USA > Missouri > Livingston County > Past and present of Livingston County, Missouri : a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 19
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tact and presence of mind, and withal of integrity and good character, Captain Kirk at once had the confidence of the people of Confederate sympathies, and in a short time he had gathered about him quite a company of well armed and mounted men, some of whom were as desperate fighters as the war produced.
Kirk's plan of operation seemed to contemplate the hold- ing of Jackson township, or the country between the forks of Grand river, as Confederate ground, into which the Federal troops must not enter. In the summer of 1861, as elsewhere noted, his notices to the Federals warning them not to tres- pass on his dominions were numerously posted, and he per- sistently refused to go South with his company, but remained to make good his warnings, and as he said, to protect his friends. His operations were chiefly of the partisan ranger style of warfare-the forming of ambuscades, sudden waylays, surprises, and predatory incursions and foragings on the en- emy. While under commission in the Confederate service and perhaps entitled to be called Confederates, yet, from their usual style of warfare, Kirk and his men were called bush- whackers.
In the fall of 1861 the bushwhackers drew the first blood. A band of them under John Blackburn waylaid and fired upon Lieut. E. West, of Daviess county, an officer of the 23rd Mis- souri, who was on return to his regiment with some recruits. Of this incident, the Lieutenant, now deputy sheriff of Daviess county, says :
I started from my home in Bancroft, on Sunday morning, October 13, 1861, with six recruits, a driver and myself (mak- ing eight in all), in one wagon to go to Chillicothe, and from there to St. Louis by rail. When we got within about three miles of Spring Hill and were just passing out at the eastern border of what we called Blacks Grove, and immediately on entering the prairie, a band of bushwhackers arose from their concealment, all in line, about fifteen steps from us and com- menced firing upon us. We were all unarmed, which fact their leader, John Blackburn, knew, for he had talked with us not more than two hours before, and knew we had no arms
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with us. When the firing commenced five of the recruits jumped out of the wagon and ran through some high weeds to make their escape. Only two of them were badly wounded; Ransom Shores received two bad wounds and Jack Duncan four. The driver, John Roe, one recruit, John Shire and my- self remained with the team and were all wounded, the driver slightly, Shire severely in the head, and I received four severe wounds. All eventually recovered.
The year following a band of bushwhackers waylaid an- other lot of recruits going to Chillicothe, under the leader- ship of Joseph Conkling, at the northwestern border of the same grove and half a mile from where we were fired upon. Many persons get the two occurrences mixed.
By the early spring of 1862 Kirk and his men had become quite notorious throughout this county and the eastern part of Daviess, and had given the Federals no little trouble. They defied all attempts at capture and frequently fired on small parties of their pursuers. A thorough familiarity with the country, and the fact that nearly every citizen was not un- friendly towards them greatly facilitated their movements, and they kept the Federal forces in the country in a constant state of uneasiness and annoyance. At last a plan was ma- tured by Lieut .- Col. A. M. Woolfolk, of the Ist M. S. M., for their capture or dispersion.
At ten o'clock on the night of May 24, 1862, Colonel Wool- folk left Chillicothe with Captain Ballenger's company (G) and a detachment of Captain Peery's (K) for the Spring Hill country. At the same time Captains McGhee and Folms- bee with their companies (A & B) left Breckinridge for the same destination. The two detachments intended to cooperate as soon as they reached the enemy's country.
The expedition was fairly successful. Colonel Woolfolk's battalion succeeded in capturing Joe Kirk, John Cooper, Jr., and James Hale. The detachment from 'Breckinridge, under Adjutant Doyle, captured Charles Cooper. Three horses and three revolvers were also taken. Some days previously a num- ber of horses had been taken from Union men in Jackson town-
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ship, and Kirk's and Cooper's men were accused of having taken them.
Kirk was taken to Breckinridge and confined in a railroad car with other prisoners. One night he succeeded in cutting a hole in the floor of the car and through this he made his escape. In twenty-four hours he was again in the saddle.
On the 5th of August about twenty men of Co. B, Ist M. S. M., under Lieut. J. T. Goodbrake, and about twenty-five enrolled militia attacked Kirk's and Capt. Frank Davis' com- panies at Diamond, in Daviess county, and defeated them. Five of the Federals were wounded, and some six or eight of the Confederates. The next day the Federal militia cap- tured a young man named Thomas Hinklin, who had been with Kirk in the fight the day before. Because he re- fused to give the names of his comrades or betray their ren- dezvous, the officer in command had him cruelly shot to death. No soldier of Rome or Sparta ever died braver. He unhesitatingly refused to purchase his life on the terms of- fered and calmly facing his executioners died without a tremor of fear or a murmur of protest. Before he was shot he wrote a few lines to his widowed mother and two sisters, but the militia officer tore up the paper. The place of his execution was in Daviess county, twenty-five miles from his home, but his two young sisters recovered his body and bore it to the family cemetery for final interment.
The same day, or the next, Daniel Hale, a brother-in-law of Kirk, was killed in a cane patch, where he was hiding. This was west of Spring Hill. The killing was done by the same detachment that killed young Hinklin, but while the latter's body was treated with some respect, being decently buried, the body of Daniel Hale was shown shameful in- dignity.
After the Diamond fight Kirk returned to Jackson town- ship. He refused to follow off Poindexter when the latter came into the Spring Hill country, but continued to fight on his native heath. About the 17th of August he captured five Union men, citizens of Jackson township (some of whom belonged to the militia, and had come here from Chillicothe,
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on leave), at W. G. Eads' residence, in Daviess county. This was on Sunday, and the following Tuesday a part of Kirk's company under Lieut. David Martin, bushwhacked some twenty of the enrolled militia on Hinklin's branch, northwest of Spring Hill. The militia was returning to Chillicothe from Grundy county and some of them were in a wagon. One militiaman named Joseph Conklin was killed and another named Thomas was mortally wounded. The remainder scat- tered in every direction. The bushwhackers suffered no loss. Kirk himself denounced Martin's conduct on firing on the Federal detachment.
At this time Kirk was endeavoring to secure an exchange of prisoners with the Federals of Chillicothe, and had sent in one man that he held-J. B. Weaver-with a note to Lieu- tenant Turner, demanding the release of two of his man whom the Federals had previously captured. Kirk threatened that unless these men were returned to him he would shoot two of the militiamen in his hands the next morning at nine o'clock. One of the men demanded was sent to Spring Hill, but the other was wounded and could not be sent. Kirk refused the man sent him.
Matters were becoming serious for the two Federal pris- oners in Kirk's hands, when on Tuesday evening Colonel Shanklin sent a force of militia out from Chillicothe towards Spring Hill. In the van of the militia rode William Hale, Sr., Kirk's father-in-law, and his son who had been made pris- oners, and were used as hostages for the safety of Weaver and Marion Hicks, the two militiamen.
Colonel Shanklin says: "The night after Turner's report of Kirk's capture of Hicks, my headquarters at Chillicothe were visited at midnight by a young lady who claimed to be a rebel sympathizer, but a friend of Hicks. She said unless Kirk's wrath was appeased in some way, he would cause Hicks to be killed. I immediately issued the necessary orders to give the people of the forks to understand that if Hicks was killed-and whether he was or not, if Kirk's band was longer harbored and fed in the forks-I would make the whole country between the two rivers a wilderness, and we would
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call that peace. The next morning I sent out two or three companies."
Kirk had moved down from his position on the Doss farm to the Indian hill, whence his scouts saw the Federals approaching with the two Hales conspicuously in front. See- ing that he was outwitted, knowing that if he harmed his pris- oners his relatives would be killed, Kirk retired, and the same night released Marion Hicks unconditionally.
Not long afterwards Kirk crossed Grand river with his company and took up a position on the east bank of the river, in the Van Winkle bend, about four miles northwest of Chilli- cothe. Learning of his presence, Colonel Shanklin sent Cap- tain Spickard with his and Captain Winters' companies of Grundy and Captain Turner's of Livingston, all enrolled mi- litia, from Chillicothe to attack him. Bursting suddenly upon the bushwhackers the militia routed them completely, driving them across the river, and capturing a number of horses, arms, etc. One of Kirk's men, Joseph Allen, was drowned in swim- ming the river. Some of the horses captured were identified as belonging to certain Union men of Jackson township; five had been taken from James Hicks, Sr.
Thereafter the movements of Kirk and his men were prac- tically insignificant. By reason of the presence of an over- whelming force of his enemies he was forced to give up the forks, and went south of the Missouri. Here he was desper- ately wounded, and obliged to leave the service. Bold and shrewd as ever, he made his way back to the county, and then went to California, where he remained until after the war. He is now a quiet, well respected citizen of the county.
THE LATE THOMAS HUTCHINSON A CENTENARIAN
As the historian of this volume we cannot omit reference and add briefly a story of a Christian man, a resident of Liv- ingston county almost sixty years and whose centennial an- niversary was celebrated on Monday, February 26th, 1900, but who was called to rest January 18th, 1901 :
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To attain the venerable age of one hundred years; to retain one's health and be hale and active when the century mark is reached; to have unimpaired the mental activities at the dawn of one's hundredth birthday anniversary; to have the memory so active and reliable that events of one's child- hood can be recalled as easily and as accurately as they could be three quarters of a century ago; to live in the esteem of one's neighbors five score years; to be regarded through this long period as one of nature's real noblemen ; to regulate one's conduct, through a period of years exceeding those allotted man by the Psalmist, so rigidly as ever to be pointed out as a consistent Christian example, worthy of all emulation; to live through an entire century, barring a few short months, with fair prospects ere the final summons comes of spending a few days in the third that has illumined the earth since one's ad- vent thereon-are blessings vouchsafed few mortals in this transitory world of ours, but such were the privileges of Thomas Hutchinson, who for almost sixty years had been a resident of this county. He was one of the pioneers of North- western Missouri, and two generations have known and hon- ored him since first he braved the dangers and trials of a long and tedious journey, through almost trackless forests and across broad expanses of prairie, but lately the demesne of the red aborigines, to cast his lot with those thousands of hardy pioneers from Virginia and Kentucky and Tennessee (among them grand old Daniel Boone himself) who added vim and vigor and respectability to the population of the young com- monwealth-Imperial Missouri.
Thomas Hutchinson first saw the light of day in Pittsyl- vania county in the southern part of Virginia, on February 26, 1800-but two months after the death of Washington, the most illustrious of all that army of noblemen whose names crowd the escutcheon of their mother state. His father was John Hutchinson, and Thomas was the only one of his chil- dren born in the Old Dominion. In 1802, when Thomas was but two years of age, his parents were attracted by the glowing accounts sent back by Daniel Boone and his companions, and they concluded to sever the ties that bound them to home and
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ST. JOSEPIT'S ACADEMY, CHILLICOTHE
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its associations and seek their fortunes in the wilds of Ken- tucky. Thither they made the journey on horseback, the only other means of travel (there being no roads through the wil- derness and across the Alleghanies) being on foot. The young child was carried on his mother's lap and after many a weary day's journey his parents located on a farm in Casey county. Not yet was a home in the "dark and bloody ground" entirely without danger. Bands of predatory savages occasionally in- vaded the state, and one knew not at what moment from be- hind a tree a lurking foe would speed the deadly bullet, or the piercing warwhoop would chill the very blood coursing through the veins of wife and little ones as they cowered in the darkest corner of their primitive log cabin, fearful lest the next moment would send the reeking tomahawk crashing in- to their brains. But slowly was the red man being pushed to the West, and fewer and fewer became those deeds of terror east of the Mississippi river.
In this new home nine children were born to John Hutch- inson and wife, and here Thomas spent his boyhood days and received such an education as the limited facilities of the times afforded. Of these brothers and sisters, only one is left- James Hutchinson of Chillicothe, Missouri, who was ninety- eight years of age May 23rd, 1913.
On this farm John Hutchinson died when something over sixty years of age, while his wife, Jane, came to Missouri with her youngest son, George, and died many years later. She was a cousin of General Linthacum who served in the Con- tinental army during the Revolution.
One day while attending a protracted meeting, Thomas, then a young man, witnessed the immersion of a number of persons. Among these converts was a young lady to whom he seems to have been attracted, whether by her piety or by her comeliness we know not. The attraction seems to have been mutual, for the young man formed her acquaintance and at once proceeded to lay siege to her affections, pressing his suit with so much earnestness that she speedily promised to share his fortune for life. This young lady was Miss Polly Tate, of Lincoln county, Kentucky, a niece of Gen. Charles Lee,
Vol. I-15
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of the Revolutionary war, and on the 15th of November they were married. Polly was born on February 18th, 1799, hence was a year the senior of her husband.
After the honeymoon had begun to wane, Mr. Hutchinson bought a tract of land situated in the forks of Green river and Indian creek, including the valley of each. On this farm was a boiling spring and a salt well. From the latter all the salt used by the family during the first years of their residence there was manufactured.
Here the young couple began life for themselves; and while the husband toiled early and late on the farm, putting into practical use the lessons learned so well under the teach- ings of his father, his young wife presided with equal dig- nity and frugality over the department sacred to Lares and Penates, serving these equally as well as her husband served Agricola. Here their children-nine in all, six boys and three girls-were born, and here was laid the foundation of that competency which the couple enjoyed in after life. But after some twenty years they began to hear wonderful stories of the fertility of the soil and of the genial climate of the new com- monwealth beyond the Mississippi, and oft were their long- ing eyes turned to Hesperides. At length, in common with many of their neighbors, the spirit of emigration swept them off their feet; hence in 1840 the farm was sold to a brother, Jeremiah Hutchinson, and Thomas set out on horseback for the fabled Utopia in Northwestern Missouri. Here he bought twelve hundred acres of land, situated principally in Jackson township, Livingston county. This land included all or a part of the estates of Jerd M. Hutchinson, John P. Hutchin- son, Jas. Hutchinson, Alexander Dockery and Luther Wil- liams.
Mr. Hutchinson brought with him from Kentucky a quan- tity of blue grass seed, practically unknown in this region at that day. This he supplied to all applicants, and in a few years it had largely rooted out the prairie grass and was seen in the fence corners from Jamesport to Spring Hill. Kentucky blue grass was a great curiosity to the natives, growing fre- quently from three to four feet in height.
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In 1830 the subject of this sketch united with the Baptist church and was immersed by Reverend Wariner, who after- wards located in this part of Missouri. Afterwards, through the teachings of Alex. Campbell, the branch of the Baptist church with which Mr. Hutchinson united was known as the Church of Christ. For seventy years he had lived a con- sistent and exemplary Christian life, and for fifty-eight years had been an elder in his church. Such long service in the cause of the Master here on earth will surely entitle one to an eternity of rest in the Land Elysian.
In Missouri seventy years ago, there were, in the rural districts, no church buildings or even schoolhouses in which preaching could be held. It was customary to have services at private residences. Such services were held alternately on one Sunday in each month at the farm residences of Mr. Hutchinson and John Boyle. A peculiarity of the time was the custom of almost the entire congregation remaining to dinner with the family at whose home the preaching was held. That surely worked quite a hardship upon the feminine por- tion of the household-but hospitality was at tidewater in those days. It is a pity more of it had not survived the "re- construction" period subsequent to the Civil war. A half cen- tury ago, in Missouri, as throughout all the southern states, for a farmer to accept pay from a stranger for entertainment, or neighbor to demand or expect remuneration for a few days' help in the harvest field or during other busy seasons was something unknown.
The products of the farm in those days were hemp, flax, wheat, tobacco, corn, oats and hay. The farmer hauled his surplus of these to Brunswick, while his cattle were driven to Leavenworth before a market was reached. The few "store goods" used by the family were purchased at Chillicothe and Brunswick. About all the cloth used for clothing and bed- ding, and nearly all the food were produced on the farm. In those days "Adam delved and Eve span." For a buxom and intelligent lass to have reached womanhood without learning to card, spin, dye, weave, and cut and make garments, would have been a disgrace.
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Seven men-Messrs. Peery, Kesler, Carson, Davis, Ram- sey, Blackburn and Hutchinson-united in furnishing the means to build the first schoolhouse in Jackson township, in what is now known as the Blackburn district; and in this schoolhouse Thomas Hutchinson taught the first free school in that locality. He taught only one term of school, but there- by earned the reputation of being a very successful teacher, being much better educated than the majority of the pioneers.
In 1835 Mr. Hutchinson was elected county judge of Liv- ingston county, and was re-elected for a second term. It was about this time that a proposition to sell all the swamp and overflowed lands, donated by the state to the various coun- ties for school purposes, came up. Over this question the two dominant parties of the time-the Democrats and the Whigs -both split. Mr. Hutchinson (who was then, and had been all his life, a Democrat) was opposed to the sale of these lands, believing that the time was not far distant when they would be greatly enhanced in value-and it has since been demon- strated that he was right. When he came before the voters for re-election the third time, his opposition to this measure caused his defeat.
During the Civil war Mr. Hutchinson remained at home, taking no part in the strife, being even then past the usual age at which a man bears arms. His sympathies were with the South. While he lost considerably in the way of stock and feed, etc., he was not molested personally. His slaves, of which he owned several, remained with him until 1863, and one man until near the close of the war when he left to avoid being drafted.
The subject of this sketch had always been a man of peace and conservatism. His home had always been noted for its hospitality and the congeniality of its inmates.
ONE HUNDRED YEARS! Mr. Hutchinson, as we have stated, was born two months after the death of Washington. He was born during the administration of the second president of the United States, hence lived in the term of every chief execu- tive except the first. He was born about the time Spain ceded to France that vast territory west of the Mississippi, out
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of which Missouri was subsequently carved. He was seven years old when Robert Fulton astonished the world by pro- pelling his vessel, the Clermont, on the waters of the Hudson river by means of steam. He was twelve years old when the War of 1812 began, and relates that his father personally out- fitted a man named Randall Sluter, who enlisted in a regi- ment commanded by Colonel Coffey, and won the distinction at the Battle of New Orleans of being the first man to leap over the cotton-bale breastworks in pursuit of the flying Brit- ish, whose ranks again and again had been decimated by the pitiless storm of lead from the unerring rifles of the Southern frontiersmen. He was of age at the election of John Quincy Adams (1824). He was nineteen years of age when the good ship Savannah sailed into a British port, from America, un- der steam. He was in his twenty-second year when Missouri became a state. He was thirty years old when the first train of cars was drawn by a locomotive. He was forty-four years of age when the first message was flashed over the electric telegraph. He was forty-six years of age when General Tay- lor, hitherto almost unknown, won that renown on the plains of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma and Buena Vista which elevated him to the presidency; and General Scott carried his conquering eagles from Vera Cruz, by a path deemed well nigh impregnable, to the ancient capital of the Montezumas. He was sixty-one years old when that gigantic strife between the states broke out, the losses in engagements of which were numbered by thousands, and in which the "battles" of the wars of the last few years would have been regarded only as significant skirmishes, scarcely worthy of mention in the of- ficial reports. His hair was already snowy when the tele- phone and electric lights came into use. He has seen the reap- ing sickle give place to the cradle, the cradle to the reaper, the reaper to the harvester, and the harvester to the self- binder. He had seen the population of our country increase from four millions to seventy-five millions. He had seen the area of the United States increase from 800,000 square miles to nearly 5,000,000 square miles.
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SOME OLD PEOPLE
Following comprise a partial list of the octogenarians and nonogenarians in Livingston county, together with place and date of birth and date of their coming into this county :
Mrs. Catherine Jones, a resident of Blue Mound township, was born in Wales, England, April 11th, 1831, where she was reared to womanhood. Emigrated to Bevier, Missouri, in 1893; removed to Red Oak, Iowa, soon after and thence to her present abode in the year 1902. Mrs. Jones is hale and hearty.
One of the nonogenarians of Livingston county is Mrs. Cynthia J. Lauderdale, a resident of Jackson township. Mrs. Lauderdale was born in Bourbon county, Kentucky, on De- cember 25, 1822, being the daughter of James and Jane Boyle, who were also natives of the blue grass region. The parents of the subject of this sketch were early settlers of Linn county, Missouri, where the father died. The mother then came to this county with her children and resided until her death. On June 23, 1847, she was united in marriage to the late Robert Lauderdale, who was one of the most successful farm- ers and stock raisers in the county. The first matrimonial ven- ture of Miss Boyle was her union with Wm. Watson. Of the children born to Mr. and Mrs. Lauderdale, only one sur- vives, L. L. Lauderdale of Chula, Missouri. Grandma Lau- derdale was ninety years of age Christmas day, 1912, and is quite healthy.
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