USA > Illinois > Marshall County > Records of the olden time; or, Fifty years on the prairies. Embracing sketches of the discovery, exploration and settlement of the country, the organization of the counties of Putnam and Marshall, biographies of citizens, portraits and illustrations > Part 24
USA > Illinois > Putnam County > Records of the olden time; or, Fifty years on the prairies. Embracing sketches of the discovery, exploration and settlement of the country, the organization of the counties of Putnam and Marshall, biographies of citizens, portraits and illustrations > Part 24
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The Church then extended an invitation to Mr. H. G. Pendleton, a licentiate from Lane Theological Seminary, to become their preacher, which invitation was accepted, and he at once entered upon the discharge of his duties. The first sacramental communion of the members of the new Church was held on the last Sabbath of May, 1839, and on the first day of August following, the Church and community were called upon to mourn the death of James Mears, one of the first chosen Ruling Elders of the infant Church.
Almost from its inception this Church seems to have been torn by dis- sensions, and as a matter of course it could not become prosperous, either in a temporal or spiritual view. In August, 1842, Horace Morse, with quite a number of other members who sided with him in one of these un- happy quarrels, preferred a request to the session for letters of dismissal
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MERITED RECOGNITION OF FAITHFUL SERVICE.
to a church at Hennepin. A motion was made to lay the petition on the table, -otherwise to refuse the request. This brought on a most stormy and acrimonious debate, and after long discussion and the exhibition of much hard feeling, the request was granted and the letters issued.
It seems that the slavery question, pro and con, which was agitating the country from Maine to Texas in 1844, crept into the Granville Church and proved a fire-brand there. Some of the members were strong Aboli- tionists, while others were either indifferent to the question or openly took part on the other side. It was probably on that account that Rev. Mr. Pendleton, feeling that his day of uscfulness had ceased there, was · prompted to sever his connection with the Church. About the time that he did so those who were opposed to him procured a declaration to be en- tered on the Church minutes severely reflecting upon him for entertaining pro-slavery views. In August, 1844, at a church meeting, the following resolution was adopted :
Resolved, That Brother H. C. Pendleton having served four years as stated supply, and at the end of the fourth year it was decided by a large majority that he was not satisfactory to the Church on account of his pro-slavery sentiments, a portion of the Church deeply sym- pathize with him, as he had proved himself a laborious and faithful minister.
Mr. Pendleton having severed his connection with the Church, on Sep- tember 7, 1844, Rev. J. A. Hallock was called to its pastorate as a "supply," who was followed April 10, 1845, by Rev. R. C. Clark, also as a supply.
In 1845 the congregation built a neat and substantial church edifice, which has been in constant use for religious purposes ever since.
Dating back for several years this Society was in a bad way. Rent by internal dissensions, much bitterness existed among the members. Some had gone off and connected themselves with other churches, others abandoned attendance upon any church services whatever, and those who remained were not happy.
In November, 1847, one of the persons who had withdrawn from the Church in 1842 applied for re-admission. This created a storm from the effects of which the Church never recovered, and the work of disintegra- tion was complete. A Congregational Church having in the meantime been established at Granville, a proposition was made to unite the two or- ganizations, and in October, 1850, that arrangement was perfected.
REV. H. G. PENDLETON.
The labors of the Rev. Mr. Pendleton deserve special notice. His
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RECORDS OF THE OLDEN TIME.
name is closely identified with those of the Presbyterian Churches of Granville, Lacon, Henry, and Providence, Bureau County ; with the Henry Female Seminary, and with the cause of Christianity, education and hu- man progress generally in this section of Illinois.
In April, 1839, the New School Presbyterian Church at Granville was organized, and Mr. Pendleton, who was then a licentiate from Lane Theo- logical Seminary, was invited to come and preach for them, which invita- tion he accepted. In January, 1840, having completed his course of studies at the Seminary and passed a rigid and most satisfactory examin- tion, he was ordained a minister by Peoria Presbytery, and for four years after that time was the beloved pastor of the Granville Church. At the beginning of his labors there the membership was twenty-seven, and when he retired from its pastorate there were the names of sixty-seven active members on the rolls. That church organization now constitutes substantially the present Congregational Church of Granville.
In August, 1844, Mr. Pendleton was invited by the Presbyterian Church of Lacon to become their pastor, which position he accepted, and remained there for one year, during which time twenty persons were added to the church. There are many persons in Lacon at the present time who have very pleasant recollections of the days when this gentle- man ministered to their spiritual needs.
In March, 1845, the New School Presbyterian Church at Henry, with twelve members, was organized under the auspices of Mr. Pendleton, which organization is the basis of the present Congregational Church there. While he was acting as pastor of the Henry church, he had pas- toral charge of the Presbyterian Church at Providence, Bureau County, over which charges he presided for four years. But his labors were not confined alone to these. He had eight appointments in as many different parts of the country, which he regularly filled, and it was while making these itinerent journeys he became impressed with the great lack and increasing need of qualified school teachers. This state of things led Mr. Pendleton to consider the possibility and probability of founding an insti- tution to be devoted to education and preparation of suitable persons as teachers. In his travels he saw that because of the previous absence of almost everything that looked like schools, the masses of the people were very deficient in even the most essential educational accomplishments, and that the children who were growing up were equally unfortunate. It is true that in most of the villages and neighborhoods some attempts were
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LABORS IN BEHALF OF EDUCATION.
made at school teaching, but these were but, spasmodic efforts made by . incompetent or untrained persons without system or correct ideas as to what studies should be pursued, usually started or carried on by those who had nothing else to do or could find no other employment whereby they might make their living, and in log huts which were uncomfortable, unhealthy, and not at at all adapted to the purposes for which they were used.
The more he saw of the want of better arrangements for educating the rising generation, the more impressed he became with the neces- sity of putting forth his strongest efforts to carry out the idea which had possessed him, and the Henry Female Seminary was the result. 'After much scheming, planning and consultations with friends, he suc- ceeded in raising money sufficient to erect a building forty-four feet square and three stories high, with an ell sixteen by forty feet, two stories in height. The Seminary building was well adapted to the purposes for which it was built, and was a monument to the good man who had labored so long and patiently for its erection.
On November 12, 1839, the doors of the Seminary were thrown open for the admission of pupils, and from that time until the winter of 1855 the school was well sustained by eager young people, anxious to prepare themselves for the profession of teachers; the fall and winter sessions fill- ing the building to its utmost capacity. February 15, 1855, the building was unfortunately destroyed by fire. The following summer the ell of a new building, twenty-four by thirty-two feet, three stories high, was put up on the old site, and during the spring and summer of 1856 the main building, forty by eighty feet, was also erected; all at a cost of $15,000.
November 25, 1856, the doors of the new Seminary were opened, and the prosperity attending the old blessed the new. The Legislature granted this Seminary a charter at its session of 1856-57.
The teachers employed in the Seminary were drawn mainly from that most excellent seat of learning, the Holyoke (Mass.) Female Seminary, from whence has been supplied to all parts of the Union large numbers of most thoroughly competent and able instructors. The school was well sustained until the financial crash of 1857 prostrated business throughout the whole country. Another influence that operated against the pros- perity of the institution was the new system of public graded and high schools, which were just then coming into operation in the State, and took away much of its patronage.
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RECORDS OF THE OLDEN TIME.
About the beginning of the late war Mr. Pendleton contracted a sale of the Seminary building to the Methodist Central Conference, and sur- rendered the premises to their control, with the exception of the rooms occupied by his family. The Methodists held the building for about three years, when, through the inefficiency of their agent, they failed to fulfill their contract, and the property reverted to its former owner. After this, having gone through many changes and vicissitudes during which the prosperity of the enterprise was becoming continually lessened, in the autumn of 1869 it was sold to the German Reformed Church, which closed the connection of Mr. Pendleton with the institution.
GRANVILLE ACADEMY. To Rev. Naham Gould, the First Presbyterian minister who settled in 1 Granville Township, the village of Granville and the Academy which was one of its chief ornaments are indebted for their birth and existence. His idea was to establish an academy, commencing on a very moderate scale, commensurate with the necessities of the community and its financial ability. From such modest beginning he hoped that his pet enterprise would rapidly assume more pretentious proportions, which would become so enlarged as to convert his academy into a college, with an organized faculty and the usual collegiate paraphernalia.
Having secured the promise of needed assistance from his neighbors, he, in 1835, set about the erection of a suitable building for his school, and soon he had a strong, well built and convenient house, 24x36 feet square, two stories high, finished and ready for occupancy. The neigh- bors had turned out with skillful hands and willing hearts, gone to the forest and hewed out the necessary parts, the quality of which was so good and the workmanship so perfect that the frame of that old academy is standing to-day, after having withstood the storms and blasts of many winters, and the racking and jostling of having been moved, as perfect, sound and useful as though it had just been delivered from the workman's hand.
The association that had the matter of the erection of the building and the establishment of the Academy in charge, procured a charter from the Legislature in 1837. This having been obtained, they turned the estab- lishment over to the Township Trustees for the purpose of opening a pub- lic school, and the doors were thrown open for that purpose in December following.
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285
THE FOUNDING OF GRANVILLE ACADEMY.
This institution, from a very small beginning, gradually acquired con- siderable fame, not only in its own locality, but all over the West. The men who took a leading part in the enterprise were the old settlers of the Township, and with no endowment save their own energy and public spirit, had the satisfaction of seeing their school grow into notice and become a seat of learning from which afterward many prominent and scholarly men and women were to graduate.
The first teacher who had charge of the new school was Otis Fisher, several years afterward ordained as a Baptist minister. After him was- Miss Lovejoy, a sister of Owen Lovejoy, a man whose name lives in tlie history of his county; and later, Miss Jane Hawks.
Among those whose names have attained prominence in the State who were educated at the Granville Academy, are Harvey Jones, Mr. Jackson, Henry Hunter, of Chicago; Judge John Burns, of the Circuit Court of Illinois, of Lacon; Benjamin F. Lundy and his twin sister; Rev. Charles Bolton, of Fond du Lac; Rev. Daniel Whitaker and Rev. Thomas Allen, missionaries to Burmah; Hon. P. A. Armstrong, of Morris; Ex-Governor of Illinois John L. Beveridge and his brother, and many others.
A new building, much larger, more commodious, and possessing many modern improvements, has taken the place of the old one. Its dimensions are 40 by 75 feet; built at a cost of $8,000.
The Rev. Mr. Gale, founder of the prosperous city of Galesburg, then unborn and unknown, came to Granville on a prospecting tour, seeking a place which would be desirable as a site for a town and college, which he was designing to establish. He soon discovered in the prairies, timber, soil, climate and surroundings of Granville all the requisites which nature could furnish for the purpose, and concluded to invest his capital and apply his energy and business capacity here, in the development of his scheme. He broached the subject to Mr. Gould, who at once claimed a prior determination to the same end and purpose. Mr. Gale very cour- teously said: "There is room in Illinois for two such places and colleges as we design to create; let us separate. I will seek a location elsewhere." He did so, and Galesburg was the result.
OLD SCHOOL HOUSES.
The first school taught in Granville Township was in the fall of
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RECORDS OF THE OLDEN TIME.
1834, Miss Burr being the teacher. It was in a small log cabin, about twelve feet square, which Mr. Wafer had put up for a smoke-house, nea.I. his residence on the edge of the timber, about one mile north-west of the village of Granville. The school was conducted on the pay system, and was patronized by George Ish, Thomas Ware, Mrs. Laughlin and Mr. Mears.
In the fall of 1835, James Laughlin and one or two others built a log school house in the timber, and afterward attempted to move it to the center of the district, but did not succeed in doing so. Miss Burr taught in this building in the fall and winter of 1835. The same winter a public school was opened by Miss Abbie Hawks in the Academy building, before it was entirely finished. Since then the Township has so greatly increased in population that eleven schools are now taught within its limits, in as many different school districts.
AN OBLIGING TRAMP.
Of James Willis this.story is told : In the spring of 1830 he returned to his former home to settle up some business, and on his way stopped at a wayside house of entertainment, where he made the acquaintance of a traveler, looking up, as he said, a location. As usual in those days the men made known their respective business, and Mr. Willis stated that he had been quite successful in closing up his affairs, and was conveying home the results. He had some ready money, and proposed to improve his farm, and was on the lookout for a suitable man to engage. The stranger listened with interest, and replied that he thought of visiting the Illinois country, and if Mr. Willis would give him a job he would change his route and accompany him home. A bargain was easily made, and the next morning the two started out, Willis riding his horse and the stranger on foot. In this way they passed the settlements, and entered on an ex- tensive prairie, Willis occasionally giving his companion a ride and walk- ing himself. As they journeyed along a deer sprung up, and the stranger asked to shoot it. His request was granted, but though the chance was good, the fellow didn't fire, saying he "couldn't get the hang of the tarnal thing." Not long after they again changed, Mr. Willis having resumed his gun. The money was carried, be it known, in a pair of saddle- bags behind the saddle. After mounting the stranger rode off leisurely
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TREATMENT OF PRISONERS ÍN THE OLDEN TIME.
but in a gradually increasing gait until a sufficient distance was obtained, when he raised his hat, bade Willis good bye, and rode off at a gallop. Willis brought his fusee to his face and ordered him to stop, but the pow- der had in the meantime been removed from the pan, and it would not go off. He turned off the regular road and was soon lost to view. Willis meanwhile pushed on hard as he could. A dozen miles or so ahead was a settlement where he was known, and a few hours sufficed to gather a dozen trusty men on fleet horses, and after a sharp chase of thirty, miles the thief was overhauled, and money and horse recovered. The proper way would have been to have strung the fellow up, but Judge Lynch was not presiding then, and he was turned over to the Sheriff of the county where the capture was effected, and Willis proceeded homeward.
There was no jail in the county and the Sheriff took his prisoner home, placed shackles on his limbs, and kept him in his own house. The fellow took the arrest quite coolly, and appeared to be not at all dissatis- fied with the arrangement. It was the beginning of a hard winter, and the prospect of comfortable quarters was not at all displeasing. He read and sang, played the fiddle, and made himself both useful and agreeable. Finding his landlord's household wanted shoeing, he made it known that he understood the whole art and mystery of cobbling, and said if his en- tertainer would furnish the leather he would do the work. It was done, and the good natured tramp made shoes for the whole family, while chained by one leg to his work-bench. One stormy day when the Sheriff was absent and none about the premises but women, the cattle broke into a field where corn was standing in shocks, and the accommodating prisoner unlocked his shackles with an awl, drove them out, and then replaced the irons on his legs as usual. Toward spring he grew uneasy, and as court was about to convene he told his entertainers his health was failing, and was afraid they 'd have to part, so removing his shackles in their absence, he left.
THE HOPKINS TRAGEDY.
Among the mysterious tragedies occasionally enacted where human life is taken without apparent cause, and no clue left by which to appre- hend and punish the perpetrators, the killing of Thomas Hopkins and his young and beautiful wife, in the town of Granville, on July 6, 1867, stands out as a marked and remarkable occurrence.
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RECORDS OF THE OLDEN TIME.
Thomas Hopkins, aged twenty-five, and his wife, aged about fiftcen or sixteen years, were the victims of as terrible a fate as fiends in human form could devise. To obtain any certain clue by which to track the murderers baffled the skill of the sharpest detectives, and to this day the perpetrators have never been brought to justice.
Hopkins was the son of a farmer living near LaSalle, but had aban- doned the honorable occupation in which he had been reared, prefer- ring an idle life among vagabonds rather than the companionship of reputable companions. He obtained a flatboat, fitted it up as a dwelling, and floated along the river, up and down between Hennepin and Peru or LaSalle, loading his craft with driftwood, and supplying himself with other conveniently reached property, with little regard, it is said, to any rights of ownership save that of possession. In one of his trips he became acquainted with a girl named Sophia Baker, a rather pretty young lady, inclined to idleness, whose parents lived not far from the river in the town of Granville. She was attending school at the time, and quit it one day to marry Hopkins. They had been married but a few weeks, and little was known of their conjugal life. At the time of the murder their floating home was moored in the river a few miles below Peru, near the Granville side, and within the jurisdiction of Putnam County.
A man named Sherman, the last person known to have seen this ill- fated couple alive, stated that he visited them in the evening of the night of the murder to deliver a load of wood and a sack of flour, which latter Mrs. Hopkins took from his hands. He left them apparently cheerful and happy, with everything about the boat seemingly in good order, and the table spread for supper. Returning next morning, he found Hopkins' body in the water at the side of the boat, in a standing position, the head beneath the surface. Near by a sand-bag club was found, but no marks of violence were discernible upon the corpse. The table was spread as he had seen it the evening before; there was no evidence of confusion, scuf- fling, or acts of violence such as the forcible removal of one or two persons from so small a room would have caused. There was no torn clothing, no blood stains, no marks of violence, nor the slightest indication of any other persons than the victims having been present. Nothing had been disturbed; their personal effects, and such articles of merchandise as Hop- kins had supplied himself with in his trading expeditions were all there, and one hundred and fifty dollars were found in the dead man's pockets. Mrs. Hopkins was strangely absent. Upon their accustomed hook were
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LYNCH LAW AMONG THE PIONEERS.
found her bonnet and shawl, and it was evident she had either made a singularly hurried flight or been very cunningly abducted.
The news of the murder soon attracted the people of the neighbor- hood, and prompt efforts were made to sift the mystery. Some one had heard the voice of a woman screaming during the night, the sound appar- ently coming from a short distance down the river, but as boats often passed with drunken men and abandoned women on board, no heed was paid to the circumstance. A watchman at the mills at Hennepin, ",when he came to think of it," was certain he heard a woman's voice about day- light of the fatal morning, calling piteously for help, and simultaneously a boat was seen by him floating down stream near the opposite bank. The country turned out and searched everywhere, and at length, three days afterward, the body of the poor woman was found on a bar below Hennepin, about nine miles from where her husband's boat was moored. Beside a few slight scratches on her neck, which might have been caused by accident, no marks of violence nor evidence of ill-usage were discovered upon her person.
THE RAMSAY TRAGEDY.
Sometimes by a persistent and long-continued defiance of public opin- ion a bold villain exasperates a community past endurance, until scorning forms of law, and the law's delay, they sweep all aside, and taking the culprit in hand exact justice, deep, terrible and lasting. The instinct of self-preservation may justify such a resort, but nothing else, though there are seemingly times when the enormity of the crime, the danger of escape, or the degraded character of the criminal, make the invokers of Judge Lynch at least pardonable.
One of the early settlers of Granville Township was John C. Ramsay, who lived on the bottoms of the Illinois River north of the village. He is remembered as a good neighbor, but not one with whom a person cared to be too intimate, and outwardly sustained a character for morality, sobriety and industry. He was circumspect in language and deportment, was a member of the Church, an attendant upon its meetings and a Superintend- ent of the Sabbath School. His prayers were long; he dwelt much on youthful follies and had little charity for those who went astray. To some he seemed a regular pillar of light and a shining example for sinners
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RECORDS OF THE OLDEN TIME.
to pattern after, yet there were those who believed all this was a mask to cover deep purposes, and beneath a saintly exterior he concealed the wickedness of a devil incarnate.
Reports had gone abroad of strange goings on about his secluded home. Property mysteriously missing had been tracked towards his saintly dom- icile, and rumors were afloat that his family relations were not strictly angelic. After a time his wife died suddenly, and no one could tell how it occurred save that she was found dead in the smoke-house. Her deeply afflicted spouse related to the jury, with tears in his eyes, that she went there, locked herself in, and was found dead. As the smoke-house could only be locked on the outside, the jury could not see how a dying person could affect it; but any attempt to get him to explain away this absurdity caused the poor man to relapse into paroxysms of grief that were simply dreadful. As the jury found no signs of poison, or blows, or violence, the twelve wise men looked grave and in effect pronounced the cause of her death unknown.
Affairs went on as before at his exceedingly pious dwelling, and the people continued to lose property and wonder why it was thus. Stories again got afloat of a terrible nature, some perhaps "o'er true " and others highly imaginative. It was said he had debauched his own daughters, murdered their unnatural offspring, robbed his neighbors, and though his children were all cognizant of the facts, such was their fear of him, none dare make it known.
Affairs finally reached a crisis. There was a rebellion at home, and the ghastly secrets could no longer be concealed.
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