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KENDALL COUNTY

iLijiisrois,

PROM THE

Eai'liest Discoveries to the Present Time,

— BT —

REV. E. W. HICKS.

Author of " Life of Jesus, for Young People."

-♦♦♦-

AURORA, ILL. :

Knickbrbocker & HoDDER, Steam Printers and Blank Book Makers,

Nos. 24, 26 k 28 Broadway,

1877.

DEDICATION.

To the children and grandchildren of our pioneers this book is
respectfully dedicated. Forgetting their faults, may they remember
their heroism, copy their hospitality, and practice their virtues, is the
heartfelt prayer of The Author.

H5^

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I— The Mound Builders.— Geologic ages. Terrace epoch. Wild
animals. Kendall county mounds. Ancient pottery. An extinct race.

CHAPTER II — Indians and French Missionaries. — Origin of the Indians.
Pottawatomies. First missionaries. The Mississippi. Marquette.

CHAPTER III — Explorations of LaSalle. — Exploring Illinois. Troubles.
Starved Rock. Tonti. Lonely travels. Death of LaSalle.

CHAPTER IV — Trade and War. — Monopolies. The seven years' war. Pon-
tiac. The Starved Rock tragedy. Buffaloes. North-west territory. Indian
territory. Tecumseh. Illinois.

CHAPTER V — Early Settlements. — Galena mines. Illinois in 1823. Chicago.
Indian Boundary Line. Jesse Walker. Fox River Mission. Vermillion county.
Two Quotations. Mark Beaubien.

CHAPTER VI — Holderman's Grove. — Robert Beresford. Seminary land.
Landscapes. Reuben Reed. Vetal Vermel. Prairie Du Chien treaty. Res-
ervations.

CHAPTER VII — Indians, Groves and Prairies. — Waubonsie. Gnarled oaks.
Origin of the prairies. Sweet and Specie. Bailey Hobson. LaSalle county.
Spring election.

CHAPTER VIII — Our Earlier Pioneers. — Earl Adams and Ebenezer Morgan.
George and Clark Hollenback. William Harris and Ezra Ackley. Daniel
Kellogg. Moses Booth.

CHAPTER IX— The Shadow of War.— E. G. Ament. George HavenhiU.
Abram Holderman. Pierce Hawley. John Dougherty. Walter Selvey. The
Cherokee lottery.

CHAPTER X — The First Bloodshed. — Shabbona. Indian councils. Still-
man's Run. Fox river council. The fatal blow.

CHAPTER XI — The Flight. — The warning. Scalps and spoil. A good Provi-
dence. "A carousal A narrow escape.

CHAPTER XII— Ansel Reed's Story.— Busy at work. The first alarm. A
hurried flight. Concealed in the thicket. On to the fort. Rescuing his deliv-
erer.

CHAPTER XIII— More Bloodshed.— Mike Gurty. Indian creek. The Mas-
sacre. Death of Adam Payne. Vermel's story.

CHAPTER XIV— The War Ended —Peter Miller. John Schneider. Chicago
fort. Cholera. The Hall girls. Death of Black Hawk. Deathof Mike Gurty.
First settlers at Oswego. Old settlers returning.

VI CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XV— The Year of the Early Spring— Early emigration. Be-
ginning of Newark. The Aments. Beginning of Yorkville. Compulsory tem-
perance. Beginning of Bristol. Lyman and Burr Bristol. Daniel Pearce.

CHAPTER XVI— S. G. Minkler's Story.— Lost. Fording. Death of Mrs,
M inkier. Hard times.

CHAPTER XVII— Township Pioneers.— David Evans. John Darnell. Hugh
Walker. Chester House. John ShurtlifF. Daniel Piatt. Stage route.

CHAPTER XVIII— The Old Trappers.— Indians. Pioneers and keel boat
men. Falling of the stars. Settlers in Fox. Settlers in Big Grove.

CHAPTER XIX — Claim Furrows. — Schneider's mill. Waubonsie's spree. Os-
wego. Newark. Millington.

CHAPTER XX— The Governor's Party.— The Southern heart. William Mul-
kev. Gov. Matteson. First schoolhouse.

CHAPTER XXI — The Pledge and the Covenant. — Old temperance pledge.

First Sunday School. Old log church. Pavilion Baptist Church. Rev. A. B.

Freeman. Early Methodism.
CHAPTER XXII— Speculation and Business.— The Ship of State. First

house in Lisbon. Seward schoolhouse. Fox. Little Rock. Mrs. Duryea.

Death of Peter Specie.

CHAPTER XXIII— Treaties and Wolf Hunts.— Bristol. Oswego. Indian
signatures. Hudson. Na-au-say. War dance. Wolves. An astonished ox.

CHAPTER XXIV— The Year of Corner Lots.— Inflation. Indian encamp-
ment. Big Grove. Plattville. Jesse Jackson. Little Rock.

CHAPTER XXV — Crowding into the Wilderness. — Yorkville laid out.
Bristol. Oswego. Mrs. Young. Seward. Kane county. Poem. Education.

CHAPTER XXVI— The Year of the Panic— Mrs. Preston. Newark. Hol-
lenback school. New settlers. Buried in a well. Preaching " at early candle-
light."

CHAPTER XXVII — Departure of the Indians —Lisbon school. Millbrook.
Moving the Indians. Oswego postoffice. Bristol school. The royal monogram.

CHAPTER XXVIII — Emigration at Low Tide. — Lisbon and Millington laid
out. Millington church. A trip by schooner. Fourth of July. First Survey.

CHAPTER XXIX— A Change for the Better.— Dr. Brady. Marcus Steward.
Hiddleson school. A jury trial. Plattville school. Lisbon Congregational
Church. A retrospect.

CHAPTER XXX— The Land Sale. — Newark. Misner's plows. Oswego. Bris-
tol. The " Wolf" tavern. How farms were bought.

CHAPTER XXXI— The Underground Railway.— Settlers and topics of 1840.
Debt and poverty. " Tippecanoe and Tyler, too 1" An exciting Fourth.
Abolitionism. Dr. Dyer.

CHAPTER XXXII— Our County's Birth.— Oswego school. Piano cemetery.
Stebbins' school. Indian cemetery opened. Birth of Kendall county. First
officers. Horatio Fowler. Long Grove school.

CONTENTS. VII

CHAPTER XXXIII— Dark Days.— The old store book. Accumulated misfor-
tunes. Land sale of 1842. Pioneer experiences.

CHAPTER XXXIV— Claim Fights.— New settlers. Newark Congregational
Church. Newark and Millington cemetery. Schools : Millington, Boomer,
Albee. Claim fight. Miller excitement. Ryder murder case.

CHAPTER XXXV— The Slave Auction. — Wet season. Academies. Newark
Baptist Church. Schools : Shouts', Suydam, Marysville. Albee's cemetery.
Negro sale.

CHAPTER XXXVI— The County Seat.— Settlers and improvements. Pearce's
cemetery. Doud's cemetery. Schools : Holderinan's, Davis'. McCormick
reaper. More fugitives. Negro laws. County seat election.

CHAPTER XXXVII— The Mexican War.— Oswego Congregational Church.
Union and Millbrook schools. Oswego cemetery. Captain Dodge's Company.
Captain Fullerton's Company. Telegraph. Local excitement. Oswego brew-
ery. Norwegian settlement. Schools : Minkler, Asburj', Bronk, Scofield.

CHAPTER XXXVIII — Schools and Churches. — Country towns. Travel.
Lisbon. Oswego Baptist Church. Schools : Foster, Austin, Atherton, Ware.
Bristol Baptist Church. County officers. Broom factory. Lutheran cemetery.
Schools : Plattville, Chapman. Bronk cemetery.

CHAPTER XXXIX — Townships and Railroads.— Supervisors. Naming
townships. Union cemetery. Union stores. Brown school. Union Presby-
terian Church. Pieshur's reapers. Cold weather. New railroads. Johnson
school. Parochial schools.

CHAPTER XL— New Towns.— Oswego Station. Bristol Station. Piano. Cholera.
Morris flats. Churches : Oswego Presbyterian, Oswego Lutheran, Newark
Methodist, Bristol Congregational. Schools : VVhitlock, Newark, Yorkville,
Piano, Pletcher, Naden, Seward Centre, Grove, Fowler Institute. Agricultural
Society. Protective Association. Little Rock Press. Little Rock cemetery.
Ottawa road. Paper mills.

CHAPTER XLI — The Flood and the Panic— Oswego Courier. Newark
saw mill. Schools : Lisbon Center, Sleezer, Lewis, Shepard, Henderson.
Markets. Flood of 1857. Panic of 1857. New enterprises. Post's mills.
Blackberry mills. Churches : Plattville, Piano Methodist, Millbrook, Milling-
ton, North Lutheran, Lisbon Baptist. Schools : Pearce, Walker, Scott, Van
Cleve, Serrine, Becker. Revivals.

CHAPTER XLII— The Plano Harvesters.— Railroad enterprises. Post's
bridge. Shabbona's death. Crops. Marsh Brothers. Harvester Works.
Messenger's " gopher." Murders. Schools : Faxon, Bristol Station, Windett,
Booth, Worsley, Greenfield, District No. 5, Oswego. Churches : Yorkville,
Fairview. Bristol Station cemetery. Latter Day Saints.

CHAPTER XLIII— The First Gun !— Hurrying to the front. Captain Carr's
Company. Tenth Regiment. Seventh Regiment. First enlistments. Thir-
teenth Regiment. Twentieth Regiment. Thirty-sixth Regiment. Fourth
Cavalry. ^Fifteenth Cavalry.

VIII CONTENTS,

CHAPTER XLIV — Deeper Struggles. — Eighty-ninth. Ninety-first. One
Hundred and Fourth. One Hundred and Twenty-seventh. Draft riots. Boun-
ties. One Hundred Day Regiments. Close of the war. Home ! Soldiers
Aid Societies.

CHAPTER XLV— Our War Record for i86i.— Oswego, Bristol, Kendall,
Fox, 227 names.

CHAPTER XLVI— Our War Record for 1861, coNxiNUED.—Big Grove, Lis-
bon, Little Rock, Na-au-say, Seward, 308 names.

CHAPTER XLVn— Our War Record for 1862.— Kendall, Oswego, Lisbon,
237 names.

CHAPTER XLVin— Our War Record for 1862, continued.— Big Grove,
Bristol, Fox^ Little Rock, Na-au-say, Seward, 218 names.

CHAPTER XLIX— Our War Record for 1863-5.— 1863 : Oswego, Big Grove,
Bristol. 1864 : Big Grove, Fox, Kendall, Bristol, Oswego, Seward, Lisbon,
Na-au-say, Little Rock. 1865 : Kendall, Fox, Big Grove, Lisbon, Bristol, Na-
au-say Last company, 261 names.

CHAPTER L — Accidents and Improvements. — Tanneries. -Fires. Black
Hawk's cave. Survey of Fox river. Book of Mormon published. Harvey
school. Chapman cemetery. Flood. Accidents. Woolen factory.

CHAPTER LI — The Mill and Canal. — Railroad bonds. Cattle disease. Cat-
tle panic. Prohibition. Woman's Suffrage. Accidents. Heap school. First
cars. Kendall county Geology. Post's dam. Wing's mill. Millington canal.

CHAPTER LII — New Enterprises. — Papers. Piatt's wells. Manslaughter.
Young school. Murder. Grangers. N. S. Grimwood. Horse Association.
Churches : Little Rock Union, Piano Baptist. Seward town house. Piano boot
and shoe factory. Narrow Guage Railroad.

CHAPTER LIII— Our Natural Possessions. — Pure water. Magnetic springs.
Sulphur springs. Soils. Peat. Sand. Moulding sand. White sand. Limestone.
Brick clay. Potter's clay. Wood.

CHAPTER LIV — Kendall County Inventions. — Plows. Cultivators. Har-
rows. Reapers. Headers. Harvesters. Binders. Horse rakes. Ditcher and
Scrapers. Wire fence. Stoves. Stereoscopes. Sewing and Knitting machines.
Water wheels. Transportation conveyor. Store furniture. Railroad improve-
ments. Miscellaneous inventions. Publications.

CHAPTER LV — Our Neighbors. — Ox family. Deer family. Bear family. Dog
family. Weasel family. Squirrel family. Rat and mouse family. Mole fam-
ily. Birds. Birds of prey. Climbers. Perchers. Scratchers. Waders. Swim-
mers, il^eptiles. Snakes. Fishes. Insects.

CHAPTER LVI— Our Plant Life.— Trees. Shrubs. Wood plants. Marsh
plants. Prairie flowers. Grasses. Flowerless plants.

CHAPTER LVII — Farewell! — Four stages of local histor>'. A higher sphere.
Development of mind. Satan's traps. True science. A wider life. Farewell.

CHAPTER 1.

THE MOUND BUILDERS.

ONG AGES ago Kendall county was
the southeastern corner of barren rock,
Sv which reached up to, and beyond the
northern end of the State. Chicago
on one side was under water, and Mor-
ris and Streator on the other, with the
southern part of the State, were part
of a vast swamp where evergreens and rushes grew and
were made into coal. That was the mediaeval time in
the world's physical history. Before that, when the sea
covered all the country, there were in the water shoals
of curious little fellows which geologists have called
Tentaculites Oswegoensi, viz. : the Oswego sort of ten-
taculites, or shell worms. This sort have been found
nowhere but in the Oswego rocks, near the mouth of
Waubonsie creek. Then after fourteen or fifteen geo-
logical epochs came the

TERRACE EPOCH,

or the ages during which the land was raised and rivers
cut new channels below the old. As a consequence
nearly all rivers, lakes, and even the sea itself, in many

2

10 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

places, have two sets of banks, one confining the present
stream or lake, and the other bounding the flood plain
into which the water rises during freshets. The upper
banks are often very wide apart. Those of the Fox
river below Oswego are more than a mile, and farms are
now laid out and a railroad runs over what ages ago was
the river bed. It was shallow, however, as were all
streams not confined by rocky banks. They probably
amounted to but little more than continuous swamps,
making the country very unhealthy for human beings.

The table lands between the rivers were swampy in
proportion, and in Northern Illinois especially, or that
part of it south and west of the lake, there was, per-
haps, but a small amount of really dry land.

Kendall county was half under shallow water; the
temperature somewhat w^armer than at present, and the
long sedge grass growing out of the marshes alternated
with the groves growing on the ridges between.

At some time during this period Lake Michigan had
an outlet by the Illinois river to the Mississippi, and so
to the Gulf, and a large part of Cook county and per-
haps of some others were under the lake. It is not
likely that all the lakes flowed this way, for some of them
at least have been flowing through Niagara a great deal
longer than that. There may have once been a ''divide"
midway between the east and the west, which was after-
wards broken through. Col. Long, a well-known gov-
ernment surveyor, believed that he had located this
ancient divide near Detroit.

WILD ANIMALS,

except such as loved water, were not plenty in this part

A FEW SPECULATIONS. 11

of the State in those days — compared with other parts.
Wolves, bears, coons, and bisons, inhabited the upland,
and gigantic beavers worked along the streams, while
the huge mastodons, the largest animals that ever trod
the earth, haunted the marshes and slou<zhs and the
groves that bordered upon them. It is curious that the
remains of mastodons are always found in marshy places
to-day, showing that the lay of the land is the same now
as then, and that these animals have not been extinct
long enough for wet places to become dry. Farther
south enormous horses galloped over the prairies, and
mammoth, hairy elephants wandered in droves through
the woods.

In regard to the ancient inhabitants we can only offer
conjectures. Some — as George Bancroft, the historian —
believe that the mysterious mounds and earth-works were
formed by nature and belong to geology, rather than to
history. But it is most generally believed that they are
the work of a people who, for want of a better name, are
called

MOUND-BUILDERS.

Their earth-works, which have become their monu-
ments, are of three kinds : mounds, embankments and
enclosures, and are found all the way from Wisconsin to
the mouth of the Mississippi. One mound in Cahokia,
Illinois, is 500x700 feet in size and 90 feet high. Cen-
tral America is one vast field of them, and temples of
stone were erected on them which still remain, while in
this country the buihlings were made of clay and have
long ago perished.

The age of these remains seems to decrease as we go

12 HISTORT OF KENDALL COUNTY.

south. Those of North America appear to be the old-
est ; then come the relics of the traditionary Toltecs of
Central America ; while the Aztecs, of South America,
were in their prime 350 years ago. Both these peoples
believed they had come from an unknown land at the
north.

The mounds in this part of the State are generally
small, but quite numerous. Between one and two dozen
are clearly marked on the bluffs along Fox river, in this
county, and doubtless many others have been wholly or
partially obliterated. One of the finest is on the county
line at Millington, on Joseph Jackson's land. It was
dug into by a committee "of citizens about forty years
ago, and found to be a great burial heap. Numbers of
human teeth were taken out, but some fragments of
bones found were replaced and again covered. It is
probable that these were remains of Indians subsequently
buried there. Three rows of five mounds each are found
on the northern bluff of the river : one on Mrs. Duryea's
land, near Bristol ; another on Truman Hathaway's ; and
a third on D. R. Ballou's, above the woolen factory at
Millington. In Mrs. Duryea's mounds were also found
in 1837 some teeth and a decayed skull. Others par-
tially effaced are at the mouths of the Bob Roy and
Rock creeks, and are only a few feet above the level of
the river, proving that since they were built the river
has flowed in its present channel. The Rob Roy mound
a short time ago was partly uncovered by water, and
George Steward, of Piano, our indefatigable archseolo-

MOUND builders' WORK. 13

gist, picked up there three hundred and twenty frag-
ments of

ANCIENT POTTERY,

and others may be found by any one curious enough to
look for them. The material is a coarse clay, mingled
with sand and flint, and the outside is often rudely or-
namented with lines and figures made in the clay before
baking. We have no record that our Indians either did
or could make such ware, while it is far too coarse to
have belonged to any white family, so that we are thrown
back on the supposition of an aboriginal race that were
in intelligence between Indians and Whites. There are
on the same ground an abundance of flint chippings,
suggesting to us that the spot may have been a primi-
tive store and workshop.

THE MOUNDS

are generally fifteen to twenty feet in diameter, and from
two to five feet high ; probably not more than one-third
their original height. They are surrounded by no
ditches or depressions, and are composed of black earth,
by which we may understand that the builders had no
digging tools, but scratched up the soil from the surface
and brought it in their jars or aprons. It demonstrates,
too, that the mounds are not the work of nature, other-
wise the interior would be clay or gravel. Their pur-
pose was doubtless for burial mounds. Having no means
of excavating graves, the people placed their dead on
the surface and heaped the soil about them, probably
adding to the heap from time to time as others died,
until a large tumulus or sepulchral hill was raised.
Such ancient mounds, called "barrows" in England, are

14 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

found all over the world, and are of a class with the
stone "cromlechs" of Europe, the "cairns" of Scot-
land, and the "dolmen" of France. The larger kinds,
however, were undoubtedly designed for defense against

enemies.

Admitting these conclusions, it needs but little imag-
ination to picture before us those first inhabitants of our
country, with their red adobe dwellings along our streams,
their rude pottery kilns smoking in the ground by our
clay banks, and their funeral processions toiling to cover
their dead and leaving some weeping mourner to watch
the precious mound.

But the end came. A fierce people, less skillful in
peace but more cunning in war, came in upon them and
either drove them out or exterminated them, and dwelt
in their stead. Soon the rude houses decayed and the
conquerors cared not to repair them ; the utensils were
broken and they could not replace them, and the frag-
ments, like old hieroglyphics, remain to outline the
story. The conquered race either perished or passed on
to other wilds, perhaps towards the waters of the Col-
orado, where the remains of a similar dying race are
found to-day.

It does not seem necessary to assign a high antiquity
to the mound builders. They were here before white
men came, but that was only three hundred years ago.
Trees six hundred years old grow on some of their
works, but those works may have been abandoned cen-
turies before the race went out. Then there is the anal-
oaT of the adobe dwellers of Colorado, who. though
slowly perishing, are still in existence, while yet they

CAUSE OF AMERICAN DISCOVERY.

15

have been surrounded by the wild Indians for hundreds
of years. And part, at least, of the perishable remains
found in the mounds are confidently believed by scienti-
fic men to belong to the mound builders. They may
well enouorh have been here in that traditional time w^hen
the gigantic mastodons roamed the lowlands and crossed
the swamps in which they were mired, and that time is
not ancient enough for wet places to have become dry ;
but whatever be the time in which this people was here,
they have all gone. Like the ancient monarchies of the
East they have passed away ; but unlike those monarch-
ies they have left no hieroglyphic monuments to tell the
story.

CHAPTER II.

INDIANS AND FRENCH MISSIONARIES.

;HE INDIANS were so called by Co-
lumbus because he supposed he had
sailed across the western sea to the
eastern shores of India. He did not
know that a new continent in mid
ocean had stopped his course before he
was half wav to India, and that 3000
miles of land blocked the "North-west Passage."' It
was this gorgeous East that inspired the efforts of all the
early navigators, none of them realizing that they had
discovered a more valuable West. Nor did they give

16 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

over until every nook and cranny of the American coast,
from Brazil to Greenland, had been explored, in hope of
finding an avenue through to the Pacific Ocean. But
what past generations could not find, the present gener-
ation has made, and the continent has become more than
a substitute for the ocean, inasmuch as the Panama and
Union Pacific Railways are swifter than ships.

When the Indians came to this continent we have no
present means of knowing, and their traditions do not
tell ; nor do we know from what land their ancestors
came. They did not originate here, for they have dis-
placed an older people. There are many ways by which
they could have come. Behrings Strait is only fift}^ miles
wide, with islands between. It is set down accurately
in a very old Japanese Map in the British Museum,
showing that the ancient Asiatic navigators were ac-
quainted with it and with the land beyond. Then
below the Strait, and reaching from Japan to America,
is a natural bridge of one hundred and seventy islands —
the Kurile and Aleutian groups. On the other side of
the continent Greenland and Iceland, whose authentic
history reaches back a thousand years, form connecting
links with Europe. Greenland is but two hundred miles
from British America. Over these different routes many,
many voyagers undoubtedly have come whose adventures
there was no historian to record. Other pathways are
across the great ocean itself. Japanese junks have more
than once been blown to our shores ; Polynesian island-
ers have been drifted across the sea in open boats ; four
hundred years ago the Portugese were wafted uncon-
sciously to Brazil ; six hundred years ago a Welsh fleet

ORIGINAL INHABITANTS. 17

under Madoc, Prince of Wales, drifted to America, and
landed, it is supposed, on the coast of Virginia; and
nine hundred years ago the Scandinavians founded a
colony on the coast of Massachusetts. We cannot go
farther back, for history stops. The latter colony con-
tinued for three hundred years, and would probably have
been permanent if they could have cut themselves loose
from the mother country and become natives. They
were not indigenous to the soil. This the ancestors of
the Indians did, and they flourished and became tribes
and nations which in lapse of time differed in appearance
and in dialect one from another. Whatever their ances-
tral civilization might have been, they relapsed into sav-
ages, and were able by force of numbers to expel all
conflicting races not as savage as themselves.
In 1634 the

FIRST JESUIT MISSIONARIES

visited the trackless wilds of Canada, and were followed
in the course of thirteen years by more than forty others.
By 1641 they had penetrated to Lake Superior — five
years before the devoted Eliot had addressed the tribe of
Indians that dwelt within six miles of Boston. In 1667
the mission was still maintained and the Pottawatomies
and Sacs and Foxes visited it, and invited the missiona-
ries to their homes. We get these accounts from the
Jesuit narratives which were published at Paris, and are
still preserved in old libraries. We believe they are
reliable, as the missionaries, as a class, were humble,
self-denying men. We cannot be sure whether

THE POTTAWATOMIES

were here at this time or came later. Schoolcraft, the

18 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

famous Indian historian, says that in the early part of
the eighteenth century the Pottawatomies had crowded
the Miamies from their dwellings at Chicago, that they
came from the islands near the entrance of Green Bay,
and were a branch of the great nation of the Chippewas
or Ojibwas. Others say they came from Canada, at an
unknown date. Perhaps both these accounts are true,
though we never shall certainly know, for Indians wrote
no histories. A piece of writing was to them a dark
mystery.

The Miamies were undoubtedly here in 1672, for that
year they were visited by Allouez and Dablon, two French
Missionaries, who were the first whites of whom we have
any record who set foot in Northern Illinois.

But as yet

THE MISSISSIPPI

had not been discovered. It was described bv the In-
dians as the Great River, in whose waters were savage
monsters, and on whose banks were savage nations.
There were three theories about it : first, that it ran south-
west to the Gulf of California ; second, that it ran south
to the Gulf of Mexico; third, that it ran south-east to
the Atlantic Ocean. The whole region was a mystery,
and was mapped and peopled pretty much as fancy might
invent. The earliest books on America contained the
wildest tales. They told of races of pigmies and of
giants. That the southern forests concealed tribes of
negroes, and the inhabitants of the north were white like
the polar bear or ermine. One writer had heard of a
nation that did not eat, and another believed, if not in
a race of headless men, at least in a race whose heads
did not rise above their shoulders.

THE GREAT FRENCH MISSIONARY. 19

The question of the river, however, was more than a
matter of curiosity ; it had a commercial and political
importance. At last the Governor of Canada in 1672,
more than two hundred years a^o, committed the explor-
ation to two men, Louis Joliet, who is known only in
connection with this discovery, and

JACQUES MARQUETTE,
the famous missionary, who was then at his mission vil-
lage in northern Michigan. These two, with two canoes
and five men, floated down the Mississippi for a month
as far as an Indian town, near the mouth of the Arkan-
sas river, when they became satisfied that it emptied into
the gulf.

On their return they entered this State by the Illinois
river, and were struck with the beauty of the forest and
prairies and variety of the game in some parts of the
country, and the interminable marshes of other parts.
They found an Indian town of four hundred and sixty
lodges, near Utica, below Ottawa, and as they passed up,
gazed for the first time on the lofty walls of Starved
Rock. They were well received at the Indian town, and
one of the chiefs, with some of the young men, piloted
them up the O'Plaine river, helped carry their boats
across the portage of four miles in Cook County to the
north branch of the Chicago river, down which they
came to Chicago — to Lake Illinois as they called it.
Here their guides left them, and they went up the lake
to Green Bay, and Joliet returned to Quebec. Mar-
quette, according to a previous promise to the chiefs,
spent the succeeding winter with the tribes at Ottawa
and Chicago, and died at the Marquette river the year
after, 1675.

CHAPTER III.

EXPLORATIONS OF LASALLE.

T THAT time Robert Lasalle, an educated
and talented young man, skilled in the Indian
dialects, was residing at Kingston, Canada,
then Ft. Frontenac, having obtained a large
grant there from the French government.
^<Kp His fields were fertile ; his herds multi-
plied. His hunters roamed the forests after furs, and his
mechanics built canoes and vessels, while under his shel-
ter the missions flourished, his countrymen settled, and
groups of friendly Iroquois built their cabins. Fortune
was within his grasp. But Joliet, as he descended from
the upper lakes, passing the forts, had told the story of
his discoveries, and Lasalle was at once fired with plans
of commerce between Europe and the Mississippi. Going
to France, he unfolded his vast schemes, obtained his
commission, returned with the necessary men, Tonti, an
Italian veteran, as his lieutenant, launched a ship of ten
tons at Niagara, and about Sept. 1, 1769, shipped back
his first ship load of furs from Green Bay. He never
heard of this ship again ; she was probably wrecked.
Weary of waiting for her return, he determined to

EXPLORE ILLINOIS.

And in December ascended the St. Joe river, and down

TROUBLES OF LA SALLE AND TONTI. 21

the Kankakee to its mouth, above Morris. Descending
the Illinois river, he reached the Indian town visited by
Marquette, near the mouth of the Vermillion, but the
tribe was absent in the chase. Farther down, where the
river widens into Lake Peoria, Indians appeared, and
still farther down he built a fort, calling it, in his grief,
the Broken Heart, and afterwards set off on foot, with
three companions, for Kingston, leaving orders with
Tonti to fortify the Great Rock, now Starved Rock.
This he did the following spring. But LaSalle had ene-
mies in Canada, who were jealous of him on account of
the authority and trading monopoly granted him by the
government, and as soon as they knew^ he had returned
to Kingston for supplies, they stirred up the Iroquois
and persuaded a large party of them to go to Illinois and
destroy his forts. The Indians came by canoe around
the lakes, and in September, 1680, descended the Illi-
nois river and invested Starved Rock. Tonti was not
prepared for a siege, and, after a parley, was allowed to
escape with the few men left him, for many had deserted,
and took refuge with the Pottawatomies at Chicago, who
appear to have displaced the Miamas about this time.
Then began the famous persecution by the Iroquois of
the Illinois Indians, who were friendly to LaSalle. At
least at this time it first comes into history. The Iro-
quois had long traded with the whites, and were well
armed, and the others, living so far in the wilderness,
were beaten again and again and consumed everywhere
with horrid butchery. Only traditions and imperfect
accounts have come down to us, giving but gleams of the
truth — but those gleams are tongues that tell uniformly
the same pitiless tale.

22 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

TONTI AND HIS MEN
mav have remained some time with the friendlv Potta-
watomies, and scoured with them the prairies of Ken-
dall County — drank of its springs and camped in its
groves. But it is most probable that he preferred win-
tering on the other side of the lake St. Joe, and, if so,
there the intrepid LaSalle found him the next spring,
having returned from Canada with men and stores for
another little ship or barge. They built it at Green
Bay, during the summer, launched it in the spring of
1682, and with another cargo of furs, the party again
descended the Illinois. They doubtless gazed long and
earnestly at the deserted Rock Fort, as they floated past,
but kept on to the Mississippi, and completed the explo-
ration of the river to its mouth. LaSalle then formally
took possession of the entire country in the name of
France, calling it Louisiana. The news was gloriously
received at the French court. It was the beginning of
what, it was confidently believed, Avould be a vast and
wealthy empire, making France the mightiest nation on
earth. And that piece of tall sandstone, now known as

STARVED ROCK,

was the centre of those ambitious hopes — so far as the
great West was concerned, for it was for years the only
important military station in the West, besides Macki-
naw, and was far the stronger of the two. Lasalle
returned there from his Mississippi exploration, cut away
the forest trees from the top of the rock, built houses,
stretched palisades across the isthmus, and gathered at
the base as many of the friendly Illinois tribes — Tama-
roaSj Kaskaskias, Cohokies, Michigans, Peorias, &c. —

LA SALLE RETURNS TO FRANCE. 23

as he could find. It was a lively place for the time.
He either wintered there, or leaving Tonti in command,
went on to Green Bay. In either case, the territory of
Kendall county was too near not to be traversed again
and again by the French garrison and their Indian allies
in search of game, and the coveted furs, for the sake of
which the post was largely maintained. Wolves and
raccoons were shot in our groves, beavers trapped along
our streams, and the lordly buftalo chased over our prai-
ries and brought to the ground by Indian arrows or
French flint-locks. The following year Lasalle's monop-
oly expired, and he returned to France to have it
renewed, leaving the faithful Tonti in command at the
fort. He never saw Illinois again. In the meantime
the missions were continued at the Rock and Kaskaskia.
The last is the oldest European settlement in the Missis-
sippi valley, and Illinois is consequently the oldest of
all the interior States. Among the missionaries was
Allouez, one of the two who visited Illinois eleven years
before.

Lasalle was expected back in the summer of 1684,
and in the early spring Tonti sent a letter by trusty
messengers to await him at the mouth of the Missis-
sippi. But he came not, and the messengers left the
letter at an Indian village, with directions to deliver it
to the white ships when they arrived. They were faith-
ful to their trust, and fifteen years afterwards delivered
the letter to D'Iberville, who entered the mouth of the
great river with a Canadian colony.

Three years wore away. The lonely Illinois garrison
passed their time in fishing, hunting, trapping, trading

24 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

with the natives, and taking turns in going to market
with the furs and returning with stores and articles of
barter. The

MISSIONARIES

had the hardest life. Marest wrote : " Our life is passed
in roaming through thick woods, in clambering over
hills, in paddling the canoe across lakes and rivers, to
catch a poor savage who flies from us, and whom we can
tame neither by teaching nor by caresses."

He thus describes a journey from the rock to the Peo-
rias : ''I departed, being accompanied by only three
savages, who might abandon me from levity, or from
fear of enemies might fly. The horror of these vast
uninhabited forest regions, where, in twelve days, not a
soul was met, almost took away all my courage. Here
was a journey where there was no village, no bridge, no
ferry, no boat, no house, no beaten path, and over
boundless prairies, intersected by rivulets and rivers,
through forests and thickets filled with briers and thorns,
through marshes where we plunged sometimes to the
girdle. At night repose was sought on the grass or on
leaves, exposed to the wind and rain, happy if by the
side of some rivulet of which a draught might quench
thirst. A meal was prepared from such game as'was
killed on the way, or by roasting ears of corn."

This is from Marest's letters published a quarter of a
century later, at Paris, but applies equally to the state
of things in Tonti's day. In the spring of 1687, the
Italian lieutenant having heard through Canada that
Lasalle with four ships and a large colony had sailed
from France for the Mississippi, and unable to bear his

THE DEATH OF LA SALLE. 25

suspense any longer, went down with a single compan-
ion in search of him. Finding no success, he built a
log cabin on an island near the mouth of the Arkansas
river, erected a large cross to attract the attention of
passing boats, and resolved to spend the season there,
in hope of obtaining some trace of his master. It soon
came. July 24th, six men and an Indian guide appeared
on the Arkansas side of the river, and proved to be a
remnant of Lasalles party. The first question was :
"Where is Lasalle?" ''^JDead!'' On arriving three
years before he had missed the mouth of the Mississippi,
spent two years on the coast of Texas after the wreck
of the one ship left him, and started with sixteen men
to reach Canada, eighteen hundred miles through the
wilderness. On the way he was shot by two of his men
and left to be devoured by wolves on the Texas prairie,
on one of the lower branches of the Trinity river.

So perished one who by his adventures is linked to
Northern Illinois, and who for true genius, vast concep-
tions, force of will, energy of purpose and unfaltering
hope, had no superior among his countrymen. It is no
sorrow to us to know that his murderers were themselves
murdered while quarreling over the spoil. The surviv-
ors obtained a guide who piloted them to the Indian
town on the Arkansas, nearly the very spot where
Tonti was awaiting him. In a few days they took their
sad journey up the river to the Illinois Rock, where, so
far as we know, Tonti remained in command during the
following eighteen years.

CHAPTER IV.

TRADE AND WAR.

;I'RING this time there was a continued
struggle hetween French and English for

MONOPOLIES IN TRADE.

France, through her missionaries, had the
start, and, with the exception of the At-
lantic coast, claimed and held the entire land from Maine
to Hudson's Bay. It was called New France. Yet, so
weak were the garrisons that English traders, through
the Senecas, obtained a large share of the commerce of
the lakes, and individual rangers penetrated every for-
est where there was an Indian with skins to sell.

In 1689 war was declared between France and Eng-
land that continued eight years, and the Jesuits, hereto-
fore so self-denying, became bloody partisans for their
country. They stirred up the Indians to such horrid
massacres of the English colonists, that the very name
of a French missionary was hated, and in 1700 the New
York legislature made it legal to hang any Popish priest
who should come into the province. The blood policy,
though ruinous in the end, was successful at the time, for
when peace was made, France retained all but the cod
fisheries of Nova Scotia.

THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR. 27

In 1696 it was stated in a public document to be the
wish of Louis XIV of France to preserve the rock fort
in Illinois as a permanent fortress, but whether it was
done or not we cannot say. Tonti, with twenty Cana-
dians, left it in February, 1700, again going down
the Mississippi to meet some new arrivals, and we have
no certain account of his ever returning. He had
become an old man, and after twenty-two years of wil-
derness life, doubtless longed for his native Italy. The
probability is that the post was maintained, as traders
were still more numerous. That very year a company
in quest of copper ore wintered among the lowas, far
up the Mississippi, above St. Paul. But the western
records of the following half century are scarce. We
find fewer missionary narratives to appeal to. Their
pens were drowned in blood. Or, perhaps the stoi'y of
the wilderness being once told, there was less to write
about. The general history, however, was one of Indian
trading; the colonist had not begun to come. In 1756,

THE SEVEN YEARS' WAR

begun between the powers of Europe, during which 886,-
000 men were slain. In many parts not enough were left
to till the ground. Nothing at all was gained by those
who planned the carnage. The possession of the Great
West passed over to England. Illinois ceased being a
part of New France, and became a part of the North-
western Territory. The Indians under

PONTIAC
continued the war two years longer, and then yielded.
This imperious, long-haired, dark-skinned orator, prophet
and general, was truly one of nature's noblemen, but had

28 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

the misfortune to be born a savage. He was of extraordin-
ary talent and force of character, and was signally famous
for his hatred of the English. He organized against
them a confederacy of Indian tribes, through a region
of wilderness a thousand miles long, but only to be
defeated in the end. He retreated to Illinois, and in
April, 1769, was killed by an Indian assassin from the
tribe of the Peorias. On this, a bitter Indian war fol-
lowed, which resulted in nearly exterminating some of
the Illinois tribes. One

ILL-FATED PARTY

was besieged on the rock of the old French fort. Their
provisions gave out. For water, they rolled up their
blankets and let them down to the river below, but the
cords were cut off by their watchful enemies. And so,
by the agonies of hunger and thirst, they perished, and
the spot has ever since been known by the name of
Starved Rock — the greatest historical relic in Illinois.
One great battle was fought on the site of the city of
Morris, and the bones of the dead still moulder there in
the soil. At this time there were about two thousand
whites, including women and children, in the whole Illi-
nois valley, and about fifty families at St. Louis, the
center of the fur trade with the Indian nations on the
Missouri. Daniel Boone had but just wandered forth " in
quest of the country of Kentucky."

Illinois was regarded as a land of boundless plains and
boundless wealth, and many advocated sending out colo-
nies immediately to take possession of it. But it was
objected that a power would be formed which distance
would make practically independent of the colonies on

CESSION OF CHIKAJOUX. 29

the coast. So the land was left to become the asylum of
the distressed and adventurous, the poor man's refuge,
and log cabins and clearings rapidly multiplied. It is
a strange fact, but probably true, that

THE BUFFALOS

went out with the French. Up to that time, as the
Indians said, "they were as thick as trees in the forest,"
and roamed in vast droves over the prairies. They were
so plenty and so valued that one of the specifications in
LaSalle's first commission was a monopoly of the trade
in buffalo robes. But in 1763 the snow fell, it is said,
twelve feet deep — the severest winter ever known — and
the buffaloes, cut off from their supplies, wholly perished.
For fifty years or more, acres of bleaching bones, here
and there upon our prairies, testified to the hard winter
that destroyed nearly every buftalo east of the Missis-
sippi.

In 1790, Gen. St. Clair was appointed Military Gov-
ernor of the northwest territory, and the first territorial
legislature meeting, at Cincinnati, elected William Henry
Harrison delegate to Congress.

St. Clair was succeeded by Gen. Wayne, who defeated
the Indians in a pitched battle, and so made peace for a
time. In the peace treaty, the Indians ceded to the
United States, " one piece of land six miles sijuare, at
the mouth of the Chikajo river, emptying into the south-
west end of Lake Michigan, where a fort formerly stood."
The name of the river in one of the missionary narra-
tives is Chikajoux.

30 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

In 1800, the territory was divided, and Illinois was
included in the

INDIAN TERRITORY.

In 1804 Fort Dearborn was built, and Mr. Kinzie,
father of John H., moved there as Indian trader. In
1811 Gen. Harrison was Governor, and defeated the
Indians in a bloody battle at Tippecanoe, not more than
a hundred miles southeast from Yorkville. Tecumseh
was not present, but was the general commander of the
Indians. British agents, however, were the real cause
of the troubles, and this battle greatly increased the
desire of the people, especially along the frontier, for
war Avith England, both to avenge their calamities and also
as the only sure road to peace. This feeling was shared
by Congress, and led to a declaration of war in June,
1812. In August, the traitor general Hull, command-
ant at Detroit, ordered the Chicago fort to be abandoned,
and the garrison, in trying to escape, were nearly all
murdered by the Pottawatomies, near what is now Twelfth
street. Their bones bleached on the prairie for four
years, until the war was over, when they were gathered
and buried in 1816.

Got. 5, 1813. the renowned Shawnee orator and com-
mander,

TECUMSEH,

one of the most formidable Indian chiefs that ever fou2;ht
against the United States, was killed at the battle of the
Thames, near Lake St. Clair, in Upper Canada. Shab-
bona, the ff\mous Pottawatomie, was with him at the
time, as one of his aids. He had a presentiment that it
would be his last battle, and gave his sword to one of

THE DEATH OF TECUMSEH. 31

his followers, to be given to his son as soon as he should
become a warrior. Then raising the war-cry, he sprang
up from the swamp where he lay with his men, and
charged the Kentucky cavalry. He was wounded sev-
eral times, but fought on with the greatest desperation.
At last, says Shabbona, he sprang forward with uplifted
tomahawk towards a man riding a gray horse. Before
he could reach him the man discharged a pistol, and the
fiery chief received a mortal wound in the breast. He
shouted his last word of command, and stepping forward,
sunk down at the foot of a tree and died. The officer
on the orrav horse was Col. Richard M. Johnson. As
soon as they knew their commander was no more, the
red men were seized with terror and despair, and fled.

Such scenes were repugnant to the peaceful disposi-
tion of young Shabbona, and it was the last great battle
he was ever engaged in. In referring to it he used to
say : " Indians and red coats all run ; Shabbona run, too.
He never more fight 'Mcricans ; Ugh, never I" At the
close of the war in 1815, the Indians made a general
peace, which was not broken for seventeen years. In
1816 the fort was re-built, and the Pottawatomies c^dcd
to the State a tract of land twenty miles wide, for the
canal route from Chicago to a line uniting the mouths
of the Fox and Kankakee, or thereabouts. Thev asked
but a trifle'for it, being convinced by the treaty commis-
sioners that the canal would be greatly to their benefit.
The project was the result of a lesson learned by the
government during the war, viz : The need of a more
perfect means of communication with the interior.

32 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

In 1818,

ILLINOIS,

made the Union of legal age, by being admitted as the
twenty-first State. Shadrach Bond was the first Gov-
ernor. There was not in the northern part a single
white man, so far as known, except at the military post
at Chicago. The prairies, covered with grass and span-
gled with flowers, were undisturbed save by droves of
passing deer, or Indian travelers following their trail in
single file. The rivers and creeks, stocked with fish,
flowed silently by. The solitude of the groves was
unbroken except by the hungry howling of the wolves
and the occasional sound of an Indian's musket.

CHAPTER V.

EARLY SETTLEMENTS.

EMPTY was the wilderness, that in
1820, when Alexander Wolcott, the In-
dian agent at Chicago, wished to be
united in marriage to Ellen M. Kinzie,
he was obliged with his bride and party
to go down the silent Fox and Illinois
valleys, one hundred and thirty miles,
to Fulton county, to find a Justice of the Peace to per-
form the ceremony.

The year following Lewis Cass arrived in a birch
canoe, charged with the weighty business of obtaining
from the red men the right of way for a government

ILLINOIS IN 1823. 33

railroad from Detroit to Chicago, uniting Lake Erie and
Lake Michigan. He obtained the land, but the project
fell through and was left for the Michioran Southern Rail-
road Company to accomplish. The lead mines at Galena
caused that portion of the State to be settled before any
of the surrounding territory. The mines began to be
worked in 1821, and in five years Galena was laid out,
and the county organized. The first miners used to
spend their winters at home, returning to the mines in
the spring at the time when suckers run, and this coin-
cidence and their great numbers caused them to be called
"Suckers." In this way, so the tradition runs, the inhab-
itants of Illinois came by their cant name.

The American Atlas, published at Philadelphia in
1822, says : "Illinois has nineteen counties and fifty-
five thousand inhabitants. The settlements at present
are confined to the southern portion of the State, and
the neighborhood of the great rivers. Vandalia is now
the seat of government. Kaskaskia, the former capital,
contains a bank, a land office, and about one hundred and
sixty houses, scattered over an extensive plain. The
town was settled upward of one hundred years ago by
emigrants from Lower Canada, and about one-half the
inhabitants are French. The surrounding country is
under good cultivation."

On the accompanying map counties were laid ofi" as
far as Madison, opposite the mouth of the Mississippi
river. All north of that was unsurveyed territory, con-
taining Indian villages only.

In 1823, after seven years' delay, Majors Long and

34 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Keating surveyed the canal lands. In their report they
say :

"The scenery about Chicago consists merely of a
plain in which but few patches of thin and scrubby
woods are observed scattered here and there. The vil-
lage presents no cheering prospect, as notwithstanding
its antiquity it consists of but few huts, inhabited by a
miserable race of men — scarcely equal to the Indians —
from whom they are descended. Their log or bark houses
are low, filthy and disgusting, displaying not the least
trace of comfort. The number of trails centering at this
point and their apparent antiquity indicate that this was
probably for a long time the site of a large Indian vil-
lage. As a place of business it ofiers no inducement to
the settler."

The poor opinion of the government surveyors possi-
bly contributed to the delay of the work, for another
S£ven years passed before much more was done.

The northern boundary of the canal tract, known as the

INDIAN BOUNDARY LINE,

strikes Kendall county at the north-east section corner,
on the estate of William Murray, town of Na-au-say,
passing through the Aux Sable timber, in the town of
Seward, and crosses the creek on J. McKanna's land.
There it turns, where there is a jog in the road, at a
point opposite to where the south boundary strikes the
Kankakee, and goes nearer west, crossing Lisbon creek
four times, in the town of Lisbon, passing a few rods
south of the red school house, in the town of Big Grove,
through Apakesha grove, and out of the county, eighty
rods north of Holderman's grove. It strikes Fox river

THE FIRST PIONEERS. 35

two or three miles below Sheridan. The southern
boundary ends at the Kankakee river, two miles above
Wilmington. Those surveyors were probably the first
whites who explored our county. No provision was
made for constructing the canal until Congress, in 1827,
granted every alternate section in a strip five miles in
width for that purpose. Two years afterwards Chicago
was laid out by the canal commissioners, on the first
alternate section.

We have now reached the time of the first pioneers.

In 1823 Archibald Clvbourne came from Virorinia,
horseback, to Chicago, and took up a claim on the west
fork of the North Branch, three miles from the fort.
The same year Dr. Davidson built a cabin by the mineral
spring in what is now South Ottawa, and traded with the
Indians until his death three years after.

In 1824,

• REV. JESSE WALKER

was sent out as a Methodist missionary among the Pot-
tawatomies, and traversed much of the same ground
passed over by Marquette one hundred and sixty years
before. The same hills that then echoed to the French
tongue, now echoed to the English, but a purer gospel
was proclaimed, and one more free from the additions of
men. Mr. Walker was a small man, and usually wore
a light-colored beaver, nearly as large as a lady's para-
sol. He was not a talented preacher, but had good
sense, courage and zeal. He was born in Buckingham
county, Ya., June 9, 1766, and was converted in a Baptist
meeting, while young. He was bv trade a dresser of
buckskin, or deer leather, for gloves, moccasins, pants.

36 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

vests and hunting shirts, and he was often familiarly
called the " skin-dresser." He was first appointed mis-
sionary to the territories of Illinois and Missouri in
1806, and in 1820 preached the first Methodist sermon
in St. Louis, in the Baptist meeting house, and a thriv-
ing church was formed. In 1823 he entered upon his
special mission to the Indians, liaving first gained per-
mission of the head men of the tribe and of the Secre-
tary of War. His field was Northern Illinois, with
Ottawa for a centre. One of his stations was a log
chapel in the edge of the timber, near a little stream,
just over the west line of Kendall county. The stream
is since known as Mission creek, and the tongue of tim-
ber as Mission Point. The chapel, it is believed, stood
about where Frank Bowen's barn now stands. There
the lone missionary held preaching services, by the help
of an interpreter, and established an Indian school for
the dusky boys and girls. He preached also in the cab-
ins at Ottawa, for several other settlers had come in, viz :
Joseph Brown, Lewis Baily, Mr. Covill, Enos Pem-
brook, Warner Ramsey, Pierce Hawley, Robert Beres-
ford, and Edmund Weed. In 1825 he formed the first
Methodist class in Peoria. Three of the members were
James Walker and wife, and Mrs. John Dixon. Indeed,
he traveled and preached and taught wherever he could
hear of Indians or settlers. The veteran, John Sin-
clair, often declared that wherever he went Jesse
Walker had been ahead of him. In 1828 he was suc-
ceeded at the Indian mission by Isaac Scarritt, and he
removed to an Indian village near the site of Plainfield.
In 1832 he was appointed to Chicago. At Conference

PROGRESS OF ORGANIZATION. 37

the following year, by a majority vote, the preachers
were recommended to wear straight-breasted coats, but
Jesse Walker, as well as John Sinclair and Peter Cart-
right, voted in the negative. James Walker and Wil-
liam Roval favored the recommendation. Jesse Walker
died Oct. 4, 1835, and is buried at Plainfield.

In 1825 Mr. Long, James Galloway, Greorge and Hor-
ace Sprague and Mr. Ransom came into LaSalle county.
In the fall W. F. Walker came up the river to Ottawa
in a keel boat.

In five years three tiers of counties had been added to
the State in its progress northward, and in 1826

VERMILLION COUNTY

was organized and became the latest territorial name of
this vicinity. It embraced all the country from Dan-
ville to Chicago. Ninian Edwards was elected governor
and served four years ; he was also our territorial gov-
ernor nine years. It may be noticed, in passing, that
in 1826 a motion was introduced into the legislature by
Joseph Duncan, cashier of the unfortunate State Bank,
to dispose of the Seminary Lands by public lottery, but
it was lost in committee.

A motion was also introduced and considered in com-
mittee, to lay a tax on all bachelors over twenty-five
years old.

TWO QUOTATIONS

from State papers of that year may not be uninteresting
in a centennial history :

Gov. Coles in his valedictory message says : " On the
Fourth of July last, Thomas Jefferson, the renowned
author of the Declaration of Independence, and John

38 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Adams, its ablest advocate, ceased to live, thus sanctify-
ing by their deaths a day rendered glorious by the most
important event of their lives. That these two fathers
and ex-Presidents, one of whom drafted the Declaration
of Independence, the other seconded the motion which
led to its adoption, both members of the select commit-
tee which reported it, and constituting, at the time of
their deaths, two of the only three surviving signers of
that memorable instrument, should have died on the
same day, and that day the fiftieth anniversary since
its adoption, is such an extraordinary co-incidence, that
it would seem as if heaven were desirous of increasing
our reverence for our liberty, and for the memory of
those who were instrumental in achieving it. This mel-
ancholy bereveament has put the entire nation in mourn-
ing, and it has been a subject of regret that the sparse
population of Illineis has prevented its citizens from
publicly manifesting their respect for the memories of
these two great statesman. But there is one painful cir-
cumstance connected with this event. Thomas Jeffer-
son, after sixty-one years' service of his country, found
himself involved to such an extent that nearly all his
property, even Monticello, his favorite residence, where
are now his remains, will have to be sold."

And Gov. Edwards, in his inaugural message, says,
in relation to the State Bank, whose notes were then
only worth two-thirds their face value : " Money is an
essential element of power. Character is the means of
obtaining money from others, when we have it not of
our own. Character, therefore, is capital, and the loss
of it is the most disastrous species of bankruptcy, since

THE FIRST PIONEERS. 39

it may find us unable to help ourselves, and destitute of
the means of obtaining help from others. The punctual
observance of its engagements and a fair and honest ful-
fillment of all its authorized expectations are as indis-
pensable to the character of a state as to that of an indi-
vidual."

In 1826 the quarter section on which Ottawa stands
was taken up by Dr. David Walker, father of David
Walker, Esq., and of George Walker, first sheriff of La-
Salle county. There arrived, also, Col. J. D. Thomas and
James Walker. The latter afterward removed to Plain-
field, The same year

MARK BEAUBIEN

became a fur trader at Chicago, and soon after com-
menced those log cabin and Saganash House experiences
which hav6 made his name famous wherever western his-
tory is known. Mark has chosen Newark, within the
borders of Kendall county, as the spot on which to spend
his closing days, and there, with his cherished pipe and
violin and numerous friends, he lives in retired peace —
one of our most interesting mementoes.

He was born in Detroit, April 25, 1800 ; came to
Chicago with his family in a wagon, 1826, and joined
his brother, John B. Beaubien, who had been a trader
there since 1817, having purchased his residence of the
American Fur Company. That year Mark planted pota-
toes and corn in the field along the river, embracing the
court house square. In 1829 he opened a log hotel, on
what is now the corner of Lake and Market streets, and
the following year established a ferry at the fork of the
river, paying a county license therefor. The rales were

40 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

sixpence for a foot passenger and a shilling for a team.
In 1833 the Saganash House a two-story frame, with
green blinds, supplanted the log house. Saganash was
the Indian name of Billy Caldwell, a Pottawatomie
chief, and the grateful man left Mr. Beaubien a govern-
ment reservation of eighty acres at the mouth of the
Calumet, which is now quite valuable. Mr. Beaubien
lived in the vicinity of Naperville eight years, from
1844. In 1852 he became keeper of the Chicago light-
house, removing in 1861 to Naperville, and soon back
to Chicago again. He has also lived in Manteno and
Kankakee. He has raised a family of twenty-three
children, most of whom are living and doing well, though
scattered in different localities.

CHAPTER VI.

holderman's grove.
N 1826, or perhaps the year following,

ROBERT BERESFORD,

v,ite and two sons, settled at the southern
point of Holderman's grove, on one of the
newly located sections of what was known
as Seminary land, and thus became the first
actual settler in Kendall county.

THE SEMINARY LAND

was a donation of thirty-six sections from the United
States to the State of Illinois, for the purpose of found-
ing a State college. They could be located anywhere on
the public lands, and Governor Edward Coles in 1825-0
caused twenty-six of the sections to be located by a
Board of Commissioners, and reserved from general sale.
In locating one section at Holderman's, the Board left
civilization far behind, but their attention w^as probably
directed there by the canal survey, and they acted on
the best information they could obtain. But if they
could have once feasted their eyes upon the

GLORIOUS LANDSCAPES

south and west of the famous little grove they would

have been in no doubt about the propriety of driving

.•I

42 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

their stakes there. It is situated on the broad, swelling
water shed between the Fox and Illinois rivers, and is a
fit beginning to a country that has as many magnificent
views an<l delicious bits of landscape in proportion to its
size as any county in the State. There are no high hills
in Kendall county, yet from some points thirty miles
can be seen in one direction, and townships unroll like a
panorama before the eye. The range i^ not so extensive
along the county line road from David Wheeler's around
to Holderman's, but for beauty it is unsurpassed.

Probably in 1826 also

PIERCE HAWLEY

followed Mr. Beresford from Ottawa, and located about
a mile from him on the north end of the grove, close to
the survey, or Indian boundary line. These two cabins
were for a year the only ones on the eighty miles be-
tween Chicago and Ottawa.

In 1827 or thereabouts, Moses Booth, one of the first
pioneers of this country, came to Ottawa. That summer

REUBEN REED,

with a little family, moved from Ohio to Chicago.
While there, October 1st, 1827, a son was born, who is
now Levi Reed, of Pekin, 111. If not the first white
child born in Chicago, he certainly antedates several who
have claimed to be the first.

Late in November Mr. Reed went the lonely road to
Ottawa, and feeling better suited with that place than
with Chicago, sent back a team for his family. The
weather was cold, but bravely wrapping herself and little
ones as warmly as possible, the mother started on the

ARRIVAL OF THE REED FAMILY. 43

journey. Her maiden name was Hannah Bailey ; she
deserves to be remembered. They forded the O'Plain
near Riverside well enough, but at Plainfield the driver
had to cut the ice before he could ford the DuPage.

They remained over night at Beresford's, and in the
morning, though it was steadily snowing, pursued the
slow tenor of their way. But the snow came thicker,
the driver lost the trail, and at night they found them-
selves at Beresford's again, having made a circle on the
prairie.

It was then decided that James Beresford, one of the
sons — afterwards killed at Indian creek — should pilot
them through. But it was very cold, and he had no
overcoat ; nor was there an overcoat in the settlement
to borrow. Fortunately, however, there was material
found to make one, and at it they went the next day.
In the course of the day they lacked a needle, and
Ansel Reed, the oldest boy, then nine years old, was
sent around the grove to Mr. Hawley's to borrow one.
And with the borrowed needle the coat was finished.

Half a century has passed since then, and Ansel Reed
is getting to be an old man, but he remembers still the
first journey he took in Kendall county. Having lodged
the third night at Beresford's, they starrted again the
following day and reached Ottawa in safety, where the
father had secured quarters for them at David Walker's,
by the spring. In a little while they moved out a mile
and a half into a small cabin owned by Col. Sears, and
afterwards went on a claim owned by Mr. Pembrook.
Moses Booth was on Covill's creek, three miles southwest
of the mouth of the Fox.

44 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

In 1828 Mr. Beresford sold to John Dougherty and
moved back to Ottawa. The same year two new neigh-
bors settled on the Seminary section adjoining Mr.
Dougherty. One was Mr. Edmond Weed, and the other
was

VETAL VERMET,

an enterprising Indian trader, who in his journeys between
Peoria and Detroit, used to stop at Dr. Walker's, and
lost his heart to Miss Huldah, one of the daughters. It
was the end of his trading. They were married in
1828, and going out on the prairie, settled down near
that favored and favorite spot first commended by the
canal surveyors, and then known as " Beresford's."
Being also on the direct line from Chicago to Ottawa, it
was presumably a fine point for a tavern, and might in
time become a village and go ahead of Chicago. The
feat did not appear difficult, for of the two the splendid
little grove on the highland was by far the best site.
Chicago was a butt for the ridicule of travelers, and was
only a hamlet at most. In 1827 its tax amounted to
three dollars, so it is said, and the Sheriff of Vermillion
county paid it out of his own pocket rather than travel the
one hundred and twenty miles intervening between its
quaking swamps and the county seat. The four families
now of Hawdey, Dougherty, Weed, and Vermet consti-
tuted the settlement. There was besides a man by the
name of

COUNTRYMAN,

who had married an Indian wife, and lived with the
Indians in the grove across the slough, three-(iuarters of
a mile from Dougherty's. lie liad a log cabin on the

KENDALL CEDED BY THE INDIANS. 45

edge of the slough, about eighty rods from the present
residence of William Stephen, and a bark wigwam in
the middle of the grove. His Indian name meant Sand
Hill Crane. His squaw, a sensible, hard-working woman,
after some years, left him, and died of small pox at Mil-
waukee. He was one of those characters found on every
frontier, who, either indolent or unfortunate, take up
with a wandering, barbarous life as an escape from the
toils or restrictions of civilization.

A half-breed, Francois Bourbonnais, jr., or " Bull
Bony," as the settlers called him, resided on the mission
premises at Mission Point. Mr. Vermet and the other
settlers at the grove, used to go there to grind their corn
in a horse mill which was owned by the mission, and which
was the only grist mill within reach in those days.

In October William Marquis and his little family came
from Ohio and settled beyond Morris, the first settlers in
Grundy county.

In 1829, by a treaty made at Prairie Du Chien, the
Indians ceded to the government the territory north of
the old boundary line, and thus Kendall county was
open to settlers. But a large portion of the Indians
were unwilling to sell. Black Hawk and Keokuk were
rival chiefs, and the former declared that the latter signed
away lands that he had no right to. A feeling of resent-
ment had been growing for years. The whites were
encroaching. The hunting grounds were being spoiled.
Promises made at former treaties had been badly kept.
The representations made at the canal treaty thirteen
years before had not been realized. And now it appeared
to the restive Indians, that the whites, having for years

46 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

been robbing them piece-meal, were at last resolved to
take the whole. It was inevitable, certainly, but the
Indian lacked both the wisdom to understand and the
philosophy to accept the inevitable. However, the treaty
was made, burdened, as usual, with special

RESERVATIONS

in favor of whoever should show a claim or had friends
influential enough to make one. The Pottawatomie
war chief, Waubonsie, obtained a reserve of a hunting
ground of five miles square near Aurora. Two reserves
were granted in Kendall county. One of a quarter sec-
tion to an Indian called Mohahwa, who had rendered
some important service or other, hence called the " Mo-
hahwa Reserve," in the town of Oswego, north end of
Aux Sable grove. There had been an Indian village on
it, and a dancing ground which is intact to this day.

The other was three-quarters of a section on the east
side of Aux Sable grove, town of Na-au-say, and was
granted to Weskesha, the Indian wife of David Lawton.
Both these reservations were located "at or near the
head waters of the Aux Sable." Lawton died five years
after. His brother in 1831 kept a log tavern on the
O'Plain, near Riverside. A section at Mission Point was
also reserved to Bourbonnais, who sold it to M. E. Bowen
and John S. Armstrong.

In 1829 the chapel cabin, at Mission Point, was de-
stroyed by fire, and was never rebuilt. The cause of
the fire does not appear, but it was probably accidental.

And so ended an enterprise which, although it con-
tinued but about five years, was yet important enough

END OF THE MISSION. 47

to be perpetuated in the name of the township afterward
formed, and the results of which are undoubtedly
recorded in heaven and will be as permanent as eternity.

CHAPTER Vll.

INDIANS, GROVES AND PRAIRIES.

r Y 1830 glowing accounts of the fertile Illinois
prairies began to spread more extensively
through the older States, and a tide of emi-
gration set in, most, however, settling far-#
ther south than Kendall county. A famous

song of those days ran :
" Move your family West

If good health you would enjoy,
And cross at Dixon's ferry,

In the State of Illinois."

John Dixon was one of the twelve original founders
of the American Bible Society, and in 1830 settled
where Dixon now stands, on Rock river. His wife and
some of his family were killed during the Indian troubles,
and he was never himself afterward.

In the spring of the same year Abraham Trumbo,
father of Mrs. John Armstrong, settled east of Ottawa,
and was joined in the summer by Matthias Trumbo,
father of Mrs. Joseph Jackson and Mrs. West Matlock.

48 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Abraham Lincoln also came with his parents to Illinois
that year.

August 4th, 1830, Chicago was laid out by authority
of the canal commissioners, and lots were sold. The
north side of the river was solid timber, and John Kin-
zie cleared a patch for a cow pasture. Madison street
was the city limits. A large pond occupied part of
Court House Square.

INDIANS

were daily visitors, for their numbers had not then been
lessened by emigration. The Pottawatomies were a fine
race of men physically, and as an average were more
intelligent and peaceable than either the Sacs, who lived
over the Wisconsin line, or the Winnebagos, who inhab-
ited the country along the Rock river. Black Hawk
was the Sac chief; Big Thunder was the Winnebago
chief. His headquarters were on the Kishwaukee, at
Belvidere.

WAUBONSIE

was the Pottawatomie chief, with headquarters at Aurora,
and a smaller camping-ground and favorite residence at
the mouth of Waubonsie creek, at Oswego. He has
been well described as "a giant in size and a devil in
nature." As strong as a grizzly bear, and as ignorant
and barbarous as the dogs that followed his ponies, he
was dreaded by his people and feared and avoided by the
whites. Liquor, no doubt, made him worse, for he
drank immoderate quantities of whisky whenever he could
get it, but he was naturally harsh and vindictive. He
beat and murdered his wives so habitually that perhaps
it may be said that one of the poor unfortunates was

INDIAN ENCAMPMENTS. 49

sooner or later left behind in the soil of every camping-
ground. His bark wigwam, at Oswego, covered a quar-
ter of an acre of ground, and in a hollowed stump out-
side his squaws ground his corn, with a sweep and
pestle. He claimed to have eight hundred ponies, and
some of them were superb stock.

An Indian encampment was a novel and yet a dirty
sight. Lazy men, homely, working women, ponies,
dogs and children. The dogs were half wolf, appar-
ently as useless as the men, good for little but to bark,
play with the children and follow the ponies. Wherever
they encamped for a season, blue grass sprung up the
season following, and those patches became both field
and pasture for them. The squaws planted corn there,
and the ponies pawing away the winter snow, nibbled
there. Such places were always in the shelter of the

GROVES.

There was very little underbrush or second-growth
timber in the groves, as there is to-day. The prairie
fires kept it down. The old black oaks on the uplands
were often useless to the settlers, so gnarled and tough
were they from the constant fires of their younger days.
As a consequence, groves were so open one could see
through them, and see the Indians as they filed over the
prairies beyond them. When the fires ceased, the groves
began to spread, so that there is more timber in the
country to-day than there was fifty years ago. The
same cause has doubtless operated to produce our

PRAIRIES.

There are three theories about them, which we may
call the soil theory, the rain theory, and the fire theory.

50 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Accordino; to the first, prairie soil is not adapted to the
growth of trees. But in answer to that, we find trees
readily grow when planted. According to the second,
lack of moisture is the cause, since it is claimed more
rain falls along streams and marshes than on uplands.
But trees when planted find moisture enough. Accord-
ing to the third theory, prairie fires were the cause, and
this was the current theory among the early settlers. It
is a curious fact that a fire which will destroy the last
vestige of life in a tree, even burning the roots out
of the ground, will let the grass roots escape unharmed,
and the next crop will be more luxuriant than before.
But for the streams and marshes which protected them,
we should probably have had no groves, and but for the
fires we should probably have had no prairies. So all
things have been shaping for good, and are tokens of the
Divine Hand, which first created and then prepared and
preserved the country for the working race that occupy it.
In this countv the new settlers were limited to five
men.

PETER SPECIE

and Stephen Sweet left the swampy lake village of
twelve houses, to prospect in the country, and settled on
a claim in Specie grove.

They were unmarried, and kept house for themselves
in their own little cabin, with nothing but reports to mo-
lest or make them afraid. It was known that there was
a general dissatisfaction among the Indians, but the
reports of intended hostilities were too distant and vague
to be alarming to pioneers who had lived among the In-
dian people a large part of their lives.

EARLY SETTLERS. 51

In the spring of the year

BAILEY nOBSON

came to Vetal Vermet's in search of a home, and staying
with him over night, passed on toward the Fox river,
and made his claim in the timber below Newark, far
away from any neighbor. He then returned to Ohio for
his family, and with them and a friend by the name of
L. Stewart, arrived at Vermet's again at midnight of
September 12th. They stayed with Mr. Vermet until
the middle of October, during which time they sowed
some winter wheat and cut and put up a stack of hay on
the edge of the Big Slough. Then removing to the
claim they lived in a tent until the log cabin was ready,
about November 1st, when, work being done, Mr. Hob-
son went out exploring again, and selected the site known
as Hobson's mill on the DuPage river as a new claim.

The succeeding winter was a hard one for the pioneer
family, but they survived it, and when the Indians com-
menced making sugar in the spring they moved first to
Vermet's and then to Scott's, at Naperville, near their
new home. Walter Selvey, a son-in-law of Mr. Dough-
erty, came that year, if not a year or two previous, and
settled on a quarter section of the Seminary land.

There were then in 1830

NINE FAMILIES

in the county — Dougherty and Selvey on the south of
Holderman's grove, Vermet on the knoll at the south-
west corner. Weed next to him, and Hawley on the
north, Countryman in Kellogg's grove, Hobson in the
Newark timber, and Lawton, Sweet and Specie in the
Aux Sable timber. But Lawton and Countryman were

52 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

away with the Indians to other hunting and trapping
grounds during the winter.

Several new counties had been formed out of the broad
acres of Vermillion, and the remainder was divided Jan-
uary 16th, 1831, by the organization of Cook, LaSalle
and Putnam. Little Putnam with four townships, now
one of the smallest in the State, was forty-two miles
long. Cook was great ; beginning ten miles south of
Joliet it reached to the Wisconsin line, seventy-eight
miles. It was named after Daniel P. Cook, our repre-
sentative in Congress, who had rendered the Chicago
villagers grateful to him for his instrumentality in secur-
ing the alternate section grant for the canal.

LASALLE

was forty-eight miles square, the northern boundary be-
ing the town line between the upper and middle row of
townships in Kendall county, passing close to Yorkville.
Thus the north part of our county was left out as unor-
ganized, but that and all the remaining territory north
of LaSalle county to the State line was for the present
attached to that county. Thus it included the present
counties of LaSalle, Grundy, Kendall, DeKalb, Kane,
McHenry and Boone, and a part of Marshall, Lee, Liv-
ingston, Ogle and Winnebago. The county seat was at
Ottawa, eighty miles over prairies and swamps from
Stephen Mack's trading post, at the mouth of the Peca-
tonica. But scattering traders did not care to vote, and
usually dispensed their own justice.

The first election was held at Ottawa, March 7th.
George E. Walker was elected Sheriff; Moses Booth,

LA SALLE COUNTY ORGANIZED. 53

Coroner ; and John Green, James B. Campbell and
Abraham Trumbo, County Commissioners. At the first
meeting of the commissioners, March 21st, David Walker
was appointed Clerk, and the county was divided into
three election precincts. Kendall county was in the
third, embracinti; also Grundy, Kane and McHenry. The

SPRING ELECTION

was held at the house of Vetal Vermet, on the historical
knoll by the prairie grove. John Dougherty, Edmund
Weed and William Schermerhorn were the judges.
Whether or not any came from Woodstock or Marengo
or Harvard Junction to vote, is not recorded, but proba-
bly not. The Kendall county settlers, however, had an
official opportunity of meeting together and talking over
their prospects which were undoubtedly improved. Sev-
eral new comers were there, too, on that second day of
April, who had not been in the precinct long enough to
vote, but were interested in the matter of prospects.
The convenience of the groves, the richness of the soil,
the advantages for stock raising, the probable trouble
with the Indians, the locality of desirable claims, mem-
ories of far away friends, and incidents of frontier life,
were all discussed, and then on foot or horse-back, or
with the ox team, they separated to their lonely cabins.

CHAPTER VIII.

OUR EARLIER PIONEERS.

MONG those who came out prospecting in
the spring of 1831 were

EARL ADAMS AND EBENEZER MORGAN,

from New York. Thev descended the Ohio

ft/

to the Mississippi, and then up to St. Louis,
where buying ponies, they followed the
banks of the Illinois river to Ottawa, and up the Fox
to Yorkville. Reining up their horses on the present
Court House Hill, they gazed on the lovely stream
below them, the wide, beautiful prairies beyond them,
and the timber behind them. The green was dotted
with flowers, the birds sang in the branches, and a group
of deer stood gazing at the strangers from the edge of a
hazel thicket some distance away. "Here," thought
Mr. Adams, " is my home," and dismounting he drove
his stake in the soil and took possession. Following up
the river about two miles farther, they came to a creek,
where Mr. Morgan halted and made his own claim.
This done, they passed up to Chicago, sold their ponies,
and returned home by way of the lakes.

But before that, indeed as early in the season as it
was possible to travel,

GEORGE AND CLARK HOLLENBACK,

from Magnolia, Putnam county, and their friends Wil-

HOLLENBACK AND OTHERS LOCATE. 55

Ham Harris and Ezra Ackley, were on the ground.
They were from West Virginia, and had approached the
frontier by short stages; first to Ohio, then to the
Wabash, and lastly to Magnolia. The men came first
on a prospecting tour, in the latter part of March.
Traveling on foot, they crossed the Fox river at Ottawa,
passed over the high prairies of the town of Mission to
Vermet's, and from there struck out for the Big Woods,
above where Aurora now stands. At Specie grove they
were informed that the Big Woods country was very
wet, so they did not go as far as they intended, but
encamped at a place near Oswego.

In the morning, while the others prepared breakfast,
Mr. Hollenback strolled off on a tour of observation,
and in a few minutes found and drove a stake on his
claim. But it had been decided that they should settle
together, and when the others objected that there was
not enough timber there for all of them, he relinquished
his claim. Where now ? Mr. Hollenback remarked
that he had noticed a large grove on their left as they
came up, which, from its lying low, seemed to promise
desirable shelter as well as timber ; so it was agreed
that they should return to that. It was Hollenback 's
grove, near Millbrook. They entered it on the east
side, and it was at once settled that the ridge between
the two creeks should be the dividing line, Ackley and
Harris taking the north, and Hollenback the south.
And that rido-e is a dividins; line still.

Then they brought up their families : Clark Hollen-
back, wife, daughter and three sons — young men ; George
Hollenback, wife, daughter and three sons, who were

56 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

boys ; William Harris, wife, three daughters and four
sons ; Ezra Ackley, wife and two daughters ; Patrick
Cunningham and wife ; and William Brooks, — a little
colony of twenty-nine souls. Clark IloUenback settled
in the Newark timber, living in Hobson's old cabin until
he could build his own, on the hill below Mr.Needham's.
Cunningham put his stake on the opposite side of the
timber, where John Boyne now lives.

In a few days Hobson happened along, and was not
particularly pleased at finding his old house inhabited ;
but Mr. Hollenback satisfied him, and they j^arted good
friends. But it was the common law of squatter days
that when a man forsook his claim, it was the rightful
property of whoever should, next claim it.

The others settled on their respective claims and at
once erected three shanties, viz : enclosures of logs, cov-
ered with bark and split timber, to shelter their families
while the houses were building. Mr. Hollenback's was
on Hollenback's creek, near the present residence of W.
A. Hollenback. Mr. Harris' was near the present site
of a tenant house owned by Thos. Atherton, north of
Ackley's creek, and Mr. Ackley's was near the ridge,
midway between.

Arrived on the ground April 18, they immediately
began to make clearings to plant corn, for they had rather
plant among the stumps than risk the prairie sod. But
Clark Hollenback broke, during the summer, fifty-five
acres and fenced it in. It is now Albert Needham's
farm.

GEORGE B. HOLLLENBACK,

the oldest son of Clark, started a pioneer blacksmith

FIRST FRONTIER STORE. 57

shop, which he afterward sold to his father and Mr. Hol-
derman. When the summer's work was done, he built
a log store in the edge of the grove, and going to Peoria
on horseback, he took the boat to St. Louis and pur-
chased a stock of Indian goods to the amount of two
hundred dollars. They were brought up the Illinois
river, and thence overland. This was the beginning of
a frontier store which became widely known, not only
among the surrounding settlers, but even in the States.
It was the beginning of the business of Newark, or
Georgetown, as, for many years, it was called — after the
founder. His wife was Mrs. Reynolds, whose daughter
is Mrs. A. D. Newton, of Yorkville. It is perhaps need-
less to say that he sold but little of his goods for cash,
but traded them to the Indians for muskrat skins.

Early in the spring, about the time Geo. Hollenback
and party came up prospecting,

DANIEL KELLOGG

was on the move. Leaving Ottawa, where he had been
chosen the first Justice of the Peace in LaSalle county,
he came to Holderman's, and crossing the narrow
slough, bought oat Countryman, at what has ever since
been known as Kellogg's grove. And the Indian fam-
ily, packing their little property on ponies, bade fare-
well to their old wigwam, and filed out among the trees
and over the prairie in search of another resting place.
A few weeks after,

MOSES BOOTH,

on foot, with an ax and gun, crossed that slough, and
weary with his journey, lodged with his friend and old
neighbor, Mr. Kellogg. In the morning he set off pros-

5

58 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

pecting, and after exploring all day through the towns
of Big Grove and Fox, found himself at dusk at the
infant settlement in Hollenback's grove. Mr. Hollen-
back's family had arrived that day, and had just estab-
lished themselves in their new shanty. It aftbrded but
little room, but what frontiersman was ever known to
turn away the stranger ? Mr. Booth was entertained,
and in the morning, when no pay would be taken, he vol-
unteered to cut down a tree, and did so — thus giving the
little settlement their first lift. Then retracing his steps
of the previous day, he choose for the site of his cabin
the splendid knoll on the north-east corner of Apakesha
grove, now occupied by the fine residence of Lott Sco-
field. Looking out from among the tall white oaks that
formed the border of the grove, his eye could take in
the wide sweep of level prairie to Plattville, and around
almost to Minooka. It would have been glorious to a
poetic temperament, but Mr. Booth was a practical man,
and proceeded at once to cut ^'a set of house logs." This
done, he brought his family,* which consisted of his
wife and

ANSEL REED,

the boy who, four years before, went through the snow
from Beresford's to Hawley's, in search of a needle. He
was a slim lad, not yet thirteen years of age, and had
been bound to Mr. Booth about two years. The coun-
try hiid changed somewhat since his previous trip.
Instead of two lonely families, out of sight of each
other — the only inhabitants in eighty miles — there were
five houses, and other little settlements near ; traders
and travelers passing every few days, and Indians every

THE OLDEST HOUSE IN KENDALL COUNTY. 59

day. Ansel Reed now owns a fine farm near Plattville,
and has a sister — Mrs. Emeline March — at Bristol Sta-
tion. She was five years old at the time of the journey
through Kendall. Mr. Booth remained at Kellogg's a
few weeks, and rented of him five acres of land, to
plant corn and pumpkins. But dissatisfied with his
claim, for some reason — perhaps remembering the north-
east wind — he made another in the adjoining Big grove,
where a mile of heavy timber would be between him and
the north wind in any shape. There, about twenty
rods in the grove, on the south side, he built his house.
It was sixteen feet square, and Mr. Kellogg, his son
Ezra, and his hired man — William Teal — helped raise
it, Ansel Reed looking on. It still stands, as a part of
the residence of J. W. Mason, Esq., and was not only
the first house in Big Grove, but is, without doubt, the
oldest existing building in Kendall county, and as such
we may hope it will be long preserved and cherished as
a memento of the days that are past, and that will come
again no more.

CHAPTER IX.

THE SHADOW OF WAR.

HILE Booth was building his house,
the Ament brothers arrived from Bu-
reau county, where they had been liv-
ing several years. They were origin-
ally from Livingston county, N. Y.,
in 1824. The eldest,

EDWARD G. AMENT,

worked a few weeks at Peoria for Joseph Ogee, an In-
dian interpreter. Then came along John Kinzie and
Medore Beaubien — the latter a young man, son of John
B. Beaubien — with a Mackinaw boat and a two ton cargo
of Indian goods for the fall trade. They were on their
way up from St. Louis. Mr. Ament hired to Mr. Kinzie
for ten dollars a month, and went with him. They made
but slow progress working the heavy boat up the stream.
When it would siet aground, Kinzie and Beaubien would
leap into the cold water, and one each end of an oar
would push it off again. But at Marseilles they found
it impos-^ible to navigate further, and Mr. Kinzie, leav-
ing the two young men in charge of the goods, went to
Chicao[;o after ox teams and was-ons. He was silver-

ament's early experiences. 61

smith to the Indians, making silver ornaments, brooches,
bracelets, &c., which the wealthy Indians freely indulged
in, and Mr. Ament's work was to do chores, cut wood,
make hay, tend stock, &c. There were but seven fami-
lies in the place. In 1825 he hired to the Claibornes,
four miles up the north branch. There were two broth-
ers. Archibald spent most of his time trading with the
the Indians, while Henley helped work the farm. That
year Edward helped a man by the name of Vermet raise
the first log cabin on the site of Evanston. The logs,
instead of being raised up on forked sticks as usual, were
pushed up on skids — a much easier process. In 1826 he
went to the Galena lead mines, where his brothers were
getting twenty-five dollars a month. He spent two years
there working leads for himself, and then removed to
Red Oak Grove, Bureau county, where he and his
brothers were the only settlers between Galena and
Peoria — fifty miles on one side and one hundred on the
other. Early in the spring of 1831 he came up this
way, prospecting, and stopping at Dougherty's, met Peter
Specie, his old Chicago friend. Specie had a little farm,
formerly, about where Bridgeport now is, two or three
miles out on the south branch, and the good man was in
such constant difiiculty with his neighbors that he sorely
tried the patience of Mr. Kinzie, then Justice of the
Peace. Mr. Ament, however, had had no trouble, for he
had had no deal, and Peter was glad to see him, escorted
him to the cabin which he and Colonel Sweet called
home, and there Edward made his claim, and returned
for his brothers. Four came with him — Hiram, Cal-
vin, xlnson and Alfred — all unmarried, and the young-

62 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

est, Alfred, not more than ten years old. The eldest
brother, Justus, was married, and remained behind.
They arrived about May 10th, and set to work at once
to improve their claim. They were entitled to the dis-
tinction of being the youngest squatters in Kendall
county.

About the same time

GEORGE HAVENHILL,

wife and two sons- — Fielding and Oliver — and his son-
in-law, Anthony Litsey, entered the county. Mr. Hav-
enhill was born in Virginia, in 1778, and emigrated to
Tazewell county, in Illinois, in 1830, His brother.Wil-
liam was the first white child born in Kentucky. Mr.
Litsey had a family of four little children, so that the
party consisted of ten persons. Part of Mr. Havenhili's
family was for the present left behind. They found tem-
porary shelter at Mr. Dougherty's and Mr. Kellogg's,
and, renting a few acres of land, planted it to corn. Mr.
Litsey placed his stake on the site abandoned by Mr.
Booth, and using the logs already cut, erected his cabin
nearly on the site of Mr. Scofield's present residence.

Soon after they arrived, Countryman, who had moved
to Pawpaw Grove, came over to get some one to break up
a corn patch for him, and Fielding Havenhill was com-
missioned by his father to do the work. With two yoke
of oxen, a plow and wagon, he undertook the journey,
crossing the river by the ford at William Smith's and
ate and lodged with the Indians while he remained. The
squaws followed the plow in a troop, planting the corn
and treading it in with their feet. It was a novel expe-
rience for the young man, but he acquitted himself well.

THE HOLDERMAN FAMILY. 63

He brought back seed enough for their own field in Ken-
dall. The summer was spent by the settlers in making
clearings, building cabins, and making ready for winter.
Geo. Hollenback was gone six weeks after one grist. He
waited for the wheat to ripen, cut it with a cradle,
ground it in a horse mill, bolted it by hand, and reached
home with it just as the last loaf was being divided.
On the last day of October, 1831,

ABRAHAM HOLDERMAN

arrived with his family at Dougherty's and Kellogg's, in
search of a new home. He came from Cass county,
Ohio, having sold his property there, and was the wealth-
iest settler that had yet entered Kendall county. Ansel
Reed says : " November first was a cold, frosty morning.
I was up before sunrise and drove Mr. Booth's oxen and
wooden-wheeled wagon over to Kellogg's after a load of
pumpkins and there I found the new-comers."
Mr. Holderman had eleven children, as follows :
Harriet, now Mrs. Peter Miller of Sheridan, lilinois ;
Ruianne, now Mrs. Newton Reynolds, New Lenox, 111. ;
Matilda, now Mrs. Samuel Hoag, Nettle Creek, 111. ;
Caroline, now Mrs. Isaac Hoag, Morris, 111. ; Jane mar-
ried and removed to Iowa, where she died ; Henry is in
Bates county, Missouri ; Burton, ditto ; Abraham is two
miles east of Seneca, 111. ; Samuel, at Morris, 111. : Ja-
cob is dead ; Dyson is on the old homestead, at Holder-
man's grove.

Mrs. Reynolds was noted as a fearless rider, and rode
all the way from Ohio on horseback. Mrs. Miller was
married, and she and her husband did not come until
the next spring. Mr. Holderman's first act was to buy

64 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

out Walter Selvey, who owned one hundred and sixty
acres, of which one-half lay in the grove. The sale was
made before Daniel Kellogg, Justice of the Peace, and
and the deed was recorded Nov. 14, 1831. It is the
earliest sale on record in the county.

Two days after, he bouo!;ht out John Dougherty and
Pierce Hawley — eighty acres each. The latter sale was
made before Stephen J. Scott, a Naperville Justice, who
happened to be present. Willard and Hadassah Scott
were witnesses. The other was made before Mr. Kel-
logg, with Bailey Hobson as witness. Edmund Weed,
with his one hundred and twenty- eight acres, held out
for a month, and then sold. The affidavits were made
at Mr. Kellogg's, with Edward A. Rogers as witness.
Deed recorded December 20th. Mr. Vermet did not sell
until the following year. Mr. Holderman now owned
the largest part of the Seminary section — the only land
in Kendall county which was in the market, and to
which a title could be given. Mr. Dougherty and Mr.
Selvey went over to the Aux Sable grove and took up
claims near the Lawton reservation, where they remained
several years, but finally emigrated to Oregon.

Walter Selvey was undoubtedly the first settler in
Na-au-say, his claim covering the farm now owned by
David Goudie. Mr. Dougherty went into the timber
nearly a mile north of Selvey's, where was a fine spring
of w ater, and cleared up a little field with as much labor
and patience as if prairie flowers did not bloom all
around him. Mr. Selvey returned a few years ago to
Aurora, and died there in 1876.

Mr. Weed after a while went to California.

FIRST WHITE CHILB IN KENDALL. 65

December 1, in George Hollenback's cabin, Geo. M.
Hollenback was born, the first white child born in Ken-
dall county, and to-day is one of our most valued citi-
zens.

THE WINTER

set in early, and was known as "the winter of the deep
snow." The Indian ponies were unable to find their
usual feed, and some of them died. It was a lonely
time for the settlers, though none of them suffered for
want of provisions, of which corn was the chief. It was
ground by beating it in a pestle made out of a block cut
from a tree. An iron wedge answered for a mortar to
pound it with. The mail facilities were far between.
The nearest office was at Ottawa. The next nearest was
at Chicago, where a half-breed was the mail carrier. He
made trips twice a week from Niles, Michigan, and
easily carried the entire mail in one pouch, pony-back.
So closed the year 1831. It was signalized by new
cabins, and clearings, but the next was to be signalized
by the

TERROR OF WAR.

Not all the Indians were involved ; it is Black Hawk
and his turbulent Sacs who must bear the blame. And
yet there were, doubtless, those who were more blame-
worthy still, viz: Indian agents, who, to secure treat-
ies, often made utterly false representations and prom-
ises that were never kept — and then cheated in the pay-
ment of the annuities, so as to secure a share for them-
selves. There was a current conviction with some
classes that among white men Indians had no estab-
lished rights. As a gigantic instance of this see the

6Q HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Cherokee lottery, which was taking place the very year
now under consideration — 1831.

The Cherokee nation owned one million acres of land
in Georgia. There were gold mines on some parts of it.
The Georgians wanted it. The Cherokees declined to
sell. The State declared the land seized and ordered
it disposed of by lottery. The gold lands were divided
into 35,000 lots, of forty acres each, and the remainder
into 18,000 farms of one hundred and fifty acres each.
Any freeholder was to send in his name and have a
chance of securing, without any adequate money or
price, a share of the coveted spoils. Eighty-five thous-
and men wanted farms, and sent in their names. The
gold fields were more attractive, and were competed for
by one hundred and thirty-three thousand persons.
There were about four blanks to a prize. The drawing
was made at Milledgeville. There were two mission-
aries of the American Board, Messrs. Worcester and
Butler, with the Indians. They w^ere their pastors and
teachers, and feeling the utter injustice of the entire
proceeding, gave their counsels against it. Refusing to
remove from ther fields of labor, they were forcibly
taken, and spent sixteen months in the penitentiary.
Again and again they were offered their freedom if they
would cease teaching among the Cherokees ; but they
would not yield. The U. S. Supreme Court decided
against the State courts, but the decision was not regarded.
At last they were released, and went back to their work.

Black Hawk's warriors had no such provocation, but
were simply irritated by a long accumulation of causes.
It was a war of revenge, in which they expected not to

COMMENCEMENT OF WAR.

67

conquer, but to kill. And like a sudden thunder burst
it swept down upon the lonely clearings of Northern
Illinois.

CHAPTER X.

THE FIRST BLOODSHED.

jNE OF the most prominent names con-
nected with the struggle of 1832, is
that of

SHABBONA,

the peace chief of the Pottawatomies.

He belonged originally to the Ottaw^as,
of Canada, and was born near Montreal, about 1775.
While yet a young man, in company with a number of
his tribe he joined the Pottawatomies, who were also
from Canada and had emigrated to the Northwest in an
early day. He subsequently removed to Northern Illi-
nois, where detachments of his tribe had for many years
had their hunting grounds. In 1832 Shabbona came
into prominence as the firm opposer of the fiery chief of
the Sacs and Foxes They were both old men — one
near sixty and the other near seventy years of age — and
had been associates under the mighty Tecumseh. Black
Hawk's town, at Rock Island, had been burned and he
and his tribe driven over the river into Iowa : and

68 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

the treaty stipulations under \yhich it was done, he
claimed had been obtained frandulently. He burned for
revenge. The Winnebagoes, occupying the country west
of Rock river, spoke a dialect of the Sac language and
were, therefore, foreigners to the Pottawatomies. But
they were neighbors, with common interests, and upon
these two tribes the aged Black Hawk depended for help
in the contemplated war. He sent messengers to them
to represent his cause, and finally

A GRAND COUNCIL

of the Pottawatomies to consider the matter, was held

on the O'Plaine river, a few miles west of Chicago. Geo.

F. Walker, Sheriff of LaSalle county, was present by

invitation. The result of a long conference was that

the tribe resolved not to take part in the war, and at

the close, Mr. Walker and the renowned Billy Caldwell

gathered a band of one hundred braves for the defence

of the settlements, and put them under the charge of

Waubonsie. During the war they marched as far as

Dixon, but soon evaporated, without accomplishing much.

As soon as the decision was reached, Shabbona made a

visit to his old companion-in-arms at the Des Moines

river. He represented to him how numerous and strong

the Americans were, and besought him not to open a

war which could but end in his destruction.

It was surely

A SCENE

worthy of preservation — those old chiefs, life-long friends
as they had been, now drifting apart on the old and hard
question of devotion to the white man. One, determined
and bitter — the other, anxious and pleading ; one, burn-

SHABBONA AND BLACK HAWK. 69

ing under a sense of insult and injury — the other, con-
scious of friendship and favor. 0, the hard lines of some
lives ! It is the rule that every man is the architect of
his own fortune ; yet, is there not something to be said
about the election of circumstances? We often go a way
we know not. Fate is the child of sin, but is none the
less sad. How good it is that in the great gulf stream
of the gospel all counter life- currents may be swallowed
up, and forever ! And it is, whosoever will ! Shab-
bona's arguments were in vain. The die was cast. The
dark-visaged Sac chief and his eager warriors had set out
for Illinois and ruin — and that so speedily that there
was no time to be lost. Meantime the Kendall county
settlers were busy about their

SPRING WORK.

Beins: once assured that their own Pottawatomies were
peaceful, they dismissed all serious thoughts of danger
from their minds, and went on plowing and sowing and
laying many plans for the future. The plans were not
all of work, either, for Cupid visited those virgin groves.
On May 1st, Edward G. Ament was married to Miss
Emily Ann, daughter of Wm. Harris. Rev. Isaac Scar-
ritt performed the ceremony. It was the first marriage
within the present limits of Kendall county, and they
took their wedding trip two weeks afterward, when they
fled from the Indians.

EARLY IN MAY

the ao-ed Black Hawk and his turbulent braves crossed
the Mississippi at Rock Island, then Fort Armstrong,
and passed up the north side of Rock river. Gen. At-
kinson, in command at the Fort, followed them as soon

70 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

as possible, passing up on the south side, and so the long
threatened war was fairly begun. At Dixon's a force
of volunteers had assembled, under Major Stillman,
which probably deterred the Indians from showing them-
selves at the ferry there ; for, making the circuit of the
great bend, they crossed at Byron, thirty miles above.
Major Stillman's company marched up on the other side
of the river, and on the edge of a grove at

stillman's run,
near Byron, they discerned some mounted Indians. At
once a part of the volunteers — without any military
order — dashed away in pursuit, but soon found them-
selves attacked by a larger force than they anticipated,
and began to retreat. A panic seized the others, and it
was at once apparent that nothing more could be done
that day but for each man to save himself They struck
out for Dixon's, and from midnight until morning con-
tinued to arrive in parties of three and four on horse-
back and on foot. The serious part of it appeared the
next morning at roll call, when forty-two did not answer
their names, though all but twelve afterward turned up.
The ludicrous side was illustrated by the speech, after
roll call, of a volunteer who had formerly been a Ken-
tucky militia captain. Mounting a stump, he congratu-
lated his brethren in arms on their escape from a savage
foe, expressed sorrow for those who had fallen, and con-
cluded: "Sirs, Bonaparte or Wellington never com-
manded better disciplined forces. But the most impos-
ing scene of all was their outflanking us ; they out-
flanked us in the majesty of their greatness, and their
muskets glistened in the moonbeams!"

INDIANS IN COUNCIL. 71

In the absence of supplies, Dixon's oxen were killed
and eaten without bread or salt.

Gen. Atkinson arrived that day, and at once pro-
ceeded to the scene of action, and buried the twelve
dead. They were shockingly mutilated and dismem-
bered, and were reverently gathered and interred in a
common grave. Thus the soil of Ogle county drank
the first blood of the war. Afterwards, at the battle of
the Wisconsin, the war cry of the whites was, '' No
Stillman's Run here!" and the issue proved it.

Passing rapidly through the territory of the Winne-
bagoes, who were more than half friendly to his cause,
his bands scouring the country in various directions,
Black Hawk, on the evening of the 14th, or early in the
morning of the 15th, reached

FOX RIVER,

at Post's Mill. He was met by the Pottawatomie chiefs
and their braves on that remarkable hill, or natural
fortress, sometimes called Black Hawk's Mound. It is
a spur of limestone sixty or eighty feet high, isolated
from the main ridge by a wide ravine, and washed on
the remaining sides by Little Rock creek. The top is
covered with trees, and is broad enough for a tribe to
encamp at once. It has probably been used from ancient
times as an Indian fortress and council ground, as many
old relics have been found there. At this council, so
tradition tells us, Black Hawk made the leading speech,
and used all his eloquence to persuade the others to
rescind their action at the O'Plain council, raise the
tomahawk, and help to drive the white man from their

72 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

lands. On the other hand Shabbona, with less eloquence
but more reason, again presented the argument for re-
fraining from war. It was in vain. Not only were the
Sacs unconvinced, but many of the Pottawatomies were
in sympathy with them. Upon Shabbona now depended
the safety of the little settlements in Kendall county,
with their seventy souls. Messengers had been dis-
patched from Dixon's to alarm them, but were inter-
cepted and probably put to death by one of Black Hawk's
bands, and the peaceful Pottawatomie chief alone re-
mained.

It seems strongly probable that the Indians who made
the trouble in this county were Pottawatomies, neigh-
bors of the settlers, with perhaps a few Sacs for leading
spirits. It is certain that many Pottawatomies left their
tribe and joined the various marauding bands under
Black Hawk, and others, doubtless, who did not go away,
were as eager for plunder at home. They had decided,
as a tribe, not to engage in the war, and this gave a false
idea of security to the settlers and came near costing
them their lives.

When Shabbona found that he could not control the
council, and that even his own people were breaking
awav from him, he at once acted. It was the middle of
the afternoon, and a short space of sunlight was all that
was left, for he felt that with the darkness

THE FATAL BLOW

would fall. He had a nephew, a fine young fellow by
the name of Pyps — called Peppers for short by the set-
tlers — and who was well known to all acquainted with
Shabboiia's camp. Tliis young man Shabbona at once

THE INDIAN WAR.

73

despatched, telling him to go by way of George Hollen-
back's. For some reason, however, he did not go there,
but gave the alarm first at George B. Hollenback's, and
passed on to Holderman's. Shabbona himself waited
until the assembly broke up, and then stole away and
rode at express speed to spread the alarm further south.

CHAPTER XI

THE FLIGHT !

UST AS young Peppers rode up to Geo.
B. Hollenback's, his wife was setting sup-
per, and he had washed and was wiping
on the towel, when the Indian said, with-
out dismounting: "The Sacs are com-
ing !" Mr. H. made some light reply ;
but the other added : " My friend, I am
in earnest ; go at once if you will save your lives." His
wife and step-daughter took the alarm at once, and drop-
ping their work, hurried over to Clark Hollenback's
with the warning. Clark himself had gone to Ottawa
to get a plow sharpened and do some other business ;
and here, too, the women were frightened, and to keep
close to the truth, the boys were slightly nervous, as
well. Thomas, mounting an unbroken colt, started to
alarm his uncle George, and one of the others ran over
to Cunningham's. The women, with what articles they

6

74 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

could carry, were mounted on tlie horses, the men on foot,
and so they left for the fort at Ottawa. The prairie grass
was green, and wild flowers were growing where Newark
now stands, but the fugitives had no heart or time to
admire beauty, save the beauty of seeing, as they now
and then looked behind, that the}' were getting farther
away and no Indians in sight.

Reaching the point of the Mission timber by dark,
they turned the horses out to graze, and hid themselves
in the thicket. But it soon commenced to rain, and
they decided to move on, most of them this time on
foot, as they were unable to catch but one of the horses.
The journey was a slow and tedious one, and they
reached Ottawa the next evening.

Meanwhile, Thomas, on his

FRIGHTENED COLT,

made double-quick time over the Pavilion road between
Newark and William Hollenback's. His uncle, when
he arrived, was tying the horses out to grass, after their
day's work ; but on hearing the alarm immediately
brought them up again, and left the boys to harness
them while he hurried over to arouse the other families.
Mr. Harris' team had strayed away, and himself and
the two older boys were absent searching for them. To
add to their dismay, Mrs. Harris' father — old Mr.
Coombs — was so sick with inflammatory rheumatism as
to be unable to be moved. There appeared no alterna-
tive but to leave him if they would save their lives, and
to this he urged them. " Leave me to m}^ fate," he
said, " and save yourselves ; I am an old man and can
live but a little while at best." Taking what articles

COMMENCEMENT OF THE RAID. 75

they could, with tearful farewells, they left him and hur-
ried away on foot. Mr. Ackley had no wagon, and he
mounted his wife and one child on one horse, while he
and the remaining child rode the other. By the time
they reached Mr. Hollenback's the sun had set and it
was growing dark ; but the boys had the team and wagon
all ready, so that they started at once, taking an east-
erly direction over the prairie towards Plainfield. Before
sunset the Indians were on the move, eager for

SCALPS AND SPOIL.

They struck Harris' cabin first, and Mr. Coombs gave
himself up for dead; but having satisfied themselves
that he was sick, they did not molest him. Passing on
to the two other cabins, they found no one at home ;
but the supper tables were spread, and they helped
themselves to what they pleased. " Shabbona did this,"
they said one to another in their Indian guttural, and
they laid up a score against him.

They had been but a few minutes at Hollenback's
when — the wagon having mired in a slough about a mile
out — Mr. Hoilenback returned to get a chain that lay
on a shaving horse in his yard. As he approached the
fence, through the brush, he saw a light through the
cracks, between the basswood puncheons of which the
door was made. Indians do not usually make lights
while on their raids, but these were undoubtedly on a
savage spree, and believing their victims had received
warning and fled, were ofi" their guard. In a moment
the door opened, and one came out bearing a torch ;
at that instant the dry twigs snapped under Mr. Hollen-
back's feet as he ran away, pursued by two Indians.

76 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

His line of flight was parallel with the present Pavilion
road for about a mile, when his strength gave out, and
he fell — rolling into a ditch at the foot of the hill south
of Dr. Cook's. Fortunately, his pursuers ran past him,
and soon gave up the chase. The moon was nearly at
the full, but everv few minutes it would cloud over and
be dark, and Mr. HoUenback being thus unable to keep
the wagon track even after he found it, became lost, and
rambled about all night. Mr. Harris and his two sons,
while after the horses, became lost, but in the morning,
strangely enough, came on their family encamped on the
prairie. They had passed the slough by unloading
the wagon. Although not at that time professing Chris-
tians, they always regarded that meeting as a special

interposition of

god's providence ;

for had they returned to the house, or taken any other
route than the one they did they probably would never
have met again.

In the morning the company separated, Mr. and Mrs.
Ackley turning off to arouse the Aments. Coming to
the door Mrs. Ackley said to them who were up : "" Call
Edward ; the Sacs and Foxes are upon us, and he must
leave just as quick as he can," and while she continued
talking Edward was called, and preparation for flight
was begun. In a few minutes they were on the road,
Mr. Morton, a man who lived with Anient, being with
them. With the other party was Peter Bolinger, a
single man who worked for HoUenback. Crossing the
wide prairie they came soon after sunrise to the claims of
Selvey and Dougherty, where two new-comers, Kceler

CHECKED BY A CAROUSE. 77

Clark and his brother William, were breaking sod. The
latter was afterwards well known as a Mormon preacher.
They put part of their breaking team on the wagon in
place of Mr. Hollenback's jaded horses ; thus strength-
ened, the party continued their journey with less fear of
attack. At this point, too, they were joined by Mr.
Hollenback, who was received as one from the dead.

At Clark Hollenback's the Indians found more to hold
them, for there were groceries and tobacco and whisky in
the store, and they spent the remainder of the night there
in wild carousal. It was a fortunate spree for the

HOLDERMAN GROVE SETTLERS.

They had been warned the night before, but the war had
been so long talked of they did not believe there was
any immediate danger. The possessions that must be
left behind doubtless caused some of the hesitation, for
Mr. Holderman had but just returned from Ohio with a
load of provisions. Two other families had moved in,
Mr. Cummins and Wyatt Cook, making again the orig-
inal number at the grove.

Mr. Kellogg was away and was not expected home for
a day or two, but he would not have hastened matters if
he had been present. Mr. Vermet, however, sent his
hired man over to warn Mr. Booth and Mr. Litsey, but,
perhaps through fear, he did not do his errand.

Before breakfast, in the morning of the memorable
and beautiful sixteenth of May, Mr. Holderman took a
piece of bread and butter in his hand, mounted his horse,
and, in company with Ezra Kellogg and Mr. Cummins,
rode over to Newark to see if Clark Hollenback credited
the report. Mr. Cummins wore an overcoat and carried

78 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

a rifle ; the others were unarmed. Going first to Pat
Cunningham's, they found no one at home ; then passing
up towards Hollenback's, their suspicions were aroused.
They did not like the appearance of things and stopped.
Between them and the house a new sod fence had been
made, and an Indian now appeared on the fence and
beckoned with his hand to them to come on. It was
enough. Instead of coming on, they turned their horses
and fled, and were instantly shot at and pursued by a
large party of Indians, who were secreted in the fence
ditch. Thev had been drinkinoi; and were all excited,
otherwise it would seem impossible that the men could
have escaped with their lives. As it was, the only bul-
let that took eff"ect cut the neck of Mr. Cummins' horse,
below the mane. The little valley south of Earl Adams'
homestead used to be a sunny spot. The hill each side
was a great den for wolves and badgers. There the
Indian ponies had strayed, seeking the green grass, and
the Indians were consequently obliged to follow the white
men on foot, which they did with all their speed, and
with furious yells. But on the Adams hill, Holderman
swung his hat and shouted to imaginary reinforcements,
and the device was successful. The Indians stopped,
and after a short parley retreated. When they reached
Kellogg's, Mr. Holderman shouted over the slough to
his family, " Gear up, gear up !" and leaving their break-
fast untasted, they hastened to obey the warning call.

They did not know but the Indians, catching their
ponies, would be upon them within a few minutes, so
they made ready with the utmost speed, and were soon
far on the road to Ottawa. The Indians, however, did

INDIANS AT HOLLENBACK S.

79

not leave Hollenback's until the following night, detained
either by love of their good fare or by the hope that
other settlers might visit them. The last, undoubtedly,
was the stronger motive, as the store was tolerably well
known through the surrounding settlements, and was
frequently visited. It is illustrative of Indian nature
that from first to last these robbers skulked in thickets
and groves in the daytime, and did their traveling mostly
in the night.

CHAPTER XII.

ANSEL reed's STORY.

"^^ LEVEN families were now on their way

out of the county, and but three more

^, remained. Mr. Booth had as yet received

no warning, and how it came may be best

told in Ansel Reed's own words :

It was a pleasant morning, and soon after daylight I
was up and went down a little piece from the house, to
rive shingle bolts. While at work I heard three reports
of guns, close together, from the direction of Newark,
and soon after saw three men horseback galloping over
a rise of ground toward Holderman's. I supposed then
that those three men had fired the guns, and thought
little more of it. There had been a talk of war for years,
but we did not know as it would ever come. There was

80 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

a pond a little out from the edge of the grove — a quar-
ter of a mile from the house. Mr. Booth wished to plant
a patch of potatoes by it, and after breakfast I went out
to drive up the oxen to do the plowing. While looking
for the cattle, Booth came out too, and crossed the fresh
horse tracks. They were made by large horses that
were shod, and so he knew they were not Indians. Yet,
in thinking about it, I remembered that the Indians had
appeared unusually busy that spring. Their trail ran
along by the grove, about on the line of the Newark and
Lisbon road. There were three or four trails side by
side. In some places, where the rain had washed them
out, they were three feet deep. Indians passed along
these every day, sometimes riding at the top of their
speed. Booth's oxen were a fine, large, spotted pair ;
well known because of their strength and color, and the
pride he took in them. He plowed the ground, while I
spent the forenoon chopping for sod corn with a wooden
ax. There were seventeen acres in the field ; the pond
was in the same enclosure. We worked on so all the
forenoon, not knowing we were left nearly alone in Ken-
dall county, and that the savages were so near us. They
had set Clark Hollenback's cabin on fire, and I saw the
smoke all the afternoon. Mr. Booth saw it, too, but
thought it was burning brush. If the Indians had come
then, they certainly would have killed us all, but
they probably supposed we had fled. In going to
work in the afternoon I met two Frenchmen, half-breeds,
riding each a mare with a colt following. They said
they lived in Kankakee and were going north for seed
corn, and asked if I could not get them some din-

ANSEL reed's STORY. 81

ner. I directed them to the house, but they would not
go unless I went too. I knew if I went back without
permission, Mr. Booth would not like it, so I declined.
They talked a little while longer and passed on toward
Newark. The trail did not run through the present
site of Newark, but left it a little to the right, and about
there it was crossed by the Chicago trail. Mr. Booth
came out and had made two or three turns in furrowing
out the potato land, when the Frenchmen returned in
a great fright and told Mr. Booth what they had seen.
He sent them on to alarm Anthony Litsey, and beck-
ened to me to hurry, saying, as I came near, "I don't
know but we shall all be killed." We had heard Litsey
calling to his oxen during the forenoon. He had joined
teams with William Parcell, a bachelor who lived at
Cherry's Grove, and they were breaking ground together.
Parcell had a two-wheeled cart, which was the only
vehicle on the place, as Litsey had none. Booth's wagon
had a rack on it, but no box. It had solid wheels, a
sapling for a tongue, and was wholly of wood — not even
a nail about it. We put on some maple sugar and a loaf
of bread, and then I was sent to drive up the cows, but
could not find them. I ran around the prairie, but they
were nowhere in sight. In coming back I met Mrs.
Booth, carrying the youngest child. She looked fright-
ened, and said, as she passed,

"where is MR. BOOTH?"

The road that led up to the house was the same that
leads to it now, and when I came up Mr. Booth said,
'' Let down the bars and get your shoes and coat and
come on." I did so, and then ran on after him. He

82 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

had fastened the door by planting a heavy stick against
it on the inside. When we had gone a little way he saw
his steers, and let me drive while he went back to the
house to yoke them up. But in a moment he said, " I
don't think it's safe to go back," and, turning, ran on
after his wife. They walked a mile and a half to the
north-west corner of Collins' Grove, then called Duck
Grove, because there was a large pond in it and wild
ducks were plenty there. The thicket was very dense,
and Booth hid his wife near where the wagon would pass,
while he ran on to alarm Kellogg and the other famil-
ies. It was about three-quarters of a mile further. Mr.
Kellogg had built a better house, of hewed logs, a few
rods from William Stephens' residence. I reached Mrs.
Booth and took her on board, and soon Booth came run-
ning down, hat in hand, tired out and frightened, and
reported that the Kelloggs had gone, leaving their break-
fast table set and the coffee poured out in the cups. We
were afraid now to go on, and hoping to keep hid until
dark, we went

FARTHER INTO THE THICKET,

over logs and fallen limbs, and then I unhitched the cat-
tle and took them down to the duck pond, where there
was a good bite of grass. I remember that the ring
in the yoke staple made such a horrible noise, as the
oxen walked, that I believed the Indians must surely
hear it. In the meantime, Litsey and Parcell had
started, and Booth went up to hail them as they passed.
On his way he saw a number of Indians entering Big
Grove, north of his house, as if intending to enter it by
the rear ; we left, therefore, none too soon. Mr. Litsey

FLIGHT TO THE FORT. 83

did not think it best to wait until dark, so Mr. Booth
returned and brought his wagon out of the almost impen-
etrable timber. Parcell's cart wheels were making a
terrible squealing, and they greased them with some
pork Booth had with him. The sun was now about an
hour high. Litsey had two horses, and rode one while
Booth rode the other, and Parcell and I drove the teams.
He had three yoke of oxen in his team, but in the slough
this side of Holderman's my wagon mired, and he had
to pull me out, and after that we drove two yoke each.
From Holderman's, where we found the breakfast table
still spread, we struck across the prairie toward Mar-
seilles — Booth and Litsey riding ahead, Parcell follow-
ing, and I in the rear. The night was cloudy, and
about midnight there came a very heavy thunder shower,
which compelled us to stop and take off the cattle, and
cover the women and children with quilts. We struck
the Illinois river timber below Marseilles, near where a
Mr. Shaver lived, but they had gone. The next settler
was Samuel Parr, and the next Mr. Milligan. They
were all gone. By this time it was broad daylight.
When we came within two miles of Ottawa, our neigh-
bors at the Fort recognized Booth's oxen, and were
alarmed, for we had been reported

DEAD AND SCALPED.

But when we had approached near enough for them to
know us their alarm was turned into joy, and we had a
glad reception. Booth's cattle that he had left behind
followed the next day, and were found at their old home
on Covin's creek. A company was at once formed to go
back to the settlements and reconnoiter, but before they

84 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

Started Mr. Kellogg came in on his return journey. He
rejected the idea that there was any real danger, and
against the persuasion of his friends went on alone to
his farm. He found everything quiet, and the table set
as it was left, so he sat down in his accustomed place and
ate a hearty meal. He then started back, intendino; to
bring his fiimily up, and met a military company barely
in time to be saved from assassination at the hands of an
Indian who had been watching him and was lurking in
the bushes until he should pass. He did not remove his
family. The very thought of how certain the bullet and
scalping knife of that lurking Indian would have found
him if his neighbors had not met him at just that point,
made the shudders creep over him. The company num-
bered twenty-five men. They found the cabins at New-
ark burned to the ground, but at the other groves they
were undisturbed, except that milk and provisions had
been taken away. After that companies used to come
up nearly every day, and found no considerable damage
done until three weeks had passed, when, at every house,
some animal was found killed and beheaded. It was the
Indian declaration of war.

One day, while Booth was at Big Grove, a boat arrived
at Ottawa with a family bv the name of Kino^, who after-
wards settled toward Joliet. They had apples on board,
and a French half breed stepped up and bought some.
I at once recognized him as one of the men who first
warned us of the danger. As he turned to go away he
was arrested as a spy, and held under guard for trial, but
I felt they did not mean to try him, for I heard some say
significantly, "Only wait till night comes," and I was

SUSPECTED MAN SAVED.

85

very much alarmed. At dusk Booth arrived, and as
soon as I told him about it he hurried over and procured
his release, and did not leave him until he was safely
away.

When the fort was built on the bluff in South Ot-
tawa, though only a boy, I drove the oxen to help haul
the logs, and enjoyed it, too. I had few cares of my
own, and there was something exhilarating about seeing
so many people at work. As soon as it was safe to
travel we removed to Macomb, and remained there dur-
ing the summer.

CHAPTER XIII.

MORE BLOODSHED.

lie'

jfO LIFE was lost within the limits of
Kendall county, which might have in-
duced a belief that the Indians were not
so dangerous after all, and wished
rather to frighten than to kill the set-
tlers. But within a mile of our county
line they showed their hand, and again
in a more terrible massacre within ten miles. It is pos-
sible, however, that these last were committed by a dif-
ferent band of Indians. They were a mixture of Sacs
and Foxes, and Winnebago and Pottawatomie outlaws,
and were led by

MIKE GURTY,

a half breed, one of the most heartless wretches who
ever escaped human justice. He was a large, heavy-set

86 HISTORY OF KENDALL COUNTY.

savage, with high cheek bones, a flat nose and black
eyes, and said to have been the son of Simon Gurty, a
well-known Revolutionary outlaw who found refuge at
last among the Indians of the Ohio, and in Wayne's war,
when Col. Crawford was taken prisoner, laughed in
fiendish glee while he burnt him alive. Mike aspired to
be a chief, but was never wholly trusted by the Indians.
He had married a squaw and had a family of sons, some
of whom are now living with their tribe in the far West.
He acted as interpreter at a council held near the mouth
of Crow creek in 1827, between Gen. Cass and the In-
dians, and at the close the General gave him a silver
medal as a mark of esteem. He fastened it about his
neck by a buckskin string, and wore it until death. As
soon as the war opened, Gurty and his band scoured the
country for blood and plunder, and having raided the
country south of us, they came this way, guided b}'^ a
treacherous half-bree