USA > Minnesota > Goodhue County > History of Goodhue county, including a sketch of the territory and state of Minnesota > Part 23
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A field of about sixty acres was under Indian cultivation. The lower end of the field commenced near the spring, at the corner of Bush and Fourth streets, extended westward and included a part of the ground now enclosed in the court house square. The field was occupied by the Indians in common. Each family had a certain division or section, which was marked by sticks planted in the ground. The enclosure was made of stakes driven into the ground at certain distances, and poles tied along them with strips of bark. Only one tier of poles were used. There was no occasion for a "hog-tight" fence, for there were no hogs to guard against. There was nothing to disturb the " crops " but Indian ponies, and one pole was enough to turn them.
Such was the condition of the "county seat" of Goodhue county twenty-nine years ago. The white population was represented by seven adults, James Wells, at Lake Pepin ; Rev. James Aiton and wife, Rev. Joseph W. Hancock and wife, and John Bush (the Indian farmer) and wife. Mrs. Bush was, in fact, a half-breed, who had been educated at Marquette, and partially raised in a white family at that place, by whom she had been learned to household duties. Mr. Hancock says she was a fat, rather good-natured woman, extravagant and fond of dress. When her husband would receive his payment from the government, or money
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from any other source, she would go to St. Paul, when stores were opened there, and spend it in dress goods, regardless of cost or economy.
In 1850 Mr. Geo. W. Bullard, under the protection of an Indian trader's license, settled at the head of Lake Pepin, in what is now Wacoota township, and made the first permanent improvement in that part of the country. A man named Abner W. Post came with Bullard and built his house. No other settlers came to Wacoota until 1852, when quite a wave of immigration set in.
A little later, in 1850, a man named Snow came to Red Wing, and opened a trading-house under like authority, on the site subsequently occupied by the Metropolitan Hotel. In 1851 a man named Calvin Potter became associated with Snow as a business partner. Soon after the partnership commenced, Snow died of cholera in St. Paul, and Potter continued the business until the Indians were removed, in 1853.
July 18, 1851, a treaty was partially concluded with the Indians for the purchase of all their lands east from the Sioux River and Lac Traverse to the Mississippi, except a reservation of one hundred miles long and twenty miles wide, on the head-waters of the Minnesota River, the purchase including about 21,000,000 acres. The treaty was acted upon by the authorities at Washington during the winter of 1851-2, but as some changes were made from the draft prepared and signed by the treaty commissioners and the Indians, it became necessary to call another convocation of the parties in interest in order to secure their consent to the change. This convocation was held at Fort Snelling in the fall of 1852. The proposed changes created a good deal of dissatis- faction among the Indians, but means were devised to quiet the dissatisfaction, and secure their consent to the proposed amendments.
These changes bring forcibly to mind and render very pertinent in this connection a speech made by Chief Wacoota, before the treaty council at Mendota, on Tuesday, the 29th day of August, 1859. When the draft of the treaty was prepared and ready for the signatures of the contracting parties, Wacoota said :
"Fathers, your counsel and advice is very good to Indians, but there are a great many different minds and different opinions, and it appears almost impossible to get an agreement, though we have all been con- sulting so many days.
" Fathers, you have come with the words of our Great Father, and have put them in this paper; but the Indians are afraid it may be changed hereafter. I say this in good feeling. Perhaps you think many of these things will be altered at Washington yourselves! You have been asked a great many questions, and have answered ' yes' to them.
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If all prove as you say, it will be very good indeed. But when we were at Washington, we were told many things, which when we came back here, and attempted to carry out, we found it could not be done. At the end of three or four years, the Indians found out very different from what they had been told-and all were ashamed.
"I hope, when the people sign this treaty, you will take and deliver it to the President as it is. I want you to write, first, that I wish the country for our home to be reserved north of where I now live. I was not brought up in a prairie country, but among woods ; and I would like to go to a tract of land called Pine Island, which is a good place for Indians. I want you to write this in the treaty. I mention to you my wishes in this respect, but if you do not think it can be complied with, and is not right and just, I will say no more about it."
In April, 1852, before intelligence of the ratification of the treaty had been received in Minnesota, John Day came over from Diamond Bluff, Wisconsin, and selected a claim in the southeast quarter of what was subsequently established (under government survey ) as section 25, town 113, range 15. . About the time he selected this claim, he moved over from Wisconsin, and occupied one of the mission houses, and commenced to improve his claim by the erection of a cabin ; but the Indians were jealous of their rights, and no sooner was the cabin built than the Indians tore it down. It was rebuilt, and again razed to the ground. In addition to this trouble, the Indian children began to annoy Day's descendants, and fearing that the annoyance would lead to difficulty with the parents of the little Indians, Day soon moved back to Wisconsin, and stopped with E. C. Stevens, at Trenton, but continued to watch his claim. He would come down in his canoe, do a day's work, and paddle back at nightfall. As soon as he was fairly out of sight of his cabin the Indians would tear it down; and so it continued until the cabin had been built and torn down a half dozen times.
Among the Indian occupants at Red Wing, there was a French half- breed, named Benjamin Young, who anticipated the treaty, and selected a large tract of land around Barn Bluff. Some time after Day selected his claim, a dispute arose between him and Young in regard to the line dividing their respective claims-the half-breed claiming a part of the land selected by Day. The controversy was finally settled by compro- mise, without detriment to either party ; but during the pendency of the dispute, the validity of the half-breed's title was raised, because of his neglect to enter upon such improvements as would give evidence of his intention to become a bona fide occupant of the land. The discussion of this question so discouraged Young, that he subsequently
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relinquished his claim to Dr. Sweeney, a part of the consideration being a yoke of cattle. Young remained in the country for some length of time afterwards, but at last moved away. He was heard of two years ago in St. Paul, where he was seeking to organize an expedition to the Black Hills.
While Day was living at Trenton a little incident occurred that gave Day great prestige with his Indian neighbors on the Minnesota side of the great river. While seated at breakfast one morning, Mrs. Day called the attention of her husband to a large black object, which at first they thought to be a black hog, but which, upon closer inspection, proved to be a bear. Day had loaned his rifle to Mr. Stevens, and was not in reach, but another gun, loaded with slugs, happened to be at hand, and seizing it, Day started on the chase. He fired at the bear, but the slugs fell short of the mark. The bear took to the water and made for the Minnesota shore, leaving Mr. Day standing disappointedly watching his movements. While thus engaged, a splashing of the water below him attracted his attention, and turning his eyes in that direction, he saw his wife coming up with a small skiff. As soon as she discovered that her husband had missed his aim, and that the bear had taken to the water, with a woman's forethought, she caught up a chopping axe, and hurrying to the skiff unmoored it, and started to the aid of her husband, determined that the prize should not escape. As soon as the skiff was close enough to the shore Mr. Day jumped in and followed in bruin's wake, and suc- ceeded in heading him off and turning him back towards the Wisconsin shore. When nearly opposite his home Mr. Day managed to get close enough to use the axe. A short but desperate struggle ensued, result- ing in a victory for Day. The bear was towed to the shore, and was found to weigh 400 pounds. The Indians considered this an unparal- leled act of bravery, and averred that their boldest, best hunters would not have dared to attack a bear in that manner. They declared that Day was waukon-supernatural, and from that day till the last of them had quit the country, he had their most unbounded admiration for his daring and prowess. He gave the claws and tusks of the animal to some of the Indians, which they fashioned into ornaments, esteeming them very highly, and it is presumable they are still preserved in the families of those to whom they were originally presented. In their admiration and praise for Mr. Day, they forgot that most of the credit for the success of the adventure belonged to Mrs. Day. If it had not been for her forethought in taking the canoe and axe to her husband when he missed his mark, he would have stood there until the bear had escaped across the river and become lost in the country beyond. Of such stuff were Minnesota's pioneer women made.
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In May, 1852, soon after Day had moved back to the Wisconsin side, and while he was there " watching and waiting" for news of the ratifi. tion of the treaty, which would enable him to come back and occupy his claim, Dr. W. W. Sweeney, then living in St. Paul, became interested with other parties in the development of Red Wing's village as a town site. Calvin Potter had succeeded Snow as Indian trader, and thought it would be a good site for a town. A third party was desirable, and William Freeborn, an old settler of St. Paul, who enjoyed a large and popular acquaintance, was selected as the most available and desirable associate. Freeborn could not remove to the new El Dorado at once, and Dr. Sweeney volunteered to come in his place. This objection removed, and the preliminary plans of the enterprise mapped out, Messrs. Freeborn and Sweeney came down to Red Wing, when Dr. Sweeney purchased the claim right of the French half-breed, Benjamin Young, already mentioned, and now included in what is known as "Sweeney's Addition to Red Wing." A purchase was also made of a two-story log building, weather-boarded with antediluvian lumber, that stood on the river bank in the rear of the First National bank block. The doctor then returned to St. Paul and arranged his business so as to come on and occupy his possessions. On his return to Red Wing he was accompanied by James McGinnis. They made their headquarters in the two-story building already designated, where they kept " bache- lor's hall."
These arrangements were made in anticipation of the ratification of the treaty, and while the country was still in the absolute possession and control of the Indians. But as a physician or " medicine man," Dr. Sweeney's presence was really desirable to the red occupants, and he met with no objections to his settlement among them, although, strictly speaking, he had no rights on the west side of the Mississippi River that the Indians or any other people were legally bound to respect. His presence was only tolerated by Indian sufferance and their desire for a healing medium in their midst. His only guaranty of protection was such as the mission could give, or Indian respect for his profession command.
In 1844 Dr. Sweeney and his brother Charles, now a popular lawyer of Fredonia, Wilson county, Kansas, went from Fulton county, Illinois, to Galena, and commenced the publication of a newspaper called the Sentinel, which they continued until some time in 1846, when they sold the office to other parties, who change the name of the paper to the Jeffersonian. After the sale the doctor returned to Fulton county, and remained there until 1850, when he removed to St. Paul, and engaged in the practice of medicine until his removal to Red Wing in 1852.
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In June, 1852, news was brought that the treaty had been ratified. There was nothing now to interfere with or hinder white occupancy of the country. Day moved back and set to work to rebuild his cabin. His family came over with him. The first night or two after their arrival Mrs. Day and the children slept under an inverted batteau as a protection against the dew and damp of the night; and for a week afterwards, until the cabin was completed sufficiently for occu- pancy, they slept in a cave hollowed out of the bank for a root cellar. These points establish the fact that the household of John Day was the first white family that came to Goodhue with the purpose of making it a permanent home, a purpose they have resolutely maintained to the present.
That Mrs. Day is a woman of remarkable nerve and forethought has already been shown in the part she took in her husband's capture of a bear. But there is still another incident in which her heroism stood out in bold relief. On one occasion, while they were living on the Wisconsin side of the Mississippi, her husband had been down to some of the lower towns, and came up on the steamboat " Nominee." The river was so rough the boat would not attempt to make landing on the Wisconsin side, but put Mr. Day ashore on the Minnesota side, opposite his Trenton home. In a lull of the elements he managed to call over to his wife and tell her if the wind and waves went down to send a canoe over for him. The children became alarmed lest their father would be compelled to remain out in the storm over night. Added to their grief and agony was the feelings of the wife and mother, and quieting the little ones as best she could, she went to the river's bank, unmoored a canoe, and regardless of the waves that were dashing here and there almost as high as a man's head, she bravely pushed away from the shore and started to relieve her husband from the perils of a pitiless storm-night on the opposite shore, yet within sight of their home. She crossed in safety, although Mr. Day says there were times when she was lost to his sight behind the rolling waves. " Ah, such times," said Mr. Day, while relating the incident to the writer, " my heart was in my mouth, and I was the worst 'pale-faced' man in the Indian bailiwick. I expected every time she went down in the trough of the waves that the canoe would swamp, and that she would be buried beneath them. I have been pretty badly scared sometimes-have been in some pretty scary places both before and since, but I tell you I never had such feelings creep all over me as I did that time, and I never want to experience such feelings again. In making the return trip, I made my wife lie down in the canoe, while
15
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I, trembling like a leaf, as its parent stem is shaken by the wind, man- aged to guide the canoe to the other shore, where the children were watching and waiting our coming with tearful eyes."
E. C. Stevens came over from Wisconsin with Day, and during the summer selected a claim south of the original town plat that is now included in T. J. Smith's addition to Red Wing.
David Pucket, Jack Saunders and Benjamin Hill, came in during the summer. Charles Parks, now of Cannon Falls, came in November; Warren Hunt and his family, including his wife's sister, Miss Cary, came about the same time. Miss Cary was the reigning pale-faced belle of the country, " whose right there was none to dispute," as she was the only unmarried white woman of marriageable age in the district. She subsequently became Mrs. Calvin Potter, their marriage being the first ceremony of the kind solemnized among the white settlers. Potter and his wife were recently living at Kellogg, where Mr. Potter was engaged in merchandizing.
In December, the two Middaugh's-H. B. and Joseph-came as car- penters to prepare the material for a hotel the town proprietors had planned to build. After their work was completed they remained as permanent settlers.
The pioneers of the Norwegian and Swedish population, came at nearly the same time. Mathias Peterson was the first son of Norway to claim a home in the territory subsequently organized as Goodhue county. He afterwards settled in Zumbrota township, where he became a successful and prosperous farmer. To Nels Nelson belongs the honor of pioneering the way from Sweden for the hundreds of his countrymen and countrywomen that help make up the population, and whose enter- prise, industry and economy, have added so largely to the wealth of the county. These men were the last arrivals of 1852, commencing their residence here in December of that year.
The names thus far mentioned, represented the entire white popula- tion at the close of the year 1852. All told, the number did not exceed forty persons.
In 1853 the tide of immigration grew stronger. Among the additions to the Red Wing colony were William Freeborn and family, H. L. Bevans and family, William Lamber and family, James Akers and family, T. J. Smith and family, and W. D. Chilson, that are distinctly remembered. H. L. Bevans opened a small store, which was the first, Potter's Indian trading house excepted, and Akers was the first justice of the peace elected in the Red Wing community.
When the government surveyors, engaged in establishing meridian
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and parallel lines, reached what is now the southeast corner of Pine Island township in June, 1853, no wagon had ever penetrated to that part of the county. The teams accompanying the surveyors were the first to disturb the grass and herbage. Mr. S. D. Hart, a resident of Goodhue county since 1854, was a member of the government survey- ing party, and he relates that when they reached Cannon Falls, in the fall of 1853, they found a small, uncovered shanty-or rather the pole structure of what was intended for a shanty-that had been erected on the west side of the falls, to " mark a claim." That was the only evidence of civilization they found until they reached a point within five miles of Red Wing, where they found the body of a shanty on Spring Creek.
This year, 1853, settlements began to extend back into the county, and the first settlers back of the immediate vicinity of Red Wing came in August that year. They were a party of Swedes, who came directly from their native country, except a young man by the name of Hans Mattson, who had been a couple of years in the United States, and was the only one amongst them who could speak the English language. He was sent out to Minnesota in behalf of. a number of his countrymen in Moline, Illinois, to find a location for a settlement, and with him came two others, Charles Roos and A. G. Kempe. After prospecting for claims in the towns of Featherstone and Burnside, they selected the town of Vasa for their settlements, and removed there early in Septem- ber, 1853. The first claims were taken for H. Mattson and S. J. Wil- lard, his brother-in-law, where Vasa church now stands, and for Ch. Roos and Mr. Kempe in the valley where White Rock post-office is now located; but the first habitation was in a tent camp in the timber on Belle Creek, adjoining the place now called Jentland, where the three pioneers, Mattson, Roos and Kempe, remained some time, cutting hay and preparing for winter.
In November the little colony, which had then built their first log house in the White Rock Valley, across the line in Belle Creek town, was increased by the arrival of S. J. Willard. He and Mattson, however, did not remain in the settlement the first winter, but went down to the Mississippi bottoms, near the mouth of Cannon River, and started a wood camp, in which they and some Norwegian young men, Albert Halvar and Christian, chopped steamboat wood all winter. In March Mattson and Willard, with Mrs. Willard and a little babe, Zelme, moved on to their claims in section 15, town of Vasa. That spring the families left in Illinois began to arrive.
See further in history of Vasa.
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THE HISTORY OF GOODHUE COUNTY.
There were some other additions to the population during the year, but at the close of 1853 the entire white population of the county did not exceed seventy persons. On Christmas Day of that year the entire Red Wing community partook of dinner at the residence of William Freeborn, the first and only time the entire white population of Red Wing dined together at any one house.
THE FIRST MILLINER.
Another woman who was a prominent representative of the female pioneers to Goodhue county, is worthy of especial mention, as showing what a woman can do.
Miss Sarah McDonald came to Red Wing from the State of New York, in the year 1854. She had previously acquired some knowledge of millinery, and had faith enough in her own ability to commence business on her own account. She hired a room about 10 x 16 feet square in the upper part of a story-and-half dwelling house on Bush street, which had just been completed, in which she opened a small assortment of millinery goods-the first stock of the kind opened in Red Wing. She boarded herself, worked diligently, and for a while had the custom of all the fair part of the population, and no competition. Economical and industrious, she was soon enabled to secure a more eligible situation and an enlarged assortment of goods. Availing her- self of the advantages offered by the pre-emption laws, she obtained a title to 160 acres of government land in the township of Belle Creek. She purchased a lot on Main street, on which she erected a building in 1859, of sufficient dimensions for a workshop, salesroom and dwelling, where her establishment became the resort of all the fashionables, and more than ever the means of increasing her income. But alas for human hopes. A fire broke out in June, 1865. The first hotel, called the Te-pe-ton ka, with several adjoining buildings, were destroyed, and Miss McDonald's establishment was pulled down to prevent the further progress of the fire-fiend. She was advised by some of her friends to bring suit against the city for damages, etc., which she did, and gained the suit in the lower court. The city authorities took an appeal to the Supreme Court, where the rulings of the court below were reversed. Beaten, but not conquered, her independence asserted itself in new determinations and undertakings. She soon opened another shop and recommenced business anew. Perseverance, industry, and rigid econ- omy, soon brought their reward and won for her the victory. She now owns the lot and brick building on Main street, occupied by Wilkinson & Hodgman; another lot on Main street, west of Broadway, and thirty-
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five acres of land near Zumbrota. She sold her pre-empted 160 acres of land a few years ago for $2,500. In 1870 she married L. W. Peck, Esq .. a well-to-do farmer in Cherry Grove, with whom she is still living, a happy and contented matron.
HUMOROUS INCIDENTS.
GOING A DUCKING AND GETTING A "DUCKING "-CANOE RIDING BY LAND.
Missionary and pioneer life is not always shaded and clouded, not- withstanding the representatives of these classes are frequently shut out for months at a time from all communication with the inside, civil- ized world. There are sunny places and humorous incidents with them, just as there are among the people of densely populated districts and more advanced communities. Generally speaking, the pioneers are genial, humorous fellows, and as frolicsome as a sunbeam. They sport with the winds, and laugh at storms and the freaks of the elements. And missionaries, to whatever people or wilds, are not much unlike other people, notwithstanding the sacredness of their calling. They are happy in the work they have chosen to do, and having thrown aside all other cares and responsibilities, they bend to the duties of their philanthropic undertakings with hearts ready for any fate. Deprivation, exposure to personal danger and want, may often encompass them round about, but with a faith that no opposition or persecution can weaken, they accommodate themselves to conditions and circumstances, and are as ready to
"Enjoy a little recreation now and then, As any other class of the sons of men."
If the experiences, humorous and otherwise, of the thousands of men and women who have taken upon themselves the duties of missionary servants, and gone out among the uncivilized tribes of the earth to point to the better way, were collected into printed volumes, a record of interest would be preserved that would be universally read. Some of its pages would cause tears of pity, while others would excite uncontrollable merriment and risibility.
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