USA > Illinois > McLean County > The good old times in McLean County, Illinois : containing two hundred and sixty-one sketches of old settlers, a complete historical sketch of the Black Hawk war and descriptions of all matters of interest relating to McLean County > Part 57
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Jesse Wheeler, who lives three miles west of Hudson.
William L. Wheeler lives in Ford County, near Gibson City.
Mrs. Rebecca Miller, wife of John G. Miller, lives in Bloom- ington.
John T. Wheeler lives in Clay Centre, Clay County, Kansas. James A. Wheeler lives in Farmer City, De Witt County.
Rachel, Elizabeth, Mary and Henry Wheeler, live at home.
Benjamin Wheeler is almost six feet in height, is a very kind gentleman, can tell what he knows, and fortunately knows some- thing to tell. His hair is gray, and his whiskers are of mixed red and gray. He has a hopeful disposition and a pleasant temper. He suffers with the asthma, which, he thinks, he brought on by contending with fires and becoming suddenly warm and breath- ing the smoke and heated air. Mrs. Wheeler, his lady, was born June 9, 1810, in Licking County, Ohio. She is a woman of ten- der sympathy, has a kind heart and a pleasant word for all.
JOHN SMITH.
John Smith was born December 11, 1804, in Randolph Coun- ty, North Carolina. His father's name was David Smith, and his mother's name was Polly MeLaughlin. His grandfather, Zachariah Smith, was a German, who came to America when a boy. He was a Baptist preacher during the Revolutionary war. Polly MeLaughlin was of Scotch descent. David Smith moved to Georgia in 1811, and returned the following year to North Carolina. Many soldiers were seen on the way. He volunteered to go to the war in 1812, but was never called out. Shortly afterwards the Smith family went to Kentucky, where they re- mained a year, and then went to Centreville, Indiana, on the Whitewater River. They farmed and cleared forty acres of land on the beach. They hauled their corn on a sled, as the settle- ment did not have a wagon for two years. After four years of
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farming there, they went to Strawtown. The health of this place may be inferred from the fact that only one man in it failed to take the fever and ague. A little difficulty occurred there with the Miami Indians. Some of them came to the house of a pio- meer, named Shintaffer, and insisted on having whisky, which was refused. One of them in his anger struck Shintaffer's wife on the cheek, and it hurt her severely, as she was suffering with the toothache. Mr. Shintaffer picked up the Indian and threw him on the fire, while Mrs. Shintaffer took the butt end of the whip to him. The Indian was severely burnt, and would have been roasted alive, had not the squaws made an outcry. This was in the fall of the year. During the following spring, Mr. Shintaffer went with John Smith to blaze a road to the Wabash River, and a party of twelve Miami Indians attempted in his ab- sence to murder his family : but he returned just as they were about to commence, and was assisted in defending his family by some whites, who were watching the Indians. After a severe scuffle, one Indian and one white man were killed. The Shin- taffer and the Smith families moved down to the mouth of Eel River. There the Smiths lived two years, then moved to Honey Creek prairie on the Wabash, where they remained one year, then went to the Grand Prairie near the State line, between Illi- nois and Indiana. The Grand Prairie was a name given to the whole prairie of the Mississippi valley. On the line, where the Grand Prairie commenced, the beech and yellow poplar stopped.
In 1824, John Smith moved a family to Peoria, which then contained only two or three houses. While on this trip, he saw, about twenty miles above Peoria, a large log in a tree, and on climbing up he found it contained the bones of an Indian, who must have been six feet and five inches tall. On Mr. Smith's return home he moved to Big Grove, Illinois, near where Urbana now is. While he was there, a man went to Peoria on foot to perfect his title to some land, and it was necessary to see the per- son whom John Smith moved there. On the man's return he walked himself to death, and was found lying between the San- gamon and the head of the Vermilion.
The Indian trading-house was at the east end of Big Grove. In the timber were two Indian sugar camps. They had all the apparatus for making sugar. They had immense troughs, which would hold six or eight barrels of sap.
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In the spring of 1830, the Smith family moved to what was afterwards called Smith's Grove. John Smith immediately en- tered the land, where the Jones family now live.
The winter of the deep snow was a hard one for the Smith family. When the first heavy snowfall came, John Smith was at White Oak timber, and during that night stayed at More's mill with several others. He was watching the mill as it ground his corn, but it broke during the night, and he could grind no more. The mill was built of logs, and was not chinked, and the snow drifted on the inside about eight feet high. It required the whole of the next day for Mr. Smith to go to Havens' Grove. and the whole of the following day to reach home at Smith's Grove. A few days afterwards, when the snow became settled and packed, it was impossible to go anywhere.
John Smith married, March 30, 1831, Anna Havens. In the spring of 1832 he settled at Havens' Grove, about three-quarters of a mile north of his present residence. In 1849 he settled about half a mile from Hudson, in the edge of Havens' Grove, and has lived there ever since.
John Smith relates an incident, which occurred in December, 1836, during the sudden change in the weather. On the day of the sudden change, a man, named Lapham, was crossing the Mackinaw. He came over the ice on horseback ; but just as his horse was stepping from the ice, which had been raised by the thaw, it went into the mud and water between the ice and the steep bank. While Lapham was trying to get out his horse, the sudden change came on, and the intensely cold wind stupefied the horse, and Lapham left it and walked two miles and a half to John Smith's house. On the following day he and Smith went back for the saddle, bridle and blankets. The horse was frozen solidly in the ice. The water and mud had not reached to its flanks, but it was so chilled by the sudden change, that it was powerless to loosen itself.
John Smith has raised quite a family of children. He has had eight altogether, of whom six grew up. They are :
Dr. Lee Smith, who was born May 8, 1832, and lives in Bloomington.
Mrs. Irena Lewis, wife of Samuel H. Lewis, lives in Hudson.
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Jesse and David Smith, twins, were born December 31, 1836. Rev. Jesse Smith lives at Hamilton on the Mississippi River, is a Methodist minister, and belongs to the Central Illinois Confer- ence. David Smith lives at home and attends to the farm.
Christiana Smith lives at the homestead.
John Smith is five feet and nine inches in height, and is rather slenderly built. In his younger days he was pretty muscular and was a hard worker. He is very industrious and strictly honest. His hair is heavy and stands high on his head. Old age leaves its effects on him, and his eyesight is poor and his hearing has partially failed. He is a good man and wishes to perform all of his duties honestly and religionsly. He has been very snecessful in life, and is one of the earliest and most honored pioneers in the grove where he lives. The following incident may throw some light on Mr. Smith's character and disposition. In an early day an old Quaker, named Joseph Wilson, attempted to build a mill on the Mackinaw, but his undertaking was not fortunate, as the Mackinaw is rather an uncertain stream. He afterwards went to the northern part of the State and built a mill on Elk- horn Creek, and became quite well to do in the world. He came to McLean County in search of grafts for fruit-trees, and while on this excursion, called on " his old friend, John Smith." The two old pioneers talked over their matters together. Friend Wilson said, he wished to have plenty of apple trees, so that he could sit down with a basket of apples beside him, and when they were gone, he could say : "Boys, bring another basket of apples." The friends disenssed their financial matters, too, and John Smith told how by his care and labor he had money at interest. Friend Wilson asked Smith, if the latter did not think he should have given his money to the poor. "No," said John Smith, "I have worked hard for it, and think I have earned it, and if I should give it to others they might not appreciate it.". John Smith was right.
ALBERT YOUNG PHILLIPS.
Albert Y. Phillips was born April 14, 1812, at Huntsville, Alabama. His father's name was Glenn Phillips and his moth- er's name before her marriage was Leah McCord. Albert Y. Phillips is of Scotch and Irish descent. Glenn Phillips was a
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soldier in the war of 1812 and fought at the battle of Horse Shoe Bend under Andrew Jackson against the Creek Indians, and died of hardship, exposure and want of food.
When Albert Y. Phillips was about fourteen years of age the family moved to Overton County, Tennessee, and there Albert resided until the fall of 1830, when he came to Illinois. He ar- rived at Twin Grove, in what is now McLean County, November 8, 1830. He did very little during the succeeding winter, which was the one of the deep snow, but kept his toes warm in the house as well as possible.
In April, 1832, the Phillips family went to Indian Grove, which is now in Livingston County, but were alarmed for fear of Indian troubles during the Black Hawk war, and went to White Oak Grove. The Kickapoo Indians at Indian Grove were quiet during the Black Hawk war, but the whites were suspicious and fearful of them. This anxiety was increased by the freaks of an Indian, named Turkey, who alarmed the whites by appearing among them with his face painted a blood-red color. But the Kickapoos were friendly, polite and well behaved. They con- ducted themselves as gentlemen should. They attended church and listened to the preaching. At one time they listened to the exhortations of a Methodist preacher, named Walker, whose ser- mon was interpreted to them by Peter Cudjoe, who had married an Indian woman. Mrs. Phillips says she was glad to have the Indian women come to see her, and thought them quite good looking. They had regular features and would have been con- sidered remarkably fine women, if the copper-colored tan could have been removed from their checks.
In September, 1832, Albert Phillips and his brother, Calvin Marion, and a man named Andrew Barnard, moved to Indian Grove to the old Indian town, which the Kickapoos had aban- doned during that fall. The men started with little to eat, as they expected to be joined by their families and by others on the following day. But the families were detained and did not come for a week, and the three men were obliged to live during that time on honey and hog potatoes. These potatoes grew wild on the creek bottoms and along the sloughs. They were little black things about the size of an egg, and could be boiled or roasted, but had a flavor very different from Irish potatoes. They were
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tubers, grew from three to six inches apart, and had two or three potatoes to a stem.
The deer, which had been killed off during the winter of the deep snow, became numerous a few years later, and had a bad habit of eating up the settlers' corn. They would eat the corn from the cob without tearing off the husk or breaking down the stalks, and the patch would appear a fine field of corn, when scarcely a kernel was left. The settlers hunted the deer not only to obtain venison, but to protect the corn, They usually, or at least very often, hunted on horseback, and when a deer was killed, it was very common to tie it to a horse's tail and in this manner have it dragged home. In the fall of the year the necks of the bucks became as large as their bodies and very hard and gristly. Mr. Phillips tells of a man, named William Popejoy, who fired at the neck of a deer, which was lying in the grass. The deer jumped up, looked around and laid down, and Popejoy shot it in the eye and killed it. He tied it to the tail of his horse, and brought it home, and when it was dressed, the ball was cut from the neck, in which it had only penetrated two inches and was flattened in the gristle. Mr. Phillips saw this himself.
The following story, which Mr. Phillips tells of Nicholas Jones, is a very remarkable one, but is confirmed by nearly all the settlers in Money Creek timber. It seems that Nicholas Jones once shot a deer in the neck and stunned it. He went up to it, and not having a butcher knife, neglected to cut its throat, but tied it to his mare's tail and started home. When he had gone only a few steps across Money Creek, his mare stopped and Jones felt a decided jerk. Looking around, he saw that the buck had come to life and was trying to gore the mare with its antlers. He whipped his horse into a run and went home, but could not stop running for a moment for fear of the deer. He ran his horse around the wagon, all the time calling to his wife: "Oh, Jane! fetch the butcher knife, the butcher knife, Jane, quick, the butcher knife!" At last the deer's antlers be- came tangled in the wagon wheel and it was killed.
Albert Phillips is five feet and ten inches in height, is rather sparely built, is a very industrious man, loves humorous stories and is very hospitable and kind. He married Margaret Moats,
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February 17, 1850. She is the daughter of Jacob and Sarah Moats, of Money Creek timber. They have had no children. They married late in life, nevertheless their wedded life has been very happy. But they advise young men and women to get married early.
ISAAC TURNIPSEED.
Isaac Turnipseed was born July 16, 1809, in Fayette County, Ohio. His father's name was Christopher Turnipseed, and his mother's name was Mary McMullen. His father was of Penn- sylvania Dutch descent and his mother's ancestors were from Scotland. He came to what is now McLean County, Illinois, on horseback, in the spring of 1831. Here he worked during the first serson for Jacob Haner, and in the fall bought cattle and fed them through the winter. In the spring he went back to Ohio, stayed two years, and then returned to McLean County, where he lived until his death.
He bought a claim on Mackinaw, near Haner's mill, and made a settlement. He married, July 30, 1834, Jane Messer, who is yet living. He succeeded pretty well, and was pretty sharp to see the value of things. He had nine children, seven of whom grew up and were married. They are :
John M. Turnipseed lives on Buck Creek, north of the Mack- inaw.
Mary Jane, wife of Matthias Carter, is dead.
Sidney Ann, wife of John Neubarger, died in Kansas.
Sarah Elizabeth, wife of J. D. Viles, lives in Jasper County, Illinois.
Anderson Y. Turnipseed lives in Kansas.
Isaac Turnipseed, jr., lives at Mr. Hinthorn's.
G. W. Turnipseed lives at home. The two latter are not mar- ried.
Mr. Turnipseed was a man of medium height, and very healthy, and took very little medicine. He was one of the best known settlers in Mackinaw timber. He lived in the edge of Money Creek timber at the time of his death. His widow, Mrs. Turnipseed, still lives on the homestead place. She is a kind and hospitable old lady, whom it is a pleasure to be acquainted with.
OLD SETTLERS OF
ELIJAH PRIEST.
Elijah Priest was born September 10, 1812, in Muskingum County, Ohio. His father's name was James Priest, and his mother's maiden name was Hannah Anderson. James Priest was a great hunter after deer and bear. On one of his hunting excursions the old gentleman cornered a bear by the root of a tree. It began hugging his hunting dog, and he killed it by striking it on the head with an axe. The fat on the ribs was nearly four inches thick, the fattest bear he ever killed.
Elijah Priest worked in the summer at the business of making charcoal, and in the winter he worked in a furnace for melting ore into pig-iron. This was, indeed, warm work, so warm, that the sweat ran down into his shoes and squirted out at every step he took; indeed, it was so hot, that water was poured on his clothes to prevent them from catching fire. It was Mr. Priest's duty to clear out the hole in order to draw the melted ore from the furnace into the sand-bed to cool into pig metal. . The hole was stopped with clay, and when the furnace was heated and the iron melted, this clay became as hard as iron, and had to be drilled out. Mr. Priest drilled it out while from two to four tons of melted iron were in the furnace. If he allowed a particle to fall into the liquid metal, it would boil up and spit out melted iron, and a piece of clay as large as an egg would blow up the whole mass of metal. The hands, who worked at the furnace, wore linen, and persons stood near and poured water over them. Mr. Priest worked first in the Mary Ann furnace in Licking County, Ohio, and next in the town of Zoar, in Tuscarawa County. The town of Zoar, as well as the furnace, was owned by a German, named Beimoner. This man provided for the entire town. He employed men to herd the cattle, and women to herd the sheep and geese. Mr. Priest never saw any children in the place.
On the eleventh of September, 1833, the day after he became of age, Mr. Priest married Rebecca Hinthorn, and in June, 1834, he started for the West. He arrived at Money Creek timber on the west side, where he now lives, on the eighth day of July. The journey was a warm and dry one, and he suffered greatly for want of water and food. He ran out of provisions near Big
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Grove, then called Pin Hook, now called Urbana. He made many enquiries, and heard that a certain man had recently two sacks of meal ground at mill. Mr. Priest wished to buy some, and sent a little boy, named Henry Moats, to get it. Henry came back empty-handed, but reported that the man had a big corn pone on the fire. Mr. Priest then went with the boy, and the latter was instructed to open the door, whenever Priest stood by the fire. Mr. Priest offered to buy some meal, but was refused ; then he stood by the fire, where the pone was cooking, and Henry immediately opened the door. Priest was then about to walk off with the pone ; but the man of the house saw that he must give way, and he allowed Priest a peck of meal. When Mr. Priest arrived at Money Creek timber, he would have given all he possessed to have been back in Ohio; but it was impossible to get away. He immediately began farming and worked very hard. He never bought a sack of flour after his arrival here, as he always raised his own. He was a man of great strength, and made sometimes three hundred rails in one day.
Mr. Priest has done some hunting, for deer were plenty and easy to kill. He once found a little fawn as he was out in the timber cutting a tree. When the tree fell the fawn started from its hiding place and jumped into Mr. Priest's arms. It was a pretty, spotted little creature, about two weeks old, and he took it home, and it became very tame, and ran all over the neighbor- hood. It was distinguished from the wild deer by a tassel around its neck. It was a doe, and when it grew up, he raised seven deer : but when game grew scarce, they were all killed by hun- ters. The doe was killed by Samuel Ogden, who immediately informed Priest that it was done by accident. But the parties, who killed the other seven, were never discovered.
Mr. Priest came to the West a poor man in a borrowed wagon, but has been very industrious, and has succeeded well. Four years ago he was offered forty-five thousand dollars for his prop- erty, but did not consider it for a moment. His property has been earned by his strong muscle and his good judgment.
Mrs. Priest died some years ago, and on the eleventh of Sep- tember, 1870, Mr. Priest married Mrs. Minerva MeCurdy. Her maiden name was Minerva Johnson.
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Mr. Priest has had seven children, but four died in infancy, and three are now living. They are :
Sarah Priest, James Saulsbury Priest and George Washing- ton Priest.
Mr. Priest is about five feet and nine inches in height, and weighs two hundred and thirty pounds. He is a man of extra- ordinary strength, and, in his younger days, scarcely knew what it · was to be tired. He has worked during his life without the benefit of an education, for an education could not be obtained where he lived in Ohio. But in spite of these disadvantages he has been very successful, and owes nothing to anyone, except good will. He is a very clever man to anyone who is disposed to deal fairly and do right with him ; but to anyone who is disposed to cut up shines, Mr. Priest is a very unpleasant customer. His memory seems remarkably good, and in conversation he tells of many curious and strange incidents. He is a man with a very strong constitution, and his temperate habits have preserved it unim- paired. With his great strength and good health, he ought to live to be a centenarian and celebrate one hundred Fourths of July.
SAMUEL LEWIS.
Samuel Lewis was born in the fall of 1800, in England. He was a plumber, glazier and painter by trade. He married, in England, Sarah Seeley. He emigrated to the United States in November, 1835. The Lewis family came over to New York in the sail vessel Virginia, and were twenty-six days on the journey.
At that time the Hudson colony was talked of, and the three agents of the company, Pettit, Purkit and Gregory, induced Lewis to join it and buy a section of land. The land was bought by the agents at Havens' Grove, and in May, 1836, Samuel Lewis went there with his family by way of New Orleans. They went to. the latter place on a sail vessel, which brought up a Chinese junk from the mouth of the Mississippi to New Orleans. From New Orleans they came up the river by steamboat, and on the route the passengers amused themselves by shooting at alliga- tors. The Lewis family stayed two or three months at Hennepin, and then came through to Havens' Grove with ox-teams. Mr. Lewis settled during the first winter in the south end of the grove
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in a rented log cabin. IIe immediately began farming, setting out fruit trees and grafting them. He hunted once in a while, though seldom. At one time while hunting he saw a deer come bounding up with blood pouring from its side. He fired and the animal fell. Mr. Havens came up and claimed the deer, and as but one bullet hole was found, Mr. Lewis gave it up, for it had certainly been shot before he fired. Havens took home the deer, but in dressing, be found two bullets, and it was evident, that both had entered the deer at the same spot, and that the shot of Lewis had taken effect. The deer was, therefore, divided.
Mr. Lewis hauled pork to Pekin, and during one trip carried a whisky bottle and put it into a hog, and as it was cold weather the hog froze up. On the way he met a preacher, and the two men had a very difficult undertaking to get out the whisky.
People were all neighborly in the early days. Mr. Lewis' daughter Jane was once bitten by a rattlesnake, and old John Pennel, who lived six miles distant, left his wheat stacks, where he was at work, and dug China snakeroot and cured her. He would accept no pay for this, as he " never charged neighbors anything." A horse belonging to Mr. Lewis went astray, and was taken up and kept by Peter Mccullough, who lived nine or ten miles away at Dry Grove, and when Mr. Lewis asked the bill, old Peter said he " never charged neighbors anything." In- deed, the people considered all men neighbors whom they met within eighty miles or more.
The dress, which the Lewis family wore, was somewhat dif- ferent from that worn by them in England. The English goods gave way to blue jeans and buekskin.
When Mr. Lewis had an opportunity he worked at his trade. IIe made the first vats in St. Louis for pressing stearine candles out of lard.
Mr. Lewis died December 29, 1871. IIe had six children, of whom four grew up to years of discretion. They are :
William Lewis, who was a bugler in the regular army. He died at Fort Gibson, which is now in the Indian Territory, in 1844.
Mrs. Sarah Ann Burtis, wife of Edwin E. Burtis, lived in Hudson. She died about twelve years ago.
Samuel H. Lewis lives in Hudson.
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Mrs. Jane Wheeler, wife of Valentine Wheeler, lives in Hudson.
Mr. Lewis was five feet ten and one-half inches in height. He walked erect, was a hard worker, was very successful in busi- ness, was a kind neighbor and an honest man.
SAMUEL HENRY LEWIS.
Samuel H. Lewis was born April 14, 1828, in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. His father was Samuel Lewis, whose sketch is given above. When he came to Hudson he early learned to cultivate his muscle by hard work on a farm. Nevertheless, he did not allow the work of the farm to prevent him from mak- ing sharp work with the deer and turkeys, and at one time killed three deer within a space of a few rods. One of them was not immediately killed, and Mr. Lewis ran up to finish the work with his knife, when the animal uttered a bawl, threw up its hind legs and tore Mr. Lewis' pants frightfully ; but he killed it at last. At one time he shot a deer and wounded it severely, when it turned on him with its hair bristled up and pointing forward. Mr. Lewis made quick time to the rear, and his father came to his assistance and shot the pugnacious buck.
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