USA > Missouri > Platte County > History of Clay and Platte Counties, Missouri : written and compiled from the most authentic official and private sources, including a history of their townships, towns, and villages, together with a condensed history of Missouri; a reliable and detailed history of Clay and Platte Counties --their pioneer record, resources, biographical sketches of prominent citizens. > Part 3
USA > Missouri > Clay County > History of Clay and Platte Counties, Missouri : written and compiled from the most authentic official and private sources, including a history of their townships, towns, and villages, together with a condensed history of Missouri; a reliable and detailed history of Clay and Platte Counties --their pioneer record, resources, biographical sketches of prominent citizens. > Part 3
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).
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These prairies often embrace extensive tracts of land, and in one or two instances they cover an area of fifty thousand acres. During the spring and summer they are carpeted with a velvet of green, and gaily bedecked with flowers of various forms and hues, making a most fascinating panorama of ever-changing color and loveliness. To fully appreciate their great beauty and magnitude, they must be seen.
Soil. - The soil of Missouri is good, and of great agricultural capa- bilities, but the most fertile portions of the State are the river bot- toms, which are a rich alluvium, mixed in many cases with sand, the producing qualities of which are not excelled by the prolific valley of the famous Nile.
South of the Missouri River there is a greater variety of soil, but much of it is fertile, and even in the mountains and mineral districts there are rich valleys, and about the sources of the White, Eleven Points, Current and Big Black Rivers, the soil, though unproductive, furnishes a valuable growth of yellow pine.
The marshy lands in the southeastern part of the State will, by a system of drainage, be one of the most fertile districts in the State.
11
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
POPULATION BY COUNTIES IN 1870, 1876, AND 1880.
Counties.
1870.
1876.
1880.
Adair .
Andrew
15,137
14,992
16,318
Atchison
8,440
10,925
14,565
Audrain
12,307
15,157
19,739
Barry .
5,087
6,900
10,332
Bates .
11,322
11,027
12,398
Bollinger
8,162
8,884
11,132
Boone
20,765
31,923
25,424
Buchanan
35,109
38,165
49,824
Butler
4,298
4,363
6,011
Caldwell
11,390
12,200
13,654
Callaway
6,108
7,027
7,269
Cape Girardeau
17,440
21,498
23,300
Carter
19,299
18,069
22,431
Cedar .
9,471
9,897
10,747
Chariton
19,136
23,294
25,224
Christian
6,707
7,936
9,632
Clark .
13,667
14,549
15,631
Clay
·
15,564
15,320
15,579
Clinton
14,063
13,698
16,073
Cole .
10,292
14,122
15,519
Cooper
20,692
21,356
21,622
Crawford
7,982
9,391
10,763
Dade .
8,683
11,089
12,557
Dallas
8,383
8,073
9,272
Daviess
14,410
16,557
19,174
DeKalb
9,858
11,159
13,343
Dent .
6,357
7,401
10,647
Douglas
3,915
6,461
7,753
Dunklin
5,982
6,255
9,604
Gasconade .
10,093
11,160
11,153
Greene
21,549
24,693
28,817
Grundy
10,567
13,071
15,201
Harrison
14,635
18,530
20,318
Henry
17,401
18,465
23,914
Hickory
6,452
5,870
7,388
Holt
·
11,652
13,245
15,510
Howard
17,233
17,815
18,428
Howell
4,218
6,756
8,814
Iron .
6,278
6,623
8,183
Jackson
55,041
54,045
82,328
Jasper
14,928
29,384
32,021
Jefferson
15,380
16,186
18,736
Johnson
24,648
23,646
28,177
Knox .
10,974
12,678
13,047
Laclede
9,380
9,845
11,524
Lafayette
22,624
22,204
25,761
Lawrence
13,067
13,054
17,585
Lewis .
15,114
16,360
15,925
Lincoln
15,960
16,858
17,443
Linn .
15,906
18,110
20,016
Livingston .
16,730
18,074
20,205
Carroll
1,440
1,549
2,168
Cass .
10,373
11,146
14,424
Barton
15,960
17,484
25,382
Benton
19,202
25,257
23,670
Camden
17,558
17,891
20,998
Franklin
30,098
26,924
26,536
11,607
12,673
17,188
Gentry
11,449
13,774
15,190
12
HISTORY OF MISSOURI. POPULATION BY COUNTIES- Continued.
Counties.
1876.
1876.
1880.
McDonald .
5,226
6,072
7,816
Macon
23,230
25,028
26,223
Madison
5,849
8,750
8,866
Maries
5,916
6,481
7,304
Marion
23,780
22,794
24,837
Mercer
11,557
13,393
14,674
Miller
6,616
8,529
9,807
Mississippi
4,982
7,498
9,270
Moniteau .
13,375
13,084
14,349
Monroe
17,149
17,751
19,075
Montgomery
10,405
14,418
16,250
Morgan
·
8,434
9,529
10,134
New Madrid
6,357
6,673
7,694
Newton
12,821
16,875
18,948
Nodaway
14,751
23,196
29,560
Oregon
3,287
4,469
5,791
Osage .
10,793
11,200
11,824
Ozark.
3,363
4,579
5,618
Pemiscot
2,059
2,573
4,299
Perry .
9,877
11,189
11,895
Pettis .
18,706
23,167
27,285
Phelps
10,506
9,919
12,565
Pike .
23,076
22,828
26,716
Platte
17,352
15,948
17,372
Pulaski
4,714
6,157
7,250
Ralls .
10,510
9,997
11,838
Ray
18,700
18,394
20,196
Reynolds
3,756
4,716
5,722
Ripley
3,175
3,913
5,377
St. Charles
21,304
21,821
23,060
St. Clair
6,742
11,242
14,126
St. Francois
9,742
11,621
13,822
Ste. Genevieve
8,384
9,409
10,309
St. Louis 1
351,189
31,888
Saline
21,672
27,087
29,912
Schuyler
8,820
9,881
10,470
Scotland
10,670
12,030
12,507
Scott .
7,317
7,312
8,587
Shannon
2,339
3,236
3,441
Shelby
10,119
13,243
14,024
Stoddard
8,535
10,888
13,432
Stone .
3,253
3,544
4,405
Sullivan
11,907
14,039
16,569
Taney
4,407
6,124
5,605
Texas
9,618
10,287
12,207
Vernon
11,247
14,413
19,370
Warren
9,673
10,321
10,806
Washington
11,719
13,100
12,895
Wayne
6,068
7,006
9,097
Webster
10,434
10,684
12,175
Worth
5,004
7,164
8,208
Wright
5,684
6,124
9,733
City of St. Louis
·
· ·
350,522
1,721,295
1,547,030
2,168,804
Polk
14,445
13,467
15,745
Putnam
11,217
12,641
13,556
Randolph
15,908
19,173
22,751
1 St. Louis City and County separated in 1877. Population for 1876 not given
13
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
SUMMARY.
Males
1,126,424
Females
.
1,041,380
Native
1,957,564
Foreign
211,240
White
2,023,568
Colored 1 .
145,236
CHAPTER III.
GEOLOGY OF MISSOURI.
Classification of Rocks -Quatenary Formation-Tertiary - Cretaceous- Carbonifer- ous - Devonian - Silurian - Azoic - Economic Geology - Coal -Iron - Lead - Copper - Zinc - Building Stone - Marble - Gypsum - Lime - Clays - Paints - Springs - Water Power.
The stratified rocks of Missouri, as classified and treated of by Prof. G. C. Swallow, belong to the following divisions: I. Quatenary ; II. Tertiary; III. Cretaceous ; IV. Carboniferous ; V. Devonian ; VI. Silurian ; VII. Azoic.
" The Quatenary formations, are the most recent, and the most valuable to man : valuable, because they can be more readily utilized.
The Quatenary formation in Missouri, embraces the Alluvium, 30 feet thick ; Bottom Prairie, 30 feet thick ; Bluff, 200 feet thick ; and Drift, 155 feet thick. The latest deposits are those which constitute the Alluvium, and includes the soils, pebbles and sand, clays, vegeta- ble mould, bog, iron ore, marls, etc.
The Alluvium deposits, cover an area, within the limits of Mis- souri, of more than four millions acres of land, which are not sur- passed for fertility by any region of country on the globe.
The Bluff Prairie formation is confined to the low lands, which are washed by the two great rivers which course our eastern and western boundaries, and while it is only about half as extensive as the Allu- vial, it is equally as rich and productive."
" The Bluff formation," says Prof. Swallow, "rests upon the ridges and river bluffs, and descends along their slopes to the lowest valleys, the formation capping all the Bluffs of the Missouri from Fort Union to its mouth, and those of the Mississippi from Dubuque
1 Including 92 Chinese, 2 half Chinese, and 96 Indians and half-breeds.
$
14
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
to the mouth of the Ohio. It forms the upper stratum beneath the soil of all the high lands, both timber and prairies, of all the counties north of the Osage and Missouri, and also St. Louis, and the Missis- sippi counties on the south.
Its greatest development is in the counties on the Missouri River from the Iowa line to Boonville. In some localities it is 200 feet thick. At St. Joseph it is 140; at Boonville 100; and at St. Louis, in St. George's quarry, and the Big Mound, it is about 50 feet ; while its greatest observed thickness in Marion county was only 30 feet."
The Drift formation is that which lies beneath the Bluff formation, having, as Prof. Swallow informs us, three distinct deposits, to wit : "Altered Drift, which are strata of sand and pebbles, seen in the banks of the Missouri, in the northwestern portion of the State.
The Boulder formation is a heterogeneous stratum of sand, gravel and boulder, and water-worn fragments of the older rocks.
Boulder Clay is a bed of bluish or brown sandy clay, through which pebbles are scattered in greater or less abundance. In some locali- ties in northern Missouri, this formation assumes a pure white, pipe- clay color."
The Tertiary formation is made up of clays, shales, iron ores, sand- stone, and sands, scattered along the bluffs, and edges of the bottoms, reaching from Commerce, Scott County, to Stoddard, and south to the Chalk Bluffs in Arkansas.
The Cretaceous formation lies beneath the Tertiary, and is com- posed of variegated sandstone, bluish-brown sandy slate, whitish- brown impure sandstone, fine white clay mingled with spotted flint, purple, red and blue clays, all being in the aggregate, 158 feet in thickness. There are no fossils in these rocks, and nothing by which their age may be told.
The Carboniferous system includes the Upper Carboniferous or coal-measures, and the Lower Carboniferous or Mountain limestone. The coal-measures are made up of numerous strata of sandstones, limestones, shales, clays, marls, spathic iron ores, and coals.
The Carboniferous formation, including coal-measures and the beds of iron, embrace an area in Missouri of 27,000 square miles. The varieties of coal found in the State are the common bituminous and cannel coals, and they exist in quantities inexhaustible. The fact that these coal-measures are' full of fossils, which are always confined
15
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
to the coal measures, enables the geologist to point them out, and the coal beds contained in them.
The rocks of the Lower Carboniferous formation are varied in color, and are quarried in many different parts of the State, being exten- sively utilized for building and other purposes.
Among the Lower Carboniferous rocks is found the Upper Archi- medes Limestone, 200 feet ; Ferruginous Sandstone, 195 feet; Mid- dle Archimedes, 50 feet; St. Louis Limestone, 250 feet; Oölitic Limestone, 25 feet; Lower Archimedes Limestone, 350 feet; and Encrinital Limestone, 500 feet. These limestones generally contain fossils.
The Ferruginous limestone is soft when quarried, but becomes hard and durable after exposure. It contains large quantities of iron, and is found skirting the eastern coal measures from the mouth of the Des Moines to McDonald county.
The St. Louis limestone is of various hues and tints, and very hard. It is found in Clark, Lewis and St. Louis counties.
The Lower Archimedes limestone includes partly the lead bearing rocks of Southwestern Missouri.
The Encrinital limestone is the most extensive of the divisions of Carboniferous limestone, and is made up of brown, buff, gray and white. In these strata are found the remains of corals and mollusks. This formation extends from Marion county to Greene county. The Devonian system contains : Chemung Group, Hamilton Group, Onondaga limestone and Oriskany sandstone. The rocks of the Devonian system are found in Marion, Ralls, Pike, Callaway, Saline and Ste. Genevieve counties.
The Chemung Group has three formations, Chouteau limestone, 85 feet ; Vermicular sandstone and shales, 75 feet ; Lithographic lime- stone, 125 feet.
The Chouteau limestone is in two divisions, when fully developed, and when first quarried is soft. It is not only good for building pur- poses but makes an excellent cement.
The Vermicular sandstone and shales are usually buff or yellowish brown, and perforated with pores.
The Lithographic limestone is a pure, fine, compact, evenly-tex- tured limestone. Its color varies from light drab to buff and blue. It is called " pot metal," because under the hammer it gives a sharp, ringing sound. It has but few fossils.
16
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
The Hamilton Group is made up of some 40 feet of blue shales, and 170 feet of crystalline limestone.
Onondaga limestone is usually a coarse, gray or buff crystalline, thick-bedded and cherty limestone. No formation in Missouri pre- sents such variable and widely different lithological characters as the Onondaga.
The Oriskany sandstone is a light, gray limestone.
Of the Upper Silurian series there are the following formations : Lower Helderberg, 350 feet; Niagara Group, 200 feet; Cape Girar- deau limestone, 60 feet.
The Lower Helderberg is made up of buff, gray, and reddish cherty and argillaceous limestone.
Niagara Group. The Upper part of this group consists of red, yellow and ash-colored shales, with compact limestones, variegated with bands and nodules of chert.
The Cape Girardeau limestone, on the Mississippi River near Cape Girardeau, is a compact, bluish-gray, brittle limestone, with smooth fractures in layers from two to six inches in thickness, with argilla- ceous partings. These strata contain a great many fossils.
The Lower Silurian has the following ten formations, to wit: Hud- son River Group, 220 feet ; Trenton limestone, 360 feet ; Black River and Bird's Eye limestone, 175 feet ; first Magnesian limestone, 200 feet ; Saccharoidal sandstone, 125 feet ; second Magnesian limestone, 250 feet; second sandstone, 115 feet; third Magnesian limestone, 350 feet ; third sandstone, 60 feet ; fourth Magnesian limestone, 350 feet.
Hudson River Group : - There are three formations which Prof. Swallow refers to in this group. These formations are found in the bluff above and below Louisiana; on the Grassy a few miles north- west of Louisiana, and in Ralls, Pike, Cape Girardeau and Ste. Gene- vieve Counties.
Trenton limestone : The upper part of this formation is made up of thick beds of hard, compact, bluish gray and drab limestone, varie- gated with irregular cavities, filled with greenish materials.
The beds are exposed between Hannibal and New London, north of Salt River, near Glencoe, St. Louis County, and are seventy-five feet thick.
Black River and Bird's Eye limestone the same color as the Trenton limestone.
-
17
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
The first Magnesian limestone cap the picturesque oluffs of the Osage in Benton and neighboring counties.
The' Saccharoidal sandstone has a wide range in the State. In a bluff about two miles from Warsaw, is a very striking change of thick- ness of this formation.
Second Magnesian limestone, in lithological character, is like the first.
The second sandstone, usually of yellowish brown, sometimes becomes a pure white, fine-grained, soft sandstone as on Cedar Creek, in Washington and Franklin Counties.
The third Magnesian limestone is exposed in the high and picturesque bluffs of the Niangua, in the neighborhood of Bryce's Spring.
The third sandstone is white and has a formation in moving water.
The fourth Magnesian limestone is seen on the Niangua and Osage Rivers.
The Azoic rocks lie below the Silurian and form a series of silicious and other slates which contain no remains of organic life.
ECONOMIC GEOLOGY.
Coal. - Missouri is particularly rich in minerals. Indeed, no State in the Union, surpasses her in this respect. In some unknown age of the past - long before the existence of man - Nature, by a wise process, made a bountiful provision for the time, when in the order of things, it should be necessary for civilized man to take possession of these broad, rich prairies. As an equivalent for lack of forests, she quietly stored away beneath the soil those wonderful carboniferous treasures for the use of man.
Geological surveys have developed the fact that the coal deposits in the State are almost unnumbered, embracing all varieties of the best bituminous coal. A large portion of the State, has been ascer- tained to be one continuous coal field, stretching from the mouth of the Des Moines River through Clark, Lewis, Scotland, Adair, Macon, Shelby, Monroe, Audrain, Callaway, Boone, Cooper, Pettis, Benton, Henry, St. Clair, Bates, Vernon, Cedar, Dade, Barton and Jasper, into the Indian Territory, and the counties on the northwest of this line contain more or less coal. Coal rocks exist in Ralls, Mont- gomery, Warren, St. Charles, Moniteau, Cole, Morgan, Crawford and Lincoln, and during the past few years, all along the lines of all the railroads in North Missouri, and along the western end of the Missouri Pacific, and on the Missouri River, between Kansas City and Sioux
3
18
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
City, has systematic mining, opened up hundreds of mines in different localities. The area of our coal beds, on the line of the southwestern boundary of the State alone, embraces more than 26,000 square miles of regular coal measures. This will give of workable coal, if the average be one foot, 26,800,000,000 tons. The estimates from the developments already made, in the different portions of the State, will give 134,000,000,000 tons.
The economical value of this coal to the State, its influence in domestic life, in navigation, commerce and manufactures, is beyond the imagination of man to conceive. Suffice it to say, that in the pos- session of her developed and undeveloped coal mines, Missouri has a motive power, which in its influences for good, in the civilization of . man, is more potent than the gold of California.
Iron. - Prominent among the minerals, which increase the power and prosperity of a nation, is iron. Of this ore, Missouri has an inex- haustible quantity, and like her coal fields, it has been developed in many portions of the State, and of the best and purest quality. It is found in great abundance in the counties of Cooper, St. Clair, Greene, Henry, Franklin, Benton, Dallas, Camden, Stone, Madison, Iron, Washington, Perry, St. Francois, Reynolds, Stoddard, Scott, Dent and others. The greatest deposit of iron is found in the Iron Moun- tain, which is two hundred feet high, and covers an area of five hun- dred acres, and produces a metal, which is shown by analysis, to con- tain from 65 to 69 per cent of metallic iron.
The ore of Shepherd Mountain contains from 64 to 67 per cent of metallic iron. The ore of Pilot Knob contains from 53 to 60 per cent.
Rich beds of iron are also found at the Big Bogy Mountain, and at Russell Mountain. This ore has, in its nude state, a variety of colors, from the red, dark red, black, brown, to a light bluish gray. The red ores are found in twenty-one or more counties of the State, and are of great commercial value. The brown hematite iron ores extend over a greater range of country than all the others combined, embrac- ing about one hundred counties, and have been ascertained to exist in these in large quantities.
Lead. - Long before any permanent settlements were made in Mis- souri by the whites, lead was mined within the limits of the State at two or three points on the Mississippi. At this time more than five hundred mines are opened, and many of them are being successfully worked. These deposits of lead cover an area, so far as developed, of more than seven thousand square miles. Mines have been opened
19
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
in Jefferson, Washington, St. Francois, Madison, Wayne, Carter, Rey- nolds, Crawford, Ste. Genevieve, Perry, Cole, Cape Girardeau, Cam- den, Morgan, and many other counties.
Copper and Zinc. - Several varieties of copper ore are found in Missouri. The copper mines of Shannon, Madison and Franklin Counties have been known for years, and some of these have been successfully worked and are now yielding good results.
Deposits of copper have been discovered in Dent, Crawford, Ben- ton, Maries, Green, Lawrence, Dade, Taney, Dallas, Phelps, Reynolds and Wright Counties.
Zinc is abundant in nearly all the lead mines in the southwestern part of the State, and since the completion of the A. & P. R. R. a market has been furnished for this ore, which will be converted into valuable merchandise.
Building Stone and Marble. - There is no scarcity of good building stone in Missouri. Limestone, sandstone and granite exist in all shades of buff, blue, red and brown, and are of great beauty as build- ing material.
There are many marble beds in the State, some of which furnish very beautiful and excellent marble. It is found in Marion, Cooper, St. Louis, and other counties.
One of the most desirable of the Missouri marbles is in the 3rd Magnesian limestone, on the Niangua. It is fine-grained, crystalline, silico-magnesian limestone, light-drab, slightly tinged with peach blos- som, and clouded by deep flesh-colored shades. In ornamental archi- tecture it is rarely surpassed.
Gypsum and Lime. - Though no extensive beds of gypsum have been discovered in Missouri, there are vast beds of the pure white crystalline variety on the line of the Kansas Pacific Railroad, on Kan- sas River, and on Gypsum Creek. It exists also in several other localities accessible by both rail and boat.
All of the limestone formations in the State, from the coal measures to fourth Magnesian, have more or less strata of very nearly pure car- bonate of pure lime.
Clays and Paints. - Clays are found in nearly all parts of the State suitable for making bricks. Potters' clay and fire-clay are worked in many localities.
There are several beds of purple shades in the coal measures which possess the properties requisite for paints used in outside work. Yel- low and red ochres are found in considerable quantities on the Missouri
20
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
River. Some of these paints have been thoroughly tested and found fire-proof and durable.
SPRINGS AND WATER POWER.
No State is, perhaps, better supplied with cold springs of pure water than Missouri. Out of the bottoms, there is scarcely a section of land but has one or more perennial springs of good water. Even where there are no springs, good water can be obtained by digging from twenty to forty feet. Salt springs are abundant in the central part of the State, and discharge their brine in Cooper, Saline, Howard, and adjoining counties. Considerable salt was made in Cooper and Howard Counties at an early day.
Sulphur springs are also numerous throughout the State. The Chouteau Springs in Cooper, the Monagaw Springs in St. Clair, the Elk Springs in Pike, and the Cheltenham Springs in St. Louis County have acquired considerable reputation as salubrious waters, and have become popular places of resort. Many other counties have good sulphur springs.
Among the Chalybeate springs the Sweet Springs on the Black- water, and the Chalybeate spring in the University campus are, perhaps, the most popular of the kind in the State. There are, however, other springs impregnated with some of the salts of iron.
Petroleum springs are found in Carroll, Ray, Randolph, Cass, Lafayette, Bates, Vernon, and other counties. The variety called lubricating oil is the more common.
The water power of the State is excellent. Large springs are particularly abundant on the waters of the Meramec, Gasconade, Bourbeuse, Osage, Niangua, Spring, White, Sugar, and other streams. Besides these, there are hundreds of springs sufficiently large to drive mills and factories, and the day is not far distant when these crystal fountains will be utilized, and a thousand saws will buzz to their dashing music.
21
HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
CHAPTER IV.
TITLE AND EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
Title to Missouri Lands - Right of Discovery - Title of France and Spain -Cession to the United States - Territorial Changes - Treaties with Indians - First Settle- ment-Ste. Genevieve and New Bourbon-St. Louis - When Incorporated- Potosi - St. Charles -Portage des Sioux -New Madrid -St. Francois County - Perry - Mississippi - Loutre Island -"Boone's Lick " - Cote Sans Dessein - Howard County -Some First Things - Counties - When Organized.
The title to the soil of Missouri was, of course, primarily vested in the original occupants who inhabited the country prior to its discovery by the whites. But the Indians, being savages, possessed but few rights that civilized nations considered themselves bound to respect ; so, therefore, when they found this country in the possession of such a people they claimed it in the name of the King of France, by the right of discovery. It remained under the jurisdiction of France until 1763.
Prior to the year 1763, the entire continent of North America was divided between France, England, Spain and Russia. France held all that portion that now constitutes our national domain west of the Mississippi River, except Texas, and the territory which we have obtained from Mexico and Russia. The vast region, while under the jurisdiction of France, was known as the " Province of Louisiana," and embraced the present State of Missouri. At the close of the " Old French War," in 1763, France gave up her share of the con- tinent, and Spain came into the possession of the territory west of the Mississippi River, while Great Britain retained Canada and the regions northward, having obtained that territory by conquest, in the war with France. For thirty-seven years the territory now embraced within the limits of Missouri, remained as a part of the possession of Spain, and then went back to France by the treaty of St. Ildefonso, October 1, 1800. On the 30th of April, 1803, France ceded it to the United States, in consideration of receiving $11,250,000, and the liquidation of certain claims, held by citizens of the United States against France, which amounted to the further sum of $3,750,000, making a total of $15,000,000. It will thus be seen that France bas twice, and Spain once, held sovereignty over the territory embracing
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HISTORY OF MISSOURI.
Missouri, but the financial needs of Napoleon afforded our Govern- ment an opportunity to add another empire to its domain.
On the 31st of October, 1803, an act of Congress was approved, authorizing the President to take possession of the newly acquired territory, and provided for it a temporary government, and another act, approved March 26, 1804, authorized the division of the " Louis- iana Purchase," as it was then called, into two separate territories. All that portion south of the 33d parallel of north latitude was called the " Territory of Orleans," and that north of the said parallel was known as the "District of Louisiana," and was placed under the jurisdiction of what was then known as " Indian Territory."
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