The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches, Part 2

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald
Publication date: 1882]
Publisher: [n.p.
Number of Pages: 1154

USA > Missouri > Pettis County > The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches > Part 2

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THE WHITE RACE IN MISSOURI.

SPANISH AND FRENCH DISCOVERERS.

In 1512 the Spanish adventurer Ponce de Leon discovered Florida; and at this time and for some years after the old countries of Europe were filled with the wildest and most extravagant stories about the inexhaustible mines of gold, silver and precious stones that existed in the country north of the Gulf of Mexico; also of great and populous cities containing fabulous wealth, beyond what Pizarro and Cortes had found in Peru and Mexico. And besides all this, the "fountain of perpetual youth," which all Europe had gone crazy after, about this time, was supposed to be in that region. Indeed, it can hardly be doubted that the Spaniards in Mexico had gathered from the natives some inkling of the wonderful healing waters now known as

* See Smithsonian Report, 1879, pp. 357-58. Also " American Antiquities," by Josiah Priest, 1833, pp. 1850-51-52.

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

Hot Springs, Arkansas, and the brilliant quartz crystals found in that region, as well as the glittering ores of Missiouri.

Ferdinand de Soto was a wealthy cavalier who had won fame as a leading commander in Pizarro's conquest of Peru; he imbibed deeply the current imaginings about the undiscovered wonders of the new world, and was eager to immortalize his name by bringing to his king and coun- try the glory of still more important conquests and discoveries; and he especially desired to find the supposed " fountain of perpetual youth." Accordingly, in 1538 he received permission from the king of Spain to conquer Florida at his own cost -"Florida " then meaning all the unknown country from the Gulf of Mexico to the Northern ocean. He collected a band of more than six hundred young bloods who were able ·. to equip themselves in all the gorgeous trappings and splendor of a Span- ish cavalier dress parade, and with this plumed and tinselled troupe, very like the grand entree riders of a modern circus, he landed in Tampa Bay, Florida, in 1539. From here he boldly struck out into the interior, wan- dering about and pushing forward with dogged perseverance, in spite of bogs and streams and bluffs; in spite of tangling thickets and dense for- ests; in spite of heats and rains; in spite of the determined hostility of the natives-until in May, 1541, he discovered the Great River, a few miles below where the city of Memphis now stands; and thus he made his name memorable for all time. After some delay, to construct boats, they crossed the river and pushed on northward as far as where the city of New Madrid now stands; and this was the first time that the eyes of white men looked upon any portion of the soil now comprised within the State of Missouri.# But, so fruitless was this visit that no white man set foot within our present State boundary again until one hundred and thirty-two . years . afterward, when the French missionaries, Marquette and Joliet, . came from the great lakes down the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers, to the mouth of the Missouri, in June, 1673. This was the first time white men had beheld the waters of this great stream, and they named it Peki- tonoui, or " Muddy Water River". It was known by this name until about 1710 or 1712, when it began to be called "the river of the Mis- souris," referring to a tribe of Indians that dwelt at its mouth, chiefly on the lands now comprised in St. Louis county. Marquette and Joliet went on down the river as far south as the mouth of the Arkansas river, of course making several camping stops on Missouri soil, and discovering the Ohio river. From the Arkansas they returned northward the same way they

* De Soto and his army came into Missouri from the south, twice crossing the Ozark mountains. He spent the winter of 1541-42 in Vernon county, in the extreme western part of the State. Ruins of their winter camp structures and smelting operations are still found there. They melted lead ore for silver, and the glittering, lustrous, yellow, zinc blende or Smithsonite for gold; but were deeply disgusted to find at last that they had been handling only the basest metals.

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

came down, and reached Green Bay, Wisconsin, again in September of that year - 1673.

The next visit of white men to this State was in 1682. In 1678 the French had built a fort with a missionary station a.id trading post, near where the city of Peoria, Ills., now stands. During the winter of 1681 -82, Robert de la Salle made preparations, first in Canada, and then at this Illinois fort, to explore the Mississippi river to its mouth. He left the fort with a company of twenty Frenchmen, eighteen Indian men and ten squaws, in such boats and canoes as he could provide. They rowed down the Illinois river and reached its mouth on the 6th of February; a few days were spent here making observations, repairing boats, preparing food, and establishing signals that they had been there and taken posses- sion of the land in the name of their great king. By February 13th La Salle was ready to push on, and started with his little fleet to solve the great mystery of a navigable waterway to the Gulf of Mexico. Of course this expedition passed along the eastern border of Missouri, but no points are mentioned to identify any landing which they may have made within our State. Early in April La Salle accomplished the grand object of his ven- ture by discovering the three principal mouths of the Mississippi; and on the nearest firm dry land he could find from the mouth he set up a col- umn bearing the cross and the royal arms of France, while the whole company performed the military and religious rites of loyalty to their king and country- and La Salle himself, acting as chief master of cere- monies, in a clear, loud voice proclaimed that he took possession of all the country between the great gulf and the frozen ocean, "in the name of the most high, mighty and victorious prince, Louis the Great, by the grace of God king of France and Navarre, 14th of the name, this 9th day of April, 1682." In honor of his sovereign he named the whole vast region Louisiana -that is, Louis' land, and named the river itself St. Louis. And thus it was that our State of Missouri first became a part of historic Louisiana, and passed under the nominal ownership and authority of France.

The next historic appearance of white men within our State was in 1705. The French settlers in this vast new country had kept themselves entirely on the east side of the Mississippi river; but during this year they sent an exploring party up the Missouri river in search of gold; it prospected as far as the mouth of the Kansas river, where Kansas City now stands, without finding anything valuable, and returned disheartened and disgusted. On September 14, 1712, the king of France, Louis XIV, gave to a wealthy French merchant named Anthony Crozat, a royal patent of " all the country drained by the waters emptying directly or indirectly into the Mississippi, which is all included in the boundaries of Louisiana." Crozat appointed his business partner, M. de la Motte, governor, and he 2

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

arrived in 1713; Kaskaskia, Illinois, was then the provincial headquarters, and source of supplies for Upper Louisiana, which was also sometimes called Illinois; but New Orleans was the nominal seat of government for the whole Louisiana territory. The old town of Mine-la-Motte, in Mad- ison county, commemorates this first governor. Crozat expected to find inexhaustible mines of gold and silver in this territory, and spent immense sums of money in vain efforts to attain his object. Practical miners were sent everywhere that the natives reported any glittering substance to exist. The explorers found iron, zinc, copper, lead, mica, pyrites, quartz crystals, etc., in great abundance, but no gold, silver or diamonds; and after five years of disastrous failure and disappointment, in 1717, Crozat returned his luckless charter to the king.

Next, in 1716 an adventurous Scotchman named John Law, got up a grand scheme for making everybody rich without work, and induced the French king and court and people to engage in it. This wild financial venture is known in history as the " Mississippi bubble," the "South Sea bubble," etc. The charter of Louisiana and monopoly of all its trade was given to a corporation, called the "Company of the West," whose cap- ital stock was to be 100,000,000 francs, with power to issue stock in small shares, and establish a bank, etc. Shares rose to twenty times their original value, and the bank's notes, though essentially worthless, were in circulation to the amount of more than $200,000,000. Law himself sunk $500,000 in the scheme; but it bursted, as bodiless as a bag of wind; while he, the originator and manager of it, had to escape from Paris for his life, and died poor at Venice in 1729. In 1731 the charter of Louis- iana was again returned to the crown. However, the excitement over this great scheme for making fabulous wealth out of nothing, had brought many adventurous Frenchmen into the territory as gold-hunters, who failing in that, worked some of the lead mines, and sent their pro- ducts back to Europe.

In 1720 or 1721, an enterprising Frenchman named Renault took charge of a large lead mining enterprise. He brought M. La Motte, who was a professional mineralogist, with about two hundred expert miners and metallurgists, and five hundred negroes, to develop the mineral wealth that actually did exist. He made his headquarters at Fort de Char- tres, on the Illinois side, ten miles above St. Genevieve, and sent out explor- ing and working parties to locate mining camps west of the Great River. Mine-la-Motte, in Madison county, was one of the first of these loca- tions; also Potosi and Old Mine in Washington county; and many others. In 1765 a few families located at Potosi. Much of the mining was surface work- hence, scattered and transitory; and their smelting operations were merely to melt the ore in a wood fire and then clear away the ashes and gather up the lumps of lead. This was carried to

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

the river on pack-horses or on rude ox-carts, and thence shipped to New Orleans by fleets of drifting keel-boats, which returned laden with for- eign goods. Many of the immigrants of this period also engaged in agriculture, especially in Illinois, so that there really began to be a settled occupation of the country, as a final outcome of the greatest speculative delusion known to history. Lippincott's Gazetteer of the World says: " Fort Orleans, near where Jefferson City now stands, was built by the French in 1719"; this was a temporary safeguard for John Law's crazy gold-hunters, but did not make a permanent settlement. Kaskaskia, now in Randolph county, Ills., was settled by the French in 1673, and was for about a century the metropolis of the vast territory sometimes called "Upper Louisiana," sometimes "Illinois," and sometimes the "Northwestern Territory." And in 1735 some emigrants from Kaskaskia, moved across the Great River and made a settlement at what is now St. Genevieve, Missouri, which was the first permanent white settlement made and maintained within the State; the previous adventurers in search of min- eral wealth had located mining camps at several points, but had not established any permanent town or trading post.

The next settlement that can be historically traced to its origin was that of St. Louis. A Frenchman named Pierre Liguest Laclede,* who lived in New Orleans in 1762, organized the " Louisiana Fur Company," under a charter from the director-general of the province of Louisiana; this charter gave them the exclusive right to carry on the fur trade with the Indians bordering on the Missouri river, and west of the Mississippi, " as far north as the river St. Peter" (the same that is now called the Min- nesota river, and empties into the Mississippi at Fort Snelling). Laclede seems to have formed a definite plan and purpose to establish a permanent trading post at some point in Upper Louisiana, for he made up a company of professional trappers, hunters, mechanics, laborers, and boatmen, and with a supply of goods suitable for the Indian trade, they left New Orleans in August, 1763, bound for the mouth of the Missouri river. The manner of navigating these boats against the current of the Missis- sippi for a distance of 1,194 miles, was of the most rude, primitive and laborious sort. Sometimes when the wind was favorable they could sail a little; but the main dependence was by means of push-poles and tow- ropes. The boats were long and narrow, with a plank projecting six or eight inches on each side. The boat would of course keep near the shore; a man at each side, near the bow of the boat, would set his pole on the river bottom, then brace his shoulder against the top of the pole with

* Campbell's Gazetteer of Missouri says this man's family name was Liguest; B. Gratz Brown gives it in Johnson's Cyclopedia as Lingueste; but the man himself appears to have written his name Laclede, of the firm of Laclede, Moxan & Co., who constituted the historic "Louisiana Fur Company."

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

all his might, and as the boat moved under him he would walk along the narrow plank until he reached the stern, and the boat had thus been propelled forward the distance of its length; then he would walk back to the bow, dragging his pole along in the water, set it on the bottom and push again as before. And thus it was that the rugged pioneers of civilization in the new world for more that a hundred years navigated the Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, Illinois, Wisconsin, and some other rivers, with what were in later years called keel-boats. But sometimes, for a rest, or when the beach was favorable, a gang of men would go ashore with a long rope attached to the boat, and thus tow it along against the current, or they would tie the forward end to a tree or snag and let those on the boat pull in the rope and thus draw the boat along-meanwhile those on shore going ahead with another rope, making another tie-and so on; this was called "warping"; but when it was necessary to cross the stream they had recourse to oars or paddles. It took Laclede three months in this way to get from New Orleans up to St. Genevieve, or Fort de Chartres, the military post on the east side a few miles further up the river, where he arrived on the third of November. Here he left his goods and part of his company, but taking a few picked men, he himself pushed on to the mouth of the Missouri. He seems to have had a sort of prophetic forecast that this was the right spot to locate the future trading post for all that vast region of country which was drained by the two prin- cipal great rivers of the new world. At the mouth of the Missouri he found no site that suited him for a town, and he turned back down the Mississippi, carefully exploring the west bank until he reached the high, well protected and well drained location where the city of St. Louis now stands. This was the nearest spot to the mouth of the Missouri which at all met his idea, and he began at once to mark the place by chopping notches in some of the principal trees. This was in December, 1763. He then returned to the fort and pushed on his preparations for the new . settlement, saying enthusiastically to the officers of the fort that he had "found a situation where he was going to plant his colony; and the site was so fine, and had so many advantages of position for trade with all this region of country, that it might in time become one of the finest citics in America."

Early in February, 1764, a company of thirty men, in charge of Auguste Chouteau, set out from Fort de Chartres and arrived at the chosen spot on the 14th. The next day all hands went to work clearing the ground and building a storehouse for the goods and tools, and cabins for their own habitation. In April Laclede himself joined them and pro- ceeded to lay out the village plat, select a site for his own residence, and name the town Saint Louis, in honor of his supposed sovereign, Louis XV. This very territory had been yielded up to Spain in 1762, but these loyal

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

Frenchmen in naming their new town after the French king never dreamed that they were then and for nearly two years had been Spanish subjects, instead of French; the unwelcome news had reached New Orleans in the same month, April, but did not arrive at St. Louis until late in the year; and when it came the inhabitants were appropriately wroth and indignant, for they hated Spain with a fighting hatred. However, the change made very little practical difference to the town or its people. In 1763 all the French possessions on the east side of the Mississippi river, and also Canada, had been ceded to England, but it was late in 1764 before the English authorities arrived to take possession of Kaskaskia, or Fort de Chartres, and other military posts; and when they did come, many of the French settlers moved over to St. Louis, giving it a consid- erable start, both in population and business. The Indians, too, being generally more friendly toward the French than the English, came over to St. Louis to trade their peltries, instead of going to Kaskaskia, as they had formerly done; and this fact gave the new town a powerful impulse.

From this time forward new settlements began to spring up within our present boundaries. New Bourbon was settled in 1789. In 1762 a hunter named Blanchette built a cabin where the city of St. Charles now stands, and lived there many years; but just when the place began to be a town or village does not appear to be known. However, in 1803, St. Charles county was organized, and then comprised all the territory lying north of the Missouri and west of the Mississippi; thus taking in all of north Missouri, and the entire States of Iowa, Minnesota, Dakota, and on west to the Pacific ocean. This was the largest single "county " ever known in the world, and St. Charles city was the county seat.

In 1781 the Delaware Indians had a considerable town where New Madrid now stands; and that year Mr. Curre, a fur trader of St. Louis, established a branch house here. In 1788 a colony from New Jersey settled here, and laid out a plat for a large city, giving it the name of New Madrid, in honor of the capital of Spain. But they never realized their high hopes of building up a splendid city there.

Among the historic incidents of early settlement worthy of mention at this point, is the case of Daniel Boone, whose hunter life in Kentucky forms a staple part of American pioneer history. Boone came to this territory in 1797, renounced his citizenship in the United States, and took the oath of allegiance to the Spanish crown. Delassus was then the Spanish governor; and he appointed Boone commander of a fort at Femme Osage, now in the west part of St. Charles county. He roamed and hunted over the central regions of Missouri the rest of his life, and it was for a long period called the "Boone's Lick country," from some salt licks or springs which he discovered and his sons worked, and which were choice hunting grounds because deer and other animals came there

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

to lick salt. Col. Boone died Sept. 26, 1820, in St. Charles county, but was buried in Marthasville in Warren county, as was his wife also. Their bones were subsequently removed to Frankfort, Kentucky.

THE AMERICAN PERIOD.

In 1801 the territory west of the Mississippi was ceded back to France by Spain; in 1803 President Jefferson purchased from the French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, the entire territory of Louisiana, for $15,- 000,000; the formal transfer was made at New Orleans, December 20, 1803. On the 26th of March, 1804, Congress passed an act dividing this vast accession into two parts, the lower one being named the "Terri- tory of Orleans," with its capital at New Orleans; the upper division was called the "District of Louisiana," with its capital at .St. Louis. This latter district comprised the present State of Arkansas and all from that north to nearly the north line of Minnesota, and west from the Mis- sissippi river to the Rocky Mountains. Don Carlos Dehault Delassus had been the last Spanish governor at St. Louis, and no change was made after its re-cession to France, until in March, 1804, when he delivered the keys and the public documents of his governorship to Capt. Amos Stoddard, of the United States army, who immediately raised the first American flag that ever floated west of the Mississippi river, over the government buildings at St. Louis. There it has floated proudly and uninterruptedly ever since, and there it will float until St. Louis becomes the central metropolis and seat of empire of the entire North American continent.

It should be mentioned here that the war of the American Revolution did not involve any military operations as far west as the Mississippi river; hence the little French fur-trading village of St. Louis was not affected by the clash of arms which was raging so desperately through all the States east of the Ohio river. But the success of the colonies in this uriequal conflict gave them control of all south of the river St. Lawrence and the great lakes, as far west as the Mississippi river; and when Napo- leon had sold to the new republic the extensive French possessions west of the Mississippi, he remarked that this accession of territory and con- trol of both banks of the Mississippi river would forever strengthen the power of the United States; and said he, with keen satisfaction, "I have given England a maritime rival that will sooner or later humble her pride."

On the 3d of March, 1805, Congress passed at act to organize the Territory of Louisiana; and President Jefferson then appointed as territo- rial governor, Gen. James Wilkinson; secretary, Frederick Bates; judges, Return J. Meigs and John B. Lucas. Thus civil matters went on,

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

and business increased rapidly. When the United States took pos- session of this district or territory it was reputed to contain nine thous- and white inhabitants and about three thousand negroes. The first cen- sus of St. Louis was taken in 1799, and it then had 897 inhabitants. This is presumed to have included the village of Carondelet also, which was started as a rival town soon after the founding of St. Louis.

In June, 1812, Congress passed another act with regard to this new country, and this time it was named the Territory of Missouri, instead of Louisiana. The President was to appoint a governor; the people were to elect representatives in the ratio of one for every five hundred white male inhabitants; this legislative body or lower house, was to nominate to the President eighteen of their own citizens, and from those he was to select and commission nine to form. a senate or legislative council. The house of representatives was to consist of thirteen members at first; they were to hold their office two years, and must hold at least one legislative session at Saint Louis each year. The territory was also authorized to send one delegate to Congress.

In October, 1812, the first territorial election was held, and these peo- ple experienced for the first time in their lives the American privilege of choosing their own law-makers. There were four candidates for Con- gress, and Edward Hempstead was elected. He served two years from December 7th, 1812; then Rufus Easton served two years; then John Scott two years; Mr. Easton was one of the four candidates at the first election; and Mr. Scott was one of the members from St. Genevieve of the first legislative council. The first body of representatives met at the house of Joseph Robidoux, in St. Louis, on December 7th, and consisted of the following members:

From St. Charles -John Pitman, Robert Spencer.

St. Louis-David Musick, B. J. Farrar, Wm. C. Carr, Richard Caulk. St. Genevieve - George Bullet, R. S. Thomas, Isaac McGready.

Cape Girardeau -- G. F. Ballinger, Spencer Byrd.

New Madrid -John Shrader, Samuel Phillips.

They were sworn into office by Judge Lucas. Wm. C. Carr of St. Louis, was elected speaker. The principal business of this assembly was to nominate the eighteen men from whom the President and U. S. Sen- ate should select nine to constitute the legislative council; they made their nominations and sent them on to Washington, but it was not known until the next June who were selected. June 3d, 1813, the secretary and acting governor, Frederick Bates, issued a proclamation declaring who had been chosen by the President as the council of nine, and they were-

From St. Charles -James Flaugherty, Benj. Emmons.

St. Louis - Auguste Chouteau, Sr., Samuel Hammond.

St. Genevieve-John Scott, James Maxwell.

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

Cape Girardeau-Wm. Neely, Joseph Cavener.

New Madrid-Joseph Hunter.

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The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches, Part 2

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald Publication date: 1882] Publisher: [n.p. Number of Pages: 1154

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald
Publication date: 1882]
Publisher: [n.p.
Number of Pages: 1154