USA > South Dakota > History of southeastern Dakota, its settlement and growth, geological and physical features--countries, cities, towns and villages--incidents of pioneer life--biographical sketches of the pioneers and business men, with a brief outline history of the territory in general > Part 2
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34
16
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
one of which (Dakota County) covered all the country lying be- tween St. Paul and Yankton, constituted the Sixth Council dis- triet, and was entitled to'two Councilmen and one Representative in the Minnesota Legislature, In 1854 the Territory of Nebraska was organized. and included a large portion of that country which is now in Dakota, beyond the Running Water, at which time there was not a white settler on the Dakota side of the Missouri River. The Harney treaty was consummated in 1855, and his forces marched from the Platte to the Missouri, and encamped for the winter at Fort Pierre. The command consisted of about 1,200 men, among the officers being the heroic Lyon, who fell in the war for the Union; Captain Gardner, a rebel general in the Southern army, and Captain J. B. S. Todd, the first Delegate to Congress from Dakota. In 1856, old Fort Lookout was occupied by the Government troops, and General Harney made his head- quarters there; but early in the spring, he selected the site and com- menced the erection of Fort Randall, where, in June of the same year, the two first companies of soldiers were landed by steam- boat.
During the same season, Captain Sully. at the head of two com- panies, marched across the plains from Fort Abercrombie for the purpose of relieving a portion of the command at Fort Pierre. at which point he remained until 1858, and then reerossed the country to Fort Ridgely. Lyon remained in charge of Fort Lookout until the summer of 1858, when both Pierre and Lookout were abandoned, and with the exception of a few companies, sta- tioned at Fort Randall, the military forces were removed from the frontiers to other parts of the country. During these early mili- tary movements, Lieutenant Warren and Dr. Hayden were prose- cuting their scientific investigations in the mysterious regions of the Black Hills and Bad Lands, while no perceptible settlements had penetrated the Upper Missouri Valley, and the soil of Dakota was yet unbroken by the hand of civilized agriculture. A few ad- venfurons pioneers had, however. entered the wilds and built cabins in the Indian country. preparatory to the consummation of the proposed treaties.
In the spring of 1857, the Interior Department sent A. S. H. White, an attache of the Indian Burean, to visit the Yankton In- dians, for the purpose of inducing them to send a delegation to Washington, with a view to negotiating a treaty ceding their
17
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
lands, in what is now Southern Dakota, to the government. White's mission was unsuccessful, and in the fall of the same year, Capt. J. B. S. Todd, of Fort Randall, at the request of the Department, securing the services of Charles F. Picotte, who had great influence with the Indians, and who still resides at the Yank- ton Agency, succeeded in his enterprise, and early in the winter of 1857, started to Washington with the Yankton chiefs, accom- panied by Mr. Picotte, as interpreter. April:19, 1858, a treaty was made with these Indians, by which they ceded to the United States all the lands owned, possessed, or claimed, by them, wherever sit- uated (except 400,000 acres, embracing their present Reservation) and described as follows:
" Beginning at the mouth of the Te-han-kas-an-data, or Calu- met, or Big Sioux River; thence up the Missouri River to the Pa-hah-wa-kan, or East Medicine Knoll River; thence up the said river to its head: thence to the head of the main fork of the Wan- dush-ka-for, or Snake River; thence down said river toits junction with the Te-han-san-san, or Jaques River, or James River: thence in a direct line to the northern point of Lake Kampeska; thence along the northern shore of said lake and its outlet to the junction of the said outlet with the said Big Sioux River; thence down the Big Sioux River to its junction with the Missouri River. And they also cede and relinquish to the United States all their right and title to and in all the islands in the Missouri River, from the mouth of the Big Sioux River to the mouth of the Medicine Knoll Creek."
In consideration therefor the United States agreed to pay to them, or to expend for their benefit, the sum of $65,000 per an- num for ten years; $40,000 per annum for and during ten years thereafter, $25,000 per annum for and during ten years thereafter, and $15,000 per annum for and during twenty years thereafter, making in all $1,600,000 in annuities in the period of fifty years.
The following chiefs signed the treaty:
Pa-la-ne-a-pa-pe-The man that was struck by the Ree.
Ma-to-sa-be-che-a-The Smutty Bear.
Chas. F. Picotte-Eta-ke-cha.
Ta-ton-ka-wete-co-The Crazy Bull.
Pse-cha-wa-ke-a-The Jumping Thunder.
Ma-ra-ha-ton-The Iron Horn.
Nom-be-kah-pah-One that knocks down two.
-
18
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
Ta-ton-ke-e-yak-ka-The Fast Bull.
A-ha-ka-ma-ne- The walking Elk.
A-ha-ka-na-zhe-The Standing Elk.
A-ha-ka-ho-che-cha- The Elk with a Bad Voice.
Cha-ton-wo-ka-pa The Grabbing Hawk.
E-ha-we-cha-sha-The Owl Man.
Pia-son-wa-kan-na The White Medicine Cow that Stands.
Ma-ga-seha-che-ka-The Little White Swan.
Oke-che-la-wash-ta -The Pretty Boy.
Immediately after the ratification of this treaty. A. H. Redfield, of Detroit, Mich .. was appointed Agent for the Indians, and ar- rived in the Territory early in July. Buildings were at once erected on the site of the present Ageney, and the Indians were all located on the Reservation before winter. As soon as the Indians were removed, settlers began to come in rapidly, locating principally on Big Sioux Point, Elk Point, Vermillion and Yankton. The ear- lier locations by the Western Town Company, of Dubuque, and the Dakota Land Company, of St. Paul, Minn., at Sioux Falls, in 1857; by the latter Company at Medary, Flandreau and Emineza, in the same year: and the pioneer locations elsewhere in Southeast- ern Dakota, beginning with those of 1857, are treated of at length in their proper places in this History. The tracing of the progress of events in these early settlements, through the adventurous vicissitudes precedent to the populousness and prosperity of the present time, the details of hardships and struggles, the Provisional Government and the days of Squatter Sovereignty, form a very considerable portion of the task before us.
Here begins the date of permanent settlement in Dakota, when the retreating red race looked back upon the advancing sentinels of civilization. who had come to subdue the wilds and adorn the rivers with thriving villages. And here commences the written history of Dakota's white race, established in a land where "wild tribes of men have marched their armies over towns and fields, and fierce battles have been fought where, ere long, churches may rear their spires, and plough-shares turn furrows amidst the graves of buried races, and children play, perhaps, where generations of chil- dren have played before." A deca le in the Northwest is a century among the older civilization of the East.
On the Sth of November, 1859, the settlers at Yankton held a meetin , with D. T. Bramble as Chairman, and M. K. Armstrong,
19
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
Secretary, and adopted a memorial petitioning Congress for a Ter- ritorial organization. A similar meeting was held at Vermillion on the 9th of the same month. at which .I. A. Denton presided. and James McHenry was Secretary. In the meantime the people of the Sioux Falls settlement were similarly active. But the prayer of the people was unheeded, and amid the tumultuous prep- arations for a Presidential election, and the muttering throes of a Southern rebellion. Congress adjourned, leaving Dakota ungor- erned and unorganized. Not to be discouraged by this partial failure, the pioneers assembled again in mass convention at Yank- ton, December 27, 1860, and again on January 15, 1861. and pre- pared earnest memorials to Congress, which having been signed by five hundred and seventy-eight citizens, were forwarded to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and to the President of the United States Senate. Congress at last granted the prayer of the petitioners; the Organic Act was passed in February, 1861, and approved by President Buchanan on the 2d day of March, 1861, thus giving to Dakota a Territorial government. The Territory being at that time so far removed from railroads and the telegraph, the news did not reach Yankton until eleven days after the pas- sage of the law.
Under the new boundaries, the Territory, at that time, com- prised all of the present Territory of Montana and the eastern slope of Idaho, and contained about 350,000 square miles, being bounded on the north by the British line, east by Minnesota and Iowa, south by the Iowa line, and the Missouri, Niobrara and Turtle Hill Rivers, up and along the 43d parallel of latitude, to the Rocky Mountains: thence along their snowy range to British America. Some 70,000 square miles of this territory was situated east of the Missouri River, and constituted that country which had been trimmed off from the State of Minnesota in 1858; while a vast expanse of the new Territory. reaching from the Missouri to the Rocky Mountains, was carved out of the old Territory of Ne- braska, as formed in 1854. Dakota. thus established, constituted the largest organized Territory in the United States, and afforded a river navigation of not less than 2,000 miles.
In the month of June, the Federal officers of the Territory arrived, and entered upon the discharge of their duties. William Jayne, of Illinois, was the first Governor; John Hutchinson. of Minnesota, Secretary; Philemon Bliss, of Ohio, Chief Justice: L.
20
IHISTORY OF DAKOTA.
P. Williston, of Pennsylvania, and J. L. Williams, of Tennessee, District Judges: W. E. Gleeson. of Maryland, United States At- torney: W. F. Shaeffer, United States Marshal; George D. Hill, of Michigan, United States Surveyor-General: W. A. Burleigh, of Pennsylvania, United States Agent for the Yankton Indians; H. A. Hoffman, of New York. Agent for the Ponca tribe.
A census was taken showing the population of the Territory to be two thousand, four hundred and two, and on the 13th of July the first proclamation of the Governor was issued, dividing the Territory into judicial districts and assigning the judges thereto. On the 29th of July, 1861. the second executive proclamation was issued, dividing the Territory into legislative districts, and ap- pointing the 16th day of September for a general election to choose a Delegate in Congress, members of the Legislature and county officers.
And now for the first time the hardy pioneers of Dakota had to do with the perplexing questions of politics. Captain J. B. S Todd appeared as the independent candidate for Delegate in Cor .- gress; a convention held at Vermillion in June nominated A. J. Bell as the Union candidate; while C. P. Booge declared himself as the people's candidate. Todd was supported by the Dakotaian, a newspaper, at Yankton, and Bell by the Republican at Vermillion, while Booge relied upon his stump speakers and fast horses. Elec- tion came and passed; five hundred and eighty-five votes were cast in the Territory, of which Todd received three hundred and nine- ty-seven, Booge one hundred and ten, and Bell seventy-eight. The Board of Territorial Canvassers therefore issued to Todd the certificate of election as first Delegate to Congress from Dakota. The Legislature chosen at the same election, consist- ing of nine members of the Council and thirteen members of the Lower House, was convened by the Governor at Yank- ton, March 17, 1862. and perfected its organization by the selection of J. H. Shober, President, and James Tufts, Secre- tary of the Council; and George M. Pinney, Speaker, and J. R. Hanson, Chief Clerk of the House. A creditable code of laws for the Territory was enacted. the capital located by law at Yank- ton, and the Pembina settlement given a representation of three legis'ators. The contest over the location of the capital grew so threatening that the Governor ordered a squad of armed United States soldiers into the House to prevent violence to Speaker Pin-
21
IHISTORY OF DAKOTA.
ney. The next day Pinney resigned, and J. L. Tiernon was chosen Speaker. The Legislature adjourned May 15, 1862, hav- ing been in session sixty days.
During the winter of 1861-62, in the midst of the Rebellion, the Secretary of War authorized the enlistment of Company A, Da- kota Cavalry, which organization, consisting of ninety-six men, was mustered into the United States service, April 19, 1862, with Nelson Miner as captain; and in the following winter, Company B, Dakota Cavalry, consisting of eighty-eight men, was mustered into the United States service, with William Tripp as captain.
In March, 1862, during the breaking up of the Missouri River, that great stream became gorged with ice below the mouth of the Dakota River, and the waters were thrown over the banks, cover- ing nearly the whole valley for sixty miles to Sioux City. The settlers were driven from their homes by the floods, and were obliged to flee to the high lands, with their families and their herds, for safety. The preceding winter had been one of terrible storms and drifting snows, causing much suffering in the poorly constructed houses of the pioneers, and in some cases death from freezing; while the great prairie fires of the previous autumn had brought much disaster to property and danger to life. The sea- son of 1862 following, however, proved to be one of comparative prosperity to the husbandman; the harvests were bountiful, immi- gration increased, and towns and villages sprang to view along the wooded streams.
The second general election was held September 1st, 1862 .--- Gov. Jayne and General Todd were opposing candidates for Con- gress. Politics were discarded, and they entered the field as Union candidates, accompanied by two corresponding tickets for territo- rial offices and members of the Legislature. Eight hundred and sixty-seven votes were polled in the Territory, of which Jayne re- ceived four hundred and eight and Todd three hundred and seven- ty-five. Todd contested the seat of Jayne before the United States House of Representatives, and was awarded the seat as Delegate in that body, upon a basis of three hundred and forty-five votes for Todd, and two hundred and forty-six for Jayne.
On the 30th day of August, 1862, the inhabitants were startled by the alarming news that the Sioux Indians of the adjoining state of Minnesota had broken out in bloody war against the whites, and that several hundred defenceless men, women and children
22
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
had been savagely murdered in their homes. This fearful tale of slaughter, coupled with the report that the revengeful army of red men, reeking with innocent blood, was moving westward to attack the weak and defenceless settlements of Dakota, could not but east terror and tears around the hearthstone of many a home in the territory. Here these people had planted their humble abodes in the Wild West, and with seanty means, but with indus- try and frugality, they were perfecting, day by day, their little homes of peace and comfort.
The Governor immediately issued a proclamation, calling into armed service all citizens of the Territory subject to military duty, to protect the frontier homes and families against the expected at- tack. Some four hundred citizens of the Territory responded to the Governor's proclamation, left their fields and work-shops, and formed themselves into hastily organized military companies, fur- nishing their own fire-arms, subsistence and clothing. Fortifica- tions were speedily thrown up in the principal towns, and all the farming settlements on the Missouri slope were quickly abandoned, . some sending their women and children to the neighboring States for safety, while others took refuge in the stockades at the towns, to unite with the villagers in mutual protection. Two citizens of Sioux Falls were murdered near the village; one citizen was mur- dered and others wounded at the Dakota River ferry, within three miles of the capital; the United States mail carrier between Sioux Falls and Yankton was waylaid and robbed: a stage driver on the publie highway, near Choteau Creek, was shot dead; and between Vermillion and Yankton a skirmishing war-party for a time pre- vented travel upon the stage-road. At Yankton all the inhabitants of the surrounding country had assembled for defence within the barracks of the town. Within these rude walls the citizens re- mained under arms day and night, until United States troops began to arrive, and the Indians had retreated from the embargoed set- tlements. The farmers then ventured back to their devastated homes, to gather a winter's subsistence from their damaged har- vests and scattered herds. Company A, Captain Miner, and Com- pany B. Captain Tripp, were stationed for the winter among the settlements.
The second session of the Territorial Legislature commenced on the 1st of December. The Lower House was in session seventeen days before a permanent organization could be effected, the Gov-
23
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
ernor withholding his message meanwhile. The Council organized permanently on the first day of the session, by the selection of Enos Stutsman, President, and James Tufts, Secretary. The House formed a temporary organization by the election of A. J. Harlan, Speaker, and B. M. Smith, Chief Clerk. Ten days were consumed over contested seats, when, upon the ground of an ob- jectionable decision by the Speaker, six members withdrew from the House, leaving that body without a quorum. The six men- bers returned on the sixteenth day of the session, and the House was permanently organized by the election of M. K. Armstrong, Speaker, and Robert Hagaman, Chief Clerk. The following day the Governor's messrge was received, and the session proceeded in harmony.
During the summer of 1862. the first discovery of gold had been made in Western Dakota, on the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains, within the limits of the present Territories of Idaho and Montana; and on the 3d of the following March, 1863, Con- gress constructed the new Territory of Idaho, comprising all that portion of Dakota west of the 27th degree of longitude, passing northward through the Black Hills, and near the mouth of the Yellowstone River. Over twelve thousand people emigrated to the mountain mines of Idaho in 1863, and in May, 1864, the new Territory of Montana was framed out of Eastern Idaho, with a population of ten thousand people, and a yearly product of seven million dollars in gold.
The spring of 1863 had opened with discouraging prospects to the settlers in Southern Dakota. The fear of a long and disas- trous Indian war was still prevalent among the people. The set- tlements were again unguarded and defenceless; no military pro- tection was afforded by the commander of the district until a dar- ing murder was committed by a war-party of Indians on a public highway within three miles of the capitol, and whole settlements of industrious farmers had abandoned the Territory with their families and herds.
In June, 1863, the Government dispatched to the Territory two thousand mounted troops, under General Sully, who pursued and punished the Indians at the battle of Whitestone Hills, and after- wards returned to garrison the frontier settlements for the winter. Fort Sully was built and garrisoned as the most frontier military post in the Territory. The Santee and Winnebago tribes of Indians
24
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
were removed, during the same season, from Minnesota and located upon reservations in Dakota. Eighteen large steamboats passed up the Missouri River into the Territory the same season, being engaged in transporting freight for the soldiers and Indians, and mills and machinery for the mines in the Rocky Mountains.
Dakota's population was augmented in the spring of 1864, by a colony from the State of New York, headed by Hon. J. S. Fos- ter, nearly all of whom located in the Missouri Valley.
In June of this year. General Sully led his second military expe- detion through the Territory, to punish the tribes which were still on the war-path. One of his steamers made the first trip up the Yellowstone River to near mouth of the Big Horn, carrying sup- plies for the troops. His command numbered about two thousand five hundred men, and notwithstanding detachments of troops were left in his rear to protect the settlements, the United States mail stage was attacked and a murder committed almost within signal-shot of a garrison. A whole family of innocent and defenceless children were horribly butchered by the Indians at St. Helena, twelve miles below Yankton. The season of 1864 was a sad one for the settlements. Not only did lurking Indians hang upon the border for robbery and rapine, but unremmitting drouth and clouds of grasshoppers swept the bloom from the fields and verdure from the plains, and with the approach of autumn, the despondent farmers repaired with their teams to the neighboring States, to bring in supplies upon which to subsist until another hervest-time. The prospects for the future were indeed gloomy, and many of the earliest settlers abandoned the Territory for the purpose of making homes elsewhere.
On the 11th of October occurred the third Congressional Elec- tion, wherein W. A. Burleigh and J. B. S. Todd were opposing candidates for Delegate, running substantially upon the same po- litical platform. But little interest was manifested. and a small vote was polled. Indians. grasshoppers and continued misfortunes had abated the political and agricultural ardor of a despondent people. Six hundred and seven votes were polled, of which Bur- leigh received three hundred and eighty-six and Todd two hundred and twenty-two. Burleigh was therefore duly declared by the canvassers to be elected as the third Delegate in Congress. The annual message of Governor Edmunds to the Legislature, in De-
.
25
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
cember, recited in full the misfortunes and losses of the past year, but predicted a more encouraging future.
The spring of 1865 gave promise of a prosperous future to the Territory. Eighty-five thousand dollars had been appropriated by Congress for the opening of wagon roads through the Territory to the Rocky Mountain gold mines. Col. James A. Sawyers was ap- pointed Superintendent to construct the road from Niobrara to Virginia City, with $50,000; Col. G. C. Moody was assigned to the road from Sioux City up the Missouri Valley to the Great Chey- enne, with $25,000; and W. W. Brookings, with $30,000, was se- lected to construet a road across Dakota from the Minnesota line, out to Cheyenne, to intersect with the Sawyers route, west of the Black Hills. The first permanent bridges were built over the Big Sioux, Vermillion and Dakota Rivers.
In June, Gen. Sully led his third expedition up the Missouri Valley into the Indian country, and with the exception of the Brule Creek Massacre in August, peace and safety generally pre- vailed throughout settled portions of the Territory. The season was a favorable one for the farmers, and the fields yielded a boun- tiful harvest. Schools were numerously established throughout the Territory, and the erection of an Episcopal church was begun at Yankton. The Supreme Court of Dakota held its first session at Yankton, on the 6th day of July. 1865.
With the opening of spring in 1866, the three years' war with the Indians was declared at an end, and a Board of Peace Commis- sioners, to form treaties of perpetual peace and friendship with the wild tribes of Sioux on the Missouri River, was sent out by the Government, Governor Edmunds, of Dakota, being one of the Commissioners, and M. K. Armstrong, Secretary. The Commis- sion left Yankton by steamboat in May, and ascended the Missouri above the mouth of the Yellowstone, into Montana, returning in August, having spent nearly four months in holding councils and making treaties with nearly all the wild tribes on the upper river.
In the autumn the regular Congressional election occurred. Dr. W. A. Burleigh and W. W. Brookings were opposing candidates. Burleigh ran on the "Johnson" platform-Brookings as a straight Republican. The total vote was eight hundred and forty-six, of which Burleigh received five hundred and ninety-two, and Brook- ings two hundred and fifty-four, indicating a population of about five thousand. The previous year, the first assessment of personal
26
HISTORY OF DAKOTA.
property in the Territory had been made, the returns exhibiting a valuation of one hundred and fifty-eight thousand, nine hundred and sixty-three dollars.
There was a steady and increasing growth in 1867 and 1868; new counties were organized, towns and villages increased, immigra- tion was renewed. the land surveys were extended into the Red River Valley, and the Territory, for the first time, began its career of permanent progress. The first railroad to Sioux City, Iowa, was completed in 1868, near the eastern line of Dakota. The Union Pacific railroad was also completed through Southwestern Dakota, and the territory of Wyoming was created therefrom by act of Congress. Prior, however, to the separation of Wyoming from Dakota, the fifth congressional election had been held in the autumn of 1868, whereat the united vote of the two Territories was 4,681; S. S. Spink received 1.424: J. B. S. Todd, 1,089: M. Too- hey, 878; W. A. Burleigh, 697: J. P. Kidder. 591. Spink was therefore declared elected.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.