USA > Missouri > Vernon County > History of Vernon County, Missouri : past and present, including an account of the cities, towns and villages of the county Vol. II > Part 4
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HISTORY OF VERNON COUNTY
Specimens of "grease rock" or "oil rock" obtained in this township have been examined by experts and declared to con- tain petroleum or coal oil, and to indicate the presence here of vast quantities of that substance. There are those who are con- fident that the southern portion of Dover township will one day become a great oil producing region.
COAL.
The coal in Dover township is abundant in the southern part. At Bellamy the mining, in times past, has been extensive. The want of a railroad running through prevents the development of the coal fields of this township.
THE FIRST SETTLERS.
The first settlers of this township came in about 1842, in which year a man named Britton settled on the northeast quarter of section 7, north of the branch. He was from Greene county directly. On his death here, which occurred about 1844, his farm was sold to Charles Massey. About the same time Stephen Wilson located on Clear creek, near the Collins bridge (lot 9, northwest quarter section 2), and a little east of him Andy Sharp came soon after. Wilson was a one-armed man, and a school teacher. He had a wife, but no children, and the couple died many years ago.
John Prior and John Branson came from Gasconade county to this township in 1843. Prior settled first on the northeast quarter section 19, but in a short time located at the spring near Warwick P. O., section 20. Branson lived on the southeast quar- ter section 19, across Little Clear creek, on the south side, from Prior's first location. Branson set out the old orchard from slips brought from the Harmony mission.
In 1844 Peter Welch took a claim in the northeastern part of the township on lot 2 or 3, northwest quarter section 2-and removed from Cass county. Isaac Lemmons settled on the site of Warwick postoffice, but in a few years sold his claim and moved over on Little Drywood, in the northeastern part of Moundville township. The same year Nathan Jarrell came from Pulaski county and settled in the northwestern part of the town- ship, on lot 6, northeast quarter section 5.
In 1845 there was a considerable accession to the population.
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On the 7th of April the families of Thomas Capeheart, Daniel Prior, and Mrs. Tabitha Frazier landed at the spring near War- wick, where John Prior was then living, and soon after found homes for themselves in this vicinity. All were from Gasconade county. Capeheart was a brother-in-law of Prior, who was a son-in-law of the widow Frazier, and the latter was the mother of Joe Frazier.
The same spring-1845-Nathan Creek came to lots 1, 2, 3 . and 4, northeast quarter section 2, and bought a claim of his brother-in-law, Peter Welch, who had come the previous year. He was a Kentuckian, but came to Vernon directly from Cass county. He stated that Welch did not make the first improve- ment on his claim, but that there was a deserted cabin standing there in 1844, when he (Welch) came .. Who built this cabin cannot now even be conjectured. Mr. Creek was a stonemason, and did nearly all the stone work in this neighborhood in early days. He was employed at Fort Scott when the Mexican war broke out.
In 1844 Samuel Dunnagin settled in Dunnagin's Grove (sec- tion 25), in the southeastern part of the township. His house stood in the northeastern part of the section, within 200 yards of where the church building now stands. Here he died in the year 1867.
Elias Riley came from northeast Missouri to the northwest quarter of section 15 in February, 1857.
Daniel Prior was on section 16, about a mile west of Riley, and had been there long enough to have a bearing orchard. South of Prior, on the same section, was John Woodward. Jesse Mattox lived in the center of section 22, having come in the previous fall from Monroe county. Calvin Goss, a son-in-law of Morris Baker, had recently came to the site of Warwick post- office.
Zach and David Williamson were on Little Clear creek, on section 19. Joe Frazier and Tom Massey were on the east side of Clear creek, below the forks, on section 4, and a little farther down was Abram Woodall. A. J. Phillips was on the west side of Clear creek, in the northeastern part of the township.
Wm. McCoy lived south of Riley; he was killed during the war by Joe Phillips, who accused him of wrongful interference in his domestic affairs. Joe and George Abbott lived on Clear
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creek, on the west side of section 28 or the east side of section 29, south of where the Baptist church now stands. William Curry lived north of the Abbotts.
TRAGEDIES OF THE CIVIL WAR.
The killing of the seven bushwhackers at the Gabbert place, in this township, in May, 1863, is detailed elsewhere. The Gab- bert house was burned at the same time.
There were a number of other tragedies and burnings in this township during the war. In every instance reported the Con- federates and their friends were the victims. Probably this was because there were no Union men of the unconditional stripe in the township to kill or burn out. The Mayfield family, including Brice and Crawford, lived in section 14 of this township.
Among those tragedies may be mentioned the killing of Shelby Jarboe, who lived on Little Clear creek, a mile north of Warwick. Jarboe was of Confederate sympathies, but had never taken up arms. He was husking corn in his field early one morning, when some Kansas troops came riding by, on a scout through the country. On their approach Jarboe, fearing they might harm him, ran and concealed himself in a shock of corn. The soldiers saw him, thought he was a bushwhacker, called to him to come out, and when he did not do so fired into the corn shock at a venture and shot him through. They declared afterward that they would not have harmed him if he had not acted so sus- piciously.
It was on Walnut branch, in section 11, where Joe Ray was killed, in the summer of 1864.
George and Lafayette Prior were killed at their home on Clear creek, in section 16, by a detachment of Federals under Lieutenant Pond, of the Third Wisconsin. Both were young men. George had been for a time in the Confederate army, but at the time they were killed both boys were generally deemed harmless, although the Federals said they were bushwhackers. Lieutenant Pond rode over to Elias Riley's and ordered him to bury the Prior boys, which he did.
In March, 1861, the Kansas troops burned Jo Frazier's house on Clear creek on the lower part of section 4; he moved his family into another house near Warwick, and in July, 1863, the Kansans came back and burned it also. Not only were the corn
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fields and smoke-houses of the "rebels" levied upon by the Federal troops, but even the professed Union men were visited by the foraging parties. On one occasion Capt. L. J. Shaw, of the Third Wisconsin, stationed at the Lambert ford on Drywood, came and took 1,000 pounds of bacon for his men and seven tons of hay for their horses from Elias Riley, who at other times was fed on and plundered by the bushwhackers.
Often the Federals and rebel scouting parties came together in this township. The Clear creek timbers abounded in coverts and- Jairs for the bushwhackers, and often the "Feds." ran on them. In June, 1863, Joe Frazier and half a dozen other rebel partisans were encamped on Little Clear creek, a mile or more northwest of Warwick. They were washing in the creek, when a scouting band of Kansas troops crept up and leaped upon them, scatter- ing them in all directions. Philip Brown was killed.
South of Joe Frazier's, on Clear creek, Will Kelly, another bushwhacker, died fighting. He and Tom Moore had started to Ft. Scott on a matter of business. Half a mile out on the prairie they met ten Federals and turned and fled. The soldiers chased them into the brush and an overhanging limb knocked Kelly from his saddle. The Federals said he disdained to surrender. Emptying his revolvers he threw them at his pursuers and died like a Spartan. "We hated to kill him, he died so game," said the leader of the Federals.
BELLAMY CITY.
The town of Bellamy City was laid out by Thomas Bellamy, in September, 1882. It stands on the northeast quarter of section 23, Dover township, on a high prairie, in a most beautiful loca- tion.
Dover Cemetery. On section 21, was regularly laid out in 1866, by an association of citizens. The site is to be used "for- ever" as a cemetery. It is an old burial ground; interments were made here as early as in 1850.
CHURCHES.
Warwick Baptist Church. The organization of this church dates from January, 1881, some of the original members being
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HISTORY OF VERNON COUNTY
M. M. McGrew and wife, F. M. McGrew and wife, E. D. Owen and wife, Henry Owen and wife, C. Collins and wife, and two daughters, John Owen, Jennie Owen, J. James and wife, J. De Villiers and wife, Fannie Wilson, D. Job and wife, Mrs. R. Doyle and daughter, and Jeptha Rauthbun and wife.
Olive Branch Baptist Church. Was organized soon after the war with C. D. Smith and wife, H. L. Williams and wife and G. Drummond and wife among other constituent members. Wor- ship was conducted in a school house until 1884, when a neat frame building, costing about $700, was erected.
Dunnagin's Grove Christian Church. To Elder Wallace, well known in this community, is due much of the credit for the suc- cess of the organization of this church, which was started June 3, 1877. The first members were, as far as remembered, C. D. Lindsey, E. Riley and wife, J. W. Keithly and wife, H. C. Wallace, who was also the first elder ; E. W. Smith and L. Batts and wife.
DRYWOOD TOWNSHIP.
Drywood township is composed of congressional township 34, range 31. Although scant six miles in width, from east to west, it extends from the Barton county line north eight miles.
Three-fourths of the township is prairie. The only timbered tracks lie along Pleasant Run and its tributaries in the southwest, and the Landon and Lost branches in the northwest. The gen- eral surface is level, but along the streams it is broken. The sandstone is exposed in many places, especially in the western part of the township.
Pleasant Run is appropriately named. It is indeed a very pleasant stream. Rising a mile north of Sheldon, it flows in a general direction to the northwest, leaving the township two miles north and five miles west of its source at the railroad, and empties into Little Drywood. Along its banks in many places the sand- stone forms cosy grottoes, and with the trees and bushes pre- sents delightful retreats and pleasant seats.
On the southwest quarter of section 23, a little west of the railroad water tank north of Sheldon, a fine natural mound rises out of the prairie to the height of sixty feet, its base covering more than an acre of ground. From the top of this mound, which is covered with ferruginous sandstone, a delightful view of the surrounding country is to be had.
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EARLY SETTLERS.
Perhaps William Hudson was the first actual settler in Dry- wood township. In 1840 or 1841 he came from Alabama to the north west corner of the township and settled on lot 6 of the northwest quarter of section 6. Here he built a large double log cabin, known as Hudson's tavern, because he entertained trav- elers, passing over the road known as the Texas trail-the main road from Balltown to Fort Gibson and on to Texas. Here was the voting precinct of Drywood township, when this was a part of Bates county. Hudson was one of the county judges of the county (Bates) from 1842 to 1846, and one of the townships of Bates county was named for him.
A mile or more south of Hudson, on lot 2, lived Jesse Mundin, an Illinoisan, in 1842. In 1846 he evacuated his claim, however, and went to Jasper county. A little south of Mundin, on lot 1, lived Dr. James White; and still below, on section 7, lived a man named Bigham; both Bigham and his wife died about 1847.
According to the testimony of Peter Teel, who came to the country in 1842, there was a considerable settlement at that time in the neighborhood of Avola. The families of Jefferson Cope- land and Jesse Copeland, and the Nugents, Halls and Bloom- field were living here. The Halls and Nugents lived on section 19, west and northwest of the village. All were from Illinois. A few years later the Nugents removed over on the Osage and the Copelands and Halls to Iowa.
Samuel Simpson came in 1847 to the southeast quarter of section 18, a mile north and a little west of Avola. His brother, Benjamin, came the same time and located on Pleasant Run, aft- erward at "Shanghai." The Simpsons were natives of Kentucky, but came directly to this township from Gasconade county. Ben Simpson was killed in the Confederate service during the war.
Other early settlers in the township were Judge Grace, who lived in the northeast corner of the township; Dr. Helper, who lived near Sam Simpson; Barnett Boulware, who lived a mile east of Avola, having removed there from the western part of the county in 1855, where he married a Miss Apperson, daughter of Mrs. Celia Apperson, who came to Harrison township in 1842; Rev. Thomas R. Davis, who lived near Shanghai.
In 1850 Jonathan Estes, with his wife and five children, came
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from North Carolina and settled in this township, on the north side of Pleasant Run, on the south part of section 6. He built a blacksmith shop on the old Nevada and Lamar road, and this he operated for some years. During the Civil War he was com- pelled to leave, and with his family removed to Cooper county. Returning in 1865, he found his farm dismantled by the storms of war, but in a few years he had about made his losses whole. Mr. Estes died in 1879; his wife in 1876. His eldest daughter, Helen M., married George C. Hardy, of Moundville township.
The first postoffice in the southern part of Vernon county was at the residence of Judge William Hudson, who was the first postmaster. The office was called Drywood. After Judge Hud- son the next postmaster was Judge James Grace. After the war Peter Teel had charge of the office for many years. Then it was moved a mile to the eastward, and when Milo was estab- lished the office was discontinued or practically removed to Milo.
SHANGHAI.
In the southwest corner of this township in the northeast quarter of section 31 there was a locality before the war called "Shanghai." (The situation was about a mile and a half south of Avola.) Several years before the war Rev. Thomas R. Davis started a steam sawmill a quarter of a mile from the exact loca- tion where he had laid out a town which he called "Fairview." At "Shanghai" proper Benjamin Simpson had a considerable dry goods and grocery store, and there was a blacksmith shop, a grocery and two or three dwelling houses.
Shanghai was a hard locality. A great deal of whisky was sold and drank and the place was the scene of frequent brawls and fights. In vain did Mr. Davis try to repress the sale of whisky and the proceedings of those who drank it. When the war broke out Mr. Davis went to Illinois, where he remained until it was over. Nothing more was heard of this place after the war and the site is now an excellent farm.
During the Civil War Drywood township was the scene of some tragedies worthy of note. All occurred at or in the imme- diate vicinity of Shanghai.
In the fall of 1861 the first tragedy occurred at the cross- roads near the house of Mr. Davis. A Union citizen from Bar- ton or Dade was fleeing into Kansas. His family was with him,
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as was another man, and the entire party were traveling in a wagon. At Davis' they were overtaken by a party of secession troops who had followed them. The Union man jumped from his wagon to defend himself, but the leader of his pursuers shot him dead after an exchange of shots between them. The other man's life was spared, but the dead man's arms and his saddle were taken. The family were then allowed to go on to Kansas, taking the dead man with them.
Another time, in 1863, a Union man named Buffington, who had lived near Greenfield, was on his way to Fort Scott in a wagon with his household goods. He, too, was overtaken at the Davis place by a party of Confederates and killed. His horses were taken at the time, but his wagon, some harness, a spinning wheel and other trumpery were scattered about and left to decay.
In the fall of 1864-some say it was at the time of the Price raid-three Confederates, or bushwhackers, were captured down in Barton county (at Jesse Riggs', probably), by some Kansas troops, brought to Shanghai and hung on the apple trees in Mr. Davis' orchard.
But in the summer of 1863 an incident occurred at Davis' which was bloodless in its character, but exciting, full of interest and fairly humorous. Benjamin Archer and Benjamin Simpson, Jr., two young bushwhackers, just setting out, waylaid two Kan- sas soldiers at the Davis house. The soldiers were mounted and going from Lamar to Fort Scott. Archer and Simpson were in Davis' abandoned house ; one had a musket and the other a horse pistol. The road ran by within thirty yards of the doors and when the soldiers came opposite the house the boys poked their weapons through a crack and called out, "Halt! Surrender or we will blow you through!" The soldiers stopped and threw their arms over the fence, when Archer went out and dismounted them. Simpson came out and the two buckled on the captured revolvers and carbines, mounted the horses and sent the prison- ers on to Fort Scott. The Kansans were greatly chagrined when they found how they had been taken in. They swore as only troopers can swear and declared they believed Archer and Simp- son when they said, "There are ten muskets and shotguns point- ing at you." But at last they made the best of the situation and good-naturedly set out on their trudging journey to Fort Scott.
In the spring of 1865, before Lee surrendered, a Federal sol-
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dier, named Wilhite, was killed by some bushwhackers at the house of Joseph Copeland on the Landon branch. The soldier lived in Cedar county, near Stockton; he was on his way to Kan- sas on private business and stopped at Copeland's for the night. The bushwhackers rode up dressed in blue and claimed to be Federal soldiers from Fort Scott. The soldier was deceived, ad- mitted his identity in spite of the hint of Mr. Copeland that he was in danger and the bushwhackers took him out and shot him. His body was buried on the Landon branch on the south part of section 4. In years past the lonely grave was strewn with flowers every Decoration day.
PERMANENT SETTLEMENT.
According to the best information obtainable, the first per- manent settlement in Drywood township was made a score of years before the beginning of the Civil War. The credit is due to one of three men-Barnett Boulware, L. Caney Grace or Sam- uel Simpson. These three men, with their respective families, located in 1840 or thereabouts in the neighborhood of what was later Avola in West Drywood. As is usual in all new countries, the first settlements were made in the vicinity of water courses, and this is, in all probability, the reason that Little Drywood and Pleasant Run were chosen as the first homes of white fami- lies in this township. L. Caney Grace, who was probably the township's first settler, came from Tennessee, a state which, with Illinois and Indiana, furnished the majority of South Vernon's emigrants. While the first permanent settlements were made about 1840, it was only shortly before the time of the Civil War -in the early fifties-that this section began to attract general attention.
The township's first schoolhouse was built in 1850 at what was later Avola, and, curiously enough, the pine lumber from which it was constructed was hauled from Arkansas-from Van Winkle's sawmill-a mill in northern Arkansas, well known to southwest Missourians of the early days, and the nearest point at which sawn lumber could be obtained. The old schoolhouse stood for many years, its exterior blackened and charred by prairie fires which many times threatened its destruction and, in fact, it was only by heroic effort of volunteer fire fighters on several occasions that it escaped. The prairie grass in Drywood's
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early days and, indeed, up to the middle eighties grew not as we know it now, but as a luxuriant, tangled mat, tall as a high horse's withers, of coarse, rank, succulent growth and in which a well-developed prairie fire meant a serious matter.
This first school was taught by C. Correll, who forty-six years later was chosen to represent this county in the Missouri legis- lature and was one of the township's foremost citizens. In this house Mr. Correll frequently conducted religious services on Sun- day afternoons, as the township in the fifties was without church facilities.
The first postoffice in the township was called Drywood and was established in the fifties at the home of Peter Teel in the extreme northwestern corner of the township, with Mr. Teel as postmaster, and it is needless to say that his duties were neither exacting nor arduous. Avola was platted in 1869 and the Dry- wood postoffice, which had been discontinued during the Civil War, was re-established there with James Hyder as postmaster. Mr. Hyder soon tired of the duties of postmaster and resigned in favor of his brother, W. B. Hyder, who had arrived the pre- vious year from Tennessee, and who served as postmaster through successive administrations. The Avola, as well as the discon- tinued Drywood office, were served by a star route, the mail being carried from Nevada to Lamar by a carrier who made the trip occasionally on horseback.
The Avola school district at that time was composed of what later made the Sheldon, Avola and Correll districts. When the Avola district was separated from the others, a schoolhouse of hewn hickory logs was put up in what later became the Correll or Prairie View district. Some time later, about 1871, some pub- lic benefactor conceived the idea of making a passageway through the prairie grass to the schoolhouse for those children who lived in the southeastern corner of the district, and with this end in view a team was hitched to a small log and this was dragged through the five-foot prairie grass from a point southeast of where Sheldon now stands to the log schoolhouse. This trail crossed what is now Main street in Sheldon at the intersection of Second street, where the Farmers' Bank building now stands and from there on a direct line northwest by west. This path was greatly appreciated not only by the few school children for whose use it was made, but, lacking roads, it became a thor-
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oughfare for all who had occasion to travel in that general direc- tion; the herds of cattle which fed at pleasure on the prairies used it for their passage and it became so definitely marked that it was not until the plow of the farmer succeeded the herd of the cattleman that it was obliterated. Sheldon district separated from the Correll district in 1875 and the first school in the former district was built in that year.
The evidences of civilization and the improvements which had began to manifest themselves in the early fifties were largely destroyed during the stirring time of 1861-64, and it was not until the establishment of peace that the real and permanent growth of the township began. A house, which until recent years stood southeast of Avola, was during the War of the Re- bellion the scene of a sharp engagement between a small body of Federal troops from Kansas, who had taken possession of the building and were attacked by a detachment of Confederates. The house, which was known as the "Riggs' place," bore many bullet holes which gave mute evidence of the warmth of the engagement.
Avola, which until the establishment of Sheldon and the building of the Missouri Pacific railroad through the county, was the township's principal trading point, at that time rapidly lost prestige and population and now nothing but a name and a memory remains of what was once the stopping point of prac- tically every traveler who journeyed north and south through Vernon and Barton counties.
AVOLA.
The village of Avola was situated in the southwestern part of this township on the lower half of the section line between sections 19 and 20, mainly on the southwest quarter of the latter section. James Hyder settled a quarter of a mile north of the site some years before the war, and a schoolhouse was built in 1859 or 1860. It is said that the lumber out of which this house is built was hauled with ox teams from Arkansas. During the war the soldiers set out a prairie fire which charred the weather boarding a little, but the building itself passed through the war all right, and furnished shelter for many a houseless, homeless family.
After the war Mr. James Gordon, an Irishman, came directly
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from Ohio, bought a tract of land which included the school- house, built a little storehouse, and opened a stock of goods. Mr. James Hyder laid out the village, but the plat was never recorded.
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