USA > Indiana > Henry County > Henry County; past and present: a brief history of the county from 1821 to 1871 > Part 5
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The order for letting the court-house provides that it be "advertised in three of the most public places in the county, and in the Western Times, a paper published in Centreville, Wayne county, Indiana," and it was, in "height, materials and construction, to be similar to the court-house in Connersville, Fayette county, Indiana."
The said building was ordered to be placed on the southeast corner of let four, block twelve, which was a little southwest of the present site. So soon as the building was covered, the con- tractor was to receive twenty dollars of the "purchase money," and it was also stipulated that it was to be completed before the second Monday in February.
According to arrangement, the Agent did "sell the court- house," on the 14th of May, 1823, to George Barnard, for $247, and in May following the Commissioners adjourned from the house of John Smith to the new court-house, which they for-
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HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
mally accepted, as it was done according to contract. Once es- tablished in a building adequate to the wants and fully com- porting with the dignity and wealth of our flourishing county -one that cost them a sum abont equal to the tax duplicate for three years, it cannot be doubted but the Commissioners felt im- measurable relief. Doubtless the tax-payers grumbed at the ex- travagance of those fellows who could thus squander $247, and they were soon rewarded by being permitted to retire to the rest and quietude of private life.
The jail, court-house, and stray pen, or pound, being com- pleted, a "long spasm of retrenchment and economy" occurred, until the county, fast becoming rich, began to grow proud, and, in 1831, ordered the building of a
SECOND COURT-HOUSE,
Which was to be "forty feet square, walls included," the foun- dation "to be dug eighteen inches beneath the surface of the ground, the walls to be two feet thick from the foundation three feet up," the lower story to be fifteen feet high, and the upper story to be twelve.
This time, instead of a "cabin roof" sufficiently weighted down with poles, it was to have one of good yellow poplar "join shingles," eighteen inches in length, "to be pitched from each square to the center," the whole to be surmounted with an eight square cupola, eight feet in diameter, to "arise" twenty feet, eight feet of the distance to be enclosed with "Venecian blinds," and said cupola to be surmounted by a suitable cap from which was to be raised a spear bearing a wooden ball, ten inch- es in diameter, "nicely gilt," and still above this a neat vane, and higher yet "a cross with a gilt ball on each end," and the whole surmounted with a "neat cap" on top of the spear.
Let the reader picture to himself the transition from the little cramped up, cabin roofed, puncheon floored, chinked and daubed, poorly lighted, hewed log concern, standing high and dry upon six "nigger heads," and an outside chimney, to this spacious brick, with twenty-three windows of twenty-four lights cach, and a large folding door and "fan light" above, with foundations hidden away the enormous distance of eighteen
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COUNTY BUILDINGS.
inches under ground, and the whole surmounted with a cupola, which, for architectural design and finish, must have been the wonder of the age, and he cannot but be struck with the amaz- ing strides in the paths of luxury taken by our forefathers. We are amazed at the old fellows, not one in twenty of whom had anything better than a cabin at home, to be willing to un- dertake the erection of a "temple of justice" of such propor- tions and at such an enormous cost, as it seemed at that time, as there were but seventy-five dollars and three-fourths of a cent in the treasury to commence on.
The building was nevertheless sold to one Nathan Craw- ford, in the latter part of the year 1831, "he being the lowest bidder," for the sum of $5,315, to be paid on the 1st of January each year, for five years as follows : in 1832, $400; in $1833, $700; in 1834, $1,000; in 1835, $1,200; in 1836, the balance. The walls were to be up and covered and all outside wood work was to be completed by January 1, 1834, and two years to be allow- ed for finishing off the costly interior. In short, it was expect- ed that the contractor would "push things," and spend some- think like a thousand dollars a year. Robert Murphey was allowed $2 50 for furnishing the design of this elaborate struc- ture. About nine o'clock, on Thursday morning, January 7, 1836, comes the said Nathan Crawford, and moves the Commis- sioners, Robert Murphey, Tabor W. McKee, and John Whitta- ker to take the job off his hands; which they promptly decline to do, and declared that they had examined the "said court- house" and "are of the opinion" that it is deficient in almost every particular, that the "roof leaks," plastering is not neatly done; and carpenter work ditto, and that the "contraet is for- feited in toto, and the materials out of which said house is constructed are, in a great many cases, deficient."
This was "rough" on the said Crawford, but he had to bear it till the March term, when a compromise was effected, and the building was received at $4,500, which was docking him $815 only.
The first court-house, though so soon rejected, was certain- ly in good plight, and to-day, after the lapse of more than a
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HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
third of a century, a portion of it is doing good services as a pig sty on the premises of M. I. Powell, Esq. The second or brick building was destroyed by fire, about the time of the assem- bling of a county convention, on the 13th day of February, 1864.
THE FIRST JAIL.
At the February terin, 1823, the Commissioners also ordered the sale of "the jail of Henry county," which, they specify, shall
"Of the dimensions fourteen feet square, seven feet between the floors, the logs to be square ten Inches, to be dovetailed at each corner and pin- ned; upper and lower floor to consist of logs squared of the same di- mensions, the upper floor each log to be pinned down with one inch and one-half nuger, one round of logs above the upper floor ilt down, the door to be three feet wide, the shutter to be made of two inch oak plank doubled, and be well spiked and hung with good and sufficient hinges to open outside with a good and sufficient bar with staples and lock, a cabin ' roof, the lower floor to be lald on two onk sills, and the house to be built on the lop thereof. one window one foot square with four Inch square bars of Iron to be sufficiently let in."
This was not a very imposing structure to a man outside, but once shut in, say in July or August, especially if there were several of the "four inch square" iron bars across the one win- dow (a foot square), all efforts to escape must have soon become quite feeble. The reader of these specifications (which were doubtless clear enough to the Commissioners,) may be a little puzzled to determine whether "the house to be built on the top thereof" was to be placed on the lower floor, or whether the house was to have a second story intended for a jailer's residence or some such purpose.
It was subsequently ordered that the jail should be com- pleted before the second Monday in August, and that the Clerk should issue a county order to the builder for twenty dollars so soon as the building shall be "erected to the height of four rounds."
Obediah R. Weaver, being the lowest bidder, undertook "the faithful performance" of the contract for $120.
Although this building was to have been completed in Au- gust, 1823, we find that, in May, 1824, the Board refused to re- cetve it, "inasmuch as it is considered that the same has not
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COUNTY BUILDINGS.
been executed according to contract." The building was sub- sequently received of Mr. Weaver, and forty-five dollars paid in full for the work; twenty dollars having been previously ad- vanced, when the structure was but "four rounds high."
This jail was soon found to be inadequate, and the growing wants of the times induced the Commissioners to order the "selling" of
THE SECOND JAIL,
Which was also to be built of timber. It was really to be an extension of the old one, the door of which was to be taken away and the space filled with logs. The addition was te be built adjoining the old part, leaving only eight inches between, which was afterward to be filled with timber. The new part was to have one window like the old one, one foot square, and when carried up to the height of the old one, a second story was to be built on, of logs, extending over both, and to be entered from one end by a "strong stairway," and the only entrance to the lower story was to be through a strong trap door, two feet square, "to be made secure with a strong bar of iron and good and sufficient lock," &c. Once let down into one of these "black holes," the most hardened desperado could dismiss all fears of "the dogs biting him" so long as his incarceration con- tinued.
On the 7th of January, 1830, Moses Brown, Esq., under- took the reconstruction of said jail, for the sum of $97 50, which was certainly cheap enough even in those days.
The rule that all things earthly must pass away seems to have made no exceptions in favor of Henry county jails. In less than five years from the completion of the second jail or "goal," the Commissioners ordered a third to be advertised and erected. This time the external walls were to be of brick. The founda- tion was to be set in the ground two feet, and to be twenty- eight inches in thickness. Above, the wall was to be thirteen inches thick, and eighteen feet by twenty-five in dimensions, and two stories in height. The floor of the prisons or "dun- geons" were to be of good oak timber ten inches thick, and, on top of this a floor of good oak plank one and one-half inches,
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HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
thick. Just inside the brick walls and on top of the floor, was to be "bullt a log wall" of "hewn timber, ten inches square, to be laid down half dovetailed," and seven fect high. And this was to be lined with one and one-half inch becch plank, and "cross lined" and well spiked on with "cut spikes, six inches in length" and not to exceed three inches distant. The wooden walls were to be continued so as to make two tiers of dungeons, but the upper ones were not required to be so well lined, or otherwise made so strong. The upper story was, doubtless, in- tended for the more corrigible class of culprits, while the more hardened sinners were to be "sent below."
The dungeons in the lower story were to be ready for occu- pants by the third Monday of October, and the whole structure by the first Monday in May, 1836.
"At a sale held at the court-house," to "sell the building of the goal,", Miles Murphey, jr., "bid off the same for $1,100," $500 to be paid January 1, 1836, and the residue in one year. This work was done according to contract, and the structure, with little amendment, stood the racket for about thirty years, and until torn down to make room for the splendid edifice now decorating the public square.
STRAY PEN.
A stray pen or pound, in early days, was considered an in- dispensable appurtenance of every "well regulated" county. Stock was much more given to straying, no doubt, in early times than at present. The love of home, or faculty of inhabi- tiveness, was probably not so well developed then as now, while the powers of locomotion were generally much better, especially with the porkers. The time and money lost in looking up lost stock in this or any other new county, thirty or forty years ago, notwithstanding the comparatively small amount kept, was much larger then at present, and, doubtless, led the assembled wisdom of our early General Assemblies to give it more careful thought than they now devote to some of the great ques- tions of the hour.
By an act of 1824, it was made the duty of the "Commis- sioners in each and every county in the State to cause a pound
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COUNTY BUILDINGS.
to be erected at or near the court-houses, with a good and suf- ficient fence, gate, lock, and key, where all stray horses, mules, and asses, above two years old, taken up within twenty miles of the court-house, shall be kept on the the first day of every Cir- cuit Court, for three succeeding terms, after the same shall be taken up, from eleven until three o'clock in each day, that the owner may have the opportunity of claiming his, her, or their property, and any person having taken up such property, and living more than twenty miles from the court-house, was not compelled to "exhibit it more than once."
In obedience to some such act as this, the Henry County Commissioners ordered such an enclosure made or "sold" the
"Erecting of a pound, commonly called a stray pen, the said pen to be erected in the southwest corner of the public square, the said pen is to be forty feet square, to be erected at least five feet high, and of good and durable timber commonly called a post and rail fence, with a gate and lock to the same."
Minor Fox undertook this great "public enterprise" for the sum of $12 50 and "gave bond with sureties approved of by the Commissioners of Henry county," and faithfully performed the labor within four months in so satisfactory a manner that the Commissioners accepted it, and made him the first Pound-keep- er.
COUNTY ASYLUM.
The buildings and belongings of the establishment where the county's poor are cared for ought to be a matter of more interest to the people of Henry than is generally manifested. Caring for those unfortunate persons who have, from any cause, become unable to care for themselves, has been accepted by the County Commissioners as a duty, ever since the meeting of the first Board, in 1822, and, although the arrangement for the com- fort of paupers may have seemed parsimonious at times, sur- rounding circumstances must be taken into account. It would never do to make the fare, comforts, and general attractiveness of the asylum such that able-bodied, but lazy, shiftless, persons, of whom there are a few in every community, would seek for a residence at the county home, and beside the item, "on.account of poor," has ever been a large one in the "budget" of Henry county, and is largely on the increase.
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HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
On the 6th day of March, 1839, Commissioners Shawhan, Corwine and Ball, purchased of William Silver a farm of one hundred and sixty acres, about one mile northwest of New Cas- tle, for the sum of $2,000. In May following, a contract was made with John D. Foosha for keeping the paupers as well as for the building of a "poor house," and it was also ordered that "all persons who are now, or may hereafter become, a county charge, shall be removed, as the law directs, to the poor house provided for that purpose."
Just what sort of a house this was to be, or the price paid to the man who bought it, the records do not show, but, on the 4th of January, 1844, a special session of the Board was called to receive sealed proposals for the building of another house, which was to be of briek, with a cellar under one wing, four- teen by thirty feet. The size of said building is not specified, but it was to have a porch on three sides of the same, with fourteen posts and bannisters between, from which it may be inferred that it was of considerable size. The brick were to be burned on the place, and all the sills, sleepers, posts, and plates were to be got off the farm. The brick work was to be painted red and penciled with white, and the porch painted drab. John Shroyer, Miles Murphey, jr., and Dr. Reed were appointed to superintend the building of the said house. John H. Polsley undertook the work for $1,100, and was allowed, for extra work, . the sum of twenty dollars. The Superintendents each received twenty dollars for their services.
This building was burned down, and the paupers rendered homeless, in May, 1857, when the Commissioners promptly ordered the building of another and more commodious struc- ture at an expense of about $7,000.
For two or three years, the contract was made with Foosha to care for the paupers that might, from time to time, be sent to him at the rate of $1 25 per head per week, with some little extra allowances in "extreme cases," he paying $150 for the rent of the farnı.
In 1841, the Commissioners resolved to turn over a new leaf, and so they let the contract to "board, clothe and feed" all
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COUNTY BUILDINGS.
paupers, and "to treat them in a humane manner, and especial- ly to attend to the moral instruction of said panpers," to Sam- uel Hoover and Mark Modlin, for three years from the 1st of March, 1842, at one dollar per capita per week, they paying $125 for rent of farm. At the end of this time, they called for "sealed proposals" for keeping the paupers, raising the rent of the farm to $150. The position had come to be looked upon as being so desirable that there was strife over it and Mr. Fooshee instituted an unsuccessful suit to secure possession of it, after the contract was awarded to other parties for three years. In 1844, he was a successful applicant, giving twenty-five dollars more than had been previously paid for the use of the farm, and agreeing to take, "board, clothe, feed, and lodge," and mor- ally instruct all paupers, for 62% cents per head per week, and bring in no other charge whatever. This was quite a coming down, but, after he had given bond to the satisfaction of the Board, he seems to have "flew the track," and Mark Modlin was awarded the prize at 75 cents per head per week, for one year.
Afterward the rent of the farm was reduced to $100 per year, and 75 cents per weck was allowed for keeping the pau- pers, and to "board, clothe, feed, humanely treat, and morally instruct," &c., which was cheap as dirt.
It is pleasant to know that our late Commissioners have turned over still another leaf, and do not now let that import- ant charge on the sole condition of economy, and yet we hear no complaint on this score.
The farm has been enlarged to 280 acres, much of the late purchases being first class bottom land. The Superintendent, Mr. Mahlon D. Harvey, now serving his second term, receives a salary for managing the farm for the county. At the begin- ning of the year, there were thirty-eight paupers in the asylum.
CLERK'S AND RECORDER'S OFFICES.
In the earliest days of the county, the position of a county officer was not a very lucrative one. The records of their trans- actions were very brief and imperfect, and for a whole term of court might have been carried on a few scraps of paper in a vest pocket. One man acted as Clerk and Recorder and per- 7
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HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
formed many of the dutles now devolving upon the Auditor, an office not created for twenty years after the county was or- ganized. In this state of affairs, some small room that could be rented for fifteen or twenty dollars per year was all sufficient for one of the officers, and, in fact, there was but little use for a room, except at stated intervals, for a few years, and a party having business with the court would be as likely as any way to find its Clerk ont in his corn field, with a hoe in his hand, or in his clearing, grabbing.
Of course this sort of thing could not last always, and we accordingly find that the Commissioners let the building of a Clerk's and Recorder's office to Thomas Ginn for the sum of $844. The same was to be a one-story brick building, eighteen feet wide and thirty-eight feet in length, divided into two rooms. As hundreds of our readers will fully recollect it as occupying the southeast corner of the public square, down to November of the year 1867, when the offices were removed into the new court-house, no lengthy description of it is desirable. THIE AUDITOR'S AND TREASURER'S OFFICE,
On the northeast corner of the public square, erected in 1847, George Lowe, contractor, for the sum of $545, was the counter- part of the last named building in almost every particular.
These little buildings, doubtless, answered the purpose in- tended quite well, when first constructed, but the rapid accumu- lation of records and papers, and great increase of public business, and number of persons doing business, had, for a number of years, rendered it apparent that their days of use- fulness were drawing to a close, when the catastrophe of 1864 "opened the way," rather unexpectedly, for the building of
THE PRESENT COURT-HOUSE.
After the burning of the second court-house, in 1864, the Commissioners rented Murphey Hall, which, by adoption, be- came the court-house of the county, and continued to be so used till the completion of the present beautiful and commodi- ous strneture, in 1869.
At the time of the conflagration, some of the public records and a great mass of official papers, stored away in one of the
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COUNTY BUILDINGS.
jury rooms, for want of room elsewhere, all more or less valu- able, were lost or destroyed.
Commissioners Edwards, Minesinger, and Phelps at once set to work to devise ways and means for the erection of a new building dedicated to justice. There were several essential points to be secured in this proposed edifice. It must be free from dampness, which would destroy the precious records of the county, on which so much of the "peace and quiet" of our community depends. It must, of course, be fire proof, and suf- ficiently commodious for all legitimate purposes not only now, but for many years to come ; must be of durable materials, and last, if least, it must be "good looking," a monument of the en- terprise and taste of the people of one of the wealthy counties of the State. All these prerequisites have been faithfully com- plied with, and our county can boast of an edifice second to none in the State in all the essentials of such a structure.
The cut with which this work is embellished gives a very fair representation of the external appearance of the building, coming as near doing it justice as a single view can be well made to do, though we fancy that it makes the building appear a little shorter than it really is, and giving the tower a little more prominence than it deserves.
The main building is sixty-six feet wide by eighty-two feet in length, while the tower, which serves as main entrance and the initial point of the stairway to the court-room, jury room, &c., above, adds some nineteen feet more, making the ex- treme length one hundred and one fect. The height of the walls is fifty feet and of the tower one hundred and ten feet from the foundation.
There is a cellar under the building with a labyrinth of arched passages, or halls, or whatever the name is, which con- tain not only the furnaces and flues for heating every part of the building above, but furnish ample room for the storage of the annual supply of fuel.
Of the capaciousness and convenience of the rooms for the county officers, on the first floor, it would exceed the limits of this work to speak minutely, and an attempted
HENRY COUNTY; PAST AND PRESENT.
description without entering into the minutiæe would be futile. There Is a large fire proof and alnost burglar proof vault con- nected with each of the offices for the storage of the abundant and valuable archives on file.
The vaults to the Auditor's and Clerk's offices have been supplied with suitable cases and pigeon holes for the ponderous tomes and innumerable papers, not in daily use but indispensa- ble for reference in emergencies. In the first named vault there are shelves to hold ninety-eight of the largest sized records, while there have already accumulated one hundred and forty bound volumes, some of the earliest of which are of a size that will admit of three or four being placed in the niche allotted to the larger ones. This room is also supplied with 1,428 pigeon holes.
The vault to the Clerk's office has room for one hundred and nineteen volumes of the larger size on the shelves, while the bound records already accumulated exceed two hundred, most of which are of a large size. Three-fourths of them probably cost the county little short of twenty dollars each on an aver- age.
The court-rooms, rooms for the grand and traverse juries, Sheriff's room, &c., reached by the main stairway, are all wor- thy of a more extended notice than this work will allow. The court-room itself, about sixty-five feet' by fifty feet, is one of the finest and best appointed in the State, both as to conveni- ence and tasteful ornamentation. The fresco painting on its walls and ceiling alone cost about $1,400, and, as a consequence, ought to be a thing of beauty.
The entire cost of this magnificent "temple of Justice," so well constructed and of such materials as to withstand the or- dinary ravages of the "tooth of Time," till several generations shall have passed away, has been about $120,000. This is seem- ingly a large sum, but it must be remembered that everything used, cost "war prices," and already, by comparison with other public buildings, it is coming to be regarded as not too large a sum for such a building. Although there has been no little grumbling by some of the tax-payers, it can safely be predicted
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