USA > Indiana > Biographical and historical sketches of early Indiana > Part 34
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"After this campaign (the Mississiniwa), and without a res- pite, Captain Dunn's company of rangers was ordered to Fort
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Harrison to relieve a company of United States infantry which had charge of that garrison.
" No language which your petitioner can command can ad- equately describe the situation of this infantry company when the Rangers took charge of the fort. Of the whole company four only were able to perform duty. The physician who was stationed at the fort had been sick and confined to his bed for weeks. At his request your petitioner attended upon the sick of his company until those who recovered (for some died) were able to leave the fort. Within the short space of three months after Captain Dunn's company of rangers was stationed at Fort Harrison there were eighty-five men out of one hundred and six who were sick and confined. Such was the rapid increase of disease that your petitioner was wholly unable to attend per- sonally upon the sick, and he was obliged to apply to the offi- cers to obtain the aid of three or four intelligent individuals to assist him in preparing and administering medicines, and to attend on the sick during their operation. Nearly all the sick were affected with remitting and intermitting fever, some few from dysentery or bloody flux. The rangers were continued at Fort Harrison for four months, and during that time, and, in fact, until the company was discharged, in March, 1814, the sick were often requiring additional medicines. Of the whole number of rangers at the fort, only one died during the service ; but more than twenty never perfectly recovered, and died within eighteen months afterward."
Such were some of the hardships the pioneers of Indiana en- dured that this fair land might be opened to settlement and its inhabitants made secure in their persons and property.
On Captain Dunn's return to his home he put aside the sword and put his hand to the plow. Soon afterward he joined the. Presbyterian church at Charlestown, twenty-five miles from his home, and continued a member of it until the establishment of a Presbyterian church at Madison, to which he removed his membership. In February, 1820, a church was organized at Hanover, of which Judge Dunn became a ruling elder, and he continued to occupy this high office until he died.
In 1814 Governor Posey commissioned Judge Dunn an Asso-
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ciate Judge of the Circuit Court of Jefferson county. He held this office until 1816, when he was elected to the first Legisla- ture under the State constitution. He was re-elected to the second, third and fourth Legislatures, and during the sessions of the third and fourth was Speaker of the House. While a mem- ber of the Legislature he was virtually offered a seat in the Uni- ted States Senate, but he declined the honor because it would have taken him away from his family.
In May, 1820, Judge Dunn was commissioned, by President Monroe, Register of the Land Office for the Terre Haute dis- trict. Three years afterward the land office was removed to Crawfordsville. Judge Dunn and Major Whitlock, the Receiver of the Land Office, entered the land where Crawfordsville stands, and laid out the town. Judge Dunn was re-appointed Register in 1827 and held the office until 1829, when he was superseded by General Milroy. A short time after leaving the Land Office he returned to Hanover and remained a citizen of that town while he lived.
Judge Dunn donated fifty acres of land to establish Hanover College, and also donated the ground upon which Wabash Col- lege, at Crawfordsville, was erected. Thus it will be seen that these colleges are mainly indebted to him for their establish- ment.
In 1832 Judge Dunn was a candidate for the State Senate, but on account of his views upon temperance and the Sunday mail, was defeated by David Hillis. At the end of his term Mr. Hil- lis was re-elected, and in 1837, having been elected Lieutenant- Governor of the State, resigned his seat in the Senate, and Judge Dunn was chosen to fill the vacancy.
In 1843 Judge Dunn was nominated for the Senate by the Whigs of Jefferson county. Shadrach Wilber, also a Whig, became an independent candidate, and the Hon. Jesse D. Bright, a Democrat, received a plurality of the votes cast and was elected. This was the real beginning of his long political ca- reer.
In 1846 Judge Dunn was elected Probate Judge of Jefferson county over George S. Sheets, a very brilliant young lawyer of Madison. He was re-elected at the end of his term and held the office when the court was abolished.
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In September, 1854, while overlooking some improvements of a plank road of which he was president, Judge Dunn was sunstruck, and taken to his home in a helpless condition. He remained an invalid until November 11, 1854, when he died. When his life went out one of the best men of Indiana was no more.
The children and grandchildren of Judge Dunn inherited his bravery and love of arms. His sons, David and Thomas, served in the Mexican war, the first as a lieutenant and the latter as a private soldier. In the war of the rebellion they again enlisted in the service of their country. David became lieutenant-colonel of the Ninth Indiana regiment of volunteers, and Thomas the captain of a company. He was afterward appointed to a cap- taincy in the regular army, and is now a major in that service. Judge Dunn's son James was also lieutenant-colonel in the vol- unteer service, and his son Williamson served as a surgeon throughout the war. Another son, William McKee, who was a member of Congress when the war broke out, was offered a colonelcy by Governor Morton, and a brigadiership by Presi- dent Lincoln, but declined them both, that he might fill out the term for which he was elected. When it expired he was ap- pointed Judge Advocate of the department of Missouri, and served for some time in that capacity. Subsequently he was appointed Assistant Judge Advocate-General, and on the retire- ment of Judge Advocate-General Holt he was selected to fill the vacancy.
All of Judge Dunn's grandsons, except two, who were boys, served in the war of the rebellion. One of them, William Mc- Kee Dunn, Jr., who is now a major in the regular army, was a member of General Grant's staff, and was distinguished for his coolness and bravery. General Grant once said of him : " He is as brave as Julius Cæsar. Had I ordered him to a place where it was certain death to go I do not believe he would have hesitated a moment to obey the order." He is a true descend- ant of Williamson Dunn. His grandfather never hesitated to go where duty called him. If there ever was in this State a family that equaled the Dunns in bravery and soldierly qualities I hope some one will point it out. I have no knowledge of such an one.
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Judge Dunn took great interest in public affairs. He started the movement which culminated in the election of Zachary Tay- lor President of the United States. A meeting was held at Madison in 1848, which formally put forward General Taylor for the presidency. Judge Dunn was the moving spirit of that meeting. He introduced the resolutions favoring General Tay- lor's nomination, and supported them in an earnest speech. In February, 1849, when on his way to Washington to assume the presidency, General Taylor stopped off at Madison and was given a public dinner. Judge Dunn presided at this dinner, and, on arising to propose the health of the guest, read an or- der he had received from him at Fort Harrison in 1813. He then paid a high tribute to the soldierly qualities and strong common sense of General Taylor, and ended by proposing his health. The toast was drunk with water, a cold-water banquet being the only kind at which Judge Dunn ever presided.
Judge Dunn had moral bravery as well as physical bravery. He did what he believed to be right, and would have suffered burning at the stake rather that do an act he knew to be wrong. He was of the stuff of which martyrs are made.
In 1848 or '49 a temperance wave swept over Southern Indi- ana, and at Madison petitions were numerously signed praying the repeal of the license law and the enactment of a law to make the selling of liquor a felony, punishable with fine and impris- onment. A year or so afterward, when the temperance move- ment had waned, the liquor men procured copies of these peti- tions and had them published in the Madison papers. This played havoc with the aspirations of several men who were am- bitious to serve the public in an official capacity. A candidate for the mayoralty of Madison on being confronted with one of these petitions with his name to it sought to evade responsi- bility by claiming that he did not know its contents when he signed it. A day or two after his card to this purport had ap- peared in the Madison Courier I was at Hanover, and seeing Judge Dunn in his porch, approached him and took a seat by his side. We conversed awhile upon politics, and the canvass for the mayoralty of Madison being mentioned, Judge Dunn said :
" I see by the Courier that - is trying to crawfish out
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of having signed the temperance petition. I have a contempt for a man who, having done a proper thing, turns his back upon it to please the public. I, too, signed that petition. I did it with my eyes open, and I stand by the act. It was right, and I. will do it again if the opportunity offers."
It was his unyielding devotion to conviction that twice cost him a seat in the Senate of the State.
In appearance General William McKee Dunn is the coun- terpart of his father. At the late meeting of the Army of the Tennessee in Indianapolis, while sitting on the platform at the Park Theater, I saw General Dunn in the parquette, and, had I not known his father was dead, I would have thought he was before me. I never knew a son more like his father.
Judge Dunn was five feet ten and one-half inches high, and was very strong and muscular. He had a fair complexion and bright blue eyes. In his latter years his head was entirely bald, save a fringe of hair behind his ears. His sons were all good and patriotic men, but none of them was so good and patriotic as he. He was a model citizen, and a Christian without re- proach.
Rev. Jonathan Edwards, once president of Hanover College, in an address at the dedication of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of the Northwest, at Chicago, thus speaks of Judge Dunn :
" Early and intimately associated with Dr. Crowe in the founding and fostering of this institution ( Hanover College ) was his neighbor, Williamson Dunn, once Register of the Land Office at Crawfordsville, but for the last thirty years of his life a resident of Hanover. He had been a judge, but was best known as a farmer and an elder of the church. Comparatively hidden as was his light, Judge Dunn was yet widely known and highly appreciated. His general intelligence, his practical sense, his prudence, his great firmness, his rare integrity of character, are still embalmed in the traditions of his State, and he lives in the recollection of those who knew him as one of the best specimens of the American citizen."
ABEL C. PEPPER.
ABEL C. PEPPER was born in Kentucky, and emigrated to Indiana Territory in 1815. He was a soldier in the war of 1812, having been a private in Captain William Garrard's troop of volunteer light dragoons. He was mustered out of the service by Lieutenant-Colonel James V. Bell, at Lower Seneca, Au- gust 10, 1813, and received from his captain the following cer- tificate :
"FRANKLINTON, August 18, 1813.
"By virtue of the within order, Abel C. Pepper, a private in my troop of volunteer light dragoons, who has served under my command twelve months, is hereby honorably discharged from the service, and is entitled to the privileges and emoluments provided by the acts of Congress upon such discharge.
" WILL GARRARD, JR., "Captain of Volunteer Light Dragoons."
When he came to Indiana he settled in Dearborn county, and soon afterward became one of her leading citizens. He had a taste for military affairs, and had been in the Territory but a short time until he became a militia captain. He was advanced to the office of colonel, and subsequently to that of brigadier- general, although he was generally called by the title of Colonel. He served as County Commissioner of Dearborn county, as her Sheriff, and for several terms represented her people in the Legislature of the State. In 1828 he was a candidate for Lieutenant-Governor, but was defeated by Milton Stapp a few hundred votes. In 1830 General Stapp was a candidate for Governor, and during the canvass made a speech at Rising Sun, in which he said the people of Dearborn county ought to sup-
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port him, for they did but little for him when he ran for Lieu- tenant-Governor. Continuing, he said :
" When the returns came in from every portion of the State. except old Dearborn, I felt rejoiced at the result. But when the votes of Dearborn were counted, it was ' Pepper,' ' Pepper. 'Pepper,' and I assure you it came near peppering me."
In 1829 Colonel Pepper was appointed sub-Indian agent at Fort Wayne by General Jackson. He was afterward promoted to the office of Indian agent, and then superintendent for the removal of the Indians in Indiana, Michigan, Illinois and Wis- consin. In 1839 he resigned this office. Subsequently he was elected a Sinking Fund Commissioner, and in 1845 was ap- pointed by President Polk United States Marshal for Indiana. He held this office until 1849, when he was superseded by John L. Robinson. In 1850 he represented Ohio and Switzerland counties in the constitutional convention, and took a very ac- tive part in its proceedings. He served on the committees of elective franchises, apportionment and representation, banks and banking, arrangement and phraseology, and of the militia. being chairman of the last.
In the convention Colonel Pepper took a decided stand against a State bank. Early in the session he offered a resolution. "That from and after the expiration of the charter of the State Bank of Indiana all connection between the State and banks shall cease." He made a speech in favor of the resolution, in which he declared himself in favor of free banks and opposed to a State bank.
During the session of the convention Colonel Pepper offered a resolution of inquiry in relation to the unsold lots and land included in the donation by the national government to the State. In speaking on this resolution, he said :
" My object in offering the resolution is to secure the preser- vation of these lots for the use and pleasure of the people of the State as well as the citizens of Indianapolis, as public grounds. In all the large cities of our country it became an object of great interest to secure squares and open plats of ground in their midst, to be ornamented with trees and shrubbery, and to serve
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the double purpose of public use and private gratification. While it is yet possible to secure such lots here I wish to see it done."
Colonel Pepper died at his home in Rising Sun, March 20, 1860, and was buried in the cemetery there. His death caused much grief among his neighbors, and he was also mourned throughout the State, for he was well known to the people as a good and patriotic man.
Colonel Pepper was a devoted member of the Masonic fra- ternity. He was made a Mason in 1816, and afterward received the highest honors of the craft, serving both as Grand Master and Grand High Priest of the order in the State. He was one of the brightest and most zealous Masons ever within the ju-" risdiction of the Grand Lodge of Indiana.
When Colonel Pepper was a young man he determined to study and practice medicine. Accordingly he entered the office of a physician as a student, and soon afterward a man came to get medicine for a sick person while the doctor was away. The student thought he would act the doctor for the nonce, and put up what he thought was a dose of salts, gave it to the messen- ger, and sent him away. The doctor soon returned, and, on being told by Mr. Pepper what he had done, ordered him to mount a horse at once and overtake the messenger, as what he had given him was the rankest poison. The student did as directed, and succeeded in reaching the house of the sick man just in time to prevent him from taking the poison. This nar- row escape from causing the death of a human being induced Colonel Pepper to quit the study of medicine, and hence he did not become a physician.
After this Colonel Pepper concluded to study law. He pur- chased some law books, and for a time diligently studied them. Soon after commencing these studies a farmer came to him and narrated a difficulty he had had with a neighbor, and urged the Colonel to take the case. He had no license, but knowing - the suit could be brought before a justice of the peace, he ac- cepted the employment. The case was tried, decided against his client, and then appealed to the Circuit Court, which con- firmed the judgment of the justice. The costs were so heavy
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that the farmer had great difficulty in saving his farm from being sold to pay them. This ended the Colonel's aspirations to be- come a lawyer.
After this Colonel Pepper engaged in merchandising, and continued at it most of the time he was not in public life.
Mr. Shadrach Hathaway, eighty-eight years old, and now living at Rising Sun, in 1883, says that he and Colonel Pepper once walked from Rising Sun to Cincinnati, some thirty miles or more. Their route was through Kentucky. When they were near Covington they encountered a hill, and the Colonel, being much fatigued, said he would give "a quarter" if he were at its top. Mr. Hathaway took him upon his back and safely carried him to the top of the hill. The "quarter " was paid.
A gentleman of this city, who was a lad of thirteen when he looked upon the face of the Colonel at his funeral in March, 1860, has very pleasant recollections of the last years of the Colonel's life. During a series of lectures at Rising Sun by home talent-doctors, lawyers, clergymen and " statesmen "- the Colonel lectured upon his experience among the Indians, oc- cupying the old fashioned high pulpit in the Universalist church. As he proceeded with his description he gave forcible illustra- tions by means of his Indian relics. With the aid of the county sheriff dressed up with a buffalo's head, tinkling bells, and other instruments of terror to eye and ear, he presented to the audi- ence the " medicine man " as he appeared in his native forests. The boys were impressed and the adults amused by the spec- tacle and the vivid description, punctuated by tosses of the head and jangling of the bells. The fright of the young folks was tempered by a suspicion that they knew the man in costume.
In the winter of 1860 a committee of boys from a literary so- ciety called upon Colonel Pepper one evening and solicited his patronage to the society, and asked him to address it. They found him tired with a hard day's work in killing hogs, but were received with kindness, and with a dignity that reminded them of the Father of his Country.
Colonel Pepper presided at the ceremonies of laying the cor- ner-stone of the Court-house of Ohio county, at Rising Sun. The stone-mason, who supplemented speculative masonry with
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limestone and mortar, had trouble in convincing the Colonel which corner should be honored, as the building did not front due east and west, the street upon which it stands running 36° north of west by 36° south of east.
For a time after the election at which Colonel Pepper was a candidate for Lieutenant-Governor it was supposed that he had been elected, and preparations were being made to do him honor, when unexpected returns from distant parts crushed the hopes of his friends, and left him a defeated candidate for the second office in the State.
Colonel Pepper was slightly above medium height, spare and sinewy, of easy and pleasing address. He was urbane and dignified in his intercourse with his fellow men, and was par- ticularly polite to ladies. He was a useful and patriotic citizen, and his memory should be perpetuated in the history of the State.
JOSEPH LANE.
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THE Lanes have been prominent actors in the politics and history of Indiana. Amos Lane was a leading lawyer in early. times, and served in Congress from 1832 to 1836. His son. James H., was a colonel in the Mexican war, was Lieutenant- Governor of Indiana from 1849 to 1852, and a member of Con- gress from 1853 to 1855. Subsequently he removed to Kansas. and from March, 1861, until 1866, when he died by his own hand, he was a Senator of the United States from Kansas. Henry S. Lane was a gallant soldier, an eloquent speaker, and a conscientious man, and, after receiving the highest honors his State could confer upon him, died in 1882. But the Lane who was best known to the country, and who served Indiana longer than any of his name, was Joseph Lane, a pioneer of the State and a distinguished soldier of the Mexican war.
Joseph Lane was born in Buncombe county, North Carolina. December 14, 1801. In 1814 his father's family emigrated to Kentucky, and two years afterward the future general, then a boy of fifteen, crossed the river and came to Darlington, then the county seat of Warrick county, Indiana. He worked al- ternately in the office of the County Clerk and in a dry goods store until 1821, when he married and settled on a farm in Van- derburgh county, just across the Warrick line. The next year. before he was twenty-one years old, he was elected to the State Legislature from the counties of Vanderburgh and Warrick, and had to wait until he reached the legal age before he could take his seat. From that time until 1846 he was almost contin- uously a member of one branch or the other of the State Legis- lature.
The breaking out of the Mexican war found him a member
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of the Senate, but he laid aside his official robes and joined Captain Walker's company of infantry as a private soldier. When the volunteers were organized at New Albany he was elected colonel of the Second regiment, and on the Ist day of July, 1846, he was appointed a brigadier-general and given command of the Indiana troops. He started at once for Mexico, and when he reached the seat of war his brigade was assigned to the First division, under command of Major-General Butler.
A thrilling episode in the shape of a personal difficulty just prior to the battle of Buena Vista is described by the New Al- bany Ledger of February, 1876. It was between General Jo Lane and Colonel James H. Lane :
" While General Taylor's army was encamped at Agua Nueva, fourteen miles south of Buena Vista, the quarrel was brought about by a trivial occurrence. It commenced in Gen- eral Lane's tent, and in the presence of Colonel B. C. Kent, of this city, Lieutenant A. L. Robinson, aid to the General, and several other officers. They were engaged in the discussion of the relative merits of two companies of the brigade (incidental to a discussion with reference to the organization of another regiment at the close of the service of the regiments then in the service), General Lane championing Captain Sanderson's com- pany, of the second regiment, of this city, while Colonel Lane was equally enthusiastic in regard to the qualities of the com- pany of Captain Ford, of the third regiment, of Madison, this State. Both of these companies were excellent, and it was the utmost difficulty to decide which was really the better of the two. During the discussion the Lanes became very much ex- cited, and something aroused the General to such a pitch that he deemed it necessary to fight it out then and there, and, reach- ing to his camp chest, produced a pair of very excellent dueling pistols, and handing them toward Colonel Lane, asked him to take his choice. The latter endeavored to secure one of the pistols, but the parties were separated by Lieutenant Robinson and others, when Colonel Lane withdrew from the tent.
"' Both of these officers were highly exasperated, and were with difficulty prevented from laying violent hands on each other. This occurred in the afternoon, near the time for the
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usual dress parade. of the several regiments. When the third regiment was assembled on the parade ground, ready for the ex- ercise, Colonel Lane being present, General Lane came down the line of tents with an old-fashioned rifle on his shoulder, and called upon the Colonel to arm himself, for he had come to demand satisfaction for the insult offered him in the tent. Colo- nel Lane promptly directed one of the color guards to load his . gun with ball cartridge, which was done at once. In the mean- time intelligence had been conveyed to Major J. A. Cravens, of the second Indiana regiment, who was officer of the day, and he at once repaired to the parade ground and arrested the two officers just as they were about to take their places for an ex- change of shots. Their swords were surrendered and sent by Major Cravens to General Wool's headquarters.
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