History of Chicago. From the earliest period to the present time, Part 22

Author: Andreas, Alfred Theodore
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 1340

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the twelve months following the event, and declare themselves American citizens, they could not be con- sidered as such without going through the process of naturalization. The Secretary of War, John C. Cal- houn, immediately directed Governor Cass of Michi- gan Territory to revoke all licenses hitherto granted to persons thus circumstanced, and he, in turn, ordered the several Indian agents accordingly. This oi der temporarily threw out of employment many traders connected with the American Fur Company, which had retained in its service Canadians formerly British sub- jects, who had been licensed by the various Indian agents to trade, they claiming the right of citizenship under the provision of Jay's treaty. Following is the letter of Mr. Varnum :

"UNITED STATES FACTORY, CHICAGO, June 20, IS19

"The exclusion of foreigners from the Indian trade, will, it is believed, justify the extension of the operation of this establish- ment. This, together with the consideration of the large supply . of blankets and cloths now on hand, induces me to recommend a distribution of the goods of this factory among the adjacent villa- ges for trade, to such an extent as will ensure the sale of nearly all by the expiration of the trading season. Such a measure, I am well convinced, will be highly gratifying to the Indians, as a greal number by this means will be enabled to supply themselves with goods on more reasonable terms than could otherwise be done ; nor do I apprehend any difficulty in effecting it to the advantage of the Government, as gentlemen of unquestionable integrity have already applied for such outfits. JACOB R. VARNUM."

It may readily be seen that the American Fur Com. pany would not quietly submit to such a diminution of its prerogatives, and measures were immediately taken to prevent the present unpleasant aspect of affairs be- coming a permanent fact. Ramsey Crooks and Samuel Abbott hastened to Washington to be present at the ses- sion of 1819-20. That their efforts to obtain such terms as they desired for the company in which they were both interested were successful, is shown by the following extracts from a letter written to John J. Astor by Ramsey Crooks,* dated "New York, May, 1820." Mr. Crooks says :

" The new-fangled obnoxious Indian system died a natural death, as the House of Representatives, pleading a press of much more important business, refused to act on the bill from the senate, and from the interest our friends took in the explanations given by them by Mr. Samuel Abbott, who remained at Washington for the purpose, I have not the smallest doubt, had the bill been brought forward, but the monster would have been strangled. Now that nothing can be effected until Congress meets again, I presume the trade will be for this summer continued under the former regula- tions : but had Mr. Secretary Calhoun carried his point in getting the proposed new law passed, it is no longer concealed that the first step was to license so few traders that the factories were sure of reviving ; another appeal to Congress for the increase of the public trade fund would no doubt have followed ; and private trade con- fined to a limited number nf favorites, among whom I hazard but little in saying the American Fur Company would not have been found : because we will not suffer ourselves to be trampled upon with impunity either by the military or any other power, and be- cause others, profiting by our example, have of late shown them their teeth."

The same month that the agent of the American Fur Company wrote thus to his principal, the Factor at Chi- cago, again discouraged, writes under date of " May 23, 1820 ":

" The Indians have been induced to come here this season by the facility with which they were enabled to procure whisky. In fact the commerce with them this season has been almost exclusively confined to that article. I will venture to say that out of two hun- dred harks (Indian boxes containing about forty pounds) of sugar taken, not five have been purchased with any other commodity than whisky. I have not been able to procure a pound of sugar from the Indians, but can get a supply from the traders at len cents a pound."

The factors, from first to last, attributed the ill suc- * This letter and others from which extracts are taken, are in the posses. sim of tiurdon S Hubbard

هے

UNITED STATES INDIAN AGENTS AND FACTORS AT CHICAGO.

cess of the system to the licensing of British traders, brought up in the business, thoroughly conversant with the nature and desires of the Indian, and determined in their opposition to the factories. On the other hand, the private traders and the fur companies affirmed that the system was radically wrong, and that the Indians were equally cheated, and equally well supplied with whisky by the factories as by themselves. Major Irwin says in letters to the Superintendent of Indian Trade, during the years 1817-19 :

" There appears a palpable incongruity in the manner of con- ducting the Indian trade, the factors are sent to supply the wants of the Indians, and the Indian agents can adopt such measures as to defeat all their plans to that end. It is very certain that the authority vested in them to issue licenses is well calculated to de- stroy all the benefits that might be expected from the factories ; particularly too when they interfere with each other's districts. The truth is, the factories required to be well supported before they can be of any utility ; one of the first measures to which should be the prohibition to grant licenses where the factory can supply the necessities of the Indians."

On July 5, 1821, Colonel McKenney writes from the " Indian Trade Office " to Major Irwin :

" Sir :- I have the honor respectfully to represent, that for the three years last past, the two factories on the lakes, one at Chicago, the other at Green Bay, have been in a measure useless to the In- dians, and, in a pecuniary point of view, to the Government also. This state of things is owing entirely to the unsuitable provisions which exist for the regulation of the trade. . . The contination of the same inactivity which has hitherto characterized the business at these two factories, promising to make inroads upon the fund allot- ted for the trade, I do not Ieel myself authorized further to delay a decision on the subject, and recommend it accordingly for the Executive approval ; it is to break up and discontinue the two factories located at Chicago and Green Bay."

In opposition to the views of the Government Fact- ors at Chicago and Green Bay, may be given the views of two gentlemen who visited them, the one in 1820 the other in 1822. Dr. Jedidiah Morse in his report on In- dian affairs, says :

' An intelligent gentleman, who had just visited Chicago, in- formed me (July. 1820), that there were goods belonging to Govern- ment, at that place, to the value of $20,000, which cost more at Georgetown than the traders ask for their goods at the post of de- livery ; and that the goods are inferior in quality, and selected with less judgment than those of the traders ; that only twenty-five dol- lars' worth of furs was sold by the Factor at Chicago ; that the Government makes no profit on its capital, and pays the superin- tendents, factors, sub-factors, and their clerks out of their funds.

' The fact,' he added, ' that the Government sells goods at cost and carriage, and pay their own agents ; and that yet the Indians pre- fer dealing with the traders, is pretty conclusive evidence that the traders have not been exorbitant in the prices of their goods, nor . have maltreated the Indians, who have had liberty to trade with one or the other as they pleased. It is evident,' he said, ' that by some means, the Indians had not confidence in the Government, as fair and upright in their trade.' Nothing was said or intimated on this subject, by the gentleman above alluded to, which in the re- motest degree impeached the character or conduct of any of the factors. They appear as far as I have knowledge of them, to be upright men, and faithfully and intelligently to have discharged the duties of their office. This want of confidence in the Govern- ment, on part of the Indians, I have witnessed with solicitude in many other instances, and it has often heen expressed by the In- dians in my interviews with them. Whether this prejudice has arisen from foreign influence, exerted to answer particular purposes, or from that of the traders, as is alleged in the preceding commu nications (from the factors at Chicago and Green Bay), or has been occasioned by the manner in which their landis have been obtained from them by the Government ; or in the inferiority in quality and high prices of the goods whien have been offered them in barter, ,it the Government factories, or delivered to them in payment of their annuities, as other confidently assert, it is not for me to decide. It is my opinion, however, from all I could learn, that each of these causes has had more or less influence in creating and fixing this un- happy prejudice in their minds."

General Mbert G. Ellis, who was the first editor of the Green Bay Intelligencer, the pioneer newspaper of

Wisconsin, describes, in his " Recollections,"* Green Bay as it was on his arrival in 1822. Speaking of the United States factories, he says :

" One had been placed at Green Bay, and Major Matthew Irwin, of l'ennsylvania, appointed to the office. We found him at Fort Howard in 1822, the sole occupant of the post. in his stone build- ing and living under the same roof with his family, the troops hav- ing been removed two years before to Camp Smith. Major Irwin was a gentleman of intelligence. culture and integrity, and as well fitted for the trust as any other citizen totally unacquainted with the Indian country, its trade and inhabitants, could be-that is, not fitted at all: and, moreover, being furnished by the Government with goods unsuited to the Indian trade, and coming in competing contact with life-long, experienced. astute traders, of course the effort to gain confidence, trust and influence with the Indians was a total failure. His sleazy woolen blankets, cheap calico, and, worst of all. his poor, unserviceable guns, were all rejected by the Indians, and during four years' trade he did not secure fifty dol- lars' worth of peltries; but the natives, as well as French inhabit- ants, made quantities of maple sugar-this was not current at New York for payment of goods, as peltries were, and not so much cared for by the old traders. The Indians resorted with it to the United States Factor, Major Irwin, who bought large quantities of it, and had many thousand pounds in store at the time of our arrival in 1822. . . That fall Major Irwin closed up most of the business. shipped his sugar to Detroit, turned over the concern to a young gentleman succeeding him by the name of Ringgold, and left the country. Messrs. Ileron and Whitney. sutlers to the troops, bought Major Irwin's house, and the old factory was converted into a hospital building for the sick of the garrison."

The services of Mr. Varnum as Factor at Chicago ended the same year. After the order for the discon- tinuance of the factory was issued, A. B. Lindsey. of Connecticut, was sent to Chicago to wind up its affairs. While living in Chicago, Mr. Varnum boarded in the old John Dean house, with J. B. Beaubien, then its owner. He is spoken of by Major Irwin as a gentle- man of well-known integrity. After the goods belong- ing to the United States remaining in the factory had been disposed of, the building, which was just south of the fort, was bought by a Mr. Whiting, probably Cap- tain Henry Whiting, an ex-army officer, then sutler of the fort.t It was sold by Mr. Whiting to the American Fur Company, and by that company to Jean Baptiste Beaubien, whose residence it remained until 1839.

During the continuance of the factory, from the rebuilding of the fort in 1816, to its final abandonment in 1822-'23, there were two Indian Agents. Charles Jouett was reappointed in 1815, came to Chicago in 1816, and remained two years or more. His residence, and the Agency-house for that period, was a log build- ing of two large rooms, about twenty steps from the river bank, on the north side, according to the testi- mony of his daughter, Mrs. Susan M. Callis, who came to the place with her parents in 1816t and remained here several years. She also says that this house, which was west of John Kinzie's, was built before the massa- cre of 1812, and that between it and the Kinzie house was another, occupied in 1816 by a Mr. Bridges. She mentions also an encounter which her father had with Main Poc, a furious Indian, the old war-chief of the Pottawatomies.

In a letter written by this lady to Hon. John Went-

* Wis. Hist. Cull., vol. VII.

+ James F. Herun and Henry Whiting were sutier- at Furt Drarbarn m 1821-'22, and were both, in 162;, at Fort Howard, Green Bay, with Captam I'm. Whistler. Heron had been Assistant Commissary of Porches in the atiny freun Septemslu r. 1ST4, un:il disbanded. Fire 1. 13.5); then satler at \.it ki- nac for a short time-at Chicago 'n 182, at Fort Howard in :823, and -by - puently at Fort Leavenworth and Fort Jesnp until 184%.

Henry Whiting, of New York, was commissioned freund Lieutenant ni thi zar1 Infantry, May 1, 1812, First Lieutenant in June, 1812 ; wounded in the bat lle of Niagara, July 25. 1814: Captain in September. 1814: retainer on Ft - arrangement of the army on peace establishment. May. 18ts. a> First Livuten- ant of zd Infantry with brevet; disbanded June. 18=1: sutler at Chicago It 18.1 -* 22, and subs, quently at Green Bay.

: From the description supyjord tu be the old " Burn- House," mentioned 11 " Wantun.""

§ " Chicago Antiquities." p. 105.

HISTORY OF EARLY CHICAGO.

worth, she mentions other incidents and persons of early Chicago. She says :

" My muther's oldest child was Charles Lalime Jouett, who was - born in Chicago, October 26, 1809, and died there September S. . 1810. it has been said that he was the first white child born in Chicago .* There was a Government Factor there named Jacob I. Varnum, who had a child born there.t l'ossibly this child was born before my brother. My mother's nurse was a half-breed French and Indian woman, who was bound to her until she was eighteen years of age. Her name was Madaline Alseum or Olscum. She married the day we left Chicago for the last time. Joseph Ozier, a soldier from the garrison. I remember James Riley.# who acted as father's interpreter. My impression is that Dr. Alexander Wol- cott was father's successor as Indian Agent. Father resigned the agency at Chicago about ISIS-'19 and returned to Kentucky. There was a Dr. McMahon stationed at Chicago. There was a Dr. John Gale there from New llampshire, who left before we did, and who died at Fort Armstrong, July 27, 1830. I remember the Indian chief, 'White Dog,' who pretended he could not speak English. But he got drunk one day, and we then found out that he could speak it very well. I also remember a tall and powerful Indian chief, 'White Elk,' who was pointed out to me as the man who killed the children of Mrs. Susan Corbin at the massacre of IS12. I remember a half-breed Indian who was in the employ of John Kinzie, named Perish LeClerc, who used to boast of his l'ot- tawatomie descent. I also remember Major Daniel Baker, who had command at Fort Dearborn. f frequently saw an Indian called 'Blue Earth.' because he always painted his face with a sort of blue clay, which gave him a ghastly appearance. He kept princi- pally by himself, and it was hinted he was a white man in disguise. He was out of health; and I once saw the Indians dance what was called the 'medicine dance,' around him, in hopes of effect- ing a cure. There were two lieutenants in the garrison, whose names do not appear in any of your Chicago publications. They were married about the same time. They visited us frequently. One was Lieutenant Brooks.| The other was Lieutenant James Hlackley, Jr., who married Rebekah Wells, of Fort Wayne, daugh- ter of Captain William Wells, who was killed in the Chicago massa- cre of 1812, and for whom your street was named.", When my mother first went to Chicago it was in midwinter, and she went al! the way on horseback. This journey she often described as her bridal tour. Father had as guides a half-breed ludian named Rob- inson, and a negro named Joseph Battles. In traveling through lllinois they found the snow very deep and drifted on the prairies. They frequently heard the cries of panthers at night, who were dle- terred from them by their camp-fires. The Indians were always very: kind, and mother never felt any fear. But she became tired of living so far from all society, and persuaded father to move back to Kentucky. He lived on a farm near Harrodsburg, Ky., where all his children, except the one at Detroit and the one at Chicago, were born. As he lived in Chicago when my brother died in (Sep- tember) ISIo, and at Harrodsburg the Sth of February, ISII, when my sister Caroline was born, you can judge when he left Chicago the first time. Mother often congratulated herself that she left Chicagn in time to escape the massacre. . . The Agency-house where we lived was on the north side of the river, nearly opposite the garrison, and Inhn Kinzie, Sr., fived near by on the same side. Mother always said that the little river (as it then was) was lined all along its banks with wild onions, and took its name Chicago therefrom; Chicago meaning, in the original Indian tongue, 'union.' "

DR. ALEXANDER WOLCOTT succeeded Mr. Jouett as Indian Agent in 1820, and held the position until his death in 1830. He was the son of Alexander and Lucy Waldo Wolcott, and was born at East Windsor, Conn., February 14, 1790. His father, who graduated at Yale in 1778, and settled at Windsor as an attorney, was a man of distinguished ability and standing. Alex-

* Two children had been born to Lieutenant Williamn Whistler, and twar to John Kinzie, in Chicagu, prior to 18.2. + Sub-quent tu 18tf.

$ James Riley, and his brother- Peter and John, were wms of Indler Riley. of Schenectady, who was at one tune a trader with the Indians at Saginaw. the boys were half-breeds, the mother being of the Indian race. ("Chicaga Antiquities," p. tor .. )

$ S* ** Wanhun." p. 181. " Chicago Antiquities, " ". .... Mr. Hurlbut quotes from a letter of Mr. Call -: " I'he house in which my father lived was banh before the massacre of :84. 1 know thị- from the fact that . White Elk .. an Indian chiet, and the tallest I ever saw, Was ppunted san to me as the savage that dashed out the brains of the chikfren ot Sukry Corhin against the side of this very hoter."

Lieutenant Edward F. Brooks, of Kentucky. He was made ( aplain and transferred to Detroit about 290. He resigned June o 1827. His wife was the el.mghter of Chief Justor May. if Mu higan, and our odf lus daughter- married IL M Showed. of Chicago, Mr. Book- dud in Thetrail

" Toutenent Har kky was promoted to sayday and resigned number +1, 1818

ander Wolcott, Jr., graduated at Yale in the class of 1809. He was the third of four children. His oldest sister, Frances, married for her second husband, Arthur W. Magill of Middletown, Conn., to which place the Wolcott family had removed. Henry, the second child, was appointed Collector of the Port of Middletown by President Adams in 1828. He removed to Chicago in 1836, and died there April 5, 1846. Henry was the father of Alexander Wolcott, long the Chicago City Sur- veyor. Alexander, and Mary Ann. a younger sister, were the third and fourth children. After Dr. Wolcott's arrival here he finished and resided in a building com- menced during Judge Jouett's incumbency. This was the agency-house on the north side of the river. near where now is the foot of North State Street, and which was facetiously called "Cobweb Castle." during his residence there as a bachelor,-probably from the no- ticeable accumulation of those terrors to good house- keepers during those years. On the 20th of July, 1823. he was married at the residence of John Kinzie, by John Hamlin, J. P. of Fulton County, to Ellen Marion, eld- est daughter of John and Eleanor Kinzie. In 1820 Dr. Wolcott accompanied the expedition under Governor Cass from Detroit through the upper lakes to the sources of the Mississippi. The party left Detroit on the ist of May, performed the journey, and returned to Lake Michigan the latter part of August. At Green Bay the party divided, some proceeding to Mackinac, and a part-among whom were Governor Cass. Dr. Wolcott, Major Robert Forsyth and Henry R. School- craft,-coming down the western shore of the lake to Chicago, where they arrived August 29, and remained until the 31st ; when Governor Cass, accompanied by his secretary, Major Forsyth, Lieutenant Mackay, John Kinzie and others, took the old Indian trail to Detroit, and Schoolcraft and Captain Douglas the route by the eastern shore of the lake to Mackinac. Mr. Schoolcraft speaks of Dr. Wolcott as a gentleman "commanding respect by his manners, judgment and intelligence." On the 29th of August, 1821, a treaty was concluded with the Indians at Chicago, which was signed in the presence of Alexander Wolcott, Jr., Indian Agent, Jacob B. Varnum, Factor, and John Kinzie, Sub-Agent. In May, 1823, the garrison was withdrawn from Fort Dearborn and the post and property left in charge of Dr. Wolcott, who moved into one of the houses erected for officers' quarters, and there resided until the fort was again occupied by United States troops in August, 1828. He was appointed Justice of the Peace for Peoria County December 26, 1827, and is recorded as judge and voter at the special election for justice of the peace and constable, held at the house of James Kinzie in the Chicago Precinct, July 24, 1830. When troops arrived to re-garrison Fort Dearborn in 1828, Dr. Wolcott and family returned to their old home in the agency-house, where he died late in the fall of 1830. By his will, dated October 18, 1830, he left all his property to his wife Eleanor* MI. Wolcott and his daughter Mary Ann. The latter died in infancy, and his widow became his sole surviving heir.

Mrs. Wolcott, with her mother and half-sister. Mrs. Helm, remained at the agency-house until the spring of 1831. The order having been given for the cracia- tion of Fort Dearborn by the troops, the household goods of Mrs. Wolcott were sold by auction, and she accompanied her sister, Mrs. Lieutenant David Hunter now Mrs. General Hunter to Fort Howard. Green Bay. Mrs. John Kinzie and Mrs. Helm went to Fort Winne-

* Spelled Eleanor, both in the will of le. Wobr. ot. and in th. recepel ot hier marriage in the " Woont Memorial. . She signed her name Filen M.

THE FUR TRADE AND TRADERS.

bago at the same time, with John H. Kinzie and wife, who had been in Chicago on a visit. The following extracts from a letter written in Chicago about 1821-22 by Dr. Wolcott to Governor Cass, in reply to certain queries of the latter in regard to the language and con- dition of the Pottawatomies, are given to show the sprightly and agreeable manner in which this early settler of Chicago expressed his ideas, and as revealing the pleasant humor of the man :*

" Dear Governor :- Thank God, I can at last in part disbur- then my conscience of a crime that has long laid heavy upon it, the crime of neglecting to comply with your repeated requests re- specting your queries. Many a time and oft, when I cast a rueful giance over that interminable string of 'Ioquiries,' which could not be properly answered by a philosopher, till after at least ten years' study ' with all appliances and means to boot,' 1 have wished them at the bottom of the Red Sea, along with so many other wicked spirits, whose only object on earth was to distorb the repose of quiet, lazy people like myself. Could the necessary knowledge be acquired by the use of any kind of machinery. could it be accomplished by the use of steam it would be a matter of no difficulty. It is only to buy an engine, and the thing is dooe. But to find a person well acquainted with the Indian tongue who knows any thing about any other language on the face of the earth, or who can be made to comprehend its most simple principles, is a pretty impossible sort of an affair. Nevertheless, I have endeavored to do a little something to quiel certain stirrings and twitchiogs somewhere about the region of the pericardium, which have for a long time troubled me exceedingly : more especially whenever my eyes happened to rest upon a little ugly-looking book, full of notes of interrogation. That I have done so little, and that I have done that little so imperfectly, is only to be excused from the considera- tion that I have worked without tools. I have been in the situa- tion, and met with the success, you will perhaps say, of a man who should attempt to polish a diamond with a wood rasp, or fashion a watch with a sledge hammer. That I have delayed it so long can- not be excused at all, unless you will accept of the true plea, that I was deterred by the hopelessness of the task, aod you have full leave to laugh when I tell you that the confusion and want of ar- rangement in the papers arise from want of time. But it is liter- ally true. Since I commenced my inquiries, some weeks ago, re- specting the construction of the language, I have kept myself at il night and day ; but I found such amazing difficulty at every step that my progress has been but slow, and it is now too late to make any attempt at arrangement, as Captain Whitingt is ready to start. Ali, but what relates to language, has been written for a long time, and a meagre account it is. But the truth is, that of all the tribes and nations that people this globe, the Pottawatomies have the least that is peculiar in their inanners and costoms, or interesting in their history. The only very prominent trait in their character is their universal and insatiable love of ardent spirits, and that is common to all tribes who are so lucky as to live in a state of fre- quent jotercourse with Christian men.# I suppose by this time you will have another book of 'queries ' under way, with which you will favor your friends in due time. Should you be desirous that I should make farther inquiries, please to sigoify it, and ! promise a more prompt attention to your request than I have given heretofore. And now I will not say another word on the subject of Indian languages except that I am as glad to escape from it as we were to escape from the ucheard of comforts of Sandy Lake. Don't you feel a horror creeping over you every time the idea re- curs to your memory? i never think of it, but, like the l'hariste, I thank God that I am not as other men-Indian-traders and'dwel- lers on the borders of Sandy lake."

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History of Chicago. From the earliest period to the present time, Part 22

Author: Andreas, Alfred Theodore Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas Number of Pages: 1340

Author: Andreas, Alfred Theodore
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 1340