History of Grant County, Wisconsin, Part 85

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Co.
Number of Pages: 1044

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When the court met again, the prisoners did not appear. A motion was made to take judgment against the bail, but Judge Dunn said that if the people arose and drove them away, the bail could not be held responsible. None of them dared make their appearance for a long time. I afterward heard that Roundtree died in a hovel in Fair Play. I believe that all engaged in the killing of Jim Crow came to some bad end.

BY T. M. FULLERTON.

I arrived from Missouri, in Grant county, on Sunday morning, July 22, 1837. We slept on the bank of the Mississippi River at the mouth of Platte River the previous night. What is now Potosi was the point we were aiming to reach. The place was known throughout the mines as " Snake Hollow." Among the first discoveries of mineral was a rich deposit in a cave, on the west side of a ravine two miles in length. Several thousands of pounds of this mineral was white as chalk, and very pure, resembling chalk, except in its remarkable weight. In ex- ploring this cave, the miners, in winter, discovered many snakes in a torpid condition; hence the name given to this locality, In 1837, a few houses had been erected at the mouth of the " hollow " and named La Fayette. Nearly a mile further north, another group of shanties was called " The Hollow," and afterward Van Buren, which was the name of the post office. About a mile further north was the " Head of the Hollow," afterward known as Jackson. These three parts were, by Legislative act, in 1839-40, called Potosi, and the post office so named. Southeast of La Fayette nearly a mile, opposite the mouth of the Grant River, and being the ferry landing on the Wisconsin side, began to be a village called Osceola.

My destination at first was La Fayette, where I was selling a small stock of goods on commission. There was a similar establishment up in the hollow. But the inhabitants were chiefly adventurers engaged in mining, and except such things as they needed there was little call for merchandise, there being but a half-dozen or so of families in the southern part of the county. As a matter of course the society was rough, and morals were almost dispensed with. Drinking, gambling, stabbing and shooting were far too common, and " Snake Hollow " became throughout the mines notorious for its wickedness.

In 1837, there was, between " The Hollow " and " The Head of the Hollow," a small log Catholic chapel, the only evidence of Christianity to be found there. A priest resided there, and his little plantation bell called his people to occasional worship. During that year, Rev. John Crummer, an Irishman, came once or twice to preach the Gospel as the Methodists under- stand it. He was the regular " circuit rider " on a circuit embracing all of Wisconsin west and

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south of Blue Mounds. The preaching-place was a very small miner's cabin in which the family ate, slept and lived. The room did not exceed twelve by fourteen feet in size. The congregations were able to get in and room to spare. In August, 1838, the Illinois Conference sent Rev. Isaac I. Stewart to the Platteville Circuit, which embraced all of Grant and parts of other counties. During the spring of 1839, Rev. James G. Whitford, just returned from the Indian Mission at Caposia, now in Minnesota, came as Mr. Stewart's assistant. In the latter part of that year a class was formed, consisting of Thomas Clayton, Leader, Thomas J. Crock- well, Local Preachers; John Crockwell, Catherine C. Crockwell, George Medeira and wife, James R. Short and wife, and Jonah Pedlar and wife. They had been members before coming to the place. A weekly prayer-meeting was established, and preaching was had once a fortnight, all in the small residence of J. R. Short.

In the conference year of 1839-40, Rev. H. W. Reed was in charge of the circuit, and Mr. Whitford continued as assistant. They had thirty-two regular preaching-places in four weeks. In December, 1839, we began a Sabbath school, the first, I think, in Grant county. We had procured a log house for meeting purposes, about fourteen by sixteen feet in size, formerly used as a drinking saloon, and the scene of several stabbing and shooting affrays. It became our chapel for several years, and was the spiritual birthplace of many sinful souls. On the 2d of January, 1840, Messrs. Reed and Whitford began special revival services, assisted sometimes by neighboring local preachers. It was my good fortune to be the first fruits of that revival. During the three weeks the meeting continued, forty-two were converted and joined the class of Methodists already organized. The awakening was general and the reformation of the place was very marked. The influence did not stop with the meeting, but continued for more than a year. During the summer of 1840 Rev. James Gallaher, an Evangelist, formerly Pastor of a Presbyterian Oburch in Cincinnati, Ohio, held a series of meetings. and organized a Presbyterian Church, but left them without a Pastor, and they soon began to decline.

Out of the Methodist revival several went out to preach. Robert Langley, a tailor, intem- perate and profane, was reformed and converted. He subsequently became a member of the conference, did good service in the itinerant ranks, and died in the ministry at Reedsburg, August 16, 1874.

William Vance was our chief infidel, being a correspondent of infidel papers and a lecturer of his neighbors. He did all he could for two weeks to hinder the revival, but finally yielded to his convictions, was converted and preached several years as an itinerant. He went South and I lost track of him.

James W. Simpson went among the Chippewa Indians as a teacher, intending to be a missionary, but was thwarted in some cherished purpose, became a trader with the Indians at St. Paul, and gave up all pretensions to piety, dying some ten years ago.

This writer, after fifteen months of activity in church work at Potosi, went to Iowa County in March, 1841, and became a " circuit rider," continuing, with two interruptions for a short time, to this day.

Before leaving Potosi, arrangements were well on the way for building a Methodist Church, which was completed and occupied soon after.

On the 10th of October, 1840, the first temperance society was organized, called the "Snake Hollow Grant County Temperance Society." The pledge adopted was :

" We will neither drink nor make use of any ardent spirits or alcoholic liquors, unless for medicinal purposes in cases of sickness, believing ardent spirits are of no benefit to man in his daily pursuits of life ; we will, therefore, discountenance, and, so far as lies in our power, pro- hibit the use of them in our respective places of residence." Nineteen signatures were appended. The oficers were: William G. Thompson, President ; William Drake, Vice President; Lansing D. Lewis, Corresponding Secretary ; John H. Dodson, Recording Secretary ; and Robert Langley, Treasurer.

The annual meeting was held in just three months, January 11, 1841. There were then one hundred and two members. The officers then elected, were Hon. James P. Cox, President;

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George Medeira, Vice President ; T. M. Fullerton, Secretary ; R. Langley, Treasurer; C. C. Drake, T. J. Crockwell and Simon E. Lewis, Managers.

Although we had no vote in the Presidential election of 1840, excitement ran high, and " Tippecanoe and Tyler, too," was a thrilling watchword. George Medeira had recently come to the place with a stock of goods. He purchased and moved his family into a small log house, but proceeded to build a good frame residence on the same lot. Into this he had just moved when the convention nominated Harrison for the Presidency. Immediately he had his carpenters en- large the door of the old log house to six feet in width. A fence board was used for a latch ex- tending clear across the door, and six inches beyond it. To this was attached a three-quarter- inch rope, going through the door, and a block of wood four inches square, and ten inches long, fastened on the outer end of the rope. On the walls outside were stretched all the coon-skins he could procure. Then he moved his furniture and family back to the log cabin, and lived there till after election. This illustrates the feeling on one side with the "latch string always out," and the other side was equally enthusiastic.

This Medeira was a very excitable man. In 1830, he lived in a miner's hut a mile or more south of Mineral Point, where, in a fit of jealousy, aggravated with liquor, he mortally stabbed a worthy young man with a penknife. He was arrested in Galena, and was the first man ever put in jail there, as stated in the weekly Gazette of that city, February 18, 1881. He was in- dicted at Mineral Point for murder, the indictment quashed on some technicality, and never renewed. While living in Potosi, he was an active and useful member of the Methodist Church, a very kind and benevolent man. But his excitable nature sometimes led him into rash acts, causing him much sorrow, and not a little expense. When I left that village for an itinerant life, meaning to go afoot for want of means to buy a horse, he presented me with one, saddled and bridled, saying, " Take him in the name of the Lord," and accompanying me out of town on another horse, with blessings.

During the first three years of my residence in Wisconsin, the frost, in September, killed all the corn and other late crops. The seed was from the South, and not acclimated. It was a universal belief that the country was " too cold for corn." No one claiming that fruit could be raised here, could obtain credit for sanity. Again, it was the general opinion that the country would never be settled, except by transient miners, because fuel and building material could never be obtained, except by importing. These current beliefs caine fresh to me, when, after forty years' absence, I passed over the prairies of 1837, and found the orchards bending under their thousands of bushels of apples, the corn like the plentiful years of Egypt, and the farmers con- suming wood to get it out of the way of the plow.

SHULLSBURG, Wis., February 23, 1881.

BY J. W. SEATON.

It was in the month of July, in the year 1847, that a Northern Lake boat, " bearing Cæsar and his fortunes," and a few less distinguished personages, landed in the city of Milwaukee. The shore was reached by a broad plank-uncarpeted-being shoved out into the sand. Down this, one by one, the passengers filed, and through the deep, burning sand, carpet-sack in hand (grip-sacks were undeveloped), for half a mile or more, the few passengers made their way to the limits of the city (it was quite a limited city then), and sought the accommodation of a first- class hotel. They found one. It consisted of a long, one-and-a-half story frame building with a porch in front, and chairs ranged thereon for the accommodation of guests. The fare was beef- steak, boiled potatoes with the jackets on, coffee, warm biscuits of a saffron hue and an alkaline flavor, all placed on the center of a long table, within reach of the most modest guest, which was " Cæsar." They were disposed of with a relish, however, and perhaps went as far to satisfy the inner man as the sumptuous hills of fare which are now served from the sideboards of the New- hall and the Plankinton. Rest for the weary was provided up one flight of stairs, on beds of straw duly separated by board partitions. Dizzy dormitories on sixth and seventh story floors were not reached by elevators on this occasion, and, when morn broke in the east, you did not

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HISTORY OF GRANT COUNTY.

look out like an angel from mansions in the skies, to take observations of the waking world, and then descend, like a miner down a shaft, to the common level of mortals. None of these condi- tions existed. But one day and one night of this delectable, primitive city life sufficed for a lifetime, and, in a two-horse hack, with a jovial companion of lesser note than the writer consid- ered himself at that time, but who has since managed to " climb the steep where Fame's high temple shines afar "-the Hon. Orsamns Cole, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court-we set out in search of green fields and fresher pastures, over farmless prairies, around the margins of charming lakes, which in their undisturbed repose, and the cool quiet shade of the old oak open- ings which lined their borders, seemed an epitome of the "Saint's Rest "-through fenceless valley's and over the brow of treeless hills, we reach at length, on the second day out, the gallant young city of Madison, the capitol of the State. Stat umbra et preterea nihil. An unpretentious hotel situated near the foot of Lake street, wearing the modest title of " Lake House," gave us of its cheer, which was a repetition of the Milwaukee sort, with the addition of broiled prairie chicken and fried fresh fish. It enjoyed also the more exalted honor of being the headquarters of His Excellency, Gov. Henry Dodge, who was then in the zenith of his power. It was here he gave the famous reception to the German Count, displaying a hunting knife and a pair of horse pistols as the insignia of his rank and badge of his office. The city boasted of two other hotels of about the same magnitude and style of architecture as the Lake House; the one standing near the present site of the Vilas House, kept by Robert Lansing, and the other the notorious " American," which stood on the corner to the north of the park. These, with the old capitol, which looked more like a prison house of the Dark Ages than the capitol of a civilized State in the nineteenth century, and perhaps a hundred or more private residences, environed with hazel-bushes and the primitive oak groves-no house as yet being erected west of the grounds reserved for the public park-comprised all there was of this now beautiful inland city. Even then it was an enchanting spot. Nature, in one of her most wanton moods, seemed to have lavished here her fairest charms and most seductive smiles. Lakes, groves, and undulating hills all conspired to captivate the senses, and lead the adorer to exclaim in his heart,

"These are thy glorious works, Parent of Good !

Almighty ! thine this everlasting frame, Thus wondrous fair!"

Here were landscapes and pictures of loveliness, unapproachable in their design, perfect in their execution, painted by the hand which had long since designed the blue canons of the skies, and painted the starry galleries of the heavens.

Leaving this paradise of places, where reason and the charms of nature invited us to stay and make our fame and fortune (if such a thing were possible), we resumed once more our journey westward, and soon were approaching the lofty summits of the Blue Mound. Arriving at the old home of Ebenezer Brigham, which stood a short distance from the public highway, in all its original simplicity-a double log cabin of the Southern type-we partook of a choice meal of venison and pastry, supplemented by other rare dainties of a well-spread Western table, which we have ever since held in grateful remembrance. Here for the first time, I met the hero of Pecatonica, Gov. Henry Dodge, who, in company with Judge and Frank Dunn, was on his way to Madison, the latter to attend a session of the Supreme Court, of which the Judge, in Territorial days, was Chief Justice. The stockade near the Mound, called "Mound Fort," was still standing about a mile and a half south of Brigham's house, and could be seen from it, excited the most lively emotions in my young and enthusiastic mind. Here was one of the strongholds of the early settlers, where they had brought their wives and children, to protect them against the wily assaults of the renowned chief of the Sacs and Foxes and his followers-Black Hawk and his warriors. In this neighborhood the blood-thirsty savages had murdered a member of Brigham's family. It was in the sight of this Fort two of its inmates, who were out recon- noitering, had been surrounded by the lurking enemy, killed and horribly mutilated, in the presence of their companions, and which deed of atrocity had led to the relentless punishment

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which Gen. Dodge and his command soon after gave them at the famous battle of the Pecatonica, where, out of a band of seventeen warriors, not a red-skin was left to tell the tale. All were. killed. It was to this fort the young Hall girls, after a month's wandering and captivity, were. brought in a most destitute and forlorn condition, and where they were so kindly received and treated by the ladies of the Fort. The scene of these cruelties and war-like exploits made a deep and lasting impression upon my mind at the time, as well as the wide, romantic view of the surrounding country, which these lofty summits enables the eye of the traveler to obtain. From here onward we came in contact with the old-time mode of transportation of lead across the State to the lake ports-three and four yoke of cattle attached to a heavy wagon-the " prairie schooners " of early times-which made their regular monthly voyages to and from the lakes and mines-taking out their cargo of pig lead, and returning with merchandise and family stores. It was a slow but sure and profitable business. In driving these teams many a Yankee boy learned forcible expressions and expletives which he never dreamed before were in the English language. Passing through the already important and wealthy mining villages of Dodgeville, Mineral Point and of Platteville, all then flourishing places and deserving of men- tion, we reach, at last, the brow of the hill where the road descends into this ancient burg- Potosi. What a view is here again presented ! Before you, to the southward and westward, is. a prospect the most beautiful which can be imagined. It is not in your immediate presence, in. superlative languages, sublime, illimitable, immense; it is rather quiet, impressive, peculiar. To the right and left are gentle, undulating slopes, clothed in emerald green of waving oaks, mark the northern limits of the long, deep and sinuous ravine you are about to enter. Its trailing course, as it presented itself to the early settler, winding in dark and dismal folds to the river, begot the name of "Snake Hollow," by which sobriquet it was long known among the miners. On either hand burst forth two large and never-failing springs of limpid water, which form the source of the beautiful stream called by the harsh, ill-sounding pseudonym of " Snake Hollow Branch." All the diminutive streams in the mining region which branch out from and supply the larger water-courses are known by this peculiar, and I may say, appropriate appella- tive. Hence we have "Rigsby Branch," "Dry Hollow Branch," " Long Branch," "Eayres' Branch," and many other branches, all tributary to the Grant and Platte Rivers, which course through the town in nearly every direction, furnishing pure and living water to almost every farm. None of them are sluggish in their movement, but go rippling and bounding down to mingle with the great Father of Waters ; and to their purifying influence more than any other causes, may we justly attribute the continued exemption of this town from malarial and other diseases, so destructive to human life and happiness in many Western towns.

The moisture with which they continually supplied the earth and air were also produc- tive of a heavy growth of forest trees which are still numerous, and which, fifty years ago, shaded nearly every rod of ground within the borders of the town with their dark, dense foliage. And it is to these huge trees, many of them the slow growth of centuries, more than the products of the mines, rich and valuable as they have been, Potosi has derived a preponderant share of its wealth and prosperity. Chopping and boating cord-wood and timber to the Dubuque market has for years been a lucrative business, and many of our prominent citizens have derived there- from a respectable independence, a fact which can be said of but very few who have delved and wasted their lives in the lead mines.

But to return to the brow of the hill, where like De Soto, I gazed for the first time upon the broad, matchless and almost boundless valley of the Mississippi, where sweeps its mighty waters to the ocean. It was standing upon this elevation, looking over and beyond the little valley in my immediate presence into the vast and almost measureless valley beyond, that I became impressed with the greatness and grandeur of the country I had reached. There, almost at my very feet, flowed the world's most magnificent river. There, within reach of my vision, clearly defined by the shores of this mighty stream, were the eastern boundaries of an empire yet to be. The Great West, with its vast prairies, its arid plains, its streams and mount- ains, its wooded hills and valleys, its " boundless contiguity of shade," yet uninhabited and

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unexplored by the foot of civilized man, stretching onward and onward to the far limits of a continent, presented itself to my mind, and I shrunk into nothingness, and was ready to exclaim in the language of the Psalmist " What is man that thon art mindful of him or the Son of Man that thou visitest him." Surely, thought I, here is a region so far-reaching in its limits, so wild and weird in its aspect, so much beyond the necessities of the present civilization that centuries must elapse before the broad acres of its prairies will be needed to supply the wants of man, and generations must expire before the solitude of its woods and streams shall be broken up or re-echo to the sound of the woodman's ax.

At this date, 1847, Potosi was second to no other town in the county. Her miners were pros- perous, her mechanics were profitably employed, her merchants were doing an increasing and extensive business both in the wholesale and retail trade. Lancaster, Wingville, Beetown, the Hurricane and all surrounding points came here to purchase their supplies. Steamboats left the landing weekly, freighted with lead and brought back in return the necessaries and luxu- ries of life, as whisky, bacon, flour, staple groceries and dry goods. A printing office whence issued the Potosi Republican (whereof your humble servant was proprietor and editor, and weekly expounded good, sound, Democratic doctrine) was here sustained and shed its benign in- fluence over the darker portions of the county ; four lawyers, Cole & Biddlecome, the former now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and the latter one of the brightest intellects and most promising young men the State could boast, who since pursued his profession in St. Louis and died in Florida ; Judge Cyrus K. Lord and Hon. William Hull, both residents at the present time of La Crosse, where they still pursue their honorable profession. Judge Lord was Receiver of the Land Office at that point, holding his appointment from President Franklin Pierce, and William Hull distinguished himself in the Legislature during the term of Gov. Bashford's ad- ministration as the popular Speaker of the House ; closing his political career, he located at La Crosse and became the attorney of Commodore Davidson's Northern Line of Boats, which posi- tion he still holds. The medical profession was eminently represented by such skilled prac- titioners as Dr. Carlos M. Hewitt, now a respected citizen of Boscobel, but whose failing health has prohibited him for several years from active practice. Drs. Bennett Armstrong, George W. Bicknell and John Creighton, all of whom are now dead, and a few years later, Dr. Taylor L. Graham, who still resides and pursnes his profession among us.

Among the principal merchants at that period, who were engaged in active business, were Solon M. Langworthy, now of the city of Dubuque, a son of old Dr. Langworthy, an early pioneer of the mines. Donald A. McKinzie, a Scotchman by birth, boasting Highland blood, who came from St. Louis about the year 1840, entered into the lead and mercantile business and established a character for honesty and fair dealing which became proverbial. He subse- quently entered into partnership with Julius Augustine and James Garmick, doing business under the firm name of Mckenzie, Augustine & Co. The firm was dissolved in the spring of 1855, Mr. Mckenzie removing to Dubuque and Mr. Garmick to Dunleith, where, for a few years, they were connected with the Dubuque & Dunleith Ferry Company, Mr. Mckenzie for many years being the trusted and efficient clerk of the company. The members of this firm are now all dead, Mr. Garmick having become an invalid and cripple several years before his death from a railroad accident, suffering the loss of his right arm. He was a good citizen, and an intelli- gent, worthy man.

Samnel Wilson, a native of County Down, Ireland, was another leading merchant. He came to Potosi about the year 1840, from the city of Galena, where he had previously been in business, and engaged at first as a clerk in the store of D. A. Mckenzie. Subsequently pur- chasing the stock of Lawther & Dyer, who removed to Dubuque, he commenced business for himself, and continued it until the summer of 1857, when his active and busy career was brought to an untimely end, and he passed from the busy walks of life to the cold and silent grave. Mr. Wilson was a fine man, correct and expert in all his business transactions, and the soul of honor. His memory is yet cherished by all who knew him, and none pass his mar- ble monument in our village cemetery without mentioning his manly virtues, and paying a

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History of Grant County, Wisconsin, Part 85

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899 Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Co. Number of Pages: 1044

Author: Butterfield, Consul Willshire, 1824-1899
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Chicago : Western Historical Co.
Number of Pages: 1044