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 12
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became my brother-in-law, by marrying my eldest sister, Miss Martha Flower. Mr. Pickering, like myself, returned to England. On his coming a second time to this coun- try, he was accompanied by his venerable father, Mr. Mathew Pickering. He also brought valuable live-stock- a fine bull of the purest Durham blood; a thorough-bred Shetland pony; two rams and four ewes of the Lincoln- shire sheep, famous for producing, in its highest perfection, the long-combing wool of England; and four rams and eight ewes of the thorough-bred Bakewell-Leicestershire sheep. Gen. Pickering, a widower for many years, is now a resident of Albion. Mr. Pickering has ever taken a lively interest in every thing of a public nature. He has served in the Legislature, is extensively known in our own state, and also known abroad.
With my father's family, came Mr. Thomas Shepherd, his wife, two sons, and daughter. Thomas Shepherd had lived with my parents from his youth; his father with my grandfather (on my mother's side); and his great-grand- father with my great-grandfather. Such instances are not uncommon in England. In these cases, the confidence between the employer and the employed is mutual, and the separation like the separation of blood relations. Mr. Shepherd had the care and management of my father's garden, and of his riding-horses, and some other arrange- ments about the house. Mrs. Shepherd had the exclusive care of the children of the family. Conscientiousness and integrity were the prominent traits in her character. The habit of reading, from her childhood, almost amounted to a passion with her. In a book she indulged at every
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TIIOMAS SHEPHERD AND FAMILY.
opportunity. The habit of reading, aside from the infor- mation it imparts, and the tone of quietude and reflection it induces, is eminently suited to those who have the care of children. Thus the children of our family had always the advantage of association with a conscientious, kind, and well-informed friend.
Some of the previous earnings of Mr. Shepherd were invested in a quarter- section of land immediately after our arrival, within two miles of Albion. After staying with my father a short time, he went on his own property, which soon began to improve under his energetic industry. He did not live long to enjoy his dawning prosperity. The active labor, which can be carried on continuously in cooler climates, too often proves fatal under our hot sun and sudden changes. The son, also named Thomas, was soon old enough to work the farm for his mother. A few years afterward, we see him a married man, and father of a family. Mr. Thomas Shepherd is an excellent specimen of a practical farmer; strong, industrious, and intelligent. The monotony of labor is, in his case, mitigated by the perusal of useful books, and the varied information con- tained in the newspaper press. This description of men, in which our Settlement is rich, are the true conservative elements of the country. The purely intellectual man, the exclusively hard-working or purely physical man, are each of them but half a man. It is knowledge and industry combined that makes the well-balanced character.
Mrs. Shepherd, the mother, now lives with her son, en- joying every filial attention. Now in the eighty-fourth year of her age, she enjoys a book as well as ever : exem-
II
162 ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
plifying Montesquieu's maxim, that there is no "pleasure so cheap as reading, and none that lasts so long."
Two sisters of Thomas Shepherd also came out with us. Mrs. Carter, the elder, had been a widow for many years ; she lived with my mother as housekeeper; and a few years after, married Mr. Wood whose wife died at the mouth of Wabash, as before related. Mrs. Ellis' husband died at Pittsburgh. Her daughter and only child married Mr. John Wood, he who came out with me. Mrs. Ellis was married in my house to Richard Field, one of Wellington's old life-guardsmen, who turning his sword into a pruning- hook, engaged in the better occupation of cutting up corn and pumpkins, instead of cutting down Frenchmen and their allies, as he was wont to do in former days; and all these friends had farms contiguous, or in sight of each other; and finding themselves every year better off in this world, until the moment they quit it. In the year 1818, Mr. Henry Cowling, and his brother, Mr. John Cowling, who were afterwards joined by their youngest brother George Cowling, all Lincolnshire-men, came in. Mr. Henry Cowling, not finding the Illinois mode of working for a living quite to his taste, went South into those states where the practice of making others work for you, whether they like it or not, and giving them no wages for their labor, is considered the right thing. Liking the country well, there he lived, married, and died. Mr. John Cowling, the second brother, is living on his farm, about four miles south-east of Albion; hale and hearty, an energetic and in- dustrious farmer.
It was in 1818 or 1819, that Mr. Hornbrook, of Devizes,
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A PARTY OF CORNISHMEN.
Devonshire, called on me, as he came to see the Settle- ment; but having made previous decision to remain at Pigeon Creek, Indiana, where Evansville now stands. He had brought with him two men, Richard Husband and Mathew Coombs, and one young woman. They were in- debted to Mr. Hornbrook between two or three hundred dollars; as they all three wished to stay with me, I paid to Mr. Hornbrook the amount, taking their notes to be re- paid in work. The young woman lived with me as maid- servant, and the men kept with me at their work, until they had faithfully paid me all. Much of the complaint of servants, leaving their employers in America, on contracts made in Europe, arises from the contract being made at the low European price of labor, which begets feelings of discontent, when they see double the price given for the , same work in America. I always gave to the persons I employed the full American wages.
It was in the year 1817, that a party of Cornish men, Edward Coad and family, William Truscott, Sen., and Junior, Samuel Arthur and others, under the leadership of a Mr. Slade, went farther, by nearly a hundred miles, into the interior of the State than we were; and settled at a point on the Kaskaskia River, where Carlyle now stands. This little colony, going much farther into the interior at that early period, suffered more inconveniences than we did. Mr. Slade in some sort abandoned his Colony by getting elected to Congress, and the people came into our Settlement. Old Mr. Coad, as we then thought him and called him, lived on my land for several years, and after- ward bought a piece for himself, where he has lived ever
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since. He is between eighty and ninety years old, and it is only within these three years that he has left off working as vigorously as ever. Old Neddy Coad possesses one of those simple-hearted and direct natures, that seems to know no guile, a truthfulness and simplicity of purpose seldom found united with brighter intellect and higher at- tainment. His wife died a few years back. It is said that she visits them now and then, and is seen by the hus- band, son, and daughter, who live in the same house. And why not? We learn from high authority, that spirits visit their former domicile for slight occasion, even to the pay- ing, of small but just debts. On questioning one of the family as to her appearance, she looks, said he, as she used to do, only about fifteen years younger. If there be a place where faded beauty can renew its charms, the road to it will surely be found, and when found, a popular road it will be. So let us be hopeful, that if fifteen years of Time's defacements can be obliterated, perhaps the time may be extended, and our fair friends return to us, fairer than the lilly and brighter than the rose. All I can say about the matter is, if such things are to be believed from the testimony of others, I had rather take old Neddy Coad's word than that of many wiser and more learned men. So it will be seen that we are not behind the times, even to a spiritual manifestation.
Richard Husband, before inentioned, was a remarkably hard-working man. He soon acquired a farm of his own, and traded to New Orleans for several years in his flat- boats, which he built himself and loaded with pork and other produce. On his return from one of these trips he died at Shawneetown, of fever contracted on the river.
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WILLIAM CAVE-ACCIDENT.
Mr. Samuel Arthur, one of the Cornwall band, a very young man then and not very old now, has for many years been a citizen of Harmony, and a respectable man of good property.
Mr. William Cave, a Devonshire-man, after brief stay in Ohio, joined our Settlement with his wife and family of sons and daughters; and lived for sometime on my farm about a-quarter of a mile from Park House. Mr. Cave had been a soldier for many years in England, a fine, tall, strong man, and an excellent swordsman. He was fond of music and played excellently on the violin; and generally made one of our musical party that met every fortnight at Park House. One day, as he was chopping down a large tree near his house, it fell suddenly, knocking down his two sons, who were caught and crushed under its heavy branches. One had his scull fractured and died immedi- ately, and was buried in our small family burying-ground near Park House. The other lad had his thigh fractured, which was set by Dr. Spring. He recovered completely, and only two years ago went to California, where he died at the age of thirty-two. His sisters, then small children, are now married and settled in California.
But from time to time little parties came in year after year, chiefly small-tradesmen and farm-laborers. The latter, a most valuable class, came from all parts of Eng- land. The farmers brought with them their various ex- periences and tools, necessary to work the different soils. In this way a greater variety of workmen and tools are to be found in the English Settlement than perhaps in any one neighborhood in England.
Three brothers, Joseph, Thomas, and Kelsey Crackles,
.
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
able-bodied farm-laborers, from Lincolnshire, came with a full experience in the cultivation of flat, wet land; and brought with them the light fly-tool for digging ditches and drains, by which a practised hand can do double the work that can be done by a heavy steel spade. They lived with me three years before going on farms of their own. Their experience has shown us that the flat, wet prairies, generally shuned, are the most valuable wheat lands we possess.
I omitted to mention, in connection with Mr. Olver, the name of John May, a laborer from Devonshire, who ac- companied Mr. Olver's family to this country. John May was a remarkably sturdy, hard-working, industrious, and honest man. He married a young English woman who also came out with Mr. Olver. They were both of them saving antl industrious people. He worked on Park-House farm for many years. He became possessed of a good farm, which he cultivated well, and built upon it a com- fortable house. What is rather uncommon at his advanced time of life, he learned himself to read, and enjoyed read- ing as much as any man in the latter part of his life. His two sons, living on their own farms, are men of property and respectability. These I have mentioned are a part of those who came in 1818. 1819, and 1820. They are a sample of the men of which the English Settlement was made. They are those who encountered and overcame the first difficulties, who made the way smooth for those that came afterward. For the present, I must take leave of the settlers and their little town, not more than three years old, and proceed to topics of more general interest connected with their history.
CHAPTER VIII.
Religion in the Settlement-Slanders and Efforts to divert Emi- grants-First Religious Services-Mr. Pell and Mr. Thomas Brown-The Hard-Shell Baptist Preacher-Jesse B. Browne and Judge Thomas C. Browne-The Campbellites or Christian Church -First Episcopal Church-Gen. Pickering an Active Promoter Influence of the Chimes of Bells-Bishop Chase Consecrates the First Episcopal Church of Albion-William Curtis and his Congregation-Backwoodsmen don't like Episcopacy-The Meth- odist Church Better Adapts Itself to all Classes-Reflections Thereon-A Methodist Camp-Meeting Described-Mr. Birkbeck Unjustly Assailed-Mr. Birkbeck's Letter on Religion-Features of the Country-A Glowing Description-The Calumnies against the Settlement Rebutted by Mr. Birkbeck - Toleration of all Religious Opinions.
THE exhibition of religion in the English Settlement must not be overlooked. As we have been especially assailed on that point, it is our duty to show the record as it is. Our assailants, that accused us of infidelity and all manner of wickednesses, raised their clamor from no pure motive, but desired to pander to popular prejudices in any way to render the Settlement unpopular, in order to stop emigration to it, as I shall presently show.
In a Settlement like ours, of a mixed population, various in nationalities, and individually differing in circumstances as to wealth and poverty, degrees of intellect and educa- tion, from every county in England, and various districts of Scotland, Wales, and Ireland, from Germany and France,
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
and from almost every State of the Union, there doubtless existed almost every shade of religious opinion. In a new settlement there may not be found enough of any one sect to support a minister and build a church; and there is not often liberality enough amongst religious sects to aid and support each other. Thus there may be a vast deal of religion laid away and concealed, as it were, no public exhibition being made of it.
A trivial but singular circumstance occurred, that acted as a spark to combustibles already laid in train. I think it was Mr. Pell, the son-in-law of Mr. Birkbeck, who happened to be in Shawneetown, when a man landed from a boat. The first thing he asked of the landlord was, if there was any religion in the English Settlement? What the answer was, I don't precisely know; but it could not be very encourag- ing, for the man muttered something, and said then he would not go there; turned round, and went on board the boat again, to find some place that had a better char- acter.
Why had this man asked such a question? Was it usual to ask, when one got within a hundred miles of a place, if there was any religion there? This was a puzzle. What could it mean? It meant this: That a parcel of land speculators in New York and Philadelphia, seeing that our Settlement was attracting emigrants, whom they wanted to settle on their land, east of the mountains, set on foot every disparaging report, as to health, success, provisions, morals, and religion; plying each individual on the point at which he was most sensitive. And this began almost as early as our first-settlers arrived. Of all this, we
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PREACHING AND RELIGIOUS SERVICES.
were for a time unconscious. It was not until after their attacks appeared in print, that we were at all aware of the extent of these calumnies. And it took a long time for a book or a pamphlet, from the Eastern cities, to reach us in those days.
Mr. Pell, whom we called a smart Yankee, although he came from New York, saw at a glance that it would never do to have it said aboard that we had no religion; and that another Sunday had better not pass without public worship. As far as my recollection serves me, Wanbor- ough took, for a short time, the precedence of Albion in organizing public religious meetings.
Mr. Thomas Brown,* a New-Englander by birth, a shoe- maker by trade, then a resident of Wanborough, now. a magistrate and a venerable resident of Harmony, procured a volume of Boucher's sermons from Mr. Birkbeck's library, and read one of them to a small congregation, assembled in a little cabin.
A native of the Island of Gurnsey, Mr. Benjamin Grutt, read the Episcopal service in a room, in Albion, set apart for the public library. In religious sects, there is scarcely toleration enough to allow of a united movement. Each sect, therefore, is left to struggle on as it can. An itiner- ant minister would occasionally ride in, and give a sermon
* Thomas Brown and his wife were natives of Litchfield, Kennebec Co., Maine. They emigrated to Edwards County at a very early day, and settled at Wanborough, soon after the town was laid off by Mr. Birkbeck, and occu- pied a cabin adjoining his. Mr. Brown was a most devoted friend and admirer of Mr. Birkbeck. On the death of the latter, he removed to New Harmony, Ind., in 1825, and was appointed postmaster of the town by Gen. Harrison in 1841, on the recommendation of Hon. George H. Proffitt of Petersburg, Pike County, then a Whig member of Congress from Indiana.
170 ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
in the court-house, and pass along .* Mr. Jesse B. Browne was clerk of the court at that time. He was brother of Judge Browne of Shawneetown. A fine man was Mr. Jesse B. Browne, six feet seven inches high, a kind and jovial man, too. On one occasion, an itinerant preacher, called
* Jesse B. Browne, after leaving Albion, became a captain in the First Regi- ment United States Dragoons, then commanded by Col. Kearney. Leaving the army, I believe, he settled at Fort Madison, Iowa Territory, and, during territorial times, was a somewhat prominent Whig politician.
Thomas C. Browne was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of the State, October 9, 1818, and served continually for more than thirty years. When the judicial system of the State was changed, in 1841-2, the number of judges increased and assigned to Circuit duties, Judge Browne was sent to the north-western Circuit, including Joe Daviess, Stephenson, Carroll, Lee, Rock Island, Mercer, Winnebago, Ogle, Boone, and Whitesides Counties. IIe settled at Shawneetown, Gallatin County, soon after the Territory of Illi- nois was organized and was a member of the Territorial House of Represen- tatives, from Gallatin County, in 1814 and 1815. He was a member of the Territorial Legislative Council for 1816, '17, and 'IS, when the Territory of Illinois was admitted into the Union as a State. He was then appointed one of the first four judges of the Supreme Court by Gov. Shadrach Bond, better known, even after he was elected governor, as "Captain Bond". Judge T. C. Browne died, several years ago, at San Francisco, Cal., at the residence of his son-in-law, Hon. Joseph P. Hoge, formerly of Galena, and member of Congress from the Galena District, from 1842 to 1846.
There was an incident in Judge Browne's career which led to stupendous results. In the gubernatorial contest in 1822, Chief-Justice Joseph Phillips ran as the pro-slavery candidate, with what was thought a certainty of an election. Edward Coles, representing the anti-slavery sentiment, was brought out as a candidate, and it was thought he would have great strength in the " Wabash Country", where the influence of the English Colony was beginning to be felt. The other side feared his strength in that part of the State, and, to take votes from him, Judge Browne, then a very popular man in the Wabash Valley, was induced to present himself as a candidate for governor. The Judge obtained an unexpectedly large vote, falling but a little short of the vote given to Phillips. As the result proved, he did not take votes from Coles, but from Phillips. Had not Browne been in the field, Phillips would have obtained nearly all the votes given to Browne, rendering his election absolutely certain. But for this state of things, Coles could not possibly have been elected, and thus enabled to play the role he did in preventing Illinois becom- ing a slave-state.
CAMPBELLITES, BAPTISTS, AND EPISCOPALIANS. 17I
a hard-shelled Baptist, applied to Mr. Browne for the use of the court-house, which was readily granted. The good preacher was invited by Mr. Browne to meet two or three friends and take a little refreshment, in a private room, after the sermon. Corn-whisky, the only refection, was duly honored, each taking his fair share without flinching. At the end of the sitting, our hard-shell, true to his name, could sit straight in his chair and walk more steady out of the door, it is said, than any of his lay-companions. These were not the days of temperance societies. Cold water was not then inaugurated.
Soon after my father arrived, in 1819, he preached regu- larly, in Albion, every Sunday morning. The service was conducted after the manner of dissenting worship in Eng- land-singing, sermon, prayer. Earnest, energetic preach- ing generally attracts attendance. It was so in this case. The service was gratuitously performed, from a sense of duty in holding public worship. No creed, no catechism, no membership; it was a free church, even if it could be allowed to be a church at all, by more strictly-organized bodies.
Then came the church, built and brought together chiefly through the instrumentality of Mr. Daniel Orange, of a branch of the Baptists called Campbellites or Chris- tian church. A Rev. Mr. Baldwin, Episcopalian mission- ary, preached several sermons, gathered the Episcopalians together, and organized a church; designated as St. John's Church. Mr. Pickering was an active promoter, and gave very efficient aid to this organization. But it was not until some years afterward, when the Rev. Benjamin Hutchins
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
from Philadelphia, came first as missionary, afterward as a permanent resident, that an Episcopal church was built. There was a handsome subscription raised, a large share borne by Mr. Hutchins himself; and a church was accord- ingly built, and furnished with its pulpit, seats, altar, choir, and bell. But the chime of the English parish-church was wanting! And without that charm, Episcopacy can never here attain to the same power, over the feelings of the people, as it does in England. The touching, but cheerful, peals, simultaneously, from every parish spire in the realm, as the shades of evening close in, are felt by all hearts in every station and condition of life. Their charming melody warms the hearts of its friends, and does more to allay the bitterness of its foes than all the preaching of its clergy, and the exaltation of its ceremonies.
Yet so little valued are these sweet tones in the United States, that one of the finest chimes of large-sized Spanish bells, the finest in the world, charged with their full alloy of silver, which gives such melody to the tone, were knocked down at auction as old iron, and afterward broken and melted into water pipes or railroad iron.
The Episcopal church of Albion is sustained not alone by Episcopalians, but by those who, if they belong to any church, prefer the old established church to any other. The building, when completed, was duly consecrated by Bishop Chase to a crowded congregation.
Mr. William Curtis, a plain, working farmer from York- shire, a man of small pecuniary means, and limited education, preaches to a small congregation about two miles east of Albion. Mr. Curtis is a specimen of a
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FORMS OF WORSHIP.
numerous class of religious men that took root, and sprang up, under long and violent persecution. These heads of small voluntary communities are found very generally in Scotland and the northern counties of Eng- land, hating episcopacy especially, from which they received their chief persecution. They claim the right to preach and teach for every man, whether learned or unlearned, who feels so disposed. Our religious forms in Wanborough and Albion, whether of Episcopacy or dis- sent, although they might suit the religiously English, were not accepted or in any way attended to by the backwoodsmen around. By the backwoodsmen I mean the little-farmers from Tennessee, Kentucky, and indeed from all the Southern States before mentioned, and some families from the Eastern States, also, but more particu- larly the former. The silence and solitude, the absence from all emotion in which they lived, seemed to demand some excitement. Whenever they came into town, at an election, or a court, and frequently on any ordinary occasion, the warmth of feeling in which they stood in need, first raised by a little whisky, would show itself in free fights generally, an erratic movement in that way. An elegant sermon read from a book, a calm, logical disquisition, carrying a chain of reasoning, tracing effect from cause, a hymn sung in moderate tone and without any gesticulation, a short prayer in a subdued voice; was all nothing to them. Their religious feeling could only be excited by more powerful influences, embodied in a Methodist camp-meeting. This was the exhibition of feeling in which they delighted. In the camp-meeting
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
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