USA > Minnesota > Waseca County > Child's history of Waseca County, Minnesota : from its first settlement in 1854 to the close of the year 1904, a record of fifty years : the story of the pioneers > Part 27
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an engineer came along with his staff and said he wanted to locate a railroad through Waseca county. He did; and he left Wilton out in the cold. A station was established about five miles north of her, and then it began to be whispered that it would be better to have the county seat where the county market was. This generated a terrible local storm. The lightning flashed, the thunder rolled, and the elements jarred so that the Second Adventists declared the crack of doom had come.
"When the firing ceased and the smoke of battle cleared away, they began to look around for the dead and wounded, but not a soul was to be found. While the Wiltonians slept, the garrison fled, carrying the archives and munitions of war with them. They threw up fortifications and entrenched themselves at a place called Waseca, and then swore by the 'Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress' that they had come to stay, and stay they will. Now there is not a man in the county but is proud of the county seat. And as this is the centennial birthday of our nation, we can not do better than to banish the recollection of past feelings of animosity from our hearts, should any still linger there. Let us throw the mantle of forgiveness over all men and stand erect before God and the world, thus proving our title to true manhood. Let us for- give those who have wronged us. It is not worth while to hate when so few years are given us in which to love. Let our affections and good in- tentions be strengthened, that our hearts may be lighter and our hands stronger for the life work before us."
HORSES STOLEN AND BARN BURNED.
On August 14, 1876, Mr. Fred Schultz, residing in Freedom, had a span of young horses stolen from his stable, and the stable, together with another horse and some grain, was eonsumed by fire. Several haystacks were also burned. A fellow named George Buck was caught with the stolen horses at Minnesota Lake the next day and arrested. He was afterwards sent to prison.
THE NORTHFIELD BANK ROBBERY.
On the 7th of September, in our Centennial year, the James and Younger gang of cutthroats, from Missouri, invaded North- field, Minn.
About 2.30 p. m. of that day, three armed men entered the bank in Northfield, where Heywood, cashier, Bunker, assistant cashier, and Wilcox, clerk, were present. They immediately jumped over the counter, through a space of about two feet left for the use of the teller, and cried out, "Hold up your hands! We are going to rob the bank." One of the robbers starting to go into the vault, Heywood followed him and partially closed the vault door. The
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robber pushed Heywood baek, and one of the other robbers eame to his assistanee and struek Heywood on the head with his revol- ver. The two then dragged Heywood again towards the vault, cursing him and telling him to open the safe, the inner door only of which was closed. At this time they drew their knives, and one of them drawing his knife across the cashier's neek, making a serateh, again ordered him to open the safe. Just at this moment Bunker attracted their attention by starting for the baek door. One of them immediately fired at him, striking him in the fleshy part of the shoulder. He however, did not stop, but ran out, giving the alarm. Failing to make the brave Heywood open the safe, and hearing firing out of doors the robbers started out. The last one jumping over the eounter, turned, and placing the muzzle of the revolver within a foot of Heywood's head, shot him in the right temple, killing him instantly.
About the time the three robbers entered the bank, six others. three of whom advanced from opposite ends of Main street ,com- meneed firing revolvers promiseuously right and left, and yelling furiously and profanely "Get out you s- of a b -! " The first two shots they fired into Lee & Hitcheock's front windows, eut- ting smooth holes through the glass and tearing great holes in the shelving inside. Most of the windows for five hundred feet on both sides of the street bore evidence of the reekless shooting. In a few moments quite a number of citizens opened fire on the robbers. A. R. Manning and Henry Wheeler shot two of the robbers dead and wounded one or two others. The people were thoroughly frightened and the robbers soon left, taking with them their wounded.
They passed through Dundas and thence into the timber west of Cannon River.
The whole country was thoroughly aroused. Armed men in this eounty and throughout Southern Minnesota guarded the highways and watched every avenue of escape until most of the bandits were killed or captured September 27th. The following arcount of the capture of the Younger brothers is from the Man- kato Review, which said :
"Soon after arriving at Madella we were fortunate in capturing Capt. W. W. Murphy, one of the gallant captors, who rendered valiant service
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in the memorable fight. From him we learn that the first intelligence was brought to town by Oscar Suborn, a lad about seventeen years old, son of Ole Suborn, 'who lives in Linden township, Brown county. It seems that the four robbers came to his father's house, on Thursday morning, and asked for breakfast. They were told it was not ready, but if they would wait it would be furnished them. They said that they could not wait, and got some bread and butter, went off some distance from the house and sat down to eat it. They represented themselves as a hunting party, but the family suspected them as being the robbers, and after they left, the boy took a horse from the team his father was using to haul hay, and brought the information to Madelia, four and one- quarter miles distant. The location is in the vicinity of Armstrong lake. Sheriff Glispin was one of the first to receive the intelligence, and with- in five minutes he and several others were mounted and started. Others were directed to go in other directions to intercept them in their re- treat. The first sight Glispin's party had of them was at the right hand outlet of Hanska lake, six miles west of Madelia. Here Glispin called upon them to surrender, but they continued to retreat and shots were exchanged.
"A horse owned by a Norwegian in the pursuing party was wounded, and it is thought fatally. The robbers then waded a slough, Glispin and his party being mounted could not follow them, but had to go round-a distance of several miles. After crossing the slough the robbers made straight for the Watonwan river, which they struck and crossed, at the bend, six miles west of Madelia, and near the house of Andrew Anderson. Glispin and party crossed about a mile east and got in front of them. They saw the robbers, and drove them back into the brush of willows and plum trees lining the bank in that vicinity. By this time horsemen and teams from town and elsewhere began to arrive, and there were prob- ably fifty persons occupying the bluffs. Here the horsemen were dis- mounted, and recruits called for to charge the brush. Only seven per- sons responded: James Glispin, sheriff; Ben. Rice, son of the ex-sena- tor, of St. James; Capt. W. W. Murphy of Madelia; Geo. Bradford, Chas. Pomeroy, jr., T. L. Vought, of Flander's House; and Jas. Severson, clerk in Yates' store. Others were called for but they refused to respond, and the gallant little band of seven, charged the robbers, passing through the thick brush in a northerly direction until striking the river, when they deployed as skirmishers, their line being formed about five feet apart. Then moving westward, up the river, after going about fifteen rods, they ran upon the four men, secreted in thick willows. Glispin was on the extreme right of the line, advancing in an open path, and be- ing seen by the robbers, a shot was fired at him, which he dodged by falling on his knee, at the same time returning a well-directed shot from his carbine. Seeing Glispin fall, Murphy next at hand, supposed him to be shot and he opened fire with his revolver, the rest of the party follow- ing suit in rapid succession. Glispin kept up a rapid fire and Murphy
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having exhausted the six chambers of his revolver, Glispin handed his re- volver to Murphy, the party steadily advanced sending volley after volley at the robbers. All stood up manfully, not flinching, but each and every one doing his whole duty. In the hottest of the fray assistance was call- ed for from those in the rear, but no one responded. Then the order to charge was given. The man who seemed in advance of the robbers was hit, ran two rods in a cornering direction from the attacking party and fell mortally wounded. Cole Younger and his brother were seen to fall and were heard groaning, and the other brother, wounded at Northfield, stepped out of the brush, saying 'Don't fire any more, we are all shot to pieces.' The pursuers ordered him to hold up his hands, which he did, and fearing that it was a plan to decoy them, Glispin told his men to take aim at the man, and then commanded him to advance and deliver his pistol to Murphy, which he did. The firing ceased, and Glispin's men advancing, found one man dead, and Cole Younger and his brother lying together on the ground badly wounded."
Two of the gang, supposed to be the James brothers, left the other murderers and escaped to Dakota on stolen horses. As often as their horses tired out they would turn the tired ones loose and steal others. The two were never captured. The cap- tured ones plead guilty, thereby under a peculiar statute, es- caping hanging. They were sent to state's prison for life. One of the brothers died in prison, a second committed suicide after being paroled, and Cole, the worst of the brothers, has been pardoned-to the everlasting disgrace of the state.
The Pioneer Press of November 23, 1876, paid these cutthroats the following compliment :
"The three Missouri handits and cutthroats-Cole, Jim, and Bob Young- er-made their last appearance in St. Paul yesterday. At least it is hop- ed that we may never look upon their ugly mugs again. Sheriff Barton, of Rice county, assisted by his son and J. H. Passon and Thomas Lloyd, accompanied the convicted scoundrels to the state prison, where they have been sentenced to remain for life. * * Three vulgar and brutal ruffians, every one of whom richly deserves a gibbet, have passed from their reception rooms at Faribault,-where they have been flattered and pampered for weeks, (by the foolish,) and where they have received their visitors with a benignity and patronage that was something royal in its style-to the penitentiary in Stillwater. Now let the warden of the prison see that they are kept there. The legislature of Minnesota has given these wretches their miserable lives-and it is hoped that an in- secure prison will not give them their liberty also."
THE FALL ELECTION.
There were three tickets in the field and the campaign was a
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very earnest one. The Prohibitionists cast five hundred votes straight. The following officers were elected :
P. C. Bailey, state senator; Anthony Sampson and Fenton Keen- an, representatives; Edgar Cronkhite, auditor; C. G. Parke, court commissioner ; H. K. Stearns and R. O. Craig, county com- missioners.
RAILROAD BONUS.
The year closed with an election in Woodville and Waseca in which the people decided by a vote of 266 to 51 to issue the bonds of the town in the sum of $30,000 to aid in the construction of the M. & St. L. railway, the bonds to be issued upon the com- pletion of the road.
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CHAPTER XLV, 1877.
COUNTING IN OF PRESIDENT HAYES-LINNEHAN HOUSE BURN- ED, ALSO HOUSE OF GEO. KLINE-JOHN HABEIN INJURED- DEATH OF MRS. BENNETT, MOTHER OF SIXTEEN CHILDREN- BUILDING OF THE M. & ST. L. RAILWAY-DEATHS OF THE YEAR -COMPLETION OF M. & ST. L. RAILWAY, BANQUET AND AD- DRESS.
The strenuosity of the people of this county during the Cen- tennial year was followed in 1877 by a cahn. The most exciting affair of the year was the counting in of President Hayes and Vice-president Wheeler. At one time anarchy was feared, and even at this time men of the highest intelligence and integrity are wont to speak of the affair between the North and the South at that time as keenly critical. The commission that the matter was referred to was composed of five judges of the supreme court, five senators and five representatives-eight Republicans and seven Democrats. To the regret of many, the commission divided on party lines.
HOUSE BURNED.
The house of Mr. John Linnehan, of Byron, was destroyed by fire Feb. 4, 1877. Mr. and Mrs. Linnehan were visiting a brother in the neighborhood at the time. In the evening the boys built a fire and went out to do the chores. In a short time the house was discovered to be on fire. Everything was lost except one feather bed. In addition to the loss of household goods, fifty bushels of seed wheat and a harvester were consumed. There was an insurance of some $200 on the house.
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On the 9th of the same month George Kline, one of the "boys" of the First Minnesota, residing in St. Mary, lost his home by fire. He awoke about midnight and found his house all on fire. His children had a narrow escape from being burned with the house. All the household goods, elothing, and everything else in the house were totally consumed. He carried insurance to the amount of $500.
John Habein, of Blooming Grove, son of Win. Habein, while blasting roek, April 24, 1877, met with a serious aceident. He was charging a roek, and while driving in briek to confine the powder, it exploded, inflieting a deep wound in the flesh between the thumb and first finger of the right hand, and a severe one on the cheek, just below the eye, carrying away the flesh from the outside corner of the eye nearly to the top of the nose, and blowing his face and hands full of powder and small pieces of brick. Fortunately his eyes were not injured. IIe soon recovered.
MOTHER OF SIXTEEN CHILDREN.
Mrs. Esther Bennett, mother of Ed. Bennett, Esq., of Waseca, died at Tivoli, Blue Earth county, on the 14th of May, 1877. De- ceased was the mother of sixteen children, fourteen of whom at- tained their majority-ten males and four females. The Bennett family located in Blue Earth county in 1856, and maintained a prominent position in its early history. The deceased was a most estimable lady, highly esteemed by a large acquaintance.
BUILDING OF THE M. & ST. L. RAILWAY.
The Minneapolis and St. Louis railroad was constructed through Waseea during the year 1877. Thomas White, of Wa- seca, had the contract for building four miles of the road on each side of Waseea. The road was completed to Albert Lea Nov. 7.
MARTIN KRASSIN, OF ST. MARY,
Who first visited Waseea county in 1854, and who located here with his family in 1855, died June 1, 1877. Martin Krassin was the son of Gottlieb Krassin, Sr., and was born in Prussia in the year 1821. He came to America with his aged parents and young wife in July, 1854. He stopped for a month or two with rela- tives, near Princeton, Wis., and then made a trip of exploration
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through Minnesota in company with Mr. John Greening, as noted in the "First Settlement of St. Mary."
OTHER DEATHS.
Mrs. Eleanor M. Helms, wife of Hon. M. H. Helms, passed to rest June 30, 1877. She was one of the daughters of Samuel Dodge, who settled near Wilton in 1857. Her age at the time of death was 25 years, nine months. She left surviving her hus- band and two daughters.
COMPLETION OF MINNEAPOLIS AND ST. LOUIS RAILROAD.
This important line of road, for which the people of Woodville had voted $30,000, was completed in the fall of 1877, and on the 11th day of December of that year, the managers of the road, in connection with the business men of Minneapolis, gave a free ride and a free banquet to five hundred invited guests along the line of the road. Addresses of welcome and responses were deliver- ed, each village and city being represented on the program. To the toast "Waseca," the response was reported by the Minneapo- lis Tribune as follows :
Mr. Child said :
"Mr. President: Waseca rejoices at the completion of the connecting link of road which unites Lake Superior with the lower Mississippi. This is a happy day for Waseca county. Her humblest citizen may well feel proud of this grand festal occasion. Waseca county, with her streams of pure water, her numerous silvery lake-gems, scattered here and there in every township; her thriving villages, her school houses, her milis, her mercantile enterprises, her banks, her forests and groves of timber, her herds of cattle, her thirteen hundred farms, her granaries crowded with a million bushels of wheat ready for your mammoth mills, her twelve thousand happy and prosperous souls, reaches out her hand to-day across the intervening prairie and woodland, and warmly clasps that of Minne- apolis, who, with her palaces of brick and granite, with her merchant princes, with her inexhaustible water power, with her mills of world-wide reputation, with her men of indomitable pluck, with her warm hearted hospitality, has become noted throughout the nation-aye, throughout the civilized world.
"Twenty-three years ago today, the oldest male inhabitant in Waseca county, now living within its borders, belonging to the 'red shirted brig- ade,' and was engaged in 'swamping' at a lumbering camp on the north branch of the Oconto, in northern Wisconsin. He was a wild, fanatical fellow. One evening by the camp-fire, after reading a friend's letter de- scriptive of Southern Minnesota, he made up his mind to pack his 'turkey' and make a winter trip to the land of promise.
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"On the 6th of January, 1855, he and two other venturesome men, one of whom now sleeps in the Wilton cemetery, and the other of whom, poor fellow, is engaged as assistant postmaster in the United States senate, started for Minnesota with ox teams. On the 2d day of February, 1855, they arrived in what is now Waseca county, having camped two nights in the open air, on Minnesota snow banks. One lone shanty was all there was of civilization to break the native solitude of the prairie and wood- land, from Straight river to the frontier town of Mankato. What a change in these twenty-four years! This occasion will not permit even a glance at the hardships, the privations, the struggles, the heroic labors of those who first broke the prairie sod and started civilization in a new country. But the people of Freeborn, Waseca, LeSueur, Rice, and Scott counties, who a few years ago were seen carting their wheat to Hastings, camping at night by the roadside, in fair weather and in storm, need not to be reminded of these scenes, for they have been written upon the tab- lets of memory by the hand of experience; and that experience prompts every heart to rejoice that to-day we may visit the metropolis of the state, in palatial railroad cars-going in the morning and returning to our own firesides in the evening. The day of slow coaches, foundered horses, and brave (sometimes tyrannical) stage drivers has passed, and in place thereof we have the iron horse with his train of rolling palaces-the grandest production of American capital, skill and ingenuity. Waseca joins with Albert Lea, Hartland, Richland, Waterville, Kilkenny, Mont- gomery, New Prague, and Jordan in accepting the hospitality of this city, on the 'Minneapolis plan,' and will contribute her full share toward the upbuilding of the dual city at the head of navigation, on the grandest river of North America.
"But this is a digression. Waseca is the theme. Well, Waseca is noted for many things. She is noted for a variety of statesmen. She has more 'honorables' to the square mile than any other county in the state. Some are as wisely silent as Gen. Grant, while others are as noisy-if not as wise-as 'Sunset' Cox or Wendell Phillips. She boasts of six hundred men who, with clear heads and untainted breath, at the last election, cast their ballots in favor of 'destroying the destroyer of millions' and freeing our land of a slavery more intolerable than that which drenched South- ern soil with the blood of our fathers and brothers.
"She is noted for her rich and productive soil; for her industrious and well-to-do farmers; for her No. 1 wheat; for her pleasant and com- fortable homes; for her four newspaper offices; for her numerous churches and numerous saloons, almost equaling Minneapolis, and for her enterprising business men in every branch of trade.
"In 1876 she produced from 47,877 acres 475,177 bushels of wheat. That was the lightest crop ever raised in the county. This year from fifty thousand acres, she has produced one million bushels of wheat. She boasts of over three thousand work horses, thirteen hundred beef and working cattle, four thousand milch cows, thirteen hundred farmers'
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families, sixty-nine thousand acres of plowed land, and numerous culti- vated groves containing 265,000 forest trees.
"The sheep of Waseca county in 1876 produced 9,089 pounds of wool; the cows produced 283,250 pounds of butter, and 4,288 pounds of cheese; the bees, 136 hives, produced 1,629 pounds of honey; the apple trees in bearing, numbering 5,629, produced 2,325 bushels of apples. The total amount of hay saved was 27,384 tons.
"It is a glorious, good county, a near relation to the garden of Eden, and, as its Indian name implies, is a 'land of plenty,' 'abundant in food' and contains as much solid mud to the square mile, on a rainy day, as any county in the state.
"But on this occasion we may all look beyond the limits of our several localities and join in congratulating one another upon the nation- al importance of the completion of the thoroughfare that now unites the great 'unsalted seas' of the North with the never freezing waters of the Sunny South. And we do not and should not forget that the success ot this important enterprise is due to the energy and labors of President Washburn and his Minneapolis co-workers. To the ability and courage of such men the people of the state owe a large debt of gratitude. Without doubt all will join in expressing the hope that the fraternal relations now existing between the North and the South, the East and the West, may grow with our growth and strengthen with our advancing years, and that ere the close of another decade the people will have cast aside all local prejudices, so that our great natural highway by way of New Orleans may be utilized to the fullest extent by the millions that are to possess the great valley of the Mississippi.
"Waseca is proud to be represented here to-day by so many of her citi- zens, and rejoices in the fact that Minneapolis and St. Paul are now with- in a few hours ride of our happy hunting grounds. We cordially invite our friends of these cities to visit our goodly land that flows with the milk of human kindness and the honey of Christian charity-except about election time-and to learn how good and how pleasant it is to dwell in the land of plenty where every one sits by his own fireside and calls no man master."
CHAPTER XLVI, 1878.
MILD WINTER-SOCIAL AND MORAL WORK-MRS FOSTER'S TEM- PERANCE REVIVAL-MRS. STEVENSON FOUND DEAD-LINES ON THE DEATH OF MRS. STEVENSON BY MARY DAYTON-BUILDING OF THE COUNTY JAIL-COURT SCENE, LAUGHABLE AND DIS- GRACEFUL-RICHARD TONER AND ANNIE McCANN BURNED TO DEATH-NEW JAIL BROKEN-JIM JOHNSON SHOT-D. C. FREE- LAND-FIRE COMPANY ORGANIZED.
The winter of 1877-8 was one of the mildest in the history of the state. Frost came out of the ground in January so that plowing was done in some localities during that month. There was very little snow all winter and no sleighing. For several weeks the roads were dry and dusty. Some farmers sowed wheat in Feb- ruary. The Mississippi River from St. Paul to New Orleans was free from ice as early as March 8.
SOCIAL AND MORAL.
Owing to the mild weather, no doubt, there was considerable doing in the way of lectures and social gatherings during the season. The month of January, in Waseca, brought a great tem- perance revival. Mrs. J. Ellen Foster, then a noted lecturer and attorney, of Iowa, delivered a series of powerful lectures, or ad- dresses, in Waseca.
THE LECTURES.
The local paper, speaking of Mrs. Foster's work, said: "Mrs. Foster has taken the town by storm. She has started a good work. The "Blue Ribbon" is a success. Mrs. Foster's lectures,
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delivered in this place since last Thursday, together with the terrible death of Mrs. Stevenson, whose body was found last Sunday morning, have created an emotional temperance senti- ment in this place which we hope may settle down to something sound, substantial and practical.' The death of Mrs. Stevenson was detailed in the local paper of Jon. 9, 1878, as follows:
TERRIBLE DEATH OF MRS. STEVENSON.
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