USA > Kansas > Marshall County > History of Marshall County, Kansas : its people, industries, and institutions > Part 4
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QUIVERA.
Coronado wintered on the Rio Grande and during that winter another Indian appeared with stories of a land still farther away, called Quivera. This Indian was nicknamed the "Turk" and may have been a captive Arkan- sas or Quapaw Indian. His stories of a far-distant and wealthy land was sufficient to cause Coronado to again resume his search for wealth, and after thirty-five days of travel they came to the country of the Teyas and these Indians told them that "Turk" was deceiving them and that Quivera lay to the north. Coronado selected thirty of his bravest and boldest men and half a dozen foot soldiers, and sending the remainder of the army back to Tiguex, on the Rio Grande, he pushed due northward and according to most authorities arrived at the place, which is now Dodge City, on the Arkansas river. The first act of' Coronado on reaching the Arkansas river was to execute "Turk", who had deceived him. This was the first murder on Kansas soil of which we have any record.
LOCATION OF QUISERA.
Coronado had at last reached Quivera. It is to be regretted that his first act in killing the "Turk" was cruel, but that was the spirit of the times. On one point all authors practically agree. Quivera was in what is now Kansas. That it lay in the Northeast, which was the land of the Canza (Kansas) Indians and which embraced Marshall county, is the opinion of Bandalier, who is an accepted authority.
Coronado spent several weeks in the exploration of Quivera. He says in his notes that he reached the fortieth parallel, which is the line between Kansas and Nebraska. There is no reason to question this statement. The general opinion is that he traveled eastward from Wichita, then took the old Indian trail north and followed up the Big Blue river. If so, he traveled through where Marshall county is now laid out.
The Pawnee Indians were of the Quivera tribe. They had villages all along the Big Blue. One of their oldest villages was on the site of Blue
MARSHALL COUNTY, KANSAS.
Springs, Nebraska. In Coronado's time they ranged almost to the Missouri river, and we may believe they roamed to the western limits of the buffalo plains.
A LINK WITH THE PAST.
Late in the year 1908 a rapier was found by Carl Johnson, youngest son of Julius Johnson, on the hill on North Ninth street, which is the highest point in the city of Marysville. This rapier was buried in the ground, hilt downward. with only three inches of the point exposed. The exposed por- tion was very much corroded, the maker's name was obliterated and the hilt is missing. The blade is thirty-three and three-quarters inches long, and the unexposed portion is in a good state of preservation.
The surest and perhaps the only sign of the presence of Coronado in this county is this weapon. It may have been used as a marker for a cache, or it may have marked a grave.
The rapier is a fancy sword carried by so-called gentlemen. Among those restless Spaniards, pushing ever onward in the search of gold, per- haps one met that enemy against whom his sword proved no protection. It may be that his companions bore his body to this eminence overlooking the Valley of the Blue, and buried him with military honors; Coronado and the rapier are alike silent. Some day, when practical men level and grade the street, the grave may tell its secret.
ORIGIN OF "KANSAS."
There has been much discussion as to the origin and meaning of the name Kansas. It was variously written by carly explorers and we find it : Kantha, Kanza, Cansa, Canses, Kan. Kaw and many other forms. Lieu- tenant Pike wrote it Kaus. It has been said to mean "swift" and "smoky." Mr. W. E. Connelly, secretary of the State Historical Society. Topeka, gives the meaning of Kansas as "Wind People," or "People of the South Wind." Undoubtedly it has some reference to wind. Exactly what this reference is, there is little hope of finding out with absolute certainty; but it is estab- lished beyond question that the name means, "Wind People," or "People of the South Wind."
"Superstition is the child of ignorance." The ignorance of the Indian like that of all primitive races created superstition. His religion was one of fear and his worship that of propitiation. He offered sacrifices to some unknown power, of which he lived in awe. He worshipped a god called WaKanda.
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and this symbol was anything which the Indian did not understand. The forces of nature were all evil and unnatural to him. The wind was unnatural, and so it was evil. It was WaKanda and had to be propitiated by sacri- fices. The Kansa Indians drew out the hearts of their slain enemies and offered them as sacrifices to the wind. In time they were called the "people who sacrifice to the wind" or "wind people."
The Kansa or Kaw tribe of Indians lived on Kansas soil for more than three hundred years. They called this territory theirs and ranged its plains. They built lodges along the Blue river and contested for the hunting ground with their enemies, the Pawnees.
KANSAS SOLD TO UNITED STATES.
In 1846 they sold to the United States government all the north part of Kansas and south half of Nebraska. They did not own this land except in an hereditary sense, through having lived on it. From this tribe of Indians the state derives its name, Kansas.
Mr. G. P. Morehouse, who is the historian of the Kansas Indians, states that the Independent Creek town which is referred to by early French writers as the "Grand Village des Canzes," seems to have been a Jesuit missionary station, located near where the town of Doniphan now stands, as early as 1727. This fact he bases on French-Canadian records of the Province of Ontario, which state that the name of Canzes, or Kansas, was a well-known geographical term to designate a spot on the Missouri river within Kansas, where the French government and its official church, nearly two hundred years ago, had an important missionary center. "In this document," Mr. Morehouse says, "this mission away out in the heart of the continent was classed with other important Indian missions such as the Iroquois, Abenaquis and Tadousac, and that the same amount per missionary was expended." It was "Kansas," a mission charge on the rolls of the Jesuit Fathers, for which annual appropriation of money was made as early as 1727.
This simple line tells us that devout pioneers of that church spent lonely hours, far from civilization, on a wild plain in order to instill into the minds and hearts of savages that faith in which they themselves so ardently believed. No more to bow in silence as the angelus intoned upon the air; no more at eve to hear the convent bell or join with clasped hands the reverent black- robed procession. In place of the companionship of the scholar, the brutal face of the brave and his stolid squaw confronted the missionary. The sword alone is not the symbol of heroism.
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SPANIARDS ATTEMPT INVASION.
Early in the eighteenth century the Spanish attempted to invade and colonize the Missouri valley. The French became alarmed and sent men to explore the valley and treat with the Indians.
M. de Bourgmont had been commissioned military commander of the Missouri valley in 1720 and made an expedition into the land of the Kansas in 1724. Ile visited the Grand Village des Canzes, and held a celebration which lasted two weeks, consisting of powwows, councils, trading horses or merchandise and making presents to the Indians. No doubt. many other adventurous traders and hunters spent time with the Kansas Indians, but no record is made of them.
In the summer of 1804 the famous "Lewis and Clark expedition" passed up the Missouri river and traded with the Kansas Indians. In 1818-19 Major Stephen A. Long's exploring expedition visited them. In 1819 Major John O'Fallon was appointed sutler of the post and Indian agent for the upper Missouri, and on July 4. 1819. the nation's birthday was celebrated and the Kansas Indians learned their first lesson in patriotism. In 1847 the Kansas Indians lived in the Kaw Valley, east of Manhattan and that same year were moved to a reservation in the Neosho valley, adjoining Council Grove. And from then on they moved south and west along what became known as the "Old Kaw trail," hunting buffalo. Those hunting trips were usually made in the fall. The old Indian agency building still stands about four miles from Council Grove.
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OTOE INDIAN COUNCIL, AGENT AND PAYMASTER.
From left to right: Jesse W. Greist, agent; Arkaketah, chief; Howdy-Howdy; Pawnee Cuehee; White-horse; Wahanyi; Joe-John; Toehee; Baptiste DeRoin, inter- preter, and Captain Pearman, United State Any paymaster. Chief Arkaketah is the man for whom the town of Oketo was named. The picture was taken shortly before the removal of the tribe from their reservation in the northern part of Marshall county to Oklahoma.
CHAPTER III.
INDIANS IN MARSHALL COUNTY.
In the days of Coronado, the Kansas Indians occupied a strip of terri- tory on each side of the Missouri river, from the vicinity of the mouth of the Kansas river to Independence creek. That and adjacent land continued to be the habitat and hunting ground of the tribe for more than two centuries.
They hunted west for buffalo going as far west as the Republican river. In those days the Pawnees and Wichitas were the strong tribes in the terri- tory reaching from the Missouri river to the Rocky Mountains and stretch- ing as far north as the Platte. The Pawnees claimed the land as far east as the Missouri river and regarded the Kansas Indians as intruders and made war on them. Evidences of battles have been found in Marshall county.
Arrow heads and spear heads have been found in large numbers on section 7 in Rock township, the former home of Mrs. S. S. Martin. Mrs. Martin can recall the Indian village near Winifred, and that Indians from all sections of the country gathered there in large numbers to trade and hold councils. She remembers one fierce Indian battle near there.
WAR WEAPONS.
Mr. Otto Wullschleger has a large collection of arrow- and spear-heads of many different varieties, which he found on sections 12 and 13. Center township. These arrow-heads indicate that a battle was once fought on that ground. He has also a number of stone axes found near the old lodge. which was located on the Walker farm.
The Indian trail crossed the Vermillion, near Winifred. and traversed Marshall county in a northwesterly direction, crossing the Big Blue, at the point where Frank Marshall afterwards established a ferry at Independence crossing. This trail is said to have been the longest Indian trail in North America, reaching from the Missouri river to the Pacific coast.
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Mr. George Eddy says that an Indian village, or lodge, was located on section 20 in Walnut township. Many arrow-heads have been found there. all of small size, evidently used in hunting small game.
On section 19, Elm Creek township. there is a very steep cliff, and it was the practice of the Indians to stampede the buffalo over that cliff, then kill all the cattle that were injured by the fall and unable to get away. Mr. Eddy found at the foot of this cliff a stone "killing hammer." and some flint knives.
The old Indian trail used by the many different tribes of Indians, and by Fremont, became the Mormon trail and the gold seekers' trail to Cali- fornia. In place of the single trail of the Indian, the Mormons and other immigrants traveled along three parallel roads, covering a width of seventy- five to one hundred yards. The wagons, whenever possible, were kept nearly abreast, so that in case of an attack by the Indians, they could be quickly parked, the women and children placed in the center and the defense made. In a long-drawn-out train on one road this could not have been accomplished so readily, so the three-parallel-road method was adopted. Three parallel roads are discernible today in such stretches of the trail as have not been plowed.
Stone axes, hammers and different utensils of Indian make have been found in all parts of the county.
OTOE INDIANS.
The Otoe Indians did not own any of the country in Marshall county until after it was ceded by the Kaws. The Otoe Reservation was assigned by treaty and it was only accidental that but two miles of it came into Kansas. The Otoe and Missouri Indian Reservation was twenty-five miles long and ten miles wide. It began at a point on an island near what is now Oketo, Marshall county, Kansas, extending about four miles east, ten miles north, twenty-five miles west and ten miles south and back to place of begin- ning.
On account of the locators not knowing where the Kansas-Nebraska line was, a part of the reservation was in Kansas, through mistake. This reserva- tion contained one hundred and sixty thousand acres and by a treaty with the government about two-thirds of the west part was sold in 1878. This land was appraised by F. M. Barnes, of Otoe agency, William La Gorgue, of Gage county, Nebraska, and Captain Baker, of Salina. Kansas. The remain-
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ing one-third was appraised and sold in 1883, the Indians having gone to the Indian Territory in 1881.
A day school for the Otoe Indians was established in the early seventies and was discontinued in 1877, when the boarding school was established. This school was in full operation until June, 1881, and was not reconvened in the fall owing to the Indians having left. The Otoes and Missouris were affili- ated tribes for many years and were supposed to be closely related to the lowas, Sacs and Foxes, and the Osages, as their languages were practically the same. All traces of the burying grounds, of which there were several, have disappeared, having been plowed up by the farmers who bought the land on which those grounds were located.
INDIAN DEPREDATIONS.
Among the oldest settlers in the Vermillion valley were the Puntneys, John D. Wells, Fred H. Brockmeyer, Daniel M. Leavitt, Elizabeth Withan and G. H. Hollenberg. Hollenberg was a German, the founder of Washing- ton county, Kansas, and for whom the town of Hollenberg was named. He later died while crossing the Atlantic, on his way to visit his old home in Germany, and was buried at sea.
On coming in the year 1855 to the valley of the Vermillion they found there Louis Tremble, a Frenchman, who had married a Sioux squaw, and who had been driven from the Rocky Mountains by an order of General Harney, expelling everyone of that nationality. Louis Tremble built a puncheon toll-bridge across the Vermillion at the old Mormon or Hollenberg crossing.
Tremble had a neighbor, another Frenchman named Changreau, whose wife was also a Sioux. Mrs. Changreau had a sister, a girl about fifteen, who lived with them. They had a family of several small children.
Roving bands of both Kaws and Sioux traveled up and down the Blue river in search of prey. They were enemies and at war with each other. The two Frenchmen felt that they were in danger, but both were prospering, Tremble from his toll-bridge and Changreau from a little farm of about twenty acres, which he cultivated with care. This furnished him a living and he sold plenty to travelers.
INDIANS ABDUCT GIRL.
One day Changreau's house was surrounded by mounted Sioux Indians. They soon discovered that Changreau was absent, entered the house and
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pillaged it. The chief seized the young girl. all mounted their ponies and rode rapidly away. Changreau's wife ran to the field where he was at work and told what had happened. Ile well knew the fate awaiting the young girl and appealed to his neighbors to go with him to her rescue. Some of the neighbors joined him and followed the trail until they feared an ambush, when they decided they had best return to the defense of their own families.
Changreau followed the band with their helpless prisoner. When night fell the lodges were pitched and a brilliant campfire lighted. After a feast. the poor girl was led out and bound to a tree. He rode away in the dark- ness and from a distant hilltop watched the fire and saw the cruel dance, tou far away to hear the prisoner's cry of anguish or the hideous yells of the torturing fiends.
In the gray dawn he crept stealthily near enough to know that the young girl, bound and helpless, had been scourged to death amidst revels of the war dance and orgies of the night. Sick at heart he hastened home and removed his family to a place of safety. Tremble also moved from that locality. These two men were the earliest settlers on the Vermillion.
Some historians state that this murder took place near Council Grove. but neighbors of the Changrean's, who are still living, state positively that the murder of this young Indian maiden took place near where Irving now stands.
FURTHER MURDERS.
During the year 1857 the overland emigration to California was immense. During May and June in that year the trails leading westward across Kansas were crowded with the trains of emigrants and their herd -. A party of twenty-five men, women and children were crossing the prairie taking a short cut to F't. Kearney. At a point near where Republic City non stands, they were surprised by a band of Pawnees and robbed, and half the men in the party were killed, including the captain.
The Indians took everything they could carry away and ripped open sacks of flour, spilling the contents on the ground, in order to carry away the sacks. The poor people were far from any settlement and were in danger of starvation. Two men of the party started east and procured assistance in Marshall county.
In May, 1862. occurred the massacre of the Cassel party in Cloud county. This was soon followed by the White Rock massacre, and these were fol- lowed by the Indian raids in the Solomon Valley.
As time went on, roving bands of Indians attacked and robbed emigrants
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and ranchmen and murdered settlers, until panic reigned. On the roth of August, 1864, the citizens of Marysville were thrown into great excitement. Refugees poured into the town with stories of an Indian massacre on the Little Blue. Teams with wagons filled with settlers, ranchmen and their families arrived, bringing stories of the outrageous torturing of men, women and children and asking help in recovering friends who had been captured by Indians.
MILITIA MUSTERED.
Militia companies were immediately mustered and, after making hasty preparations, went in pursuit of the Indians. One company under the com- mand of Capt. Frank Schmidt and one in charge of Lieutenant McClosky. left Marysville on . August 11th. They were joined by a company from Vermil- lion under Capt. James Kelly and one from Irving under Capt. T. S. Vaile. The Marshall county troops were under the command of Col. E .. C. Manning. Companies were also formed in Nemaha, Riley and Washington counties, under command of General Sherry, of Seneca.
These troops marched over Marshall county to the west and while they saw plenty of evidence of Indian warfare and depredations, they met with no Indians. However, the presence of armed troops had a wholesome effect on the Indians and a cessation of the worst depredations ensued. It was several years before the Indians came to believe that they were not the owners of the land and that murder and pillage were not justifiable.
Many of the refugees from the Overland road and from counties west remained in Marshall county for weeks before returning home:
INDIAN ATTACKS RENEWED.
About the 10th of May, 1860, Reuben Winklepleck and son, Alonzo, Edward Winklepleck, a nephew, Philip Burke, J. L. McChesney. a Mr. Cole and son, from Michigan, left Waterville with two wagons, to go west, look at the country and hunt buffalo. They followed the Republican river to beyond the mouth of White Rock creek, in the northwest corner of Republic county. They obtained a supply of buffalo meat and were on their way home on May 25, when overtaken by Indians, whom they drove away by firing at them at long range. McChesney, who was guide for this party, advised crossing the river and making for Scandia, where there was a colony house and where the settlers had made some preparations for defense from Indian attack. McChesney feared the Indians would return for a night attack.
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The remainder of the party did not take the matter so seriously and they camped on the west side of the Republican river. Early on the morning of May 26, while they were preparing to break camp. they were attacked by Indians and all killed except McChesney, who jumped into the river and by secreting himself in the overhanging brush escaped and reached Scandia that day.
SIX VICTIMS.
Ed S. Rowland, now a resident of Marysville, Kansas, makes the fol- lowing statement :
"On May 10, 1869. 1 left New York City as a member of the Walker colony from that city, which located on land about twenty miles west of Scandia. There were sixty people in this colony, some of whom had left New York about a month earlier than I did. Concerning this Indian massa- cre. I had been out at the colony about a week engaged in putting up shacks on homesteads and had helped bury four men, buffalo hunters who had been killed by the Indians. A man named Robert Watson and myself drove into Scandia. I put up at the colony house and on Friday afternoon about three o'clock, a man who seemed 'all out of sorts' and who afterwards turned out to be John McChesney. sat down beside me and asked for something to eat. I ordered a meal for him and while waiting, McChesney told me that his six companions had been killed by the Indians that morning up the river, and asked that a party be raised to go and find out what had happened, and to bury or recover the bodies of his companions.
"I reported the above at once to others and by Saturday we had a suffi- cient posse to venture forth. We had to have the Fisher boys, who were early settlers in that country and who knew Indians and their ways, to act as guides. These boys lived about ten miles northwest of Scandia. We went there first and got them and on Sunday morning we started east to where the attack was made. When near the spot we divided into two parties. There were twelve or fourteen in the party. We found the two wagons on the west side of the Republican river. horses gone. harness cut in pieces. not more than a foot long. the barrels of the guns bent elbow shape between the spokes of the wheels. The wagons and buffalo meat were unmolested. We found all the bodies on the east side of the river, opposite the wagons. The bodies were huddled together. Two men had been scalped. one scalp taken. the other left beside the dead man. The clothing had all been stripped from them and carried away. A pair of shoes only left on the feet of the boy, all his other clothing taken. We buried the bodies on the spot where we found
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them, only a few yards from the river, on that Sunday. I am under the impression that this place of burial is nearly opposite the mouth of White Rock creek. It looked to us that the hunters had left the teams and wagons to search for a good place to cross the river and when they were separated from their teams, wagons and guns, the Indians came from ambush and massacred them. After the burial we all returned to Scandia."
Lieut. I. N. Savage, historian of Republic county, in which the Winkle- pleck massacre took place, is authority for the statement that the victims were buried on section 15, township I, range 5, Republic county.
As far as the writer has been able to ascertain, this covers the only serious depredations by Indians in Marshall county, or affecting its people. The late increased immigration and the effective defense made, finally drove the Indians farther west.
CHAPTER IN.
SETTLEMENT OF MARSHALL COUNTY.
THE PIONEER.
"Our little systems have their day, They have their day and cease to be."
"Westward ho!" has been the cry of men for ages. The golden west has lured men of all times and climes. The story of Casar and Columbus is the story of Washington, of Lewis and Clarke, of John C. Fremont and of Kansas. The Indian and Spaniard came and passed away. The French- man lingered. The German, Irish, Swede. Dane and Swiss came and con- quered. The adventurer from the South who came to usurp became a citizen. He saw the American pioneer, with his gun and ax and plow, transform the desert into fertile fields. Rev. Patrick O'Sullivan says: "It was a grand generation of heroic moll. who, amidst hardships, privations and dangers, broke the prairiess built homes and brought religion and civilization to Mar- shall county."
Of those who yet remain, the snow of age has touched the hair and Time has slowed the footstep and enfeebled the frame. When we meet them we are reminded that they made possible the conditions existing today. Lives of men and women went into the making and are a part of the warp and woof of the beautiful fabric which is the Marshall county of today.
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