USA > Indiana > Johnson County > History of Johnson County, Indiana > Part 3
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"Some time during the latter part of 1817, Jacob Whetzel, then living in Franklin county, in this state, bought a tract of land in Harrison's Pur- chase, near the mouth of Eel river in Greene county. The usually traveled
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route from the White Water country, where Whetzel lived, to the Purchase, was by way of the Ohio and Wabash rivers, or from the Falls at Louisville, overland to that place. Jacob Whetzel was a born and trained woodsman. He had been hunting wild beasts and fighting Indians all his life. He had served as a spy and scout with the armies of St. Clair and Harrison, and, now that a pathless woods lay between him and his purchase, he determined to cut through rather than go around.
"The Delaware Indians were at that time in the undisturbed possession of the White River country, and Jacob Whetzel, early in the summer of 1818, applied to the Delaware chief, Anderson, at his village on White river, where Andersontown (Anderson) has since been located, and obtained his permission to cut a road through from near Brookville to the Bluffs of White river. In the month of July, in company with his son Cyrus, a youth eighteen years of age, and four good, stout axmen, Thomas Howe, Thomas Rush, Richard Rush and Walter Banks, he set out for the nearest point on White river, in- tending to work from thence back to the settlements. Taking one of the men, . Thomas Rush, with him, he went in advance, blazing the proposed road, while young Cyrus, with the rest of the men, followed after, carrying their axes and nine days' provisions. These had not entered the wilderness very far, when, one evening late, they met a party of Indians, whose actions, not- withstanding their protestations of friendship, excited suspicion. The two parties passed each other, but the white men, without arms, kept a more vigilant watch that night than was common even in that day. The night set in cloudy, and rain soon began falling, but the hours passed quietly on, until the camp-fire burned low, when the man on watch discovered Indians lurk- ing in the vicinity. Quietly waking his sleeping companions, they as quietly abandoned their camp, and, notwithstanding the darkness of the night, fol- lowed the trace of Jacob Whetzel and his associates by feeling of the notches and blazes cut in the trees. Whatever motive led the red-men to prowl around their camp-fire at night, nothing more was seen of them on that journey.
"Meeting with no other hindrances save such as were incident to the trackless wilderness, Cyrus Whetzel and his comrades journeyed on, cross- ing Flat Rock about seven miles below the present site of Rushville; Blue river, four miles above Shelbyville, and Sugar creek, a little north of Boggs- town. On reaching a water course, a few miles east of White river, a nest of honey bees was discovered in the hollow limb of a walnut tree, which yielded a large supply of honey ; but being too bitter to be eaten, because made from a bitter, honey-bearing bloom, it was reluctantly thrown away; never-
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theless, from this circumstance originated the name of "Honey creek," the first creek within the borders of this county to receive a name at the hands of white men.
"White river was struck at a place Jacob Whetzel called the Bluffs, and we may well imagine that the scene which met the gaze of these pioneers was such as they little expected to behold. Jacob Whetzel had set out to reach by a short cut a prospective home at the mouth of the Eel; but standing on the Bluffs, in those July days, he looked out over a wide, deep and rapidly flow- ing river, through whose clear depths'the eye could penetrate to the white pebbles that lay on the bottom far below, whose waters swarmed with fish, and whose level bottoms and rolling uplands were covered with great forests that grew from a soil of wonderful richness, and there, on the banks of the Waw-pe-kom-i-ca of the Miami red men, he resolved should be his future home.
"Jacob Whetzel went on down the river alone, while young Cyrus and the axmen turned back and began the work of cutting out what was long known as Whetzel's Trace. Their progress was slow. A path had to be cut of a width sufficient to admit the passage of a team. After passing the rolling lands extending a few miles back from the river, the country through which they went was level, and at that season of the year was almost an end- less swamp. Their first day's work took them to an old beaver dam near the present east boundary line of Pleasant township. It was built across the outlet of a swamp, and made a pond of water a half-mile long and several yards in width at the narrowest places; but at that time it had apparently been long deserted.
"Presently, they reached the Hurricane, and there they established their camp, and as this stream afforded the only running water between Sugar creek and Honey creek, it was surmised that here would be a noted camping ground in the future, and the stream they named Camp creek; and subsequent events proved the surmise to have been well-founded. Slowly hewing their way through the woods, the axmen came at length to a deep swamp, some two miles west of the present east boundary line of the county, which was known in the early day as the Great Gulf. This was a mile in width and two miles in length. Two streams, Flat creek and Leatherwood, entered the Gulf at the north end, and their combined waters made Little Sugar creek. Sugar creek was already named when the Whetzels came. It was noted for the large forests of sugar trees that grew at intervals on its banks, and to this circumstance it is supposed that its name is due. The entire distance to
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Sugar creek, after passing the skirt of rolling lands lying back from the river, is said to have been a continuous swamp. The axmen were often mid-sides in water while cutting their way, and at night they cut brush and made heaps on which to sleep.
"Arriving at the Brandywine late one evening, the party encamped, when Jacob Whetzel rejoined them. After their scanty meal had been eaten, Jacob produced a bottle of peach brandy which he had obtained in Owen county, and over this the party pledged the memory of the wives and sweethearts at home. To the inspiration due to that bottle are the people of Shelby county indebted for the name of one of the prettiest streams, Brandywine. The name was given on that night. The provisions giving out, the party was soon after compelled to push on to the settlement, and leave the work unfinished; but in a short time, Whetzel returned and finished it.
"This work proved of great importance in the settlement of Marion, Johnson, Morgan and Shelby counties. It was known as Whetzel's Trace, and hundreds of the early settlers of central Indiana traveled along it in search of their wilderness homes."
Over this trace, Franklin Hardin, when a lad of fifteen, came with his mother in the last week of October, 1825. They stopped at Lewis Morgan's home in the northwest part of Shelby county. Morgan's house was the last chance for a lodging on the Trace until they should reach Nathaniel Bell's home, at the crossing of the Whetzel and the Berry trails, twenty miles to the westward.
Of this trip, Judge Hardin writes: "The next morning was Sunday, and having bidden good-bye to our kind friend (Morgan), under his direc- tion we were sent around the north end of the Great Gulf, as it was usually called, thus leaving Whetzel's Trace at Morgan's, and going up Sugar creek, first on one side and then crossing at Huff's Mill, and traveling up the west bank till our northing amounted to two or three miles, thence westward, near where Madison Morgan long after resided, and crossing Flat creek and Leatherwood, at the north end of the gulf, and thence south along the west side of the gulf to a point directly west of Lewis Morgan's to the Whetzel Trace, at a point called at the time Loper's Cabin, but long before known and named Camp Creek by the Whetzels. When Whetzel marked out his trace in the summer of 1818, the weather being exceedingly dry, the waters of the Great Gulf had disappeared, and he ran straight across it from Mor- gan's to Camp Creek .* The Great Gulf is as yet (1880) an unsolved prob-
*NOTE-This crossing must have been at McConnell's Ford .- AUTHOR.
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lem. It is a depression of two or three miles west of Sugar Creek, being three or four miles in length, and having the same direction and about the same capacity as the present valley of Sugar Creek. Whether that stream once occupied that basin, but was forced by driftwood and the agency of beavers to cut another channel, might yet be determined by a careful exam- ination. Two small creeks entered at the north end, but soon lost their channels and then mingled their waters and covered the basin generally throughout the year. It sustained a growth of heavy timber of such kinds as would grow in it. It was, during long years after I saw it first, the home of bears, wolves, catamounts, panthers and other wild animals. A volume could be written of the exploits of two brothers named Hosier, who settled near its north border, and who by traps, guns and dogs, made sad havoc of wolf cubs, catamounts and other game. A more dismal place I never saw, and as we rode around it for six miles or more-an old woman and a boy-I trembled with fear. Added to the gloom of the dismal place, away to the north was an Indian encampment, making the most of their privilege to hunt here. They seemed to be making a drive of their game to the south- ward, the direction we were traveling to Loper's Cabin on Camp creek. The constant crack of the rifle, the crash of the brushwood caused by the troops of the flying, frightened deer as they rushed thundering on with branching horns and tails erect, widespread, grandly leaping high above the shrubbery, with heads and eyes averted as if to see the distant foe, and the widely scat- tered flock of wild turkeys, as they sped on with long, outstretched necks, half on foot, half on wing, far as the eye could reach, was altogether a sight, one never to be forgotten by an old lady and a boy unused to such wild display.
"In our approach to Loper's Cabin, at the camping grounds on Camp creek, the wolf paths leading to the encampment along the side of the road were as continuous and well beaten in the soft soil as hog paths about a farm, and great plantigrade foot-prints over the muddy grounds showed that bruin often quitted his secret hiding place in the gulf and roamed abroad. Camp creek afforded good water. and from the time the Whetzels first erect- ed their camp here until the trace ceased to be used as a highway, here was the emigrants' hotel. In the morning as they moved on, the wolves entered to devour the dead animals and the garbage left in the encampment. Daniel Loper was a wild man. I could never learn whence he came, nor yet where he went when he left Johnson county. The first we knew of him was in October of 1820. Then he had erected a hut at the crossing of the Whetzel
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and Berry traces, on the northeast quarter of the southeast quarter of sec- tion 7, township 13 north, range 4 east, lately owned by the Bracketts. He kept a sort of entertainment there,-that is, a man felt that he was not quite out of doors when he stayed in his cabin.
"Nathaniel Bell came from Ohio in 1821 along the Whetzel trace, destined for the Eel river country, in search of some eligible situation for himself and family. He rode on horseback with a sack under him, in which he carried his provisions. His horse carried a bell around his neck, which was kept silent by day, but when night came, Bell made a camp, unloosed the bell, hobbled the horse, turned him out to graze, and then lay down to sleep. Bell, having explored the Eel river lands, and not liking them, returned and. called at the cabin of John Doty, who had located a camp on the school section, near the center of the present White River township, on the 8th of May, 1821. Here Bell disclosed his purpose, and that was to get a descrip- tion of the land at the crossing of the traces, and enter them at Brookville on his way home, and then settle there, and keep a tavern, and build a horse-mill and a distillery for whisky.
"Applying to Peter Doty, son of John Doty, for aid in getting a description of the land, Peter agreed to furnish it for one dollar, but Bell declared he had no money beyond the sum necessary to enter the land. Finally, Peter agreed to accept the bell on the horse, and the desired infor- mation was thus obtained. Bell forthwith ordered Daniel Loper to leave his cabin, as the land was now his. Thus, under a threat of expulsion and a claim of ownership falsely made, Loper was driven out, and retired to Whetzel's old camp (at Hurricane creek, near Robert Fitzpatrick's lands) and there erected another hut, and occupied it for one or two years. Here Loper continued to reside for a time, and give such aid and lodging as he could to emigrants.
"Loper, when he first came to the county, had a man living with him by the name of John Varner. Varner made several trips to White Water with an old wagon and a yoke of oxen belonging to Loper, and in exchange for the fruits of the chase received and brought back provisions and occasionally a few gallons of bad whisky. Whether from the unhealthiness of Camp creek, on the borders of the gulf, or some other cause, John Varner took sick and suddenly died. By some means, Loper got word to John Doty to come and assist in his burial. John Doty and his son Peter responded at once, taking with them a shovel for digging the grave. When they arrived, Loper, despairing of assistance, had gone to work with a garden hoe, the
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only implement for digging he had, throwing out the earth with his hands. The grave was soon ready. But there was no coffin, nothing except a large trough. Into this they put his body, and covered the trough with a rude slab, split from a log, and thus was John Varner buried at Camp creek. *
"Bidding adieu to Camp creek, with its strange associations and inci- dents, we continued on the Whetzel trail westward, meeting five or six men, who were off for a bear hunt on the borders of the gulf. We were alarmed at the sight of these men as they approached, thinking they were Indians. They were exceedingly rough, large men, with uncouth apparel, dressed in buckskin pants, bearskin caps, each with a large fire-lock on his shoulder, while six or eight great, ugly wolf dogs were in company. These men were a party of Bell's, then a power in the land. They treated us kindly, and directed us in our travels. Seven miles from Camp creek, in the midst of a dismal forest of trees, briars and brush-wood, there broke suddenly on our view Bell's horse mill and its surroundings. It was a quiet Sabbath evening, but the mill was in full clatter, with its unequalled hundrum produced by its loose machinery. Twenty or thirty men stood around in clusters in friendly chat, and forty to fifty horses in working trim were hitched in every direc- tion. The mill was far behind in its grinding, and was running night and day without halting for Sunday. The men were waiting for their several turns to grind, for the mill ground in order of their arrival, and if a man was absent when his turn came, the next succeeded to his rights. At this point we left Whetzel's Trace in a northerly direction. and in a couple of hours found ourselves at the end of our journey, in the midst of our near friends."
It is worthy of note that the Great Gulf has come to be in our day one of the finest bodies of land in the two counties, and the way from McCon- nell's Ford to the Hurricane road leads through farm lands of endless fertility.
THE INDIAN TRAIL.
This trail. sometimes known as the ancient river trail, followed the line of a prehistoric glacial river southward through Johnson county, toward the Falls of the Ohio, at Louisville. It crossed Driftwood at the "upper falls," ran northwesterly thence to Sugar creek, finding a ford at the place later called Collier's Ford, and then probably with the line of the Mauxferry road, two-thirds of the way to Franklin, when it swerved more to the left, passing the farm now owned by Milo Canary. then with the ridge to the Big Springs at Hopewell, then nearly north with the line of present highway running
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through the center of the west half of that row of sections, to the Marion county line, and onward to the Indian village on the Wabash near the pres- ent site of Lafayette. Below Driftwood the trail divided, one leading to the Kentucky river trail, the other to the Falls at Louisville.
The Kentucky River Indian trail led by way of Vernon to Madison. Along this trail must have come John Vawter, whose route the writer has attempted to follow on the maps of today with indifferent success. To give the reader a like opportunity, Vawter's letter to the Madison Republican of February 27, 1819, is herewith reprinted :
"Vernon, Feb'y. 16, 1819.
"Gentlemen :- Capt. Campbeel and myself have just returned from an excursion into the Delaware lands, and should you consider the following sketch worth an insertion in your paper for the amusement of your readers, and the information of. emigrants and persons wishing to explore these lands, it will gratify some of your readers.
"We traveled the new cut road from this place to Geneva (on Sandy) a new town laid out on the old Indiana boundary line, about eight miles from this place in a N. W. direction. We then took a new cut road (opened to Flat Rock sufficient for waggons), which bears nearly N. 45 W. The first stream we crossed after leaving Person's Mill on Sandy, is called Little Sandy; the second Leatherwood; the third, Fallen Timber Creek (all ap- propriate names). We next passed a remarkable beaver dam, in which the ingenuity of these animals is wonderfully exhibited. The 4th stream is Flat Creek, the 5th Deer Creek, the 6th Crooked Creek; all of which streams will answer for light machinery, and run to the S. W., the bottoms gen- erally gravelly and water very clear. We next came to a stream by the name of Clifty, sufficient for any kind of water works, and about ten miles distant in the new purchase. I think, without exaggeration, that every quarter section that may be laid out in this ten miles, will be fit for cultiva- tion and will be settled. The lands are of a black, sandy quality, timbered with beech and black ash principally. The general face of the country is rather inclined to a plain, with hollows rather wet. The lands on Clifty are very rich and well timbered on both sides of the stream with blue ash, walnut, sugar tree, honey locust, beech, etc.
"After crossing this stream we came to a most beautiful walnut ridge about one and one-half miles north of Clifty. We next crossed Middle Creek, then Grassy Creek, then Tough Creek, Stillwater and Pleasant Run, all of which are small mill streams running to the S. W., some of which
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have very muddy bottoms, and lie between Clifty and Flat Rock at the dis- tance of seven miles. In this seven miles, the lands are principally very rich and level, the valleys rather wet, and timbered principally with oak, black ash, walnut, sugar tree, poplar, hickory, etc., until we came to the lands immediately upon Flat Rock. These lands exhibit a scenery I never expected to see in Indiana. They resemble the rich lands on the two Elk- horns in Kentucky, for richness and timber, and to appearance, abound on both sides of the stream, which has a gravel bottom and is about 80 yards wide.
"On the north side of this creek we found only one stream until we arrived at Driftwood, about eight miles in a S. W. (N. W.) direction from where we crossed Flat Rock. The lands between these two streams are level and very dry, timbered with white oak, black oak, walnut, honey locust, underbrush, dog wood and hazel. We found beautifully rich and level lands on both sides of Driftwood, and well timbered. The river (by count- ing the horses' steps) was 180 yards wide where we crossed it. I think there are very few springs in this country, but believe water may be had with very little labor. To sum up my views on the subject, I am of the opinion that if Jefferson county would make a good highway in the direc- tion to this place, that Madison would be the key on the Ohio River to one of the best tracts of country I have seen in this state; and a delay will speedily bring forward some other point as the country is now settling. We met two families and teams on the road to this Eden.
"Yours with esteem, "JOHN VAWTER."
In the same year of Vawter's trip, one Richard Berry established a ferry at the crossing of the Kentucky River Trail and Driftwood, and blazed the trail north and south of his home, and hence that part of the old Indian trail running through Johnson county became known as Berry's Trace. As noticed elsewhere, the Madison and Indianapolis state road laid out near the line of the Kentucky River Trail, and the road leading to the Falls of the Ohio near the route of the Ancient River Trail, furnished the principal routes of commerce and immigration in the first days of the county. Joining the latter road near Seymour was another highway lead- ing by way of Brownstown, Vallonia, Salem and Corydon (then capital of the state) to Mouck's Port on the Ohio river.
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GEORGE KING
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THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS R L
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COUNTY ORGANIZATION.
Upon the old stone marking the grave of Eleanor King in the old Franklin cemetery, near the confluence of Hurricane and Youngs creeks, is this inscription : "Eleanor, wife of George King, First Proprietor of Frank- lin, died April 8, 1831, aged 50 years." George King was not only "First Proprietor of Franklin," but to his efforts Johnson county owes its organi- zation.
At the time of the adoption of the Constitution of 1816, out of the territory south of the old Indian boundary line, only the following counties had been organized: Wayne, Franklin, Dearborn, Switzerland, Clark, Jef- ferson, Harrison, Washington, Knox, Gibson, Warrick, Posey and Perry. Of these, the most populous and hence entitled to the largest representation in the convention were Harrison, where the state capital was located; Clark, near the Falls of the Ohio; and Knox, embracing the old settlements about Vincennes.
One can trace the tide of immigration into the New Purchase in the organization of new counties; At first, the movement was slow, Pike, Jen- nings, Monroe, Orange and Sullivan, coming in the same year the new state was formed. In the next year, Davies, Dubois and Scott were organized. With the signing of the treaty at St. Mary's, another inrush of settlers came, and in 1818 Crawford, Lawrence, Martin, Morgan, Owen, Randolph, Ripley, Spencer, Vanderburgh and Vigo counties came into being. Then came a three-year period of inaction, Floyd county, which was cut off from the territory of Jefferson and Harrison, being the only new county formed.
With the opening of the land office at Brookville, the tide again flowed strongly to the north and in 1821 Bartholomew, Decatur, Green, Henry, Marion, Parke, Putnam, Rush, Shelby and Union were organized.
Such was the situation when George King came to this section in the autumn of 1822. He had been here twice before. With a party of his Ken- tucky neighbors, including Simon Covert, Samuel Demaree, Cornelius De- maree, Peter A. Banta, William Porter, James Shannon, Wallace Shannon and Prettyman Burton, all residents of Henry and Shelby counties, Ken- tucky, he came by way of Madison, thence eastward to Versailles, turning then to the left by way of the forks of Flat Rock, where he and his com- panions took up the Kentucky River Trail. Passing through Johnson coun- ty by way of Berry's Trace, they continued the journey northward as far as the home of William Conner, on White river, some sixteen miles beyond the
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present capital. At this place Conner had established a trading post with the Indians as early as 1806, and had made himself a comfortable home with no white neighbors nearer than sixty miles. It was at Conner's home that the commissioners appointed by Governor Jennings met on May 22, 1820, to select the site of a new state capital.
King and his companions then turned backward, passing Indianapolis, then without a name and with only four small cabins to mark the place of the present metropolis, and came to the Bluffs of White river. There they took Whetzel's Trace out to Loper's Cabin on the Berry Trail, whence they traveled southward by the Big Springs and Berry's Ford, on the old Ken- tucky River trail homeward.
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