USA > Wisconsin > Milwaukee County > Memoirs of Milwaukee County : from the earliest historical times down to the present, including a genealogical and biographical record of representative families in Milwaukee County, Volume I > Part 28
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the largest ravine within the present corporate limits of the city. There were, however, in addition to these a few smaller ravines upon the west bank of the Milwaukee river just above the present dam, one of which, known in the olden time as the "Picnickers' Retreat," is as yet unchanged, the others having mostly disappeared.
This topographical description from the pen of Mr. Buck, al- though somewhat lengthy, will no doubt be deemed by the reader of sufficient importance to justify its insertion in this history of Mil- waukee. All now is changed, but it is interesting to go back and com- pare the site of Wisconsin's metropolis in a state of nature with what it is to-day.
EARLY SETTLERS.
We will now return and take up events that were important in their way in laying the foundation of the splendid city on the western shore of Lake Michigan. The survey of the plats of the two rival towns was made in 1835. Although Juneau and Kilbourn did not purchase their lands from the government until late in the summer of that year, their claims to the tracts of which they had taken pos- session were generally respected, in accordance with the unwritten law relative to the occupation of the public lands, and their plans and pur- poses were therefore matters of interest to incoming settlers and visitors. That both men intended to lay out town-sites became known early in the year, and this had its influence upon those who came here to "spy out the land" and seek homes for themselves and families. The United States survey of public lands in Milwaukee county had been commenced in December, 1834, by William A. Burt, and in Feb- ruary. 1835, he had completed the survey of fractional townships 7 and 8, in range 22, between Milwaukee river and the lake. It should be stated in this connection that in the treaties made with the Meno- monee Indians, by the general government at Washington, in 1831, the Indians ceded all the lands north and east of the Milwaukee river to which they had previously laid claim, and in the treaty of 1833, made at Chicago, the Pottawattomie Indians ceded to the government the lands west and south of the river, which they had long claimed as their own. The survey made by Burt was designed to include only lands ceded by the Menomonees, but in order to fill out the two townships the survey was extended west and south of the river into lands which had been reserved to the Pottawattomies by treaty stipu- lations until 1836. when their final removal from the lands was to take place. This tract of land was sold at Green Bay in 1835, and the tracts purchased by Juneau and Kilbourn respectively were platted
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and town lots were offered for sale long before the close of the year. As soon as the towns were laid out sales of lots commenced, many applications having been made before the surveyor's notes were trans- ferred to paper. In fact, Juneau had platted his lands in advance of purchase, and made his first sale of a lot to Albert Fowler, in August, 1835. The first sale of a "West Side" lot was made by Kilbourn to Samuel Brown on Oct. 16. 1835. and the first recorded plat of that portion of the city, made by Garrett Vliet, was placed on record Oct. 9. 1835. Many people bought lots who did not immediately build on them. This is always the case with new towns. In some cases householders may have bought the lots adjoining them, for garden and pasturage, not an unusual thing to do. On Sept. 17. 1835. the first election was held in Milwaukee and the whole number of votes cast was thirty-nine. The only law authorizing such an election was the law of necessity, which required that some provision should be made for the government of the settlement, and by common consent a supervisor, a town clerk, three assessors, two commissioners of roads, one constable, two inspectors of schools, three pathmasters, one poundmaster and three fence-viewers were elected. It is reasonably certain, however, that there was not much necessity for the election of persons to fill some of these offices, as there were no schools to inspect and no fences in Milwaukee or in Milwaukee county for that matter, to "view." But these early settlers were from the Eastern states, where the "town" system of government prevailed, and they evidently were determined to have the full complement of local officials.
The vote cast at this election would indicate that there had not been a large addition in population to the new settlement during the spring and summer months of 1835; and this fact is further evidenced by the burden of official honors heaped upon George H. Walker, Enoch Chase, and Uriel B. Smith. It is plainly impossible to give the names of all those who became settlers of Milwaukee during the pioneer period of its history, but as the year 1835 was when it secured its start a peculiar interest is attached to those who sought a domicile here in that year. The following is believed to be an approximately correct list of those who became actual settlers in that year: Owen Aldrich, Lucius I. Barber. A. O. T. Breed, William Bunnell, Amasa Bigclow, Hiram Burnham, Chauncey Brownell, Benson Brazce, John Bowen, P. Balser, Ellsworth Burnett, Paul Burdick, H. H. Brannon, Samuel Burdick, William Baumgartner. N. W. Cornwall, Enoch Chase, Alfred L. Castleman, Parker C. Cole, Luther Cole, Mathew Cawker, Luther Childs, John Childs, Harvey Church, Benjamin Church, Loren B. Carleton, William H. Chamberlain, William Clark,
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James Clyman, George D. Dousman, Talbot C. Dousman, Andrew Douglas, Martin De Laney, John Davis, B. H. Edgerton, E. W. Edger- ton, Andrew Ebel, N. Eseling, E. S. Estes, Hiram Farmin, Uriel Far- min, Jonas Foltz, Elon Fuller, Worcester Harrison, Cyrus Hawley, Joshua Hathaway, P. W. Hodge, Thomas Holmes, Henry H. Hoyt, Thomas D. Hoyt, H. M. Hubbard, David Jackson, Isaac B. Judson, J. K. Lowry, Jacob Mahoney, James McFadden, B. S. McMillen, James McNeil, David Morgan, James Murray, Patrick Murray, John Ogden, Nelson Olin, Alfred Orendorf, Almon Osborn, Zebedee Pack- ard, S. Parsons, William Piper, Joseph Porthier, George Reed, D. H. Richards, Thomas M. Riddle, Hiram Ross, S. Rowley, Edmund Sanderson, James Sanderson, Walter Shattuck, Henry Shaft, Robert Shields, Henry Sivyer, Samuel Sivyer, William Sivyer, William Skin- ner, Isaac Smart, Joseph Smart, Richard Smart, Uriel B. Smith, Alexander Stewart, I. Stewart, Samuel Stone, Wilhelm Strothmann, Alanson Sweet, Joseph Tuttle, William O. Underwood, Garrett Vliet, E. Weisner, Daniel Wells, Jr., George H. Wentworth, George S. West, Henry West, Joel Wilcox, Joseph Williams, Wallace Woodward, and William Woodward. A number of these gentlemen grew to promi- nence in the county and state, and have already been given extended personal mention on other pages of this work.
Ellsworth Burnett was numbered among these worthy pioneers, but he was not destined long to labor or enjoy the fruits of his efforts. He was a native of Gouvenor. St. Lawrence county, N. Y., and upon coming to Milwaukee made a claim on the southwest quarter of section 31, township 7, range 22, afterward the home of Clark Shepardson, the Burnhams, and others. In the fall of 1835, in company with Col. James Clyman, he went to Rock river on a land-hunting trip, and while making camp near the present village of Theresa, in Dodge county, was shot dead, and his companion was badly wounded in the left arm and his back was filled with small shot. The crime was com- mitted by two Indians named Ashe-ca-bo-ma and Ush-ho-ma, alias Mach-e-oke-mah (father and son) for some fancied wrong. They were promptly arrested, confined in the fort at Green Bay until June, 1837, when they were brought to Milwaukee and tried before Judge Frazier, convicted, and the old man was sentenced to be hanged ; but both were finally pardoned by Gov. Henry Dodge as an offset to the escape of the two white men, Scott and Bennett, the murderers of Manitou, the Indian who was killed in 1836, Scott and Bennett having escaped from the jail in April, 1837, and were never retaken.
Among those whose names are given above there were doubtless all the types of men who are usually drawn to a new settlement.
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James S. Buck thus describes William Baumgartner, who enrolled him- self among the settlers of 1835: "This man was noted for his personal ugliness. Short in stature, with an immense head and face, flat, short, thick cars and a mouth that, when open, would have fooled a king- fisher or a sand martin. But his chief deformity was his eyes, these organs being like those of the trilobite, placed nearly in the side of his head, and in addition to all this he was cross-eyed. He properly be- longed to the oolitic period when monsters were the rule. The only way to approach him unseen was to come directly in front of him. He was, without exception, the worst looking human being that it was ever my fortune to see. His very presence caused a chill wherever he went and no child could be induced to approach him. Even strange dogs eyed him askance. Where he came from or where he went to I never knew ; he disappeared in 1838."
Alfred L. Castleman was one of the pioneer physicians who came in 1835, hailing from Kentucky. He had read medicine in his native state, and attended lectures in Louisville. He left Milwaukee for a time to make his home in Washington, D. C., but soon returned, and in 1847 was elected a member of the Constitutional convention, serv- ing on the Banking and Corporations' committee. He was for several years a regent of the State University, in which he took an especial pride, and was president of the Wisconsin State Medical Society in 1850-51 and 1855. Originally a Democrat, the move made to extend the number of slave-holding states and the demands in general of the advocates of slavery displeased him, and he became a member of the Republican party in its infancy. On the breaking out of the Civil war he did not hesitate as to where he would cast his lot ; he was from the first an outspoken defender of the Federal cause, became interested in raising troops, was commissioned surgeon of the Fifth Wisconsin infantry, and went at once into active service, the regiment being as- signed to General Hancock's brigade. During his connection with the regiment he kept a diary of events, which, after his resignation in De- cember, 1863, he published under the title "The Army of the Potomac Behind the Scenes." He returned to Milwaukee after his resignation to find that others had supplanted him during his absence. For a time he carried on a farm in Delafield; afterward a "hydropathic sanitarium" in Madison, but failing health, brought on by exposure in the army finally induced him to go to California in 1873, and there he remained until his death in 1877.
Col. James Clyman was a native of Kentucky, and previous to his settlement in Milwaukee had not only been a resident of nearly every state north of the Ohio river, but he had also explored much of the
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vast territory lying west of the Mississippi, then an unbroken wilder- ness. He had crossed the Rocky Mountains three different times and returned, going once to California and twice to Oregon, besides serving five years in the United States army; and he was probably not over forty years of age when he came here. He became part owner of the saw-mill erected upon the northwest quarter of section 26, township 7, range 21, town of Wauwatosa, the mill being afterward known as the "Ross Mill." every vestige of which has long since disappeared ; but a large amount of lumber was manufactured there during several years, and it was a faithful worker while it lasted. With Ellsworth Burnett, Colonel Clyman left Milwaukee on Nov. 4, 1835, for a trip to Rock river, in search of land, and it was on this ill-fated trip that Burnett was killed by the two Indians as related above. Clyman was severely wounded in the left arm at the same time, but he bound up the injured member with his handkerchief and started for Milwaukee, with the Indians in pursuit for some distance. He held his left arm in his right hand, traveled hard all night, during which it rained steadily, the next day and night, and in the forenoon of the second day came out near the Cold Spring, having eaten nothing during all this terrible journey. He was taken to the house of William Wood- ward, at the Cold Spring, where his wounds were dressed by John Bowen, and where he remained until he had recovered from his in- juries. As an exhibition of physical endurance this has seldom been equaled. The country had no sooner begun to settle up than Clyman went away, going first to California, where he was at the time of the gold discoveries, and lastly to Oregon, where he took an active part in the Indian wars of the '50s.
Andrew Douglas was born in Scotland on April 18, 1810, and was the son of James and Ann (Oliver) Douglas, natives of the south of Scotland. The family came to America in 1828, when Andrew was eighteen years old, and first settled on a farm in Virginia. In 1834 Andrew Douglas decided to come to the great and new West, and in the fall of that year arrived at Chicago, where he secured employment with Archibald Clybourn, who had a meat market, and young Douglas delivered meat to all the residents of the town. He took up a claim on the present site of Lincoln park, but owing to the prevalence of fever and ague he abandoned it. He attended the first land sale at Green Bay in 1835, and returned via the present site of Oshkosh, where he and his companions camped one night, and where at that time there was not even a cabin. The next night he camped on the present site of Fond du Lac and decided to take up a claim there. but upon being informed by a passing mail carrier that the land had been put in the
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market he returned to Milwaukee and in 1835 took up the northwest quarter of section 17, town of Lake, where he resided until his death in 1896. Mr. Douglas was always prominently identified with the affairs of his town and acted as one of the first assessors, and he was also chairman of the town board a number of times, the last being the year 1879. In February, 1852, he went to California via Panama, arriving at San Francisco on April I of the same year. After spend- ing a year in mining, in which business he was very successful, he returned via the Nicaragua route, arriving in Milwaukee in May, 1853. During the winter of 1871 and 1872 he again went to California to visit old scenes and associations, this time going via the Central Pacific railway and making the trip in six days. He spent the summer of 1881 in Scotland. He was a member of the Old Settlers' Club from the time of its organization and was a staunch Republican in his politics.
James Murray came to Milwaukee from Crieff, Scotland, in 1835. When news was received of the killing of Ellsworth Burnett, mention of which is made on a previous page, he was one of those who went in pursuit of the murderers, captured them, and saw them safely lodged in the fort at Green Bay. He sold to the city for charitable purposes- at the nominal sum of ten dollars per acre-the present sites of the Industrial School for Girls, the Protestant Home for the Aged, the Protestant Orphans' Asylum, and St. Rose's Orphan Asylum, the transfer amounting in effect to the gift of a splendid property. In politics he was a Republican, and took an active interest in all the political issues of the day. He died in June, 1863.
Capt. James Sanderson, who came to Milwaukee from Cleveland, as master of the schooner "Nancy Dousman," was a man noted for his marked peculiarities and eccentricities of character, as well as his some- what remarkable subsequent career. He was a native of Rhode Island, was naturally of an uneasy and restless disposition, and, like thousands before him, went carly to sea; and after visiting different parts of the world in the capacity of a common sailor, finally brought up, about 1830, in Buffalo, then a young and promising inland mari- time city, where, with many others, who like himself were seeking a rise in their profession, he hung out his shingle as a full-fledged "master mariner." James S. Buck is authority for the statement that "if a temper like a hyena, backed by a will of iron and innate cussed- ness enough for a plantation driver in the palmiest days of slavery. would fit a man for that position, then he was certainly qualified be- yond a question, and entitled to a full diploma." Captain Anderson settled upon a portion, forty acres, of the northeast quarter of section
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5, township 6, range 22, town of Lake, in 1836, and there he built a frame house and a barn on Grove street, just south of Railroad street. He was the owner at one time of what is known as Milwaukee proper, half of which he afterward sold to Alanson Sweet. He was also the owner of considerable other real estate, and about 1850 he purchased an interest in the old steamer "Globe," which was run one season between Chicago and Buffalo, with him as commander, and this was the immediate cause which resulted in his social and financial ruin. With what he could save out of the sale of his property in 1853, he left for California, there to commence life anew in his old age. He had become completely demoralized and sank lower and lower in the social scale, until the last known of him he was working in a livery stable for a small pittance and his whisky.
William Sivyer, a native of England, was born at Wadhurst, county of Sussex, Feb. 27, 1810, being the second son of John and Lydia Sivyer. His early life was passed with his parents and, at the premature age of ten years he was permitted, on account of his natural inclinations and aptitude exhibited for building, and his own expressed desire, to serve an apprenticeship to an architect and builder. Before the expiration of the required term of seven years his talent for his adopted profession, mainly that of masonry structure and artistic plaster work, had so developed as to render him capable, at seventeen years of age, to superintend construction of buildings, while at the age of twenty-one years he individually contracted for the construction of buildings at St. Leonard's-on-Sea, on the south coast of England, and engaged in the business to some extent in the city of London, and at Gravesend, on the lower Thames river. On April 1, 1835, ac- companied by his wife and child (George J., one year old) and his brothers, Henry and Samuel Sivyer, he, with a party of friends and acquaintances, embarked at Rye, county of Sussex, upon the schooner "Alfred Pilcher." After reaching New York, with no special point in view and a desire to see the interior or frontier regions lying to the westward, taking the most comfortable means of transportation then afforded, he and his party again embarked, steaming up the beautiful Hudson river to the city of Albany. Thence to Rochester on an Erie canal boat, and being favorably impressed with this city and surround- ing country, a period of three weeks was very pleasantly passed here, when, again taking a canal boat, two days' journey brought him to Buffalo. Five days sufficed for this city, and, securing passage for himself and party on a lake steamer, a voyage of four days landed hin at Detroit. A stop of four days here, and he again embarked, and this time upon a steamer, the "Daniel Webster," destined for the head of
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Lake Michigan. Mr. Sivyer found Chicago, June 14, 1835, the day of his arrival, a wild, savage-appearing place, with Fort Dearborn and its stockades giving about the only substantial protection afforded to about 300 settlers and traders, against 3,000 red warriors, then en- camped in the environs, trading and awaiting government annuities. Skilled labor in this remote locality was almost impossible to obtain, and the work upon the "Lake House," for years the best hostelry in Chicago, was constructed mainly by Mr. Sivyer's own hands ; and the work was of such superior order and so quickly executed, that his repu- tation was at once established and his services were in demand. To investigate reports from Milwaukee to his own satisfaction, he en- gaged passage for himself and family in a sailing yacht from Chicago to Milwaukee, landed and was received by Mr. Juneau at a point on the east side of Milwaukee river, where Grand avenue bridge now spans it. This was on Oct. 27, 1835, when Milwaukee-in the in- cipient stages of civilization, with its paucity of rude habitations and dwellers of unknown character, commingled with the aborigines, gathered about the place of landing in startling numbers-was any- thing but inviting as a place of residence. Following his arrival Mr Sivyer made tours of observation over perhaps all of the present limits of Milwaukee, and indulged in occasional shooting or hunting expedition into adjacent forests, wherein abundant game not only gratified his love for sport but afforded ample opportunities for gun practice, exhibitions of skill as a marksman, and his extraordinary physical powers. Finding one brick mason in the little settlement and employing him, Mr. Sivyer, with the assistance of his brother Henry (who had not yet learned the building business) started work, and with his own hands laid the first brick, and in the completion of a brick oven, fireplaces and a mammoth old-fashioned chimney in a new build- ing for Mr. Juneau, finished the first brick masonry work ever con- structed in Milwaukee. With his family Mr. Sivyer passed the winter of 1835-36 with some English friends who had settled at Oak Creek. On March 15, 1836, he removed his family from Oak Creek to a cabin near the mouth of Milwaukee river, where he remained a few weeks before beginning the occupancy of a little home provided in the village. On May 4, 1836, in their new home, a boy baby was born to Mr. and Mrs. Sivyer, and the village folk some days later, headed by Solomon Juneau, requested that the newcomer be named Milwaukee, as the first born white boy. Mr. and Mrs. Sivyer had concluded to name the boy Charles, but in compliance with the request settled upon Charles Mil- waukee, as later he was christened. In the fall of 1836 Mr. Sivyer built the first brick building erected in Milwaukee-a dwelling for
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himself-and for fifteen years thereafter he was actively engaged in contracting and building. His last contract was the building of St. John's cathedral, on Jackson street, opposite the court-house, when, feeling that a competence had been acquired in the various city prop- erties he owned, and which were of sufficient importance to consume considerable of his personal attention, he retired from the building busi- ness. On Aug. 5, 1890, in the eighty-first year of his age, saying, "Lucy, good wife, I am going home; come to me soon," he passed away to his everlasting and final rest, a good, honest man and a strong character, whose life had been well and profitably spent.
The speculative fever had not yet become epidemic in Milwaukee in 1835, and not much real estate changed hands, neither was there much done in the way of making building improvements. The most important of the year were the fitting up of a temporary tavern by John and Luther Childs and another building for the same purpose by Jacques Vieau. The last mentioned structure became somewhat fa- mous as a pioneer hostelry, was known later as the Cottage Inn and was destroyed by fire in 1845. Juneau and Martin began the erection of the Bellevue in this year, which building was later called the Mil- waukee House, but it was not completed until 1837. It was located at the northeast corner of Broadway and Wisconsin streets. The establishment of a postoffice with Solomon Juneau postmaster was an- other evidence of the advancement of civilization during the year. ยท Religious services were held for the first time in the new settlement in the month of May under Methodist auspices, and in July the first Presbyterian church service was held with Rev. A. A. Barber as the officiating minister. Several dwellings were erected during the year, Juneau moved into a new frame building, and Horace Chase, who had formed a business partnership with Archibald Clybourn, of Chicago, built a warehouse and was prepared to engage in the forwarding trade as well as merchandising. The greater number of those who came to the embryo city in 1835 were unmarried men, or if married, they left their wives behind until they had selected a place for settlement. A few of the new settlers, however, had families, and the first child born in Milwaukee of purely white parents was a daughter of Uriel B. Smith, born in 1835, and christened Milwaukee Smith. The first male child born in the settlement was Charles Milwaukee Sivyer, here- tofore mentioned, who was born the following year.
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