History of Berrien and Van Buren counties, Michigan. With biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 55

Author: D.W. Ensign & Co. pub; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia, D. W. Ensign & Co.
Number of Pages: 821

USA > Michigan > Van Buren County > History of Berrien and Van Buren counties, Michigan. With biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 55
USA > Michigan > Berrien County > History of Berrien and Van Buren counties, Michigan. With biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 55

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Mr. Hutton's success is not enigmatical, but shows to the young men of to-day what can be accomplished by energy and industry, though poverty be their lot at the beginning of life.

SILAS IRELAND

was born in Concord township, Ross Co., Ohio, Nov. 10, 1818, and was the eldest of twelve children. His father, Stephen Ireland, was a, native of the Eastern Shore of Maryland, and of Scottish descent; his mother, Elizabeth (Carmean) Ireland, a native of the same place, was of German descent. They removed to Ross County about the year 1808.

Silas' father being poor and he the oldest son, he had to assist in the support of the family, working on his father's farm. When about sixteen years of age he commenced studying mathematics and surveying, devoting all of his leisure time to it, and we may say is a self-educated man, having had very little opportunity for schooling.

In October, 1839, he emigrated to Michigan, having but seven dollars in money upon his arrival. He worked at whatever came to his hand, doing some jobs of surveying. May 3, 1842, he married Miss Matilda Michael, a native of Greene Co., Ohio, but at the time of her marriage living within three miles of their present home.

Mr. Ireland, in June of that year, bought eighty acres five miles east of Berrien Springs, upon which they settled, first living in a log cabin. This was the site of their present home. They have resided on this place ever since, except two years and a half, in Dowagiac, Cass Co., where they moved, to educate their children, returning the day after Abraham Lincoln's first election. Mr. Ireland's family consists of the following children : Elam M., born July 5, 1843; Alpheus F., March 3, 1846; Almeda M., Nov. 28, 1847, died Jan. 5, 1865; Carey H., May 6, 1849, died Oct. 19, 1877 ; Martha Alice, May 14, 1851 ; Charley A., Nov. 28, 1853; Mary E., Nov. 21, 1855 ; Frank S. A., Oct. 4, 1857 ; Milo S., Dec. 11, 1860; Hattie B., Aug. 3, 1863; Roscoe W., Sept. 28, 1866; George R., July 2, 1868.

Mr. Ireland has held every township office except treas- urer. He has been superintendent of the county poor twelve years ; was supervisor five years. He acted as one of the committee to draft and make specifications for county jail, sheriff's dwelling, and county poor-house, which he built in 1869. Has been engaged as guardian for minors and others and settling estates of deceased persons for the past thirty years ; was elected representative to the State Legis- lature from the first district, Berrien Co., in November, 1876, receiving as the Republican candidate sixteen hundred and ten votes to his Democratic opponent's thirteen hundred and ninety-four. He has continually held some office since the age of twenty-two. Has been deputy surveyor of Cass and Berrien Counties. Was a Democrat till the opening of the Kansas and compromise troubles, when he joined the Re- publican party; was a firm supporter of the Union during

the war. At present he owns some seven hundred acres of land, and a flouring-mill at Silver Creek, Cass Co .; he is a director of the First National Bank of Niles, and vice-presi- dent and director of the First National Bank of Dowagiac.

CHAPTER XXIX.

BAINBRIDGE TOWNSHIP .*

Settlement of the Township-Stage-Coaching Days-Temperance- Mills-Roads-The German Settlement-Post-Office and Postmas- ters-Township Organization and List of Officers-Church History of Bainbridge-Schools-Patrons of Husbandry.

BAINBRIDGE is numbered town 4 south, range 17 west, and embraces thirty-six sections, covering an area of six miles square. Watervliet is on the north, Pipestone on the south, Van Buren County on the east, and Benton town- ship on the west.

No township in Berrien County is more completely agri- cultural than this, as it is entirely given over to that interest, which, it may be observed, is both extensive and profitable. As an apple-growing region it invites especial notice, and as an evidence of its importance in that respect, mention is made that one of its apple-orchards, owned by John Byers, contains two thousand trees, and in 1878, Mr. Byers shipped upwards of two thousand barrels of apples as a portion of his fruit product in that year. Numberless large apple- orchards may be found in the township approximating that of Mr. Byers, but his is supposed to be the most extensive, and to contain, moreover, the largest trees.

As to peach culture, disease among the trees has much cut down the annual crop latterly, until the peach interest is comparatively small. The plan of promptly destroying diseased trees is generally approved by the farmers, who re- call a similar experience of Delaware peach-growers, some years ago, and they say that by abandoning peach culture for a time it may be revived at a later date with highly profitable results, as has proved to be the case in the history of Delaware.

The nearest approach to a village in Bainbridge is the village of Millburg, of which there are eight lots in Bain- bridge, the larger portion of the place being across the line in Benton township. The village of Benton Harbor is the market-town for the major portion of the people, and their post-office as well, although there are post-offices at Mill- burg, Bainbridge Centre, and at other points.

A large element of the population of Bainbridge consists of Germans, who occupy chiefly a region known as the Ger- man settlement, and who exercise an important voice in the administration of township affairs. Apart from the Ger- mans, the inhabitants are New Yorkers or their descendants, a majority of the early settlers having come from Jefferson and Livingston Counties in that State.

Numerous ponds or lakes diversify the surface of the country, which is undulating, the largest of these being known as Pipestone Lake, which covers perhaps 400 acres. Small streams are abundant, but among them there are none

* By David Schwartz.

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HISTORY OF BERRIEN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

susceptible of furnishing valuable water-power. Bainbridge has manifested a disposition to assist railroad enterprises for the construction of roads in the township, but thus far no tangible results have followed, although they are likely to accrue before long. Railway stations are found at Benton Harbor, Coloma, and Watervliet, and afford desirable con- veniences.

Bainbridge's assessed valuation in 1879 was $247,401.

EARLY SETTLEMENT.

The pioneers of Bainbridge belonged to the class known as Canadian Frenchmen, and were represented by a Cana- dian family named Sharrai, whose members were Barthol- omew, the father, and his wife, five sons,-Peter, Luke, Tenos, Louis, and Bartholomew, Jr.,-and three daugh- ters,-Louise, Catharine, and Mary,-nine persons in all, who came in company from Canada about 1833, and settled upon an 80-acre tract in section 8, a portion of the tract being now occupied by C. D. Weber. The Sharrais lived together and divided their time between clearing their land, raising crops, and boating on the St. Joseph. One Ruleaux, also a Canadian, came to Bainbridge soon after the Sharrais. He built a log shanty on the Sharrai place, stocked it with a few bottles of whisky, and called the house a tavern. That it was not much of a tavern, and that its business was meagre, seems to be conceded by general report; but the presence of Ruleaux's tavern there gave to the locality the name of the " Ruleaux Place," by which it continued to be known long after the tavern was swept away. Ruleaux bought also a village lot in the Bainbridge portion of Mill- burg, when that place was laid out. In 1835 he sold that lot to J. H. Enos and moved away.

The elder Sharrai being taken quite ill not long after his settlement, was to be taken to St. Joseph for medical treat- ment, but died while on the way there. His sons did not remain in the township very long after settlers began to come in. Peter, Luke, and Tenos now live in Sodus township.

J. H. Enos, who purchased Ruleaux's village lot in Millburg, came from New York to Michigan in the fall of 1835, with his brother Joseph, on a prospecting tour. Having bought Ruleaux's land interest, Harvey returned, with his brother, to New York, whence in the spring of 1836 they came again to Michigan, with Harvey's family and Roswell, another brother. Harvey moved into a log house that Ruleaux had built, and in the same year put up a saw-mill on Blue Creek, in the Benton portion of Mill- burg. Roswell and Joseph, his brothers, continued for a while to live with him and work for him, and then sought locations of their own,-Joseph in Benton, and Roswell in St. Joseph. Mr. Enos was Bainbridge's first postmaster. He kept at his house on the Territorial road a tavern-stand, where the daily stages between Detroit and St. Joseph halted ; he operated the Millburg saw-mill some years, and for fourteen years was a citizen of considerable prominence in that neighborhood. After 1850 his health began to fail, and retiring then from active pursuits, he removed to Ben- ton township, where he still resides.

In the fall of 1833, Martin Tice, a young man, then re- siding in New Jersey, started, in company with a Mr.

Griffin, for St. Joseph, Mich., traveling by water to De- troit, and thence on foot to Kalamazoo and Watervliet ; the only highway they found between the two latter points being a well-worn Indian trail. Reaching St. Joseph, they worked for Maj. Britain that winter, and the next year for various persons in the vicinity of St. Joseph. In 1835, Tice concluded to become a settler, and just then being employed in the laying out and construction of the Bain- bridge portion of the Territorial road between Detroit and St. Joseph, he entered a tract on section 17 in Bainbridge, on the line of the road named, and after completing his work on the road he settled upon his farm, put up a log cabin, and kept bachelor's hall until 1838, when he mar- ried a daughter of Jonas Ivery, a blacksmith of Water- vliet. From 1836 to his death, in 1876, he was a resident in Bainbridge, and lived all that period on his place of first settlement, where his daughter, Mrs. John McIntyre, now resides. She relates that she frequently heard her father say that the only house in Bainbridge at the time he came into it was that of Peter Sharrai, living " up north."

Directly upon the opening of the Territorial road through Bainbridge, John P. Davis put up a log tavern opposite Tice's house, and as travel over the thoroughfare set in briskly, Davis' tavern became a regular stopping-place for stages on the route as well as for freight carriers. Four- and six-horse passenger coaches passed daily, while vehicles of various descriptions, laden with merchandise, moved over the road in considerable numbers. As already noted, Harvey Enos' tavern, opened at Millburg about the time Davis opened his, was likewise a popular stopping-place, and had a flourishing trade. Davis lived only until the fall of 1836, and was the third person to die in the town- ship. He was buried in a lot at the rear of his tavern, and some time afterwards his body was removed to the Bain- bridge burying-ground. Davis' widow carried on the tav- ern a while, and then transferred it to Ezra C. King (a carpenter living near the tavern), who was succeeded by C. C. Sutton, S. R. Gilson, and A. R. Pinney, the latter of whom married the Widow Davis (who still retained con- trol of the property), and continued to be the landlord until the completion of the Michigan Central Railroad turned travel from the turnpike.

Pinney took the tavern in 1841, and replacing it with a substantial and commodious frame structure, carried on a profitable business for some years. During his time traffic was much greater than it had been during the time of either of his predecessors. Report says that he frequently provided breakfast for one hundred people when the busi- ness season was at its best. He went to California, and upon his return settled in Kalamazoo. Pinney's tavern- quite a famous landmark in those days-still stands, and, somewhat remodeled, is now the residence of Mr. T. J. West.

During the winter of 1835, Joseph Matran, George Wilder, and a company of twenty-three others were engaged in clearing timber-land in Niagara Co., N. Y., for Smith & Merrick, extensive land-owners in New York and Michigan. In the spring of 1836 they were ordered to proceed to Bainbridge township, in Michigan, where Smith & Merrick had made large land purchases. Seventeen of the party,

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TOWNSHIP OF BAINBRIDGE.

including Matran and Wilder, concluded to go, but the others declined to venture so far West. The seventeen traveled on foot to Buffalo, sailed via Lake Erie to Detroit, and walked from there to Bainbridge, where they halted at Davis' tavern, and were presently met by Dr. N. B. Moffatt, who had previously been sent out to Bainbridge by Smith & Merrick to look after their interests there, and to open the country to settlers. Moffatt had prepared for the com- ing of the men by the erection of two log houses, and the engagement of a family to board them. Mr. Matran says that when he and his fellow-travelers reached their desti- nation,-a log house then standing near the site of the present German Catholic church,-it was nine o'clock at night, and all were ravenously hungry. The woman of the house, however, refused to prepare supper, but did prepare it eventually under continued protest. Her conduct led to her dismissal the following day, and the installation in her place of the wife of John Nash, one of the seventeen.

When Matran and his companions reached their field of operations in Bainbridge, they found there Stillman Wood, Stephen R. Shepard, James Wilder, and others already engaged in clearing land for Smith & Merrick. Peter Sharrai was there, and, although considered a settler, spent much of his time in boating on the St. Joseph. Dr. Moffatt set his men so vigorously at work clearing land and putting in wheat that at the end of the twelve months which the party had agreed to work a considerable tract of land in the northern part of the township had been broken. Their land-clearing labors ended in that section, the men passed to other Western points, except Wood, Wilder, and Shepard, who located farms in Bainbridge, upon the lands they had assisted in clearing. Wood remained until 1859, when he removed to the village of St. Joseph, where he now lives, at the advanced age of ninety-four. George Wilder still resides in Bainbridge, upon a farm he bought of Jason Knapp. Shepard settled upon section 28, and there died. One of his sons, Morton R., lives in Pipestone. Moffatt went West, and, in 1849, setting out for California, died on the way.

When Matran went westward, in 1837, after finishing for Smith & Merrick in Bainbridge, he had against that firm an unpaid claim for labor. After waiting until 1839 without receiving money on it, he returned to Bainbridge, and in settlement took 80 acres on section 28. During the ensuing three years he worked on the St. Joseph River, and at times doing some labor on his farm, succeeded in clearing 15 acres by 1842, when he left the river, settled upon his farm, and became a Bainbridge pioneer in earnest. In 1843 there arose some question touching Mr. Matran's eligibility to vote, and he visited Berrien Springs to satisfy himself on that point. While there he bought 12 apple- trees of Eli Ford, of Berrien township, and brought them home on his back. With them he started his first orchard, and it became an excellent one. Mr. Matran lived on sec- tion 28 until 1850, when he bought a farm on section 14, to which he then removed, and where he has since lived.

One of Bainbridge's settlers in 1836, and of course one of its earliest, was "'Squire" Samuel McKeyes, who in 1835 came from Broome Co., N. Y., with his wife and five children to Michigan, and stopping at Prairie Ronde bought

a mill-interest there, but not liking the place on account of much sickness prevalent there, sold out and moved into Berrien County, where he bought of the general govern- ment 16 separate tracts of land, each containing 80 acres. Six of these tracts were in Bainbridge, and in that town- ship he decided to make his home, upon section 11, where Jacob Cribbs now lives. Mr. McKeyes died there in 1853. The only one of his children now living in Bainbridge is Mrs. Jacob Cribbs.

Peter Sharrai, of whom mention has already been made, rented his Bainbridge farm in 1838 to Jabez Knapp, who came in that year with his family from Jefferson Co., N. Y. Knapp occupied Sharrai's farm two years, during which time Sharrai boated on the St. Joseph in the summer and boarded with Knapp in the winter. In 1840, Knapp re- moved to the farm upon which Dr. N. B. Moffatt had lived. In 1841, having bought 120 acres of Smith & Merrick, on section 7, he went there to live, and was the first settler on the north-and-south road running through sections 6 and 7, which was surveyed in 1841, on the day Mr. Knapp raised his log dwelling-house. Mr. Knapp was by trade a ship- carpenter, and until 1846 followed that business at St. Joseph, while his sons looked after the farming interests. In that year he changed his location to a farm in Water- vliet, near Coloma, and lived there until 1875, when he went to California, of which State he is still a citizen. The only child of Mr. Knapp living in Bainbridge is Mrs. J. K. Bishop.

Levi Woodruff left Broome Co., N. Y., for the far West in May, 1837, with his wife and ten children, and halt- ing in Michigan, bought 160 acres of land of Smith & Merrick, on section 10, in Bainbridge. On the same sec- tion Silas Irving had been a settler and lived with his family in a log house, but growing tired of his pioneer ex- perience had sold out to Samuel McKeyes and gone to Kalamazoo. Into Irving's abandoned cabin Woodruff moved his family, and lived there until his own dwelling was completed. Newton and Philo, two of the sons, located near the elder Woodruff. Newton still lives where he first settled. Philo moved to Minnesota in 1856, and is now there. Levi Woodruff died in Bainbridge in February, 1862. His children now in Bainbridge are Asa, Simeon, Newton, and Mrs. Joseph Matran. Simeon Woodruff, Levi's brother, moved to Bainbridge from Ohio not long after Levi's settlement, and he, too, lived with his family in Irving's old hut during the preparation of a house of his own on section 15, but he died before his new home was completed. His widow and children occupied the farm until 1848, when, selling it to Martin Byers, they moved to Ohio. While he lived in Bainbridge, Simeon Woodruff, who was an ordained Presbyterian minister, preached occa- sionally in the settlement. Levi Woodruff, his brother, was instrumental in effecting a Congregational Church or- ganization in Bainbridge, and served as deacon. The church existed but a short time before being merged with the church at Coloma.

Returning now to the district bordering the Territorial road, the settlement of the Byers families in 1836 invites mention as an incident of importance. In June of that year, David Byers, his nephew John Byers (a lad of six-

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HISTORY OF BERRIEN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

teen), and John's mother departed from Livingston Co., N. Y., for Michigan, being persuaded thereto by David's brother Tobias, who had preceded them to the West and located in Van Buren Co., Mich. They visited Tobias, and, while there, purchased land in Bainbridge, -Mrs. Byers, 160 acres on sections 13 and 24, and David, 240 acres on the same sections. David Byers lived upon his place until his death, in March, 1874, and in August of the same year John Byers' mother died upon her Bain- bridge home, where John Byers now resides. Of all the settlers in Bainbridge when John Byers came, he is the only one now living in the township, and is therefore to-day the longest resident therein, and may in some sense be considered a patriarch.

Upon his coming the dwellers in the township included John P. Davis, at the Territorial road tavern, Martin Tice, at the same point, Harvey Enos, at Millburg, and the Shar- rais and McKeyes, in the north. South of the Territorial road there was no one.

John Byers recites the history of the origin of peach culture in Berrien County, as follows : In 1840, David Byers, his uncle, went back to Livingston Co., N. Y., to be married, and upon his return to Michigan brought 100 peach-trees. Of these, he gave John 40 and kept 60 him- self. In 1843 the trees bore their first fruit, and their combined product, amounting to 40 bushels, was taken to St. Joseph and sold, for $100, to the steward of Capt. Ward's steamer, which ran to Chicago. The purchaser took them to Chicago, and, according to Mr. Byers, that was the orig- inal shipment of peaches made from Berrien County, and from which the county's subsequent important peach trade arose. Touching the claim of Mr. George Parmelee to the honor of originating peach culture in this section, Mr. Byers says that Mr. Parmelee lived in Bainbridge from 1840 to 1843, when he removed to Benton, and that it was not until after he became a resident of the latter township that he engaged in the cultivation of the peach.

Lot Sutherland, of Broome Co., N. Y., migrated west- ward in the spring of 1836, with his family of seven children, and, locating first near Kalamazoo, remained but a short time, and then removed to Bainbridge, where he purchased 100 acres of Smith & Merrick, on section 27, and lived there until his death. His children now living in Bainbridge are Justus, Ebenezer, and Henry Suther- land, Mrs. John Morgan, and Mrs. Edwin Youngs.

Artemas Stickney accompanied Isaac Moffatt to Water- vleit in 1836, where he worked for Smith & Merrick. He settled, with his family, in Bainbridge, in 1837, on section 28, but moved to Pipestone some years later and died there. His widow now lives with her son, Eliphalet, in Bainbridge.

Wallis and John Tabor purchased land on the Territo- rial road as early perhaps as 1835, but did not occupy it until some time afterwards. John worked as a blacksmith in Chicago a few years, and then settled upon his Bain- bridge farm, where he lived until 1875, when he removed to California. He lived near the Pinney tavern, and was the successor of Harvey Enos in the Bainbridge post-office. Wallis left Bainbridge in 1850 for California. Later he settled in Sodus, which township has since been his home.

Adam Miller, of Livingston Co., N. Y., came West in 1837, in company with his family and Samuel Fletcher, his brother-in-law. The latter settled in Van Buren County, while Miller bought of the government 80 acres on section 24, in Bainbridge, where he now lives. Mr. Miller's daughter Fidelia, now living in Kalamazoo, was the first white child born in the township, the year of her birth being 1838.

H. H. Selter, who settled in Bainbridge in 1838, enjoyed the distinction of being a party to the first marriage cele- brated in the township. He was married the year of his arrival to Mary, daughter of Isaac Youngs. The ceremony was performed by David Byers, then a justice of the peace. Selter located at first upon a place north of Pinney's tavern, and afterwards changed his location to section 15, a little north of the township centre, where he died in 1875. His son Isaac married one of David Byers' daughters, and now lives on section 13.

Daniel Pettis, now living on section 28, started from Vermont in 1837 for Van Buren Co., Mich., and after working there two years at his trade of carpenter, bought 80 acres on section 28, in Bainbridge, of Smith & Merrick, took his family to the place in the spring of 1840, and made a clearing. At that time the north-and-south road east of this place was only partially open. The east-and- west road, on which his farm now lies, he himself assisted to construct. On that road, when Mr. Pettis came in, the only settler was Artemas Stickney.

Isaac Youngs was one of the early inhabitants of what was known as "Shingle Diggings," in that portion of Bain- bridge subsequently set off as Watervliet. In 1837 he left the Diggings and located upon a farm near Davis' tavern, where also his brother-in-law, Stephen R. Gilson (likewise a former resident at the Diggings), settled temporarily. Mr. Youngs moved to section 10, where he died. There his son Edwin now lives.

Gilbert Van Vranken worked at J. H. Enos' saw-mill in Millburg from 1837 to 1841, and then, purchasing 80 acres of land on section 28, in Bainbridge, became a pioneer, al- though he did not actually settle upon the place until 1842, when he married a daughter of James Higbee, of Benton. Mr. Van Vranken died in 1877, leaving a widow, who still lives on the old place.

In 1840, Jacob Cribbs, a house-carpenter, came to Bain- bridge. In 1841 he assisted Philo Woodruff in the con- struction of Pinney's new tavern, and in payment for his services received some land on section 15. In 1842 he married a daughter of 'Squire McKeyes, and since that time has been a resident of Bainbridge.

As already remarked, Smith & Merrick were owners of great tracts of land in Bainbridge, and in the beginning of the year 1876 sent Dr. Isaac Moffatt out to superintend the work of clearing and cultivating their broad acres. Moffatt brought several men out with him, and from time to time his force was increased until he had quite a colony about him. Much of the land was in the northwestern portion of the township, and that locality, by reason of the extensive land-clearing operations going forward there, came to be known by the name of " The Jobs." Stillman Wood,

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History of Berrien and Van Buren counties, Michigan. With biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 55

Author: D.W. Ensign & Co. pub; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Johnson, Crisfield Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Philadelphia, D. W. Ensign & Co. Number of Pages: 821

Author: D.W. Ensign & Co. pub; Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Johnson, Crisfield
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia, D. W. Ensign & Co.
Number of Pages: 821