USA > Michigan > Calhoun County > History of Calhoun county, Michigan : a narrative account of its historical progress, its people, and its principal interests, Volume I > Part 3
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Walbridge, Jolın J., 930.
Walbridge, Robert M., 930.
Walker, Charles E., 894.
Walkinshaw, James E., 1048.
Walter, George C., 616.
Walter, Lizzie M., 617.
Ware, William E., 1188.
Warner, Wareham. 418.
Warner, Willard H., 1238.
Warren, Frank A., 1283.
Warren, Levi S., 469, 1321.
Warriner, Eva, 328.
Warsop, Ervin A., 1255.
War times, 96. War with Spain, 597.
Washingtonian movement, 160.
Waterman, Adolphus C., 969.
Waterman, Henry B., 968.
Waterman, John B., 972.
Water system, Marshall, 255.
Watson, John, 1285.
Wattles, Jervis H., 886. Wayne, General, 3. Webb, Caleb, 1101.
Webb, Fred H., 1263.
Weeks, Burr L., 670.
Weeks, Monfort D., 438.
Weeks, Ralph, 1201.
Weeks, Ward S., 664.
Weiekgenant, Jacob, 622.
Welcome home, 603. Wells, Fred, 815. Welsh, James M., 439. Werstein, Leopold, 800.
Wesleyan Seminary and Female Colle- giate Institute, 120.
West, Edmond C., 1235.
"Western Citizen," 332. "Western Health Reform Institute," 370. Western sharpshooters, 547. "Western Statesman," 270.
Weston, Vernum, 625. Wet Prairie, 175.
Wetzel, Frank 1., 779.
Whalen, John, 1092.
Whalen, Thomas F., 1093. Wheelock, Charles H., 710.
Wheeloek, Frederick A., 440. Wheelock, Moses W., 707.
Wheelock, Sarah W., 709.
Whitbeek, George S., 991.
Whitbeek, Henry E., 990.
White, Arthur J., 1143.
White, Gilbert B., 1019.
White, L. E., 447.
Whitney, Harlan K., 978.
Whitney, Henry A., 975.
Whitney, William W., 941.
Wild cat banks, 246.
Wild cat banking, 105. Wildey, Clark E., 803.
Willard, Charles, 341, 1116.
Willard, Charles, Library, 339.
Willard, George, 1112.
Willard, George B., 331, 1115.
Willard library, Battle Creek (view), 341. Williams, Arthur B., 808.
Williams, Howard H., 440.
Williams, Isaac L., 1289.
Williams, L. C., 859.
Willis, Edward F., 1207.
Willis, Stephen H., 1173.
Wilmot proviso, 51, 78.
Winsor, Herbert E., 272, 277.
Winter, John, 1163.
Wirt, George P., 818.
Wisner, Robert P., 1064.
Wolcott, H. J., 455.
Woleott, L. J., 455.
Woman's Christian Temperance Union, 162, 409, 413, 476.
Woman's Club, 408.
Woman's League, 408, 410.
Woman's Relief Corps, 283, 474.
Wood, Abram L., 1098.
Wood, Jolın V., 780.
Wood, Luke B., 1065.
Wood, Melville J., 1318.
Wood. William D., 641.
Woodbridge, William, 12.
Wooden, Andrew, 912.
Wooden, W. R., 408.
Wooden, William R., 987.
Woodruff, Frank G., 1070.
Woodruff, George, 273.
Woolnough. Walter W., 857.
Woolsey, George S., 699.
Wright, Orin J .. 669.
Yankees, 16. Year Book of Albion College, 117.
York, George H., 1228.
Young, David, farm house (view), 171.
Young Men's Christian Association, 409, 410. Y. M. C. A. building, Battle Creek (view), 411.
Young, Myron, 780. Yoxheimer, David, 1300.
Zelinsky, Thomas, 1252. Zimmer, Edward B., 1336.
History of Calhoun County
CHAPTER I
MICHIGAN UNDER THE FRENCH FLAG
Three different national flags have waved in recognized anthority over what is now the State of Michigan. That of France for 156 years, that of Great Britain for 20 years and that of the United States for 129 years. In 1607, or but one year after the English sailed up the James River, landing at Jamestown and affecting there the first permanent English settlement in America, the French ascended the Saint Lawrence and established the first permanent settlement of the French in the New World. Fourteen years later, the Pilgrims landed from the Mayflower on the shores of Plymouth Bay. From these three fountains opened in the New World, there was destined to flow three mighty streams of influence affecting severally and unitedly every part of the North American Continent.
It is our purpose to treat briefly the second of these as most affecting Michigan in the order of time. Three motives seemed to dominate the French in their coming to America-first, the love of adventure on the part of a few resolute and ambitious men who sought to explore unknown parts of the northeastern section of America, to plunge into the wilder- ness and search out the great lakes, the mighty rivers and the lofty water falls and over all to raise the standard of their sovereign and claim the soil as subject to the government of France. Another class, moved by the love of gain, came in the wake of the explorers hoping to find, as many did, rich rewards for the perils and privations they
endured. The third class was composed of priests, mostly of the Jesnit order, who, fired with a zeal which no hardship could abate and no sacrifice quench, plunged into the trackless wilderness searching out the haunts of the wild men of the woods and, having found them, counted not their lives dear unto themselves if they could but bring the savage warriors to accept the Prince of Peace and pattern their lives after the Man of Galilee. While the results seemed meager and not at all com- pensatory of the efforts put forth, it still remains that the story of the hardships passed through, the privation endured, the tortures patiently borne for His sake, and finally the sacrifice on the altar of self-immola-
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tion in the name of the Master, constitute one of the most thrilling chapters in the history of our common country.
While the French attempts at colonization were not a success, for reasons which do not come within the scope of this work to discuss, it is but fair to say that the foot prints of explorer, of trader and priest are still traceable from the Raisin to the Straits and from the Straits to the Saint Joseph; that the nomenclature derived from the French rivals that from the Indian in our state ; and that so long as Marquette, Cadillac, Saint Ignace, Sault Ste Marie, Ponchartrain and Detroit remain, the influence of the heroic and devoted men who lived and wrought under the French regime will abide a living force within the borders of our State, constant reminders of the heroic people who lived and endured in the days of its primitive history. The rival claims of the French and English explorers; the sharp competition between the traders of the two nations with the Indians, particularly in furs; and the enlistment on the one side or the other of the friendship and warlike aid of the powerful Indian tribes whose habitations bordered on the Great Lakes; the jealousies and resulting clashes between the colonists, that fringed the Atlantic seaboard from the Penobscot to the James with their constant extensions toward the interior, with those of the Saint Lawrence and the Great Lakes, were sure to arouse to action the respective home govern- ments, jealous of their real or assumed rights and relations of their children on this side the seas. Harrassing encroachments with threatened invasions and counter invasions resulted in the inevitable. The student of history is not surprised to see columns of marching troops under English commanders heading north and northwest through the forests, leaving the settlements behind them, nor counter columns of French soldiers headed southward; each and every column on both sides accom- panied by the ferocious and blood-thirsty savages as accepted allies. The unbroken wilderness repeatedly resounded to the clash of arms, and Crown Point, Ticonderoga, Fort DuQuesne, Fort Frontenac and Fort Niagara are enrolled among the places for which brave men struggled and baptized them with their blood. Upon the Plains of Abraham, adjacent to Quebec, in September, 1759, the decisive battle was fought. Wolfe, the commander of the British troops, fell upon the field where his soldiers were victorious, while Montcalm, commander of the French, died a few days later of wounds received in the engage- ment, but not until the city, in defense of which he gave his life, had been surrendered to the triumphant enemy. A year later Montreal capitulated to the British arms. In due time the Treaty of Paris followed and the French power was broken and its flag forever furled on the North American Continent.
CHAPTER II
MICHIGAN UNDER THE BRITISH FLAG
With the ratification of the Treaty of Paris, Great Britain elaimed sovereignty over all North America, save a strip to the southeast held by Spain and to the Louisiana country in the southwest. The mutter- ings of discontent which were heard in some of the colonies on the Atlantic seaboard, even while the struggle was yet on with the French along the Canadian border, grew in scope and intensity until the flame of war blazed up at Lexington and Concord and burned with increasing intensity through seven weary years from Bunker Hill to Yorktown. The treaty of 1783 between Great Britain and America, whereby the former granted independence to the latter with jurisdiction over certain defined limits of territory which latter embraced the present state of Michigan, did not result in the immediate withdrawal of the British troops, nor bring peace and repose to the inhabitants residing in what is now the Peninsular State.
When the line of the Great Lakes was agreed upon as the international boundary, it was expected that the military posts held by Great Britain within the United States would be surrendered, but instead, she not only continued to hold them, but her agents and representatives encouraged, if they did not aid, the Indians in their deelared purpose to make the Ohio River the northwest boundary of the United States. To make good this purpose, the great Shawanese Chief, Joseph Brant, who had held a commission in the British army during the Revolution and who was a man of very unusual talents and possessed of some edueation, formed an alliance of the tribes of the six nations viz: the Hurons, Ottawas, Miamis, Shawanese, Chippewas and Cherokees, with the Dela- wares and Pottawattomies and the Wabash Confederacy to resist the encroachments of the Whites north and west of the Ohio River. In the endeavor to carry out this purpose there is abundant evidence that the Indians were encouraged and abetted by conspicuous British officers, both civil and military. Repeated councils were held with the repre- sentatives of these various tribes, but were unavailing to effect a per- manent settlement.
Three different military expeditions were sent against the powerful Indian confederation. The first, led by General Harmar in the fall of 1790, met with defeat ; the second, by General Saint Clair in the follow- ing year, met with most disastrous results; but the third, under the leadership of General Wayne, was correspondingly successful. The
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power of the federation was broken at the battle of Fallen Timbers, August 20, 1794, after which the savages were ready to sue for peace. Accordingly chiefs in large numbers met at Greenville, Ohio, in the fall of 1794, where after a long consultation a treaty was agreed upon between these savage leaders and General Wayne. It was signed by all the Chiefs in Council and resulted in the cession of a vast domain of territory to the Whites and in terminating any serious trouble with the Indians in the northwest until the war broke out with Great Britain in 1812.
In the mean time the Treaty of 1795 negotiated by John Jay and his associate members brought about the evacuation of all forts and the withdrawal of all British troops from within the American boundary. This was to be done on or before the eleventh day of June, 1796, and on the eleventh day of July following the American flag was far the first time raised over Detroit. This was twenty years after the opening of the Revolution and nearly thirteen years after the surrender of Corn- wallis and the treaty that acknowledged American Independence.
CHAPTER 111
MICHIGAN UNDER THE AMERICAN FLAG
A confusion of elaims by individual States to territory lying north of the Ohio River and west of Pennsylvania presented a perplexing problem to the Colonial Congress. Many of these claims were based upon assumed rights under royal grants and charters prior to the Revolution. The different States of the Confederacy gradually came to see the wisdom and the justice of surrendering these claims and ceding to the general government the territory west of certain definite limits which had been gained by common sacrifice and treasure during the war for independence. So it gradually came about that all the territory north and west of the Ohio River, within the treaty limits, was brought under the jurisdiction of the United States. This Northwest Territory, as it was called, embraced all of the present states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin. While at the time we are considering there were a good many people living within the limits named, there was no form of government; hence it devolved upon the Congress, repre- sentative of all the people, to make provision for the control and govern- ment of this vast and soon to be generally inhabited region.
Out of this situation confronting the Congress, there was evolved the celebrated Ordinance of 1787. So important was this ordinance and so inseparably associated with the future welfare, not only of Michigan and the northwest, but of the whole country, that we deem it proper to quote some of its salient features. It may be said "that a comprehensive plan was first evolved and reported in 1784 by a committee of which Jefferson was chairman : later this was modified by a committee of which Monroe was chairman and was still further amended and finally reported in July, 1787, by Nathan Dane, of Massachusetts, and passed on the 13th of the same month by a unanimous vote of all the States then represented in Congress. This ordinance became a sort of constitution for the Northwest Territory. Among other things, it provided for not less than two nor more than five States to be created out of the territory; that a temporary government in each of these should be administered by a governor, a council of five, a secretary and a court of five judges, all to be appointed by Congress. When a certain population should be reached, then representative government should begin and a House of Representatives should, with the Governor and the Couneil, make a Legislature. When this state was reached, a delegate might be sent to Congress." Among other things, the Ordinance declared that "Religion.
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morality and knowledge being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall be forever encouraged," and as an earnest of good faith, the 16th section in every township of land was set apart for the support of public schools. In Michigan at this time the proceeds from the sale of school lands amount to something over five millions of dollars, which is held by the State as a trust fund upon which interest is annually paid for the support of the public schools. Freedom of religious worship was stipulated in the Ordinance. Considering the times and the provocations, the paragraph relating to the Indians speaks well for the fathers of the Republic. It declares that "The utmost good faith shall always be observed toward the Indians; their lands and property shall never be taken from them without their consent; and in their property, rights and liberty they shall never be invaded or disturbed unless in just and lawful wars authorized by Congress; hut laws founded in justice and humanity shall from time to time be made for preventing wrongs being done to them and for preserving peace and friendship with them."
It is doubtful if any member of Congress realized the tremendous import of the brief paragraph relating to slavery or deemed it possible that seventy-five years later in a great civil war, when the perpetuity of the government itself should hang in the balances, it should tip the scales in favor of the Union. The paragraph in question declared : "There shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in the said territory, otherwise than in the punishment of crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted."
A plan of civil government, freedom of religious worship, provision for public schools, the prohibition of slavery and justice and humanity toward the Indians are salient points in this immortal instrument.
Bancroft, the historian, calls it "The Great Ordinance." The late Chief Justice Cooley of our State says that "No Charter of Government in the history of any people has so completely stood the tests of time and experience."
The distinguished Senator Hoar, of Massachusetts, put it on a plane with the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. The his- torian, Schouler, says, "The Ordinance of 1787 deserves to rank among immortal parchments, both for what it accomplished and what it inspired. Nor would it be wild hyperbole to opine that, save for the adoption and unflinching execution of that ordinance hy Congress in early times, the American Union would ere today have found a grave."
CHAPTER IV
MICHIGAN TO THE CLOSE OF THE WAR OF 1812-1814
The withdrawal of the British from American soil, under the treaty, left the way open for settlement and improvement of Michigan which. after Ohio was made a State in 1802, became a part of the territory of Indiana with William Henry Harrison, afterward President of the United States, as Governor.
In 1805 the territory of Michigan was created and set apart from Indiana with General William Hull, of Massachusetts, as the first territorial governor. There was but little gain in population, in enter- prise or development in the earlier years of the last century. In the entire territory of Michigan down to 1812, it is estimated there was not to exceed 5.000 white people, while Detroit, though a hundred and eleven years had passed sinee Cadillac had first established a settlement there, contained but 800 Europeans. Several things contributed to this slow growth. It had been originally settled by the French and not the English and had drawn its life from French rather than English sources. After the Revolution conditions remained practically the same with British garrisons holding the forts on American soil along the frontier, with a wide expanse of unbroken forest lying between the settlements of the Americans to the south and southeast and the fringe of French settlements along the border of the north and northwest. There were by land no roads worthy of the name and no boats of carrying capacity on the lakes. As a result, the country known as the territory of Michigan remained for years practically at a stand still.
There was also a twofold menace to the Michigan settlements. The one, was the British troops stationed near the border on the one side and the Indians in sullen and hostile mood on the other, both under con- ditions that might at any time arise and unite to overcome the Ameri- cans and devastate the settlements.
On the 18th of June, 1812, the Congress declared war against Great Britain.
One of the first moves of the enemy was to capture Detroit, the most important post on the frontier. The authorities at Washingon showed lamentable lack of foresight and enterprise in view of the fact that they were the initiators. While Governor Hull was making his way through the wilderness of Ohio to his post at Detroit with a considerable force of troops, the British Commander in Canada, through inexcusable neglect on the part of the American Secretary of War, was first apprised of the fact that war had been declared and by that knowledge entered
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the contest at an advantage that resulted in the surrender of General Hull and his entire force with the town of Detroit to the British General Brock, on Sunday morning, August 16, 1812, less than two months after the declaration of war. This surrender of the most important post on the American frontier, without the firing of a single shot, was a dis- graceful and humiliating act, which brought. upon the Americans shame and ridicule at home and abroad. General Hull was tried by Court Martial and sentenced to be shot, but with a recommendation for execu- tive clemency, which resulted in his permanent retirement to private life and the spending of the rest of his days in a vain effort to repair his shattered reputation.
Included in the surrendered forces under Hull was a young Colonel of Infantry, named Lewis Cass, who indignantly snapped his sword blade as a helpless protest against the action of his superior officer. He was destined to be, for a hundred years at least, the most conspicuous character developed by the commonwealth and to do more for the upbuilding of a great state than any other one person.
A sequel to the surrender of Detroit was the invasion of northwestern Ohio by the British under General Proctor, of unenviable fame. The march of the American forces to counteract that advance made in the icy days of January, 1813, resulted in the frightful massacre on the river Raisin which, for atrocity, has no parallel in the annals of Michigan and few in those of the entire country. But disastrous and in part dis- graceful to the American Arms as the war had thus far been, better days were coming.
During the winter of 1812-13 and the spring following, a young lieu- tenant of the navy named Oliver Hazzard Perry had been entrusted with the task of creating a navy on the Great Lakes that should be able to compete with the British ships in those waters. So well did young Perry meet the conditions imposed by his government that in the following August he sailed from his improvised ship yards in the harbor at Erie, Pennsylvania, with a squadron of two brigs, two schooners and a brig that had been earlier captured from the British, and on the 10th of the following September a decisive engagement took place off Put-in-Bay, Lake Erie. "We have met the enemy and they are ours," said Perry in announcing the result. It not only thrilled Americans then but will start the red blood bounding through the veins of every patriot as long as the flag floats over the nation.
While Perry was capturing the British fleet on Lake Erie, General Harrison was moving toward Detroit with a large force of infantry and cavalry. The enemy withdrew to Canada. Harrison followed and on the 5th of October, 1813, the decisive battle of the Thames was fought in which the British, under Proctor, were badly defeated. Tecumseh, his great Indian ally who bore a commission as Brigadier General in the royal army, was killed and his followers driven in con- fusion or captured on the field.
This battle ended the war in this section of the country. The con- fidence of the Indians in their British friends was broken forever. Michigan was redeemed and the flag again floated without dispute over the lower peninsula, to be followed in the upper with the signing and proclamation of the Treaty of Ghent in the following year.
CHIAPTER V MICHIGAN UNDER GOVERNOR CASS
MATERIAL DEVELOPMENT-THE TERRITORIAL ROADS.
Lewis Cass, who, on October 29, 1813, was appointed by President Madison Governor of the territory of Michigan, was born in New Hamp- shire in the year 1782. His father, who had been an officer in the army, brought his wife and several children, of which Lewis was the oldest, to Marietta, Ohio, then on the frontier, in the year 1800, when the future Governor of Michigan was eighteen years old. Shortly after coming to Marietta, he began the study of law in the office of Mr. R. J. Meigs, who was afterward Governor of Ohio. At twenty-one he was admitted to the bar and following a practice of many young lawyers, he soon became a candidate and was elected Prosecuting Attorney, then later a member of the legislature. In 1812 he was commissioned Colonel of an Ohio regiment and soon after was on his way to the scene of action near the Canadian border. During the war he so acquitted himself as to gain the rank of Brigadier General and at its close, as we have before stated, was made Governor of the Michigan territory.
Henceforth, his life is inseparably associated with the commonwealth, he did so much to shape and develop in its formative period.
The Battle of the Thames was decisive in so far as the lower peninsula of Michigan was concerned. The Indians, however, were a constant source of apprehension to the settlers. To the task of removing that element of danger and consequent uneasiness, Governor Cass early set himself. He succeeded in negotiating a number of treaties, the com- bined effeet of which was to secure the transfer of most of the aborigines to the west of the Mississippi River.
The chief undertaking to which Cass addressed himself was to build up the waste of war, Americanize the population, induce an inflow of people from the states, and in the wake of material development and progress lay the foundations secure and strong for a great and pros- perous State in the American Union. It is estimated that at the close of the war of 1812-14 there were not in the territory of Michigan to exceed 5,000 white people. For nearly fifty years the population had not materially increased. In 1810, Detroit thongh 109 years old and then, as now, the metropolis of the State, had but 1,400 people. In the entire territory outside of Detroit there were but 4,762. The settlements fringed the eastern border from Monroe, or Frenchtown as it was then
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