History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 5

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942

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EARLY SETTLEMENTS.

boating never contributed sensibly to the growth of Indianapolis.

CHAPTER III.

First Period - Early Settlements-Organization of Marion County and Erection of Townships - Erection of Publio Buildings-Notable Events and Incidents of the Early Set- tlement and of Later Years-Opening of Roads-Original Entries of Lands in the County.

ALTHOUGH the treaty of 1818 expressly conceded the occupancy of the "New Purchase," as it was called by the whites, to the Indians till 1821, its profusion of game, its fertility, its abundanee of excellent building timber began to allure settlers frem the White Water Valley before a year had passed, and from the Ohio River before the reservation had expired. It will give the reader a suggestion of the natural attractions of the country to suggest that Mr. William H. Jones, a leading dealer in lumber in the city, aided when a boy, in 1824, in catching young fawns in the vicinity of the present site of the Vandalia Railroad depot and of the corner of West and Merrill Streets ; that Robert Harding, one of the earliest settlers, killed a deer on the area called the " donation" for the first Fourth of July celebration and barbecue in 1822; that as late as 1845 or later wild turkeys in their migrations made a roost in a large sugar grove that covered the portion of the present city site about Meridian, Illinois, and Tennessee Streets above the crossing of St. Clair or thereabouts. As late as 1845 a turkey seared from this roost by hunters ran into the city and into the basement of what was called the " Governor's House," in Cirele Park, and was caught there. Lost quail were frequently heard piping in the baek yards of residences. In 1822 saddles of veni- son sold at twenty-five to fifty cents, wild turkeys at ten to twelve and a half, a bushel of wild pigeons for twenty-five cents. An early sketch of the condition of the country says, " A traveler who aseended the river a few years prior to the settlement saw the banks frequently dotted with wigwams and the stream en- livened by Indian canoes. At night parties for ' fire- hunting' or 'fire-fishing' were frequent among the

Indians, and occasionally formed by their white sne- cessers. ? '

The first settlers drawn to the New Purchase were Jacob Whetzel and his son Cyrus. The former was the brother, the latter the nephew of the noted scout and Indiau-fighter, Lewis Whetzel, or Wetzel, dis- tinguished in the bloody annals of West Virginia and Pennsylvania. " The elder Whetzel," says Mr. Now- land, in his "Prominent Citizens," " soon after the conclusion of the St. Mary's treaty went to Ander- son, head chief of the Delawares, who lived in the large Delaware town named for the chief and retain- ing the name still, and from him obtained permission to ' blaze a trace' from the White Water in Franklin County to the Bluffs of White River." It may be as well to explain for the benefit of later settlers that " blazing" was cutting away a large strip of bark and wood from a tree-trunk on the side next to the pro- posed " trace" or road. Such a mark would remain conspicuous for many months in an interminable forest without a sign of human presence except that, and a series of them close together along the line of a proposed road would be a sure and easy guide to ·backwoodsmen or any traveler with sense enough to be trusted alone. The two Whetzels came to the Bluffs in the spring of 1819, before the government surveys were completed or commenced in some cases. Their settlement was a little below the present south boundary of the county.

" The first white residents of the county," Mr. Dun- can (before referred to) says, " were Judge Fabius M. Finch, his father and family, who came to the site of Noblesville or near it in the spring of 1819," that region being then a part of the county, but separated in a few years. In the fall of 1818 one Dr. Douglass came up the river from below to the Bluffs, and re- mained there a short time, and in January, 1819, James Paxton came down the river from the upper waters to the site of the city, and came again a year later in 1820. The first settler in the present area of the county will probably remain an unsettled ques- tion for all time, as it was a disputed point in 1822, has been ever since, and is more peremptorily disputed now than ever. The prevailing tradition Is that George Pogue, a blacksmith from the White Water

HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.

settlements, came here March 2, 1819, building a double log cabin on the line of Michigan Street a little way east of the creek, on the high ground bordering the creek bottom, and lived there with his family, the solitary occupants of Marion County within its present limits, till the 27th of the following February, when John and James McCormick arrived with their families and built cabins on the river bank ncar the old National road bridge. The priority of settlement lies between these families and Mr. Pogue's. Within a few months past one William H. White, of Han- cock County, claims that he was born on the city site Oet. 4, 1819, ncar where Odd-Fellows' Hall now stands, on the corner of Washington aud Pennsyl- vania Streets. Old settlers as early as 1820-21 have no recollection of any account of such an oeeur- rence, and births were too rare in those days to allow the first one in the county or any suggestion of it, however vague or doubtful, to be forgotten. The im- pression seems to be that Mr. White has been misled by some accidental confusion or by the failing memory of his relatives. He may be right, but he is distrusted by settlers who arrived here within a year of the alleged occurrence, and disercdited by. the opportunities of knowing the truth of many who arrived within two years and repel his elaim.

In the summer of 1822, a little more than a year after Pogue's death, Dr. Samuel G. Mitchell, the old- est physician in the place, published in the Gazette, the first paper in the place, a discussion of the pre- tensions of Poguc to the honor of being the first settler, in which he maintained that the McCormicks were the first, and that Pogue eame a month later, about the time the Maxwells and Cowan came. No reply was made to this direct attack on the general opinion of the settlers, which certainly suggests a reasonable probability that its statement was indis- putable, and that the tradition of a general concur- renee in awarding Pogue the credit is ill-founded. But there comes in here the countervailing considera- tion that the pioneers of the backwoods were little given to glorifying the pen or looking to the papers for instruction. Nobody may have been disposed to take the trouble to contradiet what he knew nobody but Mitchell believed, or he may, very fairly, have

coneluded that in a little two-year-old village in the woods it would be less trouble to contradiet the story "by word of mouth" to every man in the place than to attempt so unusual a feat as writing for the papers. But this early and publie contest of Pogue's claim by an intelligent man, at a time when there could hardly have been an adult, male or female, who did not know the truth, creates a strong doubt against the current of tradition. The probability inclines to Mrs. Pogue's statement at an " Old Settlers'" meeting in 1854, as Mr. Robert B. Duncan remembers it. She was more than fourscore years old then, but her memory of early events seemed clear and accurate. She said that her husband and family came here on the 2d of March, 1820, and the MeCormicks eame on the 7th of the same month. This seems to be final as to the first settlement being made in 1820 instead of 1819, as has generally been believed, whether it settles the question of individual priority or not. Where two or threc families arrive at a place in a primeval forest within four or five days of each other, and a mile or two apart, it is easy to see how each set of the sepa- rated settlers may suppose itself the first. Virtually they are simultaneous arrivals, and the truth, or at least the probability, of history compromises this long-mooted question by coneluding that the Pogues and McCormicks were all first settlers.

Whether Pogue was the first man to live here or not, he was certainly the first to die here. Mr. Now- land's description of the man and account of his death so strikingly exhibit some of the characteristics of the time and country that it is reproduced here. "George Pogue was a large, broad-shouldercd, and stout man, with dark hair, eyes, and complexion, about fifty years - of age, and a native of North Carolina. His dress was like that of a Pennsylvania Dutchman, a drab overcoat with many capes, and a broad-brimmed felt hat. He was a blacksmith, and the first of that trade to enter the 'New Purchasc.' To look at the man as we saw him last, one would think he was not afraid to mcet a whole camp of Delawares in battle array, which fearlessness, in fact, was most probably the cause of his death. One evening about twilight a straggling Indian, known to the settlers as well as to the In- dians as Wyandotte John, stopped at the cabin of Mr.

EARLY SETTLEMENTS.

Pogue and asked to stay all night. Mr. Pogue did not like to keep him, but thought it best not to refuse, as the Indian was known to be a bad and very des- perate man, having left his own tribe in Ohio for some offense, and was now wandering among the various Indiana tribes. His principal lodging-place the pre- vious winter was a hollow sycamore log that lay under the bluff and just above the east end of the National road bridge over White River. (Above the site of the bridge, Mr. Nowland means, as the bridge was not built for more than ten years after.) On the upper side of the log he had hooks, made by cutting the forks or limbs of bushes, on which he rested his gun. At the open end of the log next to the water he built his fire, which rendered his domicile as comfort- able as most of the cabins. After John was furnished with something to eat, Mr. Pogue, knowing him to be traveling from one Indian camp to another, inquired if he had seen any white man's horses at any of the camps. John said he had left a camp of Delawares that morning, describing the place to be on Buck Creek, about twelve miles east, and near where the Rushville State road crosses that ereek ; that he had seen horses there with iron hoofs (they had been shod), and described the horses so minutely as to lead Mr. Pogue to believe they were his. Although the horses were described so accurately, Mr. Pogue was afraid that it was a deception to lure him into the woods, and mentioned his suspicions to his family. When the Indian left the next morning he took a direction towards the river, where nearly all the set- tlement was. Pogue followed him for some distance to see whether he would turn his course towards the Indian camps, but found that he kept directly on towards the river. Mr. Pogue returned to his cabin and told his family he was going to the Indian camp for his horses. He took his gun, and with his dog set out on foot for the Delaware camp, and was never afterwards seen or heard of. We remember that there were a great many conflicting stories about his clothes and horses being seen in possession of the Indians, all of which were untrue. There can be no doubt that the Wyandotte told Mr. Pogue the truth in regard to the horses, and in his endeavor to get pes- session of them had a difficulty with the Delawares

and was killed, at least that was the prevailing opinion at the time. Nothing has ever been learned of his fate to this day, further than that he was never seen or heard of again, though the settlers formed a com- pany to search all the Indian camps about within fifty miles to find some indication that might lead to a elcaring up of the mystery." Pogue's Creek, once the pride and now the pest of the city, takes its name from the proto-martyr, if not proto-settler, of the city and county.

Within a week or two after the arrival of the Mc- Cormieks, John Maxwell and John Cowan came and built on the high ground near the present erossing of the Crawfordsville road over Fall Creek, very near the site of the City Hospital. During the following three months a number of new-comers arrived, and settled principally in the vicinity of the river. Those best remembered are the Davis brothers (Henry and Samuel), Isaac Wilson (who built the first cabin on what was afterwards the old town plat in May), Robert Harding, Mr. Barnhill, Mr. Corbaley, Mr. Van Blari- cum. About the time of the arrival of the last of this first group of pioneers the State capital was located here by the commissioners appointed by the Legislature for that purpose.

When the State was admitted into the Union, April 19, 1816, a donation of four sections-four square miles-was made by Congress for the site of a capital, to be located wherever the State might choose upon unsold lands of the government. No selection had been made or attempted in the four years since the State's admission. The capital, which had been kept at Vincennes by Governor Harrison during his administration as Territorial Governor, from 1801 to 1812, was removed te Corydon, Harri- son Co., by the Legislature, May 1, 1813, and re- mained there till its permanent settlement here in the fall of 1824. On the 11th of January, 1820, the Legislature appointed ten commissioners to make selection of a site for a permanent capital. They were John Tipton (an old Indian trader), John Con- Der (brother of William above referred to, and like him reared from childhood among the Indians, the founder of Connersville), Geerge Hunt, John Gilli- land, Stephen Ludlow, Joseph Bartholomew, Jesso

HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.

B. Durham, Frederick Rapp, William Prinee, Thomas Emerson. They were ordered to meet at Conner's place (north of the eity) early in the spring. Appar- ently only half of them served, as only five votes were given in determining the selection. But Mr. Nowland says there were nine when the party got to Conner's, Mr. Prinee alone being unable to attend. If this is correct there must have been four commis- sioners who did not like any of the sites examined and declined to vote. A part of them met at Vin- eennes about the middle of May, 1820, and were joined there by the father and unele of Mr. Nowland, who were on their way to Kentucky from Illinois, but were persuaded to accompany the commissioners.

The party ascended the river to the Bluffs, where the Whetzels had settled the year before and had been joined by four or five other families. After resting a day at this point and making an examina- tion of it, they eame on up to the mouth of Fall Creek, and remained a day, some of them expressing themselves pleased with the country and disposed to put the capital here. Mr. Nowland told the commis- sioners that if the location were made here he would move out in the fall, and do all he could to induce other Kentuekians to join him. The mouth of Fall Creek had been the customary place of crossing the river by the whites ever since the White River Valley had been known to them. Mr. Nowland (the author) says that Lieut. (afterwards General and President) Taylor told him that he had crossed the river here with his foree when going from Louisville to the Wa- bash to build Fort Harrison, now Terre Haute, in 1811. While the force was here Col. Abel C. Pep- per, United States Marshal of the State under Taylor, met Tecumseh, who was on a mission to the Dela- wares, doubtless to induee them to join his combina- tion against the whites. The party went on to Conner's, some sixteen miles north, as before stated, and examined the situation there. One or two seemed to favor it, but the whole party returned here, and after re-examining the country, decided on the 7th of June, 1820, by vote of three to two, for the Bluffs, to locate the capital here. On the 6th of January following, 1821, the selection was approved by the Legislature and the location decided irrevoeably.

. The commissioners reported that they had selected Sections 1 and 12, east and west fractional seetions numbered 2, east fractional section numbered 11, and so much of the east part of west fractional sec- tion numbered 3, to be set off by a line north and south, as will complete the donation of two thou- sand five hundred and sixty aeres, in Township 15, Range 3 east. The Legislature, after approving the location, named the future eity and capital Indianapo- lis, the " city of Indiana." The name was suggested by the late Judge Jeremiah Sullivan, in the com- mittee charged with the preparation of the confirma- tory bill. He gave an interesting aecount of the affair in a letter to Governor Baker, which may be pertinently introdueed here :

" I have a very distinet recollection of the great diversity of opinion that prevailed as to the name by which the new town should receive legislative baptism. The bill, if I remember aright, was re- ported by Judge Polk, and was in the main very acceptable. A blank, of course, was left for the name of the town that was to become the seat of government, and during the two or three days we spent in endeavoring to fill the blank there was in the debate some sharpness and mueh amuse- ment. Gen. Marston G. Clark, of Washington County, proposed 'Tecumseh' as the name, and very earnestly insisted on its adoption. When it failed he suggested other Indian names, which I have forgotten. They all were rejected. A member proposed 'Suwarrow,' which met with no favor. Other names were proposed, discussed, laughed at, and voted down, and the House, without coming to any agreement, adjourned until the next day. There were many amusing things said, but my remem- branee of them is not sufficiently distinet to state them with aeeuraey. I had gone to Corydon with the intention of proposing Indianapolis as the name of the town, and on the evening of the adjourn- ment above mentioned, or the next morning, I sug- gested to Mr. Samnel Merrill, the representative from Switzerland County, the name I proposed. He at once adopted it, and said he would support it. We together ealled on Governor Jennings, who had been a witness of the amusing proceedings the

EARLY SETTLEMENTS.

day previous, and told him what conelusion we had come to, and asked him what he thought of the name. He gave us to understand that he favored it, and that he would not hesitate to so express him- self. When the House met and went into eom- mittee on the bill, I moved to fill the blank with Indianapolis. The name created quite a laugh. Mr. Merrill, however, seconded the motion. We dis- eussed the matter fully, gave our reasons in sup- port of the proposition, the members conversed with each other informally in regard to it, and the name gradually commended itself to the committee, and was adopted. The principal reason in favor of adopt- ing the name proposed-to wit, that the Greek ter- mination would indicate to all the world the locality of the town-was, I am sure, the reason that over- came the opposition to the name. The town was finally named Indianapolis with but little if any op- position." One may well feel puzzled to understand the force exerted by the argument that " the Greek termination of the name would indicate the locality of the town." The termination means " city," and that is all. The other half of the name would in- dieate locality though, and the combination would fairly enough suggest a State capital, so that its apt- ness is evident, whether the argument that secured it was sound or not.

By the same aet of approval and naming the new capital the Legislature appointed Christopher Harri- son (no relative of the general's), James Jones, and Samuel P. Booker commissioners to lay off the town. They were directed to meet on the site on the first Monday of April, 1821, to perform that duty, and make plats or maps of the town, one for the Secretary of State and one for the State agent. They were also to advertise and hold a sale of the lots as soon as praetieable, reserving the alternate lots. The pro- ceeds of the sales were to be used in erecting the buildings required by the government. Harrison was the only one of the commissioners who attempted to perform bis duties. He was a Marylander by birth, a very eccentric man, of excellent education and eul- tivated tastes, who came to Southern Indiana early in the century, and some years after the completion of his work as commissioner returned to Maryland,

and lived to a ripe old age. It is said on good au- thority that he was engaged to be married to Miss Elizabeth Patterson, a noted belle of Baltimore, but the attentions of Prinee Jerome Bonaparte over- powered her scruples and her faith, and she married the brother of the great Corsican, only to find herself repudiated by him and excluded from the ambition that had betrayed her. Mr. Harrison came to Jeffer- son County about 1804, and lived there the life of a hermit with his dogs and books for several years, then removed to Salem, Washington Co., and there his rare attainments-rare in the backwoods at least-and his abilities forced him into publie life, and finally into the position of founder of the city of Indianapolis. He came to the little yearling village at the time appointed, and selected as surveyors Alex- ander Ralston and Elias P. Fordham, with Benjamin I. Blythe as elerk of the Board of Commissioners.

Mr. Blythe lived to an advanced age in the eity, and was one of the earliest of the enterprising men who laid the foundations of the city's pork-packing prosperity. Of Mr. Fordham little appears to have been known at the time, and nothing can be learned now. Ralston was a Seotehman, a man of marked ability and rare attainments as well as high eharacter. When quite young he had been employed in assist- ing the laying out of Washington City, and may have got then the preference for wide streets and oblique avenues which he exhibited so signally and benefi- cially here. He became associated with Burr's expe- dition, presumably in ignoranee of its real character, as most of the conspirator's following were, came West in connection with it, and remained when it failed. He remained in Indianapolis after completing his work, and in 1825 was appointed by the Legislature to survey White River and make an estimate of the expense of removing the drifts and snags and other obstruetions to navigation, and reported the following winter. He built a briek residenee on West Mary- land Street, a half-square west of Tennessee, and lived there till his death, early in 1827. He was buried in the " Old Cemetery," and his grave was long un- known. A few years ago, however, some old resi- dents made a close examination and found it, or were confident they had.

HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.

The Indiana Journal of Jan. 9, 1827, contained an obituary notice of him, which from his prom- inence in the settlement may be reproduced here. He died on the 5th, at the age of fifty-six. " Mr. Ralston was a native of Scotland, but emigrated early in life to America. He lived many years at the city of Washington, then at Louisville, Ky., afterwards near Salem, in this State, and for the last five years in this place. His earliest and latest occu- pation in the United States was surveying, in which he was long employed by the government at Wash- ington, and his removal to this place was occasioned by his appointment to make the original survey of it. During the intervening period merchandise and agri- culture engaged his attention. In the latter part of his life he was our county surveyor, and his leisure time was employed in attending to a neat garden, in which various useful and ornamental plants, fruit, etc., were carefully cultivated. Mr. Ralston was successful in his profession, honest in his dealings, gentlemanly in his deportment, a liberal and hospitable citizen, and a sincere and ardent friend. He had experienced much both of the pleasures and pains incident to human life. The respect and esteem of the generous and good were always awarded to him, and be found constant satisfaction in conferring favors, not only on his own species, but even on the humblest of the brute creation ; he would not willingly set foot upon a worm. But his unsuspecting nature made him liable to imposition ; his sanguine expectations were often disappointed. His independent spirit some- times provoked opposition, and his extreme sensi- bility was frequently put to the severest trials. Though he stood alone among us in respect to family, his loss will be long lamented." Mr. Now- land adds that the old bachelor's house " was kept for him by a colored woman named Chaney Lively," who was the second colored person in the place. Dr. Mitchell brought the first, a boy named Ephraim Ensaw. These were the first colored residents, but a colored man came out with Mr. Maxwell in 1820, and remained here a few months. His name was Aaron Wallace, and a few years ago he returned here to reside . permanently, after an absence of nearly sixty years. "Aunt Chaney," as she was called, was

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History of Indianapolis and Marion County, Indiana, Part 5

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co. Number of Pages: 942

Author: Sulgrove, Berry R. (Berry Robinson), 1828-1890
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.H. Everts & Co.
Number of Pages: 942