History of Crawford and Clark counties, Illinois, Part 27

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892?
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co.
Number of Pages: 826

USA > Illinois > Clark County > History of Crawford and Clark counties, Illinois > Part 27
USA > Illinois > Crawford County > History of Crawford and Clark counties, Illinois > Part 27

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 upper bed of limestone (No. 18 of the County Section), is traversed by veins of cal- cite and brown ferruginous streaks, that give the rock a mottled appearance when freshly broken. The upper layer of the lower bed is about thirty inches thick, and is a tough, com- paet, gray rock, that breaks with an even surface and has a slightly granular or semi- volitie appearance. The lower part of this bed is a mottled gray fine-grained limestone

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and breaks with a more or less conchoidal fracture. The upper division of this limestone thins out entirely about a mile above the bridge, and passes into a green shale like that by which the limestones are separated. The tumbling masses of limestone that are found in the hill-tops above the railroad bridge, no doubt belong to the Quarry Creek bed, which is found in partial outcrops not more than half a mile back from the creek, and from eighty to ninety feet above its level. The in- tervening sandstones and shales which separate these limestones in the northeastern part of the county are much thinner than where they outcrop on Hurricane and Mill Creeks in the southern portion indicating a general thinning out of the strata below the Quarry Creek bed to the northward.

The coal spam at Murphy's place, near the mouth of Ashmore Creek, on Section 20,T. 11, R. 10, averages about eighteen inches in thick- ness and affords a coal of fair quality. Trac- ing the bluff northeastwardly from this point the beds rise rapidly, and about half a mile from Murphy's there is about thirty feet of drab-colored shales exposed beneath the lime- stone which is here found well up in the hill. At the foot of the bluff on Clear Creek, near the State line, a mottled brown and gray limestone four to five feet in thickness is found, underlaid by ten or twelve feet of vari- egated shales which are the lowest beds seen in the county. Extensive quarries were opened in this limestone to supply material for building the old National Road, and in the debris of these old quarries were obtained numerous fossils from the marly layers thrown off in stripping the solid limestone beds that lay below. The limestone is a tough, fine- grained, mottled, brown and gray rock, in tolerably heavy beds, which makes an excel- lent macadamizing material, and also affords a durable stone for culverts, bridge abntments

and foundation walls. From what has already been stated it will be inferred that there is no great amount of coal accessible in this county, except by deep mining. In the thin seams outcropping at Murphy's place, near the Wa- bash River, and at Mr. Howe's and Mrs. Brant's, southeast of Casey, the coal varies in thickness from a foot to eighteen inches, and though of a fair quality the beds are too thin to justify working them except by stripping the seams along their outcrop in the creek valleys. The coal at Murphy's place has a good roof of bituminous shale and limestone, and could be worked successfully by the ordi- nary method of tunnelling if it should be found to thicken anywhere to twenty-four or thirty inches. The higher seams found at the localities above named, southeast of Casey, are thinner than at Mr. Murphy's, though one or both of the upper ones are said to have a local thickness of eighteen inches. There is no good reason to believe that the main work- able seams that are found outcropping in the adjacent portions of Indiana, should not be found by shafting down to their proper horizon in this county, notwithstanding the reported results of the oil-well borings in the north- western portion of the county.

The writer specially requested Mr. David Baughman to furnish him with particulars of an artesian well sunk on his place in 1873-74 In reply he received the following in substance front Mr. Baughman: The well was sunk to a depth of 1,211 fect, and showed the following section: At a depth of 110 feet coal was reached, four and three Quarter feet thick; two feet of fine elay was found underlying it. At the depth of 144 feet, a vein of coal three feet thick was found; and at the depth of 230 feet a vein of coal over seven feet in thickness was found, specimens of which, Mr. Baughman in- forms us, he has on hand, subject to the inspec- tion of any who may wish to examine them. If

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there is no mistake in the reported section of this well, there are veins of coal to be found in that locality at a depth to justify their being profitably worked.

Building Stone .- Clark County is well supplied with both freestone and limestone suitable for all ordinary building purposes. The sandstone bed on Hurricane Creek, southeast of Martinsville, is partly an even-bedded freestone, that works freely and hardens on exposure and is a reliable stone for all ordinary uses. The abut- ments of the bridge over the North Fork on the old National Road were constructed of this sandstone, which is still sound, although more than thirty years have passed away since they were built. The sandstone bed overlying the limestone at the old Anderson mill below the mouth of Joe's Fork, also affords a good building stone, as well as material for grind- stones, and the evenly-bedded sandstone higher up on Joe's Fork, which overlies the green shales, is of a similar character, and af- fords an excellent building stone. Each of the three limestones in this county furnishes an excellent macadamizing material, and the Quarry Creek limestone, as well as the beds near Livingston, furnish dimension stone and material for foundation walls of good quality. A fair quality of quicklime is made from both the limestones above named, and on Quarry Creek the kilns are kept in constant operation to supply the demands for this article in the adjacent region.

An excellent article of white clay, suitable for pottery or fire-brick, was found in the shaft near Marshall, about eighty to eighty- five feet below the Livingston limestone and about fifty feet above the coal in the bottom of the shaft, which was probably the same coal found at Murphy's. This bed of clay would probably be found outcropping in the Wabash bluffs, not far below Murphy's place.

Soil and Timber .- The soil is generally a

chocolate-colored sandy loam, where the sur- face is rolling, but darker colored on the flat prairies and more mucky, from the large per cent of humus which it contains. The prai- ries are generally of small size, and the county is well timbered with the following varieties: White oak, red oak, black oak, pine oak, water oak, shell-bark and pig-nut hickory, beech, poplar, black and white walnut, white and sugar maple, slippery and red elm, hack- berry, linden, quaking ash, wild cherry, honey locust, red birch, sassafras, pecan, coffee-nut, black gum, white and blue ash, log-wood, red- bud, sycamore, cottonwood, buckeye, per- simmon, willow, etc. The bottom lands along the small streams, and the broken lands in the vicinity of the Wabash bluffs, sustain a very heavy growth of timber, and fine groves are also found skirting all the smaller streams and dotting the upland in the prairie region. As an agricultural region this county ranks among the best on the eastern border of the State, producing annually fine erops of corn, wheat, oats, grass, and all the fruits and vegetables usually grown in this elimate. Market facilities are abundantly supplied by the Wabash River, the Vandalia. Wabash and other railroads passing through the county, furnishing an easy communication with St. Louis on the west, or the cities of Terre Haute and Indianapolis on the east, and Chicago on the north. Notwithstanding the fine character of the soil and lands of the county, much of the land has been almost worn thread-bare by constant cultivation, no rest, and no manuring or fertilizing. By proper means it may be improved, and re- stored to its original quality and strength.

In addition to the indications of coal, the county contains mineral wealth to some ex- tent, though perhaps not in sufficient quanti- ties to justify mining. · At one time it was believed that silver existed here in consider- able quantities, and the excitement occasioned

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thereby was, for a time, intense. The people nearly went wild, and lands supposed to be impregnated with silver were held at fabulous prices. But the most critical examination by experts showed that while silver actually existed in many places, it was in such a lim- ited way as to be wholly unremunerative to even attempt to do anything toward mining. Further particulars of the silver excitement will be given in the township chapters.

Mounds .-- Clark County abounds in mounds, relics of that lost race of people of whom nothing is definitely known. These mounds, the origin of which is lost in the mists of re- mote antiquity, and of which not even tradi- tionary accounts remain, number about thirty in this county, and extend along the Wabash river, and at the edge of the prairie from near Darwin to below York, thence into Crawford county. They are of different sizes and shape, and some of them of considerable extent, rang- ing from ten to sixty feet in diameter, and from two to fifteen feet high. In early times they were much higher, having been worn and cut down by the cultivation of the land; in- deed, some of them are almost if not entirely obliterated, while all, at least, have been more or less reduced in altitude. The largest is on the land of James Lanhead, near York, and one and a fourth miles from the river. This mound has been explored, and from its depths were taken stone hatchets, fragments of earthenware, arrow-heads, flints, etc. Sev- eral others have been opened of late years, with much the same results.

[It has been pretty definitely settled by pre-historic writers, that these mounds were actually built by a race of people, and were of different kinds, viz .: temple mounds; mounds of defense; burial mounds; sacrifi- cial mounds, etc., etc. See Part I of this work .- ED.] The countless hands that erected them; the long succession of genera- tions that once inhabited the adjacent coun-

try, animating them with their labors, their hunting and wars, their songs and dances, have long since passed away. Oblivion has drawn her impenetrable veil over their whole history; no lettered page, no sculptured mon- ument informs us who they were, whence they came, or the period of their existence. In vain has science sought to penetrate the gloom and solve the problem locked in the breast of the voiceless past, but every theory advanced, every reason assigned, ends where it began, in speculation.

" Ye moldering relics of departed years,

Your names have perished; not a trace remains, Save where the grass-grown mound its summit rears From the green bosom of your native plains- Say, do your spirits wear oblivion's chains? Did death forever quench your hopes and fears?"

The antiquities of Clark County are similar to other portions of the State. Indian graves are not uncommon, especially in the vicinity of the mounds above described. Fragments of bones, and in one or two instances whole skeletons in a remarkable state of preserva- tion have been found. Near Rock Hill church, on Union Prairie, in the year 1850, Jonathan Hogue, while digging a cellar and some post- holes, discovered three stone-walled graves within a radius of a hundred feet, and about two feet beneath the surface, each containing the perfect skeleton of an adult person in a sitting posture facing the sunrise. Flints, arrow-heads, etc., were also found in these graves. In other instances graves have been found, where the length from head to foot did not exceed four feet, and yet contained a skeleton of full stature. This, at first, gave rise to the belief that the skeletons of a race of pigmies had been discovered. But a more careful examination of the position of the bones showed that the leg and thigh bones laid parallel, and that the corpse had been buried with the knees bent in that position.

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HISTORY OF CLARK COUNTY.

In natural advantages Clark County is in- ferior to none of her sister counties. She has her Dolson and Parker Prairies, arable and productive; her Richwoods, which are all the name implies; her Walnut and Union Prai- ries, the garden spots of Illinois. She has her river and creek bottoms, receiving their allu- viał deposits from the annual overflows, ren- dering them inexhaustible in fertility. She has her barrens, capable of producing almost any product grown in this latitude. Has her hill country, that only awaits the sinking of the shaft and the light of the miner's lamp to reveal coal-beds of exceeding richness. Sil- ver, too, has already been found in small quantities, at the mine already opened in Wa- bash township, by enterprising citizens, and there is no foretelling the possibilities. Pe- troleum exists in many parts of the county, and yet flows from the Young well, in Parker township. Capital will, at no distant future, explore the hidden depths, and compel it to become an important factor in the wealth and commerce of the county.

As a county, she is admirably adapted to the growth of all products peculiar to an ex- cellent soil in this latitude. Corn grows lux- uriantly, and yields abundantly; the various esculents attain perfection, and as a wheat and grass county, ranks among the foremost in the State. There is no portion of it but what is well adapted to the growth of large fruits, and within her limits are some very fine orchards. Small fruits, of all varieties com- mon to the climate, seem indigenous to our soil, and with little care and attention return bounteous yields.

Stock raising is one of her great resources, and can be prosecuted with large profits. It is an industry that has rapidly increased since the advent of railroads, and one that is attract- ing attention and capital. And large areas of land, where once the crawfish raised his hill- ock, and the frog and the turtle held sway,

now sustain herds of cattle and flocks of sheep.

The health of the county is inferior to none. With the exception of chills ane fever along the miasmatic river and creek bottoms, there is but little sickness. Our county being a pleteau exceeding in elevation any adjoining counties, the atmosphere is naturally purer and more salubrious, and as a consequence, ths mortality among our people, in proportion to population, is as little as any county in the State. We have the purest water to be found anywhere. Living springs gush out in countless places, and nature's pure and whole- some beverage can be found anywhere for the digging. Our railroad advantages are first-class, abundantly able to accommodate all the wants of commerce. We have supe- rior educational facilities, the efficiency of our school system being evidenced on every side; and the corps of teachers throughout the county, far above the average. Our peo- ple, as a class, are temperate, law abiding and industrious; and religious denominations with large followings flourish in country and town.

Clark is capable of supporting a dense pop- ulation, and offers superior inducements to immigrants of all kinds. The farmer in search of a home, can purchase lands, im- proved or unimproved, at reasonable rates; the artisan can find employment for his skill, the laborer find employment, the professional man find business. There is room for all.

Although Clark was one of the pioneer counties of the Wabash Valley, and although one of her towns at one time rivaled Terre Haute, yet she was among the last to receive within her territory one of those mighty arter- ies of commerce, a railroad.

For two decades or more her condition was that of inaction and stagnation. Owing to various disappointments in regard to the building of railroads through the county, men of skill and enterprise, as well as capital, left

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HISTORY OF CLARK COUNTY.

her to seek elsewhere locations more conge- nial and better adapted to active business pursuits. This centrifugal influence came very near depleting the county of the best part of her population. They went to places where the transportation facilities were equal to the wants of the people, and where years of their lives would not be spent in listless apathy.

She sat supinely by, after the failure and disappointment in her railroad projects, and saw the rushing trains speed across the do- mains of her sister counties, by far her juniors. Saw their uninterrupted course of prosperity; saw their lands rise rapidly in value-saw the smoke of their factories-heard the dull thunder of their mills. Saw them in the front rank of advancement, marching to the grand music of progress. Saw them double, even treble, her in wealth.

But things were changed as by some ma- gician's power. When the first shriek of the locomotive awoke the echoes of her hills, and the rumble of the trains rolled across her prairies, old Clark arose, Phoenix like, from the ashes of her sloth, and like a young giant, shook off the lethargy that bound her; took up the line of march toward prosperity, and made gigantic strides toward the position she should occupy in modern progress. She was infused with new life, and capital and enter- prise were attracted to her borders.

Her advancement has been almost phe-

nomenal, and has far exceeded the anticipa- tions of the most sanguine. Inaction gave way to energy, and lethargy to enterprise. Emigrants poured in, land and lots increased in value; farms were opened in every section, and industry flourished beyond precedent. Towns and villages sprang up as if by magic. Tidy farm-houses, neat and tasty school-hous- es, and churches, those surest indexes of prosperity and culture, and mighty promoters of all that is good, dotted the prairies and nestled in the uplands. Every department of business received an impetus powerful and lasting, and the trades flourished as they had never before. She entered upon an era of unprecedented prosperity. Improvements were visible on every hand. Where once sol- itude reigned, the hum and smoke of the mills fret and darken the air. Her future is indeed bright. She is grid-ironed with rail- roads and sieved with telegraphs, and the products of her fields reach an hundred marts. And when her immense agricultural and min- eral resources are fully developed, old Clark will occupy a proud position in the galaxy of counties that compose this mighty State. To- day, Clark stands side by side with her sister counties of the Wabash Valley, in agriculture and all its kindred associations. It only needs the active energy of her citizens to place her in the van, advancing as the years advance, until the goal of her ambition is reached.

CHAPTER II.

EARLY SETTLEMENTS-THE PIONEERS AND WHERE THEY CAME FROM-THEIR HARD LIFE, RUDE DWELLINGS AND COARSE CLOTHING-INCIDENT OF A BISCUIT- SALT-NEGRO SLAVERY-AN EXCITING CAMPAIGN-COL. ARCHER- GAME-"MARKS " AND " BRANDS "-TAXATION-THE INDIANS-SHOOTING MATCHES-EARLY SOCIETY -CHRISTIANITY AND PIONEER PREACH- ERS-INTEMPERANCE-THE CLIMATE, ETC., ETC.

"Great nature spoke; observant men obey'd; Cities were built, societies were made: Here rose a little State; another near Grew by like means, and join'd through love or fear."-Pope.

TT has been said, that civilization is a forced condition of existence, to which man is stimulated by a desire to gratify arti- ficial wants. And again, it has been written by a gifted, but gloomy misanthrope, that "As soon as you thrust the plowshare under the earth, it teems with worms and useless weeds. It increases population to an unnatural extent -creates the necessity of penal enactments- builds the jails-erects the gallows-spreads over the human face a mask of deception and selfishness-and substitutes villainy, love of wealth and power, in the place of the single- minded honesty, the hospitality and the honor of the natural state." These arguments are erroneous, and are substantiated neither by history or observation. Civilization tends to the advancement and elevation of man; Lifts him from savagery and barbarism, to refine- ment and intelligence. It inspires him with higher and holier thoughts-loftier ambitions, and its ultimate objects are his moral and physical happiness. But as every positive of good has its negative of evil, so enlightened society has its sombre side-its wickedness and immoralities.

The pioneer is civilization's forlorn hope. Without him, limited would be its dominions. He it is who forsakes all the comforts and surroundings of civilized life-all that makes existence enjoyable; abandons his early home, bids adieu to parents, sisters and brothers, and turns his face toward the vast illimitable West. With iron nerves and lion hearts, these unsung heroes plunge into the gloomy wilder- ness, exposed to perils and disease in a thou- sand different forms, and after years of in- credible toils and privations they subdue the forest, and thus prepare the way for those who follow.

"Who were the first settlers of Clark County?" is a question most difficult to satis- factorily answer. There is considerable di- versity of opinion among our oldest living citi- zens as to the first pioneers. There is a story extant that the first white inhabitant of Clark, as its territory is now defined, was a man who shot and killed his brother at Vin- cennes, in 1810; he escaped in a canoe and paddled up the Wabash, landing near the present Chenoweth ferry, and lived a wild, semi-savage life, a fugitive from justice. It is said he was seen by one or more of the settlers who came years later, and that the Indians asserted the fact of his existence, and that he was the first white inhabitant of the

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county. There is nothing corroborative of this story, and we may regard it as one of the many traditions of the past.

As early as 1812, Fort Lamotte, on the site of Palestine, was built, and the nearest settle- ment, except Vincennes, was Fort Harrison, near Terre Haute. A family named Hutson, however, located about five miles north of Palestine, where they were massacred by the Indians, and their buildings destroyed. As the savages were troublesome and hostile during the war of 1812, it is hardly probable that there were any settlements in Clark prior to its close, though it has been strenuously asserted that settlements were made in the county as early as 1814. From the most reli- able information obtainable, the first perma- nent settlers were the Handys; Thomas, and his sons John and Stephen. They came from Post St. Vincent, near Vincennes, to Union Prairie, in the spring of 1815; broke ground planted and raised a crop of corn, erected cab- ins, and in the fall ensuing, removed their fam- ilies hither. Thomas, the father, settled on the farm now occupied by James Harrison; John, where West Union stands, and Stephen, on the farm occupied by Mrs. Sophronia Brooks. The late Thomas Handy, son of John, once prominent and well known among our people, is said to have been the first white child born in Clark County. This is disputed by some of the oldest living settlers, who assert posi- tively, that Scott Hogue and Isabel Handy, born within a few hours of each other, saw the light of day prior to Thomas.

In the year following, there were signs of Indian hostilities and the Handys erected a fort or stockade on the hill, one half mile south of West Union, called it "Fort Handy," and removed their families there for security. The well dug within the work, and which furnished the water supply for the dwellers, could be seen a few years ago. This fort, the only structure of the kind ever

built in the county, was situated on the pres- ent farm of James Harrison. It was not a very formidable or extensive work of defense, and was built out of abundant caution by the settlers. It contained two or three cabins for the accommodation of the families, and was surrounded by a bullet-proof palisade, pierced with loop-holes at convenient dis- tanees. The same year (1816) other families came, among whom were the Hogues, the Millers, Bells, Megeath, Prevo, Blaze, Crow, Leonard, the Richardsons and Fitchs, who all settled on Union Prairie, the two last named founding the town of York in 1817. The first house erected there, a log dwelling, was built by Chester Fiteh. James Gill, yet living and residing in Cumberland County, aided in its crection. Henry Harrison set- tled in the timber, immediately west of Un- ion, in 1818. The Bartletts located near him about the same time.

Walnut Prairie, just north of Union, and separated from it by Mill Creek and a nar- row strip of timber, was settled in 1817 by the Archers, Neely, McClure, Welch, Chen- oweth, Dunlap, Blake, Shaw, Poorman, Staf- ford, Lockard, Essery and a few others. Mr. Essery afterward entered land on Big Creek, two miles northeast of where Marshall now stands, and opened what is known as the " Cork farm," where he died at an advanced age. Reuben Crow for a few years culti- vated cotton on Union Prairie, with some suc- cess, and erected, perhaps, the first cotton- gin north of the Ohio River. The experi- ment of raising cotton was tried with fair results, some years later, on Walnut Prairies. The soil of these two prairies seems admira- bly adapted to the culture of cotton, but the climate is too irregular to render its produc- tion remunerative.

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History of Crawford and Clark counties, Illinois, Part 27

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892? Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co. Number of Pages: 826

Author: Perrin, William Henry, d. 1892?
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago : O.L. Baskin & Co.
Number of Pages: 826