Past and present of the city of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois, Part 11

Author: Collins, William H. (William Hertzog), 1831-1910; Perry, Cicero F., 1855- [from old catalog] joint author; Tillson, John, 1825-1892. History of the city of Quincy, Illinois. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1905
Publisher: Chicago, S. J. Clarke Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1228

USA > Illinois > Adams County > Quincy > Past and present of the city of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois > Part 11

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The census, taken this year, showed a popula- tion in the county of 7,042, subject to military duty 1,319; in the town the population was 753, and 270 subject to military duty-about 18 per cent in the county and about 36 per cent in the town. This is a singular contrast, but it indicates how much more rapidly during the last ten years the county had been settled up, and also that the town population was largely made up of young and single men. It indicates another eurions faet in connection with the con- tests for the removal of the county seat, which first became a contested question during this year.

It will be remembered that in 1825, as has been stated in a former chapter, the commis- sioners appointed by the legislature to select the county seat came here with the intention of locating the same at the geographical center of the county-a somewhat natural notion that often prevailed in those days. It is also known that needing a pilot for that purpose they en- gaged Mr. Willard Keyes, an experienced early pioneer, as a guide, and that Mr. K. proved

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

himself to be guide, philosopher and friend, and guided the commissioners back to Quincy after a toilsome day's search for the center of the county among the Mill creek swamps, where they more nearly reached its bottom; philos- opher enough to know where the county seat ought to be, and that the best use of knowledge is often to not nse it at all. and friend enough to his own views and to the then and future in- terests of town and county to thus bring about the selection which the wearied commissioners made on the following day, and the living gratitude of Quiney will never forget the judicious blindness and far foreseeing forget- fulness of this experienced pioneer Keyes on this pregnant occasion. No objection was made to the selection then nor for years after.

During the year 1834-5 however, a move- ment was originated to compel the change of the county seat from Quincy to a "geographical center." This was the commencement of that nonsense which nurtured a sectional strife be- tween city and county, altogether baseless, but renewed at two later periods. The designation of "geographical center" was geographically incorrect-a matter of no consequence now. but one that ent quite a figure then and more so in the contest of some six years later. At the August election the vote stood for Quincy 618, "for commissioners' stake" 492; Quiney at the time casting 390 votes-of these 320 were for itself and 70 against. Later, in 1841, when the contest lay between Quincy and Columbus, the vote, as declared, was 1,545 for the former and 1.636 for the latter. Still later, on Nov. 18, 1875, there were given for Quincy 7,283 votes, and for Coatsburg 3,109.

This strife is now settled forever. These elec- tions are referred to as showing how slight was the sectional feeling in 1835, when, as it will be noted, Quiney contained but about one-third of the voting population of the county and was successful; while in later years, when dema- gogue influences had ronsed up prejudice the city stood about five to six in voting strength, still it won.

The "commissioners' stake." which was voted for. as purporting to be the precise geographical centre of Adams county, and therefore the proper place at which to locate the county seat, was not (as before said) the exact centre of the county. Connected with the history of this county seat contest, and as show- ing also that the all prevalent central idea for a county "seat of justice" was not daunted by its decided defeat in 1835, but still smouldered, ready to be raked up and revived, as it was in 1841 and again in 1875, meeting at each period the same crushing fate. As pertinent to

this, we reproduce (anticipating sequent dates by a year ) the following from the Bounty Land Register of May 27, 1836:

"SALE OF LOTS IN ADAMSBURG, THE GEOGRAPHICAL CENTRE OF ADAMS COUNTY. ON TUESDAY, JUNE 21. 1836.

"Adamsburg is beautifully situated on a high. gently rolling prairie, in the geographical centre of Adams county, said to be on the quar- ter section designated by the commissioners ap- pointed under a late act of the legislature as the most central, eligible and convenient point for the permanent location of the seat of justice for said county, but the gentlemen then owning it not being in the state the commissioners fixed

lle is a proper subject for mention for the upon a location about two and one-half miles east. A vote of the people being taken the lat- ter location of the commissioners was rejected by a very small majority, because of its not be- ing sufficiently central ; so that a permanent site for the seat of justice has yet to be selected, and but little doubt remains that Adamsburg will be the place. Its commanding location," etc., etc.

So ran the notice. The intended town above named was on the southwest quarter of section 10. 1 south, 7 west, which is now in Gilmer township, and has been for many years a most excellent farm. It was one of the thousand like speculative towns which dotted the state all over and had no existence beyond that of a paper and a plat and stakes driven in the ground. There existed at this time the maddest of manias among farmers and speculators who happened to own a handsomely situated quar- ter section of land, to survey and Jay ont the same, stake it ont into streets, blocks and lots, give the place some pretentious name, advertise it for sale, and then lie back on the lazy dig- nity of having become a "town founder." and it usually happened that within the two or three succeeding years the founded town and the "town founder" were alike found to be foundered. Special mention is here made of this town for the Ioeal reasons above given, and as it so well illustrates the town speculative craze of the day, and also because some notable names were affiliated with the county seat proj- ect. Stephen A. Douglas. James Berdan, Den- nis Rockwell, leading lawyers and business men of Jacksonville; S. S. Brooks, a well known printer and managing politician of this state, afterward recorder of Adams county, and J. H. Petit. editor at one time of the Quiney

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

Argus (now Herald ) and some others nearly as well known, were the incubators of this scheme -proprietors of the property which they sup- posed might eventually become, through this geographieal idea, the seat of justice of Adams county. The project ended almost as soon as it commenced, and the town of Adamsburg is among the "things that were" not.

The county commissioners in September in- vited proposals for the construction of a new courthouse, to be built "of brick of the best quality and in the neatest manner, the carpen- ters and joiners work to be of the best materials and finished in the most fashionable style." This was the well remembered building. com- pleted in 1838, and destroyed by fire in 1875. Three months after this. its predecessor, the superannuated old log courthouse which had stood since 1825, went up in Hames. As much justice was done to the public wish when it went up as had ever emanated from within its log walls.

Two notable departures from life occurred late in this year, the death of the first two per- manent settlers of the county, Daniel Lisle and Justus Perigo, who had resided here since about 1819 or '20. They were both of the rough stamp of character common in those days, but good men in their way. Lisle was one of the early county commissioners and his name ap- pears on the earliest of the quaint court records in connection with a controversy with John Wood. Some of his family still live in the southeastern part of the county.

Heretofore there had been no other public burial ground than the south half of the block on which the courthouse stands, now known as Jefferson square, which had been reserved for cemetery uses when the town was platted in 1825. A meeting of citizens was called on June 26th, to initiate measures for the establish- ment of another cemetery, which resulted two years later, in 1837. in the purchase by the town from E. B. Kimball, of eight and 56-100 acres at the southeast corner of Maine and Twenty-fourth streets, now Madison park. The price paid was $642. There had probably been three hundred or more burials in the first named cemetery np to the time of its discontinuance. Some of the bodies buried were those of strang- ers, nameless and unknown ; other graves con- tained the bodies of those who, through negleet of friends to mark them, could not be identified. Most of them were transferred to the other cemetery, and many of these again, at a later period were buried in Woodland cemetery. Yet there still lie and will forever lie, many undis- tinguished and unclaimed bones, rotten and for- gotten. as was noted, when a few years since.

the grading of the ground for the new court- honse exhumed much of this old sepulchral soil.

There rests, with other honored dust, the ashes of A. F. Hubbard, lieutenant-governor of Illinois from 1822 to 1826, a queer character, whose claim to fame lies more on what he was not, than what he was, and who by this accident of an undiscovered grave obtains a more widely published notoriety than anything his merits or public service could have seenred.

of its navigable streams, the Mississippi, Ohio, reason that he was the first Quincy man who filled, or rather in his case it may be better said, occupied, a prominent state position.

Ilis residence here was brief and his publie career marked only by his absurd and futile at- tempts to supplant Gov. Coles during the lat- ter's temporary absence from the state. Ile sought the governorship in 1826 but failed. The following slice from one of his speeches illus- trates his capacity and character :

"Fellow citizens. I'm a candidate for gov- ernor : I don't pretend to be a man of extraor- dinary talents, nor claim to be equal to Julins Caesar or Napoleon Bonaparte, and I ain't as great a man as my opponent. Gov. Edwards. Yet I think I can govern von pretty well. I don't think it will require a very extra smart man to govern you ; for to tell the truth fellow citizens, I don't think you'll be hard to govern, no how."

lle was well described by Gov. Coles as a "historie oddity." A well enough meaning man, of shallow bearings, but inordinate aspir- ations, type of a class which we to-day see still survives. Men, whom the shrewd and sarcastic Judge Purple used to speak of as "fellows who forced themselves on the public, claiming that they have a mission to fill, which they most always fool-fill."

The cost of living at this period was in some respects light and again in others heavy. Home products were easily and cheaply obtained at low prices: imported stuffs were exceptionally dear. The rapidly rising population, the ae- relerating business and the growing plentitude of money caused these somewhat contrary con- ditions. Labor prices and the business sitna- tion is pictured in the following from the Register in November of this year:

"Business is brisk, boats being crowded to excess with freight and passengers ; great com- plaints are made for the want of mechanics to construet buildings to shelter the emigrants and their goods. At present carpenters are getting from $1.50 to $2.00 per day and found. Masons $2.00, and other mechanics in proportion. Com- mon laborers are getting $1.00 and $1.25. Hands

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

on a farm get $15.00 to $18.00 per month; 75c per cord paid for entting wood. It is found very difficult indeed to obtain help at these prices. The arrival of a number of industrious hands would be hailed with joy by a large num- ber of our citizens."

Values in these days cannot be easily or ac- curately stated. An imperfect price current for the year shows the following averages: Hams. 8@10c: beef, 4e; best butter, 16c : coffee, 20c; brown sugar, 12e; loaf sugar, 20c; whisky, 30@50c per gallon; cheese, 10c ; coal, 20e per bushel: Hour varying much but averaging through the year about $4 per barrel : beeswax which had been a cash staple, 16c: of grass seed ( which appears to have been very scarce .. clover $8, timothy $3, blue grass. $2: hides 9c, green hides 41pc : cut nails 10c : wrought nails 20c: salt $1.00@$1.50; wheat sold for about 50c ; potatoes ranged during the year From 25c to $1 -- showing then as now the uncertainty of this climate for the growing of the potato, as significantly told by the southern darkey, "dars no medoerity 'bout de tater, his head is down in the ground, he's invariably good or inebitably bad; you can't bet on the tater."

About this time importations of staples, such as flour and bacon, ceased; the home produc- tions being sufficient. There had been from four to five thousand dollars' worth of these and such articles brought in annually sinee 1831. but during the last half of 1834 and the first six months of 1835 about $40,000 worth of these staples were home-produced much more than meeting the local demand.

From this time Quincy lived mostly on the products of local industries. During these past two half years there had been about 25.000 bushels of wheat ground. 3,500 hogs killed and packed, at an average of $3.75, also, for the first time. 40 head of cattle slaughtered, at $3 per ewt .: 900 bbls. of beef and pork put up. about 180,000 pounds of bacon, 1,300 kegs of lard and 2,000 pounds of tallow. Pork sold at about $11 per barrel.

The above gives, as near as it is possible to obtain it, the current business transacted at this period. The season was favorable for traffic and travel. Navigation opened as early as January 23rd and closed November 25th. holding good throughout the rest of the year.

With this period awoke that wild railroad mania which, shaping itself into the "internal improvement system" and running to a most extreme excess, fastened upon the state an enormous debt, burdening its progress for many years, until now after nearly half a century of struggle, the incumbrance is happily wiped out

forever. There was a valid excuse for this seemingly reckless sentiment and action.

Our great unopened state had thus far only been reached by the water courses. The banks Illinois. Wabash, and even the Kaskaskia (or Okaw. the old Indian name. / were fringed with settlements, but the back country was still a grass wilderness, and the instinct of enter- prise eraved to reach and reap the richness of this untamed prairie soil. Only by the divining touch of the railroad wand could this un- bounded fertility be aroused and developed. 1 rapid ardor for improvement spread over the state. It pulsated here. With the knowledge that the legislature would adopt a comprehen- sive project of railroad building -- called "inter- nal improvement." the first organized move- ment of Quiney was made on December 11th of this year, when after some weeks of previous notice. the first railroad meeting was held at the Land Office hotel. which was largely at- tended and very earnest. It met in connection with similar movements at (layton. Beards- town. Jacksonville and eastward through the state, and also still farther east on the present Wabash parallel in Indiana. J. T. llolmes was chairman, and C. M. Woods secretary. Most of the representative men of the place were present and acting. Judge Young was the chief adviser. The action of the meeting was that,

WHEREAS. The subject of internal improve- ment by means of canals and railroads has justly excited much publie attention through- ont the state, etc.

Resolved, That the legislature be respectfully requested to incorporate a company to con- struet a railroad from Quiney by way of Clay- ton and Rushville to Beardstown: or from Quiney by way of Clayton and Mt. Sterling to Meredosia on the Illinois river. etc.

This was the initial movement from which came in legislative action afterward the North- ern Cross railroad. out of which the Wabash and C., B. & Q. have grown.

This road was built, (we can hardly say com- pleted) and operated from Springfield to the Illinois, on the present line of the Wabash. It is the oldest railroad in the state and the only one that under the internal improvement system had even a partial finish: and on its charter the two roads above named have been based and extended.

Patriotism was vigorous in these primitive days. On the 4th of July. Browning made the speech and Snow read the declaration at "the church," there was but one church then, piety being as much concentrated as it is now seat- tered, and the exercises of the day ended with a hanquet at the Land Office hotel. This hotel.

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

where the railroad meeting above alluded to was held, was a notable place in its day-a long. white, two-story frame structure on the north side of Hampshire, a short distance west of Fifth. There were two other taverns, and they were duplicates of this one and the story might be applied to all. It is told that one of the travelers in the semi-weekly stage coach just leaving for Springfield (evidently a stranger), asked a fellow passenger, "why do they call this the Land Office hotel?" "Because," was the reply. "this is the town where all the land offices are located, and land is entered and sold. All this splendid soil that you see around us is for sale there." "Aye, ave, " said the other, in a tone that a traveler nses who has just had a bad breakfast, "I understand : it is well named, the land there is two inches above board (a sailor's expression) all over the floor, and you ean sample the soil in any of the rooms."

The cost of learning may be estimated from the advertisement of a "select school for young ladies," by a teacher of more than ordinary qualitication. The terms, per quarter, were: Reading, writing, arithmetic and geography, $2.00; higher English branches, $2.50; drawing, painting, etc., $4.00. Probably the pupils got. their money's worth full as well as they do now.

In February of this year was chartered the State Bank of Illinois, with some singular pro- visions. The capital stock was to be $1,500.000 of which $1,400,000 must be subscribed by in- dividuals, and $100,000 to be taken by the state whenever the legislature chose to do so. The stock shares were $100 each. It was provided that the main bank should be at Springfiekl, with a branch at Vandalia, and that six other branches might be located at discretion. A sub- seription of $250,000 was demanded as a basis for the location of each branch bank. There was subscribed on the 10th of April from Quiney and vieinity $120,100. It was not, how- ever, until the following year that the branch was located here.

This was a somewhat marked year for settle- ment. The earlier "okl settlers" prior to 1830 were but few. and of these now at this date. ( 1883) all but two have passed away. Immigra- tion subsequent to that period until 1834, was not great ; much of it was transitory, and three successive years of blighting sickliness had told heavily against the population. With 1834. however, and the few following years, the tide of settlement rapidly swelled. During the year 1834, there had come to stay, the Burns, Brown and Cleveland families, George and Ed. Bond. Edward Wells, J. D. Morgan, H. Dills, Adam Schmidt, Kaltz, Herleman, John Schell, Delebar. F. C. Moore, N. Pease (who had visited the town before), the MeDades and a few other

of well known names. At the same time came to the county, families yet here and more or less known to the city. the Sykes and Robinsons. of Beverly : A. II. D. Butz, of Liberty : Scar- borough and the Bernards, of Payson; the Turners, of Ellington, and Ursa: the late Obediah Waddell, of Melrose, who had seen the place twenty years before and might properly be called its first visitor. He passed over the spot where Quiney now is with the Howard ex- pedition after the war of 1812, when there then stood only the remains of a few scattered wigwams, but no evidences of a permanent set- tlement.

His story, with other evidence, dissipates the idea that this was the site of an important old Indian town. There was probably but one large Indian village in the county, in the northern part near Bear Creek, evidences of which long existed. Another also, long abandoned. was situated on the edge of Pike county, on the Sny Ecarte (or lost wandering channel, now known as the Sny Carte Slough or Sny), but all this section south of the Des Moines rapids and above the month of the Illinois was de- batable ground between the Saes and Foxes, the Pottowatamies, the Towas of the north, and their hereditary foes, the Piasaws, Kaskaskias, the Hlini, the Shawnees and other hostile tribes of the south and Past.

With the year of 1835, of which we are writ- ing. there was a decided increase in permanent population. Among the well known settlers of this date were Major J. H. Ilolton, Capt. Pit- man, Joel Rice. Lloyd Morton, JJ. P. Bert, the Churches, Mitchells, Stobies, Grimms, MeClin- toeks, A. Konantz, Phelps and many others, also Castle, for a time at Columbus, the Blacks and Wallaces, of Clayton : Richardsons and Cutters, of Beverly : Bliven, Prince and Pottle, of Pay- son; the Shinns, of Melrose: Bartholemew, of Mendon, or Fairfield, as it was then called, and many others whose names are identified with the city and county history.

The French named this slough Chenal cearte or "narrow channel." This was first abbre- viated and called Sny Carte, and now is called the Suy.

CHAPTER XTIL.

1836.

NEW SETTLERS. NEW WELL ORDERED. EARL PIERCE. MILITIA, MARION CITY. RAILROAD SCHEMES. LOCATION OF MARKET HOUSE. THE ONLY NEWSPAPER.

Coming with this year was a large number of "old settlers," men, whose names are well known, and some of them are living at this date, (1886).

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

Among them there were F. W. Jansen, the Glasses. Diekhuts, Binkerts, Stewarts. Wm. Gerry. W. Il. Gage, Amos Green. S. E. Seger, C. A. Warren, L. Kingman, II. V. Sullivan. J. T. Baker, George Miller, Wilson Lane, A. E. Drain, and many beside whose names cannot be given. The foreign immigration, mostly Ger- man, began largely with this year.

The political action of the town fathers was relatively of as much importance and created as fair a proportion of interest and criticism as do the intellectual wrestlings among the city fathers of to-day.

The board meetings were not frequent. At the April and again at the May session. the clerk was ordered to notify the road supervisors specifically of their duties, ete .. which shows that supervisors could be as lazy in those days as 110W.

An ordinance was passed on May 21st, which reads somewhat strangely: "Be it ordained by the president and trustees of the town of Quiney, that all buildings now erected or that shall hereafter be erected on any of the public grounds in the limits of this corporation are hereby declared a publie nuisance." As the old courthouse had just been burned and an- other was in process of erection, this looked like a wrathful thrust at local architects. The "meaning meant well"-as C. A. Warren was wont to say-of this sort of a boomerang ordi- nance, and its true intent can be understood. yet it is not certain that a similar one might with truth and propriety be placed on most of the corporation records of the country.

At the June election G. W. Chapman. Joel Rice. Wm. Skinner. E. L. Pearson and J. T. Holmes were elected as trustees. Holmes was made president and Pearson secretary. The report of Treasurer Williams for the past year gives an insight into the financial affairs of the town, besides exhibiting another unnsnal fea- ture. llis report showed as collected on taxes $249.82. and $5.00 paid in for show license. making $254.82, of receipts; that he had paid ont $258, and hence was a creditor of the town to the amount of $3.18.

As Mr. Williams was again chosen treasurer by the board and accepted the office, it would appear that the right of the town to owe its treasurer was recognized and approved by both parties. It does not appear that the treasurer required the town to make to him a bond.

The prominent publie improvements at this time were the public wells. two of which were ordered to "be sunk on the public square, of suitable dimensions as soon as practicable." These proved to be well-springs of trouble and contest. running through several years, con-

tracts thrown up. work abandoned. commit- tees of examination, etc .. before they were com- pleted, making the same proportionate stir that a similar question does now. (An allusion to the agitation of the question of ownership by the city of the water works. Ed. )

It seems as if the average town and city father has always been more or less afflicted by "water on the brain." A strange remissness in regard to the public business of the town both in meeting and recording the same ap- pears. Although monthly meetings of the board were prescribed. the record of July 5th adjourns to "next Monday. July 11th," but no record again appears until the next February. Either the board had nothing to do or it was ashamed to tell of it.

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Past and present of the city of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois, Part 11

Author: Collins, William H. (William Hertzog), 1831-1910; Perry, Cicero F., 1855- [from old catalog] joint author; Tillson, John, 1825-1892. History of the city of Quincy, Illinois. [from old catalog] Publication date: 1905 Publisher: Chicago, S. J. Clarke Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 1228

Author: Collins, William H. (William Hertzog), 1831-1910; Perry, Cicero F., 1855- [from old catalog] joint author; Tillson, John, 1825-1892. History of the city of Quincy, Illinois. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1905
Publisher: Chicago, S. J. Clarke Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 1228