USA > Wisconsin > The United States biographical dictionary and portrait gallery of eminent and self-made men, Wisconsin volume > Part 37
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led to the offer of other bounties and induced many enlistments.
Gov. Taylor was married in 1842 to Catharine Hurd, a most excellent and intelligent lady, by whom he has had three children, all daughters. One of these died at the age of four years, the others are both married, and live with or near their parents in Dane county. One of these graduated at our State University with high honors.
In 1873 William R. Taylor was by acclamation placed at the head of the reform ticket and elected governor of the State, receiving 81,635 votes against 66,224 for his opponent in Gov. C. C. Washburn. His career in the executive chair has been marked by the same practical ability and integrity .that have characterized all the acts of his earnest and business
life. He has enforced economy, honesty and effi- ciency in the administration of State affairs. That there have been rumors and complaints by disap- pointed aspirants to office excites no surprise or dis- affection on the part of the liberal and the just. On the contrary, his official conduct thus far has com- manded the respect of the good men of all parties, and contributed to the contentment of the people and the prosperity of the State. If popular govern- ments in the American Union are to be preserved to the people in their original purity, that end will be best attained by elevating to high official positions self-made men, whose lives, like that of Governor Taylor, furnish a noble example of honorable enter- prise and unselfish devotion to every public and pri- vate duty.
EDMUND BARTLETT,
MONROE.
F EW men have had a more varied and adven- turous experience than the subject of this sketch, and the necessarily condensed and incom- plete record of the leading events of his life read more like fiction than a chapter from real life. Aside from the thrilling character of its personal narrative, the sketch possesses peculiar interest and value, as furnishing, incidentally, an authentic history of the rapid rise, the reckless and depraved charac- ter of the class of men and women who throng to the frontier settlements of the West. The moralist and future historian may herein find much material on which to employ their respective vocations.
Edmund Bartlett was born in Northampton, Massachusetts, October 4, 1822, and is the son of Edmund Morris and Laura (Randall) Bartlett, the former a native of the same town, the latter of Worthington, Berkshire county, Massachusetts. His father was born July 25, 1795; was a soldier of the war of 1812, entering as private and passing through the intermediate grades to the rank of first sergeant. He subsequently took much interest in military matters, became an enthusiastic student of military tactics, and was afterward colonel of a regiment of Massachusetts Light Infantry, at the head of which he escorted General Lafayette into Northampton in the last visit of the distinguished nobleman to the United States (1824). He was a very active, con- sistent and useful member of the Congregational
church from boyhood till his death, and was recognized by all classes as a leader in every good work. He was a diligent reader of history, and, with a tenacious memory, acquired an extensive knowledge of its general details. He was also a man of remarkable industry and enterprise, and generous and noble in all his impulses. In 1832 he removed with his family to Ohio, and settled in the township of Brecksville, Cuyahoga county, some twelve miles south of Cleveland - at that time a wilderness - and known as the " Western Reserve ; " but Colonel Bartlett was a strong and resolute man, and with his ax he soon subdued the forest, and made his farm of one hundred and eighty acres one of the best and most highly cultivated in that section of the country, with an orchard of over one thousand of the choicest varieties of apple trees, besides smaller fruits in abundance. He was for several years president of the County Agricultural Society, and was well known throughout the region for his valuable efforts to advance the agricultural and horticultural interests of his neighborhood. His intimate friends and associates included such men as Hon. Louis P. Harvey, late governor of Wiscon- sin; Professor E. H. Nevin ; Hon. E. S. Hamlin ; Hon. John C. Vaughan, editor of the "Cleveland Leader;" Professor Jared P. Kirtland, Cleveland Medical College, celebrated as a lecturer on agri- cultural chemistry and as a scientist ; and others.
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In politics he was raised a whig, but on the dissolution of that organization affiliated with the free-soilers; and later became identified with the republican party.
On the 6th day of December, 1821, he married Miss Laura Randall, a lady of superior education and many accomplishments, who was born July 2, 1795. Before her marriage she moved in the society of which William Cullen Bryant was a member, and was well acquainted with that distinguished poet ; many of whose youthful sayings and doings she well remembers, and can at this period (December, 1876) relate in the most intelligent and interesting manner. The fruit of this marriage was .two children - Edmund, the subject of this sketch, and Lucy B., wife of W. W. Wright, Esq., of Monroe, Wisconsin. Colonel E. M. Bartlett and wife followed their children to Wisconsin, where the former died at Monroe, April 24, 1868; the latter, at the age of over eighty-one years, is in good health and in full possession of all her mental faculties.
Mr. Bartlett claims lineal descent from Adam Bartlett, a Norman gentleman and an officer in the army of William the Conqueror, who accompanied that monarch to England, fought under him at Hastings, and was subsequently granted a large tract of land (entailed estate) in Stopham, Sussex county, England, which remains in the possession of his descendants to this day, having passed to them in the regular order of primogeniture ; the present head of the family being Col. Walter Bartlett, a member of the British parliament. Robert Bartlett, a younger scion of that family, sailed from England in the ship Ann, in the year 1623, and landed at Plymouth, Mas- sachusetts, in July of that year.
He subsequently married Mary Warren, daughter of Richard Warren, and from that union our subject is descended. John Bartlett, a member of the Sus- sex family, received distinguishing honors from the " Black Prince," for his capture of the castle of Fontenoy in France at the head of the Sussex troops. Josiah Bartlett, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was from the same ancestry, as was also Richard Bartlett of Newburyport, Massa- chusetts, a representative in the Colonial legislature 1679-80-1-4. The grandfather of our subject was Preserved Bartlett, also a native of Northampton, Massachusetts, who married Mary Parsons, from whose family sprung Theophilus Parsons, LL.D., the author of " Parsons on Contracts," and other valu- able standard law books.
Until ten years of age Edmund Bartlett enjoyed all the educational advantages of his native New England village, was a good reader and declaimer, and had made considerable proficiency in Murray's grammar and other studies; but for several years after his removal to the wilds of the then "Far West," he had very few educational advantages. The schools of that day in the "backwoods" were generally presided over by incompetent teachers, while their terms were limited to three months in the winter. During one of those terms the "master " each day detailed a squad of the boys to practice the manly art of " self defense," wrestling and other physical exercises, which, rude and barbarous though they may seem to the present generation, were not with- out beneficial results to the muscular system. The other exercises consisted of reading, spelling and declamation. The schools, however, improved with the country, and subsequent teachers were generally more competent ; but the only academic advantages our subject enjoyed were about six months' attend- ance at an institution presided over by the Rev. Samuel Bissell at Twinsburg, in Summit county, Ohio. But he was a diligent student and delighted in literary pursuits, and studied at home, aided by his parents, especially his mother. At the age of sixteen he procured elementary works in the Greek and Latin languages, which he studied with great avidity under the direction of the Rev. Newton Bar- rett, a learned Congregational minister of his town. He studied in the field and in the forest ; wherever he went, or in whatever labor engaged, a book was his constant companion. At the age of eighteen he commenced teaching school, and for twelve consec- utive years taught not less than three months each year, and became one of the most thorough and ac- complished scholars of his day, whose talents would have shed luster upon any profession or avocation upon which they might have been concentrated.
On May 23, 1844, he married Miss Catherine A. Righter, and turned his attention to farming, an oc- cupation at which he continued for ten years.
In the spring of 1854 he removed with his family to Monroe, Wisconsin, where he still resides, ex- pecting to continue farming, but being governed by circumstances, he clerked for a time in the office of the registrar of deeds, and in the year following be- came deputy clerk of the circuit court, and in the fall of 1856 was elected to the position of clerk of the circuit court, which office he filled till the end of 1858. He next served two years as cashier of
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the Monroe Banking Company, and in 1861 was ap- pointed postmaster of Monroe by Abraham Lincoln, his commission, which was signed by Montgomery Blair, bearing date April 15 of that year.
Having devoted his spare time to professional reading while clerk of the circuit court he was, on March 6, 1860, admitted to the bar of the State and subsequently licensed to practice in the United States courts.
In January, 1861, Governor A. W. Randall, in anticipation of the threatened rebellion, commenced organizing the militia of the State, and presented to Mr. Bartlett a colonel's commission ; and in the latter part of that year, and during nearly all of 1862, he canvassed the counties of southern Wisconsin, mak- ing patriotic speeches, and under a recruiting com- mission enlisting men in the service, until the work of obtaining recruits became difficult, and men ex- pressed a strong repugnance to the being asked to enter the service by those who were themselves staying at home. Colonel Bartlett then pledged himself to enlist as a private soldier, and at once wrote the following patriotic and self-sacrificing let- ter to the postmaster-general :
SIR: I have long chafed under the restraints of home and official responsibilities, and desired to be among the number of those who are plucking honors from the points of rebel bayonets. I can endure it no longer. I therefore respectfully tender to you my resignation of the office of postmaster at Monroe, and recommend the appointment of D. W. Ball as my successor.
His resignation was accepted and the appointment made as recommended, and on February 17, 1863, he enlisted as a private soldier in Company B, 31st Wisconsin Volunteers, and on March 1, 1863, marched with his regiment into Dixie's land. He served faithfully and well to the close of the war and was honorably mustered out of the service in May, 1865, never having been home during the entire period. He was appointed and served for several months as captain of Company 1, 3d United States Heavy Artillery.
After his return from the war he was employed as bookkeeper for a large commission house in Chicago, which position he had held but a short time when he was induced "to take the stump " in behalf of General Ed. W. Salomon, republican candidate for the office of clerk of Cook county, and addressed the people on the political issues of the day in every ward and precinct of the city of Chicago. General Salomon was elected and our subject became his chief clerk. About the same time, however, he re-
ceived overtures from the quartermaster and com manding officer of the troops stationed at Julesburg in Colorado, to accept the position of chief clerk of the quartermaster's department at that post, and being fond of adventure, and desirous of seeing the country, he accepted the flattering offer, and in November, 1865, removed to Fort Sedgwick, a mili- tary post just established on the south bank of the Platte and adjacent to the " ranch " of Jules Bernard, in Colorado, and named Julesburg. The original town consisted of only three or four sod houses, used as telegraph offices and stables of the (verland Stage Company. He entered at once upon his du- ties in the quartermaster's department, where he continued for about a year and a half; and during that time he traveled more than two thousand miles on horseback,- his only companion being a scout in the employ of the government - through a country swarming with hostile Indians, visiting nearly every military post between Idaho and the Missouri river, and collecting material for reports required by the government. These journeys were full of wild ad- venture and hairbreadth escapes from the Indians. He traveled nearly all the summer of 1866 with his single companion, stopping occasionally at ranches or military posts over night, but generally camping out. It had been customary to accompany such expeditions by a military escort of twenty-five men, but his experienced scout considering that they would be safer alone, dispensed with the escort.
In July, 1867, when the Union Pacific railroad had arrived within four miles of Fort Sedgwick, Mr. Bartlett left the quartermaster's department for the purpose of embarking in trade in the new and noto- rious city of Julesburg- where in the preceding April he had killed the timid antelope, and where no signs of human habitation appeared -now a city of over twelve hundred houses, with a popula- tion of six thousand inhabitants. It was the ter- minus of the Union Pacific railroad, and there all goods in transit for the Pacific States and territo- ries, military posts and mining points west of that place, must be unloaded from the train and trans- ported to destination by mule and ox teams. The business transacted was immense. Hundreds of portable buildings were brought from Omaha; many were of adobe, many of sod, and scores of people carried on an extensive and profitable business under canvas tents. There were no family resi- dences, as few men would dare to take a family to such a place. There were many high-minded, hon-
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orable men engaged in legitimate business, but the city was crowded with saloons, gambling-houses and bagnios and pickpockets, thieves, murderers and des- peradoes of the worst kind flocked there from every part of America. The original ranch of Jules Ber- nard was known to be in Colorado, but near the line separating that territory from the State of Nebraska, but it was not at this time known to any one in which territory the present Julesburg was located. It was at first a city without a government, laws or officers to protect those engaged in business, and it was found absolutely necessary to adopt some meas- ures of safety and protection. The business men of the town therefore held a meeting and adopted ordinances for the government of the city and reso- lutions pledging themselves to submit to such taxa- tion as should be necessary to sustain an efficient city government. They elected a mayor and a council of five members, a clerk and treasurer. A vigilance committee of one hundred and fifty mem- bers was also organized. The mayor was empow- ered to appoint such number of policemen as he might deem necessary and draw ad libitum upon the treasurer for their payment, amenable only to the people for an abuse of his power and punishable by removal. He was also declared ex-officio judge of the police court. The first mayor was a gentleman named Cook, but he soon retired from the office, and Mr. Bartlett, who had become conspicuous among the " Vigilants," was appointed his successor.
An arrangement was effected with the command- ing officer at Fort Sedgwick by which, in the event of resistance to the constituted authorities, the aid of troops could be procured. But the military authorities, while sustaining the city government in the protection of business and in maintaining order, would permit the exercise of no civil function by that organization : hence there were no means of enforcing contracts or collecting debts if the parties concerned refused to pay.
Mr. Bartlett at once entered upon the duties of his office, increased the police force to twenty-five - agreeing to pay each man one hundred and twenty- five dollars per month, and otherwise improved the apparatus of government. He caused a log jail to be erected, and kept a well-armed guard around it day and night. Rioting and murder were of daily occurrence, and he was compelled to hold court seven days of the week. The punishment of all but capital offenses was by fine and imprisonment, but in cases of murder the culprit was ordered to
be imprisoned till the United States marshal at Denver or Omaha could be notified; the “Vigi- lants," however, generally disposed of him the first night, so that the marshal was in a great measure relieved. By fines the mayor collected money enough to defray nearly all the expenses of the city government, so that resort to taxation was sel- dom necessary. A single case will suffice as an illustration of the character of those brought before him for trial and his manner of administering jus- tice. His court-room was a rough board building fifty by twenty feet. Behind a rough table sat the judge upon a rough bench. Around his waist was a belt, hanging from which were two heavy Colt's revolvers. Two desperadoes, named Jack Hayes and " Shorty," arrived in the city from Cheyenne, and soon made their presence known by rioting among the saloons and gambling-houses, destroying prop- erty, discharging their revolvers, threatening life, and assaulting and maltreating several persons, and swearing that they would kill any man who at- tempted to arrest them. The two roughs were soon brought before the mayor, however, in charge of half a dozen stout policemen; they had a large number of friends and sympathizers in the city, over fifty of whom were in the court-room, each heavily armed with knives and revolvers; threats were freely made that the prisoners should never pay a fine nor go to jail. The "Vigilants" were also present in considerable force and well armed. The judge summoned a jury of business men, permitted the defendants to be heard by counsel, examined a large number of witnesses, and gave them a fair trial. The jury returned a verdict of guilty, where- upon the judge arose, with a cocked revolver in each hand, and proceeded to render the judgment of the court, which was that each pay a fine of two hundred and fifty dollars, and be imprisoned until the fine and costs were paid. Revolvers were drawn all over the room, but the judge coolly added : " I have heard your threats and understand your intentions, and if you are disposed to resist the execution of the sentence the best time for you to commence is now, and the best place is here, and I give you notice that there is room enough in the sand-hills to bury every man of you. Police, remove these prisoners to the jail." Over two hun- dred revolvers were in the hands of those present, but not a shot was fired, and the prisoners were removed to jail. In less than two hours they had paid their fines and were at large again. In a
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short time they returned to Cheyenne, and were soon after hung by the " Vigilants " for murder.
The mayor did not often find it necessary to telegraph to the fort for troops. On one occasion a detachment of cavalry dashed into the city and reported to him for orders within half an hour from the time he dispatched for them. At another time a company of infantry in army wagons drawn by mules reported within an hour.
In November, 1867, Mr. Bartlett, having received intelligence of the dangerous illness of his father, hastily returned to Monroe, and in the following spring opened a law office, and continued in the successful practice of his profession until the autumn of 1869, when he received a flattering offer to edit a republican newspaper at Thibodeaux, the capital of Lafourche Parish, in the State of Louisiana, which he accepted, repaired to the place and entered upon his labors. A Republican Press Association was organized at New Orleans, while he was editing the " Lafourche Republican "- the first organization of the kind in Louisiana- of which he was made secretary. In April, 1870, he resigned the editorial chair to accept a situation in the New Orleans Custom House, but during the summer, his health failing, he resigned his position, returned to Monroe, and after a season of sickness, resumed the practice of his profession. In 1874 he was again elected clerk of the circuit court of Green county, and reelected in 1876, and now holds that office.
In Jannary, 1857, he received the first degrees in Masonry, by dispensation, and soon after took all the chapter degrees. He has several times been elected master of Smith Lodge, No. 31, F. and A. M., located at Monroe. He is also an Odd-Fellow. Received the degrees of the subordinate lodge in 1855, and has passed all the chairs in Monroe Lodge, No. 72. He also received the encampment degrees in Odd- fellowship. He is not a member of any church organization, but holds to the orthodox faith, and is generous in his contributions to religious and benev- olent objects.
In personal appearance Mr. Bartlett is what may be called a fine looking man. Fair complexion, sanguine countenance, with brown hair and hazel eyes, five feet nine inches in height, good breadth of shoulders, measuring forty-two inches around the chest, and weighing one hundred and eighty-five pounds. Reared, as he was, in the backwoods, he excelled in all athletic sports; he was swift of foot, and found but few equals at wrestling, and all the
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various muscular efforts to which youth is addicted. He is a superb horseman, and most fearless and daring rider; an unerring marksman with rifle and pistol. His skill with the former weapon was well known to many of the hostile Indians of the plains, not a few of whom he sent to the happy hunting grounds of their fathers. He killed more than fifty buffaloes from the saddle during the season he remained on the plains.
As a writer and public speaker he has few supe- riors. His pen is trenchant and graphic. His letters from the seat of war during the rebellion were of the most thrilling and vivid character - his descriptive powers being of the highest order, while his style is scholarly and ornate. He is also favorably known in the regions of fictitious literature, and as a poet has produced a volume of verse, which, for brilli- ancy of conception, beauty of language, depth of thought, and fineness of fancy, is excelled by few of the laureates of these days, and which is destined to perpetuate his name for all time. As a fluent and ready speaker, graceful, complacent, and command- ing an exhaustless flow of language, he is the peer of any "stump " orator in the country.
His marriage with Miss Righter-still.in the prime and grace of womanhood - was blessed with a family of four children, two of whom, Edmund Morgan, born April 8, 1849, and Ellen L., born October 16, 1846, survive. The sun studied law in the office of Judge Dunwiddie, of Monroe, was admitted to the bar of the State at the age of twenty-one, and three years later to that of the United States courts. He subsequently attended the law school at Albany, New York, one year, and graduated from that institution. On September 14, 1875, he married Miss Lida L. Filkins, a beautiful and accomplished lady of that city, and entered into partnership with the Hon. A. J. Colvin, one of the oldest and best lawyers of Albany. Miss Bartlett, the only daughter, is a young lady of rare beauty of person, amiable and engaging manners, of the high- est mental endowments, and superior culture and refinement.
A volume of one hundred and fourteen pages just issued by Dr. Levi Bartlett, of Warner, New Hamp- shire, contains the pedigree of the Bartlett family for the last eight hundred years, down to 1875.
The Bartlett "arms," which are now in some of the families in America, is a device consisting of three open gloved hands on a shield, gold tassels pendant from the wrists, a swan couched, with wings
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extended. In the English branch of the family these "arms " have been "quartered " with some eight other noble families who have become extinct , Bartlett family.
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