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GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ijjf'-'-EN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY
3 1833 02300 1784
HISTOKY
[NDIANAPOIvIS
MARION COUNTY,
INDIANA.
B. R. SULGROVE.
I Xj Xj TJ S T I?y j^T E ID.
PHILADELPHIA:
I.. H. EVERTS & CO.
1884.
PREFACE. 1117133
In a history mainly composed of the incidents that indicate the growth of a community,
and the direction and character of it, where few are important enough to require an extended
narration, and the remainder afford little material, it is not easy to construct a continuous narra-
tive, or to so connect the unrelated points as to prevent the work taking on the aspect of a pre-
tentious directory. To collect in each year the notable events of it is to make an excellent ware-
house of historical material ; but, however authentic, it would hardly be interesting. Like the
country boy's objection to a dictionary, " the subject would change too often." To combine, as
far as practicable, the authenticity of an annuary like that of Mr. Ignatius Brown in 1868,
which has been freely used, or the compilation of statistical and historical material made by Mr.
Joseph T. Long for Holloway's History in 1870, which has furnished valuable help in this
work, with some approach to the interest of a connected narrative, it has been thought best to
present, first, a general history of the city and the county up to the outbreak of the civil war,
throwing together in it all incidents which have a natural association with each other or with
some central incident or locality, so as to make a kind of complete affair of that class of incidents.
For instance, the first jail is used to gather a group of the conspicuous crimes in the history of
the county, the old court-house to note the various uses to which it was put during the city's
progress through the nonage of a country town to the maturity of a municipal government.
Since the war the historj^ was thought more likely to be made intelligible and capable of reten-
tion and reference by abandoning the form of a continuous narrative interjected with groups of
related incidents or events, and divide it into departments, and treat each fully enough to cover
all the points related to it that could be found in an annuary, or a separation of the events of
each year to itself. Thus it has been the purpose to throw into the chapter on schools all that is
worth telling of what is known of the early schools, besides what is related of them in the gen-
eral history, with no special reference to the date of any school, while the history of the public
schools is traced almost exclusively by official reports and documents. In manufactures it would
have been impossible to present a consecutive account if a chronological order had been followed,
for the facts are scattered through fifty years, from 1832 to 1882. By taking the whole subject
PREFACE.
apart from the events with whicli its various parts are associated by date, it is possible to group-
them so as to present a tolerably complete view of tiie origin and progress of each part and of
the whole. The militar}' rosters contain all the names of Marion County soldiers in the civil
war who enlisted for three years. The list of civil officers of the county is complete and accu-
rate, and was compiled for this work. It is the first ever published, as is that of the township
and city. The entries of land from 1821 to 1825 will be found an interesting feature of the,
work, and will recall the name of many an old settler who is almost forgotten now. Mr. Now-|
land's interesting reminiscences and those of the late Hon. O. H. Smith have been freely used, \
as well as the memories of some old settlers, as Mr. Robert B. Duncan, Gen. Coburn, William i
H. Jones, Daniel Noe, and the writer's own occasionally. The histories of the townships have '
been compiled substantially from the accounts of the oldest and best-known settlers in each.
B. R. S. J
Indianapolis, Feb. 14, 1884. I
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PAGE
Location of Marion County — Topographical and General
Description — Geology of the County — The Indian Oc-
cupation 1
CHAPTEK II.
Special Features of the City of Indianapolis — Area and
Present Condition — General View and Historical Outline 10
CHAPTER III.
First Period — Early Settlements — Organization of Marion
County and Erection of Townships— Erection of Public
Buildings — Notable Events and Incidents of the Early
Settlement and of Later Tears — Opening of Roads —
Original Entries of Lands in the County 21
CHAPTER IV.
Social Condition of the Early Settlers — Amusements — Re-
ligious Worship — Music — General Description of Pio-
neer Life in Marion County — Diseases once Prevalent
— -Causes of Diminution 68
CHAPTER V.
Second Period— The Capital in the Woods 96
CHAPTER VI.
CiTT OF Indianapolis 132
CHAPTER VII.
City op Indianapolis (Continued).
Commercial and Mercantile Interests of the City 151
CHAPTER VIII.
City of I.vdianapolis (Continued).
The Bench and Bar 169
CHAPTER IX.
City of Indianapolis (Continued).
Banks, Bankers, and Insurance 215
CHAPTER X.
City op Indianapolis (Continued).
CHAPTER XI.
City of Indianapolis (Continued).
Public Buildings — Public Halls — Theatres — Lectures —
Concerts — Musical and Art Societies — Literary and
other Clubs— Hotels 249
CHAPTER XII.
City of Indianapolis (CoH(i'imed).
Medical Practice and Practitioners 274
CHAPTER XIII.
Military Matters.
Military Organizations in Indianapolis— Marion County
in the War of the Rebellion 300
CHAPTER XIV.
Marion County in the War of the Rbbellion.
Sketches of the Services of Regiments — Roster of Officers
and Enlisted Men from Marion County serving in the
Several Regiments 322
CHAPTER XV.
Orders, Societies, and Charitable Institutions of In-
dianapolis 366
CHAPTER XVI.
Churches op Indianapolis 387
CHAPTER XVII.
Schools and Libraries of Indianapolis 417
CHAPTER XVIII.
Manufacturing Interests of the City of Indianapolis 440
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XIX.
CiTiL List of Indiakapolis and Marios Codnty
CHAPTER XX
PAOE
.... 486
501
CHAPTER XXIV.
575
CHAPTER XXV.
596
CHAPTER XXI.
... 506
CHAPTER XXVI.
613
CHAPTER XXII.
... 519
CHAPTER XXVII.
623
CHAPTER XXIII.
Lawrence Tow.ssoip
... 534
CHAPTER XXVIII.
Wayne Township
647
ILLUSTKATIONS.
Aston, George W facing 603
Atkins,E.C ' " 470
Atkins, E. C. A Co., Works of. " 469
Ayres, Levi " 506
Bank of Commerce 21S
Bates, Hervey facing 35
Beaty, David Sanford " 154
Bell, W. A 426
Bessonies, J. F. A 410
Bird, Abram facing 155
Blake, James " 86
Bobbs, John S " 281
Brown, Hirara 171
Brown, S. M facing 296
Butler, John M " 204
Butler, Ovid " 176
Canby, Samuel " 502
Carey, Jason S " 461
Carey, Simeon B " 159
Caven, John " 209
Chamber of Commerce 167
Comingor, J. A facing 284
Compton, J. A " 288
Cooper, John J " 218
Dean Brothers, Works of " 467
Defrees, John D " 240
Douglass, John 235
Dumont, Ebenezer 308
Duncan, Robert B 174
Edson, H. A facing 398
Emigrant Scene 73
Evans, I. P. &, Co., Manufactory of facing 482
Fletcher, Calvin, Sr " 169
Fletcher, M. J " 440
Fletcher, S. A., Jr " 468
Fletcher, S. A., Sr " 219
Fletcher, W. B " 285
Funkhouser, David " 279
Gall, Alois D " 293
Gordon, J. W " 180
Griffith, Humphrey " 161
PAOE
Hannah, Samuel facing 216
Hannaman, William " 163
Harvey, T. B " 282
Haughey, Theo. P 227
Haymond, W. S facing 290
Henderson, William " 205
Hendricks, Thomas A " 200
Hetherington, B. F " 466
Holland, J. W 154
Holliday, William A facing 392
Holmes, W. C " 226
Howard, Edward " 291
Howland, E. J " 505
Howland, Morris " 595
Hyde, N. A 414
Indianapolis in 1S20 facing 30
Johnson, James " 665
Johnson, Oliver " 646
Johnson, William 158
Jones, Aquilla facing 474
Kingan & Co between 444, 445
Lilly, J. 0. D facing 480
Macy, David " 229
Malott, V. T " 224
Mansur, Isaiah " 225
Marion County Court-House " 250
Marion County Court-House in 1823 251
McCarty, Nicholas facing 99
McDonald, J. E " 202
McGaughey, Samuel " 297
McKernan, J. H " 166
McLaughlin, G. H " 400
McOuat, R. L " 160
Merritt, George " 478
Moore, .John " 503
Moore, Thomas " 604
Morris, Morris " 217
Morris, T. A " 301
Morton, Oliver P " 186
Mothershead, John L " 278
National Road Bridge over White River 108
vii
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
New, George W % facing 292
Norwood, George ** 442
Palmer, N. B " 215
Parry, Charles " 276
Patterson, S. J " 441
Pattison, C. B " 157
Peck, E. J " 156
Perkins, S. E " 182
Piel, William F " 452
Porter, A. G " 206
Ramsay, John F " 165
Ray, James M " 105
Ritzinger, Frederick " 230
Rockwood, William " 472
Root, Deloss " 465
Schooley, Thomas " 533
Sharpe, Thomas H " 220
Site of Union Passenger Depot in 1838 137
Sinker, E. T facing 464
Spiegel, Augustus " 456
PAGE
Streight, A. D facing 314
Sullivan, Wm " 178
Thomas, John " 471
Talbott, W. H " 162
Todd, R. N " 283
Tomlinson, Geo " 596
Toon, Martin S " 534
United States Arsenal " 305
Vance, L. M " 153
Wagon-Train on National Road 95
Walker, Isaac C facing 286
Walker, Jacob S 164
Walker, John C facing 294
Washington Street, Views of 266 and 267
Wood, John 152
Woodburn "Sarven Wheel" Co facing 460
Woollen, Wm.W " 214
Wright, C. E " 287
Yandes, Daniel " 100
BIOGRAPHICAL.
FAQE
Atkins, E. C 469
Ayres, Levi 506
Barbour, Laoian 214a
Bates, Hervey 35
Beaty, David Sanford, 153
Bell, W. A 426
Bessoniea, J. F. A 409
Bird. Abram 155
Blake, James 86
Bobbs, John S 281
Bradley, John H 214b
Brown. Hiram 171
Brown, John G 505
Brown, S. M 296
Butler, John M 204
Butler, Ovid 175
Can by, Samuel 503
Carey, H. G 228
Carey, Jason S 461
Carey, Simeon B 159
Caven, John 209
Coburn, John 214c
Comingor, J. A 284
Compton, J. A 288
Cooper,John J 217
Culley, David V 236
Dcfrees, John D 239
Douglass, John 235
Dumont, Ebenezer 308
Duncan, Robert B 174
Edson, H. A 397
Elliott, B. K 214d
Finch, F. M 214d
Fletcher, Calvin, Sr 169
Fletcher, M. J 440
Fletcher, S. A., Sr 219
Fletcher, S. A., Jr 468
Fletcher, W. B 285
Funkhouser, David 279
Gall, Alois D 293
Gordon, J. W 180
PAOI
GriflSth, Humphrey 161
Hannah, Samuel 215
Hannaman, William 162
Harrison, Gen. Benjamin 214d
Harvey, T. B 282
Haughey, Theodore P 226
Haymond, W. S 290
Henderson, William 205
Hendricks, A. W 214f
Hendricks, Thomas A 199
Hetherington, B. F 466
Hines, Judge 214e
Holland, J. W 154
Holman, John A 185
Holmes, W. C 226
Holliday, William A 392
Herd, Oscar B 214p
Howard, Edward 291
Howland, E. J 505
Howland, Morris 595
Hyde, N. A 414
Jameson, Patrick H 280
Johnson, James 665
Johnson, Oliver 646
Johnson, William 158
Jones, Aquilla 474
Knefler, Fred 214b
Lilly, J. 0. D 480
Macy, David 229
Malott, V. T 223
Mansur, Isaiah 225
McDonald, J. E 201
McCarty, Nicholas 99
McGaughey, Samuel 297
McKernan, J. H 165
McLaughlin, G. H .399
McOuat, R. L 160
Merritt, George 478
Moore, John 503
Moore, Thomas 504
Morris, Morris 216
BIOGRAPHICAL.
PAOE
Morton, Oliver P 186
Morris, T. A 301
Motbershead, John L 278
Newoomb, Horatio C 214a
New, George W 292
New, John C 214f
Norwood, George 442
O'Neal, Hugh 214a
Palmer, N. B 215
Parry, Charles 276
Patterson, S. J 441
Pattison, C. B 157
Perkins, S. E 182
Peck, E. J 156
Porter, A. G 206
Piel, William F 453
Qaarles, William 214a
Ramsay, John F 163
Ray, James M 105
Ritzingcr, Frederick 230
Root, Deloss 465
Rockwood, William 472
Scbooley, Thomas 533
PAO
Sharpe, Thomas H 220
Sinker, E. T *64
Spiegel, Angustns '156
Streight, A. D 314
Sullivan, William HS
Talbott, W. H 162
Taylor, N. B 214c
Thomas, John 471
Todd, R. N ^ 283
Tomlinson, George 596
Toon, Martin S 533
Vance, L. M 153
Walker, Isaac C 286
Walker, Jacob S 164
Walker, John C 294
Wallace, David 203
Wallace, William 214b
Wishard, William W 594
Wood, John 152
Wright, C. E 287
Woollen, William W 213
i, Daniel 100
HISTOET
OP
INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
CHAPTER I.
Location of Marion County — Topograpliical and General De-
scription — Geology of the County — The Indian Occupation.
Marion County, in which is the city of ludian-
apolis, the capital of Indiana, occupies a central posi-
tion in the State (as is mentioned more particularly
hereafter), and is bounded on the north by the coun-
ties of Boone and Hamilton, on the east by Hancock
and Shelby, on the south by Morgan and Johnson,
and on the west by Hendricks County. Its shape
would be almost an exact square but for an inac-
curacy in the government survey, which makes a pro-
jection of four miles or sections in length by about
three-fourths of a mile in width at the northeast
corner into the adjoining county of Hancock, with a
recess on the opposite side of equal length, and about
one-fourth of the width, occupied by a similar pro-
jection from Hendricks County. The civil townships
of the county follow the lines of the Congressional
townships in direction, except at the division of the
townships of Decatur and Perry, which follows the
line of White River, taking off a considerable area of
the former and adding it to the latter township.
The area of the county is about two hundred and
sixty thousand acres.
Topography and General Features. — Indian-
apolis, which is the county-seat of Marion as well as
the State capital, lies in latitude 39° 55', longitude
86° 5', very nearly in the centre of the State and
county. Mr. Samuel Merrill makes it two miles
northwest of the centre of the State, and one mile
1
southwest of the centre of the county. Professor
R. T. Brown's Official Survey, in the " State Geol-
ogist's Report," regards the entire county as part of a
great plain, nowhere, however, actually level over any
considerable areas, with an average elevation above
low water in the river of about one hundred and sev-
enty-five feet, and of eight hundred and sixty above
the sea-level. Occasional elevations run to more than
two hundred feet above the river-level, and probably
to nine hundred above the sea. The West Fork of
White River, running for twenty-two miles in a
very tortuous course twenty degrees east of north and
west of south, divides the county unequally, the
western fraction being little more than half as large
as the eastern, or one-third of the whole area. The
river valley varies from one to four miles in width,
presenting a bluff on the west side of fifty to two
hundred feet through most of its extent, and on
the east side a gentle slope. Where the bluff comes
up to the water on one side the " bottom" recedes on
the other, sometimes swampy, and frequently cut up
by " bayous" or supplementary outlets for freshets.
The current is on the bluff side, usually deep, swift,
and clear. Occasionally the low " bottom" land comes
up to the water on both banks, but not frequently.
There are many gentle slopes and small elevations in
and around the city, but nothing that deserves the
name of hill, except " Crown Hill," at the cemetery
north of the city, and one or two smaller protuber-
ances a mile or two south. All the streams that drain
this undulating plain flow in a general southwesterly
direction on the east side of the river, and south-
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
easterly on the west side, proving, as the first secre-
tary of the State Board of Health says, that Indian-
apolis lies in a basin, the grade higher on all sides
than is the site of the city, except where the river
makes its exit from the southwest.
Subordinate Valleys. — Dr. Brown says that "the
glacial action, which left a heavy deposit of transported
material over the whole surface of the county, has at
the same time plowed out several broad valleys of
erosion, which appear to be tributary to the White
River Valley." The most conspicuous of these comes
down from the northeast, between Fall Creek and
White River, is about a mile wide at the lower end,
narrowing to the northeast for six or seven miles, and
disappearing near the northern line of the county.
The grinding force has cut away the surface clay, and
in places filled the holes with gravel and coarse sand.
South of the city and east of the river are two other
valleys of the same kind. One, about a mile wide,
extends from White River, a little north of Glenn's
Valley, about five miles to the northeast, with well-
defined margins composed of gravel terraces. The
other lies chiefly in the county south of Marion, and
between it and the first-mentioned is a ridge called
Poplar Hill, composed of sand and gravel on a bed of
blue clay. West of the river there is but one of these
valleys. It begins in Morgan County, and running
a little north of east enters Marion County, passing
between West Newton and Valley Mills, and connect-
ing with White River Valley near the mouth of
DoUarhide Creek. A water-shed between the tribu-
taries of the West Fork of White River and the East
Fork, or Driftwood, enters the county two miles from
the southeast corner, passing nearly north about
twelve miles, makes an eastward bend and passes out
of the county. Unlike water-sheds generally, this
one is not a ridge or considerable elevation, but a
marshy region overflowed in heavy rains, when it is
likely enough the overflow runs into either river as
chance or the wind directs it. These swampy sections
lying high are readily drained, and make excellent
farming land.
Streams. — Except Eagle Creek and its affluents,
there are no considerable streams entering the river
in the county on the west side. There are Crooked
Creek north of Eagle, and Dollarhide Creek south,
and several still smaller and unnamed, except for
neighborhood convenience, but they are little more
than wet weather " branches," or drains of swampy
sections. Dr. Brown explains this paucity of water-
courses by the fact that a large stream called White
Lick rises northwe.st, flows along, partly in Hendricks
and partly in Marion Counties, parallel with the course
of the river, and enters the latter in Morgan County,
thus cutting off the eastward course of minor streams
by receiving their waters itself. On the east side of
the river, which contains nearly two-thirds of the area
of the county, a considerable stream called Grass Creek
runs almost directly south for a dozen or more miles
very near the eastern border of the county, and finally
finds its way into the East Fork. It has a half-dozen
or more little tributaries, as Buck Creek, Panther
Run, Indian Creek, Big Run, Wild Cat and Doe
Creek. Of the east side streams tributary to the
West Fork of White River — far better known as
White River than the short course of the combined
East and West Forks to the Wabash — Fall Creek is
much the most considerable. Except it, but a single
small stream called Dry Run enters the river north
of the city. Fall Creek enters the county very near
the northeast corner, and flowing almost southwest-
erly enters the river now near the northwest corner
of the city. It formerly entered west of the centre
of the city, but a " cut-ofi'" was made nearly a mile
or more farther north for hygienic and economic
reasons, and the mouth has thus been shifted con-
siderably. The main tributaries of Pall Creek are
Mud Creek on the north, and North Fork, Middle
Fork, Dry Branch, and Indian Creek east and south.
The duplication of names of streams will be observed.
There are two Buck Creeks, two Dry, two Lick (one
White), two Indian, and two Eagle Creeks in the
county. As few of these names are suggested by
any special feature of the stream or country, except
Fall Creek, which is named from the falls at Pendle-
ton, and Mud and Dry Creeks, the duplication may
be set down to the whims of the pioneers. South of
the city, on the east side of the river, the streams
flowing directly into the river are Pogue's Creek,
passing directly through the city; Pleasant Run,
TOPOGRAPHY AND GENERAL FEATURES.
mainly east and south, but cutting into the southeast
corner of the city (Bean Creek is tributary to the
latter), Lick Creek, and Buck Creek.
Bottom Lands. — The valley of White River, says
the Official Survey, is divided into alluvium or bottom
land proper and the terrace or second bottom. In
that portion of the valley that lies north of the mouth
of Eagle Creek it consists chiefly of second bottom,
while the first bottom largely predominates in the
southern portion. Much of this latter is subject to
overflow in times of freshets, so that while the soil is
exceedingly fertile and easy of cultivation a crop is
never safe. Levees have been made for considerable
distances below the city, on the river and on some of
the larger creeks, to remedy the mischief of overflows,
but, the Survey says, with only partial success. The
primary difiiculty is the tortuous courses of the
streams, and of the river particularly, that runs a
distance of sixteen miles to the lower county line,
which is but nine in a straight line. This not only
diminishes the fall per mile, but the water, moving
in curves and reversed curves, loses its momentum,
the current becomes sluggish, and when freshets
come the accumulation overflows the low banks, and
covers large districts of cultivable and cultivated
land, to the frequent serious injury of crops, and the
occasional destruction of crops, fences, and stock.
A straightened channel would increase the fall and
the strength of the current, and in the sandy forma-
tion of the beds of most of the streams would soon
cut a way deep enough to secure the larger part of
the land against overflow. This would be cheaper
than making levees along a crooked course that re-
quired two miles of work to protect one of direct
length, but it would have to be carried out by a con-
cert of action on the part of riparian proprietors,
which would be hard to efifect, and it would also di-
vide a good many farms that are now bounded by
original lines of survey terminating at the river,
which was made a navigable stream by law but not
by nature. Changing the bed would confuse the
numbers of sections, and possibly disturb some land
titles. This objection is presented to this policy in
Professor Brown's Survey, but an act of the Legisla-
ture might open a way for concerted action, and pro-
vide against the confusion of lines and disturbance of
rights.
Flora. — The central region of Indiana was a favor-
ite hunting-ground of the Indian tribes that sold it
in 1818. Its woods and waters were unusually full
of game. There were no prairies of any extent and
not many swamps. The entire surface was densely
covered with trees. On the uplands, which were
dry and rolling, the sugar, white and blue ash, black
walnut, white walnut or butternut, white oak, red
beech, poplar, wild cherry prevailed ; on the more
level uplands were bur-oak, white elm, hickory, white
beech, water ash, soft maple, and others ; on the first
and second bottoms, sycamore, buckeye, black wal-
nut, blue ash, hackberry, and mulberry. Grape-
vines, bearing abundantly the small, pulpless acid
fruit called " coon" grapes, grew profusely in the
bottoms, covering the largest trees, and furnishing
more than ample stores for the preserves and pies of
the pioneer women. Under all these larger growths,
especially in the bottoms, there were dense crops of
weeds, among which grew equally dense thickets of
spice-brush, — the backwoods substitute for tea, —
papaw, wahoo, wild plum, hazel, sassafras, red and
black haw, leatherwood, prickly ash, red-bud, dog-
wood, and others. The chief weed growths, says
Professor Brown, were nettles and pea-vines matted
together, but with these were Indian turnip, — the
most acrid vegetable on earth probably, — ginseng,
cohosh, lobelia, and, in later days, perfect forests of
iron-weeds. There are a good many small remains of
these primeval forests scattered through the county,
with here and there patches of the undergrowth, and
not a few nut-trees, walnut, hickory, and butternut,
but the hazel, the spicewood, the sassafras, the plum
and black haw and papaw are never seen anywhere
near the city, and not frequently anywhere in the
county. The Indian turnip is occasionally found,
but ginseng has disappeared as completely as the
mound-builders, though in the last generation it was
an article of considerable commercial importance.
Fauna. — The principal animals in these primeval
woods were the common black bear, the black and
gray wolf, the buiFalo, deer, raccoon, opossum, fox,
gray and red squirrels, rabbits, mink, weasel, of land
HISTOEY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
quadrupeds ; of the water, otter, beaver, muskrat ;
of birds, the wild turkey, wild goose, wild duck, wild
pigeon, pheasant, quail, dove, and all the train of
wood birds which the English sparrow has so largely
driven off, — the robin, bluebird, jaybird, woodpecker,
tomtit, sap-sucker, snowbird, thrush. For twenty
years or more laws have protected the game birds,
and there is said to be a marked increase of quail
in the last decade, but there is hardly any other kind
of game bird, unless it be an occasional wild pigeon,
snipe, or wild duck. Buzzards, hawks, crows, owls,
blackbirds are not frequently seen now near the city,
though they were all abundant once. Flocks of black-
birds and wild pigeons occasionally pass along, but
not numerously enough to attract the hunter. In
fact, there is very little worth hunting in the county,
except rabbits, quail, and remote squirrels. For fish
the game varieties are almost wholly confined to the
bass and red-eye. Water scavengers like the '• cat"
and " sucker" are thick and big in the off-flow of the
city pork-houses, and in the season form no inconsider-
able portion of the flesh-food of the class that will
fish for them, but game fish must be sought for from
five to ten miles from the city. In early days, and
for the first twenty-five years of the existence of the
city, the river and its larger affluents supplied ample
provision of excellent fish, — bass, pike, buffalo, red-
eye, salmon rarely, and the cleaner class of inferior
fish, as " red-horse," suckers, cats, eels ; but the im-
providence of pioneers, who never believed that any
natural supply of food could fail, and the habits ac-
quired from them, particularly the destructiveness of
seining, has reduced the food population of streams
till it needs stringent laws, and the vigilance of asso-
ciations formed to enforce the laws, to prevent total
extirpation. Even with these supports it will take
careful and prolonged efforts at restocking to repro-
duce anything like the former abundance.
Mineral Springs. — Although they form no con-
spicuous feature of the topography of the county,
and have never been used medicinally, except by the
neighbors, it may be well to note that there are a few
springs of a mineral and hygienic character in the
county, where the underground currents of water rise
through crevices in the overlying bed of clay. One
of these, called the Minnewa Springs, in Lawrent;e
township, a mile and a half northeast of the little
town of Lawrence, was talked of at one time as ca-
pable of being made a favorite resort, and some steps
were taken in that direction, but nothing came of
them. Another very like it is within a half-mile of
the same town. Southwest of the city is one on the
farm of an old settler that has been famous in the
neighborhood as a " .sulphur .spring" for fifty years.
A couple of miles nearer the city is another on the
farm of Fielding Beeler, which Professor Brown
says is the largest in the county. " It forms a wet
prairie or marsh of several acres, from which by
ditching a large stream of water is made to flow."
The water of all these springs contains iron enough
to be readily tasted, and to stain the vessels that are
used in it. and this peculiarity gives it the misname
of sulphur water.
Swavips. — There were once considerable areas of
marshy land, or land kept wet by the overflow of ad-
jacent streams, but many of these have been entirely
drained, and considerable portions of others larger
and less convenient for drainage. With them have
measurably disappeared the malarial diseases that in
the first settlement of the city, and for a good many
years after, came back as regularly as the seasons.
There is not, probably, a single acre of land in the
county that is not cultivable or capable of being
made so. Between three and four miles southwest
of city lay a swampy tract, nearly a mile long liy a
quarter or more wide, entirely destitute of trees,
which was long known in the vicinity as " the prairie,"
the only approach to a prairie in the county.
Geology of the County.' — Marion County rests
on three distinct geological members, two of them be-
longing to the Devonian formation and one to the
Carboniferous. Neither, however, shows itself con-
spicuously on the surface. Upon these lies a deposit
of drift, or transported material, from fifty to one
hundred and fifty feet thick. This forms the surface
of the country, and moulds its general configuration.
But the rock foundation, in spite of the depth of the
1 Condensed from Professor R. L. Brown's Official Survey, in
the Report of Professor John Collett, State Geologist.
GEOLOGY OF THE COUNTY.
drift upon it, aflFects the face of tlie country some-
what, most obviously along the line where the Knob
sandstone overlaps the Genesee shale. The line of
strike dividing the geological members traverses the
county on a line from the south thirty degrees north-
west. This line, as it divides the Corniferous lime-
stone from the Genesee shale or black slate, passes
between the city and the Hospital for the Insane,
two miles west. Borings in the city reach the lime-
stone at a depth of sixty to one hundred feet. It is
the first rock encountered in place. At the hospital
forty feet of shale was passed through before reach-
ing the limestone. This shows the eastern part of
the county as resting on the Corniferous limestone,
and the western on the Delphi black slate or Gen-
esee shale. Under a small area of the southwestern
corner of the county the Knob or Carboniferous
sandstone will be found covering the slate. On a
sand-bar in the river, a short distance north of the
Johnson County line, Professor Brown noticed after
a freshet large pieces of slate that had been thrown
out, indicating that the river had laid bare that rock
at some near point. This gives the level of the bed
of the river in the lower half of its course through
the county. But a short distance west of the west
line of the county some of the small tributaries of
White Lick lay bare the lower members of the
Knob sandstone. There are indications both on
Pogue's Run and Pleasant Hun that the limestone
lies very near their beds, but it is not likely that stone
can ever be profitably quarried in the county. Geo-
logical interest attaches to the deep deposits of drift
that cover the stratified rocks.
Drift. — The drift that covers our great Western
plains, continues Dr. Brown's Survey, is foreign in
character and general in deposition. It is not a pro-
miscuous deposit of clay, sand, water-worn pebbles,
and bowlders, like the Eastern glacial drift. These
are all found in it, but with nearly as much regu-
larity and order as is usually found in stratified rocks.
At the base of this formation is almost invariably
found a very compact lead-colored clay, with but few
bowlders, and those invariably composed of quartzite,
highly metamorphosed or trap rocks. Occasionally
may be found thin deposits of very fine gray or yel-
low sand, but they are not uniform. Between the
clay and the rocks on which it rests is generally in-
terposed a layer of coarse gravel or small silicious
bowlders, from three to six feet thick. Sometimes,
but rarely, this is wanting, and the clay lies directly
upon the rock. In Marion County this clay-bed
ranges from twenty to more than a hundred feet
thick, and is very uniform in character throughout,
except where the light strata or fine sand occur.
Chemically it is an alumina silicate in a very fine
state of division, and mechanically mixed with an
exceedingly fine sand, which shows under the micro-
scope as fragments of almost transparent quartz. It
is colored by a proto-sulphide of iron. A small por-
tion of lime and potassa and a trace of phosphoric
acid can be discovered by analysis. Above tliis is
generally found a few feet of coarse sand or fine
gravel, and on this is twenty or thirty teet of a true
glacial drift, of the promiscuous character of the
glacial drift described by Eastern geologists. In and
upon this drift are large bowlders of granite, gneiss,
and trap, which are not found in their proper place
nearer than the shore of Lake Superior, whence they
have been carried, as is attested by the grooves and
scratches in the exposed rock surfaces over which
they have passed. In this upper drift are the gravel
terraces, from which is obtained our best available
material for road-making. The mass of it is a yellow
or orange-colored clay, with a considerable quantity
of sand, and lime enough to make the water passing
through it hard. There is an astonishing number
and size of bowlders in and upon this clay-bed. Two
were measured by Dr. Brown which were nearly ten
feet long by five wide, with four feet exposed above
ground, and nobody knows how much below. In a
few places bowlders are so thickly scattered as to ob-
struct cultivation. In the central and northern por-
tions of the county they are almost invariably of
granite, in the south generally of gneiss or trap.
Gravel Terraces. — The gravel terraces are gen-
erally found in a succession of mound-like elevations,
ten to fifty feet above the level of the surrounding
plain, and usually rest on a compact clay. They are
frequently arranged in lines running north, a little
northeast and southwest. North of these mounds is
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
generally found a considerable space of level and
often swampy lands, indicating the position of a
mass of ice, under which a torrent has rushed with
great force, excavating the clay below, piling up the
heavier gravel and sand, and carrying the lighter clay
and finer sand to be distributed over the country.
When the ice disappeared the excavation would be a
little lake, finally filled up with the lighter material
borne from other terraces farther north. These ter-
race formations, or " second bottoms," bordering the
river on one side or the other nearly everywhere,
have almost the same character and history as the
gravel-beds of the uplands. They consist of deposits
of gravel and coarse sand, resting on the lower blue
clay, into which the river has cut its present channel.
Formerly these plains, frequently three or four miles
wide, were regarded as lake-like expansions of the
river which had been silted up by its sediment, but
an inspection of the material shows that the water
from which the deposit was made was no quiet lake,
but a current strong enough to bear onward all
lighter material, leaving only the heavier gravel and
Band behind.
Lower Blue Clay. — The Ofiicial Survey concludes
that the lower blue clay was deposited before the
strata of clay, sand, and gravel that rest upon it, and
are clearly traceable to glacial action, and that the
conditions of its deposit were very difierent from the
rush and tumult of water pouring from a melting
glacier, though evidently deposited from water. The
greater part of the material is very fine, and could
have come only from very quiet waters, and from very
deep waters too, as its compactness and solidity prove
the existence of great pressure necessary to the pro-
duction of those qualities. Besides the superposition
of the glacial strata, the precedent deposition of the
lower blue clay is indicated by the fact that the
glacial action, exhibited over the whole surface of the
country, made excavations in it by undermining cur-
rents from dissolving glaciers which now form the
small lakes so numerous in the northern part of the
State. The southern end of Lake Michigan rests on
this clay, and is excavated into it to an unknown
depth. Another fact attesting the deposit of the
lower clay anterior to the grinding and crushing era
of moving mountains of ice, is the discovery at the
bottom of it of the unbroken remains of coniferous
trees, probably cypress or hemlock. In digging wells
in the county logs ten to fifteen inches in diameter, i
well preserved, have been found. Glacial action ac-
companying or following the deposit of these trees
would have crushed them. Dr. Brown suggests a
theory of the deposition of this clay-bed. If the
glacial era was preceded by an upheaval that raised
the region of the Arctic Circle above the line of per-
petual congelation, there would necessarily have been
a corresponding depression south of the elevation,
which would be an inland sea of fresh water. During
the whole period of the progress of this upheaval
north and sinking south (in our region) torrents of
water loaded with sediment would have rushed down
and filled the huge hollow. As the waters became
quiet the sediment would be slowly deposited. The
color of the clay, caused by the combination of sul-
phur and iron, proves that these waters were originally
charged with sulphurous gases produced by volcanic
agencies. The presence of these gases explains the
absence of life in this fresh-water sea till the sulphur-
tainted sediment was entirely deposited, when the in-
creasing cold would cover it with an impervious crust
of ice, cutting off all access of air and the possibility
of life. There are no fossil remains in the clay. With
the end of the Ice Age came a reversal of conditions,
the northern regions sinking, those about here rising
and pouring their waters southward into the Gulf of
Mexico in furious torrents strengthened by the melt-
ing of great masses of ice, thus furnishing much of
the material of the Mississippi delta, and leaving
marks of denudation on the hills of Kentucky, Ten-
nessee, and Alabama.
Economical Service of the Clay-Bed. — This lower
clay stratum when exposed to the air for a few years
undergoes chemical changes which make it the basis
of a very fertile soil. Frost breaks down its adhe-
siveness and makes it a mass of crumbling, porous
earth. The oxygen of the air converts the sulphur
into an acid which unites with the potash and lime
accessible to it and makes slowly-soluble salts of them,
which supply valuable elements of fertility for years
of cultivation, needing only organic matter to be
GEOLOGY OF THE COUNTY.
available at once for use. It is an excellent absorbent
owing to the fineness of its material, and might be
advantageously used in composting manures, as it
would retain ammonia as sulphate. Of greater value,
at least to the city, than its fertilizing quality is its
action, as a filter, securing an inexhaustible supply of
pure water in the bowlders and gravel beneath it. In
a region as level as Marion County, and as prolific of
vegetation, the surface water must become charged
with organic matter, which the porous upper strata of
soil, sand and clay, but imperfectly retain, so that
the water of springs and shallow wells is rarely so
pure as to be suitable for domestic use. These im-
purities are, of course, increased in the vicinity of
residences, barns, and stables, and still more in cities,
where there are large quantities of excrementitious
matter. Surface water more or less tainted in this
way is readily absorbed by the porous soil, and may
reach the bottom of wells of twenty feet in depth.
Against the inevitable and incalculable evil of a cor-
rupted water supply, as that of Indianapolis would be
if there were no other resource than the surface water
of shallow wells, this blue clay stratum is an ample
and admirable provision. It acts as a filter to the
reservoir in the gravel and bowlder bed beneath it.
The water there is free from organic matter, though
always sufficiently tainted with iron to be easily tasted
and to color vessels used in it. This iron taint is an
invariable characteristic of the water filtered through
this blue clay, and gives the popular reputation of
mineral water to springs of it that rise through fis-
sures in the clay to the surface. The best known of
these springs have been already referred to. In the
city and several places outside of it wells have been
sunk to the sub-clay water through sixty-seven to one
hundred and eight feet, the water rising to various
distances from the surface from eight to forty feet.
The blue clay stratum runs from eight to sixty feet
in thickness. The reservoir of water under this clay
has no outlet except through openings in the clay,
and in consequence can never be exhausted by natural
drainage. To a large manufacturing centre like In-
dianapolis the power derived from water in stream or
steam is indispensable, and that, says the Survey, " we
have under every acre of land in Marion County."
Character of Soil. — The glacial drift furnishes
the material for a soil that meets every demand of
agriculture. Says the Survey, " Being formed by the
decomposition of almost every variety of rook, it
holds the elements of all in such a state of fine divis-
ion as to give it excellent absorbent properties, and .
enables it to retain whatever artificial fertilizers may
be added. In its natural state the soil of the county
generally has but one prominent defect, — the very fine
material of which it is made lying so nearly level is
easily saturated with water, and having no drainage
below, except by slow filtration through the clay, is
kept wet longer than usual. This necessitates the
escape of a great part of it by surface evaporation,
and this, especially in spring, delays the warming of
the soil and its early preparation for summer crops.
The condition of saturation has an unfavorable eflFect
on the vegetable matter in the soil, excluding it from
free contact with the air, and arresting its rapid de-
composition, often changing it into humic acid, a
chemical product injurious to crops. In the first and
second bottom lands this defect is remedied by a
stratum of gravel or coarse sand a few feet below the
surface, which rapidly passes the water downwards
and relieves the saturated surface. The same eflFect
is produced on the clay uplands by a system of tile
drainage.
Ideal Section of the County. — The following
measurements of the diflferent strata of an ideal sec-
tion of the county are given by Dr. Brown from natu-
ral sections, borings, and excavations made in different
parts of the county. Beginning with the most recent
formations, we have :
Transported Material.
1. Alluvium, or bottom land.... from 10 to 20 feet.
2. Terrace formations, gravel
and sand from 50 to 100 feet.
3. True bowlder clay (glacial), from 40 to 110 feet.
4. Blue sedimentary clay and
sand from 20 to 120 feet.
5. Bowlders and gravel from 5 to 15 feet.
Rock ill Place.
6. Knob sandstone (Carboniferous) 25 feet.
7. Genesee slate (Devonian) 80 feet.
8. Corniferous limestone (Devonian) 50 feet.
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
The corniferous limestone has been penetrated
fifty feet, but its entire thickness at this point is
undetermined, as its eastern outcrop is concealed by
the heavy drift deposit. Nos. 1,2,6, and 7 underlie
only portions of the county ; the other members are
general in their distribution.
The Indian Occupation. — The State of Indiana
formed the central and largest portion of the terri-
tory " held by the Miami Confederacy from time im-
memorial," as Little Turtle, who led the Indians in
St. Clair's defeat, told Gen. Wayne. There were but
four tribes in this. Confederacy, the leading one being
the Miamis, or, in early times, the Twightwees ; but
divisions of four others quite as well known by his-
tory and tradition were allowed entrance and resi-
dence, — the Shawanese, Delawares, Kickapoos, and
Pottawatomies. The Delawares occupied the region
in and around Marion County, but the abundance of
fish and game made it a favorite hunting-ground of
all the tribes from the valley of the White Water, or
Wah-he-ne-pay, to the valley of the White River,
the Wah-me-ca-me-ca. On this account it was ob-
stinately held by the Confederacy, and only surren-
dered by the treaty of St. Mary's, 1818.' One of the
principal Delaware towns stood on the bluff of White
River, at the Johnson County line, where, says Pro-
fessor Brown, was the residence of Big Fire, a lead-
ing Delaware chief and friend of the whites. A
blunder of ignorance or brutality came near making
an enemy of him in 1812, as Cresap or Greathouse
did of Logan in 1774. A band of Shawanese, an
affiliated tribe of the Confederacy, but residing far-
ther south, between the East Fork of White River
(the Gun-daquah) and the Ohio, acting doubtless on
the hostile impulse imparted by the great chief of
the tribe, Tecumseh, massacred a white settlement at
the Pigeon Roost, in Scott County, in 1812. The
Madison Rangers in revenge penetrated to Big Fire's
town, on the southern line of the county, and de-
stroyed it. It would seem that there should have
been little difficulty, to men as familiar with the loca-
tions and modes of warfare of the Indians as these
rangers, in ascertaining whether the war party of
' With a reservation of occupancy till 1821.
the Pigeon Roost massacre came from the north or
not ; but whether there was or not no discrimination
was made, and it required all Governor Harrison's
diplomacy to keep Big Fire and his tribe from joining
the forces against the government. " But few remains
mark the site of this ruined town," says the professor.
In Washington township, on the east side of the
river, tradition places the site of another village older,
— how much it is impossible to say or guess, further
than the vague direction of conjecture by the fact
that the place is overrun by a wood of sixty years'
growth. Near the river i.s an old cemetery of the
tribe, and near it are some unique remains of Indian
residence, both uncovered occasionally by floods.
These remains are " pits or ovens excavated in a very
compact clay," as Professor Brown describes them,
about two feet and a half in diameter and the same
in depth, and burned on the inner surfaces like brick.
In them have been found coals and ashes, and around
them fragments of pottery. Their condition and con-
tents would indicate that they were a sort of earthen-
ware kettle, constructed by the ready process of dig-
ging out the inside clay and burning the surface of
the outside, instead of taking the clay for each in a
separate mass, and moulding it and burning it and
putting back in its new shape in the hole it came
from in its old one. The Indians of this fertile
region all cultivated corn and beans and pumpkins,
and made sugar of "sugar water" in the early spring,
by freezing it during the night and throwing away
the ice, which contained no sugar, afterwards boiling
it down and graining it. Flint arrow-heads, stone
hatchets, chisels, and other implements of the
" Stone Age" are found occasionally in the soil
and gravel, especially in the southern part of the
county, near Glenn's Valley, and these are said by
Professor Brown's Report to be made in many cases
of talcose slate, a rock found no nearer this region
than the Cumberland Mountains or the vicinity of
Lake Superior. The curious forms of some of them
make it impossible to determine their use. The
Official Survey reports no mounds or earthworks of '
the mound-builders or other prehistoric race in the
county except these relics of the " Stone Age."
There may be none now, but forty-five years ago
THE INDIAN OCCUPATION.
there were two considerable mounds in the city near
the present line of Morris Street, one near the inter-
section of the now nearly efiFaced canal and Morris
Street, and the other a little farther east. The exca-
vation of the canal opened one of them, and some
complete skeletons and scattered bones and fragments
of earthenware were found and taken possession of
by Dr. John Richmond, then pastor of the only Bap-
tist Church, as well as a practicing physician. The
other was gradually plowed down, probably after
being opened at the same time the first was, but no
record or definite memory settles the question.
For a number of years the agency of the Indians
of Central Indiana was held at Conner's Station,
some sixteen miles north of the city and about four
beyond the present county line. William Conner, the
first settler of the White River Valley, established
himself there about 1800, after spending most of his
youth and early manhood among the Indians, a num-
ber of whose dialects he spoke fluently, and whose
names and customs and modes of life he understood
as well as if he had been one of the race. He was
well acquainted with all the chiefs of the Shawanese,
Miamis, Delawares, and other tribes, and was fre-
quently employed as an interpreter and guide by
Gen. Harrison. He was the guide of the army in
the campaign that ended with the battle of Tippe-
canoe, and in that made memorable by the "massacre
of the Raisin River." He accompanied Gen. Har-
rison in the march into Canada that was triumphantly
concluded by the battle of the Thames and the death
of Tecumseh, the greatest of all the Western Indian
leaders, except possibly Pontiac.
This particularity of reference to him is not im-
pertinent, for his settlement was closely connected
with that of the county, and he was long in active
business as a merchant in the city. It may, there-
fore, be apt as well as not uninteresting, to present
the reader a fact almost wholly unknown in connec-
tion with the death of Tecumseh. Vice-President
Col. Richard M. Johnson, of Kentucky, was long
credited with the honor, such as it was, of killing
the Shawanese hero, but it was later claimed for one
or two others, and the famous question " Who struck
Billy Patterson ?" was hardly a burlesque on the idle
babble, oral and printed, that worried the world as to
who killed Tecumseh. Mr. Conner could iiavo set-
tled the question if he had been disposed to thrust
himself in the face of the public. But he was not,
and the information comes now from Robert B. Dun-
can, a leading lawyer of the city, who was clerk of the
county for over twenty years, and when a lad lived
with Mr. Conner as early as 1820. To him Mr. Con-
ner told what he knew of the death of Tecumseh.
He, as usual, was Gen. Harrbon's guide and inter-
preter. After the battle of the Thames was over the
body of a chief, evidently of great distinction from
his dress and decorations, was found, and Mr. Conner
was sent for to identify it. He said it was Tecum-
seh's, and he knew the chief well. The situation,
as he described it to Mr. Duncan, showed that the
chief had been killed with a very small rifle-ball,
which fitted a small rifle in the hands of a dead youth,
who apparently liad been an aid or orderly of a major
who lay dead near him, killed by a large ball, appar-
ently from Tecumseh's gun. The solution of the case
was, probably, that Tecumseh had killed the officer,
the boy had killed the chief, and one of the chief's
braves had killed the boy.
The payments made to the Indians of this county
and the adjacent territory by Mr. Conner at his
agency were made in the spring, always in silver and
always with strict honesty, but not always with ade-
quate security, or any at all, against the payments
getting back to the agent's hands in four prices for
buttons and beads and calico, and more for whiskey.
The process of payment was peculiar and curious.
The Indians sat in a circle, each family in a separate
group. The money came in due proportions of
amount and denomination to pay the man in dollars,
the wife in half-dollars, and the children in quarters,
each getting the same number. Each recipient was
given in advance a number of little sticks equal to
the number of coins he was to get, and as he received
a coin he was to give back a stick, and when his sticks
were all gone he knew he had got all his money.
By the treaty of cession of 1818 the Indians re-
served the occupancy of the ceded territory, or " New
Purchase," till 1821 ; but a few lingered about the
streams, trapping and fishing, till the spring of 1824,
10
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
when a company of freebooting whites, remnants
of the old days of incessant Indian warfare, consist-
ing of a leader named Harper, Hudson, Sawyer and
son, and Bridge and son, killed two families of
Shawanese, consisting of nine persons, — two men,
three women, two boys, and two girls, — to rob
them of their winter's collection of skins. The mas-
sacre was on Fall Creek, where the Indians had been
trapping through the winter, a few miles above the
present county line. It alarmed the early settlers of
the county greatly, for such murders had made local
Indian wars, and brought bloody reprisals often, just
as they do to-day. All but Harper were caught,
the older murderers hung, young Sawyer convicted of
manslaughter, and young Bridge of murder, but par-
doned by Governor Ray on the scaiFold under the
rope that had killed his father. These are said to
have been the first men executed in the United States
by due process of law for killing Indians. The paci-
fication of the irritated tribes was complete, and this
is about the last ever seen or known of Indians in or
about Marion County, except the passage of the
migrating tribes through the town in 1832. For
many years there was visible a trace of Indian occu-
pancy in a deep " cut" made in the blufi' bank of the
old " Graveyard Pond," near where Merrill Street
abuts upon the Vincennes Railroad. It was believed
to have been made by a military expedition from
Kentucky, on its way to the Wabash or the Wea
settlements, for the convenience of getting baggage-
or ammunition-wagons up the precipitous bins', but
nobody appears to have been sure of either its pur-
pose or its constructors.
Though not particularly relevant to the matter of
this history, it will not be uninteresting to its readers
to know, as very few do know, that the celebrated
speech of Logan, the Cayuga (sometimes called the
Mingo) chief, which has been admired in all lands for
its manly and pathetic eloquence, beginning, " I ap-
peal to any white man to say if he ever entered
Logan's cabin and he gave him not meat, etc.," was
made to John Gibson, the Secretary of State of In-
diana Territory with Governor Harrison, and the
second Governor. In his deposition on the subject,
quoted in Dillon's " History of Indiana," he says
that when Lord Dunmore, of Virginia, was approa(;h-
ing the Shawanese towns on the Scioto in 1774, the
chief sent out a message, requesting some one to be
sent to them who understood their language. He
went, and on his arrival Logan sought him out,
where he was " talking with Cornstalk and other
chiefs of the Shawanese, and asked him to walk out
with him. They went into a copse of wood, where
they sat down, and Logan, after shedding abundance
of tears, delivered to him the speech nearly as re-
lated by Mr. Jefierson in his ' Notes on Virginia.' "
It may be remarked, in conclusion of this episode,
that Logan, in consequence of the cruelty practiced
upon him, joined Cornstalk and Red Hawk in lead-
ing the warriors in the battle at the mouth of the
Big Kanawha, in September, 1774, which was a
bloodier battle to the whites, though a less decisive
victory, than the much more celebrated battle of
Tippecanoe.
CHAPTER IL
Special Features of the City of Indianapolis — Area and Present
Condition — General View and Historical Outline.
Special Features of the City. — The general
contour of the surface of the city site and vicinity
in Centre township is in no way different from that
of the other parts of the county. It is level or
gently undulating, except where the bluffs bordering
the " bottoms" of streams make more abrupt eleva-
tions, and none of these are considerable. Following
the eastern border of the valley of Pogue's Run,
which divides the city from northeast to southwest,
is a ridge, or range of swells rather than hills, from
the extreme southwest corner to near the northeast
corner, where it leaves the present city limits, and
these are the only " high grounds" in the city. In
improving the streets these little elevations have been
cut down and the hollows filled, till in hardly any street
can be discerned any change from a level, except a
slight slope or depression. For the past thirty years
or so, before any considerable improvements had been
made on the natural condition of the site, several
SPECIAL FEATURES OF INDIANAPOLIS.
11
bayous, or " ravines," as they were generally called,
traversed it through a greater or less extent, two
being especially noticeable for volume and occasional
mischief. They drained into the river the overflow
of Fall Creek into a large tract of swampy ground
northeast of the city, from which, at a very early
period, a ditch was made by the State into Fall
Creek at a point a mile or two farther down. The
smaller or shorter of these ran through the eastern
side, in a slightly southwesterly direction, crossing
Washington Street at New Jersey, where the former,
a part of the National road, crossed on a brick cul-
vert, and terminating at Pogue's Creek. The other
passed nearer the centre of the city, turning west a
little above the State-House Square, and passing
along the line of Missouri Street, afterwards the line
of the Central Canal, from near Market to Mary-
land, and thence curving southward and again west-
ward and northward, entered the river at the site of
the water-works, where some indications of its exist-
ence can still be seen, and about the only place
where there is a relic of this once prominent and
very troublesome feature of the city's topography.
In several low places, mainly north and east of the
centre, there were considerable ponds, the drainage
of heavy rainfalls, and in the south was one or two,
but these have all been improved out of existence
many a year. The only one of these that was
perennial and distinguished by a name was the
Graveyard Pond, near the old cemetery, formed by
the retention of overflows of the river in a bayou
following the bluff of the river bottom. The whole
site of the city, both the original mile square and all
the outlying " donations" and all the " additions,"
were at first densely covered with woods and weeds
and underbrush, of which there remain only one or
two trees in Pogue's Creek Valley in the east, and
a few sycamores and elms near the creek mouth at
the southwest corner. Fall Creek and Pleasant Run
may be regarded as the northern and southern limits
of the city now.
Divisions. — Pogue's Creek divides the city, leaving
one-third or more on the southeast side, the remainder
on the northwest side. The latter contains the bulk
of the business and population. A small tract west
of the river was added to the site selected on the
east to compensate for a part of one of the four sec-
tions cut off by a bend of the river. This, called
Indianola, forms part of one of the city wards. A
still smaller area south of this, on the west side, has
been added to the city, but the greater part of the
tract west of the river and south of Oliver Avenue
has been organized into an independent town gov-
ernment by the name of West Indianapolis. North-
west is another suburb, but not attached to the city,
called Haughsville. Farther to the north is North
Indianapolis, also independent, while northeast is
Brightwood, unattached ; and east, nearly five miles,
is the handsome little town of Irvington, mainly oc-
cupied by residents whose business is in the city, and
by the faculty and students of Butler University.
Southeast is the little suburb of Stratford. A num-
ber of city additions have separate names, as Oak
Hill, Brookside, Woodlawn, Woodruff Place, but
none, except the last, is in any way distinguishable
from the city adjacent to it.
The Creek. — -More pertinently here than elsewhere
may be noticed the connection of the two streams
that enter the city, Pogue's Creek and the river,
with its history. The former was named for the
traditional but disputed first settler on the city site,
George Pogue. It rises about a mile east of the
northeast corner of Centre township, flows south-
westerly through almost the whole diagonal length
of the city, and enters the river at the angle formed
by the southern city boundary and the river. Until
street improvements turned a large part of the town
drainage into it the water was clear, well stocked with
the same sort of fish as other streams, and a favorite
swimming resort for school-boys. The bottom was
heavily wooded, subject to frequent overflows, and
often swampy. Gradually, as the town grew, and
manufactures and general business followed railroad
enterprises, the vicinity of the creek became the site
of foundries, machine-shops, mills, and other indus-
trial establishments, and a little later of the gas-
works, and these, with the flow of street gutters,
turned the clear little woods stream into an open
sewer. Worse still, the rapid inflow of street drain-
age, with other less artificial influences, made it sub-
12
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ject to violent and sudden overflows, which in the
last twenty years have done so much mischief that
suits have been repeatedly brought against the city
for indemnity. Very recently a judgment for ten
thousand dollars was obtained on one of these suits
by a large wholesale house. The current has been
obstructed and diverted by the piers and abutments
of street and railway bridges, by culverts and the
arches of the foundations of large buildings, and in
some places " washes'" have cut away the banks so as
to seriously impair the value of adjacent lots, and
even to imperil houses, and the result of all these
co-operating evils has been the recent appointment of
a committee of the City Council and Board of Alder-
men, in conjunction with several prominent private
citizens, to devise a complete and uniform system of
protection from overflows, washes, and all forms of
damage. As it follows the line of lowest level in
the city, draining the site from both sides, it has
sometimes been proposed to deepen its bed, wall and
arch it in, and make a main sewer of it. A very
large portion of it on both banks has been walled in,
and many hundreds of feet arched in by street cul-
verts and other works, and it is not improbable that
it will sooner or later be covered throughout, and
made to carry oS the whole natural flow as well as
the street drainage not diverted to other sewers. But
very little of it is left in its old bed, its crooks having
been straightened into angles and right lines. Occa-
sionally it runs dry in long droughts.
TJie Canal. — Although no natural feature of the
city's topography, and a considerable portion of it is
efiaced, the canal is still conspicuous enough both in
its topographical and economical relations to require
notice. The section from the feeder-dam in the river
at Broad Ripple, some eight or nine miles north, to
the city is all that was ever completed of the " Cen-
tral Canal," which was one of the system of public
improvements begun by the State in 1836. In places
it was almost completed for twenty-five or thirty
mUes south of the city, and nearly as far north, but
nothing was ever done wiih it but to leave it to be
overgrown with weeds and underbrush, except a
short stretch three miles south, where its bed was
very level, and the country people used it for a race-
course. Until within ten years or so the completed
section from Broad Ripple passed clear through the
city, mainly along the line of Missouri Street to
Merrill Street, and in early times was used for fishing,
swimming, skating, ice-packing, occasional baptisms
by churches, and semi-occasional cargoes of wood in
flat-boats. The State sold it a few years after its
completion to the " Central Canal Hydraulic and
Water- Works Company," and that sold to others
till it came into the hands of the company which
established the water-works, and used it as a motive-
power, some dozen years ago. Then the portion south
of Blarket Street was deepened, and a sewer built in
it, connecting with the Kentucky Avenue trunk
sewer, and it was filled up, graded, and partially
improved, and is now a street. Above Market
Street it continues in its former condition, used
for boating and ice-packing by permission of the
proprietary company, and for bathing without it.
Below the line of Merrill Street to the city limits
the canal passed through private property, which
has reverted to the original owners or their assigns,
who have left hardly a visible trace of it. When
first completed, an enlargement or basin was made
on the site of the present steel-rail mill, and a culvert
was made over the creek that occasionally broke and
made trouble. The culvert is almost the only relic
of the lower end of the city section. On each side
of Washington Street, on the east bank of the canal,
a square basin opening into it was made, each about
two hundred feet square. These have long disap-
peared, and with them a ditch along the south side
of Washington Street, extending east to within a
short distance of Mississippi, then turning directly
south to Maryland Street, and there turning west
entered the canal at the Maryland Street bridge. The
bridges were all made with " tow-paths" beneath '
them on the west side. These disappeared with the
basins and ditches. A couple of wooden locks were :
built at the south line of the " donation," but never
finished. They became a favorite fishing-place, as
did the place where the water, while it lasted, emptied
into Pleasant Run, near the river. Water never
passed farther south. A stone lock was built at
Market Street, and used a few times. From this
GENPJRAL FEATURES OF INDIANAPOLIS.
13
lock an arm of the canal ran west two blocks or so,
a few feet north of Market Street, where it entered
a basin some four or five hundred feet long, extend-
ing north into the " Military Ground." From the
north end of this basin a " tumble" let the water
down a dozen feet into a race-way that turned south,
crossed Washington Street, and entered a sort of
natural basin, formerly one of the old "ravines,"
whence the water fell by another tumble into the
river at the site of the present water-works. The
water was let into the canal at the feeder-dam in the
spring or early summer of 1839, and the State im-
mediately leased water-power to one woolen- and one
oil mill, and to two each of grist-, saw-, cotton-, and
paper-mills. These were located at the Market
Street lock, on the river bank, where the race-way
fell into the river, and at the south end of the basin
in the Military Ground. Some years later a grist-
mill south of the donation obtained its power from
the canal. The water-works company now owning
it have recently replaced the decayed aqueduct over
Fall Creek with one of the most substantial charac-
ter, and have at one time or another greatly im-
proved the feeder-dam. Its present use is mainly to
supply power to the pumping-engines of the water-
works.
The Kiver {the Wa-me-cn-me-ca). — From the
upper to the lower bridge of the Belt Railroad the
river may be considered a part of the city site,
though but a small portion bounds the site on the
west, and a smaller portion divides it from the In-
dianola suburb. This section is pretty nearly three
miles long in a straight line, and nearly four following
the banks. Originally it was a stream of considera-
ble volume, averaging probably four hundred feet in
width, and, except upon a few shoal spots, too deep
to be fordable. There was a ford a little way below
the " Old Graveyard," near the present site of the
Vincennes Railroad bridge, and in use till some
dozen or fifteen years ago, when an iron bridge was
built a few hundred feet above it. Another ford on
the Lafayette wagon-road was a good deal used later,
and known as " Crowder's" and " Garner's Ford."
Another iron bridge has superseded it. In the town
communication was kept up with the west side by a
ferry a little below the National road bridge. Di-
rectly west of the " Old Graveyard," and three or
four hundred feet above the site of the present iron
bridge, was a low sandy island, containing a couple
or three acres, and covered with large sycamores and
elms, called " Governor's Island." At the head of
it, where a narrow " chute" separated it from the
high and heavily-wooded ground of the cemetery,
was a huge drift that was for many years a favorite
fishing-place of the towns-people. A little above
this, on the west side, a considerable " bayou" ran
out, circling irregularly around an extensive tract, a
perfect wilderness of woods and weeds, spice-bush
and papaw, and re-entered the river a half-mile or
so lower. A wing-dam at the upper mouth con-
verted it into a race-way for a grist-mill erected on
the south bank, near the present line of the Belt
Railroad, in the year 1823. This was one of the
first mills built in the county. A little way east of
it, nearer the river, the first distillery in the county
was established near the same time, turning out for
several years a small quantity of " forty-rod" whiskey
that was known as " Bayou Blue." Some remains
of the mill were discernible a dozen years ago, but
all are gone now, and the bayou itself is measura-
bly effaced by plowing and naturally drying out.
" Governor's Island" has entirely disappeared too.
The river, during the freshets that have almost an-
nually occurred ever since the first settlement was
made, has cut away the eastern bank along the
" Old Graveyard" line until its entire volume is now
east of the site of the island, and that once con-
spicuous feature is merged in the broad low sand-bar
that fills the old bed. The channel has shifted at
this point, as may be seen by the west bank, four
hundred feet or more. A like change, and even
greater, has taken place below, where the current has
out the west bank, and filled in on the east side a
wide swampy tract of several acres below and along
the Graveyard Pond site, and at the foot of what
used to be called the High Banks. Within a few
years freshets have cut through a sharp elbow on the
west side at this same place, and instead of whittling
away the point piecemeal as before, the future action
of the water seems likely to take the main volume
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
bodily some hundreds of feet inland. The same
agencies have cut a number of small channels through
the " bottom" a little lower, and threaten to make a
tolerably straight course from near the old ford down
to a point a little below the lower mouth of the old
bayou. These are the most notable changes in the
river-bed in or near the city.
There has come, with the clearing of the country,
the drainage of swamps, and disappearance of little
springs and rivulets, the same change that has come
upon all the streams of the country and of the world
under the same conditions. The volume of water is
smaller, low-water mark is lower, the freshets more
sudden and evanescent. It happens frequently now
that in protracted droughts the volume of water is
reduced to that of a very moderate creek, not ex-
ceeding fifty or sixty feet in width in very shoal
places, and the tributary streams, Eagle and Pleasant
Run, go dry altogether near their mouths. Fall Creek,
however, is not known to have ever been so greatly
reduced. Before settlement and cultivation had
changed the face of the country so greatly the an-
nual freshets, — sometimes semi-annual, — usually in
the latter part of winter or spring, were used to carry
some of the country's products to market down on
the lower Ohio and Mississippi. This was done in
flat-boats, measuring fifty or sixty feet long by
twelve to fifteen wide, covered in with a sort of
house, the roof of which was the deck, where long,
heavy side-oars and still longer and heavier steering
oars were managed. The current, however, was the
motive-power. In this floating house was stored, ac-
cording to the business or fancy of the shipper, baled
hay, corn, wheat, or oats, whiskey, pork, poultry,
these chiefly. They were run out at the height of
a freshet, so as to pass over a few dams that stood in
the way, and were the source of the greatest peril to
these self-insured shippers. This sort of commerce
was maintained at intervals for probably twenty
years, but most largely from about 1835 till the
Madison Railroad oflFered a better way out, in the
fall of 1847. During the first few years of the
city's existence occasional cargoes of corn and game
were brought down the river by the Indians, and up
the river in keel-boats by poling and " cordelling," or
hauling along with ropes, in canal-boat faishion. Not
much of either was ever done, however, the new
settlement depending mainly on land transportatinn
from the White Water and on its own products.
The prominent event in the history of the city's
connection with the river is the attempt to make it or
prove it what Congress had declared it to be, a navi-
gable stream. A full account will be given in another
place, but it may be noted here that a survey was
made in 1825 which maintained the practicability of
navigation three months in the year for a distance of
four hundred and fifteen miles at an annual expense
of fifteen hundred dollars. A reward of two hundred
dollars was ofi'ered to the first steamer's captain whu
should bring his boat to the town, and in 1830 one
came as far as Spencer, Owen Co., and another
came up about the same distance or a little nearer,
but in the spring of 1831 the " Robert Hanna, "
bought for the purpose, it was said, of carrying stcjne
from the Bluffs of the river for the piers and abut-
ments of the National road bridge, came clear up tu
the town, raising a great excitement and high antici-
pations of river commerce. She remained a cou])le
of days, ran upon a bar going back, and stuck a
month or two, and finally got into safe water some
time during the fall. This was the last of the navi-
gation of White River, except by the flat-boats n-
ferred to and a little pleasure steamer in 1865, that
made a few trips during the year and was wrecked
the next summer. Within the present year a little
picnic steamer has been built at Broad Ripple, but it
can hardly be deemed an exception to the universal
failure of White River navigation.
There have been a few freshets in the river so high
and disastrous that they deserve special notice. The
first was in 1828, following an unusually wet spring.
During that rise an old hunter paddled his canoe
through the fork of a large tree on Governor's Island,
a height of overflow that has probably never been
equaled since. The " bottom" lands for many miles
were seriously damaged, fences washed away, stock
drowned, crops in store injured, though, as suggested
by Mr. Ignatius Brown, less damage was done than
by smaller floods following when the country was
better settled. The Legislature made some relief
GENERAL FEATURES OF INDIANAPOLIS.
15
provision for the sufferers by remitting taxes. The
next great flood was early in January, 1847. The
water then for a time threatened the National road
bridge. It broke through the little suburb of In-
dianola, or " Stringtown" as it was then called, from
its being strung out along the National road, and cut
two deep gullies through the solidly-graded and
heavily-macadamized pike, churning out on the south
side in the soft, loose soil of the river bottom huge
holes nearly a hundred feet in diameter and twenty or
more deep. Several houses were washed away, and
one was left on the slope of one of the big holes,
where it remained tilted over and apparently ready
to fall for several months. The third big flood was
in 1858. In 1875 came two nearly equal to that of
1847, the first in May, the next in August, both
reaching about the same height. But for the levees
then built along the west bank for a mile and more
the whole of the country west of the river to the bluff
of the " bottom" would have been drowned. In the
early part of February of this year (1883) the
highest flood ever known, except possibly that of
1847 and that of 1828, occurred, filled a large num-
ber of houses in Indianola, driving out the occupants
and damaging walls and furniture, and sweeping clear
over the National road for the first time since 1847.
It was more than a foot higher than either flood of
1875. Levees now protect the west side — the only one
endangered by floods to any extent within the limits of
costly improvements — for nearly three miles south of
the Vaudalia Railroad to a point opposite the mouth
of Pleasant Run. These will be extended in time
parallel with the levees on the east side below Pleasant
Run. These are the chief levees on the river. Some
small ones have been made along the south bank of
Fall Creek at the northern limit of the city site.
Until 1852 the only bridge over White River in or
near the town was that built by the national govern-
ment for the great national highway, the " Cumber-
land road." This was finished in 1833, and is still
in constant use, considerably dilapidated through cul-
pable neglect, but still solid in its arches and service-
able. In 1852 the Vandalia Railroad Company put
up a bridge for their line a quarter of a mile south of
the old one. Since then there have been built for
railroad or ordinary service no less than nine bridges,
all of iron or mixed iron and timber. They are, be-
ginning at the north, the Lafayette or Crawfordsville
road wagon-bridge, the Upper Belt road bridge, the
Michigan Street and Washington Street wagon-
bridges, the old National road bridge, the St. Louis
Railroad bridge, the Vandalia Railroad bridge, the
Old Cemetery wagon-bridge, the Vinoennes Railroad
bridge, the Morris Street wagon-bridge, the Lower
Belt road bridge, — eleven in all. The bridges on
the smaller streams and the remainder of the canal
are too numerous to be worth special notice.
Turnpikes. — All the wagon-roads out of the city
are now graveled, and little inferior to macadamized
roads. For a few years, some thirty years or so ago,
a sort of mania for. plank-roads ran over the State,
and the western division of the National road was
planked. It had then been given to the State by the
general government (as had all the remainder of the
road to the States through which it passed), and by
the State had been assigned to a plank-road company,
which made this improvement. It was a failure after
the first few mouths. The planks warped, the ends
turned up, and the covering soon became a nuisance,
and was abandoned for coarse gravel, which packs
solidly and makes a fairly smooth, durable, and dry
road. Many of the county and neighborhood roads
have been improved in the same way. Most of these
improved roads are held by companies and are main-
tained by tolls, which in the case of the city roads
prove to be a handsome return upon the investment.
Some of them have been sold to the county and made
free, but several are still held by the companies. The
principal roads leading out of the city are the east and
west divisions of the National road ; northeast, the
Pendleton road ; southeast, the south division of the
Michigan road and the Old Shelbyville road ; south,
the Madison road, the "Three Notch" road, the Bluff
road ; southwest, the Mooresville road ; northwest,
the Crawfordsville and Lafayette road and the north
division of the Michigan road ; north, the Westfield
and the Old Noblesville road.
Area and Present Condition. — The original city
plat was a square mile, laid off in the centre of four
square miles donated by Congress in 1816 for a site
16
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
for the State capital. The half-mile border around
this square was made " out-lots," and used as farm
lands for years, but after 1847 was rapidly absorbed
into the city, until at the commencement of the civil
war the entire " donation" was included in the city,
and was more or less compactly built over. The town
government was extended over the whole four sections
in 1838, but it was ten years later, following the
completion of the first railway, before any consider-
able occupancy of this tract was attempted, and then
it was mainly in the vicinity of the new railway depot.
Many additions of greater or less extent have been
made, more than doubling the area of the original
four sections of the "donation." It is estimated now
(1883) that an area of about eleven square miles (or
seven thousand acres) is included in the limits of the
city. It occupies a little more than one-fourth of the
area of Centre township, which is a little larger than
a Congressional township of six miles square.
Population. — The first estimate of population rests
upon an enumeration made by visitors of the Union
Sunday-school in the spring of 1824, when 100
families were counted upon the "donation," making
a probable population of 500 or more, represented by
100 voters, or 120 possibly, with 50 voters repre-
senting nobody but themselves, or a total population
of near 600. In 1827 a careful census was taken,
and the population found to count up 1066. In
1830 it was about 1500; in 1840,4000; in 1850,
8034; in 1860, 18,611; in 1870, 48,244; in 1880,
75,056. It is now estimated at about 95,000, of
which one-sixth is foreign-born, mainly Irish and
Germans, the former counting a little more than
half of the latter, or, with all other foreign-born
population, making a little more than half of all
of that class. In 1880 the whole of German birth
was 6070 : of Irish birth, 3660 ; and of all other
foreign nationalities, 2880. The proportions are
now about 8000, 4000, and 3000. The basis of the
estimate of population that gives the closest as well
as the most trustworthy result is that of the enu-
meration of school children under the law. This is
made every year to determine the ratio of distribu-
tion of the State's school fund, and is probably as
accurate as the national census. It shows the pro-
portion of children of " school age" (from six to
twenty-one) in 1880 to have been to the whole popu-
lation as one to two and four-fifths. The school
enumeration for 1883 makes the total 33,079, which
gives at the ascertained ratio a population a little
less than 93,000. The estimate of the secretary of
the Board of Trade is 100,000, but no safe basis of
calculation will give that result. A fair estimate on
the 1st of January, 1884, makes the population
95,000.
Governinenf. — The city government is composed
of a mayor. Board of Aldermen, Common Council,
clerk, treasurer, and assessor, elected by popular
vote ; marshal, chief of the fire department, attorney,
elected by the Council ; and a Board of Police Com-
missioners, appointed by the State officers and paid
by the city, who have entire control of the police
force, also paid by the city. The officers elected by
the people serve two years, the others one. The
police commissioners go out and are replaced in suc-
cessive years, one in one, one in two, and one in
three.
Police. — The police force consists of a chief, two
captains, and sixty-five men. Besides the regular
force there are three or four specially in charge of
the Union Depot, authorized by the city but paid
by the Union Railway Company. The merchants'
police, a small force of men, is appointed by the city,
but paid by the citizens whose property is specially
in their care.
The Fire Department consists of a chief and
his assistants, and a working force, held in this
service exclusively, of seventy-seven men, including
the officers named. It has six steam-engines, four
hose-reels, two hookand-ladder wagons, uses six
hundred and twenty-two hydrants, one hundred and
forty-nine cisterns, ranging in capacity from one
thousand to two thousand five hundred barrels, and
one hundred and thirty electric signal-boxes or alarm
stations.
Streets. — There are four hundred and fifty streets,
and larger alleys used as streets, all more or less
improved by grading and graveling or bowldering.
A very few are paved with wooden blocks, and
one of these has within a year been torn up and
AREA AND PRESENT CONDITION OF INDIANAPOLIS.
17
replaced by bowlders. A large number of streets
are bowldered, but much the larger portion are
graded and covered heavily with coarse gravel,
which is found to make a good durable street, given
to grind into dust and mud, but always available and
cheap. The aggregate length of streets is not accu-
rately known, but as a few are four miles long or
more, and a great many from one to two miles, the
aggregate length is conjectured to be probably be-
tween seven hundred and eight hundred miles. On
them is a total length of water-main of fifty-one
miles, with twenty-five large iron drinking-fountains
" for man and beast." With these are ninety miles
of gas-mains and two thousand four hundred and
seventy-nine lamps. There are thirteen lines of
street railways, owning five hundred mules and em-
ploying one hundred drivers. All belong to one
company.
Parks. — A very pleasing feature of the city is its
parks, of which there are four: 1st, Circle Park, in-
teDded to have been put in the centre of the " dona-
tion," as the site of the Governor's official residence,
but never used for that purpose, and, on account of
the propinquity of Pogue's Run bottom, put a little
aside from the central point, which is a half-square
south of the southeast corner of Washington and
Illinois Streets ; 2d, Military Park, the remains of a
military reservation ; 3d, University Park, held by
the city on consent of the Legislature, but given
originally to help endow a State University at the
capital; 4th, Garfield Park, originally Southern Park,
a large tract at the extreme south of the city, pur-
chased some years ago to give the population of that
part of the city a place of recreation, but so far in-
adequately improved.
Taxes. — The levy for general purposes last year
was 90 cents on $100, for school purposes 22 cents,
making a total of $1.12, the legal limit of taxation
for city purposes. This rate is levied on a total
valuation of $52,633,510, divided into "realty,"
$22,863,525; "improvements," $16,363,200; "per-
sonal," $13,406,755. There are .some slight discrep-
ancies in these statements, as the assessors' returns
had not been corrected when this report was given.
The total valuation of property for taxation in 1850
was $2,326,185 ; in 1860, $10,700,000 ; in 1866, the
first valuation after the close of the war, $24,835,750 ;
in 1870, $24,656,460. A decline in real estate came
in 1868, the valuation dropping from $25,500,000 in
1867 to $24,000,000 in 1868, and to $22,000,000
in 1869, recovering partially in 1870, and rising to
$30,000,000 in 1871. The rise continued till 1874,
then the financial crash of 1873 began to operate,
and a second decline began, which is now about
overcome. The city revenue for the last year was
$591,312.
Business. — The secretary of the Board of Trade
reports for the year ending with the end of 1882
that there were 772 manufacturing establishments in
the city, with $12,270,000 of capital, employing an
average of 12,000 hands at an average rate of $2.20
a day, using $18,730,000 of material, and producing
$30,100,000 of merchantable goods. The wholesale
trade in sixteen lines of business amounted to $25,-
[ 440,000. The total clearances of the clearing-house
I was $101,577,523. There are 12 banks in the city,
I 6 national and 6 private, with a total capital of
$2,880,000. The average of monthly deposits was
$11,435,000. Total receipts of grain for 1882, 21,.
j 242,897 bushels; of coal, about 400,000 tons, or
i 202,711 for the last six months. Of live-stock,
j 5,319,611 hogs, 640,363 cattle, 849,936 sheep, 50,-
795 horses, of which there was disposed of in the
city 3,020,913 hogs, 106,178 cattle, 70,543 sheep,
2533 horses. Of lumber, 125,000 M's, or 125,-
000,000 feet. The Board of Trade has 1000 mem-
bers.
Railroads. — Counting the two divisions of the
JefFersonville Railroad separately, as they were built
and operated at first, there are fourteen railroads com-
pleted and in operation centring in Indianapolis,
running altogether 114 passenger trains both ways
daily, and handling here an average of 2500 freight
cars daily, each car having a capacity of twelve tons
at least, and making a total daily tonnage of 30,000
tons, equal to the trade of a seaport receiving and
sending out thirty vessels daily of 1 000 tons each.
Besides the fourteen lines of railroad centring in
the city, there is the Union Railway Company with
a length of track enough to connect them all at
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
the Union Passenger Depot, and now by lease in
control of the Belt Railway, which very nearly en-
circles the city, and connects all the roads for freight
purposes by a line that enables transfers of cars and
trains to be made outside of the city, avoiding the
obstruction of many streets. Two new roads are in
progress. Every county in the State but three can
be reached by rail, and nearly every county-seat can
be visited and a return made the same day.
Newspapers and Periodicals. — There are six
daily newspapers in the city, all morning issues ex-
cept one. There is one semi-weekly, twenty-five
weeklies (including the weekly editions of dailies),
one semi-monthly, and seventeen monthlies.
Amusements. — There are four theatres, one hun-
dred and sixty public halls, four military companies,
four musical societies, and three brass bands ; ten
libraries, including the State and City and County,
and the State Geological Museum, containing over
100,000 specimens, and valued at over $100,000.
Business Associations. — Insurance fifteen ; for man-
ufactures and other purposes incorporated, sixty-one,
with a capital of $8,300,000 ; building and loan socie-
ties nineteen, with an aggregate capital of $1,755,000 ;
miscellaneous associations, fifty-five ; hotels, forty.
Professions. — Lawyers, two hundred ; physicians,
two hundred and thirty-two. (School-teachers and
preachers, see Schools and Churches.)
Secret Societies. — The secret societies number 23,
with 143 lodges or separate organizations. The Ma-
sons have 21 lodges of whites and 6 of colored mem-
bers ; the Odd-Fellows have 23 in all ; the Knights
of Pythias have 13 ; the Hibernians have 3. Be-
sides these the Red Men, and Elks, and Druids, and
several other orders have each one or more lodges.
Churches. — Baptist, 13 ; Catholic, 7 ; Christian,
6 ; Congregational, 2 ; Episcopal, 5 ; Reformed Epis-
copal, 1 ; Evangelical Alliance, 1 ; United Brethren,
1 ; Friends, 1 ; German Reformed, 3 ; Hebrews, 2 ;
Lutheran, 6 ; Methodist, 23 ; Protestant Methodist,
1; Presbyterian, 14; Swedenborgian, 1; United
Presbyterian, 1. In all there are 88 churches in the
city. Two denominations that at one time were quite
prominent, the Universalist and Unitarian, have disap-
peared altogether in the last few years as distinct sects.
Health and Sanitary Conditions. — The station
at Indianapolis of the United States Signal Service
reports for the last year an annual mean of tempei:i-
ture of 53.8 ; an annual mean of humidity of 71.1 ;
107 clear days, 141 fair days-, and 117 cloudy days ;
a mean fill of rain and snow of 53.68 inches ; the
highest temperature 94°, the lowest 10° below zero.
Drainage is efiected by an incomplete but steadily
advancing system of sewage, with two trunk lines at
present on Washington and South Streets, and a
number of small tributary sewers. The health of
the city is surpassed by no city and not many rural
regions in the world. The last report of the Board of
Health covers seven months from January to July,
inclusive, 1883, and shows, with the months of the
preceding year back to July, an average of less than
140 a month. This gives a death-rate of 18s in
1000 ; that of London i.s 21 1 per 1000, of Paris 26],
of Vienna 29, of New York 29f . Very few rural
communities in Europe or this country show a death-
rate lower than 19 in 1000.
Schools. — The free school system went into opera-
tion in 1853, when the accumulation of public funds
had allowed the previous purchase of grounds and
the erection of houses sufficient for the town's needs,
a popular vote six years before having authorized a
special city tax for school purposes. The average at-
tendance at the outset in April, 1853, was 340'. In
three years it was 1400. It is now (1883) 9938,
while 13,685 children are enrolled on the school rec-
ords, and the city contains a juvenile population of
school age (from six to twenty-one) of 33,079. The
enrollment is considerably less than half of the popu-
lation, while the attendance is about one-third. This
is a reduction of three per cent, in two years. There
are now belonging to the public school system 29 brick
houses and 2 frame. Of these 2 are one story, 25
are two stories, 3 of three stories ; 8 have four rooms
or less, 11 have eight rooms, 12 have nine rooms.
In all there are 245 rooms, with a seating capacity of
12,746, nearly equal to the entire enrollment. Value
of grounds and buildings, $938,419.30. There are
19 male teachers, 234 female teachers ; 21 are col-
ored, 232 white. Salaries in the High School,
I maximum $2000, minimum $700, average $1037 ;
GENERAL VIEW AND HISTORICAL OUTLINE.
19
in Primary schools, maximum $1100, minimum
$650, average $900.92 ; grade teachers, maximum
$650, minimum $300, average $500.
Private schools are nearly as numerous as public
schools, but, of course, less largely attended. There are
twenty-six of these, some of them of a denominational
character, some wholly secular, but most of a higher
grade than the primaries of the public system. A
few will rank with the preparatory schools of the
best colleges. Besides there are five kindergartens.
Of the collegiate class of educational institutions,
there are four medical schools authorized to give
diplomas and degrees, one law school of the same
grade, and, more considerable than these, Butler Uni-
versity, now at Irvington, formerly the Northwestern
Christian University, and located in the northeastern
part of the city.
Under the same management as the public schools
is the Public Library, supported by a tax of two cents
on one hundred dollars, and containing about forty
thousand volumes.
General View and Historical Outline. — A sum-
mary of the history of the city and of its dififerent
stages of growth, with a glance at its present condi-
tion, will give the reader a more definite and durable
impression of such points as he may desire to retain
for his own purposes or for the information of others,
than he could obtain from the best methodized and
most complete system of details unaccompanied by
such an outline. This "general view" will, there-
fore, present the epochs in the progress of Indianap-
olis, and leave the details of development in each to
the chapters treating the different departments which
make up the body of its history.
The first settlement of Marion County may be
safely dated in the spring of 1820, though there is a
probability of the arrival of one settler a year earlier,
and contemporaneously with the Whetzel (relatives
of the noted Indian-fighter of West Virginia, Lewis
Whetzel) settlement at the bluffs of White River,
or, as the Indians called it, Wah-me-ca-me-ca. In
the fall of 1818 the Delaware tribes by treaty ceded
to the United States the region now known as Cen-
tral Indiana, with a reservation of possession till
1821. Little more regard was paid to Indian rights
then than since, and settlers began, with leave or
without it, to take up lands in the " New Purchase,"
as it was called, within six months after the bargain
was made. By midsummer, 1820, there was a little
village collected along and near the east bank of
White River, and on the 7th of June the commis-
sioners of the State Legislature selected it as the site
of the future capital. Congress had given the State,
on its admission into the Union in 1816, four sec-
tions, or two miles square, for a capital site, on any
of the unsold lands of the government, and at the
junction of Fall Creek and White River the location
was fixed. The town was laid out in the summer of
1821, one mile square, with the remainder of the
four sections divided round it into " out-lots." The
first sale of lots was held in the fall of that year, the
proceeds to go to the erection of such buildings as
the State should require at its capital. Here begins
the first stage of the city's existence.
First Period. — From the first undisputed settle-
ment in the spring of 1820 to the removal of the
State offices from Corydon in the fall of 1824, and
the first meeting of the Legislature the following
winter, a period of nearly five years, Indianapolis was
a pioneer village, scattered about in the dense woods,
grievously troubled with chills and fever, and little
more encouraged for the future than any other little
county town. The first newspaper was started in
1822, the next in 1823 ; the first Sunday-school in
1823; the first church was built in 1824; the post-
oifice opened in March, 1822.
Second Period. — From the arrival of the capital,
in a four-horse wagon and ten days from the Ohio,
to the completion of the first railway in October,
1847, an interval of nearly twenty-three years, the
town was passing through its second stage. It grew
from a village to a respectable town, with several par-
tially developed germs of industrie.s, which have since
become second to very few in the Union, and with a
mayor and Council and the name and airs of a city.
For the first eleven years of this period the State
Legislature met in the county court-house. In 1832
came the first town government by " trustees,"
changed to " couneilmen" in 1888, and to " mayor
and Council" in 1847. In 1835 the old State-
20
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
House was completed, and the first fire-engine bought.
In 1834 the first bank (the old State Bank) was
chartered. In 1832 the first manufacturing enter-
prise was put in operation, and failed in a year or
two more. The fir.st brewery, tobacco-factory, linseed-
oil mill, paper-mill, merchant flour-mill, woolen-mill,
soap-factory, the first pork-packing, all date from
about 1835 to 1840. An iron foundry was at-
tempted in 1832, but failed very soon. In 1842
the first steps were taken to establish the Asylum for
the Insane. In 1843 the first tax was levied to pre-
pare for the Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb. In
1845 a similar levy was made to establish the Asylum
for the Blind. These are all located in or near the
city. This was a period of planting rather than
growth. The failure of the " Internal Improve-
ment" system in 1839 left the town with a few
miles of useless canal. The river was never naviga-
ble except for flat-boats in spring freshets. But one
steamer ever reached the town, and it did not get
back for six months. There were no means of trans-
portation, natural or artificial, but dirt-roads " cross-
layed" or " corduroyed," and covered four-horse
wagons hauling from Cincinnati at a dollar a hun-
dred. All this restriction of business and inter-
course changed a good deal with the completion of
the old Madison Railroad, which had formed part of
the State's system of improvements, and been sold to
a company when the State failed. Within a half-
dozen years came a half-dozen more railroads, and
the city entered what may be called its " third
period," though, except in its greater rate of progress,
there is little to distinguish it from that which fol-
lowed it and covers the city's history to the present
time.
Third Period. — From the completion of the first
railroad, Oct. 1, 1847, to the breaking out of the
civil war in April, 18t)l, a period of thirteen years
and a half, there was a decided quickening of the
city's energy and development. To it belongs the
establishment of the free school system in 1853, and
the permanent establishment of all the present lead-
ing industries in iron, lumber, grain, and pork.
There were the seeds and some wholesome sprouts of
all these before, but with the opening of railroad
transportation came an impulse that made almost a
new creation. The Jefi'ersonville Railroad, the Belle-
fontaine (Bee Line), the Vandalia, and the Lafayttte
were all completed in 1852, and portions of all were
in operation a year or two earlier. The Central (Pan
Handle) was completed in 1853, the Peru in 1854,
the Cincinnati (now with Lafayette making Cin-
cinnati, Indianapolis, St. Louis and Chicago) in
1853, the Union tracks and depot in 1853. With
the concentration of the State's troops here dur-
ing the war, and the business of all kinds requireil
for their care, equipment, and transportation, came
a sudden force of growth which compelled business
to betake itself to several convenient streets, when
previously it had been confined mainly to Wasli-
ington Street and the vicinity of the Union
Depot. Population more than doubled during this
period, from eight thousand in 1850 to eighteen
thousand in 1860, but it nearly tripled from 1860 to
1870. The civil war and the changes it forced or
aided may, therefore, properly mark an epoch in the
city's history and begin the " fourth period."
Fourth Period. — From 1861 to 1883, twenty-two
years, population increased from forty-eight thousand
to about ninety-five thousand, and the amount of busi-
ness increased in a still larger proportion. The Junc-
tion, the Vincennes, the Bloomington and Western,
the St. Louis, the Springfield and Decatur, the Chi-
cago Air Line, and the Belt Railroads have all been
built in this period, and two others projected. Other
results are better exhibited in a condensed state-
ment of the present condition of the city, produced
by the changes and advances in the sixty-three years
covered by these four periods. One form of these
combined results may be stated in the favorite boast
of the citizens, that " Indianapolis is the largest
wholly inland city in the United States." It has not
and never has had any navigable water nearer than
the Ohio and the lower Wabash, except, as already
remarked, that freshets in the river occasionally let a
few flat-boats, loaded with grain, or whiskey, or pork,
or poultry, or hay, down into the Mississippi to the
towns in the cotton and sugar region. But these
opportunities were uncertain, and the voyages were
uncertain when opportunities were used, so that flat-
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
21
boating never contributed sensibly to the growth of
Indianapolis.
CHAPTER III.
First Period — Early Settlements — Organization of Marion
County and Erection of Townships — Erection of Public
Buildings — Notable Events and Incidents of the Early Set-
tlement and of Later Years — Opening of Roads — Original
Entries of Lands in the County.
Although the treaty of 1818 expressly conceded
the occupancy of the " New Purchase," as it was called
by the whites, to the Indians till 1821, its profusion of
game, its fertility, its abundance of excellent building
timber began to allure settlers from the White Water
Valley before a year had passed, and from the Ohio
River before the reservation had expired. It will
give the reader a suggestion of the natural attractions
of the country to suggest that Mr. William H. Jones,
a leading dealer in lumber in the city, aided when a
boy, in 1824, in catching young fawns iu the vicinity
of the present site of the Vandalia Railroad depot
and of the corner of West and Merrill Streets ; that
Robert Harding, one of the earliest settlers, killed a
deer on the area called the " donation" for the first
Fourth of July celebration and barbecue in 1822 ;
that as late as 1845 or later wild turkeys in their
migrations made a roost in a large sugar grove tliat
covered the portion of the present city site about
Meridian, Illinois, and Tennessee Streets above the
crossing of St. Clair or thereabouts. As late as 1845
a turkey scared from this roost by hunters ran into
the city and into the basement of what was called the
" Governor's House," in Circle Park, and was caught
there. Lost quail were frequently heard piping in the
back yards of residences. In 1822 saddles of veni-
Bon sold at twenty-five to fifty cents, wild turkeys at
ten to twelve and a half, a bushel of wild pigeons for
fwenty-five cents. An early sketch of the condition
of the country says, " A traveler who ascended the
river a few years prior to the settlement saw the banks
frequently dotted with wigwams and the stream en-
livened by Indian canoes. At night parties for ' fire-
hunting' or ' fire-fishing' were frequent among the
Indians, and occasionally formed by thoii- white suc-
cessors."
The first settlers drawn to the New Purchase were
Jacob Whetzel and his son Cyrus. The former was
the brother, the latter the nephew of the noted scout
and Indian-fighter, Lewis Whetzel, or Wetzel, dis-
tinguished in the bloody annals of West Virginia and
Pennsylvania. " The elder Whetzel," says Mr. Now-
land, in his " Promment Citizens," " soon after the
conclusion of the St. Mary's treaty went to Ander-
son, bead chief of the Delawares, who lived in the
large Delaware town named for the chief and retain-
ing the name still, and from him obtained pormi.ssion
to ' blaze a trace' from the White Water in Franklin
County to the Blufi's of White River.' It may be as
well to explain for the benefit of later settlers that
" blazing" was cutting away a large strip of bark and
wood from a tree-trunk on the side next to the pro-
posed " trace" or road. Such a mark would remain
conspicuous for many months in an interminable
forest without a sign of human presence except that,
and a series of them close together along the line of
a proposed road would be a sure and easy guide to
backwoodsmen or any traveler with sense enough to
be trusted alone. The two Whetzels came to the
BluiFs in the spring of 1819, before the government
surveys were completed or commenced in some cases.
Their settlement was a little below the present south
boundary of the county.
" The first white residents of the county," Mr. Dun-
can (before referred to) says, " were Judge Fabius
M. Finch, his father and family, who came to the site
of Noblesville or near it in. the spring of 1819, ' that
region being then a part of the county, but separated
in a few years. In the fidl of 1818 one Dr. Douglass
came up the river from below to the Blufi's, and re-
mained there a short time, and in January, 1819,
James Paxton came down the river from the upper
waters to the site of the city, and came again a year
later in 1820. The first settler in the present area of
the county will probably remain an unsettled ques-
tion for all time, as it was a disputed point in 1822,
has been ever since, and is more peremptorily disputed
now than ever. The prevailing tradition is that
George Pogue, a blacksmith from the White Water
22
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
settlements, came here March 2, 1819, building a
double log cabin on the line of Michigan Street a little
way east of the creek, on the high ground bordering
the creek bottom, and lived there with his family,
the solitary occupants of Marion County within its
present limits, till the 27th of the following February,
when John and James McCormick arrived with their
families and built cabins on the river bank near the
old National road bridge. The priority of settlement
lies between these families and Mr. Pogue's. Within
a few months past one William H. White, of Han-
cock County, claims that he was born on the city site
Oct. 4, 1819, near where Odd-Fellows' Hall now
stands, on the corner of Washington and Pennsyl-
vania Streets. Old settlers as early as 1820-21
have no recollection of any account of such an occur-
rence, and births were too rare in those days to allow
the first one in the county or any suggestion of it,
however vague or doubtful, to be forgotten. The im-
pression seems to be that Mr. White has been misled
by some accidental confusion or by the failing
memory of his relatives. He may be right, but he
is distrusted by settlers who arrived here within a
year of the alleged occurrence, and discredited by
the opportunities of knowing the truth of many who
arrived within two years and repel his claim.
In the summer of 1822, a little more than a year
after Pogue's death. Dr. Samuel G. Mitchell, the old-
est physician in the place, published in the Gazette,
the first paper in the place, a discussion of the pre-
tensions of Pogue to the honor of being the first
settler, in which he maintained that the McCormicks
were the first, and that Pogue came a month later,
about the time. the Maxwells and Cowan came. No
reply was made to this direct attack on the general
opinion of the settlers, which certainly suggests a
reasonable probability that its statement was indis-
putable, and that the tradition of a general concur-
rence in awarding Pogue the credit is ill-founded.
But there comes in here the countervailing considera-
tion that the pioneers of the backwoods were little
given to glorifying the pen or looking to the papers
for instruction. Nobody may have been disposed to
take the trouble to contradict what he knew nobody
but Mitchell believed, or he may, very fixirly, have
concluded that in a little two-year-old village in the
woods it would be less trouble to contradict the story
" by word of mouth" to every man in the place than
to attempt so unusual a feat as writing for the papers.
But this early and public contest of Pogue's claim by
an intelligent man, at a time when there could hardly
have been an adult, male or female, who did not know
the truth, creates a strong doubt against the current
of tradition. The probability inclines to Mrs. Pogue's
statement at an " Old Settlers' " meeting in 1854, as
Mr. Robert B. Duncan remembers it. She was more
than fourscore years old then, but her memory of
early events seemed clear and accurate. She said
that her husband and family came here on the 2d of
March, 1820, and the McCormicks came on the 7th
of the same month. This seems to be final as to the
first settlement being made in 1820 instead of 1819,
as has generally been believed, whether it settles the
question of individual pi'iority or not. Where two or
three families arrive at a place in a primeval forest
within four or five days of each other, and a mile or
two apart, it is easy to see how each set of the sepa-
rated settlers may suppose itself the first. Virtually
they are simultaneous arrivals, and the truth, or at
least the probability, of history compromises this
long-mooted question by concluding that the Pogues
and McCormicks were all first settlers.
Whether Pogue was the first man to live here or
not, he was certainly the first to die here. Mr. Now-
land's description of the man and account of his death
so strikingly exhibit some of the characteristics of the
time and country that it is reproduced here. " George
Pogue was a large, broad-shouldered, and stout man,
with dark hair, eyes, and complexion, about fifty years
of age, and a native of North Carolina. His dress
was like that of a Pennsylvania Dutchman, a drab
overcoat with many capes, and a broad-brimmed felt
hat. He was a blacksmith, and the first of that trade
to enter the ' New Purchase.' To look at the man as
we saw him last, one would think he was not afraid to
meet a whole camp of Delawares in battle array, which
fearlessness, in fact, was most probably the cause of
his death. One evening about twilight a straggling
Indian, known to the settlers as well as to the In-
dians as Wyandotte John, stopped at the cabin of Mr.
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
23
Pogue and asked to stay all night. Mr. Pogue did
not like to keep him, but thought it best not to refuse,
as the Indian was known to be a bad and very des-
perate man, having left his own tribe in Ohio for some
oflFense, and was now wandering among the various
Indiana tribes. His principal lodging-place the pre-
vious winter was a hollow sycamore log that lay under
the bluff and just above the east end of the National
road bridge over White River. (Above the site of
the bridge, Mr. Nowland means, as the bridge was not
buUt for more than ten years after.) On the upper
side of the log he had hooks, made by cutting the
forks or limbs of bushes, on which he rested his gun.
At the open end of the log next to the water he
built his fire, which rendered his domicile as comfort-
able as most of the cabins. After John was furnished
with something to eat, Mr. Pogue, knowing him to be
traveling from one Indian camp to another, inquired
if he had seen any white man's horses at any of the
camps. John said ho had left a camp of Delawares
that morning, describing the place to be on Buck
Creek, about twelve miles east, and near where the
Rushville State road crosses that creek ; that he had
seen horses there with iron hoofs (they had been
shod), and described the horses so minutely as to lead
Mr. Pogue to believe they were his. Although the
horses were described so accurately, Mr. Pogue was
afraid that it was a deception to lure him into the
woods, and mentioned his suspicions to his family.
When the Indian left the next morning he took a
direction towards the river, where nearly all the set-
tlement was. Pogue followed him for some distance
to see whether he would turn his course towards the
Indian camps, but found that he kept directly on
towards the river. Mr. Pogue returned to his cabin
and told his family he was going to the Indian camp
for his horses. He took his gun, and with his dog
set out on foot for the Delaware camp, and was never
afterwards seen or heard of. We remember that there
were a great many conflicting stories about his clothes
and horses being seen in possession of the Indians,
all of which were untrue. There can be no doubt
that the Wyandotte told Mr. Pogue the truth in
regard to the horses, and in his endeavor to get pos-
session of them had a difficulty with the Delawares
and was killed, at least that was the prevailing opinion
at the time. Nothing has ever been learned of his
fate to this day, further than that he was never seen
or heard of again, though the settlers formed a com-
pany to search all the Indian camps about within fifty
miles to find some indication that might lead to a
clearing up of the mystery." Pogue's Creek, once
the pride and now the pest of the city, takes its name
from the proto-martyr, if not proto-settler, of the city
and county.
Within a week or two after the arrival of the Mc-
Cormicks, John Maxwell and John Cowan came and
built on the high ground near the present crossing of
the Crawfordsville road over Fall Creek, very near the
site of the City Hospital. During the following
three months a number of new-comers arrived, and
settled principally in the vicinity of the river. Those
best remembered are the Davis brothers ( Henry and
Samuel), Isaac Wilson (who built the first cabin on
what was afterwards the old town plat in May), Robert
Harding, Mr. Barnhill, Mr. Corbaley, Mr. "Van Blari-
cum. About the time of the arrival of the last of this
first group of pioneers the State capital was located here
by the commissioners appointed by the Legislature
for that purpose.
When the State was admitted into the Union,
April 19, 1816, a donation of four sections — four
square miles — was made by Congress for the site of
a capital, to be located wherever the State might
choose upon unsold lands of the government. No
selection had been made or attempted in the four
years since the State's admission. The capital, which
had been kept at Vincennes by Governor Harrison
during his administration as Territorial Governor,
from 1801 to 1812, was removed to Corydon, Harri-
son Co., by the Legislature, May 1, 1813, and re-
mained there till its permanent settlement here in
the fall of 1824. On the llth of January, 1820,
the Legislature appointed ten commissioners to make
selection of a site for a permanent capital. They
were John Tipton (an old ludian trader), John Con-
ner (brother of William above referred to, and like
him reared from childhood among the Indians, the
founder of Connersville), George Hunt, John Gilli-
land, Stephen Ludlow, Joseph Bartholomew, Jesse
24
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
B. Durham, Frederick Rapp, William Prince, Thomas
Emerson. They were ordered to meet at Conner's
place (north of the city) early in the spring. Appar-
ently only half of them served, as only five votes
were given in determining the selection. But Mr.
Nowland says there were nine when the party got to
Conner's, Mr. Prince alone being unable to attend.
If this is correct there must have been four commis-
sioners who did not like any of the sites examined
and declined to vote. A part of them met at Vin-
cennes about the middle of May, 1820, and were
joined there by the father and uncle of Mr. Nowland,
who were on their way to Kentucky from Illinois,
but were persuaded to accompany the commissioners.
The party ascended the river to the Bluflfs, where
the Whetzels had settled the year before and had
been joined by four or five other families. After
resting a day at this point and making an examina-
tion of it, they came on up to the mouth of Fall
Creek, and remained a day, some of them expressing
themselves pleased with the country and disposed to
put the capital here. Mr. Nowland told the commis-
sioners that if the location were made here he would
move out in the fall, and do all he could to induce
other Kentuckians to join him. The mouth of Fall
Creek had been the customary place of crossing the
river by the whites ever since the White River Valley
had been known to them. Mr. Nowland (the author)
says that Lieut, (afterwards General and President)
Taylor told him that he had crossed the river here
with his force when going from Louisville to the Wa-
bash to build Fort Harrison, now Terra Haute, in
1811. While the force was here Col. Abel C. Pep-
per, United States Marshal of the State under Taylor,
met Tecumseh, who was on a mission to the Dela-
wares, doubtless to induce them to join his combina-
tion against the whites. The party went on to
Conner's, some sixteen miles north, as before stated,
and examined the situation there. One or two
seemed to favor it, but the whole party returned here,
and after re-examining the country, decided on the
7th of June, 1820, by vote of three to two, for the
Bluffs, to locate the capital here. On the 6th of
January following, 1821, the selection was approved
by the Legislature and the location decided irrevocably.
The commissioners reported that they had selected
Sections 1 and 12, east and west fractional sections
numbered 2, east fractional section numbered 1 1 ,
and so much of the east part of west fractional sec-
tion numbered 3, to be set off by a line north and
south, as will complete the donation of two thou-
sand five hundred and sixty acres, in Township 15,
Range 3 east. The Legislature, after approving the
location, named the future city and capital Indianapo-
lis, the " city of Indiana." The name was suggested
by the late Judge Jeremiah Sullivan, in the com-
mittee charged with the preparation of the confirma-
tory bill. He gave an interesting account of the
affair in a letter to Governor Baker, which may be
pertinently introduced here :
" I have a very distinct recollection of the great
diversity of opinion that prevailed as to the name
by which the new town should receive legislative
baptism. The bill, if I remember aright, was re-
ported by Judge Polk, and was in the main very
acceptable. A blank, of course, was left for the
name of the town that was to become the seat of
government, and during the two or three days we
spent in endeavoring to fill the blank there wa.^
in the debate some sharpness and much amuse-
ment. Gen. Marston G. Clark, of Washington
County, proposed ' Tecumseh' as the name, and
very earnestly insisted on its adoption. When it
failed he suggested other Indian names, which I
have forgotten. They all were rejected. A member
proposed ' Suwarrow,' which met with no favor.
Other names were proposed, discussed, laughed at,
and voted down, and the House, without coming to
any agreement, adjourned until the next day. There
were many amusing things said, but my remem-
brance of them is not sufficiently distinct to state
them with accuracy. I had gone to Corydon with
the intention of proposing Indianapolis as the name
of the town, and on the evening of the adjourn-
ment above mentioned, or the next morning, I sug-
gested to Mr. Samuel Merrill, the representative
from Switzerland County, the name I proposed.
He at once adopted it, and said he would support
it. We together called on Governor Jennings, who
had been a witness of the amusing proceedings the
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
25
day previous, and told him what conclusion we had
come to, and asked him what he thought of the
Dame. He gave us to understand that he favored
it, and that he would not hesitate to so express him-
self When the House met and went into com-
mittee on the bill, I moved to fill the blank with
Indianapolis. The name created quite a laugh. Mr.
Merrill, however, seconded the motion. We dis-
cussed the matter fully, gave our reasons in sup-
port of the proposition, the members conversed with
each other informally in regard to it, and the name
gradually commended itself to the committee, and
was adopted. The principal reason in favor of adopt-
ing the name proposed — to wit. that the Greek ter-
mination would indicate to all the world the locality
of the town — was, I am sure, the reason that over-
came the opposition to the name. The town was
finally named Indianapolis with but little if any op-
position." One may well feel puzzled to understand
the force exerted by the argument that " the Greek
termination of the name would indicate the locality
of the town." The termination means " city," and
that is all. The other half of the name would in-
dicate locality though, and the combination would
fairly enough suggest a State capital, so that its apt-
ness is evident, whether the argument that secured it
was sound or not.
By the same act of approval and naming the new
capital the Legislature appointed Christopher Harri-
son (no relative of the general's), James Jones, and
Samuel P. Booker commissioners to lay oif the town.
They were directed to meet on the site on the first
Monday of April, 1821, to perform that duty, and
make plats or maps of the town, one for the Secretary
of State and one for the State agent. They were
also to advertise and hold a sale of the lots as soon as
practicable, reserving the alternate lots. The pro-
ceeds of the sales were to be used in erecting the
buildings required by the government. Harrison was
the only one of the commissioners who attempted to
perform his duties. He was a Marylander by birth,
a very eccentric man, of excellent education and cul-
tivated tastes, who came to Southern Indiana early
in the century, and some years after the completion
of his work as commissioner returned to Maryland,
and lived to a ripe old age. It is said on good au-
thority that he was engaged to be married to Miss
Elizabeth Patterson, a noted belle of Baltimore, but
the attentions of Prince Jerome Bonaparte over-
powered her scruples and her fiiith, and she married
the brother of the great Corsicau, only to find herself
repudiated by him and excluded from the ambition
that had betrayed her. Mr. Harrison came to Jeffer-
son County about 1804, and lived there the life of
a hermit with his dogs and books for several years,
then removed to Salem, Washington Co., and there
his rare attainments — rare in the backwoods at
least — and his abilities forced him into public life,
and finally into the position of founder of the city of
Indianapolis. He came to the little yearling village
at the time appointed, and selected as surveyors Alex-
ander Ralston and Elias P. Fordham, with Benjamin
I. Blythe as clerk of the Board of Commissioners.
Mr. Blythe lived to an advanced age in the city,
and was one of the earliest of the enterprising men
who laid the foundations of the city's pork-packing
prosperity. Of Mr. J^ordham little appears to have
been known at the time, and nothing can be learned
now. Ralston was a Scotchman, a man of marked
ability and rare attainments as well as high chaiacter.
When quite young he had been employed in assist-
ing the laying out of Washington City, and may have
got then the preference for wide streets and oblique
avenues which he exhibited so signally and benefi-
cially here. He became associated with Burr's expe-
dition, presumably in ignorance of its real character,
as most of the conspirator's following were, came West
in connection with it, and remained when it failed.
He remained in Indianapolis after completing his
work, and in 1825 was appointed by the Legislature
to survey White River and make an estimate of the
expense of removing the drifts and snags and other
obstructions to navigation, and reported the following
winter. He built a brick residence on West Mary-
land Street, a half-square west of Tennessee, and lived
there till his death, early in 1827. He was buried
in the " Old Cemetery," and his grave was long un-
known. A few years ago, however, some old resi-
dents made a close examination and found it, or were
confident they had.
26
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
The Indiana Journal of Jan. 9, 1827, contained
an obituary notice of him, which from his prom-
inence in the settlement may be reproduced here.
He died on the 5th, at the age of fifty-six. " Mr.
Ralston was a native of Scotland, but emigrated
early in life to America. He lived many years at
the city of Washington, then at Louisville, Ky.,
afterwards near Salem, in this State, and for the last
five years in this place. His earliest and latest occu-
pation in the United States was surveying, in which
he was long employed by the government at Wash-
ington, and his removal to this place was occasioned
by his appointment to make the original survey of it.
During the intervening period merchandise and agri-
culture engaged his attention. In the latter part of his
life he was our county surveyor, and his leisure time
was employed in attending to a neat garden, in which
various useful and ornamental plants, fruit, etc., were
carefully cultivated. Mr. Ralston was successful in
his profession, honest in his dealings, gentlemanly in
his deportment, a liberal and hospitable citizen, and
a sincere and ardent friend. He had experienced
much both of the pleasures and pains incident to
human life. The respect and esteem of the generous
and good were always awarded to him, and he found
constant satisfaction in conferring favors, not only on
his own species, but even on the humblest of the
brute creation ; he would not willingly set foot upon
a worm. But his unsuspecting nature made him
liable to imposition ; his sanguine expectations were
often disappointed. His independent spirit some-
times provoked opposition, and his extreme sensi-
bility was frequently put to the severest trials.
Though he stood alone among us in respect to
family, his loss will be long lamented." Mr. Now-
land adds that the old bachelor's house " was kept
for him by a colored woman named Chaney Lively,"
who was the second colored person in the place. Dr.
Mitchell brought the first, a boy named Ephraim
Ensaw. These were the first colored residents, but
a colored man came out with Mr. Maxwell in 1820,
and remained here a few months. His name was
Aaron Wallace, and a few years ago he returned here
to reside permanently, after an absence of nearly
sixty years. " Aunt Chaney," as she was called, was
well known to the South Side school-boys forty-five
or fifty years ago. Her residence was the north-
west corner of Maryland and Meridian Streets. She
married a barber named Britton.
On the completion of the surveying force, work
was begun at once in marking out the sections and
fractions selected by the locating commissioners in
June, 1820. The whole donation lay upon the east
bank of the river except a fractional section on the
west bank, where Indianola stands. A plat of one
mile square was set in the middle of the donation,
and almost in the middle of the plat the Circle was
placed, to be made the site of the Grovernor's resi-
dence. It was not used for that purpose, however,
though a large house was erected there in 1827 at
considerable expense, some six thousand five hundred
dollars. The publicity of the situation made it un-
desirable as a family residence, and it was used ex-
clusively as rooms for the judges of the Supreme
Court, the State auditor and engineer, the State
Library and State Bank, and occasionally for local
or individual purposes. It was proposed at one
time to add wings on each side and make a State-
House of it. It was sold as old building material in
April, 1857, for six hundred and sixty-five dollars,
and torn down and carried ofi" in the last days of the
same month. The Circle was not put in the centre
of the donation, because if the centre of the town
had corresponded with the centre of the donation, it
would have thrown too much of the central portion
of the town plat into the valley of Pogue's Creek.
The point where the four sections of the donation
" corner" is about ten feet west and five feet south of
the southeast corner of the lot occupied by the Occi-
dental Hotel. The Circle was set nearly a square
east and two squares north for the purpose stated.
A natural elevation at this point, thickly covered
with a growth of tall straight sugar-trees, aided its
nearly central situation iu making it the centre of the
original town plat. It contains between three and
four acres, and is surrounded by an eighty-feet street.
Extending north and south from the Circle on a
meridian line is Meridian Street, and crossing the
latter from east to west is Market Street, both carried
to the limits of the city, except the west end of
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
27
Market, which is blocked at Blackford Street. Par-
allel with Market and one square south is Washing-
ton Street, the main thoroughfare of the city, one
hundred and twenty feet wide. The whole plat, one
mile square, is surrounded by ninety-feet streets,
called respectively, from their location, North, South,
East, and West. The area inside these limits is di-
vided into eighty-nine blocks and fractions by nine
streets north to south and nine east to west, each
ninety feet wide except Washington. The blocks
are four hundred and twenty feet square, and are
divided into four equal parts, each containing one
acre, by alleys fifteen feet wide running north and
south, and thirty feet running east and west. All of
the streets, except the two central ones meeting at
the Circle, the main street, and the four bounding
the plat, are named for the States of the Union in
1821. The most marked features of the original de-
sign of the city are the Circle and the avenues radi-
ating from it, and starting at the corners most re-
mote from it of the four blocks that adjoin it.
These are named for States like the others. The
squares are broken by six fractions and three con-
siderable irregular tracts in Pogue's Run Valley, so
that the number of completed squares is only eighty-
nine. The intersections of the streets would have
made one hundred if completion had been possible.
Three lots were made of each quarter of a square or
acre, giving to each lot of the original plat one-third
of an acre. Few of these now retain their original
dimensions. They were sixty-seven and one-half
feet wide on the streets by one hundred and ninety-
five feet deep, being longer where they abutted upon
the narrow alleys. The half-mile of the donation
lying all round the mile square in the middle of it,
except on the river side, was not platted. In 1822
the Legislature ordered the fraction west of the river
to be laid off in tracts of five to twenty acres by the
State agent, and in 1831 he was ordered to lay off all
the remainder of the donation, some nineteen hun-
dred acres, into lots of two to fifty acres, and sell
them at a minimum price of ten dollars an acre.
These were used chiefly for farming purposes and
pastures till the growth of the city began to overrun
them. It was never imagined that the city or town
would extend to these exterior lots at all, and that
they should be covered by it would have been as in-
credible as an Arabian Night tale. Now the city
covers nearly three times the area of tiie donation.
The four streets bounding the old plat — North,
South, East, and West — were not in it at first, but
were put there at the solicitation of James Blake,
who represented to Commissioner Harrison the ad-
vantages such streets would be as public drives and
promenades when the town grew up.
The act of the Legislature creating the commission
to lay off the town required the appointment of an
agent of the State at six hundred dollars a year for a
term of three years, who was to live at Indianapolis
and attend to the disposal of the lots. Gen. John
Carr was the first agent. The place was subsequently
held by several persons, among them James Milroy,
Bethuel F. Morris, Ebenezer Sharpe, B. I. Blythe,
clerk of the commission, Thomas H. Sharpe, and
John Cook. The duties were finally transferred to
the-Secretary of State. The commissioners, or rather
one of them, having completed the survey and plat,
advertised the first sale for the second Monday in
October, 1821, and it took place at the tavern of Mat-
thias Nowland, father of John H. B., author of
" Prominent Citizens of Indianapolis." This stood
near Washington Street, west of Missouri; and at
the request of the State agent, Mr. Nowland had
built an addition to serve as an office. Oct. 9, 1821,
was " a raw, cold day," says a sketch of the city's
early history written some twenty-five years or more
ago ; " a high wind prevailed, and a man in attend-
ance came near being killed by a falling limb." The
town was very much crowded. Strangers from vari-
ous quarters had come to settle in the new place or
to secure property. The three taverns, kept by
Hawkins, Carter, and Nowland, were crowded, and
in many cases the citizens were called upon to share
their homes with the new-comers till they could erect
cabins. The bidding at the sale was quite spirited,
and, considering the position and advantages of the
settlement, high prices were obtained in some cases.
" The reservation of alternate lots was begun by the
commissioner by reserving lot No. 1." The best
sales were north and east of the bulk of the settle-
28
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ment, which was on and near the river, owing to
the prevalence of chills and fever the summer before,
when everybody, old and young, was down at one
time or another, except Enoch Banks, Thomas
Chinn, and Nancy Hendricks. This visitation gave
an eastern impulse to settlement, and accounts for
the higher prices of lots more remote from the river.
The number of lots sold amounted to three hundred
and fourteen, mostly in the central and northern parte
of the plat, and the total value of the sales was thirty-
five thousand five hundred and ninety -six dollars and
twenty-five cents. The highest price brought by a
single lot was by the lot on Washington Street, west
of the Court-House Square, which brought five hun-
dred and sixty dollars. That on the same street,
west of the State- House Square, brought five hun-
dred dollars. The intervening lots sold from one
hundred to three hundred dollars each. The condi-
tions of the sale required the payment of one-fifth of
the purchase-money down, and the remainder in four
equal annual installments.
The sales continued a week, and the amount paid
down was seven thousand one hundred and nineteen
dollars and twenty-five cents. Thomas Carter was auc-
tioneer, and the late James M. Ray clerk of these first
sales. Not a few of these lots are now worth one thou-
sand dollars a front foot, some are worth more. " Out-
lots" that were sold at first for ten, twenty, or thirty
dollars could not be bought now for as many thou-
sands, in some cases twice that. Of the lots purchased
at this first sale, one hundred and sixty-nine were
afterwards forfeited, or the payments made on one lot
were transferred to another, under an act passed a little
later " for the relief of purchasers of lots in Indian-
apolis." The early sketch already referred to says,
" These forfeited lots and the reserved lots were once
or twice afterwards offered at public sale, and kept
open for purchase all the time. But prices became
depressed, money scarce, sickness caused general de-
spondency, and for several years after the winter of
1821-22 there were but few lots sold. The amount
of cash reserved by the State for donation lands up
to 1842 was about one hundred and twenty-five
thousand dollars." This the law made a public build-
ing fund, out of which was erected a State-House,
court-house. Governor's house (in the Circle), treas-
urer's house and office, office of clerk of the Supreme
Court, and a ferryman's house at the foot of Wash-
ington Street.
The settlers brought to the new capital by the re-
port of its selection for that purpose speedily trebled
its population, and more. During the summer and
fall of 1820 there came Dr. Samuel G. Mitchell,
John and James Givan (among the first merchants I,
William or Wilkes Reagan, Matthias Nowland, James
M. Ray, James Blake, Nathaniel Cox, Thomas
Anderson, John Hawkins, Dr. Livingston Dunlap,
Daniel Yandes, David Wood, Col. Alexander W.
Russell, Dr. Isaac Coe, Douglass Maguire, and others
unnamed and not easily identified as to the time
of arrival. Morris Morris is said by one of these
early sketches to have come here in 1819, in the fall
(probably inadvertently for 1820), when he came only
in the fall of 1821. Mr. Nowland says that James
M. Ray, James Blake, Daniel Yandes, the Givans,
Dr. Mitchell, Dr. Coe, Dr. Dunlap, Col. Russell came
the following spring and summer, 1821, and with
them Daniel Shaffer, the first merchant, who died in
the summer of 1821, Robert Wilmot, and Calvin
Fletcher, the first lawyer. It is impossible now to
make a complete list of the settlers up to the layini:
out of the town and the first sale of lots, but with
the help of such records as have been made, and such
memories as are accessible, a muster-roll of consid-
erable interest can be made :
George Pogue (blacksmith), possibly, 1819, spring.
Fabius M. Finch (lawyer), 1819, summer.
John McCormick (tavern), 1820, spring.
James McCormick, 1820, spring.
John Maxwell ('squire), 1820, spring.
John Cowan, 1820, spring.
Robert Harding (farmer), 1820, spring.
Van Blaricum (farmer), 1820, spring.
Henry Davis (chairmaker), 1820, spring.
Samuel Davis (chairmaker), 1820, spring.
Jeremiah J. Corbaley (farmer), 1820, spring.
Robert Barnhill (farmer), 1820, spring.
Isaac Wilson (miller), 1820, spring.
Matthias Nowland (mason), 1820, fall.
Dr. S. G. Mitchell, 1820, fall.
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
29
Thomas Anderson (wagonmaker), 1820, fall.
Alexander Ralston (surveyor), 1820, fall.
Dr. Isaac Coe, 1820, spring.
James B. Hall (carpenter), 1820, winter.
■" Andrew Byrne (tailor), 1820, fall.
Michael lugals (teamster), 1820, winter.
Kenneth A. Seudder (first drug-store), 1820, sum-
mer.
Conrad Brussell (baker), 1820, fall.
Milo R. Davis (plasterer), 1820, winter.
Samuel Morrow, 1820, summer.
James J. iMcIlvain ('squire), 1820, summer.
Eliakim Harding ('squire), 1821, summer.
Mr. Lawrence (teacher), 1821, summer.
Daniel Larkias (grocery), 1821, summer.
Lismund Basye (Swede), 1821, fall.
Robert Wilmot (merchant), 1820, winter.
James Kittleman (shoemaker), 1821.
Andrew Wilson (miller), 1821.
John McClung (preacher), 1821, spring.
Daniel Shaffer, 1821, January.
Jeremiah Johnson (farmer), 1820, spring.
Wilkes Reagan (butcher), 1821, .summer.
Obed Foote (lawyer), 1821, summer.
Calvin Fletcher (lawyer), 1821, fall.
James Blake, 1821, spring.
Alexander W. Russell (merchant), 1821, spring.
Caleb Soudder, 1821, fall.
George Smith (first publisher), 1821, fall.
James Scott (Methodist preacher), 1821, fall.
0. P. Gaines (first Presbyterian preacher), 1821,
summer.
James Linton (millwright), 1821, summer.
Joseph C. Reed (first teacher), 1821, spring.
James Paxton (militia officer), 1821, fall.
Daniel Yandes (first tanner), 1821, January.
Caleb Soudder (cabinet-maker), 1821, fall.
George Myers (potter), 1821, f\dl.
Nathaniel Bolton (first editor), 1821, fall.
Amos Hanway (cooper), 1821, summer.
John Shunk (hatter), 1821, fall.
Isaac Lynch (shoemaker), 1821, fall.
James M. Ray (coach-lace maker), 1821, summer.
David Mallory (barber), 1821, spring.
John Y. Osborn, 1821, spring.
Samuel Henderson (first postmaster), 1821, fail.
Samuel Rooker (first painter), 1821, summer.
Thomas Johnson (farmer), 1820, winter.
Robert Patterson, 1821, fall. .
Aaron Drake (first mail), 1821.
William Townsend, 1820, summer.
J. R. Crumbaugh, 1821.
Harvey Gregg, 1821, fall.
Nathaniel Cox (carpenter), 1821.
Some thirty-three years ago the late Samuel Mer-
rill, Treasurer of State at the time of the removal of
the capital from Corydon to Indianapolis in the fall
of 1824, and charged with the supervision of the
work, prepared a map illustrating the progress of the
town at different periods, 1821, 1823, 1835, and
1850, to accompany the first historical sketch of the
city, prepared by him for the first " Gazetteer," issued
in 1850 by Chamberlain & Co., booksellers in the
town. The reader, understanding the old plat of the
city, and observing that its western boundary at
West Street was about a quarter of a mile from the
river, will see quite accurately the size and location
of the infant settlement of 1821 from a description
of the outline on this map. It extended along
Washington Street, wholly south of it, to a point
a little less than a block east of West Street, and
was less than a block in width for a distance equal to
two blocks, when it began widening, and at the river
reached from about the point where Georgia Street
strikes the bank to the old National road bridge.
The little settlement of Maxwell and Cowan farther
north, near the site of the City Hospital, seems to
have been completely detached from the main body
of the village. In 1823, the year before the arrival
of the capital, the settlement had shifted entirely
away from the river, its western extremity being
near West Street, and it extended in a narrow line
about a block in width on each side of Washington
Street to Meridian Street, where a point ran south to
Georgia Street on each side of Meridian, while east
of it, and passing east of the Circle, another point pro-
jected north as far as Ohio Street, and a third point
along Washington carried the settlement to a point
about half-way between Alabama and New Jersey
Streets. The shape of it is an exact cross, with one
30
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
arm a little higher than the other. In 1835 the
town had been under its own government by trus-
tees for two or three years, had established a brewery
and several manufactures, besides those for custom
service, had been the capital for over ten years, had
nearly completed the State-House, had a population
of about two thousand, and the County that year, as
announced by Mr. Calvin Fletcher in a public ad-
dress, contained thirteen hundred farms, and had
produced one million three hundred thousand bushels
of corn. In this condition of things the town formed
an irregular figure, much like a balloon, with the neck
near West Street, and the " bulge" opening pretty
rapidly up north to Michigan Street, reaching east to
New Jersey, and then south to Georgia and a little
below ; at the widest place, north to south, covering
seven squares, and it« greatest length along Washing-
ton Street very nearly covering the mile of the plat.
In 1850 it covered all of the plat but the northwest,
southwest, and southeast corners, and more than made
up for these deficiencies by projecting beyond it on
the northeast, the east, and the south along the Bluff
road or South Meridian Street.
In May, 1820, in three months after the first set-
tlement, or in any case after the first indications of a
possible settlement of more than a family or two,
there were fifteen or twenty families on the donation.
These increased to thirty or forty during the succeed-
ing year to July, when the sales of government lands
in this and adjoining counties began at the land-
office in Brookville, Franklin Co. Happily for
the pioneers of 1820, there was not so much sick-
ness as might have been expected, and nothing com-
parable to the visitation the next year, and, quite as
happily, nature had provided a " deadening," in
which they raised with little labor comparatively all
the corn and vegetables they needed to make a com-
fortable subsistence with the abundance of fish and
game to be had close at hand and with little trouble.
This natural " deadening" lay at the northwest cor-
ner of the donation, and contained some hundred or
more acres. The trees had been killed by eater-
pillars, and the pioneers cleared ofi' the underbrush
together, and held the field in common, simply
marking off each family's share by what Mr. Now-
land calls "turn-rows." This was known as the
"big field" for several years. Its products were
chiefly corn and pumpkins. In addition to this pro-
vision for the staples of vegetable food, each family
had a truck-patch in the rear of their log cabin,
where they raised such vegetables as they required
for immediate use, including the "love-apple," or
tomato, which nobody dreamed of eating for twenty
years afterwards. Little more belongs to the history
of this first year of the city's settlement than an ac-
count of the condition and modes of life of the set-
tlers, and that being much the same for all the early
years of the settlement will be told for all at once.
The year 1821 was an eventful one for the infant
capital. During the summer the donation had been
surveyed and the original city plat made, and a
number of the men who were to be most conspicuous
in its after-history, in spreading its business, estab-
lishing its industries, founding its schools, main-
taining its morality, its Fletcher, Yandes. Blake,
Ray, Morris, Russell, Dunlap, Brown, Landis,
had come or were on the way. It was a year of
universal sickness, privation, and suffering. Says an
early account, " Towards the end of summer and
during the fall epidemic remittent and intermittent
fevers and agues assailed the people, and scarcely a
person was left untouched. (In another place it is
told that Nancy Hendricks, Enoch Banks, and
Thomas Chinn were all that escaped.) The few
healthy ones were employed day and night in minis-
tering to the wants of the sufferers, and many in-
stances of generous and devoted friendship occurred
at this time. The recollection of their bitter suffer-
ings bound the early settlers together in after-life.
The new-comers might well be appalled at the pros-
pect before them, and it is no wonder that extrava-
gant stories were circulated of the sickness at In-
dianapolis. Although nearly every person in the
settlement was more or less assailed, and several
hundred cases occurred during the prevalence of the
epidemic, not more than twenty-five terminated
fatally. As winter approached the health of the
community improved, and by the end of the year it
was entirely restored. No cause was discovered for
the unparalleled visitation, which the old settlers
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
31
hold to this day in vivid remembrance." The report
of this calamity went abroad, and for many years
more or less aifected the otherwise strong induce-
ments of the settlement to new settlers, and for
thirty years malarial disorders came almost as regu-
larly as the seasons. The " sickly season" was as
well known and well defined a period as the " dog-
days," and continued so till the general clearing of
the county and drying out of low bottom lands and
swamps had diminished the sources of malarial influ-
ence. The effect of the epidemic of 1821 on the
settlement was to force it back from the river, and
extend it eastward past the Circle and Court-House
Square along Washington Street.
The first death in the settlement, by tradition, was
that of Daniel Shaffer, a merchant, who came early
in the year, opened a store on the high ground south
of the creek, near the present line of South Street,
and died in the summer following. The first woman
that died was the wife of John Maxwell, one of the
first two settlers after the McCormicks in the spring
of 1820. She died 3d of July, 1821, and was buried
on the bluff of Fall Creek, near the site of the City
Hospital. Eight persons were buried there during
the epidemic. Mr. Commissioner Harrison was seared
off home by it, but before he went he authorized
Daniel Shaffer, James Blake, and Matthias R. Now-
land to select a site for a cemetery. " One Sunday
morning early in August," says Mr. J. H. B. Now-
land, " they selected the place now known as the Old
Graveyard. One week from that day Mr. Shaffer was
buried there." If his memory is correct Mrs. Max-
well's was the first death in the settlement, and the
traditional burial of Shaffer near the corner of South
and Pennsylvania Streets, and subsequent removal to
the " Old Graveyard," now " Greenlawn Cemetery," is
a mistake. Most of the burials during the epidemic
were in that first cemetery.
Following this visitation came another hardly less
intolerable. The universal sickness prevented the
cultivation of the " caterpillar deadening," and the
influx of settlers at and after the first sales of lots
made provisions distressingly scarce. Coffee was
fifty cents a pound ; tea, two dollars ; corn, one dollar
a bushel ; flour, four to five dollars a hundred ; coarse
muslin or " factory," forty-five cents a yard. There
were no roads into the settlement, nor anything better
than cow-paths. All goods and provisions had to be
carried on horseback from the White Water Valley,
sixty miles away. The nearest grist-mill was Good-
lander's, on the White Water. Corn was mainly
bought of the Indians up the river and brought down
in boats. Later keel-boats brought considerable car-
goes of flour, whiskey, and powder, chiefly up the
river. The settlers considered each one's stock of
provisions the property of all that needed it, and
divided with unstinted generosity.
The year 1821 was marked by the establishment
of the first business house, the store of Daniel Shaffer.
He was followed in a short time by James and John
Givan, the latter of whom became a vagrant and
pauper, supported by an annuity contributed by the
merchants of the city, and died only a few years ago,
a very old man, with a marvelous memory of events
and persons of that early time. Robert Wilmot began
merchandising about the same time, or perhaps a little
earlier, near the present corner of Washington and
West Streets, in a row of cabins called " Wilmot's
Row." Luke Walpole opened in the same business
in the fall on the southwest corner of the State-House
Square, Jacob Landis on the southeast corner, and
Jeremiah Johnson on the northwest corner of Market
and Pennsylvania. The first log school-house was
built the same year, about where Kentucky Avenue
enters Illinois Street, near a large pond. The first
teacher was Joseph C. Reed, afterwards the first
county recorder. The first log house on the old city
plat was built by Isaac Wilson in the spring of 1820,
on the northwest corner of what was afterwards the
State- House Square. The first frame house was built
by James Blake on the lot east of Masonic Hall in the
fall of 1821. The timber had been cut during the
summer by James Paxton on the donation. This was
the first plastered house. That winter Thomas Carter,
the auctioneer of the lot sales, built a ceiled frame
tavern about where No. 40 West Washington Street
is, and called it the " Rosebush," in the old English
fashion of naming taverns, from a rough painting of
that object on the sign. It was long after removed
to a point near the canal, and then to West Street
32
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
near Maryland. John Hawkins had built a log tavern
the fall before on Washington Street, north side, near
the middle of the block east of Meridian. It may be
noted in this connection, though chronologically dis-
located, that the first brick building was erected for
John Johnson in 1822-23, on a lot opposite the site
of the post-ofiice. It was torn down a few years ago
to make room for a better structure. Though the
Johnson house was undoubtedly the first brick build-
ing in the town, it is not so certain that it was the first
in the county. Old residents of Wayne township, like
Mr. Blattern and Mr. Gladden, say that a two-story
brick residence was built by John Cook in 1821, in
what is now Maywood, near the line of Wayne and
Decatur townships. In its latter days, thirty-five or
forty years ago, it cracked through the middle, and
was held together by a hoop of large square logs,
notched at the corners and wedged tight, between the
lower and upper stories. It was a rare style of repair
for a building of any kind, and may still be remem-
bered by old residents on that account. It stood on
the northern blufi" of a low, level, wet prairie, the
only one in the county, of which the now drained and
cultivated remains, with possible patches of the orig-
inal condition, are on the southern border of May-
wood, and near the residence of Fielding Beeler, Esq.
James Linton built the first two-story house, a frame,
in the spring of 1822, on the site of No. 76 West
Washington Street. He also built the first saw-mill
on Fall Creek, above the Indiana Avenue or Craw-
fordsville road bridge, and about the same time built
the first grist-mill for Isaac Wilson on Fall Creek
bayou, now known as " the race," near the line of
North Street.
The year 1821 saw the beginning of moral and
intellectual culture as well as business. A school
was taught by Mr. Reed during the latter part of
the year, and Rev. John McClung, a preacher of
what was called the " New Light" denomination,
preached in the spring, some say in the sugar grove
on the little knoll in the Circle. It is a question
among the few old settlers who remember the occur-
rence whether that was the first sermon heard in the
New Purchase or one preached not far from the
same time by Rev. Rezin Hammond. Mr. Nowland
says that if Mr. McClung preached in the settlement
that spring it must have been at Mr. Barnhill's, who
belonged to the same denomination but lived outside
of the donation. An old settler wrote in one of the
city papers recently that Mr. Hammond preached
near the site of the old State Bank, corner of Illinois
Street and Kentucky Avenue, near a pond, which
must have been close to the site of the first school-
house, while others say he preached in the woods on
the State-House Square. Mr. Nowland, years after-
wards, met Mr. Hammond at Jeffersonville, and this
first sermon was recalled. The party surveying the
town, under Ralston, were then at work near the
Circle, and they prepared on Saturday evening for
the sermon next day by rolling logs together for
seats and building a rough log rostrum. Not more
than forty or fifty persons attended. " A few mo-
ments after the services commenced," says Mr. Now-
land, " an Indian and his squaw came by on their
ponies. They halted a moment, and passed on to-
wards the trading-house of Robert Wilmot. He was
in the congregation, and at once rose and followed
them ; but before he was out of hearing Mr. Hammond
said, ' The pelts and furs of the Indians had more
attractions for his Kentucky friend than the words
of God.' There can be little doubt," Mr. Nowland
concludes, " that this was the first sermon preached
in Indianapolis ; it was so regarded at the time."
In August of the same year Rev. Ludlow G. Gaines,
a Presbyterian clergyman, preached in the grove
south of the State-House Square. No church or-
ganization was attempted, however, till the spring of
1823. In July it was completed, and steps taken to
build a church on North Pennsylvania Street, on the
site of the Exchange Block. It was finished, at a
cost of twelve hundred dollars, and occupied in 1824.
The " Indianapolis Circuit" of the Methodist Church
was organized by Rev. William Cravens in 1822,
under authority of the Missouri Conference, but
Rev. James Scott had preached here in private
houses as early as October, 1821, by appointment of
the same authority. A camp-meeting had been held
in 1822, September 12th, and a second one in May,
1823, aft«r the organization of the circuit, but no
house was occupied specially as a church til! the
I
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
33
summer of 1825, when a hewed-log house on
Maryland Street near Meridian was bought for
three hundred dollars and used for four years. In
1828-29 a brick building was erected, at a cost of
three thousand dollars, on the southwest corner of
Circle and Meridian Streets, which became, when
replaced in 1846, " Wesley Chapel." The first
Baptist Church was organized in September, 1822,
but held services in private houses or in a log
school-house " on and partly in Maryland Street,"
between Tennessee and Mississippi Streets, which
could be had " without interruption," as a committee
reported in May, 1823, till a brick house was built
on the southwest corner of Maryland and Meridian
Streets in 1829. These were the beginnings of the
three pioneer churches in Indianapolis and the New
Purchase. They are noted here to present as com-
plete a view as possible of the early settlement and
history of the city and county.
In the summer of 1821 the first marriage oc-
curred. The bride was Miss Jane Reagan, the
groom Jeremiah Johnson, who had to walk through
an unbroken and pathless forest sixty miles to Con-
nersville for his license (this county at that time
having no organization), and the walk back made one
hundred and twenty miles. He was an eccentric
man, witty, cynical, with a fashion of retracting his
lips when talking so as to show his yellow, tobacco-
stained teeth, giving him something of the expression
of a snarling dog. He was full of humorous conceits
and quaint comparisons, and a delightful companion for
young men when he was " tight" enough to feel jolly,
as he frequently was. When the first telegraph line
was completed to the city in 1848, " Old Jerry" saw
it as ho was passing along Washington Street com-
fortably " full," and broke out in a sort of apostrophe,
" There ! they're driving lightning down the road,
and with a single line at that !" Any one who has
seen a team driven by a " single line" will appreciate
" Old Jerry's" joke. He died very suddenly in
1857.
Among other first events that have traditionally
marked this year was the birth of the first child. But
the tradition of that interesting occurrence is con-
tested by two living witnesses, who rather confuse
one's faith, and leave a slight leaning to the skepticism
which would doubt if any child was born at all.
The traditional opinion, supported by two or three
historical sketches, is that Mordecai Harding was
that memorable infant, but tradition and history are
both impeached by Mr. William H. White (before re-
ferred to) and by Mr. Shirts, of Hamilton, who claims
that Mr. Corbaley's son Richard was the first, in
August, 1820, at his residence in the western part
of the donation. Mr. Nowland denies the donation,
says Mr. Corbaley lived west of the west donation
line, but concedes the principal fact. Mr. White's
claim is disputed by the general opinion of old set-
tlers, but the other seems to be settled.
During the whole of the year 1820 the " New
Purchase" formed part of Delaware County, which,
then unorganized, vaguely covered most of the northern
and central portions of the State, and was attached
for judicial purposes to Wayne and Fayette Counties.
The residents of White River Valley were sued and
compelled to answer in the courts of the White
Water Valley, sixty miles away, and the compulsion
was costly, irritating, and intolerable. The jurisdic-
tion was disputed and resisted, and the Legislature,
to avoid further and graver trouble, passed an act
of Jan. 9, 1821, authorizing the appointment of
two justices of the peace for the new settlements,
with appeals to the Bartholomew Circuit Court.
In April, 1821, Governor Jennings appointed John
Maxwell, but he retained the office only a few
months, and resigned. The settlers then elected
informally James Mcllvaine, and the Governor
commissioned him in October. He is described
by the old residents who remember him, and by
the sketches that speak of this period of the city's
history, as holding court at the door of his little
log shanty, on the northwest corner of Pennsylvania
and Michigan Streets, with the jury sitting on a
log in front, his pipe in his mouth, and Corbaley,
the solitary constable, vigilantly crossing the plans
of culprits to get away into the thick woods close
about, as they are said to have done sometimes in
spite of him. The late Calvin Fletcher was then
the only lawyer, and the primary court of informal
appeal for the easily-puzzled old squire. The po-
34
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
sitions of counsel and judge are not often consoli-
dated in the same hands, — it is too easy for one
to use and abuse the other ; but it was never
charged that Mr. Fletcher misled his confidant in
his own interest.
The first especially exciting incident in the quiet
course of the settlement brought the judicial power
into a dilemma, from which it escaped by a pro-
cess that did more credit to its ingenuity than its
sense of justice. On Christmas-day, 1821, four
Kentucky boatmen who had come up White
River from the Ohio in a keel-boat to the Bluffs,
thought that the new settlement farther up would
be a good place for frolic, and they came and got
howling drunk before daylight at Dan Larkins'
" grocery," as liquor-shops were called in those
days, and frequently were a mixture of saloon and
grocery-store. As usual with the " half-horse and
half-alligator" men of the Mike Fink breed, the
predecessors of the " cow-boy," they began smashing
the doggery as soon as they had got all the liquor
they wanted. The row roused the settlement, and
the gentlemen from Kentucky were respectfully re-
quested to desist and make less noise. They re-
sponded with a defiance backed by knives. The
settlers consulted. They did not want the whiskey
wasted, and they did want a quiet Christmas, or
at least to make their own disturbance. They de-
termined to put down the rioters. James Blake
proposed to take the leader single-handed if the
rest of Indianapolis would " tackle" the other three,
and the consolidated remainder of the embryo cap-
ital agreed. Blake and the Kentuckian were both
large, powerful men, but the Hoosier was sober
and resolute, and the Kentuckian drunk and
furious, so the rioters were captured and taken to
Squire Mcllvaine's. They were tried, fined severely,
and in default of payment ordered to jail. There
was no jail nearer than Connersville, and it would
cost as much as their fines to take them there in
the dead of winter under guard, so they were
kept under guard here, with instructions to allow a
little relaxation of vigilance in the night, and the
hint was followed by the convenient escape of the
whole party.
Notwithstanding the appointment of justices, the
courts of Wayne and Fayette Counties still claimed
jurisdiction, and doubts were entertained of the va-
lidity of the appointment of Maxwell and Mcllvaine.
To remedy all difficulties the citizens held a meeting
at Hawkins' tavern to discuss the matter, and James
Blake and Dr. S. G. Mitchell were appointed repre-
sentatives of the settlement to attend the next session
of the Legislature at Corydon as lobby members to
secure an organization of the county. On the 28th
of November the Legislature legalized the acts of
Commissioner Harrison, he having acted alone in sur-
veying the donation and laying off the town. It
may be noted here as an indication of the readiness
of the Legislature to encourage the growth of the
place that on the 31st of December, 1821, an act
authorized Gen. Carr, the agent, to lease to McCart-
ney and McDonald forty acres of the donation for
ten years free, to be occupied as a mill-seat. On the
same day an act was passed organizing the county,
and requiring the organization to be completed on the
1st of April, 1822. It applied the present Court-
House Square to that purpose, and provided for the
erection of a court-house fifty feet square and two
stories high, and appropriated eight thousand dollars
to it. The courts that held sessions in the capitol.
Federal, State, and county, were to use it forever if
they chose, and the State Legislature was to use it
for fifty years or till a State-House should be built.
Two per cent, of the lot fund was to be given for the
founding of a county library. The sessions of court
and the elections were to be held at Gen. Carr's till
the court-house was built. Johnson, Hamilton, and
a large part of Boone, Madison, and Hancock were
attached to this county for judicial purposes. Marion,
Monroe, Owen, Greene, Morgan, Lawrence, Rush,
Hendricks, Decatur, Bartholomew, Shelby, and Jen-
nings Counties were formed into the Fifth Judicial
Circuit. William W. Wick, of Connersville, was
elected president judge by the Legislature, and
Harvey Bates, of the same place, was appointed
sheriff by the Governor. They both came on and
assumed their offices the following February, 1822.
The latter, by a proclamation of Feb. 22, 1822, or-
dered an election to be held on the 1st of the next
i
iCi^^yCl^
EARLY SETTLEMENTS.
35
April for two associate judges, a clerk, recorder, and
three county commissioners. The voting precincts
were fixed at Gen. Carr's, in the town ; John Page's,
at Strawtown, in Hamilton County ; John Berry's,
Andersontown, Madison Co. ; and William McCart-
ney's, on Pall Creek, near Pendleton. Returns were
to be forwarded by the 3d of April.
William W. Wick was a Pennsylvanian by birth,
but came to Connersville, in this State, when a young
man, and from there came to Indianapolis to assume
the duties of his oflBoe. Ex-Senator Oliver H. Smith
said that in 182-t "he, though a young lawyer, had had
a good deal of experience in criminal cases." During
his term as judge of the huge circuit, now formed
into a half-dozen, he was elected brigadier-general of
militia, no unimportant position in those days
to an ambitious young man. He was Secretary
of State for four years, from 1825 to 1829, then
prosecuting attorney, and in 1833 was beaten for
Congress by George L. Kinnard. He was success-
ful though in 1839, and served in the House
during the memorable " log cabin and hard cider"
campaign of 1840. He was elected again in 1845,
and re-elected in 1847. In 1853 he was made post-
master by President Pierce, and on the expiration of
his term in 1857 be retired from public life alto-
gether. Soon afterwards he went to Franklin and
made his home with his daughter, and died there in
1868.
Hervey Bates, who was appointed sheriff by
Governor Jennings, was a son of Hervey Bates, who
was a master of transportation during the Indian war
under Gens. Wayne and Harmar, and chiefly engaged
in forwarding provisions and munitions of war from the
frontier posts to the army in the wilderness. His son
Hervey, the subject of this biographical sketch, was
a native of Cincinnati, Ohio, and born in that place
in 1795, when it was called Fort Washington. When
but about six years of age he lost his mother, and, his
father having married again, he left the paternal roof,
and in Warren, Lebanon County, Ohio, met with
friends through whose agency he received a sufiBcient
English education to qualify him for the ordinary
pursuits of life. On attaining his majority he came
to Brookville, Franklin County, where he married
Miss Sidney Sedwick, cousin of the late Gen. James
Noble, United States senator. During the year 1816
he cast, in Brookville, his first vote for a delegate to
form a new constitution for the State of Indiana.
Soon after Mr. Bates' marriage he removed to Con-
nersville, and made it his residence until February,
1822, when Indianapolis, then a mere hamlet, became
his home. Jonathan Jennings, the first Governor
after the admission of the State into the Union, ap-
pointed William W. Wick president judge of the
then Fifth Judicial District, and Hervey Bates, sheriff
of Marion County, which then embraced several neigh-
boring counties for judicial purposes, investing the
latter with full power for placing in operation the
necessary legal machinery of the county. This he
did by issuing a proclamation for an election to be
held on the first day of April, for the purpose of
choosing a clerk of the court and other county oflBcers,
which was the fir.st election of any kind held in the
new purchase. Mr. Bates was, at the following elec-
tion held in October, made sheriff for the regular term
of two years, but declined a subsequent nomination,
having little taste for the distinctions of oflBce. Mer-
cantile pursuits subsequently engaged his attention,
to which he brought his accustomed energy and in-
dustry, and enjoyed success in his various business
enterprises. J-i^ViSG
Mr. Bates was the earliest president of the branch
of the State Bank located in Indianapolis, and filled
the position for ten years, during which time it en-
joyed a career of unparalleled success, and greatly
advanced the interests of the business community.
Through the substantial aid afforded by this bank,
most of the surplus produce of this and adjacent
counties found a profitable market. Mr. Bates was
also instrumental in the formation of the earliest
insurance company, was a stockholder in the first
hotel built by a company, in the first railroad
finished to the city of his residence, the earliest gas-
lifbt and coke company, and in many other enter-
prises having for their object the public welfare. In
1852 he began and later completed the spacious hotel
known as the Bates House, at that time one of the
most complete and elegant in the West. It was
erected at a cost of sixty thousand dollars, and
36
HISTOEY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
modern improvements added, making a total cost of
seventy-five thousand dollars. Many other public
and private buildings in various portions of the city
owe their existence to the enterprise and means of
Mr. Bates. He was a generous contributor to all
worthy religious and benevolent objects, and willingly
aided in the maintenance of the various charitable
institutions of Indianapolis. Rev. Henry Ward
Beecher found in him a cordial friend when a resi-
dent of the city, and in his less prosperous days.
The death of Mr. Bates occurred on the 6th of July,
1876, in his eighty-third year, his wife having died
previously. His children are Hervey Bates and Mrs.
L. M. Vance, both of Indianapolis, and Elizabeth H.,
deceased.
While this first election is pending a return may
be made for a moment to pick up some incidents of
the settlement that occurred between the sale of lots
in October, 1821, and the election, April 1, 1822.
No clearing of the streets had been attempted when
the sales took place. Each little cabin was stuck
away in its own little hole in the dense woods, and
they were so dense that a man standing near the site
of Bingham & Walk's jewelry-store could not see a
house half-way down the block on the other side of
Washington Street, west of Meridian ; so say old set-
tlers and common tradition. Gen. Morris once said
that it was just like camping out in a forest on a
hunting expedition when he came here with his
father in 1821, except that the camping-places were
cabins instead of tents or brush houses. One neigh-
bor could not see the next one's house. Hawkins
built his tavern of logs cut on the lot in the very
centre of Washington Street. For many years the
less settled streets were more or less filled with trees
and brush, and the only way along them was a cow-
path. In order to open Washington Street, which
the plan of the town had appointed for the principal
thoroughfare, an offer was made by the settlers to give
the timber to anybody who would clear off the trees.
It would have been a very profitable contract a year
later. The offer was accepted by Lismond Basye, a
Swede, who had come from Franklin County that
same fall. The trees were oak, ash, and walnut
chiefly, and he thought he had a small fortune safe.
When he had got them all down, and the street " to be"
was worse blocked than before, and there was no mill
to saw them, he gave up the job in despair, and the
people burned the superb timber as it lay. In Jan-
uary, 1822, the Legislature ordered the opening of a
number of roads, and appropriated nearly one hundred
thousand dollars to it, greatly to the satisfaction of the
entirely isolated settlers. In the same month the
State agent was instructed to lease unsold lots on
condition that the lessees would clear them in four
months, and this, as a step towards getting the settle-
ment in something like civilized condition, was a
gratifying measure. The lessees were allowed forty
days to remove their improvements if the lots should
be sold during their occupancy of them.
On the 28tli of January, 1822, the first newspaper
of the settlement was issued by George Smith and
Nathaniel Bolton, his step-son, called the Indianapolis
Gazette. Mr. Nowland's memoir of Mr. Smith says
" the printing-ofiice was in one corner of the cabin in
which the family lived," and the cabin was near a
row of cabins built by Mr. Wilmot, called " Smoky
Row," west of the line of the future canal and near
Maryland Street. In the second year the oflice was
moved to the northeast corner of the State-House
Square. Mr. Smith learned the printer's trade in the
oflice of the Observer of Lexington, Ky., and subse-
quently worked upon the Liberty Hall and Gazette
of Cincinnati, under the noted editor, Charles Ham- ■
mond. In later life he lived in a frame house on the
northeast corner of Georgia and Tennessee Streets,
the ground now forming a part of the Catholic prop-
erty about the St. John's Cathedral and the bishop's
residence. Here about 1840, John Hodgkins estab-
lished the first ice-cream or " pleasure garden," as it
was called, and built the first ice-house, and laid down
a little circular railway with a little locomotive to run
upon it. Mr. Smith served two terms as associate
judge of the county, and was the first man in the
place to open a real estate agency, which he did in
1827. Some years before his death he bought a
farm at Mount Jackson, which now forms part of the
grounds of the Insane Asylum, and there he died in
April, 1826, at the age of fifty-two. He was rather
an eccentric man, but notoriou.sly liberal to the poor.
ORGANIZATION OF COUNTY AND ERECTION OF TOWNSHIPS.
37
He and Governor Ray wore " cues" in the old Revo-
lutionary fashion. The Governor discarded his in
his old age, but Mr. Smith held to his as tenaciously
as a Chinaman. Some catarrhal affection, probably,
brought a fit of sneezing on him nearly every morn-
ing early after he had dressed and got out of doors,
and that sonorous sound could be heard by all the
neighbors as far and as plainly and about as early as
the morning song of his roosters.
Nathaniel Bolton was a book-binder by trade. He
became much better known to the Indianapolis people
than Mr. Smith. He continued to edit the Gazette
after the other had sold out his interest, when he had
a larger constituency to speak for, and his wife, Sarah
T. Barrett, of Madison, the earliest and most gifted
and conspicuous of the poetesses of the State, helped
his reputation by the abundance of her own. He
was made consul at Geneva, Switzerland, in 1853,
whence his wife wrote many letters to the Journal,
then under the direction of an old friend, Mr. Sul-
grove. In May, 1857, he came back in consequence
of failing health, and died in a few months. For
several years after he had sold his interest in the
Gazette, he and his wife kept a country tavern on the
farm that BIr. Smith lived on before his death at
Mount Jackson. Mrs. Bolton is now living in a
pleasant house in the country about three miles
southeast of the city, and still frequently publishes
fugitive verses on passing occurrences that interest
her, especially the death of old friends, marked with
all the fertility of fancy and grace of style of her
earlier poems.
The mechanical processes of the first paper were
primitive enough. The ink was partly compounded
of tar, and the press-work was slow and hard. Com-
position rollers were unknown till the secret of
making them was brought here just ten years later
by the late David V. Culley, for many years presi-
dent of the City Council. There were no mails at
all at first, and when a post-route was established
soon afterwards its deliveries were so irregular that
the editors had to apologize once for the deficiency of
matter by saying that the failure of the mails had
left them without any news from abroad or any suit-
able material. Several post-routes were opened during
the spring, in addition to one to White Water, opened
a few weeks after the paper appeared first, but they
came too late to relievo the urgent necessity of the
winter and spring. The incessant and heavy rains
greatly obstructed the main mail-route, and com-
pelled the entire suspension of the paper from the
3d of April to the 4th of May by catching the editors
away from home and keeping the streams too deep to
be forded. The first number appeared on the 28th
of January, the second on the 11th of February, the
third on the 25th, the fourth March 6th, the fifth on
the 18th, the sixth April 3d, the seventh May 4th.
The growth and changes of the Gazette will be
noticed particularly in the sketch of the " Press."
The first mail came very closely after the first paper.
For nearly two years such correspondence as had been
maintained between the new settlement and the older
ones east and south on the White Water and the Ohio,
had been carried on by the hands of neighbors and
occasional travelers. On the 30th of January, 1822,
a meeting of citizens was held at the "Eagle Tavern"
(Hawkins') to devise means to maintain a private
mail. The hope of a government mail does not seem
to have been strong enough to be cultivated. Aaron
Drake was selected for the duty of private postmaster
and mail-carrier. He notified the postmasters all
around of the arrangement that had been made, and
asked them to forward all letters for Indianapolis to
Connersville, where he would get them. " He re-
turned from his first trip," says an early sketch of the
city, " shortly after nightfall, and the loud blasts of his
horn were heard far through the woods, and the whole
people turned out in the bright moonlight to greet
him and hear the news." This effort aroused the
general government, and President Monroe appointed
Samuel Henderson first postmaster in February, 1822.
He opened the ofiice the first week in March. A his-
tory of the ofiBce will be found in its proper place, and
nothing more need be said of it here, except that the
first list of letters awaiting delivery contained five
names, one of them that of Mallory, the colored barber,
and first barber in the place. For some years, it is
hard to say just how long, the mails were carried on
horseback, subsequently they were taken in stage-
coaches, and Indianapolis became nearly as conspic-
38
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
uous a stage centre as it is now a railroad centre.
For many years the J. & P. Vorhees Company had
large stables and coach-making and repairing shops
here on the southwest corner of Maryland and Penn-
sylvania Streets. They were abandoned about 1852,
when the advancing railroad lines began to absorb
mails and passengers ; but the music of the " stage-
horn" was long a pleasant sound in the ears of the old
settler, for it brought him the principal variation of
the monotony of a village life, except the regular
winter sessions of the Legislature. For a short time
during the administration of Van Buren a mail-route
or two was run here on horseback in extra quick time,
and called " express mails." The riders came gal-
loping along Washington Street, blowing little tin
horns with a din that delighted the school-boys, and
for many a week they made night hideous with their
horns.
The winter of 1821-22, in spite of the prostration
and starvation of the preceding summer and fall, was
pleasantly passed in the main. The settlers becoming
better acquainted, and frequently rendering each in-
dispensable neighborly offices in sickness and destitu-
tion, were naturally well dispo.sed to relieve the lone-
liness of an unusually severe winter in an impassable
forest with such social entertainments as were within
reach, so they kept up an almost unbroken round
of quilting and dancing parties and other modes
of killing time when there was nothing to do to
enable them to make a better use of it. " A mania
for marrying took possession of the young people,"
says the early sketch, " and there was hardly a single
bachelor left in the place." The snow was very deep,
and the river frozen so hard that large logs were
hauled across it on heavy " ox-sleds." On the 25th
of February the Gazette said that a good deal of
improvement had been going on. Forty residences
and several work-shops had been built, a grist-mill
and two saw-mills were in operation, and more were
in progress near the place. There were thirteen car-
penters, four cabinet-makers, eight blacksmiths, four
shoemakers, two tailors, one hatter, two tanners, one
saddler, one cooper, four bricklayers, two merchants,
three grocers, four doctors, three lawyers, one preacher,
one teacher, seven tavern-keepers. These alone would
indicate a population of about three hundred. But
these were not alone : there were probably enough
more adult males to complete a roll of one hundred,
and show a population of five hundred.
The first election was coming close as the pro-
tracted winter began to loosen its grip on the iron
ground and let the spring blossoms out to the sun-
light. Candidates were pretty nearly as numerous as
voters. There were two parties, but not separated by
national party divisions. This was the " era of good
feeling" in national politics. The old " Federal" and
"Republican" differences were growing dim and the
names unfamiliar. The division in the first election
in Indianapolis was geographical. " White Water"
and " Kentucky" were the names of might, and the
voters took sides according to the direction they had
traveled to get here. Just what sort of a compromise
was made by the settlers who came in the first place
from Kentucky, and resided for a while in the White
Water before moving to the New Purchase, there is
no indication to direct. The " White Water" leader
was James M. Ray, the " Kentucky" chief Morris
Morris, father of Gen. Thomas A. Morris, the real
general and victor in the first campaign in West Vir-
ginia. The candidates for associate judges — there
were two — were Robert Patterson, James Mcllvaine,
James Page, Eliakim Harding, John Smock, and
Rev. John McClung. The candidates for clerk were
James M. Ray, Milo R. Davis, Morris Morris, Thomas
Anderson, and John W. Redding. For recorder there
were Alexander Ralston, James Linton, Joseph C.
Reed, Aaron Drake, John Givan, John Hawkins,
William Vandegrift, and William Townsend. No
record is left of the candidates for the three county
commissionerships, but it is said there were about
fifteen of them. There were no caucuses or conven-
tions or primaries, and no obstruction to the ambition
of any man that wanted to be a candidate. The poll
in the town showed two hundred and twenty-four
votes, a little more than one hundred probably being
residents on the donation. In the county three hun-
dred and thirty-six votes were cast, including a good
part of all the counties around it. James Mcllvaine
and Eliakim Harding were elected associate judges ;
James M. Ray, clerk; Joseph C. Reed, recorder;
ORGANIZATION OF COUNTY AND ERECTION OF TOWNSHIPS.
39
and John McCormick, John T. Osborn, and William
McCartney, county commissioners. James M. Ray
received two hundred and seventeen votes, which was
the highest vote for any candidate.
The newly-elected county commissioners qualified
and held their first session on the 15th of April, in
the house at the corner of Ohio and Meridian Streets.
On the next day they divided the county, em-
bracing the very large area already described, into
Fall Creek, Anderson, White River. Delaware, Law-
rence, Washington, Pike, Warren, Centre, Wayne,
Franklin, Perry, and Decatur townships. The first
four were in the territory afterwards formed into
other counties. The following are the formally de-
clared boundaries of the townships as first consti-
tuted, which have composed the county ever since,
with a very few slight changes. Only the "corners"
are given, as they will enable an}' one to follow the
lines readily :
" Lawrence" township, in the northeast corner of
the county, was given the following corners : The
northeast corner of Section 15, Town 17 north of
Range 5 east, is the northeast corner of the town-
ship ; the southeast corner of Section 15, Town 16
north of Range 5 east, is the southeast corner ; the
southwest corner of Section 15, Town 16 north of
Range 4 east, is the southwest corner ; and the
northwest corner of Section 16, Town 17 north of
Range 4 east, the northwest corner. The township
contains forty-nine sections, seven each way.
" Washington" township, immediately north of
Centre, has the following corners : Od the northeast,
northeast corner of Section 17, Town 17 north of
Range 4 east ; on the southeast, the southeast corner
of Section 16, Town 16 north of Range 4 east; on
the southwest, the southwest corner of Section 15,
Town 16 north of Range 3 east; and the northwest,
the northwest corner of Section 16, Town 17 north
of Range 3 east. This township contains forty-nine
sections, seven each way, like Lawrence. Three sec-
tions were subsequently taken from Pike, in Town 16
north of Range 3 east, so that the southwest corner
of Section 16, Town 17 north of Range 3 east, is the
southwest corner of the township.
" Pike" township, in the northwest corner of the
county, is now somewhat different from the bounds
set by the commissioners at this session. The four
corners as set by them at this time are as follows :
The northeast is the northeast corner of Section 17,
Town 17 north of Range 3 east ; the southeast is
the southeast corner of Section 16, Town 16 north
of Range 3 east ; the southwest is the southwest
corner of Section 16, Town 16 north of Range 2
east; the northwest is the northwest corner of the
county. The east and west boundaries were both
changed after this, so that the southeast corner is
the southeast corner of Section 17, Town 16 north
of Range 3 east, giving to Washington three sec-
tions ; and on the west the bounds of the county
were changed, giving the four east halves of sections
to Pike, thus making the area forty-four sections,
seven miles north and south, six miles on the south
side and six and a half on the north side.
'• Warren" township, on the east of Centre, was
described with the following corners : The northeast,
the northeast corner of Section 22, Town 16 north
of Range 5 east ; the southeast, the southeast corner
of Section 22, Town 15 north of Range 5 east ; the
southwest, the southwest corner of Section 22, Town
15 north of Range 4 east; the northwest, the north-
west corner of Section 22, Town 16 north of Range
4 east. The township contains forty-nine sections,
seven sections each way, being almost exactly square,
and has never been changed.
" Centre township shall consist of the territory
I included within the following bounds, to wit : Be-
ginning at the northeast corner of Section 21, Town
i 16, Range 4 ; thence south on the section line to the
southeast corner of Section 21, Town 15, Range 4 ;
I thence west to the southwest corner of Section 22,
Town 15, Range 3; thence north on the section line
to the northwest corner of Section 22, Town 16,
Range 3; thence east on the section line to the
place of beginning." The township contains forty-
two sections, seven miles north and south, six east and
west, and has never been altered.
" Wayne" township had and still has the follow-
ing corners, having remained unchanged : The north-
east, the northeast corner of Section 21, Town 16
north of Range 3 east ; the southeast, the southeast
40
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
corner of Section 21, Town 15 north of Range 3
east ; the southwest, the southwest corner of Section
21, Town 15 north of Range 2 east; the northwest,
the northwest corner of Section 21, Town 16 north
of Range 2 east. The township contains forty-nine
sections, being of the same shape and size as
Warren.
" Franklin" township is of the same size and
shape as Centre, but has its greatest extension east
and west. The corners are as follows : The north-
east, the northeast corner of Section 27, Town 15
north of Range 5 east ; the southeast, the southeast
corner of the county ; the southwest, the southwest
corner of Section 22, Town 14 north of Range 4
east ; the northwest, the northwest corner of Sec-
tion 27, Town 15 north of Range 4 east. This
township also has never been changed.
" Decatur" and " Perry" townships were at first
given bounds which made them parallelograms, but
they have since been so changed that the river forms
a boundary line between them. The four corners of
" Perry" township were as follows : The northeast,
the northeast corner of Section 28, Town 15 north
of Range 4 east ; the southeast, the southeast corner
of Section 21, Town 14 north of Range 4 east ; the
southwest, the southwest corner of Section 22, Town
14 north of Range 3 east ; the northwest, the north-
west corner of Section 27, Town 15 north of Range
3 east. This made an area of forty-two sections, the
same shape and size as Franklin, seven miles east and
west, six north and south. The township now, how-
ever, has about forty-five sections, making the river
the west boundary line.
" Decatur" township had the following corners :
The northeast, the northeast corner of Section 28,
Town 15 north of Range 3 east; the southeast, the
southeast corner of Section 21, Town 14 north of
Range 3 east ; the southwest, the southwest corner
of the county ; the northwest, the northwest corner of
Section 27, Town 15 north of Range 2 east. This
gave the township thirty-six sections, while it contains
now but about thirty-three sections.
" On account of lack of population" certain of
the townships were, until other regulations were
made, to be united and to be considered as one
township. They were Centre and Warren, to be
called " Centre- Warren" ; Pike and Wayne, " Pike-
Wayne" ; Washington and Lawrence, " Washington-
Lawrence" ; Decatur, Perry, and Franklin, all three
to be known as " Decatur-Perry-Franklin" township.
Each combination was assigned two justices except
Centre- Warren, which was given three.
Some of them were soon separated, the first being
Decatur township, which was disunited on the 12th
of August, 1823. The next separation was of Pike
township from Wayne, on the 10th of May, 1824, a
petition to that end having been presented by some
of tlie citizens of the J,ownship ; and the commission-
ers considering the population sufficient to warrant the
order, Warren and Centre townships were separated
by an order of the Board, May 1, 1826.
Washington and Lawrence were separated Oct. 6,
1826. Franklin and Perry were separated Sept. 3,
1827, on a petition presented by the people of that
township.
On March 3, 1828, three sections in Pike town-
ship, 3, 9, and 10, were attached to Washington.
On the next day after the townships were formed
the County Board ordered the election of " magis-
trates" in all the townships, assigning two to the
joint town.ships of Washington and Lawrence, two
to Pike and Wayne, two to Decatur, Perry, and
i Franklin, and three to " Centre- Warren," as it is
I
j always written in the records. The 11th of May
j was set for the election. In Centre-Warren, Obed
Foote, Wilkes Reagan, and Lismund Basye were
{ elected, and their election contested by Moses Cox.
The case was heard by the Board at a special session
j on the 16th of May, on a summons by the sheriff,
[ with whom notice of contest had been filed. Some
1 preliminary argument and ruling were made, and the
I next day the Board decided that the election should
'■ be set aside and held as null and void." A second
election was ordered on the 25th of May, eight days
j later, which was duly held, and the same men re-
I elected. That election was not disturbed.
j At the same May session of 1822 the first consta-
I bles were appointed : for Washington and Law-
! rence, William Cris and John Small ; for Pike and
I Wayne, Joel A. Crane and Charles Eckard ; for
ERECTION OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS.
41
Centre- Warren, Israel Harding, Joseph Duval,
Francis Davis, George Harlan, William Phillips,
Caleb Reynolds, Daniel Lakin, Lewis Ogle, Samuel
Roberts, Joseph Catterlin, Henry Cline, Joshua
Glover, and Patrick Kerr, — a larger force than the
two townships have ever had since.
At the April session, on the evening of the 17th,
a county seal was adopted, thus described: " A star
in the centre, with the letters ' M. C. C around the
same, with inverted carved stripes tending to the
centre of the star, and ' Marion County Seal' written
thereon." On the 14th of May this seal was
changed for the present one, thus officially described :
" The words ' Marion County Seal, Indiana,' around
the outside, with a pair of scales in the centre em-
blematical of justice, under which is a plow and
sheaf of wheat in representation of agriculture."
The first roads opened or ordered in the county were
considered upon the petition of William Townsend
and others, and " viewed" by Joel Wright, John
Smock, and Zadoc Smith for the one running " to
the Mills at the Falls of Fall Creek,"— the old Pen-
dleton road ; and by William D. Rooker, Robert
Brenton, and George Norwood for the other, running
from " the north end of Pennsylvania Street to
Strawtown," — the old Noblesville road. The next
road was along the line of the present National road,
upon petition of Eliakim Harding ; the fourth, a road
to McCormick's Mills, on White River, upon peti-
tion of John McCormick ; the fifth, the old Moores-
ville road, upon petition of Demas L. McFarland.
These were all in May, 1822.
On the 17th, continuing the same session, the
County Board established the following tolls " on the
ferry on White River opposite Indianapolis," which
was established by an act of the preceding Legislature :
" For each wagon and four horses or oxen $0.62i
" wagon and two horses or oxen 37i
" wagon (small) and one horse or ox 31i
'* extra horse or ox 12i
" man or woman and horse 1-i
" head of neat cattle 03
" head of swine 02
" head of sheep 02
" footman OBJ."
At the same session of the Board the following
" tavern rates" were established :
" Each half-pint of whiskey S0.12J
Each half-pint of imported nun, brandy, gin, or
wine 25
Each quart of cider or beer 12A
Each quart of porter, cider wine, or cider oil 25
Each half-pint of peach brandy, cordial, country
gin, or apple brandy ISjf
Each meal 25
Each night's lodging 12i
Esieh gallon of corn or oats 12i
Each horse to hay, per night 25."
The tax-payers of to-day will be interested in the
modes and rates of taxation fixed by the County
Board in the first year of the county's organization.
At a session of the Board held on the 14th ot
May, 1822, the following rates were established for
taxation :
" For every horse, mare, gelding, mule, or ass over
three years old $0.37^
For stallions, once (their rate for the season)
For taverns, each 10.00
For every ferry 6.00
For every SlOO of. the appraised valuation of town
lots 50
For each and every pleasure carriage of two wheels... 1.00
For each pleasure carriage of four wheels 1.25
For every silver w.atch 25
For every gold watch 50
For every head of work-oxen over three years old and
upwards, per head 25
On each male person over the age of twenty-one years.. .50
" Provided, That persons over the age of fifty years and not
freeholders, and such as are not able from bodily disability to
follow any useful occupation, . . . and all idiots and paupers
shall be exempt from said last-named tax."
At the same session in which the tax rates were
settled an order was made for the erection of the
first jail. The sherifiF, Hervey Bates, was appointed
county agent to receive bids. The specifications
required as follows :
" It is to be built fourteen feet in the inside, two
stories high, of six and a half feet between floors,
to be of hewed logs twelve inches thick and at
least twelve inches wide, with two rounds of oak
or walnut logs to be under ground;" and "the
second floor and the side logs to be of the same
size of walnut, oak, ash, beech, or sugar-tree;"
and " the third or upper floor to be of logs six
inches thick and at least one foot wide." The
roof was to be of jointed shingles. There was to
be a window in the lower story or dungeon twelve
inches square. The grate-bars for it were to be
42
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
one inch and a quarter in thickness, and there
was a window two feet by six inches in the second
story, opposite the door by which the jail was en-
tered. This door was four feet by two, of two
thicknesses of two-inch oak plank, with a heavy
stock-look between, and also heavy strap hinges.
There was to be a ladder leading up on the out-
side to the door in the second story, and another
door, a trap two feet square, in the floor of the
second story, leading down into the lower story,
which was to be fastened with a hasp and pad-
lock."
The contract was awarded to Noah Leaverton,
some time in Mayor June, 1822, by Hervey Bates,
and was submitted to the commissioners for in-
spection, and accepted on August 12th.
" The Board approve, adopt, and permanently
establish the building erected of hewed logs . . .
on the Court-House Square, near the corner of
Market and Delaware Streets, in Indianapolis, as
the county jail." It cost three hundred and twelve
dollars. (Pages 27, 28, 29, Commissioners' Record.)
The jail looked a good deal like a small, re-
spectable residence, bating the suggestive quality of
the heavy iron gratings. In the summer of 1833 a
negro came to the town wearing a black cap with
a red leather band around it, and leading sometimes,
sometimes riding, a buffalo. He made a show of
it on the streets occasionally, and was followed by
the usual crowd of curious boys, who gave him a
name that another man has lately made famous,
" Buffalo Bill." He was arrested for some offense,
larceny probably, and put in jail. That night he
set it on fire to make his escape, and came near
being burned in it. The hole in the ground where
the two lower courses of logs had lain was visible
for twenty years. Jeremiah Johnson was the first
jailer. It was succeeded by a brick jail on the
east side of the Court-House Square, one end abut-
ting directly upon Alabama Street. In this the
jailer was provided with rooms for residence. In
1845 a hewed-log addition was made on the north
and used for the confinement of the worst pris-
oners. It was built of logs hewed to one foot square,
and laid in three courses, the first horizontal, the
one outside of it and bolted to it perpendicular or
oblique, and the third, exterior to that, horizontal.
An exterior casing of the same kind, consisting of
one vertipal and one horizontal course of hewed
logs, was put round the first jail some time after
it was built.
In 1852 the present jail, in the east corner of
the Court-House Square, was begun and com-
pleted in 1854, when the old jail was torn away.
Several additions have been made to the present one,
at an aggregate cost of near one hundred thousand
dollars, but the increase of crime in a city so con-
venient to scoundrels, from its facilities for escape,
and so largely made up at all times of transient resi-
dents, has constantly exceeded the county's ability to
take adequate care of the criminals. Escapes have
not been very infrequent, and grand juries, whenever
they make an examination, are pretty sure to report
insuflScient room.
In this connection may be noticed more appro-
priately than in the detached accounts following a
chronological order, the crimes which have met the
extreme penalty of the law in the present jail, as well
as the first offenses in the history of the settlement.
Until within the last decade no sentence of death had
ever been passed upon any murderer in Marion
County. Then William Cluck was convicted of the
murder of his wife and sentenced to be hung. The
sheriff had the gallows built and in place in the jail-
yard, but a day or two before that set for the execution
the murderer got poison and killed himself In the fall
of 186!-, Mrs. Nancy E. Clem, William J. Abrams,
and Silas W^. Hartman, Mrs. Clem's brother, were
indicted for the murder of Jacob Young and his wife,
— a horrible affair, in which the body of Mrs. Young
was partially burned after she had been shot through
the head, — known as the " Cold Spring" murder, and
the woman was convicted of murder in the second
degree and sentenced to imprisonment for life early
in March, 1869. Just one week afterwards her
brother cut his throat in his cell to escape an inevita-
ble death by the halter. These were the nearest
approaches made to the death penalty in this county
till its first actual infliction in January, 1879. The
frequent escape of murderers whose crimes deserved
ERECTION OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS.
43
death had stirred a strong feeling into public expres-
sion against the wealcness of the law as a protection
of the community, and the almost certain escape of
every offender, whatever his crime, if he could pay
well for a defense, had strengthened this feeling. It
appeared in the editorials and communications of the
papers, in allusions in public speeches and sermons,
in social conversation, and, more emphatic than all, in
frequent lynchings all about in the State. Mrs. Clem,
though twice convicted, finally worried the law by
appeals and change of venue and postponement till
she was discharged, and this more than any other one
thing had set the community hard against any lenity
to the next murderer.
In November, 1878, John Achey was convicted of
the murder, by shooting, of George Leggett, a partner
in a gambling operation, and sentenced to death on
the 29th of January, 1879.. On the 13th of Decem-
ber, 1878, William Merrick, a livery-stable keeper on
South Street, was convicted of the murder of his
wife. She had been a school-teacher, and saved a
considerable sum of money. While paying her his
addresses he borrowed all her money, seduced her,
and only after much solicitation married her. Within
a day or two of her confinement he took her out
riding after dusk, gave her strychnine in a glass of
beer, which caused premature child-birth in the
agonies of death, and then drove with the dead
bodies to a small wood near the Morris Street bridge
over Eagle Creek, where he dug a shallow hole on
the creek bank, put the bodies naked in it, and
covered them with logs. He burned in his stable the
clothing he took from his wife's corpse in the dark-
ness of midnight and the woods, and no discovery
was made for several days. Then a boy going along
the creek found the bodies, the wife was identified by
some physical marks still discernible through the de-
composition, and very soon after the husband was
arrested. The horrible brutality of the crime, the
cool, callous, calculating cruelty in every stage of it,
the beastliness of the burial, all provoked so hot an
exasperation of popular feeling that for the first time
there were serious threats of lynching. He was
sentenced to be hung at the same time Achey was,
January 29th. Some attempts were made to obtain a
commutation for Achey, whose provocation had been
great, and would have saved him a death sentence in
any other condition of feeling of the community, but
nothing was done for Merrick. They were hung on
the same gallows at the same instant, Merrick sullen,
dogged, and silent to the last, though indicating a
desire to speak at the moment the drop fell. Louis
Guetig was convicted the same year of the murder of
Miss McGlue, a waiter in the hotel kept by his uncle
whom he had been courting, but who had discarded
him. He shot her in the courtyard of the hotel
while imploring him not to kill her, and imperiled
several other girls who were present, and was sen-
tenced to be hung with Achey and Merrick ; but his
counsel obtained on appeal a reversal of some trivial
instruction of the court below, and a second trial fol-
lowed, with a second conviction and death sentence,
and he was hung on Sept. 19, 1879, the anniversary
of the murder. These are the only death sentences
ever passed or inflicted in Marion County, except that
of a colored man named Greenly for murdering his
sweetheart. He was sentenced, but the Governor
commuted his punishment to life imprisonment.
The first grand jury of the county returned twenty-
two indictments by Joseph C. Reed, the first recorder
and school-teacher, of which six wore non pressed.
They were pretty much all, except one assault and
battery, for selling liquor without a license, a class of
offenses which has always been a strong one in In-
dianapolis and is yet. The first sufferer of thousands
of lawle.ss liquor dealers through a course of two gener-
ations was John Wyant. So many indictments at the
first term of court in so small a settlement, with no
roads and no navigable streams, and no neighbors but
Indians, would indicate the presence of a considerable
portion of the lawless element that always mixes
itself up with the real pioneer and improving element,
though there was much less of it and of a less dan-
gerous quality than that appearing on the present fron-
tiers of civilization. The first felony appears, from
Mr. Nowland's recollection, to have been a burglary
committed by an old man named Redman, and Warner
his son-in-law, on the grocery-store of the late Jacob
Landis in 1824. Col. Russell was the sheriff, and a
search-warrant enabled him to find the missing goods
44
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
or most of them. Warner's wife attempted to con-
ceal them under her clothing, but was detected. The
offenders were sent to the penitentiary for several
years. The first murder was committed long after-
wards in 1833, and will be noticed particularly in its
place.
The Court-House Square, like all the rest of the
town, was a dense wood when the first jail was put
there, and a little later when the first steps for a
court-house were taken, on the representations of
James Blake, the county commissioners made an
order that in clearing the square two hundred trees
(sugars or maples it was understood) should be spared
for a grove. No special direction having been given
the contractors they left the largest trees, which,
when the surrounding protection of forest had been
cut away, had to bear the brunt of every wind that
blew, and were soon so greatly damaged that they
were cut down and cleared away entirely. The con-
tractors for clearing were Earl Pierce and Samuel
Hyde, for fifty-nine dollars. Many years after an at-
tempt was piade to reproduce a little shade by a grove
of suitable trees, but the saplings were killed by
drought or carelessness, mischievous boys or breachy
cattle. There has never been any shade worth speak-
ing of in the Court-House Square since the primeval
forest was cut away in 1822. With the progress of
the present court-house the square has been filled
from a shallow depression to a very handsome eleva-
tion, and some fine trees would become both.
On Thursday, the 15th of August, 1822, as ap-
pears from the " Commissioners' Record" (page 45),
the County Board ordered the clerk to advertise in
the Indianapolis Gazette for bids for a court-house,
to be built upon plans furnished by John E. Baker
and James Paxton. The specifications in brief were :
The building was to front on Washington Street,
to be forty-five by sixty feet, and ninety-four feet
high from the ground. It was to be of brick, and
two stories high. The foundation was to be of stone,
eighteen inches in the ground and three feet and a
half out of the ground, and three feet thick. The
walls of the lower story were to be twenty-seven
inches thick, and of the second story twenty-two
inches. There was to be a cupola in the centre
twenty-two and a half feet high, on top of it a dome
five feet high, then a shaft twelve feet, and finally
an iron spire with a gilt ball and vane. On the first
floor were a court-room forty and a half feet square,
and another small room and a hall, each thirteen feet
three inches square. In the second story there were
to be a court-room forty-one feet three inches by
twenty-five feet, two rooms sixteen feet square, the
hall and a room thirteen feet six inches square, and
an entry eight and a half feet wide. The first story
was fifteen and a half feet, the second fifteen feet.
There was a " Doric cornice gutter on the roof, and
four tin conductors with capitals." The roof was
to be of poplar shingles, jointed, five inches to the
weather.
At a special meeting held on the 3d of September,
1822, the commissioners examined bids for building
the house, and awarded the contract to John E.
Baker and James Paxton for thirteen thousand nine
hundred and ninety-six dollars. Operations were to
commence before the 1st day of April, 1823, and the
building to be completed in three years. The build-
ing was inspected by the commissioners, who were still
in office, and this was their last official act. It was
on the 7th day of January, 1825. Only a little
painting and other work remained uncompleted.
(Commissioners' Record, pages 45, 46, 47, and 54.)
Until the completion of the court-house court was
held, as the law required, at the residence of Gen.
John Carr, a double log cabin on Delaware Street,
about opposite the entrance to the court-house. The
first session was held here on the 26th of September,
1822, with Judge William W. Wick presiding, the
newly-qualified associates, Mcllvaine and Harding,
assisting, James M. Ray as clerk, and Hervey Bates
as sheriff. After the court was organized it ad-
journed to Crumbaugh's house, west of the line of
the future canal. Calvin Fletcher was made the
first prosecutor, continuing for three terms, and fol-
lowed by Harvey Gregg, Hiram Brown, William
Quarles, Philip Sweetser, James Morrison, Hugh
O'Neal, Governor Wallace, Governor Hammond,
and others more or less eminent in the profession.
There were thirteen civil causes on the docket, and
twenty-two indictments found, of which, as already
ERECTION OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS.
45
related, six were non prossed. Eleven lawyers were
present, five of them being residents. The session
lasted three days, naturalized an Irishman, Richard
Good, licensed John Hawkins to sell liquor, indicted
a dozen or more for selling without a license, and
established " prison bounds" for the unfortunates
airested and confined for debt, that relic of barbarism
being still in mischievously vigorous condition here.
The first civil case was Daniel Bowman vs. Meridy
Edwards ; the first criminal case, State vs. John
Wyant, for violation of license laws. The second
session was opened May 5, 1823, at Carr's, and ad-
journed to Henderson's tavern, on the site of the
" New York Store." Here appeared the first divorce
ease, Elias Stallcup vs. Ruth Stallcup. The third
session was opened at Carr's, as usual, Nov. 3, 1823,
but adjourned to Harvey Gregg's house. The fourth,
April 12, 1824, adjourned from Carr's to John John-
son's, and the fifth met at Carr's, Oct. 11, 1824, and
adjourned to the partially completed court-house, and
never afterwards left it till it was torn down in 1870
to make room for the present one.
This old court-house was practically the only pub-
lic building in the town from 1825 to 1835. The
Legislature made a State-House of it for three
months every winter. The Federal Court, the Su-
preme Court, the County Court, and the County
Board all met and did business there. More than
this, after the completion of the State-House, and
the removal of that portion of public business to its
own quarters, the old court-house became the City
Hall, the place of conventions, the ready resort of
every gathering that could not go anywhere else and
could pay for lights there. The county's fuel usually
warmed all that got iu. whether public charity or
private show. Joseph G. Marshall and James Whit-
comb, two of the ablest men in the United States in
the days of the giants, held their debate there when
opposing candidates for Governor in 1843. The
eccentric wandering preacher, Lorenzo Dow, preached
there in 1827. Professor Bronson gave his first lec-
tures on " Elocution" there. Col. Lehmanowski lec-
tured there on " Napoleon's Wars." Preachers " out-
side of any healthy organization," as the Southern
senators said of Seward and Sumner, who could not
get the " Old Seminary," could always get the court-
house. " Nigger minstrels" gave the first of their
performances there. A ventriloquist gave a show
there. John Kelly played the fiddle there. Wil-
liam S. Unthank lectured there on electro-magnetism
as a motive-power more than thirty years ago. County
conventions and city meetings assembled there. But
a year or two before it was torn down the citizens
held a meeting there to take measures to get the
Agricultural College, for which Congress had made
provision in all the States, located here, against the
competition of Lafayette and John Purdue. A Mr.
Keeley in 1844 made experiments in mesmerism
there, and set half the fools in town mesmerizing the
other half. Few buildings in a new country, or any
country, have had a greater variety of experiences in
as short a life. It was State-House, court-house, oc-
casional church, convention hall, lecture-room, con-
cert-room, show-room, ball-room in forty-five years.
During the time the present court-house was in
course of erection, from May, 1870, to July, 1876,
the courts were held in a large, cheap two-story
brick building at the west gate, near where the west
entrances from the street now are. In front, and to
the east a few feet, were the old oflBces of the county,
the clerk and treasurer, recorder and auditor, the
last two in the second story, the others on the ground-
floor. In 1827 the Legislature appropriated five
hundred dollars to build a little double-room, one-
story brick house at the west entrance of the Court-
House Square, for the clerk of the Supreme Court,
then and for many years afterwards Henry P. Coburn,
one of the foremost of the old citizens in all good
work. He was one of the first trustees of the town
government, one of the first trustees of the Old
Seminary, and one of the first three trustees of the
city schools, a position in which he contributed as
largely as any man to their wise and beneficent estab-
lishment. He was always put in for gratuitous pub-
lic services, and never made any difference in the
faithfulness and efficiency of his discharge of them.
He was a graduate of Harvard and a college-mate
with Edward Everett, came to this place with the State
government in 1824, was the father of Gen. John
Coburn and Henry, of the firm of Coburn & Jones,
46
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and died July 20, 1854, at the age of sixty-four.
This little building was torn down in 1855, and the
clerk's office was removed to the State-House. The
present court-house was completed in six years from
the removal of the old one, at a cost of one million
four hundred and twenty-two thousand three hundred
and seventy-one dollars and seventy-nine cents, a lit-
tle more than one hundred times as much as the old
house of 1823-25 cost. Costly as it was, and re-
cently as it has been completed, it is said to show
signs of dilapidation. The State is once more
making a eapitol of the county's house while wait-
ing for its own building, as it did from 1825 to
1835, but it had a right to the first one, for it paid
for it and used it as an owner. It has no right to
this one, and must pay as a tenant. The city has
found quarters for its offices in the same building,
after moving about from the old Marion Engine house
on the Circle to any convenient rooms it could get till
it found something like a permanent location in the
Glenn Block, and another later where the Mfenner-
chor Hall is. It will stay now where it is till it gets
a hall of its own. The only other buildiag ever
erected on the Court-House Square was a large tem-
porary frame, built by the political parties for cam-
paign meetings in 1864 on the southeast corner of
the square. It remained for some time after its
special use was completed, and was made a sort of
public hall.
Following the incidents of the organization of the
first court and the occupancy of the Court-House
Square has carried this narrative beyond the order of
time, and it may now return to the further action of
the first ses.sion of the County Board. On the 16th
of April the commissioners, under an act of the
Legislature, appointed Daniel Yandes county treas-
urer, to serve for one year, or till the next February
session, which was the regular time of appointment.
On the 13th of November, 1822, he made his first
report, and it will be found interesting at this day,
when the revenues and expenses of the county are
equal to those of the State at that time :
" Daniel Tandes, County Treasurer, Dr.
To amount of receipts up to this date, for store
licenses, tavern licenses, and taxes on certificates
and sales and writs $169,934
To certified amount of county revenue assessed for
1822 726.79
To the balance in your favor on settlement this day.... 79. Hi
S975.84
Treasurer, Cn.
By payment to grand jurors to this date S2.25
'* to county commissioners .36.00
" to listing, appraisers, etc 70.50
*' to prosecuting attorney 15.25
" to expenses of the courts and juries 40.50
" to returning judges of elections 9.50
" to building county jail account 140.50
" to work on Court-House Square 59.00
" to viewers and surveyors of roads 8.12J
" on poor account 5.00
" on school section accuunt 1.50
*' for printing 32.87^
S421.00
To treasurer's per cent, on $421.00 at 5 per cent 21.00
By amount of county revenue yet due from Harris
Tyner, collector, for the year 1822 490.844
By amount deducted from revenue by delinquents... 42.S7i
$975.84"
Mr. Yandes was reappointed Feb. 10, 1823, to
serve for one year, and was reappointed annually till
1829. The following are the dates of his later ap-
pointments : Feb. 11, 1824, Jan. 3, 1825, Jan. 6,
1826, Jan. 1, 1827, Jan. 8, 1828. James John-
son was appointed in 1829. Hervey Bates was
elected sheriff at the regular State election in August,
and served till 1824, when Alexander W. Russell
succeeded him, and was succeeded in 1828 by Jacob
Landis. Harris Tyner appears from the report of
Mr. Yandes to have been the first tax collector.
James Paxton was the first assessor, by appointment
of the County Board, April 17, 1822. George Smith,
of the Gazette, was elected coroner at the regular elec-
tion in August, but seems not to have served, and
the first in service was Harris Tyner, commissioned
Sept. 1, 1823. A complete list of county officers
will be found in a more appropriate connection. The
purpose here is only to notice the first occupants and
duties of the officers.
On the 29th of May two keel-boats came up the
river, the " Eagle" from the Kanawha, and the
" Boxer" from Zanesville, the former loaded with fif-
teen tons of salt, whiskey, tobacco, and dried fruit, the
latter with thirty-three tons of dry-goods and print-
ing material for Luke Walpole, one of the earliest of
the merchants, who then had a store on the Court-
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
47
House Square. Stores then and for years after
kept dry-goods, groceries, hardware, queensware,
liquor, everything, as old baokwoodsmeo used to say,
'■ from scythe-snathes to salt fish, hymn-books, calico,
and tobacco," and a strip of red flannel hung over the
door was the usual sign.
On the 17th of June a meeting was held at
Hawkins' tavern, on Washington Street, to prepare
for the first celebration of the Fourth of July. It
took place on the " Military Ground," which then
covered pretty much all the area north of Washington
Street and west of West Street, then a country lane,
to the road along the edge of the bluflP of White River
and Fall Creek bottoms, now called Blake Street, and
north to Michigan Street. It was heavily wooded,
largely with hackberries, whose little black beads
of fruit with a mere scale of covering, as sweet as
any bee ever made, were a favorite indulgence of the
school-boys of a later day. A few of these old hack-
berries are still standing in what is left of the
[ " Military Ground" in Military Park. The opening
ceremony of the occasion was a sermon by Rev. John
MoCluug, the "New Light" pioneer preacher, on the
text, from Proverbs, " Righteousness exalteth a nation,
but sin is a reproach to any people." Rev. Robert
Brenton " closed with a prayer and benediction." Be-
tween the two religious extremes there came a brief
address from Judge Wick on the events and charac-
ters of the Revolution, closing with the Declaration.
Squire Obed Foote read Washington's Inaugural
Address, with remarks appropriate to the subject,
and John Hawkins read the Farewell Address, with
suitable reflections. The audience certainly got a
better quality of literature and sentiment than they
would have been likely to get from a larger infusion
of original matter. The more material enjoyment of
the day was a deer killed the day before by Robert
Harding on the northwest corner of the donation,
and " barbecued" in a sufiicient hole dug near a big
elm. A long table was set under the trees, and a
better feast made than could be got for less vigorous
appetites at ten dollars a mouth at a Delmonico's.
During the dinner the inevitable speeches were made
by Dr. Samuel G. Mitchell and Maj. John W. Red-
ding. The festivities were completed by a ball at the
house of J. R. Crumbaugh, just west of the site of the
canal near Washington Street.
The observance of the Fourth of July was kept up
faithfully for about the third of a century. Then it
began to fail in interest, and the war put an end to it.
For much the greater part of this long period the
celebration was confined to the Sunday-schools almost
wholly, only a rare parade of mechanics or firemen
breaking the current. Early in the morning the
children of each school would meet at the church,
form a procession with banners, the least in front, and
march, under the superintendent, to some point near
the Circle, where all would fall in and make a pro-
cession of several thousands in the latter days, always
under the marshalship of James Blake, and go to the
State-House Square or to some convenient grove,
where a platform and seats had been provided, and
there hear a prayer, a reading of the Declaration by
some young fellow of promising qualities, and an
oration of the stereotyped kind from a lawyer or
preacher or some one of a pursuit inclining to oratory.
Governor Porter achieved his first local distinction by
a Fourth of July address in the grove on West
Street, afterwards the site of the Soldiers' Home. It
was not of the stereotyped, eagle-screaming, sun-
soaring style, however. He had a Revolutionary
soldier on the platform, and made as efi'ective a use
of him, in a less degree, as Webster did of his old
soldiers in his speech on Bunker Hill. Another
striking address on a like occasion was that of ex-
Governor Wallace in the State-House Square the
year before, not far from the middle of the decade of
1840 to 1850. The conclusion of the celebration
was a liberal distribution of " rusks" and water, and
a benediction that sent all home before the unpleasant
hour of noon. Since the war the Fourth has been a
sort of general picnic holiday, or occasion for a fes-
tive celebration by some one of the many associations
in the city. For about thirty years it was steadily
maintained by the Sunday-schools, from 1828 to
1858.
On the 20th of June, three days after settling
upon the mode and means of celebrating the Fourth,
the citizens held another meeting at the school-
house, near the present intersection of Illinois
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Street and Kentucky Avenue, to settle the ar-
rangements for a permanent school. Trustees were
appointed, and Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence selected as
teachers. The school was maintained for some years.
Mr. Reed, the first teacher in the settlement, did
not keep his place more than one quarter, — all
schooling was counted by the quarter (of twelve
weeks) in those days, — but others succeeded him
till this permanent arrangement was made in Jun^,
1822. Who the first trustees were there is no
record to tell, and no reminiscence recalls them,
but it would not be a wild guess to say that
James Blake or James M. Ray or Calvin Fletcher
was among them.
The first State election in the New Purchase oc-
curred on the 5th of August, 1822. William
Hendricks, uncle of ex- Governor and ex-United
States Senator Thomas A. Hendricks, received three
hundred and fifteen out of the three hundred and
seventeen votes cast for Governor. He served two
terms in the National Senate after leaving the Ex-
ecutive chair. This vote would indicate a popula-
tion of fifteen hundred to sixteen hundred in the
county with the enlargement then appended to it.
As above noted, Mr. Bates was elected sheriff at
this election, and served a full term of two years.
George Smith, elected coroner, was succeeded in
1824 by Harris Tyner. In the militia election of
the 6th of the next month, James Paxton was
elected colonel of the Fortieth Regiment, Samuel
Morrow lieutenant-colonel, and Alexander W. Rus-
sell major.
The leading events of the three years of the
first settlement of the city may be summed up
thus: in 1820 the selection of the capital site,
birth of first child, cultivation of the " caterpillar
deadening;" in 1821 the first appointment of justices,
laying out the town, the epidemic and the famine,
the first sermon, the first marriage, the first death,
the first store, the first sale of lots, the first school-
house and school, — a year of first things ; in 1822
the organization of the county, designation of town-
ships, measures for county buildings, first tax levy
and report, and generally the incidents of the tran-
sition of a community from an accidental collection
into an organized body prepared to support and
take care of itself.
During the remainder of the year 1822 the
chief incidents of which any record or recollection
remains was a camp-meeting, beginning September
12th, east of the town, presided over by Rev.
James Scott, sent here by the St. Louis Confer-
ence in 1821, the first of a long series of this class
of assemblages held in or about the donation, and
still kept up, in an improved form with perma-
nent arrangements, at a convenient point southeast
of the city, near the little town of Acton, on the
Cincinnati Railroad. The " Military Ground" was a
favorite location for some years. Then they were
held in the northwest corner of the donation, in a
sugar-grove east of the canal, known as the " Tur-
key Roost," and the general resort of the school-
boys for little sugar saplings for "shinny clubs." The
camp-ground was in the western edge of it. For some
years a grove near the present site of the Deaf and
Dumb Asylum was used, then for a considerable
time they were abandoned about here altogether.
Their revival and establishment permanently at
Acton is an affair of the last decade mainly. For
a whole generation the most prominent and eSec-
tive preacher at camp-meetings was Rev. James
Havens, irreverently called by the ungodly " Old
Sorrel," a man of rugged and powerful structure,
both physically and intellectually, as fearless as the
famous Peter Cartwright, and as well able to pro-
tect himself from the violence that he sometimes
had to encounter or expect from the " roughs"
who sought diversion in disturbing the meetings.
The most notable incident in all that is remem-
bered of these gatherings about here is his en-
counter with a man named Burkhart, commonly
called " Buckhart," the leader of a lawless crowd
brought here by the work on the National road
and the Central Canal, and left here idle when
those works were abandoned. They lived by dig-
ging wells and moving houses, when they did any-
thing but steal, and when they could not do better
lived on the corn and potatoes, pigs and chickens
of the farms that then covered the greater part of
what is now the city. They were called the " chain-
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
49
gang." Two or three met violent deaths in affrays
a few years later, but Burkhart left the town, went
down about the " Bluffs," and died in his bed at
a ripe old age, in better moral condition than he
had lived for most of his life. The camp-meeting
which was the scene of the incident was held on
the " Military Ground." " Old Dave Buckhart"
appeared there on the skirts of the assembly pretty
drunk, and wandering /barefooted in the simple
costume of a dirty shirt and pair of pantaloons,
his usual style of dress, from one point to another,
singing a ribald song, or couplet rather, of his own
making. Gen. Thomas A. Morris, the hero of the
We.'t Virginia campaign, the credit of which Mc-
Clellan absorbed, and Hugh O'Neal, one of the fore-
most criminal lawyers of the State, had learned some-
thing of the purpose of the chain-gang to disturb
the camp-meeting, and went there expressly to pre-
vent it and punish the rowdies. As soon as Burk-
hart's singing was seen to attract attention they
went to him, and at almost the same instant Mr.
Havens came up. A peremptory order of silence
was met by a drunken defiance, which the legendary
account says was followed by a blow " from the
shoulder" by the preacher that knocked the rowdy
senseless. But Gen. Morris says he is not sure
that Mr. Havens struck Burkhart, and that there
was no knock-down. This phase of the story took
form from an occurrence the next day, when Burk-
hart was before Squire Scudder for disturbing the
meeting. He was " gostrating" to the crowd at-
tending the trial, and the late Samuel Merrill,
thinking that the most effectual way to " squelch"
the leader of the " chain-gang" and hold it in
more wholesome dread of the law-abiding commu-
nity would be to beat him at his own game, and
show him that rowdies were not as formidable an-
tagonists as better men, challenged him to wrestle
with him. The rowdy was heavily and easily thrown
by the sober and muscular lawyer, greatly to his
chagrin and the discomfiture of the gang. It was
not long after this that he left the town, and never
returned except for a brief visit.
An incident of the fall of 1822, still well remem-
bered by the survivors of the early settlers, was an
4
invasion of gray squirrels that came from the east
going westward. They were liberally killed, but the
massacre made no impression on their countless num-
bers. They destroyed a large portion of the corn
they found in the line they followed as undeviatingly
as a bullet, in spite of fences and streams and swamps.
In 1845 another such emigration occurred, but of
less extent and destructiveness. After this last there
came a gradual change upon the character of the
squirrel population of the county. Previously the
" gray" was the only variety known, except a very
rare red or " fox" squirrel. Afterwards the latter
became the larger, and displaced the other almost as
largely as it had itself been displaced. But this sort
of game disappeared rapidly after the completion of
the first lines of railroad, and now it is rarely seen
nearer the city than a half-dozen miles.
The fall of 1822 was signalized by the first at-
tempts to open roads under the act of the Legislature
of the preceding session. These roads must be dis-
tinguished from the county roads, ordered by the
County Board on petition, and examined by " view-
ers," which constituted so large a part of the care of
the county government in early days, and ever since
in fact. They were surveyed and some work done
upon them under direction of commissioners ap-
pointed by the act authorizing them, but little seems
to have been accomplished, except to clear away the
trees, leaving the stumps nearly as serious an ob-
struction. The White Water region was that with
which the settlement naturally desired the earliest
intercourse, and the roads in that direction were first
opened, with one southward toward Madison, over
which early in the winter a public meeting at Carter's
tavern demanded a weekly mail to Vernon, Jennings
Co., during the sessions of the Legislature at Cory-
don. The roads of this period and for many a year
afterwards were about as bad as any civilized com-
munity ever had to put up with. They were pass-
able for wagons and loads only when dried up in
summer or frozen up in winter, and even in these
favorable conditions there were long stretches that
had to be " cross-layed" with rails or logs, filled in
with chunks, to be passable even to a traveler on
horseback. Since the advent of railroads, and the
50
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
diminished reliance of the community on wagon-
roads for any but neighborhood communication, these
latter have been improved greatly everywhere, and
now there are none entering the city that are not
well graded and graveled, and as passable at one
season as another.
The first change from the primitive condition of
the roads was the " macadamizing" of the National
road by the government. An effort was made early
in the settlement to get Congress to run the line of
this then great national work through Indianapolis,
but nothing was accomplished till Oliver H. Smith,
afterwards founder of the " Bee Line" Railroad, be-
came a member of Congress from the eastern district
of the State in 1827. The line would have passed
near Columbus, in this State, Mr. Smith says in his
" Early Indiana Sketches," but he succeeded in car-
rying an amendment that brought it here, and along
our principal street, then and for a whole generation
better known as " Main Street" than Washington.
The " metaling" of this road extended through the
town and beyond the river to a point a few hundred
feet west of Eagle Creek, but it stopped in the town
at the eastern end, near East Street, leaving a con-
siderable distance uncovered to a point where a short
stretch east of Pogue's Creek was " metaled." The
survey of this road was made by the late Lazarus B.
Wilson, engineer of the " Louisville, New Albany
and Chicago" Railroad. He also planned the wooden
arch bridges on the line, which have been in constant
use with little repair, except replacing the soft slate
of the first stone-work of the river bridge with
durable limestone, since 1833. William Wernweg
and Walter Blake were contractors for these bridges.
" Cross-laying," as often as otherwise called " cross-
waying," was the universal substitute for better road-
making during the first thirty years of the existence
of the city. All the " bottoms" of streams were thus
made roughly passable, with frequent repair and re-
placing of rotten rails and logs. The old Madison
road, through Franklin and Columbus, was especially
improved or infested with cross-way work. Not lono-
before the Union Depot was built the whole breadth
of Pogue's Creek bottom, the head of this road, from
Louisiana Street, at the foot of the rise on which the
residence of Morris Morris stood on South Meridian
Street, to the rise on the other side at the " White
Point," built by Dr. John B. McClure, and long oc-
cupied by Nicholas McCarty, was a mass of rails and
saplings and chunks and swamp-slush, bordered by a
willow-fringed cow-pasture on the west side and a
corn-field on the east, where the Eagle Machine- Works
stand. In making the later substantial improvements
of this street some indications of the old condition
were discovered. The town streets were little better
than the country roads for many years. Even after
the trees were cut out, — and trees were standing in
some streets that are now built solidly for squares as
late as 1842 or 1843, — the stumps were left for the
wagon-way to wander around as crookedly as a
" bottom" bayou, reinforced by frequent mud-holes,
turned by large bodies of unrestrained hogs into hog-
wallows. The fences along each side were " worm-
fences," and sidewalks were pig-tracks hugging closely
the corners of the fences when a big mud-hole had to
be circumvented. But a few of the more central were
better.
One of the last incidents of the year was the elec-
tion by the Legislature, early in December, of Bethuel
F. Morris, grandfather of the distinguished young
naturalist and Amazonian explorer, Ernest Morris,
State agent in place of James Milroy, a non-resident,
appointed by the Governor to succeed Gen. Carr, who
had re.signed. Mr. Morris was subsequently president
judge of the Circuit Court, and cashier of the Indian-
apolis Branch of the State Bank. He died some
twenty years ago, after a long period of retired life,
at his home near the crossing of Morris Street and
Madison Avenue. About the time of his appointment
to the agency on the 7th of December, the first sale
of lots for delinquent taxes took place. It was a
long one, and the fact that the greatest delinquency
was but two dollars eighty-seven and one-half cents,
and the range ran all the way down to twenty-five
cents, showed that money was hard to come by when
such small amounts could not be commanded for so
important a purpose as the redemption of town lots.
Fortunes were going begging then if anybody had
known it. Some few may have neither known nor
guessed it, but were lucky enough to take " the tide
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
51
at the flood." With most, however, it was the story
of the man who could have got the half of the site
of Chicago for a pair of boots, but had not the boots.
Some of the largest fortunes in the city date from this
tax sale and the condition of general finances it in-
dicated. A proposition to incorporate the town this
year was beaten.
The winter of 1822-23 was made a pleasant sea-
son, like that of the year before, by social enjoyments
and free commingling of all the settlers in pursuing
them, though it followed, like the other, a summer of
much sickness, and fell in a time of great financial
trouble. The county was settling up pretty rapidly.
Two hundred and five entries of land had been made
in Centre township outside of the donation during the
years 1821-22, and many of the purchasers had be-
come residents. In Decatur township forty-five en-
tries were made in those two years ; in Wayne, one
hundred and sixty-eight; in Pike, twenty-nine; in
Washington, one hundred and forty-six ; in Law-
rence, ten; in Warren, nineteen; in Franklin, fif-
teen ; in Perry, eighty-one. It is noticeable that the
townships more remote from the older settled por-
tions of the State, from which immigrants might be
expected, received more land-buyers than those on
the east side and nearer. Wayne had a hundred and
sixty-eight to nineteen in Warren, Decatur forty-five
to ten in Lawrence, Pike twenty-nine to fifteen in
Franklin. Land-buyers thought the western part of
the county, with portions of the central tier of town-
ships, contained the most desirable land.
The first act of the Legislature in the new year of
1823 was the assignment of a legislative representa-
tion to the two-year-old county, January 7th. Can-
didates began to show up with characteristic Ameri-
can promptness at once, and the canvass of merits
was kept up briskly till the election the next August.
Early in the spring, as already related in the account
of the first religious movements in the settlement,
the Presbyterians took steps to build the first church
in the town, on North Pennsylvania Street, pretty
nearly opposite the Grand Opera-House site, and on
the completion of the church organization the follow-
ing July, Rev. David C. Proctor, of Connecticut,
who had been retained as a missionary in 1822-23,
was the first pastor, succeeded in September, 1824,
by the celebrated oriental scholar and religious
" free-lance," Professor George Bush, who was much
such another as the more noted Orestes A. Brownson,
except that he did not turn Catholic as the latter did.
The religious vagaries of no two men in the country,
backed by rare abilities and profound scholarship as
they were, have attracted so much attention. Pro-
fessor Bush continued in charge to March 20, 1829.
On the 7th of March the second newspaper of the
New Purchase made its first appearance under the
name of Western Censor and Emigrant's Guide, with
the customary ambition of papers in new settlements
taking a name better proportioned to its hope than
its importance. It was published and printed in a
building on Washington Street, opposite the site of
the New York Store, by Harvey Gregg and Douglass
Maguire. Not much is known of the former now
more than that he was a lawyer of good abilities from
Kentucky, and appeared in the bar at the first ses-
sion of the court. Mr. Nowland relates an incident
of his first visit here at the time of the lot sales in
1821 which illustrates his characteristic absent-
mindedness and the solid honesty of the people and
the times. He had brought a considerable sum with
him to buy land, and had about two hundred dollars
in gold left after making his first payments. He
missed this one morning, and supposed he had
dropped it from his pocket somewhere where he
had been examining land. He gave it up for gone
and went home. The following spring Mrs. Now-
land found it under the rag-carpet of the room he
had slept in with sixteen other men, all of whom
might have seen him stick it under the carpet, and
probably did, but had no more thought of meddling
with it than they would if it had been locked in a
dynamite safe. Travelers and moralists have boasted
that the Finns have no word for steal, and know no
use for locks. The primitive settlers of Indianapolis
might have contested the Monthyon prize of virtue
with them. It may be enough to suggest that the
condition of society has changed in sixty-two years,
and it would not be safe to put two hundred dollars
under a carpet with sixteen other men in the room,
with any expectation of seeing it again. He was the
52
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
second lawyer to settle in the new toivn. He died
early.
Douglass Maguire, his partner, long sJrvived him,
and was far better known. He came to the place in
the spring of 1823 from Kentucky, was the last State
auditor elected by the Legislature but one before
the Constitution of 1850 went into operation, and
was one of the four delegates from this county to
the convention that framed that instrument. Gover-
nor Wallace being the other Whig, and Alexander F.
Morrison and Jacob Page Chapman the two Demo-
crats. Mr. Maguire bore a strong resemblance to
Henry Clay both in form and feature, and was to the
full as generous and warm-hearted. The Western
Censor and Emigrant' s Gruide was the precursor of
the Journal, as the Gazette was of the Sentinel. Like
its rival, its first issues were irregular. The second
number appeared on the 19th of March, the third on
the 26th of March, the fourth on the 2d of April
the fifth on the 19th, the sixth on the 23d, after
which its issue was regular. On the removal of the
capital to Indianapolis in the fall of 1824, the State
printer, John Douglass, bought the paper and changed
the name to the Journal. The Journal it has been
ever since, nearly sixty years now. The old editor,
Mr. Maguire, retained an interest for some years with
Mr. Douglass, and the firm was Douglass & Maguire,
— very nearly a repetition of Mr. Maguire's name.
About a mouth after the appearance of the second
paper the first Sunday-school was organized in the
cabinet-shop of Caleb Scudder, on the south side of
the State-House Square, April 6, 1823. It proved
a very popular as well as wholesome enterprise, mus-
tering no less than seventy pupils the third Sunday.
When the weather became bad in the fall it was sus-
pended till the next spring, and was revived a year
after its formation in April, 1824. The first Presby-
terian Church was completed that spring and summer,
and the school taken there. It was never suspended
again. In 1829 it celebrated the Fourth of July in
the fashion above described, and thenceforward the
Sunday-schools monopolized the national holiday till
its general celebration was abandoned except as a
mere day of idling and making pleasant parties. The
average attendance the first year was reported to be
about forty, the second year fifty, the third year
seventy -five, the fourth one hundred and six, the fifth
one hundred and fifty. In 1827 a library of one
hundred and fifty volumes had been procured. Up
to 1829, when the Methodists completed their first
church, all denominations united in this school, and
it was thence called the " Union School," superin-
tended and mainly promoted by Dr. Isaac Coe. It
may be noted here that in all the Sunday-school pro-
cessions on the Fourth of July from 1829 for thirty
years nearly James Blake was the marshal, if he was
at home. In 1829 the Methodist scholars colonized
in their own church, and the Baptists followed in
three years, as soon as they had a suitable place in
their church. But the co-operation of all the schools
was secured by a Sunday-school Union, in which all
were represented.
There were other indications of the solid growth of
the town than the establishment of a second paper
and the acquisition of a representation in the Legis-
lature. The agent sold four acres of the donation, at
sixty-five dollars and seventy-five cents an acre, for
brick-yards. Better structures than the frames that
were partially replacing logs were contemplated,
though but one brick house, that of John Johnson,
already referred to, was in progress. About the 1st
of June two enterprising settlers, William Townsend,
a pioneer of 1820, and Earl Pearce, later, put a set
of woolen machinery in the mill of Isaac Wilson, on
Fall Creek race, where Pattison's mill stood for many
years in the later days of the town. FoUowiog close
upon this came two new hotels of a more pretentious
character than their log predecessors. I'he first was a
large frame built by Maj. Thomas Carter opposite the
court-house, opened on the 6th of October, and the
scene of the first Baptist sermo^ on the 26th of the
same month. Though a regular Baptist Church
organization had existed from September of the year
before, and a Mr. Barnes had been engaged as a
preacher in June, third Saturday, 1823, yet the first
regular sermon seems to have waited this chance in
the house of one of the most devoted and deserving
of the members. The hotel was burned Jan. 17,
1825, during the first session of the Legislature, and
the proprietor, in the days long before insurance was
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
53
known in the New Purchase, lost all he had, with no
indemnification. Mr. Ignatius Brown, illustrating
the folly that sensible men will commit during the
excitement of a fire if they are unused to such
calamities, says that a squad of the citizens thought
to save the sign which swung in country fashion to a
tall post in front of the house, and chopped it down
as they would a tree, the fall smashing the sign all to
splinters, as they would have known if they had not
lost their heads. Some months afterwards Mr. Carter
replaced the burned house with that of Mr. Crum-
baugh near the site of West Street, and kept his
tavern there prosperously for several years till his
death. The other hotel lived to become by itself and
successor the most noted in the town or the State for
about thirty years. This was the " Washington
Hall," a frame on the site of the New York Store,
built by James Blake and Samuel Henderson at the
same time as Mr. Carter's house, but opened three
months later,* Jan. 12, 182-1. Mr. Henderson had
kept a smaller tavern there previously. The successor
of the '• Hall" in 1836 was a brick, and made the
name famous under the management of the late Ed-
mund Browning. The old frame was moved to the
next lot east, and there for a number of years was a
shoe-shop in the lower story, and the law-office of
Governor Wallace in the upper, where Lewis, his son,
— now a distinguished general of the civil war and
novelist and minister to Constantinople, — wrote sev-
eral chapters of a novel in the style of G. P. R. James
called the " Man at Arms," a tale of the thirteenth
century.
Mr. Ignatius Brown notes that early in the spring
of this year — 1823 — three young settlers, named
Stephen Howard, Israel Jlitchell, and Martin Smith,
started for the Russian settlements on the Pacific by
way of Pembina. Nothing was ever heard of them,
except that they reached Fort Armstrong early in
May, and on the 15th of August, three months and
eleven days after reaching the fort on the Mississippi,
got to Fever River, having seen no white man for
twenty-three days after leaving the Vermillion Salt-
Works, and having been robbed by the Indians and
nearly starved. During the same spring the " In-
diana Central Medical Society" was formed to license
physicians to practice under the law then in force,
with Dr. Samuel G. Mitchell as president, and Dr.
Livingston Dunlap as secretary, the forerunner of
many a medical association and college since. The
Fourth of July was celebrated at the cabin of
Wilkes Reagin, near the crossing of Market Street
and Pogue's Run. He fed the company with an-
other barbecue, and the company included a rifle
company, commanded by Capt. Curry, of whom
nothing more appears to be known. Mr. Reagin was
a conspicuous man, being the first butcher, the first
auctioneer, and one of the three first justices elected
by the people. Rev. D. C. Proctor and Rev. Isaac
Reed performed the religious services of the occasion,
and Daniel B. Wick, brother of the judge, read the
Declaration, and Morris Morris delivered the address.
The September succeeding showed a population, ac-
cording to the new Censor, of six or seven hundred,
with a better state of health through the summer than
had been generally believed. The Censor, true to its
name, used the occasion to censure the jealousy with
which other towns in the State regarded the still un-
used capital.
The August election for first members of the
Legislature resulted in the choice of James Gregory,
of Shelby, as senator, and James Paxton, of this
county, as representative. There were the usual
winter diversions to close the year, but varied, ac-
cording to Mr. Brown's citation of an announcement
in the Gdizette, by a theatrical performance of " Mr.
Smith and wife, of the New York theatre," in the
dining-room of Carter's tavern, on the last night of
the year. Mr. Nowland puts this first dramatic exhibi-
tion in the winter of 1825-26, and says the performer
was a Mr. Crampton, a strolling actor. The difi'er-
cnce is of no consequence as long as there is entire
concurrence on the main feature of the affair. Music
was needed, of course, and there was nobody to make
it but Bill Bagwell, a jolly, vagabond sort of fellow,
who made the first cigars in the place in a cabin on
the southwest corner of Maryland and Illinois Streets,
and played the fiddle at the pioneer dances and wed-
dings. Maj. Carter was a rigid Baptist, of the kind
called by " unrespective" unbelievers " forty-gallon"
Baptists, who, though sober men, were not at all
54
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
fanatical in their views as to the use of liquor, but
he was immovably convinced of the sinfulness of
playing or hearing a fiddle. To get his consent to
allow Bagwell to play orchestra to the performance,
the actor and musician both had to assure him that
the instrument of the occasion was not a fiddle but a
violin, and the performance of a hymn tune satisfied
him of the difference. Mr. Nowland says the major
interrupted the exhibition to stop the orchestra in
playing the depraved jig called " Leather Breeches,"
and it required considerable diplomacy and the per-
formance of church music to appease him. The pieces
performed, the '' Doctor's Courtship, or the Indulgent
Father," and the "Jealous Lovers"; tickets, thirty-
seven and a half cents. Several performances were
given, and the couple returned the following June
but failed, and left suddenly, probably helped to the
determination by a criticism of the Censor, which
rated tlie performance rather low.
It may have been a mere whim of a couple of over-
sanguine new-comers, or it may have been a larger
promise of prosperity than appears now to have been
credible or possible at that time, but it is true, never-
theless, that a Maj. Sullinger opened a " Military
School" here on the 13th of January, 1824, for "the
instruction of militia ofiScers and soldiers." Nearly
at the same time William C. McDougal opened the
first real estate agency, though the Gazette shows that
its proprietor, George Smith, as before noted, opened
a similar est.ablishment a year or two later. The
month of January was signalized to the pioneer par-
ticularly by an act of the Legislature of the 25th,
ordering the permanent removal of the capital that
is, the State offices and records — by the 10th of the
following January, 1825, the Legislature to meet that
day in the court-house capitol of the new capital
for the first time. No doubt the promptness of the
passage of this act was due in part to the delegation
from the New Purchase, and the power of two votes
to help those who helped the owners. On the return
of Mr. Senator Gregory and Representative Paxton
on the 21st of February, a public banquet was given
them by the grateful citizens, and the occasion illus-
trated with highly-colored views of the prosperity that
would follow the change. Their dreams have been
more than fulfilled, but not till all who were old
enough to take part in the festivities were in their
graves.
The nest incident in the fifth year of the settle-
ment was the most startling and alarming that had
yet occurred. This was the murder, on the 22d of
March, 1824, of a company of nine Indians of the
Shawanese tribe, — two men, three women, two boys,
and two girls, — some eight miles above Pendleton, by
a company of six whites, four men and two boys.
An account of this cruel massacre was given in a
sketch of the occupancy of the New Purchase by the
Indians, but there may be added here, as illustrative
of the early condition of the white settlements, the
account both of the crime and the trial made by Hon.
Oliver H. Smith, ex-United States senator, who wit-
nessed the trials, and was at the time one of the lead-
ing lawyers of the State.
" The Indians were encamped on the east side of
Fall Creek, about eight miles above the falls. The
country around their camping-ground was a dense,
unbroken forest filled with game. The principal In-
dian was called Ludlow, and was said to be named for
Stephen Ludlow, of Lawrenceburg. The other man I
call Mingo. (His name appears from other accounts to
have been Logan.) The Indians had commenced their
season's hunting and trapping, the men with their guns,
the squaws setting the traps, preparing and cooking
the game, and caring for the children, — two boys some
ten years old, and two girls of more tender years. A
week had passed, and the success of the Indians had
been only fair, with better prospects ahead, as spring
was opening and raccoons were beginning to leave
their holes in the trees in search of frogs that had
begun to leave their muddy beds at the bottoms of the
creeks. The trapping season was only just com-
mencing. Ludlow and his band, wholly unsuspicious
of harm and unconscious of any approaching enemies,
were seated around their camp-fire, when there ap-
proached through the woods five white men, — Harper,
Hudson, Sawyer, Bridge, Sr., Bridge, Jr. Harper
was the leader, and stepping up to Ludlow took him
by the hand and told him his party had lost their
horses, and wanted Ludlow and Mingo to help find
them. The Indians agreed to go in search of the
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
55
horses. Ludlow took one path and Mingo another.
Harper followed Ludlow and Hudson trailed Mingo,
keeping some fifty yards behind. They traveled some
short distance from the camp, when Harper shot
Ludlow through the body ; he fell dead on his face.
Hudson, on hearing the crack of the rifle of Harper,
immediately shot Mingo, the ball entering just below
his shoulders and passing clear through his body.
The party then met and proceeded to within gunshot
of the camp. Sawyer shot one of the squaws through
the head, Bridge, Sr., shot another squaw, and Bridge,
Jr., the other. Sawyer then fired at the oldest boy,
but only wounded him. The other children were
shot by some of the party. Harper then led the way
on to the camp. The two squaws, one boy, and the
two little girls lay dead, but the oldest boy was still
living. Sawyer took him by the legs and knocked
his brains out against the end of a log. The camp
was then robbed of everything worth carrying away.
" Harper, the ringleader, left immediately for Ohio,
and was never taken. (He is said by tradition to
have reached Ohio, eighty miles away through the
woods, in twenty-four hours.) Hudson, Sawyer,
Bridge, Sr., and Bridge, Jr., were arrested, and
when I first saw them they were confined in a square
log jail, built of heavy beech and sugar-tree logs,
notched down closely, and fitting tight above, below,
and on the sides. The prisoners were all heavily
ironed and sitting on the straw on the floor. Hud-
son was a man of about middle size, with a bad look,
dark eye, and bushy hair, about thirty-five years of
age in appearance. Sawyer was about the same age,
rather heavier than Hudson, but there was nothing
in his appearance that would have marked him in a
crowd as any other than a common farmer. Bridge,
Sr., was much older than Sawyer, his head was quite
gray ; he was above the common height, slender, and
a little bent while standing. Bridge, Jr., was a tall
stripling some eighteen years of age. Bridge, Sr.,
was the father of Bridge, Jr., and the brother-in-law
of Sawyer.
" The news of these Indian murders flew upon the
wings of the wind. The settlers became greatly
alarmed, fearing the retaliatory vengeance of the
tribes, and especially of the other bands of the Sen-
ecas (Shawanese). The facts reached Mr. John
Johnston at the Indian agency at Piqua, Ohio. An
account was sent from the agency to the War De-
partment. Col. Johnston and William Conner visited
all the Indian tribes and assured them that the gov-
ernment would punish the ofienders, and obtained
the promises of the chiefs and warriors that they
would wait and see what their ' Great Father' would
do before they took the matter into their own hands.
This quieted the fears of the settlers, and prepara-
tions were made for the trials. A new log build-
ing was erected at the north part of Pendleton, with
two rooms, one for the court and one for the grand
jury. The court-room was about twenty by thirty
feet, with a heavy puncheon floor, a platform at one
end three feet high, with a strong railing in front, a
bench for the judges, a plain table for the clerk in
front on the floor, a long bench for the counsel, a
little pen for the prisoners, a side bench for the wit-
nesses, and a long pole in front, substantially sup-
ported, to separate the crowd from the court and bar.
A guard day and night was placed around the jail.
The court was composed of Mr. Wick, presiding
judge, Samuel Holliday and Adam Winchell, associ-
ates. Judge Wick was young on the bench, but
with much experience in criminal trials. Judge
Winchell was a blacksmith, and had ironed the pris-
oners. Moses Cox was the clerk. He could barely
write his name, and when a candidate for justice of
the peace at Connersville he boasted of his superior
qualifications : ' I have been sued on every section
of the statute, and know all about the law, while my
competitor has never been sued, and knows nothing
about the statute.' Samuel Cory, the sheriff, was a
fine specimen of a woods Hoosier, tall and strong-
boned, with a hearty laugh, without fear of man or
beast, and with a voice that made the woods ring
as he called the jurors and witnesses. Col. John-
ston, the Indian agent, was directed to attend the
trial to see that the witnesses were present and to
pay their fees. Gen. Noble, then a United States
senator, was employed by the Secretary of War to
prosecute, with power to fee an assistant. Philip
Sweetzer, a young son-in-law of the general, of high
promise in his profession, was selected as assistant.
56
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Calvin Fletcher, then a young man of more than or-
dinary ability, and a good criminal lawyer, was the
regular prosecuting attorney. ' In another allusion
to these cases Mr. Smith mentions the lawyers who
were present, — Gen. James Noble, Philip Sweetzer,
Harvey Gregg, Lot Bloomfield, James Rariden,
Charles H. Test, Calvin Fletcher, Daniel B. Wick,
and William R. Morris, of this State, and Gen.
Sampson Mason and Moses Vance, of Ohio. These
last were defending.
The conviction and execution of the prisoners, ex-
cept Harper, who escaped, and young Bridge, who
was pardoned, are related in the sketch already re-
ferred to. Mr. Nowland describes the novel gallows
that was used : " A wagon was drawn up the side of
the hill on planks, so that the wheels would move
easily. A post was placed on the side of the hill,
just above the wagon. To this post the wagon was
fastened by a rope, so that when the rope was cut the
wagon would run down the hill without aid. The
two old men were placed in the tail of the wagon,
the ropes adjusted, and at the signal the rope was
cut, and the wagon ran from under the men. Sawyer
broke his arms loose, caught the rope, and raised |
himself about eighteen inches. The sheriflF quickly
caught him by the ankles, and gave a sudden jerk,
which brought the body down, and he died without
another struggle." The extended quotation from
Mr. Smith's reminiscences is interesting, not only as
an account of an afikir of national importance, and
especially important to the settlers of Indianapolis
and the country around, but as a picture of the
primitive backwoods court-house and modes of court
business. These executions, as before remarked, are
claimed to be the first that ever occurred in the
United States as the penalty, judicially inflicted, of
the murder of Indians by whites. Hudson escaped
once after his sentence, and hid in a hollow log in
the darkness of an unusually dark night, but was
soon discovered and arrested. Many years ago it
used to be told among the old settlers and their chil-
dren that Governor Ray, in the speech announcing
the pardon of young Bridge, June 30, 1825, after
his father and Sawyer had been hung, said to the
young murderer : " There are but two powers in the
universe that can now save your life. One is the
Almighty God and the other is the Executive of
Indiana." It was probably a joke manufactured
after the old Governor's eccentricities had become so
striking and notorious that such an imputation could
not harm him. He was long a noted citizen of In-
dianapolis.
Governor Ray was Lieutenant-Governor with Gov-
ernor Hendricks, and from February 25th, when
Hendricks went to the National Senate, he was act-
ing Governor. He was subsequently elected two full
terms, and left the office, the last he ever held, in
December, 1831. He came to the capital about the
time the Legislature met, Jan. 10, 1825, bought
property here, and remained here till he died, about
1850. He owned a considerable portion of the
square on Washington Street, opposite the court-
house, near where Carter's tavern had stood, and in
his later life, when his mind began to be considerably
unsettled, he imagined a magnificent railroad system,
of which this block of his was to be the centre. Ra-
diating lines were to penetrate the country in all di-
rections, with villages every five miles, tow_ns every
twenty miles, and cities every fifty miles. Deep
gorges among hills were to be crossed on a natural
trestle-work, made by sawing oif the tops of trees
level with the track, and laying sills on these.
Oddly enough this very expedient has been used on
the Denver and Rio Grande Narrow-Gauge Road, or
a road among the mountains in that region. Not
less singular is the fact that this " dream of a sick
brain," as everybody thought it when it was told
and talked about, has proved a most substantial
reality, except that Governor Ray's court-house
block is not the site of the great central hub depot.
In 1826 his influence with the Indians, says Mr.
Nowland, when he was a commissioner, with Gen. Tip-
ton, of this State, and Gen. Cass, of Michigan, to pro-
cure a cession of the lands of the Pottawatomies and
Eel River and Wabash Miamis, secured from the In-
dians a grant to the State of one section of land for
every mile of road, a hundred feet wide, from Lake
Michigan through Indianapolis to the Ohio, at any
point fixed by the Legislature. It was a most
valuable donation, and the '' old Michigan road,"
NOTABLE EVENTS AND INCIDENTS.
57
running through Shelbyville, Greensburg, Napoleon,
to Madison, the point selected by the Legislature,
was long the best improved road in the State, and
never inferior to any but the completed portions of
the National road. The Governor's son, James
Brown Gay Ray, died when a boy, but a daughter
survived him, and continues his abilities, without his
vagaries, in some of our best citizens.
The usual Fourth of July celebration was held at
Reagin's, as the year before, with Gabriel J. Johnson
as orator for the citizens and Maj. J. W. Redding for
the militia. Squire Foote was the reader. The
August election following showed a change in the
lines of parties from the position in 1822, when
" White Water" was arrayed against " Kentucky."
Now the contestants were two Kentuckians, Col. A.
W. Russell and Morris Morris, candidates for sheriff
to succeed Mr. Bates. Russell was elected by two
hundred and sixty-five to one hundred and forty-
eight for Mr. Morris. At the Presidential election
in November, Clay received two hundred and thirteen
votes, Jackson ninety-nine, and Adams sixteen. Clay
had all the " Kentucky" strength and a good deal of
the "White Water." The poll in the county was
one hundred and two less in the Presidential than
in the State election, supposed to have been the re-
sult of removals to the adjacent regions in the inter-
val. In April the Sunday-school visitors reported a
resident population on the donation of one hundred
and seventy-two voters, and forty-five single women
from fifteen to forty-five. The voters would indicate
a population of about eight hundred. A little more
than two years before the Gazette, as before noted,
had enumerated sixty-one men of seventeen different
pursuits, who were supposed to be about half of the
adult male population of the spring of 1822, indi-
cating a total population of about six hundred. This
was not increased in the election on 1st of April.
So the growth of the town in two years, from April
22d to April 24th, seems to have been about three
hundred residents. It does not fairly show the addi-
tional immigration in that time, however, because a
good many who came to the town afterwards re
moved to the country. A large emigration to the
Wabash passed through the town this year. The
streets and the lots along Washington Street, and di-
verging from it in some places, were more or less
cleared of trees, the court-house was in progress, the
Presbyterian Church well advanced, a school-house
built, two or throe religious organizations holding
regular services, two new and superior hotels ad-
vancing, a distillery on the bayou, a woolen-mill and
three or four grist- and saw-mills at work, so that
there was no cause for serious discouragement, though
progress was not rapid enough to excite any very
sanguine hopes. The river and all its tributaries
were flooded during the spring, and a keel-boat
called the " Dandy" came up on the rise on the 22d
of May, with twenty-eight tons of salt and whiskey.
This flood is said by the sketch of 1857 and that of
Mr. Merrill of 1850 to have been the greatest ever
known in the river. It was probably equaled by
that of 1828 and 1847, and very closely approached
by that of February of this year C1883). The
State's revenue from Marion County in 1824 was
one hundred and fifty-four dollars and twenty-five
cents.
In anticipation of the meeting of the Legislature
the citizens formed a " mock" body in the fall of 1824
called the " Indianapolis Legislature," the members
of which assigned themselves to any counties they
chose, and discussed pretty much the same questions
as the real Legislature had discussed, or would when
it met. It elected its own Governor about as often as
it wanted to get a fresh message or inaugural, which
was sure to be a humorous affair, and its debates were
not unfrequently a good deal better than those of the
body it represented. The men who engaged in them
were sometimes ex-members, and occasionally actual
members of the real body, and the information and
arguments elicited in the sham debate more than
once decided the result of the real one. The meet-
ings were continued till about 1836. They were dis-
continued then for several years, but revived for a
while during the winter of 1842 or 1843 or there-
abouts. In November, Samuel Merrill, treasurer of
the State, arrived at the capital with several wagon-
loads of records and money, and thenceforward the
chosen capital was the real one.
During the preceding summer and fall a brick
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
house had been built for the residence of the treas-
urer, with a little brick office at the west side, on
the southwest corner of Washington and Tennessee
Streets, where the State buildings now are. Mr.
Merrill was the first occupant, keeping the place till
1834, when he gave way to the late Nathan B.
Palmer, who succeeded him in the treasurer s office
by election of the Legislature. He remained here,
however, and became one of the men who gave the
town its impulse to intellectual and moral as well as
material improvement.
Samuel Merrill was born in Peacham, Vt., Oct. 29,
1792. He died in Indianapolis, Aug. 24, 1855.
He entered an advanced class in Dartmouth College,
but did not graduate, for in his junior year he left
to join his elder brother, James, in teaching in York,
Pa. There he spent three years in teaching and
studying law, having for his familiar associates Thad-
deus Stevens, John Blanchard, and his elder brother,
James Merrill, all from Peacham, Vt., and all men
who have made their mark on their age. At the end
of this time he removed to Vevay, in this State, and
established himself in the practice of law. In 1821
he was elected to the Legislature for two years, and
during his term of office he was elected trea.surer of
State. In the discharge of the duties of this office
he removed first to Corydon, and thence in 1824 to
this place. He held the office of treasurer of State
till 1834, when he was chosen president of the State
Bank. The duties of this office he discharged with
the most unwearied fidelity and unimpeachable honesty
till 1S44, when his public life terminated, with the
exception of four years of service as the president of
the Madison and Indianapolis Railroad Company.
For several years before his death he was engaged
in the book trade, still continued by his son. His
daughter Kate until very recently was Professor of
English Literature in Butler University. Mr. Merrill
assisted in forming Henry Ward Beecher's church
here, and was all his life after most earnest and
devoted in all good works.
The following account of the journey of the capi-
tal from Corydon to Indianapolis, written by a mem-
ber of Mr. Merrill's family, is interesting, not only as
the first account of the migration ever published, but
as a very graphic description of the condition and
ways of life of the Indianians nearly .sixty years ago :
" The journey of about one hundred and sixty miles
occupied two weeks. The best day's travel was
eleven miles. One day the wagons accomplished
but two miles, passages through the woods having to
be cut on account of the impassable character of
the road. Four four-horse wagons and one or two
saddle-horses formed the means of conveyance for
two families, consisting of about a dozen persons,
and for a printing-press and the State treasury of
silver in strong wooden boxes. The gentlemen slept
in the wagons or on the ground to protect the silver,
the families found shelter at night in log cabins
which stood along the road at rare though not incon-
venient intervals. The country people were, many
of them, as rude as their dwellings, which usually
consisted of but one room, serving for all the pur-
poses of domestic life, — cooking, eating, sleeping,
spinning and weaving, and the entertainment of com-
pany. At one place a young man, who perhaps had
come miles to visit his sweetheart, sat up with her all
night on the only vacant space in the room, the hearth
of the big fireplace. He kept on his cap, which was
of coonskin, the tail hanging down behind, and gave
the children the impression that he was a bear."
At the time of the removal William Hendricks
was Governor, but was elected to the National Senate
that winter, and on Feb. 12, 1825, acting Lieutenant-
Governor Ray, who had been made president of the
Senate when Lieutenant-Governor Ruiliff Boone re-
tired, succeeded to the Governorship, and was regu-
larly elected the following August, and again in 1828.
The Secretary of State was Robert A. New, from
1816 to 1825, succeeded by W. W. Wick ; the audi-
tor, William H. Lilley, from 1816 to 1829, suc-
ceeded in 1829 by Morris Morris, who held till
1844; the treasurer, Samuel Merrill, from 1823 to
1834, succeeded by Nathan B. Palmer. The Legis-
lature, which met in January, took the court-house
before it was entirely finished, the House sitting in
the lower room, the Senate in the upper. The treas-
urer occupied the building especially erected for him,
and the other State officers went where they could.
For nearly thirty years after the erection of the
ORIGINAL ENTRIES OP LANDS IN THE COUNTY.
" Governor's house'' in the Circle in 1827, as before
noted, the Supreme judges had their " chambers"
there, and most or all of the State officers were there
for a time except the treasurer. His residence and
office were abandoned before the late war and rented.
It would be useless if it were possible to hunt out all
the rooms the State auditor and secretary occupied
up to the time they took permanent possession of the
building expressly erected for them in 1865, but it
may be noted that after the completion of Masonic
Hall, in 1850, they went there, and subsequently
moved into the " McOuat Block," on Kentucky
Avenue, where they remained till their final change.
The clerk of the Supreme Court previously had his
office in a little building in the Court-House Square,
and when that was torn down went to the State-
House. The reporter of the Supreme Court has
never had a public office, and the attorney-general
and superintendent of public instruction, after their
offices were created, found accommodations where
they chose till the " State Building" was erected and
enlarged. The State Library was kept in the "Gov-
ernor's house" for a time, in charge of the State offi-
cers there, but in IS-ll, John Cook, a bustling, " log-
rolling," pushing little fellow, recently from Ohio,
got himself made librariau, and the library was put
in the south rooms, west side, of the State-House.
Cook was succeeded in 1843, under a Democratic
Legislature, by Samuel P. Daniels, an old resident
and a tailor, and he by the late John B. Dillon, au-
thor of two " Histories of Indiana," and he, in 1850,
by Nathaniel Bolton, first editor of the town, as al-
ready related. The adjutant-general's office was
hardly a visible appendage to the commander-in-chief
of the State's army and navy till 1846, when the
Mexican war made it a place of large responsibility
and heavy duties, with Gen. David Reynolds as occu-
pant. During the late war it became again one of the
most important offices of the State, and was held by
Gen. Wallace, Gen. Noble, and Gen. Terrell. It has
never been reduced since to the unimportance of its
early existence, It and the State Library and the
State geologist's office are now in a building opposite
the east entrance of the new State-House. The library
is now, in addition to its proper use, a museum of
relics of the Mexican war and the civil war, while the
geologist's office is one of the finest museums of geo-
logical and paleontological specimens in the world.
On the 16th of November, 1824, John Douglass,
State printer at Corydon, who had come out with
Mr. Merrill, bought the interest of Harvey Gregg in
the Western Censor and Emigrant's Guide. On
the 11th of January, the day after the first meeting
of the Legislature, the paper appeared as the In-
diana Journal, a name it has retained through many
changes of ownership, with a reputation and influence
as unchanging as its name. Much of the early suc-
cess of the paper was due to Mr. Douglass.
The first period of the history of the city and
county — substantially identical — ends with the ar-
rival of the State capital. Of improvements, trade,
political movements, increase of population as accu-
curate a view has been presented as can be obtained
at this remote period, but a glance at the settlement
of the surrounding townships and at the county
business will make it more comprehensive and satis-
factory. Prom 1821, when the government lands in
the New Purchase were first opened to sale, till 1824
or the beginning of 1825, when the capital was fully
established here, the entries of land in the different
townships, as appears from the " Tract Book" in the
county auditor's office, were as appears in the follow-
ing list. It will be seen that the larger portion of
the entries of the first two years were in Centre and
the two lines of townships west and about it, the
eastern portion of the county attracting little immi-
gration till the central and western were pretty well
filled :
Centre Township outside the Citv.
Town 15 Norlh, Rang^ 3 Eaut.
Name and Date. Acres. ^j^^
Robert Harding and Isaac Wilson, July, 1821 258 3
Jesse McKay and Joseph Frazee. July, 1821 59 3
James Rariden, July, 1821 80 10
Eliakim Harding, July, 1S21 80 10
Eliakim Harding, July, 1821 80 10
Jonathan Lyons, July, 1821 80 10
Daniel Yandes, July, 1821 160 10
William Myers, July, 1821 80 10
James H. McClure, July, 1821 80 10
Daniel Yandes and Ephraim D. Reed, July, 1821. 95 11
William Sanders, July, 1821 160 13
Richard T. Keen, July, 1821 80 13
James H. McClure, July, 1821 80 13
60
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Name and Date. Acres.
David Wood, July, 1S21 100
John HiiDt, July, 1821 SO
John Smock, July, 1821 SO
Armstrong Brandon, July, 1821 80
James Pell, July, 1821 42
William A. Johnson, July, 1821 95
John Stephens, December, 1821 66
Alexander Ewing, July, 1821 63
William Wiles, July, 1821 74
James Pell, July, 1821 98
John Stephens, February, 1821 73
Michael Vanblaricum, July, 1821 SO
Joel Wright, July, 1821 80
Morris Morris, July, 1821...; 160
Jacob Ogle, August, 1.S21 80
Zadoc Smith, August, 1821 80
Laben Harding, July, 1S21 160
Cornelius Vanarsdal, July, 1821 104
Cornelius Vanarsdal, July, 1S21 80
Abraham Heaton. August, 1S21 71
Noah Sinks, October, 1823 54
John G. Brown, July, 1821 80
Alexander Ewing, July, 1S21 80
James Lewis, August, 1821 ... 60
John Stephens, December, 1821 73
Robert Brenton, July, 1821 100
Elial T. Foote, July, 1S21 68
George Vandegritf, July, 1821 SO
James T. Bradley, July, 1821 80
Henry Bradley, July, 1S21 SO
John Cutler, July, 1821 80
John Smock and John Cutler, July, 1821 80
Wickliff Kitchen, July,1821 160
John Smock, July, 1821 160
Town 15 iXorth, liamje 4 Eaut.
Mjcajah Ferguson, July, 1S21 48
Alexander Ewing, July, 1821 80
Micajah Ferguson, July, 1821 80
Isaac Kinder, July, 1821 160
James Linton, July, 1821 150
George Porter, July, 1821 153
John G. Brown, July, 1S21 160
John F. Ross. July, 1.821 77
Rezin Hammond, July, 1821 77
James, George, and Benjamin Barrett, July, 1S21 75
Joseph MeCormick and Noah Noble, July, 1821.. 75
James Givan, July, 1821 77
Cassa Ann Poguc, July, 1821 77
John Wilson, July, 1821 160
John Robinson and John D. Lutz, July, 1821 76
William Craig, July, 1821 76
John Wilson, July, 1821 80
Daniel Stephens, July, 1821 80
Rezin Hammond, July, 1S21 76
Abel Potter, July, 1821 76
Willis G. Atherton, July, 1S21 80
Wickliff Kitchell, July, 1821 80
Wickliff Kitchell, July, 1821 80
Robert Smith, July, 1821 -. 80
William McLaughlin, July, 1821 160
John Shafer, July, 1S21 80
Nathan Aldridge, August, 1821 80
Harvey Pope, July, 1821 160
Willis G. Atherton. July, 1821 160
tion.
13
Name and Date. Acres. ^j^^^
David Acre, February, 1823 80 9
Hervey Gregg, Janu.iry, 1823 80 9
Robert Weightman, November, 1822 SO 9
Jonathan Gillam, July. 1821 80 9
William McLaughlin, October, 1821 80 17
John Graham, August, 1821 80 17
John Graham, August, 182 1 80 17
S. G. Huntingdon, August, 1821 SO 17
William Sanders, July, 1822 SO 17
Maxwell Chambers, January, 1822 80 17
Jacob Mason, January, 1822 80 17
Obcd Foote, October, 1821 SO 17
Joseph Catterlin, July, 1821 SO 18
Archibald C. Reid, July, 1821 80 18
■John W. Redding, July, 1S21 155 18
David Mallery, Augu.'it, 1821 SO 18
Humphrey Griffith, August, 1821 80 18
James Curry, August, 1821 7S 18
James Curry, August, 1821 78 IS
Henry Bowser, August, 1821 160 19
Jacob Moyer, September, 1821 158 I'J
Henry Bowser. August, 1821 160 19
Henry Bowser, August, 1821 78 19
John Dickson, July, 1821 78 19
Otis Hobart, December, 1821 80 20
John Hobart, December, 1821 80 20
Hervey Bates, June, 1822 80 20
Hervey Bates, June, 1822 80 20
John Hobart, December, 1821 80 20
Joseph Greer, July, 1822 80 20
Isaac Liinpus, July, 1821 80 20
Robert McGill, July, 1822 SO 21
William Brindle, November, 1822 80 21
William Brindle, November, 1822 80 21
Jacob L. Doup. August, 1821 80 21
Joseph Scott, November, 1822 160 21
Samuel Dickson, October, 1S21 160 21
Town 16 North, Range 3 East.
Thomas Bishop, July, 1821 174 22
Francis Griffin, August, 1821 126 22
John Moler, July, 1S21 160 22
James Vanblaricum, July, 1821 60 22
John Burns, July, 1821 76 22
Noah Wright, July, 1821 160 23
William D. Booker, July, 1821 80 23
William Nugent, July, 1821 80 23
Levi AVright, July, 1821 160 23
Joseph Hanna, July, 1821 80 23
Abraham Barnett. July, 1821 80 23
John G. Brown, July, 1821 160 24
William Powers, July, 1821 80 24
Noah Wright, July, 1821 80 24
John Gallaher, July, 1821 160 24
David Huston, July, 1821 100 24
Isaac Kinder, July, 1821 80 25
John Sutherland, July, 1821 80 25
John Sulberland, July, 1S21 100 25
William Reagan, July, 1821 100 25
Thomas O'Neal, July, 1821 160 25
Robert Smitb, July, 1821 160 20
Josephs. Benson, July, 1821 80 26
William Nugent, July, 1821 80 26
John Wolfington, July, 1821 80 26
Richard Williams, July, 1821 80 26
ORIGINAL ENTRIES OF LANDS IN THE COUNTY.
61
Name and Date Acres.
Noah Flood, July, 1S21 80
James Raiiden, July, 1S21 SO
Francis Davis, July, 1821 80
James Mcllvain, July, 1821 80
James Mcllvain, July, 1821 65
Benjamin McCarty, July, 1821 79
Alexander Ewing, July, 1821 95
Samuel P. BooUer, July, I82I 160
Edward Carvin, July, 1821 143
Samuel Glass, July, 1821 160
Fielding Geter, July, 1821 95
Zenas Lake, July, 1821 83
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 78
Isaac Wilson. July, 1821 74
Jesse McKay and E. D. Reed, July, 1821 101
Jesse McKay and Jacob Collip, July, 1821 160
Cyrus C. Tivis, July, 1821 160
Robert Smith and H. Gregg, July, 1821 160
John Moler, July, 1821 SO
James Linton, July, 1821 SO
Jeremiah Johnston, July, 1S21 160
Samuel Henderson, July, 1821 160
Robert Culbertson, July, 1821 160
Jonathan Lyon, July, 1821 80
John Carr and Samuel P. Rooker, July, 1821 80
Town 16 North, Jiange 4 East.
Noah and Thomas G. Noble, July, 1821 160
Christopher Hager, July, 1821 76
Enoch Clark, July, 1821 76
Joseph Curry, July, 1821 160
Reason Reagan, July, 1821 151
Newton Claypool, August, 1821 160
Newton Claypool, August, 1821 160
Tobias Smith, August, 1821 160
Joseph Curry, July, 1821 160
James D. Conrey, October, 1823 80
John Chamberlin, June, 1822 160
William Mitchell, August, 1821 160
Benjamin Taffe, June, 1822 80
Tobias Smith, August, 1821 160
William Mitchell, August, 1821 80
Tobias Smith, August, 1821 80
Baiil Roberts, August, 1821 160
Tobias Smith, August, 1821 160
George Buckner, April, 1823 80
John Senour, October, 1823 80
Jiired Sayre, October, 1821 80
Newton Claypool, August, 1821 75
Isaac Kinder, July, 1821 75
David Bloyd, October, 1821 80
Jacob Bloyd,July, 1821 80
Jared Sayre, October, 1821 76
Jeremiah Johnson, Jr., July, IS2I 76
John Shafer, August, 1821 160
Stephen Bartholomew and Wm. Smith, July, 1821 15i
William McCleery, July, 1821 160
John Carr, July, 1821 79
Elial T. Foote, July, 1821 79
John Carr, July, 1821 SO
George Taffe, August, 1821 80
Vincent Rawlings, October, 1821 80
Lewis Robinson, October, 1821 80
Daniel Pattengill, July, 1821 160
Daniel Pattengill, July, 1821 160
78
160
160
Name and Date. Acres.
John F. Right, August, 1821 160
Levi Beebee, 1821 160
David Johnson, April, 1821 80
Isaac Cool, April, 1821 80
Decatck Township.
Town 14 North, Range 2 EohU
Ludwell Gains, August, 1824 77
Ludwell Gains, August, 1821 140
Ludwell Gains, August, 1821 SO
John Cook, June, 1824 160
John Kenworthy, July, 1824 SO
Joshua Compton, December, 1825 80
Reason Reagan, November, 1826 78
Jesse George, January, 1826 77
John Ballard, October, 1823 78
Thomas J. Matlock, July, 1821
Caleb Easterling, November, 1S22
Joseph Allen, February, 1824
Caleb Rhoads, November, 1822
Isaac George, December, 1823
Isaac George, November, 1823
Robert Furnas, January, 1826
Robert Furnas, January, 1826
Uriah Carson, June, 1826
Thomas Davis, January, 1825
Azel Dollarhide, July, 1821
Absalom Dollarhide, January, 1825
Aaron Coppock, August, 1S26
Aaron Coppock, February, 1826 ,
Zimri Brown, May, 1824
Zimri Brown, December, 1826
Abner Co.k, December, 1824
William Barnett, December, 1S25
Jesse Barnett, December, 1824
William Barnett, 1823
Thomas Barnett, 1823
James V. Barnett, 1823 8
Athanasius Barnett, 1823 8
James Haworth, November, 1824 8
James Haworth, November, 1824 8
James Haworth, October, 1826 8
James Ilorton, November, 1824 £
James Horton, November, 1824 S
Christopher Wilson, November, 1822 8
Christopher Wilson, November, 1822 S
Christopher Wilson, November, 1S22 16
Jonathan Clark, February, 1824 S
Joseph Jessup, December, 1823
Richard Mendenhall, October, 1823 160
Christopher AVilson, November, 1822 80
Christopher Wilson, December, 1824 SO
Christopher Wilson, December, 1824 SO
Gasper Koons, February, 1824 80
Joseph Mendenhall, October, 1823 160
Samuel Dodds, July, 1821 160
Samuel Dodds, July, 1821 80
Azel Dollarhide, July, 1821 80
John Dollarhide, July, 1821 80
John Dollarhide, November, 1828 80
Christopher Wilson, December, 1824 80
Town 15 North, Range 3 East.
Eli Sulgrove, August, 1821 430
Eli Sulgrove, October, 1822
80
160
206
62
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Name and Date. Acres.
Eli Sulgrove, August, 1821 3i
George Miller, July, 1821 160
Jesse Wright, July, 1821 160
Ludwell a. Gains, August, 1821 229
John Thompson, July, 1821 80
Demas L. McFarland, August, 1821 160
Demas L. McFarland, July, 1821 160
Aaron Wright, May, 1823 109
Levi Hoffman, August, 1821 llli
Cornelius Hoffman, August, 1821 112J
Levi Beebee, July, 1821 160
Seth Goodwin, July, 1821 80
Toion 14 Xorth, Runge 3 Easl.
Joseph Beeler, George H. Beeler, July, 1821 131
Samuel Winter, August, 1S21 49
Elijah Elliott, July, 1821 160
Azel Dollarhide, July, 1S21 107
Azel Dollarhide, July, 1821 107
Evan Dollarhide, August, 1821 74i
Zirnri Brown, November, 1822 40
Charles Beeler, March, 1824 47i
Charles Beeler, September, 1826 106
Seth Curtis, July, 1821 60
Seth Curtis, October, 1822 106
Seth Curtis, July, 1821 55i
Seth Curtis, October, 1822 67i
Seth Curtis, October, 1822 106i
Sibert Waugh, August, 1821 53
Levi Wooster, August, 1821 53
John Cox, December, 1823 66J
Martin D. Bush, June, 1821 240
Town 15 North, Range 2 Enel.
Cader Carter, June, 1823 80
John Rozier, October, 1824 80
Levi Hoffman, September, 1821 80
Christopher Ault, December, 1825 80
Adam Rozicr, December, 1825 80
John McCreery, April, 1824 SO
Parker Keeler, April, 1824 80
Joshua Compton, June, 1824 80
Peter Hoffman, December, 1825 80
Henry Ault, February, 1825 80
Charles Merritt, August, 1825 80
Charles Merritt, December, 1826 80
Charles Merritt, April, 1822 80
Peter Hoffman, December, 1825 80
John Kenworlhy, July, 1824 160
Caleb Cook, November, 1822 , 160
Jesse Hawkins, December, 1822 80
Reason Reagan, April, 1825 80
Wayne Township.
Town 15 Xorlh, Range 2 Easl.
Joseph Frazee, July, 1821 169
Nicholas Hendricks, October, 1821 85.5
James Parker, January, 1822 85.5
David Cassett, July, 1821 160
John Gallaher, July, 1821 160
James Parker, January, 1822 84
John M. Jamison, January, 1822 160
William Castolo, May, 1822 166
Samuel Castolo, May, 1822 80
William Gladden, December, 1821 165
Name and Date. Acres.
William Gladden, November, 1822 82
John Moore, February, 1824 82
Samuel Castolo, May, 1822 80
John Houghton, November, 1822 80
John Houghton, November, 1822 160
Reuben Houghton, November, 1822 160
Reuben Houghton, November, 1822 80
Sarah Barnhill, January, 1822 80
John Miller, October, 1820 80
Moses Silvery, September, 1822 80
John Fawcett. October, 1822 160
Joseph Scott, November, 1822 160
J. R.Crumbaugh, John Skinner, August, 1821.... 80
Franklin C. Averill, October, 1821 80
Jacob Railsback, July, 1821 160
Obadiah Harris, December, 1826 80
Joseph Scott, April, 1825 80
Joseph Scott, January, 1823 160
Joseph Scott, February, 1823 80
Joseph Scott, January, 1823 80
Robert Furnas, November, 1822 80
Robert Furnas, November, 1822 80
Caleb Easterling, November. 1822 SO
Isaac Furnas, November. 1822 160
John Furnas, November, 1822 160
John Porter, November, 1822 160
William McVey, December, 1825 SO
William McVey, September, 1829 SO
John Byrkett, December, 1826 SO
.Toseph Scott, January, 1823 80
James Rhoads, October, 1821 80
Joseph Scott, January, 1823 80
John Hendricks, March, 1823 SO
Andrew Hoover, May, 1823 80
James Rhoads, January, 1822 80
Andrew Hoover, December, 1825 80
Town 16 North, Range 2 Eatt.
Enoch D. Woodbridge, August, 1821 160
Jacob P. Andrew. December, 1825 80
Jacob P.Andrew, December, 1825 80
John M. Strong, August, 1821 160
John Adams, October, 1823 80
Enoch Railsback, December, 1825 SO
William Ivers, January, 1822 80
Robert Barnhill, July, 1821 160
Robert Barnhill, July, 1821 160
Robert Barnhill, July, 1821 160
George Avery, April, 1824 SO
John Fox, April, 1824 80
Enoch Railsback, December, 1825 80
Enoch Railsback, June, 1830 SO
Jesse Lane, December, 1822 80
Jesse Lane, July, 1821 160
Merrick Sayre, R. Armstrong, September, 1822... 80
James Logan, March, 1S24 80
John Stoops, August, 1821 80
Robert Stoops, August, 1821 SO
Isaac Pugh, August, 1821 80
William Criswell, August, 1821 80
John Hall, August, 1821 80
Stephen H. Robinson, August, 1821 80
Isaac Pugh, August, 1821 160
James Miller, July, 1821 160
Jacob Pugh, August, 1821 80
ORIGINAL ENTRIES OF LANDS IN THE COUNTY.
63
Name and Date. Acres.
Jacob Pugli, July, 1821 80
Jacob Pugh, July, 1S2I 160
Jacob Pugh, July, 1821 160
Robert Barnhill, July, 1S21 160
Robert Barnhill, July, 1821 160
Asa B. Strong, August, 1821 160
Jeremiah J. Corbaley, August, 1821 80
Jeremiah J. Corbaley, September, 1821 80
William Adams, June, 1824 80
James Adams, August, 1825 80
Joel Conroe, August, 1821 80
James L. Givan, December, 1821 80
Uriah Hultz, October, 1821 160
- Francis McClelland, July, 1821 160
Israel Phillips, October, 1821 160
Hans Murdough, October, 1822 80
Reuben Houghton, November, 1822 80
Adam Kemple, October, 1821 SO
Jacob Moyer, September, 1821 160
Francis McClelland, October, 1822 80
Bartis Boots, March, 1826 80
Aaron Masterton, June, 1825 80
Hans Murdough, October, 1822 80
Jacob Pugh, August, 1821 80
Martin Martindale, July, 1821 80
James Andrew, Jr., July, 1821 SO
James Andrew, Sr., July, 1821 80
George L. Kinnard, May, 1825 80
Archibald Boyle, January, 1825 80
Archibald Boyle, January, 1825 80
Hiram HornaJay, November, 1822 80
Martin Martindale, July, 1821 160
Martin Martindale, August, 1821 SO
Martin Martindale, September, 1822 80
Samuel Johnston, July, 1821 160
Lewis Smith, May, 1826 80
Martin Martindale, December, 1829 80
Town 15 North, Ranfje 3 Enxt.
Jesse McKay and Joseph Frazee, July, 1821 174
Jesse McKay and Joseph Frazee, July, 1821 177
Enoch Warman, July, 1821 160
Rezin Hammond, July, 1821 160
Joseph Hanna, July, 1821 87
John Holmes, July, 1821 87
Noah Noble, July, 1821 180
Israel Harding, July, 1821 160
Noah Noble and Enoch McCarty, July, 1821 160
Samuel Harding, July, 1821 180
Amos Higgins, July, 1821 107
Noah Noble and Enoch McCarty, July, 1821 80
John Holmes, July, 1821 80
John Holmes, July, 1821 55
Jesse Cole, July, 1821 160
Jesse Cole, July, 1821 160
Gilbert Fuller, July, 1821 104
James Oliver, July, 1821 160
Amos Higgins, July, 1821 160
Thomas Clarke, July, 1821 80
David Hardman, July, 1821 80
Frederick Waltz, July, 1821 160
Enoch AVarman, July, 1821 80
Obadiah Harris, 1821 SO
Obadiah Harris, July, 1821 80
Abel Potter, July, 1821 ." SO
Name and Date. Acres.
Jonathan Lyon, July, 1821 160
lehabod Corwin, July, 1821 160
Solomon Stewart, July, 1821 160
John Fox, October, 1822 80
Amos Higgins and James Burns, July, 1821 160
James W. Johnston, October, 1821 160
Hannah Skinner, July, 1821 80
Lawrence Miller, October, 1821 80
James W. Johnston, October, 1821 160
Samuel Covington, January, 182.S 51
George Bell, October, 1S21 51
Joshua Glover, October, 1S21 103
Daniel Closser, October, 1823 80
Jesse Jackson, November, 1821 80
John Byrkett, December, 1825 104
Daniel Closser, July, 1821 80
Daniel Closser, September, 1821 80
Daniel Closser, February, 1823 53
John Hendricks, March, 1823 53
Andrew Hoover, July, 1821 80
John Miller, July, 1821 80
John Miller, July, 1821 80
John Miller, August, 1821 80
William McClary, July, 1821 160
Abraham Miller, July, 1821 160
Levi Beebee, July, 1821 160
Noah Wright, July, 1821 160
Levi Beebee, July, 1821 160
Luke Bryan, April, 1824 SO
Daniel Closser, February, 1S24 80
Town 16 North, Ranye 3 East.
Isaac Kelly, August, 1821 80
John Fox, July, 1821 160
William Wolverton, April, 1822 80
Frederick Hartman, July, 1821 80
Isaac Kelly, August, 1821 80
John C. Lane, August, 1S21 80
William D. Jones, August, 1821 80
William McCaw, August, 1821 160
John Carr, July, 1821 77
John Carr, July, 1821 66
John Carr, July, 1821 3
Archibald C. Keed, July, 1821 160
Jonathan Lyon, July, 1821 142
Elial T. Foote, July, 1821 6
Jonathan Lyon, July, 1821 160
Samuel Hoover, July,182I 80
Abraham Coble, Jr, July, 1821 80
Jonas Hoover, October, 1823 80
Benjamin McCarty .and James Wiley, July, 1821.. 160
William Walker, July, 1821 80
John Senours, October, 1823 SO
Levi Beebee, July, 1821 160
John Biggs, August, 1821 55
Martin Martindale, August, 1821 55
Benjamin McCarty, Sr., July, 1821 160
Dempsey Reeves, July, 1S21 54
Samuel Johnston, July, 1 821 54
Joseph Hanna, July, 1821 80
David Stoops, July, 1821 80
David Stoops, July, 1821 SO
William Stoops, August, 1823 80
George H. and Joseph Beeler, July, 1821 160
Thomas G. Noble, July, 1821 160
i>4
HISTOEY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Acre
Name «nd Date.
Elial T. Foote, July, 1821 43
Jonathan Lyon and Thomas Anderson, July, 1821 95
John AVolf, July. 1S2I SO
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 80
Jesse McKay and Jarret Van Blaricum, July, 1821 160
Pike Township.
Town 16 North, Range 2 East.
Seth Rhodabaugh, June, 182.3 80
David McCurdy, September, 1822 75
Isaac Pugh, August. 1821 75
David McCurdy, September, 1821 160
Isaac Pugh, August, 1821 75
George Muse
Abraham McCorkle, May, 1825 SO
Abraham McCorkle, May, 1825 .,... SO
Sarah Barnhill, April, 182.3 80
Jacob Whitinger, June, 1823 80
Thomas Jones, April, 1823 80
John Jones, December, 1822 80
Anthony Swaim, March, 1824 160
David McCurdy, December, 1825 80
David McCurdy, September, 1821... 160
David McCurdy, September, 1824 80
David McCurdy, March, 1822 160
Aaron Gullifcr, November, 1822 SO
Aaron Gullifer, February, 1824 SO
Valentine Kinoyer, December, 1825 80
David Fo.'j, October, 1823 80
Thomas Burns, October, 1S21 80
David McCurdy, September, 1821 'lOO
Thomas Burns, October, 182 1 80
Thomas Burns, October, 1821 80
Thomas Burns, August, 1821 ;. 80
Toxon 16 North, Range 3 East.
John Fo.\-, April, 1824 80
Amos Robertson, July, 1821 " 150
Seth Rhodabaugh, December, 1825 52
Aaron Gullifer, June, 1823 56
William AV. Wilson, March, 1823 112
Joseph Staten, January, 1823 SO
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 160
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 80
John Fisher, July, 1S21 160
John Fisher, July, 1821 160
Martin Davinport, February, 1825 30
Martin Davinport, February, 1825 56
7*01011 17 North, Range 2 East.
James Harman, October, 1823 80
Chesley Wray, September, 1822 80
John B. Harmon, November, 1S22 160
David McCurdy, April, 1823 SO
Elijah Fox, September, 1822 80
Henry Jackson, August, 1825 80
David McCurdy, September, 1822 160
David McCurdy, September, 1822 80
David McCurdy, September, 1822 SO
David McCurdy, September, 1822 160
James Duncan, December, 1823 80
Alexus Jackson, September, 1822 SO
William Conner, September, 1S22 80
John Duncan, December, 1S23 80
John Railsback, September, 1822 160
Name and Date. Acres.
John Railsback, September, 1822 80
David Wilson, December, 1825 SO
Robert Rhea, September, 1822 80
Washington Township.
Toxon 16 NortJi, Range 3 East.
Jesse McKay and Jacob Collip, July, 1821 160
Jesse McKay and Jacob Collip, July, 1821 160
Andrew Jones, July. 1821 150
Andrew Jones, July, 1821 160
John Pugh, July, 1821 59
Alexander Pugh, August, 1S21 120
Alexander Pugh, August, 1821 76
Joseph Swett, June, 1823 76
Samuel Stephens, April, 1823. 76
Isaac Stephens, April, 1823
Andrew Jones, July, 1821 160
Jacob Miers, October, 1823 155
John Fo.\, October, 1822 80
Jeremiah Roberts, November, 1822 80
Nimrod Ferguson, December, 1823 80
John T. Ba.sye, February, 1824 80
John Fox, October, 1822 SO
Eli Wright, November, 1.S23 80
John Roberts, Jr., November, 1822 80
Jeremiah and Edward Roberts, November, 1822.. 80
Xoah Leaverton, July, 1821 71
Edward Roberts, November, 1822 80
Joseph ."^wett, June, 1823 6
John Pugh, July, 1821 77
Lismund Basye, October, 1821 55
Andrew Jones, October, 1821 61
Andrew Jones, July, 1821 94
David Huston, July, 1821 160
William Jones, July, 1821 SO
j David Huston, July, 1821 80
i Jesse McKay and Jacob Collip, July, 1821 160
' Henry Hardin, July, 1821 60
1 Jacob Wright, July, 1S21 SO
1- William Hardin, July, 1821 160
I William Sanders, July, 1821 80
i Daniel Aiken, July, 1821 80
j Daniel McDonald, July, 1821 160
Simeon Slawson, July, 1S21 160
I Rezin Hammond, July, 1821 160
Rezin Hammond, July, 1821 80
Isaac Stipp, July, 1821 SO
James Givan, July, 1821 l60
William Appleton, July, 1821 70
Thomas McOuat, October, 1821 78
Jonas Hoover, July, 1821 80
Sylvanus Halsey, July, 1821 80
Thomas McOuat, October, 1821 SO
William Sanders, July, 1821 80
William Sanders, July, 1821 89
Jacob Whitinger, July, 1821 60
Jacob Whitinger, July, 1821 73
Samuel McCormick, April, 1823 78
AViUiam Sanders, July, 1821 89
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 74
Ephraim D. Reed, July, 1821 67
William C. Vanblaricum, July, 1821 59
Tnnin 16 North, Range i East.
James Griswold, December, 1825 63
Philip Ray, July, 1821 160
ORIGINAL ENTRIES OF LANDS IN THE COUNTY.
65
Name and DatB. Acres. ,^=-
Philip Ray, July, 1S21 SO 4
James Ellis, November, 1S24 80 i
William Tucker, July, 1821 138 5
Enoeli Clark, Xovember, 1S21 68 5
Elijah Fox, July, 1821 68 5
John Jarrett, August, 1821 160 5
Nicholas Criss, October, 1823 80 5
William Bacon, July, 1821 80 5
Elijah Fox, July, 1821 68 6
Hezekiah Smith, July, 1821 68 6
Jonas Huffman, July, 1821 128 6
William Bacon, July, 1821 80 6
Robert Dickerson, March, 1822 80 6
Moses Huffman, March, 1822 75 6
William Rector. July, 1821 T5 6
William Bacon, July, 1821 80 7
Lewis Nichols, October, 1821 80 7
Robert Smith, October, 1821 75 7
Christian Hager, July, 1821 75 7
William Hardin, July, 1821 80 7
William McCleery, July, 1821 80 7
William McCIeery, July, 1821 150 7
Abraham Epler, July, 1821 160 8
James Williams, July, 1821 80 8
Richard Williams, July, 1821 80 8
John McClung, July, 1821 160 8
John Hendricks, July, 1821 160 8
James Templer, August, 1821 80 9
Enoch Clark, July, 1821 SO 9
Christian Hager, July, 1821 160 9
John Whittaker, October, 1821 160 9
Jonas Huffman, July, 1821 160 9
Daniel Rumple, May, 1822 80 17
Joseph Bartholomew and Rezin Hammond, July,
1821 80 17
Joseph Bartholomew and Rezin Hammond, .July,
1821 160 17
Joseph Bartholomew and Rezin Hammond, July,
1821 80 17
Joseph Bartholomew and Rezin Hammond, July,
1821 80 17
William D. Rooker, July, 1821 80 17
Henry Hardin, July, 1821 160 IS
William Hardin, July, 1821 75 18
William D. Rooker, July, 1821 75 18
Samuel Glass, July, 1821 160 18
Jeremiah Johnson, July, 1821 76 18
Rezin Hammond, July, 1821 76 18
Toion 17 Jforth, Range 3 Fast.
John Vincent, September, 1822 80 13
Thomas Todd, October, 1S24 80 13
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1823 80 23
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 80 24
Abraham Bowen, September, 1822 SO 24
J.acob Whitinger, September, 1822 80 24
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 SO 24
William Hob.son, September, 1822 SO 24
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 81 25
Levi Wright, September, 1822 55 25
Levi Wright, September, 1822 77 25
Levi Wright, September, 1822 62 25
Samuel Ray, November, 1822 67 25
James Bonnell, September, 1822 147 25
James Bonnell, August, 1823 SO 26
5
Name and Date. Acres.
John Roberts, November, 1822 160
Joseph Gladden, September, 1822 109
Thomas Ellis, February, 1824 86
Samuel and Jeremiah Johnson, April, 1823 50
Elijah Dawson, November, 1822 106
James Young, September, 1822 139
James Young, September, 1822 63
Charles Rector, March, 1825 45
Jonas Huffman, September, 1822 60
Jesse McKay and John Collip, September, 1822... 88
Jesse McKay and John Collip, September, 1822... 59
Town 17 North, Range 4 East.
Morgan Parr, November, 1822 80
George Midsker, December, 1823 80
Thomas Reagan,.September, 1822 19
William Sanders, September, 1822 127
George Midsker, December, 1823 140
Eliakim Harding, September, 1822 160
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 160
Joseph Coats, December, 1822 SO
Lewis Huffman, September, 1822 80
John Vincent, September, 1822 80
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 147
Jacob AVhitinger, September, 1822 161
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 141
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 160
Thomas Reagan, September, 1822 Ill
Thomas Reagan, September, 1822 117
Thomas Reagan, September, 1822 160
Thomas Reagan, September, 1822 160
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 26
William Sanders, September, 1822 26
Joseph Coats, October, 1823 80
Joseph Coiits, September, 1822 160
William Wilkinson, November, 1823 80
Michael West, October, 1822 80
Silas Moppit, November, 1823 80
Jacob Burkitt, September, 1822 80
William Coats, November, 1822 80
Thomas Brunson, December, 1825 80
James Tarr, September, 1822 80
Fielding Jeter, September, 1822 137
Jacob Whitinger, September, 1822 119
John G. Mcllvain, July, 1824 80
John 6. Mcllvain, March, 1824 40
James McNutt, October, 1S22 77
Levi Wright, September, 1822 83
Levi Wright, September, 1822 80
Charles Daily, September, 1822 80
Charles Daily, September, 1822 80
Eliakim Harding, September, 1822 80
Hiram Bacon, September, 1822 160
Jonath.an Hawkins, September, 1822 160
Aaron Carter, September, 1822 160
William Bacon, November, 1822 80
Harlan Carter, September, 1822 160
William Bacon, November, 1822 160
Lavtrence Township.
Town 16 North, Range 4 Eait.
Hugh Beard, November, 1822 74
John Johnson, July, 1825 71
John Johnson, July, 1824 74
Samuel Marrow, August, 1824 71
66
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Niime and Date. Acres.
WilMam Hardin, July, 1821 142
William Hardin, July, 1821 141
Ephraim Morrison, August, 1824 70
Robert McClaine, September, 1S21 70
Peter Casteter, October, IS21 69
William McCIaren, Jr., April, 1S24 69
David Sheets, March, 1824 SO
Daniel Ballinger, October, 1823 80
Daniel Ballinger, October, 1823 80
Philip Rny, July, 1821 80
Adam Eller, August, 1824 80
Leonard Eller, April, 1825 80
James Templer, August, 1821 SO
David Jamison, Jr., June, 1S24 160
William D. Rooker, April, 1823 160
John North, September, 1823 80
John North, September, 1823 160
Leonard Eller, April, 1825 80
Joseph Eller, March, 1824 80
John Eller, March, 1824 SO
Robert Kelley, December, 1822 80
Town 17 Xorlh, linnije 4 Eail.
Gilbert A. Cheney, March, 1825 40
Jesse Enlow, October, 1822 160
Joshua Reddick, December, 1825 80
Robert Warren, October, 1824 80
Town 17 North, Ranije 5 Eaal.
John and Daniel Runs, February, 1824 80
James Wilson, December, 1825 160
Christian Beaver, October, 1824 80
Daniel Rumpal, October, 1824 80
Christian Beaver, October, 1824 80
Daniel Rumple, October, 1824 80
Jesse Enlow, October, 1822 160
Warrex Township.
Town 15 Xorlh, Range 4 £o«t.
Joseph Charles, November, 1822 80
Samuel Ferguson, January, 1825 SO
David E. Wade, March, 1824 SO
William Ferguson, February, 1825 64
Asa Grewell, December, 1823 80
William Riley, December, 1825 80
Jacob W. Fisher, October, 1822 160
William Clemens, August, 1S21 136
William Clemens, August, 1S21 70
Michael and Zinna Skinner, August, 1821 70
Jacob Sowduski, January, 1822 160
Jacob Sowduski, January, 1822 80
John Wilson, October, 1821 SO
Joshua Stephens, October, 1824 SO
Benjamin Atherton, December, 1823 SO
Edward Heizer, August, 1823 80
Edward White, December, 1823 SO
John Hall, October, 1821 160
William J. Morrison, December, IS25 80
Andrew Morehouse, August, 1823 160
Jacob Sowdusky, August, 1824 80
David Buckhannon, February, 1824 80
Joel Blaeklidge, October, 1823 80
Ambrose Shirley, November, 1S22 80
Edward Morin, December, 1825 SO
William Morin, December, 1825 SO
Name and Date. Acres.
William S. Whitaker, October, 1824 80
John Grewel, December, 1823 80
Samuel Ferguson, January, 1825 80
Henry Brady, December, 1S23 SO
Benjamin Atherton, December, 1823 80
Jacob Blaeklidge, October, 1823 80
Andrew Morehouse, March, 1824 80
Jacob Sowduski, August, 1S24 80
Robert Brown, February, 1824 SO
John W. Redding, January, 1823 160
Levi Becbee, July, 1821 160
James Doylo, March, 1822 180
James Doyle, January, 1822 160
Jacob Daringer, November, 1823 160
David Buckhannon, February, 1824 80
Archibald C. Reed, August, 1824 80
Town 15 North, Range 5 East.
Lorenzo Dow, May, 1S26 56
William Sanders, December, 1S25 80
Samuel Fullen, October, 1825 80
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 56
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 55
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 55
Calvin Fletcher, James Rariden, November, 1826.. 80
Cornelius Williams, December, 1825 SO
James Holliday, April, 1822 160
Stephen Brown, November, 1826 112
Joseph Bray, December, 1825 SO
Cornelius Williams, December, 1825 80
Stephen Brown, November, 1826 160
Stephen Brown, November, 1826 113
Stephen Brown, November, 1826 87
Stephen Brown, November, 1826 160
Willoughby Conner, September, 1826 43
Joseph Charles, November, 1822 43
Daniel Yandes, November, 1824 63
Demas L. McFarland, December, 1825 80
James Harris, November, 1824 SO
Polly Holliday, January, 1823 80
James Holliday, April, 1S22 80
Jacob Blaeklidge, November, 1823 160
Samuel Ferguson and John Pogue, January, 1825 80
John Ketley, December, 1825 80
Benjamin Sailor, March, 1823 80
Bishop k Stevens, January, 1825 SO
Benjamin Sailor, March, 1823 80
Benjamin Sailor, April, 1S23 SO
Samuel Beeler, August, 1823 80
Nathan Harlan, October, 1823 80
Town 16 North, Range 4 EiikI.
Robert Kelley, December, 1S25 SO
Jacob Mason, August, 1822 80
William Vanlaningham, March, 1822 SO
Harris Tyner, January, 1823 80
David Shields, December, 1821 160
Thomas Askren, September, 1825 IfiO
Razain Hawkins, August, 1825 80
Razain Hawkins, .-iugust, 1825 SO
Fraxklix Towxship.
Town 14 North, Range 4 East.
Nehemiah Smith, December, 1825 SO
Abraham Lemasters, February, 1825 80
tion.
12
ORIGINAL ENTRIES OP LANDS IN THE COUNTY.
67
Name and Date. Acres.
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 80
Luke Bryan, April, 1825 SO
Luke Bryan, April, 1S25 SO
Town 14 North, Banr/e 5 East.
Jeremiah Bernight, February, 1823 78
Moses Huffman, March, 1S22 78
William Rector, January, 1822 78
John Dawson, January, 1823 80
Benjamin Rector, March, 1825 SO
Powlcr Hibs, December, 1825 SO
Hugh Beard, December, 1825 80
John Dawson, January, 1823 160
Peter Mann, October, 1822 80
William Rector, January, 1822 SO
Jacob W. Fisher, October, 1822 160
Andrew O.Porter, October, 1821 160
Peter Carberry, July, 1822 80
John Dawson, January, 1823 160
Jacob Smock, December, 1824 40
William Morris, December, 1S24 40
Town 15 North, Range 4 East.
Robert McCather and Isaac Erazleton, December,
1825 80
Stephen Yager, December, 1825 80
George Smith, April, 1825 80
William Townsend, December, 1825 160
Toicn 15 North, Range 5 East.
John Patterson, November, 1821 80
John Patterson, November, 1821 80
Josiah Bisbee, July, 1821 80
Charles W. Wilson, August, 1821 80
Michael Cloyd, August, 1821 80
Isaiah Bisbee, July, 1S21 SO
Michael Cloyd, August, 1821 80
Reuben Adams, October, 1824 160
Reuben Adams, February, 1S25 80
Charles W. Wilson, August, 1821 160
William Griffith, October, 1S24 160
Perby Township.
Town 14 North, Range 3 East.
Henry D. Bell, October, 1821 154
Isaac Kelly, August, 1821 152
Peyton Bristow, May, 1S23 80
Henry Riddle, September, 1824 80
Henry Riddle, September, 1822 80
Elijah T. Foote, July, 1821 75
Elijah T. Foote, July, 1821 75
Peyton Bristow, May, 1823 80
Peyton Bristow, August, 1821 160
John Johnston, July, 1821 74
Philip W. Sparger, October, 1821 80
John Bowen, December, 1821 80
John Watts, October, 1821 80
David C. Cassett, July, 1821 80
Rudy Daily, March, 1823 69
Rudy Daily, March, 1823 85
Elijah Elliott, July, 1821 88
Martin D. Bush, July, 1S2I 80
James Martin, July, 1823 80
Richard Watts, July, 1821 160
Name and Date. Acrea.
Henry Myers, August, 1821.... 80
Denipsey Overman, July, 1S21 160
John Watts, July, 1821 160
Henry Alcorn, July, 1821 80
Henry Alcorn, July, 1821 80
Martin Riley, July, 1821 So
James Burns, July, 1821 80
David Marrs, October, 1821 80
Cline Roland, December, 1825 80
Dempsey Overman, July, 1821 SO
Jacob Pence, August, 1822 80
James Cully, July, 1S21 SO
James Cully, July, 1821 80
Thomas Shelton, December, 1825 SO
David Marrs, October, 1821 160
Robert Murpby, April, 1825 80
Jacob Pence, August, 1822 80
Samuel True, December, 1825 80
Samuel Dabney, December, 1823 80
Samuel Dabney, September, 1825 SO
Richard Good, February, 1S25 SO
Jacob Fullenweider, December, 1825 80
Henry Alcorn, March, 1831 SO
Samuel Dabney, December, 1825 80
Moses F. Glenn, May, 1822 80
George Vandegriff, July, 1821 80
William McBride, July, 1825 80
Joseph Smith, December, 1822 160
Anthony W. Bowen, December, 1821 80
Henry Hardin, May, 1822 160
Robert Hunt, July, 1821 80
Robert Hunt, July, 1821 160
Hezekiah Smart, August, 1.S22 160
Hezekiah Smart, December, 1823 80
Town 14 North, Range 4 East.
Robert White, December, 1824 73
Thomas Carle, September, 1S25 73
Thomas Bryant, April, 1325 147
Mary Aldridge, February, 1825 80
Jacob Turner, September, 1S25 SO
Jacob Turner and Thos. Bryant, December, 1S25. SO
Peter Demott, November, 1826 147
Isaac Helms, October, 1824 71
Baker F. Ewing, March, 1825 79
John Danner, June, 1S23 79
Francis Vorie, December, 1825 158
JacobSmock, May, 1S22 80
Samuel Brewer, October, 1823 80
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 160
Luke Bryan, December, 1825 SO
Abraham Lemasters, December, 1825 80
Gerrardus R. Bobbins, November, 1822 160
Jacob Smock, M.iy, 1822 SO
Samuel Smock, November, 1826 80
Nehemiah Smith, December, 1825 80
William McClain, December, 1825 80
Robert Brenton, August, 1822 160
Cornelius Demott, May, 1822 160
Randal Litsey, October, 1822 160
Randal Litsey, October, 1822 160
William Sanders, August, 1825 SO
William Sanders, December, 1825 80
David Brewer, December 1S24 80
Daniel A. Brewer, December, 1824 160
68
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Town 15 North. Range 3 East.
Name and Date. Acres.
Simeon Smock, October, 1S21 160
John McFall, August, 1821 160
Lewis Nichols, October, 1821 80
Peter Demott, October, 1821 80
Peter Demott, October, 1S21 80
Henry Brenton, August, 1821 80
George Marquis, November, 1824 80
John Shaffer, August,1821 80
Lewis Davis, August, 1821 160
James Andrew, Jr., July, 1821 SO
Isaac Senseney, August, 1821 80
Abraham Lemasters, July, 1821 80
Joseph S. Benham, July, 1821 80
Lewis Davis, August, 1821 80
William Vandegriff, July, 1821 30
William Sanders, July, 1821 160
William Sanders, June, 1822 43
Richard Vest, November, 1821 70
Samuel Whitcher, April, 1822 139
Emanuel Glympse, March, 1823 80
William Myers, July, 1821 160
William Sanders, January, 1823 80
John D. Lutz, August, 1821 80
William Townsend, July, 1821 160
George Norwood, July, 1821 160
Abraham Lemasters, July, 1821 160
Amos Cook, July, 1821 160
Henry Ballinger, July, 1821 160
John Smock, July, 1821 160
Henry Brenton, August, 1821 80
David Marrs, October, 1821 80
John Poole, July, 1821 160
Town 15 North, Range i East.
Williams. Hughey, April, 1825 80
Nathan AUdridge, November, 1823 80
Susannah, Jacob, and Azariah Mosly, February,
1823 SO
James Thompson, June, 1824 160
William Arnold, August, 1824 160
James McLaughlin. July, 1823 80
Sarah Jane Smith, December, 1825 160
Lawrence Demott, October, 1821 157
Henry Comingore, November, 1822 156
John Smock, August, 1821 80
Richard Corwine, July, 182] 15T
John Smock, July, 1821 160
Stephen Miller, January, 1822 159
S. G. Huntington, August, 1821 80
S. S. Huntington, August, 1821 80
John Smock, August, 1821 80
Milton White, October, 1824 80
Milton White, September, 1824 80
Jacob Coffman, August, 1821 160
Benjamin L. Crothers, August, 1821 160
George Petro, August, 1821 80
tion.
25
25
CHAPTER IV.
Social Condition of the Early Settlers — Amusements — Religious
Worship — Music — General Description of Pioneer Life in
Marion County — Diseases once Prevalent — Causes of Dimin-
ution.
Thus far this history has followed as closely as any
record, or accurate memory, or other authentic ac-
count would permit, the course of events in the first
settlement and growth of the town and county up
to the opening of the year 1825, occasionally pausing
to group about some conspicuous locality or occur-
rence such incidents of the later history as closely
connected themselves with it, and presented at a
single view a summary of the subject, which would
be less intelligible if broken up by scattering the
points about in chronological order. Brief biograph-
ical references also have been introduced with the
first appearance of citizens who were then or sub-
sequently became conspicuous for services to the
community. But there is a good deal more of the
history of any State or town than appears in its
public records and the accounts of its material growth
and development. How the people lived, worked, and
amused themselves is quite as much to the purpose
of a faithful chronicle as the building of mills, open-
ing streets, and holding courts. For the first two dec-
ades of the existence of the town and the settlement
about it the social conditions were so little changed
that an account of any part of that period will be no
misfit for any other part. The changes towards x;ity
development and conditions were not distinctly shown
till the impulse of improvement that ran a little
ahead of the first railway began to operate. There-
fore the incidents, anecdotes, and descriptions in this
division of the work are used as illustrative of a
period of substantially unchanging conditions, and
not of any particular year or condition. They are
substantially true of any year for two decades or
thereabouts.
For the first few years the relations of the settlers
and Indians were occasional points of interest or
alarm. One or two incidents will show that the
New Purchase was not difi"erent in its chances of
Indian trouble from settlements beyond the Missis-
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE EARLY SETTLERS.
69
sippi twenty years ago, and beyond the Rocky Moun-
tains now. Mr. Nowland describes one of these '
incidents : " John McCormick kept the first tavern
or place of entertainment in the place, and provided
for the commissioners a portion of the time when
they were here for the purpose of locating the
capital. His house stood on the east or left bank
of the river, a few steps below where the National
road now crosses it. One bright sunny morning
about the middle of March my father and I took
a walk to the river. When within about fifty yards
of the cabin of Mr. McCormick we heard cries of
' Help ! Murder !' coming from the house. We ran,
and by the time we got there several men had
arrived. A well-known and desperate Delaware,
called ' Big Bottle,' from the fact that he generally
carried a large bottle hung to his belt, had come to
the opposite side of the river and commanded Mrs.
McCormick to bring the canoe over for him. This
she refused to do, knowing that he wanted whiskey,
and when drinking was a dangerous Indian. He
set his gun against a tree, plunged into the river,
and swam over, and when we reached the house was
ascending the bank, tomahawk in hand, preparatory
to cutting his way through the door, which Mrs.
McCormick had barricaded. At the sight of the
men he desisted, and said he only wished to ' scare
white squaw.' He was taken back to his own side
of the river in a canoe, and admonished that if he
attempted to scare the ' white squaw' again her hus-
band would kill him. This rather irritated him.
He flourished his scalping-knife towards her, and
intimated by signs from her head to his belt that he
would take her scalp."
Not far from the time of this pleasing incident of
aboriginal amiability another of a more serious char-
acter occurred, illustrating the inevitable proclivity
of whites to cheat Indians, and the very probable
efi'ect of the cheat when discovered. Mr. Now-
land is authority for the story. " Robert Wilmot,
the second merchant (Daniel Shaffer was a little
earlier), had a small stock of Indian trinkets, and
for a short time carried on trade with the Indians,
but a little occurrence frightened him, and he soon
returned to Georgetown, Ky., his former residence.
A Delaware Indian named Jim Lewis had pledged
some silver hat-bands (there is something to open
the eyes of the ' dudes' of 1883 [) to Wilmot for
goods, and was to return in two moons to redeem
them. He kept his word, but when he came back
Wilmot had sold the bands to another Indian, which
so exasperated Lewis that he threatened if he ever
caught Wilmot going alone to his corn-field he would
take his scalp. This frightened him so much that
he never would go alone, but often requested and
was accompanied by Dr. Livingston Dunlap. His
alarm grew so serious finally that he sold out and
returned to Kentucky. As it was pretty generally
known that Lewis was the murderer of the white
man found near the Blufis, on an island of the river,
this threat against Wilmot had a tendency to alarm
and put on their guard other settlers."
The Indians had been greatly irritated by the
intrusion of the whites into their favorite hunting-
ground, and occasional manifestations of enmity were
to have been and were expected ; still, the relations
of the races were not always those of ill-will and ill-
service. The late James Sulgrove, who came to the
settlement in 1823, and at his death in 1875 was
the oldest business man in the city continuously in
the same business, used to tell a little incident of the
good feeling of the Indians that may go to set ofi'
the less pleasant ones. His father, while riding
through the dense woods where West Indianapolis
now stands, with a child before him, saw an Indian
following at a rapid pace, as if to overtake him.
Feeling a little alarmed, he hurried his horse ahead,
but saw that the Indian hurried too. Knowing the
impossibility of escaping by speed in the deep, miry
mud of the river bottom with the child to take care
of, he slackened his pace and let the native come up.
As he approached he held out a child's shoe in his
hand, which had dropped from the foot of the little
fellow on the horse, and been picked up by the
Indian, who had followed pertinaciously through the
mud to return it. Trivial as such an afi'air is, it is
worth noting as an evidence that the Indians then,
i as now and always, treat the whites in much the
' same way the whites treat them. If there is no
special cause of dislike or hostility, the Indians are
70
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
as well disposed to be kindly and hospitable as other
men. If they are swindled and abused they can
hardly be more vindictive, if we may trust the early
reports of revengeful white murders.
Of the homes and modes of life of the early set-
tlers some little suggestion has been made in occa-
sional allusions, but a better idea is given in Mr. Now-
land's account of the way his father's family settled
themselves here in the fall of 1820 on their arrival.
He says that a Quaker from Wayne County by the
name of Townsend, the same who afterwards joined
in putting in operation the first wool-carding machine
here, had come out to the settlement and built a
cabin and covered it, but had left the sawing out of
the necessary openings to a more convenient season
and returned to the White Water. Mr. Nowland's
father took possession, by the advice of a friend, but,
for fear of cutting openings for doors, windows, and
a chimney in the wrong place, decided to cut none at
all, and made an entrance by the novel process of
prying up two corners of the house and taking out
the third log from the bottom. A few clapboards
taken from the middle of the roof let the smoke out,
and the whole aifair was about as comfortable as a
wigwam. The fire was built on the ground, which
was the floor, and rag carpets wore hung round the
walls to exclude the wind, against which there was
no provision of " chinking and daubing." The
neighbors, in the generous fashion of the backwoods,
all assisted readily in anything that required their
help, and a cabin of their own was soon provided for
the family. There may possibly be in the city yet
one of these primeval cabins weather-boarded over,
as a good many were, and made most excellent resi-
dences too, as handsome as a frame and as solid as
a brick ; but the unhewed cabin, unfaced and left in
its native roughness, probably disappeared with the
burning of a double log house on the bank of Pogue's
Run, near Mississippi Street, some years before the
war. The double cabin was the palatial structure
of the early settlements of the New Purchase. A
two-story, hewed-log house was sometimes built, but
it was as phenomenal as Vanderbilt's marvelous
home. There was one on Maryland Street, south
side, west of Meridian, near the present east end of
the Grand Hotel, that was occupied by a family
named Goudy for a time, and afterwards by some
of the hands employed on the National road in 1837
or 1838 or thereabouts. It may have been the first
house used by the Methodists as a place of worship
in 1825, for they did use a hewed-log house on
Maryland Street, near Meridian. It disappeared
forty years ago. One-story houses frequently made a
sort of second story of the garret by a ceiling of
loose plank or puncheons and a ladder, and this
was sometimes the children's room and sometimes a
guest's room. Doors were usually battened, swung
on large wooden hinges, and fastened with a wooden
latch, lifted from the outside by a string fastened to
it and passing through a hole in the door above.
The hospitable assurance of a backwoodsman that his
"latch-string was always out" can be readily appre-
ciated with this explanation. It meant that his
house could be entered at any time by anybody. If
the latch-string were drawn in through the hole a
person outside would have no chance to get in. A
close-jointed hewed-log house was warmer in winter
and cooler in summer than a brick, and, except that
it would rot, was preferable. Unhewed houses were
always more or less subject to the intrusion of va-
grant breezes and curious eyes by the falling out or
knocking out of the " chinking" and " daubing" that
filled the .spaces between the logs. This was usually
made of blocks of split wood, from six inches to a
foot long by three or four inches wide and an inch
or two thick, laid in oblique rows between the logs
and covered thick with the mud of the country.
Chimneys were usually built clear outside of the
house, against a hole eight or ten feet wide by five
or six high cut out of the logs or left by measure-
ment when the logs were cut before the raising, as
other openings were arranged for frequently. The
square of the chimney at the bottom, as high as the
fireplace inside, was built of heavy split timber .
notched like the logs of the wall and heavily
" daubed." The upper part was narrowed from the
square structure below to the usual size of a smoke-
vent of brick, but made of small split sticks laid on
each other in courses of pairs and thickly plastered
with clay or mud. As dangerous as such work would
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE EARLY SETTLERS.
71
appear in such close contact with the huge fires of
the backwoods, there was not more danger if the
" daubing" was well looked to than there is in the
" defective flue" that is the terror of city house-
holders and the pest of insurance companies. Be-
sides, if a chimney should take fire it could be dis-
cerned at once, for the whole extent of the flue was
as open as the door, and a tinful of water could do
all that a steam-engine is needed to do now, and with-
out damaging anything, where the engine would do
as much harm as a fire. With all the rudeness and
lack of luxuries and even of conveniences, the pio-
neers of the West had some countervailing advan-
tages even in the structure of their houses.
Log cabins were abundant here when cooking-
stoves came round, but they had been going out for
some years, and there was never any considerable
association between the home of the backwoods and
the kitchen of the city. The cooking of the cabin
was all done in the big fireplace. Mr. Nowland tells
how the fires were made. The back-log, cut the full
length of the fireplace, was laid at one end on a sled
called a " lizard," and hauled into the house by a
horse till it was opposite the fireplace, when it was
rolled in, and followed by a " forestick" of the same
size, and brought in the same way. Smaller wood
filled in the space between the two on the heavy and-
irons, — sometimes stones or smaller logs,— and with
proper attention to the small fuel such a fire would last
twenty-four hours. The baking was done in skillets,
set in front of the fire on a bed of coals, with the lid
covered with coals. If it was a "johnny-cake" that
was to be baked, it was spread out by hand till it was
a foot or so long and half as wide or more by nearly
an inch in thickness, and then laid on the "johnny-
cake board," about like the half of a modern sleeve-
board, and set on edge before the fire, supported by
a big chip or a stone or anything handy. Nothing
more savory was ever made of grain than a "johnny-
cake." The frying was done like the baking, and
not unfrequently with the same utensil. For boiling,
an iron crane usually hung in the fireplace, with two
or three heavy iron hooks, that could be moved along
the lever, like the weights on a steelyard, to find the
best spot of the fire. Against the end walls of the
big fireplace it was a common sight to see venison
hams hanging to dry, or "jerk," as the phrase is now.
Pumpkins cut into thin strips and dried were fre-
quent adornments of strings or poles near the ceiling
or along the walls. A " smoke-house," to cure the
winter's bacon, was an usual adjunct of the cabin,
and the fiimily meat was kept there with other pro-
visions. Before there were any mills, or when low
water prevented them from grinding, corn was often
made into " lye hominy," or, when just hardening
from the roasting ear into maturity, was grated on a
half-cylinder of tin punched outwardly full of holes,
the outturned edges of the hole rasping an ear away
rapidly in the deft hands of a backwoods housewife.
Potatoes were roasted in the hot ashes and embers,
and the boy who has eaten them thus cooked, and
will not swear that no other cooking is comparable,
is " fit for stratagems" and all other bad things.
In the year 1830, Mr. John Finley, of Wayne
County, wrote a New Year's address for the Indian-
apolis Journal, at the close of which occurs so
admirable a description of a " Hoosier" pioneer cabin
that no apology is required for reproducing it here :
" I'm told in riding somewliere West
A stranger found a ' Hoosier's nest,'
In other words, a buckeye cabin,
Just big enough to hold Queen Mab in.
Its situation, low but airy.
Was on the borders of a prairie;
And fearing he might be benighted,
He hailed the house, and then alighted.
The Hoosier met him at the door,
Their salutations soon were o'er.
He took the stranger's horse aside
And to a sturdy sapling tied,
Then, having stripped the saddle off,
He fed him in a sugar-trough.
The stranger stooped to enter in,
The entrance closing with a pin.
And manifested strong desire
To seat him by the log-heap fire,
Where half a dozen Hoosieroons,
With mush and milk, tin cups and spoons,
White heads, bare feet, and dirty faces.
Seemed much inclined to keep their places.
But madam, anxious to display
Her rough but undisputed sway,
Her offspring to the ladder led.
And cuffed the youngsters up to bed.
72
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Invited shortly to partake
Of venison, milk, and johnny-cake,
The stranger made a hearty meal,
And glances round the room would steal.
One side was lined with divers garments,
The other spread with skins of varmints;
Dried pumpkins overheard were strung.
Where venison hams in plenty bung;
Two rifles placed above the door.
Three dogs lay stretched upon the tioor.
In short, the domicile was rife
With specimens of Hoosier life.
The host, who centered bis aflFections
On game and ' range' and ' quarter sections,'
Discoursed his weary guest for hours.
Till Somnus' all-composing powers
Of sublunary cares bereft them.
And then No matter how the story ended.
The application I intended
Is from the famous Scottish poet.
Who seemed to feel, as well as know it.
That ' burly chiels and clever hizzies
Are bred in sic a way as this is.' "
The nickname of an ludianian, " Hoosier," occurs
in this poem the first time that it ever appeared in
print, say some old settlers. It could not have been
very old or generally known throughout the country
if it originated, as the most credible accounts relate,
in a fight among the hands employed in excavating
the canal around the Falls of the Ohio at Louisville.
Some big Irishman, after keeping out of the shindy
as long as he could stand it, at last went in and
knocked down four or five of the other party in
quick succession. Jumping up in high glee he
cracked his heels together, and shouted, " I'm a
husher." The boast crossed the river, and was
naturalized by the residents there, and thence passed
all over the State and into other States. Except
" Yankee," no other State or sectional nickname is
so well known, and it is not unfrequently used as
a designation of a Western man, as " Yankee" is of
an Eastern man. Grovernor Wright, of Indiana, once
told a foreign visitor that the name originated in a
habit of travelers calling out when they would ride
up to a fence at night with the purpose of staying
till morning, " Who's here ?" Repetition made one
word of it, and finally made a name for backwoods
settlers of it, which in some unexplained way was
appropriated to Indiana. Another explanation is
that Col. Lehmanowski, a Polish ofiicer of the first
Napoleon, who occasionally visited this place, and
preached here to a Lutheran association and lec-
tured on Napoleon's wars, about 1840 to 1842,
started the name by his pronunciation of the word
" Hussar," which some " gostrating" fellow got hold
of and used to glorify himself. This, however, oc-
curring as late as 1840, will not explain the use of the
word in Finley's poem in 1830, except in the fashion
of " Merlin's prophecy," made by the " Fool" in
" Lear."
Dr. Philip Mason, of White Water, in his " Au-
tobiography," gives an account of the agricultural
implements in use on the farms of these " Hoosiers"
that will not be uninteresting to the later generation
of farmers. " The plow was the common shovel-
plow mostly, though a few called the ' bar-share'
were used. This was a bar on the land side, with
a broad, flat share running to a point at the forward
end, attached to a coulter with a steel nose in front.
The coulter extended up through the wooden beam of
the plow. Two wooden handles, one attached to the
beam and the bar, and to the bar of the land side of
the plow, the other handle connected with a wooden
mold-board, which pressed out the dirt and partially
turned it. It was connected with the other handle
by wooden pins or rounds. Horses were often at-
tached to the plow without an iron clevis. The
double-tree was connected with a fixture not unlike
a clevis ; the single-tree fastened to the double-tree
by a hickory withe, sometimes with a kind of wooden
clevis. The horses were mostly geared for plowing
with a collar made of corn-shucks ; hames made from
the roots of the ash or oak, fashioned as best they
could be with a drawing-knife, a hole at top and bot-
tom, so as to fasten with a cord or a thong made of
rawhide ; not uncommonly a hole was made with an
auger near the middle of the hame to take in the
trace, which was made of hemp or flax tow, and spun
and made on a rude rope-walk. The trace was run
through the hole in the hame and secured by a knot,
and looped over the end of the single-tree, on which
there was a notch at the back part to keep it in place.
For a back-band a strong piece of tow cloth doubled
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE EARLY SETTLERS.
73
was used. The horses were guided by a bridle with
a rope headstall and a rope line, mostly driven with
one line. When using two horses they were coupled
together by a rope at the bits, sometimes by a stick,
with strings tied to the stick and then to the bridle-
bit. Double lines were seldom used in driving one
or two horses. Even a four-horse team was driven
with a single line attached to the near forward horse.
Salt and iron were obtained at Cincinnati, and fortu-
nate was he who could by any means obtain salt
enough to preserve his meat and salt his food. Corn
was often sold at six cents a bushel, and wheat at
twenty-five cents. Salt was often as high as two
dollars and a half and three dollars a bushel."
seasoned. From these I made a high post bedstead,
which has been in use ever since till the last seven
years." The common chair of the backwoods was the
" split-bottom," still made and used occasionally, and
superior to anything of the fashionable kind made
now. Long thin strips of tough wood that would
split in flakes about an inch wide were used to weave
the seat. They wore out or broke readily, but were
readily replaced. Sometimes buckskin was stretched
and tacked to the frame of the seat, and made a better
chair than any costly cushioned affair of this day,
until it stretched into too deep a cavity, as it always
did sooner or later.
From this account of a pioneer it will be seen that
AN E3IIGRANT
Although the pioneers all had to build their own
houses, they were not all nor generally so destitute
as to be forced to make their own furniture. Dr.
Mason thus describes his labor in this direction : " My
next object was to make us seats. For this purpose I
went into the creek bottom and selected a suitable blue
ash tree, cut it down, then cut notches into the sides,
and split off pieces of suitable length and width for
benches. With the broad-axe and drawing-knife they
were made smooth. Some were made for a single per-
son and had three legs, while the longer ones had four
legs. Our next object was a bedstead. I found on
the place some black walnut rails which were well
farmers did a good deal towards making for themselves
the appliances and implements they needed. It was
often their only chance, consequently it was no un-
usual thing to see about a farmer's barn or back yard
a rough carpenter's bench with a wooden clamp or
vise, or a " horse" with a treadle, and a notched head
pressed by the treadle down on a stick to hold it fast
against the "horse" for the use of the "drawing-
knife," the universal tool of the backwoods, only less
indispensable than the axe. The ready adaptability
of the American pioneer was balked by little in the
way of wood-work, but blacksmithing was too much,
and the blacksmith-shop was universally coeval with
74
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
the tavern and village store. He made the crane for
the fireplace, the " dog-irons" or andirons, the shovel
and tongs, the plowshare and clevis, the horse's bit
sometimes, the gearing of the wife's loom, the irons
of the husband's wagon, shod the horses, sharpened
the plows, made the grubbing hoes and the fishing
gigs, hammered smooth the battered poles of axes,
riveted the blade in the boy's broken knife, and some-
times ventured to repair the broken lock of the hunter's
rifle. Pretty much all else the family did for them-
selves, even to the wagon-making once in a while.
The spinning, weaving, cutting, and clothes-making
were the good wife's work, with plenty more besides,
and if she didn't make as neat fits or graceful drapery
as a fashionable tailor or dressmaker to-day, her
breeches were sound and durable, her " wamuses"
comfortable and convenient, her dresses admirably
adapted to the service and situation. Buckskin was
largely used for clothing and frequently for moccasins.
It is queer that the infinite superiority of the latter
in comfort to all other forms of foot-gear for those
distressed by the distortions and excrescences of civil-
ization has not reintroduced them, at least among sen-
sible people who care more for comfort than appear-
ances. Buckskin wamuses and breeches disappeared
forty years ago, except in rare instances of well-pre-
served pioneer relics. The deer was driven off into
the remotest parts of the county even before that,
and the hides becoming scarce, and dear in a double
sense, were gradually replaced in saddlery and other
manufactures by sheepskin, by no means its equal.
Ex-Coroner Dr. Wishard tells an amusing .story of
Emmanuel Glympse, one of the first settlers of Perry
township. He had been wearing a pair of ill-tanned
buckskin breeches, which got soaked in a shower as
he was going from home to a school he kept in the
neighborhood. They were pliable enough when he
sat down in them wet, but they dried before he
attempted to rise, and then they were as hard as
sheet-iron, and he had to get water and resoak them
before they would allow him freedom of muscle
enough to walk. It was much such a case as " Sut
Lovengood's" shirt. For a number of years carding
machinery was frequently attached to the motive-
power of mills to make " rolls" of the farmers'
wool, but a farmhouse was rarely without its pair
of cards for hand-made rolls if an emergency required
them. As late as 1832 or 1833 there was a carding-
machine run by horse-power — a huge wheel fifteen
feet in diameter set at a slope with a vertical shaft
in the centre, on the lower side of which a horse
was in constant motion — on the northwest corner of
Maryland and Illinois Streets, and another on Ken-
tucky Avenue near where the first tobacco-factory
was situated. These were used for no other purpose,
but in at least two mills near the city the same kind
of machinery was attached to the water-power. One
was on Fall Creek race, the other on the bayou, near
the present line of the Vincennes Railroad, in a mill
erected by the late Daniel Yandes and his brother-in-
law, Andrew Wilson. Spinning and weaving machi-
nery came, temporarily and uselessly, in a big steam-
mill enterprise some years later, but it failed, and
woolen manufacture was left to show itself nearly
twenty years later. " Store clothes" were by no
means unknown, but a large dependence was held on
the mother's skill in the country, and to some extent
in the town too, where a good deal of the country
life was retained in the woods and corn-patches that
surrounded many of the houses. It was not till the
settlement was getting into its teens that it began to
put on city airs and distinguish itself and its ways
from the country.
A portion of the home labors of the backwoods
was of a kind that required co-operation, and these
were made occasions of fun and frolic, though rarely
to the neglect of the real business. Among these
were the " quiltings" for women and girls, with the
necessary attendance of young men later, when the
games of the period were zealously kept up as long
as it seemed decorous. These were much the same
as country games in all parts of the country, of
English origin and traditional repute, and rarely
mixed up with later inventions till the town and
country began to be less closely assimilated. The point
or purpose of most of them was a kiss claimed as a
forfeit or penalty. The more intellectual entertain-
ments, like making and solving puzzles, were not so
popular as those with a little material satisfaction
lodged in their conclusion. " Apple-parings" were
AMUSEMENTS.
75
not so common here as in the East, but they were
another kind of co-operative work that was made an
amusement. " House-raisina" was a male task with
a similar accompaniment belter adapted to masculine
tastes; "log-rolling" was another. The trees that
had been cut down to clear the land for cultivation
had to be put out of the way, and no way was so
expeditious as to roll them into great heaps and burn
them, trunks, chips, limbs, brush, and leaves. So
the neighbors gathered to a " log-rolling" as to a
" raising," and many a rivalry of strength and skill
with the handspike was raised or settled tliere. There
was fighting of course, especially on visits to town
and to the "grocery," as the liquor-shop was called
then ; but the exhibition at a " log-rolling" was quite
as satisfactory proof that a man was a " good man,"
"stout," "hold his otrn," and so on, as a successful
fight at Jerry Collins' corner. " Sugar-making"
was frequently turned into a frolic, though co-opera-
tion was not so necessary to it as the other work.
The processes were much the same as now, except
that the " troughs" were not buckets or crocks, but
wooden vessels roughly hewed in the halves of
short logs split in two, unhandy, easily overturned,
and readily inclined to get dirty. They were visited
at regular intervals, and the sugar-water emptied
into a barrel on a sled, or in a wagon if there was
not snow enough for a sled, and reset, while the sled
with its load went back to the fire, usually made
between two good-sized long logs, on which the
kettles rested. Here the evaporating water was re-
placed from the barrels till it was sweet enough to
finish with, and then came the fun, " the stirring off,"
and hunting out lumps to eat, or filling egg-shells
with thick syrup to harden into a lump like a stone,
or pouring a great mass into a pan of sugar-water for
the boys and girls to pull at, or making cakes of it,
or scalding fingers with it for some favorite to doctor.
" Sugar-making" was capable of being made the
most entertaining event of the year, and it was often
done.
Besides the amusements made of occasions of really
necessary neighborly co-operation, the men of both
town and country during the first decade of the
settlement, or in some cases the first two, contrived
amusements that made no pretence of work. The
chief of these were "quarter races" and "shooting
matches." For some years the portion of West
Street along the Military Ground was the favorite
race-track, the outcome being near the crossing of
West and Indiana Avenue on the Michigan road.
Nags taken from the plow or the wagon, and ridden
by the owners or by some boy, were the contestants,
and the stake was anything from a plug of tobacco
to ten dollars, the latter not usually risked on any
animal that had not a local reputation. Forty years
ago or more these quarter races on West Street took
place nearly every Saturday, and were usually dec-
orated with a fight or two.
A conspicuous character concerned in them fre-
quently was a very remarkable man named Nathaniel
Vise, who settled and named the town of Visalia, in
California. Though constantly associated with drink-
ing men all his life and making drinking-places his
principal haunts, he was never known to drink.
Though he gambled, he was notoriously as honorable
a man as there was in the place. Possessed of phe-
nomenal strength and agility, and living among fight-
ing men, he never fought when he could help it, and
he never fought without whipping his man. His
checkered career took him to Texas after he left here,
and he became the intimate friend of Jack Hays, the
noted " Texas Ranger." They went to California
together, and there his amazing strength and skill
made him so formidable that not one of the many
noted prize-fighters then in San Francisco, like
" Yankee" Sullivan and " Country" McClusky, would
fight him " rough and tumble" for ten thousand
dollars. He was killed but a year or so ago by the
fall of a building in Texarkana. He came to this
place a mere lad with his father from Kentucky, and
grew up here. At one time, about 1839, he had a
contract on the Central Canal, near the town, and
when the public works were suspended that year he
made a pro rata division of all the money he had
among his hands. They came to the town and got
drunk on it, and were then easily persuaded by a
fractious Irishman that they had been cheated and
ought to lick Vise. Happening to pass along the
street where a group of them was gathered, a little
76
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
east of Meridian Street on Washington, they assailed
him, first with savage language and then with their
clubs and fists. He knocked and kicked down a
half-dozen of them before he got clear of them.
His activity was so great that he jumped high enough
to kick both feet in the stomach of one of the mob
and prostrate him senseless. He once beat a pro-
fessional foot-racer in racing costume, without chang-
ing a single thing he wore, and beat him so badly in
a hundred yards or so that at the outcome he turned
and walked towards his antagonist, meeting and laugh-
ing at him. He was a cousin of Judge N. B. Taylor,
of the Superior Court. So much notice of him is
due to the conspicuous place he held among the early
settlers and the reputation he left here.
After the abandonment of the canal, its bed south
of Pleasant Run, where there was a long stretch of
level bottom, was made a race-track by the ambitious
residents of Perry township, especially the section of
it some half-dozen miles south of the town in the
river bottom, called " Waterloo," a region noted for
fighting, drinking, betting, and wild frolics of all
kinds. Here lived the Snows, the Stevenses, the
Fanoillers, the Mundys, the Glympses, the Myerses,
some quiet and orderly, some a good deal like the
modern " cow-boy." All were ■' drinking" men,
however.
" Shooting matches" continued to be a popular
amusement till near the time the completion of the
first railroad changed the direction of men's minds to
the graver occupations of establishing industries and
multiplying business. There were two kinds of
matches. In one the shooting was done at a target,
in the other at the object which was made the stake.
In the first case the usual prize was a beef divided
into five " quarters," the fifth being the hide and
tallow, and worth more cash value than either of the
others. In the second case the object shot for — ^a
turkey commonly, sometimes a goose — was set against
a tree or stump, with a log rolled before it so as to con-
ceal all of it but the head and upper part of the neck.
The contestants stood oflF an agreed distance, usually
sixty yards, and shot at the head " ofi' hand." The
first to bring blood won it. Each contestant put in
enough to make the aggregate a good price for the
fowl. The rifle was the only weapon of the time in
the backwoods, whether the game were deer or bear,
turkey, quail, or squirrel. Small game could usually
be hit close enough about the head to leave the eat-
able portion uninjured. But nobody could shoot a
running turkey's head off with a rifle, as one of T.
B. Thorpe's apocryphal stories makes Mississippi old-
time hunters do frequently. It might be possible if
a turkey were running directly away from or towards
a hunter, but barely possible then, and utterly impos-
sible, except by accident, in any other direction. The
shot-gun was thought beneath the dignity of hunters
and marksmen, and even boys disdained it. The rifle
was the weapon of a man ; " shot-guns will do for
girls," said an old pioneer once in Mr. Beck's gun-
smith-shop. It was not till the German immigration
began to afi'ect social conditions that the shot-gun be-
gan to displace the rifle. Now the hunter here never
uses the rifle, and the shot-gun has become the es-
pecial agent even of the humanizing murders of our
enlightened land. Several prominent citizens were
noted for skill with the rifle. Robert B. Duncan was
probably the most formidable of all, but Squire Wea-
ver and Nathaniel Cox and several others were little
inferior, if at all. Mr. Cox was one of the conspicu-
ous pioneers of the New Purchase. He was a me-
chanical genius, and was employed to do all sorts of
work that nobody else could or would try. He was
carpenter, cabinet-maker, cooper, turner, painter, boat-
builder, anything that was wanted, — a quaint, humor-
ous, generous man, full of queer stories and dry fun,
passionately fond of hunting and fishing, and always
at it when he had no work to do. In 1842, when
he wanted to run for county treasurer, probably, he
announced himself in handbills as " Old Nat Cox,
the Coon-Hunter." He was the drummer of militia
musters, and made his own drums. He lived west of
Missouri Street on Washington for a great many
years, and died about 1851. According to Mr. Now-
land, he was the prototype of " Sut Lovengood"
in drinking the two components of a Seidlitz powder
separately and letting them mix in his stomach, an
experiment that he said " made him feel as if Niagara
Falls were running out of his head." He was a
Marylander, and came here in 1821.
AMUSEMENTS.
77
Another amusement of the early settlement of the
place was " gander-pullino;." This was imported from
the South by the settlers from North Carolina and
Tennessee, of whom there were a good many. Those
who have read some of the sketches of Southern life
and scenes by Hooper and Lonestreet will know all
that can be known about a " gander-pulling" without
taking part in it. One of the places — possibly the
only one — where it was practiced in this county was
at Allisonville, in Washington township, on the road
to Conner's place and Noblesville. Here two resi-
dents, Lashbrook and Deford, oflFered an enlightened
and Christian public the refined and intellectual en-
tertainment of a " gander-pulling" at such times as
promised to make the speculation profitable. An old
gander was caught, his neck stripped of feathers and
thickly covered with soft soap, and hung by his legs
to a strong but yielding limb of a handy tree. The
contestants mounted their horses and in turn rode at
full speed under the swinging fowl, catching its soapy
neck with one hand and holding on with all their
might to pull the head oif : that was the victory.
There is no record or recollection of the frequency of
this elegant sport or of the persons that took part
in it.
It may savor a little of the extravagance of a joke
to suggest that one of the primitive entertainments
of the settlement was fighting, and yet the frequency
and ready reconciliation of that sort of enlivenmant
certainly looked that way. Fighting at elections is
common now, but it was inevitable then ; and it was
a rare Saturday that didn't see a " passage at arms"
of the backwoods kind, " a rough and tumble" fight,
at some of the " groceries." Occasionally the diversion
was diversified by fisticufi' duels of a more sedate if
not satisfactory character than the whiskey-nurtured
rows of street corners and handy open lots. Pretty
early in the annals of the village one of these affairs
occurred between Andrew Wilson, one of the owners
of one of the early mills, and a neighbor by the name
of Zadoc (universally called " Zedick") Smith. The
pair went off alone into the thick woods about the
mill situated on the " old bayou," near the crossing
of the Belt Railroad and Morris Street, and fought
out their quarrel, came back roughly handled, and
never to their dying day told anybody which was the
victor. Not improbably the result was a good deal like
that of the fight celebrated in a " nigger" ballad of this
period between " Bill Crowder" and " Davy Crockett" :
" We fought half a day, and then agreed to stop it,
for I was badly licked, and so was Davy Crockett."
Another fight of the same secret and undetermined
kind took place later between Captain Wiley and Jim
Smith, both tailors and " sports," and both unusually
stalwart and fine-looking men. They went off to the
State House Square, a remote and rural spot then,
and settled the matter, but how they never told.
So infectious was this fighting humor that Calvin
Fletcher when prosecutor took offense at some action of
Squire Obed Foote, and undertook to thrash him in
his own oflace, with poor success, however, which he
signalized by informing on himself and having himself
indicted and fined. Eye-gouging and biting were
practiced in these affairs in the Southern fashion, but
never or rarely to the maiming or serious injury of
Of this period militia musters and militia ofiBcers
form too important an element to be overlooked.
When the county was organized the battle of New
Orleans was but .seven years old, and that was a militia
battle on our side. There was enough military spirit
in the people to demand a military system of some
kind, and to sustain it till it got to be an old song and
the events of the last war with England had faded
into legend, and a militia force was organized of all
the adult male population with some exceptions,
divided into regiments by counties and brigades by
Congressional districts. Judge William W. Wick was
the first brigadier of this district ; James Paxton was
elected the first colonel, Samuel Morrow the first lieu-
tenant-colonel, and Alexander W. Russell the first
major, as before stated. Musters were held annually^
possibly oftener, and the turn-out was expected to
embrace about all the able-bodied voting population
who were not specially exempted. But it did not, as
there were always plenty to look on besides the troops
that followed the march. The parade was formed at
the court-house usually, with no uniforms except
what the ofiicers wore, and no guns but " squirrel
rifles," and many without them taking canes, papaw
78
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
sticks, broken hoe handles, or pieces of split plank.
The march was sometimes out east to a grove, but
oftener west down Washington Street and Maryland
to the open ground between Georgia and Louisiana
Streets west of Tennessee, where the force was put
through an hour of drilling and marching, and another
hour of idling about and talking and eating apples,
and then the parade was dismissed, with about as much
improvement of military knowledge and spirit as if
all hands had stayed at home. But the parade was a
great event. The regimental officers made a most
inspiriting show. They were in their glory, as a
" militia officer on the peace establishment" — as Cor-
win said of Crary — ought to be at a militia annual
parade. It was the day for which the other three hun-
dred and sixty-four were made. They galloped back
and forth, their red and white plumes swaying and
bobbing, their sword-sheaths rattling, their blades
flashing, when they were not rusty, their voices duly
husky with dust and duty, while old Peter Winchell
and Nat Cox kept the drums rattling till no one could
hear more than an infrequent squeal of Glidden True's
fife. Little boys ran along and screamed, dogs barked,
sedate old hogs in fence corners got up and ran off
grunting, women stood in their doors holding up their
babies to see the gorgeous spectacle, and for one hour
of glorious life the militia officer had a right to feel
that he was a bigger man than any man without a
commission.
Although the militia sy.stem was intended, as Burke
said of the feudal system, to be " the cheap defense
of the nation," and the military tastes of the people
were as strong as those of any people, yet so incessant
were the demands of urgent duties and labors that
little time was left for such as availed only in remote
and improbable emergencies. Thus it came that after
the settlement of the New Purchase there was never
anything more made of the militia system than an
annual show and a little personal distinction fre-
quently used for political effect by the officers. This
will explain the reference to it here instead of in the
general course of the history, where its infrequency
would make it more irrelevant.
Ex-United States Senator Smith gives an account
of the " end of the militia system" on the White
Water, which is at once so amusing and so fully illus-
trative of the condition of the system all over the
State that it is reproduced here. Premising that an
ambitious young fellow named Lewis had been elected
major of the regiment, and that he was possessed by
a large idea of the importance of his position, Mr.
Smith goes on thus: " The great and memorable day
at last arrived. The aide-de-camp of the major came
galloping into the field in full uniform directly from
headquarters, and halted at the marquee of the adju-
tant. In a few minutes the order from the major was
given in a loud military voice by the adjutant, mounted
on a splendid gray charger, ' Officers to your places,
marshal your men into companies, separating the bare-
footed from those who have shoes or moccasins, plac-
ing the guns, sticks, and cornstalks in separate pla-
toons, and then form the line ready to receive the
major !' The order was promptly obeyed, when at a
distance Maj. Lewis was seen coming into the field
with his aids by his side, his horse rearing and plung-
ing very unlike ' Old Whitey' at the battle of Buena
Vista. The line was formed, the major took position
on a rising ground about a hundred yards in front of
the battalion ; rising in his stirrups, and turning his
full face upon the line, he shouted, ' Attention, the
whole ' Unfortunately the major had not tried
his voice before in the open air, and with the word
' attention' it broke, and ' the whole' sounded like the
whistle of a fife. The moment the sound reached the
line some one at the lower end, with a voice as shrill
as the major's, cried out, ' Children come out of the
swamp, you'll get snake bit !' The major pushed
down the line at full speed. 'Who dares insult me?'
No answer. The cry then commenced all along the
line, ' You'll get snake-bit 1' The major turned and
dashed up the line, but soon had sense enough to see
that it was the militia that was at an end, and not
himself that was the object of ridicule. He dashed
his chapeau from his head, drew his sword and threw
it upon the ground, tore his commission to pieces, and
resigned on the spot. The battalion dispersed, and
militia musters were at end from that time forward
in the White Water country." The system made a
less comical exit in the White River country, but it
went out about the same time and as completely. Its
AMUSEMENTS.
79
offices ceased to be of any value even as means of
electioneering for political positions. When it began
to be replaced, as it was in ten or a dozen years after
the removal of the capital to the White lliver region,
the substitute took the form of voluntary associations,
always sure to be more efficient than any statutory
system in a country that couldn't enforce, and wouldn't
trj', a conscription in time of peace.
In the way of ordinary amusements, such as usu-
ally divert the inhabitants of towns, there was nothing.
A theatrical performance had come and gone, and that
was all till 1830, when the first circus, McComber &
Co.'s, exhibited in the rear of Henderson's tavern.
Such diversions, besides those referred to, as the
young capital had to regale itself with it contrived
for itself, owing nothing and paying nothing to any-
body else.
Thus it came that for the first decade or two the
town and country were as closely assimilated in their
amusements and general social condition as if the
town had never been platted or its streets cleared, and
in business and in ordinary duties the separation was
little more distinct. The town was merely a little
thickening of the country settlement.
Mr. Mason speaks of the scarcity of money in In-
diana in the first few years after the State's admis-
sion into the Union, and all the survivors of the first
dozen years of the settlement of the New Purchase say
that most of their trading was barter. Money was hard
to come by, and what little was encountered in this
region was Spanish almost altogether or Mexican.
The old copper cent, as big as a half dollar, was the
only home coin that circulated in any considerable
force; the next smallest was the " fip," or " fipenny
bit," a little Spanish coin rated at six and a fourth
cents, the sixteenth of a dollar. In later years, after
flat-boats began running to New Orleans with our
corn and pork and whiskey and hay, we imported
the Southern designation and called it a " picayune."
The next coin was Spanish too, worth two of the
first, and called a " levy," sometimes a " 'leven-
pence," changed by Southern influence into "bit."
Another Spanish coin worth eighteen to twenty
cents was called a pistareen. It was so nearly the
same size, as the Spanish quarter that it was easily
passed for that if worn so much as to make the
stamp undiscernible. The quarter had the Pillars of
Hercules on the reverse, and the pistareen had not.
These coins were the common medium of business
when money was used at all, except that the dollar
coin was frequently Mexican, sometimes a French
five-franc piece helped out by a fip, but never an
American dollar. If the " daddies" had it, they
kept it. Paper money began to show itself with the
organization and operation of the old State Bank in
1834. The first American coins, except an occa-
sional ten-cent piece of the old pattern (the first
with the seated figure of Liberty) ever brought to
Indianapolis, so far as can be now ascertained, were
brought in the summer of 1838 by a jeweler named
Foster on his return from the East, and by him
placed in the corner-stone of the first Christ Church,
which was the first corner-stone laid in the place.
The primitive condition of the country and the un-
sophisticated character of the people can be better
judged by a few incidents related by eye-witnesses than
by chapters of elaborate description, wherefore it is
deemed best to add here some of the anecdotes of the
early settlement of the White lliver Valley, preserved
in O. H. Smith's and Mr. Nowland's reminiscences.
The latter, in his sketch of a noted character of the
early days of Indianapolis, " Old Helvey," tells an
amusingly illustrative story of a wedding there.
" After the bride and groom had retired the whiskey
gave out. There was no way of getting more except
at Mr. Landis grocery. He was present, but there
was no pen, pencil, or paper with which an order
could be sent to the clerk. Old Helvey suggested
that Mr. Landis should send his knife, which would
be recognized by the young man, and would certainly
bring the whiskey. This was done, and the whiskey
came, to the great joy of all present. Mr. Helvey
thought the bride and groom must be dry by this
time, so he took the jug to them and made them
drink the health of the guests."
Another incident related by Mr. Nowland indicates
a stronger matrimonial exclusiveness in a portion of
the early settlers than prevails now, or ever prevailed
in most of the country. This was the first dance
given in the settlement, by Mr. John Wyant, at his
80
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
cabin on the river bank, near where Kingan's pork-
house is, in December, 1821. Mr. John Wyant was
the first man prosecuted criminally in Marion County.
His oflFense was selling liquor without a license.
There was a charge of twenty-five cents admittance
for each adult male, to furnish the fluids, which were
the only costly articles used on these occasions. The
guests had begun to arrive, and while the landlord
was in " t'other house," as the second cabin was called,
Mr. Nowland (father), "having been educated in a
different school of etiquette from that of Mr. Wyant,
thought it but simple politeness to invite Mrs. Wyant
to open the ball with him. She gracefully accepted,
and they with others were going in fine style when
the landlord returned. He at once commanded the
music, which was being drawn from the bowels of a
dilapidated-looking fiddle by Col. Russell, to stop.
He said, ' As far as himself and wife were concerned
they were able to do their own dancing, and he
thought it would look better for every man to dance
with his own wife ; those who had none could dance
with the gals.' This order, as far as Mr. and Mrs.
Wyant were concerned, was strictly adhered to the
remainder of the night. When the guests were
ready to leave at the dawn of day they were still
' bobbing around' together." Not a bad example of
matrimonial fidelity, which it can do no harm to
recall at a time when a divorce is granted about
every day in the year in their own county.
Of one of the earliest marriages — the second prob-
ably — Mr. Nowland says, " As the two rooms were
already full the bride had to make her toilet in the
smoke-house, where she received the bridegroom and
his retinue." The wedding dinner is thus described :
" On either end of the table was a large, fat, wild
turkey, still hot and smoking from the clay oven in
which they were roasted. In the middle of the table
and midway between the turkeys was a fine saddle
of venison, part of a buck killed the day before by
Mr. Chinn (the bride's father ; the bridegroom was
Uriah Gates, a well-known citizen) expressly for the
occasion. The spaces between the turkeys and veni-
son were filled with pumpkin, chicken, and various
other pies. From the side-table or puncheon Mrs.
Chinn, assisted by the old ladies, was issuing cofi"ee.
which was taken from a large sugar -kettle that was
hanging over the fire. By the side of the coffee-potr
on this side-table was a large tin pan filled with maple
sugar, and a gallon pitcher of cream." Delmonico
could not have got up a better dinner at twenty dol-
lars a head. Mr. Nowland adds that " the dancing
was continued for two days. I remember that father
and mother came home after daylight the second day,
slept until the afternoon, and then went back and put
in another night."
An incident of the first Fourth of July celebration
is related in the same interesting collection of remi-
niscences : '■ On the morning of the Fourth of July,
1822, my father's family was aroused before daylight
by persons hallooing in front of the door. It proved
to be Capt. James Richey, who lived at the Blufis,
and a young man and lady who had placed themselves
under his charge and run away from obdurate parents
to get married. Mr. Richey and father soon found
the county clerk, the late James M. Ray, at Carter's
'Rosebush' tavern, procured the necessary legal docu-
ment, and Judge Wick married them before breakfast.
They had scarcely arisen from the breakfast table
when the young lady was confronted by her angry
father. Capt. Richey informed him that he was just
a few minutes too late, and instead of losing a daugh-
ter had gained a son. The parties were soon recon-
ciled and invited to attend the barbecue and ball given
in honor of the day, which they did."
Mr. Smith tells the following in the same humorous
vein :
James Whitcomb, Governor of the State in 1843,
and United States senator in 1848, dying 1852,
was one of the foremost lawyers in the State, and
practiced pretty much all over it, as did his lead-
ing cotemporaries. In the New Purchase he and
all the bar were in the habit of stopping at Capt.
John Berry's tavern in Andersontown (he was the
man who blazed out " Berry's trace," one of the
first from the South into the White River region)
and, as his custom was, the eminent lawyer, who
greatly resembled the English premier Disraeli in
face and complexion and fastidious taste, changed
his shirt at night. Capt. Berry was exceedingly
sensitive to any disparagement of his hotel, and
FASHIONS OP THE TIMES.
81
this, says Mr. Smith, "was well known to Calvin
Fletcher," who appears to have been the wag of the
bar as well as one of the most enterprising and benefi-
cent of the founders of the prosperity of Indianapo-
lis. " Taking the captain to one side, he said, ' Do
you know, Capt. Berry, what Mr. Whitcomb is
saying about your beds ?' ' I do not ; what does he
say ?' ' If you will not mention my name, as you
are one of my particular friends, I will tell you.'
' Upon honor, I'll never mention your name ; what
did he saj ?' ' He said your sheets were so dirty
that he had to pull ofi' his shirt every night and put
on a dirty shirt to sleep in.' ' I'll watch him to-
night.' Bed-time came, and Capt. Berry was
looking through an opening in the door when Mr.
Whitcomb took his night-shirt out of his portman-
teau and began to take oflF his day-shirt. He pushed
open the door, sprang upon Whitcomb, and threw
him upon the bed. The noise brought in Mr.
Fletcher and the other lawyers, and after explana-
tions and apologies on all sides the matter was set-
tled. Tears afterwards Mr. Whitcomb found out, as
he said, what he suspected at the time, that Mr.
Fletcher was at the bottom of the whole matter."
Among the fashions of the times was the disfavor
of beards. Side-whiskers of the " mutton-chop"
style were not uncommon, and occasionally they were
allowed to grow around the face, except a couple of
inches or so on the throat and chin, but this was the
limit. A " goatee," or " imperial," or " moustache"
would have been as strange a sight as a painted
Indian as late as 1840. A full beard would have
been very generally considered a freak of insanity.
Even whiskers were held " dandyish," and the wearer
of low esteem. Though Judge William W. Wick
cherished them when in Congress, he could not make
them fashionable. Forty years or more ago Joseph
M. Moore laughed at them in some satirical verses in
the Journal, and accused him of
"Using 'Columbia's Balm' to make iiis whiskers grow,
As forked as three WWW's all standing in a row."
The first moustache that appears of record was worn
by the then young 'Than West forty years ago or
thereabouts, as perpetuated in a young lady's poetical
6
address to some of the young bloods of the town.
She refers to the ornament in speaking of Mr. West's
avoidance of young ladies, —
"For fear that they should kiss him,
Has raised a thorn-hedge on his lip."
The best-known wearer of the moustache, how-
ever, and the most effective agent of its diffusion in
respectable society was Mr. Charles W. Cady, one
of the first insurance men of early times. Beards
began to " increase and multiply" in area and num-
ber before the civil war. That momentous experi-
ence was the end alike of slavery and universal
shaving.
A case related by Mr. Smith illustrates the slender
respect with which the early settlers sometimes re-
garded the law and its ministers. A grand jury,
while Mr. Fletcher was prosecutor, had found an
indictment against a man for selling liquor without
a license, much the most frequent offense of that
time. The foreman of the grand jury refused to
sign it ; the prosecutor urged it. " I shall do no
such thing, Mr. Fletcher ; I sell whiskey without a
license myself, and I shall not indict others for what
I do." " If you don't sign it I will take you before
Judge Wick." " What do I care for Judge Wick?
he knows nothing about such matters." " The grand
jury will follow me into court." In the court-room,
" This foreman of the grand jury refuses to sign his
name to a bill of indictment against a man for selling
whiskey without a license." Judge Wick : " Have
twelve of the jury agreed to find the bill ?" " Yes,
eighteen of them." " Foreman, do you refuse to
sign the bill ?" " I do." " Well, Mr. Prosecutor, I
see no other way than to leave him to his conscience
and his God ; the grand jury will return to their
room." In the jury-room the foreman said, "I told
you Judge Wick knew nothing about such cases."
Mr. Fletcher : " I am only taking legal steps to have
the bill signed." " What are you going to do now?
what are you stripping off your coat for?" "The
law requires the last step to be taken." " What is
that ?" " To thrash you till you sign the bill."
" Don't strike, Mr. Fletcher, and I'll sign." He did,
and the jury returned to the court-room. " Has the
82
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
foreman signed the bill ?" " He has.' " I thought
his conscience would not let him rest till he had
signed it."
Pertinent to this connection is Mr. Smith's account
of the hardships of a political campaign. A year or
so after the removal of the capital to Indianapolis he
was a candidate for Congress in the eastern district
of the State, then extending the whole length of the
State pretty nearly. In a portion wholly unsettled
he hired an Indian guide. They swam some of the
streams on their ponies, but at last found one they
could not cross in that way.
" The moment we reached the river the Indian
jumped down, peeled some bark from a hickory sap-
ling, and spanceled the fore legs of the ponies ; I
sat down on the bank. The Indian was out of sight
in a moment in the woods, and I saw nothing of him
for an hour, when he returned with the bark of a
hickory-tree about twelve feet long and three feet in
diameter. The bark was metamorphosed into a round-
bottomed Indian canoe when the sun was about an
hour high. The canoe was launched, my saddle,
saddle-bags, and blanket placed in one end, and I got
in the other. With my weight the edges were about
an inch above the water. I took the paddle, and by
the use of the current landed safely on the other
side," paying the Indian two dollars for his services.
During the rather indefinite period covered by this
attempt to present an idea of the condition of the
settlement aside from its material changes (loosely
put at twenty years), there had been organized some
ten churches, — one Baptist, two Presbyterian, two
Methodist, two Lutheran, one Christian, one Catholic,
one Episcopal, and all had places of worship of their
own. The intention here is not to present a summary
of the condition of the religious element of the settle-
ment at this time, but merely to notice some of the
early fashions and forms of public religious conduct.
Until near the close of this first twenty years of the set-
tlement the forms of worship, except in the Episcopal
and Catholic Churches, were not so fixed as they are
now. They were controlled more by the wish of the
preacher or the impulse of the occasion. A written
sermon was an unknown performance to many of the
pioneers, and to some of them would have looked like
a profanation. Choirs were unknown until introduced
by Henry Ward Beecher, except in churches with
established rituals. Mr. Beecher's brother, Rev.
Charles, an accomplished musician, was the first
choir- leader of a non-ritualistic service. Among the
first choristers were Mrs. Dr. Ackley, Mr. John L.
Ketcham, Lawrence M. Vance, A. G. Willard,
Augustus Smith. The churches generally held to
congregational singing, which was led by some man
with an approved voice and taste, who could be
trusted to select a good air of the right metre, and
start it with a pitch that all could readily follow.
Not unfrequently the starting was a volunteer effort,
coming from some one in the body of the congrega-
tion with a pet tune for the special metre of the oc-
casion. Familiar hymns were sung right along, with
or without books ; but when there were no books or
but few, and for a good while after they became com-
mon, the preacher would " line out" the hymn, or
" deacon" it, as the Yankees called it, by reading two
lines and waiting for the congregation to sing them
before reading another couplet. This would produce
an odd effect now to most hearers, even to those who
were familiar with it in childhood and youth, but it
certainly in no measure or way affected the solemnity
or sincerity of the worship. Sermons, as before re-
marked, were unwritten, and not unfrequently unpre-
pared,- — by no means identical conditions necessarily,
but often made so. They were uniformly longer than
now, an hour being neither an unusual nor unreason-
able duration. Probably they exercised a stronger im-
mediate influence on the feelings of the audience than
their shorter, pithier, more methodical and logical
successors from the writing-desk do now. There was
room for dramatic action and effect, for variety of
tone and feeling, for a vigor that comes involuntarily
with a fresh thought, and there is not much chance
for these agencies of oratory to get at an audience
through a carefully thought out and written out
sermon of the year of grace 1883.
There were a few hymns so popular from their
spirit or the air usually associated with them that
everybody knew them. One of the finest of these is
still unmatched in sacred hymnology for the pious
pertinence of the poetry or the spirited but stately
MUSIC.
83
movement of the music, — •' Am I a soldier of the j
cross?" Another was "Come, thou fount of every
blessing," frequently sung to the air that Rousseau
dreamed ; a third was " Come, humble sinner," the
air of which was a " minor" evidently adapted from an
old Irish air called the " Peeler and the Goat" ; an-
other, sung by John Brown on the scaffold, " Blow ye
the trumpet, blow" ; another, " Oh, love divine," to a
most spirited and pleasing air that is never heard
now. Besides these there were camp-meeting tunes
not greatly different from some that prevail among
the Southern colored churches now. " Old Rosin the
Bow" was one of these, adapted, and thus first named,
to a secular and satirical song, " Old Rossum the
Beau," wholly Southern however; "John Brown's
Body" was another ; and one of them was profanely
applied by some " unrespecting boys," about the end
of the period in question, to a comic song about
" The Great Sea-Snake." Music was not much cul-
tivated in a scientific or systematic way then, though
occasional teachers formed classes and gave lessons
from the " Missouri Harmony" in the " square note"
system. The " round note," or " do, re" system came
along about the time that church choirs did, and the
diffusion of a taste for the higher kinds of music
than ballad airs and dancing jigs came with the in-
flux of German immigration. The adoption of the
piano as a piece of fashionable furniture was a coeval
movement. Musical improvement made it fashion-
able, and it made music fashionable.
There has been an almost complete reversal of con-
ditions since the beginning of the period of musical
culture. Then the young lady who could play the
piano or " sing by note" was the exception ; now the
young lady who cannot is the exception. Of classic
music very little was known, so little that when
Madame Bishop first sang here in Masonic Hall in
November, 1851, the first time that a celebrated vo-
calist had ever appeared here, her performance of
" Casta Diva'' provoked a general smile, and not a
few called it " squalling." Now there are i&yf edu-
cated ladies in this city who are not familiar with
most of the best-known efforts of the great composers.
It may amuse them to learn the kind of songs that
were usually sung for social entertainment by the
young people who are now their parents or grand-
parents. Along in 1837 or 1838, when work on the
canal was going on, a song much liked by the country
boys and girls related to that sort of occupation. It
began in this way : '• I landed in sweet Philadelphia,
but being quite late in the fall, I didn't stay long in
that city, but anchored out on the canawl." Another,
with a touch of broad humor, sang the horrors of a
wreck on the " raging canawl" : " We had a load of
Dutch, and we stowed 'em in the hold ; they were not
the least concerned about the welfare of their souls.
The captain went below, and implored them for to
pray, but all the answer he could get was ' Ich kan
se nich versteh'." Of the amatory kind there was
the " Gallant Hussar," the " Minstrel returned from
the Wars," " Gaily the Troubadour," " Barbara
Allen," some of Burns' songs, popular everywhere,
" William Riley," with, a few years later, a profusion
of the earlier efforts of the colored muse, and a few
as early as 1839 or thereabouts, such as " Jenny, git
your hoe-cake done," " Jim Brown," " Clar de
Kitchen," and the like. Patriotic songs were popu-
lar and far more frequent than patriotic songs now,
though far inferior in style and literary qualities, but
by no means deficient in the spirit of the airs. One
of these was known all over the West as the " Hunters
of Kentucky," and celebrated the battle of New Or-
leans. Another little less popular paid tribute to
Perry and his heroes, beginning, " The tenth of Sep-
tember let us all remember as long as the world on
its axis rolls round." Another lamented St. Clair's
defeat. Another crowed lustily over the victory on
Lake Champlain, under the title, " The Noble Lads
of Canada." The chorus of the first verses ran thus :
" We're the noble lads of Canada, come to arms, boys,
come !" that of the last verse, owning defeat, changed
tone, " We've got too far from Canada, run for life,
boys, run !" Among the settlers from Guilford
County, N. C, there was the fag end of a queer old
patriotic song touching the French and English wars
of the time of Wolfe and the conquest of Canada:
" We'll send the news to France, how we made those
Frenchmen dance when we conquered the place
called Belle Isle," followed by a chorus that appeared
to be a jumble of unmeaning French words, or, if
84
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ever intelligible, so spoiled in pronunciation as to be
mere gibberish. There were a number of comic
songs that were frequently sung, of which four or
five will serve for samples : " Poor Old Maids,"
"Near Fly-Market lived a dame," " Sukey Suds, she
stood at her washing-tub" (a parody on " Lord
Lovel"), " The Cork Leg," " Billy Barlow," " Three
Jolly Welshmen," " I fell in love with a cook."
Most of these, sentimental, patriotic, and comic, were
contained in some of the collections called " Western
Songster" or " Columbian Minstrel," or something
of that kind. They are pretty much all forgotten
now, except by an occasional relic of old times who
retains them as indications of what old times were.
People of education and cultivated tastes sang better
songs, of course, but those cited were the favorites,
or of the class of favorites of the great mass of town
and country people.
During this period of comparatively primitive con-
ditions of life there was a steady increase of both edu-
cational facilities and of the disposition to use them.
The schools were all private, however, taught for two
to four dollars a quarter per pupil, sometimes in pri-
vate houses, sometimes in churches, and sometimes
in buildings erected or altered purposely for them.
The elementary course of instruction was much the
same as in all schools of that time, and not greatly
different from what it is now, — " Kirkham's Gram-
mar," " Olney's Geography," " Pike's Arithmetic,"
" English Reader" or " School Companion," " Day's
Algebra." The " Anthon Classics" and " Davies'
Mathematics" came later. " Webster's Spelling-
Book" was first seen here about 1833, shortly pre-
ceding the other illumination from the great star
shower in November. It was blue bound, and
actually " in boards." The sides were made of thin
veneers of sugar or beech apparently, pasted over
with blue paper, and the usual calamity of the text-
book was a back split and more or less of it torn off.
The blackboard was not generally used, except in the
town. Classic studies were rather unusual till the
second decade of the settlement was well advanced.
Music was taught to the boys in the " Old Seminary"
by Rev. James S. Kemper and his brother, and in
the female seminaries of course. With the County
Seminary and the rival schools that followed it, and
the female schools of higher pretensions than the
mixed schools that had preceded them, which also
came in the track of the Old Seminary, came a more
extended course of study. In not a few cases it cov-
ered as thorough a reading of the usual classic authors
as any Western college, and the mathematical course
ran the whole length of the science, from algebra and
Euclid to the " Differential Calculus" and " McLau-
rin's Theorem." So far in advance of the general
mathematical instruction of the period was the course
pursued in the " Old Seminary" that Mr. Kemper's
class in "analytical geometry" had to copy his manu-
script treatise on " Conic Sections," prepared by the
late celebrated astronomer. Professor Mitchell, but
never published, and study that. A fanciful but by
no means idle variation of the usual school course
was introduced here about 1843 or 1844 by an itin-
erant teacher, who made a specialty of geography,
and taught it by the " singing" method. A large
map of one of the continents was set where all could
see it, and the teacher with a long stick would point
to one object and another, and call its name in a sort
of sing-song or " intoning" fashion, and the pupils
would repeat it after him. He would take the bays
along the ocean coast, for instance, beginning with
the most northerly, and call them over in this sing-
ing way in exact succession, going back to the first
after each addition, thus keeping the whole series
constantly in mind, and repeating it till it became
fixed and indelible. Location was, in a general way,
conveyed in the order of names, and the teacher's
stick helped its deflniteness by indicating it on the
map as the name was sung. In the same way the
capes, lakes, rivers, capitals, principal cities, and
other important geographical features were taught
more rapidly and effectively than by the humdrum
method of ordinary schools. The lessons drew large
audiences to the Methodist Church, where they were
given. Lessons in penmanship were given by the
usual infallible methods in from six to a dozen lessons
by wandering teachers ; so was music, and occasion-
ally modern languages. French was always taught in
the female seminaries, and was also taught in the
" Old Seminary" by Mr. Kemper, and in " Franklin
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF PIONEER LIFE.
85
Institute" by Mr. Marston, but German was never
taught at all, or only in a very few unsuspected cases,
till about 1848, when Professor Samuel K. Hoshour,
afterwards president of Butler University, and one
of the most noted teachers of Eastern Indiana, formed
a German class here, and Mr. Paul Geiser, a young
German of good abilities and attainments, then editing
the Volksblatt, the first German paper here, taught a
private class for a short time.
The games of the pupils were much the same as
now, — tops, marbles, hop-scotch, ball, prisoner's base,
shinny. The games requiring room were more com-
mon then, because adequate room cannot be had
now, and it was all around most school-houses forty
or more years ago. Several forms of ball games were
practiced, — " cat," with one or two bases, " town ball,"
very similar to base ball, ''bull-pen," "ante and over,"
" hand up," the last three rarely seen or heard of
since the town began filling up. In "bull-pen" four
corners were occupied by four players, who threw
the ball from one to the other till one saw a chance
to hit one of the players in the square, called the
" pen," who ran constantly from one part to another,
to keep at the greatest distance from the ball. If
he missed he was out. If he hit, the boy who was
hit or any one in the "pen" who got the ball
first threw it at any one of the corner players who
was handiest, and if he was hit he was out ; if he
was not, the other was out. In " hand up" the ball
was knocked against a wall with the bare hand, usually
at the "bounce." In "ante and over," or " antuy
over," the players stood in two groups, one on each
side of the school-house. The one with the ball
threw it over the house, calling out " ante and over."
If the other side caught it they ran round the house
to hit some of the players of the throwing side.
Shinny, though, was the king game of the school-boy
of the latter part of this period. It was played with
a stout club curved at the bottom. — young sugars
were usually taken, as their roots ran close along
the surface of the ground, — and frequently charred
to make them hard and prevent them from splinter-
ing in their violent collisions with stones and gravelly
surfaces. A ball, usually of wood, a couple of inches
in diameter, was the other implement of the game.
The players were arrayed in lines facing each other,
their respective goals or " homes" being the limits of
the play-ground. The game was for one side or the
other to carry the ball " home" against the resistance
of the other side trying to carry it to their " home."
Two players in the middle began the game by one
taking the ball and calling to the other, " high buck
or low doe," and throwing the ball in the air or on
the ground according to the answer. The struggles
were violent always, and the misdirected blows some-
times serious ; scalps were laid open, legs lamed, eyes
blacked, fingers and noses broken, shins skinned or
bruised. A hard shinny player was rarely without a
sore or limp or sprain somewhere. Though abandoned
long ago by the school-boys of the later generation,
partly from its violence and partly from the lack of
convenient room, shinny is still revived at the annual
reunions of the " Old Seminary Boys," who, if they
did not intend it, made it the ruling game of the
time forty odd years ago. And the bald-headed
grandfathers who play it now — the judges, gen-
erals, preachers, editors, doctors, legislators — some-
times exhibit a good deal of the skill they learned
before the " hard cider" campaign of 1840. The
history and condition of the schools will be treated
in a special division of the work. The purpose here
is merely to notice such incidental subjects connected
with the schools and pupils of early times as will
give the reader some idea of them beyond their
studies, and that could not be so readily introduced
into the body of a work dealing with public afiairs.
The reference to the occupations and diversions of
the school-boy of the first generation would be incom-
plete if it omitted an account of one almost universal
duty and one entirely universal diversion. Driving
cows to pasture and home was the duty, and swimming
was the amusement. A large portion of the donation
outside the old plat of the town was used as farm-
land and pastures, with no small share of the vacant
squares inside the town limits. For a trifle a cow-
owner, and that was pretty much everybody that had
a house and family, could rent one of these pastures,
keep a cow from straying, keep her well fed, and have
her handy whenever she was wanted. A boy any-
where from six to sixteen could drive her out in the
86
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
moroing after milking and back in the evening after
school. It was something for idle hands to do. Cow-
driving was a part of every Indianapolis boy's disci-
pline in early times. Of course he got fun out of it
as well in gathering nuts, chasing ground-squirrels,
or taking surreptitious swims. The chief " swimming-
holes" in the creek were Noble's and Morris', the
former on the property of Governor Noble, near Market
Street and the creek, the latter just south of the house
of Morris Morris on South Meridian Street. The spot
is now covered by the south side of the Union Depot.
In the river the larger boys made their favorite resort
at the "snag," near the site of Kingan's upper pork-
house. The " tumbles" of the canal, or rather of the
"race" from it into the river, one in the Military
Ground at the north end of the basin, the other at the
river, where it still remains close to the water-works,
were also favorite bathing-places. It is among the
amusing traditions of the adventures of the boys in
their indulgence of this diversion that one Sunday,
instead of decorously betaking themselves to Sunday-
school, a dozen or so slipped off to Morris' hole. James
Blake found it out, and mounted his horse, called his
colored man to follow him, and went down to the
" old swimming-hole." The darkey captured the
clothes unperceived, and gave them up suit at a time
as his master directed till all were dressed. Then the
old superintendent started the darkey ahead, kept the
frightened boys close together following, and brought
up the rear himself to prevent escapes. Thus the
delinquent procession marched up to the old Presby-
terian Church, on North Pennsylvania Street, and
the " hookey players" were forced to do proper Sun-
day duty. It was said that the stern old Puritan
even ventured to give some of them an occasional
clip with his whip as a reminder of their double sin
of running away from school and enjoying themselves
on Sunday.
James Blake was the son of James Blake who
came from Ireland in 1774, and lived to the age of
ninety-nine years, being among the earliest settlers of
York County, Pa., where his son was born March 3,
1791. He when a youth enlisted in the war of 1812,
and marched to Baltimore when that city was threat-
ened by the British forces, serving in the army until
the declaration of peace in 181.5. He then resumed his
trade of a wagoner, and drove a six-horse team between
Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. In November, 1818, he
started on horseback for the West, going as far as St.
Louis, and returning the following spring to complete
arrangements for a final removal thither. On the
25th of July, 1821, he settled at Indianapolis, where
he resided until his death. His history for fifty years
was the history of Indianapolis, and no citizen has
ever been more closely identified with the rise and
progress of the city and its philanthropic and benevo-
lent institutions than he. He, with Nicholas McCarty
and James M. Ray, nearly fifty years ago built the
first steam-mill in Indianapolis, and thus was the pio-
neer in the manufacturing which is now so vital an
element in the city's prosperity. As a surveyor, he
assisted in laying out and platting the city. He was
selected as commissioner to receive plans and proposals
for the old State-House. He was the first to urge
upon the Legislature the importance of establishing a
hospital for the insane, and opened a correspondence
with the Eastern States on the subject. To him was
intrusted the duty of selecting a location for that in-
stitution. He was an early friend and member of the
first board of directors of the Madison and Indianap-
olis Railroad, and was also director of the Lafayette
and Indianapolis Railroad. He was a trustee of
Hanover College, Indiana, and of the Miami Univer-
sity, of Oxford, Ohio, and at his death the Indiana
commissioner for the erection of the Gettysburg
Monument. For thirty-five years he was president
of the Indianapolis Benevolent Society, and present
at every anniversary with two exceptions. In 1847
he was the most liberal contributor to the relief of
starving Ireland. Mr. Blake was a prime mover in
the organization of the Indiana Branch of the Amer-
ican Colonization Society. He was the founder of
the Indianapolis Rolling-Mill, and embarked a large
part of his fortune in that undertaking, having also
started the first wholesale dry-goods house. On all pub-
lic occasions Mr. Blake was looked to as the leader and
manager of aff'airs. When the people of Indianapolis
assembled to pay a tribute of respect to a deceased
President, Governor, or other great man, Mr. Blake
was selected to conduct and manage the matter.
V/^/^^
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF PIONEER LIFE.
87
When Kossuth, the distinguished HuDgarian, visited
iDdiana, when the soldiers returned from the Mexican
war, when the farmers came in with a procession of
wagons filled with food and supplies for soldiers' fami-
lies, when the Indiana soldiers came home from the
South, Mr. Blake was the marshal of the day, and no
public pageant seemed complete without him. His
whole life was crowned with useful labors. There
was, in fact, no enterprise or movement appealing to
public spirit in which Mr. Blake was not conspicuous,
constant, and efficient. He was among the first to
organize a Sunday-school in the city of Indianapolis,
and was ever foremost in this Christian work. For
thirty years his majestic form headed the long and
beautiful array of Sunday-school children in their
Fourth of July celebration. In the temperance
movement as in other matters he was a leader, and
his adhesion to the Democracy was first broken by
its conflict with his former adhesion to the cause of
temperance. He was the patriarch of his church,
admired and revered by all. In every relation of
life — as head of a family, leader of society, chief of
his church, or manager of business enterprises — he
was always foremost, always honored, equally for his
power and his disinterestedness. If Mr. Blake had
pursued his own advantage with half the zeal he de-
voted to the service of others and the good of the
city, he might easily have counted his wealth by mil-
lions. His ambition to become a useful citizen and a
public benefactor outweighed all other considerations.
He was not politically ambitious, and never held
public office other than that of county commissioner.
His desire for power never seemed to extend beyond
the command of a Sunday-school procession or the
presidency of a charitable meeting. The city of
Indianapolis lost in him a man of intrinsic worth and
a useful citizen, and the community a kind and sym-
pathizing friend. Mr. Blake was married in March,
1831, to Miss Eliza Sproule, of Baltimore, to whom
were born four children, — William McConnell, James
Ray, Walter Alexander (deceased), and John Gurley.
The death of James Blake occurred Nov. 26, 1870.
A prominent figure in the memories of most school-
boys of that day is Henry Hoagland, the idiot son of
a bricklayer of high respectability and good sense.
Henry was a mere animal, with no human sense and
hardly any human expression. He wandered harm-
lessly everywhere, bareheaded and barefooted, because
he preferred to be, carefully avoided by very small
children and carefully followed and incessantly tor-
mented by larger ones, who wanted to hear his queer
muddled oaths and gabble. Sometimes he was dan-
gerous when worried by his nimble persecutors too
far, and he frequently frightened women in his furious
moods and sometimes hurt the boys he caught. He
was kept at the " County Asylum" or " Poor-House"
for many years after it was put in condition for the
care of such inmates, but he frequently got away and
wandered into town. Another of later arrival and
pleasanter character was John D. Hopkins, who ap-
peared here first in the latter part of the second decade
of the settlement, bareheaded and barefooted, with a
Bible or hymn-book in his hand, and walking at a
brisk pace with a peculiar stifi"-kneed step along the
streets talking to himself. At times he would mount
a horse-block or a goods-box, sing a hymn of his own
making, and preach a wild, rambling sermon. Very
early among his visits here he brought with him a
number of sheet-copies of a song he called the " Good
Gathering," sung to an old camp-meeting tune. These
he sold, and he supported himself on such little gratui-
ties as the crowd that stopped to hear him sing or to
joke with him would give him. The song may be
judged by one couplet, —
'*Good gathering is sailing around, round, and rounds
Amidst many waters and hath no bounds;
Come join the good gathering army,"
the last a refrain to every couplet. During the po-
litical campaigns he changed from a preacher to a
stumper, and made speeches at five cents apiece on
any side the purchaser wished. He was said to have
entered the army during the civil war, and died there.
At all events he has not been seen here since, and had
not but rarely for some time before. He was believed
very generally to be careful of his money, and to have
bought a good farm with it. At least he was sober,
healthy, unusually robust, and when he chose to work
few could equal him. His wanderings appear to have
been the efi'ect of a sort of periodic mental disturb-
ance. Another well-known character of this period
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
was " Old Charley," a withered, weak-minded old
colored man, who was the first auction bell-ringer here.
There was nothing about him to make him noted but
the fact that everybody saw him oftener than anybody
else who was not in the family. His bent form, his
old plug hat with an auction-bill tied in front, his
noisy bell, traveling up and down Washington Street,
were as familiar to every man, woman, and child as
the court-house steeple. Dr. Cool, in his later years,
became a sort of public character in consequence of
his constant drunkenness. He came here in 1821,
an experienced and reputable physician, but bad
habits got the mastery of him, and in his last years
he was little better than a vagrant.
Joe Lawson, known to both the early and later
generation for his vagrancy, oddity, " dirt," and oc-
casional gleams of wit and sense, figured contempo-
raneously in part with Hopkins and Old Charley, but
not so conspicuously as later. He was the brother of
the wife of Dr. Soule, one of the earliest resident
dentists, and son of Bishop Soule, of Tennessee.
It was said Joe was always dirty, harmless, and good-
humored, too much crippled to work, and too much
indisposed if he had not been incapacitated. He
usually lived on the " crumbs" of hotel tables, and
wore any clothes that anybody gave him. No human
being in forty years or more has seen him clean and
decently dressed. He used to make great fun for the
boys and for members of the Legislature by singing
sentimental songs and reciting Shakespeare. He
lived at the County Asylum a long time, and was
then brought to the city, given a little shanty in
Blake's woods, and supported by contributions of old
residents. The last of the Indianapolis characters
was the late John Givan. He and his brother James
came here in 1820, in the fall or winter, opened one
of the earliest stores here, and were botli among the
most prominent and active citizens. John was one
of the half-dozen or more candidates for recorder at
the first county election in April, 1822. After the
death of his brother his business declined, and he be-
came a sort of " old junk" dealer near the court-
house. Then he quit all pretence of merchandising
and lived a loose, half-vagrant life, supporting him-
self mainly by little services for men occupying rooms
in connection with their offices, and by serving as
nurse to sick men who had no families or home.
The last four or five years were smoothed for him by
a provision made up by the Board of Trade and
other business men, of which a committee used to
clothe, house, and feed him comfortably. It was a
tribute to the remains of the oldest merchant in the
city and the remains of a once honorable and esti-
mable man. Liquor ruined him, but to the last his
memory was amazingly tenacious of dates and little
events of the early history of Indianapolis, and he
was always more than ready to tell them to anybody.
He died three or four years ago.
Among the early settlers were a good many from
the slave States of the class since widely known as
" poor whites," who brought here all the silly super-
stitions they had learned among the slaves at home.
A belief in witchcraft was the most conspicuous of
these, with a score of omens and portents and pro-
phetic dreams. Some of this class used to talk of a
widow by the name of Myers, whose husband had a
pottery where the Chamber of Commerce is, as a
witch and liaving bewitched the cows of several of
the neighbors whom she had a grudge against. The
persecuted cattle either gave no milk or gave bloody
milk, or the milk would not churn to any purpose, —
" the butter would not come," as they called it, — and
the calves died, or the cows had " hollow horn" or
the " tail-worm," all the efiect of witchcraft. No one
of the set seemed to think it possible the ailments
were the effect of natural causes. Some sort of
remedy was applied, partly of mild incantation and
partly of suitable medicine, but nobody ever learned
the composition of eitheT.
In one case the victim was a boy of a family by
the name of Catlin, or something like it, living on
the southeast corner of Alabama and Washington
Streets. Who tlie victimizing witch was does not
appear to have been known. The boy was ailing and
distressed, and witchcraft was finally decided to be
the source of the trouble, and Dr. John L. Rich-
mond, pastor of the Baptist Church as well as prac-
ticing physician, was applied to for an effective exor-
cism of the evil spirit. The old doctor was a good
deal of a wag as well as a shrewd, hard-headed man.
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF PIONEER LIFE.
89
aud he concluded that a remedy adapted to the faith
and brains of the family would be the best he could
use, so he arranged with one of his students, Mr.
Barrett, a brother of Mrs. Bolton, the Hoosier poet-
ess, to play the defeated and exorcised witch when
the proper ceremonies had been completed. He com-
pounded in the presence of the awe-struck family a
charm of magic power in the shape of a ball of cat's
hair, hog's lard, and a lot of other Macbeth remedies,
and after a proper incantation, with many flourishes
and ceremonies, threw the ball into the fire. The lard
blazed up at once, and as it burned out the lights
were put out, till at last all was dark, and then Bar-
rett, the witch, ran through the house sprinkling
beef blood as he went, to indicate that the witch's
blood had been spilt and her power was at an end.
The victim was cured at once, but was attacked again
in a week or two and another ceremony applied.
What the outcome was the legend does not relate.
The incident is worth preserving to show that the
negroes of the South who believe in voodoo and
fetish are not so much more ignorant than some of
the white ancestors of the city as we should like to
believe.
Among the fancies of this past generation was one
that if a boy killed a toad his father's cow would
give bloody milk ; if a man met a funeral procession,
and did not turn back and accompany it, the next
procession would be his own ; if a knife was dropped
from the table a visitor was coming ; if the nose
itched a visitor was likely to come ; if a dog howled
long at night a death was soon going to occur in the
house ; if a cat rubbed its face frequently the weather
was going to be dry ; if one pared his nails on Sun-
day he'd be made ashamed of something before the
end of the week ; if he killed a snake and left it
lying belly upward there would be rain before night ;
the first note of a dove in the spring would be heard
in the direction in which the hearer would travel
farthest that year ; a new moon lying flat on its
back portends a dry moon, because the water cannot
get out of the hollow of the crescent, but if it is
sloping or vertical the omen is of a wet month, be-
cause the hollow can be emptied, — this is an Indian
fancy ; water in which a gold coin has lain for some
hours is a remedy for scrofula ; abundance of dog-
fennel indicates a sickly season ; dreams were accepted
as •' signs,'' and " dream books" were no unusual
accompaniment of combs and brushes on a woman's
toilet table.
The Hoosier dialect has been frequently attempted
by authors of more or less pretension, but with no
great success. "The Hoosier Schoolmaster," though
written professedly as a picture of Hoosier life and
language, misses the latter sometimes as badly as an
Englishman misses the Yankee dialect. Our young
poet, James W. Riley, strikes it more fairly than
any other delineator, but some of its peculiarities,
or those of the people using it, which gave it a tone
and a turn of humor similar to that noticed in the
Lowland dialect of the Scotch, had measurably dis-
appeared before Mr. Riley was old enough to catch
it in its full-grown raciness and quaintness. If he
were twenty years older, we might expect from him
as perfect a picture of Hoosier backwoods life as we
have of the South in " Georgia Scenes" and " Simon
Suggs," or of Yankee land in the " Bigelow Papers."
The prevailing dialect of Indiana was that of the
South. The bulk of the first settlers were from
Kentucky or Tennessee or the Carolinas through
the older portions of this State, or of Ohio some-
times, sometimes by direct immigration. The East-
ern immigration was mostly modified into a Western
tone by a preceding residence in some part of the
West. Thus little of the Yankee got here in so
decided a form as to stay or afi'ect the conditions
around it. Correct pronunciation was positively
regarded by the Southern immigration as a mark of
aristocracy or, as they called it, " quality," and the
children in some cases discountenanced in acquiring
or using it. The " ing" in " evening" or " morning"
or any other words was softened into " in'," the full
sound being held finical and " stuck up." So it was
no unusual thing to hear such a comical string of
emasculated " nasals" as the question of a promi-
nent Indiana lawyer of the Kentucky " persuasion,"
" Where were you a standin' at the time of your
perceivin' of the hearin' of the firin' of the pistol ?"
Other mispronunciations went to the Hoosier shibbo-
leth, as tenaciously maintained as this. To " set"
90
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MAKION COUNTY.
■was the right way to " sit" ; an Indian did not
" scalp," he " skelped" ; a murderer did not " stab,"
he " stabbed" ; a child did not " long" for a thing, he
" honed" for it, — slang retains this Hoosier archaism ;
a woman was not " dull," she was " daunsy" ; com-
monly a gun was "shot" instead of ''fired" in all moods
and tenses. Indianapolis usually lost the first three
syllables and became " Nopolis." It took the life-
time of a generation to teach the country settler to
twist the " dia" of Indianapolis into the Yankee
" j" and make " Injenapolis" of it. Most of them
do not do it fully yet, and probably never will. One
good feature of the backwoods dialect was that it
had no euphemisms. There were no delicate names
for dirty things. If a woman's virtue was smirched
she was not a " courtesan," or even a " prostitute,"
the name was hard Saxon. A drunken man was not
" intoxicated," or " tight," or " full," or " slewed,"
or " screwed," he was plain drunk. It was an
honest dialect.
The race prejudices of the South were imported
with its dialect into the New Purchase in full vigor.
The colored man counted for little and claimed noth-
ing. The inborn tribal animosity of the time occa-
sionally broke out in riots, the only serious disturb-
ances of the peace ever known here till the outbreak
of the civil war. Probably the first exhibition of it
was the meanest, though the least violent. Cader
Carter, a quadroon, with the unmistakable eyes and
heavy features of his colored ancestors, was an un-
usually active politician of the Gen. Jackson school.
He lived in 1836 or thereabouts with Jesse Wright,
one of the leading Democrats of the county and at
one time one of the County Board. When Mr.
Wright was a candidate he was warmly opposed, and
Carter made himself conspicuously active for his patron.
The opposing party resolved to put Carter out of the
fight and the election by drawing his colored blood,
so to speak, and they proved bis African contamina-
tion beyond the legal limit, and the active and blatant
politician was silenced. The Whigs did that. When,
as heretofore noticed, the public works in this State
were abandoned in 1838-39, a large body of idle and
worthless men were left here to live as they could.
They soon made quarrels with the few colored resi-
dents here, and several times the)' attempted to mob
a family by the name of Overall, living on what was
then open ground a little east of the Military Ground,
between Market and Ohio Streets. The negroes de-
fended themselves with fire-arms, and the mob suc-
ceeded in doing nothing more than making an alarm
a few times. Not long after the completion of the
first Episcopalian Church in 1838, a young lady was
brought here from the East to play the organ. With
her came her sister, who married a colored man within
a few months after her arrival. The aflfair got wind
in some way, and a mob of unruly men and half-
grown boys, led by Josiah Simcox, surrounded the
house containing the bridal party and captured the
groom. The bride was not badly used, but the col-
ored offender was ridden on a rail (it is not believed
that he was tarred and feathered to any distressing
extent) and warned to leave, which he and his wife
did at once. In 18-15, some years beyond the limit
of the period to which this sketch of the social and
moral condition of the city and adjacent country re-
lates, but logically connected with the subject of race
prejudices, a negro by the name of John Tucker was
murdered by a mob, near the corner of Illinois and
Washington Streets, on the Fourth of July. As
usually happens in such cases, the least guilty of the
offenders was caught and punished, the worst escaped
and never returned. It may be noted here that the
leader of the mob in the miscegenation case never
dared to return to the town openly, though he did
secretly at times. The only other disturbance of the
public peace that originated in race prejudice oc-
curred at the election in 1875. One negro was
killed and one or two others hurt. The police were
mixed in it, and it was at least as much a political
as tribal difficulty. The colored citizens of Indianap-
olis have been in the main as orderly, respectable, and
industrious as any class of the population.
If the Southern immigrant brought his dialect and
race prejudices, the Eastern immigrant brought his
bigotry in no less fullness of fragrance, and made the
whole social structure redolent of it. Maj. Carter's
antipathy to the fiddle, as related in Mr. Nowland's
anecdote, was but a slight exaggeration of the feeling
1 of a large element of the community. Social pleas-
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF PIONEER LIFE.
91
ures, pleasant games, dances were discountenanced
as downright immoral or tending in that direction.
It is only within the last two decades that dances at
private houses have been conceded a reputable char-
acter not inconsistent with religious duty. Many a
gay young soul has been '• hauled over the coals" by
elders and pastors for dancing, and it is barely twenty-
five years since the Widows' and Orphans' Society
squarely refused a benefit tendered it by Mr. Sher-
lock, of the old Metropolitan Theatre, soon after its
opening, in the fall of 1858. The society needed
money badly, and had been begging for contributions.
The benefit would have given it full five hundred
dollars. But the Puritanical exacerbations that came
in the early settlement of the place condemned the
theatre as immoral, and would have none of its avails.
The male advisers of the female directors so decided,
and so it was done. It did not occur to them that
Christ never asked the young man to whom he said,
" Go sell that thou hast and give to the poor,"
whether his father had made his money by selling
rotten olives in Tyre or charging Pompey's soldiers
five prices for wheat. As long as he came by it
fairly and could use it for good, it was to be used for
good. Ten years afterwards this same society sup-
ported and conducted an amateur dramatic exhibition
of regular stage comedies to raise money it needed,
showing what a change in public sentiment had been
made in the period including the war and a few years
of peace at either end of it. Now social dances are
as common as social conversations. Clubs for diver-
sion or instruction are to be counted by scores. Dra-
matic societies, operatic associations, masquerades,
fancy dress balls, and all manner of forbidden delights
are held as innocent as the old-time " singing-school"
and " quilting" or " corn-shucking."
Among the notable exhibitions of religious zeal in
the latter part of the period covered by this sketch
were public debates on points of sectarian theology.
Challenges were issued by denominational " sluggers"
in the very spirit of a challenge to Hanlon for a
rowing match or to SchaflFer for a game of billiards,
except that there was no "stake" and no "gate-
money." They were really an opportunity for a little
personal parade, and that was no doubt the frequent
motive of them, though the parties persuaded them-
selves they were doing the Lord's service therein.
Probably nobody was ever converted by such discus-
sions, except from a moderate into a bigoted sectarian.
The old denominations were not forward in these
demonstrations. They took the defensive against the
attacks of recent organizations like the " Disciples,"
as they were then called, now the " Christians," and
by nickname always " Campbellites," and the Univer-
salists. It was as common to see challenges from
noted debaters of those denominations in their de-
nominational papers as it is to see boxing or rowing
challenges now in sporting papers. The first one was
held in the early part of 1830, beginning January
21st, on the subject of " Eternal Punishment," be-
tween Rev. Edwin Ray, a distinguished pioneer Meth-
odist preacher, and Rev. Jonathan Kidwell, a Uni-
versalist. Probably the most noted of these debates
occurred in 1838, between Rev. John O'Kane, a dis-
tinguished evangelist of the " Disciples," and Rev.
Mr. Haines, a Baptist at Belleville, Hendricks Co.
Several have been held in the city the last ten or a
dozen years ago between President Burgess, of But-
ler University, and ReV. W. W. Curry, the one a
" Christian," the other a Universalist. One day in
1840, while the excitement of the " log cabin and
hard cider" campaign was at its height and had filled
" Main Street" — as Washington Street was then
called — with a big Whig procession and the attendant
crowd, Mr. O'Kane and Henry Ward Beecher met
on the corner where the Palmer House (now Occi-
dental) was in course of erection, and good-humoredly
discussed polities during the passing of the procession,
but getting upon more familiar ground when it had
passed, talked of religious matters, and Mr. O'Kane
said, "Suppose we have a debate on it." "No,"
said Mr. Beecher, laughing ; " you'd use me up, and
I can't afford to be demolished so young." It is
worth noting that certain preachers of that early day
were noted revivalists, as Moody and Sankey and Mr.
Harrison are now. Edwin Ray, father of John W.
Ray, of this city, and brother-in-law of Mr. Nowland,
was one of these; John Strange was another, both
Methodists. John L. Jones, a Baptist, and later a
Christian, and James McVey, also a Christian, were
92
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
widely known for their persuasive powers or " exhor-
tations." They were all men of rare native eloquence,
like Wirt's Blind Preacher, and like him almost un-
known outside of the denominations that cherished
and admired them. Lorenzo Dow, who preached here
in 1827, and was once a national notoriety, was merely
an oddity of no great force of any kind except in his
legs, — he traveled well.
It is not improbable that the severity of religious
opinion held by the professedly religious settlers may
have reacted upon the portion less rigidly trained and
made them, externally at least, more indifferent than
they would have been. At all events, among a con-
siderable section of the Southern immigration dis-
paraging or even scandalous jokes on preachers and
prominent church members were no unusual enter-
tainment of social or accidental gatherings. Some
parodies of camp-meeting songs and occasional popu-
lar phrases, now forgotten, also indicated this re-
pellance of overstrained discipline and harsh judg-
ment. The nickname of Rev. James Havens, " Old
Sorrel," came in this way. The " experience" of
" Uncle Jimmy Hittleman," an enthusiastic but illit-
erate Methodist, of genuine piety, was a frequent
theme of joke and coarse parody. A favorite revival
song was made to read, —
" I went behind a stump to pray,
Glory hallelujah !
The devil came and scared me away,
Glory hallelujah !
Oh, Zion hallelujah !"
Popular phrases and proverbial sayings were some-
times framed from this sentiment of antagonism to
ironclad religious feeling. One man was said to
" pray his congregation to hell and back." A
preacher of an orthodox sect once boasted that the
members of his church could be found " all the way
from heaven to hell." " Yes," retorted a heterodox
adherent of another denomination, " and the nearer
hell the thicker you'll find them." " Grace was said
when the hog was shot" was a common announce-
ment at the beginning of a dinner to put aside for-
malities.
Until the Washingtonian temperance movement
reached here, along in 1840 or 1841, under the lead
of a Mr. Matthews, the use of liquor was hardly less
general or habitual than the use of coffee. Nowa-
days the exceptional man of good social position is
the man who drinks publicly. In the early days
under consideration the exceptional man was the
man that would not drink anywhere, publicly or
privately, though excess was rarer then than now.
Liquor at social gatherings of the most respectable
settlers was quite regular and in good taste, if the
liquor was good. It was not esteemed a solecism of
even clerical conduct for a minister to " take some-
thing." Whiskey with tansy was considered a good
general prophylactic, or, as Gen. S. F. Gary used to
say, he was told by his father " it was good for
worms" in children, and for almost anything in
adults. Dogwood bark and prickly ash made a good
medicine for the chills, or the whiskey they were
soaked in. Though excess was not common, it was
not considered so disreputable as now. A strictly
temperance beverage, antedating lemonade and "pop,"
though very like the latter, was " spruce beer." It
was largely consumed with the " gingerbread" of the
period, cut in fipenny-bit squares called " quarter
sections." This luxury was so great a favorite as to
be very generally called " Hoosier bait." Spruce
beer was not unfrequently made in households and
consumed by the family like milk or coffee, youth-
em settlers, accustomed to " persimmon beer," were
the chief or only home manufacturers. " Mead"
and " metheglin" were occasionally made of honey,
but at home usually. Whiskey was different. Among
the very first manufactured products of the settle-
ment, as early probably as the removal of the capital,
was whiskey distilled at the little establishment on
the bayou, near the site of the Nordyke & Marmon
Machine- Works, and called " Bayou Blue." It could
not have been of a very high quality, but it was cheap
and plenty, with occasional reinforcements brought
by keel-boats " cordeled" up the river. Whiskey
and gunpowder were the leading articles of importa-
tion for a good while. In 1828 a temperance society
was formed here, but it does not appear that any
public or concerted effort was made to arrest drink-
ing, though the very existence of such an association
among the best class of citizens would have some
DISEASES ONCE PREVALENT.
93
good eflFect. A change in society sentiment may
have begun with this society, but it grew with the
Washingtonian movement, and has grown steadily
wider and stronger, till to-day the reversal of condi-
tions of the use of liquor is complete. The senti-
ment against it is as general and fixed as it was for it
in early times.
The reports of the Board of Health show that the
death-rate of Indianapolis is smaller than that of
most cities of any considerable size, and lower than
that of Philadelphia, which is the healthiest large
city iu the world. But, as already related, the first
years of the settlement were disastrously unhealthy,
and ill-repute of the place repelled settlement and de-
layed improvement so greatly that it would hardly be
too much to say that the ague had shaken the town
out of five years' growth. The change has come
slowly. The " sickly season" thirty years ago was
as definite a dread as Indian summer is a pleasurable
anticipation. There were plenty of old residents who
expected the chills just as the victim of hay-fever
expects his annual swelled nose and watery eyes.
How this change has come, what influences have
worked towards it, will be best exhibited in a paper
read to the Medical Society of this county by Mr.
George W. Sloan, of Browning & Sloan, late presi-
dent of the National Pharmaceutical Association.
" Those who have been engaged in the practice of
medicine for fifteen or twenty years or longer have
noticed a material change in many of the forms of
disease incident to this locality, and especially a dim-
inution in the amount of those forms commonly
known as bilious fever and fever and ague. In the
first place, it should be remembered that this State
was for the most part den.sely timbered, and this was
supplemented by a thick matting of underbrush.
These combined influences protected the surface from
the direct rays of the sun, hence there was but little
chance for rapid evaporation. The result was a thick
slimy ooze, which was kept renewed by each rain
during the early summer months. This condition ex-
tended over a large portion of this and adjoining
States, especially in the valleys formed by the various
water-courses. We there have with the addition of
heat the proper conditions for decay and the con-
sequent production of noxious gases incident thereto,
which gases during the early summer are absorbed by
the tender succulent leaves of the plants and trees.
But as the summer advances these leaves become
hardened by the heat and continued dryness of the
later summer, and their power of absorption is very
much lessened. Hence the above-mentioned products
of decomposition were given ofi" into the atmosphere
from an extended surface of country, and the conse-
quent result was a poisonous air. In addition, the
people, or at least a large portion of them, lived in
poorly-constructed houses, often built of logs, with
the floor resting upon the ground, and were compelled
to breathe air tainted with decaying woody matter.
Frequently the same apartment was used for the pur-
poses of cooking, eating, and sleeping, while the food
was often the same articles three times a day, — pork in ' i^V^
some form, corn-bread, and coffee. It would be diflS-
cult to name three articles more difficult of digestion.
The water was often of poor quality, owing in many
cases to shallowness of the wells, and no care being
taken to protect them from surface pollution.
" From the foregoing statement of the condition of
things within a few years past, in which we have an
unwholesome atmosphere to breathe, poor and un-
healthy homes to live in, indigestible food to eat, and
polluted water to drink, is it to be wondered at that
sickness was rife ? It is within the memory of many
that the sick were more numerous than the well, when
the fall sickness was as confidently expected (and the
people were rarely disappointed) and prepared for as
was the winter. These were the influences that made
Indiana known as the home of fever and ague, and
the times when one of our drug-houses could spring
the price of quinine by simply telegraphing an order
to the Eastern market for one or two thousand ounces
of that staple. This State was also the paradise of
the patent medicine men who made liver pills and ague
remedies.
" This condition has very materially changed within
a few years, consequent upon a clearing off of the tim-
ber, the ditching and draining of the swamps, and tile
draining of the surface of the country. This, together
with the replacing of the cabins with good brick or
frame dwellings, with cellars, plastered walls, separate
94
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
apartments for living, eating, and sleeping, an abund-
ance of the best of food, pure air, and good water has
done the work. To this also may be added an improve-
ment in the manner of clothing. It is not many years
since the use of woolen underclothing was the exception,
while overcoats, especially for children, were almost
unknown. Now all, both young and old, are clad with
warm underwear, and in addition a majority are sup-
plied with water-proof garments which protect them
from the dampness. These have removed the causes
from which a great deal of the bilious type of disease
was derived.
" Again, another effect of the drying of the surface
has been to more nearly equalize the temperature of
the days and nights. As the low, swampy morasses
did not contain water of sufficient depth to retain an
adequate amount of heat to radiate during the night,
the consequence was, when the heat of day was past,
condensation began almost simultaneously with the
setting of the sun, the result being hot days and cool
nights. To this latter course many thinking minds
have attributed the so-called malarious disturbance.
Nevertheless, my mind clings to the former, and as
an additional argument in its favor will cite what
frequently happens in the spring of the year, especi-
ally in our cities, after a severe winter. The remnants
of the last year's vegetation, with the droppings from
domestic animals, together with the usual amount of
kitchen refuse that finds its way into our streets and
alleys, have accumulated during the winter months.
This has been held solid, as it were, by the ice and
snow until perhaps the last of March, at which time
the sun is high and its power great. The result is
that almost at once this mass of matter begins the
process of decomposition under the combined influ-
ence of heat and moisture. This period of the year
is fruitful of neuralgia, rheumatism, and other
diseases that are attributed to a malarious cause,
and this condition lasts until the fresh leaves put
forth upon the trees and the green grass appears,
when almost within the space of a week the major
part of the sickness disappears, and then ensues the
most healthful portion of the year, the season when
the vegetation is fresh and its absorbing power
greatest."
Although the indigenous diseases were the chief
dread of the settlers, they were not free from alarms
of epidemics. On the 17th of May a colored woman
by the name of Overall was found to have the small-
pox, and a panic ensued. A public meeting was called
and a Board of Health formed of all the leading
physicians of the place, — Drs. Samuel G. Mitchell,
Isaac Cox, Livingston Dunlap, John H. Sanders, John
E. McClure, Charles McDougal, John L. Mothershead,
and William Tichnor. They were authorized to take
any measures they deemed necessary to arrest the dis-
ease. Nothing was done, however, as no other case
made its appearance. In June, 1833, a case or two
that were supposed to be cholera excited alarm. The
churches appointed and kept the 26th as a fast-day.
The fatal prevalence of the epidemic in the southern
part of the State, especially in Salem, Washington
Co., renewed the fear here that had been allayed
by its disappearance, and a public meeting was held
in the court-house on the 17th of July, a thousand
dollars contributed by the citizens for sanitary pur-
poses, a Board of Health appointed, consisting of five
doctors and five citizens, sanitary committees appointed
in each ward, medicines obtained, and the Governor's
house, in the Circle, fixed upon as the hospital, with
Dr. John E. McClure as superintendent. Better pro-
vision for a possible calamity was apparently made in
that emergency fifty years ago than was made after-
wards, except in the provision of the City Hospital.
The city has been unusually free from fatal epidemics,
the smallpox being the only one that has appeared,
and it has never become epidemic here.
During all this early period of the history of the
city and county the primitive habits and conditions
of the settlement were but little changed, though
changes were on the way and at work in scattered
influences both in the family, school, and church, and
social and business conditions. The universal brother-
hood of the days when there were no streets, or they
were full of stumps and mud-holes, with cow-paths
for sidewalks and worm-fences for borders, was giving
way to the inevitable separation into classes and
coteries. " Stores" were dropping one and another
article or class of the miscellaneous stock they had
been keeping and approaching the specialties of city
CURRENCY AND MANUFACTURES.
95
establishments. They were leaving sugar and coflFee
to grocery-stores, abandoning liquor altogether, con-
fining themselves more exclusively to dry-goods,
and putting away their red-flannel door-signs as un-
becoming their maturer years. Barter was passing
away before the advance of cash, and the supply of
home necessities trusted less and less to the foresight
of the head of the fiimily. The winter's supply of
meat, which for years had been contracted for during
the fall with one or another farmer and cut up and
cured at home, was gradually coming more and more
largely from the butcher as the day's needs required.
cious but liberal management was a great help to the
early growth of Indianapolis and the region of which
it was the centre and depot. When the crash of
1837 was followed by the " hard times" of 1839 to
1845, the State Bank's money was all the people
had that they could trust. The State itself issued
" scrip" or " treasury notes" receivable for taxes, and
at first bearing six per cent, interest, but with all
these advantages the money was discredited. It
passed with difiiculty at par here, and would not pass
at all in Cincinnati, or only at a ruinous discount of
fifty per cent, or more. This was a grievous embar-
WAGON TBAIN ON NATIONAL ROAD.
Home-made sugar was giving place to " Orleans," but
no backwoods boy or man alive or that ever lived
will substitute " Orleans" molas.ses for " home-made."
"Store tea" was supplanting "spice-bush" and sassa-
fras without being better or half as pure. Custom
shops were sometimes encouraged to manufacture
a little for stock and the chance of a market. The
new State Bank, with its branches at the principal
points of the State, furnished an excellent though
by no means abundant currency, and by loans to
enterprising men encouraged such industries as were
adapted to the condition of the country. Its judi-
rassment, and largely neutralized the benefit the Legis-
lature hoped to find in thus " inflating" the currency.
Some few who were wise in their day made money
of the situation. They would go to Cincinnati with
State Bank money or specie and buy State six per
cent, scrip for fifty or even forty cents on the dollar.
At home it was good in trade, would buy anything
or pay any debt, though not always to the pleasure of
the creditor or seller. Others who could afford it
hoarded it for the interest and found their account in
it. One of the Supreme Court, who was one of the
least expensive men in the world, took his salary in
96
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
" scrip" and saved it. By the time the State re-
deemed it the accumulation of interest nearly equaled
the principal. These financial incidents, though re-
mote from the first settlement of the city, are still
more remote from the present time, and will serve to
illustrate to the present generation a condition of
things that will never come again. A previous issue
of treasury notes had been made shortly after the
State's admission into the Union, and, though re-
ceivable for taxes, were considerably depreciated, and
in consequence embarrassed the purchasers of town
lots seriously.
During the continuance of the " hard times,"
from 1839 to 1845, interstate emigration did little
for Indiana or the New Purchase. The " repudiation
of the State debt," as it was oflen called, — the failure
to pay interest on the bonds of 1836, — had a bad
effect on the hunters of new homes, and they passed
through the State to Illinois and Missouri and Iowa.
The National road, incomplete as it was, afforded so
much better a route than others that it was largely
used by emigrants. Long trains of wagons passed
every day from sun-up till sun-down, sometimes in
long procession, sometimes in groups, rarely singly.
There were four-, three-, and two-horse wagons, cov-
ered sometimes with canvas, sometimes with bed-
quilts, with chairs tied about the " end gate," a tar-
bucket swinging to the coupling pole, a dog hitched
to the hind axle, tow-headed children stuck about
among feather-beds and bureaus in front, a sturdy
man on foot driving, and as sturdy a woman trudg-
ing by his side with a baby in her arms, and the older
children following with the cows and sheep. Thus
came to their new homes many a man who has dis-
tinguished himself at the bar, in the pulpit, in the
school, in the doctor's office, in legislation, on the
bench, on the battle-field.
" And buirdly ohiels and clever hizzies
Are bred in sic a way as this is"
in the backwoods to this day occasionally, but the
land was full of them at the time referred to.
CHAPTERV.
Second Period— The Capital in the Woods.
The second period of the history of Indianapolis
is broken by conspicuous events into three divisions
of nearly equal length, — first, from the removal of
the capital to the incorporation of the town in 1832 ;
second, from that event to the abandonment of the
public works in 1839; third, from that time to 1847,
when the impulse of improvement ran ahead of the
opening of the first railroad. The whole period was
so uneventful, and in the main so unpromising (except
during the unfortunate real estate inflation that accom-
panied the " Internal Improvement System"), that it
can be treated more intelligibly by associating its
events in logical rather than chronological connection.
The removal of the State capital to Indianapolis
produced two beneficial changes. It improved the
tone of society by a large annual admixture of the
best intelligence of the State. The meeting of the
Legislature was for nearly a generation the great
event of the year. The members came usually on
horseback, with the now-forgotten "leggings" and
" saddle-bags." In later days such as were on stage
lines had the aristocratic privilege of riding. It was .
not till 1852 that they began to come mainly on rail-
ways, and to be regarded as of little more consequence
than other men. The hotels were all " taverns" for
many a year, and the modes of life as simple and
primitive as they were in any country town. Farmers
came in with their families to see the Legislature.
Visitors from other parts of the State, besides those
with " axes to grind," came often, and it was long
before even the townspeople lost their curiosity to see
its proceedings. There were strong men among the
legislators of the State in those days. The pay was a
trifle, and a trifling man could not afford to take such
a place. It was usually a man who was needed by
the interests of his locality or a man of conscious
ability who took a place in one house or the other as
his first step in the ladder. Elections were rarely
riotous and never corrupt, though electioneering then
no more disdained mean arts and artifices than now.
There was no money to buy votes, the consequence
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
97
was a better class of men, in the average, than do
the law-making now. Moreover, most, if not all,
of them were immigrants, with the push and persist-
ence of men who have enterprise enough to go from
home to seek fortune, and brains enough to take ad-
vantage of the chances that oflFer. In a little town
numbering but a hundred families the preceding
spring, and probably not more than six hundred
inhabitants when the first legislative session was held
here, the advent and free association of such a body
of men could not but be improving.
The other benefit following the change of the cap-
ital was the improvement in the material prospects of
the village. With no immediate or decided change,
there was a confidence of prosperity that held up the
courage of the settlers against the terrors of annual
chills. The fulfillment of this promise was long in
coming. It took twenty years to bring the first evi-
dences of probable prosperity and progress beyond a
country town.
The Legislature was always ready to do all that
might be properly done to help the place, and fre-
quently stepped in with relief laws for the embarrassed
purchasers of town lots. At its second session here,
on the 20th of January, 1826, it came to the relief
of the ague-shaken debtors who could not pay the
deferred installments of the purchase-money of their
lots and extended the time for payment, and allowed
the cash payments on lots that the holders could not
keep and wanted to surrender to go upon the lots that
were kept, thus wiping out in a large measure an
indebtedness that would finally have proved ruinous.
The condition of things urging this action is clearly
set forth in a little article in the Journal of Dec. 15,
1825, about a month before the bill was passed.
After remarking that a bill to consolidate payments on
lots would be introduced in a few days, the Journal —
it had then borne this name less than a year — said,
" Many circumstances combined to make lots sell for
more than they were worth. At the time of the sale
treasury paper, with which payments were authorized
to be made, was plenty and at a considerable discount.
Now payments which were expected to be made in
depreciated paper, and in consequence of which lots
sold very high, have to be made in specie or its
7
equivalent. Many persons also paid enormous prices
for lots contiguous to the State-House Square, under
a belief that a State-House would be speedily erected,
and that their property would consequently rise in
value. We hope the Legislature will give this sub-
ject due attention, and if they do not see the propriety
of the measure suggested they will probably agree to
extend the time of making payments." The Legis-
lature did both. It was wiser than its latter-day suc-
cessors, and took the suggestions of the press with
becoming alacrity and deference. There is a consid-
erable ray of light let in upon the condition of things
in the first year of the new capital by this little ex-
position. The donation outside of the town plat was
partly sold by an act of Jan. 24, 1824, when eighty
acres were laid off in four-acre blocks, — -the size of the
city squares, — and sold on the 25th of January, 1825,
by auction, the highest bringing one hundred and
fifty-five dollars, the lowest sixty-three dollars. On
the 12th of February of the first session here, in 1825,
an act was passed ordering twenty more four-acre out-
blocks to be laid off north and south of those pre-
viously sold, — they were on the north and south sides
of the city, thus making a double tier on those two
sides, — and sold on the 2d of May. The same act
ordered the sale of the reserved lots on Washington
Street, the clearing of Pogue's Run Valley at an
expense not to exceed fifty dollars, and the lease of
the ferry at the foot of Washington Street for five
years. The second series of out-blocks brought four-
teen hundred and sixty-seven dollars, or about eighteen
dollars an acre. The Washington Street reserved lots,
even under the elevating influence of the possession
of the State capital, did not approach the figures of
the first sale nearly four years before. The highest
brought three hundred and sixty dollars, the lowest
one hundred and thirty-four dollars. An aggregate
of street frontage equal to three squares brought but
three thousand three hundred and twenty-eight dol-
lars.
The relief act for embarrassed lot-holders had the
effect of concentrating the settlement in the centre of
the town plat, along Washington Street, as heretofore
noted. The court-house and State capitol in one was
east of a central line, and the taverns and business
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
houses were gathering upon that direction. So the
lot-holders who wished to surrender any of their pur-
chases gave up those nearest the river, and applied the
money paid upon them to lots farther east which they
wished to keep. This tendency away from the river
continued till the " internal improvement" impulse
became so strong as to force the great " improvement
system" through the Legislature of 1836. Antici-
pating this a real estate speculation took wing in 1835,
and from that time till the panic of 1837 got this far
west the course of development was westward towards
the line of the canal on Missouri Street, where ware-
houses were to grow thick and mills wake the echoes
all night long. When this westward bulge was broken
by the hard times the town's business settled down
hopelessly on the two sides of Washington Street from
Delaware to Illinois, while the residences spread about
two blocks farther east and west, and only in widely-
scattered clumps or single houses got as far north as
North Street or as far south as South Street. In
February of 1826 a local census showed a population
of but seven hundred and sixty, with a Sunday-school
attendance of one hundred and sixty-one, — a very large
and healthy disproportion.
For convenience and coherence, all the legislation
of the State directly affecting the town, during the
interval from the change of capital to the first incor-
poration, may be thrown together in this connection.
The first act was on the 26th of January, 1827, or-
dering the State's agent to survey and sell seven
acres on the river for a site for a steam-mill. The
company that bought it at a mere nominal price was in-
corporated a year later, on the 28th of January, 1828,
and was mainly composed of the oldest and most
prominent citizens, — Nicholas McCarty, James Blake,
James M. Ray, Daniel Yandes, Noah Noble, William
Sanders. This steam-mill, which stood till 1853 very
near the east end of the old National road bridge,
was the first manufacturing enterprise in the history
of the place, and on that account may be particularly
noted here. The Legislature favored it to an extent
that would be tolerated for no enterprise now. On
the 6th of January, 1831, the company was given
the right to extend the time of completing the mill
another year, and next day were given authority to
cut any timber they needed on any of the lots held
by the State. With good transportation facilities
this grant alone would have been a nice little fortune.
The mill was a very large frame, three stories high,
with a two-story attic, so solidly put together by a
noted workman of the time, James Griswold, that
after thirty years of neglect, abuse, and total aban-
donment, it was" as strong when it was burned as it
was the day it was erected. The western and smaller
and lower division was a saw-mill, the lower part of
the main building a grist-mill, and the upper stories
a wool-carding mill. The machinery was brought
here from Cincinnati, partly by wagon and partly,
some say, by the first and only steamer that ever
came so high up White River. The building was
finished in December, 1831. The saw-mill, a less
formidable structure, was finished and at work the
fall before. The grist-mill began. operations in Jan-
uary, 1832, for the first time since the settlement of
the " New Purchase," giving its customers bolted
flour. Previously flour, like corn-meal, had to be
sifted at home. For over two years the establish-
ment was maintained in an inefi'gctive way, fre-
quently idle and never remunerative, and was finally
abandoned in 1835 and the machinery offered for
sale. For a number of years, however, portions of
the saw-mill works were left for idle boys to abuse or
break up and sell for old iron, and the building was
made the haunt of thieves and strumpets, except
during the occupancy of the Messrs. Geisendorfi' with
their woolen-factory, from 1847 to 1852. The enter-
prise was too big for the place. It could supply a
home demand treble that to which it could look for
business, and beyond that it could do nothing.
The cost of getting flour to the Ohio River or any
shipping market would have been as much as the cost
of the flour itself It is among the traditions of this
first enterprise and failure that it took a hundred
men two days to raise the frame- work, and that they
used no liquor in the labor. The singularity of this
abstinence no doubt gave life to the legend. Liquor
at a " house-raising" or " log-rolling" or " corn-shuck-
ing" or any of the co-operative labors or neighborhood
frolics was as indispensable as food or Rouse's or
I Bagwell's fiddle, though, as previously noted, mis-
^ffl^i^^^L^r^i
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
99
chievous excesses were far less frequent than now.
Three of the men conspicuously connected with this
enterprise were quite as conspicuously connected
with the whole history of the earliest development
of the city's industrial and commercial interests.
These were Nicholas McCarty, Daniel Yandes, and
James Blake. Others, like Calvin Fletcher, Morris
Morris, Hervey Bates, and James M. Ray, were as
closely identified with the general progress of the
city, but less so with the special interests indicated.
Mr. McCarty and Mr. Yandes were the chief capital-
ists, so far as can now be learned. The former .stands
as the representative of the commercial as the latter
and Mr. Blake of the manufacturing development of
the city. Though Mr. McCarty was behind neither
of his compeers of their own special direction, he is
best known as the leading merchant of Central
Indiana.
Nicholas McCarty was born on the 26th of
September, 1795, in the town of Moorefield, Harding
Co., W. Va., among the Alleghanies. His father
dying when he was very young, his mother removed
to Pittsburgh, Pa., where he remained until he
was well advanced toward manhood, with little
opportunity for early school education. While still
under twenty he left Pittsburgh for Newark, Ohio,
where as a boy he won the favor of BIr. Bucking-
ham, then one of the leading merchants of Ohio, by
the sterling qualities that in later years won him the
respect of every honorable man to whom he was
known. He speedily made himself master of the
mercantile business, so far as it was developed within
his range, and Mr. Buckingham made him superin-
tendent of one of his branch houses near Newark.
His success was as speedy and conspicuous here as in
a lower position, and in a few years he had acquired
both the experience and the means to begin business
for himself. His trade was large and prosperous
from the beginning. Here his career gives the key-
note of his character, — a sensitiveness of honor that
feels a reproach like a stab, a strength of gratitude
that counts no sacrifice a loss in returning the good-
will he has received. Finding that his business was
growing at the expense of his benefactor's, when he
had counted confidently on a sufficiency for both, he
sold out and came from Newark to Indianapolis in the
fall of 1823, at twenty-eight years of age.
He established himself in a building on the south-
west corner of Washington and Pennsylvania Streets,
known for thirty years as " McCarty's Corner," and
south of this building some years later built an im-
posing brick residence, the home of the family for
many years. He was the first merchant educated to
business who conducted it systematically. He began
in a larger way, too, than others, and his success was
proportional. He established branch stores in Laporte,
Greenfield, Covington, Cumberland, and Waverly, and
trained several young men afterwards conspicuous in
the business of the city or State, imbuing them all
with his own scrupulous and resolute integrity. It
was reserved for the great crisis of his hfe to exhibit
his best qualities at their best. When the panic of
1837 and the subsequent hard times had made his
great resources, largely in real estate, unavailable, he
became involved, and made a settlement with his
creditors upon such terms as to enable them to
realize more than the principal and interest of his
obligations.
James Blake had come to Indianapolis in 1821,
under the advice of some Philadelphia friends, with
an eye to the preparation of ginseng — a profuse
growth of the woods all about the settlement at that
time — for shipment from Philadelphia to China,
where it sells at high figures, and its use is universal
now, as it was then. He established a drying and
purifying apparatus in a little house south of the
creek, on the present East Delaware Street, and Mr.
McCarty here, and by his agents at his branch stores
and elsewhere, collected the roots from farmers and
their families, who frequently helped out a short corn
crop with what they called " sang." A little hoe
was made especially for this use called a " sang-hoe,"
obsolete for forty-five years or more. The extent of
his business in a little place of less than two thousand
people may be judged by the fact that the freezing of
the Ohio in 1829 compelled him to haul in wagons
his entire season's stock from Philadelphia, requiring
sixteen six-horse Conestoga wagons to do it. The
freight of ginseng back made the audacious enterprise
profitable, — an illustration of his business perception
100
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and prompt decision, for the cold snap froze the Ohio
just as his goods reached Pittsburgh to take steam
passage to Madison. Besides his ordinary mercantile
business, he took large contracts for Indian supplies,
and made himself quite familiar with the dialects of
two or three of the tribes on the " Miami Reserva-
tion."
His enterprise appeared repeatedly in attempts to
introduce new industries or develop new resources.
He was largely interested in the eflFort to establish
silk-growing about 1835, and went with character-
istic energy into the planting of the Morus mvlti-
eaulis. A few years later (about 18-40) he began
one of the most important enterprises of his life,
though the distress of the country was too great and
general to permit it the success it would probably
have achieved a half-dozen years later. This was
the cultivation and manufacture of hemp on his
" bayou farm," now " West Indianapolis," where are
located the "stock-yards," "car-works," and other
improvements. The fibre was rotted, broken, and
cleaned in vats and mills on the bluflF bank of the
creek just below the present line of Ray Street at
Church, Carloss, and Wilkins Streets. Proving un-
profitable, the enterprise was abandoned in two or
three years.
Mr. McCarty's personal popularity was so great
that the Whigs, who had been placed under the
cloud of "hard times" from 1843 onward, thought
it possible to save a seat in Congress by him, and ran
him against Judge Wick in 1847. It was his first
experience as a politician, but his native shrewdness
served him better than many an older politician's
more devious ways. He made no pretence of oratory,
and for that reason made a stronger impression by his
solid sense and effective humor than his opponent,
who was really an unusually good speaker when he
chose to be. But the Whigs were not strong enough
to win even with a man stronger than the party. A
few years later he ran for the State Senate in the
county and was elected, serving three years, the last
three under the old Constitution. In 1852, much
against his inclination, he was unanimously nomi-
nated by the dying Whig party for the first guber-
natorial term under the new Constitution. He made
an admirable canvass against Governor Joseph A.
Wright, one of the best " stumpers" in the United
States, and by familiarity with public speaking had
become a ready, perspicuous, and forcible speaker.
The Democrats, however, being greatly in the ma-
jority, he was defeated.
He was married in Boone County, Ky., July
27, 1828, to Margaret, daughter of Rev. Jameson
Hawkins, one of the earliest of the Baptist preachers
of the county, and died May 17, 1854, in his fifty-
ninth year. Three children survive him, — Margaret,
(Mrs. John C. S. Harrison), Nicholas, and Francis J.
Susannah, the eldest daughter, and wife of Rev.
Henry Day, many years pastor of the First Baptist
Church, died sevel-al years ago. Mr. McCarty was
an example of Christian purity, integrity, and char-
ity during his whole life. He was generous " as the
day," tolerant of offenses that affected only himself,
peaceable, frank, and honorable. No man that ever
lived in the city was more sincerely or generally
loved and honored, and certainly none ever deserved
it better. He was always prompt in his aid of be-
nevolent efforts, and one of the most active in urging
the organization of the Orphans' Home. A meeting
of the citizens held on the occasion of his death
adopted the following resolution, prepared by a com-
mittee consisting of James M. Ray, Robert Hahna,
Bethuel F. Morris, Calvin Fletcher, John D. De-
frees, John M. Talbott, and Nathan B. Palmer :
. " Regnlced, That in the departure of our fellow-citizen, Nich-
olas McCarty, Esq., we realize the loss of one who, since the
early days of the city, has deservedly ranked as a most worthy,
generous, and valuable man, and who, by his aflfectioniite
heart, clearness of mind, and strict integrity of purpose, had
warmly endeared himself to all who knew him. In the im-
j portant public trusts committed to him — as commissioner of
the canal fund in effecting the first loan of the State, as sena-
tor of this county, and in other engagements — he manifested
remarkable judiciousness and ability. It was with reluctance
he was drawn into the pursuit of official station, and with de-
cided preference enjoyed the happiness of an attached circle
of family and friends. His hand and heart were ever at com-
mand for the need of the atHicted, and his counsels and sym-
pathies were extended where they could be useful with unaf-
fected simplicity and modesty."
Daniel Yandes belonged to that class of men who
naturally become pioneers. He was born in Fayette
,c^<
-U)
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
101
County, Pa., in January, 1793, when it was yet a new
country, with fertile soil, a hilly but beautiful surface,
and underlaid with coal. He was the son of Simon
Yandes, whose wife before marriage was Anna Cath-
arine Rider, both natives of Germany. His parents
lived upon a farm near the Monongahela River west
of Uniontown. They had two sons, Daniel and
Simon, who received only the limited education usual
at that time. Both of the sons worked on the farm.
They enlisted in the year 1813 under Gen. Harrison,
in the last war with Great Britain, and served six
months in Northern Ohio, but were not engaged in
battle. The father of Governor Albert G. Porter en-
listed in the same company. In 1814, when Wash-
ington City was first threatened by the British, they
again enlisted, and Daniel Yandes at the age of twenty-
one was elected major of the regiment. Before leaving
the place of rendezvous the order to march was coun-
termanded, and the troops were not again ordered
out. In 1815 occurred the most fortunate event of
his life, and that was his marriage to Anna Wilson,
the oldest daughter of James Wilson and his wife,
Mary Rabb. James Wilson was a leading farmer
and magistrate of the county. The Wilsons were
Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, and the Rabbs Scotch-
English Presbyterians, and Anna Wilson was a
Presbyterian. Her educational advantages were but
moderate as compared with those at present. James
Wilson's father, Alexander Wilson, was born in 1727,
and removed from Lancaster County, Pa., to Fayette
County, where he died in 1815.
After the marriage of Daniel Yandes, he acquired
a mill and opened a coal-mine. In 1817 his father
died, at the age of eighty-four, and in 1818, when the
advantages of the fertile soil of Indiana were heralded
in Western Pennsylvania and enthusiasm aroused, he,
with his wife, mother, and two children, floated down
the Ohio to Cincinnati, and went from thence to
Fayette County, Ind., where he opened a farm in the
woods near Connersville. In the spring of 1821 he
removed to Indianapolis, which had been fixed upon
as the seat of government for the State, and resided
there until his death in June, 1878, at the age of
eiii;hty-five years and five months. His portrait and
signature represent him at the age of eighty. His
first residence was a log cabin which he built near the
northeast corner of Washington and Illinois Streets.
In 1822 he erected and resided in a double log cabin
near the southwest corner of Washington and Ala-
bama Streets, opposite the Court-House Square. In
1823 he built a new frame residence of three rooms
in that locality. About 1831 he erected a two-story
brick residence where the Citizens' National Bank
now stands, and part of the same building included a
store-room where Harrison's Bank now is. In 1837
he was the owner of an acre of ground where the
First Presbyterian Church now stands, and where he
built a large plain two-story brick residence. Here
he lived until it was sold to the above church in 1863,
and here his wife died in 1851. After her death he
did not marry again.
He came to Indianapolis with about four thousand
dollars, and, strange as it may seem, that constituted
him the largest capitalist of the incipient metropolis
for the next ten years. That amount included the
total of his inheritance and of his own acquisitions
up to 1821. He was, in common with pioneers gen-
erally, a man of rugged health, and hopeful, confiding,
and enterprising. He was fond of building mills,
manufactories, and introducing other improvements.
On his arrival in Indianapolis, with his brother-in-law
he erected the saw- and grist-mill on the bayou south-
west of the city where the McCarty land now is, the
dam being built across White River at the head of
the island which was opposite the Old Cemetery. This
is said to have been the first mill in the New Purchase.
About 1823 the firm of Yandes & Wilkens estab-
lished the first tannery in the county, and continued
in that business together about thirty years. The
active partner was John Wilkens, a man well known
for his uncommon merits. Afterwards Daniel Yan-
des continued the same business with his nephew,
Lafayette Yandes. After the death of Lafayette he
formed another partnership with his nephew, Daniel
Yandes, Jr., and James C. Parmerlee in au extensive
tannery in Brown County, and in a leather-store at
Indianapolis. About the year 1825, Mr. Yandes be-
came the partner in a store with Franklin Merrill,
brother of Samuel Merrill. Stores in the early history
of Indianapolis contained a miscellaneous assortment.
102
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
more or less extensive, including dry-goods, groceries,
queensware, hardware, hats, shoes, etc. About 1831
he became the partner of Edward T. Porter, and the
store of Yandes & Porter was in a brick building
which preceded that where Harrison's Bank now
stands. At nearly the same time he started Joseph
Sloan in business as a merchant at Covington,
Ind., and continued his partner for several years.
In 1833 he and Samuel Merrill, treasurer of State,
dug a race along Fall Creek, and built a grist-mill,
a saw-mill, and the first cotton-spinning factory in
this region. A few years afterwards he and William
Sheets, then late Secretary of State, built on the canal
west of the State-House grounds the first paper-mill
in the county. About the same time he became the
partner of Thomas M. Smith in a store, and about
1838 was the partner of John F. Hill in another
store, both of which were on the north side of Wash-
ington Street, a little west of Pennsylvania Street.
In 1839, under great difficulties, he alone built at La-
fayette, Ind., a grist-mill, saw-mill, and paper-mill,
and opened with his son James a large store. While
engaged in this enterprise the panic was precipitated
upon the country, and Mr. Yandes found himself in-
volved heavily in debt, both as principal and indorser,
at Indianapolis and Lafayette. While he enjoyed the
good-will of his creditors, he did not command their
entire confidence as to his solvency, and during the
years 1839 to 1841 judgments in Marion County
accumulated against him to the amount of over twenty-
two thousand dollars, when he sacrificed some of his
most valuable property at much less than cost. At
the same time he was under protest at the bank at
Lafayette. In due time, however, he paid the full
amount of his debts, and it is a matter of honest
pride that he and his children have always paid in
full individual and all other indebtedness. About the
year 1817 he and Thomas H. Sharpe built the Col-
lege Hall, a brick building, which preceded the Fletcher
& Sharpe bank and store property, at the corner of
Washington and Pennsylvania Streets ; and a few
years afterwards he erected the brick building where
Ritzinger's Bank now is. In 1847 he built ten miles
of the Madison Railroad, which was completed about
September of that year, and was the first railroad to
Indianapolis. The same year he joined in building
a grist-mill at Franklin. In 1852 he and Alfred
Harrison built thirty miles of the eastern end \a
Indiana of the Bellefontaine Railroad. Previous to
this time he had twice ventured successfully in send-
ing large cargoes of provisions by flat-boats from In-
diana to New Orleans. About the year 1854, during
the Kansas excitement, his desire for the freedom of
that State impelled him to aid some young men to
settle there, whom he accompanied to the West.
About 1860 he joined Edward T. Sinker as partner
in the Western Machine- Works, where he continued
for some years.
One of his most curious traits was the manifestation
of unusual energy and labor for a series of years until
an enterprise could be put upon a solid basis, after
which he evinced unusual indolence and inattention
to details for several years until he became again en-
listed in a new enterprise. As a consequence, after
new enterprises were fairly started and tested he lost
interest in them, and in a few years would usually sell
his interest. ■ He was senior partner, and in most cases
the capitalist. Although he matured his plans pa-
tiently and carefully, he was nevertheless a little too
fond of hazard.
If his business career had terminated when seventy-
five years of age he would have been a successful
business man ; but an undue fondness for enterprise,
and a hopeftil enthusiasm, together with the fascina-
tions of the far West, an over-confidence in others, and
the deterioration incident to old age, with his unwil-
lingness to be advised, resulted in disaster. He lost
a considerable amount in mines in the West, and a
large sum in the Brazil Furnace, stripping him in
effect of his property when he was past the age of
eighty. One of these mines is now more promising.
In politics he was a very decided Whig and Re-
publican, but cared little for the distinctions of office.
He was, however, the first treasurer of Marion County,
and in 1838 Governor Noble, unsolicited, appointed
him one of the Board of Internal Improvements to
aid in carrying out the extensive system of improve-
ments provided for by the Legislature in 1836.
In church matters he was a Lutheran by preference,
but there being no church of that denomination at
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
103
ludianapolis in early times, he became a Presbyterian,
and was for somre years one of the first elders and
trustees of the Second Presbyterian Church. From
1823 to 1845, and until the failure of his wife's health,
his house was one of the favorite stopping-places of
the Presbyterian clergy. Rev. Mr. Proctor, and after-
wards Rev. George Bush, were his guests for months.
He was liberal to chanties and the church, having
given away up to 1865 about sixty thousand dollars.
It would require at least double that amount, according
to the present value of money, to be an equivalent.
Five of his children died young. His daughter,
Mary Y. Wheeler, died in 1852, leaving five children,
three of whom yet survive. His children yet living
are Catharine, the widow of Rev. Elijah T. Fletcher ;
Elizabeth Y. Robinson; Simon, formerly a lawyer;
James W., formerly a merchant; and George B., now
president of the Citizens' National Bank.
Besides the favor extended by the Legislature to
the enterprising spirit of the town in the cheap sale
of the steam-mill site, a direct appropriation of four
thousand dollars was made to build an official resi-
dence for the Governor in the Circle. This was done
on the 26th of January, 1827. A contract for the
work, at a cost of six thousand five hundred dollars,
was made on the 17th of March, with Austin Bishop,
Robert Culbertson, William Smith, and William
Speaks, by Samuel Merrill and Benjamin I. Blythe,
on the part of the State. It was of brick, about
fifty feet square, two stories high, with a sort of Man-
sard roof, containing a level space in the centre about
fifteen feet square, surrounded by a railing, standing
upon a basement some six feet above the ground,
with a large hall-door in the middle of each of the
four sides, and separated by ten-feet halls crossing
each other in the middle into four large rooms in
each corner. Its complete exposure on all sides
made it an undesirable residence for a family, and it
was never occupied except for public offices, chambers
of the Supreme Court judges, and in its later days
for almost any use that respectable applicants desired
it for. As heretofore related, it was sold for old
brick and torn down in 1857. School-boys used to
make a " circus" of its basement-rooms, and one day,
some forty years ago, a wild turkey, scared by hunters
from the noted " turkey-roost" in the sugar grove
near the line of Seventh and Illinois Streets, ran into
one of these basement-rooms, and was caught there
by a school-boy of the period. Another house, built
at the same time, was the little brick at the east gate
of the Court-House Square, for an office for the clerk
of the State Supreme Court. At the preceding ses-
sion the Legislature had ordered the State agent to
contract with Asahel Dunning for a two-story brick
ferry-house near the foot of Washington Street, on the
south side. It was built in 1827, partially burned in
1855, repaired, and reoccupied until some half dozen
or so years ago, when it was torn down.
In this connection belong.s the act ordering the first
State-House, which passed 10th of February, 1831,
upon the recommendation of a committee at the ses-
sion of 1829-30. The report estimated the cost at
fifty-six thousand dollars, and stated that the unsold
land in the donation would be fairly estimated at fifty-
eight thousand dollars. James Blake was appointed
commissioner to attend to the work and obtain mate-
rial (three hundred and sixty perches of stone by the
second Monday of May was specified), with an appro-
priation of three thousand dollars. He was instructed
to ofier one hundred and fifty dollars for a plan, embrac-
ing halls for the two houses, rooms for Supreme Court
and State Library, and twelve rooms for committees,
with such others as would be needed, and report to the
next Legislature. The cost was limited to forty-five
thousand dollars. The commissioner procured a plan
from Ithiel Town, a distinguished architect of New
York, and I. J. Davis. The Legislature approved
Jan. 20, 1832, and appointed Noah Noble (Gov-
ernor), Morris Morris (auditor), and Samuel Merrill
(treasurer), Feb. 2, 1832, as commissioners to
superintend the work, employ architects, andnise the
material purchased by Mr. Blake. The work was to
be finished by November, 1838, and to be examined
and approved by a committee of five from each house
before acceptance. The contract was made with Mr.
Town at fifty-eight thousand dollars. Work began in
the spring of 1832. The site, previously a dead level,
was plowed and scraped into an elevation in the centre
under the survey and supervision of Gen. Thomas A.
Morris, then a young West Pointer, after serving a
104
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
faithful term at the printer's " case." The building
was so far completed as to be ready for oecupaqpy
when the Legislature met on the 7th of December,
1835. The actual cost was sixty thousand dollars,
but two thousand dollars in excess of the estimate.
It was two hundred feet long by one hundred feet
wide, and two stories high. The style was the Doric
of the Parthenon, spoiled by a contemptible little
dome that was about as suitable in that place as an
army-cap on the Apollo Belvidere. The basement
was of blue slate from the Bluffs, and soon began de-
caying. The whole exterior was stuccoed, and looked
well till frost and thaw, damp and heat began to
make it peel off, and then it looked worse than a
beggar's rags. It was so dilapidated as to be unsafe
before it was torn down in 1878. The trees planted
in the square made a fine grove there, which was the
favorite resort of Sunday-school celebrations of the
Fourth of July and the usual out-door place for
political meetings.
At the same time the order was made to sell the
steam-mill site all the reserved, forfeited, and unsold
lots in the town were ordered to be sold. It was
done on the 7th and 8th of the following May, when
one hundred and fifty-three lots, of which twenty-four
were on Washington Street, were offered, with over
thirty squares of four acres each. Sales were made
of one hundred and six lots at one hundred and
eighty dollars an acre, and thirty-eight out-lots and
squares at twenty-three dollars an acre. On the 22d
of January, 1829, an act extended the time of pay-
ment of the deferred installments of the purchase-
money of out-lots, and declared inoperative the for-
feitures worked under the existing law by delinquent
payments. The next legislative order touching the
town arid the State's property was made on the 9th
of February, 1831, when the agent was directed to
plat the whole donation outside the town into out-lots
and sell them at public auction. The subdivision
was made, and the aggregate of lots offered in and
out of the town plat was nearly nineteen hundred
acres. The divisions ranged from two to fifty acres.
The minimum price was ten dollars an acre, but only
a portion was sold. It may be noticed here that the
order for the clearing of Pogue's Run Valley was
never executed, probably because the fifty-dollar limit
was too little. Property-holders, however, gradually
cleared it, and improved the health of the place by
it. The low, swampy " bottom" and dense woods and
underbrush made the very home of malarious disor-
ders, and they trooped out in force during the sickly
season. There is nothing but two or three shivered
stumps left of this dense woods now, except for a short
distance above the mouth of the creek and near the
Morris Street bridge. Here some old sycamores and
elms still remain, but one of them was blown over by
the tornado that did such damage to some of the
manufacturing establishments on the West Side last
summer. All the papaws, black haws, apple haws,
ginseng, prickly ash, spice-brush, and hazel-bushes
are gone as completely as if such things had never
grown there, yet it was a valley prolific of wild fruit,
as its clear stream was of good fish.
At the time the order of Jan. 26, 1827, was made
for the sale of forfeited and reserved lots certain
squares and alleys were vacated. Square 22 was re-
served for a State hospital, and square 25 for a State
university ; it is now University Park. The " State
University" at Bloomington has tried to get possession
of this valuable property under cover of a title it has
assumed since that dedication was made, but has failed.
On the 26th of January, 1832. the agent was em-
powered to lease the square to the trustees of Marion
County Seminary for thirty years, with the proviso
that if it should be needed for a university in that
time a half acre should be sold in fee-simple in either
the southwest or southeast corner, where a seminary
building was authorized to be erected under the lease.
The trustees built the " Old Seminary" in the south-
west corner in 1833-34, the most noted local school
of the State, and maintained with unvarying success
and wide benefit for twenty years. It will be noticed
more fully in the department of this work assigned
to " Schools." In October, 1827, Miss Matilda
Sharpe, the first milliner, came to Indianapolis, —
not the least important event of the year.
While the Legislature, as above related, was dis-
posing of unsold lots, erecting buildings, and forward-
ing the improvement of the place, the citizens were
not inactive in their own moral and social interests.
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
105
though it was late before their enterprise turned to
points of business advantage, and with no great good
fortune to encourage them when they did turn. In
April, 1825, the Indianapolis Bible Society was
formed, and is still living in the Indianapolis Female
Bible Society, a most active and beneficent agency
among the soldiers during the civil war. Mrs. Mar-
garet Givan was the first president, and the wife of
Professor George Bush, pastor of the First Presbyte-
rian Church, and since then known all over the literary
world for' eminence in oriental scholarship, was one of
its most active promoters. On the 13th of November,
1825, the Marion County Bible Society was formed,
with Bethuel F. Morris as president and James M.
Ray as secretary. It may be noted here that Mr.
Ray was secretary of pretty much every organiza-
tion ever formed during the first thirty years of the
city's existence. Whether town-meeting or bank
directory, fire company or missionary society, James
M. Ray was invariably made its business manager or
secretary. It is to his undying honor that he always
served and was never paid. He was born in the first
year of this century, in New Jersey, and learned the
trade of making coach lace, came West to Kentucky
when a young lad, and worked there with his family ;
came later to Lawrenceburg, in this State, and came
here in the summer or fall of 1821. His intelligence,
activity, and integrity put him at once among the fore-
most men of the settlement. Quiet, unobtrusive, vigi-
lant, never idle, never careless, his word was as good
as any other man's oath, and his aid in any good work
as confidently expected as the continuance of his ex-
istence. It would be impossible to gather up here all
the associations of which he was secretary at one
time or another in more than fifty years of active life
in the settlement and city, but it is really no exagger-
ation to say that the first generation of settlers trusted
him with every work of that kind that they had to
do. He was the first county clerk, as already noted,
and served till he was made cashier of the old State
Bank in 1834. He continued in that position as long
as the bank lived, and then went into its successor,
the " Bank of the State." He was Governor Mor-
ton's most trusted agent during the war, and managed
all the external finances of the State during that
momentous period. Financial disaster overtook him
in some unfortunate mining operations to which he
had given his means largely, and several years of his
later life were passed in an easy but well-paid position
in the Treasury Department at Washington. During
the last year or so he returned to his old home, and
died here Feb. 22, 1881.
The Indianapolis Tract Society was another kindred
organization made during the same year, 1825 ; and
on September 3d the first agricultural society was
formed by the late Calvin Fletcher, Henry Bradley,
Henry Brenton, and others. The following year .an
artillery company was formed under Capt. James
Blake, upon the reception of a .six-pounder iron gun
sent here by the government. It blew off William
Warren's hand while firing a salute to the " Bloody
Three Hundred" in 1832, when mustering to march
away to the Black Hawk war. It afterwards blew off
one of Andrew Smith's hands. Mr. Smith is still
living in the county, a hale and venerable gentleman,
far beyond the scriptural limit of life, after many years
of service in important county offices. On the 20th
of June, 1826, the first fire company was formed,
with John Hawkins as president and James M. Ray
as secretary. Its implements were buckets and lad-
ders, and its alarm general yelling and the ringing of
church and tavern bells. It was incorporated in 1830,
and continued in existence till the formation of the
" Marion Fire-Engine Company" in 1835, when the
old company was absorbed into the new one. In
July, 1828, the Indianapolis Library Society was
formed, the library being made up of donations. It
lasted half a dozen years or so. A musical association
called the Handelian Society was formed in the
spring of 1828. In August a cavalry company was
formed by Capt. David Buchanan. On the 24th of
April, 1829, the Methodist Sunday-school was colo-
nized from the Union School on the completion of the
old church on the southwest corner of Circle and
Meridian Streets. It began with eleven teachers and
forty-six scholars, and in a year had twenty-seven
teachers and one hundred and forty-six scholars. In
November, 1829, the Colonization Society was organ-
ized, with Judge Isaac Blackford as president. On
the 11th of December, 1830, the Indiana Historical
106
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Society was formed, with Benjaniin Parke as presi-
dent and Bethuel P. Morris as secretary. John H. I
Farnham was afterwards secretary, and the books and '
papers were long kept in the office of Henry P. Co- '
burn, clerk of the Supreme Court. The library was
given to the Union Library Society about 1846, and
when that association went to pieces the library went
to pieces too. The Historical Association numbered
among its members some of the most distinguished
men in the State, and among its " honorary members"
were Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, Lewis Cass, John i
C. Calhoun, and other men of national renown. It i
has been revived within a few years by some of the
leading citizens of the State, who arc interested in
historical affairs, and promises to be a useful as well
as durable organization. In the fall of 1831 the In- '
dianapolis '■ Lyceum" or " Athenisum" was organized
to promote literary culture by lectures and scientific ,
discussions. It lasted usefully for a few years, and
was succeeded by the Young Men's Literary Society
in 1§35. This organization was superseded by the I
Union Literary Society, composed mainly of the
elder pupils of the " Old Seminary," which collected
a considerable library, was iucorporated in 1846 or
1847, and began the lecture system hereby procuring
lectures from Mr. Beecher, Rev. Mr. Johnson, Mr.
Fisher, of Cincinnati, and others. It was disbanded [
by gradual decay, but in 1853 its last effort obtained '
a lecture by Horace Greeley on Henry Clay. i
In 1831, near the end of the first division of the
city's second period or stage of growth, came the first
illusive promise of public improvements, which soon ;
grew strong enough to realize itself partially, and to j
send a forecast nearly twoscore years ahead of the }
fact that only began to be forcefully felt in 1850 or
just before. The Legislature on the 2d and 3d of !
February chartered a group of railroads that reads in j
its titles very much like a time-table in the Union ,
Depot today. There was the Madison and Indianap- I
olis, the Lawrenceburg and Indianapolis, the New ,
Albany, Salem and Indianapolis, the Ohio and In-
dianapolis. Surveys were made on all them, and j
some grading done in patches, but nothing came of
any of them except the Madison and Indianapolis,
which was incorporated in the State's great and disas- \
trous " Internal Improvement System" of 1836. This
reference is all that need be made here, as the history
of the city's railroad system will appear fully in its
proper place.
Almost contemporaneously with the charters of
these railroads came the only steamer that ever reached
Indianapolis. It was on the 11th of April, 1831.
The steamer was the " Robert Hanna," owned by
Gen. Robert Hanna, one of tlie prominent citizens,
and some of his associates, who intended to use it in
the transportation of stone and timber for the work on
the National road, a contract for which they held. The
arrival created a great excitement. Between a steamer
actually at the wharf, as it were, and the recent charter
of four or five railroads the victims of chills and
many disappointments began to take heart and hope
that their dreams, when the capital came, might be
prophecies after all. The cannon was fired, crowds
visited the vessel, a public meeting was held on the
12th, with Judge Blackford, president, and Judge
Morrison, secretary, to make a formal welcome, and
a banquet for the officers and owners. Resolutions
demanded the improvement of the river, and the
speeches expressed the usual invariable confidence of
" the realization of our most sanguine expectations."
That was the end of it. After making a couple of
little excursions up the river on the 12th, she started
back down the river on the 13th. It was a slow
voyage. The pilot-house and chimneys got in the
way of the tree limbs, the bends were too short for
her length, the bars too frequent and shallow. She
knocked off her pilot-house and damaged her wheel-
house in one of her excursions, and scared her un-
familiar passengers so badly that a good many jumped
off into the water. With such ill omens and a slow
voyage down, probably nobody was surprised to hear
that she had grounded at Hog Island, where the
captain's child was drowned, and never got off till
the fall rise came. Hopes of river navigation never
flourished after this experiment. It was a very gen-
eral belief that the river would be made practically
navigable as Congress had formally declared it to be,
and to this impression must be attributed the early
preference of settlers for locations near the river. On
the 12th of February, 1825, Alexander Ralston, who
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
107
had laid out the town, was appointed by the legisla-
tive commissioners to make a survey of the river and
estimate the cost of clearing out the obstructions
and the extent of practicable navigability.
During the summer he made the survey, and re-
ported that an annual outlay of fifteen hundred dol-
lars would make the stream navigable for three months
in each year. From Sample's Mills, in Randolph
County, to Indianapolis was one hundred and thirty
miles, from here to the junction with White River
proper two hundred and eighty-five miles, and from
there to the Wabash forty miles, with a fall of eighteen
inches eight miles above Martinsville, and another of
nine feet in three hundred and ten miles above the
junction, with a great drift at the line of Daviess and
Greene Counties. On the basis of this report Congress
was several times petitioned by the Legislature to
make an appropriation for the proposed improvement,
but nothing was ever done. The State made some
considerable appropriations, expended by the County
Board along the river, but no improvement of any
real value could be made by such disjointed labors and
slender means, if indeed anything could be done by
any possible expenditure short of a system of " slack-
water" dams and locks. Schemes for this sort of
improvement were urged upon the Legislature by
John Matthews and others for several years after
18.30, and renewed again in 1851, when the "White
River Navigation Company" was chartered for twenty
years. That was all that was ever done. In 1865 a
little picnic steamer called the " Governor Morton"
was built by some of the citizens, and made some
short excursions during the year following, but she
never amounted to anything. She sank below the
old bridge after a life of a year, and her machinery
was taken out and put into some sort of a mill. This
is all of the history of the navigation of White River,
except that the steamer " Traveler" came up as far
as Spencer in 1830, and the " Victory" came up
within fifty-five miles of this place the same year.
Of the use of the river for commercial purposes more
will be said under the head of " Transportation."
The first stage line into the town was started by
Mr. Johnson, a relative of Col. Richard M. Johnson,
to Madison in the summer of 1828. Mr. Johnson
about the same time established a coach-making or
repairing shop on the block where the post-oflBce and
the Odd-Pellows' Hall stand. On the 8th of July,
1827, the National road commissioner, Mr. Knight,
was in the town, and fixed the lino to this point.
The next year, in September and October, the con-
tracts for the work were let, greatly to the satisfac-
tion of the town, which had been so long locked up by
cow-paths, Indian trails, and swampy roads cross-
layed. The old bridge across the river was built by
William Wernweg and Walter Blake for eighteen
thousand dollars, on plans furnished by the late Laza-
rus B. Wilson. It was completed in 1834, the con-
tract being let July 26, 1831. The macadamizing of
the road was completed nearly through the town and
about three miles west, just beyond Eagle Creek, and
abandoned in 1839 in consequence of the failure of
Congress to continue the appropriations. The road
following Washington Street enabled that thorough-
fare to get the first improvement that any street ever
got in the place, but no sidewalk work was done for
several years. After remaining in this incomplete
condition for a number of years Congress finally sur-
rendered to each State the portion of the National
road in its limits, and about the time the railroads
began advancing pretty rapidly the State gave the
road to a " Plank-Road Company," which covered it
with narrow, heavy oak plank, and made an admirable
road till the plank began to warp. In a few years
the plank-work was abandoned and the road, like
hundreds of others all over the State, was heavily
graveled and made an excellent turnpike, in which
condition it remains to-day.
The first " show," McComber's Menagerie, ap-
peared in the town on the 26th and 27th of July,
1830, and exhibited on the open space back of Hen-
derson's tavern, about where the Central Engine
house is, or a little north and east of it. Another
exhibited at the same place on the 23d and 24th of
August of the same year, showing among other curi-
osities a " rompo." Tradition does not retain a de-
scription of this mysterious beast. The next sum-
mer saw the introduction here of the first soda foun-
tain in Dunlap & McDougal's drug-store on East
Washington Street, near the middle of the block be-
108
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
109
tween Pennsylvania Street and the alley west of it on
the north side, subsequently kept by Scudder & Han-
neman. In February, 1831, the first artist, a por-
trait-painter by the name of M. G. Rogers, came
here for a professional visit. The 8th of January,
80 long celebrated in one way or another by the ad-
mirers of " Old Hickory," was celebrated in Indian-
apolis for the first time in 1830, when an address was
delivered by Alexander F. Morrison, brother of the
late Judge James and the banker William H., who
had recently removed here and started an administra-
tion paper called the Iiiduma Democrat. It suc-
ceeded the Gazette, and became the Sentinel in 1841,
as will appear more fully in the history of the press.
The celebrations of the Fourth of July were kept up,
and in 1830 there were two, one of the Sunday-
schools under Marshal James Blake, and one of the
citizens under Marshal Demas McFarland. The
deaths of Adams and Jefi'erson were celebrated here
on the 12th of August with appropriate funeral cere-
monies. The first three-story brick building was
erected by William Sanders, north side of Washing-
ton Street, a little west of Meridian, in the summer
of 1831. It is still standing in an improved condi-
tion. That same summer showed Indianapolis the
first elephant, two of them in fact, an adult and a
baby. They were not in a menagerie, but traveling
on their own merits. The population of Centre town-
ship by the census of 1830 was one thousand and
ninety-four.
Pretty nearly midway between the statement of
the census and the condition of the settlement at the
removal of the capital is the estimate of February,
1827, in the Journal. The town had then the new
■' court-house, a Presbyterian Church with thirty
members, a Baptist Church with thirty-six members,
a Methodist Church with ninety-three members,
worshiping in a cabin but building a brick church,"
the walls of which were completed and inclosed
in the fall. A Sunday-school had been in exist-
ence five years, and had then twenty teachers and
one hundred and fifty pupils. There were twenty-
five brick hou.ses in the place, sixty frames, and eighty
hewed and rough log ; rents were high and houses in
demand. The Governor's house in the Circle was
then in progress, and six two-story and five one-story
brick houses with a large number of frames had been
built that year. The editor thought the condition of
things promising enough to inaugurate an era of
manufiietures and steam-power to produce at home
the ten thousand dollars' worth of goods brought from
abroad. Among the year's importations were seventy-
six kegs of tobacco, two hundred barrels of flour, one
hundred kegs of powder, four thousand five hundred
pounds of yarn, and two hundred and thirteen bar-
rels of whiskey, besides seventy-one made here (Bayou
Blue), a pretty profuse supply of whiskey for a popu-
lation of but little more than one thousand, and a
considerable number of them women and children,
who could not be expected to drink much. Probably
half was sold to the country around or even farther
away, but even the half, or one hundred and forty-two
barrels, about five thousand gallons, would make five
gallons for every mouth, little and big, in the dona-
tion, and twenty probably for every adult male. The
large importation of powder shows that no little de-
pendence was still placed in the rifle as the food
provider.
On the 3d of June, 1832, the news of the out-
break of the Sac and Fox Indians under Black Hawk
reached the town, and next day a call was made for a
hundred and fifty men of the Fortieth Regiment,
belonging to this county, and for as many more from
the adjoining counties, to rendezvous here on the
9th, each man mounted, and armed with rifle, knife,
and tomahawk, and a supply of powder for the cam-
paign. When assembled here they were organized
in three companies, under Capts. James P. Drake,
John W. Redding, and Henry Brenton. There was
some competition for the command of the battalion
between Col. A. W. Russell and George L. Kinnard,
a member of Congress in 1835, and scalded to death
by the explosion of a steamer on the Ohio, while on
his way to the national capital. He began here as a
school-teacher a few years before this military expe-
dition. An adjustment was made which gave the
command to Russell and the adjutancy to Kinnard.
The night before the expedition started a consider-
able portion was encamped on the southeast corner of
the Military Ground, at the present crossing of Wash-
110
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ington and West Streets, and the next morning, while
the people of the town were gathering round ob-
serving the unwonted spectacle, the men were mould-
ing bullets by their camp-fires, or throwing toma-
hawks at a mark. When all were mounted and
ready to march they made as fine a body of men as
could have been found in any army in the world.
They went from here to Chicago, then a fort and an
Indian trading-post, guided by William Conner, found
the war virtually at an end, and marched round the
end of the lake to South Bend, where the late John
D. Defrees, then editing a paper there, gave them the
name they have worn ever since, and will as long as
the memory or history of the expedition remains, the
" Bloody Three Hundred." It was said that some of
them wanted to fight about it, but the cooler heads
dissuaded them. The only warlike incident of the
little campaign was the firing of a frightened picket at
a vagrant cow one night, which alarmed the whole
camp. The battalion returned on the 3d of July,
and took part in the celebration next day. The fol-
lowing January they were paid by Maj. Lamed.
William Warren, whose hands were blown oflF while
firing a salute to the command, was afterwards pen-
sioned by act of Congress, obtained by Mr. Kinnard,
under some neat little confusion of him with, the
military expedition, with which he had no more to
do than he had with the " Russian Expedition."
He was digging a cellar when he joined the gun
squad. The "good old times" were not so much
more squeamish or scrupulous than ours after all.
During the summer and early fall of 1832 sub-
scriptions were made and steps taken to build a
market-house, the leading men being Charles I.
Hand and the late John Givan, then a prominent
and honored citizen, in later life a pauper and semi-
tramp. It was built the following summer where it
still stands, greatly extended to be sure, but other-
wise unchanged, and wholly inadequate to its pur-
poses. Efibrts have very recently been made to re-
place the old structure with one suitable to the size
and needs of the city, built with the bequest made
some years ago by the late Stephen Tomlinson, but
and the alleged probability that the expense would
exceed the bequest and create a necessity for more
city tax, and some technical oversight in letting the
contract brought an injunction from the court on the
project, and thus it still lies. Thomas McOuat,
Josiah Davis, and John Walton were the committee
charged with the supervision of the work on the first
and present market-house. Under the act of Jan.
26, 1832, authorizing a lease of a seminary site to
the trustees of the county seminary, Demas McFar-
land. Dr. Livingston Dunlap, and J. S. Hall, the
trustees, obtained the lease the same year, and began
measures for erecting the building. The most im-
portant event of this year, however, was the incor-
poration of the town under the general law.
There was no separation of the town from the
rest of the county till now. All had been gov-
erned alike by State laws and the oflBcers appointed
by them. On the 3d of September, 1832, a public
meeting was held in the court-house, and it was de-
cided to incorporate the town under the general in-
corporation act. An election for five trtistees was
held the same month, and Henry P. Coburn, John
Wilkins, Samuel Merrill, Samuel Henderson, and
John G. Brown were chosen. They organized by
making Mr.. Henderson president and Israel P. Grif-
fith secretary. Five wards were made of the old
plat, — First, all east of Alabama Street ; Second,
from Alabama to Pennsylvania ; Third, from Penn-
sylvania to Meridian; Fourth, from Meridian to
Tennessee ; Fifth, all west of Tennessee. The first
marshal and collector was Samuel Jennison ; the first
assessor, Glidden True ; the first market-master,
Fleming T. Luse. Other officers were appointed
later. In December two general ordinances were
published, one for the general regulation of the
town, the other relating specially to the markets.
The general ordinance created the offices of clerk,
marshal and collector, treasurer and assessor, all held
under bond and security. Assessments were to be
made in January, and tax collections reported to the
treasurer in June. It will not be uninteresting to
note the leading ofienses defined by this first act of
considerable opposition was made in consequence of municipal legislation, — firing guns or flying kites on
the coupling of a city hall with the market building, the streets, leaving cellar-doors open or teams un-
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
Ill
hitched, driving across or on foot-paths, racing
horses, letting hogs run at large, keeping stallions
on Washington Street, keeping piles of wood on the
same street more than twelve hours, or piles of
shavings anywhere more than two days, keeping a
drinking-house or a "show" without license. Of-
fenders were to be sued in twenty days before a jus-
tice of the peace in the name of the trustees.
Meetings of the Board were to be held on the first
Friday of each month, but at any time on a proper
call. The market ordinance provided for markets on
Wednesdays and Saturdays, two hours after daylight,
the market-master to look after weights and the qual-
ities of marketable articles, as he does now. Huck-
stering was prohibited. Town elections were to be
held annually in September.
Under this first municipal organization the town
continued till 1836, then the Legislature passed a
special act of incorporation legalizing the action of
the trustees previously. The wards were left un-
changed, but the election was shifted from September
to April. The trustees were to elect a president,
clerk, marshal, lister or assessor, collector, and other
customary town officers. They were also to levy
taxes and improve the streets and sidewalks at the
cost of the owners of the adjacent property. The
rate of taxation could not exceed one-half of one per
cent., and could only be levied on property within
the town plat. The act of incorporation included the
whole donation for all purposes but taxation. The
new Board continued the old ordinances mainly un-
changed. Settlement was made by the former officer
to April, 1836, the treasurer showing the receipt of a
revenue for the year of sixteen hundred and ten dol-
lars, and the expenditure of all but one hundred and
twenty-four dollars, a far more liberal margin than can
be found between receipts and expenses nowadays.
On the 17th of February, 1838, a reincorporation
act was passed, making no material change, however,
except increasinsr the wards to six, electing the presi-
dent of the Board by a general popular vote, and
each ward trustee by the voters of the ward. Pre-
viously all had been elected by a general vote. The
Board was to be the " Common Council," and elected
annually, four to make a quorum. The president
had the jurisdiction and powers of a justice of the
peace, and the marshal those of a constable. The
trustees received twelve dollars a year, or one dollar
for each regular monthly meeting. The new wards
were : First, all east of Alabama ; Second, to Penn-
sylvania ; Third, to Meridian; Fourth, to Illinois;
Fifth, to Mississippi ; Sixth, to the river. Tax sales
for delinquencies could be made by the new charter,
and the first was made on the 25th of October, 1839.
The four boundary streets of the city plat, North,
South, East, and West, had previously been mere
alleys, or closed altogether in places, but the new
Council ordered them opened. This city organiza-
tion continued until it was changed for something like
a regular city government of a mayor and Council,
in 1847. Some amendments were made from time
to time, but nothing that affected the general course
of public business. In February, 1839, the taxes
collected in West Indianapolis (now Indianola), west
of the river, were ordered to be expended, and alleys
were authorized to be opened in the donation. In
1840, in February, councilmen were required to serve
two years instead of one, and were given twenty-four
dollars a year. In February, 1841, the marshal was
elected by popular vote, and on Jan. 15, 1844, all the
town officers were changed from appointment by the
Council to election by the people. No effort at street
improvement was made till 1836, and no city engineer
employed till that year. No grading or paving of
sidewalks was attempted till 1839 or thereabouts.
The first survey attempted for any such purpose was
made by William Sullivan, for many years a justice
of the peace, at one time a teacher in the Old Semi-
nary, and one of the most honored of the old resi-
dents. He made a survey of the street and alley
between Meridian and Pennsylvania, north side of
Washington, in 1838. In 1841, James Wood was
employed to make a general survey, and did so. His
grades were followed till it was found that his whole
scheme of survey was based on the idea of turning
the city surface into an inclined plane sloping to the
southwest corner and into the river, without regard
to natural features favoring a less artificial and ex-
pensive drainage. Of the changes of municipal gov-
ernment after the first organization as a city in 1847,
112
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
an account will be found under the heading of
" Municipal Government."
For the first twelve years of the existence of the
town its history and that of the county are identical.
The' laws and officers of both were the same, the
taxes, improvements, and changes the same, so far as
they were dependent on public and official action.
For a period still longer, as before suggested, there
was a close identity of social condition. The sepa-
ration legally came in 1832, but the other only
became distinct a decade later. There is not much
to say of the county outside of the town in this
period of identity. After the erection of the public
buildings, already noted, there was little to do and
little means to do with. The following statement of
receipts for the first half-dozen years of the county
organization will tell the story of its financial condi-
tion. Treasurer Yandes' report for 1822 shows that
the total receipts from licenses and taxes was nine
hundred and seventy-five dollars and eighty-four
cents. Another statement shows the net revenue of
this first year to be eight hundred and fifty-five dol-
lars. The following table of receipts and expenses of
the county from its organization to the separation of
the town by incorporation is compiled from the
records of the County Board :
HeceiptB.
For 1822 S855.00
" 1823 730.29
" 1824 689.60
" 1825 845.93
" 1826 915.91
" 1827 1157.87
" 1828 918.69
" 1829 1786. 73i
" 1830 2095.48i
" 1831 2242.454
" 1832 3176.21 J
Expenses.
For 1822 Not stated.
" 1823 $863. 70i
" 1824 962.27J
" 1825 1235.18*
" 1326 501.73
" 1827 683.69
" 1928 688. 15i
" 1829 1034. 13i
" 1830 1045.34i
" 1831 1330.59
" 1832 2788.03+
The County Board, when the county was organized,
consisted of three commissioners, as already noted.
On the 31st of January, 1824, an act of the Legisla-
ture changed this mode of doing county business for
a board composed of all the justices of the peace of
the county. This was repealed in February, 1831,
and the board of three commissioners restored. In
1835 this was again made to give place to a board of
justices, which was once more and finally displaced by
commissioners in 1837. The first meeting of the
board of justices was on the 6tb of September, 1824,
at the house of John Carr, the court-house not being
quite finished yet. Joel Wright was elected presi-
dent over Wilkes Reagin and Obed Foote. The
members present were Joel Wright, Henry D. Bell,
Obed Foote, Jeremiah J. Corbaley, John C. Hume,
William D. Rooker, Sismund Basye, Wilkes Reagin,
and Joseph Beeler. It may be noted as a mark of
the culture of the times that the president of the
board signs himself " Preasadent of the Bord."
The work of the Board, whether of justices or com-
missioners, was largely of a routine character ; receiv-
ing petitions for the opening of county roads and
neighborhood roads, appointing " viewers" to examine
and report on the proposed lines, allowing little claims
for services or labor of one kind or another, licensing
stores composed the bulk of it. Occasionally a con-
stable was appointed and a list of grand and petit jurors
provided for the clerk to draw from in court terms.
The first roll of grand jurors, selected from among the
tax-payers of the county at the May session, 1822,
and numbering " fifty-four discreet householders," will
not be uninteresting :
Alexander Ralston. John McClung.
Joseph C. Reed. Thomas O'Neal.
Isaac Wilson. Reuben Putnam.
Thomas Anderson. John Allison.
Joseph Catterlin. William C. Blackmore.
Asahel Dunning. William Dyer.
Elijah Fox. Samuel D. Honelly.
Samuel Harding. William Conner.
Aaron Lambeth. Curtis Mallory.
Morris Morris. Wilkes Reagin.
George Norwood. George Smith.
Daniel Pettingill. Joel Wright.
WUliam D. Rooker. Robert Brenton.
John Myers. Jeremiah J. Corbaley.
James Paige. John Fox.
Judah Leaming. John Hawkins.
Collins Thorp. Alexis Jackson.
John Finch. Samuel G. Mitchell.
Archibald C. Reed. Samuel Morrow.
John Smock. James Porter.
David Wood. William Reagin.
George Buckner. Peter Harmonson.
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
113
Isaac Coe.
Francis Davis.
James Givan.
Jeremiah Johnson.
Zenas Lake.
Isaac Stevens.
Amasa Makepeace.
Joseph iMcCormick.
William Bush.
William Forster.
A sample of the ordinary business of the county
will serve as well as a full copy of the records to
inform the reader of its character. Here is an allow-
ance : " It is ordered that Calvin Fletcher be allowed
five dollars and fifty cents for three days' services in
appraising town lots under the direction of the lister
(Col. James Paxton), and Caleb Scudder be allowed
one dollar and fifty cents for one day's similar services,
all payable out of the county treasury." " Allowed
Joseph Clark, for making two jury boxes to contain
the selected names for the grand and petit jurors,
one dollar." " It is ordered that Calvin Fletcher and
John Packer be appointed to serve as overseers of the
poor in Centre- Warren township for, during, and
until the next session on the second Monday of May
next." " Allowed Francis Davis, David Wood, and
Demas L. McFarland one dollar and fifty cents each
for two days' services in viewing Harding's road (line
of old National road), and to Alexander W. Russell,
for two days' services in surveying the same, two dol-
lars, payable," etc. Whenever a road was petitioned
for and favorably considered — usually the result,
though sometimes remonstrances were put in and the
road disallowed — three reputable citizens and house-
holders were appointed to " view ' it, and upon their
report the road was ordered opened. The routes were
always indicated by the lines of the Congressional
survey, " section," " township," and " range," and
marked, as the reports frequently say, " with two hacks
with tomahawk" or " two chops with an axe" on the
trees at certain points. Some petitions wanted the
road opened " to the centre of town." There were
no cleared streets, not even Washington, at the first
meetings for county business. Roads out of and
through the town were cow-paths or stumpy openings
too densely closed in with trees and brush to allow
one neighbor to see the house of anotlier within hail-
ing distance. These will serve as specimens of the
county road-work, and it was a large portion of all that
was done. At every session there were from two to a
half-dozen road petitions to act on, " viewers" to ap-
point, and reports to receive. Here is a specimen of
a " store license :" " James Givan and son bavin"
satisfied the Board that they have not in amount more
than one thousand dollars in stock of foreign merchan-
dise, it is ordered that on producing the treasurer's
receipt for ten dollars they receive a licen.se to retail
foreign merchandise in this county for one year." The
tavern license was twelve dollars, and three taverns
paid it in 1823, — Hawkins', Carter's, and Blake &
Henderson's. Occasionally allowances were made for
the support of paupers by private citizens for a short
time, and like allowances were made to doctors for
services to the same class. Once in 1825 an allow-
ance of three dollars is made to Samuel Duke for a
coffin for a drowned negro, apparently the first person
drowned in the settlement. The following order
possesses the interest of novelty, at least to the great
majority of readers, who are not aware that debtors
could be imprisoned like thieves in Marion County in
early times : " Allowed to Hervey Bates for meat and
drink furnished to John J. E. Barnett and Samuel
Roberts (one of the first constables), insolvent per-
sons confined in the county jail at the suit of the
State." The amount is not given, as the item is
one of several allowed to Mr. Bates as sheriff. The
appointment of supervisors of roads, of school dis-
tricts, of the poor, the resignations and elections of
justices and constables, levies of taxes will about
complete the list of the labors of the County Board,
added to those above named, during the twelve
years that the town and county governments were
identical.
The events and incidents illustrating the develop-
ment of the town during seven years, from the organ-
ization of the first municipal government in 1832 to
the abandonment of the public works in 1839, which
forms the second division of the second period of the
city's history, may be treated in four groups : 1st,
The temporary improvement in business and real
estate values, originating in the confidence of an early
completion of the State's " Internal Improvement
System ;" 2d, The first establishment of some of the
industries which are now among the chief agencies of
the city's prosperity ; 3d, Enlarged educational ad-
lU
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
vantages ; 4th, The organization of some of the usual
business conveniences of cities.
1st. Within three years after ihe organization of
the town government the swell of the " Internal Im-
provement" tide began to be felt. Prices of lots stiff-
ened and speculation began to reach out for chances.
The State had spent one hundred thousand dollars in
making roads, but that could not go far in creating
transportation facilities in a country of dense woods
and few settlements. What the people wanted was
means of getting away and getting home with goods
and produce, and country roads were a very inade-
quate provision. Railroads were a recent improve-
ment about which the whole country was excited, and
Indiana wanted railroads. The Wabash and Erie
Canal was advancing with the help of Congressional
grants, but water-ways were wanted for the central
and eastern parts of the State. A canal to connect
the Ohio with the Wabash Canal was to pass through
here. A railroad to make a similar connection
higher up the Ohio was also to pass through
here. Other railroads, as before noted, aimed here
either as a terminus or necessary junction. The Leg-
islature of 1835-36, the first that met in the new
State-House, was confidently expected to go largely
into the improvement business and give Indianapolis
an especially elevating lift. Thus started the first
speculative movement in the history of the city. The
Legislature did not disappoint expectation. The
" Internal Improvement Bill," giving State aid to five
or six railroad, turnpike, and canal projects, notably
the Central Canal and the Madison Railroad, and
ordering the issue of ten million dollars of bonds
to make the aid effective, was passed on the 26th of
January, 1836, and was welcomed in advance on the
16th with bonfires and a brilliant illumination, the
first ever witnessed here, and the saddest in the out-
come that was ever witnessed anywhere. The canal
it was known would pass through one of the western
streets, and speculation moved that way. Some of
the heaviest sales that had ever been made were of
lots on Washington Street, along the two blocks be-
tween Mississippi and Missouri. William Quarles,
one of the most prominent criminal lawyers of the
State, built a residence as close to the line of the
canal as he could get. The settlement which had so
long been moving eastward, away from the river and
the site of the first settlement, began moving back.
Houses were rising rapidly and settlers coming in en-
couragingly. The great crash came the next year,
but it did not disturb the confidence of the people
here. The State's bonds still supplied money, kept
the public works going, and furnished means of spec-
ulation and appearances of prosperity; but in 1839
the shock fell with full force here, after sending
ahead premonitory tremors for several months. Prices
fell and speculators were ruined ; business was univer-
sally embarrassed ; real estate, both town and country,
was abundant but unavailable, — it would not bring
cash and could not pay debts. A good many sacri-
ficed all they had and even then did not pay all they
owed. Many others made compromises that enabled
them to look around and wait for chances, and finally
came out with a good start in another race. The
Bankrupt Act of 1841 proved a great help to strug-
gling honesty with unavailable means, yet fewer of
the business men of Indianapolis than of probably
any town in the State sought its relief. The great
" Internal Improvement System," which was expected
to prove so great a blessing, turned out an almost
unmitigated curse. For six years it burdened the
tax-payer and for twenty discredited the State. The
failure to keep up the interest in 1841 and thence
on to 1846, when the Butler compromise with the
bondholders was completed (by giving up the Wabash
Canal for seven million five hundred thousand dollars,
half of the principal debt, and issuing two and a
half per cent, bonds for the unpaid interest and five
per cent, bonds for the other half of the principal),
placed Indiana among the repudiating States, and was
a drag on her and the capital town for many a year.
The canal and railroad intended for this place were
not wholly thrown away, however. The Madison
Railroad was completed and running north to Vernon
a year or two before the panic struck it. Until 1843
the State operated it with little advantage to anybody.
Then it was sold to a company, as will be more par-
ticularly related in the part of the work treating
of " Transportation" and railroads. The canal was
worked in many places at once along a large part of
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
115
its length, but mainly from the river at Noblesville to
the lower part of Morgan County. A large force
was engaged in and near the town, and it was at that
time, from 1837 to 1839, that songs of " the canawl"
were so popular with the " uncultured." Some allu-
sion to them was made in the preceding chapter.
Of course there were frequent rows and bloody fights.
On one occasion in 1838 two factions of the Irish
hands kept up a fight nearly all day, engaging some
hundreds altogether and furnishing a good many sur-
gical subjects, but none fortunately for the sexton.
For two years long lines of little shanties, stuck in
among heaps of sand and piles of logs and brush cut
out of the line of the canal, were conspicuous features
of a dreary scene that they made doubly dreary.
Simultaneously with the canal work was going on the
grading and metaling of the National road, and the
two evil attractions brought here an unusual force of
worthless or mischievous characters, as noted in a
previous chapter. Their outrages both of violence
and theft became intolerable, and a public meeting
was called to devise a remedy. It was decided to
make an organization of the citizens, something like a
Vigilance Committee, with the conspicuous difference
that it was intended to enforce instead of supersede
the laws. This movement had a wholesome effect,
which was strengthened afterward by the rough hand-
ling of the leader, Burkhart, as related in the sketch
of the history of camp-meetings.
The canal was entirely completed between the city
and Broad Ripple, wliere there was a feeder-dam, and
for a time used a little for the legitimate purpose
of transporting wood and corn and occasional loads
of hay or lumber, and a good deal for the less legiti-
mate purpose of bathing and fishing. If passengers
ever used it they did it in a skiff. An eager run was
made for water-power, as will be noticed further along
in the account of the manufactures of this period.
A stone lock was put in at Market Street, and a race-
way taken westward north of Market, as may be seen
to-day, for mills nearer the river. Two wooden locks
were put in at the bluff of the swamp called " Palmer's
Glade," near the line of Kansas Street, but never
finished. The canal was never used for anything but
a mill-race below the stone lock, and for many of its
last years it was not used for that. It was made a sort
of open sewer, into which eveiybody who lived handy
threw their old boots and dead cats, ashes and rotten
cabbage, till it was too offensive to be borne. In 1870
it was abandoned altogether below Market Street, and
a sewer was laid in the bottom of it from Market to
Louisiana Street, where it connected with the main
sewer down Kentucky Avenue. Then it was rapidly
filled up as far down as Merrill Street, and in scattered
places farther south, till it was measurably effaced.
Recently it has been built in and over, and on the site
of the steel-rail rolling-mill has been so completely
destroyed that the most familiar eye fails to discern its
place, and only in a short " reach" above Morris
Street can any remains be detected. From Market
Street to the Ripple it is now an important adjunct of
the water-works, and is used for boating, swimming,
fishing, skating, and in packing far more than the
river is or ever was. The account of the changes in
this portion of it belongs to the sketch of the water-
works. The owners of the ground (or their assignees)
through which the canal diverged eastward from
Missouri Street at the crossing of Merrill, reaching
nearly to Tennessee Street, when abandoned by the
State's assignees as a means of navigation and hydraulic
power, reclaimed their proprietary rights. The In-
dianapolis, Cincinnati and Lafayette Railroad Com-
pany, which had purchased of the State's assignees the
lower part of the work, brought suit to restrain them
from filling it up or obstructing it. Judge Drum-
mond, of the United States Court, in an elaborate
opinion, sustained the rights of the original owners of
the ground, and thus this costly work was legally
allowed to be wiped out, so far as the lower station of
it is concerned. It was virtually finished, except an
aqueduct at Pleasant Run and some of the southern
creeks, nearly or quite to the Bluffs, but after the
abandonment of 1839 it was never used, never held
water, and was soon overgrown with underbrush.
2d. Before the organization of the town govern-
ment no attempt was made at manufacturing other
than the usual custom work of the mechanics who
are among the early settlers of all towns, except in
iron, leather, pottery, and the preparation of ginseng.
There were two pottery establishments in the place
116
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
as early as 1832 or earlier, and a third not far from
the same time. One of the early two was on Mary-
land Street, near Tennessee, the site of the Chamber
of Commerce, belonging to a Mr. Myers ; the other
was removed to make room for the State Bank build-
ing in 1840, and was established by Robert Brenton.
It occupied the peak between Illinois Street and
Kentucky Avenue, very near the first school-house.
The third was on Washington Street, north side,
near New Jer.?ey, and set its furnace in the "ravine"
that ran through the ground down to the creek, as
described in the '' topography" of the town. These
probably made ware for stock, besides what was made
on order, before the town organization. Daniel
Yandes, one of the industrial pioneers and benefactors
of the settlement, in connection with John Wilkius,
carried on a tannery on Alabama Street, near the site
of the city station-house, for several years before. As
early as 1830 or earlier James Blake and Nicholas
McCarty established a ginseng or, as it was called in
its day, a " sang"-factory, on the south bluflF of
Pogue's Run Valley, near the Cincinnati Railroad
depot site. Mr. McCarty bought the ginseng of
farmers here, and through his agents and branch
stores in other places, and Mr. Blake attended to the
preparation of it and its shipment to Philadelphia
for the Chinese market. Very near the time of the
first town organization Joshua Grover did some iron
foundry work, but nothing of any importance was at-
tempted till August, 1832. Then R. A. McPherson
& Co. established a considerable foundry on the west
side of the river, at the end of the bridge then in
progress. It failed, however, about the same time
the big steam-mill enterprise failed, as before related.
These are all of the more extended industries that
preceded the town government. There were the
grist- and saw-mills and carding-machines, and the
usual blacksmith, carpenter, wagon-maker, tailor,
shoemaker, cabinet, and other shops, and the town
fiddler. Bill Bagwell, made cigars on the southwest
corner of Illinois and Maryland Streets, but the
workmen usually kept no journeymen, and did all
their own work for cu.stomers. For twenty years or
more apprentices were taken under indenture to learn
the trade and live with their masters, getting a sum
of money and a suit of clothes at twenty-one, but the
apprentice system passed away with the changes
brought by the railroads. It is supposed that Mr.
Johnson, who established the first stage line in 1828,
opened a shop for coach repairs, and later for manu-
facture, about the time of the establishment of the
town government.
Enterprise began to appear more conspicuously
soon after this. In 1834, John L. Young and Wil-
liam Wernweg started the first brewery, on Maryland
Street, south side, halfway between Missouri and
West. About 1840 it was taken by Joseph Laux,
and later by Mr. Meikel. About the same time a
rope-walk was started on Market Street, east of the
market-house, and a linseed-oil mill was put in opera-
tion by John S. Barnes and Williamson Maxwell in
a stable on the alley south of Maryland Street, near
Missouri, close to the grounds of the present ward
school. Scudder & Hannaman got it the next year,
and moved it to the river bank in 1839. In 1835
the same enterprising firm began the manufacture of
tobacco in the log building on Kentucky Avenue,
below Merrill, where a carding-machine, run by
horse-power, had previously been operated. In that
year James Bradley, with one or two associates, cut,
cured, and packed pork in Myers' old pottery-shop,
on the site of the Chamber of Commerce, for the first
time in the history of the place. It was the feeble
beginning, ending in failure, of what has grown to be
the largest industrial interest of the city. Its ill-
fortune warned enterprise away for several years, but
when it came again, a half-dozen years later, it
" came to stay." In 1835, Robert Underbill and
John Wood started a steam foundry on Pennsyl-
vania Street, near the site of the Second Presby-
terian Church, and maintained it successfully in
making plow points, mill gearing, and domestic hol-
low-ware till 1852, when he removed to South Penn-
sylvania Street, began a larger establishment, failed,
and left the building to other uses, and it was burned
in 1858. In 1836-37, Young & Pottage, carrying
on the hardware business, on the southwest corner of
Meridian and Washington Streets, engaged John J.
Nash to make carpenters' planes, and the excellence
of his work commanded a profitable trade as long as
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
117
the firm continued. In 1836, Hiram Devinney be-
gan the manufacture of mattresses, cushions, and
similar work, near Maryland Street and the line of
the canal. In 1839, Scudder & Hannanian built a
carding-mill on the river bank, near the site of the
water-works, and added some spinning, weaving,
and fulling machinery. About the same time Na-
thaniel West established a mill of the same kind at
the crossing of the canal and the Michigan road,
long called Cottontown. He also carried on cotton-
spinning there at the same time. At very nearly
the same time a German by the name of Protzman,
the first leader of the first brass band in the town,
began the manufacture of soap, on the canal, near
McCarty Street, then a lane, among cow-pastures and
cornfields; and about that time, too, Nicholas Mc-
Carty began the manufacture of hemp, grown on his
Bayou farm, on the canal, near the present line of
Ray Street. Within a few months William Sheets
established the first paper-mill on the canal and race
at Market Street, and maintained it successfully
nearly all his life after. In 1839 or 1840 a hay-
press was set up on the lot opposite the northwest
corner of the State-House Square, and a considerable
quantity of hay was pressed there for shipment by
flat-boats down the Mississippi River. There were
two or three at one time, but the business was not
maintained long. These early industries will be noticed
more particularly in the department of Manufactures.
It will be noticed that several of the industries re-
ferred to here were started in 1838 and 1839, just
before the failure of the public works. The canal,
it was confidently believed, would some time be
completed, and, in any event, it supplied a consider-
able water-power, which could be leased on favorable
terms of the State. This is the explanation of the
matter. By the 11th of June, 1838, sites were
leased for one woolen-mill and one cotton-mill, two
paper-mills, one oil-, two grist-, and two saw-mills,
and the buildings soon after erected and set to work.
There was long complaint of the inadequacy of the
power, and the frequent obstructions from grasses
and other vegetable growths, and of the ofi'ensiveness
of the canal-bed when the water was shut off to allow
the grass to be cut. The Legislature ordered it sold
Jan. 19, 1850, and it was sold in 1851 to Gould &
Jackson, who sold the next fall to the " Central
Canal Hydraulic Water- Works and Manufacturing
Company," an association whose multitudinous name
was the best part of it. From that concern the canal
passed to other hands, and finally, as already stated,
into the possession of the present W^ater-Works
Company, where it is likely to stay.
In February, 1835, the State Board of Agriculture
was chartered by the Legislature, with James Blake,
Larkin Siinms, John Owen, and M. M. Henkle direc-
tors, of whom Mr. Blake was president, and Mr.
Henkle secretary. They offered premiums for essays,
and made rules for the organization of county asso-
ciations. A State Agricultural Convention was held
in the State-House Dec. 14, 1835, and two or three
smaller meetings were held annually afterwards, but
the enterprise was premature. A County Society was
formed in June, 1835, with Nathan B. Palmer as
president and Douglass Maguire as secretary, and col-
lected subscriptions for a premium fund, aided to the
extent of fifty dollars by the board of justices, which
was disbursed on the last day of October in one hun-
dred and eighty-four dollars of premiums on exhibi-
tions made in the court-house yard at that time. For
the premiums of the next fair four hundred dollars
was subscribed, and the exhibitions promised to be-
come as permanent as the State Fairs are now, but
the crash of 1837 ruined this with many another
promising project of improvement. The " Benevolent
Society," still the most extensive, active, and effective
of the city's charities, was organized in November,
1835, with much the same arrangement as now, — a
president, secretary, treasurer, depositary, and visitors.
The latter collected clothes, money, household goods,
groceries, anything that the destitute could use, and
stored them with the depositary, to be delivered on
proper orders. Several associations have been formed
on the same plan since, particularly the " Ladies'
Relief Society" and the " Flower Blission," but one
has disbanded, and the other, active and beneficent as
it is, can hardly hope to reach the extent of service
of the association now nearly a half-century old.
3d. The improvement of educational agencies in
this interval following the institution of the town gov-
118
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MAKION COUNTY.
ernment was hardly less conspicuous than the improve-
ment of business and real estate, and it was much
more durable. The " Old Seminary" was finished in
1834, and first occupied by the late Gen. Ebenezer
Dumont, Sept. 1, 1834. The following January he
was succeeded by William J. Hill, who afterwards
taught in the old carpenter-shop on the northwest
corner of Market and Delaware Streets, where he was
succeeded in 1836 by Josephus Cicero Worrall, as he
always signed himself in his magniloquent quarterly
announcements. Thomas D. Gregg, who died some
years ago and left a handsome bequest to the city,
succeeded Mr. Hill in May, 1836, in the seminary,
and William Sullivan, for many years a justice of the
peace and still living, honored by everybody, followed
in December, 1836. Rev. William A. Holliday,
father of John H., the founder of the Indianapolis
Mews, came next in August, 1837. James S. Kem-
per, still annually honored in the reunions of the
"Old Seminary Boys," succeeded Mr. Holliday in the
summer of 1838, and continued till 1845, when Rev.
J. P. Safibrd, recently deceased in Zanesville, Ohio,
succeeded for a short time, and was followed by Mr.
B. L. Lang till 1852. Mr. Kemper's methods and
success, and his long retention of the school, made
him and the seminary so popular as to draw pupils
from other States, and the course of study was as
thorough in all branches as that of most colleges. A
large number of the prominent men of the city and
State were pupils at the Old Seminary. Five years
ago they formed an association called the " Old Semi-
nary Boys," gray-headed and bald-headed fathers and
grandfathers, to hold annual reunions, and with their
families renew old games, associations, and memories.
Twice Mr. Kemper and his wife have been present,
and once Mr. Lang was present. The officers now
are : President, Calvin Fletcher ; Secretary, George
W. Sloan ; Corresponding Secretary, Oliver M. Wilson ;
Treasurer, Ingram Fletcher ; Historian, B. R. Sul-
grove. In 1878, at the first reunion, there were
" Old Boys" present who had not met their old
school-mates and teacher, Mr. Kemper, in forty years.
It was a gathering almost unique in any country of
the world, and entirely so in Indiana. A meeting of
the school-boys and teacher of a school long past in a
house long torn away, after the lapse of forty years,
was something to remember, at least for the partici-
pants. The seminary in 1853 was taken into the
free-school system, then first made practical. More
wil> be said of the schools in the proper place.
A few years later than the opening of the County
Seminary, mainly for boys, though girls attended for
a short time, the Misses Axtell opened a school of
corresponding grade for girls exclusively. It was
called the " Indianapolis Female Institute," and was
chartered by the Legislature at the session of 1836—
37. The first term began June 14, 1837, in the
upper story of the Sanders Block, on Washington
near Meridian Street. Subsequently a removal was
made to the upper rooms on the same street a half-
block east of Meridian, where the city offices were
kept for a time, and burned in the winter of 1851-52.
Soon after a frame building was erected on the grounds
of the old Presbyterian Church on Pennsylvania
Street, south of the Exchange Block, and the insti-
tute taken there, where it remained while the Misses
Axtell lived. These two schools were a great ad-
vance on those previous to their establishment ; but
they were not " alone in their glory." In October,
1847, Gilman Marston, since of national reputation
as a member of Congress from New Hampshire, a
general during the civil war, and a Territorial Gov-
ernor since the war, opened a school in the rooms
afterwards taken by the Axtells, in connection with
Mrs. Eliza Richmond. The next summer they re-
moved to a frame specially built for them on Circle
Street, near the site of the residence of Mr. W. H.
English. It was called " Franklin Institute," and
looked like a country church. Mr. Marston left it
the following year, 1839, and was succeeded by Or-
lando Chester, who died in 1840, and then Mr. John
Wheeler took it and kept for a couple of years, when
it was abandoned. In November, 1839, Mrs. Britton,
wife of the Episcopalian minister, opened a female
seminary on Pennsylvania Street, near the Underbill
foundry, afterwards removed to the building north of
Christ Church, and long known as " St. Mary's Semi-
nary," under Mrs. Johnson, wife of a successor of
3Ir. Britton in the rectory.
From 1836, Josephus Cicero Worrall kept what
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
119
he called the " Indianapolis Academy" in the old
building above referred to. He was a " character,"
and not by any means a pleasant one. He did not
know much, but he could make polysyllabic poluphlos-
boyant announcements of the approaching opening
of his terms that puzzled the little dictionaries of the
day, and would have delighted the classic ears of
" Lorenzo Altisonant." They were the periodical
jokes of the town. His tastes and habits were as
eccentric as his literature. His fondness for tobacco
was a ravenous hunger. He tore it off in wads of a
mouthful, and crunched it with the eagerness of a
hungry Hoosier at a show on a " quarter section" of
gingerbread. He smoked as much as he chewed,
and he smoked while he chewed. When he didn't
smoke he kept the stub of a cigar in his mouth
and mumbled it, while he rolled a quid as a sweet
morsel under his tongue. When he undertook to ex-
plain some mathematical intricacy to a pupil he would
spit a shower of damp tobacco flakes on the slate and
rub them off to one side like snow off a sidewalk.
He whipped incessantly, with little care for provoca-
tion, but usually contented himself with a single stroke
of a beech switch applied to the pupil in her seat,
face to the wall and back turned out, as the house
was arranged. He generally made a circuit of the
three seated sides of the room about four times in each
session of the day, and whipped about one pupil in three
in each round. He made the boys saw or chop his
wood and carry it into his residence, which was a
little shed adjoining the school-house on the north.
Some of them were required to lose their Saturday's
holiday to help him move to a little frame on the
southeast corner of Delaware and Ohio Streets. The
girls were made to help his wife take care of the
baby, or wash, or do other housework. Of course
everybody, boys and girls, detested him. On Christ-
mas-day, 1837, they " barred him out," the first and
only time that this old game was played with a teacher
in Indianapolis. He was not allowed to get in till he
" treated," which he did with a half-dollar's worth of
cider and apples, and got most of both himself His
school continued in a feeble way after Mr. Kemper
took the seminary for five or six years.
Contemporaneously with Mr. Worrall another char-
acter, that would be called in the apt slang of the day
and Guiteau a " crank," taught a small school of small
boys in the lower room of a frame building on the
opposite side of Market Street from the " Academy."
His name was Main, and he was a Scotchman of un-
doubted but utterly unavailable learning. He was as
fond of snuff as his compeer of the other school was
of tobacco, and he carried a Scotch " mull," made of
horn and capped with silver, that would hold a half-
pint at least. He was very absent-minded, and given
to sitting with his spectacles dropped low on the tip
of his nose and gazing away off in the atmosphere,
as completely lost to his surroundings as if he were
asleep, or holding his head squeezed between his hands
with his elbows on the table, staring fixedly at a
crack or a nail-hole as a mesmeric subject stares at a
dime to induce sleep. In the.se moods he noticed
nothing about him. The boys could play marbles,
or pull pins, or run out-doors and roll round in the
weeds in perfect safety. If the old fellow should
come out of his reverie he would notice no disorder,
and had usually to bo prompted to know what his
next class was. If he wandered off dreaming while
hearing a recitation, as he sometimes did, he had to
be told what the class was and where the recitation
had stopped when he came to himself. Not unfre-
quently he would sit through the better of a half-
day's session and never think of calling a class unless
reminded by some importunate and preposterous pupil,
a weakness, however, that very few boys could re-
proach themselves with. He taught but a single
quarter, and then removed, with his brother, a tailor
and his brother-in-law, the first stone-cutter, or one of
the first, a Mr. Spear, to Arkansas. But very few,
even of the old residents, ever knew anything of him
or can now recall him, he was so retiring and indif-
ferent to company. Of the earlier private schools
and of the public schools an account will be given in
the chapter of schools, with a notice of all the educa-
tional institutions of the city.
4th. During the short period under consideration
were established some of those business conveniences
which in old communities soon become necessities ;
that is, banks and insurance companies and protection
against, as well as indemnity for, damage by fire. The
120
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
State Bank was chartered Jan. 28, 1834, to run for
twenty-five years. The State took half of the stock,
and appointed the president and half of the directors.
Bonds called " bank bonds" were issued to pay out the
State's stock, and made payable from the State's divi-
dends. These dividends were to be employed as a
sinking fund, and make loans to accommodate farmers
and purchasers of land primarily on mortgage security ;
the president of tlie bank to be president of the fund
management. The profits of the fund as well as
the principal were to be applied first to pay the bank
bonds, and the remainder was to go to the school fund.
So judiciously was this fund managed that when it
was wound up finally some twenty years ago it paid
to the support of free schools a permanent fund of
nearly four million dollars. The first president of
the bank and fund was Samuel Merrill, State treas-
urer ; the first State directors, Calvin Fletcher, Seton
W. Norris, Robert Morrison, and Thomas H. Scott.
James M. Ray was appointed cashier, and remained
so till the bank was wound up. In the first place ten
branches were created in the principal towns of the
State, but the number was finally increased to sixteen.
Samuel Merrill was president till 1840, when he was
made president of the Madison Railroad. He was
succeeded by Judge James Morrison till 1850, he
by the late Gen. Ebenezer Dumont till 1855, and
he by Hugh McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury,
succeeding Mr. Fessenden. W. H. Talbott was
president of the sinking fund in its last years while
closing up, about 1863 to 1864. The first location
of the mother-bank was in the Governor's house in
the Circle, then on Washington Street, and was re-
moved to its own building, corner of Illinois Street
and Kentucky Avenue, in 1840. In 1837, when the
great financial crash came, the bank and all its
branches suspended specie payment May 18th, and
remained suspended till Jan. 15, 1842, when the
Legislature ordered resumption. This course did not
impair either the credit or usefulness of the institu-
tion.
The Indianapolis Branch was organized Nov. 11,
1834, with Hervey Bates, president, and Bethuel F.
Morris, cashier. The location was on the south side
of Washington Street, on the site of the present
Vance Block. The oflBcers and location were retained
together till 1840, when the building corner of
Pennsylvania Street and Virginia Avenue, corre-
sponding in situation to the parent bank, was finished
and the institution removed there. Some years after
Calvin Fletcher was made president in place of Mr.
Bates, and Thomas H. Sharpe cashier in place of Mr.
Morris, and these remained till the bank was wound
up. Of the Bank of the State, the successor of the
State Bank, but with no State interest in it, an ac-
count will be found under the head of " Banks," with
a notice of all the banking establishments of the city.
In this connection may be noticed the first private
bank ever opened here. It was owned by Mr. John
Wood, one of the firm in the Pennsylvania Street
foundry, and began business in 1838. He failed in
September, 1841. In 1839, Edward S. Alvord &
Co. did a private banking business for four or five
years. At the same time Stoughton A. Fletcher,
brother of Calvin, began the same business, either at
first or soon after joined by William D. Wygant, on
Washington Street, and that was the beginning of a
most successful business, now in its forty-fourth year,
as Fletcher & Churchman's bank.
The first insurance company was organized here
March 16, 1836, under a fifty-year charter, with a cap-
ital of two hundred thousand dollars. Douglass Ma-
guire was president, and Caleb Scudder secretary. It
never did much, but was in operation till shortly before
the outbreak of the war. In 1865 the stock passed
into the hands of able managers and a new company
was organized, with William Henderson as president,
and Alexander C. Jameson as secretary. The Indi-
ana Mutual Fire Insurance Company was chartered
Jan. 30, 1837, and organized the next month, with
James Blake as president, and Charles W. Cady as
secretary and actuary and general manager. It did
well for a few years, but the plan was said to be inef-
fectively contrived, and it met some serious losses and
became insolvent, going out altogether about the year
1850.
On the completion of the State-House in 1835, the
Legislature provided for its protection from fire by
ordering its insurance and the purchase of twenty
leather fire-buckets, and ladders long enough to reach
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
121
the roof. It also proposed to pay half of the cost of
a fire-engine if the citizens would subscribe the other
h;ilf. A meeting was held February 12th to consider
the proposition. The old fire company of 1827 reor-
ganized as the Marion Fire Hose and Protection Com-
pany, famous for many a year after the '' Old Marion,"'
and the main dependence of the volunteer department
for more than twenty years. Caleb Scudder was the
first captain. The meeting requested the trustees to
levy a tax to pay the town's share of the cost of the
engine, and it was done, aided by individual subscrip-
tions, and the Marion end-brake hand-engine, manned
by twenty-eight to thirty men, and able to throw an
inch stream two hundred feet, was bought of Merrick
& Co., Philadelphia, for one thousand eight hundred
dollars. The State built a little one-story house for it
in 18.36, but in 1837 the town built a two-story frame
north side of the Circle, with a room for the Council
on the second story. It was burned in 1851. The
company was incorporated the next year. A second
company was formed in 18-10, but an account of the
whole fire department from the first will be found
under that caption. Five fire-wells were made in
1835-36.
The State militia system, as already described, fell
into disuse and discredit soon after the settlement of
the town, and no substitute was attempted by State or
local or individual influence till 1837. Then a meet-
ing was held on the 22d of February to form a mili-
tary company. Alexander W. Russell, the old militia
colonel, was made captain, and succeeded the next
year by Gen. Thomas A. Morris, then but a few years
out of West Point. He distinguished himself in the
first campaign of the civil war in West Virginia by
really doing all the planning and work that made that
so brilliant a success. Gen. McClellan was still in the
East, and arrived just in time to see the completion
of Gen. Morris' work, and appropriate all the credit
of it. This company continued to drill and parade
and decorate public occasions by its excellent drill and
handsome gray uniform faced with black velvet till
1845. The company was incorporated in 1838. The
following year the Marion Rifles formed a company
under Capt. Thomas McBaker. Their uniform was
a blue cotton "hunting-shirt" fringed, with blue
breeches, and they were armed with the clumsiest
breech-loading rifles that were ever invented.
A notable event of this period was the completion
and opening of what may be fairly called the first
"hotel" in the place, in 1836, the "Washington
Hall," turned into the " Glenn Block" and New
York Store in 1859. It was kept for many years by
the late Edmund Browning, and was the Whig head-
quarters as long as there was a Whig party, as the
Palmer House was the headquarters of the Dem-
ocracy. A complete account of the hotels will be
found in another part of the work. The Palmer
House, now Occidental, it may be observed here, was
begun in the latter part of 1839, and opened in 18-11
by John C. Parker, of Charleston, Clarke Co., Ind.
The first editorial convention was held here May 29,
1837. The first ladies' fair was held December 31st
of the year for the benefit of the Ladies' Missionary
Society, and made two hundred and thirty dollars.
Professor C. P. Bronson, the first noted elocutionist
that visited Central Indiana, lectured Aug. 30, 1836.
At the second meeting of the County Agricultural So-
ciety, Calvin Fletcher, the orator of the occasion, said
that one million three hundred thousand bushels of
corn had been produced on thirteen hundred farms in
the county. Luke Munsell and William Sullivan both
published maps of the town in 1836, the former May
30th, and the latter in October. Revs. James Havens
and John C. Smith held a great camp-meeting that
year on the Military Ground, August 25th to 30th,
and made one hundred and thirty conversions. In
1837, while the metaling of the National road in
Washington Street was going on, the trustees took
measures to improve the sidewalks. They were made
fifteen feet wide in the original plan, but were subse-
quently widened to twenty, and the ninety-feet street-
walks were originally changed from ten to twelve, and
later to fifteen. The property-holders resisted the
changes because it increased the expense of improve-
ment, which was charged against the property. This
was the first street improving ever attempted. The
first clothing-store was opened here in 1838 by Ben-
jamin Orr. In 1839 a mistake of eight acres was
discovered in the original survey of the donation.
Congress generously added the ground to the donation
122
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
in 1840, on the memorial of the Legislature. The
first Thanksgiving ever held in the State was in 1839,
.on a proclamation of Governor Wallace fixing Thurs-
day, the 28th of November, as the day. The winter
of 1838-39 saw the first attempt at a regular the-
atrical exhibition with orchestra, scenery, and all the
usual adjuncts of the stage. The manager was a Mr.
Lindsay. His theatre was the wagon-shop of Mr.
Ollaman, on Washington Street, opposite the court-
house. He returned in 1840-41, and made a theatre
of an old printing-ofBce on the present site of the
News building. A few years later another company
gave concerts and dramatic exhibitions in the upper
room of Gaston's carriage- factory, site of the Bates
House.
On the 12th of February, 1839, the Legislature
ordered the State officers to buy the residence, re-
cently finished, of Dr. John H. Sanders, corner of
Illinois and Market Streets, for a residence for the
Governor. Until that time the need of an official
Executive residence had not been felt. Governor
Noble, the predecessor of Governor Wallace, was a
resident of the town, and lived during his two terms
in his own house. So did Governor Ray, who, as
acting Governor for a year succeeding iu the fraction
of the term of Governor Hendricks, who had gone
to the National Senate, and for two terms, or six
years, as regularly elected Executive, held the office
nearly all the time after the removal of the capital
from Corydon. But Governor Wallace came from
Brookville, had no residence here, and for some time
lived in a two-story house on the south side of Wash-
ington Street, just west of the canal. The Executive
mansion was occupied all the time from 1839 till
1863, in the fall, when Governor Morton abandoned
it on account of its unhealthiness, and went to board-
ing with his family till he made a purchase of the
residence on the southeast corner of Pennsylvania and
New York Streets, where he lived the remainder of
his life, and died in the fall of 1877. The Governors
all suffered in that house. Governor Bigger, who
succeeded Governor Wallace, seems to have contracted
there the disease that carried him ofi' soon after he
left the office. Governor Whitcomb, who married
while occupying the house, lost his young wife there.
Governor Wright lost his first wife there. Governor
Willard's wife was always ill while there. Governor
Lane only held the office two or three days, and never
had a chance to test the morbific influence of the
house, but Governor Morton did and left. It and
the quarter of a square, or one acre, of ground about •
were sold in 1865, and compact masses of business
houses cover the whole space.
In May, 1838, the split that had for some time
been moving deeper into the Presbyterian brotherhood
reached Indianapolis and a division was made, fifteen
members withdrawing and forming the Second Church,
Nov. 19, 1838, under Rev. J. H. Johnson. In May,
1839, Henry Ward Beecher was called from Lawrence-
burg, where he began his now famous ministry, and
served here till Sept. 19, 1847. The Episcopalians,
who had been using the court-house for a church
since 1835 occasionally, organized a church in the
spring of 1837, and built Christ Church the next
year. A sketch of the history of all the churches
will treat these more fully.
The first murders in the town took place in the
seven years of this period which have been under
consideration. On the 8th of May, Michael Van
Blaricum drowned William McPherson while ferrying
him across the river, just below the line of the present
Washington Street bridge, by wilfully rocking and
upsetting the boat. His motive appears to have been
a sort of contemptuous dislike of his victim, whom
he regarded as what in these days is called a " dude,"
and probably meant no worse than to duck him and
spoil his clothes. He asserted that he intended no
more. But he was convicted and sent to the peniten-
tiary for three years in October, 1834. He was par-
doned when his time was about half out. He was the
ferryman of the ferry at that point. The second
murder was bloodier and less excusable. It was
committed April 27, 1836, by Arnold Lashley on
Zachariah Collins. Lashley was a coach-maker, who
had succeeded the Johnsons in the establishment on
the site now occupied by the post-office and the busi-
ness houses north of it on the east side of Pennsyl-
vania Street, a Kentuckian and a hot-tempered fellow.
Collins was a charcoal-burner who supplied Lashley's
establishment. On the day of the homicide he had
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
123
brought in a wagon-load of coal, and was unloading
it in the usual place, when Lashley complained that
the coal was dirty, and ordered him to stop unloading
it. Collins seems to have been as surly as Lashley
was fiery, and went coolly on with his work ; after a
few words more of remonstrance, Lashley seized a
single-tree lying on the floor and struck Collins on
the head or neck, killing him instantly. He was
arrested, and after a preliminary examination held to
bail. While under bail he ran away and was never
seen or heard of here again. Not long after this an
Indianapolis or Marion County man of the name of
McDowell had a quarrel with some one at a race in
Hamilton County, and killed him by a blow that
broke his neck.
In 1838-39 a market-house was built for the
western part of the town on the west side of Ten-
nessee Street at the crossing of Ohio. Ephraim Cole-
/Stock was paid three thousand eight hundred and fifty
dollars for it, and for making an addition to the East
Market. The new house was not used at all for four or
five years, and never was used like the old one, though
a larger and every way better house. The south end
of the same square (held by the State) was occupied
by the Arsenal during the war. When the State de-
cided to build a new State-House, the city surrendered
the market-house and vacated Market Street, thus
giving the State-House two unbroken squares, with
the intervening street making nearly nine acres.
The last division of the second period of the city's
history is that extending from the abandonment of
the public works to the completion of the first rail-
road and the organization of the town under a city
charter in 1847. Its leading features are : 1st, The
establishment of the State benevolent institutions or
asylums, or the adoption of measures with that object,
in 1843 and the two or three succeeding years ;
2d, Political events and excitements ; 3d, Incidents
wholly local and not important, but worth attention
as marks of a development ; 4th, Religious move-
ments.
1st. The Legislature, having been repeatedly so-
licited by petitions and memorials to make some
provision for the insane, deaf and dumb, and blind
of the State, in 1839 addressed Congress on the
subject of a grant to assist in making such a pro-
vision. This was never done, and there was no good
reason why it should have been done or should have
been asked. On the 31st of January, 1842, Gover-
nor Bigger was ordered by the Legislature to corre-
spond with the Governors of other States and the
officers of like institutions and ascertain the cost and
modes of construction and management of insane
hospitals, and on the 13th of February, 1843, was
ordered to obtain plans to be submitted to the next
Legislature. This was done, with the effect of se-
curing a tax of one cent on one hundred dollars to
create a "building fund for an insane hospital here.
This was the 15th of January, 1844. On the 13th
of January, 1845, Dr. John Evans, Dr. L. Dunlap,
and James Blake were appointed commissioners to
select a site of not exceeding two hundred acres.
They chose Mount Jackson, then the home of the
Indiana poetess, Mrs. Sarah T. Bolton, and her hus-
band, the first editor in Indianapolis or the New Pur-
chase. They reported the selection with a building
plan to the Legislature the following session of 1845-
46, and on the 19th of January, 1846, they were
ordered to begin work on the building, and to sell
Hospital Square 22, and apply the proceeds, with
fifteen thousand dollars from the State treasury, to
the work. The central building was begun the same
year and finished in 1847, at a cost of seventy-five
thousand dollars. The south wing was added in
1853-56, and the north wing in 1866-69. A great
many minor changes and additions have been made at
one time or another. The frontage is six hundred
and twenty-four feet. The centre building is five
stories high, including a basement and top half-story.
A belvidere on the centre building is one hundred
and three feet above the ground. The wings are three
and four stories high. The third floor of the build-
ing in the rear of the centre is used as a chapel,
with a seating capacity of three hundred. The other
two stories are used by the employes as kitchen and
dining-room, steward's office, sewing-rooms, and the
like. In the rear of this building is the engine
building, with pumps and heating pipes and other
necessary apparatus. A sewage system discharges
into Eagle Creek. Water is supplied by a system of
124
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
water-works on the Holly plan, like that of the city,
with ample protection by fire-plugs and hose against
fire. The whole structure is lighted with gas. It
can accommodate six hundred or more patients at a
time, with the necessary attendants. The superin-
dents have been, in order of succession, Dr. John
Evans, Dr. R. J. Patterson, Dr. James S. Athon,
Dr. James H. Woodburn, Dr. Wilson Lockhart, Dr.
Orpheus Everts, Dr. Rogers, and Dr. William B.
Fletcher. The last has very recently introduced the
system of intelligent restraint and kind treatment
in place of manacles and strait-waistcoats, with, so
far, decided success. A few years ago the Legisla-
ture concluded to make additional provision for the
insane, who could not be accommodated in the old
building, and ordered a new one, directly north of the
old one, on a plan furnished by the late Edwin M.ay,
architect of the new State-House. It was two or
three years in building, and has but recently been
finished. It is used mainly or wholly for female pa-
tients, and will accommodate suitably some seven
or eight hundred. The frontage is about eleven
hundred feet, with a centre building and three wings
on each side of it, each one retiring some feet back
from the line of the other, making the front a series
of steps. It is nearly three hundred feet through
the centre to the line joining the rear of the extreme
wings. Within the year sites have been selected by
commissioners for asylums for the incurably insane,
for whom hitherto no provision has been made, though
warmly urged by Governor Baker ten years ago.
There are to be five of them, located at different suit-
able points in the State. The sites selected are Fort
Wayne, Evansville, Richmond, Terre Haute, and La-
fayette. At present, and ever since the asylum has
been open, patients found to be incurable have been
returned to their friends to make room for curable
patients. In 1857, in consequence of the failure of
appropriations in a party quarrel in the State Sen-
ate, the asylums were all closed and the inmates re-
turned to their homes. The insane in some cases
were put in poor-houses. In others the counties
made arrangements to pay for their care in the State
institution here. This paralysis continued for four
or five months, and then Governor Willard concluded
to borrow money and reopen the institutions, but it
was some time before they fully recovered from the
blow.
On the 13th of February, 1843, the Legislature
levied a tax of one-fifth of a cent on one hundred dol-
lars, for a fund to establish an asylum for deaf mutes.
In the spring following William Willard, a deaf
mute teacher in the Ohio institution, came here and
opened a private school for similar sufferers in Octo-
ber, receiving sixteen pupils the first year. On the
15th of January, 1844, the Legislature made the
school a State institution, and Governor Whitcomb,
Secretary of State William Sheets, Treasurer of
State George H. Dunn, Rev. Phineas D. Gurley,
Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, Rev. Love H. Jameson,
Judge James Morrison, Dr. L. Dunlap, and Rev.
Matthew Simpson were appointed trustees, with
authority to rent a room and employ necessary
teachers. They rented the residence, a large two-^
story frame, recently erected by Dr. George W. Stipp,
on the southeast corner of Maryland and Illinois
Streets. The State Asylum or school was opened
here Oct. 1, 1844, one year after the opening of Mr.
Willard's private school. In 1845 the Governor by
authority appointed a new board of trustees, but con-
tinued most of the old members on it. In 1846 the
school was removed to the three-story brick Kinder
building on the south side of Washington Street near
Delaware, and remained there four years, till the
completion of the asylum building at the corner of
Washington Street and State Avenue, in October,
1850. This site was selected in 1846, the trustees
making a purchase of thirty acres for the necessary
grounds. The building was erected in 1848-49, at
a cost of thirty thousand dollars. Additions have
since been made to it and to the ground, so that the
latter now contains one hundred and five acres, and
the aggregate cost of the former has been about
two hundred and twenty thousand dollars. The
grounds are beautifully ornamented with forest and
other shade-trees and various kinds of flowers and
shrubbery, with winding walks and drives and a con-
servatory, besides playgrounds and an orchard and
vegetable garden. The larger portion is used for
pasture and farm ground. Mr. Willard was superin-
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
125
tendent till 1845, then James S. Brown was
appointed, and served till 1853, when he was suc-
ceeded by Thomas Molntyre, who was retired under
a change of system and management about three
years ago. The number of pupils varies from year
to year, but will run from two hundred and fifty
to three hundred usually. Successful efi"orts have
recently been made to teach articulate speech by
motion of the lips.
In 1844-45, during the session of the Legislature,
some of the pupils of the Kentucky Blind Asylum
came here, under charge of the late William H.
Churchman, and gave exhibitions at Bcecher's church,
which the legislators attended largely, and seemed
deeply interested in one of them. Mr. Dirk Rous-
seau, senator from Greene, and brother of the late
Gen. Lovell H. Rousseau, proposed an arithmetical
problem for one of the blind boys to solve by mental
process, and not making it very clear in his oval state-
ment he wrote it out, took it up to the pulpit, and
carefully held it before the sightless eyes, reading it
slowly, and tracing every line with his finger. For a
moment the absurdity of the thing did not strike the
audience, and then it all came at once in a roar that
shook the house, and that first wakened the senator's
attention. He blushed, laughed, and came down to
his seat. The Legislature was fully satisfied with the
evidence afl'orded by this exhibition, and levied a two-
mill tax to establish a blind asylum. The Secretary of
State, John H. Thompson, Auditor Horatio J. Harris,
Treasurer Royal Mayhew, with James M. Ray and
Dr. G. W. Mears, were made commissioners at the
following session to apply the two-mill fund, either
in approving a school here or maintaining the State's
pupils at the Ohio or Kentucky institutions. Mr.
Churchman was appointed to address the people of
the State on the subject, and ascertain the number
of blind requiring public assistance in acquiring an
education. On the 27th of January, 1847, Dr.
George W. Mears, Calvin Fletcher, and James M.
Ray were appointed commissioners to provide the
necessary buildings and make arrangements for a
school here, with an appropriation of five thousand
dollars for a site and furniture and other necessaries.
Seton W. Norris replaced Mr. Fletcher, who declined.
and the school was opened Oct. 1, 1847, in the same
building that the Deaf and Dumb School first occupied,
southeast corner of Maryland and Illinois Streets.
Nine pupils attended at first, but there were thirty
during the session. In September, 1848, a removal
was made to a three-story brick, erected for a work-
shop, on the asylum grounds, — the two squares north
of North Street, between Pennsylvania and Meridian
Streets, formerly " Pratt's Walnut Grove." Here
the school was kept till the completion of the asylum
proper in February, 1853. It was begun about three
years before. The cost of the original building and
grounds was one hundred and ten thousand dollars.
The main central building is ninety feet front by
sixty -one feet deep, and five stories high ; at each
end is a wing four stories high, thirty feet front by
eighty-three feet deep. The total front from east to
west is one hundred and fifty feet. A Corinthian
cupola crowns the centre building. A portico stands
in front of the centre, and iron galleries or colonnades
surround the two lower stories of the wings. The
average attendance of pupils is over one hundred, a
considerable majority of whom are usually females.
The superintendents have been William H. Church-
man, from Oct. 1, 1847, to Sept. 30, 1853; George
W. Ames, brother of the bishop, from Oct. 1, 1853,
to Sept. 30, 1855 ; William C. Larrabee, previously
a professor at Asbury University, and afterwards
editor of the Sentinel for a short time, from Oct. 1,
1855, to Jan. 31, 1857 ; James McWorkman, from
Feb. 1, 1857, to Sept. 10, 1861 ; William H. Church-
man again, from Oct. 10, 1861.
The Female Prison and Reformatory, a short dis-
tance northeast of the Deaf and Dumb Asylum, was
recommended in the message of Governor Baker in
1869, and an appropriation of fifty thousand dollars
made for it, under the management of a board con-
sisting of Judge Elijah B. Martindale, of the city,
Gen. Asahel Stone, of Winchester, and Joseph I.
Irwin, of Columbus. They obtained a plan of Mr.
Hodgson, architect of the court-house, and went on
with the work as far as they could with the money.
The failure of appropriations in 1871 delayed and
greatly embarrassed the Board, and the institution
was not ready for the reception of subjects as early as
126
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
it should have been by two or three years. It has
now been in successful operation some eight years,
under the charge of Mrs. Sarah Smith, and has
realized all the reasonable expectations formed of its
service. A good deal of trouble has been caused by
the sewage of so large a house with so many inmates,
but the last Legislature made an arrangement with
the city to assist in building a sewer to connect with
the city system, which will remove all ground of com-
plaint. The Reformatory is one hundred and seventy-
four feet long, consisting of a main central building,
with side and traverse wings, one hundred and nine
feet long. The whole structure is two stories high,
with a basement and Mansard story. The completed
portion is but a fraction of the whole contemplated
structure, which is to be five hundred and twenty-five
feet long. The character and purpose of the institu-
tion may be best judged from the definition of them
in the act creating it, drawn by Governor Baker. A
" House of Refuge for the Correction and Reforma-
tion of Juvenile Ofienders" was provided for by an
act of the Legislature approved March 8, 1867, with
an appropriation of fifty thousand dollars and a board
of managers consisting of Charles F. Coffin, of Wayne
County, Judge A. C. Downey, of Ohio County, and
Gen. Joseph Orr, of La Porte County. The " family
system" of treatment was adopted under the superin-
tendence of Frank B. Ainsworth and his wife, who
began their service Aug. 27, 1867. On the 1st of
January, 1868, a workshop and three residences were
completed, and the Governor issued a proclamation
that the institution was ready to receive inmates.
The grounds contain two hundred and twenty-five
acres, a half-mile or so south of Plainfield, Hendricks
Co. The number of inmates is about two hundred
usually. The institution is noticed here, though not
in the county, because it forms part of the same system
as the Female Reformatory, and it was really drawn
to a central location by the capital.
2d. Until the fall of 1840 no man of national dis-
tinction had visited Indianapolis. Gen. Harrison was
here for a week in January, 1833, came on the 11th,
was banqueted and made a speech on the 17th, and
came again on the 13th of January, 1835 ; but at that
time Gen. Harrison was little known outside of the
" Northwest Territory," which was so largely indebted
to his courage and judgment, and it would be strain-
ing terms a little to speak of him as a man of
" national reputation." In those days of slow com-
munication and of newspapers that troubled them-
selves little with news, what was known in one sec-
tion was not quite so readily diffused in others as now,
when a night incident on the Pacific is known all
along the Atlantic on both sides the next morning at
breakfast. The nomination at Harrisburg in Decem-
ber, 1839, was a revelation to a good many well-
informed men east of the AUeghanies. For a number
of years the general had been clerk of Hamilton
County, withdrawn from public sight and interest, and
that seclusion had helped to make his an unfamiliar
name even at home among the generation that had
grown up since the days of Tippecanoe and Tecum-
seh. Thus it came that Indianapolis was all in a fer-
ment on the 13th of October, 1840, to see the Vice-
President of the United States and the reputed slayer
of the great Indian chief, the statesman. Col. Richard
M. Johnson. He passed the night of the 13th at
a tavern a few miles east of town, Aquiila Parker's
probably, and came in next morning at the head of
a long procession which had gone out two or three
miles to meet him. He was taken to the Walnut
Grove, on the square north of the site of the Blind
Asylum, and made a very indifferent little speech, in
which occurred two exhibitions of indifferent taste,
short as it was. Something required an allusion to
the preceding Sunday and something he had done
that day, and he said he had no scruples about doing
necessary work on Sunday, adding by way of humor-
ous enlargement that he " had written his Sunday
mail report on Sunday." This was a report on a series
of petitions from over-zealous religionists asking the
suppression of the transportation and distribution of
the mails on Sunday, made in 1828 and so well con-
structed that a good many believed somebody else
wrote it. Whether true or not, it was impertinent and
sure to be offensive to the religious element of the
population to say it was a Sunday job. In reference
to his public services he said he had " that morning at
the tavern stripped to the buff and showed a friend
who shared the room, the scars of five wounds re-
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
127
ceived at the battle of the Thames." As he was on
an electioneering tour, and within a month of the
election, there was a rather unpleasant savor of Roman
mode of electioneering in this public parade of his
wounds to solicit votes. He was a better fighter than
statesman. Tilghman A. Howard, who had been
beaten for Governor the August before, made the
speech of that occasion.
On the 11th of June, 1842, ex-President Van
Buren came here, and was received, like Col. John-
son, by a procession of military companies, firemen,
citizens on foot and horseback and in wagons and
carriages, with the music of the first brass band, and
taken to the Palmer House, where he was welcomed
in a formal speeeh, and responded, standing in the
open carriage, in a very neat and graceful little ex-
pression of gratitude and the usual civilities of such
occasions. He had a reception at the State-House,
by request of Governor Bigger, in the evening. The
next day being Sunday, he attended Beecher's church
in the morning and the Methodist in the evening, and
left on Monday by stage for Terre Haute, getting an
upset at Plainfield, it was said at the time.
Henry Clay, about whom a greater curiosity, and
for whom, in consequence of the strength of the Ken-
tucky settlers, a greater admiration was felt than for
any other man in the nation, came here on the 5th of
October, 18-12. He was received east of the town by
a greater crowd than was ever assembled here before,
and, says Mr. Ignatius Brown, " considering the
means of travel then and since, a greater crowd than
has ever been gathered since." A fine woods pasture
belonging to Governor Noble, east of his residence,
was the place of ceremonies, which consisted of
speeches and a profuse " lunch" it would be called
now, but wa.s called a "barbecue" then. There were
two or three speaking-stands, but none but his own
were used while Mr. Clay was speaking. He spoke
for more than an hour, and certainly did not surpass
anybody's expectations. There was no occasion for
feeling or enthusiasm in a formal speech of response
to a popular reception, and there was none on his side
and none due to his eloquence on the other. He was
followed by Senator John J. Crittenden and Governor
Thomas Metcalf, " the Old Stone Hammer," who both
made better speeches than their chief. They were
followed by Joseph Little White, a member of Con-
gress from the Madison District of this State, and he
made the best speech of the day. He was capable of
doing it at any time, except when Mr. Clay was fully
roused. He was a born orator, like Sargent S. Pren-
tiss, whom he greatly resembled in intellectual readi-
ness and affluence. Other speeches were made by
home orators, but they have passed away with the
occasion and are forty years deep in oblivion now.
The entertainment continued for two days longer, in
which a review of the military companies was held
by the Governor, a display of fire-works made, an agri-
cultural show visited, and, it was said, a three-mile
race witnessed between " Bertrand" and " Little Red"
on the first race-course ever opened here. It was
maintained but a few years, three or four from 1841,
and was situated on the south side of the Crawfords-
ville road, about a mile west of the river.
On the 5th of August, 1844, Gen. Cass visited the
town, and was received like his distinguished prede-
cessors, though with hardly so large a display of pop-
ular interest, and was escorted by the procession to
the Military Ground, where Governor Whitcomb
made a welcoming address, and the general re.sponded
at considerable length. A Presidential contest was at
its height, and he made a strong and long electioneer-
ing speech, followed by Senator Edward A. Hannegan
and others. He held a reception at the Palmer House,
and left in the evening for Dayton.
The great Presidential contest of 1840 excited no
more feeling in any town in the Union than in Indian-
apolis. Local meetings and mass-meetings, speeches,
Tippecanoe songs. Whig emblems, "log cabin" breast-
pins, little canoes, — the significance of which must be
traced through the final syllables of an Indian name
that had no relevancy to causes, — ostentatious parade
of cider-barrels, and imitations of " latch-strings,"
and scores of varied forms of enthusiasm that every-
body felt to be silly when the fever was gone, kept
the whole community in an incessant turmoil for
nearly a year. Processions in weather so cold that
enthusiastic Whigs froze their ears by keeping their
hats waving to their " hurrahs" too long, great " dug-
out" canoes filled with young ladies and little flags,
128
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
imitation cabins drawn on big ox-wagons, enormous
choruses to very silly songs were the leading features
of the Whig side of the contest. On the corner
where the Bates House stands, a cabin of buckeye
loCTg — a compliment to Gen. Harrison's Ohio residence
— was built, and barrels of cider kept constantly run-
ning when there was a Whig meeting in the town.
One of the Whig songs, and the most popular, because,
like the lion's part in the " Midsummer Night's
Dream," it " was nothing but roaring," and capable
of employing all the strength of all the lungs within
the radius of a half mile, began thus :
" What has caused this great commotion, motion, motion.
The country through?
It is the ball a rolling on for Tippecanoe and Tyler too,
And with them we'll beat little Van.
Van, Van is a used up man,
And with them we'll beat little Von !"
It makes one feel cheap to think that such rubbish
as that could have any effect on the opinions or action
of a great nation, but it had. " Lillibullero" was not
better, and it helped James II. ofF the throne, so
our folly of 1840 was not singular. On the Demo-
cratic side the contest was managed in a much more
decorous way. They could not help it, for they had
nothing in their cause or candidate to excite enthu-
siasm, and, in the expressive slang of to-day, the
Whigs had "got the bulge." The Democrats had
too many sins of a long period of power to answer for.
Centre township gave thirteen hundred and eighty-
seven votes in the Presidential election in November,
and Harrison got eight hundred and seventy-two to
five hundred and fifteen for Van Buren. The popu-
lation of the town in 1840 by the census was two
thousand six hundred and uinety-two.
The contest of 1844 was not so one-sided. The
Democrats did quite as much fooling as the Whigs.
They raised hickory-poles and the Whigs raised ash-
poles, a suggestion of Mr. Clay's home at Ashland,
about as apt and significant as the canoe of 1840.
Both sides had singing clubs, and sang the silliest of
rhyming rant to the most monotonous of " nigger"
tunes, then in the first full tide of popularity. " Old
Dan Tucker," "Lucy Long," '-The Blue-Tailed Fly,"
" Buifalo Gals" were the favorite airs of both sides.
The Whigs for some reason made the " coon" a party
symbol, but what it symbolized nobody appeared to
know. It was paraded numerously in processions and
mass-meetings, and Whigs often alluded to themselves
as "coons," and spoke of the thieving little beast with
afi'ectionate rapture. One of their songs expressed
this preposterous sentiment :
" In Lindenwald the fox is holed.
The coons all laugh to hear it told.
With ha! ha! ha! what a nominee
Is James K. Polk, of Tennessee!"
Van Buren's " pet name'' was the " fox" in 1840,
and Lindenwald was his home. But out of aj\ this
fuss and flummery there never came any intelligible
reason for the adoption of the coon as a party symbol
or suggestion. The Democrats ought to have balanced
the case by adopting the " possum," but they did not.
In 1840 the Democratic ladies made little show in the
parades, while the Whig ladies were active and con-
stant in all that could help their friends. In 1844
the female part of the contest was very evenly bal-
anced. That was the last of the roaring, singing,
pole-raising, political folly. The annexation of Texas,
the Mexican war, and the growing prominence of the
slavery problem made issues too serious for empty or
ribald songs and the puerile agencies that had served
their turn and needed to be forgotten.
3d. There may be grouped here a number of little
items of city progress of no special importance in
themselves, but worth notice, as first things always
are, if they grow to importance later. In the spring
of 1840 the Council made two fire cisterns, the first
of the kind. In July, 1842, T. W. Whitridge, who
subsequently became quite a distinguished artist in
New York, opened the first daguorrean gallery here,
but afterwards betook almost exclusively to painting.
At this time and before, Jacob Cox, the oldest and
most eminent artist in the State, was painting por-
traits occasionally while working at his trade as a
tinner. During the fall of 1842, James Blake,
always foremost in enterprise, or only mated by
Nicholas McCarty, began the manufacture of molas-
ses from the juice of corn-stalks, a prophecy of the
later sorghum manufacture which he lived to see.
The enterprise failed soon, because the product was
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
129
tinged with an acid taste that seriously impaired it.
Still, a good many used it while they could get it
because it was cheap. The manufactory was near
Mr. Blake's barn, on North Street, between Mis-
sis.sippi and the canal, or in that vicinity. The
Indiana Horticultural Society was organized Aug.
22, 1840, Henry Ward Beecher being one of its
leading promoters. It gave several fine exhibitions
of fruits and flowers during the half-dozen years
of its existence. On the 10th of April, 1841, a
public meeting was held to make arrangements for
appropriate services on the occasion of President
Harrison's death, and on the 17th business was
suspended, an imposing funeral procession formed,
and addresses delivered by Governor Bigger and
Mr. Beecher. The 4th of May was observed as a
fast-day all over the country for the President's
death. On the 25th of April, 1842, at two o'clock
in the morning, a loud explosion was heard in the gro-
cery of Frederick Smith, a little one-story frame on
the south side of Washington Street, near Delaware.
Those who heard it and hurried in found him lying
in a heap of laths and lime, and shattered plank,
and fragments of grocery-goods, terribly burned and
bruised and unconscious, but not dead. He was left
so for some hours till the coroner came. He after-
wards recovered and left the place. On a fragment
of plank or the lid of a goods-box he had scrawled
in German with chalk an unintelliuible account of
his reasons for his suicidal attempt, but the only
decipherable words were " envy of bread." He was
thought to have been partially insane, and to have
tried to go out of the world in the blaze of an
exploding keg of powder. Why he didn't was a
mystery. This was said at the time to be the first
suicidal attempt in the town. Not far from the
same time a man by the name of Ellis committed
suicide by hanging himself in his barn in Wash-
ington township. The Smith explosion, however,
was not the first case of suicidal mania. Some years
before it a boy by the name of Alexander Wiley, a
brother of W^illiam Y. Wiley, long a prominent and
respected citizen, drowned himself in the river some-
where below the bridge, for some difference with his
father, Capt. Wylie, then a popular tailor on Wash-
ington Street; at least that was the universal belief
at the time. The body was found a week afterward.?
in a drift a few miles down the river, terribly muti-
lated by fish or carrion-birds. The annual Methodist
Conference met here Oct. 21, 1840, with Bishop
Soule as presiding officer. During the fall of 1842
lecturers on mesmerism excited a good deal of inter-
est and had a good many believers.
In February, 1843, " Washington Hall" took fire,
about two o'clock in the afternoon, and was fought
zealously all day, and barely extinguished and safe
at dusk. The engines had to be supplied with water
by lines of buckets from pumps at the corner of
Meridian Street, and in front of Mothershead's drug-
store on Washington Street, and from several private
wells. Henry Ward Beecher was one of the most
daring and effective of the workers, and got his
clothes frozen on him and his hair full of ice, as did
hundreds of others. The Old Seminary boys were
dismissed by Mr. Kemper to go down and help in
the bucket line. The loss was but three thousand
dollars, but that was the biggest fire that had ever
happened here at that time. Miss Lesner opened
the Indianapolis Female Collegiate Institute in the
" Franklin Institute" house, on Circle Street, Sep-
tember, 1843. In June, 1843, Robert Parmelee
began the manufacture of pianos here on the south
side of Washington Street, a little west of Meridian.
It did not last long or amount to much. The fall
before 1842, E. J. Peck and Edwin Hedderly began
the manufacture of lard-oil on Washington Street.
In April, 1844, was laid out the " Union Cemetery,"
east of and adjoining the " Old Graveyard." In 1833
Dr. Coe had added a considerable section, and in
1852 Messrs. Blake, Ray, and Peck made a much
more considerable addition on the east and north,
long known as the " New Graveyard." With the
addition made in 1844 the cemetery extended from
the river to Kentucky Avenue, and northward to the
Vandalia Railroad. In 1860 a large plat between
the last addition and the river was platted as an
addition, and used chiefly for the burial of Con-
federate prisoners who died in the camp hospitals
here. But little else of it was ever used as a ceme-
tery, and after Crown Hill was ready for use the
130
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
dead were removed there, and the ground occupied
by the Vandalia Railway Company for freight-yard
tracks, wood-sheds, blacksmith-shop, round-house, and
engine-house, and Ferguson's pork-house was put on
a part of it. Washington Street was graded and
graveled in July, 1845. In the same year the old
Methodist Church, erected in 1827-29, began to
crack and grow unsafe, and was torn down and re-
placed next year by Wesley Chapel. In 1843 the
Methodist Church, growing unwieldy, divided, and
one part retained the old church on the corner of
Circle and Meridian Streets, the other used the court-
house while they were building a new house, known
as Roberts' Chapel, on the corner of Pennsylvania
and Market, the present site of the Journal office.
It was completed in 1844, under the pastorate of
Rev. J. S. Bayliss. In 1868 this church was sold
and converted into the Martindale Block, and a new
church was soon begun on the corner of Delaware
and Vermont Streets. It is of stone, and not yet
fully finished, but it is one of the finest church
edifices in the State. The first city clock, built by
John Mofiatt in 1853-54, was set in the steeple of
Roberts' Chapel in 1854, and remained until 1868,
when it was removed by the fire engineers. In the
summer Seton W. Norris built, on the southwest
corner of Washington and Meridian Streets, the
block torn away a few years ago to make way for
the present Hubbard Block. It was the finest build-
ing in the place in its day. The Locomotive, for
several years a popular literary weekly paper, was
started by the apprentices in the Journal office. In
the summer of 1846 the audacity of the gamblers
provoked the citizens to harsh measures, and a public
meeting appointed Hiram Brown, the oldest member
of the bar, and one of the ablest, to the special duty
of prosecuting them. His work, with a repetition
of the public meeting the following year, drove off
the worst of the dark-legged fraternity. The depot
of the Madison Railroad was built in 1846, and was
a substantial intimation that the long isolation of the
town would soon be broken. Property had already
taken an upward turn, and values were improving in
the hopeless section of East South Street, then a
country lane, and Pogue's Run Valley. Complaint
was made of the selection of so remote a site as South
Street east of Pennsylvania, but being fixed the
Council began improving the streets leading down
there across the swampy bottom, and the property-
holders straightened the creek from Virginia Avenue
to Meridian Street.
Governor Whitcomb issued his proclamation calling
for volunteers for the Mexican war May 23, 1846,
and Capt. James T. Drake speedily raised a company,
with John McDougal, afterwards Lieutenant-Governor
of California, as first lieutenant, and Lew Wallace,
now general and minister to Turkey, as second lieu-
tenant. It was made part of the First Indiana Regi-
ment, of which Capt. Drake was made colonel. ' It
spent the whole year of its enlistment guarding the
mouth of the Rio Grande, where Luther Peck, son
of the first Lutheran clergyman here, was drowned.
Two other companies were raised in May and Sep-
tember, 1847, by Edward Lander, elder brother of
Gen. Frederick Lander, and Capt. John McDougal.
They were put in the Fourth and Fifth Regiments.
It may be noted here that in numbering the regiments
raised by the State in the civil war, the five Mexican
regiments were counted first, and the first Indiana
regiment in the late war was the sixth.
4th. During the fall and winter of 1842 and the
early spring of 1843 a strong religious excitement
prevailed throughout the West, and nowhere more ab-
sorbingly than in Indianapolis. The preaching of the
" Second Advent" by Samuel Miller had attracted
the attention even of those who had not the slightest
faith in his calculations or his interpretations of
Daniel's " time, times, and an half" The spirit of
religious revival was abroad, and in spite of the in-
evitable extravagancies of religious enthusiasm it
wrought as much permanent good probably as any
that ever disturbed the self-seeking of any community.
The " second coming" gave especial force to the ex-
hortations of the time, and when the great comet
blazed out all along the western horizon it gave a
special force to the predictions of the " second coming."
One of the portents was there before the eyes of all
the world, and it gave encouragement to the invention
of many more ; meteors went flashing down the sky,
leaving fiery trails that broke up into little patches
THE CAPITAL IN THE WOODS.
131
which finally took the Ibrm of letters and read, '■ The
Lord is coming." Strange intimations of the great
catastrophe were found in marks on leaves, sometimes
on prophetic eggs of strangely inspired pullets, some-
times on the bark of trees, or the accidental lines of
rain-drops. They were all paraded with gloomy ex-
ultation in the Midnight Cry, a paper of the Second
Advent, published in Cincinnati by Joshua V. Himes.
The " unrespective" secular press laughed at these
fantastic phenomena. They called the " Second Ad-
vent" organ the Midnight Howl and the Evening Yell,
and insisted that the mysterious letters made of a
meteor's tail spelled " Pay the printer." But the re-
vival went on, not exactly separated from the advent
excitement but independently of it ; all the churches
felt it. About the time the comet appeared a young
preacher of considerable ability, who had given the
" advent" prophecies close study, came to the town
and preached a series of connected sermons on the
subject in several of the churches, principally in the
Christian Church on Kentucky Avenue, and the First
Lutheran Church on Ohio Street near Meridian. One
gloomy, rainy night, when he was preaching at this
latter place, there was a strange lurid glare all over the
western sky, reaching up to the zenith, and looking as
if the world were really on fire in the back yard, as
the congregation was dismissed and got out of doors
into the drizzling rain. The sermon had described
with considerable graphic power the portents that
would precede Christ's second coming, and the impres-
sion was still vivid on the minds of many. That
awful red light spreading over the thick clouds all
around both poles and up to the zenith seemed a reali-
zation of the most terrible anticipation of the sermon.
Nobody fainted or screamed, but a good many women
and not a few men looked at it as they never before
had looked at an earthly conflagration. It proved to
be the burning of a few large ricks of hemp cut and
stacked on a farm on the river bank at the ford of the
Crawfordsville road.
Several of the most confident of the Adventists made
themselves ascension robes, and some sold or gave away
their property. One of the leading men sold out and
joined the Shakers in Ohio. One woman became per-
manently insane and was afterwards put in the asylum.
The failure of the world to " come to time," or rather
eternity, on the 1st of April, 1843, or thereabouts,
which was the date that Miller's calculations had de-
termined to be the limit, did not undeceive any of the
devout adherents. The prophet or interpreter of
prophets recast his calculation and concluded that
June was a safer limit than April. The failure then
began to tell on the delusion of pretty much all who
had not undeceived themselves before, and the " Second
Advent" fancy disappeared entirely.
It will not be beneath the dignity of a local history
to notice in this connection that there were three places
chiefly used for the baptism of converts, where the rite
was applied by immersion, — the river at the old ferry,
as often on the west as the east side, because the water
shoaled very gradually on that side, and on the east
there was a " stepping oif" place that would take a
man in a swimming depth in a few steps ; another
was in the canal at Washington Street, but less used
than the canal at the Kentucky Avenue bridge. It
was here that Mr. Beecher first practiced immersion,
after a declaration that he had no more faith in the
efiicacy of the rite in that form than any other, but
would administer it in the way that best pleased the
subject of it. A very common feature of Sunday
was a procession or crowd going from some up-town
church to the river or canal to administer baptism at
the close of the morning's services. When pork-
houses spoiled the river and sewage befouled the canal
the churches betook themselves to baptisteries. The
colored brethren, whose church was on Georgia Street
west of Mississippi and very near the canal, went to
the Georgia Street foot-bridge. The creek was never
used for this service, or, if at all, very early in the set-
tlement's religious development.
The beginning of the year 1847 was marked by
the highest flood ever known in the river before or
since, though that of last February could have been
but little below it. On the first Sunday of the new
year the water was at its highest. It covered the
whole of the river bottom, Fall Creek and Eagle
Creek bottoms, and in many places came up level with
the surface of the bluffs. It ran over the top of the
middle pier of the National road bridge, and several
times the big trees and masses of drift borne down on
132
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
the furious current looked as if they must striiie the
sills and girders and sweep the structure away. The
National road west of the river was covered " hub
deep" from the bridge to the bluflF. In two places the
current was so strong as to cut great gaps across the
heavily macadamized roadway, and pour down the
south slope of the grade into the low iiround of tiie
bottom in a violent cataract that churned the soft allu-
vial soil into thin mud and carried it off. In this way
two deep pits were dug, the largest of which was prob-
ably one hundred feet in diameter and twenty feet
deep. A frame house on the south side of the road
was washed off by the flood and lodged in this hole,
where it stuck, leaning dangerously over for several
months, but was finally removed, and is still standing
near its former site in Indianola. These two huge
scars left by the flood remained more or less conspic-
uous for twenty years. The mischief done by it was
so general and serious that the Legislature extended
the time of paying taxes by land-owners in the river
bottoms, and probably remitted them altogether in
cases of especial hardship. The canal bank along the
river near the Michigan road was washed away, the
feeder-dam injured, the Fall Creek aqueduct washed
out, and the Pogue's Run culvert on Merrill Street
torn away. The old " ravines" in the town made
their last serious disturbance in that flood.
The 22d of February, 1847, was celebrated by a
procession of the mechanics of the city, who marched
to the Christian Church on Kentucky Avenue, and
were addressed by the late John D. Defrees, then re-
cently become proprietor and editor of the Journal.
On the 26th a general meeting of the citizens was
held at the court-house to take measures for assisting
in the relief of the distress in Ireland. A good deal
of good work was done here by committees and by
individual liberality.
CHAPTER VL
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
There was not much change, except in name,
when the " town" became the " city" of Indianap-
olis, but it marked the beginning of a very posi-
tive and great change produced by the close approach
of the first railroad, so it may fitly indicate the be-
ginning of the " third period" of the city's history,
a period of vigorous growth and solid promise. The
leading events are: 1st, The changes in the munici-
pal government and its departments ; 2d, The intro-
duction of the free school system and the taxation to
maintain it ; 3d, The development of the railroad sys-
tem, and the improvement in business and material
condition produced by it; 4th, Associations for busi-
ness or charity, churches, private schools, lectures,
and means of intellectual culture or diversion. As the
history of the municipal government will be treated
separately and fully, nothing need be said here except
as to its general course. The public schools, churches,
railroads, and manufactures are in the same category.
First. — On the 13th of February, 1847, the Legis-
lature enacted a city charter for Indianapolis, and left
it to be accepted or rejected by a popular vote on the
27th of March, the Governor being required to make
proclamation of the operation of the charter if it were
accepted. The city was divided into seven wards, —
four north of Washington Street, the First, Second,
Third, and Fourth ; and three south of it, the Fifth,
Sixth, and Seventh. The First contained all of the
city (which covered the whole donation east of the
river) east of Alabama Street, north of Washington ;
the Second, all westward to Meridian ; the Third, all
to Mississippi; the Fourth, all west to the river,
south of Washington Street ; the Fifth Ward took all
west of Illinois Street; the Sixth, all east to Dela-
ware ; the Seventh, all the donation east of Delaware.
The first city election was to be held on the 24th of
April, the mayor to serve two years, with a veto on
the Council and the jurisdiction of a justice, his pay
to be his fees. The wards to elect one councilman each
for one year, with a salary of twenty-four dollars, or
two dollars for each regular meeting. They had all
the usual powers of municipal bodies, and were re-
quired to elect secretary, treasurer, assessor, marshal,
with a constable's powers, street commissioners, city
and such other officers as they deemed necessary.
Taxation could not exceed fifteen cents on one hun-
dred dollars, except by special authority from a popu-
lar vote. The most important question to be settled
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
133
at the election of April 24th for city officers was that
of which least was said, the levy of a special tax
to establish and maintain a free-school system. The
State school fund, at that time mainly derived from
the sale of the " school section" reserved in each Con-
gressional township for school purposes, and thence
called the " Congressional Township Fund," was not
sufficient to accomplish- anything of consequence,
and it was proposed to assist it, and make an efficient
system with the addition of a local school tax. The
people were to vote " yes" or " no" on that proposi-
tion at the first city election. The president of the
expiring Town Council, or Board of Trustees at first.
Squire Joseph A. Levy, a very respectable black-
smith on Washington Street, issued his proclamation
for an election on the 27th of March to decide upon
the acceptance of the charter. It was accepted by
four hundred and forty-nine votes to nineteen. Gov-
ernor Whitcomb proclaimed the charter in force on
the 30th. Then President Levy issued his second
proclamation for an election of city officers and the
decision of the school-tax question. The election
was held in the new seven wards, and resulted in the
choice of Samuel Henderson, the first president of
the old Council or Board, as mayor ; Uriah Gates,
councilman from the First Ward ; Henry Tatewiler,
Second ; Cornelius King, Third ; Samuel S. Rookeri
Fourth ; Charles W. Cady, Fifth ; Abram W. Har-
rison, Sixth ; William L. Wingate, Seventh. The
new Council organized the 1st of May, with Mr.
Rooker as president ; James G. Jordan as secretary,
at a salary of one hundred dollars; Nathan Lister,
treasurer, fifty dollars ; James Wood, engineer, three
hundred dollars; William Campbell, marshal and col-
lector, with a per cent, pay for the latter and one
hundred and fifty dollars and fees for the former ;
Andrew M. Carnaban, city attorney, paid by fees;
Jacob B. Filler, street commissioner, one hundred
dollars ; David Cox, mes-senger of the Marion Fire
Company, and Jacob B. Fitler of the Relief, each
twenty-five dollars ; Sampson Barbee and Jacob
Miller, market clerks or masters, at fifty dollars ;
Joshua Black, assessor, paid by the day while en-
gaged ; Benjamin F. Lobaugh, sexton. The total of
the tax duplicate for 1846-47 was four thousand
two hundred and twenty-six dollars ; the aggregate of
taxable property, about one million dollars. The vote
of the wards is worth recording here. About five
hundred votes were polled altogether. In the First
Ward, 108; Second, 85; Third, 122; Fourth, 35 ;
Fifth, 37 ; Sixth, 41 ; Seventh, 66. The vote on
the school tax was four hundred and six for it,
twenty-nine against it.
Second. — -The authority given by the popular vote
on the 24th of April for the school levy was promptly
used. Each ward was made a district with a trustee,
houses were rented and teachers engaged, but the
fund would only maintain one-quarter of the four
free. Donations were asked, lots purchased cheaply
in 1848 and 1849, and substantial one-story brick
houses built in 1851 and 1852, and so arranged as to
allow enlargement by a second story when necessary.
This was added in the First, Second, and Fifth
Wards in two or three years. All have been greatly
enlarged since, except the old house on Pennsylvania
Street a little south of South Street. It is a machine-
shop now. A two-story house was built in the first
place in the Seventh Ward, on Virginia Avenue, in
1857, and made a three-story in 1865. Lots were
bought in the Fourth Ward and what was afterwards
the Ninth in 1857, and at the close of the war in
1865 and 1866 large, handsome, commodious three-
story structures, with high basements and all im-
provements for warmth and ventilation, were built at
a co^t of thirty-two thousand dollars each. In 1867
the first four-story house was built in what was then
the south part of the Sixth Ward at a cost of forty-
three thousand dollars. Three times as many school-
houses as all these have been added to the system
since, and will be noticed in the division of the work
treating specially of schools and colleges. The first
tax levy in 1847 yielded .S1981 ; in 1848,62385;
in 1849, $2851. The aggregate of collections up to
1850 was S6160, of which $5938 were spent in the
following year for lots and houses. In 1857 the
annual proceeds were $20,329. The first expendi-
tures were wholly for lots and buildings, the teachers
getting their pay as the teachers of private schools
did, from parents. After house-room had been
secured, the revenue could go in part for tuition,
134
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
for longer terms and more teachers. In this half-
formed condition the schools were forced by lack of
means to continue till the accumulations of the tax
and State fund enabled them to make a fair start in
a real free-school sy.stem. This was done in 1853,
when the Council made Henry P. Coburn, Calvin
Fletcher, and Henry F. West trustees for all the
schools, instead of making each ward a district with
a trustee as before. A system of regulations was
drafted by Mr. Fletcher, and on the 25th of April,
1853, the schools were opened free for the first time,
with two male and twelve female teachers. Up to
that time the number of scholars had not exceeded
three hundred and forty. In the first week of the
new system it was seven hundred, and over one
thousand of the two thousand six hundred children
of school age — from six to twenty-one — were enrolled.
The new arrangement soon provided for the use of
uniform test-books and unity of method in teaching,
and in August a system of grades was adopted, the
divisions being the Primary, Secondary, Intermediate,
Grammar, and High Schools. All the lower grades
were kept together with the Grammar schools in the
same building, the latter under the " principal"
teacher. The old County Seminary was repaired
and made the High School building under Mr. E. P.
Cole, with an assistant.
Until 1855 the trustees themselves did all the
work appertaining to the system outside of the
school-houses, and did it without compensation. In
February, 1855, they made Silas T. Bowen — now
head of the oldest book house in the State, Bowen,
■Stewart & Co. — superintendent, with a salary of
four hundred dollars a year. He improved the
schools greatly, but could not spare the time that they
needed, and gave place to George B. Stone, at one
thousand dollars a year. He had previously had
charge of the High School, succeeding Mr. Cole. His i
salary was one thousand dollars, and he gave his whole
time and mind to the work. Under him the system
was fully developed, and worked as well as it ever
has since with costlier oflScers and greater pretensions. '
His success overcame all prejudices and objections,
and no tax was paid so cheerfully as the school tax.
The income increased as the city grew, and more i
teachers were employed, new houses built, old ones
enlarged, and the average attendance increased from
three hundred and forty in April, 1853, when the
system went into operation, to fourteen hundred in
1856 and eighteen hundred in 1857. Ten houses
had been built, forty-four per cent, of the children of
" school age" enrolled, and seventy-three per cent, of
the enrollment was in average daily attendance. Just
in this most promising condition the Supreme Court
struck the system a blow that prostrated it at once
and paralyzed it for five years. At the suit of Fow-
ler, of Lafayette, the court held that local taxation in
aid of schools was not the " uniform taxation" re-
quired by the Constitution, and could not be enforced.
The opinion was very general at the time, and has
only grown stronger since, that there was nothing but
the thinnest of distinctions to sustain this disastrous
ruling. It was made in January, 1858. The Coun-
cil at once met to see what could be done, and called
upon the citizens of each ward to hold meetings with
the same object. This was done on the 29th of Jan-
uary. Subscriptions were taken to maintain the
schools anyhow, and three thousand dollars were con-
tributed. This would not go far, and at the end of the
current quarter, seeing that without a revenue backed
by law nothing of value could be done, the effort was
abandoned, the schools closed, the teachers left the
city many of them, and the houses were rented for
private schools sometimes, and when they were not
they were occupied by thieves and strumpets. The
houses were kept in indifferent repair by a small tax,
and the State fund allowed a free term of a few
months, amounting to four months and a half in
1860 and 1861. No attempt at free schools was made
in 1859. In 1862 the Supreme Court reviewed its
decision, the system was reorganized, the tax re-estab-
lished, and the flourishing condition of 1857 fully
restored and improved. The further history of the
public schools will be treated in its department, as
above intimated.
Third. — The Madison Railroad, in its progress
towards the capital, after the State had sold it to a
company in 1843, was slow, halting for several months
at temporary stations, as North Vernon, Sand Creek,
Clifty Creek, Columbus, Edinburg, Franklin, and
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
135
Greenwood. It reached the last station in the latter
part of the summer of 1847, and that left but ten miles
of staging from the city. The influence of the great
public improvement, as already intimated, had gone
ahead of it, aud inspired the most active and prom-
ising enterprise and permanent progress that had yet
appeared. Thousands of the old settlers had never
seen a railroad, not even this one, which for a half-
dozen years had been within fifty miles of them.
The curiosity about it was universal, and there was
plenty of time for it to grow full-size and spread as
far as convenient access could reach. The citizens
held a meeting a few days before the 1st of October,
the day track-laying would be completed to the depot
already in progress on South Street, and made arrange-
ments to celebrate the occasion in a suitable manner.
The last spike was driven about nine o'clock in the
morning of Oct. 1, 1847, and the rail was barely in
place and ready when two big excursion trains came
up from the lower part of the road, and were received
with much shouting, shooting, and spouting. Spald-
ing's Circus, with the band, led by Ned Kendall, the
famous bugler, was in the city, and the whole availa-
ble portion of it turned out to decorate the occasion.
Governor Whitcomb made a .speech from the roof of
a car at the depot, aud an illumination and display
of fire-works at night closed a demonstration that
events proved was not the glittering illusion of the
popular rejoicing ten years and more before when the
project of the road was adopted by the Legislature.
Tlie good effect of a means of transportation that
could be depended on, and would not consume the full
value of the article in the cost of getting it where some-
body would buy it, was speedily felt. The pork packed
here and at Broad Ripple by the Mansurs since 1841,
and sent down the river in flat-boats on the spring
floods, could go anywhere now, choose a market,
and run no risk. Corn and wheat doubled in
price before Christmas, while goods brought from
abroad were cheapened by the same process that en-
hanced home products. Further notice will be taken
of the changes produced by this first admission of
the city to the commercial connections of the country
and by its successors a little later.
From the time the completion of the Madison
Road became a certainty railroad enterprise moved
more energetically, and finally with long bounds that
have not ceased yet and hardly slackened, except as
financial straits have forced it. The Peru and In-
dianapolis line was chartered in 1815-46, completed
to Noblesville, twenty-one miles, in the spring of
1851, and to Peru, seventy-three miles, in April,
1854. The Bellefontaine (Bee Line) was chartered
two years later, but was completed to Pendleton,
twenty-eight miles, three months sooner, and to the
State line at Union City in December, 1852, over a
year sooner. The Terre Haute Road (Vandalia),
chartered in 1846, was finished to Terre Haute, sev-
enty-three miles, in May, 1852. The Jefferson ville
Road, begun in 1848, was finished to Edinburg, sev-
enty-eight miles, and connected with the Madison in
1852. The Lafayette (now Cincinnati, Indianapolis,
St. Louis and Chicago, or Big Four) was begun in
1849, and finished to Lafayette, sixty-five miles, in
1852. The Central (Pan Handle) was begun in
1851, and finished to the State line near Richmond,
seventy-two miles, December, 1853. The Cincin-
nati Road (now part of the Cincinnati, Indianapolis,
St. Louis and Chicago) was begun in 1850, but not
chartered as a through road till 1851, because it
would cut off all the up-river trade of the Madison
Road. It was completed to Lawrenceburg, ninety
miles, in October, 1853. The Junction Road, to
Hamilton, Ohio, was begun in 1850, but delayed by
one obstruction or another, so that it was not com-
pleted to the city till May, 1868. The Vincennes Road
was started in 1851, and the company organized under
the late John H. Bradley in 1853, but nothing of
consequence till a reorganization was made under the
late Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside, in 1865. It was
then pushed vigorously, and completed to the city in
1868. The city gave it a subsidy of sixty thousand
dollars. An " Air Line" road to Evansville was pro-
jected in 1840, and taken up in 1853 by Oliver H.
Smith, the founder of the Bellefontaine Road, to con-
nect with the latter and make a through line from
the lower Ohio to Lake Erie, and under this organ-
ization surveys were made and work advanced vigor-
ously till the financial crash of 1857 stopped it, and
before the effects of that had passed away Mr. Smith
136
HISTOKY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
died, and the " Air Line" is still a project instead of
a fact. A " Short Line" road to Cincinnati was pro-
jected in 1853, surveys and contracts made, but
stopped in 1855 by financial stress, and has remained
dead ever since. The Toledo and Indianapolis Road,
a direct line of one hundred and eighty-five miles,
was organized in 1854 for a short lake connection,
but hard times killed it. The Indiana and Illinois
Central, one hundred and sixty miles, to Decatur, 111.,
was projected in 1852, and organized in 1853, began
work and advanced hopefully till the " hard times"
came upon it. Later it was reorganized as the Indian-
apolis, Decatur and Springfield Road, and was com-
pleted in 1881. In 1866 the Cincinnati Road wanted
a connection to reach Chicago business, and its mar^
agement projected a rival line to the Lafayette through
Crawfordsville, to which the city voted a subsidy of
forty-five thousand dollars. Work was begun and
progressing favorably, when the Lafayette was bought
and absorbed and the Crawfordsville abandoned.
This did not please the people of the rich corn and
pork section traversed by the proposed line, and then
another company was formed, contracts re-let, and the
road completed to the city as the Indianapolis, Bloom-
ington and Western in 1869. The Indianapolis and
St. Louis Road was begun in 1867 to make a Western
connection for one of the great Eastern trunk lines,
and was finished in 1869. Within the last two years
the Indianapolis, Bloomington and Western has made
an eastern extension, entering the city beside the Bee
Line tracks, and about a year ago consolidated the
Indianapolis, Decatur and Springfield Company with
itself, running both lines. The " Chicago Air Line"
road, after a long period of embarrassment and ob-
struction, was completed into the city last spring, 1883.
The Union Railway Company, wholly confined to the
city, was organized in 1S49, mainly by Gen. Thomas
A. Morris, Oliver H. Smith, Chauneey Rose, and
Edwin J. Peck. The Union tracks were laid in 1850,
and the depot, upon Gen. Morris' plans, in 1853.
Previously the Bellefontaine trains had started from
the Terre Haute (now Vandalia ) Depot, on Tennessee
and Louisiana Streets, one square west of the Union
Depot. A Belt Road, to connect outside of the city all
the roads entering it, by which the}- could transfer
cars and trains from one to the other without passing
through the city, was projected and partly graded by
a company, mainly composed of other railroad com-
panies, eight or ten years ago, but abandoned in the
stress of finances. In 1876 it was taken up by a
company, mainly of capitalists in the city or con-
nected with the railroads centring here, and on popu-
lar approval by a vote the city indorsed the company's
bonds to the amount of five hundred thousand dol-
lars, taking a mortgage on the road and stock to
secure itself, and the road was rapidly built in con-
nection with the stock-yard, and opened for business
in November, 1877. Within a year it has been
leased by the Union Company, and both are now
under one management.
The first telegraph line was constructed in the
spring of 1848, from here to Dayton, by a company
organized by Henry O'Reilly, under a general law
passed the preceding February. The first dispatch
was sent from here to Richmond on the 12th of May ;
tiie first published dispatch appeared in the Sentinel
of May 24th. The first operator was Mr. Isaac H.
Kiersted, and his office was in the second story of the
building where the Hubbard block now stands. Two
years later a .second line was built by Wade & Co.,
but consolidated with the other in April, 1853. Other
lines have been built and absorbed here, and all over
the country. The operators here have been Isaac H.
Kiersted, J. W. Chapin, Anton Schneider, Sidney B.
xMorris, J. F. Wilson, and John F. Wallaok. The
last was made superintendent here when an officer of
that kind was first found necessary, and he has filled
the place ever since, nearly twenty years. For the
first eight or ten years dispatches were taken by im-
pressions of the Morse alphabet on long ribbons of
heavy paper ; and newspaper men had to copy these,
fill out the abbreviations, and arrange them in some
sort of coherent order each for himself. A very few
years before the war operators here began to read by
sound, Coleman Wilson being the first resident sound
reader. From that time forward the operators made
manifold copies for the press, and saved editors a good
deal of work. The most notable event, next to the
first appearance of the electric telegraph, was the suc-
cessful laying, so soon ruined, of the first Atlantic
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
137
138
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
cable, in August, 1858. There was an illumination
and bonfires, and a general congratulatory time that
night. Governor Wallace made a speech, and Gov-
ernor Willard had a pleasant reception at the executive
residence. It is not generally known that the appro-
priation which enabled Professor Morse to build his
experimental line to Baltimore was carried in com-
mittee by the vote of Governor Wallace, and but for
that vote the appropriation and pregnant experiment
would have both failed for another year at least. The
committee on commerce, in which the appropriation
of forty thousand dollars was considered, was evenly
divided, as it happened, and Governor Wallace's name
coming last on the roll his vote decided the question
for the appropriation. At the ensuing congressional
election his antagonist used this vote against him
with such eiFect that it helped to defeat him. Faith
in electricity forty years ago was hardly as wide and
solid as it has grown to be since.
In February, 1851, the Indianapolis Gaslight and
Coke Company was given a special charter by the last
Legislature under the old constitution to run fifteen
years, and on the 6th of March stock-books were
opened, stock subscribed readily to the amount of
twenty thousand dollars, the capital limited by the
charter, and on the 26th an organization made by the
choice of David V. Culiey as president, Willis W.
Wright as secretary, and H. V. Barringer as superin-
tendent. The projector of the aflFair was Mr. John
J. Lockwood. The city gave the company the sole
right to make and supply gas here for public or private
use, requiring street gas at the price of that in Cin-
cinnati. In July the company bought a small tract
of half swampy creek bottom on the east side of
Pennsylvania Street, on the south bank of the creek,
and erected, in a small, cheap way, the buildings
needed. Mains were laid in Pennsylvania and Wash-
ington Streets at the same time. On the 10th of
January, 1852, the first gas was furnished for regular
consumption. In the following April, 1853, a few
weeks over a year after the organization of the com-
pany, seven thousand seven hundred feet of pipe had
been laid, six hundred and seventy-five burners were
supplied for one hundred and sixteen consumers, and
thirty bushels of coal were used per day. Previously
Masonic Hall, and the two street lamps in front of it,
had been lighted with gas made by a little apparatus
of its own. The enterprise ran heavily at the start
till a superintendent who knew his business was ob-
tained, and the works were enlarged and improved.
A special tax to pay for lighting the streets with gas
was defeated at the city election of 1852, and the
lighting of Washington Street from Pennsylvania
Street to Meridian was paid for by the property
owners. In December, 1854, a contract was made with
the company to light the central portions of Washing-
ton and the adjacent streets, and it was done in 1855.
From that time a steady annual addition was made,
the property holders paying for the posts and lamps,
till in 1868 the totail length of mains was twenty-
three miles, and of service-pipe seventy-five miles,
with fifteen hundred and fifty consumers of gas, and
an average daily production of one hundred and
seventy-five thousand feet. The largest gas-holder is
on Delaware Street, and has a capacity of three hun-
dred thousand cubic feet. In February, 1859, the
Council decided to put four lamps to a square, the
opposite corners to be lighted, and the two intermedi-
ate lamps to be allowed equal intervals from the other
two and each other, one on each side of the street.
The original charter expired March 4, 1866. The
City Council, thinking to get better terms than before,
ordered, in May, 1865, an advertisement for proposals
to light the city for twenty years. No bid was made
but by the old company, and its demand not being
satisfactory, a committee was appointed to investigate
the matter, and made a report of terms and conditions
that the company would not accept. In this emer-
gency, R. B. Catherwood & Co. made a proposition
on the 5th of March, 1866, to take a charter for
thirty years, with the exclusive right of the city, and
furnish gas for three dollars per one thousand feet,
the city to contest a claim for longer continuance made
by the old company. The gas committee made a
counter-proposition to charter the " Citizens' Gaslight
and Coke Company," with an exclusive city right for
twenty years instead of thirty, reserving the right to
buy the works after ten years, and dividing equally
the profits above fifteen per cent. The new company
was to attend to the litigation with the old one, the
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
139
capital was to be appraised every five years, the com-
pany was to fix the gas rate annually, in March, at
not more than three dollars per one thousand feet,
vpere to extend mains wherever fifteen burners to a
square were promised, insure their works, and forfeit
their charter if they made default in the conditions.
This move started the confident old company to a
serious consideration of the case, and while the
counter-proposition and ordinance of the Council
were pendiusr, it advanced a proposal to take a twenty
years' charter, supply gas at three dollars per one
thousand feet, extend mains and fill all other con-
ditions required of the new company, and lower the
price of gas if improved processes of manufacture
would allow it. The city would light and clean the
lamps, and have the amount and quality of gas tested.
The bargain was closed and is still binding. In a little
while, however, it was found that the gas bills were
getting to be bigger under the new arrangement at
three dollars per one thousand feet than the old one at
twenty-eight dollars and forty-four cents a lamp, for
gas, lighting, and cleaning. A committee investigated
the matter, and found that more lamps were charged
for than had been used and more gas charged for than
had been needed, and a gas inspector was recommen-
ded. George H. Fleming, excellently qualified, was
appointed, rules for testing the quality and pressure
of gas were made, the number of hours of lighting
fixed, and all the lamps but those on the corners were
shut oiF at midnight, thus saving twenty thousand
dollars a year. Since that time there have been some
considerable changes.
In 1877 a new gas company was organized here in
competition with the old one, called the " Citizens'
Company." Works were built at the west end of St.
Clair Street, and a considerable extent of mains laid,
private consumers supplied, and a fair prospect of
good business opened. The gasometer exploded soon
after operations began, and in a short time the old
company bought the new one. It operates the new
works, however, in connection with the old ones, now
so greatly enlarged as to cover more than half of the
square between the creek and South Street. Some
ten years ago a branch establishment, for the conven-
ience of the northeastern part of the city, was opened
near the crossing of the Peru Railroad and Seventh
Street.
The first suggestion of a street railway was made
in November, 18G0, and renewed in 1863, when a
company was formed with Gen. Thomas A. Morris
as president, Wm. Y. Wiley as secretary, and W. O.
Rockwood as treasurer. They applied to the Council,
and while the application was pending, a rival com-
pany was formed by R. B. Catherwood, of New York,
and some citizens here, with Col. John A. Bridgland
as president. They proposed better terms than the
earlier company, and oifered security to fill their con-
tract ; but the " Citizens' Company," as it was called,
finally lost the charter, and it was given to the Indian-
apolis company and refused ; whereupon it was ac-
cepted by the other, and the conditions settled. These
facts are familiar to most readers, from the frequent
controversies of the press with the company. Owing
to unavoidable delays, the Council granted an exten-
sion of time for sixty days in 1864, in the latter part
of August, in fulfilling all the conditions, but portions
of the work had been done, and the Illinois Street
Line to the Union Depot had been opened with due
ceremony by the city authorities in June of that
year. The company, consisting of Catherwood and
his associates, sold to Wm. H. English and E. S.
Alvord in 1865, and these a few years later sold to
the Messrs. Johnson, the present proprietors. The
present extent and condition of the business of the
company is stated in the summary in the last chapter.
It only needs to be noticed further here, that within
the past year the stables and shops have been enlarged
and cover an acre on the northeast corner of Louisiana
and Tennessee Streets, with a half-acre more on the
oppo.site side of Tennessee Street which is laid down
with tracks and shelter for cars not in use. A stable
and car-house have been built in Indianola within a
little more than a year, for the service of the line
running to Mount Jackson and the Insane Asylum.
The Tennessee Street establishment was seriously
damaged by fire a few years ago, but it was not al-
lowed to interfere with the operations of the company
at all. Within a few months past attempts have been
made to charter a second street railway company,
under the name of the " Metropolitan," but so far they
140
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
have not succeeded, though backed by some of the
best men in the city. On the morning of the 6th of
January, 1884, the stables of the " Citizens' " company
were again seriously damaged by fire.
The first proposal for a water supply was made in
1860 by a Mr. Bell, of Rochester, N. Y., but idly.
The company that had come into possession of the
canal renewed it in 1864 as idly as Mr. Bell. Mayor
Caven recommended to the Council the initiation of
a water system, with Crown Hill as the site for a ,
reservoir, but the Council decided that while a supply )
system was desirable, it was not desirable that the
city should make it. Nothing further was done till
1866, when the mayor again brought the matter before
the Council, and in November of that year the inevit-
able Catherwood came forward and accepted a charter
requiring the water to come from the river f;ir enough
up to avoid contamination, with other conditions
needless to specify, as nothing came of the affair. In
1869 the Central Canal Company, then mainly j
a resident of Rochester, N. Y., tried to get the
Council into a joint-stock company to introduce the
Holly scheme, which acts by direct force without a
reservoir, and put in their canal as the source of sup-
ply, at a price that would make that theretofore
useless property remunerative ; but that would not
work. In the fall of 1869, Mr. Woodruff organized
a company for a water supply on the Holly plan
independently of the city, and he was given a charter
under strict limitations, and introduced the supply
slowly and not very successfully at first. The com-
pany has changed a good deal, and is now under the
presidency of Gen. Thomas A. Morris, with Mr. I
John L. Ketcham as secretary, and supplies a large
part of the domestic and manufacturing service of the
city and all its fire service. Two or three years ago,
the sources of its supply being suspected of impurity,
it was decided to bring the whole of it from a point
so far above the city as to make contamination im-
possible, and a point was selected near the river
above the Fall Creek " cut off." This has been
reached by a costly conduit which brings water from
a " gallery," or elongated well, about twelve hun- ,
dred feet long by fifty wide and fifteen deep, which
cannot be damaged by river infiltration, or by any 1
cause that does not equally damage all springs. Below
its bed, about forty feet, is a second current which has
been reached by boring, and rises above the surface
of the " gallery" water. This can be depended on
to maintain a pure supply if needed. Several analyses
have proved the "gallery" to be as nearly pure as
anything drawn from the ground and undistilled can
be.
For some years Governor Wright had made a
specialty of agriculture and its requirements, and in
1853 the Legislature chartered the State Board of
Agriculture, with the Governor as president, the late
John B. Dillon as secretary, and State Treasurer
Mayhew as treasurer. The first fair was held in
Military Park in October, 1852, from the 19th to
the 25th, with thirteen hundred and sixty-five entries.
The next was held in Lafayette, October 11th to
13th. Horace Greeley delivered the address. Then
it went to Madison, where its success was so indif-
ferent that it returned to Indianapolis for four years.
In 1859 it was taken to New Albany, and returned
to Indianapolis for five years, till 1864, none being
held in 1861 on account of the war. In 1865 it
went to Fort Wayne, then came again to Indianapolis.
Since then it has remained here. Up to 1860 it was
held in Military Park ; then the State Board bought
a tract of some thirty acres north of the city, with
the assistance of the railroads, and held the fair there
that year. During the war it was used both as a
camp for national troops, and as a prison camp for
prisoners of war. Some years ago an association of
citizens and railroads joined the State Board in
erecting the "Exposition" building, with the pur-
pose of maintaining an annual exhibition of such
products of skill as could not be advantageously
shown in ordinary fiiir buildings. The success of the
enterprise was not such to encourage its continuance
long, and the State Board took the building with the
assurance of protecting the obligations incurred in its
erection.
Belonging to this same period is the origin of the
City Hospital. As already related, the city, during
an epidemic alarm in early days, was going to use
the Governor's house, in the Circle, as a hospital ;
but the alarm disappeared and nothing further was
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
141
done. In 1848 another serious fright was caused by
an outbreak of smallpox, in which a prominent In-
diana politician died at the Palmer House, now the
Occidental. A general vaccination was ordered, and
a lot bought and contract made for a hospital. The
fright passed away, the citizens protested against a
tax for a hospital, and the material was given to the
contractor, with a bonus of two hundred and twenty-
five dollars in consideration of his surrender of the
contract. He built a three-story frame hotel with
the means thus wasted by the city, and it is still in
use on Market Street, near the Sentinel oflBce. Again,
in 1855, a smallpox scare occurred, and it was again
determined to erect a city hospital. A large tract of
ground on the bank of Fall Creek, at the end of In-
diana Avenue, was purchased, a house begun in the
pastor of St. John's Catholic Church, asked its dona-
tion to the Sisters of the Good Shepherd as a prison
for females. At the same time he asked the comple-
tion of the city house of refuge on the Bluff road,
south of the city, of which a very substantial and
costly foundation had been laid for a year or two and
left unfinished for want of means, on ground donated
by the late S. A. Fletcher ; but the opposition of
other denominations defeated these applications, and
the hospital was left vacant for a few months, when
furniture and supplies were obtained at the sale of
government stores in JeflFersonville, a superintendent
and consulting physician appointed, and the hospital
opened July 1, 1866. The old government additions
becoming dilapidated, the city decided, about a year
a<io, to build two substantial and commodious addi-
usual fashion of failure, and f\iiled when the alarm '] tions of brick, three stories high, and one was re-
subsided. But the affair was not allowed to die
quietly or lie easily in its grave this time. Dr. Liv-
ingston Dunlap, alluded to heretofore as a pioneer of
the city, was a member of the Council, and kept the
subject in a chronic state of resurrection till the
house was fiui.shed, at a cost of thirty thousand dol-
lars, in 1859. No use occurring for it, nothing was
done with it, but as a resort for strumpets and
thieves, and it was proposed to sell it. The Council
decided that it was better to rent it, though it was
not rented. Then there was a suggestion to make it
cently completed and opened for the admission of pa-
tients. It may be noted in this connection that the
hou.se of refuge desired by the Catholic association
was soon afterwards finished and put in charge of one
of the Catholic charitable associations.
The hospital, during its occupancy by the general
government,, was under the charge of Dr. John M.
Kiletun and Dr. P. H. Jameson, who, with their
assistants, treated thirteen thousand patients there in
four years. During the few months that intervened
after the government ceased to use it as a hospital —
a city prison or home for friendless women, or to let ] from July, 1865, to April, 1866 — it was occupied as
the Sisters of Charity make a hospital of it ; but , a ''Soldiers' Home," under Dr. M. M. Wishard. The
these projects were defeated. It was at last granted | first superintendent of the institution, after it had
to an association of ladies for a " Home for Friend- been completely organized and provided, and made
less Women," but not being used, it was given rent i ready for service as a city hospital, in fulfillment of
free to somebody to take care of it. Few charitable
schemes or means have lived through harder trials,
and the hospital, now so important a feature of the
city government, would probably have gone the way
of other such efforts if the outbreak of the war had
not compelled the national government to use it for
its original purpose. The government made some
considerable additions, besides improving the grounds,
and these came to the city, with the uses of the struc-
ture settled by four years of occupancy, in place of
the rent of it. A short time after the government
its original purpose, was Dr. G. V. Woollen. The
present superintendent is Dr. W. N. Wishard.
The Chamber of Commerce traces its origin to this
period. A Merchants' Exchange was formed in June,
1848, but died in early infancy, and was succeeded
by one formed in August, 1853, by a citizens' meet-
ing, which appointed Nicholas McCarty, Ignatius
Brown, John D. Defrees, A. H. Brown, K. J. Gat-
lin", and John T. Cox a committee to make a con-
stitution, prepare a circular and map, and obtain
money. Douglas Maguire was made president, John
returned it to the city. Rev. Augustus Bessonies, the L. Ketcham secretary, and R. B. Duncan treasurer.
142
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Mr. Ignatius Brown prepared the map and circular
setting forth the situation and condition of the city,
and they were sent all over the country, for the first
time giving the outside world some knowledge of the
city's advantages as a manufacturing and commercial
centre. After a beneficial existence of two years it
died of inanition, and was revived in 1856, and con-
tinued for two years more, dying, as before, for want
of means. It was succeeded or revived in 1864 as
the Chamber of Commerce, which, after a feeble life
of a few years, began to develop under the great
impulse given to business at the close of the war, and
is now a powerful and permanent body of a thousand
members, representing forty-five to fifty classes of
business, of which eighteen are railroad and transpor-
tation companies. Operating with it for a time was
the "Merchants' and Manufacturers' Association," iu
1868, and in 1873, for a year or two, a " Real Estate
Exchange" was formed, with an especial eye to the
development of real estate business. It died, how-
ever, when the panic of 1873 culminated here in
1875.
Many of our leading educational and benevolent
institutions date from the same period, from the
adoption of a city form of government, in 1817, to
the war. The Masonic Grand Lodge Hall, begun by
the purchase in 1847 of the site it still retains, was
completed far enough for occupancy by the Consti-
tutional Convention of 1850, and dedicated the fol-
lowing spring. The Widows' and Orphans' Society
organized in December, 1849 ; the Northwestern
Christian University (now Butler), removed a few
years ago to Irvington, chartered in 1852 ; an Adams
Express office was opened first on September 15,
1851 ; the grand hall of the Odd-Fellows was begun
in 1853, and completed in 1855, at a cost of thirty
thousand dollars ; the Young Men's Christian Asso-
ciation was organized on March 21, 1854; in 1853
the free schools were first put in efiective operation.
These all remain in vigorous existence. Besides these
a number sprang up, flourished for a while, and dis-
appeared. Among these, those deserving notice now
are the Central Medical College, organized in the
summer of 1849, with a faculty composed of Drs.
John S. Bobbs, Richard Curran, J. S. Harrison, G.
W. Mears, C. G. Downey, L. Dunlap, A. H. Baker,
and David Funkhouser. Its location was the south-
east corner of East and Washington Streets, its
existence protracted for about three years. The In-
diana Female College is another, opened by Rev. T.
L. Lynch, on the southeast corner of Ohio and Me-
ridian Streets. It was continued there by his suc-
cessors till 1859, and suspended. In 1852, Dr. Mc-
Lean opened a female seminary on the southwest
corner of Meridian and New York Streets, and con-
tinued it successfully till his death, in 1860, when
Professor Todd and others maintained it till 1865.
In 1865 the Indiana Female College was re-estab-
lished in the McLean building, and maintained for
two or three years, when the premises were sold to
the Wesley Chapel congregation for the site of the
present Meridian Church. A commercial college
and reading-room were begun in 1851 by Wm. M.
Scott, but they lived only a few years, the reading-
room but a year.
Most of the existing considerable manufactures had
their commencement in the same period. Pork-
packing, previously a restricted and uncertain busi-
ness, became enlarged by additional establishments
and by the increased product and trade of all. Iron
had been rather an occasional infusion of trade than
a permanent element. Grain- and lumber-mills mul-
tiplied ; planing-mills made their first appearance,
so did furniture-factories and coopering establish-
ments, and agricultural machinery and carriage-fac-
tories that kept carriages in stock. The opening up
of means of transportation that were not dependent
on freshets in the river or the condition of " cross-
layed" roads gave a positive and speedy boom to all
classes of business that was only increased by the
war. Naturally this dozen years was to be expected
to prove encouraging, though no one did expect such
results so speedily.
The first course of lectures held here was in the
early months of 1847. The " Union Literary So-
ciety," composed at first mainly of pupils of the
" Old Seminary," but in its later years enlarged by
the addition of young men unconnected with the
school, and finally absorbed by them, secured by
the contributions of citizens means enough to obtain
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
143
the use of suitable places for free lectures by Dr.
Johuson, rector of Christ Church, Rev. S. T. Gillet,
Hon. Godlovo S. Orth, and others. The same asso-
ciation had previously obtained a lecture from Rev.
Henry Ward Beecher, in his church, but it was a
single address without a succession. In 1847 or
1848 the society, with the assistance of citizens as
before, procured a short course of lectures from a
Cincinnati clergyman, and occasional lectures were
obtained from citizens. In May, 1851, John B.
Gough delivered three or four of his noted temper-
ance lectures in Masonic Hall. In 1853 the Union
Literary Society, then in the act of expiration, ob-
tained a lecture from Horace Greeley in the fall.
The Young Men's Christian Association succeeded
the following year, and had annual courses of lectures
regularly for a number of years thereafter. A further
reference will be made to these in a chapter on "Lec-
tures and Entertainments."
In 1855 came a financial disturbance that amounted
to nearly a panic. It grew out of the condition of the
currency and the banks. The Legislature, in 1852,
had passed a " Free Banking" law, authorizing the
issue of bills by private banks on the security of our
State bonds, or those of any State approved by the
State ofiBcers. Under a lax construction of this act,
or the laxity of its provisions which no construction
could tighten, a large number of banks had grown up
all over the State, some well fortified with securities
of circulation, some indiflFerently, and .some hardly
protected at all. For a while their issues all went
ofi' freely at home, though a good deal distrusted out-
side of the State. The State officers had exercised
less than due care in distinguishing between the
securities offered, and some of a doubtful character
had been accepted, and issues upon them thrown into
the current of business. Governor Wright, who had
come to doubt the operation of the act, determined to
test the strength of some of the banks by sending
them tlieir bills to redeem in gold. One in Vermil-
lion County, in the slang of the day, " squatted."
This began an impulse of distrust and discrimination
which culminated in 1855, and continued after the
Governor had been succeeded by Governor Willard.
Free bank paper became the plaything of brokers.
One would refuse it, another would take it ; one
would accept it to-day and refuse it to-morrow. Banks
that redeemed on demand, or in any way maintained
lair credit, as some did, were called " gilt-edged," and
were good with all brokers and business men. Others
of a less- assured character were discounted at any rate
that a broker pleased. The brokers, in fact, fixed the
value of the currency of the free banks, and the daily
papers of the city made their first essays at " Money
Articles" in noting the fluctuations. They made
three classes, — the absolutely good, the uncertain, and
the bad, — and these changed, the lower once and a
while rising into the upper, but the general tendency
was downwards. Gradually the weaker banks were
closed up, the stronger became better established, and
the disturbances disappeared till in 1863. When
national banks were first organized, their notes
were not considered any better than the others, but
they possessed the vast advantage of being equally
good everywhere. That was not the ca.se with free
bank paper, which sometimes failed in a man's
pocket when he was out of the State, though pos-
sibly still current at home, and left him in as un-
pleasant a situation as that of " Titmarsh in Lille."
The free banks of Indianapolis were the Bank of the
Capital, Farmers' and Mechanics' Bank, the Central
Bank, the Traders' Bank, and the Metropolitan Bank.
In this connection may be noticed the appearance
of the first permanent theatre in a building erected
for it, the Metropolitan, now the Park. There had
frequently been temporary theatrical establishments
in improvised buildings, but in 1857-58, Mr. Val-
entine Butsch built the Metropolitan, on the corner
of Washington and Tennessee Streets, a favorite loca-
tion for circuses in earlier times, and opened it in the
fall of the latter year. It did not prove remunerative
till the outbreak of the war collected large bodies of
idle men here, either as soldiers organizing in camp
or as hangers-on of the army. Then it improved so
greatly that ten years later the same enterprising
"■entleman purchased an incomplete building on the
southeast corner of Illinois and Ohio Streets, and
converted and completed it into the Academy of
I Music, which was burned some half-dozen years later,
i Of the earlier dramatic enterprises here, those of an
144
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
occasional character in temporary quarters, and those
later than this period of the city's history, an ac-
count will be given in a chapter assigned to such
entertainments.
Municipal Government. — The history of the
city and county during the war will be treated in
its own division, and since the war so much of it is a
matter of recent occurrence, within thousands of mem-
ories, that no attempt will be made to present it except
in the details of the different special topics to follow.
These, except as to their early history, have not been
sought to be presented, as any intelligible account
must bring remote periods together in a body that
would break up entirely the course of the general
history. A sketch of our manufactures, to illustrate,
would have to mass together all material facts between
the steam-mill in 1832 and the car-works in 1882, a
period of fifty years, and to thrust such a mass into
the course of the general history would make an irre-
coverable disconnection. It would be the same with
our schools, churches, press, banks, entertainments,
and other special subjects vitally connected with the
city's history, but readily separable from the general
narrative.
The first special subject is naturally that of the
city government, of which something has already
been said. The first municipal organization was in
1832. From that time the history of the county
and that of the city are measurably separated. The
changes up to the time of the adoption of the city
form of government have been already noted ; those
since, till the addition of a Board of Aldermen, may
be very briefly stated. In 1853 the general charter
law was adopted, by which the elections were changed
from April to May, the terms of all officers to a single
year, each ward given two councilmen, all elections
given to the people, and the mayor made president
of the Council, as he has continued to be ever since.
In 1857 the Legislature amended the general charter
act, which made the terms of all oflicers two years,
and vacated half the seats in the Council each year.
In 1859 an amendment made the Council terms four
years instead of two. In 1861 the First Ward was
divided and the Ninth made of the eastern half,
and a similar division of the Seventh made the
Eighth of the eastern half In 1865 a new charter
was put in operation, which made all terms of office
two years, created the office of auditor, and made the
auditor, assessor, attorney, and engineer elective by
the Council. In 1867 this was changed so as to
create the office of city judge and give to the people
only the choice of mayor, clerk, marshal, treasurer,
assessor, and judge. The offices of auditor and
judge were abolished in 1869, the duties of auditor
going to the clerk and those of judge to the mayor.
The charter remained unchanged till 1877, when the
Board of Aldermen was created ; then the terms of
councilmen were made one year and of aldermen two
years. In 1881 a change was made, giving a term
of two years to both and changing the time of the
city election from May to October. The nine wards
of 1861 remained unchanged till 1876, when they
were increased to thirteen. When the Board of
Aldermen was created they were increased to twenty-
five and a councilman assigned to each one, while the
whole were divided into five districts with two alder-
men to each.
In noting the.se political indications of the growth
of the city it may be noted that the first addition to
the territory of the city was made by John Wood,
the banker, in June, 1836. In 1854 and 1855
Blake, Drake, Fletcher, Mayhew, Blackford, and
others made considerable additions. Mr. Ignatius
Brown estimates that between sixty and eighty ad-
ditions had been made up to 1868. Taking into
account the enormous additions and subdivisions of
additions made during the real estate speculations
after 1868 up to 1875, the whole number can hardly
be less than one hundred and fifty. Not a few of
these have since relapsed into their original condi-
tion to avoid city taxes, but the territory of the city
still is very nearly three times as large as the dona-
tion and a dozen times as large as the original plat
of the town. The city assessments for taxes since the
organization of the city government are as follows:
Year. Tii.vables.
1847 $1,000,000
1850 2,326,186
1852 4,000,000
1853 5,131,682
1854 6,500,000
Tear. Taxables.
1855 $8,000,000
1856 9,146,000
1857 9,874,000
1858 10,475,000
1859 7,146,607
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
145
Tear. Taxables,
1S6U $10,700,000
1861 10,000,000
1862 10,250,000
1863 18,578,683
186+ 19,723,732
1865 20,913,274
1866 24,835,750
1867 25,500,605
1868 24,000,000
1869 22,000,000
1870 24,522,261
1871 27,908,820
Yenr. Taxables.
1872 .$34,746,026
1873 61,246,311"
1874 67,309,193
1875 69,251,749
1876 60,456,200=
1877 55,367,245
1878 50,029,975
1879 48,099,940
1880 .-. 50,030,271
1881 51,901,217
1882 52,612,595
1883 53,128,150
The present assessment of the county is about |
§75,000,000. That of the city constituting two-
thirds of it, the fluctuations of the latter have caused
equal variations in the other. The tax-rate of the
county is 70 cents for all purposes ; that of the city
SI. 12, which is the limit. Something of the extent
of the real estate speculative fever in 1873 may be
judged from the fact that the sales in 1872 were
reported by the Board of Trade as double those
of 1871, and those of 1873 doubled those of 1872,
amounting to over $32,500,000. Since that time
there has been no such inflation of speculation. In
1864 an ordinance required the issue of a " permit"
from the city clerk to authorize the erection of a
building. In 1865 it was found that 1621 buildings
were erected ; in 1866, 1112 ; in 1867, 747 ; in 1870,
840 ; in 1873, 600. Since then the decline has been
heavy and continual until within the last two years.
The decrease in the number of buildings, which will
be observed, was more than compensated by the in-
creased value till the general financial disturbance
broke down building of all kinds almost entirely.
The first street improvement made by the city was
in 1836-37. At that time the national government
was metaling the National road through the city, and
the occasion ofiered a very obvious motive to the trus-
tees to do something for their sidewalks. The some-
thing was not much, but it accomplished some brick
pavements and some grading down of inequalities.
About that time, too, some shade-trees, principally
locusts, were set out on the street then and for a good
" An act of the Legislature this year required appraisement
at cash valuation, and all real property advanced all over the
State.
2 The effect of depreciation following the panic of 1873.
10
many years called Main Street, and in various parts
of the city. Some of these old locusts were standing
on the corner of Meridian Street for twenty years.
On the other streets they remained longer, and a few
are still standing in scattered localities. A general
plan of street improvement and drainage was made
by James Wood, in 1841, upon an order of the
Council, but nothing was done with it at the time,
though later it was partially carried out where prac-
ticable at all. The sidewalks of Washington Street
were widened from the fifteen feet of the original
plat to twenty, and those of the other streets from
the original ten to twelve, and later to fifteen. Pave-
ments were occasionally made, but more frequently
graveled walks took their place all along the interval
from 1836 to 1859, and the grading and graveling
of streets went on too ; but the first substantial im-
provement was bowldering Washington Street from
Illinois to Meridian. From that time onward street
improvement has gone on with little interruption, —
some of it of a costly kind, as the block pavement of
Delaware and other streets, which soon wore out and
required replacing by bowlders. A recent effort has
been made to replace the bowlders of Washington
Street and the blocks of Market with Medina stone,
but the cost of that material makes it unlikely to
displace bowlders on any but streets largely occupied
by wealthy residents. In 1855 an attempt was made
to number the houses on Washington Street, but it
was indifferently done, and nothing further was at-
tempted in that direction till 1858, when A. C. How-
ard, on a Council order, numbered all the streets;
but counting only the houses then erected, the faulty
plan was soon disclosed, and in 1864 he renumbered
them on the Philadelphia plan of making fifty
numbers to a block. The most extensive and costly
improvement, however, has been the sewage system,
adopted in 1870. It began with a main sewer of
eight feet in diameter from Washington Street to
the river, down Kentucky Avenue. A branch was
carried up the bed of the canal from the avenue to
Market Street, which effaced the canal that far.
Another branch was carried along South Street to
Fletcher Avenue, and down that avenue to its ter-
mination. Since then a branch has been constructed
146
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
on Illinois Street, Pennsylvania Street, and other
streets, and the trunk line extended to the creek at
Noble Street to connect with a line to the Female
Reformatory. In 1868 a fifteen-cent sewage tax was
levied, and a sewer on Ray Street, from Delaware
to the creek, was made, terminating under Ray Street
bridge, at a cost of sixteen thousand five hundred
dollars. The later and larger aifair cost one hundred
and eighty thousand dollars. The contractors were
Wirth & Co., of Cincinnati. Their competitors were
Symonds & Hyland, who were alleged at the time to
have offered the city more favorable terms, and their
rejection by the Council caused open charges of cor-
ruption to be repeatedly urged in some of the city
papers. The other street improvements — the street
lamps, railway lines, and the water supply — have
already been referred to, and do not belong to an ac-
count of works prosecuted by the city. In 1871 the
perils of crossing the union tracks on busy streets
caused the erection of an iron viaduct on Delaware
Street, some six hundred feet long and high enough
under the upper span for the easy passage of engines
and cars. It was but little used, however, and in
1874 was taken down and the iron used in making
canal and creek bridges. In 1873 a more effective
relief, it was thought, would be given to the crowded
business of Illinois Street at the west end of the
Union Depot by a tunnel extending, with its ap-
proaches, from near South Street to near the middle
of the block north of Louisiana Street. It was built
at a cost of forty thousand dollars, — so stated at the
time, — with two wagon-tracks, in separate arches, and
an elevated foot-passenger track on each side some
three feet higher. The latter were soon found to be
used for vile purposes, and were closed. The main
tunnel was maintained in good order, but surren-
dered wholly to the street-railway company, which has
two tracks in it. In heavy rains the tunnel is so flooded
as to be frequently impassable for a time. The amount
of street-work done in twelve years — from 1836 to
1848 — may be judged from the fact that it had all
made a debt of but six thousand dollars, and that
only because the city would not bear a tax heavy
enough to pay its way. An election was held in
1849 to determine whether a special tax of ten cents
should be levied to pay it, and the proposition was
carried by only eleven votes. That made the whole
tax-rate forty-five cents on one hundred dollars, and
I made a general growl of discontent. Aside from
these necessary improvements, the citizens have made
a beautiful and desirable one of their own in the
lines of shade-^rees — the maples, and catalpas occa-
sionally — that border all the principal streets of resi-
dence, making continuous arches of grateful shade
for miles. Much pride is taken in this voluntary
decoration of the streets, and the Council has sup-
ported it by appointing a forester to look after the
general interests of shade-trees in streets and parks.
The city has four parks, — the Circle, Military,
University, and Garfield. The last is far larger than
all the others together, and is the only one the city
really owns, and the only one the city has never tried
to improve. It lies a little south of the southern
boundary, at the junction of Pleasant Run and Bean
Creek, contains about one hundred and ten acres, and
possesses an agreeable diversity of forest and meadow,
level and ascent, and might easily and cheaply be
made a popular resort. It cost about one thousand
dollars an acre. The other three parks belong to the
State, but are given to the city as places of recrea-
tion on condition of their proper care and mainte-
nance. They have all been handsomely laid out
with walks and turf-plats and patches of trees and
shrubbery, with a considerable pond and fountain in
Military Park. It is the remains of the old Military
Ground, or Reservation, that figures so frequently in
the early history of the city. It contains about
twenty acres, the others about four acres each.
The city had no police force till 1854. In Septem-
ber of that year it appointed fourteen men to that ser-
vice, with Jefferson Springsteen as captain. The ordi-
nance creating this force was repealed Dec. 17, 1855,
partly because the citizens grumbled at the expense,
and partly because an attempt to arrest some offend-
ing Germans in August — under the prohibitory liquor
act which went into force the preceding June and
was never regarded by anybody — made a riot on East
Washington Street that ended in several of the Ger-
mans being wounded by pistol-shots. The citizens
and the Council sustained the police, but the Su-
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
147
preme Court speedily killed the prohibitory luw.
The expense was serious, the police services not
conspicuous then, and the Germans were bitterly
exasperated at the force. Early in the following
year, however, a second force of ten men, under
Capt. Jesse Van Blarioum, was created. This was
ended the next May by hostile party action, which
made a substitute of one officer in each ward ap-
pointed by the marshal. The next May saw a i
change of party power, and another police force
of seven men, under Capt. A. D. Rose, was created.
Two men were added to this force the next year,
1858, under Capt. Samuel Lefevre. Rose went back
in 1859, and the force was increased to two men
from each ward in 18(51, making fourteen men.
Rose held till October, and was succeeded by
Thomas Ramsey. Two men were dropped the same
year, and John R. Cotton took command the next
May, 1862, when the two day-patrolmen were re-
placed, and the force uniformed at the city's expense.
Thomas D. Amos was made captain in 1863, the
force increased by a lieutenant and twenty-five men,
— eighteen for the night- and seven for the day-
patrol. David M. Powell succeeded as chief the
same year, and the city obtained material help, in
preserving peace, from the military authorities, which
were then strong, and the force of rowdies and
scoundrels equally strong, and needing the com-
bined repression of both powers. The ordinance of
March, 1864, established police districts, and Sam-
uel A. Cramer was made captain in May. During
the State Fair of 1864 twenty-six special policemen
were added. On the 5th of December an ordinance
added sixteen men till the following May, and made
the chief's salary fifteen hundred dollars. The pay
of the men was also increased in 1863 and 1864, being
fixed finally at two dollars and a half and three
dollars a day. In 1865, Jesse Van Blaricum was
again made chief, with two lieutenants, nine day- and
eighteen night-patrolmen, two detectives, and sixteen
specials. He was succeeded in April, 1866, by
Thomas S. Wilson, and he in 1870 by Henry Paul.
Eli Thompson came in 1871 and continued till
1874, when he was succeeded by Frank Wilson, who
held two years, and was followed in 1876 by A. C.
Dewey for a year, when Albert Travis succeeded
from 1877 to 1880, and Robert C. Williamson fol-
lowed till 1883, when the Metropolitan Police Act
superseded him and the whole city force. The
number was varied occasionally during this time, but
was never so low as in the days preceding 1870.
The present condition of the force under the new
system will be found in the preliminary statement of
the general condition of the city, and need not be
repeated here. The Metropolitan force was created
by an act of the Legislature of the winter of 1883,
authorizing the appointment of three commissioners
by the State officers, who should hold office three
years, one retiring each year, and who should ap-
point and control the whole police force of the city.
They made Maj. Robbins chief, who retired recently,
and was succeeded by John A. Lang, who had pre-
viously been a captain. Maj. Robbins had given
offense to many by regulations in derogation of the
State law touching the conduct of liquor saloons.
In 1865, Alexis Coquillard organized a force of a
dozen men to patrol the business streets and protect
business property at the expense of the persons
served. The Council gave them police powers. A.
D. Rose subsequently commanded it. Capt. Thomas
now commands it, in a considerably enlarged force
however. Besides these there are a half-dozen at
the Union Depot, appointed and paid by the Union
Railway Company, who are invested with police
powers by the Council, and later by the Metropolitan
authority. In this account of the police force of the
city the facts are derived from Mr. Ignatius Brown's
sketch, so far as its earlier history is concerned.
In 1826, as already related, a fire company was
organized under Capt. John Hawkins, to operate
with buckets and ladders. It maintained its organi-
zation till 1835, when it was absorbed by the Marion
Engine Company, organized to operate the " Marion
Engine," purchased at the joint expense of the State
and city in that year. It was an " end-brake," re-
quiring about twenty-four men to work it fully,
and a powerful and very serviceable ■' machine" it
proved. It was made by Merrick, of Philadelphia.
A two-story frame house was built for it in 1837
on the north of the Circle, the City Council meeting
148
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTl.
in the upper rooms. It was burned in 1851, and
with it a large portion of the city records. In 1855
a handsome two-story brick was erected for it at the
corner of Massachusetts Avenue and New York
Street. In 1840 a second engine, and second-band
engine, too, called the "Good Intent," was purchased
and " ran" with the Marion for a year ; then a por-
tion of the company, under John H. Wright, took
her and formed the " Relief Company" to work her.
The members of both these companies were among
the leading citizens. Caleb Scudder was the first
captain of the Marion, and James M. Ray the first
secretary. Capt. Scudder was succeeded by James
Blake, Dr. John L. Mothershead, and others of the
same position. John H. Wright was a leading mer-
chant here, and one of the founders of the pork-
packing business. The law at that time exempted
firemen from city taxes and jury duty, and though
these were slight considerations to the first of our
volunteer firemen, they were con,siderable induce-
ments to their successors, who were of the class that
usually make up fire companies in other cities. Ten
years of active service entitled a member to retire as
an '' honorary," with all his exemptions. This per-
mission was taken advantage of by the early mem-
bers as fast as it could be used, and the consequence
was that by the year 1850 very few of them were
left in either company in active service. The later
companies never boasted of the possession of any of
the " pioneers."
For nearly ten years these two companies remained
alone, depending on church and hotel bells and per-
sonal and general yells to make their alarms, and on
private wells and the creek and canal for their supply
of water. Private wells were made available some-
times by letting down a " worm" fence or tearing
away a panel of picket fence, and sometimes by " lines
of buckets," that is, of spectators passing buckets
from the well to the engine. At the first organization
of a fire company, in 1826, every householder was
expected to give all the bucket help he could, but no
" fire-buckets" for that especial service were made for
some years after, probably not till the Marion Engine
Company was organized. Then they came, great
awkward leather affairs, made by our own harness-
makers in some cases, if not all, and painted blue
inside by Samuel S. Rooker, the pioneer painter.
They were about a foot and a half high, a foot across
the mouth, ten inches at the bottom, with a swell in
the middle that gave them the look of a small beer
keg, with a leather-covered rope round the mouth, and
a broad leather strap for a handle, which made them
easy to carry but exceedingly hard to discharge with
a throw, such an effort being likely to leave half the
contents scattered over the person of the adventurous
thrower. A later style of bucket, which was smaller,
conical, with a considerable spread at the mouth, suc-
ceeded and did better work.
In 1849 the " Western Liberties Company" was
organized in the west of the city and took the old
" Good Intent" from the " Relief Company," when
the latter got a "row-boat" engine, in which the men
were all seated and the brakes worked horizontally.
This was housed in a two-story brick on the west
side of Meridian Street, in what is now " Hubbard's
Block." In 1858, near the end of the volunteer ser-
vice, with the help of the Council and the subscrip-
tions of citizens, the " Relief" purchased a handsome
end-brake engine and used it till disbanded in Novem-
ber, 1859. The " row-boat" they broke up and sold
the next spring. The Marion Company exchanged
their well-tried engine for a fine side-brake in 1858,
but never used it much, and it was sold to a Peru
company, in 1860, for two thousand one hundred and
thirty dollars. The later companies having short
lives and little history, need little notice. The
" Western Liberties," formed in 1849, used the
" Good Intent" in a house on the point between
Washington Street and the National road till 1857,
when a brick building was erected for them on
West Washington Street, where one of the steam-
engines is stationed now, and a new engine called
the " Indiana" given them. Like most of the other
companies, they were disbanded in 1859 and their
engine sold. The " Invincibles," derisively called
the " Wooden Shoes" by the older companies, or-
ganized in May, 1852, and got a little iron-box,
end-brake engine called the " Victory," which, light
and easily handled, and working well with a strong
company, was always early and frequently first at fires,
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
149
the great point of competition with volunteer com-
panies. In 1857 they obtained a fine new engine,
the" Conquerer," and used it till August, 1859, when
they were disbanded. Their house was a brick on
the east side of New Jersey Street, a half-square north
of Washington. It was afterwards a notorious bagnio
during the war. The " Invincibles" went into the
"paid" department in 18G0, with their engine, but
remained only a few months, when they finally dis-
banded and sold their engine to Fort Wayne. The
" Union Company" was organized in 1855 ; a handsome
two-story brick house was built for them on the south
side of East South Street, now occupied by a steam-
engine, and a fine large end-brake engine given them,
which they called •' The Spirit of 7 and G" because
they represented those two wards. They were dis-
banded in November, 1859.
The " Rovers" organized in 1858 in the north-
western part of the city, and were given a house and
one of the old engines. Before anything more could
be done the volunteer system was so obviously breaking
down that the company was disbanded in June, 1859.
The " Hook-and-Ladder Company" was organized in
1843, and did all that their means and opportunities
allowed till they were disbanded with the other com-
panies in 1859. Its house was on the west end of
the East Market space. Besides these regular com-
panies there were two companies of boys engaged in
the volunteer service for a time, the " 0. K. Bucket
Company" and the " Young America Hook-and-
Ladder Company." The former was organized in
1849, used the old city buckets for a time, and were
then provided with new and better ones and with a
handsome light wagon to carry them. This com-
pany was often of considerable service to the others
by its ready supply of buckets. They had a frame
house on the northeast corner of Maryland and Me-
ridian Streets. They were disbanded in 1854, reor-
ganized next year, again disbanded and organized as
an engine company with the little iron-box " Vic-
tory." The " Young America Company" were given
their " hooks" and other apparatus in 1858, but did
little, and were disbanded in November, 1859.
There were no " hose companies" in the volunteer
service, though in each engine company there came
to be in the latter days a sort of separate formation
of "engine" and "hose" men. The ofiicers were a
captain (who was also president), secretary, treasurer,
engine directors, hose directors, and messenger, the
latter being paid some fifty dollars a year by the
Council to attend to the apparatus and keep it in re-
pair. A "suction hose" man was u.sually appointed
from the most experienced members, his duty being
to couple the sections of the " suction" hose and at-
tach it to the engine, a service on which a good deal
of the readiness of the engine for action depended.
Until 1852-53 the cost of the volunteer system was
a trifle. Occasional repairs of hose, rarer repairs of
engines, and an occasional repainting made the sum of
it; but as the character of the service changed by the
retirement of the original members, the pioneers both
of the city and the service, the expenses increased.
The companies were less associations of citizens for
mutual protection than unpaid employes of the
public, and they became clamorous for larger outlays,
not in wages, but in parades and houses and fine ap-
paratus. They were entirely independent, however,
and to remedy some of the evils of rivalry and occa-
sional contention it was determined in 1853 to sub-
ject them fully to the city authority, and a chief fire
engineer was appointed with two assistants. The
first chief was Joseph Little, the first assistant B.
R. Sulgrove, second, William King. Obedience was
made the condition of aid from the Council. As a
protection against a power which might be tyranni-
cally used the firemen determined to unite on their
part to secure co-operation and unity of purpose, and
they formed the Fire Association, with B. R. Sul-
grove as president. It was composed of delegates
elected from each company, and met monthly in the
upper room of the " Relief Company" on Meridian
Street. It was recognized by the Council as the
representative of the whole body of firemen, and of
course became at once a formidable political power.
By a sort of tacit agreement the city clerk was as-
signed to the firemen. Their " legislature" assumed
to determine all fire appropriations, and as they felt
their power more clearly they made their demands
more imperiously. The citizens grumbled at the ex-
pense and the Council at the usurpation of its power,
150
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and finally the association split into factions, the pres-
idency began to be " log-rolled" and intrigued for,
and the end was evidently close at hand. It came
with the election of Joseph W. Davis, captain of the
" Invincibles," as fire engineer in 1858. He had
made warm friends and bitter enemies, and the ani-
mosities went into the association when he went into
the fire chieftancy. The firemen had held their
power by union against the hostility of the citizens,
and now their union was broken. In 1859 an at-
tempt was made, by the election of John E. Foudray
as chief, to restore harmony and maintain the volun-
teer system, but it was idle. Steam had made its
Way to recognition and favor because, as Miles
Greenwood, the chief of Cincinnati, said, " it neither
drank whiskey nor threw brickbats," and steam made
its way here in the fall of 1859. An order for a Lee
& Lamed rotary engine was made then, and the en-
gine received the following March. It was put in
the house of the " Westerns" and the steam depart-
ment fairly established, though for some months two
hand-engines and the hook-and-ladder wagon were
retained. The steam-engine was in charge of Frank
Glazier, the hand-engines of Charles Richman and
William Sherwood, and the hook-and-ladder of Wil-
liam N. Darnell. The volunteer system died in No-
vember, 1859. Joseph W. Davis was chief of the
new paid department, with a salary of three hundred
dollars. In August, 1860, a small " Latta" was
bought and put in the Marion house on Massachu-
Betts Avenue. In October a Seneca Falls engine
was obtained and put in the Union house on South
Street. The first of these was in charge of Charles
Curtiss, the second of Daniel Glazier. The hand-
engines were then permanently dismissed and the
last vestiges of the volunteer system lost.
In 1863 an alarm-bell was placed in an open frame-
work tower in the rear of the Glenn Block on Wash-
ington Street, and was rung by an apparatus from
the cupola on the block, where a watch was stationed
day and night. Till 1868 this watch designated the
locality of a fire by striking the number of the ward ;
then in February a system of automatic telegraph
signals was introduced, at an expense of six thousand
dollars, and has continued in operation ever since.
The signals are made by a little motion of an ap-
paratus in a locked iron box, which communicates
electrically with all the fire-bells in the city, each
box automatically ringing a certain number of strokes,
designating its locality, and repeating them five times.
I The keys of the boxes are kept in adjacent houses,
1 and their places and their signals published, so that
at any alarm anybody may know almost the exact
place of the fire.
The water supply, as already stated, was for a con-
siderable time dependent on private wells, though as
early as 1840, or thereabouts, one or two public wells
were dug for the engines. These were increased
afterwards, but no cisterns were made till 1852,
when a cistern tax was levied and sixteen constructed
' in difierent parts of the city. Two small three hun-
dred-barrel cisterns were made in 1850, but their
inadequacy only proved the necessity of more.
There are now one hundred and forty-nine in the
city, many of them exceeding two thousand barrels,
besides the supply from the waterworks by five
hundred and thirty-two hydrants. The present
steam paid department consists of seventy-six men
(thirteen firemen, six engineers, six stokers, twenty-two
hosemen, six laddermen, nineteen drivers, two tele-
graph-men, one supply-driver, one watchman at head-
quarters), eight engines (of which six are in service,
one in reserve, one used for filling cisterns), ten reels
in service, two in reserve, one chemical apparatus or
engine, two hook-and-ladder wagons, two supply-
wagons, thirty-four horses, three watch-tower men,
fifteen chemical extinguishers (hand), twelve horses,
one hundred and eight fire-alarm boxes. The water
supply, as already stated, is furnished by the Holly
system of " direct pressure," and the hose can be
used effectively directly from the hydrants.
The notable fires in the city are not numerous, and
none have been very destructive. In 1826 or 1827
the residence of Nicholas McCarty, on West Mary-
land Street, was burned, and was the second fire in
the place. That of Maj. Carter's tavern, in 1825,
already related, was the first. The next was the first
tobacco- factory on Kentucky Avenue, which was
burned in 1838, causing an uninsured lo.ss of ten
thousand dollars. On 4th February, 1843, the
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
151
Washington Hall was seriously damaged by fire. May 9. — Corner Kentucky Avenue and Sliarpe
In 1852 the row of two-story frames from the Capi- Street, Indianapolis Stove Company, stove foundry,
tal House, east to the alley at Tomlinson's Block, was ! cause unknown; loss, $21,938; insurance, $15,980.
burned, the most extensive fire in area that had then
occurred in the place. In 1853 all the stables and
out-buildings in the rear of the " Wright House," or
Washington Hall, were burned, making a very large
and destructive conflagration. In 1852 the Eagle
Machine- Works were damaged to the extent of
twenty thousand dollars, and the next year by an-
other fire nearly as serious. In 1853 the grist-mill
of Morris Brothers, on the corner north of the Eagle
Machine- Works, was totally destroyed and never re-
built. In 1856, Carlisle's mill, on the canal basin at
the end of Market Street, was burned. In 1858 the
smoke-house of W. & I. Mansur's pork-house was
burned, causing a serious loss of cured meats. In
the spring of 1865 the most disastrous fire ever
known here took place in Kingan's new pork-house,
then but a single year in operation. The loss was
two hundred and forty thousand dollars, but largely
insured. In 1874, March 22d, both sides of North
Pennsylvania Street, including the " Exchange
Block" and the unfinished hotel, now the Denison,
and the " Martindale Block," were nearly destroyed,
causing a loss, mostly insured, of two hundred thou-
sand dollars. In 1876, Tousey & Wiggans' meat
storage-house, on South Pennsylvania Street, was
damaged by fire to the extent of ten thousand dollars
or more, insured. In June, 1875, Elevator B was to-
tally destroyed, with a loss of thirty thousand dollars.
In 1876 the street-car stables were burned. In the
winter of 1880, Ferguson's pork-house, south of the
Vandalia road, on the east bank of the river, was en-
tirely destroyed, with a loss of two hundred thousand
dollars. In the winter of 1878-79 the " Centennial
Block," on South Meridian Street, was damaged to
the extent of thirty thousand dollars. The most
important fires of the past year were the following :
March 13. — Corner Dakota Street, J. Shellen-
berger, butter-dish factory, cause unknown ; loss,
$10,900.50; insurance, $7500.
April 20. — Pogue's Run and East Michigan Street
Corner Kentucky Avenue and Sharpc Street, Eugle
Machine- Works, storage-room, communicated ; loss,
$5200 ; insurance, $2000. Corner Kentucky Ave-
nue and Sharpe Street, W. W. Choezum, saloon and
residence, communicated ; loss, $1239 ; insurance,
$1000. No. 21 Sharpe Street, Gus. Wilde, resi-
dence, communicated ; loss, $650 ; insurance, $900.
July 2. — 354 East Washington Street, Helm &
Hartman, flour-mill; loss, $5057.45; insurance,
$4100.
Sept. 28. — Mclntire Street near Canal, T. P.
Haughey, glue-factory ; loss, $6047.05 ; insurance,
$9550.
Oct. 31. — Second Street and Canal, J. F. Failey,
wheel-works; loss, $6204.66 ; insurance, $18,000.
Jan. 6, 1884. — Tennessee Street, stables of the
Citizens' Street Railway Company, damaged to the
amount of .$10,000.
CHAPTER VII.
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.— (C'on/nme</.)
COMMERCIAL AND MERCANTILE INTERESTS OF THE CITT.
The early commerce of Indianapolis was a matter
of road-wagons and country stores. The most of
it was barter and all of it was mixed. Dry-goods,
drugs and groceries, cutlery, queensware and leather,
books, tubs, and salt fish were all to be found in the
same establishment, and whiskey was universal. A
half-dozen yards of red flannel swung over the door
on two sticks and hung down the sides was an un-
failing sign ; a name over the door was not. The
trade that was not barter — and that was not much —
was managed with Spanish silver. The railroads of
those days did all the transportation, but the rails
were as often an obstruction as an assistance, as already
J. R. Pearson et al, butter-dish factory, incendiary; ; related. The cars that ran upon them and across
loss, $4489.36 ; insurance, $6000.
them were usually drawn by four horses, — rarely less
152
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
than three, — and rang their bells in a bow above the
hames in an incessant and not unmusical jangle.
The canvas cover was full a dozen feet along the top,
following the deep hollow from the uptiit at each
end, and six or seven in diameter. A good big
wagon loaded and belled, with a good team well
harnes.sed, and a driver of the Clem Peery school
mounted in his " wagon" saddle — a different variety
from the " riding" saddle, being made with black
harness-leather skirts cut square — on the " near"
wheel-horse, and driving with a ten-feet line of
inch bridle-leather fastened to the ■' bit" of the
" near" leader, his " blacksnake" whip in hand —
and your teamster would have held it a shame to u.se
anything else — cracking as merrily as an Italian cab-
driver, was an inspiriting sight. In good weather,
along the old Michigan road, on the way to Cincin-
nati by Lawrenceburg, or to Madison by Napoleon,
one might sometimes see a dozen of these gigantic
white caterpillars following each other, loaded with
goods for McCarty, or Wright, or Iledderly, or Ilan-
naman, or Justin Smith, and driven by Clem Peery,
Bill Stuck, his brother Perry, Sam llitchey and his
brother Arnold, Wash Norwood, or Charley O'Neal,
a brother of the noted criminal lawyer Hugh O'Neal,
or some of the teaming fraternity, who took the place
of the railroads, engines, and trains of to-day. They
rarely took anything away, so the trip one way had
to pay for both. Our exports usually went out afoot.
Hog driving was almost a separate occupation forty
years ago and before, and all the time till railroads
came. It was a slow, cold, wearisome business,
for it could only be done in winter ; was usually
done to Cincinnati; the roads were rough, the way
long, and the night was consumed in feeding the
" grunting herd." Wagons sometimes followed to
take care of the lame and exhausted, or what are
now called "slow" hogs. The hog drover, in his
normal night condition, was covered with the slop
of thawing roads, tired, cross, and hungry. In
this condition the late Oliver H. Smith carried to
Cincinnati with his drove of hogs the news of his
own election to the United States Senate. The
elder John Wood drove horses to New Orleans in
the same fashion, but less unpleasantly. He was
the only trader in Indianapolis in that line or that
direction.
John Wood, who was of Scotch-Iri.sh parentage,
was born July 25, 1784, in Orange County, N. Y.,
where his boyhood was spent in school or in various
active pursuits. He married, in 180G, Miss Rachel
Brown, and had children, — Daniel B. and Rachel
(Mrs. George Myers), both of whom died in Lan-
caster, Ohio, in 1832, and one whose death occurred
in infancy. He married a second time, in 1812,
Miss Sarah West, of Brown County, Ohio, to whom
wore born children, — Eleanor (Mrs. Thomas M.
.1(111 N WOOD.
Smith;, John M., Phebe ( Mrs. M. A. Daugherty),
Mary (Mrs. Robert L. Browning), Martha (Mrs. E.
K. Foster), Cornelia (Mrs. R. L. Browning), and
William E. Mr. Wood early became a dealer in
horses, and continued this business first in New
York State and later in Kentucky, to which State
he removed. While residing in Maysville, in the
latter State, he took horses in large numbers to the
New Orleans market, and was the first man from
Kentucky to engage in this enterprise. In Septem-
ber, 1834, Mr. Wood made Indianapolis his resi-
dence, having for a brief period resided in Lancaster,
Ohio, and purchased a farm of four hundred and
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
153
eighty acres, most of which is now embraced within
the city limits. He continued his business in Indi-
anapolis, and became a large shipper of horses to
other localities. He also opened an extensive livery-
and sales stable, to which his son John succeeded in
1840. and has since transferred to his son, Horace
F. Wood. Mr. Wood was in politics a firm and
uncompromising Whig, but not an oflBce-sceker, his
time and attention having been entirely absorbed in '
the management of his extended private business.
He was, however, active in the political field, and j
eager for the success of his party. He was a mem-
ber of the order of Free and Accepted Masons,
which he joined at an early day in Kentucky, as
also of the Independent Order of Odd-Fellows.
His death occurred Jan. 6, 1847. in his sixty-third
year. Two of his children, John M. and William
E., still reside in Indianapolis.
Among the merchants of this primitive period of
transportation were Lawrence M. Vance and David
S. Beaty (of the firm of Vance & Beaty), both
dead now after lives of honorable activity, cut off in
their prime.
Lawrence Martin Vance was the youngest of
nine children of Capt. Samuel Colville Vance, who
for many years held the responsible position of pay-
master of the Northwestern Territory, with head-
quarters at Fort Washington, now Cincinnati. He
subsequently removed to a locality on the Ohio
River which he named Lawrenceburg, after his
wife's maiden name. His wife, Mary Morris Law-
rence, mother of Lawrence M. Vance, was a grand-
daughter of Gen. Arthur St. Clair.
L. M. Vance was born at Cincinnati, July 1(5, 1816.
His youth until eighteen years of age was spent at
Lawrenceburg. He was a companion in boyhood ol'
Governor A. G. Porter, who speaks of him as a
bright, venturesome lad, with sanguine temperament
and open, manly nature. Those traits certainly
characterized his later life. His opportunities for
early education were ample, but, freed from restraint
by the death of his parents in early childhood, he
followed his inclination to engage in active business
pursuits and never completed a collegiate course.
He removed in early manhood to Indianapolis.
There he engaged in general merchandise in partner-
ship with the late Hervey Bates, whose eldest daugh-
ter, Mary J. Bates, he married in 1838.
With the first internal improvements in Indiana
he became interested in railroads and railroad build-
ing. He was an oflBcer of the first railroad to enter
Indianapolis, and a large contractor and builder of
one of those subsequently constructed. These en-
terprises occupied the remainder of his active busi-
ness life. He possessed a very large share of
musical talent and no little culture, and was a
member of the first choir in the city, that in Mr.
Beech er's church.
From the first agitation of the " irrepressible con-
flict" he was an ardent Republican, and a most zeal-
ous supporter of the principles subsequently estab-
lished by that party. He sent three sons to the war
in defense of the Union, and himself was active and
earnest in the cause, being intrusted with many im-
portant commissions by the War Governor. His
death, from pleurisy, occurred in March, 1863. His
name is perpetuated in one of the largest business
blocks in the city, erected by Mrs. Vance since his
death.
Mr. Vance possessed a large, whole-souled, emo-
tional nature, and Christian faith and work was a
pleasure as well as a duty with him. The charac-
teristics of his nature were those that came under
obedience to the higher law of morals with natural
ease and grace.
Socially, his wit and humor made him a most
agreeable companion ; his intelligence and good sense
made him an instructive one. Warm-hearted, kind,
afiectionate, a stranger to malice, he was the life of
every circle in which he moved. He was a true
friend, an affectionate father, a faithful husband, an
upright and honest man.
David Sandford Beaty. — John R. Beaty, the
father of the subject of this sketch, was born Dec.
8, 1782, and married Elizabeth Sandford, born May
4, 1791. The birth of their son, David Sandford,
occurred Dec. 31, 1814, in Brookville, Ind.,
where the years of his childhood were spent. After
obtaining the rudiments of an education, he became
a pupil at the State University, located in Blooming-
154
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ton, Ind. He then determined upon a business
career, and choosing Indianapolis as a promising
field for professional and business undertakings, he
became an employe of Hervey Bates, Esq., and re-
mained with that gentleman until his later con-
nection with L. M. Vance in the establishment of
a general dry-goods business. He was one of the
chief promoters of the scheme for lighting the city
with gas, assisted in the organization of the gas com-
pany, and was for many years its efficient secretary.
Mr. Beaty then established a general business agency
for the collection of debts, the settlement of decedents'
estates, and the exercise of guardianship.
These duties absorbed his time and attention and
called him much into the Probate Court, in which
he had extensive business connections. His ability
and undoubted integrity soon threw upon him a
large responsibility, and. in the special department
which he controlled, so increased his labors as to
make serious inroads upon his health, which was
at no time robust. The trusts confided to him
were often of the most important and delicate nature,
requiring the greatest fidelity and keen business per-
ception. The records of the county indicate how
faithfully they were di.scharged, and many widows
and orphans recall with gratitude the scrupulous
manner in which their interests were guarded. Mr.
Beaty also for a while engaged in farming pursuits,
but not to the exclusion of other matters of greater
import. He was one of the first to introduce and
encourage the system of public schools, and an early
member of the School Board of Indianapolis. He
was in politics first a Whig and later a firm adherent
of the principles of the Republican party. In poli-
tics, as in other matters, he was a man of profound
convictions, which led him to be regarded as a strong
partisan. He was in religion a supporter and mem-
ber of the Christian Church. Mr. Beaty was mar-
ried, on the 25th of October, 1842, to Miss Nancy
Singleton, daughter of Dr. John Sanders, of Indian-
apolis, and had eight children, of whom four survive.
Mr. Beaty's death occurred Jan. 17, 1875, in his
sixtieth year. He was regarded as " an honorable,
upright man, whose life was pure and whose repu-
tation was as bright as burnished silver."
As before intimated, the early (Stores of the city
mixed up groceries and dry-goods always, and it
was thirty years or more before the separation was
made complete and a customer had no reason to
expect to find salt and silk, coffee and calico in the
same house. When the separation was made, and
hardware and groceries were kept to themselves,
among the first In the enterprise of maintaining an
unmixed grocery stock was John W. Holland, and in
the similar maintenance of hardware was Abram Bird.
John W. Holland is the son of John Holland,
who was of Southern birth, and resided successively
in Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, and Indiana. Re-
moving to the latter State in 1816, he settled in
Franklin County, and engaged in the trade of a
grocer. In 1825, Johnson County, Ind., became his
residence, from whence he removed to Bartholomew
County, and in 1827 he became a citizen of Indian-
apolis, where he remained until his death in 1865,
in his eighty-eighth year. He was married to Sarah
Crisfield, and had children, — George B., Nancy H.,
John W., David S., Samuel J., Rebecca E., and two
D. S. BEATY.
^^^^a^^ /<ilcw(^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
155
who died in infancy. Jolin W., their second sod,
was horn in Wellsburg, Brook Co., W. Va., Oct. 23,
1810, and early removed with his parents to Franklin I
County, Ind., where, after receiving a plain education,
he served an apprenticeship in the printing business
with Rev. Augustus D. Jocelyn, at Brookville, in the j
above county. In 1829 he removed to Lawrence- j
burg, and pursued his trade until the following year,
when Indianapolis became bis home. Here he en-
gaged as clerk in the store of A. W. Russell & Co.,
at one hundred and twenty dollars per year and his
board, and was thus employed until 183G, when he ,
became a partner, and continued a member of the i
firm until 1839, when the business was closed. In i
1842 he entered the establishment of William Sheets ;
& Co. as clerk, and in 1847 began the commission
grain business under the firm-name of Blythe &
Holland. Connected with it was the jobbing of
groceries, which was continued until 1850, when the
firm removed their stock to the corner of Washing-
ton and Pennsylvania Streets, and conducted an ex-
clusively grocery jobbing business. This was con-
ducted under various firm-names until 18*77, when
the disasters of the panic, together with enfeebled
health, occasioned Mr. Holland's retirement. He,
however, still maintained his character for integrity
and honor by liquidating all his indebtedness. It
was proverbial that in all his business transactions
" his word was as good as his bond." Mr. Holland I
. 1
is in politics a Republican, though not an active
worker in the political ranks. He is in his religious
affiliations a member of the Methodist Episcopal
Church, having for fifty-two years identified his name
with the Old Wesley Chapel, in Indianapolis, and
continued his relations with that church until his
later connection with the Roberts Park Methodist
Episcopal Church. He has at various times filled I
the positions of class-leader, exhorter, local deacon,
and local elder. Mr. Holland was. in 1834, married
to Miss Nancy A., daughter of William Farquar, of
Louisville, Ky., to whom were born seven children,
the survivors being Charles Edward, Theodore F.,
Francis R., John H., and Edmonia M. Mrs. Hol-
land died in 1848, and he was a second time mar-
ried, in 1849, to Eliza J. Beckwith, daughter of'
Joseph Roll, of Marion County, whose children are
Pamelia H., Benjamin B., and Willie G.
Abr.\m Bird. — Henry Bird, the father of Abram,
was a native of Virginia. His wife still survives, in
the eighty-eighth year of her age. Their son Abram
was born Nov. 8, 1817, on a farm near Shelbyville,
Ky., from whence, after some years devoted to farm
labor, interspersed with limited educational advan-
tages, he removed to Indianapolis, at that early
period but a small village. His first business expe-
rience was as a clerk in a hardware-store, where by
industry and economy he. after several years of ser-
vice, accumulated sufficient means to establish himself
in the same business near the northeast corner of
Washington and Illinois Streets. At this time
Washington (then called Main) Street was not
adorned with shade-trees, Mr. Bird having been the
pioneer in the planting of trees in this locality.
This disinterested act called forth the warmest com-
mendation from the editor of the Sentinel, who pre-
sented him, as a tribute of regard, a year's subscrip-
tion to the paper. Mr. Bird developed early in life
unusual business capacity, which with assiduous de-
votion to his various enterprises secured a compe-
tence, with which he retired about the beginning of
the late war. Though not directly associated with
any religious organization, he manifested a keen in-
terest in church enterprises, and frequently contributed
toward the erection of churches and the furtherance
of religious causes. In politics he was an ardent
Whig until the dissolution of that party, when he
espoused the principles of the Democratic party, of
which he was in later years a zealous defender. He
was in November, 1843, married to Miss Ann Maria,
daughter of George Norwood, of Indianapolis, to
which union two children were born, William F. and
Georgia (Mrs. Goldsberry). The death of Mr. Bird
occurred Oct. 20, 1881, at his home in Indianapolis,
at the age of sixty- four years.
Although all inward transportation was so largely
done by wagons, and wholly by them after the first
decade of the settlement, a considerable amount was
done by keel-boats up to that time, while all exporta-
tion of any consequence was done by flat-boats, as
related in the earlier part of this work. Of the
156
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
extent and character of the commerce of that day
some notion may be obtained from a report in the
Journal oi 1827. The total "imports" of the year
amounted to about ten thousand dollars, embracing
chiefly seventy-six kegs of tobacco, two liundred bar-
rels of flour, one hundred kegs of powder, four thou-
sand five hundred pounds of spun yarn, and two hun-
dred and thirteen barrels of whiskey, besides seventy-
one barrels made here. Except this statement we
have little account of the early commerce of the city,
and no means of making comparisons or estimating
advances from one period to another. But in one
of the earliest copies of a daily paper published in
Indianapolis, dated Jan. 16, 1843, — the earliest daily
was but a year older, — there is an interesting indica-
tion of the business of that time in the advertise-
ments. Though irrelevant to this particular topic, it
is relevant to the general history to notice here the fact
that legal advertisements were published in this paper
for Morgan, Hendricks, Boone, and Hancock Counties,
— a fair indication that forty years ago neither county
had a paper of its own. The first business adver-
tisement is that of our pioneer artist, Jacob Cox, still
easily the first and most emment, and his brother
Charles, that they are selling " cooking stoves," a
comparatively recent innovation then. " Brandreth's
Pills" are advertised largely as for sale at the book-
store of Charles B. Davis, still a resident here.
Tomlinson Brothers advertise " Sand's Remedy" and
" Dr. E. Spohn's Remedy for Sick-Headache." One of
the brothers is still living here. Benjamin Orr adver-
tises ready-made clothing ; he was the first to open a
house of that kind here in 1838. E. Hedderly, a
leading grocer then, advertises printing ink. Daniel
Yandes, one of the leading pioneers in all enterprises,
advertises a pocket-book, with " ten dollars and valu-
able papers" in it, lost " during Mr. Clay's speech"
the preceding October. Judge Blackford advertises
his reports of the Supreme Court, cheap then, in-
valuable now. John Lister advertises a new '■ livery-
stable on the alley north of the Palmer House"
(Occidental). The late William W. Weaver adver-
tises a " cabinet wareroom." Day, Tyler & Co. ad-
vertise bookbinding. Mr. Tyler is now a farmer
in Perry township. Peck & Willard (Mr. Willard
is still living) advertise a stock of the miscellaneous
character usual at that period, — " machine cards,
ladies' shoes, cambric linen handkerchiefs, silk shirts,
ladies' gloves, hemp and manilla cordage, Chine silks
for ladies' dresses ; want two thousand pounds of
geese feathers." Craighead & Brandon, predecessors
of Browning & Sloan, take a whole column for their
patent medicines. E. Hedderly and Justin Smith
take another column for their groceries. Mr. Smith
was father-in-law of Mr. John H. B. Nowland, tiie
well-known local author. Last of all, E. J. Peck and
E. Hedderly advertise to farmers that they have made
preparations '• to manufacture lard from oil, and are i
ready to receive lard in large or small quantities ;"
" mast-fed pork will be taken at a small difi'erence in
price." Mr. Peck was master bricklayer on the old
State- House, subsequently largely interested in the
gas company here and the Vandalia Railroad, of
which he was superintendent and president.
Edwin J. Peck was amon^ the foremost citizens
of Indianapolis, and actively identified with its com-
mercial and religious interests. His birth occurred
near New Haven., Conn., on the 16th of October,
1806, where his life prior to his advent in Indiana
was spent. He was on his arrival in Indianapolis
employed in superintending the mason-work of the
new State-House then being erected, and intended
during the fall of 1836 to return to his native State.
He was, however, so greatly impressed with the
enterprise, hospitality, and extended opportunities
offered in the capital city that he decided upon
making it his permanent residence. Very speedily
engaging in business, he contracted for and built
the Branch Bank buildings at Madison, Terre
Haute, Lafayette, and South Bend. He was a
director of the Madison and Indianapolis Railroad in ■
its most prosperous days, and prominent in the pro-
jection of the Indianapolis and Terre Haute Railroad
(now the Vandalia Line), having given it his per-
sonal supervision during its construction as well as
the survey. He was elected its first treasurer, and
afterward became its president, and was for a period
of twenty years associated with its management.
He was also president of the Union Railway Com-
pany. He was for several years president of the
I
^y^jS,
CMctv_-ivo^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
157
Indianapolis Gaslight and Coke Company, and for
a long time one of the directors of the Insane Asy-
lum. In connection with other prominent citizens
he laid out and beautified the burial-place near the
city known as Greenlawn Cemetery. Mr. Peek pos-
sessed a large-hearted generosity, and manifested
this trait in many unostentatious deed.': of kindness
during his lifetime. Especially was this manifested
in the substantial aid given to individuals in business
enterprises and in encouragement to manufacturing
interests. He was a man of strong convictions, of
steadfast purpose where a principle was involved,
and with courage to defend the right and combat
the wrong. He was cautious in all business opera-
tions, — a trait which contributed greatly to his suc-
cessful career. In his religious convictions he was
a Presbyterian, and a liberal contributor toward the
erection of the Second Presbyterian Church of Indian-
apolis, to which he made a munificent bequest on
his death. Wabash College was also the recipient
of a legacy of very considerable proportions, as was
the Protestant Orphan Asylum. Mr. Peck was in
1840 married to a daughter of Rev. John Thomp-
son, who still survives. His death occurred Nov. 6,
187(), soon after his seventieth birthday, leaving the
record of a virtuous life that rendered him greatly
beloved.
As related in a preceding chapter, several attempts
to establish an Exchange, or Board of Trade, or some
similar organization were made before any succeeded.
The late William Y. Wiley, the first real estate agent
in the days when it meant something, tried to estab-
lish an Auction and Stock Exchange in October,
1853, but it died in a few weeks, and repeated attempts
and failures preceded the present firmly-established
Board of Trade. The present condition of the city's
commerce is presented in the fact that the number of
cars arriving and leaving here is about twenty thou-
sand a week, or one million a year, of which two-
thirds are loaded, or at least six hundred thousand,
each carrying an average of fifteen tons. This gives
a total tonnage in the year of nine million, equal to
the freight of nine thousand ships carrying one thou-
sand tons each, or about twenty-five every day of the
year. Much of this, of course, merely passes through
the city, but what belongs and remains here appears
from the report of the secretary of the Board of
Trade, which says that the importations through
the Custom-House for the year 1882 — the last of
which any report is ready at this time — amounted to
§213,119, paying duties to the amount of $81,513.
The clearances of the Clearing-House amounted to
$101,577,523. In the wholesale trade we have the
following summary :
Dry-goods $6,000,000
liroceries 6,300,000
Hardware and iron 2,350,000
Drugs, paints, oils, etc 2,000,000
Boots and shoes 1,575,000
Queensware 700,000
Hats and caps 385,000
Toys and fancy goods 525,000
Confectionery 540,000
Coffee and spices 140.000
Clothing 420,000
Millinery 725,000
Saddlery and carriage goods 575,000
Leather, findings, and belting 610,000
Produce and commission 1,075,000
Agricultural machinery 1,500,000
.$2.1.420,00(1
This was an increase of seventeen per cent, over
the year before. Among the most prominent and
successful of the wholesale dealers of the city may
be named Mr. C. B. Pattison and Mr. William
Johnson.
Coleman B. Pattison. — The Pattisons are of
Irish lineage. Edward Pattison, the grandfather of
Coleman B., was a native of Kentucky, and later re-
moved to Indiana. He married Hester Day and had
children, twelve in number, of whom Isaac, John,
James, Mary, Elizabeth, Sarah, Joseph D., and Nel-
son survived. Joseph D. was born Sept. 10, 1809,
in Kentucky, and moved in his early youth to Indi-
ana, where he pursued the vocation of a farmer and
speculator. Indianapolis subsequently became his
residence, from which he repaired to Franklin town-
ship, his present home. He married Miss Lucinda
Mawzy, of Bourbon County, Ky., and had daughters,
Sarah and Elizabeth, and sons, Coleman B. and
Joseph. Coleman B. was born near Ru.?hville, in
Rush County, Ind., April 9, 1845, on the form of his
father. In early life he was sent to Farmers' Col-
lege, near Cincinnati, Ohio (of which he was a trus-
158
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
tee), where he graduated in his seventeenth year,
taking high rank in his class. He then came to In-
dianapolis, and became a clerk in the dry-goods and
notion jobbing house of Crossland & Co., then doing
business near Masonic Hall. He remained with this
house until 18G4, one year, when it changed hands,
and the firm of Webb, Tarkington & Co. came into
possession. He continued with the new firm for one
year, when another change took place, and he came
into the house as a one-third partner, the firm-name
then being changed to Landers, Tarkington & Patti-
son. In 1867 this firm was succeeded by Hibben.
Tarkington & Co., Mr. Pattison continuing with the
house. This firm was succeeded by Messrs. Hibben,
Kennedy & Co. in 1870. In 1875 the hou.se again
changed hands, Mr. Pattison taking an active part-
nership, and the firm-name being changed to Hibben,
Pattison & Co. He continued in this position until
July, 1880, when his interest was sold to Mr. J. W.
Murphy. Such, in brief, is a history of Mr. Patti-
son 's business career.
About the year 1877, Mr. Pattison's health began
to fail. He was sensible from the first of the nature
of the disease that had marked him as its victim, and
hoping for benefit from change of climate, in the fall
of 1877 went to Florida, where he remained all
winter. He returned and spent the summer of 187S
looking after his business interests, and the followini:
autumn went to Europe, remaining there until the
spring of 1879, when he again returned. His foreign
visit, like the others, had been of but little avail, but
he determined to exhaust every expedient, and after
remaining at home through the summer and autumn
of that year, he departed for California, and prolonged
his stay until the 20th of May. Finding that despiiu
all he could do bis health was fast failing, he returned
to await the inevitable result of his malady. Up to
the very hour of his death he seemed to possess all
those bright, quick, keen qualities that had been so
characteristic of him through his more active life.
Of him it has often been remarked that be was one
of the best business men in Indianapolis. He had a
lar^e circle of friends and acquaintances, both in and
out of business, and by his genial temper and attractive
qualities of mind and heart formed many attachments.
Mr. Pattison early in life exhibited quite a taste for
literary pursuits, and had he turned his attention in
that direction would undoubtedly have distinguished
himself. He wielded a graceful and facile pen, and
has contributed numerous articles to the local press.
Mr. Pattison was married on the 6th of June,
1867, to Miss Sarah J. Hamilton. Their children
are Joseph H., P]mma A., Samuel L., Day Coleman,
and George C. The death of Coleman B. Pattison
occurred on the 27th day of September, 1880.
William Johnson. — Walter Johnson, the grand-
father of William, was of German descent, and re-
sided in Sullivan County, East Tenn., where he fol-
lowed farming employments. He married and had
children, — John F., Benjamin, James, Robert, Absa-
lom, Garrett, William, Looney, Polly (Mrs. Snod-
grass), and Betsy (Mrs. Snodgrass). Their son John
F. was born in Sullivan County, Tenn., where he
continued the pursuits of his father. On the 19th
of January, 1806, he was married to Miss Nancy
Curtin, of the same county, daughter of John and
Margaret Snodgrass Curtin, who were both of Irish
extraction. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Johnson
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
159
were Susannah, born in 1807, who became Mrs.
Moser; Margaret, born in 1809, who was Mrs. Jones;
Walter, whose birth occurred in 1810; William;
Eleanor C, born in 1814, who became Mrs. Parr;
Poll; Ann, born in 1817, who was Mrs. Johnson;
Robert, whose birth occurred in 1819 ; John C, born
in 1824 ; Elizabeth Jane, born in 1826, who was
Mrs. Goodrich; and Benjamin F., born in 1828.
Mrs. Johnson died on the 13th of August, 1854, in
Indianapolis, and Mr. Johnson November 5th, of the
same year, in Benton County, Ind. The latter on
his marriage removed to Hawkins County, Tenn., and
remained twenty-six years, after which he returned
to Sullivan County, and in 1834 made Boone County,
Ind., his home, where he continued farming employ-
ments until his later residence in Indianapolis. His
son William, the subject of this biographical sketch,
was born in Hawkins County, East Tenn., on the 29th
of September, 1812. He enjoyed but limited ad-
vantages of education, and early acquired a knowledge
of farm labor, which engaged his attention during the
remainder of his active life. He was on the 28th of
November, 1833, married to Sarah Elizabeth, daughter
of Lawrence and Mary Snapp, of the same State,
who died Aug. 6, 1882, in her sixty-eighth year.
After his marriage Mr. Johnson removed to Virginia,
and there cultivated a farm. In 1857 he made In-
dianapolis his home, and combined farming with
general trading. He is still the owner of several
farms in the vicinity of the city, and also a large
holder of real estate in Indianapolis. A number of
years ago Mr. Johnson retired from active business,
though still maintaining a personal supervision over
his varied interests. He is in politics a Democrat,
and filled while a resident of Virginia the office of
justice of the peace, since which time he has held no
office. He is not identified with any religious denom-
ination, but a willing contributor to all worthy causes.
In the wholesale hardware trade, Mr. S. B. Carey
and the house with which he is connected hold a
place among the foremost in the city.
Simeon B. Carey. — John Gary, the ancestor of
the family in America, came from Somersetshire,
England, about the year 1634 and joined the Plym-
outh Colony. His name is found among the origi-
nal proprietors and settlers in Duxbury and Bridge-
water, the land he owned having been a part of the
grant made by the Pockonocket Indians in 1639.
Some of his descendants of the eighth generation
still occupy a portion of the original tract. John
Gary was the constable of Bridgewater in 1650, the
year of its incorporation, and also the first town
clerk. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Francis
Godfrey, one of the first settlers of Bridgewater, in
1644, to whom were born eleven children. Of tliis
number his son John, whose birth occurred in 1045,
married Abigail, daughter of Samuel Allen, and had
eleven children. In the direct line of descent was
born in 1735, in Morris County, N. J., Ezra Gary,
the grandfather of the subject of this sketch, who
married Lyda Thompson, and removed to Western
Pennsylvania in 1777. Their children were Phoebe,
Rufus, Cephas, Ephraim, Absalom, Elias, and George.
Cephas, of this number, was born in New Jersey on
Dec. 25, 1776, and accompanied his father to West-
ern Pennsylvania, and subsequently to Ohio in 1790,
stopping for a time on the Ohio near Wheeling, Va.
From thence he repaired to a farm in Shelby County,
Ohio, where he resided until his removal in 1840 to
Sidney, in the same county. His death occurred at
the latter place, at the age of ninety-four years. Mr.
Gary was married first to Jane Williamson, to whom
were born eight children, and second to Rhoda Je-
rard, who was the mother of eight children. His
son by the second marriage, Simeon B., was born
Dec. 20, 1822, in Shelby County, Ohio, in a log
house upon the farm of his father, where he remained
until eighteen years of age, this period being occu-
pied in labor upon the farm or in gaining such ad-
vantages of education as could be obtained at the
neighboring log school-house. His father then re-
moved to Sidney, the county-seat, where the superior
advantages of a grammar school were afforded. He
soon after entered a store as clerk and acted in that
capacity until 1844, when a copartnership was
formed with his brother, under the firm-name of B.
W. & S. B. Carey. He represented the firm in the
purchase of goods in New York, being the youngest
merchant from that locality among the many buyers
of that period. As an illustration of the difficulties
160
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
of travel, it may be mentioned that his route was by
stage from Sidney to Cincinnati, and by steamer
from thence to Brownsville, where he traveled again
by stage over the Alleghany Mountains, and thus by
railroad to New York. During the time of this
partnership he, with his brothers Thomas and Jason,
made the overland journey with pack-mules and
horses to California, tarrying at Salt Lake City, and
reaching Sacramento three months from the date of
departure. They soon after removed to the moun-
tains and engaged in traffic between Sacramento and
the mines. In the spring of 1851, after an absence
of twelve months, the illness of Thomas Carey occa-
sioned their somewhat precipitate return, via Isthmus
of Panama and New Orleans. The death of his
partner, Benjamin W., occurred in 1851, when Sim-
eon B. closed the business, and two years later re-
moved to New York, where a more extended field was
opened to him. Mr. Carey first became a clerk in the
hardware establishment of Messrs. Cornells & Willis,
36 Cortland Street, where, after an acceptable ser-
vice of two years in that capacity, he in 1855 was
made a partner, the firm becoming Cornells, Willis &
Carey. In 1869, owing to various changes which
had meanwhile occurred in the wholesale and jobbing
trade, the firm was dissolved, when he removed to
Indianapolis and again embarked in the wholesale
and jobbing hardware business, under the firm-name
of Layman, Carey & Co. This from a small busi-
ness has become the most extensive and leading
wholesale hardware establishment in the State, occu-
pying a spacious building at 67 and 69 South Merid-
ian Street, equipped with two hydraulic elevators.
Their trade is not confined to the limits of Indiana,
but extends into Ohio and Illinois.
Mr. Carey is in politics a Republican, but not an
active political partisan. He is in religion a sup-
porter of the Second Presbyterian Church of Indian-
apolis. He was married Nov. 2, 185-1, to Miss
Lydia, daughter of Eldad and Olive King, of West-
field, Mass. Their children are Ida Fannie, born in
New York, May 3, 1857, who died May 25. 1857 ;
Nellie, whose birth occurred in New York, July 14,
1859, and her death Oct. 26, 1859; Jennie King,
born Oct. 15, 1860, in New York ; and Samuel Cor-
nell, born in Brooklyn, Dec. 16, 1861, now associated
with his father in business. Jennie King was mar-
ried Oct. 26, 1881, to O. S. Brumback, of Toledo,
Ohio, who was born Dec. 2, 1855, in Delaware
County, Ohio, and graduated at Princeton, N. J., in
1877, receiving the degree of A.B., and in 1880 that
of A.M. from the same college. He graduated at
the Law Department of Ann Arbor University, Mich-
igan, receiving in 1879 the degree of LL.B , when
he located in Toledo in the practice of his profession.
In the stove and hollow-ware trade the house of
the late Robert L. McOuat & Co. holds a first rank,
and continues unchanged under the management of
his brother.
Robert L. Mc0c.\t. — The family of McOuats
are of Scotch ancestry. Thomas McOuat, the father
of the subject of this biographical sketch, having in
1830 removed from Lexington, Ky., to Indianapolis,
lie married Miss Janette Lockerbie, who was born
in Glasgow, Scotland, and had children, — William,
Thomas, George, Annie, Robert L., Mary, Andrew
W., Martha, and Jennie. Their son, Robert L.,
was born at Lexington, Ky., Aug. 8, 1827, and was
but three years of age when Marion County became
his home. He was educated under the tutorship of
Thomas Gregg, William Sullivan, and James Kem-
per, of the Marion County Seminary. At the age
of seventeen he abandoned school to enter an ap-
prenticeship at the tinner's trade with Samuel Wain-
right. Having served his time as an apprentice, he
was placed in charge of the business at the old stand
by Mr. Wainright, who opened another store. In
1850, during the gold excitement in California, he
with a friend made the trip, overland, to the gold-
mines, walking all the way from Salt Lake City, and
carrying his provisions and baggage on his back, most
of the time camping and traveling. Arriving in San
Francisco, he immediately secured employment at his
trade with one of the largest establishments, but find-
ing the climate uncongenial he returned to Indian-
apolis, and opened a stove and tinware store with a
small capital. Soon finding the room too small, his
brother George built a room on the opposite side of
the street, which was occupied for many years under
the firm-name of R. L. & A. W. McOuat, during
-5'.^ %-4if.PaK'«
I
Xt.^^i'^r-^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
161
which time he was successful and acquired a little
fortune. During the year 1880 he sold his interest in
the business to his brother and partner, Andrew W.
McOuat, to engage in the manufiicture of car-wheels,
forming a partnership with John May, under the
firm-name of McOuat & May, and for a period of
two years met with success. Having sold large bills
to a manufacturing company outside the State who
were unfortunate in their business operations, the
firm was compelled to suspend. Mr. McOuat subse-
quently secured or paid all claims, and also protected
parties who were joint indorsers on paper with him.
In 1882 he received the nomination for clerk of
the court of Marion County at the hands of the
Democratic party, whose principles he supported, and
although the county was largely Republican, lacked
but a few votes of an election.
He married in 1850, Ellen C. Wallace, whose
death occurred in 1863. He was a second time
married on the 1st of August, 1865, to Eugenia F.,
daughter of Miles W. Burford, of Missouri. Their
children are Effie B., Robert, and Burford. Mr.
McOuat was an active member of the Independent
Order of Odd-Fellows. In religion he was an Epis-
copalian, and formerly senior warden and later a
vestryman of St. Paul's Cathedral, Indianapolis, of
which he was one of the originators, having first sug-
gested the organization and personally presented the
first subscription-paper to raise necessary funds for
the salary of the rector of the parish that afterwards
built the cathedral, in which he continued an earnest
worker and liberal supporter. He was a man of
large and liberal views and indomitable energy, a
close applicant to business, but always taking pleasure
in fishing and hunting, of which he was very fond.
He was strongly attached to his family and home,
where his evenings were invariably passed. In all
his relations, both at home and abroad, he was the
Christian gentleman. Mr. McOuat's death occurred
June 28, 1883, in his fifty-sixth year.
Among the early merchants of the city whose
stocks were not so miscellaneous as those of the dry-
goods or general merchant were the dealers in clocks,
watches, and jewelry, — a trade proportionally more
important now than then, — and among the earliest of
11
these was Humphrey Griffith, and the most extensive
in later years W. H. Talbott. Both have been dead
some years now.
Humphrey Griffith. — The parents of Mr.
Griffith were Evan and Mary Ellis Griffith, the
former having been a member of the Protestant
Episcopal Church, and the latter of the Congrega-
tional Church. Their son Humphrey was born in
Dolgelly, Merionethshire, Wales, Dec. 23, 1791.
His mother died when he was eleven, and his father
when he was twenty years of age, leaving him to
carve for himself by his own unaided efforts a
career of independence. He served an appren-
ticeship of seven years at his trade of watch-
maker and clockmaker at Shrewsbury, England.
He then worked for a time in London, and in
the spring of 1817 emigrated to America, experi-
encing some difficulty in embarking, owing to the
prohibition then existing against skillful workmen
leaving the country. Having sailed from Dublin, he
landed in New York, and was employed first in Hunt-
ingdon, Pa. In Pittsburgh, with two others, he
purchased a skiff, with which he came down the
Ohio. He settled in Lebanon, Ohio, and in 1821
visited Indianapolis, where, at the first sale of town
lots, he purchased property on Washington Street.
In 1822 he left Lebanon and removed to Centreville,
Ind., and while there made additional purchases of
land in the vicinity of Indianapolis, to which place
he removed in 1825, having ordered a shop built
and ready for occupancy on his arrival, in which he
established himself as the first clock and watch-
maker in the city. The clock made by him for the
old State-House fifty years ago has, it is said, never
since run down or needed regulating. In the summer
of 1836 he retired from business with a competency,
which he increased by judicious investments. He
avoided bold speculations, and scrupulously shunned
contracting a debt. He felt great interest in the
growth of the city, and was always prominent in
every scheme of substantial improvement. In early
days he was an active member of the Common Council,
and also served for a term or more as city treasurer.
His leading characteristics were punctuality in all
things, great or little, and an investigating mind.
162
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
He was a great reader and thinker, and developed
more than ordinary mechanical ingenuity. He was
modest and sensitive, always truthful and perfectly
reliable. He married, March 13, 1819, Miss Jane
Stephenson, a native of Scotland, and had nine chil-
dren, four of whom died in infoncy, and three, John
E., Josiah R., and Mary Isabella, in mature years.
John E. and Josiah R. each left families. There
are twelve grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
The two surviving children of Mr. and Mrs. GrifiBth
are Pleasant H. and Mrs. Anne J. Whitehead, both
living in Indianapolis. The eldest son, John E.,
accompanied David Dale Owen in his geological sur-
veys in Illinois, Kentucky, and some of the Terri-
tories. He and his brother Josiah were exemplary
citizens. Mary was an active Christian, and a suc-
cessful teacher in the Sunday-school of the Third
Presbyterian Church, of which she was a member.
Mr. GrifiBth twice vLsitcd the country of his nativity
and the old homestead at Dolgelly in which his birth
occurred. He was confirmed in the Protestant Epis-
copal Church in his fourteenth year, but did not con-
tinue his membership, though always a liberal con-
tributor to all worthy religious causes. His death
occurred June 2, 1870. Mrs. GriflBth's childhood
was passed near the home of Sir Walter Scott, whom
she distinctly remembered, and of whom she related
many interesting reminiscences. She was a lady of
retiring manners and disposition, quiet in her habits,
but firm in her views of truth and duty. An active
member of the Presbyterian Church, she was warmly
attached to its doctrines and ordinances. Her death
occurred July 23, 1879, in her eighty-fourth year.
Rev. M. S. Whitehead, son-in-law of Mr. GrifiBth,
was born in 1831, and died in 1877. He was in
1868 licensed to preach by the Congregational Asso-
ciation of Indiana, and was one of the founders of the
Mayflower Church of Indianapolis, which pulpit he
filled at times acceptably. His work was not con-
fined to one locality, and several churches of dififerent
denominations were established out of Sunday-schools
organized and fostered by him. Mr. Whitehead's
influence was wide-spread, and the desire to make
the ministry the work of his life was completely
realized.
Washington Houston Talbott. — The earliest
members of the Talbott family came from England
and settled in Talbot County, Md. The parents of
Washington Houston were William and Mary (Hous-
ton) Talbott. Their son was born in the State of
Kentucky on the 29th of March, 1817, and at an
early age removed with his parents to Charlestown,
Ind., where his father owned an extensive milling
property. After enjoying ordinary advantages of
education, he in 1835 became a resident of Indian-
apolis, and established a jewelry and book business.
In 1848 he married Miss Elizabeth Coram Tinker,
daughter of Capt. William and Elizabeth Tinker, of
Cincinnati, though formerly residents of Maysville,
Ky. Their surviving children are William II. and
Mary Cleves. Mr. Talbott continued the bu.siness of
a jeweler for many years, meanwhile embarking in
other commercial ventures. During the year 1863 he
was elected president of the State Smking Fund, and
subsequently filled the same oflBce in connection with
the Indiana and Illinois Central Railroad. He was
also president of board of trustees of the State benevo-
lent institutions. Mr. Talbott was closely identified
with the Democratic politics of Indiana, having for
several years filled the ofifice of chairman of the State
Democratic Committee. He was on successive occa-
sions delegate at large to National Conventions. He
was president of the Gatling Gun Company, and
while directing the intere.sts of that company in
Europe contracted a severe cold, which occasioned
his death at his home in Indianapolis.
The first extensive drug house in the town, and
the first to put up a soda fountain, was that of Mc-
Dougal & Dunlap, to whom succeeded the late
William Hannaman and his partner, Caleb Scudder,
the pioneer cabinet-maker, in whose shop the first
Sunday-school was held. Both were largely con-
cerned in the establishment of some of our early
manufactures, as tobacco, wool, and oil. and Mr.
Hannaman survived to an advanced age, dying within
a few years past.
William Hannaman.— The Hannaman family
are of German nationality, Christopher, the grand-
father of William, having been a native of Piu.-sia.
He married Mary O'Neal, whose birthplace was Dub-
^'/^^a^fi^^
fp-^.
/f^^^i^Z'P'T-Z,
^^f-^^>^v«'7-i^ —
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
163
lin, Ireland. This union traDsmitted to their descend-
ants the sturdy qualities of both the German and
tlie Irish races. William Hannaman, the father of
the subject of this biographical sketch, was a resi-
dent of Cherry Valley, N. Y., and married Mary
Fletcher, of Harrison County, Va. Their son William
was boru Aug. 10, 1806, at Adelphia, Ross Co., Ohio,
and at the age of twenty-two removed to Indian-
apolis, where, having previously acquired the trade
of a printer, he was for several years employed in the
oflBce of the Indiana Journal. In 1833 he em-
barked with Caleb Scudder in the drug business,
which was continued uninterruptedly until 1863. He
also, with his partner, erected a cardingmachine and
oil-mill on the arm of the canal at its junction with
the White River, and manufactured the first flaxseed
oil in the locality. Mr. Hannaman was for many years
school commissioner, a director of the State Bank of
Indiana, located at Indianapolis, trustee of the State
University, and identified with many benevolent and
charitable enterprises. He was made president of
the Indiana Branch of the Sanitary Commission dur-
ing the late war, and disposed of his interest in the
drug business that he might devote his time and
energies exclusively to this humane work. The ad-
mirable management of his department and the good
it accomplished is in a large degree due to the gra-
tuitous and eSicient service of Mr. Hannaman, who
on retiring from his labors in behalf of the soldiers
was appointed by Governor Morton State military
agent for the purpose of collecting soldiers' claims.
In 1871 he became a member of the firm of Smith
& Hannaman, brokers, and continued this business
connection until his death, which occurred of pneu-
monia, at the Hot Springs of Arkansas, on the 6th
of December, 1880. Mr. Hannaman was married on
the 28th of August, 1833, to Rhoda A. Luse, whose
birth occurred Feb. 25, 1812, and her death Sep-
tember, 1876. In the summer of 1879 he was again
married to Mrs. A. P. Berry, who is still living. Of
seven children but two survive their father, Henry
G., of Indianapolis, and Mary E., of Dakota.
Among the earlier merchants of the city were the
late John F. Ramsay, in furniture, and Jacob S.
Walker.
John F. Ram.sat, retired merchant, was born in
Lebanon, Ohio, Dec. 2, 1805. His parents, Wil-
liam and Martha (Dinwiddle) Ramsay, were of
Scotch descent, and born in Kentucky, their parents
being among the earliest settlers of that State. Wil-
liam with his family came to Indiana Territory in
1810, landing at the site of the city of Madison,
there being but one house erected at this early
period, which was occupied by the ferryman. They
settled near the site of the village of Hanover, about
two miles from the block-house, to which they
were compelled to resort every night for protection
from the Indians. In 1812, the latter becoming
very troublesome, John was sent to his grandparents,
near Georgetown, Ky., where he remained a year.
His boyhood was spent in helping to clear the forests
and in farm labors, the lad being subjected to all the
hardships and privations of pioneer life. Educational
advantages in the new country were very limited.
He attended school six months when in Kentucky
and a few terms in Indiana, walking a distance of
three miles to the school-house. At the age of sev-
enteen he removed to Cincinnati, and was appren-
ticed to Charles Lehman, at that time the leading
furniture manufacturer in the West. Serving out
his apprenticeship, he worked a year in the shop,
after which he repaired to Louisville, and from
thence to New Orleans and St. Louis, pursuing his
vocation for a time in each place. Returning to
Indiana, he carried on his trade near Madison and
at Paris, Ind., and removed to Indianapolis May 15,
1833. Purchasing the property adjoining the
ground now occupied by the Occidental Hotel
(which at that time was inclosed with a rail fence
and was planted with corn), he erected a building,
opened a cabinet-shop, and by close attention to
business became the leading furniture dealer in the
place. W^ilh the advent of railroad communication
with Cincinnati, he abandoned manufacturing and
dealt exclusively in furniture made at the latter
place. After a successful career, having obtained a
handsome competency, he retired from business in
1870. He has been twice married, his first wife,
Elvira (Ward) Ramsay, having died in 1846. Five
children were born to this union, all of whom are
164
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
now deceased. He married his second wife, Leah
P. Malott, widow of W. H. Malott, of Salem, Ind.,
in 1848. Five children have been born to them,
four of whom are now living.
Mr. Ramsay was an ardent Whig during the ex-
istence of that party. Upon its dissolution and
the organization of the Republican party, his strong
anti-slavery seniiments led him to become identified
with it. He has never held any political office
other than as a member of the Common Council,
elected by the Whigs. He has always taken a deep
interest in matters affi^cting the welfare and growth
of the city, and in building and otherwise he
has done much toward advancing its material in-
terests. He has been a faithful and leading mem-
ber of the Methodist Episcopal Church during his
entire fifty years' residence in the city, and, with
others of the early settlers, has aided in giving an
impulse to its moral and religious sentiment, that has
caused it to be noted as " the City of Churches."
Jacob S. Walker. — The grandfather of Jacob
S. Walker was a soldier of the war of the Revolu-
tion. He married Miss Mary Hazelet, and had
among his children a son Thomas, who married Mrs.
Mary Rutherford, of Dauphin County, Pa., and
had two sons, Jacob S. and James, and two daugh-
ters. Susan and Eliza. Jacob S. Walker was born
in January, 1814, at Harrisburg, Pa., where the
early years of his life were spent. At the age of
sixteen, after enjoying such advantages of education
as the common schools offered, he determined to
render himself independent by acquiring a trade,
and became master of the carpenter's craft. In 1835
he removed to Indianapolis as a builder and contractor,
and during a period of ten years erected many impor-
tant edifices and built dwellings, which were, afterward
sold by him. He then embarked in the lumber
business, and continued thus engaged for twenty
years, after which he retired from active employ-
ments. Mr. Walker was a man of modest demeanor
and of humane instincts, who cared little for mere
display and esteemed highly the more substantial
pleasures to be derived from books. He was a ju-
dicious reader of the best literature, and possessed a
mind well informed on all subjects. He conferred
upon his children opportunities for education, and
implanted in them by precept and example the
principles which guided him through life. In
polities he was a Whig and later became an ardent
^^^a^e^crf^^ ^^/A&Z-A^:
Republican, but never sought or accepted ofiice at the
hands of his party. In religion he was a stanch Pres-
byterian and an officer of Rev. Henry Ward Beecher's
church when a pastor in Indianapolis. He received
the contract for the erection of this edifice, as also
for the First Protestant Episcopal Church in the city.
He was at an early period a deacon of the Second
Presbyterian Church. He was also a member of
the Independent Order of Odd- Fellows. Mr. Walker
was married in 1837 to Mrs. Sarah A. Landis, of
Harrisburg, Pa., to whom were born children,
Thomas R. and Mary F., wife of George Knodle, a
son of Adam Knodle, an early shoe merchant in the
city. He married again Mary A., only child of
Thomas Lupton, who is of English descent and
came from Chester County, Pa., to Indianapolis in
1835. The children of this marriage are Jacob L.,
married to Miss Keziah Rutherford, who is of
.„^*ie^^*^
Eri^ 'iyA.KFIJJ:<i"^
/^h-T^?^
^^ ^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
165
Scotch-Irish extraction ; Edwin J. ; Louis A., who
married Miss Eugenia, daughter of Dr. D'Acuel, of
St. Louis; Robert P., and Harry L. The death
of Mr. Walker occurred May 16, 1870, in his fifty-
seventh year.
Dealing in real estate may be fairly enough classed
among the subjects covered by the title of commerce,
and in real estate the dealings have been very large.
In 1873, during the period of speculative excitement,
the sales amounted to $32,579,256. Since that time
no record has been kept of them that will enable a
comparison to be made. In a year or two later, in fact,
the reaction came, and real estate was hard to sell and
not always easy to give away if it had no special ad-
vantages. Of the amount of sales in the past year
or the year before no official statement is made, but
the reports in the daily papers show that they ranged
from five thousand dollars to thirty thousand dollars
a day, or an annual total of probably five million dol-
lars. Among the first of our real estate dealers was
the late James H. McKernan.
James H. McKernan was born at Wilmington,
Del., in December, 1815. In his seventh year he
removed with his family to Muskingum County, Ohio,
where his father settled on a small farm of fifty
acres, subsequently increased to seventy-five. He
was able only to enjoy the merest rudiments of edu-
cation. At the age of seventeen he was left by the
death of his father the sole support of the family,
with no means other than the farm. But he was a
brave-hearted boy in the battle of life. He worked
hard, and rented land to eke out the inadequate yield
of his own land. Among his neighbors his reputa-
tion for business capacity, promptness, integrity, and
prudence was most enviable. On attaining his ma-
jority he had paid all his father's debts, erected a
valuable dwelling, and accumulated money in addi-
tion with which to start in business. Heroism and
self-dependence, combined with grasp of mind and
energy, were inborn elements of his character. In
1836 he began trading iu produce, and in 1837 em-
barked with a partner in mercantile pursuits at La-
fayette, Ohio. In 1842 he established himself in the
foundry business in the same town, and in 1845
removed to Indianapolis, where he began his active
career with Jesse Jones as a dealer in dry-goods.
But his tastes and talents inclined strongly to inven-
tions and the mechanic arts. Whatever his imme-
diate occupation mechanical constructions, improve-
ments, and suggestions were always floating in his
mind, several valuable inventions having been pat-
ented. A man of his energy quickly sought and
created the widest field of action. He speculated in
real estate, bought whole forests, built saw-mills to
cut them, and erected streets of cheap but serviceable
houses, extending Indianapolis on the southwest far
beyond the dreams of its inhabitants. In the prose-
cution of his real estate and other enterprises, how-
ever, Mr. McKernan did not lose sight of a subject
which had led him into many expensive experiments,
— the reduction of iron ore by means of ordinary
Western coal. He had satisfied himself of its prac-
ticability, and detected the defects in the operation
of those who had attempted it and failed. So certain
was the result in his mind that he determined to
settle the question finally and fully. In the spring of
1867 he obtained the abandoned furnace of the Pilot
Knob Company, at St. Louis, and after changing its
construction made experiments which were completely
successful, first-class iron having been produced. This
was a great success for Mr. McKernan. He had
fully realized his hopes, though every one before him,
with vastly more capital and better opportunities, but
lacking his original theories and combinations, had
failed. He had shown St. Louis a new source of
business and prosperity of immense value. He found
it necessary, however, to obtain additional means or
abandon his enterprise. The St. Louis Board of
Trade and several large capitalists urged him to
remain and prosecute his work. Additional means
were promised him, and under the promise of the
Board of Trade and prominent citizens the work of the
furnace was in 1867 resumed, and the results, after
inconveniences resulting from his business associa-
tions, were such as amazed everybody, and made iron-
smelting with cheap Western coal a fixed fact. This
success, however, did not in a pecuniary sense profit
Mr. McKernan. He sacrificed all his prospective
gains, and returned home no richer than he departed.
St. Louis has reaped the benefit of his investigations,
166
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and the iron industry has risen to be one of tlie prime
elements of her prosperity. A leading journal stated
that, " in view of all the facts, it becomes St. Louis
to decide fairly what acknowledgment she owes to
him who has achieved the great result in making
iron, and whom she by failing in her promise forced
to sacrifice all his interests and prospects in his own
discovery." Mr. McKernan returned to Indianapolis,
and at once embarked extensively in real estate oper-
ations. While liberal and indulgent with those in-
debted to him, he was particularly prompt in the
payment of all demands against himself His daily
life was marked by a ceaseless activity. Bold and
confident in his temperament, he inspired others with
like feelings. The praise of far-.seeing men of sound
judgment was ever awarded to him, and the success
that crowned his efforts was of a character to consti-
tute a public as well as a personal benefit. In all
personal relations he was social, frank, and courteous,
and at his home hospitable and cheerful. In his
religious views he was a member of the Roman
Catholic Church. Mr. McKernan was married to
Miss Susan Hewitt, whose children were David S.,
Lewis, Joseph V., William E., and Leo A. The
death of James H. McKernan occurred in January,
1877, at his home in Indianapolis.
The lumber trade of Indianapolis is a very im-
portant part of the total, the retail trade of 1882
amounting to 81,500,000. From the general state-
ment of business it would appear that the total
receipts of lumber for the year 1882 were 124,000,-
000 feet, and the shipments 66,000,000. Saw-mills
cut 22,000,000 feet of veneer that year.
A specialty of the lumber trade is the trade in
" hard wood" lumber, especially black walnut. Until
the close of the war not much was done in this direc-
tion, or in any general lumber business. For the
first thirty-five years of the city's history pine lum-
ber was little used. Oak made the frame-work of
houses, and poplar the weather-boarding, shingles,
and finishing. But slowly, after the development of
the railroad system, pine began to be used in the
place of poplar, and later in the place of oak. Lum-
ber-yards began to figure among the forms of trade
that required capital and made money for the city.
By the close of the war the lumber business had
grown into first-class importance. There were a
dozen or more large yards in difl'erent parts of the
city, some of them with mills to cut logs, some to
cut veneers, and some with planing-mills, and sash-
and door-factories connected with them. The walnut
lumber trade came later. In early times the black
walnut was about the worst tree the farmer had to
deal with. It was too brittle for good lumber, and
too hard to be cheaply sawed. It was not good fuel,
and did not make durable rails. In fact it was a
nuisance. Now it is no uncommon thing to find a
single walnut-tree that is worth more money than the
whole farm it stands on. More than a thousand dol-
lars worth of veneers have been cut from a single
tree and left a considerable part of it. Jjven as late
as 1868 there were hundreds of farmers and business
men in Indiana and Indianapolis who were unin-
formed of the value of walnut wood and threw it
away as refuse or burned it as rubbish.
A saw-miller in Indianapolis about that time had
collected quite a heap of walnut knots from the logs
he had sawed, and had thrown them aside to burn in
his boiler furnace when he could get time to split
them. An agent of an Eastern lumber dealer saw
them and the ill-posted sawyer sold them for fifty
cents apiece. He was a little worried a day or two
afterwards when he learned that they would have
been cheap at ten dollars apiece if they were sound
and well twisted in grain. The great demand for
this kind of lumber for furniture, both in this coun-
try and Europe, has thinned it out very greatly, and
the trade in it is declining. It is impossible to give
any idea of the development or decline of the walnut
lumber trade, because no separate account or report
has been made of it. In 1874 the Board of Trade
report says the total receipts of lumber were 119,-
800,000 feet, of which about 60,000,000 was walnut
lumber. The indications are that the total has never
been so large since. The trade is still large, how-
ever, and a large part of it is in logs brought here to
be sawed up. There are ten mills here sawing
walnut and hard woods, and eighteen dealers who
handled in the year last reported in full, 1882, to
December 31st, 38,000,000 feet. This shows a de-
En4alyB.B.Han 8. S<ms. 62 Khan S'KXfiOTi iHirto ly Biafy.
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
167
cline from 1873 of more than one-third. The pine
lumber business, however, has kept on a steady ad-
vance with other commercial interests, and occupies a
score or more yards large and small, besides those
attached to factories as stores of material. Oak ap-
pears to hold its own as firmly as it did in the last
generation. The demand for it as building timber
has declined greatly, but it has been made up fully
by the demand for it to make cross-ties for railway
tracks. Hickory, birch, and sugar have never been
accounted or used as timber, and elm but little more.
They went for fuel when it was deemed worth while,
and now good, well-seasoned wood of these varieties
is a valuable product. Coal is slowly displacing
wood, but has not done it yet. The amount of coal
brought to the city appears from the partial report of
the secretary of the Board of Trade to have been
about 400, OUO tons for the year ending Deo. 31,
1882, the last of which any report has been made.
Among the articles reported for the last six months
of 1882 — the last oflBcial statement published — are
20,000 bales of cotton, or 40,000 for the year ; 40
car-loads of eggs, estimating in the same way ; 800,-
000 barrels of flour ; 801 tons of hides — the total
value of all hides and pelts for the year is put at
$1,500,000; 64,000 cars of general merchandise;
46 cars of poultry — annual value of poultry, 81,000,-
000 ; 40,000 tons of ice ; 40,000 tons of provisions ;
36,000 barrels of salt ; 640 cars of shingles ; 50,000
barrels of starch ; 2600 cars of stone ; 26,000 bar-
rels of tallow ; 43,000 hogsheads of tobacco ; 300,-
000 rabbits shipped East and sold here in 1883 and
winter of 1884.
In grain the trade has been steadily growing for a
number of years. The receipts of wheat for the year
ending April, 1883, were about 8,000,000 bushels ; of
corn, 17,000,000, as appears from the report of Secre-
tary Blake. In 1872 a company was formed to build
and conduct an elevator, and that year erected the
first one west of the river on the St. Louis Railroad.
It has a capacity of about 350,000 bushels. In 1874,
Mr. F. Rusch, in association with two or three others,
built Elevator B, the second one, with a capacity of
300,000 bushels. It was entirely destroyed by fire
in June, 1875, but rebuilt at once in better shape.
and has been constantly busy since. Some three
years ago, about the time of the completion of the
Indianapolis, Decatur and Springfield Railroad, a
third elevator was built by the company close to the
Corner of Marylaud and Tennessee Streets
track, in the manufacturing suburb of Hanghsville,
with a capacity fully equal to either of the older
ones. Besides these there are several smaller in the
city.
Since 1877 the stock-yards have formed a con-
spicuous element of the city's commerce. They
were built by the Belt Road Company on one hun-
dred and ten acres of the old " Bayou," or " McCarty
farm," on the Vincennes Railroad, at the southern
border of West Indianapolis, about two miles from
the Union Depot. In convenience of arrangement,
amplitude of supply, and completeness of shelter and
means of shipment, they are pronounced by those
familiar with all the stock-yards of the country un-
surpassed by any, and unequaled by any but one or
two. On the northeast corner of the grounds are the
engine-house and machine-shop, the blacksmith-shop,
the coal platform, and the pumping engine which
forces water from a well about ninety feet deep into
168
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
two large elevated tanks or reservoirs, whence it is
distributed all over the premises. At the north end,
to the west of these buildings, is the residence of the
superintendent ; south of this, about four hundred
feet, is the " Stock-Yard Exchange," a large, hand-
some, three-story brick building, with a front of about
one hundred and twenty feet, and a roar building,
making a total depth of over one hundred and fifty
feet. It is occupied as a hotel in the icur building
and the upper stories of the front, and as oflSce^of
stock-dealers on the ground-floor. On the east of this
is a large storage-house for hay and corn and stock-
feed generally. On the west is a large stable for the
finer grades of horses. Directly south of the Ex-
change, and separated mostly by a broad passage-way
of forty feet or so, are the stock stables, built of red
cedar posts set deep in the ground, and planked up the
sides and ends high enough to make a perfect shelter
for the stock. On the roof of each is an attic, with
lattice sides, the full length of the stable. There are
five of these, separated from each other by a narrow
passage for stock, fifteen feet or so in width. They are
about a thousand feet long by one hundred and seventy-
five wide, with broad passage-ways down the middle
and smaller lateral ones between the divisions. Stock
is received on the west side, where there are railway
tracks coDnecting with the Belt extending along the-
entire length of the stables. From the receiving
platform, which is covered with pens, a passage leads
to the scale-room, where the animals are weighed
and driven off to their quarters. The western stables
are chiefly appropriated to hogs. When shipped
away the stock is driven to the east side, where a
platform the length of the stables, amply provided
with shipping-pens, enables a train to bo loaded in a
ver}' few minutes.
LARGEST RECEIPTS IN ONE DAT, 1882.
December 9 8809 (Hogs, SS09).
October 28 2026 ^Cattle, 238).
October 28 4184 (Sbeep, 1534).
May 10 316 (Horses, 26).
LARGEST SHIPMENTS IN ONE DAT, 18S2.
January 4 4125 (Hogs, 4115).
October 28 1325 (Cattle, 794).
M:iy20 4194 (Sheep, 1856).
■I'll.v 4 281 (Horses, 149).
Their business in 1882, the last year of which
any statement has been made, is summed up as fol-
lows : Hogs, 5,319,611 ; cattle, 6-40,363 ; sheep, 849,-
936 ; horses, 50,795 ; shipments, hogs, 2,298,895 ;
cattle, 535,195 ; sheep, 780,395 ; horses, 48,361 ;
Indianapolis delivery, hogs, 3,020,913 ; cattle, 106,-
178 ; sheep, 70,543 ; horses, 2533.
Until the completion of the Madison Railroad no
business was done oflF Washington Street, except that
a year or two a little family grocery was kept in a
one-story brick on Indiana Avenue, at the corner of
Tennessee Street. In 1847, however, commission-
houses and pork-packing houses began to be estab-
lished about the Madison Depot. Foundries and
shops started up in convenient openings, and during
the war groceries, drug-stores, hotels, saloons, and
eating-houses were put wherever they could go.
Thus came business diverted from Washington
Street. With this change, or a little preceding it,
came the separation of different classes of merchan-
dise into diflferent establishments.
Below is given the annual live-stock report of the
Indianapolis Stock-yards, prepared by W. P. Ijams,
general .superintendent. It will be noticed that as
compared with the year 1882 there was a handsome
increase in business, while it fell short of the business
done in the years 1878, 1879, 1880, and 1881. The
table given below is self-explanatory :
RECEIPTS.
Hogs. Cattle. Sheep. Horses.
Total for the year 1883 931,121 121.448
Total for the year 1SK2 65.1,597 114,746
Totiil for the year 1881 |l.l-,i9,8H4 144,144
Total for thi- year 1880 'I,:i21,;i76 13:i,655
Tolal for the year 1879 1.12:i,4()9 125,723
Total for the year 1878 | 98(i,639 118,945
One month and 20 days, 1877 104,696 4,150
Total Not. 12, 1877, to Dec. 31, 1883. 6,260,732 761,811 l,r07,696 67,545
254,653
288.698
225,622
142.7J5
111,927
76.107
4,857
18,800
15.987
9,288
9,358
6,912
685
SHIPMENTS.
Hogs. I Cattle. I Sheep. iHoises.
Total for the year 1883
Total for the year 1882
Total for the year 1881
Total lor the year 1880
Total for the year 1879
Total for the year 1878
One month and 20 days, 1877..
699,514
464.953
2M,095
8,027
102.342
9 1. 142
120,611
11CI,.559
104,»45
105,117
3,021
Total Nov. 12, 1877, to Dec. 31, 1883. 2,742,7951 637,637
237,612 17,725
2G.S.K95 15.097
2113,246 8.9110
132,904 8.901
100,879 9,031
69,8971 6,770
4,772 662
1,018,005 66,086
a..-'^0'^'>^--z^zy i
J^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
169
INDIANAPOLIS DELIVERY.
Total for the year 1883 487,221 19.106
Total for the v™r 1882 ■ 329,008 24,714
Tot.il for the yeiir 1881 492,:i74 2:t,53H
Total for the year 1880 I 721,862, 22,096
Total for the year 1879 658,456 20,S78|
Tolal for the year 1878 i 722,423 14,328|
One month and 20 days, 1877 96,790 629
14,041 1,075
21.003 966
22,376 665
9,821 387
11,048 327
6,210 165
85
23
Total Nov. 12, 1S77, to Dec. 31, 1S83. 3,508,134, 125,284 84,584 3,608
LARGEST RECEIPTS IN ONE DAY, 1883.
December 4 12,775 (Hogs, 12,775).
February 17 1,705 (Cattle, 567).
September S 3,065 (Sheep, 814).
April 29 238 (Horses, 66).
LAHGEST SHIPMENTS IN ONE DAY, 1883.
December 19 4,655 (Hogs, 3,352).
August 4 1.902 (Cattle, 1,902).
September S 3,460 (Sheep, 2,446).
July 1 221 (Horses, 87).
CHAPTER VIII.
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.— (Coii(///Hei?.)
THE BENCH AND BAR.
In the general history is related the organization
of the county and the early sessions of the first court.
No more need be said here than that Judge William
W. Wick was elected the first judge by the Legisla-
ture at Corydon in the winter of 1821-22, and
Hervey Bates appointed sheriff by Governor Jen-
nings early in 1822. Both were residents of Con-
nersville, and came here together in the early spring
of 1822. The circuit consisted of Marion County,
enlarged for judicial purposes by a considerable por-
tion of the territory now composing Johnson, Hamil-
ton, Boone, Madison, and Hancock Counties, with
the following earlier-organized counties : Monroe,
Morgan, Lawrence, Hendricks, Green, Owen, Rush,
Decatur, Bartholomew, Jennings, and Shelby. The
first session of the court was held at the house of
Gen. Carr, the State agent, on Delaware Street
opposite the court-house, Sept. 26, 1822. Judge
Wick presided, with Eliakim Harding and James
Mcllvain as associates. James M. Ray was clerk
by election the previous April, and Hervey Bates
sheriff by regular election in August succeeding his
appointment. Calvin Fletcher was the first prose-
cutor by appointment. Up to 1824, when the
court-house was so far completed as to be available
for the sessions, the first meeting was held at Carr's
house, as the law bad designated that place, and
then an adjournment was made to Crumbaugh's on
Washington Street, — or the place in the woods where
the street was to run, — just west of the future line
of the canal. We have no record of the lawyers in
attendance at that first session of the first court of
the county, and there is no certainty that there were
any belonging to the town except Mr. Fletcher, the
pro.secutor, and Harvey Gregg, one of the founders
of the Western Censor, the predecessor of the
Journal. Mr. Fletcher long held a prominent place
at the bar, and only left it to take the presidency of
the Indianapolis branch of the State Bank.
Hon. Calvin Fletcher. — Robert Fletcher, the
progenitor in America of the Fletcher family, was
probably born in Yorkshire, in 1592. He settled at
Concord, Mass., in 1630, with a family consisting of
a wife, two sons, — Luke and William, — and one
daughter. In the direct line of descent from this
pioneer was born, on the 4th of February, 1798,
Calvin, the subject of this sketch, the eleventh in a
family of fifteen children. Under the teachings of
all excellent father and a mother of more than ordi-
nary ability he learned those habits of industry and
self-reliance which, coupled with upright principles,
uniformly characterized his later life. While per-
forming all the duties exacted from a boy upon a
New England farm, he very soon manifested a great
desire for a classical education. Depending upon his
own earnings for the means by which to achieve his
desire, he set about the preparation for college by
pursuing his studies at Randolph and Royalton
Academies, Vermont. After some vicissitudes he
for a time abandoned study and began labor in a
brick -yard in Pennsylvania. Circumstances soon after
influenced his removal to Ohio, where he first taught
school at Urbana, Champaign Co., and was sub-
sequently private tutor in the family of a Mr. Gwin,
whose fine library afforded him abundant opportunity
for reading. He finally .studied law with Hon. James
170
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Cooley, afterwards United States Chargi d Affaires
to Peru. In 1819 be removed to Virginia, and was
licensed to practice by tbe Supreme Court of tbat
State, but bis strong love of freedom and tbe rigbts
of man caused bim to renounce bis intention, and
returning to Urbana, Ohio, be became the law-part-
ner of Mr. Cooley. In 1821, Mr. Fletcher settled
in Indianapolis, the capital of tbe State, with bis
family, and was tbe first lawyer in that city. His
business soon became lucrative. He later became
prosecuting attorney, and associated with bim as
partners Ovid Butler, Esq., and Simon Yandes, Esq.
On making tbe capital bis home Mr. Fletcher actively
interested himself in its prosperity, and readily won
tbe confidence and esteem of its citizens. In 1827
he was elected State senator, in whieli office he was
continued until 1832, when be abandoned politics,
though a successful career was open to bim had be
chosen to follow it. He was in 1825 appointed
State's attorney for tbe Fifth Judicial Circuit, em-
bracing from twelve to fifteen counties. In 1834 be
was appointed one of four to organize a State bank,
and to act as sinking fund commissioner, which office
was held for seven years. From 1843 until 1859,
when the charter expired, be acted as president of
tbe Indianapolis branch of the State Bank. Mr.
Fletcher was a strong man physically, morally, and
intellectually. He was equal to the emergency when
justice to himself required an exhibition of strength,
and in the same spirit be stood ready to befriend
those who might have been otherwise injured. He
was a lover of nature. He took mnch interest in
the study of ornithology, and made himself familiar
with the habits of birds, their instincts and charac-
teristics. The domestic animals found in bim a sym-
pathizing fiiend. He was kind to them, and ever
ready to acquire a knowledge of their dispositions
and qualities, that be might turn it to their advan-
tage. He was fond of the science of astronomy,
and, in fact, of all studies tbat were elevating and
ennobling. In bis well-selected library of general
literature, in addition to law-books, might be seen
local histories, periodicals, the works of Audubon,
school journals, and miscellaneous works. In one
leading trait his course was marked and earnest, — no
poor man ever applied to Calvin Fletcher in bis need,
either for counsel or assistance, and was sent empty
away. When tbe friends of the colored man, fleeing
from bondage, were few and unpopular, his sympathy
and helping band were never withheld. He was like
all men of power in his age, exceedingly rapid in
thought and action. Before others bad begun the
argument be bad concluded it. Repose was not bis
dominant characteristic. But more to be admired
than all these traits was his earnest, consistent Chris-
tian character. No man could love and respect the
Bible and tbe minister more than he. He was a
constant student of the one and bearer of the other.
Calvin Fletcher was married, on the 1st of May,
1821, to Miss Sarah Hill, of Champaign County,
Ohio, a lady of remarkable energy of character,
combined with gentleness of disposition and refined
tastes. Her death occurred in September, 1854, and
he was again married, to Mrs. Keziah Price Lister.
The cliildreu of Calvin Fletcher are James Cooley,
Elijah Timothy, Calvin, Miles Johnson, Stougliton
Alfonzo, Maria Antoinette, Crawford, Ingram, Wil-
liam Baldwin, Stephen Keyes, Lucy Keyes, and
Albert Elliott. The death of Calvin Fletcher oc-
curred May 26, 1866. At a meeting of the bankers,
held at Indianapolis, resolutions respecting his death
were adopted, of which the following extract is
appended :
'■That in the career of Mr. Fletcher are presented very
striking evidences of what great and good things may be ac-
complished under our free institutions by sound sense and
unfailing energy, no matter how unpromising the circum-
stances of the possessor may be at hi? outset in life.
"That bis success in business is the history of a life of
hopeful labor, pure integrity, genial benevolence, steady ciiu-
tion, and active usefulness, in which great results have been
attained, not by brilliant strokes of adventure or any depend-
ence upon fortune, but by those plainer and less obtrusive
methods which are within the reach of the great majority of
men, and affords a lesson of hope and warning, — hope to tbe
upright, diligent, and frugal, warning to the reckless and idle
who wait upon fortune."
In the fall of 1823, a little over a year after the
first session of court, a lawyer of marked ability came
from Pennsylvania primarily, but later from Lebanon,
Ohio, where be had studied law with the celebrated
CITV OF INDIANAPOLIS.
171
orator and lawyer, Thomas Corwin, and made his
home here permanently. He was as prominent in j
the profession as Mr. Fletcher, and much longer in |
it. That was Hiram Brown.
HiR.iM Brown, an eminent advocate in Indiana,
traced his descent from a famil}' of Welsh origin,
living in Southern England, that accompanied ur
soon followed Lord Baltimore's colony to Marvland,
settling at Welsh Flats, in Pennsylvania. The de-
scendants of this emigrant remained in that region
and in Maryland for years, and one of them, Wendel
Brown, with his two sons, prior to 1754, crossed the
mountains and visited the Monongahela Valley,
making no settlement because of the savages ; and
it was not till 1765 that his son, or grandson, Thomas
Brown, located at Redstone Old Fort, — so called be-
cause the mound-builders in former ages had erected
a large stone intrenchment on the top of a detached
hill at the mouth of Nemocolius Creek, a locality
widely known in the early settlement of the West.
Col. Michael Cresap (unjustly charged with mur-
der in Logan's celebrated speech! had prior to 1765
located a " tomahawk right" to several hundred acres,
including the Old Fort, and in 1770 built a hewed
log house on it, with a nailed shingle roof, the first
west of the mountains. Thomas Brown bought
Cresap's house and claim, and in 1785 perfected his
title by purchase from the commonwealth, and laid
out the town of Brownsville. He died in 1797,
aged fifty-nine years, and was buried in the Old
Fort, his tombstone stating that " he was the owner
of this town." He left a large estate and family,
but their hospitality and extravagance dissipated
their patrimony, and the members scattered throughout
the West, leaving few representatives of the name or
blood in their old home.
One of the sons, Ignatius Brown, born Dec. 1,
1769, at Brownsville, died at Lebanon, Ohio, June
:!, 183-1:. Early in 1791 he married Elizabeth
Gregg, a woman of good mind and great force of
character, and to them, on the 18th of July, 1792,
was born their first child, Hiram Brown, the subject
of the present sketch. They afterwards had six other
children, — Milton, a distinguished lawyer and con-
gressman from Tennessee ; Ashel, a leading lawyer at
Lebanon, Ohio ; Hervey, a lawyer and member of the
Legislature, both in Indiana and Tennessee ; and
three daughters, — Minerva, Matilda, and Orpha, — •
all of whom married. In 1798, Ignatius Brown
removed his family and remnant of his property to
Kentucky, where he bought several thousand acres
of land and resided several years; but his title proving
defective he was impoverished, and compelled again
to emigrate. He located a claim in the Symmes'
Purchase, near Denfield, in Warren Co., Ohio, but
when returning caught cold, which produced paraly-
sis of the optic nerves, resulting in instant and total
blindness ; in this helpless state he was led by
his comrades through the wilderness to his family.
Vision afterward slowly returned, and in old age he
could read without glasses. While blind he was
made justice of the peace, and subsequently associate
judge of the County Court, a position he held at the
time of his death.
The young wife, brave under this disaster, moved
her helpless husband and family to the new location,
and began making a home in the woods. The
burthen, of course, fell on Hiram, then a mere boy,
172
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and for years his life was devoted to this work, fore-
going an education that the rest should get it, and
have shelter and food. • By studying at night
he learned to read well and write, acquired some
knowledge of grammar, and " cyphered as far as the
rule of three." Subsequently, by reading the best
authors, he gained so great a command of pure Eng-
lish that his forensic efforts, though never specially
prepared, were admired for their fluency, finish, and
perfection of style. After several years' work on the
farm he determined to become a merchant, and
entered a store in Lebanon, but the change so in-
jured his health that he was thought to be consump-
tive. Returning at once to farm work, to chopping
and milling, he soon recuperated and became noted
for activity and strength, being champion in all
athletic exercises. It is said that, with a few yards'
run, he could jump over the head of a man his equal
in height. At twenty to twenty-five years old he
was in the prime of physical strength. He was five
feet eight inches high, weighed one hundred and
sixty-five pounds; erect, symmetrically formed, with
small hands and feet. His head was large, fea-
tures clearly cut, brows arched, shading large light-
blue eyes ; mouth firm, and lips thin. His voice
was musical, high-pitched, and under perfect con-
trol.
His business being prosperous, he was married,
May 29, 1817, to Miss Judith Smith, a very beauti-
ful and amiable woman, who survived him nearly
six years. She was born July 12, 1794, in Pow-
hatan County, Va., the daughter of Rev. James Smith,
one of the earliest Methodist preachers. This union
was a happy one, lasting over thirty years. They
had nine children, one dying in infancy ; the rest
survived them.
After marriage he traveled on horseback to Wash-
ington City to patent a boat-wheel he had invented,
but before doing anything with it the panic of 1820
overwhelmed him, with many others, and he lost all
his property. After settling his affairs he studied
law with Thomas Corwin for six months and was
admitted to the bar. Mr. Corwin wished him to
remain at Lebanon, but deeming Indianapolis a better
point, he removed here with his familv early in No-
vember, 1823, and was admitted by the Supreme
Court in 1824.
He soon acquired a good practice, ranking highest
as an advocate in criminal cases. Before a jury his
bearing was easy, gestures apt, voice clear and pene-
trating, his statement of the evidence fair and forci-
ble. He instantly grasped the strong points in his
cases, and illustrated them in .so many different ways
that he fixed them in the jurors' minds without
wearying them by the repetition. He identified
himself with the feelings and interests of his clients,
and made their cause his own. His native wit and
keen sense of humor often enabled him to so ridicule
an opponent's case that it was laughed out of court.
He was sometimes, though not often, sarcastic and bit-
ter in denunciation, but his nature was kindly and for-
beai'ing. He was most formidable in desperate cases,
when the odds were heaviest against him. " Court
week" then brought the whole country into town,
and when he spoke the house was always crowded.
A volume would be needed to detail the incidents in
his professional career and give the anecdotes told of
his wit, humor, and stinging repartee. Some have
been published, but most have perished with those
who heard them. For years he was in every impor-
tant case, and was generally successful. With the
exception, perhaps, of a short service as prosecutor, at
an early day, he declined executive or judicial posi-
tion, practicing bis profession from November, 1823,
till June 8, 1853, when he died, the "father of the
bar." His early associates had nearly all died or re-
tired, and a new generation was growing up whose
ways were unlike their fathers'. He disliked the
change, and missed and mourned his old opponents.
He often fell into reveries, his memory busy with the
past, his face changing with each crowding recollec-
tion, his eyes flashing until he would break out with
the exclamation, " Ah, there were giants in those
days !"
We now have no idea of the hardships endured by
the old bar in their practice, the circuit once ex-
tending from Bloomington to Fort Wayne, its whole
extent a wilderness. Traveling it was a campaign
often involving weeks of absence from home, man
and horse struggling through endless swamps, swim-
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
173
niing swollen rivers, and sleeping in the woods. It
was at all times tedious and laborious, and in some
seasons difficult and dangerous. The fees were far
less than now, and often remained mere promises to
pay. This at least was Mr. Brown's experience, for
though he nominally made a great deal of money, his
indulgence lost him the greater part of it. He gen-
erally tore up the notes and accounts against his more
dilatory clients rather than press their collection.
With his wife and son he traveled through Iowa in
1848, stopping each night with some old client en-
countered on the way, and on his return said he
ought to receive some credit for the rapid growth of
that State, for he found it largely peopled by his run-
away clients.
He had no love for or desire to accumulate money, ;
and at his death he left only his town residence and I
a small farm south of the city, on which and its
orchard he had expended money enough, if it had
been invested in town property, to have made him
rich. He admitted this, but said he then would not
have enjoyed it, maintaining that men only actually
possess the money they spend, and get no benefit from
it unless so used.
Neither a politician nor a partisan, he was a life-
long Whig and admirer of Henry Clay, naming his
oldest son for him. He made Whig speeches, and
during the Morgan excitement was strongly urged to
run for Congress by the anti-Masons ; but though
success seemed certain he refused, and never entered
political life. His habits and tastes were strongly
opposed to such a career. He disliked the glare of
public life, and delighted in home and its pleasures,
the society of children and old friends. With them
his fun-loving nature had free rein, and wit, humor,
and anecdote were lavished on all around him. Those
only who saw him under such circumstances could
properly appreciate the sterling worth and honesty of
the man.
He inherited hospitality, and the latch-string was
always out. All preachers and clients were welcome,
and for years his house contained nearly as many
guests as members of his own family ; and as they
generally came on horseback, this " entertainment for
man and beast" not only increased the labors of
his hou.sehold, but seriously diminished his re-
sources.
Reared at a time when. liquor was kept in every
house and tendered to every visitor, it was only
natural, with his temperament and social qualities,
that at times he used it to excess. It was a common
vice with the bar, but with him a little went a great
way. He left off its use entirely for years before he
died, and notwithstanding his opposition to secret
societies — believing them to be inimical to republican
institutions, which require the most open discussion
and treatment of all questions — he united with and
became a prominent officer in the Sons of Temper-
ance, and labored in that cause till his death. At
about the same time he joined the Methodist Church,
— in which his wife had been a life-long member, —
and died in that faith. He denounced gambling in
all its forms, and was selected by a public meeting to
assist in the prosecution of the gamblers, who seemed
to have been given free rein by the regular authori-
ties. In endeavoring to do so he was hampered, and
the facts and evidence withheld from him in the
clerk's office. Commenting on this at a subsequent
public meeting, he said that whether the action of
his friend the clerk was right or not, it had at least
illustrated the greatest of the virtues, for " his charity
had covered a multitude of sins."
He was among the earliest to introduce fine fruits
into this section, and spent much time, labor, and
money in the effort. Though rarely tasting fruit
himself, and though no market then existed for it, he
planted twenty-four acres in the choicest varieties,
as he said, for the public benefit and future markets.
His devotion to it caused his death, for, having spent
a very hot day in it, he was partially sunstruck, and
on returning home at night was seized with conges-
tion of the brain. He rallied from the first attack,
and seemed better for several days, but a relapse took
place on the night of the Yth of June and he lay
unconscious till eight o'clock p.m. of the next day,
when he died. When his critical illness became
known his old friends hastened to his side. Among
them came Calvin Fletcher, his old opponent at the
bar, who seemed most deeply affected at his loss.
His death was a shock to the community. Full
174
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
obituary notices, with sketches of his life, appeared
in all the journals. The courts adjourned ; the bar
passed resolutions, which were spread on the records,
and bench and bar attended his funeral in a body.
The funeral discourse was pronounced by his old
friend, Rev. W. H. Goode, at Roberts' Chapel, June,
1853, and his remains were interred in Green Lawn
Cemetery. They were subsequently removed, with
those of his wife and two of his sons, to a lot at the
eastern base of the hill in Crown Hill Cemetery,
where they rest in peace, awaiting the resurrection.
Mr. Brown had nine children ; one died in infancy,
the rest survived him. Eliza S., the eldest daugh-
ter, married J. C. Yuhn, a prominent merchant of the
city ; they have four surviving children and several
grandchildren. Minerva V., the second child (now
deceased), married A. G. Porter; they have five sur-
viving children and several grandchildren. Angeline,
the third child, died at four years of age. Martlia
S., the fourth child, married Samuel Delzell, a prom-
inent business man of the city ; they have one sur-
viving child. Clay Brown, the oldest son, was edu-
cated at the seminary under Kemper, and at Asbury
University ; studied medicine with Dr. John Evans,
and graduated at Rush Medical College; began prac-
tice at Anderson, Ind., but removed in a few years to
this city, soon taking high rank in his profession ; he
was appointed assistant surgeon of the Eleventh In-
diana Volunteers, and was present at Fort Donelson,
wliere overwork and exposure produced illness, from
which he died at Crump's Landing, Tenn., just before
the battle at Shiloh ; his body was brought home by
Adjt. Macauley, and buried with the honors of war.
Matilda A. was married to Jonas McKay, and is re-
siding at Lebanon, Ohio ; she has two daughters.
Ignatius Brown, the second son, was educated under
Kemper and Lang at the seminar}', studied kw with
his father, graduated Bachelor of Law at Blooming-
ton, and began practice ; he married Miss Elizabeth
M. Marsee, oldest daughter of Rev. J. Marsee ; she
is now dead ; they have four children ; Mr. Brown
left the practice at the beginning of the war, and is
now with his sons in the abstract-of-title line. James
T. Brown, the third son, was educated at the semi-
nary under Kemper and Lang, became traveling
salesman for Guthrie & Co., of Louisville, married
Miss Forsythe, and died (childless) in 1861. Mary
E., the youngest child, married Barton D. Jones, and
is now residing in Washington City ; they have
three surviving children.
Probably no man connected with the county courts
was so widely known and closely associated with their
history in the minds of all early residents as Robert
B. Duncan, the deputy of James M. Ray for several
years, and then for nearly a score of years the clerk
succeeding Mr. Ray, on the latter's acceptance of the
eashiership of the old State Bank in 1834.
Robert B. Duncan is of Scotch descent, his
grandfather, Robert Duncan, born in 1726, a native
Scotchman, having emigrated to America in 1754,
where he engaged in the pursuit of his trade, that of
a tailor. He married Agnes Singleton, burn in 1742,
also of Scotch parentage, and had children, — Robert,
James, John, and three daughters. Robert was born
in Pennsylvania, Sept. 28, 1772, and during his youth
resided in that State, after which he removed to
Western New York and engaged in farming pur-
suits. He married Miss Anna Boyles, and had
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
175
children, — James, Esther, Williaiu, Robert B., Mar-
garet, John, Samuel, Jane, and Annie. The death
of Mrs. Duncan occurred in 1822, and that of Mr.
Duncan Jan. 6, 1846. Their son Robert B. was
born in Ontario County, N. Y., June 15, 1810,
where the earliest seven years of his life were spent.
In 1817 he removed to Ohio and settled near San-
dusky, his residence until the spring of 1820, when
the family emigrated to Conner's Station, in the pres-
ent Hamilton County, Ind., then an unsurveyed
prairie. Various employments occupied the time
here until 1824, when he became a resident of Pike
township, Marion Co., and engaged in the pioneer
labor of clearing ground and farming. The year
1827 found him a resident of Indianapolis, where
he entered the county clerk's oflSce as deputy, and
remained thus employed until March, 1834, when
he was elected to the office of clerk of the county,
and held the position for sixteen succes.sive years.
]Mr. Duncan had meanwhile engaged in the study of
law, and immediately, on the expiration of his official
term in 1850, began his professional career, confining
himself mainly to business associated with the Pro-
bate Court. He still continues to practice, devoting
himself to the interests of the firm with which he is
associated in connection with the Probate Court and to
consultation. Mr. Duncan was early in his political
career a Whig, and continued his relations with that
party until his later indorsement of the articles of the
Republican platform. With the exception of his
lengthy period of official life as county clerk, he has
never accepted nor sought office. He was reared in
the stanch faith of the Scotch Presbyterian Church,
and still adheres to that belief. Mr. Duncan was
married in December, 1843, to Miss Mary E., daugh-
ter of Dr. John H. Sanders, of Indianapolis, to whom
were born children, — John S. (a practicing lawyer),
Robert P. (a manufacturer), Anna D. (wife of Wil-
liam T. Barbee, of Lafayette, Ind.), and Nellie D.
(wife of John R. Wilson, of Indianapolis). Mr.
Duncan enjoys the distinction of being the oldest
continuous resident of the county.
Two years after Mr. Duncan came to the town to
take the deputy's place with Mr. Ray, James Morri-
son came up from Charleston, Clarke Co., having
been elected Secretary of State to succeed Judge
Wick. He was born in Ayrshire, Scotland, in 1796,
came to this country a young lad, with his parents
and brothers (the late William H. and Alexander F.),
studied law with Judge William B. Rochester, in
Western New York, and after his admission to the
bar came to Charleston, where he practiced his pro-
fession with the late Judge Charles Dewey, of the
State Supreme Bench from 1836 to 1847. When
elected Secretary of State, in 1829, he removed here
permanently with his brothers, and succeeded Judge
Bethuel Morris as presiding judge of the circuit.
He also succeeded Samuel Merrill as president of the
old State Bank, on the accession of the latter to the
presidency of the Madison Railroad. He was the
first attorney-general of the State, and the first presi-
dent of the Burns Club, being a native of the same
shire. For twenty-five years he was senior warden
of Christ Church, and during the remainder of his
life, after the organization of St. Paul's Church, held
the same office there. He was one of the best men,
intellectually and morally, that the city has ever
claimed. He was an honorable lawyer, and that
means a great deal, and he was a Christian gentleman.
In the latter part of the second decade of the city's
existence, Mr. Ovid Butler came to Indianapolis and
formed a partnership with Mr. Fletcher, which was
subsequently enlarged by the addition of Simon
Yandes, Esq., eldest son of the late Daniel Yandes,
the pioneer mill builder of the New Purchase. Mr.
Yandes was noted at the bar for accuracy, clearness,
and persevering labor, as was Mr. Butler, and with
Mr. Fletcher's experience and dash, the firm was one
of rare strength, as well known for its integrity as
its ability.
Ovid Butler was born on the 7th of February,
1801, in Augusta, N. Y., and died at Indianapolis,
Ind., on the 12th of July, 1881. His father, the
Rev. Chauncey Butler, was the first pastor of the
Disciples' Church in this city. He died in 1840.
His grandfather, Capt. Joel Butler, was a Revolu-
tionary soldier, and served in the disastrous Quebec
expedition. He died in 1822. In 1817 the family
removed from the home in New York to Jennings
County, in this State, where Ovid Butler resided
176
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
until he arrived at the years of manhood. Here he
taught school for a few years and studied law. In
1825 he settled at Shelbyville, where he practiced
his profession until 1836, when he removed to In-
dianapolis, which became his permanent residence.
He continued in his practice here, having as part-
ners at diflferent times Calvin Fletcher, Simon
Yandes, and Horatio C. Newcomb, among the ablest
and most prominent lawyers of the State. His busi-
ness was extensive and very lucrative, but owing to
impaired health he retired from the bar in 1849.
He was married in 1827 to Cordelia Cole, who
lived until the year 1838. He was again married,
to Mrs. Elizabeth A. Elgin, daughter of the late
Thomas McOuat, in 1840, who survived him one
year. No man was more fortunate in his domestic
relations. As a lawyer Mr. Butler excelled in the
office. In the argument of legal questions and the
preparation of pleadings he was laborious and inde-
fatigable. With firmness, perseverance, clearness of
purpose, and tenacity without a parallel he pushed
his legal business through the courts. With not
many of the graces of the orator, he surpassed, by
dint of great exertion in the preparation of his cases,
those who relied upon persuasive eloquence or sudden
strategy at the bar. Plain, quiet, gentle, modest, but
solid and immovable, he was a formidable antagonist
in the greatest cases that were tried during his prac-
tice. His style was strong and sententious ; without
ornament, without humor, without elegance, but
logical and convincing. His clients always got his
best ability in the preparation and trial of their cases.
His legal knowledge was general and comprehensive,
his judgment sound, and his reasoning powers vigor-
ous. He met few competitors at the bar combining
80 much industry, strength, perseverance, and cul- I
ture. He had the unbounded confidence of the
community in his common sense, integrity, and
general capability in his profession. j
After his retirement from the bar he devoted his
life mainly to the interests of the Christian Church
and of the Northwestern Christian University. But
for a few years after the close of the Mexican war,
while the questions as to the extension of slavery into
the territories acquired were being agitated, he took
an active part in politics. In 1848 he established a
newspaper in Indianapolis called The Free Soil Ban-
ner, which took radical ground against the extension
of slavery and against slavery itself. The motto was
"Free soil, free States, free men." He had been pre-
viously a Democrat. He served upon the Free Soil
electoral ticket and upon important political commit-
tees, and took the stump in advocacy of his princi-
ples in the Presidential campaigns of 1848 and 1852.
In 1852 he contributed the funds, in a great meas-
ure, to establish The Free Soil Democrat, a newspa-
per for the dissemination of his cherished views upon
these questions. This was finally merged in The In-
dianapolis Journal in the year 1854, Mr. Butler
having purchased a controlling interest in that news-
paper. In the year 1854 the Republican party was
organized out of the anti-slavery men of all parties,
and took bold ground upon the subject, and the
Journal became its organ. The influence Mr. But-
ler exerted upon public sentiment was great and be-
neficent. He ranged in the higher walks of politics,
steadfastly and intelligently advancing the great ideas,
then unpopular, which have since become the univer-
sal policy of the nation. He lived to see his prin-
ciples written upon the banners of our armies and
gleaming in the lightning of a thousand battles, to see
them embodied in the Constitution and hailed with
delight wherever free government has an advocate.
Mr. Butler gave further evidence of devotion to
his principles by aiding in the establishment of a
free-soil paper in Cincinnati, and taking a wider
range when Kossuth came preaching the gospel of
liberty for down-trodden Hungary, he again opened
his liberal purse for humanity.
But he sought quiet and retirement. Many years
ago he removed his residence from his old home in
town to his farm north of and beyond its limits.
Here, among and in the shade of the great walnut-,
ash-, sugar-, and elm-trees, he built his house, and
here he spent the remainder of his years. Here,
walking or sitting beneath these grand representa-
tives of the primeval forest, might be seen his ven-
erable form fitly protected by their shadows. Here
he received his friends and welcomed them to his
hospitable board. Here bis family assembled, his
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
177
children and his children's children, to enjoy his
society and to pay respect to his wishes.
The appearance of Mr. Butler was not strikins.
Of about the average height, as he walked he leaned
forward, as if in thought. His eye was bright and
cheerful, and the expression of his countenance was
sedate, indicative of sound judgment, strong common
sense, an unruffled temper, a fixedness of purpose,
and kindness of heart. His voice was not powerful
or clear, his delivery was slow and somewhat hesitat-
ing ; but such was the matter of his speech, so clear,
cogent, apt, and striking, that he compelled the at^
tention of his hearers. The weight of his character,
the power of his example, the charm of a life of rec-
titude and purity gave a force to his words which,
coming from an ordinary man, might not have been
so carefully heeded. Emerson says, " It makes a
great difiFerence to the sentence whether there be a
man behind it or not." He was a little shy and un-
obtrusive in his manners, especially among strangers,
but to his old friends cordial, winning, and confiding.
He avoided controversies, kept quiet when they were
impending, and conciliated by his decorous forbear-
ance those who, by active opposition, would have
been roused to hostility.
Stronger than all other features of his character
was his unaffected piety. For many years of his
life he was an humble and devoted Christian, illus-
trating in his daily walk and conversation the prin-
ciples he professed. Devout without display, zealous
and charitable, he placed before and above all other
personal objects and considerations his own spiritual
culture ; looking to that true and ultimate refinement
which, begun on earth, is completed in heaven.
The great and memorable work of Mr. Butler was
connected with the Northwestern Christian Univer-
sity, now called " Butler University." • He, with
many friends, had for some years contemplated the
establishment of this institution, and in the winter
of 1849-50 obtained the passage of a charter through
the Legislature of this State. Mr. Butler drafted it,
and had the credit of giving expression in it to the
peculiar objects of the University. The language of
the section defining them is as follows : " An institu-
tion of learning of the highest class for the education
12
of the youth of all parts- of the United States and
of the Northwest ; to establish in said institution
departments or colleges for the instruction of the
students in every branch of liberal and professional
education ; to educate and prepare suitable teachers
for the common schools of the country ; to teach and
inculcate the Christian faith and Christian morality
as taught in the sacred Scriptures, discarding as un-
inspired and without authority all writings, formulas,
creeds, and articles of faith subsequent thereto, and
for the promotion of the sciences and arts." As
to intellectual training, this calls for a high standard.
As to religious teaching, it is radically liberal.
But Mr. Butler was not an aggressive reformer.
His gentle nature had no taint of acrimony or intol-
erance in it. While he entertained, announced, and
adhered to his own views with unalterable tenacity,
he exercised toward all who disagreed with him an
ample Christian charity. He was not a sectarian in
the narrow and offensive sense. He was willing to
wait patiently for the gradual and slow changes of
piiblic opinion as truth was developed.
For twenty years he served as president of the
board of directors of the University, and in 1871, at
the age of seventy, he retired from the office, saying
in his letter of resignation, " I have given to the in-
stitution what I had to offer of care, of counsel, of
labor, and of means, for the purpose of building up
not merely a literary institution, but for the purpose
of building up a collegiate institution of the highest
class, in which the divine character and the supreme
Lordship of Jesus, the Christ, should be fully recog-
nized and carefully taught to all the students, to-
gether with the science of Christian morality, as
taught in the Christian Scriptures, and to place, such
an institution in the front ranks of human progress
and Christian civilization as the advocate and expo-
nent of the common and equal rights of humanity,
without distinction of sex, race, or color."
He had fought the good fight, he had adhered to
his ptirpose, he had not labored in vain. But for
ten years more, and until his death, he gave the Uni-
versity his attention and his best thought. He had
devoted so many years of his life and so much of his
energy to this purpose that it had become the hfbit
178
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUN'J'Y.
of his being to promote and protect the interests of
the University. His influence and his spirit are still
as powerful as ever there. Absence, silence, and
death have no power over them.
He did not run to the mountains, or the seaside,
or Saratoga for happiness. His residence, his car-
riage, and his dress were plain. He gratified his
taste, but it was an exalted one. The campus of a
college, his gift to men, was to him a finer show than
deer-parks or pleasure-grounds. The solid walls of
the University were more pleasing than a palace
carved and polished and decorated for his own com-
fort. He delighted to look upon well-trained men
and women rather than pictures and statuary. He
preferred to gather the young and docile of the hu-
man race, and put them on exhibition, rather than
short-horns or Morgan horses, and yet he did not
de.<pise or underrate these other good things. He
gratified a refined and ennobled taste when he selected
the man for culture and not the animal. But it was
not all a matter of taste ; he looked much farther
than that. He loved cultivated men and women for
their uses ; for their power and capability to do
good ; to teach the truth, to set examples ; to lead
men from vice and ignorance ; and to give them
strength and encouragement. And so he put forth,
fur many of the best years of his life, his constant
exertions to build up a great institution of learning,
ill which the principles of human freedom and of
Christianity should be taught forever. He did not
die without the sight. He in.=pired many to unite
with him in the work, and has laid a foundation in a
]ilace and in a way that, so far as can be seen, will be
perpetual for great good.
The Circuit Court was the only one known here
till 1849, except the Probate Court, which was hardly
accounted a court, and not held in high consideration,
being little more than a sort of relief to the Circuit
Court, the probate business of which it assumed.
The judge was never or rarely a lawyer, and his bu.si-
ness was that of an accountant rather than a judge.
In 1849 the bar decided, after some consultation, that
the Circuit Court needed to be relieved in a more ef-
fective fashion than the Probate Court did it, and the
late Oliver H. Smith drafted a bill to create a Com-
mon Pleas Court for this county. It passed, and
Abram A. Hammond, subsequently Lieutenant-Gov-
ernor and Governor, was made the first judge and
clerk, the bill adding one duty to the other to make
the fees a sufiicient salary. In a year he went to Cali-
fornia, and was succeeded by Edward Lander, an elder
brother of the late Gen. Fred. Lander, and the
first chief justice of Washington Territory. An act
of the Legislature of May 11, 1852, abolished this
local court and created a State system of Common
Pleas Courts, specially charged with probate business,
but given also concurrent jurisdiction with the Cir-
cuit Court and ju.stices of the peace in a certain
range of civil and criminal business. The order of
judges of this court will be found in the list of county
officers. The district contained Marion, Boone, and
Hendricks Counties. In 1873 " all matters and bus-
iness pending in the Courts of Common Pleas" were
" transferred to the Circuit Courts of the proper
counties," and the system of Common Pleas Courts
came to an end, after an existence in Marion County
of nearly a quarter of a century.
In the courts of inferior jurisdiction the justices
of the county and city occasionally attained a credit-
able and well-earned distinction. Among these were
Henry Brady, Thomas Morrow, Samuel Moore,
Charles Bonge, Hiram Bacon, James Johnson, John
C. Hume, and others in the county outside of the
city ; and in the city, Obed Foote, Henry Bradley,
Caleb Scudder, Charles Fisher, and particularly Wil-
liam Sullivan, whose long tenure of the office, with
the extent of his business and the soundness of his
judgment, made him of almost equal authority with
the Circuit Court. For many years he was almost
the only justice of the peace that the bar would trust
with any business.
William Sullivan.— The ancestors of Mr.
Sullivan were among the earliest settlers of the
Eastern Shore of Maryland and the adjoining State
of Delaware. His grandfather, Moses Sullivan, was
of Irish-English descent, and his wife, Mary Parker,
of Kent County, ISId., was of English extraction.
Their children were David, William, and Mary, the
first-named of whom was the father of the subject of
this sketch. He married Elizabeth Peacock in 1794,
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
179
and settled in Kent County, Md. Their children
were Joel, Aaron, Sarah, Nathan P., William, Ellen
C., and Georsie R. The survivor of these children,
William Sullivan, was born April 25, 1803. His
father having died when the lad was in his fifth year,
he was placed in the academy at Elkton, Md., and
remained at this institution until his seventeenth
year. On the death of his mother in 1827 he made
an extended tour for purposes of observation and
improvement, and continued his studies, after which
he accepted employment from a corps of civil engi-
neers as land surveyor and general assistant, and
gained much practical knowledge in this vocation.
He removed in 1833 to Ohio, and for a term en-
gaged in teaching, subsequently entering Hanover
College, Indiana, where he was employed both in
study and as an instructor. In 1834 Indianapolis
became his home, where he immediately opened a
private school, and later became connected with the
Marion County Seminary, of which he acted as prin-
cipal. In 1836 he was appointed to the office of
civil engineer of the city of Indianapolis, and under
his direction the first street improvements were made.
The office of county surveyor of Marion County was
also conferred upon him. During this time he con-
structed a large map of the city for general use, and
a smaller one for the use of citizens. Mr. Sullivan
took an active interest in educational matters, and
was instrumental in organizing and building the
Franklin Institute, which in its day enjoyed a suc-
cessful career. He on dissolving his connection with
this institution accepted the appointment of United
States deputy surveyor of public lands, and imme-
diately entered upon the discharge of his duties in
Northern Michigan among the Chippewa Indians,
then a tnjublesonie and dangerous tribe. He was,
while discharging the duties of this office, appointed
chief assistant of the distribution post-office, then
removed to Indianapolis, and held the position for
four years, keeping account of the business and
making quarterly and final settlement of the office
receipts during the whole of that time.
In the spring of 1641 he was elected mayor of the
city, and served one term. In the fall of that year
he was chosen justice of the peace in and for Centre
township, Marion Co., at Indianapolis, and continued
to hold the office until 1867, a period of twenty-six
years, frequently discharging the duties of police
judge during the absence of the mayor. He was
also, while acting as justice of the peace, the only
United States commissioner at Indianapolis. He was
later appointed by the United States Court the com-
missioner in bankruptcy for the State of Indiana.
Meanwhile he has devoted both means and time to
public improvements, particularly to plank-, gravel-,
and railroads centring at Indianapolis, serving for
several years as a director of the Central Railway
from Richmond to Indianapolis, and subsequently as
trustee of the Peru and Indianapolis Railroad. Mr.
Sullivan was a well-read elementary lawyer before
coming West. On retiring from active pursuits in
1867 he had a large amount of unsettled business,
which induced him to be admitted as a practicing
attorney in the various courts of Marion County,
though he has during later years declined business
for other parties. In politics he acted with the
Democrats until the passage of the " Kansas- Nebraska
Acts," since which time he has voted with the Re-
publican party. On the 8th of March, 1835, Mr.
Sullivan was married to Miss Clarissa Tomliuson,
who was of Scotch and English descent, and resided
in Indianapolis. Their children now living are Clara
E. (wife of Col. Richard F. May, of Helena, Mon-
tana), Flora (wife of E. Wulschner, of Indianapolis),
and George II. Sullivan, who married Miss Annie
Russell, of Indianapolis, and has one son, Russell.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan, though advanced in
years, enjoy excellent health and exceptional mental
vigor.
In 1865 the Criminal Circuit Court of Marion
County was created to relieve the original court of a
class of business that consumed a great deal of time,
obstructed important interests, and largely increased
the cost of maintaining the court to the county and
the costs of litigation to parties. A separate court
would hasten the dispatch of business of all kinds,
and be a money-saving as well as trouble-saving
measure. The Criminal Court, however, was not
separated so completely from the parent court as was
that of the Common Pleas in 1849. It was separate
180
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
ouly in its duties and its judges. The county clerk
had charge of its papers and records, and the county
sheriff served it as he did the old Circuit Court and
the Common Pleas Court. These three, the Circuit,
the Common Pleas, and the Criminal Court, con-
sitituted the judicial force of the county from 18G5
to 1873, when the Common Pleas was reabsorbed into
the Circuit Court. The Criminal Court continues,
with a little modification since its original establish-
ment, with a series of accomplished and efficient
judges, as will be seen from the list appended to this
work. The member of the city bar who is probably
the best known as an advocate in the Criminal Court,
though his practice is by no means confined to that
class of business, is Jonathan W. Gordon.
Hon. Jonathan W. Gordon was bom Aug. 13,
1820. His father, William Gordon, was an Irish
laborer, who emigrated to the United States in 1789-
90, and settled in Washington County, Pa., where,
Aug. 18, 1795, he married Sarah Wallon, a native
of Greenbrier County, Va., by whom he had fourteen
children, of which the subject of this biography is
the thirteenth. The father removed from Pennsyl-
vania to Indiana in the spring of 1835, and settled
in Ripley County, where he resided until his death,
Jan. 20, 1841. His wife survived him until May
29, 1857, when she died at the residence of her
youngest daughter, Mrs. Charlotte T. Kelley.
In the mean time the subject of this sketch mar-
ried Miss Catharine J. Overturf, April 3, 1843 ;
entered upon the profession of the law Feb. 27,
1844 ; went to Mexico, June 9, 1846, as a volunteer
in the Third Regiment of Indiana Volunteers ; lost
his health in the service, and upon his return aban-
doned the law and studied medicine on account of
hemorrhage of the lungs; was graduated as M.D.
from Asbury University in 1851, and resumed the
practice of the law at Indianapolis in 1852. He was
elected prosecuting attorney in 1854 ; member of
the House of Representatives in the General As-
sembly in 1856, and again in 1858 ; and during the
latter term was twice chosen Speaker.
In 1859 he was nominated by many members of
the bar, without distinction of party, for the office
of Common Pleas judge, made vacant by the death
of Hon. David Wallace ; but, finding that some
aspirants for the position desired a party contest, he
declined the race, holding that the judicial office
ought to be kept clear of party politics. In 1860 he
took an active part in behalf of Mr. Lincoln, to
whose nomination he had largely contributed by de-
feating an instruction of the Indiana delegation for
Edward Bates. His speech against Mr. Bates was
published, and though effective for the purpose for
which it was delivered, was scarcely less so to prevent
his own appointment to any civil position under Mr.
Lincoln. In 1861 he was chosen clerk of the House
of Representatives, but resigned the position for a
place in the ranks of the army upon the outbreak of
the war. He served during the three months' ser-
vice in the Ninth Indiana Volunteer Infantry, and
received from the President during the time the
appointment of major in the Eleventh United States
Infantry. He accepted the position and served in
garrison duty until March 4, 1864, when he resigned;
and, returning to Indianapolis, resumed the practice
of the law. He united with those represented in the
Cleveland Convention of that year in the support of
Gen. Fremont, but when he ceased to be a candidate,
supported Mr. Lincoln. He made two political
speeches during the contest, taking strong ground
against public corruption, and the exercise of all un-
authorized power. In the fall of the year he
defended those citizens of the State who were ar-
raigned and tried before military commissions, and
maintained the want of any jurisdiction on the part
of such commissions to try a citizen of a State not
involved in actual war. His argument was printed
and largely circulated at the time, and it is believed
that little was added to it by any subsequent discus-
sions. He opposed not so much the impeachment
of President Johnson, as the heated and partisan
manner in which the Republican party tried to make
it effective. This he opposed with zeal and enthu-
siasm from first to last, and when it failed in the
vote on the eleventh article, congratulated the coun-
try on its failure.
He supported Gen. Grant in 1868, and in the
course of the canvass delivered one of his ablest
speeches in defense of the constitutionality of the
w&
^i'C5">— S^Cc/Vt/
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
181
measures of Congress for the reconstruction of gov-
ernments in the seceding States. In the spring of
1SG9 he suffered a great loss in the burning of his
house and the greater part of his library. This loss
he has never been able to repair, and his preparation
in many a great controversy since has limped be-
cause of it. In 1872 he again supported Grant; was
phiecd at the head of his electoral ticket in the State,
and being elected was chosen by his colleagues
president of the electoj'al college. In his speech
upon taking the chair, he endeavored to ameliorate
the asperity of party feeling and spirit by a generous
tribute to the great journalist who had been sup-
ported by the opponents of the President. His party
nominated him in 1876 for the office of attorney-gen-
eral of the State, but as the party was defeated that
year in the State, he went down with the rest. In
1868 he ran for and was elected to the House of
Representatives in the General Assembly. His can-
vass was regarded as indiscreet and audacious by
many of his more prudent friends. Under the leader-
ship of its most prominent leader, the Republican
party of the State was deeply poisoned with the
greenback virus. He knew this as well as others ;
but believing that it was altogether more important
that sound views on the subject of the currency
should be presented to the people than that he should
be elected to the Legislature, he exposed and ridiculed
the fallacies of the greenbackers without stint or
mercy. His defeat was confidently predicted by
many prominent men of his own party ; but at the
close of the election it was found that just views are
understood and appreciated by the people, for he
ran as well as his associates on the ticket. In the
Legislature he devoted his labors and time to the
amendment of the criminal law, so as to secure con-
viction of the guilty in many cases where it was be-
fore next to impossible. His labors were defeated
for want of time to carry them through. He did
succeed, however, in limiting the power of courts to
punish for contempt, a thing hitherto neglected in
the State.
Having lost his first wife, he married Miss Julia
L. Dumont, March 13, 1862. He has had six chil-
dren, five by his first, and one by his last wife.
He has followed his profession with a fair degree
of success, bestowing great labor upon such new
questions as have from time to time arisen in the
course of his practice. In several instances he has,
it is believed, given a permanent bent to the law
as decided by the highest tribunal of the State ;
but has in others failed where ho believed, and still
believes, that he was right. In such cases he finds
consolation in the faith that just principles do finally
triumph, and that his defeats are not final. He has
not been satisfied to be merely a lawyer, but has
taken a general view of literature and philosophy.
Smitten with the love of poetry, he has sometimes
mistaken it for the impulsions of genius, and essayed
to sing. Some of his fugitive pieces have met with
popular favor, and others with neglect. In this way
he has been preserved from surrendering himself to
the muses by the dead level of appreciation. He is
not likely now to be spoiled by the passion for literary
success. His last published poem shall end this
sketch.
THE OPEN GATE.
I stand far down upon a shaded slope,
And near the valley of a silent river,
Whose tideless waters darkling, stagnant mope,
Through climes beyond the flight of earthward hope,
Forever and forever.
No sail is seen upon the sullen stream,
No breath of air to make it crisp or quiver.
Nor sun, nor star to shed the faintest gleam
To cheer its gloom ; but as the Styx, we deem,
It creeps through might forever.
An open gate invites my bleeding feet,
And all life's forces whisper, " We are weary ;
Pass on and out, thou canst no more repeat
The golden dreams of youth : and rest is sweet,
And darkness is not dreary.
" Pass on and out; the way is plain and straight.
And countless millions have gone out before thee;
What shouldst thou fear, since men of every state,
And clime, and time have found the open gate,
The gate of death or glory.
" Then fearless pass down to the silent shore,
And look not back with aught like vain regretting ;
The sunny days of life for thee are o'er,
And thy dark eyes shall hail the light no more,—
The final sun is setting."
182
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
They cease; and silent through the gate I glide,
And down the shore unto the dismal river,
That doth the lands of Death and Life divide,
To find, I trust, upon the farther side
Life, light, and love forever.
In 1871 the Superior Court of Marion County
was created with three judges, from the decision of
any one of whom an appeal lay to all of them in
"banc." In 1877, March 5, the number of judges
was increased to four, and reduced again to three by
the act of May 31, 1879. One of the most noted
judges of the Superior Court, though not of the first
three, was Samuel E. Perkins, for many years a
member of the Supreme Court.
Samuel Elliott Perkins was born in Brattle-
boro', Vt., Dec. 6, 1811, being the second son of
John Trumbull and Catharine Willard Perkins.
His parents were both natives of Hartford, Conn.,
and were temporarily residing in Brattleboro', where
his father was pursuing the study of law with Judge
Samuel Elliott. Before he was five years old his
father died, and his mother removed with her chil-
dren to Conway, Mass., where she also died soon
afterward. Before this, however, Mrs. Perkins
being unable to support her family, Elliott was
adopted by William Baker, a respectable farmer of
Conway, with whum he lived and labored unlil he
was twenty-one years of age. During this time, by
the aid of three months' annual schooling in the free
schools in winter, and by devoting evenings and rainy
days to books, he secured a good English education,
and began the study of Latin and Greek. After
attaining his majority he pursued his studies in
difierent schools, working for his board and teaching
in vacation to provide means for tuition and clothing.
The last year of this course of study was spent at the
Yates County Academy, N. Y., then under the presi-
dency of Seymour B. Gookins, Esq., a brother of the
late Judge Gookins, of Terre Haute, Ind. Having
obtained a fair classical education he commenced the
study of law in Penn Yan, the county-seat of Yates
County, in the office of Thomas J. Nevius, Esq., and
afterward as a fellow-student of Judge Brinkerhoff,
late of the Supreme Bench of Ohio, studying in the
office of Henry Welles, Esq., since one of the judges
of the Supreme Court of New York. In the fall of
1836 he came alone, on foot, from Bufl'alo, N. Y., to
Richmond, Ind., a stranger in a strange land, not
being acquainted with a single individual in the
State. His original intention had been to locate in
Indianapolis, but on reaching Richmond he found
the roads impassable from recent heavy storms, it
being necessary to carry even the mails on horse-
back. Finding it impossible to proceed farther, and
desiring to lose no time in qualifying himself for
practice, he inquired for a lawyer's office, and was
referred to Judge J. W. Borden, then a practicing
attorney in Richmond, and now criminal judge of
Allen County. He spent the winter in his office
doing office work for his board. In the spring of
1837, after a satisfactory examination before Hon.
Jehu T. Elliott, Hon. David Kiigore, and Hon.
Andrew Kennedy, a committee appointed by the
court for that purpose, he was admitted to the bar
at Centreville, Wayne Co., Ind. He immediately
opened an office in Richmond, and soon obtained a
large and lucrative practice. The Jeffersonian, a
weekly paper, had been established in 1837 by a
Democratic club, with Mr. Perkins as editor. In
1838 the Jeffersonian was sold to Lynde Elliott,
who conducted it about a year and failed. He had
mortgaged the press to Daniel Reed, of Fort Wayne,
for more than its value. Mr. Reed visited Rich-
mond, after Elliott's failure, for the purpose of mov-
ing the press to Fort Wayne. Unwilling that the
Democracy of the place should be without an organ,
Mr. Perkins came forward and paid off the mort-
gage, took the press, recommenced the publication
of the Jeffersonian, and continued it through the
campaign of 1840. In 1843 he was appointed by
Governor Wiiitcomb pro.?ecutiug attorney of the
Sixth Judicial Circuit. In 1844 he was one of the
electors who cast the vote of the State for Mr. Polk.
In the winter of 1844, and again in 1845, he was
nominated by Governor Whitcomb, a cautious man
and good judge of character, to a seat on the
Supreme Bench, but was not confirmed. On the
adjournment of the Legislature, quite unexpectedly
to himself, he received from the Governor the ap-
pointment for one year to the office for which he
^^^^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
183
had been nominated. He was then thirty-four years
of age, and had been at the bar and a resident of the
State but nine years. With much reluctance he ac-
cepted the appointment, having to risk the reelection
of Governor Whitcomb for a renomination to the
Senate the following year. He was, however, re-
elected, and Judge Perkins, having served on the
beneli one year, was renominated and confirmed by
the Senate, receiving a two-thirds vote, seven Whig
senators voting for him. In 1852, and again in
1858, he was elected, under the new Constitution, by
the vote of the people to the same position, and was
therefore on the Supreme Bench nineteen consecu-
tive years. When, in the stress of political disaster
in 18G4, he left that court he did not therefore
despair or retire, but entered at once into the prac-
tice of his profession. In 1857 he accepted the
appointment of professor of law in the Northwestern
Christian (now Butler) University, which position
he retained several years. In 1870-72 he was
professor of law at the Indiana State University, at
Bloomington. He felt much pride and gratification
in the marked success of so many of his students.
In addition to his immense labor as one of the
judges of the Supreme Court and professor of law,
he prepared in 1858 the " Indiana Digest," a book
containing eight hundred and seventy pages, and
requiring in its writing, arrangement, and compila-
tion for the press a great amount of labor, involving
the deepest research into the statutes of the State
and the decisions of the Supreme Court. This work
has received the approbation of the members of the
Indiana bar as a work of great merit and utility. In
1859 he also produced the "Indiana Practice," a
work requiring an equal amount of labor. In 1868
he undertook the editorship of the Herald, formerly
and since the Sentinel, the Democratic State organ.
In August, 1872, he was appointed by Governor
Baker, to fill a vacancy caused by the resignation of
Judge Rand, to a seat on the Superior Bench of
Marion County, a nisi prius and inferior tribunal,
one of great labor and responsibility, and discharged
its duties with all diligence and fidelity. He was
subsequently elected to the same ofiice in 1874 with-
out opposition. Nor was there ever a juster act of
popular gratitude and recognition than when the
people of the State, in 1876, almost without action
upon his part, took him from this place and returned
him to a higher station in the courts of the common-
wealth which he had formerly so long adorned with
his presence. To his studious application, which
supplemented the natural qualities of his mind, much
was due for the reputation of the Indiana Supreme
Bench in the days when it was honored for its wis-
dom. He helped to give it the name it had in the
days of Blackford and Dewey, his first associates in
the court, and not the smallest part of the loss occa-
sioned by his death is, that it deprives the bench of
the quality it needs most and has least. Shortly after
Judge Perkins' appointment to the Supreme Bench
he became a resident of Indianapolis, where he con-
tinued to live until the time of his death. He took
a lively interest in the development of the material
interests of his adopted city, and during his long
residence there assisted with his means and influence
in many enterprises looking toward the prosperity of
Indianapolis. As he was familiar with adversity in
his early days, and often experienced all that was
bitter in poverty, his heart continually prompted
him to acts of benevolence toward the unfortunate
of his neighborhood. It was a mystery to many how
he could apply himself professionally with such unre-
mitting diligence, and at the same time take such a
lively interest in everything looking toward the pros-
perity of Indianapolis ; but the fact is he knew no
rest; he was indefatigable; he never tired when there
was anything to be done. His life was an unceasing
round of labors which he never neglected, and which
he pursued with a devoted industry from which more
robust constitutions might have recoiled. On politi-
cal subjects the judge was a pertinent and forcible
writer, and when his pen engaged in miscellany its
productions possessed a truthful brevity, perspicuity,
and beauty which ranked them among the best liter-
ary productions of the day. His eulogy on the late
Governor Ashbel P. Willard, delivered in the Senate
chamber during the November term (1860) of the
United States District Court, does ample justice to
the character and memory of that distinguished man ;
and the sentiments that pervade the entire address
184
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
bear testimony to the soundness of the head and
jjuodness of the heart from which they emanated.
The pith and fibre of his mental faculties are not by
anything better attested than by the very evident
growth and progress of his judicial style. His mind
was of that finest material which does not dull with
age or become stale with usage. He improved
steadily and constantly to the very last. His last
opinions are his best. There is in these a manifest
terseness, a cautious, careful trimming and lopping oflF
of all superfluousness ; the core only, the very kernel
of the point to be decided, is presented. But for this
tacit acknowledgment of a Aiuit in his earlier writings
he is not to be upbraided, but commended rather for
the moral courage necessary in the avowal and avoid-
ance of such fault. The first, and not the least,
quality in a judge is thorough integrity of purpose
and action. In this great qualification he was fault-
less. In a long and diversified course of public life
no charge was ever made against him of corruption
or oppression, or even of discourtesy or unkindness.
In his intercourse, whether with his colleagues of the
bench and bar, or with the people at large, no stain
was ever found upon the ermine which he wore.
Too much praise can hardly be bestowed upon the
firmness with which he maintained his political
integrity. In early life an ardent friend and sup-
porter of the principles of Jackson and Jefi'erson, he
remained faithful in his adherence to them to the
end. There were many notable examples in his day
of political apostasy ; there were many of his contem-
poraries who, yielding to what was called the force of
circumstances, did
" Crook the pregnant hinges of the knee,
That thrift might follow fawning."
But he was not of the number. At the grand
assizes of the future, posterity will award to the
late chief justice of Indiana the white glove of
purity, in token of a lengthened term of public ser-
vice in which justice was administered without fear,
without favor, and without reproach. Judge Per-
kins died of paralysis of the brain, at his residence
on West New York Street, Indianapolis, at mid-
night, Dec. 17, 1879, in the sixty-ninth year of his
age. He died full of years and honors.
It seldom falls to the lot of a single individual in
these feverish and changeful times to fill a position
of such high honor and trust in the State such a
length of time. As is customary on the death of a
member of the profession, a bar meeting was called,
and, after appropriate remarks, the following memo-
rial was reported by Governor Baker, as chairman
of a special committee :
" Again, in the history of the State, death has entered the
Supreme Court and made vacant a seat upon its bench. The
chief justice is dead. ^Ye meet to do suitable honor to the
name and memory, and mourn the death, of Judge Perkins.
Uis eminent success is an encouragement, bis death an admo-
nition. Endowed with strong and active faculties, he pursued
the purposes of his life with fortitude and determination, and
at the close of his career he stood among the distinguished of a
profession in which distinction must be merited to be achieved.
" He was successful in life, and attained exalted position and
enjoyed the admiration and approval of his countrymen, not
only because of his excellent natural endowments, but also
beeanse his faculties were cultivated and developed by diligent
labor, and beautified by extensive and useful learning, and also
because his motives were pure and his conduct upright. In
this we have a lesson und an encouragement.
'• The people gave him high honor, and made it as enduring
as the laws and the records of the State. His name is forever
interwoven in our judicial history. So long as society shall
remain org.anized under the government of law will the student
of laws consult his opinions and decisions. Through coming
generations will his labor and learning influence both the legis-
lator and the judge.
"He was an able and faithful judge, and brought honor on
our profession. We will cherish his memory.
" In his death we are admonished that no earthly distinction
can defeat or postpone the * inevitable hour.'
'The paths of glory lead but to the grave.'
"To his family and kindred we extend our sympathy."
Judge Perkins was married, in 1838, to Amanda
Juliette Pyle, daughter of Joseph Pyle, a prominent
citizen of Richmond, Ind. By this marriage there
were ten children, three of whom lived to maturity.
Mary married Oscar B. Hord, and died in 187-1,
leaving four sons, — Samuel E. P., Henry E., Frank
T., and Ricketts Hord. Emma married H. C. Hol-
brook, and died without children. Samuel Elliott,
Jr., the only one now living, married Sue E. Hatch,
and has two little sons, — Samuel Elliott and Volney
Hatch Perkins.
In the three " rooms" or divisions of the Superior
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
185
Court is now transacted mucli the larger proportion
of all the civil business of the county, except probate
business, which all goes to the Circuit Court. The
sessions run on almost continuously from one year's
end to another. The succession of judges will be
fiiund in the appended list of county officers. Among
those who have served with efficiency and high credit
none have left the bench with a more desirable
record and reputation than Judge John A. Holman.
John A. Holman comes of English stock. His
■great-grandfather, George Holman, was born in Mary-
land, Feb. 11, 1762. When sixteen years of age he
went with his uncle to Kentucky, where they settled
near the site of the city of Louisville. In February,
1781, while going to Harrodsburg, he with his com-
panions were captured by the Indians, carried as a
prisoner into what is now the northern part of Ohio,
where he was compelled to run the gauntlet and
barely escaped death. Not long afterwards he was
sentenced by a council to be burned at the stake, but
was rescued by a warrior who adopted him as a son.
He was in captivity three years and a half when the
tribe consented that he might return to Kentucky to
obtain supplies for them, in company with some of
their number. Returning through the forest they
struck the Ohio River a few miles above Louisville,
and, with guns and blankets lashed to their backs,
swam the river. Young Holman was at once ran-
somed and immediately entered the service of Gen.
George Rogers Clark, and served under him in the
following campaign.
On his return from captivity he had passed down
the White Water, and was delighted with the coun-
try. In 180-1 he, with two friends, returned to the
White Water country and selected a home on the
east bank of the river, about two miles south of
where the city of Richmond now stands, to which he
removed his family in the following spring. They
were the first settlers in Wayne County, where he
resided the remainder of his life.
His son William was a captain in the war of 1812,
and afterwards became a Methodist preacher on the
frontier, and was widely known for his zealous devo-
tion to the establishment of the principles of Meth-
odism. James, another son of the old pioneer, was
well known for his steady integrity. His younge.st
son was George G. Holman, who married Mary, the
daughter of Governor James Brown Ray. Ho was
a leading merchant in Centreville for many years,
from whence he removed to Indianapolis.
John A. Holman, the subject of this sketch, is the
youngest child of George G. and Mary Holman. He
was born in the city of Indianapoli.s on April 16,
1849. He was educated at the Northwestern Chris-
tian University, graduating at the age of seventeen.
Even before this he had determined to devote his life
to the profession of the law. Immediately after com-
mencement-day he began his studies under the in-
struction of those eminent jurists, Samuel E. Perkins
and David McDonald, and was admitted to the bar,
ex gratia, upon their recommendation, when but nine-
teen years of age.
Martin M. Ray, his kinsman, then practicing at
the Indianapolis bar, was so well pleased with the
boy that he took him into his office at once as an as-
sociate, with whom he remained in active practice
until the sudden death of Mr. Ray, in August, 1872.
Although now only twenty-two years of age, he had
already taken higli rank at the bar, and continued to
practice alone with eminent success until 1876, when,
on Judge Perkins being again elected to the Supreme
Bench, young Holman was at the age of twenty-
seven appointed by Governor Hendricks to the va-
cancy on the Superior Bench of this city. His early
training and profound knowledge of the principles of
jurisprudence eminently fitted him for the discharge
of judicial functions. He knew the source and his-
tory of the law. He was familiar with the origin
and development of the rules of property and busi-
ness, whether found in statutes or recorded only in
the treatises and reports. His knowledge was so
thorough and his faculties so well disciplined, that
from the beginning he presided with dignity and even
justice. He remained upon the bench until the end
of the year 1882, when he again returned to the bar.
The bar of Indianapolis has had the good fortune
to be steadily recruited from the local bars of the
State, and it has thus become possessed of no incon-
siderable share of their ability and reputation. It
has in a measure swallowed them as fast as they
186
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
showed force enough to be felt beyond their local
limits. A lawyer in a county town attracts atten-
tion, in time gets to be prominent in politics, is
elected to a State office, comes to the capital, and
stays. Others, for the advantages offered by the Su
preme and Federal Courts, come and settle here perma
nently. Thus came here Governor David Wallace
William J. Brown, Oliver H. Smith, Caleb B. Smith
Ovid Butler, Samuel E. Perkins, Oliver P. Morton
Thomas A. Hendricks, Conrad Baker, Joseph E
McDonald, John M. Butler, Jonathan W. Gordon
Ralph Hill, William Henderson, Oscar B. Hord
Benjamin Harrison, and others. Among members
of the city bar of national reputation, professionally
and politically, are ex-Governor and Senator Oliver
P. Morton, ex-Governor and ex-Senator Thomas
A. Hendricks, and ex-Senator Joseph E. McDon-
ald.
Oliver Perry Morton. — In the little village of
Saulsbury, Wayne Co., Ind., on the 4th day of
August, 1823, Oliver Perry Morton was born. He
was of English descent, his grandfather having emi-
grated from England about the beginning of the Revo-
lutionary war, and settled in New Jersey. His
mother died when he was quite young. After the
death of his mother the most of his boyhood days
were spent with his grandparents in Ohio, and with
his widowed aunts in Centreville, Ind. His op-
portunities for education were rather limited, and at
the age of fifteen he was put to learn the hatter's
trade with his half-brother, William T. Morton. At
this occupation he worked four years, employing all
his spare time in study. Early in 1843 he entered
Miami University, at Oxford, Ohio. He remained
there two years in hard study. While there he was
counted the best debater in the University, and dis-
played the powers of presenting an argument that
afterwards made him so famous.
On leaving college he entered the office of Hon.
John S. Newman, at Centreville, and began the study
of law. He was then nearly twenty-two years of
age. On the 15th of May, 1845, he married Miss
Lucinda M. Burbank, daughter of Isaac Burbank, of
that place. This marriage proved a most happy one,
his chosen companion holding and exercising over him
from their marriage until his death an influence that
did much to advance his fame.
He went into the study of the law as he did every-
thing else— with all the energy and industry he had.
I His preceptor said of him that he was a most labori-
ous student, occupying all his time in mastering the
fundamental principles. He did nothing half-way.
He centred all the powers of his mind on his study,
and his intense application brought its reward. In
1847 he was admitted to the bar, and entered the
practice of the law in Centreville. Although Indiana
then had not attained to the powerful position she has
since occupied, the bar of Wayne County was an ex-
ceptionally strong one, and one that would have ranked
high in any State. It numbered among its members
such men as John S. Newman, Caleb B. Smith, James
Rariden, Samuel W. Parker, Jehu T. Elliott, and
others. It was among these men young Morton ex-
pected to try his fortunes. They were the men he
was to meet and combat. They were men learned in
the law, men of high character, with reputations
already established, and a young man to occupy a
place among them had to be possessed of more than
ordinary ability. Among these men he soon came to
be acknowledged a sound lawyer, and they found that
in him they met one able to cope with them before
the bench or jury. Business multiplied, and he was
retained in many important cases in all the neighbor-
ing counties. lu 1852 he was appointed judge of
the circuit. He had only been practicing five years
when he received this high honor. In a circuit com-
posed of such distinguished law3'ers as those men-
tioned above, this appointment at so early an age was
no light honor, and is but an evidence of the ability
he was recognized as possessing. He only remained
on the bench a year, when he relinquished it to again
enter active practice, in which he continued until
1860.
Some men have been disposed to look upon him as
more of a politician than a lawyer, and to regard his
legal attainments as being limited. This was not the
judgment of those who knew him. In fact, it is con-
trary to the natural order of things for a man with
his analytical mind and his powers of application to
have been a poor lawyer. The universal testimony
-^T- i.i'G.E.PeiiMSiC'^i'
M^/^^
OLI\^R P MOHTON
GOVERNOR OF INDIANA.
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
187
of those who met him at the bar is that he was a
master. His o;reat faculty was his power of going to
the very root of a thing. He studied his cases
closely, seized upon the salient points, and those he
presented with vigor and skill. He discarded all the
tricks so often resorted to by lawyers, and depended
solely upon the law and the facts. When he was
ready to go into the trial of a case he was prepared
at all points ; there were no surprises in store for
him, but he was thoroughly conversant with every
feature of the case and the law bearing upon it. He
seemed to deal with the great principles of the law,
and to apply them to the case at bar, disdaining to
seize upon quibbles or technicalities. In his addresses
to the court or jury he was always impressive, build-
ing his facts into an edifice, cemented by the law,
that was impregnable against all attacks. One who
knew him well, and had met him at the bar, said of
him, " His great characteristic was that he studied
up his cases, and he never came into court without
giving evidence of careful preparation. ... I dis-
tinctly remember that in the four years before he
was called into the service of the State he literally
annihilated everybody connected with the bar of
Wayne County, and walked rough-shod over all
other lawyers of the circuit. . . . There are prob-
ably few men who have at the same age surpassed him
in ability and success." His success was demonstrated
by the fact that when he left the practice in 1860
he was the leading attorney in all Eastern Indiana,
and was engaged in every prominent case. After his
death the bar of Indianapolis adopted unanimously
a memorial, in which it was said, " Having chosen
his profession, Senator Morton's place in it by natural
right was in the front rank, and, without a struggle,
he was conspicuous there by force of character, gen-
erous stores of knowledge, and eminent ability. He
was a judge remarkable for the wise, speedy, and
impartial administration of justice on an important
circuit at an age when most men are making their
first steps in professional life." The men who drafted
the memorial and adopted it knew whereof they
spoke, for Mr. Morton had been called at one time
to preside over the Circuit Court of Indianapolis.
Of that time one of the most prominent lawyers of
Indianapolis said, " I saw him but once in the exor-
cise of the functions of judge. . . . His decision
was a clear and forcible enunciation of the law,
which left no doubt in the minds of those who heard
it of its correctness." His great political rival, Hun.
Thomas A. Hendricks, said of him at a public meet-
ing, " I never met Governor Morton in court, and
had no knowledge of his habit in the management
of cases. I have heard from others, however, that
which convinces me that he was very able, and I
know he must have been, because he possessed every
qualification for eminence in our profession." Such
was the testimony universally given.
All his speeches on'the stump, in the Senate of the
United States, all his messages to the State Legisla-
ture, show an intimate knowledge of the great prin-
ciples of law, especially constitutional law. One re-
markable instance of this kind he exhibited in his
speech on the right of secession. It had been
claimed upon all hands that there was no power
inherent in the government to coerce a State. In
that speech he took the ground that secession was
the act of individuals and not of States, and ought to
be so regarded ; that the individuals could not shield
themselves behind State governments. This. was the
key to the whole problem. The late Senator Matt
H. Carpenter, who had been associated with him in
the investigation of the Louisiana case, said, " No
one need tell me that Morton is not a great lawyer.
I know better. I have seen him and been a witness
to his power and knowledge of the law." Senator
Thurman, in one of the debates, said, " The Senator
from Indiana may have been a lawyer at one time,
but has been too much engaged in politics, and has
forgotten the law on this subject. He has not kept
up his reading." Senator Morton's only reply was to
call from memory for the reading by the secretary of
passages of law from a large number of authorities,
all so applicable to the case and so much against the
position taken by his opponent, that Senator Thur-
man was overwhelmed and signally defeated.
Senator Morton was a Democrat in politics iu his
earlier years, and always took a deep interest in polit-
ical affairs. In 1854, when the Missouri Compromise
was repealed, Mr. Morton was one of the vast army
188
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
who left the Democratic party and united to stem the
tide of slavery aggression, and he became the leader
of the new party in his section of the State. He
attended the Pittsburgh Convention in 1856, and
actively participated in its discussions. On the first
of May of that year the new party met at Indianap-
olis to nominate a State ticket. Mr. Morton was
elected unanimously to head the ticket. His oppo-
nent was Hon. A. P. Willard, the idol of his party,
and who was regarded as the ablest sturap speaker in
the State. A joint canvass was arranged, nnd the
champion of the new party soon proved himself more
than a match for his opponent in debate. His strong,
logical arguments utterly drove his antagonist from
all his defenses. The election resulted in favor of
the Democrats, and Mr. Morton thousrht his polit-
ical career was ended. The Republican party grew
very rapidly between 185G and 1860. In the latter
year he accepted the second place on the ticket with
Hon. Henry S. Lane as its head. Ho throw himself
heart and soul into the canvass, and was everywhere
recognized as the most powerful debater in either
party. This time his party was successful.
The anticipated election of Mr. Lincoln as Presi-
dent had brought about threats of secession, and his
success was no sooner heralded than South Carolina
made haste to take herself, as she thought, out of the
Union. It was a critical time. All hearts feared the
Union was gone. The prevailing sentiment seemed
to be that there was no remedy for secession. The
Democrats held that there was no power to coerce a
State, and the leading Republicans were advocating
that the "wayward sister" should be permitted to de-
part in peace. There were stormy forebodings on all
sides. The idea of civil war was abhorrent, yet the
loyal people did not like the idea of having the Union
dismembered. In the midst of this general gloom
there came a lightning flash which electrified the
North and startled the South. On the 22d of No-
vember a monster meeting was held in Indianapolis to
ratify the election of Lincoln. The newly-elected
Governor Lane and others spoke. Their speeches
were of a conciliatory nature. At length Lieutenant-
Governor Morton arose, and in his very first words
the vast audience saw that the man had come with
the hour. There was no uncertainty with him. He
at the very outset announced that if the issue was to
be disunion and war, he was for war. It was a mo-
mentous occasion, and he felt that he was speaking
for the Republican party, and not alone for it, but for
the whole loyal element of the country, and his
measured words fell upon the air like the notes of a
bugle calling men to action. He discussed the right
of secession and the power to coerce, and gave to the
acts of South Carolinians an interpretation none be-
fore had been clear-sighted enough to see. On coer-
cion he said, —
"What is coercion but tlie enforcement of tlie law? Is any-
thing else intended or required? Secession or nullification can
only be regarded by the general government as individual
action upon individual responsibility. Those concerned in it
cannot intrench themselves behind the forms of the State gov-
ernment so as to give their conduct the semblance of legality,
and thus devolve the responsibility upon the State government,
which of itself is irresponsible. The Constitution and laws of
the United States operate upon individuals, but not upon St.ates,
and precisely as if there were no States. In this matter the
President has no discretion. He has taken a solemn oath to
enforce the laws and preserve order, and to this end he has been
made commander-in-chief of the army and navy. How can
he be absolved from responsibility thus devolved upon him by
the Constitution and his official oath?"
He demonstrated that there was no right of seces-
sion belonging to the States ; that they were parts of
a whole and could not dissolve the connection, and
that if they attempted to dissolve the Union force
must be employed. He said, —
"The right of secession conceded, the nation is dissolved.
Instead of having a nation, one mighty people, we have but a
collection and combination of thirty-three independent nnd
petty States, held together by a treaty which has hitherto been
called a Constitution, of the infraction of which each State is to
be the judge, and from which any State may withdraw at
pleasure. . . . The right of secession conceded, and the way to
do it having been shown to be safe and easy, the prestige of the
Republic gone, the national pride extinguished with the na-
tional idea, secession would become the remedy for every State
or sectional grievance, real or imaginary. ... -If South Caro-
lina gets out of the Union, I trust it will be at the point of the
bayonet, after our best efforts have failed to compel her to sub-
mission to the laws. Better concede her independence to force,
to revolution, than to right and principle. Such a concession
cannot be drawn into precedent and construed into an admis-
sion that we are but a combination of petty States, any one of
which has a right to secede and set up for herself whenever it
I
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
189
suits her tempei- or views of peculiar interest. Such a contest,
let it terminate as it may, would be a declaration to the other
States of the only terms upon which they would be permitted to
withdraw from the Union. . . . Shnll we now surrender the
nation without a struggle, and let the Union go with merely a
few hard words ? If it was worth a bloody struggle to establish
this nation, it is worth one to preserve it, and I trust that we
shall not, by surrendering with indeoeut haste, publish to the
world that the inheritance our fathers purchased with their
blood we have given up to save ours."
In concluding, he struck the key-note of the whole
in declaring and emphasizing that we are a nation
and not a combination of States. Upon this point
he said, —
"We must, then, cling to the idea that we are a nation, one
and indivisible, and that, although subdivided by State lines
for local and domestic purposes, we are but one people, the
citizens of a common country, having like institutions and
manners, and possessing a common interest in that inheritance
of glory so richly provided by our fathers. We must, therefore,
do no act, we must tolerate no act, we must concede no idea
or theory that looks to or involves the dismemberment of the
nation. . . . Seven years is but a day in the life of a nation,
and I woulrl rather come out of a struggle at the end of that
time, defeated in arms and conceding independence to success-
ful revolution, than to purchase present peace by the concession
of .a principle that must inevitably explode this nation into
small and dishonored fragments. . . . The whole question is
summed up in this proposition : ' Are we one nation, one peo-
]>Ie, or thirty-three nations, or thirty-three independent and
petty States ?* The statement of the proposition furnishes the
answer. If we are one nation, then no State has a right to
secede. Secession can only be the result of successful revolu-
tion. I answer the question for you, and I know that my
answer will find a true response in every true American heart,
that we are one people, one nation, undivided and indivisible."
This was the first time that resistance upon the
part of the North had been advocated. It touched
the popular chord everywhere. From that tiilie on
there was no hesitancy upon the part of the loyal
masses. Mr. Lincoln, when he read it, said that " it
covers the whole ground, and declares the policy of
the government." That speech made Mr. Morton a
leader in national politics.
On the 14th day of January, 1861, he took the
oath of office as president of the Senate. Two days
afterward Governor Lane resigned to take his seat in
the United States Senate, and Mr. Morton became
Governor of the State. The history of his adminis-
tration of the affairs of the State for six years has
become the foundation-stone of his fame. He every-
where became known as the great War Governor.
When the war came in April, as he had been the
first to predict that it would come, and the first to
crystallize the loyal sentiment of the North, so he was
the first to respond to the call of the President for
troops. At his word Indiana sprang to arms, and
thousands of her loyal sons answered the call of the
President for six regiments. Here was a chance for
his wonderful executive ability. Indiana, like the
other Northern States, was unprepared for war.
She had but few men in her borders who were
possessed of any military training. Volunteers were
plenty, but how to arm and equip them was the
trouble. Governor Morton was equal to the emer-
gency. He grasped the situation at a glance, and
seemed to be everywhere present, stirring and ani-
mating the citizens, bringing order out of chaos, and
reducing all to a system, so that in comparatively few
days Indiana was a vast military camp, and troops
were ready for the field. An agent was sent to the
leading manufacturers of the East and Canada to
purchase arms. He gave but few hours to sleep in
those days, but wore out his secretaries in continuous
labors. During the four years of the war this intense
strain was continued. A large number of the people
of his State were opposed to the war, and thousands
of them actively sympathized with the Rebellion.
These things added to his labors. He was the
youngest of all the loyal Governors, but so mani-
fest was his ability, so lofty his patriotism, so hope-
ful was he in the darkest hours, that all turned to
him for counsel. President Lincoln and his great
war secretary trusted him and leaned upon him as
they did upon no one else. He was often consulted
by the generals in the field, especially those in the
West, in regard to the movements of the army, and
he was always the first one appealed to for help and
reinforcements. No such appeal was ever made in
vain. Of the high opinion entertained of him and
his labors by the members of Mr. Lincoln's cabinet,
the following extract from a letter written by Hon.
S. P. Chase to Governor Morton in 1865, will evi-
dence. Mr. Chase wrote him a letter stating that,
1 in a conversation with Secretary Stanton the night
190
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
before, " we naturally, turning our minds to the i
past, fell to talking of you. We agreed that no
Governor rendered such services, or displayed such 1
courage or more ability in administration ; and we
agreed that your recent services were most meritor- i
ious of all, because rendered under circumstances of
greatest personal risk of health and life, and which
would have been by almost any man regarded, and
by all accepted, as good reasons for total inaction.
I have seldom heard Stanton express himself so
warmly."
As we said before, the war found the North unpre-
pared. In the autumn of 1861 he found that the
general government would be unable to supply the
men with overcoats in time to prevent suflFering from
the cold. He went to New York and purchased
twenty-nine thousand overcoats for the use of the
Indiana troops. The soldiers were his first care.
To relieve the sick and wounded he organized a sani-
tary commission, which afterwards was adopted by
the other States. To show his deep interest in the
soldiers, and the care he took of their interests, it
may be mentioned that during the siege of Vicks-
burg, when the army hospitals were full of sick and
wounded, he applied to the Secretary of War for per-
mission to remove the Indiana sick and wounded to
the North. The secretary declined to grant the per-
mission. Governor Morton declared his intention to
take the matter before the President. He did so,
and the result was a general order permitting not
only Indiana, but any other State to remove the sick
and wounded and care for them. Under the system
of relief inaugurated by him, Indiana collected and
disbursed over six hundred thousand dollars in money
and supplies.
In this short sketch we can do no more than
glance at his work as Governor. In 18t)2 the Dem-
ocrats elected a Legislature hostile to the war, and
efforts were made to cripple the Governor in the dis-
charge of his duties. They refused to make appro-
priations to carry on the State government and to
meet the interest on the public debt. Governor
Iilorton was undismayed. He went to New York,
and through the banking firm of Winslow, Lanier &
Co. and some of the counties of the State and a few
of the patriotic citizens, arranged for money for the
use of the State. He established a financial bureau
without authority of law, and in one year and nine
months he raised and paid out over a million of dol-
lars. Every dollar of this was paid out upon his own
check, and not a dollar was lost or misappropriated.
His extraordinary activity was well demonstrated
in 1862, during the invasion of Kentucky by Gens.
Bragg and Kirby Smith. These two active rebel gen-
erals had slipped around Gen. Buell and invaded
Kentucky, threatening both Louisville and Cincin-
nati. On the 17th of August, late at night, he re-
ceived a telegram that Kentucky had been invaded
at several points. Before night of the 18th one
regiment was mustered in, armed, and started for the
scene of action. During the night of the 18th four
more regiments were forwarded. On the morning of
the 19th some of the patriotic banks and citizens
advanced half a million dollars, and during the day
and night four more regiments were paid and sent
forward. By the 31st of August more than thirty
thousand troops had been armed and sent to the relief
of Kentucky. All this time the arsenal of the State
was employed day and night in the manufacture of
ammunition, making three hundred thousand rounds
daily, and all the river towns of the State were occu-
pied by the State militia. Ohio as well as Kentucky
wanted help. Cincinnati was threatened. Governor
Morton was called upon, and Indiana troops rushed
to the defense of her sister State. Ammunition was
wanted for the heavy guns being placed in position.
The mayor of Cincinnati and Committee of Defense
telegraphed to Columbus for a supply. They were
instructed to make out a requisition in due form and
have it approved by the commanding oflScer, and for-
ward it, and the ammunition would be supplied.
They then applied to Governor Morton. No requi-
sition was a.sked for, but the telegraph flashed back
the answer that in an hour a train would start; and
the train did so, bearing about four thousand rounds
for artillery and seven hundred and twenty tliou.sand
rounds for small-arms. In eight days Indiana sup-
plied thirty-three thousand rounds for artillery and
three million three hundred and sixty-five thousand
for small-arms, the entire amount having been made
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
191
at the State arsenal. For his services the Cincinnati
Common Council ordered his portrait painted and
placed in the City Hall, which was done with impos-
ing ceremonies.
In 1864, in the midst of a heated Presidential
canvass, the exposure came of the organization known
as the Knights of the Golden Circle, or Sons of Lib-
erty. This organization numbered fifty thousand
members in the State, and an uprising was planned.
Governor Morton had possessed himself of all their
secrets, and before they knew that they were even
suspected he dealt them a terrible blow and crushed
them. He ordered the arrest of the prominent leaders
of the movement, and so alarmed were the members
to find that their plots were known, and that they
were in the power of a man whose hatred of treason
was so intense, and who was so unrelenting in his
efforts to crush all disloyalty, that dismay seized
upon them and they stood bewildered, not knowing
what to expect. The trial and conviction of the
leaders is a part of the general history of the country.
Governor Morton was triumphantly elected to the
office of Governor in 1864, and the people placed a
loyal Legislature to help him. It was the grandest
political triumph ever achieved in this State. He
entered upon the new term filled with the same
ardor, the same resistless energy, the same tireless
activity. But the war soon closed. It brought no
relief to him from labor. But now came his greatest
trial. His labors had been incessant for more than
four years, the strain upon his nervous system had
been intense, and he was now to pay the penalty.
One morning in 1865 he awoke to find that paralysis
hail seized upon his left leg. This leg had been
injured by a fall, and the disease struck the weakest
spot. Overwork had stricken him down in the noon-
tide of his power, and just as he saw his fame ripen-
ing. He was advised to go to Europe and place him-
himsclf under medical treatment. He convoked the
Legislature in extra session. It assembled on the
14th of November, when he read a message wliich
surpassed all his others in the comprehensive manner
with which it treated of State and national policy.
Ho concluded it with the following eloquent tribute
to the American soldier :
" The war has established upon imperishable foundatioDS the
great fundamental truth of the unity and indivisibility of the
I nation. We are many States but one people, havinj; one undi-
j Tided sovereignty, one flag, and one common destiny. It has
i also established, to be confessed by all the world, the exalted
character of the American soldier, his matchless valor, his self-
sacrificing patriotism, his capacity to endure fatigues and
hardships, and his humanity, which, in the midst of carnage,
has wreathed his victorious achievements with a brighter glory.
He has taught the world a lesson before which it stands in
amazement, how, when the storm of battle had passed, he
could lay aside his arms, put ofT the habiliments of war, and
return with cheerfulness to the gentle pursuits of peace, and show
how the bravest of soldiers could become the best of citizens.
To the army and navy, under the favor of Providence, we owe
the preservation of our country, and the fact that we have to-
day a place, and the proudest place, among the nations. Let it
not be said of us, as it was said in olden time, ' that Republics
are ungrateful.' Let us honor the dead, cherish the living,
and preserve in immortal memory the deeds and virtues' of all,
as an inspiration for countless generations to come."
The parting scene was of the most aifecting char-
acter. Party lines were forgotten ; all recognized the
great services rendered by the stricken man, and all
joined in words of commendation and sympathy. Pew
States, few Legislatures, if any, ever witnessed such
a scene. None who were present will ever forget it.
It was a sublime as well as touching spectacle.
Early in December he sailed from New York, and
spent some time in France, Italy, and Switzerland,
but received little or no benefit from either travel or
treatment, and in March, 1866, he returned. He
gave himself no rest, but at once commenced the
preparations for the political campaign of that year.
He opened the campaign in a speech at Masonic Hall,
which has been pronounced the greatest political
speech ever made in America. It seemed as if he
had determined to crush his political opponents at the
outset of the campaign and render them powerless.
He employed all of his wonderful powers of logic to
arraign his opponents at the bar of public opinion
for what he considered their political failures. The
speech not only served as a basis for the platform of
his party, but for all other speeches during the cam-
paign. It lashed his enemies to fury, but it aroused
his party to the very highest pitch of enthusiasm.
Oliver P. Morton was twice elected a member of
the United States Senate by the Republicans, his first
192
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
term commencing on the 4th day of March, 1867,
and his second on the 4th day of March, 1873. The
limits of this sketch forbid anything like an attempt
at a history of his senatorial labors. During his ten
years of service he was foremost in all things, — in
debates, in party counsels, in labors. It is not in-
vidious to say of him that in labors he was more
abundant than any other, notwithstanding his physical
disability. He entered the Senate at a stirring time.
The war was ended, but the South was in a state of
chaos. What was to be done, and how to do it, were
the two questions uppermost in the minds of all.
There was an irreconcilable quarrel between Congress
and the President. At the very outset of his sena-
torial career, although it was his first legislative ex-
perience, he was given three important places. He
was made chairman of the Committee on Manufactures,
and a member of the Committee on Foreign Relations
and that of Military Affairs.
The first great question in which he took part was
that of reconstruction. He went into the Senate with
well-settled views upon this question. He had held
tenaciously to the idea that this was a nation, and he
insisted upon that on all occasions. He looked upon
treason as a crime deserving of punishment. He
could not be led to believe that those who had laid
down their arms after a four years' struggle to over-
throw the Government could safely be intrusted with
power until, at least, they had given evidence of
having renewed their allegiance. He was inspired
by no hatred of the people of the South ; it Was their
treason he hated. His first speech on this question
was an impromptu reply to Senator Doolittle, of Wis-
consin. In that speech, brief as it was, he outlined
his whole after-attitude on this question. He said, —
** The issue here to-day is the same which prevails through-
out the country, which will be the issue of this canvass, and
perhaps for years to come. It is between two paramount ideas,
each struggling for the supremacy. One is, that the war to
suppress the Rebellion was right and just on our part; that the
rebels forfeited their civil and political rights, which can
only be restored to them upon such conditions as the nation
may prescribe for its future safety and prosperity. The other
idea is, that the rebellion was not sinful, but was right; that
those engaged in it forfeited no rights, civil or political, and
have a right to take charge of their State governments, and be
restored to their representation in Congress, just as if there were
no rebellion and nothing bad occurred. The immediate issue
before the Senate now is between the existing State govern-
ments established under the President of the United States in
the rebel States and the plan of reconstruction presented by
Congress."
He then proceeded to demonstrate that Congress
had all the power that was necessary to formulate or
dictate to the States the kind of a constitution they
should adopt, and that it was in duty bound to insure
justice, security, and equality to all classes in the
South, and said, — •
'• Sir, when Congress entered upon this work it had become
apparent to all men that loyal republican State governments,
such as are required by the Constitution, could not be erected
and maintained upon the basis of the white population. We
had tried them. Congress had attempted the work of recon-
struction through the fourteenth constitutional amendment by
leaving the suffrage with the white men, and by leaving with
the white people of the South the question as to when the col-
ored people should exercise the right of suffrage, if ever; but
when it was found that those white men were as rebellious as
ever; when it was found that they persecuted the loyal men,
both white and black, in their midst; when it was found that
Northern men who had gone down there were driven out by
social tyranny, by a thousand annoyances, by the insecurity of
life and property, then it became apparent to all men of intel-
ligence that reconstruction could not take place upon the basis
of the white population, and something else must be done.
Now, sir, what was then left to do ? Either we must hold these
people continually by military power or we must use such ma-
chinery on such a new basis as would enable loyal republican
governments to be raised up : and in the last result I will say
Congress waited long, the nation waited long, — experience had
to come to the rescue of reason before the thing was done. In
the last resort, and as the last thing to be done. Congress deter-
mined to dig through all the rubbish, dig through the soil and
the shifting sands, and go down to the eternal rock, and there,
upon the basis of the everlasting principle of equal and exact
justice to all men, we have planted the column of reconstruc-
tion ; and, sir, it will rise, slowly but surely, and * the gates of
hell sh:ill not prevail against it.' "
On the charge of inconsistency on the subject of
negro suffrage he said, —
"Why, sir, let me frankly say to my friend from Wisconsin
that I approached universal colored suffrage in the South re-
luctantly. Not because I adhered to the miserable dogma that
this was the white man's government, hut because I entertained
fears about at once intrusting a large body of men just from
slavery — to whom education had been denied by law, to whom
the marriage relation had been denied, who had been made the
most abject slaves — with political power. And the senator
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
193
has referred to a speech which I made in Indiana in 1865.
Allow me to show the principle which then actuated me, for in
that speech I said, ' In regard to the question of admitting the
freeduien of the Southern States to vote, while I admit the
equal rights of all men, and that in time all men will have the
right to vote, without distinction of color or race, I yet believe
that in the case of four million slaves just freed from bondage
there should be a period of probation and preparation before
they are brought to the exercise of political power.' Such was
my feeling at that time, for it had not then been determined by
the bloody experience of the past two years that we could not
reconstruct upon the basis of the white population, and such
was the opinion of a great majority of the people of the
North. ... I confess (and I do it without shame) that I have
been educated by the great events of the war. The American
people have been educated rapidly ; and the man that says he
has learned nothing, that he stands now where did six years
ago, is like an ancient mile-post by the side of a deserted high-
way."
He concluded as follows :
"The column of reconstruction has risen slowly. It has not
been hewn from a single stone. It is composed of many blocks,
painfully laid up and put together, and cemented by the tears
and blood of the nation. Sir, we have done nothing arbitrarily.
We have done nothing for punishment — aye, too little for pun-
ishment. Justice has not had her demand. Not a man has yet
been executed for this great treason. The arch-fiend himself is
now at liberty upon bail. No man is to be punished; and now
while punishment has gone by, as we all know, we are insisting
only upon security for the future. We are simply asking that
the evil spirits who brought this war upon us shall not again
come into power during this generation, again to bring upon us
rebellion and calamity. We are simply asking for those secu-
rities that we deem necessary for our peace and the peace of our
posterity.*'
To Senator Morton more tlian to any other man
is due the credit of the adoption of the fifteenth
amendment. He was bold and aggressive in his ad-
vocacy of this important measure, designed as it was
to secure to the colored man the right of suffrage.
It was opposed by Senator Sumner and some other
Republican members, but Mr. Morton led in the de-
bate and carried the measure triumphantly through.
He met all arguments, repelled all assaults, held the
friends of the amendment together until the final
vote was taken. Nor did his labors end with its
adoption by Congress. It had to be ratified by the
States. The Democratic members of the Indiana
Legislature resigned to defeat its ratification. Sen-
ator Morton reached Indianapolis the morning the
13
resignations were banded in. He sent word to the
Republican members not to adjourn, but take a recess
and meet him. He then showed them the resigna-
tions did not break a quorum, and demonstrated that
they had the power to ratify the amendment. They
acted in accordance with his wishes, and the work
was done, to the amazement of the Democrats. Still
States were wanted. Senator Morton was equal to
the emergency. A bill was introduced providing for
the reconstruction of Mississippi, Texas, and Vir-
ginia. He seized the opportunity and ofiered an
amendment providing that before these States should
be admitted to representation in Congress they should
ratifiy the proposed fifteenth amendment. The
amendment was referred to the Committee on Judi-
ciary. An adverse report was made by Senator
Trumbull, chairman of the committee. Senator
Morton still adhered to his amendment, and, after
a debate lasting three days, was successful. This
was one of the most remarkable debates of the
Senate. Still another State was wanted, and again
Senator Morton led in the work of securing it. He
introduced a bill authorizing the military commander
of Georgia to call the Legislature of that State to-
gether, including the colored members who had been
expelled the year before, and empowering the Legis-
lature to reconstruct that State, by electing two
United States senators, after ratifying the fifteenth
amendment. Again the Judiciary Committee an-
tagonized him, but again he triumphed, and the
fifteenth amendment became a part of the Consti-
tution, and stands to-day a monument of his love of
justice and his powers as a leader, more enduring
than brass or marble.
Space will not permit the dwelling on his labors in
the great kuklux debates and other similar measures,
but in all he took a leading part, and upon all he left
the impress of his lofty and unyielding patriotism.
As chairman of the Committee on Elections and
Privileges he rendered signal service. All questions
that came before him were treated with the utmost
fairness, and stern justice ruled in the decisions of his
committee. One notable instance of this- kind was
his action in regard to the election of Caldwell as
senator from Kansas. It was evident that his election
194
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
had been procured by corrupt means. Senator Mor-
ton held that he should be expelled from the Senate
as unworthy a seat in that body. The friends of
Caldwell plead to have the election simply declared
void. Mr. Morton would not listen. His sense of
justice had been outraged and he felt that American
politics needed purifying, and insisted on expulsion,
and to save himself from that the Kansas senator
resigned. With fraud, force, or corruption he had
no patience, and he would neither listen to the plead-
ings of friends of the accused, nor pay heed to their
threats. He believed in the right and had the cour-
age to at all times and under all circumstances to
maintain his beliefs.
In 1873 he delivered a speech in the Senate, which
in the light of later events looks almost like prophecy.
The question under discussion was a resolution in-
structing the Committee on Privileges and Elections
to report upon the best and most practicable mode of
electing a President and Vice-President, and provid-
ing a tribunal to adjust and decide all contested
elections connected therewith. Senator Morton took
strong grounds in favor of doing away with the
Electoral College and electing a President by the
direct vote of the people. In the course of that
speech, in regard to the dangers of the present
system, he said, — ■
" There is imminent danger of revolution to the nation when-
ever the result of a Presidential election is to be determined by
the vote of a State in which the choice of electors has been
irregular, or is alleged to have been carried by fraud or vio-
lence, and where there is no method of having these questions
examined and settled in advance; where the choice of Presi-
dent depends upim the election in a .State which has been
publicly characterized by fraud or violence, and in which one
party is alleged to have triumphed and secured the certificates
of election by chicanery or the fraudulent interposition of courts.
If the system of electoral colleges is to be continued, some
means should be devised by which the election of these electors
in the States may be contested, so that if it has been controlled
by fraud or violence, or if there be two sets of electors, each
claiming the right to cast the vote of a State, there may be 1
some machinery or tribunal provided by which fraudulent re-
turns could be set aside or corrected, and the contending claims
of different sets of electors be settled in advance of the time
when the vote is to be finally counted, and by which the Presi-
dent of the Senate may no longer be left to exercise the
dangerous powers that seem to be placed in his hands by the
Constitution, nor the two houses of Congress by the twenty-
second joint rule."
Could he have been given the power to look into
the future only three years he could not have been
able to better portray the dangers that were before us
as a nation. This was one of his great powers, — to
discern the .signs of the times, and see the pitfalls
and the rocks that lay hidden from view. It was
this power which stamped him before all other Amer-
icans, a wise statesman.
It was Morton that gave to us the civil rights bill,
which were intended to make good the promises of
the nation to the colored men, — that they should
have equal and exact justice with all races. That
they have since failed was no fault of his.
In the Senate he left the stamp of his individuality
upon all legislation. He was the moving spirit, the
leader, the one upon whom all relied. There was no
question of public moment too small for his attention ;
but his mind grasped all, his wisdom foresaw all, and
as fitr as pos.sible he attempted to warn and to guide
the country that it might avoid the danger he saw
before it. He spoke often in the Senate, but always
with effect, and was listened to with the utmost at-
tention, for it soon became recognized that when he
summed up the arguments there was little or nothing
left to be said. When defeated, as he sometimes was,
he at once accepted the situation, but never despaired.
His fertility of resource was wonderful, his industry
was prodigious. The last stroke, which ended eventu-
ally his life, came while in the discharge of his sena-
torial duties, and though not in his place at the cap-
itol, yet, like John Quincy Adams, he died in the
harness. In 1877 the Senate ordered an investigation
into the case of Senator Grover, of Oregon, who was
charged with having secured his election to the Senate
through corrupt means. This duty devolved upon
the Committee on Privileges and Elections, of which
Senator Morton was chairman. It was neces-^ary to
go across the continent to Oregon. Senator Morton,
though physically feeble and worn out by his incessant
labors, did not hesitate to undertake the long and tire-
some journey, in company with Senators Saulsbury,
of Delaware, and McMillan, of Minnesota.
During the entire trip to San Francisco he was
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
195
much prostrated, but the sea-voyage to Portland,
Oregon, seemed to do him good. The investigation
lasted eighteen days, during which he labored inces-
santly, and the sessions of the committee were some-
times prolonged late into the night. This labor nearly
broke down the other members of the committee, but
it seemed the iron will of Senator Morton rose above
every trial, for, in addition to his work on the com-
mittee, he prepared an elaborate political speech to be
used in the approaching Ohio campaign. At the con-
clusion of the investigation he addres.sed the people
of Salem in a speech of considerable length, which
was pronounced the ablest speech ever beard in the
State.
He arrived in San Francisco on his return home
early in August, and on the 6th received his second
stroke of paralysis. By morning his entire left side
was paralyzed. We take the following account of
his journey home and the closing scenes from a
sketch written by Hon. C. M. Walker:
" NotwithstandiDg his alarming condition he insisted upon
starting liome the next day, and accordingly a special car was
furnished, in which a cot was provided and the best arrange-
ments possible made for his comfort. Then, on the 7th of
August, accompanied, as usual, by his wife and son, he started
from San Francisco for his Indiana home. During this long
journey, though he was very much depressed and even feared
he would not reach home to die, he uttered not a word of com-
plaint, but bore his affliction in heroic silence. At Cheyenne,
W. T., he was met by his brother-in-law, Col. W. R. Holloway,
who thenceforward was a constant attendant at his bedside,
and at Peoria, 111., Dr. W. C. Thompson, the senator's long-
time physician, joined the sad party. His house in Indian-
apolis not being prepared for his reception, he was taken to
Richmond, Wayne Co., and to the residence of his mother-
in law, Mrs. Burbank, in that city. Here he was at once made
as comfortable as his condition would permit, and had every
attention that medical skill or loving affection could devise.
The news of his attack had already spread abroad, and, al-
though as yet his friends did not think it would prove fatal,
the greatej^t concern was man! Tested throughout the country.
Letters and telegrams poured in from all parts, and this con-
tinued during his entire illness. Many distinguished men
visited him, and a still larger number sent messages of love
and sympathy. On the 1 3th of September the President of
the United States visited Richmond for the express purpose
of calling on the sick senator. The meeting between them
was simple but affecting. The great war Governor and dis-
tinguished senator lay stretched upon his bed broken, ema-
ciated, and almost helpless. His once massive features were
pinched with pain, and the eyes that had flashed fire in so
many contests were dimmed by sickness and by the medi-
cines taken to alleviate his sufl"crings. Approaching the bed,
the President pressed the senator's extended hand warmly,
and then, bending over, kissed him on the forehead. Tho
interview wns necessarily brief, and after a few words of
earnest sympathy from the President, In which ho said he
spoke for the country as well as for himself, he retired from
the room evidently much afiected. In this interview Senator
Morton assured the President that he would bo in his seat in
the Senate at the opening of the regular session of Congress
in December. Such was doubtless his expectation at the
time, but it was not to be realized.
"On the evening of the 15th of October he was placed in a
special car and removed to his home in Indianapolis. This
short trip seemed to do him some good, and the hope of his
recovery, at least sufficiently to take his seat in the Senate, was
strengthened. During the following weeks Col. Holloway and
other friends were unremitting in their attentions, and nothing
was left undone either to prolong his life or mitigate his sufl'er-
Ings. All this time he took a lively interest in current afl"airs,
and ei'pecially in what was passing in the political world. He
wanted the papers read to him during nearly every waking
moment, and even at night, waking from a short sleep, his
first exclamation was ' Read.* If the reader stopped a moment
to rest or for any other purpose, he would say, ' Read on ! Don't
stop till I tell you.' So absorbing was his interest in public
afl'airs, and his desire to keep up with current events. Mean-
while it had become apparent that his vital forces were giving
way, and that he could not last much longer. For many days,
even weeks, he took no nourishment except milk, or occa-
sionally a little bL*ef-tea, and even these were not digested.
The paralysis seemed to have reached bis stomach, and all
natural action was destroyed. Still his mind continued active
and clear, and when friends visited bis bedside he would wel-
come them with a pleasant smile and grasp of the hand. As
long as there was the slightest ground for hope those nearest to
him clung to the belief that he would recover, but from Tuesday,
October 30th, it became evident to all that his case was hopeless.
His symptoms on that day were such as to make it plain that
his end was drawing near. During the 31st his death was
hourly expected, and several times the rumor went abroad that
he was dead. A great many telegrams were received from all
parts of the country, inquiring if thrse rumors were true, and
asking for information as to his condition. Thursday, Novem-
ber 1, 1877, dawned gloomily. The dull, gray light that first
found admittance to the sick-room fell upon a dying man,
though the end was yet some hours distant. During the day
he lay very quietly, only making known his wants in broken
accents. A number of friends were in and out of the room
during the day, and his wife and family remained ntar the
bedside. In the afternoon he sank rapidly. At 4.45 o'clock
he had a paroxysm of pain, and passing his hand over his
stomach, said feebly, ' I am dying.' A little later his youngest
196
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
son, taking his hand, said, 'Father, do you know me?' He
nodded an assent, and gave signs of satisfaction when his son
and other members of the family kissed him. A few minutes
after five o'clock, while Dr. Thompson was holding his hand, he
said, ' I am dying ; I am worn out.' These were the last
audible words he uttered. Then he ceased to move, and at
twenty-eight minutes past five o'clock the vital spark went
out, and his great life was at an end.
" The news of Senator Morton's death caused a profound
sensation throughout the country. Although the event had
been anticipated for several days, it came as a shock at last,
and created a sorrow so deep and wide-spread that it could only
be compared to that caused by the tragic death of Abraham
Lincoln. Fhigs were displayed at half-mast, and bells were
tolled throughout the land. Men gathered on the street cor-
ners, and discussed the event as a national calamity. The
President of the United States issued a special order directing
the flags on all the public buildings to be placed at half-mast,
and the government departments to bo closed on the day of the
funeral. He also sent a telegram to W. R. Hoiloway, expres-
sive of his personal bereavement, and his sympathy for the
surviving family of the departed statesman. The Vice-Presi-
dent of the United States sent a similar dispatch. The cabinet
met, and gave expression to their deep sense of the nation's
loss. The Senate and the House of Representatives each ap-
pointed committees to attend the funeral, and both adjourned
as a further mark of respect to his memory. The Governor of
Indiana and the mayor of Indianapolis issued proclamations
closing public offices, and calling upon citizens to suspend busi-
ness during the funeral services. The bells of Indianapolis
were tolled and the City Council met, and, after passing me-
morial resolutions, resolved to attend the funeral in a body.
The City Council of Cincinnati met, and appointed a committee
to attend the funeral. Citizens' meetings were held in all the
large towns of the State, and appropriate action taken in regard
to the sad event. The State University and the public schools
of Indianapolis were ordered to be closed on the day of the
funeral. The Senate Committee on Privileges and Elections,
of which Senator Morton was chairman, met, and having passed
a resolution of s3-mpathy and condolence, adjourned in honor
of his memory. The members of the bar of Indianapolis and
other cities met and took appropriate action. In many of
the country towns throughout the State the court-houses were
draped in mourning and business was suspended. The press
teemed with elaborate articles upon his character and public
services, and agreed with remarkable unanimity that the coun-
try had lost one of its greatest men. Military companies and
social organizations of various kinds met and determined to
attend the funeral. Thus in all directions, and by every means
known to modern society, men gave expression to their pro-
found sorrow, and to the respect and afl"ection which they bore
for the deceased.
"There being a general desire on the part of the public to
view the remains of the departed statesman, they were
in the main hall of the court-house at Indianapolis, where they
lay in state during Sunday and part of Monday. During this
time they were viewed by many thousands of persons who came
from afar and near to take a last look at one who had filled so
large a place in the history of the country. Special trains
were run on several of the railroads, bringing a great number
of persons to the city, and the solemn procession which passed
through the court-house during those days had seemingly no
end.
''The funeral, which took place Monday, November 5th, was
a grand and imposing pageant, — solemn, impressive, and mem-
orable. A vast concourse of people was assembled from all
parts of the country. Every branch of the federal government
was represented. The President, being unable to attend, sent
his son to represent him. Of the cabinet officers. Secretary
Thompson, of the navy, and Attorney-General Devens were
present. On the part of the Senate of the United States there
were Senators McDonald, of Indiana, Davis, of Illinois, Bay-
ard, of Delaware, Cameron, of Pennsylvania, Burnside, of
Rhode Island, and Booth, of California. On the part of the
House of Representatives there were Representatives Hanna
and Cobb, of Indiana, Banks, of Massachusetts, Townsend, of
New York, Wilson, of West Virginia, Burchai-d, of Illinois, and
Davidson, of Florida. The judiciary department was repre-
sented by federal judges from several neighboring States, and
the army bj' a number of officers. Besides these, there were
a great number of distinguished citizens from all parts of Indi-
ana, Governors, ex-Governors, and representative men from
other States, numerous military companies and delegates from
civil societies, and thousands of his neighbors who knew and
loved him."
It would not be proper or just to close this short
sketch without referring, at least in a brief way, to
the political services of Senator Morton other than
those directly connected with his labors in the Sen-
ate and as Governor of Indiana, and to touch upon
the general characteristics of the man.
Great as was his work in both of the high offices
to which the people elevated him, his labors in the
general field of politics were no less prodigious.
From 1856, when he first entered politics, until
death claimed him, his voice and pen were never
idle. In every political contest he was foremost in
the fight, and the downtrodden and oppressed were
always his care. Not only did he engage in the po-
litical battles in his own State, but in almost every
State of the North he sent forth the bugle-call which
rallied the forces of republicanism. Few men made
more stump speeches than he, and none ever carried
such weight. In Indiana, during each campaign, he
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
197
spoke incessantly, and he always knew how to touch
the popular chord of patriotism. He not only spoke,
but hundreds of editorials from his pen found their
way into the columns of the leading; papers. His
political speeches, if collected and published, would
make a political history of the country in its great
struggle unequaled. He was always ready to answer
the calls of his party. His devotion to bis party was
witnessed by his declining the English mission.
President Grant was desirous of concluding a treaty
with Great Britain on the subject of the depredations
of the rebel cruisers, and urged Senator Morton to
undertake the mission. He was inclined to accept it,
but the Legislature of Indiana was controlled by the
Democrats, and he declined. President Grant wrote
to him as follows :
*' ExEcoTivE Mansion,
"Washington, D. C, October 21st.
" Hon. 0. P. Morton, U. S. S.
" Dear Sir,— Yoar letter of the 19th inst., declining the Eng-
lish mission, with reasons therefor, is received. I fully concur
with you in all the reasons which you give for the course you
find it your duty to pursue in the matter, but regret that the
country is not to have your valuable services at the English
Court at this important juncture. Your course, however, I
deem wise, and it will be highly appreciated by your constitu-
ents in Indiana and throughout the country.
" With assurances of my highest regard, I remain, very
truly, your obedient servant,
"TJ. S. Grant."
It is difficult to justly sum up the character of such
a man. He was a born leader, and no sooner did he
enter political life than he took the leadership of his
party and maintained it until his death. He was a
man of strong will, indomitable energy, and untiring
industry, and was possessed of moral and physical
courage which approached the sublime. As a party
leader and organizer he has had no equal. The uni-
versal testimony of those who were with him in the
Senate is to the effect that America has never pro-
duced a party leader who could even lay claim to
rival him. He was strong because he was always in
earnest ; because he never forgot a friend ; because
he was ever ready to meet a foe. He always mastered
his subject, and never undertook to discuss it until he
had thoroughly studied every phase of it. It was
this that gave him such great power with an audience.
His mind was of an analytical order, and when he
spoke his sentences were terse, logical, and oftentimes
eloquent. There was little or no fancy about him,
and he rather despised those fancy flights of oratory
by which some men endeavor to capture their audi-
ences. He dealt with facts, and he dealt with them
as living things. While he was often severe and even
terrible in his denunciation or arraignment of his op-
ponents, he never was personal, but always calm, dig-
nified, urbane. To illustrate this we cannot do better
than quote a paragraph from a letter written by
Senator Jones, of Florida, to the Morton Monument
Association. He says, —
" He was one of the few public men of eminence who was
strong enough in all the resources of legitimate argument so aa
never to feel the necessity or entertain the inclination of resort-
ing to personal vituperation in the discussions of the Senate.
He attacked communities, States, and parties at times with
great vigor, but, in the language of Mr. Grattan, * ho knew how
to be severe without being unparliamentary.' "
His patriotism was something sublime. He loved
the country, the whole country, with a devotion that
knew no shrinking, and to it he gave heart, soul,
everything. He clung to the idea that we are a
nation with a tenacity that forced conviction upon
every mind he addressed. It was the burden of
nearly all his speeches. He labored to impress this
ruling idea upon the people, for to him it was the
key of our whole political system. To his mind it
embraced the true conception of our government,
and the only one upon which the Union could safely
rest. To him the idea that we were but a mere con-
federation of States was abhorrent. In it he saw
future disaster and ruin. In May, 1860, he wrote, —
" It cannot be too strongly impressed upon the public mind
that we are one people, a nation, and not a mere coalition of
sovereign and independent States."
In 1865 he said,—
"The war has established upon imperishable foundations
the great fundamental truth of the unity and indivisibility of
the nation. We are many States, but one people; having an
undivided sovereignty, one flag, one common destiny."
In 1871, at Providence, R. I., he said, —
" The idea that we are a nation, that we are one people,
undivided and indivisible, should be a plank in the platform
198
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
of every party. It should be presented on the banner of every
party. It should be taught in every school, academy, and
college. It should be the political north star by which every
political manager should steer his bark. It should be the
central idea of American politics, and every child should, so to
speak, be vaccinated with the idea that he may be protected
against this political distemper which has brought such
calamity upon our country."
In Ohio, in 1873, he said, —
" What the sun is in the heavens, diffusing light and life
and warmth, and by its subtle influence holding the planetii
in their orbits, and preserving the harmony of the universe,
such is the sentiment of nationality in a people ditfusing life
and protection in every direction, holding the faces of Ameri-
cans always toward their home, protecting the States in the
exercise of their just powers, and preserving the harmony of
all. We must have a nation. It is a necessity of our political
existence. We should cherish the idea that while the States
hare their rights, sacred and inviolable, which we should
guard with untiring vigilance, never permitting an encroach-
ment upon them, and remembering that such encroachment
is as much a violation of the Constitution of the United States
as to encroach upon the rights of the general government ;
still bearing in mind that the States are but subordinate parts
of one great nation, — that the nation is over all, even as God
is over the universe."
We might multiply such quotations, for they crop
out everywhere in his speeches and writings.
He hated treason with all the power he had, and
he would stamp it out as a poison that if left alone
would kill the body and soul of the nation. He was
unsparing in his denunciation of the foul crime, and
was often accused of hating the South. His feelings
in this matter are best expressed in his own language.
On Decoration Day, 1877, in the last speech he ever
made in his own State, he said, —
" We will let by-gones be by-gones. We cannot forget the
past; we ought not forget it. God has planted memory in our
minds and we cannot blot it out. But while we cannot forget,
yet we can forgive, and we will forgive all who accept the great
doctrines of equal liberty and of equal rights to all, and equal
protection to all, and will be reconciled to them. And while
we cannot forget the past, we will treat them as if the past had
never occurred, and that is all that can be asked ; and that is
true reconciliation. True reconciliation does not require us to
forget these deadj does not require us to forget the living sol-
dier and to cease to do him justice. We must remember that
there is an eternal difference between right and wrong, and that
we were on the right side and that they were on the wrong side;
and all that we ask of them is that hereafter they shall be on the
right side. We should forever remember that we were in the
right. We want to transmit that as a sacred inheritance to our
remotest posterity. We know that in that great struggle we
were in the right. We were grandly in the right and they
were terribly in the wrong. The whole civilized world has now
said that we were in the right, and we know if there is such a
thing as right and wrong, we were in the right and they were
in the wrong. We want that grand distinction to pass down
through all time ; but that is entirely consistent with true recon-
ciliation. We say to those who were on the other side of that
great contest that cost so dearly in blood and treasure, that cost
us so much suffering and sacrifice, that while we shall forever
cherish the lessons that were taught us by that struggle, and
while we shall forever stand by the principles that we main-
tained in that contest, all we ask of them is that they shall
hereafter stand upon those principles, and let us go forward
hand in hand and as Americans and as brethren through all the
future pages of our country's history."
He was possessed of moral courage that few public
men obtain to, and a physical courage which almost
amounted to an insensibility to personal danger. The
first was exhibited often by the stand he took upon
great public questions, regardless of what clamor
there might be from political friends or foes. Mak-
ing up his mind that a thing was right, it mattered
not what all the world might say or do, he stood
like a rock. He was ambitious, and yet for popu-
larity's sake he would not desert a right. One of
the greatest acts of his life was when, as it appeared
to his friends, he closed the doors against all hopes
of reaching the Presidency by the stand he took in
favor of the Chinese immigrants. He was an open
candidate for that high office. To speak for the
Mongolian was, seemingly, to espouse a cause so un-
popular as to be political death. He did not hesitate
a moment. He believed he was right, and with all
his power he took up the cause of the Chinese. The
fear of being called inconsistent often keeps public
men from changing their ideas of public policy. It
was not so with Mr. Morton. He had the courage
of his convictions. His physical courage might be
illustrated by numerous incidents, but one must
suffice, and we tell it as it was narrated by Governor
Porter, who was a witness to it. In his earlier years
as an attorney Mr. Morton appeared in a case of
some magnitude at Indianapolis. One of the oppos-
ing lawyers was of the flre-eating kind, and had a
reputation as one who was ready to use his revolver.
During the trial he was exceedingly ugly, and ap-
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
191)
peared in court with his pistol ostentatiously dis-
played, and had succeeded in cowing the other attor-
neys. Finally, Mr. Morton administered to him a
scathing rebuke. As he took his seat the subject of
his rebuke arose and said to those near him that he
intended to make Morton apologize then and there.
All expected a tragedy. Few knew anything of Mr.
Morton. He went to where Mr. Morton was sitting
and said, in an insulting tone, " I have come to
demand an apology from you." Quick as a flash
Mr. Morton turned upon him, and looking him
steadily in the eyes, said, in a tone sharp and clear,
" I have no apology to make to you," and then de-
liberately repeated the offensive remark. He had
met a man that knew no fear, and was cowed com-
pletely.
Mr. Morton was simple in his tastes ; honest in
the strictest sense of the word. No taint of corrup-
tion ever lingered near him. He loved his home,
his family, his friends, and they clung to him with a
devotion equal to his love. His nature was kind and
sympathetic. The cry of the suffering or sorrowing j
always found an echo in his heart. The cares of j
state often absorbed him to such a degree that he :
forgot himself, his own physical weakness, his own
wants, but never so that he forgot his home or family, i
and he always turned to them for rest. When in the i
bosom of his family he was as simple as a child. |
His children were especially dear to him, and amid
all the cares of state he thought of them and en-
deavored to guide their young minds into the paths
of honor. Few men in the height of power would
write to their children so simple, so loving, and yet so
grand a letter as the following :
*' Washingto.v, January 1, 1871.
" Mij Dear Ck!Uh-en,—Th\s is the Brst day of the New Year,
and here it is briglit and cheerful and warm, and everybody
seems happy. Tour mother is as well as usual, and sends her
love to you, and her heartfelt wishes for your health and for
your future happiness and success in life. You can never know
the depth of a mother's love, — how constantly you are in her
thoughts, her anxiety about you from day to day, and what
sacrifices she would make for you. We have been talking about
you, and wondering what you are doing, and hoping you will
make great progress in your studies during the year which has
just come in. One year is a great portion of one's lifetime.
Much may be done in one year in getting an education and
fitting yourself for the duties of lifo. Lost time can never be
recalled, and cannot be made up. Each year should show a
great deal learned, and great improvement in the manners and
characters of my dear children.
"My great anxiety and desire are about my little boys. I
am constantly wondering what they will be when they grow up
to be men. Will they be learned, talented, good, prosperous,
and an honor to their parents and country ? Such is my daily
prayer. We hope you think of us, and love us, and think of
your dear absent brother, who is so far away on a lonely island
in the Northern Sea. You must constantly remember him in
your prayers, that he may be preserved in health, and be pros-
perous and be safely returned to us during the year.
" Your mother will return to you in a few days, and in the
mean time you must not neglect your books, and show to her
that you can be dutiful and studious in her absence.
" And now I wish you a happy New Year, and may God bless
you and preserve you, is the prayer of your loving father,
'' 0. P. Morton."
There was no love of pomp in his nature, and he
was always accessible to the people, the poor equally
with the rich. He gave to the country seventeen
years of his life, and wore himself out and died a
poor man, as he had lived. His last audible words
expressed it all, " I am worn out." Yes, he had worn
himself out.
The people of Indiana have raised in the Circle
Park of Indianapolis a bronze statue of the great war
Governor and senator, but his greatest monument
lives in the pages of the Constitution and laws of his
country, and in the doctrines of patriotism he incul-
cated and enforced.
Hon. Thomas A. Hendricks was born Sept. 7,
1819, on a farm near Zanesville, Muskingum Co.,
Ohio, his father, John Hendricks, having been a
native of Western Pennsylvania. The family was
one of the first to settle in Ligonier Valley, West-
moreland Co., and took an active part in the admin-
istration of public affairs, serving with honor in the
Legislature and other places of trust. The mother,
Jane Thomson Hendricks, was of Scotch descent.
Her grandfather, John Thomson, emigrated to Penn-
sylvania before the Revolution, and was conspicuous
among the pioneers of that date for his intelligence,
integrity, enterprise, love of country, and far-reaching
good-will to men. As soon as assured of the wisdom
of emigration, he addressed a letter to the Scotch
people setting forth the advantages of American soil,
200
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
climate, and institutions so forcibly that the section
of the State where he lived was principally settled by
his countrymen. Several of his sons were soldiers
in the Revolutionary war, and many of bis descend-
ants have attained distinction in the different walks
of life. Beside those bearing his name, may be men-
tioned the Agnews, of New York, the Blacks and
Watsons, of Pittsburgh, the Wylies, of Philadelphia,
and the Hendrickses, of Indiana. The wife of John
Hendricks and her niece are the only members of the
Thomson family who emigrated West. In nearly
every branch of the family the pioneer Calvinistic
faith of the Thomsons is still maintained. When
Thomas A. Hendricks was six months old his parents
removed from Ohio to Madison, Ind. This was the
home of William Hendricks, that uncle of Thomas A.
who in indirect line preceded him in the enjoyment
of his signal tokens of public confidence and respect.
He was then a member of Congress, three years sub-
sequently he was elected Governor, and at the end of
the term was chosen to the United States Senate.
All of these positions he filled acceptably. He was
indeed the first representative in Congress who
brought the State into favorable repute. John, the
father of Thomas A., had some share of government
patronage. He held the appointment of deputy sur-
veyor of public land under Gen. Jackson, and in that
capacity became generally known and respected. As
early as 1822 he removed with his family to the
interior of the State, and held the first title to the
fine land upon a portion of which Shelbyville, the
county-seat of Shelby County, is located. In the
heart of the dense forest, upon a gentle eminence i
overlooking the beautiful valley, he built the sightly i
and commodious brick homestead which yet stands in [
good preservation in open view of the thriving city [
and richly cultivated country around. It soon be- i
came known as a centre of learning and social de-
light, and was the favorite resort of men of distinc- I
1
tion and worth. It was in particular the seat of i
hospitality to the orthodox ministry, Mr. Hendricks
being the principal founder and supporter of the
Presbyterian Church in the community. The pre-
siding genius of that home was the gentle wife and
mother, who tempered the atmosphere of learning i
and zeal with the sweet influences of charity and
love. Essentially clever and persistent, she was pos-
sessed of a rare quality of patience, which stood her
in better stead than a- turbulent, aggressive spirit. A
close analysis of the character of Thomas A. Hen-
dricks is not necessary to show that this trait was
pre-eminently his birthright. It is thus apparent
that the childhood and youth of Mr. Hendricks were
passed under the happiest auspices. Together with
his brothers and sisters he attended the village school
and derived the full benefit of very respectable and
thorough instruction. His senior brother, Abram,
pursued college studies at the University of Ohio, and
at South Hanover, Ind., and subsequently became
a minister of the Presbyterian Church. In turn
Thomas A. attended college at South Hanover, and
then began the study of law at home under the
advice and instruction of Judge Major. In so doing
he followed the bent of his early and most cherished
inclinations. In boyhood he developed a fondness
for legal discussions, and when but twelve years of
age attended the hearing of important cases in the
courts. The final period of law study he prosecuted
under the tuition of his uncle, Judge Thomson, of
Chambersburg, Pa., and was admitted to the bar at
Shelbyville. His success was not rapid, but he grew
in favor by careful attention to business, and acquired
a leading practice. His professional career has since
been so interwoven with official life that it is next to
impossible to refer to one without speaking of the
other. In 1848 he was elected to the Legislature,
and declined a renomination. In 1850 he was chosen
without opposition senatorial delegate to the conven-
tion empowered to amend the State Constitution, and
took an important part in the deliberative proceed-
ings. In 1851 he was elected to Congress from the
Indianapolis district, and re-elected in 1852, but
defeated in 1854. He was in 1855 appointed com-
missioner of the general land office by President
Pierce. This mark of executive favor was expected,
and the wisdom of the selection proved by the able
and satisfactory manner in which the duties were
discharged at a time when the sales, entries, and
grants were larger than ever before in the history of
the country. The term of four years in the land office
y\^. ^ AAt-w-L o^^v- cA-s^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
201
was followed by an unsuccessful race for Governor in
1860. In 1862 he was chosen United States senator
by the unanimous vote of his party, and during the
period of his term in the Senate, the Democrats
being in a small minority, he was compelled to take a
prominent part in the proceedings of that body. He
favored the earnest prosecution of the war, and
voted for supplies to sustain the army. He was op-
posed to conscription, and favored the enlistment of
volunteers and payment of soldiers' bounties. At the
close of the war he held that the States engaged in
rebellion had at no time been out of the Union, and
were therefore entitled to full representation in Con-
gress. He maintained that the people of those States
should have entire control of their respective State
governments. These views placed him in opposition
to the reconstruction policy which was adopted by
the majority in Congress. He also opposed the con-
stitutional amendments because the Southern States
were not represented, and because, in his opinion,
such amendments should not be made before sectional
passions had time to subside. He held that amend-
ments to the Constitution should be considered only
when the public is in a cool, deliberative frame of
mind. His term in the Senate expired March 4,
1869, when he devoted himself exclusively to the
profession of law, having in 1860 removed to Indian-
apolis with that end in view. In 1862 he formed a
partnership with Mr. Oscar B. Hord, which was
extended in 1866 to a cousin. Col. A. W. Hendricks,
under the firm-name of Hendricks, Hord & Hen-
dricks. The business of the firm was large, impor-
tant, and lucrative. In 1872, Thomas A. Hendricks
was forced to relinquish the practice of his profession
by an election to the office of chief executive of the
State. He accepted the nomination against his earn-
est protest, but made a vigorous contest, supporting
the Greeley ticket. He was inaugurated Governor
Jan. 13, 1873, and served the State in that office for
four years. He gave his undivided attention to the
interests of the State, his administration of public
affairs being above criticism. In the political contest
of 1876 he was the Democratic candidate for the
Vice-Presidency, and carried his own State by upward
of five thousand majority. After the decision of the
Electoral Commission Governor Hendricks, accom-
panied by his wife, made a brief sojourn in Europe,
spending the summer in a tour nf Great Britain,
Germany, and Prance. He resumed on his return
the practice of law with his former partners, with
the addition of ex-Governor Conrad Baker, who
took Governor Hendricks' place in the firm when
succeeded by him in the gubernatorial office, the
firm-name being Baker, Hord & Hendricks. The
personal mention of Thom'as A. Hendricks may be
given briefly : he was reared in the Presbyterian
faith, but has for some years been a member of the
Episcopal Cburch, and is senior warden of St. Paul's
Cathedral, Indianapolis. He was married near Cin-
cinnati, Ohio, Sept. 25, 1845, to Miss Eliza C. Mor-
gan, who is a granddaughter of Dr. Stephen Wood,
a prominent citizen and early settler of Hamilton
County, Ohio. Governor and Mrs. Hendricks have
had but one child, a son born in 1848, who lived to
be three years of age. The extent and character of
Governor Hendricks' attainments can be well gauged
by his public and professional record. The same
may be said of his political views, although he has
stronger convictions than are credited to him. Under
a somewhat cautious, reserved manner he conceals
great depth of sentiment and indomitable fiiith in the
triumph of right over wrong, truth over envy, malice,
and detraction. In social as in public relations he is
steadfast in his friendships and generous to his foes.
He has a happy equanimity of temper which recon-
ciles him to the inevitable and nerves him to make
the best of life. A certain amount of benignity is
imparted to his voice, which in carrying a point
before a jury is almost irresistible. In appearance
Governor Hendricks is distinguished, possessing a
fine figure and a dignified presence. As his methods
of thought and forms of expression are peculiar to
himself, so in the execution of his plans he departs
so much from the beaten track that the end in view
is often lost sight of by others. It is none the less
plain to him, and it is a question if he ever sought
an object, the accomplishment of which depended
upon his own exertions, that he did not gain.
Joseph Ewing McDonald was born in Butler
County, Ohio, on the 29th of August, 1819. His
202
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
father, John McDonald, was of Scotch extraction, a
native of Pennsylvania, and by occupation a farmer.
He was a man of sterling worth, determined and self-
sacrificing. He died when Joseph E. was still in his
infancy, thus depriving him of support and counsel,
and casting upon him many burdens and responsi-
bilities. His mother, Eleanor Piatt, was a Pennsyl-
vanian, her ancestors being French Huguenots, who
located first in New Jersey and afterwards perma-
nently in Ohio. She was a woman of superior intel-
lect, her standards all high, her influences always
elevating. Her highest ambition — a mother's — was
to educate her children and make them useful mem-
bers of society. She and her husband were both
earnest members of the Presbyterian Church. She
later married John Kerr, of Butler County, Ohio, a
native of Ireland, and a frugal, industrious farmer.
He with hi.s family moved in the fall of 1826 to
Montgomery County, Ind., Joseph E. then being
seven years of age. While still a mere boy he de-
termined to make the profession of law his life-work.
At twelve years of age he was apprenticed to the
saddler's trade at Lafayette. For nearly six years he
served as an apprentice, being released from the last
three months for fidelity to the interest of his em-
ployers. These three months he spent in studying.
During his apprenticeship he had access to the library
of a government official, and what leisure he com-
manded was devoted to the English branches. He
entered Wabash College, Crawfordsville, Ind., in
1838, supporting himself by plying his trade. Two
years later he was a student at Asbury University,
Greencastle. Mr. McDonald did not graduate. A
diploma and degree were given him, however, while
he was a member of the United States Senate. His
first preceptor in law was Zebulun Baird, one of the
first lawyers of the State, and a resident of Lafayette.
In 1853 he was admitted to practice upon an exami-
nation before the Supreme Court of the State. Four
years later he began practicing in Crawfordsville, and
in 1859 removed to Indianapolis. His first law part-
ner at Indianapolis was ex-judge of the Supreme
Court of Indiana, Addison L. Roache. His present
partners are John M. Butler and A. L. Mason.
Mr. McDonald, with the late Judge Black, was
counsel for the defendants in the celebrated case of
Bowles, Horsey, and Milligan, tried for treason and
conspiracy by a military commission at Indianapolis,
and sentenced to be hung. The case was taken to
the Supreme Court of the United States, where a
number of important constitutional questions arose as
to the relations of the general government to the
States, the war power of the government, and the
rights of the citizen. The defendants were released
by the Supreme Court. In the case of Beebe vs. the
State, in which the Supreme Court decided that the
enactment known as the Maine liquor law was un-
constitutional, Mr. McDonald was of the counsel for
the defendants. He was also one of the attorneys
for the parties who assailed the constitutionality of
the Baxter liquor law. He has taken an active part
in many other important cases before the Supreme
Court of the State and the Federal Court.
The senator is most successful in his pleading be-
fore a jury, and is a shrewd examiner. He is not an
eloquent talker, but has the ability to influence those
who listen to him by the fairness of his arguments.
Before he had received his license to practice law,
Mr. McDonald was nominated for the ofiice of prose-
cuting attorney, and elected the following fall over
Robert Jones, Whig, and a prominent member of the
Lafayette bar. This was the first election of that
class of officers by the people, they having been for-
merly chosen by the Legislature. As prosecuting at-
torney he served four years. He was elected to the
Thirty-first Congress from the district in which Craw-
fordsville was then situated, having removed to that
place during his official term as prosecutor at Lafay-
ette.
Returning to the State after his congressional term,
he was elected attorney-general of Indiana five years
later. He was the first choice of the people for this
office, and held it two terms. With Oliver P. Mor-
ton as an opponent, he made the race for Governor of
Indiana in 186-t. He ran ahead of his ticket, but
Mr. Morton was elected by nearly twenty thousand
votes. Eleven years later Mr. McDonald took his
seat in the United States Senate as a successor to
Daniel D. Pratt. He was chairman of the Commit-
tee on Public Lands and the second member of the
-'V=iy23SaiiA5i>'>!-''y-
\^f^O^C^c^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
203
Judiciary Committee. He visited New Orleans to
investigate the count of the vote of Louisiana in the
contest of 1876, and made the principal argument
for the objectors before the Electoral Commission.
The senator was also a member of the Teller- Wallace
committee to investigate the frauds in elections in
Rhode Island and Massachusetts. At the expiration
of his senatorial term he returned to Indianapolis,
where he has since been engaged in the active prac-
tice of his profession. He is and always has been a
firm and consistent Democrat of the Jefferson ian
school, as personified in the political life of Andrew
Jackson. He believes the true idea of American
democracy is to preserve unimpaired all the rights
reserved to the States, respectively, and to the people,
without infringing upon any of the powers delegated
to the general government by the Constitution, and
that constitutional government is of the first impor-
tance and a necessity to the perpetuity of the Amer-
ican Union. He believes in the virtue of the people,
and in their ability and purpose to maintain their
institutions inviolate against the assaults of designing
men. As an orator, both at the bar and on the hust-
ings, Mr. McDonald is cool, logical, and forcible ; as
a citizen, he has the confidence and respect of all who
know him, regardless of political creeds. He is re-
garded by all parties as a statesman of acknowledged
merit. His views are broad and comprehensive on
all questions of public interest, — not a man of expe-
dients, but stating his views clearly and boldly, leav-
ing the result to the candid judgment of the people.
The opinions of his most bitter opponents are never
treated with disdain. His steadfiistness of purpose,
his honest desire to accomplish what was best for the
people have given him a home in their hearts and won
for him high honors at their hands. Their confidence
has never been betrayed or sacrificed for personal
aggrandizement. Mr. McDonald is in religion an
attendant and pew- holder, but not a member, of the
Second Presbyterian Church of Indianapolis. He
has been three times married. On the 25th of No-
vember, 1844, he was united to Miss Nancy Ruth
Buell, to whom were born children, — Ezekiel M.,
Malcolm A., Frank B., and Annie M. (Mrs. Cald-
well). Mrs. McDonald died Sept. 7, 1872, and he
was again married on the 16th of September, 1874,
to Mrs. Araminta W. Vance, who died Feb. 2, 1875.
On the 12th of January, 1881, he was married to
his present wife, Mrs. Josephine F. Barnard, ni'e
Farnsworth, of Indianapolis, daughter of Joseph
Farnsworth, formerly of Madison, Ind.
Governor David Wallace was bom in Mifflin
County, Pa., April 24, 1799. His parents removed
to Ohio when he was a boy, and from that State,
through the influence of Gen. Harrison, he received
a cadetship in West Point Academy, where, after
graduation, he was for some time a tutor in mathe-
matics. He removed to Brookville while still a
young man, and began the practice of the law there.
He represented the county in the Legislature some
years, and in 1834 was elected Lieutenant-Governor
on the ticket with Governor Noble's re-election.
In 1837 he was elected Governor and removed to
the capital, which was thenceforward his home.
He married, as his second wife, Zerelda, eldest
daughter of the eminent physician. Dr. Sanders, and
in 1839 the Legislature purchased for the oflBcial
residence of the Executive the house then recently
built by Dr. Sanders on the northwest corner of
Illinois and Market Streets. In 1841, at a special
election to meet the demand of President Harrison
for an extra session of Congress, he was elected over
Judge Wick, and served till March 4, 1843. In
Congress it was his fortune to be the last man on the
roll of the committee to which had been referred the
petition of Professor Morse for forty thousand dol-
lars to make an electric telegraph line from Washing-
ton to Baltimore. The vote on recommending such
an appropriation was a tie till Governor Wallace gave
the casting vote for it. He saved that just appro-
priation, and it beat him in his contest for re-elec-
tion. His opponent, the late William J. Brown,
used the idleness and waste of spending money on
such schemes with disastrous effect. After the es-
tablishment of the Court of Common Pleas he served
a term as its judge. He was also prosecutor in the
Circuit Court for some years. Both in intellect and
personal appearance and bearing Governor Wallace
seemed formed by nature for an orator, and when
deeply moved, as he was sometimes at the bar, espe-
204
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
cially in prosecuting cruel crimes, he was the most
eloquent man ever heard in Indianapolis. His na-
ture was exceedingly social, genial, and generous, and
he was a most delightful companion for young men,
whose company he seemed to prefer. He died in
September, 1859. His eldest son, William, is a dis-
tinguished member of the bar, and even more distin-
guished as an orator and leading member of the Odd-
Fellows. His second, Lewis, is the well-known nov-
elist and general, now minister to ConstaDtinople.
Less known as a politician, but not less favorably
known professionally than the distinguished lawyers
whose lives have just been briefly sketched, is John
M. Butler.
John Maynard Butler. — The parents of Mr.
Butler were Calvin Butler and Malvina French But-
ler, the latter of whom was a direct descendant of
Governor Bradford, of Massachusetts, both natives of
Vermont. The former learned the trade of a shoe-
maker, which wa.s followed until his thirtieth year,
when, having a desire to acquire an education, he
made his way through Middlebury College, and subse-
quently entered the Theological Seminary at Andover,
Mass. Having thus gained a thorough theological as
well as classical training, he came West to preach, and
settled in Evansville, Ind. Subsequently he removed
to Northern Illinois, where his death occurred in 1854.
There being a large family of children in the house-
hold, the subject of this sketch, who was born at
Evansville, Ind., Sept. 17, 1834, was compelled to
rely mainly upon his own exertions, and consequently
at the age of twelve years engaged as clerk and in
other employments. Having inherited a love of learn-
ing and a determination to acquire a thorough educa-
tion, he succeeded in entering Wabash College, at
Crawfordsville, in 1851, and through his own efforts,
with partial help, graduated in 1856. The same day
he was elected president of the Female Seminary at
Crawfordsville, which position he held for three suc-
cessive years, after which he became principal of the
High-School. During this period he pursued the
study of the law with the intention of adopting it as
a profession. In the fall of 1861 he made an ex-
tended tour through the Northwestern States, in pur-
suit of a location for the practice of law. Returning,
he settled in Crawfordsville in November, 1861 . From
that day until the present he has been kept constantly
busy, his first case being an important one that passed
through the Circuit and Supreme Courts of Indiana,
ending in the complete success of the young lawyer.
This gave him an early prestige and greatly increased
his practice in the town and surrounding, counties.
In 1871 he came to Indianapolis and succeeded Judge
A. L. Roache as partner with Hon. Josepli E. Mc-
Donald, their relations being continued to the present
time. Mr. George C. Butler was taken into the firm
in 1875, and after his death Mr. A. L. Ma.son, the
present firm being McDonald, Butler & Mason.
Their practice has steadily increased, notwithstanding
the protracted absence of Mr. McDonald when filling
the office of United States senator at Washington.
Mr. Butler's thorough mastery of the intricate prob-
lems of the law, and ability in the conduct of important
cases, have placed him in the foremost rank of suc-
cessful lawyers in the State. Differing from his dis-
tinguished partner politically, he has always affiliated
ardently with the Republican cause, and has taken no
inconsiderable part in forwarding the interests of that
party. Aspiring to no office, and repeatedly declining
nominations, he has been an active worker in political
campaigns, speaking throughout this State and ex-
tending his labors to other States. He is a popular
political orator, his speeches having been extensively
published and read. Mr. Butler is an active member
of the Second Presbyterian Church of Indianapolis,
in which he is a ruling elder and member of the
board of trustees. As a jurist he stands in the first
rank in a bar that embraces in its list many of the
ablest lawyers in the country, the practice of the
firm being with cases of the weightiest importance.
Wisely avoiding the paths that lead to military and
civic distinction, he has a far more enviable record
as a successful lawyer, a useful and respected citizen,
and a thorough Christian gentleman. Mr. Butler
was married in April, 1857, to Miss Sue W. Jen-
nison, of Crawfordsville, Ind. Their children are a
son and a daughter. George Calvin Butler, a brother
of Mr. Butler, was born May 3, 1851, in Marine, 111.,
and graduated at Wabash College in 1872. He
adopted the law as a profession, became a partner in
jm^
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
205
a film that was constantly dealing with difiieult suits,
involving the subtleties of the law and vast property
interests. His talents commanded the confidence of
his superiors and placed in liis charge cases rarely
intrusted to a young man. He invariably became
master of his cases, and early won the high approba-
tion of the judges of the highest courts at which he
practiced. His brilliant career as a promising and
successful lawyer and a sincere and earnest Christian
was suddenly ended by death on the 10th of Novem-
ber, 1882.
From its central situation the capital has been the
principal point of business for Eastern agencies ever
since it was large enough to have any business to
attend to. Claims of Eastern merchants have been
largely sent here to collect in all parts of the State,
and the business, though involving no great extent of
law practice or erudition, has been very lucrative.
The firm of Fletcher, Butler & Yandes did a very
extensive collecting business, with a very large liti-
gated business besides ; but probably the largest col-
lecting business, combined with ordinary legal busi-
ness, ever conducted in the city was that of William
Henderson.
William Henderson. — The ancestors of Mr.
Henderson were of Scotch-Irish extraction, and
resided in the north of Ireland. John Henderson,
his father, was a native of Albemarle County, Va.,
where his parents settled before the Revolution. He
was married to Miss Nancy Rucker and had children,
— Thomas, Robert, Reuben, John, Polly, and Wil-
liam. Mr. Henderson on reaching manhood re-
moved to Alabama, and later to Mooresville, Morgan
Co., where his death occurred. His son William
was born Oct. 14, 1820, in Lawrence County,
Ala., in the immediate vicinity of the town of Mol-
tcm, and at the age of nine years removed with his
parents to Indiana. His early educational advan-
tages were limited, both from want of opportunities
adjacent to his home and lack of means to prosecute
his studies abroad. At the age of seventeen years
he engaged in active labor, and later acquired the
trade of a saddler in Eaton, Preble Co., Ohio. Dur-
ing an apprenticeship of four years, diligent atten-
dance upon the sessions of a night school enabled
him to become proficient in the various English
branches, and fitted him for the calling of a teacher.
He, during this interval, began the study of law
with Messrs. J. S. & A. J. Hawkins, of E|iton,
which was continued for two years, when hi was
admitted to practice in Indiana, his licen.se having
been signed by Judges J. T. Elliott and David Kil-
gore, and in March, 1844, removed to Newcastle,
Henry Co., Ind., where an oflBce was opened in
connection with the late Judge Samuel E. Perkins,
of Richmond, Ind., and later of Indianapolis. This
business connection was continued until the appoint-
ment of the latter to the Supreme Court Bench,
when the copartnership was dissolved. Mr. Hen-
derson was admitted to the bar of the Supreme
Court of Indiana by examination in November, 1849,
and to the bar of the United States Supreme Court
in 1857. He continued to be a resident of New-
castle until 1851, when he located in Indianapolis.
Here his abilities soon brought an extended and
lucrative practice, which has been continued, with
the exception of a brief interval devoted to other
pursuits, until the present time, his business having
pertained rather to commercial interests than to
litigation of a general character. He has been since
1852 attorney for the Berkshire Life Insurance
Company, and for ten years their general financial
agent for the investment of the company's funds.
He was one of the incorporators and has been for
several years a director of the Board of Water- Works
of the city of Indianapolis.
Mr. Henderson was in his political affiliations until
1 854 a Whig. A change of views at that time caused
him to act with the Democratic party, of which he has
.since been one of the most active supporters, though
not a candidate for preferment at its hands. Wil-
liam Henderson was married in January, 1845, to
Miss Martha A., daughter of Jonathan Paul, one
of the earliest settlers of Decatur County, Ind.
Their two children are William R., a clergyman of
the Presbyterian Church, settled at Holden, Mo.,
and Sarah (Mrs. J. P. Wiggins), of Indianapolis.
Mrs. Henderson's death occurred in May, 1854, and
he was married in April, 1855, to Miss Rachel
McHargh, of Greensburg, Ind.
206
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Though the Indianapolis bar has been so largely
recruited from local bars, it has not lacked a fine sup-
ply of homegrown ability and attainment. Among
those who have acquired a good position and repu-
tation, after studying and entering the profession
here, may be named Governor Albert G. Porter, Gen.
John Coburn, William Wallace, Judge C. C. Hines,
John Caven, the last better known as the mayor and
executive officer of countless city duties during the
greater part of the war, and the efiBcient promoter of
the water supply and the Belt road and stock-yard
enterprises, William W. Woollen, John S. Duncan,
Gen. Fred. Knefler, Ciiarles P. Jacobs, A. S. Wishard,
and others. Governor Porter came here a young
man or well-grown lad, and studied his profession
with Hiram Brown, his father-in-law, and entered
the bar here, as did Mr. Caven, who also came here a
young man, and studied law with Smith & Yandes.
Hon. Albert G. Porter was born at Lawrence-
burg, Dearborn Co., Ind., April 20, 1824. His
father was a native of Pennsylvania. At the age of
eighteen the father became a volunteer soldier in the
war of 1812. At the engagement of Mississiuewa,
in the then existing Territory of Indiana, he re-
ceived a serious wound, which never left him free
from pain, and which he carried through life as an
evidence of the honorable part he bore in that mem-
orable struggle. He was a man of courage and
convictions, of plea^•ant anecdote and brimming
liunior.
The mother came of a family of exceptional busi-
ness tact and ability, and was accordiniily a woman
of extraordinary good sense and judgment. She
believed in cheerfulness, thrift, and energy, sturdy
honesty, and honest straightforwardness. These fell
to her son as an inheritance, and under the inspira-
tion of his young ambition, even in his youth, the
lines of his character were carved clean and clear.
His father, at the end of the war of 1812, settled
in Indiana, at Lawrenccburg. The family remained
there until the death of the grandfather of young
Porter on his mother's side, when his father removed
to Kentucky, having purchased the old homestead
which belonged to his grandfather. Attached to that
homestead there was a ferry across the Ohio River,
nearly opposite Lawrenceburg. This ferry was on
the regular route of travel from Indiana to Ken-
tucky, and the father, who was then in moderate
circumstances, left the entire management of that
ferry, which consisted both of a horse-boat and a
skiif, to his two sons. The responsibility which was
thus early placed upon young Porter, and the neces-
sity in a great measure of earning his own livelihood
by labor, developed in him those traces of independ-
ence of character for which he became noted in later
life. Many notable people were rowed across the
Ohio River in his skiff when the travel was not
heavy enough for the horse-boat.
At the age of fourteen he had saved money enough
from the allowances he received fur running the ferry
to start for college. At the earliest opportunity he
left the skiff and ferry-boat for Hanover College,
Indiana, where he entered the preparatory depart-
ment. There he remained until the scanty means
which he had saved were exhausted. His father was
unable to assist him, and there seemed to be no
recourse fur him except to go back to the horse ferry-
boat and the skiff, or to seek some other means to
secure the funds necessary for the education that he
was determined to have. At this juncture an uncle,
who was in good circumstances and with whom the
nephew was a favorite, wrote to him, telling him that
he had heard that his means were exhausted, that he
understood that he was determined to have an edu-
cation, and that he, the uncle, would help him to get
it. In the language of the letter, he would " see
him through." That was the happiest day in young
Porter's life. He speedily and gratefully accepted
his uncle's proposition, and from that time there were
fewer obstacles in his youthful career. But the ac-
ceptance of the offer made necessary a change of
location. His uncle was a Methodist, and he desired
that his young ward should enter upon his studies at
Asbury University, at Greencastle, Ind.
To this place Mr. Porter went, and he remained
there until he was graduated in 1843.
After graduation he returned to Lawrenceburg
and studied law for about ten months, when his
health began to fail. Thinking that a change of
occupation, even for a short time, would be beneficial,
..-A^. (^^-1^,
CITY" OF INDIANAPOLIS.
207
he secured a position as clerk in the ofiBce of the
auditor of State, Horatio J. Harris. Governor
Whitcomb, who was at that time without a private
secretary, noticed the neatness of the young cleric's
writing and his habits of accuracy, and requested the
auditor to allow Mr. Porter to act as his secretary.
The request was granted.
Governor Whitcomb was a man of studious habits
and scholarly attainments, whose association would
sensibly quicken and influence the efforts of any
young man. Mr. Porter remained with the Gov-
ernor for several montjis and then turned again to
the study of law, locating permanently at Indianap-
olis, where he entered upon the practice of his pro-
fession, in which he has long held a front rank at the
Indiana bar. He vpas appointed May 3, 1851, as
city attorney for a term of two years, and subse-
quently (May, 1857-59) served as a member of
the Common Council.
In 1853, Mr. Porter, who was then a Democrat,
was appointed by Governor Wright reporter of the
decisions of the Supreme Court of Indiana, to fill a
vacancy that had occurred by the death of the former
reporter. By this time Mr. Porter had attained a
reputation for industry and ability, and he was unan-
imously recommended by tiie Supreme Court judges
to fill this vacancy. The following year he was
elected to the same oflBce on the general ticket by
fourteen thousand majority.
In 1&56 he came into the newly-formed Republi-
can party on the question of the exclusion of slavery
from the Territories, and in 1858, although not a
candidate for the nomination, Mr. Porter was nomi-
nated by the Republican convention at Indianapolis
as a candidate for Congress. Hon. Martin M. Ray
was his Democratic opponent.
The district two years previously had gone
Democratic by eight hundred majority, yet Mr.
Porter was elected to Congress by a miijority of
more than one thousand, and two years afterwards,
when he was a candidate against Robert L. Walpule,
he was elected by an increased majority. Before the
meeting of the convention to nominate a candidate
again, however, Mr. Porter published a card declining
further service in Congress. Gen. Dumont, then
in the army, was nominated in his place, but Mr.
Porter did most of the canvassing for him.
While in Congress, Mr. Porter was a member of
the Judiciary Committee for his entire term of ser-
vice. In this capacity he developed great ability as
a lawyer, and assisted in drawing the important law
reports for that committee during his term of service.
He made a report on the liability of railroads
which had received land-grants to transport United
States troops and war material free of charge. Tiiis
report attracted a good deal of attention, and, upon
motion of Elihu B. Washburne, was republished at
the next session of Congress as a very important
contribution to anti-monopoly literature. That re-
port took the ground that the provision in the land-
grant acts should be and ought to be enforced. Be-
fore that time the monopolies had been having their
own way, having seemed to control both Congress
and the executive ; but after Mr. Porter's report
they were compelled to transport troops and muni-
tions of war free. The consequence was that the
revenues of the government were largely increased
from this source. Like most young members, he
made a speech in favor of the abolition of the frank-
ing privilege. He was always on the side of the
people. In the notable contest relative to the Isth-
mus of Chiriqui, Mr. Porter took sides against the
scheme, and antagonized Gen. Dan Sickles, who was
one of its noted advocates. Another of Mr. Porter's
notable speeches was on the general subject of the
war, and condemning all compromise schemes. Mr.
Porter retired from congressional life because he had
a young and growing family, and wisely thought
that he ought not to sacrifice his future in political
life, but should return to the profession of the law,
and endeavor to build up his fortune. This he did,
and in his professional career he was eminently suc-
cessful.
Mr. Porter was put in nomination before the con-
vention of 1876 as a candidate for Governor of In-
diana, but he caused a letter to be read declining to
allow his name to be used. Notwithstanding his
declaration, however, he received many votes in the
convention. From the time he left Congress he
devoted himself assiduously to his profession, although
208
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
he nearly always took some part in State political
campaigns. He continued his practice until he was
very unexpectedly invited, in 1881, to accept the
appointment of First Comptroller of the United
States Treasury. This appointment was tendered
him by Secretary Sherman, who knew his position
as a lawyer in Indiana, and who desired a competent
person to fill the place. The duties of First Comp-
troller of the Treasury are not generally understood.
They are very important, and are entirely judicial.
It is the one office in the government from whose
decisions there is no appeal. The Secretary of the
Treasury cannot annul decisions of the First Comp-
troller. The word of the First Comptroller of the
Treasury is the final autliority on all constructions
of law and interpretations of statutes relating to the
vast disbursements of the treasury. To this office
Mr. Porter was summoned without notice by the
Secretary of the Treasury, and he occupied it with
distinguished ability. It is a position which requires
great knowledge of the law and unimpeached in-
tegrity.
From this position he was called by the convention
of June 17, 1880, to represent his party as the
candidate for Governor of the State. As has been
the case with every office which he has held, this
honor has come to him unsought. The campaign
was made in the spirit of his dispatch of acceptance,
in which he said, —
" The contest will be a strenuous one, but if there
is not one Republican who feels that he is too humble
to do something for the cause, and all will work
earnestly and with good cheer, we shall win the
field. Let us have very many township and school-
house meetings and few great conventions, and let
every man feel that what is greatly worth having is
greatly worth working for."
He was elected in October, 1880, over Franklin
Landers, the Democratic nominee, by a majority of
six thousand nine hundred and fifty-three, — about
two thousand ahead of the ticket.
The administration of Governor Porter thus far
has been one of the most faithful, honest, and eco-
nomical which has ever characterized t)he history of
Indiana. There are few men in public life who are
purer in private character. Possessing an almost
unlimited fund of anecdote, it is always free from
indelicate or vulgar utterance.
Governor Porter is by nature of a conservative
temperament, but it is a conservatism that comports
well with all his other characteristics, and has in it
nothing suggestive of timidity. It is that mental
poise which causes him to thoroughly investigate
all questions before taking action upon them.
These qualities have been brought with effect to
the discharge of the duties of Governor, noticeably
in the veto messages sent by him to the Assemblies
of 1881 and 1883, which, had not a veto intercepted
the passage of bills, would not only needlessly have
caused the expenditure of large amounts of money,
but, in at least one instance, would have invaded the
constitutional guaranty of personal security. In no
instance, except upon purely party questions, has a
bill been reconsidered by the Legislature after his
veto. The same care has been bestowed upon the
consideration of public accounts, and in whatever
degree authority to control public expenditures is
vested in the Governor he has used it, though
unostentatiously, in the interest of economy.
Those in whom the pardoning power has been
reposed unite in saying that no duty which devolves
upon a Governor brings with it so great a burden of
responsibility. Governor Porter has made it a rule
to investigate each application for pardon through
independent sources, and if he has issued pardons
sparingly, it has been because the demands of justice
outweighed the promptings of a warm sympathy.
His agreeable manner would lead one to think that
he could be easily influenced, but, though slow to
express an opinion on a subject presented for his
consideration, when once he makes use of his char-
acteristic expression, " My mind is made up," his
decision is irrevocable. His idea of right and his
sense of responsibility are the measure of his firm-
ness. His habit of thoroughness was never more
felicitously rewarded than in the prompt and happy
manner in which it has enabled him to respond to
invitations of the various conventions, — agricultural,
mechanical, industrial, educational, and religious, —
which have all learned to expect a recognition from
/ ^^~ -' .
^
>t2^^-
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
209
the head of the State. It reflects credit upon the
choice of the people that some of these brief addresses
have been widely copied.
Among literary men the quality of equanimity is
frequently attainable, but among men in public life it
is as rare. It need not mean, as it does in the minds
of some, the neutralization of one salient character-
istic by another, but rather the thorough blending of
all in one syminetrical personality. This quality,
with an habitual cheerfulness, frankness, and courtesy,
is Governor Porter's in a strong degree.
He has brought to the discharge of the duties of
Governor a fuller measure of resources than even his
most zealous supporters had expected.
Governor Porter was married in 1847 to Miss M.
V. Brown, a lady of rare domestic virtues, a daughter
of Hiram Brown, Eiq., one of the early noted lawyers
of Indianapolis. Five of their children are living.
She died in November, 1875. In January, 1881,
just before his inauguration as Governor, he was
married to Miss Cornelia Stone, of Cuba, New York,
a lady of fine education and attainments, whose
kindly feelings and refinement have won for her the
regard of all who know her.
Few men in public life are more happily situated
than Governor Porter. He has a sufficient com-
petency to be independent of the vicissitudes of
politics; he enjoys the influences of a beautiful home
lite and the thorough friendship of the people.
Hon. John Caven. — In presenting to the readers
of the History of Marion County this sketch of the
life, character, and public acts of Hon. John Caven,
of Indianapolis, we shall be required to introduce
incidents connected with tlie peace and prosperity of
the capital city of Indiana of the highest importance.
Tlie necessity for referring to such occurrences will at
once be conceded when our readers are informed
that the subject of this sketch held the important
office of mayor for five terms, making in all ten years
that he performed the duties of chief magistrate of
the largest inland city on the continent. When a
citizen is deemed worthy of great public trusts, and
in their execution evinces qualities of bead and heart
which shed lustre upon his name and win the ap-
proval of the people, it is not surprising that there
is a popular demand for full knowledge of all the
facts relating to his career, parentage, birth, early
advantages and surroundings, employments and ambi-
tions. The desire for such information is eminently
praiseworthy. It enables society, and especially the
students of forces and factors which operate in the
line of success and eminence, to arrive at correct
conclusions, and to establish theories of life, its obli-
gations and possibilities, of the highest advantage to
reflecting people. The subject of this sketch is the
descendant of Scotch-Irish and English-Scotch pa-
rentage, and was born in the State of Pennsylvania,
Alleghany County, April 12, 1824, and is therefore
fifty-nine years of age. His father, William Caven,
was of Scotch-Irish lineage, and his mother, Jane
(Longhead) Caven, of English-Scotch descent.
Young Caven did not inherit wealth, nor any of the
advantages which wealth is supposed to confer; but
he did inherit what was far better, a healthy body
and a healthy mind. He inherited a reverence for
the good, the beautiful, and the true, and upon that
foundation has erected a character symmetrical in
outline, embodying the grandeur of stern integrity,
devotion to honest conviction, and fidelity to trusts
which knows no wavering, no matter what may be
the character of the influences and obstacles thrown
in his way. Generous in judgments, cautious in
opinion, indefatigable in purpose, John Caven is
esteemed in the councils of good men a chevalier
sdiis peur et sans reproche. Such is the exalted
position Mayor Caven occupies in Indianapolis. And
if we are asked, What were his youthful surround-
ings ? the reply is that they were such as to develop
the best traits of his intellectual and physical organ-
ism, — he was required to work. His avocations
brought him in direct contact with the hardy chil-
dren of toil, and he has a right to be known as a
" self-made man." His early educational advantages
were limited. He had few books, and only inferior
school-teachers, but what he learned was thoroughly
learned, and as his years increased his thirst for
knowledge became more intense, until at last the
perfection, grace, and beauty of his public expres-
sions, whether oral or documentary, naturally led to
the conclusion that some renowned university was his
210
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
alma mater, when in fact his diplomas tell of studies
in salt-works, in coal-mines, and at the oars of flat-
boats.
At school he mastered the old English Reader
and DaboU's Arithmetic, and with such a foundation
for an education young Caven went forth to master
all the required branches of an English education to
prepare him to enter the legal profession. He came
to Indianapolis in 1845, and in 1847, at the age of
twenty-three, entered the law-office of Smith &
Yandes, where he mastered the intricacies of the law,
and in due time took his rightful place in a bar dis-
tinguished for learning and ability. Such an ex-
ample of pluck and perseverance, if properly studied
by the youth of Indiana, cannot fail to be productive
of results of incalculable benefit to the State. With-
out wealth or influential friends, with an education
limited to the rudiments, we see a young man steadily
progressing in the right direction, overcoming ob-
stacles, growinu in knowledge and the strength which
knowledge confers, growing in the esteem and confi-
dence of citizens capable of appreciating good char-
acter and manly ambition, until he stands the recog-
nized peer of the best. In 1863, at the age of thirty-
nine, the subject of this sketch was elected mayor of
Indianapolis without opposition. His administration
was of a character to win universal approval, and in
1865 he was again elected without opposition. Dur-
ing the period embraced in these two terms — four
years — Indianapolis was rapidly developing her com-
manding advantages as a commercial and manufac-
turing city, and Mayor Caven was contributing by
his ability and influence to give impetus to her prog-
ress. In 1868 the people of Indianapolis elected Mr.
Caven to the State Senate for four years. In that
body he maintained the high estimate his constitu-
ents had placed upon his abilities, and his recorded
votes and speeches attest his statesmanship and
breadth of views upon all matters touching political,
educational, and humanitarian subjects. He voted
for the Fifteenth Amendment, and earnestly advo-
cated the establishment of schools for colored chil-
dren. In 1875, Mr. Caven was again elected mayor
of Indianapolis, and the two terms following he suc-
ceeded himself in occupying the office, having been
re-elected in 1877 and 1879. Such facts of history
are monumental. They bear the highest testimony
possible to the ability and integrity of Mr. Caven, as
also to the fidelity which distinguished his public
career. It is in the fulfillment of the varied duties
devolving upon him as chief magistrate of Indian-
apolis that he has specially endeared himself to the
people. We should prove entirely unworthy of the
trust confided to us if, in writing a sketch of the
public service and private virtues of John Caven, we
should omit to bring into the boldest prominence his
ceaseless labors, intelligent counsel, unflagging energy,
and prudent zeal in advancing the growth of the city
in population, wealth, and business enterprises. In
the mere routine work of the office of mayor he met
every requirement of a just and humane magistrate,
and his efforts to reform the wayward who were
brought before him will forever remain fadeless cre-
dentials of his faith in human nature and moral
suasion ; but in the discussion of economic prob-
lems in connection with the business expansion of
the city his views are eminently conclusive of his
power to grasp questions of the greatest gravity. As
a business enterprise Indianapolis has' just cause for
gratulation over the building of the Belt Railroad
and the establishment of the Union Stock- Yards,
and it is no disparagement of others to place the
credit of originating those great enterprises where
it rightfully belongs. They are commemorative of
business forecast, and will increase in importance
with the lapse of years. This credit is justly due to
Hon. John Caven, the subject of this sketch. An
account of the initial steps taken by Mayor Caven to
inaugurate the Belt Road and stock-yard enterprise
was published in a city paper May 18, 1881. It is
historical, and well deserving a place in any sketch of
his life and public services, and is as follows :
" One day in September, 1875, I walked around
the old abandoned embankment west of White River,
and from the Vandalia Road to the river I walked
all the way through weeds higher than my head,
pushing them aside with my hands. I took off my
boots and waded White River, not far from the pres-
ent Belt Road bridge, and, as the water was deep, I
got my clothes wet. Climbing over to the partially-
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS,
211
built abutment on the east bank to dry, I sat there
for two hours considering the question of whether
the great work of a road around this city could be
pat in motion. It would combine all the benefits
sought, not only furnish work for our laboring pop-
ulation during the savage year of 1876, or at furthest
1877, but also relieve our streets. It would also
bring here an immense cattle business and lay down
a great taxable propert}'. As I looked over that
almost desert-looking river bottom, the outlook for
moving in the matter to furnish bread to hungry
people a year or two anyway was gloomy, but I then
and there determined that this was the only project
that could accomplish the result, and resolved to
make the effort and see what will and a good purpose
could do. Having got somewhat tired out, I put on
my boots and started home, and commenced an in-
vestigation of the subject of bread-riots and what
makes cities, — what had made great cities. I exam-
ined a great deal of history on the subject of what
had made other cities, — location, natural advantages,
accidents, minerals, manufactures, and what enter-
prise and capital had done, and then tried to apply
these principles to the city of Indianapolis. What
were our natural advantages, and how might capital
and enterprise develop them, and what could be
done to make Indianapolis a great city, and during
the winter of 1875 I proposed the Belt Road mes-
sage, and read it in Council on July 17, 1876. It
was published in Tuesday's morning papers, and on
Thursday morning I was holding court and noticed
two men sitting back among the audience for some
time. After a while they came forward and asked if
they could speak with me a few minutes. I sus-
pended hearing a cause to hear what they had to say.
One of them said he was president of the stock-
yards at Louisville, and had read the Belt Road mes-
sage and at once started for Indianapolis, as he re-
garded it the best location for stock-yards in the
country, and he wished to come here and engage in
the business. I told them we wanted the enterprise
very much, and asked them if they had the means
to build, and they said they had not, but thought
perhaps the city would aid them. I told them the
city would not aid in money, but suggested the idea
of the exchange of bonds, the plan which was
adopted and carried out. One of these men was
Horace Scott and the other Mr. Downing, the pres-
ent superintendent of the stock-yards. A company
was formed and the necessary steps taken to carry
out the enterprise, but met with great opposition."
Such was the beginning of an enterprise which,
while it is making its owners rich, is adding indefi-
nitely to the welfare of the city.
On Monday, July 17, 1876, Mr. Caven, then
mayor of the city, presented to the Common Council
of the city a masterly paper relating to the local ad-
vantages of Indianapolis as a manuliicturing centre.
It is worthy of being known as a " State Paper."' It
discusses the question of fuel with a breadth of
thought, argument, and illustration worthy of the
most profound consideration. It is a paper entitled
to the dignity of "standard authority," and should
be so regarded by merchants, manufacturers, and
business men generally. Indeed, we regard it of so
much importance, as illustrative of the compact reas-
oning powers of its author, that, if our space per-
mitted, we should reproduce it entire.
In what we have said Mr. Caven is given an
advanced position as a political economist, as a stu-
dent chiefly of utilitarian enterprises. To this posi-
tion he is entitled by every consideration of simple
justice to his eminent thought attainments. But the
people of Indianapolis have found him to be remark-
able in other regards than those which we have re-
corded. We refer particularly to his masterly control
over men in times of public peril. In the year 1877 a
wave of extreme danger rolled over the land. Mayor
Caven was not taken by surprise. He had not been
unobservant of coming events, nor had he misinter-
preted the dark shadows which betokened their com-
ing, and his early and urgent advocacy of the Belt
Road and stock-yard undertaking was in part, at least,
the result of his prescience, as the building of the
road would be the means of giving idle men work
when other means of employment failed. It is not
required to more than recall to mind the labor strike
which occurred in 1877, and the terrible scenes
enacted in certain localities. When the strike
reached Indianapolis there was excitement, alarm,
212
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
and danger. Fortunately Mayor Caven was equal
to the occasion. He was calm, self-possessed, and
vigilant. He understood human nature, and fortu-
nately comprehended the human nature of working-
men, — he had been a workingman himself. He
believed in suasion rather than shot-guns ; he did
not adopt the policy of intimidation ; he discarded
rash measures. He made no compromises with riot-
ers, but with lofty courage he pointed out the sad
consequences which must follow violations of the law,
and appealed to the strikers, as men and as citizens
interested in the order and peace of the community,
to refrain from acts of rapine. He sought work for
the idle; he provided bread for the hungry. The
strikers saw in Mayor Caven a stern, courageous
magistrate, devoid of fear, determined to do his duty
at all hazards; but they also saw in Mayor Caven
their friend and a wise counselor. When he spoke
they listened, and a terrible calamity was therefore
averted, and after a few days of excitement and
unrest the peril vanished, not a life was sacrificed,
not a person was injured, not a dollar's worth of
property was destroyed, and the good name and fair
fame of Indianapolis was maintained. Nor was this
all : Indianapolis in June, 1877, was threatened with
a bread-riot. Public meetings were held and arrange-
ments made for a street demonstration. The riot
spirit was abroad, and danger was imminent. A
vast concourse of people had assembled in the State-
House ground, — idle men and hungry men. There
was excitement ; passion was getting the better of
judgment. Here again the fact was demonstrated
that Mayor Caven was the right man in the right
place. His earnest words stilled the tempest. Men
ready for acts of violence gave pledges to abandon
plans which were likely to result in public calamities.
But Mayor Caven did not abandon the hungry peo-
ple when they had determined to bear their sufferings
like law-abiding citizens. He at once proceeded to
relieve their immediate necessities. The circum-
stances surrounding that meeting on the 6th of
June, 1877, are historic, and we should regard this
sketch of Mayor Caven imperfect if his connection
with it was omitted. There are circumstances which
bring into bold relief certain elements of character of
the greatest value. Again we quote the account as
published at the time. The meeting having closed.
Mayor Caven gave an account of further steps to
restore quiet, as follows :
" I requested those who were willing to pledge
themselves to preserve the peace and obey my orders
in putting down any disturbances to hold up the right
hand, and every hand went up. There were men
there who, together with their families, had not
tasted food for two days, and I told them they
should not go to bed hungry that night, and- invited
the crowd to go with me, and we first went over to
Simpson's bakery, south from the State-House. He
happened to have a large quantity of bread on hand.
I commenced handing out six loaves to each one as
the hungry crowd passed by, and the supply was soon
all gone. We then went to Taggart's, on South
Meridian Street, but could not obtain admission,
and from there to Bryce's bakery, on South Street,
the hungry crowd following. Mr. Bryce was in bed,
but got up wlien I told him what I wanted, and J
directed the crowd to pass the door. Mr. Bryce
hauded me the loaves, and I handed them to the
men, giving six loaves to each ; but as the pile be-
came smaller we reduced the number to five, and
then to four and three, and then to two, and I in-
vited those who only received two and three to wait,
and if we could give them more we would ; and they
came again, and we gave them all the bread in the
bakery, and succeeded in supplying them all. As
soon as I had paid Mr. Bryce his bill I went out in
the street, and where a few minutes before was that
hungry crowd was as still as the grave, not a human
being in sight. They had left for home as quickly
as supplied, and the only persons were Mr, Dannis
Greene and myself. At the State-House I told the
men to go to the Beatty farm in the morning and
they would find work. About 2 p.m. next day I
went there, and about three hundred men were at
work, many of them the hungry men of the night
before, and it seemed as if the Belt Road, for which
we had so labored to furnish work to the hungry,
had thus providentially come to the rescue to the
very day, almost to the very hour, of our extreme
necessity. A day later and doors would have been
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
213
broken for food. As I looked at the men at work,
the expression of despair of tlie night before lifted
from their faces, vividly came to my memory the
cool September afternoon twenty-one months before,
when I sat drying myself on the partially-built aban-
doned abutment on the east bank of White Kiver,
looking over into the cheerless river bottom, wonder-
ing whether it could be converted into a scene of life
and activity, and whether from it could be extracted
work and food for hundreds of starving laborers
within the next year or two, and almost with faint-
ness at my heart looked with more of doubting than
hoping, and now it seemed as if God was with His
poor, and had not forgotten them."
In the foregoing we have traced John Caven from
his childhood, from poverty and obscurity, and,
whether toiling in the salt-works, manning an oar
on a flat-boat, or delving in a mine, always display-
ing the same sturdy zeal to win his way to fortune.
We have observed him utilizing every advantage,
educating himself, and an earnest, uncompromising
devotee of the best theories of life, and animated by
ambitions which always lead to usefulness, eminence,
and influence. We have seen him steadily advanc-
ing in the confidence and esteem of men of wealth,
education, and high character, and repeatedly chosen
by them as the exponent of their political, business,
and social theories, and in every instance responding
to every prudent requirement, — dignifying office by
making it subserve every interest of society, mapping
out new enterprises, and finding new pathways to
success. As a worker, in the costume of toil ; as a
lawyer, mastering the philosophy of jurisprudence ;
as a senator, advocating measures of far-reaching
consequences ; as a chief magistrate of a growing
city ; as a man, a citizen, combining personal worth
with official authority, calming popular unrest and
giving peace and security in times of peril, — in all
of these varied situations of life John Caven has
given proof of extraordinary intellectual power, and
has won a place in history of commanding promi-
nence. As a Mason, Mr. Caven is familiar with all
the mysteries of the ancient order, from an entered
apprentice to the supreme lights that blaze upon its
highest elevations, and his oration, delivered on the
occasion of laying the corner-stone of the Masonic
Temple in Indianapolis in 1866, demonstrates the
thoroughness of his knowledge of Masonic mysteries
and his deep devotion to the principles of the order.
Mr. Caven glories in seeing workingmen improving
their condition by association, by giving aid to each
other in times of need, and the Brotherhoods of
Locomotive Engineers and Locomotive Firemen of
the United States and Canada venerate him for the
sympathy and encouragement he has given them on
many occasions.
Such is a brief and necessarily imperfect sketch
of the life, character, and public acts of Hon. John
Caven, of Indianapolis. Our privileges do not war-
rant an entrance upon the domain of his private
life. If it were otherwise, our task would be em-
bellished by charming pictures of sympathy for the
unfortunate and acts of benevolence indicative of a
nobility of soul that, after all, is the true standard
by which to measure men. Physically, Mayor Caven
is a noble specimen of manhood, standing six feet
and weighing two hundred and ten pounds. His
complexion is florid, eyes blue and of that peculiar
type that speaks the universal language of sympathy,
benevolence, integrity, and moral courage. Mayor
Caven is a bachelor, but not a recluse nor a cynic.
He loves home and social enjoyments ; and, above
all, he is a recognized Christian gentleman, and all
of his acts, public and private, bear high testimony
that he holds in the highest veneration all sacred
things. Time has dealt kindly with Mayor Caven,
and now, though on the verge of threescore years,
he bids fair for many years to come to be the centre
of an extended circle of appreciative citizens, whose
confidence and esteem is the crowning glory of a life
well spent.
The county attorney, William Watson Woollen, is
also a product of home study, and his success is a
credit alike to him and his native city.
William Watson Woollen. — The Woollen
family are of English lineage. Leonard Woollen,
the grandfather of William Watson, was born on the
Eastern Shore of Maryland, but early removed to
Kentucky, and thence, in 1828, to Indianapolis.
The birth of his son Milton occurred in Kentucky,
214
HISTORY OP INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
in 1806. After tlie removal to Indiaaapolis he was
married to Miss Sarah, daughter of Joshua Black, a
pioneer of 1826. By this marriage there were a
number of children, the eldest of whom was Wil-
liam Watson, the subject of this biographical sketch,
born on the 28lh of May, 1838, in Indianapolis.
His youth, until the age of eighteen, was spent on a
farm in Lawrence township. Being the elde.st son.
his services early became valuable to his father, and
as a consequence very limited advantages of educa-
tion were enjoyed until his removal, in 1856, to In-
dianapolis, where he became a student of the North-
western Christian University. Having determined
upon the law as a profession, he entered the law
department of that institution, and at the same time
studied in the office of Messrs. Gordon & Connor.
He graduated from the law school, and was admitted
to the bar in October, 1859. The following winter
was spent in teaching, and in April, 1860, his name
was added to the roll of practitioners in the capital
city of the State. On the 5th of February, 1863,
Mr. Woollen married Miss Mary A. Evans, of Indi-
anapolis. He was in October, 1864, elected district
attorney of the Common Pleas Court for Marion,
Hendricks, and Boone Counties, and re-elected in
1866 without opposition. In December, 1881, he
was chosen by the board of commissioners of Marion
County attorney for the corporation, and reappointed
in 1882 and 1883. Extravagant abuses which had
crept into the public service Mr. Woollen attacked
with courage and success. He was one of the organ-
izers of the Indianapolis Bar Association, which, in
its library and other advantages, has proved an inval-
uable aid to the attorneys of the city.
Mr. Woollen is a supporter of the principles of the
Republican party, but not a strong political partisan.
He was reared in the faith of the Baptist Church,
and was formerly a member of the First Baptist
Church of Indianapolis, from which, with others, he
withdrew for the purpose of projecting and organizing
the North Baptist Church, of which he is at present
a member.
Mr. Woollen early demonstrated that he was en-
dowed with a capacity and force well fitted to his
work. His thorough knowledge of the law and log-
ical mind enabled him speedily to take his place
among the successful lawyers of the metropolis. A
manifest candor and scrupulous integrity mark all his
professional relations. He never encourages useless
litigation nor deceives a client who has no grounds
upon which to rest his case. This conscientious
dealing has won general confidence and gained for
him a lucrative practice.
Although there are three medical colleges in the
city, and at one time or another have been two or
three that lived a few years, there has never been
but one law school here, and that seems to have gone
out recently. In 1857 a law .school was opened in
connection with the Northwestern Christian Univer-
sity, of which the late Judge Perkins was the chief
teacher. In 1870-71 a law department was formed
in the same institution, with Judge Byron K. Elliott,
now of the Supreme Bench, Charles P. Jacobs, and
Judge Charles H. Test as professors. When the
university was removed to Irvington the law school
was continued in the city. Professors Jacobs and
Elliott continuing with it until within a year or so.
There were two hundred and fifty-seven lawyers
in the city in 1883. The profession, like merchan-
dising, has separated itself into classes, not definitely,
but with a much less miscellaneous association than
once prevailed. In a few years we shall have dis-
tinctively criminal lawyers, and patent lawyers, and
real-estate lawyers, and claims lawyers, as we now
have the germs with a pretty plain development here
and there. It is the tendency of growth and im-
provement to limit fields of labor and work with
more elaborate care on fewer subjects, and the legal
profession will some time obey the irresistible law,
and make division of its labor as laborers do. A
bar association manual has existed here for a number
of years.
The members of both the bench and bar of Indian-
apolis and the State of Indiana have deservedly taken
high rank in the legal profession of not only this
State but of the whole country. In the chronological
list of its members will be found men whose history
is a part of the history of the United States, and
whose names will be handed down to posterity as
giants of the law in " Ye olden time."
'o-^t^^^
i.
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
214a
William Quarles was accounted one of the first
criminal lawyers of the State, and especially success-
ful in the cross-examination and bewilderment of
adverse witnesses. His death followed close on his
exertions in defense of Merritt Young for killing
Israel Phillips about 1852. Though a fluent speaker,
he was not an orator, and succeeded by dint of in-
cessant use, in every possible form and connection, of
one or two strong points. He drove them into a
jury by so much hammering that no amount of
refutory logic or apppeal could displace them. His
son John, at one time one of the best debaters of the
old Union Literary Society, was the superior of his
father, and if he had lived would have stood among
the foremost lawyers of the nation unless thwarted by
his own self-indulgence. He was killed two or three
years after his father's death by falling down the
stairway at College Hall and striking his head
against cither the raised stone sill of the stairway-
door or the stone curb of the pavement, though
there were rumors at the time of violence resulting
from a quarrel. Mr. Quarles, the father, was brother-
in-law of the late Thomas D. and Robert L. Walpole,
both noted and successful lawyers both in civil and
criminal business. They were Kentuckians, and
sons of Luke Walpole, one of the first merchants of
the city. Thomas was a prominent politician of the
Clay school till 1844, when he went over to the
Democracy. Robert was a Demoefetic candidate for
Congress near the time of the breaking out of the
war.
Hugh O'Neal, who was both county prosecutor
and United States attorney, and one of the first and
ablest members of the Indianapolis bar of any
period, was raised in Marion County, educated at
Bloomington as one of the two students to which each
county was entitled, studied law in this city, and
was admitted to the bar about 1840. He soon made
himself conspicuous as a Whig orator, and was one
of the most efficient of the party champions from the
campaign of 1844 to that of 1852. After that till
his death he concerned himself little with politics.
He went to California soon after the gold discovery,
and did well there, but not so well as to prevent his
return in a couple of years or so. He resumed the
practice of the law here, living in his office, — he was
never married, — and died there, in the second-story
room next to Fletcher's Bank, during the war. For
some years he and the late Governor Abram A. Ham-
mond were partners, and made the most formidable
firm of the city of that time except Smith & Yandes
and Barbour & Porter.
LuciAN Barbour was a Connecticut man, born
in 1811, graduated at Amherst, in 1837, and came
West to Madison, in this State, where he studied
law. He came to Indianapolis about 1840, or a little
later, and soon formed a partnership with the late
Judge Wick, in connection with whom he prepared
a little treatise on business law and forms, known for
years in the profession as " Wick & Barbour."
Later he and Governor Porter formed a partnership
which was maintained till Mr. Barbour went to Con-
gress in 1855 or later. In 1851 he was one of the
commissioners appointed by the Legislature to revise
the statutes and simplify the pleadings and proceed-
ings of court, as the new constitution required. The
lawyers used to call this the " Carr code," from
George W. Carr, one of the commissioners, who had
been president of the Constitutional Convention, a
sensible, good man, but no lawyer, and not a strik-
ingly judicious selection for that service. Mr. Bar-
bour, always a Democrat till the Kansas-Nebraska
question came up to disrupt parties, shifted to the
anti-slavery side in 1854 and was elected to Congress,
where, after' one term, he was succeeded by Mr.
Gregg, a Democrat of Hendricks County, and then
for two terms by his old law-partner, Governor Porter.
While in partnership with Mr. Wick he married
Mrs. Wick's sister, Alice, and thus became the
brother-in-law of the late Lazarus B. Wilson as well
as his law-partner. Mr. Barbour in the last years of
his life had associated with him the versatile and
widely-read Charles P. Jacobs.
Horatio C. Newcomb is entitled to all respect
as one of the best lawyers, ablest publicists, and
truest men that ever honored Indianapolis with a
residence. He was born in Tioga County, Pa., in
1821 was removed by his parents when a child to
Cortland County, N. Y., and thence to Jennings
1 County, in this State, in 1836. He learned the sad-
214b
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
dler's trade there, as did Judge Martindale and
Senator McDonald in their outset of life, but in two j
or three years ill-health compelled him to quit it,
and in 1841 he began the study of the law with Mr.
Bullock, the first lawyer in Jennings County. He
practiced there till 1846, when he came to Indian-
apolis and formed a partnership with Mr. Ovid
Butler. The impression made by his abilities may
be judged by the fact that in 1849 he was elected
the second mayor of the city in his twenty-eighth
year. In 1854 he was elected to the Legislature,
and in 1860 was elected to the Senate, which he left
after one session to take the presidency of the Sink-
ing Fund Board. He was superseded there in 1863
by the late W. H. Talbott. In the summer of 1864,
after the retirement of Mr. Sulgrove, he became po-
litical editor of the Journal, and so continued till
1868, serving two sessions in the Legislature in that
time. He went back to the law practice in 1869,
and continued till he was appointed one of the first
three judges of the Superior Court in March, 1871.
This term expired in 1874, when he was elected to
the same place by a popular and unanimous vote,
being put on both party tickets, as was Judge Per-
kins, his associate, who had succeeded Judge Rand
on the resignation of the latter. Soon after Presi-
dent Grant tendered him the assistant Secretaryship
of the Interior, but he declined it. In 1876 he was
nominated by the Republicans for the Supreme
Bench, but beaten. Under the act authorizing com-
missioners of the Supreme Court to assist the judges
in dealing off the accumulations of the docket, he
was made one, and died while in that duty. He was
all his life here a constant and devoted member of
the Presbyterian Church, and one of the ruling
elders. As editor of the Journal he showed a ver-
satility of power with which he had not been credited,
as well as a sagacity and sound judgment in party
management that were badly needed to supplement
the efforts of Governor Morton. He died in May,
1882, at his residence on North Tennessee Street.
John H. Bradley. — Although chiefly occupied
with his business as banker and railroad operator after
Lis removal to this city, the late John H. Bradley
sometimes figured in the old court-house with such
effect of eloquence and legal erudition as was rarely
equaled by any of his associates. He was a member
of the Legislature from Laporte County in 1842, and
formed one of the noted quartette of that year, — he
and Joseph G. Marshall, of the Whigs, Edward A.
Hannegan and Thomas J. Henley, of the Democrats.
Mr. Bradley retired from active business for several
years before his death, and wrote a small treatise on
the evidences and philosophy of spiritualism. Dr.
John M. Kitchen and Morris Defrees are sons-in-law
of Mr. Bradley.
William Wallace. — Among the living members
of the bar are several who still hold foremost places
in the profession, though some, as Simon Yandes,
Esq., and Governor Porter, have retired, and are
engaged in other pursuits. William Wallace, one
of those who have been longest at the bar of the
city and are still as active and conspicuous as ever,
was born in Brookville, Oct. 16, 1825. He came
to the capital when his father had to take up his
official residence here as Governor in 1837, and
has remained ever since. He went to school here
first to Mr. (now Gen.) Gilman Marston, and later
to Rev. James S. Kemper, at the old seminary. He
oscillated for some time between schooling and clerk-
ing, finally settling down to studying law and work-
ing in the office of the county clerk, then Robert B.
Duncan. When the latter left that office in 1850
Mr. Wallace began the practice of the law, and has
continued ever since, except during one term in the
office of county clerk, from 1861 to 1865, beating
Michael Fitzgibbon. His business has been of a
quiet kind, not so well calculated to exhibit the
striking oratorical talent which put him at the head
of the old seminary boys, at the criminal and litigated
civil business in which his father shone so brilliantly,
but it has made him one of the foremost and most re-
spected of the lawyers of the capital, and put him in
many positions of responsibility in private . affairs.
His native eloquence has not been allowed to rust in
probate business, however. He is one of the fore-
most Odd-Fellows of the State, and has more than
occupation enough in making addresses for the order
on formal or conspicuous occasions. No man in the
city stands higher or by a better title of native gen-
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
21-Jc
erosity and manliness and unspotted honor than
William Wallace.
Gen. John Coburn, whose life, however, presents
a striking contrast of variety and incessant activity
to the unvarying smoothness of the other's, is an old
schoolmate and life-long friend of William Wallace.
He was born in this city, Oct. 27, 1825, very soon
after the removal of his father, the late Henry P.
Coburn, clerk of the Supreme Court from 1820 to
1852, from Corydon to the new capital. His
early education was chiefly acquired at the old
seminary, whence he went to Wabash College in
1842, graduating in 1846. He served as deputy to
his father and studied law till 1849, when he was
admitted to the bar, practicing for some years as the
partner of Judge N. B. Taylor, and later of Governor
Wallace. On the death of the latter while occupying
the bench of the Common Pleas Court, Mr. Coburn
was appointed to the vacancy, and elected the year
following. On the 18th of September he was com-
missioned colonel of the Thirty-third Regiment, hold-
ing the command steadily till he was mustered out,
Sept. 20, 1864. The next year he was brevetted
brigadier-general. The first experience of his regi-
ment was a rough one. It left this city on the 28th
of September, 1861, and on the 21st of October was
fighting Gen. Zollicoffer at Wild Cat, Ky., where
that distinguished rebel was killed, and our Hoosier
colonel exhibited the coolness and commandiDg force
that were needed for a serviceable and honorable mil-
itary career. After this it was stationed at Crab
Orchard, Ky., until early in January, and full two-
thirds of the men were down with the measles. After
this Col. Coburn was in and about Cumberland Gap
for a long time, but early in 1863 was sent to Nash-
ville, and thenee to Franklin, Tenn., where, during
an engagement into which he was forced by the im-
prudence of a temporary superior, some four hundred
of his men and himself were taken prisoners. The
men were paroled, but he was taken to Libby, and
was there at the time a Union force gave the city
of Richmond a considerable fright. His life there
was that of hundreds of others with which the
country is familiar. In the Atlanta campaign his
regiment was one of the foremost, and he was the
officer deputed by the commander to receive the
surrender of the city. In October, 1865, he was
elected to the Circuit Court Bench, but resigned to
go to Congress in 1866. He served four terms in
Congress with a record of as good service and hard
work as any man in the body, and with as high
consideration from his fellow-members. He was
chairman of the Military Committee, one of the most
important in the House at that time, and, besides the
unknown work of legislation, illustrated his congres-
sional career by speeches of unusual force of style
and familiarity with his subjects. He never spoke
for buncombe or to have a little exhibit of his services
to frank to his constituents, but because he knew
something on the subject that needed to be told and
a good many needed to learn. So strong an impres-
sion had he made that on the resignation of Secretary
Belknap he was urged for the War Department. It
is a pity he hadn't got it ; we have had no such man
since. On the expiration of his congressional term
Gen. Coburn accepted an appointment as one of the
commissioners to settle the complicated disputes about
the titles of land in Hot Springs, Ark. This work
he completed but a year or two ago. Since then he
has been constantly engaged in his profession.
Napoleon B. Taylor was born October 18, 1820,
in Campbell County, Ky., and came to this place a
child with his father, the late Robert Taylor, one of
the earliest of our brick-masons. He, like his old
friends Wallace and Coburn, was an " old seminary
boy," leaving the school to study law about 1842 or
1843. For some time after his admission to the
bar he mixed bricklaying with law to have some-
thing to do and make something to live, but in 1849
he formed a partnership with the late John L. Ketch-
am, and since then has confined himself to the law.
He worked his way up slowly, but he never got a
foot ahead and slipped back two. What he made he
held, and in a few years he came to be known over
the State as peculiarly skillful and able in the prepa-
ration of cases for the Supreme Court. That reputa-
tion he has kept and increased ever since. In 1853
he and Gen. Coburn formed a partnership for about
throe years. In 1872 he formed a partnership with
his son Edwin and Judge Rand, one of the first
214d
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
judges of the Superior Court, which was maintained
till Judge Taylor's electiou to the Superior Bench in
1882. In 18G4 he was nominated for reporter of the
Supreme Court against Gen. Ben. Harrison and beaten,
and he was frequently talked of for the nomination for
the Supreme Bench. He stands among tlie first law-
yers of the State for erudition and sound judgment,
and among the first citizens of Indianapolis for all
the qualities of good citizenship.
Btron K. Elliott, judge of the Supremo Court
■ from the central district of the State, was born in
Butler County, Ohio, Sept. 4, 1835, lived in Hamil-
ton till 1849, then removed to Cincinnati, and on the
21st of December, 1850, to this city. He studied law
here, and was admitted to the bar in February, 1858,
and in May, 1859, was elected city attorney, — a most
creditable .proof of ability and character to command
such a place in the first year of professional life,
and at the early age of twenty-four. He went into
the hundred days' service in May, 1864, in Col.
Vance's One Hundred and Thirty-second Regiment,
as captain, but was put upon Gen. Milroy's staff in
two or three weeks as assistant adjutant-general.
On his return to the law he was elected city attorney
again in May, 1865, and re-elected in 1867 and
1869. His four terms in that office enabled him to
make it a position of importance, worth a good law-
yer's tenure and attention, and it had been a mere
party makeweight previously. In October, 1870,
he was elected judge of the Criminal Court, and
resigned the office of city attorney. In November,
1872, he resigned the judgeship to take the city
solicitorship unanimously tendered him by the Coun-
cil. He was elected city attorney again in May,
1873, and in October, 1876, one of the judges of
the Superior Court. He was again nominated for
the place by acclamation in March, 1880, but re-
ceiving the Republican nomination for Supreme
judge in June of the same year, he accepted that
and was elected in the following October. He was
made chief justice at the November term, 1881, and
served through that term. In and out of the pro-
fession he is regarded as one of the purest, fairest,
and most clear-sighted judges that have occupied the
appellate bench in this generation, and in no rulings
is greater or more general confidence felt than in
his.
Fabius M. Finch was born in Western New York
in 1811, and came to Ohio in 1816, with his father.
Judge John Finch, and from Ohio came to this
county in 1819, being the first family in the New
Purchase, except possibly the Whetzels, at the
Bluflfs. The settlement was made near Noblesville,
which for some time was made a part of Marion
County. Several families came with the Finches.
In 1828 the future judge came to this place and
studied law with Judge Wick, whose first wife was
his sister. He was admitted to the bar in 1831, at
the age of twenty, showing unusual maturity of in-
tellect, and settled at Franklin, Johnson Co., where
he remained till 1865, when he removed perma-
nently to this city. He was elected judge of the
Fifth Circuit in 1842 by the Legislature, and in 1859
was elected to the judgeship of this circuit by the
people, serving one term. For some years he and
his son, John A , have confined their business largely
to insurance cases, and have made a very high repu-
tation in that branch of the profession. John A.
was the State commissioner at a national meeting of
insurance men in New York some years ago, and
has published several elaborate articles on insurance
organizations, methods, and law, which have attracted
wide attention and commendation.
Gen. Ben. Harrison was born in February, 1833,
in Cincinnati, where he received his early education.
He graduated at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, and
studied law with the celebrated Judge Bellamy Storer.
He came to Indianapolis in 1854, and practiced law by
himself for some years. About 1856 he made a more
conspicuous place for himself by convicting a negro
cook at the Ray House of poisoning some of the
boarders. His management of that case was univer-
sally commended by the profession, which before that
had been a little disposed to regard the tow-headed
youngster, who looked younger than he was, as pos-
sessing his best claim to attention in the fact that
he was the grandson of his grandfather. He soon
showed, when the chance came, that he could build
broadly and solidly enough on his own ioundation,
and he has done it most effectually. His first public
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
214e
position was that of reporter of the Supreme Court in
1861. In August, 1862, he accepted the command
of the Seventieth Regiment, and remained witli it till
it was mustered out at the close of the war in June,
1865. A sketch of the history of that regiment
will be found in the chapter on the City and County
in the War. Gen. Harrison was associated with
Governor Porter and William P. Fishback, as Por-
ter, Harrison & Fishback, for several years. Mr.
Fishback, who came here in 1856 from Ohio and
soon established a good practice and reputation, left
the firm in 1870 to take control of the Journal, and
later of the St. Louis Democrat, and never rejoined his
associates, first accepting the clerkship of the United
States Court for a couple of years, and then resign-
ing that and confining his work to the mastership in
chancery of the same court. The firm then became
Porter, Harrison & Hines, by the accession of Judge
Hines, and remained so till Mr. Porter retired a few
years later, when Mr. Miller, of Toledo, came here to
take a place in the firm in 1874, which then became
Harrison, Hines & Miller. This has only recently
been changed by the accession of John B. Elam.
In 1876 the Republicans deemed it best to re-
move Godlove S. Orth, their nominee for Governor,
and put Gen. Harrison in his place. It was a very
embarrassing situation, but Mr. Harrison made as
much of it as any man could, and so fixed his
hold on the regard of his party that his nomination
to the United States Senate, when the Republicans
gained control of the Legislature in the election of
1880, was a foregone conclusion. There was no
serious contest made against him. Now his judicious
course in the Senate has given him no inconspicuous
chance for the Presidential nomination.
Judge Hines, so long a partner of Gen. Harri-
son, was born in Washington County, N. Y., Dec.
10, 1836, whence his mother, who was left a widow
with her young family , went to Lonsdale, Conn., where
Cyrus worked for several years in the cotton-mills.
Then for a year or two he studied and taught in the
Normal Institute at Lancaster, Mass., and thence he
came to Indianapolis in 1854. He studied law with Si-
mon Yandes, Esq., and became a partner in December,
1855, continuing until the latter retired from the pro-
fession in 1860. Mr. Hines wont into the three
months' service as sergeant of Company H, Eleventh
Regiment, and when that was througii went into the
three years'service, attaining the position of colonel of
the Fifty-seventh Regiment, in which he is described in
the adjutant-general's official history of the regiment as
" an officer of great and acknowledged ability, who had
chiefly formed the character of the regiment." He
was so severely wounded at Stone River that he had
to resign. In 1866 he succeeded Judge Coburn in
the Circuit Court, and held the place till 1870, when
he was succeeded by Judge Tarkiugton. Mr. Miller,
who entered the firm with Gen. Harrison and Col.
Hines in 1874, was born in Oneida County, N. Y.,
September, 1840, studied law with Chief Justice
Waite in Toledo, then practiced for eight years in
Fort Wayne, and came here in 1874. John B.
Elam served through the war as a private soldier
in an Ohio regiment. When the war was over he
studied and graduated at Oxford (Ohio) College,
where Governor Morton and Senator Harrison were
once students, then studied law in the law depart-
ment of the Ann Arbor University, and came to this
city in 1874. In 1878 he was made prosecuting
attorney, and convicted the first three men ever hung
in Marion County, William Merrick, John Achey,
and Louis Guetig. He is regarded as one of the
foremost of the younger members of the bar, and
as prominent politically as professionally.
Gen. Fred. Knefler has long held an honorable
position at the bar here, and was known for years as
deputy clerk before he entered the bar. He is a
Hungarian by birth, and when a mere boy served in
the revolutionary army of 1848 under Gen. Bern,
one of Kossuth's best leaders, and was wounded.
He came to this country with his father. Dr. Knefler,
in 1849, and learned the carpenter's trade first.
Then he got a place in the clerk's office, and so
worked his way into the bar. In 1861 he served in
the Eleventh Regiment of three months' men as
lieutenant. In the three years' service he was
captain of Company H in the Eleventh, and in Au-
i/ust 1862, was appointed colonel of the Seventy-
ninth, which led the way in the charge at Mission
Ridge, Col. Knefler leading the regiment. He re-
214f
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
tired from the service at the close of the war with
the brevet of brigadier. He formed a law-partner-
ship with the late John Hanna, which was only
terminated by the death of the latter. He succeeded
William H. H. Terrell as pension agent here, as
noticed in the list of government oflBcers resident
here.
The partners of ex-Senator and ex-Governor
Thomas A. Hendricks have been among the fore-
most members of the bar of the State and city for
many years. Ex-Governor Baker went into the
firm in 1873, when Mr. Hendricks became Governor.
He had been one of the most prominent of the law-
yers of the State for years in Evansville before he
came to Indianapolis to act as Governor while Gov-
ernor Morton was in Europe in 1865-66. He re-
mained here thenceforward, and took as commanding
a place at the bar here as at his old home. In 1864
he was provost-marshal of the State on duty here,
and arrested a mob of re-enlisted veterans of the
Nineteenth Regiment who attacked and proposed to
demolish the Sentinel office for some allusion in the
paper that they disliked. He met the angry men on
the stairs, with their guns in their hands, and held
them back till he brought them to reason. Two of
the most conspicuous features of his administration
were the payment of the State debt of 1836 and the
official proclamation of the stoppage of interest in
1870, and the recommendation of asylums for the
incurable insane, now just put in the way of accom-
plishment.
Oscar B. Hord, attorney-general of the State
from 1862 to 1864, and for twenty years a partner
of Governor Hendricks, was born in Kentucky,
near Maysville, where he was brought up. He
studied law with his father, and came to Greens-
burg, in this State, in 1849. In 1852 he was made
prosecuting attorney, serving two terms. Some years
later he and the late Col. Gavin, his partner, made a
digest of the statutes of the State, which was greatly
needed, and gave its authors a substantial professional
reputation at once. In 1862, Mr. Hord was elected
attorney-general and removed to Indianapolis, forming
a professional connection with Mr. Hendricks which
has never been sundered since, except during the
latter's term as Governor (from 1873 to 1877). Mr.
Hord is one of the hard-working men of the Indian-
apolis bar, and stands second to none in the care he
gives his cases and thoroughness of his investigation
of the law. He is one of the steadiest of friends
and most genial of companions, as well as one of the
first lawyers of the State. He was born in 1829.
Mr. Abram "W. Hendricks, a cousin of the ex-
Governor, is well up towards sixty, but none the less
a close student and indefatigable worker. He is held
by the profession to be one of the most thoroughly-
read lawyers in the country, and was so well esteemed
twenty-six years ago that he was nominated by the
Republican party for the Supreme Bench. He was
born in Westmoreland County, Pa., and came to
Madison, to his uncle, in 1839. He studied law
with Governor William Hendricks, and graduated at
the Lexington (Kentucky) Law School. For some
years he was a partner of William McKee Dunn, late
judge-advocate-general. He came to Indianapolis in
1866, to join his cousin, Thomas A., and Mr. Hord,
when the firm became Hendricks, Hord & Hendricks,
now Baker, Hord & Hendricks.
John C. New, though he never figured as a law-
yer, was for a good many years clerk of the county,
and as well known a figure of the court as the judge.
He was born in Jennings County, in 1831. His
father, the late John B. New, was a cabinet-maker
by trade and a Christian preacher by preference,
and removed to Greensburg when John was still a
child. After a course of country town schooling he
went to Bethany, Va., where he took a four years'
course under the late Alexander Campbell, graduating
fairly in 1851. His cousin, Jeptha D. New, member
of Congress two terms from the Jennings County Dis-
trict, was at the same college at the same time. Rev.
John B. New removed to this city about the time his
son graduated, and here the latter studied law with
Governor Wallace, was admitted to the bar in 1852,
and having a good memory, an aptitude for system,
and a naturally good business disposition, with a neat,
legible cbirography. Clerk Stewart made him deputy
soon afterwards ; and when Stewart died, leaving a
year of his term vacant, the County Board put the
deputy there, and at the next election the people
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS.
2140
elected him over George MeOuat by a slender ma-
jority. Here he laid the foundation of his fortune,
and left the oflSce a young man, but already a rich
one. Governor Morton made him quartermaster early
in the war ; then he served a term in the State Sen-
ate; then, in 1865, went as cashier into the First
National Bank, and remained there ten years, till he
was made treasurer of the United States in Spinner's
place. A year here sufficed him, and he returned to
the bank as vice-president. A little later he bought
out William H. English, and became president. In
1880 he was made chairman of the Republican State
Central Committee, and bought the Journal. He
was also the Indiana member of the National Repub-
lican Committee. He has been the First Assistant
Treasurer of the United States for several years,
which position he has recently resigned. Mr. New
has been twice married, — first to Melissa, daughter
of the late Joseph Beeler, and next to Miss McRae,
daughter of a son-in-law of Dr. J. H. Sanders.
William P. Adkinson.
Henry C. Allen.
Fremont Alford.
Ayres & Brown.
Ayres & Cole.
Bailey & Van Buren.
John W. Baird.
Baker, Hord & Hendricks.
James P. Baker.
Pliny W. Bartholomew.
Will F. A. Bernhamer.
Isaac L. Bloomer.
William Bosson.
John W. Bowlus.
Daniel M. Bradbury.
Cornelius D. Browder.
Wilbur F. Browder.
William T. Brown.
Samuel M. Bruce.
John C. Brush.
James Buchanan.
Salmon A. Buell.
H. Burns.
Burns & Denny.
Byfiold & Howland.
Bynum & Beck.
Howard Cole.
Canary & Medkirk.
Nathaniel Carter.
Vinson Carter.
Carter & Bin ford.
Charles E. Clark.
Ross Clark.
ROLL OF ATTORNEYS.
John W. Claypool.
Claypool & Ketcham.
Coburn & Irvin.
W. H. Corbaley.
Cropsey & Cooper.
Vincent G. Clifford.
James B. Curtis.
Dailey & Pickerell.
Benjamin F. Davis.
Guilford A. Deitch.
Austin F. Denny.
Robert Denny.
Almon H. Dickey.
Samuel R. Downey.
Charles A. Dryer.
Duncan, Smith & Duncan.
Dye & Fishback.
John B. Elam.
William F. Elliott.
Harmon J. Everett.
Charles W. Fairbanks.
Finch & Finch.
Florea & Wishard.
Samuel W. Fogger.
James E. Franklin.
George W. Galvin.
Jonathan W. Gordon.
John C. Green.
Otto Gresham.
Griffiths & Potts.
Orvin S. Hadley.
Upton J. Hammond.
Jesse D. Hamrick.
Harding & Hovey.
James W. Harper.
Charles 0. Harris.
Harris & Calkins.
Harrison, Hines & Miller.
Jonathan S. Harvey.
Lawson M. Harvey.
Charles R. Haseley.
Roseoe 0. Hawkins.
Charles C. Heckman.
James E. Hellei'.
Heinrichs & Kessler.
William Henderson.
George G. Hendrickson.
John A. Henry.
Maxwell B. Henry.
Herod & Winter.
Isaac Herr.
James T. Hill.
Hill & Martz.
John A. Holman.
Louis Howland.
William A. Hughes.
Charles P. Jacobs.
Ovid B. Jameson.
Lewis Jordan.
John M. Judah.
Julian & Julian.
Kealing & Clifford.
Joseph M. Keatinge.
Justin A. Kellogg.
John Kidd.
Israel Klingensmith.
2r4H
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
Knefler & Beiryhill.
David K. Paultow.
William F. Stilz.
Orlando Knowlton.
William Patterson.
George W. Stubbs.
Eugene G. Kreider.
William H. Payne.
Horace G. Study.
Ira M. Kratz.
William A. Peelle, Jr.
James Sulgrove.
William C. Lamb.
Peelle & Taylor.
William Sullivan.
Lamb & Mason.
Samuel E. Perkins.
Sullivan & Jones.
John T. Leeklider.
George K. Perrin.
Lucius B. Swift.
Frank H. Levering.
Henry D. Pierce.
Talbott & Wheeler.
Frank P. Lindsay.
George T. Porter.
John S. Tarkinston.
Reuben D. Logan.
Wallace W. Pringle.
Taylor, Rand & Taylor.
William A. Lowe.
James A. Pritchard.
La Frank R. Teed.
Dow McClain.
Rand & Winters.
Harrison T. Tincker.
Z. T. McCormack.
William A. Reading.
Tobin & McCray.
McDonald & Butler.
Warwick 11. Ripley.
John W. Tomlinson.
McMaster & Boice.
Ritter & Ritter.
Thomas J. Trusler.
Gilbert B. Manlove.
Roachc & Lamme.
Turpie & Pierce.
E. B. & Charles Martindale.
Charles F. Robbins.
Richard S. Turrell.
Francis J. Mattler.
Thaddeus S. Rollins.
Flavins J. Van Vorhis.
Harry J. Milligan.
Rooker & Hatch.
Joseph W. Walker.
Jehu Milner.
John N. Scott.
William & Lewis Wallace.
James L. Mitchell.
Adolph & G. Seidensticker.
William B. Walls.
John 0. Moore.
Silas M. Shepard.
John C.Wells.
Merrill Moores.
Horace E. Smith.
Williams & Johnson.
John Morgan.
J. Hervey Smith.
Harry L. Wilson.
Morris & Newberger.
Robert E. Smith.
Oliver M. Wilson.
Frank W. Morrison.
Spaan & Heiner.
Wilson & Wilson.
Wilson Morrow.
George W. Spahr.
George W. Winpenny.
Charles R. Myers.
Horace Speed.
Bennett F. Witt.
David A. Myers.
William W. Spencer.
William Watson Woollen.
Nicbol & Buskirk.
Roger A. Sprague.
Frank M. Wright.
Lester L. Norton.
Charles S. Spritz.
George B. Wright.
Orlando B. Orton.
Stanton & Scott.
Granville S. Wright.
Eben A. Parker.
Stevenson & Stevenson.
Augustus B. Young.
Parmlee & Holladay.
George W. Stillwell.
John Young.
ylC^ , yaUuiy \^
CITY OP INDIANAPOLIS.
215
CHAPTER IX.
CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS— (Co,i(mi,erf.)
BANKS, BANKERS, AND INSURANCE.
For twenty-five years the old State Bank and its
Indianapolis branch furnished the best and the only
safe paper currency in the State. The hard times of
1841 to 1845 were alleviated to some extent by the
issue of " State scrip," and until the Free Banking
Act of 1852 the only home currency we had was
made up of State paper and State Bank paper. The
beginning of this serious crisis in the condition of the
State and Marion County occurred while Nathan B.
Palmer was in the State Treasury, the end of it
while Samuel Hannah was there, when the progress
of the old Madison Railroad gave promise of a new
era.
Hon. Nathan B. Palmer was born at Stoning-
ton, Conn., Aug. 27, 1790, and by the death of his
father left an orphan at the early age of ten years.
Subsequent to this event his mother removed to New
York State, accompanied by her son. Here he grew
to man's estate and married Miss Chloe Sacket, who
aided not a little to her husband's success in life.
The newly-married pair removed to Pennsylvania in
1812, in which State Mr. Palmer was elected to more
than one oiEce of trust and honor before his thirtieth
year, in each of which he acquitted himself with
credit. More than two-thirds of a century ago Mr.
Palmer came down the Ohio River and settled in
Jefferson County, Ind., where he resided for four-
teen years, and during this period was chosen to
represent his county in the State Legislature. In
1833 he was elected Speaker of the House, and dis-
played marked ability as an efficient and just presiding
officer. In 1835 he became a permanent resident of
Indianapolis, having been chosen to fill the responsible
office of State Treasurer. As a public servant, having
large and important trusts in his hands, his career
was marked by the most scrupulous integrity and
exactness. While in charge of the State finances
large amounts of scrip were issued and used as a
circulating medium. He was in 1841 made ex-
aminer of the State Bank and its branches, and in
this responsible position manifested the same ability
and shrewdness that had characterized his previous
official career. He was during his lifetime identified
with more than one public enterprise of moment, and
took a leading part in both local and State politics.
Having the sagacity to discern that railways must
eventually supplant canals, he was ah energetic
mover in the construction of railroads in various parts
of the State, and by his example and efforts gave this
class of improvements an impetus which was long
after felt in Indiana. The construction of the old
Madison and Indianapolis Railroad, the first in the
State, was in no small degree the result of Mr.
Palmer's exertions, and the company for a number of
years had the benefit of his services as president and
chief executive officer of the line. He was during
his life a member of the Democratic party, though
his integrity and ability were such as to command
the political support of those not identified with his
own party. The death of Mr. Palmer occurred April
13, 1875, and that of Mrs. Palmer, June 10, 1871.
Their children are Charles C, Aurelia E., William
S., Jane C, Jerome W., Louisa S., Jane M., Minerva
A., Trumbull G., Blackford M., Marshall E., Edward
L., Nathan B., Jr., and Mary L.
Samuel Hannah was born Dec. 1, 1789, in the
State of Delaware. At six years of age he removed
with his father's family to Brownsville, Pa., on the
Monongahela River, thirty miles above Pittsburgh.
He was married July 11, 1811, to Eleanor Bishop,
who died Sept. 26, 1864. Their family numbered
eleven children, four daughters and seven sons.
Anna married Gen. Solomon Meredith, Eliza married
Hon. John S. Newman, Sarah married Rev. Dr. F.
C. Holliday, Ellen married Dr. John M. Ross, Alex-
ander M. married Elizabeth N. Jackson, Henry R.
married Jerusha Cain, William P. married Margaret
A. Dunham. James, Israel, Thomas, and Septimus
died in youth. In the spring of 1815, with his wife
and two children, Mr. Hannah went in a flat-boat to
Cincinnati, and thence by wagons to Warren County,
Ohio, where he taught school for two years, number-
ing among his pupils some who were afterwards dis-
tinguished in the learned professions and other vo-
cations.
216
HISTORY OF INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION COUNTY.
He left Ohio in 1817, settling in what is now
Washington township, Wayne Co., Ind., and resided
on his farm until December, 1823. Having been
elected sheriff of Wayne County, he removed to
Centreville, the county-seat. Belonging to the So-
ciety of Friends, and conscientiously opposed to the
collection of fines for refusing to do military duty,
he resigned his office in the spring of 1825. The
following August he was elected as a representative
to the Legislature. He declined a re-election, but
was in 1826 elected a justice of the peace, which
office he held about four years. The county business
being then done by the board of justices, he was
chosen and continued president of the board until
1829, when the board of county commissioners was
restored. He was appointed postmaster at Centre-
ville under the administration of John Quincy Ad-
ams, and held the office until removed under that of
Andrew Jackson, in 1829. He was one of three
commissioners appointed by the Legislature to locate
the Michigan road from the Ohio River to the lake,
and to select the lands secured to the State by a
treaty with the Indians, held on the Upper Waba.sh
in 1826. In 1830 he was elected clerk of Wayne
County, and served seven years. In 1843 he was
again elected to the Legislature. In December, 1846,
he was elected by the Legislature, treasurer of State,
and served three years. After his election to this
office he removed to Indianapolis, where he resided
until his death, with the exception of a residence of
about two years at Centreville during the construction
of the Indiana Central Railway. In March, 1851,
he was chosen first president of the company, but
resigned in July following. He was the same sum-
mer elected treasurer of the Indianapolis and Belle-
fontaine Railroad Company. In May, 1852, he
accepted the office of treasurer of the Indiana Cen-
tral Railway Company, and held the position until
January, 1864, when he retired from active life. He
died Sept. 8, 1869, aged nearly eighty years.
Contemporaneously with Mr. Palmer in the treas-
ury, Morris Morris, one of the pioneers of 1821, and
one of the most esteemed citizens of any period, held
the office of State auditor. During his administration
pretty much all of the State scrip issued at all was
put out and into the currency of the State. He con-
tinued in the office fifteen years, from 1829 to 1844.
Morris Morris was a grandson of James Morris,
who with his brothers John and Morris came from
Wales and early settled in Virginia. Morris, the
grandson, was born in Monongahela County, Va., in
1780, and removed in youth with his parents to
Fleming County, Ky., where he remained until forty
years of age. He received a thorough English edu-
cation, chose the law as a profession, and practiced
for many years. In 1803 he was married to M 
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