History of the St. Clair County, Michigan, containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources.., Part 38

Author: Western historical company, Chicago. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas & co.
Number of Pages: 814

USA > Michigan > St Clair County > History of the St. Clair County, Michigan, containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources.. > Part 38

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This son was the father of our Michigan pioneer, who was the oldest of six children, two sons and four daughters. His father died at the early age of thirty-three years. After the death of Zephaniah's father, his mother went to live with her mother Drake, who was a sister of Unele Joseph Pratt. who was also one of the first settlers of Hartford. His home farm comprehended the grounds on which the State House now stands.

The grandfather Drake had five children, two sons, Ebenezer and Samuel, and three daughters, Mary, Martha, and Submit. Mary, the oldest, was the mother of the boy whom Michigan inherited. Submit, the youngest, took her name from the sad fate of her father, who was lost at sea, before she was born. Nine captains sailed out of Hartford at one time, all married men. A terrible storm fell upon them and every one of them was lost. It is very remarkable that each wife subsequently gave birth to a daughter and they were all named " Submit."

Ebenezer Drake, the oldest son of Capt. Drake, followed the occupation of his father. He was gone on his last voyage thirty-one years, and is said to have visited every port of any impor- tance in the known world at that time. Samuel, the youngest, joined St. Clair's army as a private and was promoted to the office of Colonel. Neither of these Drake boys were ever married. Both died at their mother's, in Hartford. Submit married William Emerson. of Northampton, by trade a hatter. On one of his visits to Hartford he persuaded the mother of Zephaniah to let him take the boy and bring him up as his own child. She consented to this, and young Bunce, then between five and six years of age, went to live with the hatter, learned the trade of him, and became quite pro- ficient in the business of hat-making. At the age of twelve years, his uncle sent him out through the mountains of New Hampshire and through the thinly settled parts of the country to buy up furs. and this became quite a business for him. He was very skillful in horsemanship. He tells of a boyish freak in which he used to indulge with his uncle's horses. On a stream where he watered the horses, there was a perpendicular fall of several feet. The back water from a mill-dam com- pletely covered this fall, and young Bunee would go up the stream, mount a horse, sometimes standing upright on his back, and then put him to the top of his speed down the stream. The horse, not aware of the fall, would make a glorious plunge, and the boy, holding on to the halter would swim ashore, bringing the horse out well cleansed from all mud spatters.

This uncle having failed to give his nephew the education the young man thought he was en- titled to, a separation took place between them when 'Zephaniah was seventeen years old. He then took his effects and engaged as a journeyman hatter in another house in the same town. There he earned money and sent himself to school for a time. He then left and started the hatting business in Claremont, N. II., where he remained three years. From this place he went to Chester, Vt., started the hatting business there, and continued it four years. He then connected himself with one Allen, in the dry goods trade, in Albany, N. V. With this business he connected the sale of ready-made clothing. One day in the fall of 1816, a young man came into the store to rig him- self out with a suit of clothes. He was the brother of the late Thomas S. Knapp, of Detroit, on his way from that military post to his home at Hudson. Knapp told such a story about the prices and scarcity of such goods here that young Bunce got the Western fever.

In the spring of 1817, he put on board a one-horse wagon $3,000 worth of ready-made clothing

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and started for Detroit on the 15th day of April. 1817. He passed through Rochester. N. Y, when there were only twenty persons there, and a choice of lots could be had then for $50. Our adventurer was detained at Buffalo some days for the completion of the schooner Michigan, on which he intended to cross Lake Erie. This schooner was the one which was subsequently sent over the Niagara Falls with the wild animals on board. After a three days' passage. he arrived at Detroit, stored his goods with James Abbott, and engaged board at Col Richard Smith's tavern. He made an effort to see the farming country around Detroit, and for this purpose told Col. Smith, his landlord, to have a horse saddled for him. He mounted this animal and took his course across what was then called the Commons, to a French wood road, followed this till he found himself' deep in the mud and water. Tried another and another road and found all the same. lle then re- turned to the tavern and asked the Colonel to put him on to a road that would take him into the country, " Where do you want to go?" he inquired. "Out among your farmers, to see what you have got for a back-bone for your city," he replied. "We have got no such bone. You will find nothing in that direction but swamps, wolves, wild cats and Indians. If you want to see our farmers you must go up or down the river." He took his advice and went as far as Hudson's (now Fisher's) on Lake St. Clair, by way of the old stone windmill.

He was invited by Col. Jack Langhan, Paymaster in the United States Army, to go with him and assist in paying off the troops at the River Raisin, now Monroe. They started at 3 o'clock in the morning, Col. Langhan and Col. Dick Smith on horseback and Chauncey S. Payne and the Judge in a one-horse wagon. They crossed the Rouge by swimming the horses and carrying the wagon over in two canoes. In the same way they crossed the Ecorse. The ground over which they passed in the first part of the journey was sandy, and they found no great difficulty until they reached Swan Creek. There they mired their horse and wagon, but after one expedient and another. they extricated themselves from this quagmire. Here night came on, a dark, dreary night, with nothing to amuse or cheer them but the howl of the wolves, which kept up their serenade until nearly daylight. The last part of the way there was a road made by United States troops through a dense forest, free from stumps, but with no bottom to the spongy soil. They arrived at the Raisin about 9 o'clock in the evening.

After four days at the Raisin, they started at 6 o'clock A. M. on their return, and having day. light for the worst part of the way they got along better than when going down, crossing the Ecorse about 9 o'clock in the evening. Half way between that river and the Rouge they found a pack of wolves in the road before them, which opened to the right and left and let the travelers pass, at the same time saluting them with a hideous howl. Payne, badly seared, stuck to the wagon The Judge, having provided himself with a cudgel, posted himself in the hind end of the wagon for defense ; but neither of them was injured. The horse suffered the most from the effects of Payne's whip. They reached Detroit in the wee hours of morning.

Mr. Payne was for many years a citizen of Detroit, associated with one Levi Brown in the silversmith business. Payne married the daughter of Jacob Smith, an Indian trader. Capt. Garland, of the army, married another daughter of Smith. These girls inherited from their father an Indian reserve west of this city. Mr. and Mrs. Payne are both yet living, and able to give a large amount of information and interesting incidents of Indian and pioneer affairs. The traffic of this family with the Indians was carried on mostly through the house of Conrad and Jerry Ten Eyck.

Judge Bunce was married to Laura Ann Durvee, daughter of John T. Daryee. a New York merchant, September 13, 1827. He left for Detroit in November, with his wife and a stock of dry goods. Crossed Lake Erie on steamer Michigan, of which Sherman was master, and Blake, mate. Sold goods at Detroit for one year and then went onto the place where he still lives. They have had eight children, but only three of them are now living. Mrs. Bunce died January 26, 1857, aged fifty- six years. She was a most excellent woman. The following is the pathetic language in which the old man spoke of her death: "She was a woman of rare attainments, possessed of every endowment that constitutes a lady ; refined, amiable, and Christian : but alas ! she is gone."

Judge Bunce, now eighty-seven years old, moved onto the place where he now lives fifty-soven years ago. In the early days of Michigan, he traveled extensively over the Territory, held public offices, and occupied positions enabling him to take observations of the growth of this common- wealth from its first incipieney. At one time, he says, he knew personally every man who lived in Michigan. " When I first made his acquaintance in 1831." says Rev. Mr. Thompson, " he

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was Judge of the County Court, and continued so during all my residence in that county, some fifteen years. He was a member of the first Legislature of Michigan, and served in that body from 1821 to 1824. The first year after his arrival on the River St. Clair, he built a saw-mill on the creek emptying into the St. Clair near his residence, which creek has borne his name to the present time. Near the site of this mill were the remains of a mill which was built ninety years before his, and even that was the second mill on that spot, the first having been built 136 years ago."

A description of their mode of traveling in the early days of his residence on that river shows that, when there was no ice to prevent, the conveyance was a canoe with the motive power of an Indian paddle in the stern; in the winter, a French train on the ice, drawn by an Indian pony. If the ice was sound, they sometimes went through the middle of Lake St. Clair in going to Detroit. The most common route was down the St. Clair River, through the north channel, passing Middle and Cartwright Islands, through the Chenal ecarte (or lost channel), to Milk River Point. Thence to Detroit they had their choice by land or ice. In the autumn or spring, when the ice was unsound, they took the margin of the river and lake, down the north channel to old Mr. Chortier's, thence across the prairie to the lake at Toad Creek, down the lake to Swan Creek, and Salt River to the farm of James Meldrum, who was the son of the senior partner of the firm of Meldrum & Park. From this farm there was a road to Mount Clemens, which they could take if they wished, or they could take the shorter route by the ice to the month of Huron River, now called Clinton River They sometimes crossed Huron Point to the bay at the mouth of Milk River, near the residence of a Frenchman named Larabee. He was of the Catholic persuasion, something of a scholar, and became noted on account of a lawsuit with old Father Richard. They disagreed with regard to some of their matters, so the Rev. Father forbade his neighbors from having anything to do with him. This brought on a lawsuit, ably defended by Counselor O'Keefe for the plaintiff, and Gov. Woodbridge for the defendant. Larabee was victorious. From Milk River Point they usually had a fair road to Detroit.

In the year 1818, Judge Bunce had occasion to visit Mount Clemens from Detroit twice. Once he met a large white faced bear, but the bear did not molest the Judge, nor the Judge the bear. In the spring of the same year-1818-heavy ice had come down from Lake Huron, blocking up the channel of the mouth of St. Clair River, setting the waters back so that the St. Clair Lake and the Detroit River were literally drained. The waters of the lake had receded at least four miles from shore. The surf had raised several sand ridges. The Judge took the farthest ont, as it would bring him most direct to old Papineau's, near the road leading to Mount Clemens. About one mile from Milk River Point, he came so near the water of the lake that he could see the current of the North Channel, which appeared to be running at the rate of three miles an hour. He was then about four miles from what is ordinarily the shore. There has been one such freak of the ice since that, though not to so great an extent. Where the banks of the St. Clair were low, men were obliged to take their wives and children upon their backs and wade through the ice and water four feet deep, to reach dry land.

The only dock at Detroit then was the public dock thirty feet wide, extending into the river until a depth of eight feet of water was reached. A second dock was built by Mr. Hudson, and a third by Mr. Roby. In the spring of that year, Judge Bunce hired one Jackman, and started on horseback for his St. Clair home. The lake was nearly free of ice, but some remained in the bogs. At the mouth of the Clinton, he inquired as to the soundness of the ice across the bay to Salt River, and was told that an Indian had just come down, and would hire to pilot them back. They found the ice firm enough to within a short distance of the shore, when looking back they saw their Indian in full run for the Clinton River. They soon found that the ice was floating out into the lake. Sounding the water with his rifle, the Judge found it three feet deep. He jumped his horse into the water, mounted him, took Jackman on behind, and reached the shore in safety.

One year he was in Detroit in the beginning of winter and purchased goods of Conrad and Jerry Ten Eyck. Some of these goods he needed at once, and decided to take as many as he could in his train. He made a box some three feet square by three and a half feet high, and filled it with goods. This box formed his seat on the train. When ready to start, he found his leading lines missing, and substituting a cod-line for them, started on the ice, which was sound along the margin but open in the lake. There were many cracks in the ice, from two to eight feet in width, running from the shore to open water. Our hero came within a rod of one of these cracks before seeing it, when he drew suddenly on the cod-line and it broke at both ends near the bits. There was but

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one expedient left for him now, and that was to make the horse leap the chasm if possible. He plied the whip with full strength. The third jump he cleared the track, about four feet wide, and being impatient of the lash, he kept on at full speed toward the open water. The driver crawled down from his box, got hold of the breeching, and from strap to strap succeeded in reaching the headstall and checked his speed, after being taken out of his course three or four miles. He then steered direet for Salt River. leaving Point Huron a mile or more to the left. While on this beat, he was struck by a tornado, which wheeled him quite around like a top. He managed to bring the horse's head to the wind in order to reach shore, but the horse either would not or could not budge a bit in that direction. About a quarter of a mile to the east he saw a ridge of broken ice leading in the direction of Larabee's. He made for that, and affer a few more whirls, succeeded in reaching it, and bringing his starboard runner in contact with the rough ice prevented the whirl. After breaking through several times he reached Larabee's at half past 2 o'clock in the morning, cold and hungry, but not frozen.

In the spring of 1826, while returning from Mt. Clemens with Counselor O'Keefe, when near where New Baltimore now stands, they were overtaken by a blinding snow-storm. They steered for Swan Creek, hoping to reach Shommenegoblin's wigwam, but brought up at open water far out in the lake. They followed up the channel, and when yet a distance from shore, broke through the ice in three feet of water. The Judge and the horse succeeded in climbing onto the ice; but O'Keefe was so benumbed with cold that he stayed in the train. They reached Capt. Pierre's, two miles below Mr. Chortier's, at 2 o'clock in the morning, thoroughly wet and weary.

In the fall of 1827. Mrs. Bunce's mother came from New York, to reside with them at St. Clair. The Judge met the lady at Detroit, and there hired a Frenchman to take them to the mouth of the Clinton in his cart. There he hired another Frenchman to take them in a canoe to Mr. Chortier's. During this voyage, a lake gale sprung up, the Judge took the paddles from his ferryman, and suc- ceeded in reaching Mr. Cartwright's about 3 o'clock in the morning. wet, tired and sleepy.

In 1828, he left home for Detroit with Mrs. Bunce, her brother, and three Indians- Onsha. leutagon and Mickaninne. They took the vessel route down the St. Clair River, by the north channel and Snibora, to Milk River Point. An easterly wind arose and with it a heavy swell, so they were in the trough of the sea and soon taking in water fearfully. Old Onsha began to whistle and east over tobacco, an Indian sign of great peril. There was but one course left for them, and that was to reach shore at the nearest point and in the shortest time possible. As they neared the shore, the swells increased. and it was plain that the canoe would fill as soon as it reached the break ers. Onsha was told to jump into the water as soon as the canoe reached the breakers, and take Mrs. Bunee in his arms and get her ashore if possible. He, being a very tall, stout Indian, accomplished this feat very nobly. The Judge caught a trunk and leaped ahead of a swell, and so reached the shore successfully. was rescued with more difficulty.

Young Duryee lay seasick in the bottom of the canoe, and They then made their way to the wigwam of Brant. the half Indian. He is said to have been the son of old Commodore Brant, who in days of yore resided two miles above Hudson's, on Grosse Point. When they reached the shanty, Brant was off hunting and the door was barred. One of the party made his way through a window, unbarred the door, and all entered. They soon made a lire, took down a venison hamn hanging on a rafter, and with toa. bread and pork, were enjoying supper when the Indian returned from his hunt. With the usual Indian grunt of surprise, he manifested his displeasure at their freedom: "Tyah. Anbunce, spose you not one shentlemen at all !" But a loaf of quashegun, some kokosh, with a few shillings for the venison, soon soothed him, and he became quite friendly. In the morning he went to the settks. ment. hired a Frenchman with his pony and cart. to take Mrs. Bunce and the Judge over to Milk River Point, the Frenchman going before, sometimes up to his middle in water, to pilot them through. Young Duryee, with the Inggage, went around by water.

In 1828, the wind blew with unabated fury for three days and nights. The Judge was then running the mills which Thomas & Knapp. of Detroit. had built some fifteen miles above the outlet of Lake Huron. He made a road to that place as near the margin of the lake as the ground would permit. This road passed through a heavy grove of white-oak timber, that was about titty rods long and twenty-five rods wide. Every vestige of this grove was swept away by the violence of the storm. Some of the trees were three feet in diameter. It was equally disastrous at several points between that place and the St. Clair River. After the storm abated they found the shore strewed with round clams, very much like the ocean clams, except in flavor. They were fresh and

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insipid. If cooked and highly seasoned, they were palatable. They gathered a bag full of them.

The two following incidents are related by Judge Bunce in his experience of St. Clair life: He started one evening to go to Harson's Island for hay, the nearest place where that artiele could be bought. It was winter and he was in his train ; when passing a point a little below where St. Clair is now, he saw some animals clambering up the steep bank, and on the iee by the side of his path lay a deer which the wolves had just killed and which they had butchered very scientifically. It was still bleeding at the wounds in the throat. The Judge bethought himself that a venison steak would be a treat, and he appropriated the deer to himself by putting it into his train, and started on; but he had not gone far before the whelps whom he had robbed came yelping after him in such earnestness and growing numbers that they began to be somewhat troublesome. He succeeded, however, in beating them off with his whip till he came to a rough place in the ice which compelled him to go slow, when he began to fear that the wolves would have him and the deer, too, and so he compromised the matter by tumbling the deer out of the sleigh, and, putting the whip to his pony, left them to their carnival.

Once while crossing Lake St. Clair on the ice, driving nearly across the middle of the lake, he saw an animal in the beaten road before him and he gave chase, but the animal kept ahead for miles. The snow was deep on each side of the track. After a long drive, the brute, tired out, jumped into the snow and stood on his haunches. The Judge raised his heavy hickory whip-stock and struck at the animal's head, and so stunned the beast that he cut his throat without difficulty and put him into his train; when reaching the shore he inquired of a French settler what it was. The astonished man asked the Judge where it came from. "O, I got him back here on the ice," replied the Judge. " Got him !" shouted the Frenchman, " Got him alone ? Mon Dieu ! You must thank the Virgin that he did not got you !" He found that the prize he had captured was a huge wild cat.

What a change like dissolving views has been wrought on the shores of the St. Clair since this old gentleman first cast his eyes upon them. As he recollects, there were then nineteen men with their families living on the American side of the river.

Old Mr. Cartwright lived on Cartwright Island. He was one of Lord Selkirk's colony. When they broke up their settlement on the Thames, on account of inundating waters in the spring, some went to Bear Creek, some to Chortier. Cartwright came here.

On Harsen's Island were Jacob, George and Frank Harsen, good families. Harvey Stewart was a prominent man, a good farmer, and ran a small distillery. His wife was the daughter of Mr. Graveraet.

On the main Jand, at the lowest point of Duchesne, was Louis Chortier, who came from Three Rivers, between Quebec and Montreal. He was a trapper and a raiser of ponies. He had fifty-five at that time and fed them on the prairie, which was about nine miles in circumference.

Commodore Harrow, as he was called, lived a little farther up the river. The remains of a brick distillery which he built are still there. He had two sons and two daughters, who are yet living near the old place.

Old Capt. Thorn ocenpied a place above Harrow's. He had two sons, William and John. John owned and platted the first village lots in Port Huron. One of the daughters was married to Billy Brown, another to James Fulton, who was the founder of St. Clair. The other became the wife of Andrew Westbrook.

Capt. Robertson owned and occupied a farm above Thorn's. He was somewhat famous for catching white fish. More white fish were taken on the St. Clair River at that time than at any other place, and they were better fish. The white fish of Lake Erie were small, weighing from one- half to one pound, on the Detroit River from one-half to one and a half pounds, and on the St. Clair from one to two and a half pounds. No steamers were here to frighten the fish then, and they were caught in large quantities ; you could take your choice for $1.50 a hundred. The Judge went with the Indians one day to the mouth of the middle channel of St. Clair River to inspeet their mode of fishing. This channel was as deep as any other, but shallowed off as it entered the lake to three feet, where were three small islands. These in the spring of the year were covered with gulls' eggs. The Indian mode of catching sturgeon was this : They boiled a sturgeon and took off the oil and mixed it with sand ; then took branches from the trees, put them into a canoe and went out to the middle of the river. They threw over the sand and the branches and then went to the shoal water below and waited for the branches. When they appeared, seven sturgeon appeared with them. They took three of the seven. One of these measured tive feet nine inches. Before Black River

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was obstructed by dams, the sturgeon, pike and mullet went far up this stream to deposit their eggs. Often the sturgeon would be too late in getting down and would have to get into deep holes and wait for a flood. The Indians would then attack them drive them into shoal water, and kill them with hatchets.

George Cottrell had a good farm, three sons, and one daughter. George, Jr., was the farmer; Henry, the Sheriff, and David, the Associate Judge-all very respectable.

William Brown kept a public house and was a thrifty man.

Peter Yax comes next. lle was a good Catholic, as were also most of the citizens on the river. Father Richard visited them twice a year and frequently stopped with Yax. Yax had three stalwart sons, all fiddlers. The Rev. Father thought there was too much dancing among the young people and prevailed on them when they came together to sing and amuse themselves in some other way. So he told Mr. Yax that the young people had agreed to amuse themselves without dancing so much. Now, as the old man's sons were all fiddlers, it rather interfered with his financial interests, but he was obliged to submit. The next time the Father came round he said: "Well, Monsieur Yax, not so much dance among the young people, I suppose?" " No, Fath- er, not so much dance, but the young men get the cards and gamble. They drink whisky and get drunk. They curse, they swear. No, not so much dance; oh, no! not so much dance."

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History of the St. Clair County, Michigan, containing an account of its settlement, growth, development and resources.., Part 38

Author: Western historical company, Chicago. [from old catalog] Publication date: 1883 Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas & co. Number of Pages: 814

Author: Western historical company, Chicago. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1883
Publisher: Chicago, A. T. Andreas & co.
Number of Pages: 814