USA > Illinois > Kendall County > History of Kendall county, Illinois, from the earliest discoveries to the present time > Part 3
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In 1824,
REV. JESSE WALKER
was sent out as a Methodist missionary among the Pot- tawatomies, and traversed much of the same ground passed over by Marquette one hundred and sixty years before. The same hills that then echoed to the French tongue, now echoed to the English, but a purer gospel was proclaimed, and one more free from the additions of men. Mr. Walker was a small man, and usually wore a light-colored beaver, nearly as large as a lady's para- sol. He was not a talented preacher, but had good sense, courage and zeal. He was born in Buckingham county, Va., June 9, 1766, and was converted in a Baptist meeting, while young. He was by trade a dresser of buckskin, or deer leather, for gloves, moccasins, pants,
36
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
vests and hunting shirts, and he was often familiarly called the " skin-dresser." He was first appointed mis- sionary to the territories of Illinois and Missouri in 1806, and in 1820 preached the first Methodist sermon in St. Louis, in the Baptist meeting house, and a thriv- ing church was formed. In 1823 he entered upon his special mission to the Indians, having first gained per- mission of the head men of the tribe and of the Secre- tary of War. His field was Northern Illinois, with Ottawa for a centre. One of his stations was a log chapel in the edge of the timber, near a little stream, just over the west line of Kendall county. The stream is since known as Mission creek, and the tongue of tim- ber as Mission Point. The chapel, it is believed, stood about where Frank Bowen's barn now stands. There the lone missionary held preaching services, by the help of an interpreter, and established an Indian school for the dusky boys and girls. He preached also in the cab- ins at Ottawa, for several other settlers had come in, viz : Joseph Brown, Lewis Baily, Mr. Covill, Enos Pem- brook, Warner Ramsey, Pierce Hawley, Robert Beres- ford, and Edmund Weed. In 1825 he formed the first Methodist class in Peoria. Three of the members were James Walker and wife, and Mrs. John Dixon. Indeed, he traveled and preached and taught wherever he could hear of Indians or settlers. The veteran, John Sin- clair, often declared that wherever he went Jesse Walker had been ahead of him. In 1828 he was suc- ceeded at the Indian mission by Isaac Scarritt, and he removed to an Indian village near the site of Plainfield. In 1832 he was appointed to Chicago. At Conference
37
PROGRESS OF ORGANIZATION.
the following year, by a majority vote, the preachers were recommended to wear straight-breasted coats, but Jesse Walker, as well as John Sinclair and Peter Cart- right, voted in the negative. James Walker and Wil- liam Royal favored the recommendation. Jesse Walker died Oct. 4, 1835, and is buried at Plainfield.
In 1825 Mr. Long, James Galloway, George and Hor- ace Sprague and Mr. Ransom came into LaSalle county. In the fall W. F. Walker came up the river to Ottawa in a keel boat.
In five years three tiers of counties had been added to the State in its progress northward, and in 1826
VERMILLION COUNTY
was organized and became the latest territorial name of this vicinity. It embraced all the country from Dan- ville to Chicago. Ninian Edwards was elected governor and served four years; he was also our territorial gov- ernor nine years. It may be noticed, in passing, that in 1826 a motion was introduced into the legislature by Joseph Duncan, cashier of the unfortunate State Bank, to dispose of the Seminary Lands by public lottery, but it was lost in committee.
A motion was also introduced and considered in com- mittee, to lay a tax on all bachelors over twenty-five years old.
TWO QUOTATIONS
from State papers of that year may not be uninteresting in a centennial history :
Gov. Coles in his valedictory message says : "On the Fourth of July last, Thomas Jefferson, the renowned author of the Declaration of Independence, and John
38
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
Adams, its ablest advocate, ceased to live, thus sanctify- ing by their deaths a day rendered glorious by the most important event of their lives. That these two fathers and ex-Presidents, one of whom drafted the Declaration of Independence, the other seconded the motion which led to its adoption, both members of the select commit- tee which reported it, and constituting, at the time of their deaths, two of the only three surviving signers of that memorable instrument, should have died on the same day, and that day the fiftieth anniversary since its adoption, is such an extraordinary co-incidence, that it would seem as if heaven were desirous of increasing our reverence for our liberty, and for the memory of those who were instrumental in achieving it. This mel- ancholy bereveament has put the entire nation in mourn- ing, and it has been a subject of regret that the sparse population of Illinois has prevented its citizens from publicly manifesting their respect for the memories of these two great statesman. But there is one painful cir- cumstance connected with this event. Thomas Jeffer- son, after sixty-one years' service of his country, found himself involved to such an extent that nearly all his property, even Monticello, his favorite residence, where are now his remains, will have to be sold."
And Gov. Edwards, in his inaugural message, says, in relation to the State Bank, whose notes were then only worth two-thirds their face value : "Money is an essential element of power. Character is the means of obtaining money from others, when we have it not of our own. Character, therefore, is capital, and the loss of it is the most disastrous species of bankruptcy, since
39
THE FIRST PIONEERS.
it may find us unable to help ourselves, and destitute of the means of obtaining help from others. The punctual observance of its engagements and a fair and honest ful- fillment of all its authorized expectations are as indis- pensable to the character of a state as to that of an indi- vidual."
In 1826 the quarter section on which Ottawa stands was taken up by Dr. David Walker, father of David Walker, Esq., and of George Walker, first sheriff of La- Salle county. There arrived, also, Col. J. D. Thomas and James Walker. The latter afterward removed to Plain- field. The same year
MARK BEAUBIEN
became a fur trader at Chicago, and soon after com- menced those log cabin and Saganash House experiences which have made his name famous wherever western his- tory is known. Mark has chosen Newark, within the borders of Kendall county, as the spot on which to spend his closing days, and there, with his cherished pipe and violin and numerous friends, he lives in retired peace- one of our most interesting mementoes.
He was born in Detroit, April 25, 1800; came to Chicago with his family in a wagon, 1826, and joined his brother, John B. Beaubien, who had been a trader there since 1817, having purchased his residence of the American Fur Company. That year Mark planted pota- toes and corn in the field along the river, embracing the court house square. In 1829 he opened a log hotel, on what is now the corner of Lake and Market streets, and the following year established a ferry at the fork of the river, paying a county license therefor. The rates were
40
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
sixpence for a foot passenger and a shilling for a team. In 1833 the Saganash House a two-story frame, with green blinds, supplanted the log house. Saganash was the Indian name of Billy Caldwell, a Pottawatomie chief, and the grateful man left Mr. Beaubien a govern- ment reservation of eighty acres at the mouth of the Calumet, which is now quite valuable. Mr. Beaubien lived in the vicinity of Naperville eight years, from 1844. In 1852 he became keeper of the Chicago light- house, removing in 1861 to Naperville, and soon back to Chicago again. He has also lived in Manteno and Kankakee. He has raised a family of twenty-three children, most of whom are living and doing well, though scattered in different localities.
CHAPTER VI.
HOLDERMAN'S GROVE.
N 1826, or perhaps the year following, ROBERT BERESFORD,
wife and two sons, settled at the southern point of Holderman's grove, on one of the newly located sections of what was known as Seminary land, and thus became the first actual settler in Kendall county.
THE SEMINARY LAND
was a donation of thirty-six sections from the United States to the State of Illinois, for the purpose of found- ing a State college. They could be located anywhere on the public lands, and Governor Edward Coles in 1825-6 caused twenty-six of the sections to be located by a Board of Commissioners, and reserved from general sale. In locating one section at Holderman's, the Board left civilization far behind, but their attention was probably directed there by the canal survey, and they acted on the best information they could obtain. But if they could have once feasted their eyes upon the
GLORIOUS LANDSCAPES
south and west of the famous little grove they would have been in no doubt about the propriety of driving
42
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
their stakes there. It is situated on the broad, swelling water shed between the Fox and Illinois rivers, and is a fit beginning to a country that has as many magnificent views and delicious bits of landscape in proportion to its size as any county in the State. There are no high hills in Kendall county, yet from some points thirty miles can be seen in one direction, and townships unroll like a panorama before the eye. The range is not so extensive along the county line road from David Wheeler's around to Holderman's, but for beauty it is unsurpassed.
Probably in 1826 also
PIERCE HAWLEY
followed Mr. Beresford from Ottawa, and located about a mile from him on the north end of the grove, close to the survey, or Indian boundary line. These two cabins were for a year the only ones on the eighty miles be- tween Chicago and Ottawa.
In 1827 or thereabouts, Moses Booth, one of the first pioneers of this country, came to Ottawa. That summer
REUBEN REED,
with a little family, moved from Ohio to Chicago. While there, October 1st, 1827, a son was born, who is now Levi Reed, of Pekin, Ill. If not the first white child born in Chicago, he certainly antedates several who have claimed to be the first.
Late in November Mr. Reed went the lonely road to Ottawa, and feeling better suited with that place than with Chicago, sent back a team for his family. The weather was cold, but bravely wrapping herself and little ones as warmly as possible, the mother started on the
.
43
ARRIVAL OF THE REED FAMILY.
journey. Her maiden name was Hannah Bailey ; she deserves to be remembered. They forded the O'Plain near Riverside well enough, but at Plainfield the driver had to cut the ice before he could ford the DuPage.
They remained over night at Beresford's, and in the morning, though it was steadily snowing, pursued the slow tenor of their way. But the snow came thicker, the driver lost the trail, and at night they found them- selves at Beresford's again, having made a circle on the prairie.
It was then decided that James Beresford, one of the sons-afterwards killed at Indian creek-should pilot them through. But it was very cold, and he had no overcoat ; nor was there an overcoat in the settlement to borrow. Fortunately, however, there was material found to make one, and at it they went the next day. In the course of the day they lacked a needle, and Ansel Reed, the oldest boy, then nine years old, was sent around the grove to Mr. Hawley's to borrow one. And with the borrowed needle the coat was finished.
Half a century has passed since then, and Ansel Reed is getting to be an old man, but he remembers still the first journey he took in Kendall county. Having lodged the third night at Beresford's, they started again the following day and reached Ottawa in safety, where the father had secured quarters for them at David Walker's, by the spring. In a little while they moved out a mile and a half into a small cabin owned by Col. Sears, and afterwards went on a claim owned by Mr. Pembrook. Moses Booth was on Covill's creek, three miles southwest of the mouth of the Fox.
44
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
In 1828 Mr. Beresford sold to John Dougherty and moved back to Ottawa. The same year two new neigh- bors settled on the Seminary section adjoining Mr. Dougherty. One was Mr. Edmond Weed, and the other was
VETAL VERMET,
an enterprising Indian trader, who in his journeys between Peoria and Detroit, used to stop at Dr. Walker's, and lost his heart to Miss Huldah, one of the daughters. It was the end of his trading. They were married in 1828, and going out on the prairie, settled down near that favored and favorite spot first commended by the canal surveyors, and then known as "Beresford's." Being also on the direct line from Chicago to Ottawa, it was presumably a fine point for a tavern, and might in time become a village and go ahead of Chicago. The feat did not appear difficult, for of the two the splendid little grove on the highland was by far the best site. Chicago was a butt for the ridicule of travelers, and was only a hamlet at most. In 1827 its tax amounted to three dollars, so it is said, and the Sheriff of Vermillion county paid it out of his own pocket rather than travel the one hundred and twenty miles intervening between its quaking swamps and the county seat. The four families now of Hawley, Dougherty, Weed, and Vermet consti- tuted the settlement. There was besides a man by the name of
COUNTRYMAN,
who had married an Indian wife, and lived with the Indians in the grove across the slough, three-quarters of a mile from Dougherty's. HIe had a log cabin on the
45
KENDALL CEDED BY THE INDIANS.
edge of the slough, about eighty rods from the present residence of William Stephen, and a bark wigwam in the middle of the grove. His Indian name meant Sand Hill Crane. His squaw, a sensible, hard-working woman, after some years, left him, and died of small pox at Mil- waukee. He was one of those characters found on every frontier, who, either indolent or unfortunate, take up with a wandering, barbarous life as an escape from the toils or restrictions of civilization.
A half-breed, Francois Bourbonnais, jr., or " Bull Bony," as the settlers called him, resided on the mission premises at Mission Point. Mr. Vermet and the other settlers at the grove, used to go there to grind their corn in a horse mill which was owned by the mission, and which was the only grist mill within reach in those days.
In October William Marquis and his little family came from Ohio and settled beyond Morris, the first settlers in Grundy county.
In 1829, by a treaty made at Prairie Du Chien, the Indians ceded to the government the territory north of the old boundary line, and thus Kendall county was open to settlers. But a large portion of the Indians were unwilling to sell. Black Hawk and Keokuk were rival chiefs, and the former declared that the latter signed away lands that he had no right to. A feeling of resent- ment had been growing for years. The whites were encroaching. The hunting grounds were being spoiled. Promises made at former treaties had been badly kept. The representations made at the canal treaty thirteen years before had not been realized. And now it appeared to the restive Indians, that the whites, having for years
46
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
been robbing them piece-meal, were at last resolved to take the whole. It was inevitable, certainly, but the Indian lacked both the wisdom to understand and the philosophy to accept the inevitable. However, the treaty was made, burdened, as usual, with special
RESERVATIONS
in favor of whoever should show a claim or had friends influential enough to make one. The Pottawatomie war chief, Waubonsie, obtained a reserve of a hunting ground of five miles square near Aurora. Two reserves were granted in Kendall county. One of a quarter sec- tion to an Indian called Mohahwa, who had rendered some important service or other, hence called the " Mo- hahwa Reserve," in the town of Oswego, north end of Aux Sable grove. There had been an Indian village on it, and a dancing ground which is intact to this day.
The other was three-quarters of a section on the east side of Aux Sable grove, town of Na-au-say, and was granted to Weskesha, the Indian wife of David Lawton. Both these reservations were located "at or near the head waters of the Aux Sable." Lawton died five years after. His brother in 1831 kept a log tavern on the O'Plain, near Riverside. A section at Mission Point was also reserved to Bourbonnais, who sold it to M. E. Bowen and John S. Armstrong.
In 1829 the chapel cabin, at Mission Point, was de- stroyed by fire, and was never rebuilt. The cause of the fire does not appear, but it was probably accidental.
And so ended an enterprise which, although it con- tinued but about five years, was yet important enough
47
END OF THE MISSION.
to be perpetuated in the name of the township afterward formed, and the results of which are undoubtedly recorded in heaven and will be as permanent as eternity.
CHAPTER VII.
INDIANS, GROVES AND PRAIRIES.
Y 1830 glowing accounts of the fertile Illinois prairies began to spread more extensively through the older States, and a tide of emi- gration set in, most, however, settling far- ther south than Kendall county. A famous song of those days ran :
" Move your family West If good health you would enjoy, And cross at Dixon's ferry, In the State of Illinois."
John Dixon was one of the twelve original founders of the American Bible Society, and in 1830 settled where Dixon now stands, on Rock river. His wife and some of his family were killed during the Indian troubles, and he was never himself afterward.
In the spring of the same year Abraham Trumbo, father of Mrs. John Armstrong, settled east of Ottawa, and was joined in the summer by Matthias Trumbo, father of Mrs. Joseph Jackson and Mrs. West Matlock.
-
48
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
Abraham Lincoln also came with his parents to Illinois that year.
August 4th, 1830, Chicago was laid out by authority of the canal commissioners, and lots were sold. The north side of the river was solid timber, and John Kin- zie cleared a patch for a cow pasture. Madison street was the city limits. A large pond occupied part of Court House Square.
INDIANS
were daily visitors, for their numbers had not then been lessened by emigration. The Pottawatomies were a fine race of men physically, and as an average were more intelligent and peaceable than either the Sacs, who lived over the Wisconsin line, or the Winnebagos, who inhab- ited the country along the Rock river. Black Hawk was the Sac chief; Big Thunder was the Winnebago chief. His headquarters were on the Kishwaukee, at Belvidere.
WAUBONSIE
was the Pottawatomie chief, with headquarters at Aurora, and a smaller camping-ground and favorite residence at the mouth of Waubonsie creek, at Oswego. He has been well described as "a giant in size and a devil in nature." As strong as a grizzly bear, and as ignorant and barbarous as the dogs that followed his ponies, he was dreaded by his people and feared and avoided by the whites. Liquor, no doubt, made him worse, for he drank immoderate quantities of whisky whenever he could get it, but he was naturally harsh and vindictive. He beat and murdered his wives so habitually that perhaps it may be said that one of the poor unfortunates was
49
INDIAN ENCAMPMENTS.
sooner or later left behind in the soil of every camping- ground. His bark wigwam, at Oswego, covered a quar- ter of an acre of ground, and in a hollowed stump out- side his squaws ground his corn, with a sweep and pestle. He claimed to have eight hundred ponies, and some of them were superb stock.
An Indian encampment was a novel and yet a dirty sight. Lazy men, homely, working women, ponies, dogs and children. The dogs were half wolf, appar- ently as useless as the men, good for little but to bark, play with the children and follow the ponies. Wherever they encamped for a season, blue grass sprung up the season following, and those patches became both field and pasture for them. The squaws planted corn there, and the ponies pawing away the winter snow, nibbled there. Such places were always in the shelter of the
GROVES.
There was very little underbrush or second-growth timber in the groves, as there is to-day. The prairie fires kept it down. The old black oaks on the uplands were often useless to the settlers, so gnarled and tough were they from the constant fires of their younger days. As a consequence, groves were so open one could see through them, and see the Indians as they filed over the prairies beyond them. When the fires ceased, the groves began to spread, so that there is more timber in the country to-day than there was fifty years ago. The same cause has doubtless operated to produce our
PRAIRIES.
There are three theories about them, which we may call the soil theory, the rain theory, and the fire theory.
.
50
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
According to the first, prairie soil is not adapted to the growth of trees. But in answer to that, we find trees readily grow when planted. According to the second, lack of moisture is the cause, since it is claimed more rain falls along streams and marshes than on uplands. But trees when planted find moisture enough. Accord- ing to the third theory, prairie fires were the cause, and this was the current theory among the early settlers. It is a curious fact that a fire which will destroy the last vestige of life in a tree, even burning the roots out of the ground, will let the grass roots escape unharmed, and the next crop will be more luxuriant than before. But for the streams and marshes which protected them, we should probably have had no groves, and but for the fires we should probably have had no prairies. So all things have been shaping for good, and are tokens of the Divine Hand, which first created and then prepared and preserved the country for the working race that occupy it.
In this county the new settlers were limited to five men.
PETER SPECIE
and Stephen Sweet left the swampy lake village of twelve houses, to prospect in the country, and settled on a claim in Specie grove.
They were unmarried, and kept house for themselves in their own little cabin, with nothing but reports to mo- lest or make them afraid. It was known that there was a general dissatisfaction among the Indians, but the reports of intended hostilities were too distant and vague to be alarming to pioneers who had lived among the In- dian people a large part of their lives.
51
EARLY SETTLERS.
In the spring of the year
BAILEY HOBSON
came to Vetal Vermet's in search of a home, and staying with him over night, passed on toward the Fox river, and made his claim in the timber below Newark, far away from any neighbor. He then returned to Ohio for his family, and with them and a friend by the name of L. Stewart, arrived at Vermet's again at midnight of September 12th. They stayed with Mr. Vermet until the middle of October, during which time they sowed some winter wheat and cut and put up a stack of hay on the edge of the Big Slough. Then removing to the claim they lived in a tent until the log cabin was ready, about November 1st, when, work being done, Mr. Hob- son went out exploring again, and selected the site known as Hobson's mill on the DuPage river as a new claim.
The succeeding winter was a hard one for the pioneer family, but they survived it, and when the Indians com- menced making sugar in the spring they moved first to Vermet's and then to Scott's, at Naperville, near their new home. Walter Selvey, a son-in-law of Mr. Dough- erty, came that year, if not a year or two previous, and settled on a quarter section of the Seminary land.
There were then in 1830
NINE FAMILIES
in the county-Dougherty and Selvey on the south of Holderman's grove, Vermet on the knoll at the south- west corner, Weed next to him, and Hawley on the north, Countryman in Kellogg's grove, Hobson in the Newark timber, and Lawton, Sweet and Specie in the Aux Sable timber. But Lawton and Countryman were
52
HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.
away with the Indians to other hunting and trapping grounds during the winter.
Several new counties had been formed out of the broad acres of Vermillion, and the remainder was divided Jan- uary 16th, 1831, by the organization of Cook, LaSalle and Putnam. Little Putnam with four townships, now one of the smallest in the State, was forty-two miles long. Cook was great; beginning ten miles south of Joliet it reached to the Wisconsin line, seventy-eight miles. It was named after Daniel P. Cook, our repre- sentative in Congress, who had rendered the Chicago villagers grateful to him for his instrumentality in secur- ing the alternate section grant for the canal.
LASALLE
was forty-eight miles square, the northern boundary be- ing the town line between the upper and middle row of townships in Kendall county, passing close to Yorkville. Thus the north part of our county was left out as unor- ganized, but that and all the remaining territory north of LaSalle county to the State line was for the present attached to that county. Thus it included the present counties of LaSalle, Grundy, Kendall, DeKalb, Kane, McHenry and Boone, and a part of Marshall, Lee, Liv- ingston, Ogle and Winnebago. The county seat was at Ottawa, eighty miles over prairies and swamps from Stephen Mack's trading post, at the mouth of the Peca- tonica. But scattering traders did not care to vote, and usually dispensed their own justice.
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