USA > Kansas > Marshall County > History of Marshall County, Kansas : its people, industries, and institutions > Part 38
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"Thirty-four homes and business houses were entirely destroyed, the loss exceeding $50.000. Wagon bridges were blown into the river, loss $15,000.
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Churches, schools, elevator, bridges, business houses and dwellings were totally destroyed and many were entirely blown away.
"The storm seemed to have gathered south of Blue Rapids, sweeping down the Game Fork. Valley, killing two people. and wrecking farm. buildings. The same storm struck the west fork of the Vermillion, killing five persons and seriously injuring ten others, and destroyed a large amount of property. Part of the storm passed up the Big Blue river, wrecking a new farm house belonging to James Schroyer. The storm crossed the river at that point.
"On the Corn Dodger creek several buildings were destroyed and Milo Weeks was dangerously injured.
"Those killed in Frankfort were: Mr. and Mrs. James Downs, John Howe, Mrs. Henry Johnson and a man named Grove. The damage to prop- erty was very great."
As soon as the storm ceased sufficiently to make it possible, relief parties went to Irving. A train of nurses and physicians was hurried out from Atchison and the night was spent searching for bodies and members of fam- ilies over the prairies and among the wrecked buildings. The night was dark and the rain fell continuously. The morning broke upon a scene never to be forgotten by those who witnessed it.
A detailed account of the storm and incidents connected with it, may be found in the public library in Blue Rapids, but mention will be made of some of the peculiar incidents. Some of the killed were found entirely divested of clothing, a gold watch was found hanging by its chain, in a tree half a mile away. Chickens were entirely devoid of feathers, except a frill around the neck; spokes blown out of a wagon wheel leaving the hub and rim intact ; wheat and oat straws driven into telegraph poles ; house scattered over lot, the stove standing on the kitchen floor uninjured and the fire burning.
On June Ist a sad procession followed the victims of that fearful eve to the secluded cemetery, Sylvan Shade, where they sleep today. Irving remembers them on each succeeding anniversary with floral tributes and appropriate ceremonies. On that tragic day were shattered and scattered many hopes for that growing city. Perhaps the future may unfold a brighter page in her history.
COTTAGE HILL CEMETERY.
Cottage Hill Cemetery Association was chartered in February, 1891. The charter members were P. T. Vickery, James Clark, C. G. Thomas, John L. Nichols, Samuel Lamereaux, M. H. Gilbert, John Sisco, John Paul, Jackson
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Thomas, Margaret McDonald, Sylvester Hartman, Charles Powel, L. R. Kistler, George R. Kistler, Joseph Green, A. M. Sherwood, Reuben Fuller, C. J. Nugent, Robert Dockerty, Otto F. Hohn, John Swanson and Ben Lam- ereaux. The officers were: President, John Paul ; secretary. M. H. Gilbert : treasurer, John Sisco. This cemetery being in such a prominent part of Cottage Hill, the entire township is interested in it, and they pride themselves on the beautifying and upkeep of the grounds. It is the best kept and prettiest cemetery in any country place in Marshall county.
The present board are: C. G. Thomas, president ; Roger Pischney, secre- tary; John Sisco, treasurer ; executive committee, Herman Anderson, Frank Paul, M. M. Rice. These officers have an endowment fund of more than twelve hundred dollars, drawing interest. The interest is used to keep the cemetery in excellent condition.
MARSHALL. COUNTY AND THE WORLDS FAIR.
Marshall county was represented at the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893.
Entries were made in the agricultural department by George Binder, of Waterville, wheat; William Kossow, Marysville, oats; F. M. Spangler. millet.
Awards were made to W. W. Eddy, for best winter wheat; Gotlieb Adam, best red winter wheat; J. L. Johnson, best hard winter wheat; A. Anderson, best hard winter wheat; J. B. Hammett, Schroyer, best yellow car corn.
Mrs. Josie Furman exhibited an oil painting of Perry Hutchinson's mill. Miss Mamie Schroyer exhibited an oil painting of Alcove Springs. The ladies of Irving exhibited a rug, which was afterwards sent to the old ladies' rest at Leavenworth.
GRASSHOPPERS.
The year 1874 was one of severe drought and the prevailing wind was from the southwest. On Sunday, August 23, the wind changed to the north and with it came myriads of grasshoppers. They were so plentiful that they created a haze in the atmosphere. They literally devoured every green thing, except peach leaves. It is impossible to describe the numbers, or to tell the damage. Corn, tomatoes, beets, onions, wheat-every living thing was stripped, and then they began on board and picket fences and on hoe and rake handles.
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The marks could be plainly seen for years afterward. The sides of. buildings were literally covered with them. West of Marysville, the train had to pull up a steep grade and the hoppers frequently were so thick on the track that it was impossible to proceed until the track was sanded. Every possible device for their destruction was employed, but to no avail. Finally, a scourge broke out among them and they perished from the effects of the sting. The few which escaped this enemy disappeared.
People were greatly depressed, not only on account of losses, but be- cause of dread of a reappearance of the plague. But they have never reap- peared in such numbers as in that terrible grasshopper year.
It makes one shudder to picture anything so terrible, so appalling and so pathetic. It is almost impossible for the human mind to realize the awful devastation of crops and vegetation that befell the states of Kansas and Nebraska that year.
The settlers were greatly amazed as, looking into the blue depths of the cloudless sky, in the direction of the blazing sun, they saw that the air was full of living organisms.
It was the invasion of the locust or grasshopper. At first, one here and there would alight : but in a short time, the host was so great as to cover all the fields and outnumber the people, millions to one. There was a bounti- ful prospect that year and the undesirable hosts lit on the corn fields riddling them in a few hours and as the ears were in the milk stage, the loss was very apparent.
Gardens and orchards went just as fast as the cornfields. The first set- tlers used to cultivate "homestead tobacco" and the prospect had been very good with its long and broadly streaming leaves-even that went just as fast. Onions, beets and carrots were devoured to the roots. The forest trees were defoliated in a few days. And what was the result of this great calamity which visited this unfortunate state. In the autumn of 1874 there was a continual tide of "prairie schooners," returning from the West, pour- ing through the highways and byways out of the desolated country, going East.
When asked, "Whither bound," the answer invariably was, "Going back to old Missouri"; "To old Mizzoo", or "Back to God's country." Some even had written on their wagon covers, "Busted; back to Missouri." And they certainly looked as though they were busted-this stream of humanity pouring over what is now the ocean to ocean highway. Their outfits were
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ragged and forlorn and they themselves looked anxious and forsaken. Many of them were quartered and fed free of charge, owing to their needy circum- stances.
FIRST HOMESTEAD PATENT GRANTED.
Marshall county has the distinction of having been the home of the man who held the first homestead patent ever granted. This man was Daniel Donahy. The land which he homesteaded is in Pottawatomie county, but only a half mile south of the Marshall county line, being the southwest quar- ter of section 2, township 6, range 9. Mr. Donahy also owned the quarter just north of this homestead and a section just north of that in Mar- shall county. As soon as he had proved up on his homestead he moved into Marshall county, where he continued to reside until his death. The land then passed into the hands of his eldest son, Daniel Donahy, who still owns all of it.
Hettie Magill, daughter of Judge Magill, one of the original members of the Palmetto Town Company, was the first white child born on the town- site of Palmetto. This lady is now Mrs. Daniel Kelley, of Kansas City. Kansas.
"TREMBLE."
"Whereas. Lewis Twombly has at his own expense and at a cost of about $1,000, erected a good and sufficient bridge across the Vermillion branch of the Big Blue river at the crossing of the Independence and Cali- fornia road, it was enacted that Lewis Twombly should have exclusive right to the benefits and profits of toll for a period of five years." ( Statutes. Kan. Terr .. 1855. P. 771.)
The name of Lewis Twombly is spelled by F. G. AAdams as Tremble. and in "Marshall County Clippings" (Vol. 3. p. 27) as Tromley. His ford was said to be located at the Elizabeth crossing of the Vermillion, between Langdon's mill and Barrett's mill.
TRAGEDIES.
Many dark deeds of frontier life are hidden from the historian by the lapse of time. Violence was common, and for some crimes, retribution did not always wait for "the strong arm of the law."
Horse stealing was a crime, which it was tacitly understood woukl be stummarily dealt with and a certain elm tree that stood near the northeast corner of the city park, south of O. W. French's house. Marysville, was
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the gallows upon which more than one guilty wretch paid the penalty of his crime.
The first record of the action of "Judge Lynch" is reported in the Big Blue Union of October 15, 1864. E. C. Manning, the editor, published the following :
"A LOYAL MAN MURDERED BY A TRAITOR. "SUMMARY RETRIBUTION. "A WARNING.
"It is our painful duty as journalists to record the assassination of a most worthy citizen, and the execution of his murderer.
"Last Saturday evening the citizens of our town were startled by the report of a pistol shot, and on investigation found a loyal, peaceable, law- abiding citizen weltering in his blood, in front of our court house, while in the grasp of the officers was his murderer, defiant still, though knowing the penalty of his crime.
"During the day a man named Goisney was observed to be trying to pro- voke a quarrel. He was avoided as he was known to be quarrelsome. There had been a political meeting during the afternoon and Goisney was heard to threaten to shoot any man who would not vote for McClellan. Later in the evening he attempted to get into the court house, where there was to have been a dance, when Henry Agle, who is the constable of the township, took hold of Goisney and told him to keep quiet and that he could not go into the court house.
"A scuffle ensued during which Goisney drew a revolver and, just at this juncture, Mr. Patrick Casey came up for the purpose of helping Henry Agle, who had called for help, when Goisney pointing his pistol at Agle and firing, exclaimed, 'Take that.' Casey fell dead, the ball having entered his neck under the left ear, passing out on the opposite side. Mr. Casey died instantly without uttering a word or sound. The murderer was imme- diately carried to jail and ironed. During the night the guard was awak- ened by a large crowd of men who took the prisoner and hanged him upon a tree near town. The next morning the body was taken down, a coroner's inquest held and the body was carried out to the prairie and buried.
"On Monday the remains of poor Casey were buried with military honors. A large concourse of citizens attended to pay the last tribute of respect to a good man, a worthy citizen, a faithful friend and an affectionate husband and father. Patrick Casey had been a soldier and served as ser-
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geant ; had avowed patriotic and loyal principles, and for this he met his death at the hands of a disloyal traitor."
MURDERED FOR HIS GOLD.
During the year 1860 a train of soldiers, emigrants, and gold seekers was returning from the West. The party camped on the grounds of the present city park. In the evening a number of the men came up town to a saloon, which was kept on the spot where White Brothers' store is now located. They drank heavily and one man in the company a German, dis- played a pouch of gold. Later, the German was seen to leave the saloon with a man who seemed sober. Nothing was thought of the matter at the time.
During the forenoon of the following day some hunters came into the same saloon and reported the finding of the body of a man in the creek. There had been a light fall of snow during the night and the footsteps of the two men were traced to the spot on Spring creek, where the body of the man had been found. The body was quickly identified by a number of men who had seen him in the saloon displaying his gold.
The train was followed, stopped and the men in charge informed of the murder. The German had not been missed from the party, but suspicion fell on the man who left the saloon with him on the previous night. A search was made and the man was found concealed in one of the wagons. The entire train returned to Marysville. A short trial was held without judge or jury and the only witnesses were the lifeless body and the confessed mur- cerer.
A short consultation, a trip to the elin tree on Spring creek. two graves, one on the prairie and one in the cemetery on the hill, and the train moved eastward.
The gold, a watch and a letter giving name and address were sent to the dead man's people.
That night the whole matter was thoroughly discussed in the saloon and it was mmanimously decided that justice had been done.
HORSE THIEF HANGED.
The following story was told the writer by a prominent pioneer : "There was a gang of horse thieves operating through Marysville and some good horses had been stolen. One night 1 lost a fine mare and the next day a crowd of us started in search. We found the thief with my mare and
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another southeast of Waterville, hiding in the brush on a creek. We put the fellow on a lead horse, tied his hands and started for Marysville. It was just coming day when we reached Spring creek and the thief began to quarrel because we refused to untie his hands. He was told to keep still, whereupon he kicked the horse viciously. We were tired of him any way, and one of the men had a long rope halter, and we left him hanging to the elm tree."
Later the tree was cut down, but that fact did not prevent the meting out of swift punishment to the criminal.
The passing of the years, the civilizing influences of the school, the pulpit and the press had awakened the sense of allowing legal processes to govern criminal action, when a dastardly murder aroused the people of the city, and this time the new bridge over Spring creek became the means of sending a guilty man out of the world.
THE PENNINGTON MURDER.
Mr. and Mrs. Pennington lived alone on a farm in Wells township and found it necessary to keep a hired man. They employed a stranger who proved very helpful to them on the farm. He had been in their employ about two weeks when, one day, a neighbor going to the Pennington home, dis- covered the murdered bodies of both these good people. The crime was traced to the hired hand, he was apprehended in Nebraska and brought to Marysville and confined in the old jail.
He was brought to trial, found guilty and, while awaiting sentence, a body of masked men went to the jail about midnight and took the murderer to Spring creek bridge and hanged him.
Dastardly as was the crime, and with no doubt of the man's guilt, yet the manner of his death was felt to be a lingering remnant of barbarism. It was the opinion of all that "Judge Lynch" had had his time and that thereafter the law would be respected.
It was the passing of the old frontier spirit and the dawning of a better way. Since that time law and order have prevailed in a larger measure and every man is allowed his "day in court."
THE MURDER OF UNDER-SHERIFF BATTERSON.
In April, 1898, bold burglaries were committed in Vermillion and Blue Rapids. The members of a gang, James S. Dalton, Ed Royal and Tom Taylor were apprehended and placed in the old jail at Marysville. Charley
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Batterson was under-sheriff for Sheriff Huff, and in order to keep close guard over the prisoners, had a cot placed in the corridor and slept there.
The prisoners managed to loosen the rivets in the clasp of the door between the cell room and the sheriff's office, also to reduce the heads of the staple which held the padlock to Dalton's cell, so that the staple could be pushed out and thus release the door. A city election had been held that day and Batterson had been down town to get election returns. Coming home a little late he lay down on the cot and fell asleep. Dalton had wrenched an iron slat from the cot in his cell, and as the door was loose he soon opened it. and also the door to the corridor, and with the slat beat Batterson into insen- sibility. He then took the keys of the jail opened the doors of the cell in which Taylor and Royal were and opened the outer door and all escaped. Batterson lived a few days, but never regained consciousness.
Dalton enlisted under an assumed name in the United States army and went to the Philippines. St. Claire Guthrie, Sr., was elected sheriff of Mar- shall county and determined to bring Dalton to justice. He learned that Dalton's mother lived in Indiana and knew that sooner or later she would have a letter from her son. Detectives were put on guard.
During Dalton's absence he did not write to his mother, but on returning to San Antonio, Texas, he wrote to her and the letter was intercepted by the authorities. After four years of freedom, in 1902, Dalton was again incar- cerated in the cell from which he escaped.
He was tried and sentenced for life to Lansing. Under the wardenship of W. H. Haskell, Dalton was made clerk in the "Bertillon" room and soon became very expert. Gov. W. R. Stubbs paroled him and made him Bertillon clerk at Hutchinson state reformatory.
So the man who brutally murdered Charley Batterson, is now a salaried state official, on parole from the Kansas state penitentiary.
CHAPTER XXII.
SIDELIGHTS ON MARSHALL COUNTY HISTORY.
FREMONT'S EXPEDITION.
Gen. John C. Fremont in his report of the expedition of 1842, says : "I had collected at St. Louis, Missouri, twenty-one men, principally Creoles and Canadian voyageurs, who had become familiar with prairie life in the service of the fur companies in the Indian country.
"Mr. Charles Preuss, a native of Germany, was my assistant in the topographical part of the survey. L. Maxwell, of Kaskaskia, had been engaged as hunter, and Christopher Carson, more familiarly known as Kit Carson, guide. In addition to these, Henry Brant, son of Colonel J. B. Brant, of St. Louis, a young man nineteen years of age, and Randolph, a lively boy of twelve, son of Hon. Thomas H. Benton, accompanied me."
On June 19, 1842, Fremont writes: “Longitude 96 degrees, 14'- 49"; latitude 39 degrees, 30'-40". ( Near the southeast corner of county.)
"The morning of the 20th was fine with a southerly breeze and a bright sky ; and at seven o'clock we were on the march. The country today was rather more broken, rising still, and covered everywhere with siliceous lime- stone, particularly on the summits where they were small, and thickly strewn as pebbles on the shore of the sea. We crossed at ten a. m., the Big Ver- million, which has a rich bottom of about a mile in breadth, one-third of which is occupied by timber. Making our usual halt at noon, after a day's march of twenty-four miles, we reached the Big Blue, and encamped on the uplands on the western side, near a small creek, where was a fine, large spring of very cold water. This is a clear and handsome stream, about one hun- dred and twenty feet wide, running with a rapid current through a well- timbered valley. Today, antelope were seen running over the hills, and at evening Carson brought us a fine deer. Longitude of the camp 96 degrees -- 32'-35" : latitude 39 degrees-45'-35"; thermometer at sunset 75 degrees."
The commonly accepted statement that General Fremont camped for
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days at Alcove Springs and that he lost some soldiers there by death from cholera, is not borne out by the published report made by Fremont to the war department.
This report also states that he did not lose any men by death on the trip. The men who accompanied him were not enlisted men in the service of the government, but were hired for the trip, except the two boys who accompanied him for love of adventure. The spring was on the old Schroyer home farm and is still a living spring.
MORMON MEANDERINGS.
One of the great movements in the West was the exodus of the Mor- mons in 1846 from east of the Missouri river to Great Salt Lake. Thou- sands of those exiled "saints" crossed at the Independence Crossing and in time the name "Mormon Crossing", was applied to it.
For more than two years these people traveled this trail under all sorts of conditions. By ox team, wagon team. on foot and on horseback; some with all their worldly belongings heaped in wheel-barrows and pushearts; others with bundles on their backs, all with eager, even anxious faces turned towards "the promised land". This vast concourse of people, not less than seventy-five thousand, entered what is now Marshall county, near the south- east corner of the county, traveled in a northwestern direction, and near where Barrett is now located, crossed the Vermillion and followed the trail to the crossing on the Big Blue. as seen by the picture.
When the river was swollen, the travellers camped on its banks until the water subsided. Hundreds of wagons and people were sometimes gath- ered there and about Alcove Springs, where there was always a plentiful supply of pure cold water. It was a motley crowd, hastening from the fer- tile Valley of the Blue westward to the great American desert.
The ill-fated Donner party followed this trail in 1846 and left a lonely grave on the hillside, a silent testimony of the hardships of pioneer life.
So the great mass of restless humanity surged westward. The Indian trader, the gold seeker, the adventurer and the explorer as well as those seeking homes, all "hit the trail", and crossed the Big Blue river in what afterwards became Marshall county.
THE OVERLAND STAGE.
The exodus of the Mormons and the discovery of gold in California, necessitated the establishment of a mail route across the country.
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The first contract was let to Samuel H. Woodson, of Independence, Missouri, which was an old point and which soon became very prominent during the days of the Overland mail.
In 1859 up to June 30th, there were no less than six different routes for carrying the mail to and from California. The route which traversed Mar- shall county was known as the Central-Overland-California line. The fare across the continent was one hundred dollars in gold.
At that time Marysville, one hundred miles west of the Missouri river, was almost at the outskirts of civilization and was the last town of conse- quence on the Overland route between Atchison and Denver.
SOME NOTABLE TRAVELLERS.
Among the men who traversed Marshall county by the Overland stage, and crossed the Big Blue at Marysville, were Ben Holladay, the owner of the stage line; Albert D. Richardson, war correspondent for the New York Tribune; Schuyler Colfax, Colonel Thomas Knox, who had gone around the world for the New York Herald; Mark Twain, Gen. P. E. Connor, United States commandant at Great Salt Lake; Richard J. Hinton, Bayard Taylor. Bishop E. S. Janes, of the Methodist Episcopal church; Fargo, Cheney and Barney, great express men : Jim Bridger, famous scout ; Russell, Majors and Waddell, noted transportation men; Artemus Ward, scores of army officers and scouts; senators and representatives from the great West ; delegates to Congress from the western territories ; prominent Mormon lead- ers from Utah, and hundreds of others. The trail across the state was worn "as smooth and hard as a floor", according to an old military man who traveled it.
THE OKETO CUT-OFF.
Some differences existing between Holladay and the town of Marys- ville, a cut-off of thirty-five miles was talked of by the stage authorities, to run northwesternly from Guittard's via Oketo across the Otoe Indian reserva- . tion, leaving Marysville to the south.
To forestall this a new road was laid out from Marysville to Seneca, leaving Guittard's a few miles to the north. It was hoped to induce the freighters to travel this road but the plan did not succeed.
All these plans and schemes only served to augment the existing ill will and, finally, Holladay opened up the road and about the middle of October,
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1862, the Overland stage began traveling the Oketo cut-off. Before this change Marysville had a tri-weekly mail. For a month afterward the people were without mail.
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