USA > Indiana > St Joseph County > A history of St. Joseph County, Indiana, Volume 1 > Part 7
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
eastern part of the county, which are 875 to 900 feet above the sea. The levels of the more important railway stations in the coun- ty show the following altitudes in feet, above tide: Osceola, 736; Mishawaka, 700 to 743; South Bend, 708 to 726; Notre Dame, 710; Warren, 730: Lakeville. 837; Walkerton, 711. In seeking for natural gas and oil at South Bend three wells were sunk into the rock. The following is the result of the borings of one of these wells. as given in the 18th report of the state geologist, showing the depth in feet of the drift and of the several layers of rock at this point. down to the Trenton rock : Drift. 160; Sub-carboniferous and Devonian. 220; Corniferons, 60; Lower Hei- derberg, 40: Niagara, 640; Clinton, 60 ( ?) ; Hudson River, 200: Utica shales, 200; Tren- ton Limestone, 427. Total depth of well, 2,027. No gas or oil.
The drift over about one-half of the county is a gravel plain, formed, as we have seen, by the outwash from the ice-sheet. In the northwestern part of the county the outwash is from the Michigan moraine, and the plain descends from 800 feet at the border of the moraine to 725 at the Kankakee flats. In the southwestern part of the county the out- wash is westward from the moraine of the Maumee lobe, and there is a similar descent from the moraine to the Kankakee valley. In the northeastern part of the county there is an extensive gravel plain along the St. Joseph river. The southeastern part of the county is occupied by a till, or elay. plain, which borders on the Manmee moraine on the east.
St. Joseph county contains an area of abont four hundred and seventy-seven square miles, the surface of which is diversified hy prairies, marshes, oak-openings and rolling timber lands. The oak-openings are covered with a light sandy soil. excellently suited to the raising of small fruits and vegetables. The timber lands possess a subsoil of clay. covered with a rich dark soil, which yields all the eereals in abundance. The prairies,
both old and young, for the marshes and beds of former lakes are but incipient prai- ries, have the richest and most productive soils, and are nnexcelled for the raising of all farm produce, except wheat, which winter- kills on the lowest grounds. No prairies in the world are more beautiful or fertile than those of St. Joseph county. The finest and largest of these is Terre Coupee, in Olive township. over six miles in length, east and west, by four or five miles, north and south. Others are: Portage Prairie, in German town- ship; Palmer Prairie, in Center township; Sumption Prairie, in Greene township; and Harris Prairie, in Harris township. The flood valley of the Kankakee is itself a prairie of the richest and fairest promise, though as yet not fully reclaimed. No more varied, richer or more beautiful farm lands exist anywhere than in this good county of St. Joseph.
IX. LAKES OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
The lakes of St. Joseph county, as said by Prof. Blatchley, in his report as state geolo- gist for the year 1900, are small in size, and most of them rapidly becoming extinct. De- posits of marl are found near and under many of them: not generally, however, of good workable area and thickness.
Among the most beautiful and noted of our lakes are Chain and Bass lakes, in Warren township, a few miles west of South Bend. The marl beds in and around these lakes cover nearly three hundred and fifty acres. Their sparkling waters have always been fa- vorite resorts for boating and fishing. They were dear to the Indian long before the com- ing of the white man. Near by, to the east of these lakes, at Mount Pleasant, on Portage Prairie, stood the historic village of the Miamis, famous in story and song, where the treaty with LaSalle was made in 1681.
The Lakes of Notre Dame, already men- tioned. lie northwest of and near to the Uni- versity, and about two miles northeast of South Bend. St. Joseph's. the upper lake. has an area of about sixty-five acres, and a
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IHISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
maximum depth, on the west side, of twenty- five feet. The water area of St. Mary's, the lower lake, is a little more than thirty acres. The two lakes are separated by a stretch of low ground containing ten or more acres, in the midst of which is a small gravel island rising to a level with the uplands surround- ing the lakes. In the past the lowland was covered with water, and there was but one lake, with the island in the middle. There is a marl deposit in and about these lakes which is of especial interest from the eireum- stance that it furnished the earbonate of lime material for the first, and for more than twenty years the only, Portland cement fac- tory in Indiana. At St. Mary's lake the water deepens abruptly and elose to the shore. The marl extends baek several rods from shore. Under both lakes, it is elaimed that the marl has an average thickness of more than thirty feet.
Clear lake and Mud lake lie on and just south of the Michigan-Indiana state line, about eight miles northwest of South Bend, the northern two-thirds of Clear lake being in Michigan, and the remainder in Warren township, this county. . There is no workable marl deposit at these lakes. Clear lake fur- nishes a typical example of a lake whose water area has been encroached upon by de- caying vegetation until the lake has become almost extinet. In 1880. according to the testimony of persons living in the vicinity, the entire basin of the lake. eighty acres or more, was covered with water to a depth of twenty to thirty feet. There was then no aquatic vegetation except along the south shore. Now the southern half is a vast morass of muek and spatterdock, with water nowhere more than six inches in depth. The western margin for one-third the distance across the lake is similarly filled. Many floating islands, or moving morasses of muck, rise nearly to the surface in other parts of the lake, so that its elear water area is but little over fifteen aeres, and its deepest water only about twelve feet. A fine wooded ridge, with a gravely margin, rises twenty or more feet high along the north half of the east side.
The banks on the northwest are lower, while the southern shores are marshy. Game fish is abundant. The high banks of Clear lake are the resort of numerous pleasure parties in the summer; one of the most enjoyable being the annual picnic of the old settlers of St. Joseph county, Indiana. and Berrien coun- ty, Michigan.
No one who has not visited a lake like this can realize how varied the kind and how abundant the individuals of plant life that can flourish in water. It is one of the best examples at present in Indiana of a dying lake,-an incipient marsh. ITere one can see in actual progress many of those intermediate stages and processes which in time change a body of fresh water into a body of land.
The northern edge of the basin of former Mud lake lies south of the basin of Clear lake about one-third of a mile. Its former water area was over three hundred acres and its outline very irregular. It has now be- come a vast marsh, with not more than thirty acres of water, and that shallow and occupy- ing two or three small isolated areas. The vegetation, however, is not nearly so dense or so varied as that at Clear lake.
Goose lake, ealled also Sousley's lake, lies a little over two miles north of the town of North Liberty. It is surrounded by low ground, and formerly ineluded what is now ealled Little lake. The total area, ineluding marsh and the surface of both lakes, is about four hundred acres. Goose lake now has an area of forty or fifty acres, and Little lake abont thirty aeres. Goose lake is very shal- low, Little lake somewhat deeper. The sur- rounding bluffs are generally rather abrupt and fifteen to twenty feet high. There is an extensive deposit of marl in and about the lakes, but it is deeply covered over by muck.
Rupel's lake is a small body of water, lying southeast of North Liberty. It is shallow and mostly surrounded by flat marshy land. with beds of marl beneath. Other small bodies of water are Pleasant lake and Riddle's lake. in Union township, south of Lakeville: Whar- ton lake and Duck lake, in Greene township : and Fish lake, in Warren township.
CHAPTER II.
EARLY HISTORY.
I. MARQUETTE.
Sec. 1 .- FIRST FOOTPRINTS .- The annals of St. Joseph county reach further back into the shadowy realms of romance and tradition than do those of any other county in the state of Indiana. The landscape of this coun- ty was the first in Indiana to be looked upon by the eye of the white man, and its soil was the first to receive the impression of the white man's foot. As in case of many other localities in the state, it is not a question alto- gether free from doubt as to when civilized man first walked over our valleys and uplands and gazed upon the sparkling waters of our lakes and rivers; yet, while it must be ad- mitted that the evidence is slight, neverthe- less it is the opinion of many of the most trustworthy authorities that such evidence as we have is sufficient to show that in the month of May, 1675, Father James Marquette, the intrepid Jesuit missionary explorer, dur- ing his last illness and a little before his death, journeyed up the winding Kankakee to a point a little below the limits of the present city of South Bend. The tradition is that his faithful Indians carried his frail bark and guided his feeble footsteps from that point along the ancient Portage, to the St. Joseph, then the River of the Miamis, upon whose crystal waters he floated down to Lake Michigan. It seems a benediction for all time that this saintly hero should thus, in his last hours upon earth, have passed along our rivers and walked upon our soil, drinking of
the sweet waters of our valleys and breathing the airs that we breathe. As he moved by the well-worn trail across the highlands of Portage Prairie he must have looked into the valley where the busy city of South Bend now flourishes, and over the wooded plains beyond the St. Joseph where the sun-lit towers of Notre Dame and St. Mary's appear upon the distant landscape. Father Marquette represented in himself enterprise, heroism, love of God and a love of human kind. Are these high attributes, so strikingly manifested by our people to-day, the blessed heritage of that far off day ?
Sec. 2 .- ROUTES OF TRAVEL .- It was by way of the Sault de Ste. Marie (The Falls of St. Mary's River) and the straits of Mackinaw that the French reached the Northwest from Canada. In 1641 the first Canadian envoys met the western Indians at the Sault. It was not, however, until 1659 that any of the ad- venturons fur traders spent a winter on the shores of the northern lakes, nor till 1660 that the devotion of the missionaries, led by Father Mesnard, caused the first station to be established. Five years later, in 1665, Father Claude Allouez built the earliest of the lasting habitations of the white men among the kindly and hospitable Indians of the northern lakes. In 1668, came Fathers Claude Dablon and James Marquette and founded the mission at the Sault. Two years afterwards, in 1670, Nicholas Perrot, as agent for Talon, the Intendant of Canada, explored
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
Lake Michigan" as far as Chicago; and in 1671 formal possession was taken of the Northwest by French officers in the presence of Indians assembled from the surrounding regions. In the same year Marquette gath- ered a little flock of listeners at Point St. Ignaee, on the mainland west of Mackinae Island. In 1673, two years after the found- ing of the mission at St. Ignace, Marquette, with the sanction and active aid of Talon, the far-seeing intendant of Canada. began prep- arations for his long contemplated exploration to the west of Lake Michigan. He wished to establish missions for the conversion of the Indians living along the borders of the great river running to the south, the existence of which was reported by the Indians and which was believed to flow either into the Gulf of Mexico or into the Pacific Ocean. The gov- ernment sent Louis Joliet, a merchant of Quebec, and five boatmen to accompany him. On the 13th of May, 1673, the little band of seven left Michilimackinac in two bireh bark canoes. They proceeded across the head of Lake Michigan into and through Green Bay and thenee up the Fox river to an In- dian village where Father Allonez had preached to the Miami, Mascouten and Kiek- apoo tribes. From this village they crossed the portage to the Wisconsin river, down which they floated to the Mississippi, which was thus discovered June 17th, 1673.6
Another route to the west, which was used by the Indians and by the early explorers, was from the stations at the head of the lakes down by the west shore of Lake Michi- gan to the Chicago river; thence up that river and by the portage to the Illinois river, and so down to the Mississippi. A third route was along the eastern or western shore of Lake Michigan to the mouth of the River of the Miamis, or St. Joseph, and up that river to the portage at South Bend; thenee down
a. For a time known as Lake of the Illinois, from the Indians of that name, and also as the Lake of the Dauphin, in honor of the heir to the French throne.
b. Perkins' Annals of the West, St. Louis, 1851.
the Kankakee and Illinois to the Mississippi. It is said that there is a southern current along the west shore of Lake Michigan and a northern current along the east shore; and, consequently, that the voyage down the lake and to the west was usually taken by the Chicago portage, while the return journey from the Illinois country was more often taken by the portage of the Kankakee and the St. Joseph.
There was also a route to the west by Lake Erie, the Maumee river and the portage to the Wabash. and so on to the Ohio and the Mississippi. It is believed LaSalle knew of this route in his earlier explorations of the west, and that he was the discoverer of the Ohio and the Wabash. This Maumee route was, however. for a long time unsafe by rea- son of the incursions of the Iroquois from New York. The route was afterwards adopted as the main highway of civilized commerce to the Southwest. the Wabash and Erie Canal having been constructed over the old portage. The canal fell into disuse only on the build- ing of our modern railroads.
After the discovery of the upper Missis- sippi by Marquette, in 1673, and his return to St. Ignace, he went again to the Illinois Indians, at their urgent solicitation, and es- tablished missions among them, where he toiled until the failure of his health, in 1675. He then started on his return to the mission at St. Ignace, near the island of Mackinac, proceeding, as it is believed, by the more easy and direct way of the Kankakee and St. Jo- seph, and so passing through the whole length of our county, as already related. After en- tering Lake Michigan on this journey, he went along the eastern shore of the lake as far as the little river which bears his name: on the banks of which, worn out with his labors, he died, May 18, 1675, at the age of thirty-eight years. Two years afterwards his affectionate Indians came down the lake in a fleet of eanoes and reverently bore his body to his beloved St. Ignace, where it was finally laid to rest. and where a suitable monument was
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
erected to his memory on the two hundredth anniversary of the discovery of the upper Mississippi. The state of Wisconsin has caused the statue of Marquette to be placed in the Capitol at Washington as that of one of the great men of the West.
Sec. 3 .- HISTORICAL DATA .- While, as al- ready intimated, the writers on our early his- tory are not in agreement on the point, yet there is good authority, as there are also satisfactory reasons, in support of the per- sistent belief that the great discoverer made his last journey from the west by the ancient route through our own county, so well known to his devoted Indian friends, and which had been used by Indian and Mound Builder for hundreds, perhaps thousands. of years, in their annual journeys between the Mississippi and the lakes. This is the opinion of the eminent historian. John Gilmary Shea. who says that on this occasion Marquette "seems to have taken the way by the St. Joseph river and reached the eastern shore of Lake Michi- gan. "'a
Bishop Bruté also, who in 1834 became the first bishop of Vincennes, says in his writings, as quoted by Henry S. Canthorn, himself an honored member of an old Vincennes family. that "the St. Josepht portage was used by Father Marquette long before LaSalle and Hennepin passed through that portage." The saintly bishop further says, as also quoted in Mr. Canthorn's exceedingly interesting his- tory of his native city, that, very early in their missionary career in the Northwest, "Fathers Marquette and Allouez passed through that portage on their way to the Oubasche country."> Bishop Brute was a native of France; and it is reasonable to believe that during the years while he was
a. "Discovery and exploration of the Mississ- ippi Valley." See also "The St. Joseph-Kankakee Portage," by George A. Baker; and "La Salle in the Valley of the St. Joseph," by Charles H. Bartlett and Richard H. Lyon. And see Cowles' Hist. Berrien County, Mich., 1871, p. 27.
b. Hon. Henry S. Cauthorn, former speaker of the Indiana House of Representatives. History of the City of Vincennes, p. 63.
in charge of the diocese of Vincennes he be- came well acquainted with the old French families of the city and the neighboring towns, and with their histories and traditions : and that he also familiarized himself with the records of the missions, all of which were written in his native language. From the his- tory of Father Gibault, the friend of George Rogers Clark. we know that the missions of Kaskaskia. Cahokia and other Illinois settle- ments were closely associated with the mission at Vincennes. Mr. Cauthorn, as quoted by William H. English, tells us that the same missionaries often served at Kaskaskia and Vincennes : that the church records show many intermarriages: and that there was fre- quent intercommunication between the two places.ª As Marquette was himself in charge of those Illinois missions during the last years of his life, we can well understand that what Bishop Bruté has told us of the great mis- sionary and his journey has in it something of the certainty of contemporary history. Mr. Canthorn, former speaker of the Indiana house of representatives, who was one of the inost distinguished sons of the old city. and who gave years of devoted study to her early history, says that "It is well known that he [Marquette] left the Jesuit mission at Kas- kaskia a sick and worn out man in conse- quence of his labors and exposure, to return to St. Ignace. a few days after Easter, 1675. On this. his final trip, he traveled by way of the St. Joseph portage." These statements by Bishop Brute and Henry S. Canthorn, who had such unequaled opportunities to discover the facts of our early French history, are entitled to the greatest respect. So also is the guarded opinion expressed by John Gil- mary Shea. With the exception of Francis Parkman. if indeed Parkman be an exception. there is no historian who. from painstaking research, had acquired a more intimate knowl- edge of the early history of the northwest. or
a. William H. English, Conquest of the North- west, Vol. 1, pp. 288-292.
b. Cauthorn Hist. Vincennes, p. 65.
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
who was more careful in his statement of facts, than Mr. Shea. It seems, then, reason- able to conelnde that Marquette erossed our portage in 1675, and that he was therefore the first white man to visit the territory now comprising the county of St. Joseph.
II. LA SALLE.
Sec. 1 .- PREPARATIONS. - Marquette and Joliet explored the Mississippi from the mouth of the Wisconsin to a point below the month of the Arkansas; and then returned in their frail canoes, having beeome satisfied that the great river emptied into the gulf of Mexico. The report of this achievement fired the imagination of the people of all Canada. and of France itself. René Robert Cavelier. Sieur de La Salle, a native of Normandy, had emigrated to Canada from France, in 1666. In 1669 he set out upon a tour of western exploration. in the course of which he is be- lieved to have discovered the Ohio river and to have followed its course down below the mouth of the Wabash. He now became am- bitions to follow in the footsteps of Marquette and Joliet and to perfect the discoveries so well begun by them. He went to Frontenac, then governor-general of Canada, and laid before him his plan for the establishment of a French empire in the west by connecting Canada and the Gulf of Mexico by a series of posts and forts from the great lakes down to the mouth of the Mississippi. The scheme was worthy the mind of a statesman and was at once accepted by Frontenac, who advised La Salle to proceed to Franee and obtain for his projeet the sanetion and patronage of Lonis XIV, then king. and of Colbert, his minister of finance and marine. Colbert and the king approved La Salle's plan of empire. He was made a chevalier and given command of the then frontier post of Fort Frontenac. This fort. named after the governor-general, was situated near the east end of Lake On- tario, at the head of the St. Lawrence river. on the site of the present city of Kingston. A fort had already been built at the locality.
but had fallen into negleet. It was to be re- built by La Salle and made the base of his operations. He returned from France in high spirits and labored until the close of 1677 in the rebuilding and strengthening of the fort. He then went to France again and obtained additional favors and assistance from the gov- ernment. On September 15th, 1678, La Salle, with his lieutenant, Henry de Tonti. an Ital- ian, and thirty men, arrived at Quebee. and in a few days proceeded to Fort Frontenac. There he was joined by Father Louis Henne- pin, who was to become the principal his- torian of the proposed expedition, and who afterwards, nnder La Salle's direction, be- came an extensive explorer and discoverer himself.
See. 2 .- ON THE GREAT LAKES .- On No- vember 18th. 1678, La Salle embarked in a lit- tle vessel, to cross Lake Ontario froni Fronte- nac to Niagara Falls. This is said to have been the first ship that sailed upon this inland sea. The winter following and the first part of the year 1679 was employed in the fur trade with the Indians and in construeting a vessel on Niagara river. This vessel was named the Griffin and was the first to navigate the upper lakes. On the 7th of August they set sail. passed through Lake Erie, by the straits, Lake St. Clair and Lake Huron, to Michilimack- inae, where they arrived on the 27th of the month. A fort was constructed at this point. and La Salle went with the Griffin to Green Bay for a load of pelts gathered there for him by the Indians. The vessel was sent back to Niagara with her precious cargo, and with instructions to exchange the furs for supplies needed for the expedition.
While waiting for the return of the Griffin La Salle and his party made preparations to proceed to the south end of the lake where he proposed to erect a fort and fix permanent headquarters. The eanoes were divided into two fleets, one of which started ahead under La Salle himself, while the other was to follow under command of Tonti. The meeting place was to be at the mouth of the River of the
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HISTORY OF ST. JOSEPH COUNTY.
Miamis, afterwards named the St. Joseph. Here, after establishing a strong post to se- cure the future safety of the enterprise, they would await the coming of the Griffin. La Salle, eoasting the western and southern shores of Lake Michigan, arrived at the river on November 1, 1679; and during that month built his fort on a high point between the lake and the river, where the city of St. Joseph now stands. He named the post FORT MIAMIS. Tonti, coming by the eastern shore of the lake, arrived towards the end of the month.ª
See. 3 .- THIE PORTAGE OF THE ST. JOSEPH. -That La Salle should have selected the route by the St. Joseph for his first memorable expedition to the west, makes it evident that this route, and the portage by the Kankakee, were, even then, well known to the French missionaries and explorers. If Marquette, but a little more than three years previous, had chosen the same route on his last journey from the Mississippi, it is not hard to under- stand that La Salle should have followed his example. The building of the fort, even be- fore sailing up the river, is proof of La Salle's confidence in the feasibility of reaching the Mississippi in this way. He must have had full and aeeurate knowledge of the St. Joseph and the Kankakee and of the portage conneet- ing them. There can be no doubt that Mar- quette, who had a genius for geographical investigation and who had passed the last years of his life in the missions to the Illinois Indians, was familiar with all the routes from
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