USA > Wisconsin > Jefferson County > The history of Jefferson county, Wisconsin, containing biographical sketches > Part 59
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WATERTOWN
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HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
was only the work of their well-known broad and generous natures, their helpful and kindly sympathy with the poor early settlers.
Another cause operating to make Jefferson County Democratic, proper to be mentioned here, was a tendency on the part of persons identified with the Whig party to sympathy with the objects and aims of the Know Nothings. Not that any organization of the kind existed in the county, but the foreigners, who were rapidly filling up the country, strongly suspected the Whig party of illiberal tendencies, and that, whether well or ill founded, served to settle the question as to where our foreign-born citizens would ally themselves, and so, with rare excep- tions, they are attached to the Democratic party.
The history of the early contests in the county between the Whig and Democratic parties shows that, at an early time, the former had able and sagacious leaders ; indeed, many of the early pioneers of the county were Whigs, and were men of great worth as citizens, notably the Cole brothers, in Watertown ; many of the settlers in the towns of Oakland and Lake Mills, and also in the towns of Koshkonong and Palmyra. The last battle under those names was fought in 1854, the Democrats carrying the county. In 1856, the young Republican party came into the field and made a good fight, but gained no permanent advantage, except that it found its leaders and learned that it could strike heavy blows. In 1858, the Democrats again carried the county. In 1860, the long struggle over the Nebraska Bill and the repeal of the Missouri Compromise gave great energy and vigor to the new party, and it carried the county by a fair majority, for the first time. In 1862, the Democrats recovered their lost ground, and again, in 1864, asserted their supremacy at the polls. In 1866, the Republican party made a vigorous campaign, worked with great energy and determination ; but failed, excepting that their candi- date for County Treasurer, Mr. Edmund Sweeney, of Watertown, was elected. The majorities of most of the Democratic candidates were run down very low. Mr. Sweeney was a very lib- eral and popular man, and outrun both his opponents and his friends, being justly held in high esteem by men of all parties.
Since 1866, the Republicans have not made a strong effort to carry the county, but have mainly confined their efforts to breaking the Democratic ranks, here or there, where they have thought they discovered a weakness, but not with any success until 1878. The trouble so sure to attend great majorities has now fallen upon the great and once invincible Jefferson County Democracy. Bad faith among leaders, selfishness among candidates-of which a dominant party is always possessed of a surplus, and with whom the interests of the party are secondary in importance-have done their work, and the party lately so proud and strong presents a most humiliating spectacle of disorganization and helplessness. In 1878, the county elected a Repub- lican Senator, by a larger majority than was ever given to a Democrat ; elected Republicans in two of the Assembly districts which had been Democratic ; gave the Republican condidate for Congress a large majority; defeated the Democratic candidate for District Attorney, and reduced the majorities of all the candidates. So far as it went, the rout was complete. This is not the time or place to inquire into the causes for such a defeat, but it is safe to say it sug- gests a necessity for reform in the methods or' party management.
The Republican party in the county is in the hands and control of an exceedingly able and sagacious body of men, and they promptly seize upon the mistakes of the majority and turn them to account ; and, however overwhelming a defeat may overtake them at the polls, they close up the ranks, scan closely the causes, and challenge the old enemy anew. The officials of the General Government, in the county, are fit and competent men, next to the consideration of which the most common purpose of their appointment is utility and willingness to work for the party. The effectiveness of such work is most clearly pointed out in the results of the late election (1879). While the Democratic candidate for Governor carries the county by a reduced majority, the candidate on the ticket with him for County Superintendent of Schools is defeated, and the candidate for Clerk of the Circuit Court barely escapes defeat. . These are the only county candidates running at this election. A Republican is elected by a large majority in the First Assembly District, which is usually Democratic by 600 majority ; and a Republican is
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HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
also elected in the Second District by an estimated majority of over 400, which usually gives 125 Democratic majority.
It has been said by eminent political philosophers that it is impossible for a political party to correct abuses and reform itself while it holds power in its hands. It remains to be seen whether the Democratic party in the county, as well as in the State and nation. can perfect and accomplish internal reforms in itself while out of power and smarting under most inglorious defeat.
WATERTOWN.
Fortunately for posterity, Timothy Johnson, the first white settler in what is now the city of Watertown, has left us a sketch which will shine in these pages as a jeweled monument to his memory until age and the fingers of unborn generations shall have faded and worn them beyond man's power of transcription. Already the documents handed down to us by this earliest of early pioneers begin to show signs of decay and emit the mnusty odor of age. Who, could they behold them, would say that the advent of the compiler is untimely. or that the preservation of these historical fragments is not a commendable deed for a worthy object ? Let us hope that some future historian will perpetuate the memory of Timothy Johnson and his companions of 1836-37, by collating this record with the spirit of duty and pride which should animate the breast of every student of research.
Luther A. Cole, one of the very few early settlers of Watertown now living, came from Milwaukee to what was then Johnson's Rapids (now Watertown), in 1836, arriving in company with Reeve Griswold (who now lives a short distance south of Watertown), Philander Baldwin and Amasa Hyland. Mr. Cole was born in West Charleston, Orleans Co., Vt., November 1, 1812. He says that previous to 1836, very little or nothing was reliably known of the spot where the city of Watertown now stands. It is reported that a Frenchman had established a trading-post on the west side of Rock River, in what is now the Third Ward, on a rise of ground where Timothy Johnson built the first dwelling-house ever erected by an American within the present limits of the city. Near the Frenchman's deserted and decaying cabin, was an Indian burying-ground. containing several graves. At the head of one of them stood a rude wooden cross, which tradition says was the last resting-place of the solitary trader, who had been murdered by the Indians in a fierce impulse of passion, to avenge some real or fancied injury, or to get an opportunity to plunder his stock. It is well known that Indians sometimes pay their debts in that way, and at the same time supply their wants. Who the trader was, where he came from, how long he had been here, what acts aroused the fatal resentment of his savage neighbors, are inquiries so deeply involved in mystery that they can never be answered.
When Mr. Cole came to Johnson's Rapids, he found the west side of the river occupied by Winnebago Indians, and the east side in the possession of Pottawatomies. Scattered abont here and there, were several acres of cleared land which had been cultivated as cornfields by the Indians, and the old hills, where the corn had been planted, he says, were plainly visible. They were strongly attached to this region; it had long been their home, and here were the graves of their ancestors. They surrendered it with regret and left it unwillingly.
It is related that in the summer of 1833, a detachment of soldiers, commanded by Gen. Henry Dodge, crossed the river a few rods north of Main street bridge, in pursuit of that cele- brated war chief, Black Hawk. Evidence of this was found in the form of an old, broken-down Government wagon which had been abandoned by the troops, half a mile east of the river. The red men of the forest, who dwelt in this beautiful valley before the advent of civilization, have, many of them, gone to "the happy hunting-grounds." A few of them still linger about the scenes of their youth and gaze, seemingly, with regretful eyes upon grand structures standing upon the ground once warmed by the ashes of their campfires.
401
HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
TIMOTHY JOHNSON.
A few of the incidents connected with the experience of Timothy Johnson, before he settled on the site of Watertown, are identical with the subject of this chapter. Mr. Johnson, not long before his death, wrote a narrative of his experience here, from which the subjoined facts are taken. He was a native of Middletown, Conn., born June 28, 1792. After traveling over and living in many parts of the South and East, he found himself, in the fall of 1835, in the village of Racine, at that time composed of but a few shanties. In January, 1836, undeterred by the severity of winter storms, he continued his march westward, striking the Rock River Valley in the vicinity of Wisconsin City, a " paper village" with one inhabitant, the site of which is now embraced within the limits of Janesville. Going to Rockford, Ill., for a supply of provisions, he returned to Wisconsin City, and, in February, renewed his journey, following the course of the river northward. Stopping about two miles below the present site of Jefferson, Johnson erected a small log shanty. He occupied his time by clearing a small spot of ground, and in making short excursions about the country. During one of these exploring expeditions, he discovered what was soon afterward known as Johnson's Rapids (now Watertown). The banks of the river at this point were fringed with a beautiful growth of red cedars, the background being thickly wooded, on the west side with stately oaks and on the east with a forest of maples, elms and ash. The eastern half of the streamn was covered with a sheet of glistening ice, and, felling a tree across the unfrozen current, the solitary adventurer crossed over the rippling waters and returned to his shanty. While on this expedition, Johnson was robbed of the provisions he carried with him by a band of red-skins, and was without food forty-eight hours.
Johnson visited " the Rapids " again within a few weeks, and staked out a " claim " of about one thousand acres, whereon the principal portion of Watertown now stands. In June, 1836, he made a trip to Milwaukee, where he purchased a fresh supply of provisions, a yoke of oxen and a wagon. He returned to his shanty on Rock River by way of Fort Atkinson, bring- ing with him Philander Baldwin, Reeve Griswold and Charles Seaton. During the summer, they cut a road from Johnson's shanty up the cast side of the river to "the Rapids," and soon afterward built a log cabin on the west side of the river, below the railroad junction, on the site now occupied by Mr. Carlin's residence. Scaton, Griswold and Baldwin were permitted by Mr. Johnson to make claims within his thousand-acre plat, and temporary cabins were erected thereon. In the fall, Johnson sent word to his family in Ohio to meet him in Milwaukee, and, about the time he calculated they would reach that point, he took his departure from " the Rapids," on horse- back, for the purpose of joining them, following the Indian trails through Ixonia. Oconomowoc and Summit to Prairieville (now Waukesha). While crossing the river, Mr. Johnson was thrown from his horse, receiving a thorough wetting and rendering useless his fire-matches. Being with- out a supply of " fire-water," he passed a cold and disagreeable night beside a fallen tree near the junction of the Twin Lakes.
A DIFFICULT VOYAGE.
On reaching Milwaukee, he found his family awaiting him. Procuring their conveyance to the upper lake on the Oconomowoc, Mr. Johnson, on his Indian pony, returned to that point by a less circuitous route than the one to be traveled by his family. Arriving there on "sched- ule time," he met, as per previous arrangement, Reeve Griswold and Richard Miller, the latter having in the mean time joined the settlers at " the Rapids." Here the trio, armed with the necessary edged tools, dug three poplar canoes, each being thirty-one feet in length. A cedar raft was then constructed capable of carrying several tons, and the primitive fleet was launched and then lashed together. With this catamaran Mr. Johnson anticipated but little trouble it floating his household goods down the Oconomowoc and Rock Rivers to " the Rapids." But. the voyage proved to be anything but a pleasant one. Passing out of the lake, they found the
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HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
water quite shallow, and some days they did not travel to exceed eighty rods. After five days of tribulation, the party reached what is now the village of Oconomowoc, at the head of the lower lake. The next morning the lake was covered with iee, and further progress was impos- sible. Abandoning the project of reaching their destination by water, Johnson and Miller set out to procure a team with which to complete the journey. Returning to the spot where his family was temporarily encamped, Mr. Johnson filled his wagon with the most necessary articles comprising the cargo of his peculiar craft, including his wife and children, and started for " the Rapids." At the crossing of a stream, afterward known as Battletown Creek, about three miles from the lake, it was found necessary to build a bridge in order to get the wagon and team over. The weather was intensely cold, and a temporary cabin was constructed to shelter the party while the work of bridging was going on. During his stay at this point, Johnson had "a slight unpleasantness" with a man in his employ named Gardner, which ended in an old-fashioned fisticuff, in which Gardner was defeated. The next morning, Reeve Griswold wrote with a piece of red chalk, across the face of a fresh-cut stump, the word " Battletown." From this incident Battletown Creek took its name.
The bridge finished and the stream crossed, it was found necessary to cut a road through the woods the remaining thirteen miles to "the Rapids," and on the 10th of December, 1836, three weeks and three days from the time the poplar canoes and cedar raft were launched, the party reached their final destination.
These are but a few of the incidents attending the first settlement of Watertown, about all of which there is any record from the pen of Timothy Johnson. Thus they are born again to live, let us hope, for all time to come.
LUTHER A. COLE.
A few years ago, Luther A. Cole wrote a sketch upon the subject of his experience in Wis- consin. He premised his remarks by saying he left his home in Vermont at the age of twenty- two, and landed at Detroit in 1834. From there he went to Grand Haven, where, in company with Philander Baldwin and Elisha M. Osborn, he went to Chicago. From that village the trio started on foot for Milwaukee, following the Indian trails most of the way, and arriving there May 10, 1836.
" I worked," says Mr. Cole, "at the carpenter and joiner business until December, with the exception of about two months, which I devoted exclusively to the ague. Taking my blanket and provisions upon my shoulder, I started for Johnson's Rapids, passing over the road which had been cut out by Mr. Johnson a few weeks previous. Amasa Hyland accompanied me. A few months before, I had, through the agency of a friend, made two claims at the Rapids, one covering the farm now owned by John W. Cole, and the other the farm now owned by heirs of Benjamin J. Morey. In January following, I purchased, at Milwaukee, three barrels of flour and three of pork. I paid $20 a barrel for the flour and $40 a barrel for the pork. Building a cabin in company with Mr. Hyland and my brother, John W., we commenced keeping what we called 'bachelors' distress.' The peculiar luxury of this method of living can only be appre- ciated by those who have enjoyed it. We made it a point not to wash our dishes until we could count the mice tracks upon them.
" The season of 1837, I worked on the saw-mill and dam of Charles F. H. Goodhne & Son. From that time until the fall of 1839, I was occupied mainly at lumbering and farming. In November of that ycar, Mr. Hyland, J. A. Chadwick, David Griffith, William P. Owen, William Stanton, Jr., Brice Hall, John Dimmiek and myself went to Arkansas for the purpose of spend- ing the winter in chopping stcamboat wood. We floated down Rock River in a skiff, and were eight days reaching the Mississippi. We remained in Arkansas until the following spring, each of us making a clever-sized 'pile,' when we returned to Watertown.
" In 1841, my brother John W. and myself erected the building on the corner of Main and Sceond strects, and opened the first store in Watertown. The next year, Mr. Bailey and myself
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HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
purchased of Selvay Kidder (he having previously purchased of the Goodhues) 750 acres of land on the east side of the river, included in the present site of the city, with the mill and water- power. We were to pay 1,000,000 feet of lumber, to be delivered at Beloit within seven years. We associated with us, the next year, Linus R. Cady and my brother, Ebenezer W., and in three years and a half from the date of the purchase we made the last payment.
* * * "In the spring of 1838, provisions and money were scarce. We had but ittle pork in the settlement, and subsisted mainly upon fresh fish, with which Roek River bounded. Our flour having failed us, at one time we were nearly a week without bread.
" The Winnebago Indians committed many petty thefts for some time after Watertown was irst settled. One of them having stolen a watch from Mr. Griswold, a pair of mittens of Peter V. Brown, and a quantity of tobacco from me, we thought it best to make an example of him. Forming a ring and stripping him of his blanket, Griswold and I took turns in applying the ash to his back. But we tempered justice with mercy; no blood was drawn. The expedient worked like a charm. After that, Indian thefts were hardly known in the settlement."
A MILD REVENGE.
Timothy Johnson has also left some sketches regarding the unpleasant features of having Indian neighbors. "In January, 1837," he says, "I bought a load of provisions at Milwaukee. One barrel of flour I could not get into my shanty, and I left it, for the night, outside the door. in the morning, it was gone, as was also a bed-cord I had used to bind the load. I could easily letermine, from the tracks in the snow, that the thieves were Indians. I followed them nearly o the present village of Lowell, but, not overtaking them, gave up the chase. About two years afterward, I ascertained the name of the mover in the theft. He said that he and his company ashed two poles together with the bed-cord, and, fastening them to the pack-saddles of two ponies, placed the flour upon them. The reason he assigned for the theft was that, while I was n Milwaukee after my provisions, he had sold a pony to my son for five gallons of whisky, which, he said, he found to have been watered. He maintained that the flour would no more han make good the supposed cheat.
AN UNEQUAL STRUGGLE.
" In the spring of 1837, six drunken Indians and their squaws came to my log house and sked for whisky, saying, in their native language, that they were ' whisky hungry.' I refused o let them have any. This exasperated them, and one of their number, catching up an ax, timed a blow at my head ; but I warded it off, and, jerking the ax from him, threw it at some ods distant. I then seized a pitchfork, and, striking him over the head, felled him to the ground. Drawing to strike again, the instrument was caught by the remaining five Indians, ind neither party was able to wrench it from the other. Letting go with my right hand, I used ny fist upon the red-skins, and, knocking them all down, rushed into the house and bolted the loor. One of them got the ax, and, approaching the door, gave it a blow, the mark of which s visible to this day. I told him I would assuredly shoot him if he broke in the door. A con- ultation took place between them, and, picking up the Indian whom I had first struck, they leparted, encamping for the night near the present residence of William M. Dennis. Early he next morning, the father of the wounded Indian visited me, and said he wanted some whisky with which to wash his papoose's head, as he was ' much hurt.' I told him he could not have he whisky, but that I would go up and see the fellow. I did so, and found the camp thirty trong. I examined his skull, but found it was not broken, although it had been laid bare by he blow from the pitchfork. I assisted in dressing the wound, and then left. Had not the ather of the young man voluntarily proclaimed that he was 'a bad papoose,' the affair might lave been attended with serious consequences ; as it was, I heard no more of it."
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HISTORY OF JEFFERSON COUNTY.
AN ANCIENT MARINER.
Capt. James Rogan is one of the few who still live to relate the circumstances of Water- town's first settlement. The Captain is now seventy-eight years ofage. Ile converses upon the subject of pioneer days in Wisconsin in the manner of one in the possession of a good memory, and is gifted with the faculty of depicting the early events with wonderful detail, and coloring them with that happy Munchausen hne so faithfully employed by writers of the modern daily press. He acquired the title of Captain through being the commander of a schooner which plowed the treacherous waters of Lake Michigan, and belongs to that army of "old salts" whose weather-eye is ever on the alert for Fortune Harbor. In 1835-36, the Captain made several trips in his vessel from Cleveland, to Milwaukee, and in the latter year he abandoned the mission of a mariner when in port at the latter village, establishing himself there in the general merchandise business. In the summer of 1836, Charles Seaton, who, as already related, came to the present site of Watertown with Timothy Johnson and Reeve Griswold, and located a claim, returned to Milwaukee, where he met Capt. Rogan. The beanties of Rock River Valley were narrated by Seaton with such eloquent effect that the Captain concluded to cast his lot in that direction. Exchanging his schooner, which rode at anchor in the lake, for Seaton's land claim, he made preparations to remove, with his family, to the spot predestined to be their home for many years. In January, 1837, the Captain came to the Rapids, made a claim on the west side of the river, built a house thereon, and returned to Milwaukee for his family and friends. The party consisted of Capt. Regan, his wife and two daughters (the eldest of whom after- ward became the wife of Dr. Cody), Peter Rogan and Ezra Dolliver. They arrived at Johnson's Rapids on the 2d of March, 1837, and camped on the west side of the river. Their first work was the construction of a double log house on the site now occupied by Woodard & Stone's bakery. The Captain's shanty at once became the headquarters of all new arrivals, and was for some time regarded as "the leading hotel at Johnson's Rapids." Gov. Ludington and his uncle, Harvey Burchard, and John Hustis, are among those who have roasted Irish potatoes (the Captain's native fruit) in the hospitable fireplace of the Hotel de Rogan.
" Potatoes cost me twenty shillings a bushel in Chicago," says the Captain, "and four shil- lings a bushel to bring them here from Milwaukee ; but I consider them cheap even at that price, when I think of the good solid comfort we had baking them in the ashes and eating them with the jackets on. When I came here," continued the Captain, after a solemn pause, "there were over four hundred Winnebago Indians camped within half a mile of the place whereon I built my shanty. But they were the best neighbors I ever had. I brought with me from Milwaukee a large supply of that indispensable concomitant which figures so largely in the complete commissariat of every frontiersman. It was of a good quality, too, and when I sold or traded it to the Indians I refrained from the reprehensible practice of diluting it with water-a practice which, I am sorry to say, is a prevailing one among dealers of the present day. The Indians all liked me and my whisky ; and even now the remnants of their race still living in this vicinity, when they visit Watertown, come to my house, and they never go away thirsty. * * *
This was the prettiest valley I ever saw-standing boldly out in its native grandeur ; grand groves of oaks and elms and maples and basswood; the banks of the river on either side fringed with red cedars, resembling hedge fences. Within the forest abounded herds of deer. I have seen at one time over one hundred of these animals gamboling over the very spot where St. Bernard's Church now stands."
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