USA > Michigan > Calhoun County > History of Calhoun county, Michigan, With Illustrations descriptive of its scenery > Part 4
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THE FIRST MARRIAGE
solemnized in the county, according to the rites of civilization, between white persons, was that one celebrated, in the year 1832, by Rev. John D. Pierce, be- tween John Kennedy, one of the first party of settlers of Calhoun, and a lady whose name we have not been able to ascertain.
The matrimonial knot was not in those days always easy to tie, as certain in- stances in Battle Creek and Athens strongly testify. When Frank Thomas and Amanda Goddard, of the former place, had agreed to take each other for better or for worse, and the day was fixed for the wedding past recall, the justice of the peace, Moses Hall, was notified to be ready. But, as it hath ever been from the beginning of time, that
"The best laid plans o' mice and men, Gang aft aglee,"
so it proved in this instance, the day named being his honor's "ague day." The marriage of course could no more be postponed at its stage of progress than could the " shake" in its inevitable course, but still the judge fortified himselt against the attack by taking a huge dose of quinine in the morning, and, to make assurance doubly sure, reinforced it with a still larger reserve dose at noon, and by the time the wedding-party arrived the judge was " as crazy as a loon." Right here came in the ever-fertile wit of the ladies to surmount all difficulties in the
14
HISTORY OF CALHOUN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
way of a good matrimonial venture, and the judge's wife soon found a way out of this, to some people, insurmountable difficulty. She took her crazy liege to the well, and drenched him thoroughly with the cold water thereof, and in the lucid interval, brief though it was, the parties were got into position and the ceremony performed.
In Athens, in the winter of 1833, Robert McCamley and Mary Nichols were to be married, and sent for Squire Dwinnel, who was the nearest justice, and lived near Ceresco. The wedding ceremony was performed, and the fee paid, and the justice departed for home, but, on arriving there, looked at his license, and dis- covered the house where the ceremony was performed was situated in Branch county, where he had no jurisdiction in matters civil or official. He immediately returned to the parties, who also, before his arrival, discovered they were not suf- ficiently married to permit the entailing of their estate upon any posterity that might happily result from their union ; and therefore, on the next morning, they were put into a wagon and driven across the line into Calhoun County, and there, with the blue-vaulted heavens for their canopy, and the flowery sod of the prairie for their footstool, the irrevocable words were spoken that bound them to each other for life.
THE FIRST WHITE CHILD
born in the county was Helen Chisholm, a daughter of Peter Chisholm, who opened her eyes to the bright sunlight on the south side of the river at Marshall, in October, 1831. The little lady was not long without company, and that too of the right sex, for on January 22 following (1832), Luther Hays, a son of Dr. A. L. Hays, put in his appearance on the stage of action, and Calhoun had as many " sorts" as her older sisters. The next babies who came to gladden the forest homes of the pioneers were Ellen Minerva Chisholm, a daughter of Thomas Chisholm, and Mark McCamley, a son of Sands McCamley, and who now lives at Battle Creek, who were born in 1832. A daughter, Mary, was also born that year to Lot Whitcomb, in Athens township. The first child above named is now Mrs. Cox, of Gem Plains, Kalamazoo county. Luther Hays died in his youth, at the age of fifteen years or thereabouts. The second Miss Chisholm married a Mr. Boughton, and is now deceased. Whether Mary Whitcomb is living or not we have no information.
THE FIRST DEATH
that occurred in the county was that of Isaac N. Hurd, who died in 1832, when the cholera ravaged the settlements in the county, taking in all fourteen* victims. The following incident touching Mr. Hurd's death is related by Mrs. Dr. Hays, now residing at Clinton, Iowa. When Rev. J. D. Pierce came to Marshall, in 1831, there was no house for him except a double log house built by some young men for a boarding-house, and he made arrangements to go into that, and the young men built them another for a private room. They were gathered there in the evening of the same night Mr. Hurd was attacked with the scourge, he being among the number. The evening was spent in flute-playing and singing, one of the pieces sung being the familiar lines, " The burial of Sir John Moore," at the close of which Mr. Hurd remarked that when he died he would like to be buried in the manner indicated by the lines just sung. Soon after, Mr. Hurd was attacked with the disease in its most virulent form, dying the next day, and was buried at midnight by torchlight, not particularly because of his wish to that effect, but because he could not be prepared for burial sooner, and they dared not delay the sad service longer. The wife of Rev. Mr. Pierce was also one of the victims, and the husband, alone in his grief and great affliction, with his own hands prepared her for burial, and, assisted by Randall Hobart, committed her to the earth. Eight died in Marshall out of a population of seventy souls. On Dry prairie, Warren Nichols, his wife and three children were stricken down and died, and also Isaac Crossett.
CEMETERIES.
Before a burial-place had been laid out or a cemetery surveyed in the county, death had begun his harvests, and tender buds, opening flowers, and ripened fruit had been garnered beneath the flower-bedecked sod of the openings and prairies, upon whose cold and pulseless forms tears of affection had fallen from the eyes of mourners, who, pausing for a brief moment to lay their treasures away, turned again to resume the broken thread of an imperative present. There was no time for use- less regrets ; no words of affection or piteous plea could again call from the relentless grasp of the reaper-whose sable plumes cast a shadow upon our homes, and send a chill through our hearts-the loved and the lost! The stern duties of the pioneers' lives demanded instant and constant recognition, and there was no choice but in obedience, which was rendered as cheerfully as circumstances would allow. The first burial-place assigned especially for the sepulture of the dead was a flat on which the victims of the cholera were buried, in Marshall, on the land of Mr.
Hurd, and which after his decease his heirs gave to the village for burial purposes. This was used until 1839, when the Marshall Cemetery Company was formed, and the beginning of the present eligibly located and naturally lovely grounds made.
CHAPTER V.
MEANS OF COMMUNICATION-ROADS-TRAILS-BRIDGES-TAVERNS-MAIL ROUTES-STAGE-COACHES-POST-OFFICES-RAILROADS-STEAMBOAT NAVI- GATION ON THE KALAMAZOO.
FOR a sociable people, means of communication are a sine qua non, and the pioneers of Calhoun being pre-eminently of that class of people, were not long in their settlements before roads were surveyed and " blazed," and, as fast as possi- ble, cut through the forests, whereby their intercourse could be free and unre- stricted. When the first settlers came into the county they followed the trails of the Indians, which, though devious, were always over the hardest ground, making wide detours sometimes to avoid a marsh, and again taking a line "as the crow flies," for some crossing of a creek or morass, where the traverse was accessible and safe. Through the woods in all directions these trails were struck, and in many instances government roads followed the meanderings of the same in their early location.
The great Chicago national military road from Detroit, between the city of Tecumseh and its terminus, follows to-day, with the exception of one mile in Washtenaw county, the trail of the Sacs on their annual pilgrimages to Malden for the annuity of the British government from the beginning of the nineteenth century. Along that trail Black Hawk marshaled his fierce warriors and their women and children, and returned laden with the finery of the traders, the coureur des bois, and sometimes with the "squiby" (whisky) of the settlers.
The first road surveyed through Calhoun County was ordered by the legislative council of the Territory of Michigan on November 4, 1829, which began " in the Chicago road at or near the inn of Timothy S. Sheldon, in the township of Ply- mouth, in the county of Wayne, thence west on the most direct and eligible route through the village of Ann Arbor, by Samuel Clements, to Grand river, where the St. Joseph trail crosses the same, and also through the Cohgwagiac* and Grand prairies, thence westerly on the most eligible route to or near the Pawpaw to the mouth of the St. Joseph river of Lake Michigan." The commissioners to survey and establish the road were Seeley Neale, of Panama (afterwards of Marengo township, of Calhoun County), and Orrin White, of Ann Arbor, of Washtenaw county, and Jehial Enos, of " Grand Prairie of the Kalamazoo." In March, 1831, the legislative council approved the survey, and established the same as a public highway.
The second road was established July 30, 1830, beginning at the intersection of the north line of the Salt Springs reservation, in the county of Washtenaw, with the Chicago road, thence westerly, via the north bend of the Raisin, through Nottawa-seepe prairie to Young's prairie (Cass county). Orange Risdon, Alfred Davis, and B. Holms were the commissioners. Afterwards a road was established from Jacksonburg (Jackson), via Spring Arbor, Homer, Tekonsha, Burlington, through Nottawa-seepe prairie, via Centreville to White Pigeon, in St. Joseph county, which traversed the same route, or nearly so, through Calhoun County, in 1833.
On June 18, 1832, roads from Battle Creek to the mouth of the Kalamazoo river, and from Blissfield to Marshall, were laid out and established. The com- missioners of the first one were Isaac Barnes, Wm. Duncan, and Caleb Eldred, the latter the first settler in Comstock, and who died in 1876, over one hundred years old. The commissioners on the second survey were Isaac N. Swaine, Sidney Ket- chum, and Isaac E. Crary.
A road was laid from Marshall to Grand Rapids, " beginning at the junction of La Plaisance Bay and Chicago roads, thence through Marshall to the rapids of the Grand river," in 1833. Commissioners, Louis Campau, Joseph W. Brown, and Oshea Wilder.
Roads from Marshall to Coldwater, and from county-seat of Hillsdale county to Marshall, were established in 1833. One from Ypsilanti to the north bend of the St. Joseph river, in Calhoun County (near Homer, in Clarendon township), and from Marshall to Climax prairie, were laid out and established by the territorial government in 1834.
# Eight in Marshall and six in Athens.
# Goguac, in Battle Creek township.
.
15
HISTORY OF CALHOUN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
THE FIRST BRIDGE
over the Kalamazoo was built by George Ketchum as engineer, Dr. A. L. Hays, and a hired man of each of the individuals named, in the winter of 1831-32, on or near the same location of the present bridge by Perrin's stone mill (or the ruins thereof). It served for years, until the present one was built. For a sub- stitute previously, Dr. Hays and Peter Chisholm felled a tree on the south shore of the river, which spanned the channel between that shore and the island, just below the site of the present iron bridge, and then felled another, which spanned the channel between the island and the north shore.
THE FIRST TAVERN
opened in the county was S. Camp's, in Marshall, in 1832, which was kept in a frame building put up by the host himself. Rev. John D. Pierce kept a board- ing-house, by reason of a contract with the parties of whom he bought or leased his house, the double log, in 1831, but never called it a hotel. Camp's house was known as the Exchange. Mr. Vandenburgh succeeded him in its proprietor- ship.
THE FIRST MAIL ROUTE
was established in the fall of 1832, from Jackson via Marshall to Centreville in St. Joseph county. Camp was the first mail contractor, and also operated the
FIRST LINE OF STAGES
coming into the county between Jackson and Marshall, the old sheriff of St. Joseph county, E. A. Trumbull, being the contractor and stage proprietor between Marshall and Centreville. Camp's stages were open lumber-wagons, however. Later on, when the railroad reached Jackson, Zenas Tillotson ran fine coaches, with four and six horses, between that point and Niles, and earlier between Ann Arbor and Niles. Tillotson succeeded Camp on the stage route in 1835, and operated the stage line till the railroad came.
THE FIRST POST-OFFICE
was established in the county at Marshall, in 1832, George Ketchum being the postmaster. The mail was brought on horseback, and Mrs. Ketchum used to change the same in the absence of her husband, using her sleeping apartment for the purpose, and keeping the mail for the settlement in a cigar-box. Mr. Ket- chum was succeeded by Rev. John D. Pierce, who used his clock-case for the receptacle of the postal matter. There are twenty post-offices at the present time in the county, including two or more money-order offices.
RAILROADS.
The railroad agitation in the county began in 1840, the first meeting being held in Marshall, on the 27th of January of that year. Philo Dibble was the chairman, and S. S. Alcott secretary ; and the meeting memorialized the legisla- ture to push forward the completion of the Michigan Central railroad, then owned and being constructed by the State. On September 8, 1841, proposals for grading and bridging the road from Jackson to Marshall were called for, and the road completed to Jackson in December, 1841. It was not completed to Marshall until August 10, 1844, when the first arrival of cars was greeted with great enthusiasm.
The Michigan Central air line, under the name of the Michigan air line, from Jackson to Niles via Homer and Tekonsha, was completed in or about the year 1870, those two townships contributing liberally in aid of its construction. The Michigan Northern railroad was constructed through Homer and Albion in the year following, those towns also aiding generously in its construction, and in 1868-69 the Peninsular railroad was built through Battle Creek, that city giving a handsome bonus to the company to aid the building thereof.
In 1844 the total receipts of the Michigan Central road in the State were $211,169.84, of which $83,551.03 were for passenger traffic, and the balance for freight and carrying mails. Its expenses were $121,750.20 for operating and repairs, $25,345.31 were paid into the State treasury, $57,424.53 paid for iron, and balance used for construction of side tracks, etc. The road was graded to Kalamazoo in 1844-45. There are now about ninety miles of main track in the county, besides the grade of the Mansfield, Coldwater, and Lake Michigan railroad, and the Marshall and Coldwater railroad, the latter roads not being ironed at the present writing. These roads have been liberally aided, but their further construction seems to be in doubt; it is to be hoped they will yet be com- pleted for the benefit of the country through which they pass. The business of the Michigan Central and Southern railroads for the year ending December 31, 1876, in the county, was as follows: Freight forwarded, 104,249,100 pounds ; freight received, 73,575,542 pounds ; passenger traffic, $74,060.93.
The first express company which transacted business in the county was Wells & Co., who opened an office in Marshall in September, 1844. Zenas Tillotson was the conductor of the first passenger-train that arrived at that place, in August of that year. The Erie and Michigan Telegraph Company established an office at Marshall in the fall of 1848, the first in the county. Jabez S. Fox was the first telegraph operator. He is now in the treasury department, Washington.
STEAMBOAT NAVIGATION
upon the Kalamazoo was once a roseate-colored vision of the people of Calhoun, and in the struggle between Comstock and Kalamazoo for the county-seat of Kalamazoo county, Marshall secured the plum of the declaration of its site as the head of steamboat navigation on the Kalamazoo. But it was valueless, as no steamer could be made of draft sufficiently light to navigate the shallows and " riffles" of that stream, and carry any freight worth the investment.
General Isaac E. Crary and General Ezra Convis had the contract of working the Detroit and Chicago road from the one hundred and thirty-sixth mile stake from Detroit to the Indiana line, building bridges and cutting out the trees, grub- bing the central thirty feet, and corduroying the marshes, etc., in 1834.
CHAPTER VI.
FIRST LAND ENTRIES-FIRST FARMS-LIVE STOCK-THE HEN FEVER-FRUIT -IMPROVED FARM MACHINERY-PRODUCTS OF THE PRESENT-MANUFAC- TURES-PIONEER ARTISANS-TRADERS-MANUFACTURES OF THE PRESENT -BANKING : STATE, WILD-CAT, NATIONAL.
THE land office at which the first entries of public lands were made was located at Monroe, and the entries made up to June, 1831, were all made thereat; but in that month an office for the western part of Michigan was opened at White Pigeon, St. Joseph county, where it remained until June, 1834, when it was removed to Bronson, now Kalamazoo.
The first entries of public lands, as has been before stated, were made in 1830, at Albion and Marshall, by Noble Mckinstry and Ephraim Harrison. On the 5th day of February, 1831, Abram Davidson entered the west half of northwest quarter-section 25, and Jonathan Wood entered the east half of northeast quarter- section 26, in the township of Marshall, on which the county-seat was afterwards located. There were no other entries made until the 17th day of June, when John J. Guernsey, of Duchess county, New York, entered the northeast quarter of section 12, the south half and south half of northeast quarter, and the north- west quarter of section 1, of Battle Creek township, and the south half of north- west quarter and southwest quarter-section 6 of township 2, range 7 west. There were in June of that year seventy-six entries made, and one hundred and thirty- six during the year. A large emigration came into the county in 1833-34, but the heaviest purchases were made in 1835-36. There were set off as university lands, in the county, eight sections of the very best in the townships where they are situated, viz. : six in Marshall, one each in Battle Creek and Athens.
THE FIRST FARMS OPENED
in the county were those of Dr. A. L. Hays and Sidney S. Alcott, in Marshall, in 1831, corn and potatoes being the crops raised. It is probable that crops in greater or less quantity were raised that same year in Battle Creek, and possibly in Albion.
LIVE STOCK.
Calhoun County farmers have, from the earliest days of their settlement, paid more or less attention to wool-growing. As early as 1838 John Willard intro- duced the fine-wooled Saxon sheep, from the Vernon flocks of Oneida county, New York, and soon afterwards John D. Pierce introduced some of the same variety. The common and coarser-wooled varieties have been graded upon the French and Spanish Merino stock, J. D. Patterson introducing the first-named breed at first, and afterwards the latter stock. S. G. Pattison, John Houston, Charles A. Miller, Martin, and the Harrises, have been and are still more or less extensively engaged in the breeding of the American Merino. Jacob Anderson, of Albion, is a heavy wool-grower, having a fine graded flock of some hundreds of animals at the present time. George Hentig, a farmer near Marshall, intro- duced Cotswold sheep in 1845. Devillo and Lawrence Hubbard are, and have been for some years, engaged in breeding Leicester and Cotswold sheep. Colonel William C. Fonda, of Bedford, in 1854, introduced Merino sheep into this town- ship, thoroughbreds from the celebrated flocks of Vermont. In 1837 Judge Dickey
16
HISTORY OF CALHOUN COUNTY, MICHIGAN.
bought all of the wool grown in the six counties of Calhoun, Branch, Kalamazoo, Barry, Eaton, and Jackson, and the whole clip amounted to less than eight thou- sand pounds. In 1873 the clip of Calhoun alone was 486,355 pounds, 90,849 sheep being sheared.
BLOODED CATTLE
were first introduced into the county by S. G. Pattison and G. W. Dryer, of Marengo, about the year 1850. The animals were from the Weddle herds of " short horns," of Ontario county, New York, and descendants of imported stock. Mr. Pattison is still engaged in breeding that variety of stock. Van Buren Hyde, of Fredonia, has also a fine herd of ten animals of the same stock. Samuel Wormley, in 1852, introduced the Kentucky short-horns, from the noted Clay herds of the blue-grass regions ; and. H. A. Tillotson, also about that time, and later, was an extensive breeder of the same variety, from the Ontario county herds, New York. In 1855 Colonel Fonda introduced some fine Durhams from the John North farm, of Chester county, Pennsylvania, and later, procured some very fine Alderneys from Burton, who imported direct from Bates, of England. W. H. Hewitt, of Marshall, has some fine Alderneys also.
The stock of horses in Calhoun County for draft and roadster purposes is good, and many fine animals are owned by the citizens thereof. S. G. Pattison has been interested somewhat extensively in the breeding of horses, and Kellogg, of Battle Creek, about 1856 to 1860, introduced a good horse known as " Old Champion," who gave his characteristics to a large posterity. Goodrich, of Albion, introduced the Black Hawk Morgan stock, from Vermont. In 1861, Dr. A. L. Hays, who always had good horses about him, brought in an English coacher stallion, called " Admiration," who left some fifteen or twenty fine colts, whose descendants are still found in the county, and exhibit the same showy, stylish figure and bright brown or bay color of the sire, but like him lack speed. He died from an injury received on shipboard while crossing the Atlantic.
SWINE.
John Willard introduced Berkshire hogs quite early, but the stock was neglected, and not much attention paid to improvement of swine until after 1850. In 1852, Mr. Wormley introduced a pair of Suffolks from imported stock of Sherwood, of Auburn, New York, and Stickney, of Boston, the progeny of which were exten- sively sought after throughout the county and elsewhere. In 1860, he introduced the Chester county white hog, and by a fortunate cross upon an unknown white hog obtained a very valuable animal, which proved quite popular, and is still raised in the county. The Berkshires were re-introduced after 1860, William Conley breeding them now for sale. W. H. Witt, of Marshall, is an extensive breeder of Poland-China stock, and Arza C. Robinson also breeds both Berkshire and the latter variety. The Newberrys have always been good feeders, and raised fine animals. Grove C. Brackett, of Convis, was formerly in the business some- what largely. Colonel Fonda also introduced Chester county " whites" in 1860.
Poultry is receiving considerable attention in the county, the " hen fever" com- mencing its ravages in 1853-54, the first victim being Samuel Wormley. The attack was slight at first, but it rapidly assumed serious complications, and at one time, before convalescence intervened, Brahmas and Cochins, buff, brown and white, and the various breeds which have " ruled the roost," in the palmy days of Chan- ticleer and Partlett, were to be seen in his well-kept parks. Wild turkeys were re-introduced to the haunts from which civilization had driven them, by Mr. Wormley, and crossed upon the domestic black turkey produced a fine, hardy fowl. Wormley's first venture was a single egg, deposited by an imported Brahma, in transition in the box in which she was confined, and there being no contract with the express company for the transportation of eggs, the prize fell to Mr. Wormley, by right of discovery. He gave it to an ordinary dung-hill fowl to incubate, and a fine pullet was the result. A cockerel was bought by him, and thus the Brahma invasion of Calhoun was begun. Mark Hurd and S. B. Smith are breeders of fancy poultry in Marshall, and Frank Gray, of Battle Creek, is an extensive breeder of game fowls.
FRUIT.
The first orchard planted out in the county was one by Oshea Wilder, and was located in the township of Eckford. W. E. Sawyer planted out a nursery on seminary lands soon after. Mr. Wilder gave considerable attention to fruit-grow- ing while he lived. Peaches formerly were very abundant in the county, but the severity of the climate has rendered this delicious fruit an uncertain product, yet at times good crops are still raised. In 1872 nearly fifteen hundred bushels were raised. Small fruits and grapes thrive well and produce fine fruit, and have been cultivated many years. Cranberries are found in various parts of the county in their wild state, but no attempts have been made to domesticate this fruit, or pay much attention to its culture.
IMPROVED FARM MACHINERY.
The farmers of Calhoun County coming, as the greater portion of them did, from New York and New England, were not long in introducing newer and better methods of preparing the soil and harvesting and thrashing their crops, than those which were in vogue at first. The flail was too slow a process to use where wheat produced thirty-five bushels per acre, and from forty to one hundred acres of the cereal was grown in a season ; and horses tramping out the grain was too dirty a way to be endured any longer than possible, especially as the zephyrs had to be utilized to winnow the chaff away. Therefore it was but a short time after the first farms were opened before the open cylinder thrashers made their appearance, accompanied by the fanning mill. These latter were largely manufactured in 1836, and later by Judge Dickey, at Marshall. The reaper was introduced after 1844, and the separator thrashing-machine about the same time. Plows were improved about 1840 and after, but the old breaking plow that required ten yoke of good oxen to drag it through the grubs held its place for a long time, until the farms were well subdued.
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