USA > Indiana > Pulaski County > Counties of White and Pulaski, Indiana. Historical and biographical > Part 14
USA > Indiana > White County > Counties of White and Pulaski, Indiana. Historical and biographical > Part 14
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Newspapers .- In 1871, the inhabitants of Reynolds became anxious to have a newspaper published in their midst, and in consequence thereof purchased the Zionsville (Ind.) Times office and removed it to Reynolds, and in February, 1871, the first edition of the White County Banner was issued. The paper was a 20x26 inch, five-column folio. This was a stock enterprise. Abram Van Voorst suggested the name for the sheet. J. L. Anderson was the first editor. In 1872, J. E. Dunham purchased the paper of the stock company for $400, ran it one year and changed the name of the sheet to that of the Central Clarion, and in 1876 the name was again changed and the paper was called the White County Register, and this name it retained until its death in 1878. Financial starvation killed the enterprise. J. E. Dunham still owns the office.
Miscellaneous .- The following persons in Honey Creek Township have lived to see the three-score-and-ten mile post : Nathaniel Bunnell, Bar- zilla Bunnell, Joseph Skevington, Abram Van Voorst, " Boss " White, C. S. Wheeler, Mrs. C. S. Wheeler, Mrs. Sophia Bunnell, John Ehart, Ira John, Ira Keller. Mrs. Ira John, Michael Rosentroter, Jeremiah Conners, William Borst and Elizabeth Schrrantes.
The following is a list of the early physicians who practiced medicine in Reynolds, given in about the year and also about the order in which they began practicing in the place : Dr. Thomas, 1856; Dr. R. Har- court, 1858; Dr. Smith, 1859; Dr. Shaw, 1866, and Dr. Delzell the same year, and Dr. Cornell, 1867. It is said that M. M. Sill (now of Monticello) was quite a noted doctor among the early settlers, though not a regular practitioner.
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HISTORY OF WHITE COUNTY.
CHAPTER VI.
BY ED. A. MOSSMAN.
JACKSON TOWNSHIP-EARLY CONDITIONS-ERECTION OF TOWNSHIP AND FIRST ELECTION-INDIANS AND GAME-MISCELLANEOUS MAT- TERS-ANTI-SLAVERY PETITION-MORMONISM-FIRST POST OFFICE -BURNETTSVILLE-MALE AND FEMALE SEMINARY-IDAVILLE-A TRAGEDY-AGRICULTURAL ASSOCIATION-CHURCHES.
T THE first settlement in Jackson Township was made in the vicinity of the present town of Burnettsville. Thomas Harless, Joseph James, Eliab Fobes, John Scott and Aaron Hicks settled in that part of the town- ship in the year 1831; but which came first cannot now be ascertained. Those who came shortly afterward can say no more than that they were all living there when they came. None of those first settlers are now living in the township to speak for themselves nor are any of their descendants there to speak for them. The opinion of many of the surviving settlers who came a few years after that time is that they all came together, and formed a kind of colony, or neighborhood there. It is a matter of but little consequence which came first, however, inasmuch as they all ex- perienced many of the worst phases of pioneer life. The few roads that they had were often very bad, and frequently travel was wholly im- peded in consequence of the streams, across which there were but few bridges, and those of the rudest construction, becoming swollen by heavy falls of rain. Of course they could raise no crops for the subsistence of their families and their domestic animals until they had been there a sufficient length of time to enable them to clear and fence a few acres of ground. Those who chanced to be single-handed and had large families to maintain, and were poor besides, made such slow progress, being thus overburdened with cares, that it was several years before they could get their farms sufficiently improved to enable them to make a living by till- ing the soil. During the interim, truth, to which the writer hereof is an abject slave, compels him to say that their table comforts were not such as a true epicure would delight in. Their bill of fare frequently consisted of naught but hominy, roast venison, and sassafras tea, with the addition sometimes of baked squash and potatoes. To place all those esculents on the table at one time, however, was considered rather extravagant living. For several years there were but few who succeeded in raising more grain than was sufficient for their own use ; and those who failed to raise enough
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to supply their own wants were compelled to haul it from the Wea Prairie, in Tippecanoe County, a distance of about thirty miles. Wea Prairie was jocosely called " Egypt," and, going thither to buy corn, was termed "going to Egypt." Whether in all the land of the Weas, into which they journeyed, there was a Joseph, possessing the sterling virtues of the Biblical character of that name, whose patronymic remains an unsolved enigma, the early settler saith not. Perhaps he did not feel sufficiently interested to inquire. The corn he got; and, with him, that was the great desideratum. Whilst making those journeys to " Egypt" for corn, they would frequently have to stop on the bank of some stream, and wait a day or two for the swollen waters to subside, so that they could cross. But those men who took it upon themselves to brave the hard- ships of frontier life in order that they might create homes for themselves to enjoy in the eventide of their lives, and have a competence to leave to their loved ones when they themselves "passed over to the majority," were not the men to be easily daunted. True, they had a rough ex- terior ; but the times were rough, and rough was the work they had to do. True, too, they would be sneered at by the snob of to day, who sports a massive pinchbeck chain, dallies with a cane, parts his hair in the middle and wears a double-decker on his empty head ; yet, for genuine moral worth, for probity, and for good, sound, homely logic, they stood as high above such snobs as the attic of Heaven is above the basement of the nether regions. They were generally men of good physique. Men who lacked this essential qualification of a frontiersman seldom had the temerity to tackle these unbroken wilds. But is it to the men alone that the credit is due of transforming this wild waste into the well-improved and highly productive agricultural district that it now is ? And, shall nothing be said of the brave-hearted women, whose cheering words ani- mated and encouraged them, when. heavily oppressed with the burden of cares that rested upon them, they were upon the point of yielding to de- spondency ? This history would be incomplete if it omitted to mention the important part that those courageous and self-sacrificing women per- formed in effecting this great transformation. Not only did they animate and encourage their partners with cheering words, and kind and sym- pathizing looks ; but they acted as helpmates as well. Whilst the men labored to get the means of subsistence, the women labored and planned to save : and by their aptitude in economic planning, their slender means were made to minister to their wants in many ways that would be truly surprising to the housewife of to-day. They had no sewing machines in those days with which a garment could be made in a few hours, as almost every family has to-day. All the clothing required by the family they had to make stitch by stitch. Neither were their kitchens graced with
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HISTORY OF WHITE COUNTY.
magnificent kitchen stoves, such as the modern housewife has. All their baking they had to do in an old-fashioned Dutch oven, which they set upon a bed of coals, on the hearth, and heaped a lot of live coals upon the top of it ; and thus whilst they baked the bread, they almost baked themselves, too.
The houses (if they may be so called) in which the early settlers lived and reared their families were no palaces. They were made of round logs or poles, and generally consisted of but one apartment. Those that were built before the introduction of saw-mills into the country had puncheon floors, and there was naught but the roof between the occu- pants and the heavens above. The roofs were of clapboards, which were held in their places by poles, called weight-poles, being placed upon them. The doors were the only parts that were made of sawed lumber ; and the materials out of which they were made the settler either brought with him or hauled from some distant place. The interstices between the logs were chinked and daubed with clay, "to expel the winter's flow." The door was secured with only a wooden latch, which was raised from the outside by means of a string, called the " latch-string," one end of which was attached to the latch, and the other was passed through a small hole in the door, and hung down on the outside. At night, instead of going to the trouble of hunting all over the house for the key, which " the baby " had been playing with, and had lost, no one could tell where, thereby putting the whole family out of humor, and causing a general jamboree, they just simply pulled in the " latch-string," and all went to bed as serene as a bright, rosy morning in the smiling month of May. Thus, notwithstanding the multifarious inconveniences and disadvantages under which the pioneers labored, they had, withal, some advantages which the people of these modern days have not. If their neighbors resided at so great a distance that they seldom had the pleasure of a visit with them, they just laid all their work aside and had a jolly good time when they did make or receive a visit. The whole family, even to the dog, went; and frequently those visits would be quite protracted, lasting sometimes several days; or, if it was very sel- dom that they visited each other, perhaps a week. The male portion of the families would beguile the time with hunting, shooting at mark and various other pastimes, whilst the gentler sex would pass the time in talking about -well, it would require a whole volume, and a very large one, too, to tell all that they did talk about. What was done with the " latch string" on such occasions the writer hereof failed to find out. It is probable, however, that there was an insurmountable difficulty here that more than countervailed the aforementioned advantages.
Creation of Townships .- Jackson Township was created in July,
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1843, at the time when the county was first organized, and, as at first cre- ated, embraced all of White County east of the Tippecanoe River. Its territory was subsequently diminished by striking off therefrom, at vari- ous times, other townships or parts of townships. For the periods when it was so diminished, see other chapters in this history.
First Elections .- The first election held in the township, as shown by the files at the county seat, was held at the house of Daniel Dale Novem- ber 7, 1843. The voters at this election were Jonathan Shull, Ephraim Million, Lewis Shull, James Courtney, Robert Hannah, Ezekiel S. Wiley, Joseph Dale, Eliab Fobes, George Gibson, Hugh Courtney, John Gibson, Joseph James, John Morris, Joseph Winegarner, Allen Barnes, George Hornbeck, William Wiley, Aaron Hicks, John Hannah, John Smith, John Lowery, William Gibson, Stephen Neill, Robert P. Gibson, William Price, John D. Vinnage, William R. Dale and William James. This was the gen- eral election at which Van Buren was elected; and overwhelming indeed would his majority have been, if each voting precinct had voted as solidly for him as did Jackson Township. Of the twenty-eight votes cast in the township, the Democratic electors received twenty-six, and the Whig electors two. As voters had the right, as the law then was, to vote any- where in the county, all those whose names appear in the above list may not have been residents of Jackson Township, whilst the names of others who were residents of the township may not be in the list, for the reason that they may have voted elsewhere. As above stated, this was the first election held in the township, as shown by the files at the county seat ; yet it is maintained by many of the early settlers that there was an election held in the township in the spring of the same year. All that can be said on that point is, if such was the fact, the files do not show it. It may be, however, that such was the fact, and that the returns have been misplaced. Such a thing is not be- yond the range of possibilities, nor even of the probabilities. At an elec- tion held at the house of Daniel Dale on the first Monday in April, 1837, the following new names appear : Dennis Pringer, Enos H. Stew- art, William W. Mitchell, Solomon McCully, Madison Reeves, Lewis J. Dale and Jephtha York. The next election was held at the house of Daniel Dale, on the first Monday in August, 1838. At this elec- tion, the following persons voted, who did not vote at either of the preceding elections : Thomas McLaughlan, Andrew J. Hannah, Silas Gitt, Alexander Hornbeck, John A. Billingsley, Samuel Smith, John Street and James T. Mitchell. At one of the early elections held in this township, there was but one Whig ticket voted, and that vote was cast by Andrew Hannah. They tried to prevail upon him to vote the: Den ocratic ticket, and thus make the vote of the township unanimous
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HISTORY OF WHITE COUNTY.
but he could not see it in that light. He had a principle in view, and he had the stamina to stand up for that principle, even though he stood alone. He could not be induced to thus trifle with this most sacred right of an American citizen for the paltry purpose of perpetrating a joke. The house in which the first election was held is still standing in the same place in which it then stood. The last election was held within two hundred yards of the old house, and at least two of those who voted at the first election (Robert P. Gibson and John Hannah) voted also at the last election. The ballot box used at those elections was an impro- vised affair, and consisted of a hat, with a handkerchif placed over the top of it .. Aaron Hicks was the first Justice of the Peace elected in Jackson Township. To Daniel Dale was accorded the privilege of naming the township, and he named it in honor of that patron saint of Democ- racy, Andrew Jackson.
Indians .- Indians were quite numerous at the time of the ingress of the first settlers in this township. They were inveterate beggars, very obtrusive in their manners, and always a "heap hungry." Their begging propen - sity was a source of great annoyance to the settlers. They would also frequently kill the settlers' hogs, and appropriate them to their own use, which far more annoyed the settlers than their begging proclivities. On one occasion, one of them killed a hog belonging to Joseph James, who caught him flagrante delicto, followed him to camp, and complained against him; whereupon the other Indians tied him up and administered to him a good sound castigation.
Game .- Game was very plenty in those days, and the settlers used to have what they termed wolf-drives and deer-drives. Word would be given out and circulated far and wide over the country, that on a certain day there would be a drive, and that a certain hour, and a certain designated place (which was always some one of the numerous small groves that abounded in the township) would be the time and place of meeting ; also the time of starting, and the territory to be embraced within the lines would be stated in this pronunciamento. Previous to the day set, scaffolds were erected in the grove, upon which, on the day of the drive, the marksmen (men selected for the purpose of shooting the game when it should be driven in) were placed. At the appointed hour, the lines were formed, with as few gaps and as short ones as possible ; but, as it was not possible to have the line wholly without gaps of such an extent that the men would be out of sight of each other, especially at the starting, horns and bells were used for the double purpose of scaring the game and of preserving the alignment. Thus they would gradually close in, driving the game before them ; and, as the deer and other animals would approach the grove the marksmen, who were placed upon the scaffold, as before stated,
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would shot them down. The number of deer and other animals killed on these occasions was very great.
Jackson Jurors .- At the first court held in White County, it is said that every man in Jackson Township, who had resided therein a sufficient length of time to qualify him to sit on the jury, was on either the grand or petit jury. Rufus A. Lockwood, who subsequently removed to Cali- fornia and established a national reputation as an attorney by his able management of the Mariposa Claim case and other notable cases, ap- peared as an attorney in this court in an action of replevin. He ap- peared for the defendant, and it is said that he made a masterly defense.
Morality .- The first settlers were very largely composed of adher- ents of the Seceders' Church, who are, as is generally known, distin- guished above most other churches for their sedateness and for the aus- terity with which they enforce moral discipline among their members, and especially among their children. Consequently, such things as drunk- enness, carousing, dancing, swearing, fighting, and other immoral prac- tices were almost wholly unknown in this township for a good many years, and, in fact, there is not to-day a saloon in the township, notwithstand- ing it contains two towns, each of which has a population of about four hundred. There have been saloons in the township, but their patronage was so small that the business was not remunerative, and they were soon closed. Truly, in this the record that Jackson Township has made for her- self is one to be proud of, and which is deserving of a conspicuous place in her history.
Vital Statistics .- Alexander Barnes was born in February, 1835, and was probably the first child born in the township. This is a question, however, that is somewhat involved in doubt, as there are many of the sur - viving early settlers who think it probable that some of Joseph James' family may have been born in the township prior to that time. Mr. James settled '. in the township in 1831, and those who came in between that time and 1835 say that he had a large family of children, some of whom were quite young ; wherefore, they think it altogether probable that some of them may have been born in the township. Whether they were or not, however, cannot be definitely ascertained. Amos Barnes died December 2, 1835, and, with the exception of two of Joseph James' children, whose names could not be ascertained, his was the first death in the township. Amos Barnes' death occurred in the same house in which Alexander Barnes' was born. John D. Vinnage and Rachel Gibson, who were married in the spring of 1836, were probably the first couple married in the town- ship.
Schools .- The first schoolhouse in the township was built about 1836, and stood about where the northeast corner of the town of Burnettsville
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HISTORY OF WHITE COUNTY.
now is. It was built of logs, and did not differ materially from other schoolhouses built in those early times. William Dale was the first teacher who taught in this house. He taught the first two or three terms that were taught in it. The first school in the township was taught in a vacant house owned by Ephraim Chamberlain, situated in the southeast quarter of Section 33, and was taught by James Renwick. The second schoolhouse in the township was built about the year 1842, and stood on a part of the farm then and now owned by Thomas Barnes. Among the early teachers in this house were William Barnes, Melinda Noah, a man named Shadell, and Henderson Steele., The third house was built about 1847, on Solomon McCully's land, in the same neighbor- hood in which the second was built. George Hall taught the first school in this house. He taught three or four terms, and was followed by Joseph Thompson, George Barnes, John Bright, Asbury Shultz, William P. Montgomery and Josephus Tam.
Anti-Slavery Petition .- About 1837, a memorial and petition, graphically portraying the enormity of human slavery, and praying Congress to abolish it in the District of Columbia, was drawn up by Thomas Mclaughlin, a citizen of Jackson Township, who zealously labored with an ardor born of noble impulses, to induce his neighbors and fellow citizens to lend the influence of their names to the further- ance of this noble cause, to the end that this foul blot upon our national escutcheon might be forever wiped out. Through his untiring efforts, some eighteen persons, most of whom resided in Jackson Township, were induced to attach their signatures to this petition. The names of all the citizens of the township who signed it could not be ascer- tained, but Thomas McLaughlin, William Gibson, Thomas Barnes, Elijah Eldridge and Allen Barnes, and probably David Barnes and James Small were among the number. Thomas Mclaughlin, after ineffectually exhausting all his persuasive powers in the effort to induce Robert P. Gibson to sign the petition, said to him, " You may oppose it as much as you like, but the time will come and you will live to see it, when slavery will be abolished, not only in the District of Columbia, but throughout the United States." This prediction has been fulfilled to the letter. Mr. Gibson is still living and slavery, that most inhuman of all human institutions, no longer exists to cause the words to stick in our throats, when we would boast of the perfect liberty that prevails throughout our fair land.
A Distillery .- As this is a complete history, "The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth," must be told. Therefore the bad, as well as the good, that which is discreditable as well as that which is creditable, must be recorded. Be it recorded, therefore, that about the
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year 1840, a man named Samuel Smith started a small distillery about one mile southwest of where the town of Idaville is now situated. He continued the business there up to the time of his death, which occurred about the year 1850. He bought a little corn once in awhile, and, when he could do so, bartered his whiskies for corn. As before stated, it was but a small affair, as may be readily inferred from the fact that all the " goods" that he manufactured were disposed of in the neighborhood. As his distillery was located near the south line of the county, and as the citizens of Jackson Township were noted for their temperance proclivities, as previously stated, it is highly probable that the larger portion of his beverages, by far, were sold to persons residing in Car- roll County. Of course, the people of Jackson had to have a little " to make vinegar of," a small quantity for "bitters, to keep off the ague, you know," a mere modicum "to make liniment of," and "some to keep about the house for snake-bites and other emergencies."
Mormonism .- Be it also recorded, that about the year 1842, Mor- monism, that relic of the age of barbarism, obtained a foothold and had quite a large following among the citizens of Jackson Township. Out of respect for the feelings of those who then espoused, but have since renounced, the infamous doctrines of this most infamous denomina- tion, all names, except those of the emissaries who had been sent thither for the purpose of propagating the nefarious doctrines of Mor- monism, will be suppressed. A church, or branch, as they termed it, was organized at a private house about three miles north of where the town of Burnettsville is now situated, by Alva L. Tibbetts, a Bishop in the Mormon Church. This branch continued to exist for about three years. At the expiration of that time, their meetings were discontinued and all those whose sensuality (it is too great a strain upon the credulity for an intelligent person to believe that it could have been anything else), was so potent as to impel them to turn their backs upon all their relatives and friends and upon civilization, and cast their lot among those slaves to the baser passions, emigrated to Nauvoo. This branch had at one time a membership of about sixty- five, of whom about two-thirds resided in Jackson Township. There were three families went from this township to Nauvoo, one of whom after staying there fifteen days and sixteen nights, returned to their former neighborhood almost in a state of penury, but with a large amount of experience. One went from Nauvoo to Iowa and the other went to Salt Lake City at the time of the general exodus of the Mor- mons from Nauvoo. During the existence of this branch, besides Alva L. Tibbetts, who organized it, as previously stated, there were two other Mormon propagandists whose names were Ezra Strong and John Martin,
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HISTORY OF WHITE COUNTY.
who frequently harangued the faithful and others whose curiosity led them to attend their meetings. They professed to be able to speak in unknown tongues, to heal the sick and all that sort of thing. On one occasion, they undertook to heal one of the sisters who was quite sick, and who was the wife of one of the Elders of the branch, but they could not heal her any to speak of. It might be supposed that this would place them in a very awkward dilemma, but they very adroitly got out of it by saying that the sister lacked faith. They established a cemetery about two miles north of Idaville, in which several interments were made.
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