USA > Illinois > Vermilion County > History of Vermilion County, Illinois : a tale of its evolution, settlement and progress for nearly a century, Volume I > Part 14
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JAMES HOAG AND SAMUEL MUNNEL.
James Hoag and Samuel Munnel are both known to have lived along the Little Vermilion as early as this time, but little is recorded of them.
ROBERT COTTON.
Robert Cotton came to this section in the fall of 1822. He was born in the vicinity of Beardstown, Kentucky, and there grew to manhood and married Han-
KATHERINE (ALEXANDER) McDONALD
HEZEKIAHI CUNNINGHAM
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HISTORY OF VERMILION COUNTY
nah Howard, who was born in the same place. They were the parents of two children before they left their native state to go to Switzerland County, Indiana. Thence they went to Decatur County in the same state and, once more moving, they came to what is now Vermilion County, Illinois. In many respects both Robert Cotton and his son Henry showed their Puritan ancestry, they being de- scended from John Cotton of Massachusetts. Robert Cotton lived but two years after coming to this section, dying while yet a young man in 1824. He left seven children. Henry Cotton, the son of Robert Cotton, was the next to the youngest of the children of Robert Cotton. He grew up amid wild scenes of pioneer life. The wild beasts abounded, deer were plentiful, and the wolves howled about the cabin door at night. The education of the Cotton children was had in a log cabin school-house with puncheon floors, the window panes of greased paper and the only means of heating being a long fireplace, across one end of the room. The school term was but a few months in the winter, and the requirements of the teacher were but that he could read, write and cipher. Henry Cotton liked to go to school and when he was twenty-two years old he had acquired enough informa- tion to tempt him to, in turn, be teacher. He taught school for two or three years, during the winters. During the time he was teaching school, Henry Cotton was married to a Miss Getty of Pennsylvania. During the summer months Henry Cotton would follow the life of the flatboat man. He made eighteen trips to and from New Orleans in this way. It was upon one of these trips that he met Miss Getty and soon afterward was married. They lived in Vincennes for eight years and then came to Danville township, and was on his way to pros- perity. He was working at the carpenter's trade while not on the river. Soon the war of the rebellion broke out, however, and Mr. Cotton enlisted in service, joining the 125th Illinois Infantry. A year later he was obliged to accept an honorable discharge on account of ill health. He left the country for other locations after this and did not return until 1882 when he came to Westville and became a merchant. He made his home here, serving as postmaster three years during the term of office of Pres. Arthur, and was justice of the peace for several years.
STEVEN DUKES.
Steven Dukes was born in Virginia and his wife, Rachel (Lewis) Dukes, was a native of Tennessee. They came to Brooks' Point in 1822. Brooks' Point was just east of Westville about where Kelleyville is now located. Their eldest son was born at that place January 25, 1828.
ASA ELLIOTT.
Asa Elliott, who was one of the most prominent men of the county in its earliest life, came to Butler's Point to make his new home in 1822. He was one of the second Board of Commissioners of Vermilion County, and was the first justice of the peace. He was a good business man and very successful. His home, at which the court was held just before the county seat was located at Danville, was about a quarter of a mile from the west line of Catlin village. He had a log house at first but built a better one. He lived here all his life and
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after his death his son sold the property to Mr. Sandusky and moved to Kan- sas. Mr. Elliott was buried in the old Butler burying ground.
JOHN MILLS.
John Mills came to this part of Illinois in 1822, bringing his family with him. He settled in the northwest quarter of section 23, range 12, township 17, after a journey attended with many difficulties. He was a native of North Carolina and moved to Ross Creek, East Tennessee, before the war of 1812. He was one of the men who belonged to the Society of Friends in Tennessee and left to get away from the institution of the South which was very objectionable to him. Henry Canaday and John Haworth had both preceeded him. He came in company with George Haworth. Along their route there were various swamps, and when four or five miles south of Quaker Point, their destina- tion, they found themselves unable to go further. There were a half dozen girls in the party of neighbors who had made the trip together, and they started off on foot. Taking the teams from the wagons, which they abandoned, for the present at least, the men, women and little children came on as best they might. If the way was too difficult for the horses to draw the wagons, it could not be in very good condition for walking. They reached John Haworth's by dark, however, very glad to find their journey at an end, since he lived near Quaker Point just within the limits of present day Vermilion County. Later, the travelers man- aged to get their wagons free of the deep mud and taken on their way. John Mills settled among the Indians and wild animals and entered four and one- fourth sections of land, where he put up a round log cabin, with a puncheon floor, a great fireplace in one end of the room, with a stick and clay chimney outside and a clapboard roof. The house contained only one room but there was a loft where the boys slept. The nearest trading point was Terre Haute, and the pio- neers went to mill on Sugar Creek, in Parke County, Indiana, with ox teams. Deer were numerous, the settlers being able to kill them almost from their door. The wolves made night dismal with their howling, and the chickens, pigs and sheep, had to be securely housed in order to save them. The woods were full of bee trees and there was an abundance of wild fruit. This section of the coun- try was almost literally a "land flowing with milk and honey," but there was much sickness. The death of Hannah Mills was the first one in the neighborhood. She died in the summer of 1823, and her remains were the first to be buried in what is now Vermilion Grove Cemetery. Mr. James Haworth, who accom- panied John Mills to Illinois and settled near him, was the father of eleven chil- dren, most of whom lived to maturity and did their part in molding the affairs of Vermilion County.
ALEXANDER MCDONALD.
(Written by R. D. McDonald.)
Alexander McDonald, a pioneer of Vermilion County, Illinois, was a native of Tennessee, where he was born in 1796. He, in company with John B. Alex- ander and his family, one of whom he had married, came to Illinois in the year
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1820. He located near Paris, where he remained two years, and in 1822 he moved to the Little Vermilion timber, and made a farm about three miles west of where Georgetown now is. His neighbors were mostly Indians, bears, panthers, wild cats, and other wild creatures, of which the woods were full. Among the earliest recollections of the writer of this sketch are accounts of the child-like crying of panthers, told by the first settlers in this wilderness. There was no Georgetown, no Vermilion County, no Danville, no Chicago, then. It is hard for a citizen of Vermilion County, of sixty years of age, to believe that only a few years before his birth, Illinois was such a wilderness. Such it was for many years after Alexander McDonald commenced making his farm. At that time Edgar County reached almost to the northern border of the state. In 1826, the land attached to Edgar County on the north was made into a new county, and named Vermilion. The south part of the state was settled first and mostly by people from the southern states. On his farm on the border of civilization, Mr. McDonald lived with his wife, Catherine Alexander McDonald, who came into this world in the year 1800, and on it they raised ten children, six daughters and four sons, all of such character that their acquaintances were glad to point to them as their friends. Mr. McDonald was justice of the peace, whether by ap- pointment or by election, I do not know. He was also postmaster. The duties of both offices were performed at his residence. The first Cumberland Presby- terian church in the county, was organized at his home and in it, the congrega- tion held all services for a long time, and, until a meeting house was built on his land. He was an elder in the church until his death in 1861.
Uncle Alex McDonald was an old fashioned Democrat. Accepting the principles of the Declaration of Independence as to the inalienable rights of men in their true spirit, he could not remain contented in a slave state. He was among the first insurgents in the Democratic party, when it attempted to extend slavery. He claimed no advantage of birth, condition or position. The passport to his confidence was merit. He had sympathy and hospitality for all. I lived, when a boy, in his house for some time. I never saw, or heard of an applicant for a meal or a night's lodging, being turned away. All were supplied without money and without price. I can truly apply the following lines to him :
"A man he was to all the country dear, Remote from towns he ran his godly race Unskillful he, to fawn or seek for power Far other aims his heart had learned to prize. More bent to raise the wretched than to rise His house was known to all the vagrant train, He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain. The ruined spendthrift now no longer proud, Claimed kindred there and had his claim allowed."
The wives of the pioneers deserve equal honors with their husbands, if not greater. They endured, and shared all the hardships incident to a new country and suffered its privations and by their womanly nature softened the manners of the people. Catherine, wife of Alexander McDonald, when scarcely more than
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a young girl, left society and many cultured friends among whom she was raised, and came into the wilderness where she endured privations unknown to women of this year 1910. She was a helpmeet, indeed. With no servant, she, with handspinning wheel, hand loom, scissors, and needle made all the clothing for the family, and over, and around an open fire, she cooked the food they and their guests ate. I can truthfully say that Aunt Catherine never spoke a cross word to, nor a complaining word of, any person. I feel sure that of her, as Jesus said of little children, could be said, "of such is the kingdom of heaven." She lived to be eighty-one years old and died in Danville in the home of her son, Milton, and was buried by the side of her husband in the Weaver graveyard, about one mile south of the house where they raised their family.
JOHN LENEVE.
John LeNeve, a young man of twenty, came to what is now Newell township in 1823. His birthplace was Tennessee, whence he came with his parents to Illinois when he was but a lad and they settled in what is now Lawrence County, on the Ellison Prairie directly west of Vincennes. He had a brother, Obadiah, who in 1822 took a journey into the newer country looking for a location. This journey took Obadiah LeNeve from Vincennes to St. Louis, and thence into northeast Missouri, and on his homeward trip through a circuit in northern Illi- nois. Coming into the section now Newell township of Vermilion County, he took a great fancy to the country and decided upon locating there. Before he left the favored place he took the numbers of the following tracts: W. one-half N. W., one-fourth sec. 23, and E. one-half N. E., one-fourth section 24, town 20 N., range 11 W., 3rd principal meridian, and after going home there was a sale of land when he bought this particularly desired part. Just before Christmas the two brothers took their belongings, such as would be needed in a new country, as provisions and bedding, and set off for their new home. A third person accompanied them to take the team back. On reaching their destination they cut a few rails and laid up a square, chinking and filling the spaces with pulled grass, and cov- ering one-half of the rude structure with puncheons. The Indians were very friendly and proved themselves honest and, on the whole, not bad neighbors. When they were about at the time the new white settlers were eating, the Indians were invited to share their meal which they did and showed themselves friendly and inclined to treat the newcomers with all kindness. These two brothers spent the winter splitting rails until, when in February they began making prepar- tion for their return to arrange a permanent removal to this section. They used some of their rails to build a cabin for Ben Butterfield who expected to arrive toward the last of February. He came, as was expected, and the LeNeves went back, to return later, prepared to make a permanent settlement. John Le- Neve married Rebecca Newell, the daughter of the man who was the leader of affairs in that part of the county as long as he lived. Rebecca Newell came with her father from Harrison County, Kentucky, not long after the LeNeves had made this settlement in this particular section.
John LeNeve, it is said, had a limited amount of money, in exact figures being one hundred and thirteen dollars and fifty cents ($113.50) and he invested
MRS. JOHN DICKSON
JOHN LE NEVE
REBECCA (NEWELL) LE NEVE
SAMUEL ADAMS
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HISTORY OF VERMILION COUNTY
$100 of it in timber and prairie land at one dollar and a quarter an acre leaving him thirteen dollars and fifty cents with which to begin farming. But he could count among his assets a pair of good strong arms and a willing heart to work, so his success was assured. From this modest beginning Mr. LeNeve became a" land owner of pretention, and his farm is yet a landmark testifying to his thrift, and industry.
His brother, Obadiah LeNeve, was a man particularly remembered as one of charity and public spirit. He was always kind to the widow and orphan and seemed to feel a responsibility to share with those less well off than he. He never butchered without killing more than enough for himself, so as to give to those not able to buy meat. He was always ready to help any one in distress and was widely known and universally loved. He was born in 1799 and died in 1884. John LeNeve lived on the old homestead all his life and died there. His wife also spent her last days in her own home and died and was buried from the old homestead.
WILLIAM MCDOWELL.
William McDowell came to the Little Vermilion in the year 1823 with his four grown sons and two married daughters. He came from Kentucky and settled south of the creek. His sons were John, Archie, James and William, and they were all very much in need of this world's goods. They had come to this new country to try to make a new home under better conditions. The seven years previous to his coming had been spent in Palestine in poverty, but the children were old enough to help in the family and all had concluded to spend the $100 which they had managed to save up that would be enough to enter eighty acres of land. So the eighty acres of land was entered in sections 35 and 36, range 13, and they came here to live with little else other than the strength of the father's hands and the courage of the not overstrong sons. When McDowell arrived at this new home, he built his cabin on a piece of land adjoining what he had bought, thinking he would buy this other piece as soon as possible. One day he learned that another man, Peter Summe, had gone to Palestine to enter that same piece of land. He had not a dollar but he deter- mined if possible to prevent that and to save the land. He started on horse- back to ride to Palestine, and spared neither the horse nor himself. Riding all night he reached there before business hours and went directly to the house of the register, who was a friend of his, and told him the trouble. The register, to help him out, made the papers out trusting him for sixty days. This act would have cost him his place had it been known, because Peter Summe was there with the gold in his hand. McDowell came back happy, but it cost him dearly, since the worry over getting the hundred dollars inside of the two months (he had to sell some of his land to do this) threw him into a fever from which he died. Several members of his family died at about the same time. The death of his father compelled John McDowell to care for the family and work out his fortune as best he could. He had no money, but he was plucky and worked for whomever needed him, for whatever wage he could get, ali the time determined to win out, which he did. A few years later he split rails to pay for the land he lived on and, in time, he bought and paid for eleven hun-
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HISTORY OF VERMILION COUNTY
dred and fifty acres of land, the most of which he gave to his children, living all the remainder of his life on the land which his father made that night's ride to Palestine to buy on credit.
AARON MENDENHALL.
Aaron Mendenhall was born in Guilford, North Carolina, near the scene of the battle of the Guilford Court House. Soon after the opening of the Ohio Territory, his father brought the family to this new territory and was killed while on his way, by Indians. At this time Aaron Mendenhall was a small child. He grew to manhood in Ohio and in 1824 he, with his family, following in the footsteps of his father, started for a new country. They came to the Little Vermilion and entered two hundred and forty acres of land which is now in the farm of Silas Baird. This land was entered while yet Illinois was a wilderness, at least excepting in certain localities in the southern part. Like other pioneers this family endured hardships and privations incident to such a life. They were, however, brave and stout hearted and made successful battle in subduing the wild land and making it blossom. Thrifty and industrious, they taught their children to work and developed them physically and morally at the same time. Politically, Mr. Mendenhall was, as his son said, "a whig, morning, noon and afternoon," as long as that party was in power. He looked upon Henry Clay as one of America's greatest statesmen, and so taught his children to do. Later they were as staunch Republicans. His children who lived to maturity lived about him, and in this neighborhood of friends were most consistent members of that society.
CYRUS DOUGLAS.
Cyrus Douglas was one of the few early citizens of Vermilion County who was a native of any place above the Mason and Dixon line. Mr. Douglas was born in Vermont and came to Butler's Point in 1824. Whether he was an old friend of James Butler there is no record nor if he even knew Mr. Butler prev- ious to his coming to this place. The fact that they came from the same state when so few people from that part of the country were drawn to this section, is suggestive, but may have been but a coincidence.
Mr. Douglas was a hatter by trade in New York and brought material with him in emigrating to the west to engage in business in St. Louis. He remained there for a time and then went to Brown County, Indiana. He remained in Indiana for a short time when the report of the promising conditions on the Wabash reached him and he went to Eugene entering some land near there east of Georgetown. The grant to this land was signed by President Monroe. After a while he moved to Butler's Point and it was while he was there that he was married, being the first or perhaps it were better to say, second man married within this section, later known as Vermilion County.
ROBERT DICKSON.
Robert Dickson was a native of Maryland, born December 16, 1765, and moved to Kentucky, where he was married in Mason County to Phebe Means.
RICHARD AND LOUISA MENDENHALL
WILLIAM AND ELIZABETH HOLODAY
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HISTORY OF VERMILION COUNTY
Some time after their marriage they settled in Lewis County, but later decided to try a new country and came to Illinois in 1824, settling in the southern part of that which was to be Vermilion County. Mrs. Dickson died that year at the age of forty-eight. Mr. Dickson survived her but three years when he died from typhus fever. Politically Mr. Dickson was a Democrat, and as well as his wife, he was a staunch Presbyterian. David Dickson was the sixth son of Mr. Robert Dickson, and came from Kentucky with his parents when he was almost a man grown, he having been born December 13, 1806. When his father died three years later he was at his majority and took a man's part. He bore his part in the development of the county and well deserves to be reckoned among the makers of Vermilion County. His life was one of sobriety and his temperate habits showed in his honorable old age. He was the pioneer stock- man and feeder and in all his intercourse with his fellowmen he always had their confidence and esteem. The oldest son of Robert Dickson was a boat builder and when they decided to leave Kentucky he and David built a flat- boat and their father bought a keel boat, and they loaded their stock, farming utensils and household goods, together with the family, on these boats, and set sail on the Ohio river for the "promise land."
At Louisville, however, they were obliged to abandon their boats and un- loading the stock, which consisted of oxen, horses and cows, and make their way overland to their destination. The two boys who had built the boat, and another older brother, pushed the keelboat up the Wabash river and unloaded its contents a little way above Newport, Indiana, at Coleman's Prairie, thence they hauled their property to their destination, which was the land their father had entered from the government when he came the year before. When David Dickson was twenty-three years old he married Miss Margaret Waters, who had but a year previous to this time come with her father from Bourbon County, Kentucky. Mr. Dickson loved to describe this section as it looked to him when he first saw it. It was, according to his description, exceedingly beautiful, diversified with prairie and timber, the meadows and marshes thriving with a luxuriant growth of prairie grass and wild flowers. Wild animals of many kinds abounded, while poisonous reptiles, the rattlesnake, blue racer, black and garter snake, kept the traveler on the close lookout. There were also great quantities of wild birds, geese, ducks and pheasants, besides turkeys and pigeons. The people of that time and place were noted for their hospitality, and the commun- ity of interest which led them at all times to be regardful of each other's welfare. After the death of Robert Dickson each of the boys started out for himself. While all were bright and energetic, David was, perhaps, most successful. He began entering land and in time found himself the owner of 1,400 acres which he had to a large extent put into a good state of cultivation. Much of this land was obtained on a Mexican warrant. Before he was married he worked at one time at the salt works. He walked to Fort Clark (now Peoria) in 1827, just after his father died on his way to Galena to work in the lead mines. He car- ried his clothes and provisions in a knapsack. There he had the vessel which was fired upon by the Winnebago Indians pointed out to him. He worked for a while in the mines at New Diggings and became acquainted with the founder
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of Fort Gratiot. In the fall of the year he worked his way down the Missis- sippi river to St. Louis on a keel boat, then purchased a pony and rode home. Mr. Dickson made his first trip to the little town of Chicago in 1832, taking a load of produce drawn by oxen. Later he began feeding cattle and was the first man to engage in this industry on the Little Vermilion river. In 1844 he drove 100 head of hogs to Chicago and in the years immediately following, he shipped several herds in this way to Philadelphia and New York City. Mr. Dickson was a Democrat in his political faith all his life.
JOHN SNIDER.
John Snider, with his wife and three small children, came from Ohio on horseback to what is now Blount township of Vermilion County, in 1824, and built his home in the forest. He entered a quarter section of land and built a log house. The Indians made sugar and held their meetings near the cabin of John Snider. It was a strange place to try to build a home; the entire country was full of sloughs and ponds. However, John Snider lived to see a great change in the country. He helped fell the trees and clear the land and assisted in organizing the township. A debt of gratitude is surely laid on this gener- ation to him and others like him who have been pioneers in the development of Vermilion County. John Snider was born in 1797, and died November 12, 1849. His wife, who was the daughter of Charles Blount, the man for whom the township was named, survived her husband for several years, she living until in the seventies. abram?
DR. ASA PALMER.
Dr. Asa Palmer was a native of Connecticut, who was born at Coventry in 1786. He became a resident of Vermont in his boyhood days, and later lived in the Black River country of New York. Subsequently he became a resident of Moscow, where both his parents died. While living in New York state, Dr. Palmer studied medicine and practiced a little. He was married while living in New York state. He made a trip to the west in search of a location, and came here to live in 1824. His first trip was made on horseback, but when he came to locate, the journey was made by boat, going first to Pittsburg and then down the Ohio river and up the Wabash river. His destination was the Vermilion river country but at that time there was no Danville to attract him, not even so small a settlement at this place. Dr. Palmer began his practice in this section and for many miles around the settlements from the Little Vermilion to those north and west of the mouth of the North Fork of the Vermilion River, he rode in his prac- tice. After Danville became the county seat, his home was there and his practice was over a broad territory from that point. Eventually he gave up the practice of medicine and lived retired. In connection with his son he established the first drug store in Danville. He was a leading and influential citizen of this sec- tion from the time he came in 1824 to his death in 1861. Dr. Palmer was mar- ried three times, his third wife being Adelia Hawkins and one of the honored pioneers of Vermilion County. Dr. Palmer was one of the original members of
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