History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 119

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198

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( LEMENT A. LOUNSBERRY, BISMARCK

ERASTUS A. WILLIAMS Bismarck pioneer, lawyer and legislator

Photo at 21 years of age, when Captain in 20th Michigan Volunteers

ALANSON W. EDWARDS

Fargo pioneer

A GROUP OF NORTH DAKOTA

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nesota ; Dr. Philip Holmes, A. B. Taylor, Jr., and George .1. Brackett, with Pierre Bottineau as guide. The report does not state at what point the party crossed the Red River of the North coming from Minnesota, but it was probably near the mouth of the Cheyenne River. Their route through the territory was up the north side of the Cheyenne, over a country of good fertility to Fort Totten at Devil's Lake. From Totten a good route was found to Fort Stevenson, twenty miles south of the old trading post of Fort Berthold, on the Missouri River, where the party found a suitable terminal point. This survey, which was prose- ented on horseback was for the purpose of examining the country with the view of securing a feasible route through the most promising agricultural portion. When the road was finally located, however, it took a more direct line further south, striking the Missouri about opposite the mouth of Heart River.

The western party consisting of Thomas 11. Canfield, general agent : W. M. Roberts and Win. HI. Johnson, topographical engineers: Mr. James Moor- head of the famous Jay Cooke & Co., banking firm, and Samuel E. Wilkenson, traversed the country east from Walla Walla, Oregon, on the Columbia River to the Yellowstone, crossing the Rocky Mountain Divide not knowing it was the main range, so gradual was the ascent and descent. This party made a very encouraging report.

Finally and apparently as a last resort to secure the funds to build the road, the company, in 1867, tendered to Jay Cooke & Company, bankers of Philadelphia, the financial agency of the company. This firm had stood with the secretary of the treasury. Salmon P. Chase, during the Civil war, and successfully man- aged the sale of hundreds of millions of United States bonds. Cooke. before accepting, caused a thorough inspection of the country through which the line was projected. Meanwhile Congress had authorized the company to place a mortgage on all its property including its land grant ; and the house of Cooke, upon concluding to take up the enterprise, secured this mortgage, and work was then begun, Jay Cooke & Company advancing the money for this purpose.

The principal advantages held by the Northern Pacific Railway and peculiar to the route were these: It lessened the distance by water and rail between New York and the Pacific coast about six hundred miles. It lessened the distance between London and Chinese ports, by the trans-continental route. 1.400 miles. Its elevation in the mountain region is 3.000 feet less than that of other lines, resulting in diminished snow fall, a milder climate, and far easier gradients.

On the 15th day of February, 1870, ground was first broken at Thomson June- tion, near Duluth, Minnesota, and at the close of the year 18-1 the Northern Pacific Railroad had been constructed to the east bank of the Red River of the North, where the Town of Moorhead had been founded by the Puget Sound Land Company, an organization in charge of townsites along the line of road.

The Northern Pacific track was laid to the east bank of the Red River of the North, early on Wednesday, January 3, 1872, and on Thursday, the 4th. the first train arrived at Moorhead on the Minnesota side. The officers of the train were C. W. Block, conductor : W. Snyder, engineer : E. Cameron, fireman : and Capt. R. II. Emerson, engineer of the snow plow. Several deep cuts had been filled with snow. It was a winter remarkable for its heavy snows and cold weather.

The bridge for the Red River of the North crossing from Moorhead to Fargo was shipped on this train already framed and ready to be put in place. It was a single span 100 feet in length. This bridge was put in place and com- pleted, and on the 8th of June, 1872, the iron was laid and the first locomotive crossed to the Dakota side.

The railroad line was located across the territory from Fargo (Centr lio. nearly to the James River crossing in 1871. The directors of the comp m bud a meeting in New York in September of that year, and awarded a contract in Payson, Canda & Company for the construction of the line through D 10t Territory from the Red River to the Missouri, a distance of 200 miles, the wine Vol. 1- 14

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to be completed by the ist of July, 1873, and at the same time another contract was let to DeGraff & Company of St. Paul, to construct a road from St. Cloud, Minnesota, to Pembina, a distance of 350 miles to be completed by January I, 1874.

An engineer's camp was established in November, 1871, on James River, 110 miles west of the Red River, and fifty miles west of the second crossing of the Cheyenne ; and the Puget Sound Land Company located a town there in 1872, naming it Jamestown, in honor of Jamestown, Virginia. It had a motley popula- tion of settlers, including many Sioux half-breeds. The Indians annoyed the surveyors in the field, and troops were ordered to the James Crossing by Gen- eral Hancock, then in command of the Dakota department, and barracks were erected, named Fort Cross, and afterward called Fort Seward, in memory of the famous New York statesman. The name first given was in memory of Colonel Cross, of the Fifth New Hampshire Volunteers who fell at the battle of Gettys- burg. Two companies of troops under General Thomas were stationed at Fort Seward in 1872. The engineers had not definitely located the route for a portion of the line west of the James at this time, grading, however, had been completed to the James and for some distance west. General Rosser, the chief engineer and B. C. Lindsley, assistant chief, were at the camp on the James, while Gen. George A. Brackett, of Indian war fame had charge of the construc- tion work. During the year the work of construction was prosecuted with great energy. One of the grading contracts, covering, it was said, about fifty miles on the western end had been taken by Hon. W. A. Burleigh, who had been identified with the preliminary negotiations for the Dakota Southern Railroad. Thus he became associated with the construction of the two first and most important railroad lines in the territory.

The opposition of the Indians was strongly manifested during 1872, not only west of the Missouri where the engineers were looking over the proposed routes beyond, but also between the James and Missouri; the surveyors and construc- tion parties found it necessary in the prosecution of their work to be attended by troops, in order that they might be free from the annoyances of small war parties whose evident purpose was to disturb and hinder the work by threats and intimidating conduct, which might have been made more serious but for the fort at James River and the two companies of soldiers that patrolled the un- finished line. The season of 1872 that permitted of grading closed in the early winter, owing to rigorous weather. with about fifteen miles of the grade on the western end unfinished.

Surveying parties west of the Missouri were under the escort of a strong force of troops under able and experienced commanders. While the peace treaties were observed by a majority of the Sioux, there were many strong bands in open warfare against the extension of the railroad through the country west of the river on the ground, as they claimed, that it would frighten the game away upon which they largely depended for subsistence. About this time the notorious Sitting Bull came into prominence as a leader of this hostile element and as one of the most incorrigible ; and for several years he continued as the hostile leader in what was known generally as the Yellowstone country, through which the Northern Pacific was projected.

To protect the railroad surveyors the commander of the department gave orders for the organization of a strong military force. Six companies of cavalry were detailed from Forts Randall, Sully and Rice as an escort for the railroad parties, with Gen. John G. Whistler, then at Fort Sully, in command. An artil- lery detachment was connected with the expedition, a train of mule teams carrying provisions, camp equipage and ammunition, and a company of Indian scouts from Forts Abercrombie, Ransom and Wadsworth. Whistler's rendez- vous was at Fort Rice, in September, and an enumeration of his force gave him about eight hundred effective men. The enemy lie expected to meet was made tip of Sitting Bull's incorrigibles, composed of fragments of the Uncpapas, Black-

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feet and Minneconjoux, the tribes who had already left their agency at Grand River, prepared for war, for the purpose of resisting the military and destroying the railroad surveyors. Whistler's expedition does not appear to have met the hostiles in any considerable force, the Indians pursuing a stealthy policy, in small parties, more intent on securing plunder, in the shape of horses, rather than exposing their combined forces to battle. It is probable, however, that had Whistler been poorly equipped with a smaller force, he might have met an overwhelming force and been destroyed. His enemy was undoubtedly well informed regarding his force and equipment, especially his artillery which they dreaded, and discreetly left him alone.

General Stanley, who was in command of the District of Dakota with head- quarters at Fort Sully, also headed a northwest expedition in 1872, said to have been 1,400 strong, whose purpose was to study the Indian situation gen- erally in the hostile region, for the purpose of ascertaining the strength of the refractory element, what tribes were represented in the obstructive work, their numbers and their grievances. Ile also gathered mich valuable information regarding the Yellowstone and tributary country and made observations at cer- tain points with a view to the establishment of military posts.

Hostilities and the attitude of Sitting Bull had already assumed a phase so serious that military men freely predicted an Indian war before the differences could be settled ; and General Sheridan, who commanded the department of the Missouri at the time, asked for the construction of two military posts between the Missouri and Fort Ellis, Montana, the estimated cost of which would be a quarter million dollars. Two thousand troops, it was estimated, would be re- quired to give effectual protection to the parties employed in building the road.

Fort MeKean had been built in 1871 near the mouth of Heart River on an eminence overlooking the country, mainly for the purpose of affording protec- tion to the railroad people. Two skirmish fights during the fall took place not far from the post with fatalities on both sides. Lieutenant Crosby, of the Sev- enteenth Infantry, in command of an engineer's camp on Heart River was killed and badly mutilated within a few hundred feet of the camp. He had wounded an antelope and followed it over a near-by hill out of sight of the camp. He did not return and his comrades went in search and found him very near the place where he had disappeared over the hill. The Indians had been on the lookout for an opportunity of this kind. Two or three days later, Lieut. Lewis Dent S. Adair, of the Twenty-second Infantry was riding by the side of General Rosser, division engineer, when the two men were attacked by Indians not far from the camp, and the lieutenant shot through the body. Adair returned the fire after receiving his fatal wound. and killed the Indian who shot him. Adair was a relative of President Grant.

It was currently reported during the year 1872 that Jay Cooke had become convinced that without the aid of foreign capital the further construction of the Northern Pacific Railroad west of the Missouri River would have to be for the time relinquished. The financial centers of the United States could not be depended upon for further loans, and there was an unrest and anxiety in all the great financial centers of Europe. It was only the year before, 1871. that the great war between France and United Germany was concluded -the event that marked the advent of Bismarck to a position among the world's greatest statesmen : the permanent consolidation of the German states, and the wresting of Alsace and Lorraine from France. It also marked the dethronement and downfall of Napoleon 111. the French Emperor, and the establishment of the French Republic which has since been the ruling power of France. This mno- mentous event alone added to the heavy money indemnity exacted of Paris by the victorious Germans, prechided all possibility of obtaining financial aid from that quarter which before had been relied upon as able at most any time to float the debt of nations. Moved by a sentiment of admiration for the German chu cellor, possibly mingled with a purpose to pave the way to the financial heart of

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the German capitalists of the patriotic class, the authorities of the Northern Pacific Railroad called the name of the town at the Missouri terminal, Bismarck. A map of the road and townsite was sent to the distinguished Prince Otto von Bismarck, who acknowledged the compliment paid him in an autograph letter.

There existed an unusual stringency in all the great financial centers of Europe at this time. The distinguished AAmerican statesman, John Sherman, who represented Ohio in the United States Senate and was regarded as one of this country's leading financial authorities, made a tour of the leading capitals of Europe studying the financial systems and the financial situation. Very soon after his return a bill was quietly introduced by him in the Senate to amend the coinage laws of the United States, which, however, attracted little attention at the time, the United States financially working under the law suspending specie payments enacted early in 1861 as a war measure.

As the country had been for eleven years on a paper basis, using no metallic money whatever in the ordinary business of the people, the change did not attract attention for a number of years, but in the course of time it was discovered that the value of silver, measured by gold. had lost heavily. and as this was the period when our great silver mines were being developed in Montana, Colorado, Dakota, and the other districts where the mining of precious metals formed a leading industry, the difference in value was found to be such a burden to the silver industry that mining the metal became unprofitable, and the matter became a national political issue, and stirred the country as no question, save secession, had before affected the public mind.

Mr. Sherman's bill became a law without opposition, and without its pur- pose and effect being understood by many members of Congress who voted for its adoption, nor was its vital point discovered by the President who approved it. Later it transpired that this bill had demonetized silver ; had abolished the double-standard under which the Government had conducted its financial opera- tions from the beginning, and erected the single gold standard in its stead. Mr. Sherman, however, did not direct particular attention to the change during the pendency of the bill, and if he referred to it must have treated it as a matter of small importance, so that a large number of Mr. Sherman's contemporaries, who voted for the measure, afterwards declared they did not know that it interfered with the bi-metallic system.

It was presumed that the motive of Mr. Sherman was to align the United States in its financial policy with the other leading powers of the world having become convinced during his tour of Europe of its wisdom-and thus aid our enterprising and public spirited men to obtain the co-operation of foreign capi- talists in promoting and prosecuting our expensive internal improvements. What- ever effect the adoption of the measure had in the old world, it did not relax the purse strings of its moneved people in favor of the Northern Pacific Railroad.

Owing to the unsettled conditions on the frontier caused by the hostility of the Indians as the ostensible reason, it was given out that no work on the line of the Northern Pacific, west of the Missouri River would be attempted during the year 1873, unless it should be favorable for surveying operations. The engineers who prosecuted the surveys under military protection during 1872 had not been successful in finding a satisfactory practicable route to the Yel- lowstone, and further preliminary surveying would be necessary. It was 1111- officially decided, however, to place a line of steamboats on the Missouri River to ply between Bismarck and Fort Benton. Montana, and also for a few hundred miles south to a number of forts and Indian agencies. In this way it was pre- sttmed the road could control the bulk of the Montana carrying trade and prac- tically all of the Government business to the forts and agencies. It was not pub- licly known at this time that the railway company was financially embarrassed : but a few months later, in September, the great banking house of Jay Cooke & Company, of Philadelphia, closed, and the failure of the financial head of the Northern Pacific Railway was known to the world. Various causes, which the

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reader can gather from the course of events in the then recent years, led to this momentous disaster ; but probably the most direct injury came from the depre- ciation of American Railway securities in European markets brought on by the failure of the St. Paul & Pacific Road to meet the interest on its bonds. This would naturally reflect injuriously upon Northern Pacific interests, which at that time were regarded as more intimately connected with Minnesota than any other state. But whatever the causes, the great financier of the enterprise was "on his back," financially speaking, and practically retired from the field.

No further forward movement was made in road construction on the Northern Pacific for the following six years. Something like to miles of the road on the Pacific slope, from a point called Kalama, on the Columbia River to Tacoma on Puget Sound had been completed and was in operation, and the company continued the operation of its completed line and branches, from Duluth to Bis- marck, which enjoyed a profitable and growing traffic during the interval that lapsed before re-construction commenced in 1879.

It was understood in the fall of 1873, that the work of construction would be suspended, west of the Missouri, for a year or two, just how long could not be determined. The line had been partially surveyed from the Missouri to the Pacific, and construction could be taken up at any time when the finances of the company were in a condition to warrant it. The lines already completed through Minnesota and Dakota, amounting to 453 miles, and 105 miles on the western end including the terminus, were all doing a paying business. The most reliable opinion concerning the resumption of construction work, fixed the date not later than 1875, and this was based on the action of Congress in granting the company an extension of two years in which to complete the road.

Chief Engineer Rosser, who had been directing the surveys for the extension west from Bismarck through the hostile Indian country, reported to the directors, in August, 1873, that he had found a new and final route from the Missouri to the Yellowstone, distant 205 miles, which was twenty-one miles shorter than the survey of 1871. "At this point the road will cross the Yellowstone and con- tinue up the northwest bank to Pompey's Pillar, some distance above the mouth of the Big Horn, where it will join the survey made from the Pacific end in 1872, and this will complete the surveyed line across the Continent."

The names of the officers and directors of the company in 1873 were as follows :

President- George W. Cass, New York: resident vice president-Charles B. Wright : vice president on the Pacific coast-Richard D. Rice ; secretary-Samuel Wilkeson ; treasurer-Albert 1. Pritchard: land commissioner-William .1. Howard : executive committee-George W. Cass. Charles B. Wright, Richard D. Rice, William G. Moorhead, and Frederick Billings; trustees of bondholders- J. Edgar Thompson and Jay Cooke.

George W. Cass, New York : Chas. B. Wright, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ; Richard D. Rice, Augusta, Maine; Frederick Billings, Woodstock, Vermont ; William G. Moorhead, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: J. Gregory Smith, St. Albans, Vermont : William B. Ogden, New York : William Windom, Windom, Minnesota ; \. 11. Barney, New York; R. P. Cheney, Boston, Massachusetts ; William G. Fargo, Buffalo, New York ; James Stinson, Chicago, Illinois ; Albert HI. Catlin, Burlington, Vermont-directors.

The stock and franchises of the Lake Superior and Puget Sound Land Com- pany were sold to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company in November, 1873, and thereafter the railroad company controlled and managed its own townsites including Bismarck. The stockholders of the Puget Sound Land Company were paid the first cost of their stock with interest at 9 per cent to October I. 1873, and a bonus of 50 per cent. Payments were made in North Pacific honds at go cents.

.At a meeting of the Northern Pacific Railroad directors held in New York about the first of May, 1873, the name of the town which had been selectedl

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as the terminus of the railroad on the Missouri, was changed from Edwinton to Bismarck, in honor of the great Prussian statesman who had recently won world- wide fame by his success in the Franco-Prussian war, and united the German states in one confederacy. There may also have been a financial reason coupled with the compliment.

Buffalo County had been organized and its county seat was at Gann Valley, but the large majority of the invaders near the North Pacific crossing, had not been informed. C. H. McCarthy, recommended for county commissioner, had been a member of the Dakota Legislature of 1866-67. He was elected one of the early sheriffs of Burleigh County, and was drowned in the Missouri River while engaged in some official duty. Buffalo County took in about one-half of the territory east of the Missouri, its eastern boundary being as far east as Devil's lake in the north. An important territorial election ( 1872) was pending at this time ( Moody and Brookings, both republicans, running for delegate to Congress, and M. K. Armstrong, for the same office, heading the democratic ticket ), and Edwinton had been made a voting precinct and had a candidate for the legislative house in the person of Lawyer E. A. Williams. Another precinct had been established at Gann Valley in the southern part of the county. The result of the election was disputed. which threw a contest for the legislative seat before the house, in which Williams was successful.

This election was participated in quite generally through the northern portion of the territory in Buffalo and Pembina counties, at a number of points where no precincts had been established by the constituted authorities. The vote of such precincts was not recognized nor canvassed by the territorial board of canvassers. The vote at Edwinton, however, was polled at an authorized precinct and was duly canvassed, and was the vote which gave Mr. Williams his seat.

The situation in the vicinity of the point where the Northern Pacific was to cross the Missouri, during the year 1872, was one of uncertainty, and because thereof a number of towns or trading points were located and some improvements made in each. For reasons presumed to be for the best interests of the railroad company. the line had not been located in 1872 to the Missouri River. The final location terminated about ten miles east of the river, and Doctor Burleigh, who had the contract for grading fifty miles, was obliged to begin his work at that terminus. The Puget Sound Land Company, an organization that had charge of the townsites for the railroad company, located its headquarters two miles back from the river, and named their location Edwinton out of regard for Mr. Johnson, consulting engineer of the railroad company who was associated with a gentleman named Edwinton. The land company erected several large log buildings at Edwinton, and placed a tract of town property on the market, selling lots for $150 for corners and $100 for inside lots, with the privilege of a lot in the permanent town, when it was located, free. In Edwinton and surroundings, the earliest settlers were Shaw, Cathcart and Patten, of St. Paul, with a large stock of general merchandise, who opened and transacted their business in a large tent 100 feet in length by 25 feet wide. Marsh & Marsh, of Sioux City, were another firm near by, who kept an eating house and hotel, and Stocking & Co., of Montana, kept a saloon. Devay & Co., of Sioux City, had a shed near the boat landing on the Missouri, in which they kept a stock of groceries, and close by was a Montanian with the pioneer bakery, coining money. The P. S. L. Company had a large log structure near by on the landing, and two or three saloons had been temporarily domiciled there. This point on the river was supposed to be Carleton. Burleigh City, another point, was thought by quite a number, to occupy the prospective railroad terminus. It was about two miles south of Edwinton and contained about a dozen log buildings. Its site was in a conspicuous and eligible position on the bluff overlooking the bottom, and con- tained a hotel, store, barber shop, and saloon, all owned by John McCarthy and a syndicate from Grand River. Ed S. Comings, of Sioux City, was among the pioneers, and though he had a stock of goods on one of the steamboats, did not

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History of Dakota Territory, volume I, Part 119

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920 Publication date: 1915 Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company Number of Pages: 1198

Author: Kingsbury, George Washington, 1837-; Smith, George Martin, 1847-1920
Publication date: 1915
Publisher: Chicago, Ill. : S.J. Clarke Publishing Company
Number of Pages: 1198