the men left with Tonty at Fort Creve-Cœur mutinied, and, having plundered the fort, partially destroyed it. This compelled Tonty and five companions who had remained true, to retreat to the Indian village of the Illi- nois near "Starved Rock," between where the cities of Ottawa and La Salle now stand, where he spent the summer awaiting the return of La Salle. In September, Tonty's Indian allies hav- ing been attacked and defeated by the Iroquois, he and his companions were again compelled to flee, reaching Green Bay the next spring, after having spent the winter among the Pottawato- mies in the present State of Wisconsin.

During the next three years (1681-83) La Salle made two other visits to Illinois, encountering and partially overcoming formidable obstacles at each end of the journey. At the last visit, in company with the faithful Tonty, whom he had met at Mackinaw in the spring of 1681, after a separation of more than a year, he extended his exploration to the mouth of the Mississippi, of which he took formal possession on April 9, 1682, in the name of "Louis the Grand, King of France and Navarre." This was the first expedition of white men to pass down the river and determine the problem of its discharge into the Gulf of Mexico.

Returning to Mackinaw, and again to Illinois, in the fall of 1682, Tonty set about carrying into effect La Salle's scheme of fortifying "The Rock," to which reference has been made under the name of "Starved Rock." The buildings are said to have included store-houses (it was intended as a trading post), dwellings and a block-house erected on the summit of the rock, and to which the name of "Fort St. Louis" was given, while a village of confederated Indian tribes gathered about its base on the south which bore the name of La Vantum. According to the historian, Parkman, the population of this colony, in the

LA SALLE.

HENRY DE TONTY.

F.T. DEARBORN FROM THE WEST- 1808.

FORT DEARBORN FROM THE WEST, 1SOS.

WAR EAGLE.

CHIEF CHICAGOU.

FE DEARBORN AN 74

FORT DEARBORN 2D. IN 1853, FROM THE SOUTHWEST.

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days of its greatest prosperity, was not less than 20,000. Tonty retained his headquarters at Fort St. Louis for eighteen years, during which he made extensive excursions throughout the West. The proprietorship of the fort was granted to him in 1690, but, in 1702, it was ordered by the Governor of Canada to be discontinued on the plea that the charter had been violated. It con- tinued to be used as a trading post, however, as late as 1718, when it was raided by the Indians and burned. (See La Salle; Tonty; Hennepin, and Starved Rock.)

Other explorers who were the contemporaries or early successors of Marquette, Joliet, La Salle, Tonty, Hennepin and their companions in the Northwest, and many of whom are known to have visited the "Illinois Country, " and probably all of whom did so, were Daniel Greysolon du Lhut (called by La Salle, du Luth), a cousin of Tonty, who was the first to reach the Mississippi directly from Lake Superior, and from whom the city of Duluth has been named; Henry Joutel, a towns- man of La Salle, who was one of the survivors of the ill-fated Matagorda Bay colony; Pierre Le Sueur, the discoverer of the Minnesota River, and Baron la Hontan, who made a tour through Illinois in 1688-89, of which he published an account in 1703.

Chicago River early became a prominent point in the estimation of the French explorers and was a favorite line of travel in reaching the Illi- nois by way of the Des Plaines, though probably sometimes confounded with other streams about the head of the lake. The Calumet and Grand Calumet, allowing easy portage to the Des Plaines, were also used, while the St. Joseph, from which portage was had into the Kankakee, seems to have been a part of the route first used by La Salle.

ABORIGINES AND EARLY MISSIONS .- When the early French explorers arrived in the "Illinois Country" they found it occupied by a number of tribes of Indians, the most numerous being the "Illinois," which consisted of several families or bands that spread themselves over the country on both sides of the Illinois River, extending even west of the Mississippi; the Piankeshaws on the east, extending beyond the present western boundary of Indiana, and the Miamis in the northeast, with whom a weaker tribe called the Weas were allied. The Illinois confederation included the Kaskaskias, Peorias, Cahokias, Tamaroas and Mitchigamies-the last being the tribe from which Lake Michigan took its name. (See Illinois Indians.) There seems to have been

a general drift of some of the stronger tribes toward the south and east about this time, as Allouez represents that he found the Miamis and their neighbors, the Mascoutins, about Green Bay when he arrived there in 1670. At the same time, there is evidence that the Pottawatomies were located along the southern shore of Lake Superior and about the Sault Ste. Marie (now known as "The Soo"), though within the next fifty years they had advanced southward along the western shore of Lake Michigan until they reached where Chicago now stands. Other tribes from the north were the Kickapoos, Sacs and Foxes, and Winnebagoes, while the Shawnees were a branch of a stronger tribe from the south- east. Charlevoix, who wrote an account of his visit to the "Illinois Country" in 1721, says: "Fifty years ago the Miamis were settled on the southern extremity of Lake Michigan, in a place called Chicago from the name of a small river which runs into the lake, the source of which is not far distant from that of the River Illinois." It does not follow necessarily that this was the Chicago River of to-day, as the name appears to have been applied somewhat indefinitely, by the early explorers, both to a region of country between the head of the lake and the Illinois River, and to more than one stream emptying into the lake in that vicinity. It has been con- jectured that the river meant by Charlevoix was the Calumet, as his description would apply as well to that as to the Chicago, and there is other evidence that the Miamis, who were found about the mouth of the St. Joseph River during the eighteenth century, occupied a portion of Southern Michigan and Northern Indiana, ex- tending as far east as the Scioto River in Ohio.

From the first,.the Illinois seem to have con- ceived a strong liking for the French, and being pressed by the Iroquois on the east, the Sacs and Foxes, Pottawatomies and Kickapoos on the north and the Sioux on the west, by the begin- ning of the eighteenth century we find them, much reduced in numbers, gathered about the French settlements near the mouth of the Kas- kaskia (or Okaw) River, in the western part of the present counties of Randolph, Monroe and St. Clair. In spite of the zealous efforts of the mis- sionaries, the contact of these tribes with the whites was attended with the usual results- demoralization, degradation and gradual extermi- nation. The latter result was hastened by the frequent attacks to which they were exposed from their more warlike enemies, so that by the latter part of the eighteenth century, they were

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reduced to a few hundred dissolute and depraved survivors of a once vigorous and warlike race.

During the early part of the French occupation, there arose a chief named Chicagou (from whom the city of Chicago received its name) who ap- pears, like Red Jacket, Tecumseh and Logan, to have been a man of unusual intelligence and vigor of character, and to have exercised great influence with his people. In 1725 he was sent to Paris, where he received the attentions due to a foreign potentate, and, on his return, was given a command in an expedition against the Chicka- saws, who had been making incursions from the south.

Such was the general distribution of the Indians in the northern and central portions of the State, within the first fifty years after the arrival of the French. At a later period the Kickapoos ad- vanced farther south and occupied a considerable share of the central portion of the State, and even extended to the mouth of the Wabash. The southern part was roamed over by bands from beyond the Ohio and the Mississippi, including the Cherokees and Chickasaws, and the Arkansas tribes, some of whom were very powerful and ranged over a vast extent of country.

The earliest civilized dwellings in Illinois, after the forts erected for purposes of defense, were undoubtedly the posts of the fur-traders and the missionary stations. Fort Miami, the first mili- tary post, established by La Salle in the winter of 1679-80, was at the mouth of the St. Joseph River within the boundaries of what is now the State of Michigan. Fort Creve-Cœur, partially erected a few months later on the east side of the Illinois a few miles below where the city of Peoria now stands, was never occupied. Mr. Charles Ballance, the historian of Peoria, locates this fort at the present village of Wesley, in Tazewell County, nearly opposite Lower Peoria. Fort St. Louis, built by Tonty on the summit of "Starved Rock," in the fall and winter of 1682, was the second erected in the "Illinois Country," but the first occupied. It has been claimed that Marquette established a mission among the Kas- kaskias, opposite "The Rock," on occasion of his first visit, in September, 1673, and that he re- newed it in the spring of 1675, when he visited it for the last time. It is doubtful if this mission was more than a season of preaching to the natives, celebrating mass, administering baptism, etc .; at least the story of an established mission has been denied. That this devoted and zealous propagandist regarded it as a mission, however, is evident from his own journal. He gave to it

the name of the "Mission of the Immaculate Conception," and, although he was compelled by failing health to abandon it almost immediately, it is claimed that it was renewed in 1677 by Father Allouez, who had been active in founding missions in the Lake Superior region, and that it was maintained until the arrival of La Salle in 1680. The hostility of La Salle to the Jesuits led to Allouez' withdrawal, but he subsequently returned and was succeeded in 1688 by Father Gravier, whose labors extended from Mackinaw to Biloxi on the Gulf of Mexico.

There is evidence that a mission had been established among the Miamis as early as 1698, under the name "Chicago," as it is mentioned by St. Cosme in the report of his visit in 1699-1700. This, for the reasons already given showing the indefinite use made of the name Chicago as applied to streams about the head of Lake Michi- gan, probably referred to some other locality in the vicinity, and not to the site of the present city of Chicago. Even at an earlier date there appears, from a statement in Tonty's Memoirs, to have been a fort at Chicago-probably about the same locality as the mission. Speaking of his return from Canada to the "Illinois Country" in 1685, he says: "I embarked for the Illinois Oct. 30, 1685, but being stopped by the ice, I was obliged to leave my canoe and proceed by land. After going 120 leagues, I arrived at Fort Chicagou, where M. de la Durantaye com- manded."

According to the best authorities it was during the year 1700 that a mission and permanent settle- ment was established by Father Jacques Pinet among the Tamaroas at a village called Cahokia (or "Sainte Famille de Caoquias"), a few miles south of the present site of the city of East St. Louis. This was the first permanent settlement by Europeans in Illinois, as that at Kaskaskia on the Illinois was broken up the same year.

A few months after the establishment of the mission at Cahokia (which received the name of "St. Sulpice"), but during the same year, the Kaskaskias, having abandoned their village on the upper Illinois, were induced to settle near the mouth of the river which bears their name, and the mission and village - the latter afterward becoming the first capital of the Territory and State of Illinois-came into being. This identity of names has led to some confusion in determin- ing the date and place of the first permanent settlement in Illinois, the date of Marquette's first arrival at Kaskaskia on the Illinois being given by some authors as that of the settlement

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Historical encyclopedia of Illinois and history of St. Clair County, Volume I, Part 49

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897. ed. cn; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913. jt. ed. cn; Wilderman, Alonzo St. Clair, 1839-1904, ed; Wilderman, Augusta A., jt. ed Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 698

Author: Bateman, Newton, 1822-1897. ed. cn; Selby, Paul, 1825-1913. jt. ed. cn; Wilderman, Alonzo St. Clair, 1839-1904, ed; Wilderman, Augusta A., jt. ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Chicago : Munsell Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 698