Past and present of the city of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois, Part 9

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 9

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

What we now call mail facilities were any- thing but facile during this period. Twice a week the eastern mail was expected to be de- livered in Quiney, and usually it came, some- times it didn't. There were two stage lines, one through Carrollton and Rushville, arriving on Thursday, and one through Springfield and Jacksonville, coming in on Friday of each week. There was also a weekly mail north- ward to Peoria and westward to Palmyra, and farther on each route. The eastern mails and passengers were, when the roads permitted, brought in by the old-fashioned "Troy coach" stage, but during no small portion of the time the means of conveyance was the "mud wagon," or, with equal appropriateness, called the "bonebreaker," which was a huge square box fastened with no springs, npon two wheels, into which said box mail and passengers were promiseuously piled, and the conjoint and con- stant prayer of the insensate mail and of the contused passengers was "good Lord, deliver us." The earliest, most copious and most sought for news, was that gleaned from the St. Louis papers which were brought up on the boats and privately circulated.

Correspondence by mail was an expensive luxury. Postage rates were, for a single letter or one piece of paper not exceeding 30 miles, 6 cents: not exceeding 80 miles, 10 cents; 150 miles, 1215 cents : 400 miles, 1834 cents. and on all over 400 miles, the single letter postage was 25 cents, and if the letter was written on two, three or more pieces of paper the postage was doubled or trebled, etc., accordingly. This post- age was not then, as now, paid in advance, but at the time of delivery, and had to be paid in silver.

It will be noticed that these rates are graded on a different currency system from that which now exists. Although the present decimal sys- tem of enrreney was then the only legitimate national coinage. yet the great preponderance in cirenlation of English, Colonial, Spanish and Mexican silver, compelled the law to be ac- commodated to the specie grades that were current, and alike with this, trade and busi- ness of every kind were governed ; goods were

bought, marked and sold by this foreign stand- ard of money rates.

Mail matter came leisurely. Letters from the seaboard cities and from Washington were gen- erally about two weeks in transit. There were four postoffices in the county outside of Quincy -Liberty, Bear Creek, in the north part of the connty, Ashton in the south, and Walnut Point in the east.

Postage being so high and required to be paid in silver, it was not unusual for letters to lie in the postoffice for a long time before the needed "rhino" could be secured with which to ob- tain their deliverance. The same consideration affected also the selection of the postmaster. As the receipt of his own letters free and the franking privilege were the perquisites and part of the postmaster's salary, the office gen- erally fell into the hands of some responsible and respected leading business man, to whom the saving of this excessive cost of correspond- ence was a large economie factor, thus giving the office a prima facie repute, to which in mod- ern days it is too much a stranger. As an il- Justration of the prominent part that postage played in those days we know of a ease (and there were others similar) where for many years, the office was held by a party, who, hav- ing an extensive distant correspondence, gave all the emoluments to an assistant, who per- sonally attended to its business. The weekly and semi-weekly mail would bring and take away a basket full of personal letters for the postmaster and contain abont one-tenth as many for the general distribution, the post- master realizing an ample reward in having an untaxed corespondence.

It was the scarcity of small silver and its necessary use in trade, entering lands and pay- ing postage, that led to the use of "ont money." A Mexican or Spanish dollar would be ent into eight pieces, each of these little silver wedges representing twelve and a half cents, and their circulation was general. It was shrewdly understood, however, that if all the pieces of any one dollar could come to- gether again there would be discovered nine- eighths-the coiner thus paying himself for the labor of manufacture.

This "ent money" above described, quite enrrent since territorial times. especially in the interior of the state, gradually disappeared. It gave way before the advance of the legal federal coin which profusely accompanied east- ern emigration. Where these silver pieces went to and what became of them is a query as unan- swerable as "what becomes of the pins?" Some of the stuff undoubtedly vet exists, but most probably greatly changed from its original

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

form. In the writer's Family a portion of it is thus preserved. His father, had, as postmaster, for many years received it in large amounts and substituted legitimate coin therefor on settlement with the department. From the handfuls of silver wedges thus left in his pos- session he caused to be manufactured a "tea set " consisting of sugar bowl, cream cup, etc., which have since often socially, eireulated with as much satisfaction as they formerly did in their particular cuneal form. This set is still preserved, special in its attractiveness alike from being a family heirloom. more than half a century old, and also from the oddity of its origin. Much more has undoubtedly been saved in a similar way.

Following this adroit device for the crea- tion of a small coin circulation and at the same time speculating therein by obtaining nine- eights from each divided dollar, there came another specie speculation in small coins, some- what more profitable and decidedly more legiti- mate. At this time almost the only small silver coins in nse were the Mexican and Spanish Picayune (614 cents) and bits (1212 cents), and by these all trade prices and values were scaled.

The federal half dimes and dimes, of which there were but few, passed current from hand to hand, equal severally with the picayune and the bit, so that whoever in the eastern states exchanged dollars for dimes, receiving ten dimes for each dollar, and brought his bags of dimes to the west. made twenty-five per cent by the operation. With eight of these ten-cent pieces he could buy a dollar's worth of any- thing, and have two dimes remaining, equal in purchasing power to twenty-five cents. This. as may be imagined, was an exchange factor of no light weight.

The moneyed condition of the country (if paper is money ) superficially viewed, was won- drously Hush and favorable to the settlement and development of the west, but was intrin- sieally fictitious and rotten. The veto of the national bank, by which step the government assumed the vieions policy of refunding to pro- tert its people by guarding the legal promises to pay, which are the indispensable needs of all civilized communities, and of refusing to es- tablish a cirenlating medium uniform, staple, safe everywhere, since the resonrees and sta- bility of the people and of each one of the peo- ple who used it would be pledged to its valid- ity, this unwise movement opened the flood- gates of banking irresponsibility, and the land was made to teem with "shoddy" and "wild- cat" bank notes. With this profusion of en- graved paper, miscalled money, came that dehi-

sion which appears to periodically affect each generation, making men, as says America's most eminent writer, to "mistake the multipli- eation of money for the multiplieation of wealth, not understanding that it is a mere agent or instrument in the interchange of traf- fie, to represent the value of the varians pro- duetions of industry, and that an increased cir- culation of coin or bank bills, in the shape of currency, only adds a proportionately increased and fietitions value to such productions."

This wild inflation affected the whole coun- try, especially pervading the west, so inviting at that time to speculative chanees, and Quiney and its surroundings shared in the mania. Land had then as now, and as always, its fixed rela- tive productive value, but money was cheap. common. plenty, "thick as autumnal leaves, that strew the forests of Valambrosa," and ultimately about as valueless. It passed as freely from hand to hand as a candidate's "shake" on election day.

As illustrative of this speenlative whirl and of the great fall and deep depression in prices that inevitably succeeds these natural condi- tions, we cite the sale of what is now Nevins' addition. This tract, containing one hundred and twenty aeres, comprised within Twelfth. Jersey. Eighteenth and Broadway, was bought at this time by an eastern company for thirty thousand dollars. Five years later the pur- chasers sought to sell for five thousand but could not, and it was not until 1850, fifteen years after the above-named purchase, when it had been divided among the owners and was platted into sixty lots of about two acres each, that it could be put upon the market. The lots then sold at prices running from three to eight hundred dollars-a few bringing more, but the average was, aside from the fifteen years' taxes, money interest, ete., hardly to the origi- nal buyers a return of their purchase money. Yet these unnatural money conditions, with their certain future relapse, gave for the time, a brisk prosperity to the place, and, it must be admitted, developed conditions which resulted in permanent growth.

Its business situation is fairly represented in the following statement, prepared at the time by one of Quiney's earliest settlers, and one himself peculiarly a part of its early history. Some omissions and inaccuracies oreur, slightly characteristic of the compiler, but in the main it is a correct and comprehensive schedule. as no one then but Judge Snow could have made. It somewhat varies the appearance of the town as pictured in a previous paper, for the reason that this was made up at a later period in the year.

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

"There are in Qniney," says this report, "ten stores, one land ageney, one silversmith, three cooper shops, six lawyers, six physicians. three blacksmiths, one printing office, two bak- ers, one coachmaker, four tailors, two wagon makers, three plasterers, two drug shops, one bonnet store, two masons, four groceries, two warehouses, twenty-one merchants, five carpen- ter shops, two shoemakers, two butchers, one gunsmith, one government land office, one milli- ner and mantna maker, three taverns, one pork merchant, four saddlers, two stonemasons, one wheelwright, one chairmaker. one steam mill, one woolearding machine, two regular steam packets to St. Lonis.

Some of these occupations existed prior to this period, some dated with the year, while still others were established subsequent to the time when the foregoing schedule was com- piled, and of course do not appear. llere fol- lows as a proper and pleasant touch to recollec- tion brief mention of a few of these then repre- sentative business men, who now have almost entirely passed from life and taken their names with them into partial forgetfulness. Such no- tice, at this dim distance of time, naturally can be but seant and without pretension to full ac- curacy or precision.

The lawyers alluded to by Judge SHow were O. 11. Browning, Archibald and Robert R. Williams, J. H. Ralston, J. W. Whitney (Lord ('oke) and bonis Masqueier. Several of them have been heretofore sketched. The first two carried conspicuous names. O. H. Browning. who, as a young lawyer from Kentucky, settled here in 1831, almost immediately acquired, and maintained for nearly fifty years, the recog- mized leadership at the Quincy bar. Expelled as he may have been in some one line of ea- pacity or attainment by this or that professional compeer. yet in industry, experience, sagacity, knowledge of men. self-possession, grasp alike of comprehensive principles and of detail; in- deed in the general aggregate of excelling qual- ities needful to the symmetrical mold of a great legal mind, he had no equal here or superior in the northwest. He possessed, to a rare degree, one most especially valuable legal attribute ; a natural meidity of expression through which to transfer his own thoughts with equal clear- ness and force to every member of a mixed and miscellaneous andience, composed as it might be of all grades of intellect and intelligence. and to do this in such a way that each listener re- ceived what he heard as seeming to himself to be the self-flattering elaborations of his own brain. Ile retained these splendid mental traits nnelonded, and his physical faculties equally preserved, throughout his eminent half-century

career, down almost to the day of his life's close in 1881. Archibald Williams, heretofore spoken of as the first lawyer to settle in Quincy, coming here in 1829, filled for thirty-two years a foremost position at the bar and earned a rep- utation more extensive than the state.

While not possessing some of the varied mental adornments peculiar to Mr. Browning, and not so educationally advantaged in youth, vet in native muscularity of intellect he was at least his equal. His force of thought was singularly strong, and his comprehensive and concise analytical power would most striking- ly appear when, before a court, he would in the briefest of terms unfold, apply and enforce a legal principle. It was the mutual good for- tune of these eminent men to be for thirty years in almost constant professional collision. they severally being the especial legal repre- sentatives of the opposite positions in the con- tested and unsettled tax laws of the state. What benefit it must have been to two such minds to be so opposed in a struggle over such great interests, involving the profoundest principles of human law, may be well imagined.

Louis Masquerier was a notable man in his day : a man of many varied qualities: a ready speaker and writer, of much information, al- ways ambitious, but always failing from his caprices and lack of judgment. A wag de- seribed him as graduating from an institution "for the promotion of useless knowledge and the general confusion of the human under- standing." Ile was a clever fellow and gen- erally liked. Soon after this time he moved to Southern Illinois and there died.

The physicians were Drs. Eels & Nichols (partners), S. W. Rogers, Hornsby, Ralston & 11. Rogers (partners ). Some of these have been previously sketched. Dr. Hiram Rogers was a physician of education and skill. He came to Quincy in 1843, from New York, and first en- gaged in the drug business with Dr. Ralston. lle was register of the publie land office from 1845 to 1849. Tle died several years since, leav- ing liberal charitable bequests. Ilis widow, the danghter of Capt. Pease, yet resides here.

Dr. Samuel W. Rogers, the elder brother. was the first physician who settled in the place (1829). Outside of his professional position, which was high, he was a man of much force and leadership in public affairs. He was promi- nent in town councils, and equally so in his party ; was city postmaster during the admin- istration of President Polk. Ile died about four years since at his daughter's residence in New Hampshire.

All of these men ranked high in public esti- mation. Indeed, both the medical and legal

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

profession then aggregated at home and abroad, a fairer standard of success and re- speet than is common in later years. While lacking the advances of science and experience, they were for that period, equal to the respon- sibilities which they ware called to meet, and if there were fewer men of eminence, there were fewer charlatans. This cannot as well be said of the clerical profession. With the exception of the faithful "Parson" Turner, there were few if any among the frequent floating preach- ers who would instinetively be ealled a "di- vine."'

The two "drug shops" cited by Judge Snow were those of Rogers & Ralston and Wells & Morey, who kept a small stock of drugs, chem- icals, etc., although most of the physicians sold medicines.

The steam mill at the foot of Delaware street was operated by J. T. Holmes & Co. Capt. Nathaniel Pease, located on Front street near Vermont, was the only pork merchant.

The one printing office was that of the Bounty Land Register, now the Quiney llerald, established this year by C. M. Woods.

Three taverns graced, some say disgraced the town. They were Rufus Brown's, the first in the place, where now stands the Newcomb HIotel : the Land Offiee Ilotel, kept by W. S. Walton, on the north side of the square, just west of Fifth street, and George W. Hight's Steamboat Hotel on Front street, about oppo- site the present railroad depot, better then known as "Catfish Hotel." No special delinea- tion of these need be given. Their reputation was long preserved in the expressive vernaen- lar. current in those days, which we cannot ex- hmne without offending the tastes of our read- ers and also drawing too strongly against the third commandment.

The bonnet store and milliner and mantua- maker's shop was kept hy Mrs. Dr. Nicholas and Mrs. Burns, on the west side of Fourth street, near Maine, afterwards immediately op- posite. Fortunately, forty-seven years ago "boughten goods" were not so prevalent, nor was "style" thought to be so indispensable as now. home-made truck meeting the general want, so that these ladies had little difficulty in keeping up with the fashionable demands on their tastes and time.

D. G. Whitney was then, as before and after, the leading merchant, who had associated with him. successively. Richard Green, and his own brothers, Ben and William. Mr. Whitney was from Marietta, Ohio, and came westward early. He possessed unusual mercantile enterprise and skill, carrying on several branches of business at the same time : an extensive store on the west

side of the square, a distillery some two miles below the town, a grist mill in the south part of the county, and a warehouse near by on the river bank, also having interests in several country stores. All these made him the most extensive, as he was the most popular business man of the county. Hfe built the mansion after- ward owned by Gen. Singleton ("Boscobel") east of the city, which then was the most palatial residence in this part of the country. His fail- ure in business, was to himself and to the gen- eral public, the most hurtful of any that ever occurred here. Mr. Whitney removed to Cali- fornia in 1849, and there partially restored his fortunes. He finally died about ten years (1886) since, erushed by a railroad car eolhi- sion.

The Pearson brothers, E. L. and Albert, were merchants from near Philadelphia. They owned and resided on fine farms, of 160 acres each, immediately east of Twenty-fourth street, at the southeast side of the city. Their store was on the west side of the publie square, near the center of the block. After retiring from mercantile life, the elder, Edward L., removed to California, and there died. Albert engaged for a time in banking at Warsaw, Ill., afterward returned east and died in 1881, at his home in New Jersey. They were men of mind, of more than ordinary originality and vigor of thought, influential and respected for their intelligence and hospitality, and possessed of some marked errentricities. Albert, the second brother, held it to be the sacred and bounden duty of every American citizen to denounce Andrew Jackson, an obligation which he patriotically performed to the last day of his life.

Matthews & Co .. from Ohio, were like Whit- ney and the Pearsons, early settlers. Their store was on Maine, corner of Third. Subsequently they opened a store at Carthage, and later at Warsaw, to which latter place they moved, and finally left for the east. There were three brothers, of whom only one (James) we believe is living at this date (1886).

Rogers & Dntcher were a prominent merean- tile and commission firm. Samuel C. Rogers, the senior member, was a very superior business man. He passed quite a portion of his time in New Orleans. He was quite an ardent and liberal Cathohe, and that church owes much to him and to his gifted wife. Thos. B. Dutcher, also a man of good business habits, after his failure in Quincy, engaged in the commission business at St. Louis, and latterly in New Or- leans. Both of these gentlemen have long been dead.

Stephen and Samuel Holmes were brothers of J. T. Holmes, several times mentioned. The

PAST AND PRESENT OF ADAMS COUNTY.

Holmes family was from Connecticut, and pos- sessed of Yankee enterprise to the amplest ex- tent. Stephen died a few years after this time. Samuel, one of the most enterprising, rapid- minded men of the town. was prominent in many public matters, especially devoted to po- litical affairs, holding various offices in the town and city. mayor several times. register of the government land office, representative to the general assembly and speaker of the Ilouse, etc. He died in 1868. The store of the IHolmes '. who kept the same under several changes of firm name, was at the southwest corner of Maine and Fifth. Later in the year Geo. W. Brown, a brother-in-law. was associated in the business, and finally assumed it.

John Burns. Jr., a former sea captain, came from Massachusetts in 1834. to remain. He had visited Quincy the year previous. His store was at southwest corner of Maine and Fourth. Capt. Burns afterward moved to Payson, and retiring from business, returned to Quincy, where he died at an advanced age. The family is extensively represented here and in the Pa- cific states. Their homestead for many years was the "Burns place," now owned by Lewis Kendall, one mile north of the city, on Twelfth street. This was a large family of active and enterprising people.

Joel Riee, who died several years ago, was a Kentuckian by birth, but came to Quiney in 1835, from Cincinnati and began business on Front street, as a general dealer and shipping merehant, afterward engaging in grain and pork packing. A lucky event a few years later closed his speculative ventures, which were really foreign to his cantions, prudent nature. The river froze quite unexpectedly and con- tinued closed for some time, holding in its grasp a steamboat on which Mr. Riee had shipped the produet of his entire winter's work, indeed, almost all that he was worth was in- vested in the enterprise. Ile had to ship in the face of declining prices and of a certain loss, to what extent, he could not know. He had made his negotiations with the Illinois State Bank, and his payments were to be made to the bank and in its paper. The bank failed while the steamer lay locked in its icy fetters. The depreciation of its paper saved him from the apprehended loss. He quit speculation to any extent after this experience. as he said. he "didn't think a bank would fail and the river freeze up at the same time again." Mr. Rice subsequently engaged in the iron business, retiring several years ago. He died about 1878. Mr. Rice was an earnest publie worker, espe- cially during the earlier period of the city's history. He was of somewhat quaint manner.

methodical habits, and preeise in expression. Hle left a reputation for straightforward in- tegrity such as few men obtain.

John W. McFadon, located on Hampshire, not far from Fourth, was one of the early mer- chants. He was a native of Baltimore, a man of broad information, derived from unusual op- portunities of foreign travel and business as a ship supercargo, which occupation carried him almost over the world. Ile was for some years engaged in business at Rio Janeiro. Ile brought west a snug sum of money, opened a store at Marcelline, and later at Quincy, he invested sagaciously in lands and town lots, and hand- ling his business prudently and living frugally, left at his death, in 1864, one of the largest es- tates in the county, and a name of honor. Mr. MeFadon was very averse to political notoriety, although possessing most positive political at- tachments and prejudices : his likes were with the Whig party, especially on aceount of its commereial and financial policy, and his dis- likes were for the Democratic and Abolition parties, although, like most of the Whigs. he was anti-slavery in principle. When asked onee why he never got into public life, "By Jupi- ter," said he, his favorite expression, "I'm too mueh of a Whig and a gentleman to be anything but postmaster at Bear Creek, where they have to have some such man to read the directions on the letters."

John A. Pierre's store was on Maine street, north side, near Fourth; later removed to Fourth. just south of D. G. Whitney & Co. Ile had been a sea captain and had all the bluff, frank and genialty and general intelligence that usually attaches to that pursuit, but totally unskilled as a merehant. He returned to New York the following year, having disposed of his business to I. O. Woodruff.

S. R. M. Leroy for a short time kept a store adjoining the Land Office Hotel; he died dur- ing the year, leaving an extensive family eon- nection, now represented by the Sullivan, Rich- ardson, Dunlap and Lane families of Quiney and the Reeds and Belknaps of Keokuk, Iowa.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

Past and present of the city of Quincy and Adams County, Illinois, Part 9

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