USA > Illinois > The early history of Northern Illinois > Part 3
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Many of the first settlers, for whatever rea- son, tried living in Tennessee or Kentucky be- fore coming to Illinois. One cannot study those early movements without being impressed by this. He is often tempted to say that Illinois was settled by Kentuckians.
From south to north, the people very definite- ly settled our state. And so it came to pass that
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the southern part of the state was well popu- lated while the northern part was a wilderness. And the capitals of Illinois as a territory or state, followed the same rule. At first, it was Kaskaskia, then later, Vandalia, and then Springfield.
And now in 1825 seven years have passed since Illinois became a state. The settlers have pushed farther and farther north. A very few families have gotten as far as Fort Clark, built on the site of Fort Creve Coeur, or Fort Broken Heart, built by La Salle in 1680, the name giv- ing expression to his bitter experience; the fort later being the site of Peoria. One family has gone a little farther up the Illinois river to found the future city of Ottawa.
But in 1825, Northern Illinois was still a wil- derness. If you will put a ruler on the present map of Illinois, from Peoria to Chicago, and then from Peoria to Galena, in that great area no white man lived, except a few at each end of the ruler. Fort Dearborn had little if any attraction for anybody. But La Pointe or the Fever River Settlement was the magnet pulling strongly on adventurous souls. It was the key to the settling , of Northern Illinois.
Let us turn our attention there for a moment. The explorer Hennepin has been named before in this writing. In 1887 he shoved his boat up the Mississippi river as far as the present site of Dubuque and found in that region, a few In-
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dians mining lead, and so marked it on a map still in existence.
Now lead was what the world wanted, Illinois wanted, for nearly all of the settlers carried guns and needed ammunition. For many years French traders went to the lead-mine region and bartered with the Indians for the lead, but there was never enough to satisfy the demand. When Illinois became a state, while some more lead was being mined by the few Indians and a few squalid whites who managed to win the good graces of the Indians, the clamor for more lead increased.
There at La Pointe was the lead, and between Fort Clark and the lead-mines was a great ex- panse of magnificent forests and fertile prairies. What was needed was a wagon-road between the two terminals. It was this double appeal the clamor for lead and the desire for homes with more roomy surroundings, by the people east of the Alleghenies, that brought Oliver W. Kellogg from the south to Fort Clark this early Spring day in 1825.
It is about this man Kellogg and some men who worked with him not only to establish this road but other roads to different points in Northern Illinois which led to the exploiting of the lead-mine regions and the settlement of much of Northern Illinois that we write. If this book is worth while, it is this second part that gives it its value.
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THE EARLY HISTORY OF NORTHERN ILLINOIS
SECTION B (This is the more important part of this book)
ENTITLED The Kellogg Trail-Crane's Grove-and Abe Lincoln
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A. INTRODUCTION
There are two reasons that impel me to write on such a theme as this. One is that this chapter of Illinois history, one of the earliest and most important, was never very well known because news was not as easily broadcasted then as now. A hundred years and more have passed since those outstanding events. They have become more and more blurred, and some of them have entirely faded out and are lost forever. Before these events have faded any more, they should be preserved so far as possible and restored if it can be.
It is a fascinating story that needs preserving that the younger generation for their own sakes may know the heroic achievements of their fore- bears. Every boy and girl in Northern Illinois should be helped to rediscover The Kellogg Trail, should be helped to make the period from 1825 to 1835 the most indelible of all of "its wondrous story"; for during those years, the foundations were laid for all that has followed or will follow.
During those years the roads were laid out to the farthest boundaries of the state: north, west, east, and south to meet the immigration wave at Fort Clark which had come from the southern tip of the state. And those roads were the open invitation to the people living in the states along the Atlantic seaboard or the Gulf
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of Mexico or nearer, to come here and build their cabins and establish their homes, to help make this, our Illinois, the greatest state in the nation.
The other reason is that my people touched hands with those very earliest settlers, that I grew up along The Kellogg Trail (where I am now living), played in the ruins of the first buildings, walked along the deep furrows made by the wagons of the rugged lead-miners, and listened to the tales of their deeds. The acres of my little pasture have never been plowed. The original prairie sod over which the buffalo roamed and the Indians chased them in mad pursuit, is an unbroken chain connecting these forerunners of the first white settlers with the present owner.
Some forty years ago and over a period of several years, I read especially the early county histories of Northern Illinois, published in the seventies and eighties, giving information fur- nished by the children of the earliest settlers.
Indeed one of those histories was published in 1837 (printed in Philadelphia for there were no printing presses here) describing "Oregon City" with perhaps less than a dozen houses, and what was more interesting, telling of two saw-mills on Pine Creek, a few miles west of Oregon, sawing PINE lumber from the NA- TIVE timber and advertising it for sale at $22.00 per thousand feet. Those who would
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have us believe that the remnant of the pine forest in White Pine States Park is a modern creation might well read this history.
I searched the histories and other available material in the Chicago public libraries, and read the preserved volumes of some of the oldest newspapers in this region, going back to the beginning years; finding now and again a long obituary of one of those first comers with interesting bits of news that added some- thing to the composite picture. In such ways I rebuilt the history of those first thrilling years. Then more immediate duties forced me to put these matters aside.
Now it becomes possible to get out the old material, to scan the new, and wish many, many times that I could go back sixty years or more, and capture many widely-scattered pages of that history, now probably forever lost.
"Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,
And make me a boy again, just for tonight."
While I am eager to get to the telling of the story, time will be saved and a clearer under- standing given, if there are certain explana- tions made before we go further.
The first is that we are dealing constantly with a number of so-called trails that should not be called trails at all, but wagon-roads. These will be the Kellogg trail, the Lewiston
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trail, Crane's trail, Chambers' trail, Phelps' trail and the Crane-Phelps trail, or the Crane's Grove-Fort Dearborn trail. We will honor their old names by continuing to call them trails; but wish to make it clear that they be- longed to an entirely different class; they were wagon-roads.
For many scores of years, the territory that became the state of Illinois in 1818, was a land of trails. The herds of "buffalo" that lived here had certain paths leading from one grazing ground to another, and these were called trails. The Indians made paths from one hunting ground to another, along which they walked or rode their ponies, and these were called trails. French traders and missionaries went from one Indian camp to another by water in canoes or overland with ponies, and these were called trails. Hunters or adventurers made expeditions hither and yon, and these too were trails. All of them were more or less desultory or casual or shifting.
The trails of our group were entirely differ- ent. They had two very definite goals or pur- poses. The lead-mine region now marked by Galena and Dubuque, was the North Star to- ward which all of them moved. And the second- ary purpose was to help would-be settlers get to coveted locations for the establishment of homes. They could not follow the normal trails for they would mire in the mud. They had to
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keep on the hills and ridges and away from the rivers.
Edward L. Burchard, author of a pamphlet entitled "Early Trails and Tides of Travel in the Lead-mine and Blackhawk Country," quotes a Mrs. John Kinzie who was making a trip on horseback from Portage, Wisconsin, to Fort Dearborn in 1831, as telling of following the Kellogg trail from Buffalo Grove to Dixon's Ferry, and giving her impression of it in the following language: "It is * a narrow path deeply indented by the hoofs of the horses, on which the Indians travel single file * * * it is dif- ficult sometimes to distinguish it at the distance of a few rods." One thing is sure, if that is an accurate description of what Mrs. Kinzie saw she did not see the Kellogg trail which had been laid out in 1825. During those six or seven years, literally thousands of wagons, many of them heavily loaded with lead, had travelled over that road. Long before her trip, the Kellogg trail would have been worn deeply into the prairie soil; not a single-file Indian trail but a broad wagon-road.
In comparing the county histories and other histories and miscellaneous material, a person will find many discrepancies. But patient re- search will clear up most of these, and show which is right. If any person is interested enough to read my story and then compare it with various histories, he will find disagree-
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ments. I can only ask for not too hasty judg- ment. I am not suggesting that this writing is free from errors, but I do think that most of these statements will be substantiated. Some of these corrected inaccuracies will be pointed out as we go along.
There are many disagreements too about the spellings of proper names. Of course there is nothing unusual about that. Most communities have examples of where the different members of a family group spell their family-name in two or three different ways. One of the promi- nent characters in our "Development Company" is Thomas Crane. The Crane family was an old English family that settled in this country in 1645.
Our branch of the family later on settled in Georgia, then moved to Kentucky, and still later to Randolph county, Illinois. Among them, the name was spelled in three different ways, Crane, Craine and Crain. But one of the Stephenson county histories uses the three spellings for the same man, the one we are talking about. That he preferred the spelling Crane is evident from the spellings his neighbors gave to local fea- tures : Crane's cabin; Crane's Grove; Crane's creek; Crane's Grove school and Crane's Grove cemetery. And Tom Crane's sister, Mrs. Amelia Crane Garner of Cherry Grove gave that spell- ing Crane to the reporter for one of the Carroll county histories.
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B. THE HISTORY OF NORTHERN ILLINOIS
In the early spring of 1825, a man named Oliver W. Kellogg refusing longer to listen to a voice behind him saying, "There's no sense in going further-it's the edge of cultivation," stood at the northern border of Fort Clark, fac- ing the great wilderness stretching to the state of Wisconsin and gazing fixedly at a tiny oasis of human life in the very northwestern corner of the state, named the Fever River Settlement or La Pointe, proceeded to assemble his scanty baggage with the determination to blaze a trail through that wilderness.
His making of that trail or rather the chart- ing of a wagon-road; and with companions, his influence during the succeeding years upon the settlement of Northern Illinois is a chapter that is rapidly fading from the mem- ory of the past generation and has no place in the knowledge of the present one. Yet here is one of the most fascinating and important chap- ters in the history of our great state.
What Kellogg's achievement meant to North- ern Illinois may be compared to that of Colum- bus crossing the Atlantic Ocean to discover the western continent. After that eventful journey in 1492, many travelers sailed the same waters, zigzagging in many directions and reaching America in different places; but Columbus re- mained the discoverer, the one who pointed the
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way to this great continent. So it was with the broad expanse of northern Illinois. In the years that followed Kellogg's deed, many roads were laid out and many offshoots penetrated new re- gions but the name of Kellogg endures as the one who blazed the trail that opened to settle- ment the broad stretch of land from the lead- diggings in the La Pointe region on the banks of the Mississippi river entirely across the state to the tiny Fort Dearborn on the western shore of Lake Michigan. And in addition to the survey- ing and developing of the route, Kellogg and his companions did much to help the immigrants as they journeyed or sought places along the way for the staking of their claims.
I am trying to recapture and make plain this "fascinating chapter," this "achievement" by Oliver W. Kellogg and his comrades.
Mrs. Carpenter has paraphrased a portion of a song much used during World War I, to ex- press my purpose :
"There's a long, long trail a-winding, From out the land of my dreams, Where the forest-trees are beckoning Along the sparkling streams.
'Twas a long, long way from the eastern sea To the land of the westering sun; But the pioneers' hearts were stout and brave All the way 'til their journey was done,
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'Twas a long, long time from then until now, When the pioneers' dreams have come true; And I'm bringing the story of that long, long trail
From out of the past to you."
Kellogg's equipment was simple. For such an undertaking, baggage had to be reduced to a minimum : a horse and light wagon, a small quantity of essential food, hunting and fishing outfits for he had to subsist largely upon what he could obtain along the way, a compass to steer by, a hatchet to blaze trees and prepare wood for fires, perhaps a blanket: that was enough and he started up the Illinois river. It may be more interesting if you have a map be- fore you on which to follow the journey he made.
Leaving Fort Clark, he went along a well- beaten Indian trail up the west side of the river about as far as the present site of La Salle. You will see by the map that he was veering a little to the east, thus going somewhat out of his way ; but there were several advantages. The Illi- nois river was certain to be a prominent fac- tor in the settling of that part of the state, and a wagon-road within reach would often render good service. Again he was following a good path so that no blazing was required and he was not delayed by needing to spend time finding fording places or how to avoid marshes. From
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the present site of La Salle, he travelled due north until he came to about the present site of Mendota. This part of the trail bearing about due north from Fort Clark to the present site of Mendota may be called the first leg of his journey.
Now lay your ruler on a modern map from Mendota to Polo or set your compass about northwest, to pass through Amboy, Sublette, Dixon, Woosung and a mile west of Polo, and you will mark the second leg of his journey. Just beyond Polo there was a grove, later named Buffalo Grove because of a large pile of buffalo skeletons where seemingly a herd of these ani- mals had been caught in a blizzard and frozen to death. Buffalo Grove is very prominent in this future history.
Now lay your ruler from Polo to Baileyville and a mile further north and you will chart the third leg of Kellogg's journey, the trail running almost due north. This part of the road started in Buffalo Grove, and ended in Crane's Grove, five miles south of Freeport. A conspicuous hill in the southern part of the grove which I call Kellogg's Lookout must have been the landmark that for miles before he reached it, he steered by, to keep on the high ground. And from the top of that hill one can look for miles and miles across the timbered land where now Van Brocklin, Pearl City and the Black Hawk monument in Kellogg's Grove
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are situated. I have no doubt that from this hill-top Kellogg mapped the next part of his route, running far west by a little northwest. If you will lay your ruler from a point a mile north of Baileyville to Kent, you will mark the fourth leg of his journey. After working out his plan and getting his bearings, he went a little farther into the heart of the grove to the bank of Crane's Creek where two beautiful springs broke from the foot of the bluff. I like to think that Kellogg made his camp here, caught a mess of fish for his supper and spread his blankets on the ground where two years later he and Crane made their plans, and where four years later, Crane built his home. Any- how, the trail from this point turned rather sharply to the west (it is still visible) and as above indicated, keeping south of the Yellow Creek bottom-lands, continued on to a large grove destined to be named after the trail- blazer and be the center of the fighting in the Black Hawk War, Kellogg's Grove about a mile east of Kent.
Now lay your ruler from Kent almost due north to Warren, near the Wisconsin line and you will chart the fifth leg of the journey.
From Warren the trail turned sharply to the west for the sixth and final part of the journey, and entered the lead-mine diggings. Kellogg followed along from one lead-mine to another, going through the Apple River diggings, Scales
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Mound, and then angling a little south through Council Hill into Galena. He had arrived at "the end of the trail," had laid out a passable road connecting Fort Clark and the settled part of the state with the coveted treasures of the lead-mine region beyond the wilderness. See page 117 for map of The Kellogg Trail.
The effect upon the country was electric even though transportation and mail-service were slow. Within a very few weeks the word had travelled down the Mississippi river and was soon spreading inland into Illinois and Ken- tucky and beyond. Immediately a procession started nothward up the trail. Men were streaming afoot, on horseback, in wagons drawn by oxen or horses. Some were adventurers, others were traders or hunters or men seeking the ore "more precious than fine gold," or plan- ning "a home in the wilderness." And this continued until winter set in, making travel impossible.
The next spring (1826) before the ice had gone out of Rock River, 200 wagons were waiting on the south bank of the river to be ferried across by the Indians. The crossing was interesting. Two canoes were placed side by side with the right wheels of the wagon in one canoe, the left in the other. While the Indians ferried the wagon across, the horses were forced to swim. Then the wagons creaked on toward the Fever River Settlement. We
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wish that we might know the number of wagons passing over the trail each year ; but there were hundreds of them.
Today, nearly 125 years after Kellogg made his momentous journey, the deep ruts worn by these wagons are still plainly visible, not far from where I am writing these words. The in- creasing number of wagons is clearly indicated by the increased output of lead. The tonnage output figures are from government records. From 1800 to 1822 because of increased travel on the Mississippi river the output had grown considerably to 170 tons a year, all being carried down in boats or barges. In 1827, two years after the trail was charted, the output was 2500 tons, nearly 15 times as much. And in 1829, four years after the trail was in use, the output was 6700 tons, nearly forty times as much. A man with a wagon normally made one trip a year. This increase continued during the years ahead; and Kellogg and his companions had much to do with it.
Kellogg probably returned south the same year to spend the time until 1827, "selling" the project of developing northern Illinois to some of his friends, five of whom enter very promi- nently into this picture.
I am going to represent that group of six men as "The Northern Illinois Development Com- pany." There was no such name, no organiza- tion, and they may not have had any formal con-
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tracts ; but there is no question as to there hav- ing been the closest cooperation and planning together in many undertakings. Let me give a brief account then of these six men. All of them came from southern Illinois, and before that from Kentucky. And some of them at least, came from Tennessee or even Georgia; and back of that, the families were English who years before had come across the Atlantic, landing in Vir- ginia or Maryland or North Carolina, to help establish America.
The six most prominent figures in the devel- opment of northern Illinois were Kellogg, Crane and Chambers, the first three and Dixon, Phelps and Hitt, who entered "The Northwestern De- velopment Company" a little later. Kellogg had brought his family into southern Illinois from farther south when he blazed the trail.
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Two years later, in 1827, four of the men, Kellogg, Chambers, Crane and Phelps went to Galena. John Phelps went up the Mississis- sippi River on a boat. The other three went up the Kellogg Trail. Isaac Chambers took his family with him and spent the following two years in Galena, running a store and mining. John Phelps also stayed on in Galena. Kellogg and Crane returned south that year. But some important plans had been made in the meantime as will appear later. Before telling of these, let us dispose of "The Disgraceful Winnebago War."
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Prior to 1827, there was considerable bad feeling between the miners and the Winnebago Indians. The Indians owned this mining region, but the miners paid little attention to their rights. They were never properly paid for their rights or their interests safeguarded. Is it al- ways this way between the stronger and the weaker? Not only were treaties unfair but they were ignored and often violated. Miners finding rich leads of ore on the Indians' land, would move there in spite of the warnings from the white superintendents who should have made their warnings insistent enough to bring obe- dience. The trespassers assumed that the In- dians had no rights which a white man was bound to respect.
Some time in the early part of 1827, two keel- boats used to transport supplies to Fort Snell- ing, passed up the Mississippi river and camped a little above Prairie du Chien with a large camp of Winnebago Indians.
As to what followed I quote from Reynolds : "The boatmen made the Indians drunk-and no doubt were so themselves-when they captured six or seven squaws, who were also drunk. These captured squaws were forced on the boats for corrupt and brutal purposes. But not satisfied with this outrage on female virtue, the boatmen took the squaws with them in the boats to Fort Snelling."
When the Indians had recovered from the
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drunken debauch the White men had been re- sponsible for, and realized how their wives had been mistreated, they were furious and resolved to be revenged. If they had not been they would not be entitled to a particle of respect.
That the boat-crew realized that they deserved to be punished, is indicated by the fact that for the return trip, they armed themselves and also tried to run by the Indian village in the night. But the Indians burning with revenge were not to be outwitted.
They did however permit the boat containing the men not guilty of the offence, to pass by un- molested. But when the boat containing the guilty men, came by, the Indians in ambush fired on them and attacked them.
The boat finally succeeded in getting away, but several of the crewmen were killed.
The incident served both to inflame the In- dians in the entire region, and also to alarm the Whites. The Indians threatened some families but did not injure them. Many of the Whites rushed to Galena for protection and started the building of stockades.
Troops were rushed into the territory af- fected, and a large body of volunteers was en- listed from the lead-mine region. The Winneba- goes were always a peaceable tribe in relation to other Indian tribes or white men. And in this instance, they planned no defence, they offered no resistance. The leaders of the attack on the
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boat, were surrendered and they were "properly punished," the papers say ; but they say wrong- ly. The men who should have been punished, received no sentence, and the opportunity to show the Indians that the white men could be fair, was not improved.
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