USA > Missouri > Buchanan County > The history of Buchanan County, Missouri > Part 9
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The stranger who comes into the county with none of the informa- tion which those possess who have resided here for years, works at a great disadvantage in many respects. He does not at first know whom to interview, or where to find the custodians of important records. How- ever, he possesses one great advantage which more than makes up for this : he enters upon his work with an unbiased mind ; he has no friends; to reward, and no enemies to punish ; his mind is not preoccupied and prejudged by reports which may have incidentally come into his posses- sion while transacting the ordinary affairs of business ; and when in addi- tion to this, he is a person whose business it is to collect statements and weigh facts of history, he is much better qualified for the task, and to dis- criminate between statements, seemingly of equal weight, than those who either immediately or remotely are interested parties and whose regular employment lies in other fields of industry. This is true, even. though the former be a total stranger and the latter have become familiar with men and things by many years of intercourse and acquaintanceship. He is best judge and best juror who is totally unacquainted with both plaintiff and defendant, and he is best qualified to arbitrate between con- flicting facts of history who comes to the task without that bias which is the price one must pay for acquaintanceship and familiarity. The best history of France was written by an Englishman, and the most authentic account of American institutions was written by a Frenchman, and it remained for an American to write the only authentic history of the Dutch Republic.
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The American people are much given to reading, but the character of the matter read is such, that, with regard to a large proportion of them, it may truthfully be said that "truth is stranger than fiction." Espe- cially is this the case in respect to those facts of local history belonging to their own immediate county and neighborhood. This is, perhaps, not so much the fault of the people as a neglect on the part of the book pub- Nishers. Books, as a rule, are made to sell, and in order that a book may have a large sale its matter must be of such a general character as to be applicable to general rather than special conditions-to the nation and state rather than to county and township. Thus it is that no histories heretofore published pertain to matters relating to county and neighbor- hood affairs, for such books, in order to have a sale over a large section of country, must necessarily be very voluminous and contain much matter of no interest to the reader. After having given a synopsis of the history of the state, which is as brief as could well be, we shall then enter upon the history of the county. The physical features of the county and its geol- ogy, will first engage our attention ; then the Platte Purchase and treaty with the Iowas, Sacs and Fox Indians; then the act under which the counties of Platte and Buchanan were organized ; the location of first county seat ; then we shall give something of the history of the Platte country, and the incidents which led to its annexation to the state ; then speak of the first settlers, treating of them as accurately, definitely and fully as warranted by the facts at our disposal, giving the date when cach one came to the county, from what state or country, and where now located, if still living. Pioneer times will then be described, and incidents related showing the trials and triumphs of the pioneer settler. Then county organization, courts and first records, removal of county seat, the early bench and bar, Mexican war, Oregon expedition, California emigrants, old settlers' reunions, etc. A history of St. Joseph from date of earliest settlement, its growth and prosperity, manufac- tures, newspapers, schools, churches, railroads, public buildings, enter- prises, citizens, etc. We shall give a biographical directory, the value of which will increase with years, and conclude with a chapter of facts and miscellaneous matter.
The compiler of a history of a county has a task which may seem to be comparatively easy, and the facts which come within the legiti- mate scope of the work may appear commonplace when compared with national events ; the narration of the peaceful events attending the con- quests of industry as
" Westward the course of empire takes its way"
may seem tame when compared with accounts of battles and sieges. Nevertheless, the faithful gathering, and the truthful narration of facts bearing upon the early settlement of this county, and the dangers, hard-
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ships and privations encountered by the early pioneers, engaged in advancing the standards of civilization is a work of no small magnitude, and the facts thus narrated are such as may challenge the admiration and arouse the sympathy of the reader, though they have nothing to do with the feats of arms.
THE NAME.
It has been intimated by one that there is nothing in a name, but a name sometimes means a great deal. In this case it indicates, in a measure, the character of the people who settled the county, and have. given to it its distinctive characteristics. Names are sometimes given to towns and countries by accident ; sometimes they originate in the childish caprice of some one individual, whose dictate, by reason of some real or imaginary superiority, is law. However, in this instance the county and its chief city did not receive a name by accident ; neither did they originate in the vagaries of one man, but the christening took place after mature deliberation and by general consent.
During the period when the "Platte Purchase" was made, and divided into counties, the man after whom the county was named, had, at that time, not only distinguished himself in the council chambers of the nation, as one of the leaders of the two great parties which were then struggling for the mastery, but had won a more extensive and enduring fame in a foreign field.
The Russian government had, theretofore, refused all intercourse of a commercial character with the United States. The effort had been repeatedly made on the part of our government, through its foreign min- isters, but all attempts had been futile, until James Buchanan was appointed Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to St. Petersburg.
By his adroitness and talents, the commercial intercourse and friendly relations between the two nations were successfully and perma- nently established. His services in that behalf were so signally merito- rious that he grew in favor and popularity with his countrymen, until in 1856, he was elected President of the United States, by one of the largest popular majorities ever received by any man for that place. At the time, therefore, of Mr. Buchanan's rising fame, when his name was being mentioned with admiration by all, the small area of territory now known as Buchanan County was then christened. Whether or not the policy of naming counties after illustrious politicians and famous generals be a good one, it has, nevertheless, been followed to a greater or less extent in the various states throughout the Union, and in none more so than in Missouri, as is illustrated by the following named counties : Atchison, Barton, Bates, Benton, Clay, Clark, Clinton, Dallas, Lewis, Pike, Polk,,
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
Tancy, Randolph, Washington, Webster and many others, but in no case was the selection of a name more appropriate than that of Buchanan County.
A brief sketch of the man whose name the county bears, will be in place here :
He was born in Franklin County, Pennsylvania, April 13, 1791. His father was an Irishman, who had eight years before emigrated from Donegal, and was a farmer. James Buchanan completed his education at Dickinson College, Carlisle, graduating in 1809. Studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1812, and located at Lancaster, Pennsylvania. In 1812 he joined a party of volunteers who, under command of Judge Shippen, marched to the defense of Baltimore, against the British. In 1814 he was elected to the State Legislature, and was re-elected the fol- lowing year, and in 1820 became a Member of Congress. While in Con- gress he uttered grave warnings against alliances with Mexico and the South American Republics. In 1828 he supported General Jackson for President, and was at the same time re-elected to Congress. During the following year he succeeded Daniel Webster as the head of the Judiciary Committee, and in that capacity he conducted the trial and impeachment of Judge Peck. He retired from Congress in 1831, and in 1832 was appointed Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to St. Petersburg. His mission was marked by the treaty of commerce between the United States and Russia. Returning home, he was elected to the United States Senate, and retained his seat till 1845. In the struggle between Calhoun and Jackson, he strongly defended Jackson. He advocated the independence of Texas, and also her annexation. He supported the establishment of an independent treasury. In 1845 was Secretary of State under President Polk, and during President Pierce's administration was Minister at Great Britain. He was the originator of the Ostend Conference, and one of its three members. In that confer- ence he advocated the seizure of Cuba.
Was elected President of the United States in 1856, and thereafter led a retired life, until his death, which occurred in 1868.
Thus much have we deemed proper to be said with regard to the person for whom the county was named. So much every boy or girl, whose home is within the bounds of the county, should know, and less than that certainly would be unsatisfactory to one, whose mind has ever been led to the investigation of the county's history.
CHAPTER II.
PHYSICAL FEATURES.
LOCATION-BOUNDARY-CIVIL AND CONGRESSIONAL TOWNSHIPS-SURFACE-RIVERS- LAKES-TIMBER-ITS IMPORTANCE TO EARLY SETTLERS-CLIMATE-RAINFALL- HEALTH-SOIL-PRAIRIE-WASTE LAND.
Buchanan County is situated near the northwestern portion of the state. Its latitude is 39° 47' north, and longitude 94° 55' west. It is near the same parallel of Philadelphia, Columbus, Indianapolis, Spring- field, Denver and San Francisco. It is about the same meridian as Lake Itasca and Galveston.
It is bounded on the north by Andrew County, east by DeKalb and Clinton, south by Platte, and west by the Missouri River, and contains 272,329 acres, or about four hundred square miles. Missouri is divided into one hundred and fourteen counties, Buchanan being the smallest in area, excepting Clark, Clay, Clinton, Cole, DeKalb, Dunklin, Grundy, Hickory, Mississippi, Moniteau, New Madrid, Platte, Schuyler, Scott, Warren and Worth. Texas is the largest county, containing 700,000 acres, and Dunklin is the smallest, having an area of 110,799 acres.
Buchanan County is at an altitude of about one thousand feet above the level of the sea, and is about four hundred feet above Chicago and nearly six hundred feet above St. Louis. The highest point in the county is Reservoir Hill 310 feet, two and a half miles north of St. Joseph.
The county is divided into twelve civil townships, three full con- gressional townships, and nine fractional congressional townships. The civil townships are as follows: Platte, Jackson, Crawford, Bloomington, Rush, Wayne, Center, Agency, Tremont, Marion, Washington and Lake, Lake being the smallest.
SURFACE.
The land in the county, away from the streams, is generally an undulating prairie, and has altogether a diversity of country seldom found in so small a space. At a varying distance from the larger streams rise irregular lines of bluffs, or hills, sometimes wooded, and sometimes, previous to improvement, covered with a luxuriant growth of prairie grass, having between them water bottom lands of surprising beauty and unsurpassed fertility. These hills are generally a gentle
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
slope, easily ascended and descended by wagons, and sinking into nere benches, moderately lifted above the surface of the valley ; again, some- times they rise to a height of over two hundred feet above the bed of the Missouri River. From side to side, between these hills, the streams meander with banks varied by hill, meadow, and forest. Rising to the higher points the eye often commands views of exquisite loveliness, embracing the silvery course of river or creek, the waving foliage of trees, the changing outlines of hills and the undulating surface of flower- decked prairie, with cultivated farms, with farm houses from the log hut of the first settler to the brick or painted houses and barns of the more advanced cultivator of the soil, and the palatial mansions of the wealthy capitalists.
The county has less land unfitted for cultivation by reason of sloughs and marshes than any of the neighboring counties. There is probably not a section of country of like extent in the state which pos- sesses a better distributed drainage system than Buchanan County. There is proportionately such a small area of waste and swamp lands, and the facilities for drainage are so admirable, that waste lands arising from this cause are too insignificant to be worthy of particular mention.
The country presented to the first settler an easy task in subduing the wild land. Its natural prairies were fields almost ready for the planting of the crop, and its rich black soil seemed to be awaiting the opportunity of paying rewards as a tribute to the labor of the hus- bandman. The farms of Buchanan County are generally large, level, unbroken by impassable sloughs, without stumps or other obstructions, and furnish the best of conditions favorable to the use of reaping machines, mowers, corn planters, and other kinds of labor-saving machinery.
The Missouri River bottoms are bounded by an irregular line of bluffs, varying in altitude from one to three hundred feet in height. North of St. Joseph they reach an elevation of one hundred and forty- five feet, and southward some of these attain an elevation of from two to. three hundred feet above the level of the river.
RIVERS.
Buchanan County is so well supplied with living streams of water. and they are so well distributed over the county, that the people of the county could not possibly make an improvement upon the arrangement if they were allowed the privilege and endowed with the power to make a readjustment of the system of rivers and creeks. Some of these streams have fine mill-sites, and by reason of the water power thus made so accessible, the early settler was spared many of the hardships and incon- veniences experienced by the pioneers of other sections.
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
The Missouri River is the largest stream, and forms the western boundary of the county. Wide, level bottoms border the Missouri, a great portion of which are still covered with native forests.
The Blacksnake, Contrary, Lost, and other small streams flow west, into the Missouri. The Platte River runs from north to south, nearly through the central portion of the county, and receives the One Hun- dred and Two River, Bee Creek, and other small streams on the west, and the Third Fork of Platte, Castile and Malden Creeks on the east. These streams are clear, and of course never-failing. Springs are abun- dant and good, and pure water can be obtained in any part of the county.
LAKES.
Besides the many rivers, creeks and springs which supply the best of living water for both man and beast, convenient to almost every quarter-section of land in the county, there are a number of beautiful lakes in the townships bordering on the Missouri River. The principal of these is Contrary Lake, five miles southwest of St. Joseph. It is semi- · circular in shape, six miles in length, half a mile in width, and abounding in perch, black bass and other kinds of excellent fish. It is a great place of resort for, the anglers and sportsmen of St. Joseph and surrounding country. Uj an the shore of this lake have been erected two or three hotels for the accommodation of those who frequent it during the sport- ing seasons of the year. These hotels are pleasantly located, and are supplied with all the comforts and conveniences usually found at such places.
Sugar Lake contains also an abundance of fish. Horseshoe, Muskrat, Lost, Singleton, Prairie and Marks' Lakes are all in the county near the Missouri. These lakes are prized not only on account of the fish with which they teem, but also because of the geese and ducks which gather there by tens of thousands during the fall. The fish from these lakes supply the St. Joseph market.
TIMBER.
" Majestic woods of ev'ry vigorous green, Stage above stage high waving o'er the hills, Or to the far horizon wide diffused, A boundless deep immensity of shade "
The circumstance which more than any other favored the early and rapid settlement of Buchanan County was the abundance of timber. The presence of timber aided materially in bringing about an early set- tlement and it aided in two ways: first, the county had to depend on immigration from the older settled states of the Union for its popula- tion, Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee. These states
6
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
were originally almost entirely covered with dense forests, and farms were made by clearing off certain portions of the timber. Almost every farm there, after it became thoroughly improved, still retained a certain tract of timber, commonly known as "the woods." The woods is gen- erally regarded as the most important part of the farm, and the average farmer regarded it as indispensable when he immigrated West.
The great objection to the country was the scarcity of timber as compared to the Eastern States, and he did not suppose that it would be possible to open up a farm on the bleak prairie. To live in a region devoid of the familiar sight of timber seemed unendurable, and the aver- age Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky emigrant could not endure the idea of founding a home far away from the familiar sight of forest trees. Then again the idea entertained by the early emigrants that timber was a necessity, was not simply theoretical and ethical. The early settler had to have a house to live in, fuel for cooking and heating purposes, and fences to enclose his claim. At that time there were no railroads whereby lumber could be transported from the pineries ; no coal mines had yet been opened or discovered. Timber was an absolute necessity, without which personal existence as well as material improvement was an impossibility. No wonder that a gentleman from the East, who in early times came to the prairie region of Missouri on a-prospecting tour with a view of permanent location, returned home in" disgust and embodied his views of the country in the following rhyme :
" Oh, lonesome, windy, grassy place, Where buffalo and snakes prevail ; The first with dreadful looking face, The last with dreadful sounding tail ! I'd rather live on camel hump, And be a Yankee Doodle beggar, Than where I never see a stump, And shake to death with fever 'n 'ager."
As before remarked, there are two reasons why the first settlers refused to locate at a distance from the timber, and why the timbered regions bordering upon the rivers became densely populated while the more fertile and more easily cultivated prairies remained for many years unclaimed. The pioneers were in the main the descendants of those hardy backwoodsmen who conquered the dense forests of the South and East. When farms were opened up in those countries a large belt of timber was invariably reserved from which the farmer could draw his supply of logs for lumber and fence rails, and fuel for heating and cook- ing purposes. Even at the present day a farm without its patch of timber is exceedingly rare in those countries. Having from their youth up been accustomed to timber, the emigrant from these timbered regions of the East would have ever felt lonesome and solitary deprived of the
.
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
familiar sight of the tall forest trees and shut off from the familiar sound of the wind passing through the branches of the venerable oaks. Then again, timber was an actual necessity to the early settler. In this day of railroads, herd laws, cheap lumber and cheap fuel, it is easy enough to open a farm and build up a comfortable home away out on the prairie, far from the sight of timber. But not so under the circumstances sur- rounding the first settlers. There was no way of shipping lumber from the markets of the East, coal mines were unknown, and before a parcel of land could be cultivated it was necessary to fence it. In order to settle the prairie countries it was necessary to have railroads, and in order to have railroads it was necessary that at least a portion of the country should be settled. Hence the most important resource in the development of this western country was the belts of timber which skirted the streams ; and the settlers who first hewed out homes in the timber, while at present not the most enterprising and progressive, were nevertheless an essential factor in the solution of the problem.
Much of this primeval forest has been removed ; part of it was eco- nomically manufactured into lumber, which entered into the construction of the early dwelling houses, many of which still remain ; much of it was ruthlessly and recklessly destroyed. From the fact that attention was early given to the culture of artificial groves, Buchanan County now has probably about as much timber as formerly, and the state much more.
Among the most abundant of all trees originally found was the black walnut, so highly prized in all countries for manufacturing purposes. Timber of this kind was very plentiful and of good quality originally, but the high prices paid for this kind of timber presented itself as a tempta- tion to destroy it, which the people, frequently in straightened circum- stances, could not resist. Red, white and black oak are still very plentiful, although they have for many years been extensively used as fuel. Crab apple, elm, maple, ash, cottonwood and wild cherry are also . found. Some of the best timber in the state is to be found in this county.
A line of timber follows the course of all the streams. Detached groves, both natural and artificial, are found at many places throughout the county, which are not only ornamental, in that they vary the monot- ony of the prairie, but likewise very useful, in that they have a very important bearing on the climate. It is a fact fully demonstrated by the best of authority that climate varies with the surface of a country.
CLIMATE.
The climate is what is generally termed a healthful one, subject, how- ever, to the sudden change from heat to cold. The winters, however, are as a general thing uniform, although there seems to have been some
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HISTORY OF BUCHANAN COUNTY.
modifications in the climate during the past few years, resulting, doubt- less, from the changes which have taken place in the physiognomy of the country,
The average yearly rainfall and melted snow, for twenty-five years, has been 36.62 inches. The average rainfall and melted snow, for each month respectively, for this period, has been as follows: January, 1.68 inches ; February, 1.67; March, 2.10; April, 3.49 ; May, 4.39; June, 4.75 ; July, 4.69 ; August, 4.66; September, 3.30; October, 2.33 ; November, 1.69 ; December, 1.89 inches. The rain and melted snow for winter, 5.25 inches ; spring, 9.25 ; summer, 14.10; autumn, 7.32 inches.
The following article, from the pen of William I. Heddens, M. D., Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine in the College of Phy- sicians and Surgeons, in St. Joseph, Missouri, was published in a recent issue of the St. Joseph Gazette, and is applicable to the whole of North- west Missouri :
"Almost the whole of the Platte Purchase is healthy and singularly free from consumption, asthma, bronchitis, laryngitis, and the diseases most dreaded by the inhabitants of the Eastern states. It is seldom that typhoid or other fever prevails, and it is unusual that epidemics of any kind exist. The climate is dry and pure. The few localities that are by nature unhealthy, can almost all of them be made healthy by a little foresight. The malarial fevers, so common in the Western and Southern states, are almost certain to be confined to the river bottoms, and are of a much milder character than those originating further south and west. There is scarcely any rheumatism in this climate, and what few cases there are, are mild in comparison with low and moist localities. In fact, as to climate, and to all climatic, teluric and other influences ; in regard to pure and cold water, free from mineral and other poisons ; drainage, wholesome vegetable and animal products, cereals and fruits, no country can boast of superiority in all that pertains to a man's health, strength and longevity, over the famous 'Platte Purchase.'
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