USA > Minnesota > Wabasha County > History of Wabasha County : together with biographical matter, statistics, etc. : gathered from matter furnished by interviews with old settlers, county, township, and other records, and extracts from files of papers, pamphlets, and such other sources > Part 40
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84 | Part 85 | Part 86 | Part 87 | Part 88 | Part 89 | Part 90 | Part 91 | Part 92 | Part 93 | Part 94 | Part 95 | Part 96 | Part 97 | Part 98 | Part 99 | Part 100 | Part 101 | Part 102 | Part 103 | Part 104 | Part 105 | Part 106 | Part 107 | Part 108 | Part 109 | Part 110 | Part 111
585
VERY EARLY TIMES.
and it was made known to the first explorers of that lake and its vicinity, the working of the deposit was not commenced till nearly two centuries later. Stranger still, that a race far older than the savages with whom the Jesuit fathers conversed, a race of which but little more is known than that it existed, must have been extracting copper from the mines of Lake Superior long before Co- lumbus set forth to discover the new world. These people are sup- posed to be mound-builders ; and in the mounds, which are their only memorials, copper utensils and ornaments have been found. The Indians inhabiting the country had no knowledge of mining nor skill in working metals.
In the winter of 1847-8 a most curious discovery was made on the south shore of Lake Superior, near the Ontonagon river, where the Minnesota copper mine is situated .* Mr. Knap discovered the remains of an old working, and found a mass of native copper ten feet long, three feet wide and nearly three feet thick, and weighing six tons. In the vicinity of the same were found stone hammers, copper knives and chisels, and wooden bowls for bailing out water. Though very rude, yet they were most ingenious, and must have been made by a people which had made greater progress in civiliza- tion than the Indians who succeeded and supplanted them.
As Minnesota, and this part of it so near our city, was the first place in the new world where the attention was called to the exist- ence of earthworks, I have given some space to the consideration of the same and the opinion of others.
Lake Pepin excited Carver's admiration greatly, as it has that of every traveler since his time, and he says of it, " I observed the ruins of a French factory, where it is said Capt. St. Pierre resided and carried on a great trade with the Nadoussioux before the reduction of Canada." Undoubtedly this "factory," as he calls it, was old Fort Beauharnais. Carver was the first English traveler who visited the Falls of St. Anthony, and this Capt. St. Pierre is supposed to be the same to whom Washington bore despatches from Gov. Dinwiddie in 1753. At that time the aged St. Pierre was in command of a rude post in Erie county, Pennsylvania.
During the war existing between France and England in America, the officers of the northwestern posts were called into action and stationed near the enemy, so that several posts were left unprotected.
* Ray's "From New Foundland to Manitoba."
586
HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY.
It appears that the erection of trading-posts on the Mississippi had enticed the Dakotahs from their old residence on the Rum river to come to these posts, which gave them the name of River Bands. Carver, in speaking of the Nadoussioux, says there were originally twelve bands, but one band revolted and left, which, at the time he made their acquaintance, left eleven ; and they were called " River Bands, because they chiefly dwell near the banks of this river," meaning the Mississippi. Carver's theory in regard to the Indians is not unlike that of many others who have given much time to research and the study of monnds and their builders. ' He supposed the Dahkotahs came from Asia, but says "this might have been at different times, and from various parts, as Tartary, China, Japan, for the inhabitants of those countries greatly resemble each other." Others have observed the resemblance between the American Indian and those of Tartary, and theologians have generally believed that they could trace an affinity with the Hebrew, others again, with the Gaelic or Erse, particularly at the Sandwich islands. In his book of travels Carver says nothing in relation to a grant made to him from the Dahkotahs, but after his death it was asserted that there was a deed in existence belonging to him of valuable lands, and that it was executed at the cave in the eastern suburbs of St. Paul. In this deed is the first known mention of "brother Jonathan," and it is presumed the term arose from this transaction. The deed claims to have been executed "at the Great Cave, May 1, 1767," and signed by HAWNOPAWJATIN and OLOHTONGOOMLISHEAU.
After Jonathan Carver's death a claim was urged for the land upon which St. Paul now stands, and many miles adjacent ; and in 1840 a corps of engineers came on to look up the lands for the English heirs, he having had two wives, the second one being an English lady. No good title, however, has ever been acknowledged, neither was the original deed presented by the heirs' assignees, and in 1823 the committee of public lands made a report to the United States, stating that, owing to the want of proof as to those facts, in their opinion "the claim was not such as the United States were under any obligation to allow"; and the territory has remained the property of the United States.
In May, 1800, the Northwestern Territory was divided. The portion now distinguished as Ohio was organized as the territory of Indiana, and in December following the Province of Louisiana, of which Minnesota was a part, was officially delivered to the United
587
VERY EARLY TIMES.
States by the French. President Jefferson, thinking it highly important to explore the country acquired, took measures for an expedition to the upper Mississippi. The first American who visited Minnesota, on business of a public character, was Lieut. M. Pike ; and in September, 1805, he arrived at Prairie du Chien, where he was politely entertained by the traders there at that time. These traders were Fisher, Frazer and Woods. Fisher traded there until 1815, when he went to the Red River of the North in service of the Hudson Bay Company, where he remained several years. From 1824 until 1826 he was at Lake Traverse. One of his daughters was the mother of Joseph Rolette, of Pembinaw, by J. Rolette, trader at Prairie du Chien. Mr. Rolette had two wives ; his first wife had two daughters, one of whom is still living, Mrs. Maj. Hooe, of Washington. His second wife married Mr. H. L. Dousman, a partner in the American Fur Company, of New York, and trader at Prairie du Chien, where they continued to reside until Mr. Dous- man's death, which occurred in September, 1868. They had one son, who now resides in one of the palatial residences of St. Paul. Mr. Donsman was a man of sound and cultivated judgment, and great executive ability, and was successful in all his efforts to bring to proper working system the operations of traffic of the wide field in which he was engaged. Frazer has a son living at Mendota. Jean Baptiste Faribault was the last survivor of the old traders. He and his sons resided at Faribault for many years. Mr. Faribault entered the service of the Northwest Fur Company when a very young man, in spite of great opposition from his family, and the station or post to which he was assigned was that of Kankakee, on the river of that name, and not very far from the present city of Chicago, license having been granted them to trade within the jurisdiction of the United States by the proper authorities. Mr. Faribault, displaying so much business tact, was assigned the charge of a more important post on the Des Moines river, about two hundred miles above its mouth. The post was named Redwood, and the Indians with whom he traded, the Yankton Sioux. He continued in charge of that post four years, during which time he saw no white man except his own assistants. The region abounded with beaver, otter, deer, bear, and other wild animals, and it was the favorite resort of the Sacs and Foxes, the Iowas and Sioux.
The wages of a good clerk at that time was two hundred dollars per annum, an interpreter one hundred and fifty dollars, and a com-
588
HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY.
mon voyageur one hundred dollars ; rations allowed them being of the simplest kind.
Having served his time, Mr. Faribault returned to Mackinaw with the intention of going back to Canada, but hearing there of the sudden death of both his parents within fifteen days of each other, he again entered the service of his former employers and was dispatched to the river St. Peters (now Minnesota) and took charge of a post at Little Rapids, about forty miles above its mouth. The band of Sioux with whom he traded were called Wah-pay-ton, or People of the Leaf, and during the third year of his residence there he was married to a daughter of a Mr. Hause, a previous superintendent of Indian affairs. The groom was in his thirty-first year and his bride in her twenty-second. He was thenceforth a permanent denizen of the northwest. His eldest son, Mr. Alexander Faribault, was born at Prairie du Chien, and this son was the founder and a highly respected citizen of Faribault, in this state. The Northwest Fur Com- pany, not being permitted to continue their business upon American territory, sold out their interests to the American Fur Company, of which John Jacob Astor, of New York, was the head. Joseph Rolette was constituted the agent of the newly forined association in the northwest, and Mr. Faribault made arrangements with him for the supply of merchandise requisite for his trade, and afterward removed his trading station to Pike's island, near the present site of Fort Snelling. Mr. Faribault had four sons and several daughters, but one of whom is still living. He died August 20, 1860, at the ripe age of eighty-seven years. His memory deserves to be respected and perpetuated among the pioneers of Minnesota.
After Lieut. Pike's stay of some days at Prairie du Chien he resumed his ascent of the Mississippi, and at Point du Sable, on Lake Pepin, he found a trader by the name of Cameron, and his son, who accompanied Pike to the Cannon river, where he found Red Wing, the second war-chief of the Dahkotahs. Continuing his ascent, he finally reached the encampment of J. B. Faribault, which was three miles below Mendota, where he made a short stay. Thence he ascended the river and continued his explorations as far as Red Cedar lake, and at Lake La-Sang-Sue hoisted the American flag, effecting at both these points peace with the Sioux and Chippewas.
Upon this trip he fixed the source of the Mississippi to be Leech lake, that being the highest point he reached, owing to the inclem-
589
TREATIES WITH THE NATIVES.
ency of the weather, which prevented his pushing his discoveries still farther.
Upon his return he passed through Lake Pepin with barges, and stopped at a prairie about nine miles below the lake, on the right bank going down, and there went out to view some grounds which he thought had the appearance of an old fortification. . These fortifi- cations, no doubt, were the same described by Jonathan Carver. Upon reaching Prairie du Chien, Pike was again entertained by the traders. Lieut. Pike was a bold, enterprising man of great tenacity of purpose, and will ever be entitled to the distinction of having been the first to extend researches to regions so wild and repulsive, at a time, too, when there existed no fort on the Mississippi above Prairie du Chien, the old French forts having been abandoned for years.
CHAPTER LII.
TREATIES WITH THE NATIVES.
IN 1830 steps were taken for a congress of tribes at Prairie du Chien, and at this council the M'dewakantonwan Dahkotahs made a treaty, and conveyed to their relatives of mixed blood that tract of land about Lake Pepin known as the "half-breed tract." The tract of said treaty is described as follows : "Beginning at a place called the Barn, below and near the village of the Red Wing chief, and running back fifteen miles, thence in a parallel line with Lake Pepin and the Mississippi about thirty-two miles to a point oppo- site Au Boeuf river, thence fifteen miles to the Grand Encampment opposite the river aforesaid." This is the tract upon which our annals are laid, and with which the history of the city of Wabasha is so closely connected. Oliver Cratte, of this place, asserts that he was present at that treaty, and that the above is a true rendition of it ; also that these lands were intended for the half-breeds of that generation only, and that no "scrip " should ever have been placed upon them. The chiefs present upon that occasion, according to Mr. Cratte, were Red Wing, Black Dog, Little Crow (the father of the great Crow of Sioux massacre notoriety), Waconta and Wapashaw. In 1831, dur- ing the month of April, the authorities at Washington instructed the Indian agent at Sault Ste. Marie, H. R. Schoolcraft, to proceed to the upper Mississippi, and use his influence to make peace between
590
HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY.
the contending tribes, Dakotahs and Ojibways, in which he partly succeeded, and in 1832 he was again instructed to visit the tribes toward the sources of the Mississippi. In June of that year he arrived, in company of a military escort commanded by Lieut. James Allen, at the Fond du Lac trading-house on the St. Louis river, and, slowly making their way, in July they arrived at Elk Lake, which Mr. Schoolcraft named Itasca. The party were sure they had reached the truc source of the great river at last, and geographers still mark`Lake Itasca as the head and source of the Mississippi. The lake is about seven miles long, and varies from one to three miles broad, is of irregular shape, with no rock in place but some boulders on the shores.
The Indian trade of the northwest was found to be so completely in the hands of British subjects, that trade could not be carried on by the Americans without their assistance. The secretary of the treasury in consequence issued a circular allowing the agents to license interpreters and voyageurs, who might be employed by the American traders. Mr. Taliaferro was the first Indian agent in Minnesota, and he held the office twenty-one years, licensing traders at different points as occasion demanded at different times. In 1833 the licensed traders of Minnesota were : Alexis Bailly, Men- dota ; J. R. Browne, mouth of the St. Croix ; J. B. Faribault, Little Rapids ; Joseph Renville, Lac qui Parle ; Louis Provencalle, Traverse des Sioux ; Hazen Moores, Lac Traverse, and B. F. Baker at Fort Snelling. In 1835 we find Joseph R. Brown at Lac Traverse, near the head of the Minnesota river, and Joseph Laframboise on the Coteau de Prairie, at the Lake of the Two Woods, and Alex- ander Faribault, son of J. B. Faribault, on the Cannon river. There were other prominent traders who came into the country in 1837, among whom were N. W. Kittson, Philander Prescott and Fran- cois Labathe. Franklin Steele and Win. H. Forbes also came to Minnesota in 1837, and H. M. Rice, who was at the head of an extensive trade with the Winnebagos and Chippewas, in 1839. In 1837 about twenty chiefs and traders, by direction of Gov. Dodge, proceeded to Washington to make a treaty ceding to the United States their lands east of the Mississippi. They were accompanied by Maj. Taliaferro, agent, and Scott Campbell as interpreter. The fur company was represented by H. H. Sibley, Alexis Bailly, Joseph La Framboise, Augustin Rocque, Labathe, the Faribaults, and others. Joel R. Poinsette, a special commis- sioner, represented the United States.
CHAPTER LIII.
BUSINESS BEGINS.
THE first white man to resume trade in these parts after the old forts were abandoned, was Augustin Rocque, grandfather of the family by that name in Wabashaw. His first post was built about 1800, where Reed's Landing now stands. Lient. Pike makes no mention of him in his account of his explorations, and it is probable that Rocque had left the post before Pike passed up the river, as it appears that for some reason he abandoned this post and returned to Prairie du Chien. Mr. Rocque was a French Canadian, coming to these wilds when a very young man. He married a Dahkotah woman, by whom he had a large family, his son Augustin being the father of the family now at this place. About the year 1830 Augustin, who followed the business of his father as Indian trader, moved back to this point on the "half-breed" land and erected a dwelling and trading-post on the site of old Fort Perrot. Being con- nected by inarriage with the Sioux and Fox Indians, he traded through different parts of Minnesota and Iowa, one of his outposts being on the site of the present town of Cedar Rapids. Mr. Rocque's influence among the tribes with whom he traded was almost unbounded, and several outbreaks at different times were quelled by his sagacity and influence. So great was the respect of the Indians for him, they looked upon him almost as a father, and hence his influence. The portrait of Mr. Rocqne hangs in the capi- tol at Washington, together with several of the Sioux chiefs. At the time of his return to this point, the present site of Wabashaw was covered with underbrush and trees. IIis place, when steam- boats ran, was called Rocque's Landing. At that time Wapashaw Red Leaf) was living with his band where Winona now stands, the prairie being called Wapashaw prairie-by the old voyageurs, " La Prairie Oseilles"-that is, "Flag-root Prairie." The city of Winona was named for Wapashaw's sister Weenonah.
The first steamboat upon these waters was the Virginia, which ascended the Mississippi as far as Fort Snelling in 1823. Fort Snelling was first named Fort St. Anthony, but in 1824, at the sug- gestion of Gen. Scott, it was changed to Fort Snelling. As Col.
592
HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY.
Leavenworth and troops, en route for Fort St. Anthony in 1819, stopped at Prairie du Chien, a child was born to Lieut. N. Clark, whose first baptismal name was Charlotte, after its mother, and the second was Ouisconsin, given it by the officers in view of the fact that she was born at the junction of that stream with the Mississippi. In course of time Miss Clark married a graduate of West Point, who afterward became Gen. H. P. Van Cleve, U. S. A., and this very worthy couple still reside in Minneapolis, Mrs. Van Cleve being the oldest resident of Minnesota. In 1820 Mrs. Col. Snelling gave birth to a daughter, which was the first white child born in Minnesota.
Before the advent of steamboats upon these rivers commerce and navigation had been carried on by means of keel-boats and canoes, and for a long time after it was found that steamboats could ascend the upper Mississippi, commerce being unequal to the sup- port of steamboat navigation, the keel and canoe were used as before. The British and American fur companies always used the canoe for shallow waters and rapids, and the keel-boat for transpor- tation, until the volume of business warranted their supersedure by the steamer. The keel was built much like an ordinary barge, but shallower, and provided with running-boards on each side, their carrying capacity varying from seven to twenty tons. The largest were usually manned by fourteen men, six on a side with poles for propelling the boat, and a cook, with sometimes a trader or agent on board. These men were Canadian-French half-breeds, called voyageurs, under the supervision of some active trader or agent.
The earliest manuscript written in Minnesota is written by Col. Snelling, dated August 4, 1820, and reads as follows :
In justice to Lawrence Taliaferro, Esq., Indian agent at this post,* we, the untlersigned, officers of the Fifth Regiment here stationed, have presented him this paper as a token not only of our individual respect and esteem, but as an entire approval of his conduct and deportment as a public agent in this quarter.
Given at St. Peter, this 4th day of August, 1820.
T. SNELLING, Col. 5th Inf., N. CLARK, Lieut.,
S. BURBANK, Br. Major, · Jos. HARE, Lient.,
DAVID PERRY, Capt., ED. PURCELL, Surgeon,
D. GOODING, Br. Capt., P. R. GREEN, Lt. and Adjt.,
J. PLYMPTON, Lieut., W. G. CAMP, Lt. and Q. M.,
R. A. MCCABE, Lieut., H. WILKINS, Lieut.
(St. Peter was afterward called Mendota.)
* Neill's " History of Minnesota."
·
593
BUSINESS BEGINS.
The first white man who built on the present site of Wabasha was Oliver Cratte,* who came here from Fort Snelling in 1838. About the same time came Joseph Buisson, who, for some time, car- ried the mails on foot from Fort Snelling to Prairie du Chien, a dis- tance of two hundred and four miles, accomplishing the round trip in fourteen days. Mr. Cratte was sent to this place by the govern- ment and located as blacksmith for the Wapashaw band. He was born in Liverpool, England, in 1801. He was early left an orphan, and he and his sister came to Canada when he was a mere boy. He learned the blacksmith's trade at Montreal, and after completing it he came west as far as Mackinaw, where he remained about a year. He then went to Prairie du Chien in company with some traders, and was there employed by the United States government. In 1828 he was sent to Fort Snelling, where he remained until he came to Wabasha in 1838. Mr. Cratte has been married three times. His first wife was a daughter of Alexander Graham, by whom he had tive children, and his present wife is a daughter of Scott Campbell, who acted as interpreter for the chiefs and braves who visited Washing- ton in 1837 for the purpose of ceding their lands east of the Missis- sippi to the United States. Mr. Cratte is still living and is the oldest living white man of his time. He is entirely blind, yet his memory is good, and it is like reading history to hear him recount the scenes of his long and varied experience. The old man is poor, which renders his blindness still more pitiable. He has, in his day, been far beyond want ; but loaning gold and, in his own honesty of purpose and heart, trusting the word of those who came to him in need, taking no proper security, he has thus, in his old age, become reduced to poverty and sorrow. Coming here in the fall of 1838, he built a shop of logs on the levee, chinking it with mnd and sand, and occupying it that winter for shop and dwelling. In the spring following he added a "lean-to" and sent for his family, they having remained at Fort Snelling during the winter. This dwelling was the first ever built by white man at this place. Mr. Joseph Buisson built a small house the same season and brought his family here also, which house was the second one erected on the site of Waba- sha.
Mr. Cratte's eldest son, David Cratte, who resides in Wabasha, has been a man of great activity and swiftness of foot, figuring
* Cratte's Landing was the original name of the site of the present city of Wabasha.
35
594
HISTORY OF WABASHA COUNTY.
largely in the early annals of the place. In 1854 he was sent by H. S. Allen's agent at this place with dispatches to Chippewa Falls, where Mr. Allen resided. Young Cratte carried them on foot, and upon his return, just after leaving Eau Claire, he noticed a party of Chippewas lurking around in ambush for a party of Sioux, who were on their way to St. Paul. The Chippewas, knowing the surroundings far better than the Sioux, waited for and surrounded them, capturing and killing every one of them. Cratte, learning what was going on, and fearing for his own life, took to his heels and ran all the way to Wabasha, arriving at nine o'clock in the evening, a distance of fifty miles in nine hours.
The enmity existing between the Ojibways (Chippewas) and Dahkotahs (Sioux), owing to their frequent encroachments npon each other's hunting-grounds, was very bitter, and was the cause of constant feuds among them.
Mr. J. Buisson was a trader of some ability, remaining at this place until his death, in 1857. He had quite a family of sons and danghters, most of them still residents of Wabasha.
On the island just opposite the present city of Wabasha stood a trading-post in 1849, erected by one Robar. Mr. La Bathe, a French trader, built and, in 1841, occupied the log house on the levee, just below the residence of W. T. Duganne, as a trading-post. In 1844 he sold this post to Alexis Bailly, who occupied it for store and dwelling for many years. A part of said house is still standing, and in good repair, being occupied as a dwelling. * Mr. Bailly added to the building, living in it until after his second marriage, in 1857, when he built the substantial residence which, since his death, has been known as " Riverside " to all travelers.
In 1841 another post was built upon the same island, about mid- way between Wabasha and Read's Landing, by a Mr. Nelson, which point is familiarly known as Nelson's Landing. These posts were built expressly for trade with the Chippewas.
The history of the early days of our western homes has been so obliterated by the march of improvement in a quarter of a century, and traces of first beginnings so lost that a comparison of the present times with those of the past is hardly possible, and young people of the present day emigrating from their luxurious eastern homes
*Since the above was written the building has been consumed by fire, April 23, and thus destroying the last landmark of the old traders.
595
BUSINESS BEGINS.
should bear in patience the slight ills to which they may be subjected, being, as they are, so small in comparison with the trials, privations and hardships of the early settlers. It is, no doubt, difficult for them to realize how very primitive were all these beginnings, and history itself eannot portray them as they really were. Again, the settler on any of our western prairies, and the axman who enters upon the primeval forest, must often be the subject of strange reflections as he follows his plough, throwing the riel alluvial soil that through all the ages has remained undisturbed, or hews down the lofty pine that for thousands of years has flourished and grown unnoticed and uneared for, and the majestic oak in all its strength ; he must wonder how it should oeeur that he, of all the people that have lived, and still live on the earth, should be the first to appro- priate to his own comfort these blessings so long held in nature's vast storehouse ; and wonder, too, why his race should require all the resources of earth, the prodnetions of forests, mines, rivers, lakes, oceans and seas,-of the soil planted, cultured and garnered ; the floeks and herds feeding and gamboling in undisturbed freedom upon a thousand hills, for his subsistence and convenience, while other raees have remained from generation to generation in all the untamed wildness of the deer and elk upon which they subsist. What of the race that but yesterday was here? Have these rivers, plains and forests, now so peaceful, always been so calm and still ? Or have they been the scene of sanguinary savage confliet? We speculate in vain upon the long-ago dwellers upon the banks of these lovely streams. Then savage yells may have been the only sound that ever waked the stillness of these hills ; or a race long since gone may have builded and worshiped, and cultivated all the amenities of eivilized life, and the records of their virtues and deeds have become obliterated by time's relentless fingers.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.