USA > Indiana > Elkhart County > A standard history of Elkhart County, Indiana : an authentic narrative of the past, with particular attention to the modern era in the commercial, industrial, educational, civic and social development, Volume I > Part 3
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Sensibaugh, Engenius M., 773
Shafer, J. W., 229
Sharith Israel, Goshen, 296
Stauffer, Harlan A., 153
Stauffer, John P., 723
Stephens, Henry E., 659
Stephens, Jerome C., 598
Stephenson, W. L., 275 Stevens, Mrs. Margaret, 312 Stevenson, Amasa H., 917
Stilson, Abner, 242, 251
Stonex, Wilber L., 87, 88, 164
Stonex, Mrs. Wilber L., 267
Stoops, C. R., 383 Strasburg, J. M., 317
Schauble, Gotlieb, 232
Schmidt, J. H., 294
Schools (see educational), 101
Schutt, Jackson E., 489
Schwalm, H. M., 39I
Schweitzer, Casper, 504
Schwin, Payson E., 663
Scofield, L. T., 292 Scoles, S. LeRoy, 390
Secret and benevolent societies, Elk- hart, 349
Seidel, William F., 514
Starr, William M., 278
State Bank of Goshen, 282
State, James H., 357
Statue of Dr. Havilah Beardsley (view), 320 Stauffer, Amos, 473
Shaver, William F., 843
Sheep, 94 Sidway, Charles A., 368
Sidway Mercantile Company, Elk- hart, 365 Simmons, A. W., 230
Simon, Charles F., 239 Simonton, A. P., 307 Simonton, D. S., 160
Simonton, Lawrence R., 628 Simpson Memorial M. E. Church, Elkhart, 344
INDEX . xxvii
Strubler Computing Scale Company, Typical Old Sawmill, Elkhart (view), Elkhart, 373 Studebaker, Jacob, 78 201 Typical Pioneer Cabin-Exterior and Interior (view), 180
Stump, Jonathan, 885 Stutz, Christian, 394
Sunderman, M. F., 335
Swart, Charley, 674
Swart, Gilbert D., 232
Swart, Jelle K., 691
Vail, Jacob J., 229
Vail, Jesse D., 195, 206, 401
Vail, Lou W., 148, 282
Vallette, William O., 499 Valparaiso moraine, 31 Van Doran, Lorenzo D., 625
Vanfleet, John M., 14I VanFleet, Vernon W., 358
Tarman, Grover C., 683
Taylor, William B., 251
Teachers' Institutes, 118, 120, 122
Tecumseh, 17, 18, 19, 21 Teed, Minnie S., 848
Teters, Benjamin F., 125, 909
Test, Charles H., 137 The County Infirmary (view), 82 The 1870 Courthouse Before Re- modeling (view), 80 The Present Postoffice (view), 252
Thiers, Fred O., 467 Thomas, D. W., 318
Thomas, Freemont, 666
Thomas, Scott W., 733
Thomas, Thomas, 136
Thomas, William A., 136, 282
Wagner, John H., 384
Wagner, William, 766
Waldschmidt, Julius M., 229, 235
Walker, Orange, 392
Walker, Edward W., 49I
Walker, F. A., 395
Walter, Jacob B., 734
Walters, J. S., 384
Wakarusa-Mount Olive postoffice, 388; platted, 389: the present vil- lage, 390; churches, 391 ; the news- paper and banks, 391 Wakarusa Tribune, 391
Walburn, Robert H., 379
Waterford Mills, 107
Walk, J. B., 243
Walley, Charles E., 546
Waltz, J. K., 317
Wambaugh, Harvey, 528
Washington township, 70 Watchtower Church of the Evangeli- cal Association, 335 Weaver, Abraham E., 88, 125, 944
Weaver, Daniel, 308 Weicksel, L. M. C., 296
Turner, Porter D .. 308
Weinstein, Harris, 296
Turner, Perry L .. 837
Turnock, Enos H., 899
Ulery, Anan, 690 Union township, 71
Swart, John N., 462
Swartz, T. B., 318
Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Trin- ity Church, Elkhart, 341 Sykes, Henry B., 308, 699 Sykes, Walter A., 701
Vannuys, E. A., 291 Vannuys, Hervey L., 288, 417
Venamon, W. H., 234
Vernon, O. C., 695 View on Main Street, Goshen (view), 271 Views on Elkhart River (view), 34 Violett, Isaiah, 688
Violett, John H., 63, 87, 190, 193, 197 Vistula, 403 Volkmann, C. D., 379
Wabash Company, 173
Wabash Road, 166
Wadleigh, George T. R., 25I
Wagner, Albert, 768
Thomas, William H., 87, 88, 136, 354 Thompson, John E., 75, 81, 87, 187, 230
Thompson, Mark B., 187 Thompson, Nathaniel, 81
Thompson, Otis, 308 Thompson, Otis D., 357 Throop, Samuel B., 51I
Tinstman, Albert B., 795
Titus, M. O., 394
Toledo & Chicago Air Line Railway Company, 173 Tonti, 6 Tousley, Hiram S., 14I Township libraries, 115 Townsend D. B., 231 Townsend. H. B., 333
Trinity Evangelical Lutheran
Church. Goshen, 294 Troyer, Daniel J., 87 Truth Publishing Company, 375
Tucker, Alha M., 234, 308, 934 Tuffts, William, 224 Turner, A. A., 344
Weis, Joseph, 617 Weldy, Amos. 725
xxviii
INDEX
Weldy, Henry, 798
Weldy, Jacob B., 751
Weldy, Jacob I., 871
Winterhoff, Hugo, 451
Werner, Calvin, 792
Wirley, John R., 655
Western Rubber Company, 274
Wisler, Isaac S., 775
Weston, John, 313
Women's Clubs, Goshen, 303 Women's Clubs, Elkhart, 358
Weyburn, George W., 254
Weyrick, Arthur E., 874
Wood, Ed. J., 232 Wood, I. O., 262, 281, 282
Whitehead, Melvin B., 468
Wood, Mrs. I. O., 267
White, John C., 332
Woodbridge, Enoch, 187, 392
White, Laura Fell, 267
Woods, W. A., 141, 235, 248
Whitmer, Harry R., 446
Wickwire, Frank W., 90I
Woolverton, Jackson, 389
Wiggers, J. A., 318
Work, James A., Jr., 602
Wilder, John J., 229
Wright, Enoch, 187, 309
Wildermuth, William. 335 Wildman, W. D., 234
Wysong, Daniel, 865
. Willard, Ellen B., 543 Willard, E. R., 295 Willard, R., 88
Yarian, Jonathan J., 756
Willard, Stanford, 848
Yoder, A. B., 391
Willson, Fred E., 644
Yoder, John, 385
Wilson, Edward R., 141
Yoder, Levi W., 386
Wilson, Henry D., 141, 243
Yoder, Samuel, 345, 385, 443
Wilfore, Irving A., 459
York township, 72, 106
Williams, Craton U., 631
Young, Samuel T., 253
Williams, Gustav P., 341
Young, Virgil 307
Winchester, Charles H., 374 Winder L. B., 402
Ziesel, Conrad, Tr., 349
Winey, August G., 470
Zigler, Edward B., 570
Zimmerman, Erastus R .. 564
Winey, Austin B., 470 Winey Brothers, 469
Zook, Aaron S., 125. 147
Winey, Harvey, 470
Zook, H. E., 383
Whitaker, Eli, 657
Woods, William A. (portrait), 140
Widner, Sylvester A., 704
Worden, James L., 14I
Wright, Henry C., 307
Wysong, Milton, 125
Winona Interurban Railway, 176 Winship, William H., 358, 456
History of Elkhart County
CHAPTER I
THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND
FOOTPRINTS OF LA SALLE-IROQUOIS ATTACK THE ILLINOIS AT STARVED ROCK-INDIAN LEAGUE ORGANIZED BY LA SALLE- VINCENNES AND THE OTHER FRENCH SETTLEMENTS-FORT CHARTRES BUILT-SURRENDERED TO BRITISH-WHOLESALE FRENCH MIGRATION-CLARK AS FATHER OF AMERICAN NORTH- WEST-COUNTY OF ILLINOIS ERECTED-ORGANIZATION OF THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY-DIVISIONS OF THE NORTHWEST TERRI- TORY-INDIANA TERRITORY DIVIDED -- THE LORDS OF THE SOIL DISPOSSESSED-FOUNDING OF PROPHET'S TOWN-HARRISON AND TECUMSEH TO "FIGHT IT OUT"-BATTLE AT PROPHET'S TOWN- THE WAR OF 1812-THE HARRISON CAMPAIGNS-THE PUBLIC LAND SURVEY-ORGANIZATION OF THE STATE-DEVELOPMENT OF STATE AND FORMATION OF COUNTIES.
The steps which approach the creation of Elkhart County, passing along wide sweeps of history, commence to fall nearly three centuries before its geographical limits were defined. In 154I De Soto ascended the Mississippi from the south and pen- etrated the country to a point considerably above the mouth of the Arkansas, laying the groundwork of French Louisiana, and during the first third of the seventeenth century the Catholic orders of France established missions among the Indians of the Upper Lake region. Later, the fur traders and the Jesuits cooperated, and Mar- quette loomed as the great figure of the Catholic Church in the Northwest. In 1675 he died quietly and piously on the shores of Lake Michigan.
Vol. I-1
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
LA SALLE IN THE LAKE REGION
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
FOOTPRINTS OF LA SALLE
It was La Salle, however, who was to leave his footprints, faint though they be, upon the history of Northern Indiana and the valley of the St. Joseph. Both Priest and Cavalier were of the real nobility, and Rene Robert Cavelier Sieur de la Salle was to follow in the footsteps, perfect the discoveries of Father Jacques Marquette, and broaden the scope of New France. In 1669, six years before the death of Marquette, excited by the reports of the Indians in regard to a river which rose in the country of the Senecas and flowed to the sea, he started with a party of twenty- four maintained at his own expense, on a tour of discovery. After overcoming the most vexatious difficulties, he reached the Ohio and descended it to the falls. Returning to his trading post of LaChine, and pondering his plan of discovering a new route to China and the East, he was startled by the reports of Marquette and Joliet. This seemed, to his eager mind, the first step toward the realization of his dream, and centering everything in the enterprise, he sold his property and hastened to France, where he secured loans of money, and prepared to carry out his plans upon a large scale. Constructing a large vessel-the Griffin-he set out with a party of thirty men and three monks, August 7, 1679, for the scene of Marquette's discoveries. He first conceived the idea of securing the country, thus discovered, by a series of forts, which should form a barrier to resist the encroachments of the English, who were gaining a strong hold on the Atlantic border. This received the encouragement and aid of Frontenac, who was then Governor General of Canada, and, rebuilding Fort Frontenac as a base of operations, he set sail for Lake Michigan. Arriving at Green Bay, he loaded his vessel with furs and sent it, under the care of a pilot and fourteen sailors, on its return voyage. Waiting there for the Griffin's return until forced to give it up in despair, he set out with canoes to pursue his enter- prise, and landed at St. Joseph. Following the river bearing the same name, he reached the Kankakee by a short portage, and passed down that river to the Illinois. Marquette's mission had been established near the present site of Utica, in La Salle County, Illinois. There, in December, 1669, La Salle found an Indian town of 460 lodges temporarily deserted, and, passing on to where the city of Peoria now is, found another village of about eighty lodges, where he landed, and soon established amicable and permanent
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
relations. With the consent of the tribes, La Salle soon built the fort of Crevecoeur, a half a league below, and then early in March of 1680, set out for Fort Frontenac, in Westen New York, and thence to Montreal to repair the loss of his vessel, the Griffin.
IROQUOIS ATTACK THE ILLINOIS AT STARVED ROCK
In the meanwhile the Jesuit faction, engaged in fierce competition with him in securing the peltry trade of the Indians and jealous of La Salle's success, and the English of the Atlantic border, united in stirring up the Iroquois to assault La Salle's Illinois allies in his absence. "Suddenly," says Parkman, "the village was awakened from its lethargy as by the crash of a thunderbolt. A Shawanoe, lately here on a visit, had left his Illinois friends to return home. He now reappeared, crossing the river in hot haste with the an- nouncement that he had met on his way an army of Iroquois approaching to attack them. All was panic and confusion. The lodges disgorged their frightened inmates; women and children screamed; startled warriors snatched their weapons. There were less than five hundred of them, for the greater part of the young men had gone to war." There Tonti, La Salle's able lieutenant, left in charge of the fort, found himself weakened by the early desertion of most of his force, and now, an object of suspicion to his allies, in an awkward and dangerous predicament. Undaunted by the untoward circumstances, he joined the Illinois, and when the Iroquois came upon the scene, in the midst of the savage melee, faced the 580 warriors and declared that the Illinois were under the protection of the French king and the governor of Canada, and demanded that they should be left in peace, backing his words with the statement that there were 1,200 of the Illinois and sixty French- men across the river. These representations had the effect of checking the ardor of the attacking savages, and a temporary truce was effected. It was evident that the truce was but a ruse on the part of the Iroquois to gain an opportunity to test the truth of Tonti's statements, and no sooner had the Illinois retired to their village on the north side of the river than numbers of the invading tribes, on the pretext of seeking food, crossed the river and gathered in increasing numbers about the village. The Illinois knew the design of their foe too well, and, hastily embarking, they set fire to their lodges, and retired down the river, when the whole band of
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
Iroquois crossed over and finished their work of havoc at their leisure. The Illinois, in the meanwhile, lulled into a false security, divided into small bands in search of food. One of the tribes, the Tamoroas, "had the fatuity to remain near the mouth of the Illinois, where they were assailed by all the force of the Iroquois. The men fled, and very few of them were killed, but the women and children were captured to the number, it is said, of seven hundred," many of whom were put to death with horrible tortures. Soon after the retreat of the Illinois, the Iroquois discovered the deception of the Frenchmen, and only the wholesome fear they had of the French governor's power restrained their venting their rage upon Tonti and his two or three companions. As it was, they were dismissed, and bidden to return to Canada.
INDIAN LEAGUE ORGANIZED BY LA SALLE
It was in the wake of these events that La Salle returned in the winter of 1680 and found this once populous village devastated and deserted, surrounded by the frightful evidences of savage car- nage. Disheartened but not cast down, he at once set about re- pairing his fortune. Discerning at once the means and object of his enemies, he set about building up a bulwark to stay a second assault. Returning to Fort Miami on the St. Joseph, by the borders of Lake Michigan, he sought to form a defensive league among the Indians whom he proposed to colonize on the site of the de- stroyed village of the Illinois. He found ready material at hand in remnants of tribes fresh from fields of King Philip's war; he visited the Miamis and by his wonderful power won them over to his plans; and then in the interval, before the tribes could arrange for their emigration, he launched out with a few followers and hurriedly explored the Mississippi to the Gulf. Returning to Michilimackinac in September 1682, where he had found Tonti in May of the previous year, La Salle, after directing his trusty lieu- tenant to repair to the Illinois, prepared to return to France for further supplies for his proposed colony, but learning that the Iroquois were planning another incursion, he returned to the site of the destroyed village and with Tonti began, in December, 1682, to build the fort of St. Louis, on the eminence which is now known in history as "Starved Rock." Thus the winter passed, and in the meanwhile, La Salle found employment for his active mind in
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
conducting the negotiations which should result in reconciling the Illinois and the Miamis and in cementing the various tribes into a harmonious colony. The spring crowned his efforts with complete success. "La Salle looked down from his rocks on a concourse of wild human life. Lodges of bark and rushes, or cabins of logs, were clustered on the open plain, or along the edges of the bordering forests. Squaws labored, warriors lounged in the sun, naked chil- dren whooped and gamboled on the grass. Beyond the river, a mile and a half on the left, the banks were studded once more with the lodges of the Illinois, who, to the number of 6,000, had returned, since their defeat, to this their favorite dwelling place. Scattered along the valley, among the adjacent hills, or over the neighboring prairie, were the cantonments of half a score of other tribes and fragments of tribes, gathered under the protecting aegis of the French-Shawnees, from the Ohio, Abenakis from Maine, and Miamis from the sources of the Kankakee and the valley of the St. Joseph." In the meanwhile, a party was sent to Montreal to secure supplies and munitions to put the colony in a state of de- fense, which, to the disappointment and chagrin of the sorely beset leader, he learned had been detained by his enemies, who, by a change of governors had come into official power. Devolving the command of the enterprise upon Tonti, La Salle set out in Novem- ber, 1683, for Canada and France, where he hoped to thwart his enemies and snatch success from the very jaws of defeat. Trium- phant over his enemies, he returned to America in 1685, and after wandering ineffectually for two years in the inhospitable wilderness of Texas, fell dead, pierced through the brain by the bullet of a treacherous desperado of his own band. It was not until the latter part of 1688 that Tonti, with grief and indignation, learned of the death of La Salle. In 1690, Tonti received from the French govern- ment the proprietorship of Fort St. Louis on the Illinois, where he continued in command until 1702, when by royal order the fort was abandoned and Tonti transferred to Lower Louisiana. This fort was afterward reoccupied for a short time in 1718 by a party of traders, when it was finally abandoned.
VINCENNES AND OTHER FRENCH SETTLEMENTS
The French early improved the opening thus made for them. From 1688 to 1697, little progress was made in colonization owing
7
HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
to the wars between France and Great Britain, but after the peace of Ryswick, the project was taken up with renewed activity. In 1698, large numbers of emigrants, under the lead of officers ap- pointed by the Crown, left France for the new world, and in the following year made the settlement of Biloxi, on Mobile Bay. In 1700, the settlement of the French and Indians at old Kaskaskia was removed to the spot where the village of that name now stands. A year later, a permanent settlement was made at Detroit by Antoine de la Motte Cadillac, who, in July of that year, arrived from Montreal with a missionary and one hundred men, and in 1795 was authorized by the French government to grant land in small quantities to actual settlers in the vicinity of Detroit.
In 1702, Sieur Juchereau and a missionary named Mermet, estab- lished a "poste" at Vincennes. Trouble with the Indians, and the wet, swampy condition of the surrounding country, delayed the development of the little settlement here, but throughout the early history of the country this post continued to be of the first im- portance.
FORT CHARTRES BUILT
In 1718, Fort Chartres was erected on the Mississippi, sixteen miles above Kaskaskia. About the fort rapidly sprang up a village, which was subsequently called New Chartres : five miles away, the Village of Prairie du Rocher became a 'growing settlement, while all along the river between Kaskaskia and the fort a strong chain of settlements was formed within a year after the fort was finished. The erection of Fort Chartres at this point, however, was dictated by national considerations rather than by fear of the savages. The colonization of Louisiana consequent upon the exploration of the Mississippi and the influx of colonists who found a home at Cahokia and Kaskaskia, made this section the key to the French possessions in America, the connecting link between Canada and Louisiana. Here the French settlers, but little disturbed by the forages of the Sacs and Foxes, pushed their improvements up to the Illinois, while lands were granted, though perhaps never occu- pied, some distance up this stream. The military force found occu- pation in supporting the friendly Illinois tribes against the Iroquois and Sacs and Foxes, and in unsatisfactory or disastrous campaigns against the Chickasaws. In the meantime, from the Southwest the
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
Spaniards were jealously watching the French colonists, while the British, gradually pushing westward, were building forts near the Ohio and Mississippi rivers.
The European war of 1741-46, in which France and England were opposed, was echoed in these western wilds, and it was found that the fort must be strengthened or abandoned. The former course prevailed, and in 1750 the old fortress of wood was trans- formed into one of stone, and garrisoned by a full regiment of French grenadiers. It was from this point that an important con- tingent went out to the capture of George Washington and his forces at Fort Necessity, July 4, 1754, and thus furnished to George II one of the causes for a declaration of hostilities and a beginning of the "Old French war." In the ensuing war, a detachment burned Fort Granville, sixty miles from Philadelphia ; another party routed Major Grant near Fort Duquesne, but, compelled to abandon that fortress, set it on fire and floated down the river in the light of its destroying flames ; again a large detachment, augmented by a con- siderable number of friendly Indians, assisted in the vain attempt to raise the British siege of Niagara, leaving dead upon the field the flower of the garrison. The fort was no longer in condition to maintain the offensive, and, learning that the British were preparing at Pittsburgh to make hostile descent upon him, the commandant writes to the governor general: "I have made all arrangements according to my strength, to receive the enemy." The victory on the Plains of Abraham decided the contest, but the little backwoods citadel, knowing but little of the nature of the struggle, dreamed that it might be the means of regaining, on more successful fields, the possessions thus lost to the French Crown. The news that this fort, with all territory east of the river, had been surrendered with- out so much as a sight of the enemy, came like a thunder-clap upon this patriotic colony. Many of the settlers, with Laclede, who had just arrived at the head of a new colony, expressed their disgust by going to the site of St. Louis, which they supposed to be still French ground.
FORT CHARTRES SURRENDERED TO BRITISH
Though transferred by treaty to the English in 1763, the fort was the last place in North America to lower the white ensign of the Bourbon King, and it was not until the latter part of 1765 that
9
HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
the British formally accepted the surrender of Fort Chartres. Pon- tiac, the unwavering friend of the French, took upon himself, un- aided by his former allies, to hold back the victorious English. Major Loftus, Captains Pitman and Morris, Lieutenant Frazer, and George Crohan, some with force, some in disguise, and others with diplomacy, sought to reach the fort to accept its capitulation, but each one was foiled and turned back with his mission unaccom- plished, glad to escape the fate of that Englishman for which Pontiac assured them he kept a "kettle boiling over a large fire." Wearied out with the inactivity of the French, the Indians sought an audience with the commandant, and explained their attitude. "Father," said the chieftain, "I have long wished to see thee, to recall the battles which we fought together against the misguided Indians and the English dogs. I love the French and I have come here with my warriors to avenge their wrongs." But assured by St. Ange that such service could no longer be accepted, he gave up the struggle, and the flag of St. George rose in the place of the fair lilies of France. Thus another nationality was projected into this restricted arena, a situation which was immediately afterward still further complicated by the secret Franco-Spanish treaty, which made the west bank of the Mississippi the boundary of the Spanish possessions. "It is significant of the different races, and the varying sovereignties in that portion of our country," says a writer, "that a French soldier from the Spanish City of St. Louis should be married to an Englishwoman by a French priest in the British colony of Illinois."
WHOLESALE FRENCH MIGRATION
At the first announcement of the treaty the natural hostility of the people to the English induced large numbers of the colonists to prepare to follow the French flag, and a hegira followed which swept out of the colony fully one-third of its 3.000 inhabitants. There was still a large number left, forming the largest colony in the West; but there were forces constantly at work which gradually depleted its numbers. Under the British rule, an abnormal activity among traders and land speculators was developed. The natives were constantly overreached in trade by unscrupulous persons pro- tected by the dominant power, and representatives of land pur- chasing organizations were acquiring vast tracts of country from
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
ignorant savages, who had little comprehension of the meaning or consequences of these transactions. These schemes and practices, though happily brought to naught by the Revolution, rendered the Indians, for a time, savagely hostile, and left their blighting influ- ence long after their removal. The lack of proper sympathy be- tween the governing race and the governed, the hostility of the savages in which they were involved with the British, induced many of the French colonists to leave their old homes as rapidly as they could make arrangements to do so.
The British garrison had hitherto occupied the old French Fort Chartres, but one day in 1772, the river having overflowed its banks, and swept away a bastion and the river wall, the occupants fled with precipitate haste to the high ground above Kaskaskia, where they erected a palisade fort. This was the principal achievement of the British forces, up to the beginning of the war with the colonies. In this struggle removed from the scene of active opera- tions, the commandant resorting to the favorite means of the British during their entire early history on this continent, furnished supplies and munitions of war to the savages, and thus equipped, incited them to war upon the unprotected frontier settlements in Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Virginia.
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