USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 10
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For years the export of honey through the Mississippi river towns was a source of much revenue to Northeast Missouri settlers. This product sold at from twenty-five to thirty-seven and one-half cents a gallon. Judge John C. Collins, of Scotland county, told of seeing seventy-five barrels of this wild honey passing his place one day.
The Platte Purchase.
Eighty-four years ago the government at Washington bought the land which comprises the city of St. Joseph, Buchanan county and the five counties of Platte, Atchison, Andrew, Holt and Nodaway. The Indians conveyed the title and moved. The land was thrown open to white settlement. The price paid was $2,500 in cash, an interpreter, a blacksmith and a grindstone. The develop- ment of the Platte Purchase in about the allotted span of a single life has been wonderful. It is history. But today this region and its surrounding territory seem to be entering upon an even more remarkable period of gain.
The popular movement for the Platte Purchase originated, according to Colonel Switzler's researches, at a regimental muster on Dale's farm near Liberty, Gen. Andrew S. Hughes addressing the meeting. A committee was appointed to memorialize Congress, consisting of William T. Wood, David R. Atchison, A. W. Doniphan, Peter H. Burnett and Edward M. Samuel. Judge Wood wrote the memorial. Senator Benton introduced the bill, and he and Senator Linn urged its adoption, and in 1836 the "purchase" was accomplished.
The Missouri river was made the western boundary of the state from Kansas City northward. This added to the state as much land as Delaware contains-land of extraordinary fertility. Benton gave his colleague, Dr. Linn, the credit for the favorable action of Congress in the matter of the Platte Pur- chase. The land was bought from the Sac and Fox Indians.
The occupation of Platte county was much like the rush for land when
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portions of Oklahoma were opened sixty years later. The purchase was made in 1836, but before the Indians could be moved out the intending settlers came in. In the spring of 1837- nearly every quarter section was taken. So rapid was the development of the purchase that Weston became the second city of Missouri. Platte became the chief hemp-growing county. Weston shipped more hemp than any other place. One year the business men of Weston claimed commercial supremacy over St. Louis. Between 1840 and 1850 Platte hecame next to St. Louis the most populous county in Missouri. In 1850 it had 21,000 people. Four years later Nebraska and Kansas were organized as ter- ritories. Platte county people by the thousands moved across the Missouri.
Neal Gilliam's Map.
At an old settlers reunion in St. Joseph in 1874, Judge James H. Birch made an interesting contribution to Missouri history. Sometime before the government extinguished the Indian title to the Platte country and gave to Missouri what became six of its richest counties, Judge Birch was publishing at Fayette a rather modest paper called the "Western Monitor and Boone's Lick Correspondent," at that time the westernmost newspaper office in the United States. He received a letter from General Andrew S. Hughes who was the agent of the Indians to whom had been assigned the Platte country for a reservation. General Hughes, in this letter, pointed out the advisability of getting the Indians removed and the reservation annexed to Missouri. He accompanied the letter with a rude map drawn by Cornelius Gilliam, sometimes called General Gilliam, but more familiarly known as Neal Gilliam. This pioneer cartographer was a mighty hunter. He was an ardent Jackson man and when running for sheriff of Clay county in 1830, he won easily on the strength of the following speech which he delivered from a big elm log:
"Fellow Citizens .- I am a Jackson man up to the hub. I have killed more wolves and broke down more nettles than any man in Clay county. I am a candidate for sheriff and I want your votes."
He got down from the log, and the crowd shouted "Hurrah for Neal !" Birch said that he enclosed the letter of Hughes and the map of Gilliam in a letter of his own to Senator Benton with whom he was on good terms then. Back came a letter from Benton saying that the President and secretary of war were in favor of adding the Platte reservation to the State of Missouri for military considerations connected with the peace of the border. The effect of the an- nexation would be to make the Missouri river the boundary, instead of an arbi- trary line north and south, between white settlers and the Indians.
The bill for annexation was introduced in Congress and pushed by Ben- ton and Linn in the Senate and by Ashley in the House, each of them after- wards being given credit by their respective friends. Judge Birch thought the most marvelous fact about the Platte Purchase was that while it added largely to slave territory, the bill was reported favorably by a unanimous vote of the committee on Indian Affairs, the chairman of which was a lifelong emancipa- tionist, Horace Everett of Vermont, who presented the report.
Courtesy Missouri Historical Society
AUGUSTE CHOUTEAU He led the first thirty to begin the building of St. Louis
GOVERNMENT HOUSE AT ST. LOUIS AS REMODELED BY AUGUSTE CHOUTEAU
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MISSOURI GEOGRAPHY
Peter Burnett's Ride.
Peter Burnett, a lawyer at Liberty, afterwards governor of California, car- ried the news of the Platte Purchase out into the country. Arnold Chance, one of the old settlers, remembered :
"The first intimation we had of it was the appearance of Peter Burnett galloping into town from Liberty, swinging his hat and yelling like a wild Indian. We barely let him stop to tell us what was the matter when we all repaired to the 'grocery' and knocked a spigot out without taking time to count the cost. Merrily the flowing bowl, only it was a gourd, went round. I tell you, if ever there was a happy crowd in the world, our's was one. Just then it so happened a good, honest-hearted old minister of the Gospel hove in sight trotting leisurely down the road on a one-eyed, clay-bank mare, and under an ancient and clerical looking stovepipe hat, one that his grandfather had worn on the mountain circuit of East Tennessee, in 1788. In a minute or two more he was within reach of us, and then-poor lad! Our good brother never wore that hat again. We were young then, and bad boys. In our hilariousness we took him and brought him into the grocery and set him across a barrel. He was a good-natured soul, and was as glad of the news as we were,-and, to tell the truth, he rather seemed to enjoy the gourd. Preachers were not as finicky then as they are now, any way."
The Jog Into Arkansas.
For the curious-looking jog in the map which carries Missouri's southern boundary far down into Arkansas on the Mississippi River front, Millard Fill- more Stypes, in his "Gleanings on Missouri History," gives this interesting explanation :
"It has been a matter of speculation as to why Pemiscot county, and those portions of Dunklin and New Madrid which extended south of the general boundary of the state into Arkansas, were included in Missouri. The usual facetious reply is that the people in these counties 'didn't want to live in Arkansas because it is unhealthful.' A writer who has made some investigation in the matter says that in 1804 Louisiana was divided into two territories by a line running along the thirty-third parallel of latitude. Then, in 1812, the territory of Missouri was organized, and, in 1819, that of Arkansas. At the time of the organization of the latter territory the people in the section now comprising these three counties were bound to the up-river neighbors by ties both social and com- mercial, and an appeal was made for inclusion of them in the territory of Missouri. Prominent among those who conducted the negotiations was Col. John Hardeman Walker, who owned extensive tracts of land in these counties. He 'wined and dined the sur- veyors,' and afterwards, in company with Godfrey Lesseuer and several other prominent citizens of that vicinity, visited Washington and laid the matter before Congress. Their efforts met with success, and this cotton-growing district down to the thirty-sixth parallel and as far west as the St. Francois river was included in Missouri."
The First St. Louis County.
When the territorial legislature of Missouri in 1813 laid out St. Louis county the metes and bounds were set forth as follows:
"All that portion of the territory bounded north by the south line of the County of St. Charles, east by the main channel of the river Mississippi, south by a line in the main channel of the Mississippi immediately opposite the upper line of a tract of land owned by Augustus Chouteau, which is about half way between the mouths of the Plattin and Joachim rivers; thence running in a direct line to a point on the dividing ridge between those waters where Wight's road falls into the road leading from the town of Herculaneum to the Mine-a-Burton; thence along said road to a point thereon
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI
immediately opposite a noted spring called the 'Dripping Springs,' which spring is situated about two hundred yards off said road; thence on a direct course to the mouth of Mineral fork or Grand river; thence such a course as shall leave all the persons now settled in that settlement. usually known by the name of the Richwood settlement, to the south of said course or line in the county of Washington; thence southwest to the western boundary of the Osage purchase: thence northwardly on said line to river Missouri; thence down said river Missouri in the main channel of the same to the southwest corner of the County of St. Charles, shall compose one county, and shall be called and known by the County of St. Louis."
This extended St. Louis county to what is now the Kansas boundary.
The School Lands.
The act which resulted from Riddick's ride and Hempstead's activities in 1812 provided "that all town or village lots, out-lots, common-field lots, and commons in and adjoining and belonging to the towns or villages of the territory, which are not rightfully owned or claimed by any private individual, or held as commons belonging to such towns or villages, or that the President of the United States may not think proper to secure for military purposes, shall be and the same are hereby reserved for the support of schools in the respective towns or villages aforesaid; Provided, that the whole quantity of land contained in the lots reserved for the support of the schools in any town or village shall not exceed one-twentieth part of the whole lands included in the general survey of such town or village."
The Making of Counties.
Making of Missouri geography was one of the chief subjects of state legis- lation before the Civil war. Not infrequently one general assembly changed the work of another before names and boundaries were satisfactory to those most concerned-the inhabitants.
Strong admiration for military heroes and intense political convictions had much to do with titles. The name of one county was changed twice before the people were satisfied. That was Ozark county. In 1843 it was given the name of Decatur in honor of Admiral Decatur. Two years later the original name of Ozark was retaken.
Lafayette county was named Lillard originally at the time of its organiza- tion in 1820. James C. Lillard was one of the pioneers. Fourteen years later the legislature on the petition of residents of the county changed the name to Lafayette. The argument offered for the change was that Lillard had gone back to Tennessee and advised people not to move to Missouri because it was an unhealthy country. It was charged that he had even written letters to that effect.
There was a time when the legislature went too fast in the making of coun- ties. It created Dodge and Putnam. The line between Missouri and Iowa was supposed to be some distance north of the present location. When the courts decided in favor of the Iowa contention it cut off a northern strip. Put- nam and Dodge were consolidated into one county with the former name, fourteen miles wide and thirty-six miles long. There are maps of Missouri showing prospective counties with the names of . Dodge, Donaldson and Mer- amec. On later maps these names do not appear.
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MISSOURI GEOGRAPHY
Missouri also had counties named Rives, Van Buren and Kinderhook. Rives is now known as Henry county. The change was made for political reasons. At the time a new county was being organized in the west central section of Missouri, William C. Rives was a Virginian of wide reputation. He was much admired by the Democrats, who had a majority in the Missouri legislature. The county was named Rives in 1834. A few years later Mr. Rives became a Whig. In 1841 the Democratic majority changed the name of Rives county to Henry county, intending, as the records show, to honor Patrick Henry, also a Virginian.
Another county which had its name changed through political considera- tions was Van Buren. It was organized in 1835 and given the name to honor President Martin Van Buren. In becoming the candidate of the Free Soilers in 1848 Van Buren ceased to be popular with the Missourians in control of the legislature. At the session of the assembly in 1849 Van Buren county was changed to Cass county. Lewis Cass of Michigan had been the Democratic nominee for President in 1848.
Kinderhook county was named for the home of President Van Buren at the time when he was a political idol of Missouri Democrats. It underwent change of name in 1843 and thereafter was called Camden, taking the name of a county in North Carolina from which a number of the early settlers came.
Washington county, as part of the territory of Missouri, was organized in 1813 under an act of the territorial legislature. An imposing two-story court house with a large porch and brick columns from ground to roof was built. So enterprising were the Potosi people of that day they came within one vote of securing the location of the territorial capital.
The Military Heroes.
Missouri nomenclature shows that the pioneer settlers and early legislatures were more inclined to honor soldiers than statesmen in selecting names for counties. Of the 114 political subdivisions of the state the names of war heroes were selected for forty-four. Statesmen came next. Of them thirty-one were honored in the naming of counties. Wright county took its name from Silas Wright of New York.
A portion of the Platte Purchase had several county names. In 1841 a county called Nodaway was organized. Several weeks later the member of the house of representatives from Platte county, David Rice Holt, died. The legislature was in session. To do honor to Mr. Holt part of the county which had been given the name of Nodaway was changed to Holt. Two years later a part of Holt county was cut off and given the name of Allen. Subsequently the legislature changed the name of Allen to Atchison to do honor to David R. Atchison, United States senator from Missouri and president pro tem of the Senate.
Niangua county no longer appears upon the map of Missouri. The title was taken originally from the river which still bears that name. The Indians called the river Nehemgar. That meant a river of numerous springs or sources. The word Niangua is supposed to have been changed from Nehemgar by popular use. Niangua county was organized in 1842. Two years later George M. Dallas of Pennsylvania, having been elected Vice-President of the United States.
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Niangua was changed to Dallas county by the legislature in his honor. As Dallas county was settled history was preserved by its sub-divisions. The townships were named Benton, Grant, Green, Jackson, Jasper, Lincoln, Miller and Washington.
"The State of Pike."
As early as 1808 Victor La Gatra led a colony of French people to the salt springs near what is now Saverton. That was the beginning of settlement in Ralls county. But when the war of 1812 came Indians made conditions so uncomfortable that most of the white people went back to St. Louis. In 1818 Daniel Ralls came from Kentucky and selected a home four miles west of the present site of New London. At that time, which was before statehood, Pike county had been created by the territorial legislature of Missouri. It included all of Northeast Missouri to the Iowa line. A common saying was that "the State of Pike took in everything from the Mississippi river to the Day of Judgment."
In 1867 a proposition to change the county lines of Caldwell, Daviess and Harrison was presented to the legislature. Petitions were circulated for and against it. Mass meetings were held. The people of Kingston adopted resolu- tions denouncing the movement as a scheme of Hamilton people to get the county seat. They declared "that we regard the said move on the part of our neighbors as very unkind, ungrateful and unjust; and that, if they persist in their course, we shall feel forced to pledge ourselves to the use of all honorable means to turn from Hamilton trade, commerce and travel." The plan failed.
A colony of eleven stalwart prolific families from Campbell county in East Tennessee began the settlement of Cole county in 1818. They located on Moni- teau creek near what is now the town of Marion. They were John English and four sons, James Miller and five sons, Henry McKenney and three sons, James Fulkerson and three sons, David Yount and three sons, David Chambers and three sons, John Mackey and two sons, John Harmon and one son, William Gouge and four sons, Martin Gouge and two sons, Joshua Chambers and two sons. In these eleven families were more than sixty persons. A court was organized in 1821. It met in the house of John English. Hamilton R. Gamble was circuit attorney. David Todd was judge. The first judgment rendered was a fine of one dollar against John Shore for contemptuous behavior to the court, the defendant to be imprisoned until the fine was paid. The next case was the emancipation of Joseph, the slave of Abraham Collett.
The first term of the circuit court in Livingston county was held in the house of Joseph Cox in 1837. The house of Mr. Cox was a log cabin. The judge, jury, lawyers and witnesses were boarded free during the two days of the term. The board consisted of corn pone, venison and trimmings placed upon long tables under the trees. For Edward Livingston, secretary of state in Andrew Jackson's cabinet Livingston county took its name. A Welsh colony settled at an early date in Livingston, giving their community the name of Dawn.
Until 1825 the Big Osages had large villages in what is now Vernon county. White Hare was-their chief. The Indians were loth to give way. Vernon county
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MISSOURI GEOGRAPHY
was not organized until 1851. It took the name of Miles Vernon, a man of prominence in Laclede county. Allen and Jesse Somers, Kentuckians, are said to have been the first settlers. After them came Rev. Nathaniel Dodge and his three sons, Leonard, Samuel and Thomas. The first white settlement was in the vicinity of what is now Balltown.
Texas county was settled by hunters who took their peltries in pony loads to St. Louis, following the Indian trails. These pioneers came as early as 1815. They built a small mill on Paddies' spring.
Kingdom of Callaway.
Callaway county established its county seat at Fulton, named in honor of Robert Fulton, the pioneer in steam navigation. A courthouse thirty-six feet square was built in 1826. It cost $1,300 and was said to be the first courthouse west of the Mississippi. This seat of justice had even greater distinction than its architecture, according to tradition. A thief had stolen a horse, had been arrested, had given bond and had run away. The bond was forfeited and the bondsmen paid up. The money thus realized by the county went to build the courthouse.
"Kingdom of Callaway" gained this distinction from the course pursued dur- ing the Civil war period. The people were strongly in sympathy with the South. The legislature which assembled and sat under the Gamble provisional state government was Union. Callaway people were quite generally disfranchised because of their states' rights position. Nevertheless they voted and sent across the river to the state capital representative after representative of their own political faith. These men were rejected as often as they presented their cer- tificates. But Callaway continued to send southern sympathizers and went un- represented in the legislature. The Union men in Jefferson City bestowed upon the county, in recognition of this persistence, the name of "Kingdom of Callaway." Captain Callaway whose name was taken for the county was one of the bravest of the Indian fighters in 1815. He was a grandson of Daniel Boone and commanded a company of rangers at the time of his death. His command had overtaken a marauding band of Sac and Fox Indians in the vicinity of Prairie fork of Loutre creek, had taken some stolen horses from the squaws who were guarding them and had started back to Fort Clemson on Loutre Island when they were ambuscaded by the braves. Callaway's horse was killed under him. The captain received a slight wound but was saved by the bullet striking his watch and tearing it to pieces. He ran down the creek, plunged in and was swimming when a bullet struck him in the back of his head. He was tall, had black eyes and hair and stood very erect. An early writer pointed out that "a name sometimes means a great deal. In many instances it indicates the character of the people who settle a country and have given it its distinctive characteristics. In this instance the people of Callaway possess those fearless traits of character and that dauntless energy which distinguished the gallant leader after whom the county was named. So tenacious and unyielding have they been in the pursuit and maintenance of their rights in time past, that they have earned for their county the sobriquet, 'Kingdom of Callaway.'"
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI
A local historian traces the origin of "Kingdom of Callaway" to the "treaty" which Colonel Jefferson F. Jones made with General John B. Henderson at the beginning of the Civil war. General Henderson had recruited quite a force of Union men in Pike county and was preparing to invade Callaway. Colonel Jones assembled 300 or 400 men and boys at Brown's Spring. He had two home-made cannon, one of wood with iron rings. He announced his intention to give the invaders battle. Flags of truce were raised and messages passed between the opposing armies. The result was an agreement, drawn up in the form of a treaty, by which Henderson promised not to invade and Jones promised to . disband his force.
Jones was somewhat original in character. He named one of his sons South- west and the other Northwest. His eighth child was a girl on whom he bestowed the name of Octave.
Daviess county was a political division of Missouri which impressed Amer- ican history without regard to politics in its nomenclature. The names given the townships of Daviess were Benton, Colfax, Gallatin, Grand River, Grant, Harrison, Jackson, Jefferson, Liberty, Lincoln, Marion, Monroe, Salem, Sheri- dan, Union and Washington. The county took its name from Joseph Daviess of Kentucky.
Taney county took its name from the chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney. Two brothers named Youchuim, three Dentires and a McAdoo began the settlement of Taney making their homes on White river about 1827.
"The Mother of Counties."
Settlement of Howard county began in 1807. Three years later Cooper's Bottom was quite a little community. Benjamin Cooper and his five sons from Madison county, Kentucky, were pioneers in Howard. William Thorp, a Baptist minister, came in 1810. The county was named for Benjamin Howard, governor of Missouri territory. Out of the original Howard county were created about forty other counties. When Howard county was organized the county seat was Old Franklin, on the Missouri River. Removal to Fayette, named in honor of General Lafayette, took place in 1823. Howard was given the name of "the mother of counties." Colonel Switzler once described Howard at a Mis- souri pioneers gathering at Huntsville :
"Take a position on the Missouri river at the mouth of the Kaw, now Kansas City, proceed north to the southern boundary line of Iowa, in truth several miles beyond that line, into the territory of Iowa, then due east to the high ridge of ground, known as the headwaters of Cedar creek, now forming the border line between Boone and Callaway, . and descend the Cedar to its confluence with the Missouri, at Jefferson City, thence down the Missouri to the mouth of the Osage, thence up that crooked stream to a point near Schell City in Vernon county, then due west to the Kansas line, thence north along that line to the place of beginning; this was Howard county, now comprising thirty-six counties of the state-twenty-two and a part of three others south of the Missouri river and fourteen and a part of five others north of it,-an area of 22,000 square miles-larger than ancient Greece, larger than Saxony and Switzerland combined; larger than Vermont, Massachusetts, Delaware and Rhode Island united."
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