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PUBLIC LISHARY FORT WAYNE & ALLEN CO., IND
369341
977.2 Eslhi
PUBLIC LIBRARY Fort Wayne and Allen County, Ind.
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GENEALOGY 977.2 ES1HIB
241
L369341
977.2
HISTORY OF INDIANA
Lake Superior
Lake Huron
Lake
Michigan
Lake Erie
INDIANA
TERRITORY
NORTHWEST TERRITORY
Knox County
St. Clair
Randolph
INDIANA TERRITORY, 1800, By E. V. SHOCKLEY
AHISTORY OF INDIANA FROM ITS EXPLORATION TO 1850
BY
LOGAN ESAREY, Ph. D. Instructor in Western History in Indiana University
L 369341 -
............. ....
................
W. K. STEWART CO. INDIANAPOLIS
1915
Copyright, 1915 BY LOGAN ESAREY
L 369341 PREFACE
IN the preparation of this book several unexpected ob- stacles have been met. In the first place many traditional stories popularly regarded as substantial history have been found to be without historical foundation. In the second place there is no considerable collection of historical mate- rial to draw upon. Other States have published their docu- mentary materials and thus made them available to his- torians, but that work remains to be done in Indiana. In the third place many of the State publications have been found, after close study, to be unreliable, others are bound without indexes, tables of contents, or even continuous pag- ination. In many cases it is necessary to turn through a record, page by page, to find any desired information. These conditions have made it necessary to found every ma- terial statement on a primary source. Such work is slow and very tedious.
· INDIANA UNIVERSITY,
October 30, 1914.
ON THE BANKS OF THE WABASH, FAR AWAY
' Round my Indiana home-stead wave the corn-fields, 5
In the dis-tance loom the wood-lands clear and cool;
Often-times my thoughts re-vert to scenes of child-hood,
Where I first re-ceived my les-sons- Nature's school,-
But one thing there is miss-ing in the picture,
With-out her face it seems so in- com-plete:
I long to see my mother in the door- way As she stood there years a-go, her boy to greet,
CHORUS
Oh the moon-lightes fair to-night a-long the Wa-bash,
From the fields there comes the breath of new-mown hay;
Thro' the Sycamores the candle lights are gleaming, On the banks of the Wa-bash far a-way.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA
1
THE JESUITS PLAN A NATION OF CHRISTIAN
INDIANS
1
2 THE FUR TRADERS 3
3 LOUIS XIV AND THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY 8
4 THE MIAMI INDIANS 10
5 THE FIRST SETTLEMENTS IN INDIANA 14
6 THE FRENCH SETTLERS 22
CHAPTER II THE ENGLISH PERIOD, 1764-1779 28
7 ENGLISH CONQUEST AND GOVERNMENT 28
8 PONTIAC'S WAR 31
9 THE JOURNEY OF GEORGE CROGHAN 37
10 ENGLAND TAKES POSSESSION AND ORGANIZES THE COUNTRY 40
CHAPTER III
THE CONQUEST BY VIRGINIA,
1778-1779
47
11 THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION AND THE IN- DIANS 47
12 THE CAPTURE OF KASKASKIA 48
13 PIERRE GIBAULT AND THE CAPTURE OF VIN- CENNES 52
14 THE LAST CAPTURE OF VINCENNES 59
15 CIVIL GOVERNMENT UNDER VIRGINIA 67
CHAPTER IV CLOSING CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION 70
16 INDIANS OF INDIANA 70
17 LAST STAGE OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR IN THE WEST 78
18 THE INDIANS BECOME THE WARDS OF THE
UNITED STATES. 89
vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER V INDIAN WARS, 1790-1796 92
19 THE STRUGGLE FOR THE OHIO RIVER BOUN- DARY 92
20 THE CONQUEST OF THE MIAMIS 104
21 A YEAR OF NEGOTIATIONS AND THE END OF THE WAR. 120
CHAPTER VI GOVERNMENT OF THE NORTH- WEST TERRITORY 126
22 ORGANIZATION OF THE NORTHWEST TERRI-
TORY 126
23 THE GOVERNMENT AT MARIETTA 130
24 VINCENNES LAND CLAIMS 132
25 INDIANA A PART OF KNOX COUNTY 137
26 GOVERNMENT UNDER THE JUDGES 138
27 CIVIL GOVERNMENT OF THE NORTHWEST
TERRITORY 142
28 HARRISON IN CONGRESS 151
CHAPTER VII INDIANA TERRITORY, 1800-1816 154
29 ORGANIZATION OF INDIANA TERRITORY 154
30 INDIANA MADE A TERRITORY OF THE SECOND GRADE 159
31 THE TERRITORIAL LEGISLATURE 169
32 AARON BURR'S CONSPIRACY 177
33 DEVELOPMENT OF THE TERRITORY 178
CHAPTER VIII INDIANA AND THE WAR OF
1812 181
34 AFTER THE TREATY OF GREENVILLE. 181
35 TIPPECANOE 186
36 INDIAN WARS OF THE FRONTIER 190
37 LIFE ON THE FRONTIER 198
CHAPTER IX FROM TERRITORY TO STATE, 1813-1816 203
38 NEW SETTLEMENTS 203
39 REMOVAL OF THE TERRITORIAL CAPITAL TO
CORYDON, 1813 210
vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
40 THE ENABLING ACT 213
41 THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION OF 1816_ 217
CHAPTER X THE STATE GOVERNMENT AT CORYDON, 1816-1825 222
42 THE NEW CONSTITUTION IN OPERATION 222 -
43 THE INDIANS 228
44 FIRST STATE BANK AND THE OHIO FALLS
CANAL
233
45 MOVING THE CAPITAL TO INDIANAPOLIS,
1825 237
46 SETTLEMENT OF THE NEW PURCHASE 239
47
SOCIAL AND POLITICAL ORGANIZATION
248
CHAPTER XI ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT,
1825-1835 254
48 EARLY ROADS 254
49 THE MICHIGAN ROAD 257
50 STAGE LINES 261
51 OPENING THE STREAMS TO NAVIGATION 263
52 THE FLATBOAT TRADE 269
53 EARLY MAIL SERVICE 272
54 SETTLEMENT OF THE WABASH COUNTRY 273
CHAPTER XII RELIGION AND EDUCATION IN EARLY INDIANA 279
55 CHURCHES 279
56 EDUCATION 289
CHAPTER XIII POLITICS FROM 1825 TO 1840 296
57 THE JACKSONIAN PARTY 296
58 THE INTERNAL IMPROVEMENT PARTY 304
59 THE HARRISON CAMPAIGNS 311
CHAPTER XIV REMOVAL OF THE INDIANS
FROM THE STATE 323
60 THE TREATY GROUNDS 323
61 BLACK HAWK'S WAR, 1832 325
62 REMOVAL OF THE MIAMIS AND POTTAWAT- TOMIES 332
viii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER XV THE PUBLIC LANDS IN IN-
DIANA 340
63 THE SURVEY, ITS METHODS AND AREA 340
64 LAND OFFICES 342
65 LAND SALES 344
CHAPTER XVI SYSTEMATIC INTERNAL IM-
PROVEMENTS 352
66 THE PROBLEM, THE PEOPLE, AND THE LEGIS-
LATURE 352
67 THE WABASH AND ERIE CANAL 355
68 THE SYSTEM OF 1836 360
69 CONSTRUCTION OF CANALS AND ROADS 366
70 THE SETTLEMENT WITH THE CREDITORS 378
71 FINISHING THE WABASH AND ERIE CANAL 385
CHAPTER XVII THE SECOND BANK OF IN- DIANA 394
72 CHARTERING THE BANK IN 1834 394
73 ORGANIZATION AND POLICY OF THE BANK 399
74 THE PANIC OF 1837 403
75 THE ERA OF FREE BANKS 408
76 BANK OF THE STATE OF INDIANA-THE
THIRD STATE BANK, 1855-1865 413
CHAPTER XVIII THE PIONEERS AND THEIR
SOCIAL LIFE 418
77 THE PEOPLE 418
78 HOME LIFE AND CUSTOMS 421 I
79 OCCUPATIONS 424 I
80 THE FIRST PUBLIC UTILITIES I
428
81 FESTIVALS AND FESTIVITIES 429 I
82 SICKNESS AND PHYSICIANS 432 I I
83 STATE CHARITIES 435
CHAPTER XIX THE MEXICAN WAR
438
84 TEXAS AND OREGON QUESTIONS 438
85 INDIANA MILITIA IN 1846 439
ix
TABLE OF CONTENTS
86 ORGANIZING THE INDIANA BRIGADE 441
87 CAMPAIGNING IN MEXICO 445
CHAPTER XX THE CONSTITUTIONAL CON-
VENTION OF 1850 450
88 EARLY AGITATION FOR REVISION 450
89 ORGANIZING THE CONVENTION 454
90 POLITICS OF THE CONVENTION 456
91
THE NEW CONSTITUTION
459
CHAPTER XXI POLITICS FROM 1840 TO 1852. 462
92 A BANKRUPT STATE 462
93 CAMPAIGN OF 1844 466
94 POLITICAL DEMORALIZATION 475
95 FREE SOILERS IN INDIANA, 1846 TO 1850 477
96
THE LAST STRUGGLE OF THE WHIG PARTY,
1852
484
BIBLIOGRAPHY 491
INDEX
503
MAPS
1 INDIANA TERRITORY, 1800 Frontispiece
2 THE FRENCH EXPLORERS 13
3 INDIANA COUNTIES, 1814 33
4 EXPEDITION OF CLARK 57
5 PROPOSED DIVISIONS OF THE NORTHWEST TERRI- TORY 75
6 THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY, 1795. 99
7 INDIANA TERRITORY, 1812. 211
8 THE INDIANS 241
9 RIVERS AND STREAMS OF INDIANA 267
10
INDIANA IN 1822
301
11 INDIAN CESSIONS 329 I 1
12 LAND SURVEYS 345
1 13 INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS 355
14 INDIANA IN 1833 401
15 INDIANA IN 1852 467
L-369341
A HISTORY OF INDIANA
CHAPTER I
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA, 1634-1763
§ 1 THE JESUITS PLAN A NATION OF CHRISTIAN INDIANS
THE first account of the extensive plains and prairies south of the Great Lakes was given to the world by the Jesuit missionaries to the Huron Indians. The history of Indiana may well begin by recounting the plans of these early Jesuits for forming a Christian Indian nation around the Great Lakes.
Inhabiting the Canadian peninsula extending down be- tween Lakes Huron and Erie and Ontario was an Indian population of from ten to twelve thousand souls. Along the southern shores of the lakes from Erie to the Mississippi river were situated numerous tribes more or less related to those in Canada ; so that within easy reach of Lake Huron, Lake Michigan, and Lake Superior there were not fewer than twenty-five thousand Indians. The Jesuits were the most advanced thinkers of that day. What visions they had of ideal government among this unspoiled Indian folk can- not be known. At one time they spoke of commerce and the expansion of France. At another, they expressed their view that if France was to become the ruler of this vast country and its simple folk, the seeds of French culture and patriotism should be implanted in the savage breast. In other letters they indulged the true Jesuit spirit that the church must outweigh the state in the hearts of the new people. At still other times they lamented the internal wars of the tribesmen and breathed a hope to see all of it disap-
2
HISTORY OF INDIANA
pear in an all-consuming love of God and the king. In vis- ion they saw the red men thoroughly Gallicized, imbued with French culture and patriotism, armed and officered by the French government, carrying the lilies of France in triumph over a continent won for civilization, the church, and the king. They may have indulged the more pacific dreams of Plato or More, or the unborn longings of Rous- seau. Whatever their thoughts and hopes, they perished with their authors in the Canadian wilderness.
The little band of Jesuits who accompanied the first French explorers to the regions of the upper St. Lawrence soon saw the advantages of the situation. During the win- ter of 1634, while the Jesuit Fathers were gathered in the residence of their superior, Father Le Jeune, at Quebec, the plans for this work were laid. Including Le Jeune, there were six of the Jesuit Fathers on the Huron mission. They were not at all discouraged by the difficulty of their undertaking, although they intended the conversion of a savage nation.1 Le Jeune wrote to his superior in France "the harvest is plentiful and the laborers few." They were not without the benefit of experience, for the father su- perior himself had been in Quebec several years acquainting himself with the Indians, teaching and converting their children. He had even spent a winter with the Indians in the forest, accompanying them on their hunting trips. He knew very well what life among them meant. The terror of the work, however, only made it the more inviting. The Jesuits began at once to learn the Huron language and to collect necessary materials for the work among the In- dians.
The distance from Quebec to the home of the Hurons was almost a thousand miles. After a tiresome journey of a month, poling their canoes up the Ottawa river, the fore- most priests reached the Huron villages on Thunder Bay. After they had spent five years in missionary work among the tribes, making regular rounds from town to town, they looked over the field as best they could and decided to make
1 Francis Parkman, The Jesuits in North America, 42 scq. See also Jesuit Relations, index, "Huron Mission."
3
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA
their mission home at St. Marie on the south side of Matche- dash Bay. A systematic organization of the tribes was perfected, and the calendar of the saints was drawn on for new names for the Indian villages. There were St. Ignace, St. John the Baptist, St. Joseph, St. Michael, St. Marie, St. Louis and St. Paul. When in 1649 everything seemed promising of success, the Iroquois, the ancient enemies of the Hurons, attacked them with customary fury. The Hu- ron nation was destroyed and with it went the dream of a Jesuit empire around the Great Lakes.
Jesuit priests continued to visit the western tribes for half a century, but few of them ever set foot on what is now the soil of Indiana. Within the next half century the Jesuit Fathers, Allouez, Dablon, and Marquettei, estab- lished important missions around the Great Lakes. Some of these priests may have crossed from the Kankakee to the St. Joseph river, in Indiana, on their way to the West, but no mission is known to have been established in Indiana at this early date.
§ 2 THE FUR TRADERS
IN the next period, 1650 to 1750, missionaries and fur- traders mingled together. It is always difficult to tell whether a post was established primarily as a mission or as a fur-trading station. The latter was not so much a place where furs were collected as a center from which agents visited the neighboring tribes to show the kettles, blankets, knives, and other articles of trade furnished by the French, and to encourage the Indians to carry their furs to the large posts on the lower St. Lawrence.
The annual trip of the Indians to Three Rivers, Quebec, or Montreal was full of danger. Usually two or three hun- dred warriors went together. They made the journey in June and July, going by way of Lake Nipissing and the Ottawa river to avoid the Iroquois tribes. Arriving near Quebec or Montreal, they landed, put up their tents, greased and painted their bodies, and assorted their goods prepara- tory to trading. Their goods consisted almost entirely of furs and tobacco. The second day was usually devoted to
4
HISTORY OF INDIANA
a formal council between the French officers and the chiefs. After the council, two more days were consumed in bar- tering. Some of the tribesmen were expert gamblers and tried their luck against the French; others, especially the Hurons, were said to have been skillful thieves. After the trading was all done, the French invited their visitors to a grand feast. Then followed a night of revelry, after which the Indians set out at dawn for their homes. In this way, no doubt, many of Indiana's native inhabitants visited the French on the lower St. Lawrence.
During the fall and winter seasons the trader spent his time, in part, among the Indians preparing for the harvest of furs in the spring. He was the leading man of the post or colony holding his commission directly from his king. He had money and influence at court. Around him was a nondescript body of hunters, soldiers, and adventurers, over whom he held nominal military power. With each band of fur gatherers there went a Jesuit, whose gentle influence it was that welded the strong friendships be- tween the French and Indians. It will be enough for our purpose if we describe the labors of one of these traders.
La Salle was a member of the well-known family of Caveliers of Rouen, France, the son of a wealthy burgher merchant. He was educated by the Jesuits, who then con- trolled the best schools in the world. A brother of his was a Sulpician priest in Canada. With what little pocket- money he could get, La Salle sailed for Canada, reaching Quebec in 1666, whence he went on immediately to Mon- treal, then little more than a mission of the Sulpicians. He acquired a large tract of land at what is now Lachine, at the head of the rapids, nine miles above Montreal. This place was well situated for the fur trade.
La Salle learned from the Seneca Indians that far to the west was a beautiful river flowing through the forest to join another great river which flowed far to the south and emptied into the Vermilion Sea. It did not take him long to make up his mind that here was a chance to serve his nation and also himself. This, he thought, was the river that would lead him to the South Sea and thus open a route
5
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA
to India. The governor and the priests of Canada were easily won over to the enterprise, especially since La Salle undertook to pay all expenses himself. For this purpose he sold his grant at Lachine.
By July 6, 1669, La Salle with twenty-four men in seven canoes was ready to start from Lachine. His men paddled the canoes up the St. Lawrence and into Lake Ontario. In thirty-five days from the time they left their camp they had reached a small bay on the south side of Lake Ontario near the mouth of the Seneca river. Here they left their boats, and went with some Seneca Indians to their village homes. The Senecas did not take kindly to La Salle's plan of going to the Ohio, and refused to show him the way. The latter went back to his canoes and continued westward on the lake to Niagara river. At an Indian village in this neighborhood he met a party of warriors returning with a Pottawattomie prisoner. This prisoner La Salle ransomed on his agreeing that he lead the Frenchman to the Ohio. Tradition has it that the party then came on southward from Lake Erie until they reached a branch of the Ohio. This stream they descended to its mouth; thence down the Ohio as far as the Falls at Louisville. Here La Salle's men deserted him and turned back to the east, leaving their captain alone to find his way back to Canada as best he could.
Having returned to the Great Lakes, La Salle is said by Margry to have sailed westward across Lake Erie, through the Detroit river, and Lake Huron, around to the southern point of Lake Michigan, to have crossed over to the Illinois river, followed it down to the Mississippi, and to have floated far enough down the Missisippi to assure himself that it emptied into the Gulf of Mexico. That he discovered the Ohio, there is little doubt; but of his early discovery of the Missisippi we cannot be sure.2 During the following six or seven years he does not seem to have been active. However, he never forgot the rivers he had seen or heard of
2 Winsor, Narrative and Critical History of America, IV, 201; Park, man, LaSalle and the Discovery of the Great West (index) ; Oscar J. Craig, Indiana Historical Society Publications, II, D. 7.
(2)
6
HISTORY OF INDIANA
and the opportunities they held for fur trade and coloniza- tion. Compared with the frozen wastes of Canada, the prairies and river bottoms of Ilinois and Indiana seemed fairyland. The road from Quebec, though, was too long and dangerous, so he planned to reach the new field by way of the Mississippi. By the year 1678 everything being in readiness he started west to open up the fur trade of upper Canada. While spending the following winter at Fronte- nac on Lake Ontario, he built a small ship called the Griffin. With this he sailed through Lake Erie and up the Detroit river, across Lake St. Clair into Lake Huron, through the Straits of Mackinac into Lake Michigan, landing in Sep- tember at Green Bay. The ship started back to Niagara. The explorers came on down to the southern shore of Lake Michigan and paddled around to the mouth of the St. Joseph river, which they called Miamis, reaching this place by November 1. Here, near the mouth of the river, they built a fort-the little Fort Miamis-while they were waiting for Lieutenant Henri de Tonty and his companions, who were coming overland.
December 3 the party, numbering twenty-eight, started in eight canoes for the Illinois country, going by way of the Kankakee portage. They ascended the St. Joseph of the Lakes until they reached the south bend, near where the city of South Bend now stands. They watched carefully for the portage path which they had been told was in that neighborhood and by which they hoped to reach the Illinois. Unfortunately while the Mohegan hunter was absent they passed this path without noticing it. While La Salle was on shore searching for it he became separated from his friends. Night came on bringing with it a snowstorm. Wrapped in their blankets the weary explorers lay down to sleep. Meanwhile their leader, hopelessly lost, found a grass bed, prepared by an Indian, and in that he passed the night. So fared these early white visitors to Indiana, the first of whom we have any clear and reliable account. At four o'clock the next day La Salle regained the river and soon found his men. The Indian guide who had meantime been hunting for the trail (which he finally found) had
7
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA
returned also and together they started on the portage path for the Kankakee, five miles distant. It did not take them long to reach the Kankakee, a narrow ribbon of water, flow- ing drowsily through the tufts of swamp grass, obstructed here and there with clusters of alder bushes and pools of still water. In this stream they launched their canoes and floated slowly westward toward the Illinois country. Game was scarce and provisions ran low. Finally, when almost exhausted they found a buffalo bull mired in the swamp. They killed him, dragged him out, and feasted. They then floated on down the river into the Illinois, and down that river until they came to a high cliff overlooking the left bank of the stream. Nearby was a large Indian town, but no Indians.
Here La Salle determined to build a fort and gather around him the Indian tribes of the region which now em- braces the greater part of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Ken- tucky. To this place he determined to transport his goods and establish a central trading station for all this western country. He could send his furs down the Mississippi river to the Gulf, and thence to France, while his goods to be used in traffic with the Indians could be brought back up the Mississippi in the returning boats. The site chosen was the favorite dwelling place of the Illinois Indians. In the vicinity were encamped the Peoria Indians, Miamis, Piankeshaws, Mascoutins, Weas and others from far and near. There were even refugee Abenakis from the forests of Maine, and Hurons from the lands beyond the Great Lakes. Most of these had been driven here by fear of the Iroquois. It is doubtful if a single Indian tribe at this time made its home in what is now Indiana through dread of those wide-ranging marauders, who had secured fire- arms from the Dutch at New York. La Salle went to work immediately to carry out his plans. He named his fort St. Louis in remembrance of his king, Louis XIV. He gathered furs during the winter, and sent them by different members of the party to Montreal. The faithless agents sold the furs, but never reported to their master. As La Salle was hastening back to Canada to ascertain the
8
HISTORY OF INDIANA
trouble, on the way he met a new commander, sent out by the governor of Canada to take possession of Fort St. Louis.
La Salle concealed his anger, went on to Canada, ar- ranged matters there, but when he returned he found his fort and village completely ruined. In the autumn of 1680 a war party of Iroquois, well armed, and led by a chief in a Jesuit robe, had conquered the Illinois town. The Indians themselves were saved through the tact and bravery of Tonty, the lieutenant of La Salle, but the town was utterly destroyed; so that when La Salle returned there were only enough traces remaining to show what had been the fury of its Iroquois destroyers. Thus was dispelled the dream of making a nation of fur-gatherers out of the western Indians.
The efforts of La Salle, however, did not end with this defeat. During the year 1682-3 he was again busy among the Indians of Indiana and Illinois trying to persuade them to settle once more around his fort. He even invited Indians from across the Mississippi to join him. Indiana was al- most deserted of her native population. But the failure of the plan was assured even before La Salle's death. Had it prospered, what later became the Northwest Territory would have become an immense fur-trading field with the Indians as the fur gatherers. After the downfall of La Salle, there was a general migration of the tribes, due to a weakening of French influence.
§ 3 LOUIS XIV AND THE MISSISSIPPI VALLEY
AT the opening of the eighteenth century, it seemed that France had a firm grip on the north central part of what is now the United States. She held its two natural highways, the Mississippi and St. Lawrence rivers; but there was a fatal weakness both in the north and south. The French were hindered in the navigation of the Missis- sippi by the hostile Chickasaws, who lived on the Vicksburg bluffs. On the other hand they were not able to pass the Niagara river, or the upper St. Lawrence, on account of the
.
9
THE FRENCH IN INDIANA
hostile Iroquois. Had it not been for these two tribes of Indians the history of the Northwest might have been different. Nevertheless the French king, Louis XIV, began at this time to take great interest in the Mississippi Valley. The country was divided between the governments at New Orleans and Quebec, the dividing line running east and west through central Indiana, near Terre Haute. A French explorer named D'Iberville, under instructions from Louis XIV, tried to carry out the scheme of La Salle by concen- trating the northwestern tribes on the Ohio, but this failed.
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