USA > Illinois > Edwards County > History of the English settlement in Edwards County, Illinois : founded in 1817 and 1818, by Morris Birkbeck and George Flower > Part 10
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The first efforts of the town-proprietors to obtain water were signally unsuccessful. The first well dug was in the public-square, and more than a hundred feet deep, and no water. The next a considerable depth, and but a limited supply. We knew not exactly where to dig to find water. The elevation of the town (being on the dividing ridge, between the Great and Little Wabash), giving greater salubrity, was accompanied by the incon- venience of deep-digging for water. When ignorance is complete, we are apt to take up with any superstition. I have often smiled at our resignation in following an old well-digger, who claimed to be a water-witch, with a forked hazel-rod in hand, here and there, up and down, through the bushes, with solemn tread and mysterious air. The rod is to bend down of its own accord over the spot
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DEATH OF WILLIAM FLOWER.
where water is to be found. After following the witch for a proper time, the rod bent down. We told him to go to work. The result was water at a depth of forty- five feet, not so deep and copious, but affording a moder- ate supply. This difficulty about water was all obviated afterward, when the property was divided. Tanks and wells then became common as houses. But the want of water in the first instance was no light difficulty. Popu- lation streaming in before adequate preparations, add, to all the other inconveniences, the want of water, and it is almost fatal. When there were only two wells, I have known people to stand for two hours in the night to take their turn to dip their bucket full. Hence the efforts of the town-proprietors to get an early supply.
During the winter, I rode on horseback to Lexington, Ky., to visit my father's family. On the road, I was shocked to hear of the sudden death of my brother Wil- liam. He came with me and assisted me in the roughest part of our time. Feeling unwell, he decided to go to Lexington, and spent the winter with his father, mother, sisters, and younger brother. He was accompanied and kindly attended on the journey by Mr. John Ingle. He sometimes seemed to recover, and at others to get worse. Suddenly one morning, as he sat up in bed, his mother in the room arranging the clothes for him to put on, he sunk back on the pillow and instantly expired. I don't think the physicians knew precisely his case. They thought it heart-disease. This was a melancholy affair for us all, and a severe affliction to my aged parents.
I was busily engaged, during the winter and spring, in
I32
ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
building a comfortable dwelling for my father, not far from my own cabins. The body of the house, 50 by 40 feet, covered by a hipped-roof, consisted of four rooms in the lower and the upper story, divided by a hall-pas- sage from north to south. The south front was protected by a broad, well-floored porch, that extended the length of the house. Every room was plastered or papered, and furnished with a good brick-chimney and stone-hearth. The north front was stuccoed, to resemble stone; the south, weather-boarded and painted white. The house was well furnished. Its good proportion, large windows, and Venetian blinds gave it an appearance of the old country rather than the new. It had two wings, one of hewn stone, the other of brick, used as kitchen and offices. A well, a cellar, stables, cow-house, and every other con- venience of that sort was appended. A handsome gar- den to the south was fenced in by an English hawthorn hedge. Thirty acres of the northern woodland was pre- served, the underbrush cleared and sowed with blue grass, it had the appearance of a park. Hence its name-Park House.
Old Park-House, near Albion, will long be remembered by old settlers and distant visitors, for its social reunions and open-handed hospitalities. Here the family party of children and grandchildren met at dinner on a Sunday. An English plum-pudding was a standing dish, that had graced my father's dinner-table from time immemorial. Here all friends and neighbors, that had any musical tastes or talent, whether vocal or instrumental, met once a fortnight for practice and social enjoyment. Strangers
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PARK HOUSE-BRICK KILNS-ROADS.
and visitors to the Settlement received a hearty welcome, saw all that was to be seen, and received all the infor- mation they wished for, with necessary refreshment and repose. It may be truly said that, for thirty years, old Park House was never without its visitors, from every country in Europe, and every State in the Union. They were welcome, unless the family was absent, if their stay was for a week, a month, or a year.
One of the first things the town-proprietors did, after digging the wells, was to contract for a large kiln of brick, for chimneys and hearths, to supply the various cabins now built and being built. Nothing gives more real and apparent comfort, than a good chimney and a tidy hearth. They next built a market-house, about seventy-five feet long, standing on a stone foundation, and covered by a shingle-roof. One division was fitted up for the reception of books, that were given by indi- viduals in England, as a nucleus for a public-library, and was used for public-meetings and public-worship. When Albion became the county-town, the first courts were held therein. They cut roads east, west, north, and south, and built a bridge over Bonpas Creek, that cost them five hundred dollars. Their last act of any notoriety, was the building of the new court-house-and-jail, which was done chiefly from their own subscription, with a portion from the County. The proprietors, if they had done no more, would have done uniformly well, which is a little too much to be expected of human nature. They had some violent disputes and law proceedings, which retarded business and was for a time injurious to the growth of the town.
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
They dissolved partnership, and divided the unsold prop- erty, and of course all disputes arising out of the associa- tion were ended. My father took a lively interest in the growth of the town, and erected several buildings in which to carry on trades necessary to the existence of the town and the wants of the Settlement.
The year after his arrival, he built a good two-story brick-tavern. It was a remarkably dry fall; and the wells of the town were not more than sufficient to supply the inhabitants. But my father was not a man easily turned from his intentions. He ordered a barrel put on a sled, drawn by a pair of oxen or one horse, and all the water, necessary to the building of that tavern was hauled nearly two miles in that tedious way. On the interruption of the usual teams, rather than hinder the workmen, he had a fine blooded-mare hitched to the sleigh; from the care- lessness of the driver, she ran away and had her thigh broken by the rebound of the sleigh.
Mr. John Pitcher was the builder of the tavern. The first occupants were Mr. and Mrs. Lewis. The second, Mr. Woods-not of the family of Wood before mentioned, but another family from Surrey, with another letter to their name. Mr. John Woods, the son, has a' store in Albion, and has long held the office of county-treasurer. The next building for the benefit of the public was a mill. It was built as a tread-mill, worked by four oxen, relieved by other four, and' so kept constantly going. It soon became crowded with grists of the backwoodsmen and farmers. Besides this, wheat was bought and flour made for sale. I recollect purchasing the first wheat ground in
I35
THE FIRST WHEAT GROUND.
this mill. I had to go for it nearly seventy miles, to the prairies adjoining the Wabash, above Vincennes. It was delivered at Mount Carmel at fifty cents a bushel, from thence brought in our own wagons over execrable roads to Albion, nineteen miles. It was an excellent sample of white wheat. The history of its growth was singular. The farmer, three years before, had sown his first crop of wheat. At harvest, being short-handed, much of the over- ripe wheat had shattered on the ground, When he brought his plow to turn over the soil, the volunteer wheat looked so vigorous that he let it stand. He again harvested, and again he left the volunteer wheat stand; and this, the third harvest, grown in the same way, I bought ; and a better sample I never saw-two of the crops ripened with- out any preparation of the soil.
Two other houses of hewn-stone my father built, and he accomplished many other improvements in and about town.
Of the trades first in order come the stores. Mr. Elias Pym Fordham, who had taken my little store, sold out to Mr. Olver, a merchant from Plymouth, England. In after years, Mr. Olver removed to the neighborhood of Pitts- burgh, and opened the Edgeworth Institute, a seminary for young ladies, but he left behind him a capacious stone- house of his own building.
Mr. Joel Churchill, an intelligent and educated gentle- man, from London, after trying farming in its roughest form in the woods, some five miles south of Albion (first in a log-house), soon built a store of brick, and a stone dwelling-house behind it. His business, by his good man-
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
agement and application, in a few years, was much en- larged. To this he added the manufacture of castor-oil. These businesses, on a larger scale, are now carried on by Mr. Churchill and his two sons, Mr. Charles and Mr. James Churchill, both married men. Mr. Gibson Harris, at first the conductor of a small store for Mr. Francis Dickson of Vincennes, soon became its proprietor. After years of close attention to business, he built himself a good brick- store and dwelling-house. The house is now occupied by his widow, and the store carried on by one of his sons.
Nearly forty years ago, a young Scotchman in his teens. rode up to my house and wished me to purchase his horse, saddle, and bridle, which I did for sixty dollars-a good price in those days. I built him a forge, which he rented at first and afterward purchased. With the proceeds of the horse he purchased iron and went to work. This was the beginning of Mr. Alexander Stewart, who, after some years of labor and industry, added to his blacksmith- shop a store; business and capital increasing, he soon went largely into the produce of the country, of which pork, corn, and wheat are the staples. He is also a principal proprietor of a large flouring-mill, at Grayville.
Mr. Moses Smith, from a very small beginning, first purchasing a few articles from the Harmonites and retail- ing them in Albion, soon increased his store; then added the produce business. On his son, Mr. John Smith, the business devolved after the death of his father, which occurred about three years ago. These may be called the original stores, two of them from very small beginnings, in the earliest years of the town. Mr. Harris and Mr.
I37
BUSINESS MEN OF ALBION.
Smith being dead, and Mr. Churchill partially retired-from the toils of business, it may be said of all three, that their sons reign in their stead.
A store, owned by an association of farmers, was carried on successfully by Mr. Henry Harwick for several years. Mr. George Ferryman, from the Island of Jamaica, came to us at the period of emancipation, thinking the island would be ruined ; but he has since told me that the trade he left has largely increased. What is a little singular, Mr. Ferryman has twice removed from Albion with all his. family. There must be some strong national sympathy at work to bring our migrating settlers back. Captain Carter, one of our earliest settlers, and more recently Mr. Hen- shaw, both went back to London, and both returned to Albion.
Englishmen returning to their native country, after many years' residence abroad, think the old country has changed since they left it; but fail to see the change in themselves, worked by time, climate, and national associa- tions of an entirely different character. One of our most respectable, an early, though not of the earliest, settlers, is Mr. Elias Weaver, one of Rapp's people, a German, left the Harmonites, quite a young man at time of their re- moval, and came to Albion. Understanding the pottery business, my father built him a kiln, at which he worked some time; but he afterward changed to a business more to his liking, of which he 'also had some knowledge-a builder. He married, built himself a good house, and has assisted in the building of many others. He is now liv- ing, carrying on his business, a prosperous man.
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
In 1822, the county-seat of Edwards County was re- moved from Palmyra, a very insignificant place on the Great Wabash, at the head of the grand rapids. As usual, on such occasions, every place of any pretensions was a rival for the honor. Between Mt. Carmel and Albion (both young towns, Mt. Carmel two or three years our senior) was the competition. Albion was more central, had a better reputation for health, and the pro- prietors made liberal offers toward erecting the county- buildings. Be this as it may, the commissioners fixed the county-seat at Albion. This did not quite suit our neighbors in the eastern part of the county; and the County of Wabash was made from the east part of Edwards-Mt. Carmel the county-seat. In after years, the court-house, erected on the public-square at Albion, was followed by the erection of a good brick-building, for a public-school, sustained by private contributions. The large jail, recently built, is the third conspicuous building standing on the public-square.
About this time, one of those accidents, as they are termed, occurred in Albion, not uncommon in young towns then, and much more common in old towns now. A man named Clark, in a grog-shop, stabbed a man named Hobson. A fellow named Perry, as accessory after the fact, was found guilty and condemned, and, by Gov. Coles, almost immediately after, pardoned. Two murderers let loose on society, with the tacit consent of the chief-executive officer of the State, called down deep censure upon Gov. Coles for his misplaced leniency. It is due, however, to the governor that the extenuating
THE PARDON OF PERRY. 139
circumstances which led to this clemency should be stated.
During Perry's imprisonment, whilst under sentence of death, there lived near to Albion a young fellow of vagrant habits, who spent most of his time about grog-shops, and getting into fights. His youth and strength made him the bully of the place. The condemned Perry was the owner of a good rifle. All the backwoodsmen knew the qualities of their neighbors' rifles. Froni the frequent shooting- matches with each other, the range, power, and accuracy of all the rifles roundabout were known. Perry's rifle had a good reputation, and was coveted by the young vagabond, Jack Ellis. Jack, conferring with the prisoner, agreed to get up a petition, take it to Vandalia, and en- deavor to procure a pardon from the governor. If he succeeded, Perry was to give him his rifle. Jack set about the business with considerable tact. He took a sheet of paper, with a proper heading, and secretly and silently sped away to Vandalia, a dreary ride of seventy-five miles, the weather bad and waters out. When at Vandalia, he was in no hurry to present himself to the governor, but, as usual with men of his stamp, first went to the grog-shop. He soon told his story to the loafers hanging about the place, and, in exchange for his drams, they gave plenty of signatures to his petition. The governor signed, little thinking that the majority of the signatures were procured at some doggery, within fifty steps of his own lodgings. Jack, returning with the pardon, had fairly earned his rifle.
In his interview with Perry, after his return, a curious scene took place. Perry, brought from a neighboring jail,
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
was chained to a beam in a house, where Jack announced the success of his mission, and demanded his rifle. This, Perry flatly refused. He expostulated on the unreasona- bleness of the demand. What was he to do without his rifle? Might as well take his life as his rifle! How was he to live? It was unreasonable, inhuman, and much more to that effect. "Very well," says Jack, "no rifle, no pardon, here goes the pardon into the fire;" it went, but not into the flames, but onto the ashes close by. Perry, in his terror, gave up the rifle, adding to it all his other earthly possessions, an ax and a cow, and his old woman too, a faithful paramour, who had stood by him in his life of crime and trouble. Jack was not exacting, merely tak- ing cow, ax, and rifle, generously leaving the old woman.
But there was another party to be appeased; the public. Disappointed of the exhibition, for which they had espec- ially come, they became furious. Men and women had come in from forty miles around, on horseback, on foot, and in numerous sledges (many wagons were not then in the country); a great crowd. On learning that Perry was out of their reach, they raged and cursed at everybody and everything generally, and Governor Coles in particu- lar. If the governor had been there, he would have been in danger that day. Consoling themselves with whisky and a score of fights, they gradually dispersed. The mur- der of Hobson terminated in the transfer of a cow, an ax, and a rifle, from an old ruffian to a young blackguard, and in giving to Perry a new piece of furniture. Perry claimed the coffin and the rope that was to hang him, which the county had procured for his especial use. They were given
14I
THE FIRST COURT-JUDGE WILSON.
up to him; the former became a fixture in his cabin as a corner-cupboard, the latter a happy memento in his rural hours. Jack did not live long to use his rifle. An insolent assault on a very quiet Englishman, procured for him a blow which gave him his quietus. He did not die for months, but he never recovered from that blow.
The first court in a new county excites great interest, and the country population are in, almost to a man. At our first court, a poor Frenchman was convicted of steal- ing a quart of whisky from a neighboring distillery, and sentenced to thirty-nine lashes. He was stripped to the waist, tied to a post, and the lashes laid on without mercy by the sheriff. The sound of the whip, and the screams of the poor wretch, sent a nervous thrill through the not over-scrupulous country-people, who came in to see the opening of the court. If an honest vote could have then been taken, I am inclined to think that such institutions, as courts of justice, would have been banished as danger- ous and barbarous, by a great majority; and I don't know that the instincts of the untutored backwoodsmen were far from being right. A kidnapper, who would steal a free man, and plunge him and his posterity into everlast- ing slavery, could not be brought to trial. A murderer was sure to escape. But the poor creature who had not stolen to the value of a dime, was thus unmercifully dealt with.
Hon. William Wilson, a native of Martinsburgh, Va., then a young man, residing near Carmi, was the judge of our circuit. He was a good lawyer, and a most agreea- ble companion. He was well and widely known, respected
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
and beloved wherever known .* At that time, a court or an election would draw the people into the small towns from their most secluded haunts for miles around. Their habits, on those occasions, indicated the existing degree of civilization. The grog-shops (pioneer institutions in all young towns) were in full blast. You could scarcely cross the street (even when the court was sitting, perhaps to try some offender for a breach of the laws), without seeing two or three crowds swaying and cheering at some rough- and-tumble fight going on in their midst. Such were the scenes in Albion, from 1819 to 1821. Here, for the pres- ent, I will leave the town, and give the rise and progress of some of the English settlers in the country.
* WILLIAM WILSON was on the bench of the Supreme Court of the State of Illinois for the long period of thirty years, lacking a few months. He was first appointed July 7, 1819, nine months after the State was admitted into the Union. January 19, 1825, he was made chief-justice, and occupied that posi- tion until December 4th, 1848, when he was thrown out by the adoption of the constitution of that year. I knew him well, and argued many cases before the Supreme Court when he presided as chief-justice. He has left behind him an excellent record, and his memory will always be gratefully cherished by the profession of his day. He was a good lawyer, and a pains- taking, conscientious judge. Of fine personal appearance and courteous man- ners, he presided over the court with great dignity. On leaving the bench, he retired to his farm near Carmi, White County, where he died, several years ago. For thirty or forty years after the organization of White County, Carmi was an important political centre. There resided Gen. Willis Hargrave, Leon- ard White, Daniel Hay, Lt .- Gov. Wm. H. Davidson, Chief-Justice Wilson, Gen. John M. Robinson, U. S. Senator from 1830 to 1841, Edwin B. Webb, and S. S. Ilayes; men who made their mark in their time, and were well known all over the State.
CHAPTER VII.
Settlers on the Prairies about Albion-Death of Mrs. Wood-Other Settlers-Billy Harris' Wagon-Visiting England-Changes in the Country at large, but little in the respective Villages-An- other Ship-load of Emigrants-An Inappropriate Settler-John Tribe-William Clark and Family-William Hall, five Sons, and four Daughters- - A Well Accident Emigration for 1820-Quar- rels of Doctors-Another Well Accident-Lawrence and Trim- mer Return to England-Col. Carter-Further Settlers Sketched -Francis Hanks, Judge Wattles, and Gen. Pickering-Mr. and Mrs. Shepherd-Cowling, Wood, Field, Ellis, and others-Old Neddy Coad-Accident to the Sons of William Cave-Small- Traders and Farmers.
HAVING given the origin of the town, I will proceed to give an account of some of the individuals who first set- tled on the prairies around Albion.
Mr. Brian Walker, with his friend, William Nichols, from Yorkshire, came to Philadelphia in 1817, and to our Settle- ment in 1818. Mr. Walker had, when he landed at Phila- delphia, one guinea in his pocket. How much was left of that guinea when he got to the prairies, there is no record. He and his friend Nichols got on land, settled side by side on the skirts of a prairie, one mile east of Albion. They worked hard, opened land, built their houses, married, raised large families, and became possessed of abundance. This is putting in few words the results of the labor of many years. . Mr. Nichols died a few years ago. Mr .. Walker is yet living on his farm.
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
Mr. William Wood of Wormswold, near Loughborough, Leicestershire, a small-farmer, with his wife and a young son, Joseph, about twelve years old, left England, for the prairies, in the spring of 1819. Accompanying him, were two young men, John Brissenden from Woodchurch, Kent, and Wm. Tewks from Seargrave, Leicestershire, and Miss Mea, afterward Mrs. Bressenden; and with them came an acquaintance, with his wife and family, Mr. Joseph Butler, also from Woodchurch, Kent. Mr. John Wood, who sailed in my ship, was the eldest son of Mr. Wood. This party kept together, and came the usual route, from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, and descended the Ohio in an ark. When near their journey's end, Mrs. Wood was taken with the flux, and, on reaching the mouth of the Wabash, died. On a point of land at the junction of the Ohio and the Wabash, on the Illinois side, near no settlement or habitation of any kind, her grave was made between two trees, on which her name and age were carved.
We can scarcely imagine a more melancholy fate for an aged man, than'to lose his life-long partner, after their life of toil, and just at the end of the weary voyage they had undertaken for the benefit of their family-now to begin life again in a new country, with his one little son. Mr. Wood was a man of great vigor and good sense, and a sturdy laborer and good farmer. With gray hairs on his head, he opened his farm, planted his orchard, and, for many years, lived to eat of its fruit.
Mr. Joseph Wood, then a little boy, now a man of mature years, married Miss Betsy Shepherd. Mr. Wood is now owner of a large farm and good house, and said to
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NOTICE OF EARLY SETTLERS.
be the best farmer in the country. He is father of ten children, and how many grandchildren, I don't know.
Mr. John Brissenden, after acquiring a little money by working for others, settled on a piece of land alongside of his old friend, Mr. Wood. He went the usual way, opened his farm, married, reared a large family, built himself a capital house, and, besides his possessions in Edwards County, had a mercantile business at Maysville, Clay . County. Mr. and Mrs. Bressenden are both living in the enjoyment of good health.
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