USA > Illinois > DeKalb County > History of DeKalb County, Illinois > Part 37
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This stream suggested the pleasing name adopted for the town. Mr. John A. Hayden, one of its first settlers, was a great admirer of the song, "Flow gently, sweet Afton," and while at work breaking up and preparing to cultivate his farm, he was continually singing it. He insisted upon calling
CORTLAND PUBLIC SCHOOL.
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TOWN OF AFTON.
the stream "Sweet Afton," and this suggested the musical name for the town.
Afton was organized in 1854. Previous to that time the northern half had been attached to De Kalb, and the southern half to Clinton. Mr. W. R. Campbell was probably the first white resident of the place, and John A. Hayden the next. Other early settlers were Daniel Washburne, Timothy Pier- son, John McGirr, Benjamin Muzzy, Charles Ward, Francis Bemis, and Alex Folger.
In the autumn of 1854, Mr. Ezekiel Noble, who, with Silas Tappan and Oscar Tyler, had just moved into the place, erected temporary shanties, and commenced breaking their land, canvassed the township with a petition for its organiza- tion as a town, and obtained the signatures of twenty-three male inhabitants. It was admitted by the Board of Super- visors at their next session.
At the election next spring, Mr. Noble was chosen Super- visor, and has ever since, by successive re-elections, held the same office. Timothy Pierson and Orson Pearl were elected Justices ; Sanford A. Tyler, Town Clerk; Clark Glidden, Assessor and Collector.
In 1855 the first school was held, in a private house be- longing to Mr. Goodell. It was kept by Mr. Lord. Next year the school section was sold, the town was divided into two school districts, and a good school house was built on the northeast corner of Section Twenty-Four, in District One, which comprised the east half of the town. In 1858 the town was divided into nine school districts, to which one has since been added.
A spacious and beautiful church was built in 1867, by the sect called Second Adventists,-the only church in the placc.
The first elections were held at Sanford A. Tyler's house, on Section Fourteen. They have since then been held at the Center School House.
Afton manfully did its part in the war of the rebellion. Eighty-one men went from that thinly populated town, to fill
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
the ranks of the Union army. Its total population, by the census of 1860, was but 516. Fifty-nine men had volunteered, when, the necessities of the government calling for more men, a tax was levied upon the town, and seven more were procured. In the summer of 1864, an additional tax was voted upon the town, amounting in all to $14,000, and fifteen more recruits were enlisted.
Among those who gave their lives in the defence of their country were Charles Elliot, Dempster Wheeler, Alexander Campbell, Emerson T. Knight, and Lewis Olverson, who went out in the One Hundred and Fifth Regiment, and L. Deforest, of the Eighth Cavalry.
Among the leading citizens of Afton are Mr. Ezekiel Noble, a shrewd, intelligent New Yorker, who has always been active in its public affairs, and may be said to be the father of the town, and Mr. C. W. Broughton, one of the wealthiest and most extensive farmers of the County.
CLINTON.
Clinton is now one of the populous and prosperous towns of our County, but was not settled so early as those towns which were more favored with timbered lands. One small grove of about one hundred acres borders the Little Indian Creek, which has its head in the town; the remainder is handsome rolling prairie.
In 1835, when old Deacon Pritchard came through this section of country, on foot and alone, prospecting for a home in the west, he found at this grove just the spot he desired, and he resolved to possess it; but returning next year with his family, after a journey of forty days by wagon from New York, he was disappointed by finding it claimed and occupied by Mr. O. P. Johnson, who has given his name to the grove. Pritchard moved on to Grand de Tour, on Rock River; but eight years after, returned and bought the property, and upon it he and his sons,-among the worthiest and best citizens of the County,-have ever since resided.
In 1843, nine families constituted the population of the town. These were the families of W. B. Fields, Parker Thomas, Alexander McNish, Silas Hines, John and James Walker, Preston Curtiss, William Robertson, and C. B., Whitford, most of whom still reside in the place. In 1845 and 1846, came Shelburne J. and Tracy Scott, Felix and Baldwin Woodruff, and Sylvester Hall; and in 1847 and 1848, when Shabbona's Grove (which is on the west line of this town) was sold by the old chief, and divided into lots by the wily speculator Gates, so that all could procure timber, a dozen more settlers made claims on the prairie, and became
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HISTORY OF DEKALB COUNY. -
permanent inhabitants of the township. Among these were N. S. and Thomas J. Greenwood, Benjamin Matteson, William Sherman, Sylvester and Elbert Hall, J. L. Bailey, J. L. Mighell, Aruney Hill, and John Secor.
In 1850, when the township organization was adopted, the boundaries of Clinton included one-half of Victor and of Afton, as well as its present territory. In 1853 it was re- duced to its present dimensions.
The commissioners appointed to organize and give names to the towns found that the citizens of four of the original thirteen had selected the name of Clinton, and it was awarded to this town by lot. The Scotts and a uumber of other set- tlers had migrated from the vicinity of Clinton, in New York, and retained an attachment to the name.
In 1855 the population of Clinton had increased to 867 ; in 1860 to 1006; and in 1865 to 1016.
In 1847 the first school was opened in the township, and was taught by Mr. H. C. Beard.
The Baptists and Presbyterians organized the first churches, and for several years had regular services, which were well attended. But the Methodists have since been in the ascend- ancy, and in 1867 built an elegant Gothic church, near the center of the town,-one of the finest church edifices in the County.
Claim wars were not unfrequent in the early history of the town, and the sacredness of the claimants' rights was rigidly enforced by the people. As late as 1851, some of the settlers had not yet paid for their lands, but held them by claim only. In that year occurred the last of the claim wars. One Hugh McKerg had deeded some land claimed by John Secor. The people of the town rose in a body, and chose a committee to demand of him a release of the land, threatening to destroy his property if he refused. But Hugh's heart was hardened, and he refused to let the land go, but watched his property by day and by night. After several nights' watching, he ventured to sleep; but woke to find his fences on fire, his well
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TOWN OF CLINTON.
filled up, and much of his moveable property carried off. IIe found it politic to settle that claim without further delay. It would hardly seem that land at that time was worth fighting for. It kept the people, however hard they worked, yet mis- erably poor. They raised fine crops; uld settlers speak of having raised forty-two bushels of choice winter wheat to the acre, but it brought them little money. When they had car- ried it sixty miles to market, over roads almost impassable, it sometimes failed to bring enough to pay the teamsters' bills. It is as easy to raise five hundred dollars now from a farm as it was to raise fifty in years from 1840 to 1850.
About one person in nine of the total population of Clinton enlisted in the Union army during the war of the rebellion. She sent 111 men, and raised by taxation and contribution $13,746 for war purposes.
The names of those who lost their lives in that war were: Jonathan Morris, who died at Tunnel Hill, January 26, 1863. Egbert Matteson, at Louisville, Ky., November 19, 1862. M. C. Kirkpatrick, at home, April 10, 1863.
Seeley Simpson, at Atlanta, August 5, 1865.
Henry Kellogg, at Bowling Green, November, 1862.
James Low, at Gallatin, March 3, 1863.
Ashael Childs, at LaGrange, Tenn.
C. Rose, Jr., at Camp Butler, January 19, 1862.
Corydon Heath, at Milliken's Bend, July, 1862.
Alfred Hodgekin, at Meriden, Miss., August 7, 1864.
Charles Nears, in Virginia, June, 1864.
E. A. Pritchard, at home, July 29, 1865.
The latter, a Captain in Company H, of the Thirteenth Infantry, was a bright example of the Christian soldier. A native of Malone, N. Y., he moved with his father's family to Clinton in 1845, pursued the study of law at Aurora and Cincinnatti, and obtained a good law practice at Aurora; but impelled by motives of purest patriotism, he left his young family at the first outbreak of the war, served for three years most honorably in the gallant old Thirteenth, fighting its
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
every battle; but lost his health in the service, and returned, to fall a victim to consumption, just when the people of De Kalb County were about to elect him to an honorable civil office. He was,-in intelligence, in culture, in every manly virtue,-one of the very foremost men of our County.
Reuben M. Pritchard, his brother, a gentleman of ability and high integrity, has been for six years Supervisor of the town, and one of the leading citizens of the County.
Charles Wesley and William Wallace Marsh, who settled in Clinton in 1850, have gained both fame and fortune by the invention of the famous Marsh Harvester. The first machine was used and first patent obtained in 1858. The first made for sale were used in 1864, when twenty-five were manufac- tured. Five thousand will be built for the harvest of 1869, and the admirable invention promises to supercede all other modes of harvesting grain.
The Supervisors of Clinton have been: For 1850, Reuben Pritchard; 1851, James R. Eastman ; 1852, Arunah Hill ; 1853, C. B. Whitford; 1854, Arunah Hill; 1855, Reuben Pritchard; 1856, Reuben M. Pritchard; 1857, O. A. Tubbs; 1858-59, N. S. Greenwood; 1860-61-62, R. M. Pritchard, 1863-64, W. C. Macey; 1865, R. M. Pritchard ; 1866, J. L. Mighell; 1867-68, Robert Humphrey.
PIERCE.
Pierce is a prairie town, remote from woodland. The head waters of Big Rock Creek rise in the eastern part of the town, bursting from the side of a natural elevation sixty feet above the lowlands near it. The spring is impregnated with sulphur.
The northern portion of the town is very undulating, the southern portion very level. Its soil is particularly adapted to wheat, and for the past eight years it has probably produced more of this cereal than any other town in the County. The towns of Pierce and South Grove have been the principal wheat-growing towns of the County; and although it has been the fashion to decry the raising of wheat as an unprofitable business, yet the people of these towns have in ten years been elevated,-principally by the production of this crop,-from a condition of poverty and destitution to comparative inde- pendence.
Three-fourths of the population of Pierce are natives of Germany and Ireland. A considerable portion of the Ger- mans are, however, from Pennsylvania, but speak the German language, and preserve the German customs. The only church in the town is a Lutheran church, in which, for ten or twelve years, a German minister has been maintained, and religious services conducted in the German language. The Germans occupy the level plain in the southeastern portion of the town, while the Irish are principally in the rougher land of the north. They are generally an industrious and econom- ical population, who came here twelve or fifteen years ago with nothing, but have now grown independent, if not wealthy. They are fast buying out the farms of the adjoining American
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
settlers, and promise soon to monopolize the whole township. They are a prolific race, and raise more babies to the acre than any other town in the County !
The first settler of Pierce was Elder Nathan Wilcox, who , made a farm in the northern part of the town in 1848. In 1850, Harrison and Horace S. Champlin bought 1100 acres in this and the adjoining town of Afton, and running thirteen breaking teams, they broke up over 600 acres during that summer. Their friends called them crazy for settling so far from woodland, and predicted that they would not see that section of the County settled for thirty years, if ever. There was then not a house between them and the Somonauk tim- ber, ten miles south. Levi and Moses Hill at that time re- sided in this town, and during the same season came Thomas Halloran, P. Home, P. Dunn, L. Hennegan, John Ferrick, the Butlers, and the Dillons.
In the eastern part of the town the German settlement was started by Christian Myers, Henry Ramer, Josiah Jacob, and George Eberly. Most of the land was "entered" in 1852, and the remainder was bought up in the following year.
The School Section was sold in 1857 at $1.25 per acre ; but the purchasers were an improvident population, who failed to pay even the interest upon their purchases, and the land reverted back to the school fund, and was again sold in 1858 for from $5 to $6 per acre. All predicted that the latter purchasers would fail to pay, as their predecessors had done. No man, they argued, could afford to pay so large a price. It was as hard to raise $100 then as to raise $1000 now. But that land is now worth $40 per acre, and the purchasers have grown rich upon it.
For many years the interest upon the fund created by this sale paid all the expenses of the schools. The first school was kept in the German settlement, and was opened in 1853.
This section of country was at first included in Somonauk precinct, subsequently in Orange precinct, and before the township organization was adopted, was incorporated with
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TOWN OF PIERCE.
Cortland (or Pampas) in Richland precinct. Until 1853 the north half was attached to Pampas, and the south half to Squaw Grove. In that year it was organized into a township, and named Pierce, in honor of the President. The name was selected by Mr. Champlin and that jolly eccentric, George W. Kretsinger.
The majority of the population of this town were not cul- thusiastic in favor of the war; but when a draft was made, they promptly raised nearly $11,000, and filled their quota; $4500 of this sum being contributed by subscriptions of the citizens, and $6000 borrowed upon a note signed by twenty of the wealthy towns-people. This sum was subsequently paid by a tax upon the town. To the two last men procured as substitutes $1400 was paid by the town, in addition to $600 of County bounty and the same by the United States government; and both of these substitutes deserted as soon as they reached Chicago. The total number of men furnished was 100.
The population of the town in 1855 was 667; in 1860, 045; in 1865, 975.
The first Supervisor of Pierce was II. S. Champlin, who served in 1853-54. He was succeeded by C. M. Humistor, who served till 1860, when B. Milnemow was elected. S. Denton filled the office in 1861; Thomas Gormley in 1862-63; N. S. Cottrell in 1864; G. W. Slater in 1865-66; and C. M. Humiston in 1867-68.
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SQUAW GROVE.
Squaw Grove was probably the first township settled in De Kalb County. In the summer of 1834 one Hollenbeck, who lived near Ottawa, made a journey into this terra incog- nita as far as the present town of Sycamore, and on his return made a claim to the fine grove in this town. This he called Squaw Grove, because he found here, alone, a large number of squaws, whose dusky partners had gone on a hunting ex- pedition. He made his claim at the north side of the grove where Mr. Oscar Tanner now resides, and this was probably the first land claimed in the County.
He did not remain on his new claim, but, returning to Newark, in La Salle County, told such a flattering tale of the charms of this newly discovered country, that William Sebree, an old Virginian with a large family, who was looking for a place to settle, started at once to possess it.
In September, 1834, he reached the spot, and, camping down in the midst of the Indians, he built a temporary shel- ter of crotches and poles, which he covered with bark taken from their forsaken wigwams; and there housed his family until he could construct a small log house for the winter, which was now rapidly approaching.
It was a very cold winter. 'When he went on Christmas day to cut the slough grass for his famishing cattle, he had his ears and nose frozen. The family lived principally upon deer and prairie fowl for the first six months. The latter game were not so numerous as they were in after years, when grain fields were more plenty; but wolves abounded, and were very troublesome, snatching up everything eatable that chanced to be left out of doors.
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TOWN OF SQUAW GROAE.
A man namel Robson lived this fall in a log cabin at the crossing of Somonauk Creek, a few miles southı, but aban- doned the place at the approach of winter, and left Sebree the only white inhabitant of this section of country.
In the following spring a hoosier, named Leggett, claimed and settled upon the farm long afterward occupied by the Wards; and in October, 1835, Mr. Samuel Miller, a Ken- tuckian, moved to the grove, and commenced a farm. Jacob Lee and John Easterbrooks came in January, 1836, and William Ward in the autumn following.
The new comers lived in the most primitive manner. Most of them had cattle, horses, sheep, and swine, and Sebree re- joiced in the possession of a pair of hand mill-stones, with which the settlement all ground the corn that they raised. They made clothing from the wool of their sheep. For three years the only plow in the place was one owned by Sebree, and made with a wooden mould board. They broke up the prairie, sowed oats, and planted sod corn; and in the fall of 1836, Miller went with four yoke of cattle carrying thirty bushels of oats to Chicago. These he sold for fifty cents a bushel, returning with salt and boots for the settlement.
Their nearest neighbors at the north were upon the banks of the Kishwaukee, twenty miles distant, and in 1835 they went, as a neighborly act, to raise the first log house in that country, on William A. Miller's claim in Kingston.
Many of the first settlers still remain upon their land, and have grown rich with the rise in the value of lands, and from the results of their industry.
Mr. Miller, who paid his first tax in 1837, to B. F. Fridley, and paid sixty-two and-a-half cents, now has the doubtful pleasure of paying yearly over $200 in taxes; and his prop- erty, then worth $600 or $800, would now sell for $20,000.
The Sebrees, Wards, Lees, and other families, have been equally fortunate. They have lived through times of great destitution, but have been rewarded with the possession of abundance.
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
The first child born in the town was John Miller. The first death was that of the energetic and industrious old Mrs. Sebrec.
The first school was taught in Mr. Lee's house, by a lady ; and in the winter Mr. Cleveland, a farmer of the town, taught in the same place. In 1838, a log school house was built in the grove, in which Mr. James H. Furman kept an excel- lent school. There are now nine school districts, in each of which are handsome and convenient school houses. There is no church edifice in the town. A store, a tavern, a black- smith's and a shoemaker's shop, constitute the little village.
The town is now all settled, mostly by farmers of wealth, whose handsome farm houses and barns indicate the possession of taste, as well as wealth, and excite the admiration of the traveler, The assessed valuation of the property of the town in 1868 was $242,290, which is a larger amount, in propor- tion to its population, than any other town in the County.
The population in 1865 was 515; in 1860, 795; in 1865, 679. Ninety-three men were furnished by this town for the war of the great rebellion.
The Supervisors of the town have been: For 1850-51-52, A. L. Heminway ; for 1853-54-55-56, W. C. Tappan; for 1857-58, Philo Slater ; for 1859, W. C. Tappan ; for 1860- 61, Philo Slater ; for 1862-63, W. C. Tappan; for 1864, D. C. Winslow; for 1865-66-67-68, C. H. Taylor.
PAWPAW.
Paw Paw is the southwest corner town of De Kalb County. Most of its surface is occupied by rolling prairie,-some por- tions of it rather flat, yet none so much so as to render it unfit for the plow. There is no waste land in the township, and its deep, black soil, resting over a subsoil of clay, is extremely productive. The Big Indian Creek and its tribu- taries, which run through the township in various directions, furnish a good supply of pure, running water. Ross Grove, Coon Grove, and a portion of PawPaw Grove, lie in this town, and supply its inhabitants with a considerable portion of their fencing and fuel. These, and other natural advan- tages, attracted those seeking homes in the West at a very carly date.
The first settlers in this township arrived in the autumn of 1834. David A. Town came first, and was soon after joined by Edward Butterfield and Benjamin Harris. In the family of Mr. Harris was his aged father, Benoni Harris, a Method- ist clergyman, who immediately began to preach the doctrines of the Cross to the few scattered settlers, who gathered to - gether from great distances, coming on foot, on horseback, and with ox teams, to hear the word.
A plain marble slab, erected on the east side of PawPaw Grove, and bearing Masonic emblems, marks the last resting place of this pioneer minister in De Kalb County. He died at the age of eighty-four. His wife, Thankful, whose remains repose beside him, was the first white person buried in this town.
In the summer of 1835, several additional families moved
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
into the township, among them David A. Town, Mr. Baldwin, and Mr. Ross, who first settled and gave name to Ross Grove. PawPaw Grove took its name from the abundance of pawpaw apples found there, and which grow there to this day-a fruit small, juicy, and luscious, found nowhere else in this vicinity.
At this grove the celebrated Shabbona, chief of the Pota- wattamies, with his tribe, was accustomed to make long stays. The old inhabitants say he about divided his time between this and Shabbona's Grove. Here was their burying ground for common Indians, and the place where, between two half logs, dug out in the center, they stood up their noted dead in the crotches of trees. Herc, too, lived the chief Wabonsie, concerning whom but few of the oldest citizens knew anything, and they but little, as he soon disappeared.
For some services in the Indian war, the government gave a reservation at this grove to one Le Clair, a half-breed Frenchman. Most of this is in Lee County.
Game was found quite plentiful at that carly date. Decr, prairie wolves, wild cats, and an occasional bear, with wild turkeys, geese, ducks, and prairie chickens, were the principal species.
The first white child born was Caroline, daughter of Rus- sell and Roxana Town, in the spring of 1836, now the wife of James Kern.
PawPaw Grove has the reputation of having been, during early times, one of the principal rendezvous of the horse- thieving and counterfeiting fraternity. Wyram, or "Bogus," Gates, John Bryant, Bill Rogers, and one Webber, with others, who resided at a small grove west of PawPaw, gained, by means of the suspicious circumstances which surrounded them, the reputation of belonging to that gang, and of pro- curing by these means those large amounts of money which their neighbors saw them to possess, and knew no other way to account for their possessing.
A citizen relates that, coming on horseback from the north, he endeavored to relieve his lonely way by overtaking two horsemen in advance. But the faster he rode, still faster
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TOWN OF PAW PAW.
rode they, till the pursuit became a chase, and they hid in the woods. The horses were next day found in Gates' barn, the men arrested, tried, and sent to the penitentiary, from whence they soon escaped.
Bill Rogers was a marked character. He was bold as a lion, tall, and straight as an Indian. IIe sometimes acted as detective of criminals, and sometimes, it is said, in the char- acter of principal. An exciting story is told of his arrest of a huge, powerful negro, who had hitherto defied all efforts to capture him. Rogers met him on the prairie, when both were unarmed, and after a fight, lasting over an hour, succeeded in pinioning his arms, handing him over to the officers, and secur- ing the large reward offered for his capture.
Rogers was the contractor to remove the Indians from this country to their new homes west of the Mississippi. Five or six years ago, an early citizen of this County, crossing the plains to California, was astonished to meet him far beyond civilization, dressed in Indian costume, and mounted on a wild mustang with long hair and beard as white as snow, still hale and hearty, and still a pioneer.
All of this class of population moved from the grove, far- ther to the west, upon the approach of the refining influences of civilization.
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