History of Cook County, Illinois From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, Part 14

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 875

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Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

The number of Indians engaged was between four and five hundred. Their loss was about fifteen.

The Miamis fled at the first attack, and took no part whatever in the fight.

Captain Wells, after fighting desperately, was sur- rounded and stabbed in the back. His body was hor- ribly mangled, his head cut off, and his heart taken ont and eaten by the savages, who thought by so doing some of the courage of the heroic scout would be conveyed to them.

Mrs. Helm, the daughter of Mrs. Kinzie, had a nar- row escape from death. Assaulted by a young Indian, she avoided the blow of his tomahawk, and then seized him around the neck, trying to get possession of his scalping-knife. While struggling in this way for her

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FORT DEARBORN.

life, she was dragged from his grasp by another and older Indian, who bore her struggling to the lake, where- in he plunged her, but with her head above the water. Seeing that it was not the Indian's object to drown her, she looked at him earnestly and found it to be Black Partridge, who was thus trying to save her. After the firing ceased, she was conducted to a place of safety. When the attack was made, Mrs. Heald was riding on a very beautiful and well-trained bay mare, which she had brought with her from Kentucky, and which had long been coveted by the Indians. During the firing Mrs. Hleaid received six wounds, and was shortly captured. Both she and her husband were taken by the half-breed Chandonais to St. Joseph and permitted to reside with Mr. Burnett until they recovered from their wounds. Captain Heakl then delivered himself to the British at Mackinac and was paroled. But the survivors were not yet safe from the hostile Indians. Lieutenant Helm was carried by his captors to a village on the Kankakee, where he remained two months before he was discovered by Black Partridge, who had saved the life of Mrs. Helm. That chief at once informed Thomas Forsyth, half- brother of Mr. Kinzie who was stationed at Peoria, and efforts were made to secure the release of the prisoner. Black Partridge was provided with a ransom and dis- patched to the Indian village. The amount that he carried with him not being sufficient to satisfy the In- dians, he freely offered them his pony, his rifle and a large gold ring which he wore in his nose. This was accepted, Lientenant Hehn was released, and soon after- wards joined his wife at Detroit, where she had gone with her parents.

The day following the massacre the fort and agency building were burned to the ground and the first Fort Dearborn ceased to be. The prisoners were scattered among the various tribes, and a large number of war- riors hastened away to attempt the destruction of Fort Wayne.

Among the officers of the fort who escaped the mas- sacre, was Quarter-master Sergeant Griffith, who is men- tioned by Mrs. Kinzie in " Waubun " as being absent collecting the baggage horses of the surgeon when the troops left the fort, but, hastening to join the force, was made prisoner by the chief of the St. Joseph band, who was friendly to the whites. He escaped in the boat with 'the Kinzies two days later. This was William Griffith, afterward a captain of General Harrison's spies. He joined Harrison's army after his escape to Michigan, was placed in command of the spies, and received two wounds in the skirmish at the Moravian towns, a few days before the battle of the Thames, but participated also in the latter engagement. He was the son of Wil- liam Griffith, Sr., a farmer of Welsh descent, whose home was near the present site of Genesco, N. Y. His sister, Mrs. Alexander Ewing, removed with her hus- band to Michigan in 1802, and thence to Piqua, Ohio, in 1807, from which place William Griffith probably came to Chicago. lle died in 1824, leaving two sons and a daughter, and was buried near okl Fort Meigs, Ohio.

"The same day that Fort Dearborn was burned, Gen- eral Hull surrendered Detroit to the British.

The sources of information in regard to the massacre are the official report of Heald, and the narrative of Mrs. Juliette H. Kinzie, in " Waubun," based upon the statements ot John Kinzie and Mrs. Helm. A narra- tive by Mrs. Heald was lost in the Rebellion. The narrative of Mrs. Kinzie has been the accepted and popular one, although there are some discrepancies in it as to dates, its censure of Captain Heald is not severe, and it has much of the "after the event " flavor

about it. That the fort could have been held for any length of time against the Indians is altogether doubt- ful. A thousand Sostile warriors would have belea. guered it within a very few days, as they did Fort Wayne shortly after, and it would have been impossible for General Harrison to have relieved both places. With- ont such relief it must have fallen, Instantaneous evacuation in conformity with the advice of Winnemeg might have saved the garrison, but that partook too much of the nature of flight to suit the mind of such a man as Captain Heald. Since that was not thought honorable, the only course to pursue was to rigorously adhere to the agreement with the Indians, and turn over to them all the arms and liquor. Captain Heald was dissaaded by those surrounding him from adopting that dangerous expedient.

Bat the probabilities are that no course whatever could have saved the ill-fated garrison. War was de- clared, the Indians were aroused and allied with the Brit- ish. Certain ones had friendships with the Americans. and did what could be done to save individuals, but they had no friendship for the United States. Tecum- sch was using all the influence of his powerful name to consolidate the Indian tribes in the British interest. 'The fall of Michilimackinac and the peril of Detroit showed the Indians that England was the stronger power. With all these forces at work, the fall of Fort Dearborn and the destruction of the garrison was apparently but a matter of time.

For four years the charred and blackened ruins of the fort remained, and the bodies of the slain lay un- buried where they fell.

The war raged along the Canadian border for a time with varying success, until at last the British flag was driven from the lakes. Then came peace, and in 1816 it was ordered that Fort Dearborn shoukl be re- built. In July of that year, Captain Hezekiah Bradley, with two companies of infantry, arrived at the Chicago River. He built a fort on the site of the former one, somewhat larger and on a different plan. The remains of the victims of the massacre were then gathered and buried.

The same year John Kinzie returned with his family and again occupied his deserted home. Other settlers came straggling along, the Indian Agency was resumed. and soon the lake shore and the river showed signs of activity and life. The familiar forms of the friendly chiefs were seen around the homes and firesides of their friends, and many were the hours that were passed in recounting the tragical scenes through which they had passed, since that fatal 15th of Angust four years be- fore. All had suffered, for war possesses no discrimina- ting hand. The village of Black Partridge had been destroyed in a single day, and his people killed or scat- tered. The subsequent life of the settlers was quiet and unvaried. Cultivation of the soil furnished them with the necessaries of life, and the abundance of game added a variety that many an eastern table might have envied. A thrifty bartering of the surplus of products with the occasional vessels that came for furs, supplied other wants, and thus days on the frontier passed away.

The year 1816 was also the year of the treaty of St. Louis, whereby the Ottawas and Chippewas ceded to the United States the lands surrounding the head of Lake Michigan, ten miles north and ten miles south of the mouth of the Chicago Creek, and back to the Kan- kakee, Illinois and Fox rivers. The fort, as rebuilt, consisted of a square stockade inclosing barracks, quar- ters for the officers, magazine and provision-store, and was defended by bastions at the northwest and south-

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HISTORY OF EARLY CHICAGO.

cast angles. The block-house was in the southwest cor- ner. The officers' quarters were on the west side and the soldiers' barracks on the east side. It had two gates, one on the north and the other on the south side. A garrison was stationed at the fort, under various com- manders, until 1823, when it was ordered to be evacu- ated. The frontier line had moved westward to the Mis- sissippi, and a garrison at Chicago was not considered necessary. During these years the officers in command were as follows : 1816 to 1817, Captain Hezekiah Brad- ley : 1817 to 1820, Major Daniel Baker : 1820 to 1821. Captain Hezekiah Bradley : 1821, Major Alexander Cummings ; 1821 01 1823. Lieutenant-Colonel John McNeil : 1823, Captain John Greene.

In October, 1828, a garrison was agam stationed at Chicago, under the command of Major John Fowle ; First-Lieutenant David Hunter subsequently General . The troops remained until May, 1831, when they were withdrawn. But the time came when the affrighted set- tlers songht refuge in the furt. In 1832 Black Hawk and his warriors commenced hostilities, which will be found described in later pages of this work. In June the fort was once more garrisoned. Major William Whistler being assigned to the command, This officer had helped his father in the building of the first Fort Dearborn, and now after twenty-nine years of absence returned to be the commander of the second fort.

On the 8th of July, 1832, General Scott, with troops, arrived in a steamer off Fort Dearborn .*

In May, 1833. Major Whistler was succeeded in command hy Major John Fowle, who, however, re. mained but about one month, when he was succeeded by Major DeLafayette Wilcox, who commanded until December 18, 1833, and again from September 16, 1835. to August 1, 1836. Major John Bendu, Major John Greene and Captain and Brevet-Major Joseph Plymp- ton were in command at various times, until December 29, 1836, when the troops were permanently withdrawn, under the following order :

" The troops stationed at Fort I learborn, Chicago, will imme- diately proceed to Fort Howard, and join the garrisun at that posl. Such public property as may be left al Fort Dearborn will remain in charge of Brevet. Major Plympton, of the 5th Infantry, who will continue la command of the post until otherwise instructed."

And so the last morning and evening salute was fired; the last sentinel withdrawn, the last soldier marched out, and Fort Dearborn as a military post ceased to be.

AFTER THE MASSACRE.

In the year 1812, as before stated, there were five houses at Chicago, besides the fort and building attached to it. Of these, four were occupied by the families of Kinzie, Ouilmette, Burns and Lee. The fifth was on the Lee farm, on the South Branch. It has often been stated that all the houses in Chicago, except Mr. Kin- zie's, were destroyed in 1812, hy the Indians, but proba- bly no buildings were destroyed except the fort and agency house.

The house of Ouilmette was occupied hy himself and family, who remained in Chicago. The " Burns House " was afterward occupied by Mr. Jouett, when he was In- dian Agent at Chicago, in 1817. The cabin on the Lee farm was fitted up and used as a trading-house by Jolın Crafts, and the house of Mr. Lee near the fort, on the lake shore, was evidently sold by his widow to Jean Baptiste Beaubien, who bought " of the rightful owner thereof," a "honse and piece of cultivated ground " in

that exact locality in 1812. Mrs. Lee escaped the mas- sacre, and with her infant child was carried captive to the village of Black Partridge. She was subsequently ransomed by M. DuPin, a French trader, became his wife, and lived in the Kinzie house during the absence of the family.

JEAN BAPTISTE BEACHIEN, who may be considered the second permanent settler of Chicago, first visited the place in 1804, but did not purchase property till the year 1812, some time after the massacre. He then bought "of the rightful uwner thereof"* a house or cabin south of the ruins of the fort and near the lake shore, which had been standing there since 1804.t Ilere he resided when in Chicago, and although fre- quently absent at his trading-houses in Milwaukee and Green Bay, always considered the cabin in Chicago his home, and the home of his family, until a better house was bought five or six years later.

Jean Baptiste Beaubien was, at the time he settled at Chicago, the third of that name in America. His grandfather, Jean Baptiste Beaubien, emigrated from France at an early day and settled on the St. Lawrence. The home of the second generation of American Beau- biens was Detroit, where lived Jean Baptiste, jr., Joseph. Jean, Marie, Lambert, Antoine, Genevieve, Marion and Susan, The names of two of these brothers Jean Bap- tiste and Lambert . appear in a list of the members of a company of Detroit citizens, who, under the lead of General Cass, made a raid in 1814 upon the hostile In- dians in the vicinity. The names of three of the Mel- drums, prominent traders of Detroit and Mackinaw, also appear. Joseph Beaubien was the father of Jean Bap- tiste Beaubien of Chicago, who was born in the year 1780, at Detroit. When a young man he pushed out into the Michigan woods, and became a clerk for Wni. Bailly, a fur-trader, on Grand River. Through Bailly's instruction and help Mr. Beaubien acquired the rudi- ments of an education, which, supplemented by native shrewdness and vivacity, made him quite superior to the ordinary French traders of the day. He married. for his first bride, Mah-naw-bun-no-quah, an Ottawa woman, who became the mother of his two sons, Charles Henry and Madore. He was settled as a trader in Mil- waukce as early as 1800, and until 1818 had a trading- house there. As before stated, he came to Chicago and bought the cabin and cultivated field south of the old fort in 1812. During that year he married, for his second wife, Josette LaFramboise, daughter of Francis LaFram- boise,¿ an influential French trader then living on the

· Affidavit of Madore Beaubien.

+ Captain I'human 1 :. Anderwin, who came in Mackinaw in the spring of 18mm, and was fur many years engaged in trade with the Indians of the North- urat, states in luis " Personal Narrative," published in Vol. IX, Wis, His. Coll., that his first winter (1600-1801) was spent on the Mississippi, near the present site uf Quincy, III .; His secund ( 18or- 18us) among the lowas on the DesMoines, und his third (18.12-18og) among the Winorbagues of Rock River. Toward the cine af 1813 he started a trading-house at " Millwackse." having LaFrambuier and Let'laire for neighbors. Here he remained until the spring of 18o6. He Glys: " During my second year at Min-na wack, or Mill-wack se (roog-sãos) Captain Whistler, with his company of American soldiers, came fu take porsche sion of Chicago, At this time there were no buildings there, except a few dilapidated log hunts, covered with luirk. Captain Whistler had selected one of these as a temporary, though miserable, resadence for bis family, his officers and inen being under canvas, On being informed of his arrival, I felt it my duty to pay my respreis to the authority so much required in the country. On the murrow 1 mounted Kee-ge-kau, ur Swift-tiner, and the next day I was invited to dine with the captain. On going to the house, the outer dour opening into the dining-mom. I found the table spread, the family and guests seated, con- winting uf several ladies, as jolly as kittens."

: Probably a mon of either Alexander or Francis LaFramlamise, traders of Mackinaw aml Milwaukee. As early ax 1795 Alexander LaFramboise, of Mark- inaw, established a house at the mouth of the Milwaukee River. After it was well established he returned to Mackinaw and sent his brother Francis to take charge of the Milwaukee house. The latter had some trouble with one uf the neighboring chieta, whowe hostility, added to his own mismanagement, brought the house, and with it his brother Alexander, tu ruin. Francis La Framboise was afterwards murdered at a trading-bouse which he established among thr Winnebagors, in what is now central Wisconsin, and his business fell into the hands of his widenw, Madeline La Framboise, who, with headquarters al Mecki- naw, managed is with prudence and great success. The children nf Francis, who were well grown when he lived in Milwaukee, are mentioned in the early history of that city, an Claude, Alexis and 1.a Fortune. The Chicago LaFram-

· See narrative of Captain Augustus Walker,

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AFTER THE MASSACRE.

south side of the river, not far from Beauhien's place. In 1815, a short time before the rebuilding of the fort, an army contractor named Dean, built a house on the lake shore, at the mouth of the Chicago River, near where is now the foot of Randolph Street. In 1817. Mr. Beaubien purchased this house, which was a low, gloomy building of five rooms, for $1,000-a large sum for those days, After this purchase he lived in the Dean house for several years, his son Alexander being born there. He used the ohl cabin after this for a barn .*

In the fall of 1818, he was appointed Chicago agent of the American Fur Company, and built a small trading- house near his residence.

In 1823 the fort was evacuated, and remained for several years without a garrison. The U. S. Factory- house, just outside the south wall, was sold to the American Fur Company, and again sold by the company to Mr. Beanbien for $500. He moved into this build- ing, and resided there until he left Chicago for his farm on the Desplaines, in or about the year 1840. During the winter of 1831-32, Mr. Beaubien was president of the village Debating Society, the meetings being held within the fort. It is said the presiding officer filled his responsible position with " much efficiency and dignity." During the Black Hawk troubles, he led a party of val- iant Chicagoans to the scene of anticipated warfare, as related in the history of that war in another chapter. Two years later when the militia of Cook County was organized, he was elected its first colonel, at the famous meeting at " Laughton's Tavern," when " The Punch Bowl of Ogden Avenue " sparkled with good cheer, and the hearts of the lively crowd with fun and jollity.

THE BEAUBIEN CLAIM,-Colonel Beaubien made two pre-emption claims for the land upon which he had resided since the rebuilding of the fort, which were re- jected. Finally in May, 1835, he entered at the land office in Chicago, of which Edmund 1), Taylor was Re- ceiver, and James Whitlock Register, a pre-emption claim to the southwest fractional quarter of Section 10, Township 39. Range 14 east, the quarter-section upon which he resided. After consulting the United States District Attorney for Hlinois and Hon, Sidney Breese, afterward Judge of the Supreme Court of the State, the officials of the land-office allowed his claim, and C'olonel Beaubien became the purchaser of a fraction over seventy-five acres of land in what was known as the " Fort Dearborn Reservation," for the sum of 894.6r. Payment was made, entry recorded and certificates and receipts delivered to Mr. Beaubien. The following year t836 , Murray McConnell, a lawyer of some ability residing at Jacksonville, Ill., to whom Mr. Bean- lien had conveyed a portion of this land, brought an action of ejectment against Colonel Delafayette Wil- cox, then in charge of United States property at Fort Dearborn, which stood on a portion of the land in ques- tion. This suit was entitled " John Jackson ex. dem. Murray McConnell v. Delayette Wilcox," and was brought before Judge Thomas Ford of the Cook County

house came to this place from Milwaukee, and wus doubtless the son of one of these brothers, The family moved to the place called " Hardscrabble," and lived there many years : Francis LaFramboise or his sons being tax payers in 1825 and 1826. ""

· The old calun must have come to its end in the cholera summer of 18;a. Captain A. Walker, commander of the steamer "Sheldon Thompon," which arrived at Chicago with a part of General Scott's troops on the with of July of that year, says in a letter published in the Chicago IJemucrat in 1861 : " The number of buildings at that time (1832) where your populons rity mim stands. uus bet five, three udf which were log tenements-one of them, without a nuf. used an a stable. We remained four days after landing the troops, procuring furi for the homeward voyage, etc. The only means of obtaining anything for fuel was to purchase the roudess log-building used as a stable. That, together with the rail fence enckning a feld of some three acres near by, was sufficient to enable us to reach Mackinaw. Being drawn to the beach and prepared for une, It was boated on board by the crew, which operation occupied most of four days to accomplish.

Circuit Court, at the October term of 1836. The suit was popularly known as " the Beaubien claim."

The property involved, as before stated, was what was then known as the " Fort Dearborn Reservation," now Fort Dearborn Addition, and was by Government survey the southwest fractional quarter of Section 10, Township 39. North Range 14, East of the Third princi- pal meridian, in Illinois, containing 75.69 acres. Colonel Wilcox was defended by David J. Baker, United States District Attorney for Illinois. Waiving any right that may have arisen from the purchase and occupation of a certain claim of land at an earlier date by Colonel Beaubien, his attorney based his case on the purchase made by him from John Dean, an army contractor or sutler, in 1817. of a house near the fort, and not far from his former residence, and for which, with its field and garden, he claimed to have paid $1,000. The land in question was not surveyed, and was therefore not open to pre-emption until 1821. In 1822 the United States Factory at Chicago was finally closed by Government, and during 1823, the building was sold by order of the Secretary of the Treasury to W'm. Whiting, who resok! it to the American Fur Company. Mr. Beaubien bought it of this company for $500, and moved into it with his family, thus becoming hy right of purchase and occu- pation the owner of all there was in the quarter-section on which he lived, except the fort and its immediate en- closure, still in possession of the Government. In 1824 the Commissioner of the General Land Office, at the re- quest of the Secretary of War, "set apart " the whole of Section 10 for military uses. In 1831 the heirs of John Kinzie claimed pre-emption of the fractional quar- ter of Section 10, north of the river. at the nearest land- office, at Palestine, in Crawford Conuty, which was al- lowed. Mr. Beaubien made a similar claim for the fractional-quarter-section south of the river, which was refused. In 1834 he again entered claim at the land- office at Danville, Vermillion County, which was again rejected, and finally in 1835, as before related, he pre- sented his claim at the Chicago land office, which was allowed, and he bought the Fort Dearborn Reservation, at the regular rate of $1.25 per acre, and obtained his certificate, which was dated May 28, and recorded June 26. When the suit was brought into the Cirenit Court at the fall term of 1836, Judge Ford decided that Beat- hien's claim was valid, but could not be enforced until he procured a patent from Washington : or, in technical terms, that "although Beanbien's claim is legal in every respect, yet he cannot assert his right against the United States in this form : a writ of mandamus against the proper officer for the patent is the proper remedy." The judgment of the Circuit Court was approved by the Supreme Court of the State, and in 1839 an effort was made in the House of Representatives at Washington, to establish Beaubien's title in accordance with the decision of the State courts. But the Solicitor of the Treasury, Henry D. Gilpin, informed the committee of the House in charge of the claim that the Government lawyers at Chicago-Butterfield, Collins and Morris-had drawn up a bill charging the local land-office with collusion in giving the original certificate to Beaubien in 1835. This information killed the hopes of the claimant in the House. Meanwhile the law snit had been carried into the Supreme Court of the United States, and Francis Peyton, attorney for Beanbien, on the last day of Feb- ruary, 1839, applied to the Government for certain maps which he deemed important, if not essential, to the support of his client's claim. They were not furnished, and in March, 1839, the judgment of the State Courts

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HISTORY OF EARLY CHICAGO.

was reversed .* The Secretary of War ordered the land to be divided into blocks and lots, constituting the Fort Dearborn Addition to the city of Chicago, and to be sold to the highest bidder, except block one, and fourteen lots in block two, and blocks four and five reserved to the Government .. The Government was censured by the opposition journal in Chicago for its "indecent haste " in advertising in April, almost before the decision of the Court had placed on record the sale of the disputed land on June to, 1839. It was understood that Colonel Beaubien desired to secure six lots in block five ; and hy general consent the citizens declined to hid against him. This kindness was, however, neutralized hy James H. Collins, one of the attorneys for the Government, who secured five of the six, Beaubien obtaining only one lot 11, block five', for $225 ; an advance of fourteen dol- lars on the highest price paid by Collins. This sale took place June 20, 1839. On the morning of the zist an indignation meeting was held by the citizens, at which W'in. H. Brown was president, and John H. Kinzie and James Wadsworth were secretaries, Resolutions were passed denouncing Collins and expressing the regret that the Government should find it necessary to be so ungenerous to an old and respected citizen, who had been of great service to the early settlers of Chicago in their relations with the Indians ; but all this could not change court decisions, June 13. 1840, the U'nited States filed a bill in the Circuit Court for Illinois, to set aside the receipt and certificate given to Beanbien in 1835. The Court decreed that he should deliver thein up for cancellation, and they were duly surrendered by Beaubien, accompanied with his receipt dated Derem- ber 18, 1840, for the original purchase money then re- funded. In 1878, Wm. H. Standish, a lawyer of Chi- rago, again brought the case before Congress, "explain- ing the Beaubien title to the Lake front lands, etc." He went over the points above given, re-enforcing them by affidavits of old residents, including one of E. D. Taylor. the Receiver in 1835, in which he states that he and his colleague, James Whitlock, Register, took the advice of David Jewett Baker, at that time United States Attor- ney for Illinois, who declared that "the law made it their duty to let said Colonel Beaubien pre-empt this land, whether it hurt or benefited the United States Gov- ernment," and that they received the same advice from the Hon. Sidney Breese, who " even at that day enjoyed the reputation of being an eminent lawyer." The strong points of the claim were that from August 15, 1812, to July, 1816, the land in question could scarcely be said to be a post of any sort in the actual possession of the United States, having neither Government buildings, nor sokliers nor agents there ; that it had not been formally reserved for military purposes until 1824. that it was therefore subject to pre-emption by Beaubien under the law of 1813, and that it should have been as open for pre-emption to him on the south side as it was to R. A. Kinzie on the north side of the river. To which it was answered by Senator Bayard, from the committee of Congress on private land claims, May 31. 1878; that there was a reservation and appropriation for Government uses as shown hy the actual occupation from 1804 to 1812; that the non-occupation from 1812 to 1816 " was caused by the compulsion of war," and "a citizen could not take advantages of the misfortunes of his Government." This bounty of pre-emption, it cannot be supposed was designed to be extended to the sacrifice of public establishments or of great public interests :13 Peters, 498'. " For these and other con- siderations your committee," says the Senator, "report

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History of Cook County, Illinois From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, Part 14

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas Number of Pages: 875

Author: Andreas, A. T. (Alfred Theodore), 1839-1900
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Chicago : A.T. Andreas
Number of Pages: 875