USA > Illinois > DeKalb County > History of DeKalb County, Illinois > Part 38
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Ten or twelve years after, two of the new settlers discovered on the prairie a buried deposit of some eight hundred dollars in silver coin, which it was surmised had been hidden there by one who had been many years imprisoned in the peniten- tiary.
In 1850 the township organization was adopted, and the first town meeting was held at the residence of Shadrac Bas- ley. Sixty votes were cast, and Pierpont Edwards was elected Supervisor; George V. Miners, Town Clerk ; Stanley Rug- gles, Assessor; W. J. Merritt, Collector; William Shepardson and Daniel Rexford, Justices of the Peace. The Supervisors subsequently chosen were: Pierpont Edwards in 1851; Wil- liam Shepardson in 1852; Pierpont Edwards in 1853; Wil-
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
liam Shepardson in 1854; Robert Hampton in 1855-56-57- 58-59; Alonzo Dole in 1860-61; Robert Hampton in 1862- 63-64-65-66-67; and N. H. Powers in 1868.
Hon. William Shepardson and Hon. Robert Hampton have represented the district in the State Legislature.
As the population increased, and the poverty usually ac- companying new settlements began to disappear, and after the broad prairies had, to a considerable extent, been converted into farms, the people began to turn their attention to their educational interests. Accordingly, in the summer of 1854, a building was erected at South PawPaw, standing on the line, one-half in De Kalb and one-half in Lee County, for a semi- nary.
A kind of rivalry sprang up at East PawPaw, so that, during the same summer, a similar building was also erected there. Soon after, the same spirit erected a third building at West PawPaw, in Lee County. So there were three semina- ries, occupying the three angles of a nearly equilateral trian- gle, the sides of which were about two miles. Of course, they destroyed each other, by dividing the patronage that should have been received by one; and all ultimately became common schools.
Later, in the summer of 1866, a second seminary was built at East PawPaw, which is now (1868) in operation as such.
The first church was built at Ross Grove, by the United Presbyterian church, in 1861. There are at present three in the town,-a second one near Ross Grove, and the third at East PawPaw.
The population of PawPaw in 1855 was 944; in 1860, 1007; in 1865, 954.
PawPaw sent 136 men to crush out the slaveholders' rebel- lion. Most of them went into Captain Terry's Company, of the One Hundred and Fifth Infantry, into the Fourth and Seventeenth Cavalry, the Fifty-Second, Thirty-Fourth, Sev- enty-Fifth, Eighty-Eighth, and the One Hundred and Second Infantry regiments. They were men who did the hard fight-
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TOWN OF PAW PAW.
ing, and but a single pair of shoulder-straps was awarded to the soldiers of the town.
Of the fifteen citizens of PawPaw who went out in Com- pany I, of the Fourth (Colonel Dickey's) Cavalry, five, who were of the best men of the place, gave their lives to their country. Three of these were of the highly respected family of Hydes, and each left a wife and two children.
Lycurgus Hyde was killed on a reconnoissance in Tennes- sec ; Elliot L. Hyde was killed at Coffeeville, Mississippi, December 5th, 1862; Edwin Thomas, brother-in-law of the two former, died at Pittsburg Landing, two weeks before that great battle. Other members of that regiment, who died martyrs to the cause, were Henry Doty and Henry Jones.
John Densmore Dole, of the Thirty-Fourth Infantry, fell at the battle of Stone River, December 31, 1862, a rebel bullet piercing his brain. He was a youth of fine promise, who left his preparation for college at the call to arms, and after doing gallant service as a brave soldier, gave his life to his country. His body was recovered, through the entreatics of his mother to General Rosecranz, and was buried by Spar- tan Lodge of Odd Fellows, at PawPaw, February 10, 1863.
BONCACHANDLER
JOHN D. DOLE.
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VICTOR.
The town of Victor was organized in 1853. For many years previous it had been, with Clinton and half of Afton, in one town organization, which held its town meetings in Deacon Pritchard's large barn until the school house was built, near by, when they were convened at that place.
It was one of the prairie towns, remote from woodland, and consequently was not occupied by settlers until those sections of the country which were better favored by timber had passed out of the hands of the United States, and could not be pur- chased at "government price." In 1847 and 1848 some of the lands were first entered, and during the next five years it was all taken up.
Among the first settlers were: Jeremiah Mulford,-first post-master at Van Buren, and who named the post-office after his favorite President,-W. H. Keene, Aruna Beckwith, James Green, Newton Stearns, Peleg Sweet, Jerome Baxter, George N. Stratton, Simon Snydam, H. C. Beard, and W. R. Prescott.
When the railroad was built, in 1851, there was a large influx of new settlers. Many Irish and Germans purchased lands, and a considerable colony of Norwegians soon moved in. These are now among the most thriving and prosperous of its townspeople. There is now no land in the town that is not occupied by actual residents.
Ross Grove and Shabbona Grove furnish some of its people with timber, but most of them own no woodland. They pur- chase coal from Kewanee for fuel, and lumber from Michigan for fencing and building. The Little Indian Creek waters the township.
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TOWN OF VICTOR.
There is no village in the town. Leland, a thriving railroad village in La Salle County, about one mile and a-half south of the south line of the town, is the principal center for the trade of its people, and for those conveniences and accommo- dations which villages furnish.
The first school house in the place was built in 1850, by Mr. Newton Stearns, on Section Eight. The school section was sold in 1855.
In 1855 the population of Victor was 399; in 1860, 746 ; in 1865, 835.
This town gave 103 soldiers to the war of the rebellion, and taxed itself $10,858 for war purposes.
Those who lost their lives in the service were : Ferdinand Van Derveer, who died at Louisville, Kentucky, March 30, 1865; E. T. Pierce, at Alexandria, Virginia, April 23, 1861; C. T. Bond, at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, March 17, 1865; C. R. Snydam, at Alexandria, Virginia, January 26, 1862.
The Supervisors of Victor were: For 1853, Benjamin Darland; 1854-55-56, Samuel Lord; 1857, George N. Stratton ; 1858-59-60, H. C. Beard; 1861-62-63-64, J. S. Van Derveer; 1865-66, H. C. Beard; 1867-68, W. R. Prescott.
SOMONAUK.
The town of Somonauk for ten years past has contained a larger population, and a larger amount of taxable wealth, than any other in the County. It occupies the southeastern portion of the County. Its surface is rather level; it has a good supply of timber, and is well watered by Somonauk Creek, a handsome stream, which turns two mills.
The Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad runs diago- nally through the southern portion of the town, and upon it, four miles apart, but within the township, are the thriving villages of Sandwich and Somonauk.
In this town the first white man's habitation built in the County was erected. It was a small log house, built in the spring of 1834, on the bank of Somonauk Creck, and was used as a station house on the mail route between Chicago and Galena, by way of John Dixon's ferry, which route was first started during this year. The house was abandoned in the autumn, was used during the winter by one Robinson, and next year was kept as a tavern by James Root. It was afterwards occupied by John Easterbrooks, and subsequently became the property of the Beveridge family.
In 1835, a number of families moved into the town, and claimed the fine timber land upon the borders of the stream. Among them were Dr. Arnold, Joseph Sly, Thomas Brookes, and Simon Price.
In 1839, there were about thirty houses in the township. Among them were two taverns, one kept by John and Henry Lane, the other by Mr. Hummell. Robert Sterrett had a mill erected this year; Mr. Easterbrooks kept the post-office upon the Beveridge place; and among the householders upon
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TOWN OF SOMONAUK.
the east of the creek were: Burrage Hough, Frank Dale, Joseph Sly, Frederick Witherspoon, Hubbard, Joseph, and Thomas Latham, Harvey Joles, George S. Pierson, Captain William Davis, Alvin IIyatt, David Merritt, and Francis Divine. On the west of the creek were: Mr. Burchim, Owen and Simon Price, Dr. Thomas Brooks, William Poplin, Con- way B. Rhodes, Amos Harmon, and Messrs. Frisby, Dobbins, Bliss, and Townsend.
The settlers were all poor. Their dwellings were nearly all of logs, covered with shakes, and floored with punchcons. Many of them were ill constructed, cold and comfortless. This was a sickly season, and in many of the little cabins the puncheon floor was at times covered with the beds of those suffering from various illnesses, leaving hardly enough of well persons to take proper care of the sick. The wealthiest among them hardly had a sufficiency of comfortable clothing. Every body was shaking with ague, and the new comers, most of whom were accustomed to the comforts and luxuries of life in their eastern homes, felt that the hardships of frontier life in the new settlements were severe indeed. Nothing that they produced was saleable, except winter wheat, and although they got fine crops of this cercal, it hardly paid the heavy expense of drawing it to the Chicago markets, over sixty miles of almost trackless prairie, and through the unbridged streams.
The land sale in 1843, when this section of country came in market, and when their farms must be paid for or lost, drained the township of nearly every dollar remaining, and left the people poor indeed. Many a fine claim of timbered land was given away to friends who were able to "enter" it. and most of the prairie land remained the property of the government till about the year 1850. But the settlers main- tained the kindliest feelings among each other, and aided one another with a generosity that is now most gratefully remnem- bered.
They met for worship at the school houses, and their spirit-
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
ual necessities were ministered to by Father Abram Woolston, a Methodist preacher, a good surveyor, and a shrewd man of business, who boasted, as not the least of his many accom- plishments, that he could kill and dress a four hundred pound hog in fifty-seven minutes.
Father Lumrey, an Episcopal Methodist, was another favor- ite preacher, and Joseph Sly's comfortable cabin was always hospitably open to as many preachers as could make it con- venient to stop with him.
David Merritt, the post-master at Freeland Corner, came regularly to the meetings, bringing his mail in his hat; and much shrewd financiering was often required to raise the twenty-five cents in postage that was required to obtain the letter from his custody.
In 1851 the railroad,-that great life-giving stimulant to the impoverished West,-was built through the township, and with the thunder of the iron horse came the advantages of a market for produce at the doors of the producers, free access for the population of the world to its fertile acres, and the conversion of the rich waste into fertile and profitable farms.
In a few months, every acre of land in the township was taken up by settlers or speculators, and the population rapidly increased. A railroad station was at once established at Somonauk village, and for a year or more it was the only station in the town.
THE VILLAGE OF SANDWICH.
In the fall of 1852, William Patten, Washington Walker, and Lindsay Carr, farmers in the neighborhood of the present thriving village of Sandwich, called a mass meeting of the citizens of Newark, then a lively village six miles south, upon which occasion a committee was chosen to petition the railroad company to establish a station for their accommodation. At this time, Mr. J. H. Furman made a census of the citizens who would probably use this station, and reported one hundred and fifty at the south and fifty at the north of the railroad. The company consented to stop trains when flagged. The
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TOWN OF SOMONAUK.
neighbors contrived to have every one who could raise the necessary funds take a trip as frequently as possible; they ran a carriage to Newark daily; and, in a few months, they succeeded in inducing a belief that it was a good point for travel, and it was made a regular stopping place, with the name of Newark Station.
Mr. Almon Gage, the first proprietor of the land upon which the station was built, offered lots to all who would build upon them; and A. R. Patten, James Clark and Myrlin Car- penter availed themselves of the offer, and became the first inhabitants of the village. James Clark built the first house, -a large, rambling one-story structure, known as the Done- gana House.
Numerous additions to the village were made in the follow- ing year, and in 1855 a great impetus was given to the place by the establishment of a manufactory of agricultural machin- ery by Hon. Augustus Adams, Senator for this district. It has since grown more rapidly in trade and population than any other village in the County. In 1860 its population was 952, and it is now estimated at 1800. It has been several times ravaged by destructive conflagrations, but has speedily been rebuilt more substantially than before.
In 1865, 300,000 bushels of wheat were shipped from this station, and one grain dealer paid $+50,000 for grain pur- chased. The manufacture of agricultural machinery has constantly increased, and in 1867 the original company was merged into a stock association, with a capital of $75,000, which has since been enlarged to $125,000. It employs cighty men, and has proved very remunerative to the stock- holders.
In 1856 a bank was established by Mr. M. B. Castle, which is still in existence; and from an exchange business of fifty dollars the first year, has now grown into a large and flourish- ing institution. Mr. J. H. Carr opened the first store in the place; Mr. G. W. Culver and Robert Patten the first lumber yard.
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IHISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
In 1857, William L. Dempster started a weekly newspaper, -The People's Press,-which was discontinued six months after. The Prairie Home, published in 1859, soon met the same fate. The Sandwich News was subsequently issued bi-monthly by James Higbee, and afterwards made a weekly, with J. II. Sedgwick as editor. He was succeeded by Mr. James H. Furman, one of the first settlers and most substan- tial farmers of that town; and, under the name of The Gazette, it is now the largest paper in the County.
The first church in the township was that of the United Presbyterians, or Seceders, which was organized in 1844. with nineteen members, and with Rev. R. W. French as pas- tor. It now has two hundred and thirty-five communicants. Their place of worship is at Freeland Corners. The first church built at Sandwich was that of the Baptists, in 1853; the second, the Methodist, in 1854; the third, the Presbyte- rian, in 1855; the fourth, the Congregationalists, in 1864, (they had previously worshipped in a small chapel) ; the fifth and sixth, the German Lutheran and the German Methodist. There are now fourteen church edifices in the township, in all of which regular worship is maintained.
THE VILLAGE OF SOMONAUK.
The first proprietor of the land on which Somonauk village is built was William Mitchell. He sold it in 1844 to Alvarus Gage, who may be called the father of the village. It was the first railroad station established in the County, and, although there had previously been a small collection of houses there, the people flocked in so rapidly that many were obliged to live in tents for the first few months of their stay. Mr. Franklin Dale built the first store and the first grain warehouse in the place. Mr. Hess built the next onc.
It is now one of the most flourishing villages in the County, and has had a rapid growth during the past few years. It has nine large brick stores, in which are four dry goods estab- lishments, two groceries, one hardware store, one drug store, and one furniture warehouse. It also has a steam grist mill,
HON. ROBERT HAMPTON OF PAWPAW.
Chicago Lithographing for Chicago,
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TOWN OF SOMONAUK.
a broom factory, a brewery, a livery stable, three grain ware- houses, a large agricultural warehouse, a hay pressing estab- lishment, and two lumber yards.
It has seven churches. The Protestant Methodists built the first church edifice, the Baptists the next; and to these have been added the churches of the Presbyterians, German Baptists, German Lutherans, the Catholics, and the Episcopal Methodists.
The education of the children of the village is conducted in a fine large edifice, divided into four departments, upon the "graded " system.
The village has twice suffered severely by fires, which des- troyed a large part of its business buildings ; but the energy of its people triumphed over their misfortunes, and it was never in a finer or more flourishing condition than at present.
The township of Somonauk contributed 311 men to the war of the rebellion, and raised $27,843 by tax, to meet necessary war expenses.
Ten days after the fall of Sumter, a company of Somonauk soldiers, under Captain L. H. Carr, was guarding the import- ant strategic point of Cairo. It was the first company raised in the State, and probably the first in the Union, under the first call of the President. It was subsequently incorporated in the Tenth regiment. The gallant and honored Captain Carr met his death from the bullet of a sharp-shooter, while at the siege of Island No. Ten.
Frederick W. Partridge, a native of Vermont, a lawyer, and in 1860 post-master of the place, was chosen Captain of the next company raised in the town. It was made a part of the Thirteenth Infantry, and with it he fought most gallantly through its three years' term of service. He was an accom- plished soldier, and a thorough disciplinarian. He was twicc wounded, rose to the command of the regiment, and was bre- vetted Brigadier General; and upon his return, was elected to the office of Circuit Clerk and Recorder,-the best office in the gift of the County.
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HISTORY OF DE KALB COUNTY.
Hon. William Patten, a native of New York, has been one of the leading men of Somonauk. He has served three terms as member of the State Legislature, and is now Senator of this district. He raised and commanded a company in the One Hundred and Fifty-Sixth Infantry, during the great war, and has ever been prominent in every good word and work. Hons. W. W. Sedgwick, Augustus Adams, S. B. Stinson, W. L. Simmons, M. B. Castle, and the Culver bro- thers, should also be mentioned as prominent among those numerous high toned and honorable men whose intelligence and well-directed energies have contributed to the prosperity of the place, and of whom it may be said that the town has honored itself by placing them forward as its representative men.
Colonel Isaac and Captain Karl Rutishauser, of Somonauk, soldiers in their native Poland, did gallant service also in the war for the preservation of the Union.
One of the most respected families of Somonauk is that of Mr. George Beveridge, who moved to the place from Wash- ington County, New York, in 1844. The family are of Scotch descent,-sturdy Presbyterians in religious, and strongly anti-slavery in political faith.
In 1852, a gentlemanly stranger begged shelter for the night at this house. Something led the family to suspect that he was a detective, searching for evidence of their con- nection with the crime of aiding slaves to their freedom. Finally, seeking an opportunity of privacy, he asked directly of the venerable mother if she had not at times secreted fugi- tive negroes. "Yes," said she; "and in spite of your op- pressive laws, I will do it again whenever I have an oppor- tunity." Instead of immediately arresting her, as she had expected, the stranger laughed. He was an eminent physi- cian of Quincy, engaged in establishing stations on the under- ground railroad; and during many subsequent years, there was a frequent stoppage of trains at this station, and much time and money was spent in forwarding the flying negroes
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TOWN OF SOMONAUK.
on to the Stewards, at Plano, and to other places of refuge.
Three sons of the family have attained distinction. General John L. Beveridge, a lawyer of Sycamore, and subsequently of Chicago, served as Major of the Eighth Cavalry and Colonel of the Seventeenth, and as Brigadier General in command in Missouri. He is now sheriff of Cook County. Hon. James H. Beveridge, a merchant at Freeland, was elected in 1852 to the office of Circuit Clerk and Recorder, which he filled most acceptably for eight years; and in 1864 he was made State Treasurer. Andrew M. Beveridge has attained distinction as an eloquent divine.
The Supervisors of Somonauk have been: For 1850-51- 52-53, Lyman Bacon ; 1854-55, William Patten ; 1856-57, J. H. Furman ; 1858, William Patten ; 1859, Hubbard La- tham; 1860, William Patten ; 1861, C. Winne ; 1862, J. H. Furman ; 1863, E. W. Lewis; 1864, William Patten ; 1865, W. W. Sedgwick ; 1866-67-68, W. L. Simmons.
The village of Sandwich was incorporated in 1859, and as Presidents of the Board of Trustees the following men have represented its interests upon the Board of Supervisors: In 1860, Washington Walker; 1861, George W. Culver; 1862, Washington Walker; 1863, Perley Stone; 1864, W. L. Sim- mons ; 1865, J. H. Carr ; 1866, George W. Culver; 1867- 68, W. W. Sedgwick.
The village of Somonauk was incorporated in 1866. Wil- liam Brown and William Heun have represented it upon the Board of Supervisors.
The assessed valuation of the property of the township is $604,588.
SHABBONA.
Shabbona's Grove, twenty-five years ago, was one of the finest bodies of timber in the State, containing about fifteen hundred acres, well covered with heavy white, burr and black oaks, and black walnut. It is situated on the Big Indian Creek, and is named after an old Pottawattamie chief,- Shabbona,-who at that time, with his tribe, lived at the north end of the grove, where his headquarters, a large, long log house, now stand in a good state of preservation. It was surrounded by an immense tract of high, rolling prairie, well watered and well drained,-towards the east and south by the Somonauk, Little Indian and Big Indian Creeks, into Fox River, and towards the north by its tributaries into the Kish- waukee. All this country,-now comprised in the towns of Shabbona and Clinton,-was then called Shabbona's Grove. On account of the excellence of the land, its dry and healthy location, and the quality of the timber in the grove, it was very attractive to the early emigrants; and the settlement increased and flourished, outstripping other localities more conveniently situated.
After the railroads were built,-which, preferring on ac- count of speculation the wide, unsettled prairies, were located on either side of our dividing ridge,-emigration tended towards either line of road, emigrants preferring convenience to market, and cheaper lands to this naturally more desirable location.
Eighteen years ago, almost every resident of Chicago could tell you where Shabbona's Grove was, and all about it; now, scarcely a citizen knows that there is such a place on the face of the earth.
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HISTORY OF DEKALB COUNTY.
In another chapter will be found a brief history of the honest and kindly old chief who has given name to this grove and this town, and whose manly and generous treatment of the whites entitles him to lasting remembrance; and also of his band of Indians, who, within the memory of men yet young, were living here in patriarchal style,-these groves their towns, and these vast prairies their fields; the one fur- nishing them shelter and fuel, the other food from the chase.
In the treaty made at Prairie Du Chien, in 1829,-by which the Pottawattomies ceded this section of country to the United States,-two sections of land at this grove were made a reser- vation to Shabeney. In another treaty, made at Tippecanoe, Indiana, in October, 1832, these lands were again reserved to Shabonier,-a French method of spelling the same name. In a third treaty, made in September, 1833, it is provided that these lands reserved shall be grants in fee simple, which might be sold and conveyed by the recipient,-a privilege which he had not before possessed; but in the following year this provision of the treaty was rejected by the Senate, leaving them, as before, simple reservations.
This fact becomes important, as explaining the difficulty in the titles to these lands, which has caused a vast deal of per- plexity and loss to those of the white settlers whose title to the grove came through the old chief.
In 1845 Old Shabbona, ignorant of the repeal of that pro- vision of the treaty which gave him a right to sell his land, sold to Azell A. Gates and Orrin Gates his entire reservation. This was speedily divided into tracts, and re-sold by the Gates to the inhabitants of the adjoining prairies.
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