USA > Kansas > Johnson County > History of Johnson County, Kansas > Part 4
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"I have preached through Capt. Joseph Parks, who was in command of a company of Shawnee Indians who fought for the Government against the Seminoles in the Florida war. Afterwards he was the principal chief of the Shawnee nation. I also preached through Henry Tiblow, who received his education at the Shawnee Mission school. He was employed by the Government as interpreter for the Shawnees. and Delawares. I also preached through Bashman (Mackinaw Beau- chmie), while I was with the Pottawatomies."
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IIISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
JOSEPH PARK AND PASCHAL FISH.
Capt. Joseph Parks was a half-breed, and a prominent character among the Shawnees. His wife was a Wyandotte. He owned slaves and had a well-improved farm, with an elegant, well-furnished brick house, and in the treaty was well provided for by the grant of lands immediately upon the Missouri State line. Captain Parks lived for many years, when young, in the home of Gen. Lewis Cass. After the Shaw- nees came to Kansas he went to Washington, where he spent many years as agent of his tribe, in order to recover the money taken from them as stated on page 78 of volume 8, Kansas Historical Collections. Parks told Rev. Joab Spencer that it was through family and the good repu- tation he sustained. He was, for many years, leader and head chief of his nation. He died April 4, 1859, and was buried from the old log meeting-house.
"Another prominent man of this tribe was Rev. Paschal Fish. He was a local preacher and his brother, Charles Fish, acted as interpreter. For a few years after the division Paschal Fish served appointments in the Shawnee and Kickapoo missions under the Church South-then re- turned to the old church, remaining firm in his allegiance in spite of persecution. While fairly well educated, it appears that he was unable to write his name, as I have seen a document signed as follows :
"Paschal Fish, his x mark."
Another interpreter connected with Shawnees Mission was Matthias Splitlog. He was a Cayuga-Seneca by descent, having been born in Canada in 1816. He married Eliza Carloe, a Wyandotte, and came west with the Wyandotte nation. He made his home in the Seneca country when the Wyandottes moved to the Indian Territory. Here he erected a fine church building. He died there in 1896. An interesting sketch of his life is found in Connelley's Provisional Government, p. 34.
During the year 1851 the Shawnee manual-labor school still continued to prosper. It suffered some little embarrassment from 1849 to 1851, by reason of the prevalence of cholera in the community.
(Report United States Commissioner of Indian Affairs, 1851, pp. 87, 88.)
The report for the year 1854 shows that 105 children were in attend- ance, divided among the tribes as follows: Shawnees, 49; Delaware, 19; Wyandotte, 14; Ottawa, 23 ; but none from the Kickapoo, Kaw, Potta_ watomie or Peoria tribes. The treaty was made this year and the manual feature closed. The shops were disposed of and disappeared. In 1858 a brick one was still standing, and used as a stable.
The report of 1855 shows that but two tribes besides the Shawnees sent children to the school, the Ottawas 22 and the Wyandottes 10.
Two Spanish boys, rescued from the Cheyennes by General Whitfield, were in attendance; also one small Sioux boy-122 in all. The report
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
indicated progress and notices a disposition among the Shawnees to improve and fit themselves to live among the white people.
Thomas Johnson's last report as superintendent of the institution is headed "Shawnee nianual-labor school, Kansas, September 6, 1862," and is addresser to Maj. James B. Abbott. Indian agent. It contains the following information: During the past year, closing with the present month, fifty-two Shawnee children were in attendance-twenty- six males and twenty-six females-ages from seven to sixteen; taught ordinary English branches; health unusually good. The parents and guardians manifest interest in the children. The average attendance has been thirty. Among the names are those of William M. Whiteday, John Bigbone, Hiram Blackfish, Martha Prophet, William Prophet and Emma Chick (Emma Chick, Moon, daughter of William Chick, of Glen- wood, Kan.)
Major Abbot gives the following account of his visit to the school :
"I found the children tidy, well fed, and apparently well clothed. Their head teacher, Mr. Meek, appeared to possess their confidence and affection. They appeared happy and contented, took a deep interest in their studies, and will compare favorably with white scholars. This school is sustained entirely out of the Shawnee school fund."
MISSION ABANDONED.
The school was abandoned soon after, perhaps the following year.
Thus came to a close the most prominent Methodist mission in the territory of Kansas. The mission had a duration of about thirty-three years, a school being maintained during that period and the manual training school for a period of fifteen years. The Indian school at Lawrence, the magnificent Haskell Institute, is in its system of work and its various departments of manual training, very similar to the manual labor school established by Thomas Johnson at Shawnee Mis- sion nearly half a century before.
This manual labor school is said to have been the initiation of the effort to teach the industrial pursuits to Indian children, which, being followed by other societies and the Government of the United States, today constitutes so prominent a feature in the work of Indian civiliza- tion. Finley with the Wyandottes and McCoy with the Pottawatomies had use similar methods of instrustion.
It remains only to tell of the old mission as it stands today. The old building with the white posts, on the north side of the road, has been entirely remodeled inside, but the outward. appearance of the place remains the same. In front of it is one of the most picturesque old-fashioned yards to be found in the State. The trees, and the shrub- bery, and the shape of the yard, are all old-fashioned. Up from the gate to the wide porch that runs along the entire south side of the building
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
is a walk made of stone slabs. It is uneven still, though the thousands of feet that have trodden its stones have worn down its sharp points. moccasined feet, and many feet shod with boots and shoes, and some unshod have passed over it in the sixty-seven years of its existence. The two large buildings on the south side are still standing. The plastering has fallen in spots from the ceilings and walls, disclosing the laths beneath. These laths were all hewn with hatchets and knives, from the forests. They were about twice the thickness of the modern lath, and far more substantial. The old spring is still there and flows with undiminished volume to this day. Fragments of the iron pipe which carried the water from this spring yet remain.
The mission cemetery is a place of interest. It stands on the top of the hill, a quarter of a mile southeast of the mission buildings. The place may be found by the clump of evergreens and other trees that mark it. It is enclosed by a stone wall which Joseph Wornal and Alex S. Johnson put up some years ago. To this place the body of Rev. Thomas Johnson was brought for burial, after his foul assassina- tion by bushwhackers in 1865. His wife and a brother and seven of his children and some of his grandchildren are buried here. Outside the wall were other graves, some marked and some unmarked. Many of the stone and marble slabs have toppled over and are being buried underneath the soil. Among the graves outside the wall is that of Mrs. J. C. Berryman.
Among the graves, that of Rev. Thomas Johnson is the most con- spicuous. It is marked by a marble shaft which was put up by his family shortly after the war, and which bears this inscription :
"Rev. Thomas Johnson, The Devoted Indian Missionary. Born July 1I, 1802. Died Jan. 2, 1865.
He built his own monument, which shall stand in peerless beauty long after this marble has crumbled into dust- A Monument of Good Works."
MURDER OF REV. THOMAS JOHNSON.
Among William E. Connelly's papers is a manuscript interview with E. F. Heisler, of Kansas City, Kan., in which the story of the assassina- tion of Thomas Johnson is told as follows :
"It is the common belief that Reverend Johnson was slain in his house at the Shawnee Mission, in Johnson county, Kansas, and that his assassins were Kansas Red Legs. Mr. Heisler has gathered the proof that this belief is not in accord with facts, which are as follows: Johnson lived during the war in his house near Westport. It is now
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
in the corporate limits of Kansas City, Mo., and not far from the magnificent home of William R. Nelson, owner of the Kansas City 'Star.' He had a considerable sum of ready money which he kept loaned out to his neighbors. When one loan of $1,000 was about due, he went to the debtor and told him to have the money right on the day it was due, as he wished to use the money and must have it. The debtor had only $800, but told Johnson he would have the $1,000 the day it was due. He went about borrowing twenty-five dollars of one neighbor and fifty of another, always telling them he must have it to make up the $1,000 he had to pay Johnson on a certain day. He made the payment promptly and Johnson immediately gave it to another man to whom he had promised a loan. No person other than Johnson and the person to whom he turned over the $1,000 knew of this last transaction. The community supposed Mr. Johnson had the money in the house. That night about II o'clock he was called up by a 'hello!' Going to the door he saw a group of horsemen in front of the house. They said they wanted a drink of water. Johnson told them to go back to the kitchen, by the side of which they would find a well, and that a cup was hanging on a nail there, that they were welcome to help themselves. This did not satisfy them. They said they were cold and wanted to come in the house and get warm. Johnson told them that the household had been in bed some time, and the house was cold, and that he did not wish to make a fire and disturb all the family. He then closed the door when the ruffians began to shoot. The bullets went through the door and one of them penetrated the abdomen of Mr. Johnson, who died in a few minutes. Johnson's son, William, was at home. Looking from the window of an upper story he saw the horsemen and noted a white or gray horse. The family called out that Johnson was killed and William fired on the murderers from the upper story window. He heard one of the men say 'he believed that Bill was home and they had not better go in as they probably would not get the money anyway.' The assassins then rode away. Someone had complained of William Johnson and he was under orders from Major Ransom, Sixth Calalry, to remain at home until a certain day, when his matter would be inquired into. He went to Major Ran- som on the day following the murder and requested a body of soldiers, and leave to go with them in search of the assasins. His request was granted, and he was directed to be back on a certain day to have his matter disposed of, which he agreed to do. Young Johnson had some idea who the murderers were. The soldiers went with him to the neigborhood of where the man lived who had made the payment of $1,000. There Johnson saw a white horse in a field that reminded him of the one he had noticed in front of the house the night of the murder. They went to the man having it in charge. He told a crooked story of his possession of the horse. One of the soldiers drew his pistol
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
and said to him: 'Tell us the truth ; tell us all about this matter; tell us now. If you refuse I will will kill you. If you fail to tell the truth I will kill you when I return.' The man then said that the horse had been left there by a certain man he named; that there were with him certain other persons, whom he named; that the horse gave out and could go no farther ; that they left it there and took one of his; that they made it plain that they would kill him if he made these things known. They also had told him where they had been and what they had done, saying that if it became known that they had done this deed it would be by his telling it and he would be killed. With this information the soldiers went in pursuit of the assassins. All of them were killed except one. They had to return to Johnson's trial before the last one was found. They were citizens of Jackson County, Missouri, and some of them were Quantrell's men. The whole matter was planned to get that $1,000. William Johnson told these facts to Heisler. There can be no reasonable doubt of their accuracy."
COL. ALEXANDER SOULE JOHNSON.
Col. Alexander Soule Johnson was born at the old Shawnee Mission, in Wyandotte county, Kansas, July IT, 1832. When twenty years of age he was married to Miss Prudence C. Funk, of St. Joseph, Mo. Two boys and two girls were born of the marriage, all of whom are dead except Mrs. Charles E. Fargo, of Dallas, Texas. Col. Johnson made his home in Johnson county till 1870, when he moved to Topeka. His wife died in 1874, and in 1877 he married Miss Zippie A. Scott, of Manchester, N. H. Colonel Johnson was a member of the lower house of the first Territorial Legislature, when his father was president of the council. Colonel Johnson was the youngest member, being but twenty-three years old.
Alexander S. Johnson was commissioned lieutenant-colonel of the Thirteenth infantry, Kansas State militia. October 13, 1863, and served in the Price raid, in October, 1864. He organized Company D, Thir- teenth Kansas State militia, at Eastport, Johnson county, September 19, 1863, of which he was captain. See Adjutant-general's report, 1864, Ist pt., pp. 103, 104.
In 1866-67 Colonel Johnson served in the State legislature as a mem- ber from Johnson county. In 1867 he was appointed land commissioner of the Fort Scott & Gulf railroad. He remained in that position till the spring of 1870. He entered the land department of the Santa Fe railroad in 1874. In 1890 he resigned his position and retired from active business. He died at Dallas, Texas, December 4, 1904. His remains were brought to Topeka.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
WILLIAM JOHNSON AND HIS RECOLLECTIONS.
William Johnson, of Shawnee Mission, is one of the historians of Kansas. Born in the old mission in 1845, he knows every building. room, door, window , tree, shrub, road, hill, rock, spring, stream about the grounds of what was once the greatest Indian school in the United States. He loves to tell of them and never tires of giving the history of each.
Mr. Johnson's father, Rev. Thomas Johnson, born in 1802, came here in 1829, under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal church, and established a mission six miles west of Westport. This mission was. founded and conducted on a small scale and was solely for the benefit of the Shawnees. In 1839 the church removed the mission to a point two miles southwest of Westport, where a grant of 2,240 acres of land was secured, and a manual-labor school opened. Says Mr. Johnson, as he spoke of this school, "They think they are advancing in school work and getting new things at the present time, where they have manual labor introduced, but my father over eighty years ago devel- oped the system that is now being used in all the up-to-date schools." The pupils that came were instructed in farming, carpentering, blacksmithing, shoemaking, milling, wagonmaking, etc., and the girls in housekeeping, weaving, spinning and sewing. The boys' and girls" schools were in separate rooms. The school building proper was 35x 120 feet. The first and second story was used for chapel, dormitories, and school rooms, and in 1855 the Territorial legislature met there and the State printing office was in the building. The Indian boys slept in the attic, one room running the full length of the building, with a row of beds on each side and an aisle between. The beds were of the type found in the homes of the early pioneers, with bed cords to support the bedding, the greatest objection being the sagging in the middle, and the noisy creaking at each move of the occupants. Two windows in each of the gables furnished the ventilation.
Meetings were held in the chapel room every Sunday, at which time was placed in front of the pulpit, a big black collection box with a slot in large enough to permit the dropping in of a silver dollar. When that good old song, "From Greenland's Icy Mountains," was started, the audience rose and filed by the box dropping in the contributions. "And even in those days," said Mr. Johnson, "some of those Indians would drop in buttons by mistake. I never knew why this particular song was always sung at collections, but it was always used then."
The laying out of the farm of 2,240 acres shows a master mind. In a short time 1,000 acres were under cultivation. The only whites permitted to live on the reservation were the families connected with the mission and men needed in farm and shop operations. Of these some later married Indian wives and were adopted in to the tribe
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
and allowed all the privileges as Shawnees. Among these were Samuel Conatzer, Perk Randall, John Bowles, Isaac Parish, Samuel Garett and John Owens, and the two Choteau brothers.
Work was begun in February, 1839. At this time 400 acres of land were fenced, twelve acres of which were planted in apples trees, it being the first orchard set out in Kansas, and 176 acres planted to corn. Over 40,000 rails were made by the Indians in a short time; about forty hands were employed and the build- ings were soon under way. The brick was burned on the farm a short distance south of the school, and a saw and grist mill were erected also. Mr. Johnson says every bit of the lumber entering into the construction of the sixteen buildings that were put up here was sawed at this mill. The capacity of the grist mill was 300 bushels per day. The mill was run by steam and the sawing done with an upright saw. The school building and office and boarding house were all commended at the same time. The latter stands west of the school building and is a brick, 30x120 feet, with a thirty-foot L. It had accommodations for from 200 to 300 people. These two buildings are about 100 yards apart and stand just south of the old California road. There is a fine spring between them, which is enclosed by a stone wall. A frame store room, 20x60 feet, was northwest of the boarding room, a spring house 12x12 feet, of bricks, was west of the boarding house, and a frame carpenter shop 16x20 feet, was southwest of the spring house. The steam saw and grist mill, built in the shape of a T, 60x24 feet, stood directly south of the boarding house. The wash house was built of logs and frame, 40x40 feet, and stood southeast of the boarding house, and east of that was a log smoke house, 24x36 feet. Three hundred hogs, averaging 300 pounds each were often killed here in one season. Directly south of the chapel was the 18x20 foot blacksmith shop, and east and south of this was the wagon shop, 28x36 feet. A log cabin northwest of the blacksmith shop completes the buildings south of the California road.
North of the California road was the female ward, superintendent's office and dormitory. This building was at first 35x135 feet, but a portion of the east end was removed and the building is now about 100 feet long. It is a brick building and when Shawnee Mission was the capital several officers made their homes here; among them were Terri- torial Governors Reeder and Shannon, Secretary of the Territory Wood- son, and Attorney-General Isaacs.
While Mr. Johnson was showing me the grounds I asked him about an old stone house that had attracted my attention. "That is of no historic importance, as it has only been here since 1857," he said. The building was erected by an Irishman and used for a smoke house. The sitting room in the dormitory took just 100 yards of yard-wide carpet to cover the floor. The rooms were so arranged that a person in the east room could see the fireplace at the west end of the building.
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HISTORY OF JOHNSON COUNTY, KANSAS
The wages paid by Mr. Johnson to carpenters for services was fifty cents per day, and he had no trouble in getting plenty of help. A visitor at the present time will notice some modern windows in the buildings, but the size originally used was all 8x10 glass. The floors were oak, as were the sills and some of the window casings. The baseboards were of black walnut. The oak floors were tongued and grooved by hand and the laths were all made by hand, "rived out," as Mr. Johnson puts it. A carpenter with as many large buildings to erect as Mr. Johnson, Sr., had, and who would have to "rive out" all the laths for them, would have heart failure in these days.
In 1854, Mr. Johnson, when only nine years old, dined with an Irish nobleman, Lord George Gore, when he camped one and one-half miles west of the mission. The nobleman was over in this country on a buffalo hunt. "Speaking of 'Teddy Roosevelt,' said Mr. Johnson, "I'll bet that when he started to Africa he had no finer equipment than Lord George Gore. His camping outfit was something to behold He had some forty or fifty men with him and twenty-five or thirty kinds of guns. Guns for any kind of game that flew in the air or ran on the earth." He invited Mr. Johnson's father to breakfast with him, but his father not being able to go, he then said, "Let the boy go." And so William went. William, even at the age of nine, was some hunter, and he had been out with the men on buffalo hunts and Lord George Gore took an interest in him. "There were just the two of us at the table and a flunkey a piece to wait on us, and they did it in great style, even in a tent. I had my appetite along with me too. It was my first introduction to style and I enjoyed it immensely."
One day one of the teachers in the mission school asked Mr. John- son if he would not take charge of her room for a couple of weeks. He was not anxious for the job, but as teachers were hard to get he told her he would try it. No Indian language was to be used in the school, but the pupils in the room Mr. Johnson had charge of all knew him and that he talked the Indian language. The first half of the day not one of the bunch would talk English. At noon Mr. Johnson went out in the orchard where a fine bunch of sprouts grew and cut a bundle of them which he took to the school room when the afternoon ses- sion began. The pupils started in with this Indian jargon as before. and then Mr. Johnson got busy and one after another was introduced to the sprouts. After that afternoon it was surprising with what fluency those Indians could talk English.
BAPTIST MISSION.
The first Baptist Mission was established in 1831, through the efforts and influence of the Rev. Isaac McCoy. Dr. Johnson Lykins and wife were appointed by the Baptist Missionary Convention
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HISTORY OF JOIINSON COUNTY, KANSAS
teachers and missionaries to the Shawnees, and arrived at their post in 1831. No appropriation having been made by the Bap- tist Board of Missions for the erection of buildings, Mr. Lykins pur- chased a small tract of United States land on the Missouri State line, built a small log house at his own expense and commenced his labors, serving not only as minister and teacher, but physician as well. In April, 1832, an appropriation was made and the necessary buildings erected.
Rev. and Mrs. Simerwell, Rev. and Mrs. Jotham Meeker, and Rev. and Mrs. Moses Merril, all arrived during the fall of 1833, and had tem- porary quarters at the mission. In the same year Dr. Lykins by author- ity of Hon. Lewis Cass, secretary of war, was appointed by the board general superintendent of Baptist affairs in the Indian Territory, and the charge of the mission fell into the hands of Mr. Meeker. The church numbered at this time sixteen members, regular meetings being held at the mission house and occassional ones at the homes of the Indians. A school was also in operation. Mr. Meeker brought with him to the mis- sion a small printing press and types, which was put in operation during the years 1833-34 and by the tenth day of May, 1834, two books had been printed, according to a system of phonography invented by Mr. Meeker, and several adults as well as children had learned to read and write.
In the spring of 1839, Rev. Francis Barker was appointed missionary to the Shawnees and removed to the mission. October 23, he was married to Miss Churchill, a missionary at the same post, and under their efficient management the school which had been temporarily aban- doned was revived. In 1848, comfortable buildings were erected, mission buildings and a pretty little frame church near the old Sante Fe high- way. The mission was in successful operation until the latter part of 1855, Dr. Barker being its faithful minister, teacher and physician for over sixteen years.
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