History of Richardson County, Nebraska : its people, industries and institutions, Part 65

Author: Edwards, Lewis C
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1742

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DAVID KINNEY.

David Kinney, whose death occurred at his home near Verdon in 1891, was one of the interesting pioneers of the county. He arrived at Salem in 1857 and began working at his trade as a carpenter. Among his first jobs was that of making a coffin for Mrs. Betsey Borden, and building the Salem bridge across the Nemaha, under Thomas Hare, contractor, who at that time lived in a cabin in the bend of the Muddy, due west of the postoffice at Ver- don. The next year, in 1858, he built the Stumbo mills and dwelling house, southwest of Falls City, near the falls of the Nemaha river. The mills were owned and operated for many years by the Stumbo boys. In the spring of 1858 he staked out his home before the government surveyors had surveyed the land. In 1869, when Liberty precinct was formed, Mr. Kinney's house was the voting place and the first election held there was for the purpose of voting bonds for the Atchison & Nebraska railroad. There were but about eighteen or twenty voters in the precinct at that time. Afterward, the Wick- ham and Fairview school house was made the voting place and when Verdon was started, it was moved there. For a short time during 1862 his house was made the postoffice and the mail carriers left the pouches there, but the keys to open them were never sent on and so the postoffice had to be dis- continued.

FRANCIS L. GOLDSBERRY.

Francis L. Goldsberry was born in Mason county, Kentucky, in 1833, and came to Nebraska in 1855. In the month of July, 1856, at the general

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election he was chosen for county clerk of Richardson county, William H. Mann being at that time first elected as register of deeds; the one previous in this office was Neil J. Sharp, who had been appointed by the governor when the county was first designated and boundaries formed. In 1858, Mr. Golds- berry was elected county commissioner of Richardson county.

In 1856 Archer was not only the county seat but the most important business point in the county, boasting two or three stores, a hotel or two, and several mechanics' shops. Here Mr. Goldsberry entered the mercantile business with Abel Downing Kirk, but soon afterward formed a partnership with Charles Martin, at Rulo, in a general assortment store under the fırın name of Martin & Goldsberry. He was a large shareholder in the townsite of Rulo, and the proprietor of several hundred acres of land, now very vali- able. He removed from Rulo to Salem, and thence went South, and was for several years engaged in the mercantile business in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Covington, Kentucky. He returned to Richardson county from Kentucky, and established a meat market which he operated for a number of years.

DAVID DORRINGTON.

David Dorrington, during his lifetime, was the oldest resident pioneer of Falls City, one of the first to take up an abode on the townsite, was born in England, January 11th, 1812. In 1842 he moved to the state of New York, where he resided until 1857, when he removed with his family to Falls City, Nebraska, where he spent the remainder of his life. Esquire Dor- rington was one of the first justices of the peace elected in Falls City precinct. At that time the Sac and Fox Indian Reservation on the hills directly south of the Falls City townsite, on the south side of the Nemaha and Sauk town, . their principal village, where their grand sachem, Massauquit, presided, was in plain sight of the village of Falls City. White maidens frequently became enamored of the dusky chieftains, and white men were very frequently capi- vated by the charms of the maidens of the forest, and it became the duty of the Squire to tie the golden knot, and ease the heartaches, which he did in his usual brief manner, satisfactory to all the parties concerned.

The Squire was for a number of years mayor of Falls City, and nobly performed his part toward making the scattered hamlet of 1860, the thrifty and promising city of later years. The surveyors had no more than set the stakes marking the townsite, when he arrived and in the history of the city until the day of his death both he and his estimable wife played major parts.

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In all the days of the county-seat struggle, covering a period of more than fifteen years, while the people of the county were harrassed by the strife which tore asunder early friendships and embittered the people, he stood firm for his city and was tireless in its behalf. In the days of the Civil War, when sectional strife was apparent on all sides, he remained and was ever loyal to the government. His wife, a heroine of those dark days, was a diligent worker and is said to have given aid to many of the slaves who were being rushed through this section on the way to freedom in the North. They resided at the corner of Sixteenth and Stone streets on lots 9, 10, 11 and 12 of block 71, and to the west of their home were located the barns used to house the horses and coaches engaged in carrying the mail. This place was, it is said, often used as one of the stations of the underground railroad and between the evening and morning, slaves were brought and secreted for a time and then hurried on North to freedom. Mr. and Mrs. Dorrington were of the strong characters of the early days in Falls City and their good work will always be remembered by the people of this city.

DAVID R. HOLT.

David R. Holt was born in Platte county, Missouri, March 22, 1842, and later moved to Andrew county, Missouri, where he lived until April 7, 1850, when he came to Salem, Richardson county, Nebraska. In January, 1863, he engaged in the mercantile business in Falls City in partnership with C. B. Scott. In 1864, Scott sold out his interest to C. H. Norris and the firm continued in business until 1866, when their store and goods were destroyed by fire.

In November, 1865, Mr. Holt was elected county treasurer of Richard- son county and served six years. In the spring of 1866 he was appointed Indian trader on the Iowa and Sac Reservation, which position he continued to hold for six years. In 1867 he resumed the mercantile business in Falls City. in partnership with C. B. Scott; he bought Scott out in 1870 and con- tinued the business until the great mercantile panic in 1873. Mr. Holt's trade was very extensive and he sold more goods than all the other stores in the county. He built the first brick block and opened the first opera house in Falls City. Mr. Holt later served terms as deputy county treasurer under John W. Holt and J. R. Cain.

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THOMAS C. CUNNINGHAM.

Thomas C. Cunningham was born in Marion county, Missouri, in 1843. and when about four years old moved to Lee county, Iowa. In 1857 he left Iowa and came to Richardson county, Nebraska. In 1860 Mr. Cunningham made a trip across the plains to California, during the Pike's Peak gold excite- ment, and remained there engaged in mining until 1862, when he returned and enlisted in the Fifth Missouri State Militia and served in that regiment until he was mustered out in 1863. Soon thereafter he re-enlisted in the Twelfth Regiment, Missouri Cavalry, United States Volunteers, and served until the close of the war, when he returned to Richardson county, and settled upon the old homestead eight miles north of Falls. City. In the spring of 1870, Mr. Cunningham located in Falls City and engaged in the livery. busi- ness. In 1873 he was elected sheriff of Richardson county and re-elected in 1875. In 1878 he was appointed clerk of the district court for this county and in 1879 was elected to the same office for a term of four years.

JAMES HENRY LANE.

One of the most interesting and picturesque characters connected with the history of Falls City, in the days of its infancy and who later became a na -. tional figure in the dark days preceding and during the Civil War, was James Henry Lane, familiarly known as "Jim" Lane, the noted Kansas Abolitionist. He was born at Lawrenceburg, Indiana, on June 2, 1814. He attended the schools of his native state and at an early age was admitted to the bar. Among the many honors coming to him were, the command of a brigade at the battle of Buena Vista in the Mexican War, colonel of the Fifth Indiana Infantry Regiment ; lieutenant-governor of his home state (Indiana) in 1848; member of Congress in 1853. At the erection of Nebraska and Kansas as territories he came West to Kansas in 1853 and immediately became prominent and was a member of the executive committee of the constitutional convention.

Lane was active with John Brown in the business of running fugitive slaves North on the famous underground railroad and, one of the stations being in the heart of the hamlet of Falls City, was a frequent visitor there. He was officially connected with David D. Dorrington and others as the townsite company which laid out Falls City and is named as one of the founders, but his activities among the slaves kept him in Kansas most of the time, where he was elected to the United States Senate in 1856. Owing to his

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activities as above indicated he was indicted for high treason and never took his seat, but became a fugitive from justice. He was elected a second time as senator, but joined the army instead. AAt the time of the famous Quantrill raid and the burning of Lawrence, Kansas, he was there and barely escaped with his life. His stormy career ended at Leavenworth, Kansas, where he committed suicide in 1866.

General Lane was the orator of the day at a celebration hekl at Salem in 1856 and performed the same service to the people who celebrated that day in Falls City in 1857 and on the same day at Nemaha Falls, near Falls City.

FULTON PETERS.

One of the most interesting characters in Richardson county and one who has real claims to being classed as a pioneer of Richardson county and the state of Nebraska, is Fulton Peters, who is a veteran plainsman and a present resident of Barada precinct in this county. He was born in Bavaria, Germany, April 27, 1835, and was a son of Francis and Mary Peters, natives also of Germany, where they grew up, married and made their home until 1838, when they brought their family to America, locating at St. Louis, Mis- souri, where their son, Fulton, was reared, attended school and learned his trade of ship carpenter. He helped build the ferry, "Carondelet." which was subsequently transformed into a gun-boat for use in the Union navy during the Civil War, being the first unit that formed the famous "Mosquito Fleet." Fulton Peters continued to follow his trade in St. Louis until 1867, but he came to Richardson county, Nebraska, in 1856, to locate land, moving in 1858 on the place he had entered, but after a year's hard work improving the land he went back to St. Louis and did not return to his land here to make a permanent home until 1870. During the Civil War he worked in the govern- ment navy yards, under an oath of allegiance, and received five dollars per day for his work. He has lived on his farm of one hundred and twenty acres in Barada precinct for a period of forty-seven years and has carried on a general farming and stock raising business.

Mr. Peters was married in 1856 to Euphrasia Barada, a sister of .Antoine Barada, a half-breed Indian, after whom Barada precinct was named. Mrs. Peters was born in 1837 in St. Louis, and her death occurred in 1888. Her brother, Antoine Barada, was taken from the Omaha Indians when a boy and brought to St. Louis, where he was reared, and where he married a French woman. In 1855 he was notified that he was entitled to a tract of

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land in the half-breed tract or reservation in this county and he came to Barada precinct, Richardson county, developed his land and spent the rest of his life, dying in 1887. He was one of the best known of the early pioneers and when a boy visited this county with a party of Indians in 1816.

Politically, Mr. Peters is a Democrat. He has filled minor township offices and is a Catholic. Mr. Peters crossed the plains in 1853, from Kansas City to Ft. Laramie, Wyoming, in fact he made three trips in all across the great Western plains-one to Salt Lake City, Utah, and one to the Salmon river distriet in Idaho in 1854, with a train of one hundred and five wagons, taking the short cut-off by way of Pacific Springs on the Platte river and Green river in the mountains. He built a boat which he used in crossing that stream. Some members of the party became dissatisfied and started to Oregon, but when only ten miles away the deserters were attacked by the Indians or Mormons and many of the party were killed, the survivors return- ing to the original wagon train. A new party was sent ont, which chased the maurauders, but the camp was attacked the second night following and the cattle was stampeded. Mr. Peters, with twenty-five men followed the stock, overtook them and turned them back. The train was again attacked on Green creek mountain on Snake river, at a time when the party was divided, part of them having been sent to rescue another party of whites that had previously been attacked by the Indians. Mr. Peters and his band drove off the Indians and then took charge of the immigrants and their supplies, helping them to get to the settlement, the train finally reaching Walla Walla, Washington. At Baker City, Oregon, Mr. Peters engaged in mining for some time, finally returning to Nebraska. In 1873 he made a trip to the Black Hills, in com- pany with Antoine Barada, Frank Goolsby and William Ankrom, of this county. They made the trip overland to the Black Hills and started mining there, but on account of the hostile Indians of that country they were com- pelled to give up their prospects and return home, escaping the savages by strategy. They built a big fire at the camp to deceive the Indians and stole quietly away during the night. arriving at Buffalo Gap the following morn- ing, their return trip homeward from this point being uneventful.

In 1883 Mr. Peters went to Blackbird, Nebraska, to locate on land which the Barada family was entitled to, but failed to get possession, after one year's effort, even carrying the case to Congress. Some members of the family proved up on their rights to portions of the land. but others, perhaps equally as well entitled to it, have failed. Mr. Peters worked on the Ohio and Missouri & Pacific railroad, when it was being built. contracting for a

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portion of the work. He was nearby when the memorable Gasconade disaster occurred. He also worked on the construction of the Gasconade bridge of the Missouri Pacific railroad.

Mr. Peters is well preserved for a man of his age and is one of the well- known and honored citizens of Richardson county, in which he has lived to see many of the great changes since he first traversed its wild prairie more than sixty years ago.

JAMES ROBERT CAIN, SR.

It is safe to say that James R. Cain, Sr., enjoys as large an acquaintance as any man in Richardson county today. He was born on December 29, 1843, in Platte county, Missouri, and came with his parents, William R. Cain and wife, to this county in 1856, when a lad of thirteen years, landing at St. Stephens. The family settled at St. Stephens, where Mr. Cain attended school, and later spent five months at the Camden Point Academy in Mis- souri. After completing his education he started out in the world to make his own way. He was employed on the farm in Arago township until 1865, when he made a freighting trip across the plains to Denver with oxen. After his return he was employed in the county clerk's office at Falls City for six months and later was employed in a store at Rulo as a clerk. For a year afterward Mr. Cain followed the furrow on the farm, finally returning to the counter for a few months at Arago.

David R. Holt was elected county treasurer at this time and Mr. Cain was employed by him for six years. While thus employed he made a com- plete set of abstract books (complete up to that time), of the lands of the county. In 1873 he clerked for a clothing firm in Falls City for a few months and then went into a general merchandising business in partnership with George W. Powell at Falls City. In a short time Mr. Cain bought out the interest of his partner and continued the business alone for about a year. In 1880 he sold a half interest in his business to D. R. House and after an- other year Mr. House bought his interest. Mr. Cain was elected county treasurer in 1881, and was re-elected in 1883. Three years later he went to Stella and bought the Bank of Stella, owned by Hull & Ferguson, and the State Bank of Stella, owned at that time by Sweet Brothers, the purchase being made for a corporation, and for the past thirty-one years Mr. Cain has been actively connected with the management of the bank and to his untiring energy and good judgment it has easily become one of the foremost institutions of its kind in the county. He was married to Miss Martha K.

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Kirk, on March 18, 1867, at Covington, Kentucky. On January 9, 1882, his wife died, leaving three children, Mrs. Robert McCoy, now of Sioux City, Iowa; J. Robert Cain, Jr., of Omaha, and Mrs. William Julian, of Long Beach, California. In August, 1883, Mr. Cain was married to Miss Lettie J. Ingram, at San Jose, California. They have five children, Ingram, Nellie May, Harry N., Jean B. and Julian.

Mr. Cain was director and cashier of the Bank of Stella, a director of the Richardson County Bank of Falls City, and at one time president of the Farmers State Bank of Shubert, in all of which he was and is a stockholder. He makes his home in Falls City, where he has one of the most comfortable dwellings in the city. He is a thirty-second-degree Mason and has filled every station in the lodge, chapter and commandery, besides serving a term from June, 1881. to June, 1882, as grand master of Masons of the state of Nebraska. He is a member of the Ancient Order of United Workmen.

DAVID L. THOMPSON.

David L. Thompson died at his home in Falls City on November 29, 1894, of erysipelas, caused by rheumatism. Mr. Thompson was one of the first white men ever to see Richardson county. He passed through here in the early fifties and finally located at Archer in 1858, where he married China M. Miller, a daughter of J. C. Miller, the first judge of the county, and who at that time kept a hotel and store at the new town, on December 8, 1855. ()n October 16, 1892, he was married to Mrs. Emma Thomas, who survived him. When Falls City started as a town, Thompson was one of the first to locate there. For many years he had been deputy sheriff of the county, having charge of the jail and prisoners. George Thompson, his only son that grew to manhood, was killed by the cars on July 24. 1894. As an officer of the law he was fearless and always reliable, and as a citizen he was kind and generous.

DILLARD WALKER.

Dillard Walker died at his home near Humboldt, Nebraska, of heart disease on April 11, 1895, aged sixty years. Mr. Walker claimed the dis- tinction of being the third man to drive a wagon between the forks of the the two Nemahas in 1855. He helped to raise the house in Salem building the first church at Salem, the Missionary Baptist. A wife and children sur- vived him.

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MRS. MARY S. QUICK.

Mrs. Mary S. Quick, of Humboldt, died at her home. Sunday, April. 7. -- , aged eighty-eight years. Mrs. Quick with her husband settled in Humboldt. in 1867, and for twenty-five years she was one of the leading physicians in that vicinity. Old age finally compelled her to quit the practice.

JAMES L. OVERMAN.

James [ .. Overman, for many years a resident at Stella and who died in that city on December 28, 1894, at the age of seventy years, was one of the pioneers. In 1858 he became a resident of St. Deroin, a station just north of the Richardson county line, where he operated a ferry and many of the pioneers of this county landed on Nebraska soil from his ferry.

CHAPTER XXVI.

REMINISCENCES OF A WAYFARER. By Hon Isham Reavis. Written in 1909.

On as fair a day in May as ever shone upon the world, and at about the nour of high twelve in the year of grace, 1858, I. stepped from the deck of a Missouri river steamboat, to the soil of Nebraska. In those days the most rapid and comfortable mode of travel, when the objective point could be reached in that way, was by steamboat. It happened so in my case. I took passage at Quincy, Illinois, on the good boat "Hannibal City", plying on the Missis- sippi between St. Louis and St. Paul. and landed at St. Louis the next morn- ing. From there I took passage on the Missouri river packet, called the "Rowena," for St. Joseph, Missouri. There were thirty or forty passengers for up-river points, but mostly for Kansas and Nebraska, all of whom with one single exception, were young men less than thirty years of age. At Leavenworth we were reshipped to another river boat by the same line called the "War Eagle"-the Missouri river was alive with boats in those days -- and completed our voyage on that craft. At St. Joseph, those who were left of the passenger list, took passage on a more humble vessel, the "Wattosa." named perhaps for some mighty Indian brave somewhere, and on the day following. I, with another, was put ashore as before stated, at the town of Rulo in the Territory of Nebraska. While yet upon my journey and while passing from one boat to another I somehow felt in touch with home and the state of my nativity; but as I stood on the bank of the fast-flowing river, and saw the steamboat that had borne me there. cast off her moorings and slowly float out into the stream to resume her voyage northward against the turbid flood of the Missouri, an indescribable feeling of lonesomeness came over me, which I shall never forget. For the first time I realized what it was to break off the associations of a lifetime. When the little tramp steamer left me at the Rulo landing to churn its way through the muddy waters of the river. apparently too thick with mud and sand to swim in, and not thick enough to walk on, every tie that bound me to the old life and the old home -- long ago broken up and its members scattered, with all the sacred memories that cluster around them, were severed once and forever.

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NEBRASKA ISOLATED FROM THE WORLD.

That the situation may be better understood, it is proper in this connec- tion to say, that fifty years ago Nebraska was as completely isolated from the world and civilization as the land of the "Midnight Sun". in Alaska, was at the opening of the past century. There was not a railroad within hundreds of miles, and with no communication East except by the river that was frozen up half the year, and navigable for boats for only about three months of the year, in the later spring and early summer. But despondency would not do and calling up the old resolution that impelled me to make the start, gathered my gripsack and with the words of the great English poet floating through my mind :

"And whatever sky's above me, Here's a heart for every fate,"

turned my face to the town on the hillside, and to the unknown future, and my life in Nebraska had commenced.

My companion on the voyage from St. Louis, and who formed the excep- tion in point of age among the passengers I have mentioned, was none other than Joseph Tesson, well known to the older residents in and about Falls City and Rulo, and who had debarked with me from the "Watossa," accom- panied me up town, and being acquainted with some of the people there, kindly invited me to take dinner with him at the house of one of his friends, a William Kenceleur. My acquaintance with Mr. Kenceleur, so happily commenced that day, continued unbroken until the end of his life.

I was anxious to go on to Falls City, which, I was told, was about ten miles west, that afternoon, but Tesson and Kenceleur both thought, as I was intending to make Richardson county my future residence or some point in it, and as Rulo was its most important town, I had better stay over the afternoon, and see the town and get acquainted with the people and go out to Falls City the next day. On consideration, I concluded to do so, and we sailed forth for the purpose. What struck me as most singular was the fact that everything about it was new. There was not an old house in it, and there seemed to be about a hundred-all of them. as I learned, had been built within two years, and most of them within a very few months. Nor was there an old man or woman among its people, nor any who were much past middle age. Everybody was young, the town was young, the territory was young, and the youth of spring was upon everything around them, in its greenest garh.

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RULO AS I SAW IT FIFTY YEARS AGO.

Having concluded to stop over and see the town, we went out on the streets to begin the rounds. I think this statement needs some explanation, for if stepping into the immensity of all outdoors, means going out on the street, we certainly did that. There was nothing in sight to indicate the existence of a street, alley or other municipal thoroughfare, in the whole village, unless the spaces between the houses were such, in which case, as the houses had fallen out among themselves, and to have set up in separate terri- tory of their own, the town must have consisted mostly of all streets, which of course, could not be. Grass grew everywhere, except in the traveled paths made here and there, by foot passengers, among the dwellings and places of business. There was certainly enough of such highways, and as no two of the houses were built within fifty feet of each other, the footpaths branched off in all directions, and in all shapes from a straight line in places, to windings in and out like the trail of a snake in a dusty road. We first visited a store kept by Martin & Goldsberry. The senior member of the firm " was a Canadian Frenchman, while his partner was the same Frank Golds- berry, who not long ago resided in Falls City, and is remembered by most of the present residents. The next person whom I remember to have met was A. D. Kirk, a lawyer by profession and one of the early settlers of Richardson county. He was one of the representatives in the first Terri- torial Legislature, held in the winter of 1855. Mr. Kirk had his law office in the store of his brother-in-law. Goldsberry, though from the surroundings I was not impressed with the notion that his law business was very extensive. The next prominent citizens of the town whom I met were Eli Bedard and Charles Rouleau, both of whom had been instrumental in the building of Rouleau. The town possessed the most mixed population I have ever seen in a town of its size. There were a great number of idle people about the streets, who were neither French. Indian or American, but were in fact a mongrel race, compounded of the blood of all three, whom the general gov- ernment had designated as half-breeds, and for whose benefit the reservation between the Nemahas had been set apart by treaty. They were a new and strange people for me, differing in every physical characteristic from all anthropological classifications I had ever seen. In their relations with the government they were classed as Indians, and yet, the effect of the treaty assigning them lands in severalty, would be to make them citizens.

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History of Richardson County, Nebraska : its people, industries and institutions, Part 65

Author: Edwards, Lewis C Publication date: 1917 Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen Number of Pages: 1742

Author: Edwards, Lewis C
Publication date: 1917
Publisher: Indianapolis : B.F. Bowen
Number of Pages: 1742