USA > Indiana > Vigo County > History of Vigo county, Indiana, with biographical selections > Part 39
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gun away, as it was loaded, but the poor man had scarcely ceased speaking before the trigger was touched and Thompson was almost instantly killed. Hanna could not have been more than nine years old at the time, and of course it was an accident. This was the first dead person I ever saw. .
Still following Second, the next house was on the west side, second lot north from the corner of Main, a two-story frame. In that house was first printed the Western Register and Terre Haute Journal and Advertiser, by John W. Osborn, Esq., editor, propri- etor and publisher. On the northwest corner of Second and Main streets was a tavern kept by Francis Cunningham. On the north- east corner was the store of Mr. John D. Early, a large frame build- ing. On the north side of the public square, midway (nearly ) between Second and Third streets, was a store kept, I believe, by Messrs. Josephus and Stephen S. Collett, two-story frame with red roof- afterward by Mr. John F. Cruft. On the west side of the square was the store and dwelling of Mr. Wilson, father of Mr. Ralph Wilson; they were frame houses, and one story. Half way between Ohio and Walnut streets was the store of Maj. George W. Dewees; it was of round logs, with the end to the street; his dwelling was in the rear of the store, and was a one-story frame building. On the southeast corner of Second and Walnut streets was the dwell- ing and hatter shop of Mr. Robert Brasher. On the northwest and southwest corners of Second and Poplar streets were two large, hewed-log houses. There were no more houses on Second street. The jail stood on the southeast alley corner on Swan street, between First and Second streets. It was built of smoothly hewn logs, the floor being the same. Light was admitted by a small grated win- dow and the keyhole. I remember of one person being confined in it, that was black Dan, for stabbing Bill, another negro. He made his escape by digging away one of the floor logs, which was rotten. Aunt Sue, a colored woman, lived in a little log cabin a few yards south of the jail.
The first on Third street, commencing at the south, was Robert S. McCabe's dwelling, on the west side, south, and near the corner of poplar street, built of hewed logs, two stories. It was afterward occupied by Mr. Salmon Wright, who weatherboarded it. On the opposite side of the street was a large two-story, hewed-log house belonging to Dr. Modesitt. On the southeast corner of Third and Walnut streets was a frame dwelling, occupied by Mr. Malcomb McFadden, but owned by Joseph and Samuel Eversol, coopers, whose shop was of round logs, adjoining to the south. On the east side of the street, a short distance from Walnut street, was Miss Hannah Austin's house, a small frame, of two rooms, end to the street. On the west side of the street, near the alley, was George
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Ellison's blacksmith shop. On the east side of the public square, near the corner of Main, was the store and dwelling of William C. Linton, Esq., a two-story house, painted white, with red roof. On the northeast corner of Third and Main streets was Mr. McQuil- kin's tavern, a large frame house. The sign was on a post at the corner, a war horse fully caparisoned, rearing, as if impatient for some one to mount and ride into some imaginary battle to the south- west. We boys always called it the "Light Horse Tavern." On the northwest corner was a two-story house, painted white, with red roof, occupied first, I believe, by Mr. Barnet; afterward by James Farrington. The next house was midway between Cherry and Mul- berry streets, well back from the street, and on the west side. A small frame house, also on the west side, stood near the southwest corner of Third and Mulberry. The last house on Third street was on the west side, nearly up to Eagle, and was occupied by Mrs. Patty Nelson, mother of the late James Nelson, at one time sheriff of Vigo county.
There were only two houses on Fourth street ; the northern- most was on the west side of the street near the corner of Eagle, a small frame house occupied by Mr. John Disbrow. When his little daughter died, I for the first time realized that the young could die. I remember well looking at her pale, sweet face as she lay in her little coffin, and wondering if she were never to wake from her still sleep. On the northwest corner of Fourth and Walnut streets was the other house. In it lived, solitary and alone, old Jacob, a negro, who was small in size, with hair very white. He could play the fiddle, and always kept time with his half-shod foot. I think he must have been very kind, as the boys delighted to go to his- house on rainy days, to hear the music and dance. Old Jacob brought water from the river, for a great part of the town, on a sled made from the fork of a tree, and drawn by an old horse, which, had its body been as rich in flesh as its tail was in burs, would have shown its ribs less conspicuously. Adjoining Jacob's house to the west was a dilapidated old mill from which Jacob sup- plied himself with fuel. Both houses were of round logs.
On Oak street, north side, lived Mrs. Hodge. As this was " out in the woods " in my young days I am at a loss exactly where to locate it, but I think it was on the corner of Fourth and Oak streets. It was built of round logs. The only houses on Fourth street were William Marrs' blacksmith shop, frame, at the south- west corner of that street and Main. Mr. Marrs' dwelling of hewed logs stood at the southwest corner of Cherry and Fifth streets, and the school-house at the northwest corner of Fifth and Mulberry, a roughly hewed log house of one story; by the shape and size of the windows, I think it must have been built for a school-house.
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On the south side of Mulberry street, a short distance west of the school-house, was a large two-story hewed-log house. That finishes the town as I first remember it, which was in 1823, with exception of the court-house. I can not remember when it was commenced; it was not finished however, till 1832 or 1833 when William Probst, Ebenezer Paddock and somebody else were county commissioners.
On the public square to the south of the court-house was a small grove of sycamores, and near the southeast corner of the building was a low stump of a large tree. Tradition says that a carpenter by the name of Hovey fell from the eaves of the house upon this stump, and a chisel or gouge which he held in his hand, entered his 'breast and he was killed.
The first brick houses were built in 1826 or 1827. I was absent from Terre Haute from May 1826 to May 1828, and I do not know which was the first, but I think Mr. Linton's two-story house on the southwest corner of Second and Main was. The other brick buildings erected were as follows : A two-story store and dwell- ing, built by Lucius H. Scott on the southwest corner of Third and Ohio streets; one on the southeast corner of First and Swan streets (very small) ; one on the southwest alley, corner of Swan street between Water and First streets. Benjamin I. Gilman, pork packer, had built one on the northeast corner of First and Mul- berry for an office. Russell Ross had built another of one story on the west side of Water between Eagle and Chestnut streets. Joseph Miller had erected another of two stories on Chestnut, a little way east of Water street, and James and Harry Ross one nearly abreast of the end of Second street, also two stories high, both on out-lots.
The first burial ground was on the square east of Sixth street, between Ohio and Main streets. Curtis Gilbert afterward built his dwelling on the site. The second burial ground was on the out- lot north of the town, on the hill overlooking the river west of Water street. Many good people were buried there. It was in what was called the " Old Indian Orchard." The third one was on Third street north of the town on land which, in my early childhood, was an Indian cornfield. A lone grave surrounded by a picket . fence was on the west side of Seventh street near the end of Wal- nut street. The man buried there was Mr. Davenport. I never knew anything of him.
In my remembrance there were no large trees in the town plat east of Water street, but many stumps were standing, and large stumps of trees were lying in several places in the town. The river bank was lined with willows and sycamores south of Modesitt's ferry, and north of it was a large growth of maple, cottonwood and syca- more trees, with willows on the bank, The line of lots on the east
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side of Water street, from Swan to a little north of Ohio street, was cleared. The line of bushes, hazel and oaks, was along the alley between Water and First streets, from Swan to Walnut; thence east- ward upon this last named street to Second street; thence south ' along Second to near the corner of Poplar; thence northeast to nearly the crossing of Third and Walnut; thence southeast to the prairie land; from the northwest corner of Water and Walnut streets, northerly to half way between Ohio and Main streets; thence northeasterly to the crossing of Second and Cherry streets, till it reached the prairie line near the school-house, corner of Fifth and Mulberry streets. There were several fenced fields east of the town on the prairie, and I remember being called out at night to fight the prairie fires as they threatened the fences. Some of the streets were pretty well worn, but roads and paths crossed the town at all conceivable angles. The principal one was the Vincennes road, which left Second street at Poplar, running southwest, nearly to the corner of First and Oak streets; thence south. Another road, much used by Indians in those days, left the corner of Water and Poplar streets, led down the hill to the bottom land and southerly along the river bank to the " Island Ford." Another road left the north part of the town along the bank of the river to the "Indian Ripple Ford," two miles above the town. A gulley led down to the river from Walnut street, commencing in front of Mr. Hussey's house; another from Poplar street, but I can remember when Thomas Rogers ran a plow over the brink of the hill to make this gulley. There was another gulley just north of Poplar, which was older. There were very few wells in the village, and many people brought their water from the springs that then gushed out from the river banks. I can barely remember when the Indians lived to the north of the town, near the old Indian orchard. There were only a few families of them. A number of backwoodsmen lived " over the river" in the Sugar Creek country. They often passed our house, roaring drunk. The next worst animals were the wolves, but there were not many of them, I never saw the large kind but once. I was riding behind Mr. Elisha U. Brown, coming from his house to town; just as we passed the old Hunnewell house, on Straw- berry Hill, we came upon a gang of four or five devouring a hog. Of the common prairie wolves there were more, but they were timid, and I have seen them scampering through the long grass, frightened at the very sight of anything human, no matter how small. A panther I never saw or heard, but it was not unusual to hear people say that they heard a "painter" last night. The first steamboat arrival occurred in 1824 or 1825. Her name was the " Florence." She landed at the old boatyard south of the foot of Oak street. Of course, the whole town went to see her, besides
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all the country round about. The steamboats were always welcomed by firing the "old cannon." This old cannon was an institution ; it had no carriage, and was elevated by placing a log of wood under it near the muzzle. James Hanna, a poor jolly fellow, acted as artilleryman. Every time he discharged it he would have to spin a long yarn about what he had seen while "in the sarvice." On the Fourth of July the old cannon would be honored with a pair of cart wheels. On the approach of the Fourth of July the people of Clinton would steal the cannon, thus compelling the worthy people of Terre Haute to steal it back again, which they always did, being adepts in that branch of the fine arts. The people of Clinton stole it once too often, for it burst on their hands. Before the days of steamboats, goods were brought overland in wagons-mostly dry- goods-and by keelboats, which came up the river in summer time when the water was low, propelled by men with poles. These men, I remember, were a particularly rough set, the citizens of the town having very little communication with them. I give you my recol- lections of several of the earliest citizens of Terre Haute who have passed away. They are the impressions made on my memory while a boy.
Mr. George Hussey was our nearest neighbor. If I remember rightly he was a middling-sized man, with thin, sandy whiskers. He had a custom of thrusting his thumbs into the armholes of his vest, throwing his shoulders back, and making a particular kind of h-e-m. He was a player on the flute; how good I don't know. He would come to our house of evenings, play awhile on the flute, and then sit down (he always walked when he was playing) and talk about Baltimore. Of the two performances I liked the. Baltimore part the best. He was always very kind and good to me, and I liked him very much. After he moved to his farm I was often a guest of his for weeks, when he always kept me tagging after him over the farm. I don't remember which talked the most. The last time I saw him was in 1853. I paid him a visit on his farm. It was a long time before he could realize I was the once white-headed and often ragged little boy of long ago, but when he was satisfied of the fact his mind seemed to leap over intervening years, and he talked of the olden times as of yesterday.
Dr. Charles B. Modesitt was one of those rare old gentlemen that we meet but once in a lifetime, tall, erect, with hair white as snow. He was the very embodiment of "Old Virginia," aye, even Cul- pepper county itself. He was extremely polite, would say "sir" to old or young, white or black, man, woman, boy or girl. He was very kind to we little boys, and kept an orchard of sour apples on purpose for us to rob.
Maj. George W. Dewees was a grim old man, thick-set, with
Andrew Dunlap.
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iron-gray hair and whiskers, small eyes, and a very sour look. He was universally unpopular. His two ferocious white dogs made him most of his reputation with boys of my age. All that glitters is not gold, and somebody is said to be painted blacker than he is; so with the old Major. He was better than he was represented to be. I know of his furnishing a poor young woman with money to pay her passage from Louisville to Terre Haute, and even refusing to be thanked.
Col. Blake was my beau ideal of a gentleman. He was six feet in height, and well proportioned, light hair, neatly trimmed side whiskers, well brushed forward, always well dressed, the ruffle of his shirt standing out beyond his vest, with a smooth glossy hat, polished boots, and corns on his toes. I stepped on them once. He would always give me his fourpences. I liked him for that. I have heard that he was once engaged in a duel with somebody, but no one was hurt. In short, Col. Blake was the greatest man in Terre Haute, in my youthful imagination, except Maj. Lewis.
Of Lucius H. Scott I remember very little previous to 1828. He was a thin, erect man, quick in his movements and precise in speech. He came to Terre Haute very poor, but prospered. He was sheriff of the county at one time. The last time I saw him was in 1853. I happened to meet him in the cars, and traveled with him nearly 200 miles. Our talk was of the olden times.
Robert Sturgis. I hardly think there is anybody that remem- bers him but myself. Poor Bob was a universal favorite-he would keep people laughing all the time he talked, and he talked about all the time. Ostensibly he was clerk in somebody's store, but his most constant occupation was drinking whisky. I remember well the day he died. I was in the habit, small as I was, of calling to see him every day while he was sick, and he was sick some time. That day I called as usual. Mr. John Cruft was the only person in the room, or even in the house. When I entered the room he faintly called me to his bedside. As I approached he held out his emaciated hand, and taking mine in his feeble grasp, he said, "You are very kind, Billy, to think of me on such a day as this." It was the Fourth of July. After a short pause he continued, "Billy, I am dying, when you are a few years older you will know what killed me, do not let it kill you. Be a good boy and you will become a good man. Good-bye." I cried like any child, and Mr. Cruft told me I had better say good-bye too and go, for Mr. Sturgis needed rest. Mr. Cruft remained with him till he died. If I remember rightly he was buried with Masonic honors.
Mr. John W. Osborn, editor, printer and proprietor of the West- ern Register and Terre Haute General Advertiser, was a man who, in my estimation, carried in his head all the knowledge of this world.
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He was quiet in manner and kind in speech, never passing anyone on the street without a pleasant word, He was particularly opposed to horse racing (then a custom of the country universally indulged in), from a moral point of view. He was particularly sensitive in regard to razor-strops, but I never understood why. To me there were two points of interest in the Western Register; one was that the news was always "two weeks later from Europe," and the other was Lewis Redford's advertisement, with the picture of a bureau at the top and "tf" at the bottom. It was always in the paper. Mr. Osborn sold out his paper in 1832 to Thomas Dowling, a gentleman who then held different views in regard to horse racing. Mr. Osborn was a candidate for sheriff in 1833 or 1834, but was unsuccessful. He afterward published the Plow Boy at Putnamville or Green- castle.
Thomas Rogers was the ferryman at Modesitt's Ferry. He was one of those hard-working men who toil and sweat but never get along in the world. Besides tending ferry he would cut wood, drive oxen, feed hogs, kill hogs-do anything in short that an honest man could do, still he lived poor and died poor.
Mr. Robert Brasher was a hatter by trade, and was one of those good, pious, quiet Christians, inside and out, that we read of but seldom see. He was a tall, spare man, and the veins in the backs of his hands were very large. He made excellent hats, with three trifling faults, viz .: uncouth in shape, too soft in body, and alto- gether too durable. I used to delight in the snap, snap, snapping, and the twang, twang, twanging of that long bow of his as he beat up his fur. His wife was a very kind-hearted woman, and prided herself on her hospitality. She was an excellent cook, and much given to novel reading. Her three youngest children had several names each. When she stood at the door and called her absent sons (and they were generally absent), it seemed as if she were call- ing a school. If, however, she happened to be calling her daught- ers one would hear half the female characters in the "Children of the Abbey" called.
Francis Cunningham kept the tavern at the northwest corner of Second and Main streets. "Uncle Frank," as he was universally called, was one of those genial-hearted men that all love; off handed, generous, liberal, prone to anger, but soon and so easily appeased that his anger often became ludicrous even to himself. He was much given to horse racing, as was the entire community in those days, always had very fast horses -- just fast enough to be beaten. He was very persevering in that pursuit, but never successful. Whenever I went to the tavern he made me sit on two chairs and told me stories just the same as if I had been a man. Dear old " Uncle Frank," I think I can see him now. He was postmaster a
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number of years, and was an ardent democrat. Mrs. Cunningham was no less kind than her husband. I was a great favorite of hers when I was small, and always had a share of the good things when I went to her house. I have traveled far and wide, during the last thirty years, and I have seen but few women so good as I have deemed her to be. In 1853, when I was on a visit to my old home, she sent for me to come and see her. She was very glad to see me. For a few minutes she looked steadily at me with a kind of dreamy expression that told me her thoughts were far back, beyond me in the dim, unreturning past; the tear gathered in her eye, and she said, "I can see your mother in your face." Was it unmanly in me to allow the unbidden tear to moisten my eye? Surely the weather-beaten, storm-driven, tempest-tossed sailor may be allowed to have a heart.
Joseph Thayer was my first schoolmaster. He was a man of very steady habits, during vacation, that is, steady at the whisky bottle, but, in term time, he was never known to drink. We boys had to mind how we carried sail or we would get our head sheets flattened in on the wrong tack. "Yet he was kind, etc.," see Gold- smith for the rest of his character.
We once had a schoolmaster by the name of Rathbone. I re- member nothing of him except that the big boys locked him in one Christmas and burned brimstone beneath the floor. This was such great sport that Ralph Wilson, in the exuberance of his joy, sawed two of his fingers to the bone with a rusty penknife. As we advance in life we look fondly back to our school days, and I think we do rightly, for there was all our fun. We had one teacher who took the starch out of our sails, yet he never flogged us. He made a threat to flog a boy once, and sent a couple of young scapegraces out to cut him a switch for the purpose. They were gone nearly the whole after- noon, and returned just as school was about to be dismissed with half a dozen sycamore rods ten or twelve feet long and lugged them up to the teacher's desk. "School is dismissed," said Mr. Brown, and made a cut at the two young scamps with one of the rods. They were not long in getting outside the school room. The boy who was to be flogged escaped his punishment. How well I can remember my first school day. I was a small boy a little more than four years old, my sister and I loitering along the way to the school, picking flowers and tying them up in little nosegays. Mr. Thayer took me on his knee
and called me "a little man." I knew I was only a little boy and thought him very wicked for telling stories. My last school day was when I was fourteen, and as I carried my books home, I felt a pre- monition that I had seen the last of a school room as a scholar. Since then the world has been my teacher.
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Since then I've looked on many a scene Far, far beneath the stranger's sky; Upon the deep's blue, glossy sheen, It's wrathful heavings wild and high, Palace, bath, temple, glacier, flood, The classic haunts of olden time Where once a godlike race hath trod; Now wrapped in misery and crime.
How I love to linger over the past. In memory I live my young days over again. The companions of my youth have nearly all passed away, some of them have lived as they ought not to have lived, and others have died as they ought not to have died, yet I only know them as they were in my boyhood days.
John Britton was for many years a magistrate, and was es- teemed a good one, he also kept the county library. He was a great teacher of mine. He taught me how to guide a horse by haul- ing on the starboard rein if I wanted to steer to the right, and haul- ing on the port if I wished to veer away to the left. He was rather plain in manner and speech. It was said that at a trial before him, a man by the name of Leatherman jumped up and exclaimed: "So and so swears to a d -- d lie." Squire Britton then, in an excited voice said, "John Leatherman I fine you $5 for swearing, by G-d." Hewas very fond of fancy gardening and "Britton's garden" was a great place of resort thirty and thirty-five years ago.
James Farrington has too recently passed away for me to say anything interesting of him. He was for a number of years my " guardian," and a kinder-hearted man never lived. I received a letter from him in 1861, while I was in Washington City. He ex- pressed much regret at being absent when I was in Terre Haute and a heartfelt pleasure to learn that I had turned out so well in the world. He enclosed a letter to the Hon. Caleb S. Smith, Secretary of the Interior, requesting him to use his influence to assist me in any way.
John Campbell was for many years a merchant in Terre Haute, but he took to drinking and went from bad to worse till everything was gone. He was always very kind to me, but I do not think he was so kind to other boys. I was very fond of his company. We would take long rambles over the prairie, and through the woods, making Mr. George Hussey's farm our objective point, where we would remain three or four days. I remember well the last time I saw him. He bade me "good-bye" saying that I should never see him again, and wished me to remember that he had always thought a great deal of me. He pressed my hand as we parted, and I could see tears in his bloodshot eyes. I have never seen him since. The next day he was gone. I have always thought that he drowned him- self.
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