Full text of "History of Iroquois County, together with Historic notes on the Northwest, gleaned from early authors, old maps and manuscripts, private and official correspondence, and other authentic, though, for the most part, out-of-the-way sources"

"LI B R.AR.Y

OF THE

UNIVERSITY
OF ILLINOIS

977364

'HINDIS WSIDHICH sgnn

HISTORY

IROQUOIS COUNTY,

TOGETHER WITH

HISTORIC NOTES 0. THE NORTHWEST,

GLEANED FROM EARLY AUTHORS, OLD MAPS AND MANUSCRIPTS,

PRIVATE AND OFFICIAL CORRESPONDENCE, AND OTHER

AUTHENTIC, THOUGH, FOR THE MOST PART,

OUT-OF-THE-WAY SOURCES.

BY H. W. BECKWITH,

OF THE DANVILLE BAK; CORRESPONDING MEMBER OP THE HISTORICAL SOCIETIES or
WISCONSIN AND CHICAGO.

WITH MAP AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

CHICAGO:

H. H. -HILL AND COMPANY, PUBLISHERS.
1880.

I KKIGHT

/> O

PREFACE.

IN presenting the History of Iroquois County to the public the
editors and publishers have had in view the preservation of certain
valuable historical facts and information which without concentrated
effort would not have been obtained but with the passing away of
the old pioneers, the failure of memory, and the loss of public records
and private diaries, would soon have been lost. This locality being
comparatively new, we flatter ourselves that, with the zeal and indus-
try displayed by our general and local historians, we have succeeded
in rescuing from the fading years almost every scrap of history
worthy of preservation. Doubtless the work is, in some respects,
imperfect ; we do not present it as a model literary effort, but, in
that which goes to make up a valuable book of reference for the pres-
ent reader and the future historian, we assure our patrons that neither
money nor time has been spared in the accomplishment of the
work. Perhaps some errors will be found. With treacherous mem-
ories, personal, political and sectarian prejudices and preferences to
contend against, it would be almost a miracle if no mistakes were
made. We hope that even these defects which may be found to
exist may be made available in so far as they may provoke discussion
and call attention to corrections and additions necessary to perfect
history.

The "Notes on the Northwest " necessarily the foundation for
the history of this part of the country, by H. W. Beckwith, of Dan-

2 ville have already received the hearty endorsement of the press,

of the historical societies of the northwestern states, and of the most

accurate historians in the country. Mr. Beckwith has in his pos-

-sion perhaps the most extensive private library of rare historical

. works bearing on the territory under consideration in the world, and
from them he has drawn as occasion demanded.

4 PREFACE.

"Iroquois County in the Great Rebellion," by A. L. Whitehall,
we are certain, will be an agreeable surprise not only to the many
old soldiers of the late war but to every one interested in that great
event ; and when we speak of Iroquois county we necessarily include
almost every citizen, for hardly the man survives who does not take
pride in the part that this county took in the suppression of that great
iniquity. Mr. Whitehall has had in his mind the production of a
complete war history, and our readers will agree with us when we
say he has succeeded in an eminent degree.

The general county history, written by E. 8. Ricker, Esq., will
be found by our readers to be in a bold, fearless style, dealing in facts
as so many causes, and pursuing effects to the end without turning
to the right or left to accommodate the opinions or preferences of
friend, party or sect.

The township histories, by Hon. C. F. McNeill, M. H. Messer,
A. W. Kellogg, E. Whittlesey, C. W. Raymond, and S. Gray, will be
found full of valuable recollections, which, but for their patient
research, must soon have been lost forever, but which are now
happily preserved for all ages to come. These gentlemen have
placed upon Iroquois county and the adjacent country a mark which
will not be obliterated, but which will grow brighter and broader as
the years go by.

The biographical department contains the names and private
sketches of nearly every person of importance in the county. A
few persons, whose sketches we should be pleased to have presented,
for various reasons refused or delayed furnishing us with the desired
information, and in this matter only we feel that our work is incom-
plete. However, in most of such cases we have obtained, in regard
to the most important persons, some items, and have woven them
into the county or township sketches, so that, as we believe, we can-
not be accused of either partiality or prejudice.

We had designed to give our patrons a book of about 800 pages,
but the amount of interesting historical matter has been so great that
we have had to extend the work to nearly one half more than the
original design.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

PART I.

CHAPTER I.

Topography The drainage of the Lakes and the Mississippi, and the Indian and

French names by which they were severally called 11

CHAPTER II.

Drainage of the Illinois and Wabash Their tributary streams The portages

connecting the drainage to the Atlantic with that of the Gulf 17

CHAPTER III.

The ancient Maumee Valley Geological features The portage of the Wabash
and the Kankakee 21

CHAPTER IV.

The rainfall Cultivation of the soil tends to equalize rainfall, and prevent the

recurrence of drouths and floods 26

CHAPTER V.

Origin of the prairies Their former extent Gradual encroachment of the
forest Prairie fires Aboriginal names of the prairies, and the Indians
who lived exclusively upon them 29

CHAPTER VI.

Early French discoveries Jaques Cartier ascends the St. Lawrence in 1535
Samuel Champlain founds Quebec in 1608 In 1642 Montreal is established
Influence of Quebec and Montreal upon the Northwest continues until subse-
quent to the war of 1812 Spanish discoveries of the lower Mississippi in 1525, 37

CHAPTER VII.

Joliet and Marquette's Voyage Father Marquette's Journal, descriptive of the
journey and the country through which they traveled Biographical sketches
of Marquette and Joliet 43

CHAPTER VIII.

LaSalle's Voyage Biographical sketch of LaSalle Sketch of Father Hennepin
and the merit of his writings 54

CHAPTER IX.
La Salle's Voyage continued He erects Fort Miamis 63

CHAPTER X.

The several rivers called the Miamis La Salle's route down the Illinois The
Kankakee Marshes The French and Indian names of the Kankakee and
Des Plaines The Illinois "Fort Crevecreur " The whole valley of the
great river taken possession of in the name of the King of France 72

6 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XI.

Death of La Salle, in attempting to establish a colony near the mouth of the
Mississippi Chicago Creek The origin of the name La Salle assassinated
and his colony destroyed Second attempt of France, under Mons. Iberville,
in 1699, to establish settlements on the Gulf The Western Company
Law's scheme of inflation and its consequences .... 87

CHAPTER XII.

Surrender of Louisiana to the French Crown in 1731 Early routes by way of the
Kankakee, Chicago Creek, the Ohio, the Maumee and Wabash described
The Maumee and Wabash, and the number and origin of their several names

Indian villages 96

CHAPTER XIII.

Aboriginal inhabitants The several Illinois tribes Of the name Illinois, and its
origin The Kaskaskias, Cahokias, Tamaroas, Peorias and Metchigamis, sub-
divisions of the Illinois Confederacy The tradition concerning the Iroquois
River Their decline and removal westward of the Missouri 105

CHAPTER XIV.

The Miamis The Miami, Piankeshaw and Wea bands Their superiority and
their military disposition Their trade and difficulties with the French and
the English They are upon the Maumee and Wabash Their Villages
They defeat the Iroquois They trade with the English, and incur the anger
of the French Their bravery Their decline Destructive effects of intem-
perance Cession of their lands in Illinois. Indiana and Ohio Their re-
moval westward and present condition 119

CHAPTER XV.

The Pottawatomies Originally from the north and east of Lake Huron Their
migrations by way of Mackinaw to the country west of Lake Michigan, and
thence south and eastward Their games Origin of the name Pottawato-
mie Occupy a portion of the country of the Miamis along the Wabash
Their villages At peace with the United States after the war of 1812 Cede
their lands Their exodus from the Wabash, the Kankakee and Wabash . . . 137

CHAPTER XVI.

The Kickapops and Mascoutins reside about Saginaw Bay in 1612 ; on Fox River,
Wisconsin, in 1670 Their reception of the Catholic fathers On the Maumee
in 1712 In southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois Migrate to the
Wabash Dwellers of the prairie Their destruction at the siege of De-
'troit Nearly destroy the Illinois and Piankeshaws. and occupy their country

Join Tecumseh in a body They, with the Winnebagoes, attack Fort
Harrison Their country between the Illinois and Wabash Their resem-
blance to the Sac and Fox Indians 153

CHAPTER XVII.

The Shawnees and Delawares Originally east of the Alleghany Mountains
Are subdued and driven out by the Iroquois They war on the American
settlements Their villages on the Big and Little Miamis, the St. Mary's,
the Au Glaize, Maumee and Wabash The Delawares Made women of by
the Iroquois Their country on White River, Indiana, and eastward defined

They, with the Shawnees, sent west of the Mississippi 170

CHAPTER XVIII.

The Indians Their implements, utensils, fortifications, mounds, manners and

customs . 180

TABLE OF CONTENTS. 7

CHAPTER XIX.

Stone implements used by the Indians before they came in contact with the Euro-
peans Illustrations of various kinds of stone implements, and suggestions
as to their probable uses 195

CHAPTER XX.

The war for the fur trade Former abundance of wild animals and water-fowl in
the Northwest The buffalo ; their range, their numbers, and final disap-
pearance Value of the fur trade ; its importance to Canada 208

CHAPTER XXI.

The war for the empire English claims to the Northwest Deeds from the Iro-

quois to a large part of the country 224

CHAPTER XXII.

Pontiac's war to recover the country from the English Pontiac's confederacy
falls to pieces The country turned over to the English Pontiac's death. . . 234

CHAPTER XXIII.

Gen. Clark's conquest of the " Illinois " The Revolutionary war Sketch of
Gen. Clark His manuscript memoir of his march to the Illinois He cap-
tures Kaskaskia The surrender of Vincennes Capt. Helm surprises a
convoy of English boats at the mouth of the Vermilion River Organization
of the northwest territory into Illinois county of Virginia 243

Iroquois county in the war of the great rebellion 261

Regimental history Infantry 262

Cavalry 304

Artillery 314

Dead heroes 317

Roll of honor 327

History of Iroquois county 331

Topographical 331

Early settlements 334

The Indian scare 340

Organization of the county 343

Thomas Frame 346

The era of speculation 349

Navigation of the Iroquois river 355

Illinois Central railroad 358

Peoria & Oquawka railroad 363

The swamp land controversy 372

Attempt to detach a part of Iroquois to form Ford 391

Publication of the proceedings of the board of supervisors 392

County seat contest 395

Building of the present court-house 403

Burning of the county offices and loss of records 406

Political history 407

Chicago & Eastern Illinois railroad 418

Other railroads 428

Micajah Stanley's account of early times 430

Larch Farm 434

County officers 437

Biographies of Experience Lehigh, Joseph Elzeard Michaud, Franklin Blades,
Edward Matthews, Isaac Amerman, John B. Robinson, Lucas Emory Pearce,
Andrew C. Rankin, Winslow Woods, John H. Atwood, Samuel H. Harper,
Thomas M. Pangborn, James P. Forsythe, Luther T. Clark, Moses H. Messer,
Samuel M. Ayres, Edward S. Gilbert, George F. Page, E. S. Ricker, William
H. Shannon, Perry Darst, James P. Martin, Martin Burnham, William A.

Babcock -. 440-^66

Executions . 466

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

PART II.

TOWNSHIP HISTORY.

MlDDLEPORT AND BELMONT TOWNSHIPS 1

First exploration 3

First settlement in Belmont 6

Woodland 11

Officers of Belmont 12

First settlement in Middleport 12

Officers of Middleport 16

Middleport 17

Watseka 24

Incorporation of Watseka 26

Schools of Watseka 34

Press of the county seat 35

Murders and executions 40

Secret societies of the county seat 43

Biographical 49

MILFORD TOWNSHIP 125

Incidents 142

Description 145

Village of Milford 146

Societies and churches 148

Schools 149

Biographical 151

SHELDON TOWNSHIP 175

Early history 176

Religious matters 178

Schools 179

Village of Sheldon 181

Societies, etc 183

Biographical 185

CONCORD TOWNSHIP 208

Iroquois 210

Incidents 213

Religious matters 214

Schools 215

Societies 216

Biographical 217

DOUGLAS TOWNSHIP 229

City of Gilman 232

Churches 235

Newspapers 241

Biographical 244

ARTESIA TOWNSHIP 262

Buckley 265

Churches 270

Societies 272

Biographical 273

LODA TOWNSHIP 284

Loda village ... 288

Churches, societies, etc 293

Biographical 298

DANPORTH TOWNSHIP 308

Danforth village 314

Biographical 314

ASHKUM TOWNSHIP 319

Ashkum village 323

Churches, societies, etc 325

Biographical 327

TABLE OF CONTENTS. 9

CHEBANSE TOWNSHIP 329

Chebanse village 334

Churches, societies, etc 338

Clifton 343

Churches 347

Biographical 348

MILK'S GROVE TOWNSHIP 309

Biographical 376

IROQUOIS TOWNSHIP 382

Early settlements and incidents 383

The ferry war 391

Biographical 393

CRESCENT TOWNSHIP 399

Crescent City 404

Biographical 409

PIGEON GROVE TOWNSHIP 415

The cattle war 416

Biographical 419

LOVEJOY TOWNSHIP 421

Biographical 425

PRAIRIE GREEN TOWNSHIP 434

Biographical 439

RlDGELAND TOWNSHIP 452

Villages 456

Biographical 458

FOUNTAIN CREEK TOWNSHIP 466

Biographical 470

STOCKLAND TOWNSHIP 479

Description 486

Biographical 488

MARTINTON TOWNSHIP 494

Martinton village 498

Biographical 499

BEAVER TOWNSHIP 512

Donovan 518

St. Mary 519

Biographical 520

PAPINEAU TOWNSHIP 527

Papineau village 534

Biographical 536

ONARGA TOWNSHIP 547

Schools 560

Churches 568

City of Onarga 577

Decatur Bagging Company 582

Murder of Martin Meara 595

Biographical 598

ASH GROVE TOWNSHIP 640

First elections 649

Educational 1552

Churches 654

Villages 658

Biographical 660

LIST OF PORTRAITS.

PART I.

George Rogers Clarke 245

Experience Lehigh ... 336

Micajah Stanley 352

PART II.

C. F. McNeill 1

Gurdon S. Hubbard 6

10 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

John L. Donovan 32

Daniel Fry 56

Franklin Blades 65

Thomas Vennum 83

Edward Dalton 92

M. H. Peters 101

M. B. Wright 119

W. B. Fleager 201

B. F. Fry 219

J. A. Koplin 276

A. C. Rankin 292

Addison Goodell 300

J. M. Balthis 364

Lemuel Milk 373

John Wilson 390

J. L. Hamilton 431

Thomas Maggee 503

Henry Jones 529

Fabien Langdoc 539

W. A. Babcock 548

T. M. Pangborn 556

G. F. Page 565

John B. Robinson 567

Winslow Woods 583

Hamilton Jefferson 593

W. P. Pierson 613

C. H. Wood 623

W. H. Harrison 649

OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS.

PART I.

Indian Implements 197-207

Buffalo 209

Map of Iroquois County 260

Fall of color-bearer 320

Whipple & Brown's hardware store, Milford 417

Woodland Mills 427

Miller & Woodwork's Block, Milford 433

PART II.

Williams & Sons' creamery

Key of old court-house 17

Iroquois county court-house 24

First National Bank, Watseka

Iroquois County "Times " office

Pioneer log cabin 556

HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

CHAPTER I.

TOPOGRAPHY.

THE reader will have a better understanding of the manner in
which the territory, herein treated of, was discovered and subse-
quently occupied, if reference is made, in the outset, to some of its
more important topographical features.

Indeed, it would be an unsatisfactory task to try to follow the routes
of early travel, or to undertake to pursue the devious wanderings of
the aboriginal tribes, or trace the advance of civilized society into a
country, without some preliminary knowledge of its topography.

Looking upon a map of North America, it is observed that west-
ward of the Allegheny Mountains the waters are divided into two
great masses ; the one, composed of waters flowing into the great
northern lakes, is, by the river St. Lawrence, carried into the Atlantic
Ocean ; the other, collected by a multitude of streams spread out like
a vast net over the surface of more than twenty states and several ter-
ritories, is gathered at last into the Mississippi River, and thence dis-
charged into the Gulf of Mexico.

As it was by the St. Lawrence River, and the great lakes connected
with it, that the Northwest Territory was discovered, and for many
years its trade mainly carried on, a more minute notice of this remark-
able water communication will not be out of place. Jacques Cartier,
a French navigator, having sailed from St. Malo, entered, on the 10th
of August, 1535, the Gulf, which he had explored the year before, and
named it the St. Lawrence, in memory of the holy martyr whose feast
is celebrated on that day. This name was subsequently extended to
the river. Previous to this it was called the River of Canada, the
name given by the Indians to the whole country.* The drainage of
the St. Lawrence and the lakes extends through 14 degrees of longi-
tude, and covers a distance of over two thousand miles. Ascending

* Father Charlevoix 1 "History and General Description of New France;" Dr.
John G. Shea's translation ; vol. 1, pp. 37, 115.

12 HISTORIC NOTES OF THE NORTHWEST.

this river, we behold it flanked with bold crags and sloping hillsides ;
its current beset with rapids and studded with a thousand islands ;
combining scenery of marvelous beauty and grandeur. Seven hundred
and fifty miles above its mouth, the channel deepens and the shores
recede into an expanse of water known as Lake Ontario.*

Passing westward on Lake Ontario one hundred and eighty miles
a second river is reached. A few miles above its entry into the lake,
the river is thrown over a ledge of rock into a yawning chasm, one
hundred and fifty feet below; and, amid the deafening noise and clouds
of vapor escaping from the agitated waters is seen the great Falls of
Niagara. At Buffalo, twenty-two miles above the falls, the shores of
Niagara River recede and a second great inland sea is formed, having
an average breadth of 40 miles and a length of 240 miles. This is
Lake Erie. The name has been variously spelt, Earie, Herie. Erige
and Erike. It has also born the name of Conti.f Father Hennepin
says : " The Hurons call it Lake Erige, or Erike, that is to say. the Lake
of the Cat, and the inhabitants of Canada have softened the word to
Erie ; " vide " A New Discovery of a Yast Country in America," p. 77 ;
London edition, 1698.

Hennepin's derivation is substantially followed by the more accurate
and accomplished historian, Father Charlevoix, who at a later period,
in 1721, in writing of this lake uses the following words: " The name
it bears is that of an Indian nation of the Huron language, which was
formerly settled on its banks and who have been entirely destroyed by
the Iroquois. Erie in that language signifies cat, and in some accounts
this nation is called the cat nation." He adds : " Some modern maps
have given Lake Erie the name of Conti, but with no better success
than the names of Conde, Tracy and Orleans which have been given
to Lakes Huron, Superior and Michigan.";}:

At the upper end of Lake Erie, to the southward, is Maumee Bay,
of which more hereafter ; to the northward the shores of the lake again

* Ontario has been favored with several names by early authors and map makers.
Champlain's map, 1632, lays it down as Lac St. Louis. The map prefixed to Golden 'a
"History of the Five Nations" designates it as Cata-ra-qui, or Ontario Lake. The
word is Huron- Iroquois, and is derived, in their language, from Ontra, a lake, and to,
beautiful, the compound word meaning a beautiful lake ; vide Letter of DuBois
D'Avaugour, August 16, 1663, to the Minister: Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 16. Baron
LaHontan, in his work and on the accompanying map, calls it Lake Frontenac; vide
" New Voyages to North America," vol. 1, p. 219. And Frontenac, the name by which
this lake was most generally designated by the early French writers, was given to it in
honor of the great Count Frontenac. Governor-General of Canada.

t Narrative of Father Zenobia Membre, who accompanied Sieur La Salle in the
voyage westward on this lake in 1679 ; vide " Discovery and Exploration of the
Mississippi." by Dr. John G. Shea, p. 90. Barou La Hqntan's "Voyages to North
America," vol. 1, p. 217, also map prefixed ; London edition, 1703. Cadwalder Col-
den's map, referred to in a previous note, designates it as "Lake Erie, or Okswego."

J. Journal of a Voyage to North America, vol. 2, p. 2 ; London Edition, 1761.

THE LAKES. 13

approach each other and form a channel known as the River Detroit, a
French word signifying a strait or narrow passage. Northward some
twenty miles, and above the city of Detroit, the river widens into a
small body of water called Lake St. Clair. The name as now written
is incorrect : " we should either retain the French form, Claire, or take
the English Clare. It received its name in honor of the founder of the
Franciscan nuns, from the fact that La Salle reached it on the day con-
secrated to her."* Northward some twelve miles across this lake the
land again encroaches upon and contracts the waters within another
narrow bound known as the Strait of St. Clair. Passing up this strait,
northward about forty miles, Lake Huron is reached. It is 250 miles
long and 190 miles wide, including Georgian Bay on the east, and its
whole area is computed to be about 21,000 square miles. Its magnitude
fully justified its early name, La Mer-douce, the Fresh Sea, on account
of its extreme vastness.f The more popular name of Huron, which
has survived all others, was given to it from the great Huron nation of
Indians who formerly inhabited the country lying to the eastward of
it. Indeed, many of the early French writers call it Lac des Hurons,
that is, Lake of the Hurons. It is so laid down on the maps of Hen-
nepin, La Hontan, Charlevoix and Golden in the volumes before quoted.

Going northward, leaving the Straits of Mackinaw, through which
Lake Michigan discharges itself from the west, and the chain of
Manitoulin Islands to the eastward, yet another river, the connecting
link between Lake Huron and Superior, is reached. Its current is
swift, and a mile below Lake Superior are the Falls, where the water
leaps and tumbles down a channel obstructed by boulders and shoals,
where, from time immemorial, the Indians of various tribes have
resorted on account of the abundance of fish and the ease with which
they are taken. Previous to the year 1670 the river was called the
Sault, that is, the rapids, or falls. In this year Fathers Marquette and
Dablon founded here the mission of " St. Marie du Sault " (St. Mary
of the Falls), from which the modern name of the river, St. Mary's, is
derived.:}: Recently the United States have perfected the ship canal
cut in solid rock, around the falls, through which the largest vessels
can now pass, from the one lake to the other.

Lake Superior, in its greatest length, is 360 miles, with a maximum
breadth of 140, the largest of the five great American lakes, and the
most extensive body of fresh water on the globe. Its form has been

*Note by Dr. Shea, " Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi," p. 143.
tChamplain's map, 1632. Also "Memoir on the Colony of Quebec, August 4,
1663 : Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 16.

| Charlevoix 1 "History of New France," vol. 3, p. 119; also note.

14 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

poetically and not inaccurately described by a Jesuit Father, whose
account of it is preserved in the Relations for the year's 1669 and 1670 :
" This lake has almost the form of a bended bow, and in length is more
than 180 leagues. The southern shore is as it were the cord, the arrow
being a long strip of land [Keweenaw T Point] issuing from the south-
ern coast and running more than 80 leagues to the middle of the
lake." A glance on the map will show the aptness of the comparison.
The name Superior was given to it by the Jesuit Fathers, " in conse-
quence of its being above that of Lake Huron.* It was also called
Lake Tracy, after Marquis De Tracy, who was governor-general of
Canada from 1663 to 1665. Father Claude Allouez, in his " Journal
of Travels to the Country of the Ottawas," preserved in the Relations
for the years 1666, 1667, says : " After passing through the St.
Mary's River we entered the upper lake, which will hereafter bear
the name of Monsieur Tracy, an acknowledgment of the obligation
under which the people of this country are to him." The good father,
however, was mistaken ; the name Tracy only appears on a few ancient
maps, or is perpetuated in rare volumes that record the almost for-
gotten labors of the zealous Catholic missionaries ; while the earlier
name of Lake " Superior " is familiar to every school-boy who has
thumbed an atlas.

At the western extremity of Lake Superior enter the Rivers Bois-
Brule and St. Louis, the upper tributaries of which have their sources
on the northeasterly slope of a water-shed, and approximate very near
the head-waters of the St. Croix, Prairie and Savannah Rivers, which,
issuing from the opposite side of this same ridge, flow into the upper
Mississippi.

The upper portions of Lakes Huron, Michigan, Green Bay, with
their indentations, and the entire coast line, with the islands eastward
and westward of the Straits of Mackinaw, are all laid down with quite
a degree of accuracy on a map attached to the Relations of the Jesuits
for the years 1670 and 1671, a copy of which is contained in Bancroft's
History of the United States, f showing that the reverend fathers w r ere
industrious in mastering and preserving the geographical features of
the wilderness they traversed in their holy calling.

Lake Michigan is the only one of the five great lakes that lays
wholly within the United States, the other four, with their connect-
ing rivers and straits, mark the boundary between the Dominion of
Canada and the United States. Its length is 320 miles ; its average
breadth 70, with a mean depth of over 1,000 feet. Its area is some

* Relations of 1660 and 1669. t Vol. 3, p. 152; fourth edition.

LAKE MICHIGAN. 15

22,000 square miles, being considerably more than that of Lake Huron
and less than that of Lake Superior.

Michigan was the last of the lakes in order of discovery. The
Hurons, christianized and dwelling eastward of Lake Huron, had been
driven from their towns and cultivated fields by the Iroquois, and scat-
tered about Mackinaw and the desolate coast of Lake Superior beyond,
whither they were followed by their faithful pastors, the Jesuits, who
erected new altars and gathered the remnants of their stricken follow-
ers about them ; all this occurred before the fathers had acquired any
definite knowledge of Lake Michigan. In their mission work for the
year 1666, it is referred to "as the Lake Illinouek, a great lake adjoin-
ing, or between, the lake of the Hurons and that of Green Bay, that
had not [as then] come to their knowledge." In the Relation for the
same year, it is referred to as " Lake Illeaouers," and " Lake Illinioues,
as yet unexplored, though much smaller than Lake Huron, and that the
Outagamies [the Fox Indians] call it Machi-hi-gan-ing.'* Father Hen-
nepin says : " The lake is called by the Indians, ' Illinouek,' and by the
French, ' Illinois,' " and that the " Lake Illinois, in the native lan-
guage, signifies the ' Lake of Men.' " He also adds in the same para-
graph, that it is called by the Miamis, " Mischigonong, that is, the
great lake." ' Father Marest, in a letter dated at Kaskaskia, Illinois,
November 9, 1712, so often referred to on account of the valuable his-
torical matter it contains, contracts the aboriginal name to Michigan,
and is, perhaps, the first author who ever spelt it in the way that has
become universal. He naively says, " that on the maps this lake has
the name, without any authority, of the ' Lake of the Illinois] since
the Illinois do not dwell in its neighborhood." f

* Hennepin's " New Discovery of a Vast Country in America," vol. 1, p. 35. The
name is derived from the two Algonquin words, Michi (mishi or missi), which signifies
great, as it does, also, several or many, and Sagayigan, a lake; vide Henry's Travels,
p. 37, and Alexander Mackenzie's Vocabulary of Algonquin Words.

t Kip's Early Jesuit Missions, p. 222.

CHAPTER II.

DRAINAGE OF THE ILLINOIS AND WABASH.

THE reader's attention will now be directed to the drainage of the
Illinois and Wabash Rivers to the Mississippi, and that of the Maumee
River into Lake Erie. The Illinois River proper is formed in Grundy
county, Illinois, below the city of Joliet, by the union of the Kanka-
kee and Desplaines Rivers. The latter rises in southeastern Wisconsin ;
and its course is almost south, through the counties of Cook and "Will.
The Kankakee has its source in the vicinity of South Bend, Indiana.
It pursues a devious way, through marshes and low grounds, a south-
westerly course, forming the boundary-line between the counties of
Laporte, Porter and Lake on the north, and Stark, Jasper and Newton
on the south ; thence across the dividing line of the two states of Indi-
ana and Illinois, and some fifteen miles into the county of Kankakee,
at the confluence of the Iroquois River, where its direction is changed
northwest to its junction with the Desplaines. The Illinois passes
westerly into the county of Putnam, where it again turns and pursues
a generally southwest course to its confluence with the Mississippi,
twenty miles above the mouth of the Missouri. It is about five hun-
dred miles long ; is deep and broad, and in several places expands into
basins, which may be denominated lakes. Steamers ascend the river, in
high water, to La Salle ; from whence to Chicago navigation is contin-
ued by means of the Illinois and Michigan Canal. The principal trib-
utaries of the Illinois, from the north and right bank, are the Au Sable,
Fox River, Little Yermillion, Bureau Creek, Kickapoo Creek (which
empties in just below Peoria), Spoon River, Sugar Creek, and finally
Crooked Creek. From the south or left bank are successively the Iro-
quois (into the Kankakee), Mazon Creek, Vermillion, Crow Meadow,
Mackinaw, Sangamon, and Macoupin.

The Wabash issues out of a small lake, in Mercer county, Ohio, and
runs a westerly course through the counties of Adams, Wells and
Huntington in the state of Indiana. It receives Little River, just
below the city of Huntington, and continues a westwardly course
through the counties of Wabash, Miami and Cass. Here it turns
more to the south, flowing through the counties of Carroll and Tippe-
canoe, and marking the boundary-line between the counties of Warren

THE MAUMEE AND PORTAGES. 17

and Vermillion on the west, and Fountain and Park on the east. At
Covington, the county seat of Fountain county, the river runs more
directly south, between the counties of Vermillion on the one side,
and Fountain and Parke on the other, and through the county of Vigo,
some miles below Terre Haute, from which place it forms the boundary-
line between the states of Indiana and Illinois to its confluence with
the Ohio.

Its principal tributaries from the north and west, or right bank of
the stream, are Little River, Eel River, Tippecanoe, Pine Creek, Red
Wood, Big Vermillion, Little Vermillion, Bruletis, Sugar Creek, Em-
barras, and Little Wabash. The streams flowing in from the south and
east, or left bank of the river, are the Salamonie, Mississinewa, Pipe
Creek, Deer Creek, "Wildcat, Wea and Shawnee Creeks, Coal Creek,
Sugar Creek, Raccoon Creek, Otter Creek, Busseron Creek, and White
River.

There are several other, and smaller, streams not necessary here to
notice, although they are laid down on earlier maps, and mentioned in
old " Gazetteers" and "Emigrant's Guides."

The Maumee is formed by the St. Joseph and St. Mary's Rivers,
which unite their waters at Ft. Wayne, Indiana. The St. Joseph has
its source in Hillsdale county, Michigan, and runs southwesterly
through the northwest corner of Ohio, through the county of De Kalb,
and into the county of Allen, Indiana. The St. Mary's rises in
Au Glaize county, Ohio, very near the little lake at the head of the
Wabash, before referred to, and runs northwestwardly parallel with the
Wabash, through the counties of Mercer, Ohio, and Adams, Indiana,
and into Allen county to the place of its union with the St. Joseph,
at Ft. Wayne. The principal tributaries of the Maumee are the Au
Glaize from the south, Bear Creek, Turkey Foot Creek, Swan Creek
from the north. The length of the Maumee River, from Ft. Wayne
northeast to Maumee Bay at the west end of Lake Erie, is very little
over 100 miles.

A noticeable feature relative to the territory under consideration,
and having an important bearing on its discovery and settlement, is
the fact that many of the tributaries of the Mississippi have their
branches interwoven with numerous rivers draining into the lakes.
They not infrequently issue from the same lake, pond or marsh situated
on the summit level of the divide from which the waters from one end
of the common reservoir drain to the Atlantic Ocean and from the other
to the Gulf of Mexico. By this means nature herself provided navig-
able communication between the northern lakes and the Mississippi
Valley. It was, however, only at times of the vernal floods that the

18 HISTORIC NOTES OF THE NORTHWEST.

communication was complete. At other seasons of the year it was
interrupted, when transfers by land were required for a short distance.
The places where these transfers were made are known by the French
term portage, which, like many other foreign derivatives, has become
anglicized, and means a carrying place ; because in IOW T stages of water
the canoes and effects of the traveler had to be carried around the dry
marsh or pond from the head of one stream to the source of that beyond.

The first of these portages known to the Europeans, of which
accounts have come down to us, is the portage of the Wisconsin, in the
state of that name, connecting the Mississippi and Green Bay by means
of its situation between the Wisconsin and Fox Rivers. The next is
the portage of Chicago, uniting Chicago Creek, which empties into
Lake Michigan at Chicago, and the Desplaines of the Illinois River.
The third is the portage of the Kankakee, near the present city of
South Bend, Indiana, which connects the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan
with the upper waters of the Kankakee. And the fourth is the portage
of the Wabash at Ft. Wayne. Indiana, between the Maumee and the
Wabash, by way of Little River.

Though abandoned and their former uses forgotten in the advance
of permanent settlement and the progress of more efficient means of
commercial intercourse, these portages were the gateways of the
French between their possessions in Canada and along the Mississippi.

Formerly the Northwest was a wilderness of forest and prairie, with
only the paths of wild animals or the trails of roving Indians leading,
through tangled undergrowth and tall grasses. In its undeveloped
form it was without roads, incapable of land carriage and could not
be traveled by civilized man, even on foot, without the aid of a savage
guide arid a permit from its native occupants which afforded little or no
security to life or property. For these reasons the lakes and rivers, with
their connecting portages, were the only highways, and they invited
exploration. They afforded ready means of opening up the interior.
The French, who were the first explorers, at an early day, as we shall
hereafter see, established posts at Detroit, at the mouth of the Xiagara
River, at Mackinaw, Green Bay, on the Illinois River, the St. Joseph's
of Lake Michigan, on the Maumee, the Wabash, and at other places
on the route of inter-lake and river communication. By means of
having seized these strategical points, and their influence over the
Indian tribes, the French monopolized the fur trade, and although
feebly assisted by the home government, held the whole Mississippi
Yalley and regions of the lakes, for near three quarters of a century,
against all efforts of the English colonies, eastward of the Alleghany
ridge, who, assisted by England, sought to wrest it from their grasp.

CHICAGO PORTAGE. 19

Recurring to the old portage at Chicago, it is evident that at a com-
paratively recent period, since the glacial epoch, a large part of Cook
county was under water. The waters of Lake Michigan, at that time,
found an outlet through the Desplaines and Illinois Rivers into the
Mississippi.* This assertion is confirmed from the appearance of the
whole channel of the Illinois River, which formerly contained a stream
of much greater magnitude than now. The old beaches of Lake

O O

Michigan are plainly indicated in the ridges, trending westward several
miles away from the present water line. The old state road, from
Yincennes to Chicago, followed one of these ancient lake beaches from
Blue Island into the city.

The subsidence of the lake must have been gradual, requiring
many ages to accomplish the change of direction in the flow of its
waters from the Mississippi to the St. Lawrence.

The character of the portage has also undergone changes within
the memory of men still living. The excavation of the Illinois and
Michigan Canal, and the drainage of the adjacent land by artificial
ditches, has left little remaining from which its former appearance can
71 ow be recognized. Major Stephen H. Long, of the U. S. Topo-
graphical Engineers, made an examination of this locality in the year
1823, before it had been changed by the hand of man, and says, con-
cerning it, as follows : " The south fork of Chicago River takes its rise
about six miles from the fort, in a swamp, which communicates also
with the Desplaines, one of the head branches of the Illinois. Hav-
ing been informed that this route was frequently used by traders, and
that it had b,een traversed by one of the officers of the garrison, who
returned with provisions from St. Louis a few days before our arrival
at the fort, we determined to ascend the Chicago River in order to
observe this interesting division of waters. We accordingly left the
fort on the 7th day of June, in a boat which, after having ascended
the river four miles, we exchanged for a narrow pirogue that drew
less water, the stream we were ascending was very narrow, rapid and
crooked, presenting a great fall. It so continued for about three miles,
when we reached a sort of a swamp, designated by the Canadian voy-
agers under the name of '"Le Petit LacS f Our course through this
swamp, which extended three miles, was very much impeded by the
high grass, weeds, etc., through which our pirogue passed with diffi-
culty. Observing that our progress through the fen was slow, and the
day being considerably advanced, we landed on the north bank, and
continued our course along the edge of the swamp for about three

* Geological Survey of Illinois, vol. 3, p. 240.

t What remains of this lake is now known by the name of Mud Lake.

20 HISTORIC NOTES OF THE NORTHWEST.

miles, until we reached the place where the old portage road meets the
current, which was here very distinct toward the south. We were
delighted at beholding, for the first time, a feature so interesting in
itself, but which we had afterward an opportunity of observing fre-
quently on the route, viz, the division of waters starting from the same
source, and running in two different directions, so as to become feed-
ers of streams that discharge themselves into the ocean at immense dis-
tances apart. Lieut. Hobson, who accompanied us to the Desplaines,
told us that he had traveled it with ease, in a boat loaded with lead
and flour. The distance from the fort to the intersection of the port-
age road is about twelve or thirteen miles, and the portage road is
about eleven miles long ; the usual distance traveled by land seldom
exceeds from four to nine miles ; however, in very dry seasons it is
said to amount to thirty miles, as the portage then extends to Mount
Juliet, near the confluence of the Kankakee. Although at the time
we visited it there was scarcely water enough to permit our pirogue
to pass, we could not doubt that in the spring of the year the route
must be a very eligible one. It is equally apparent that an expendi-
ture, trifling when compared to the importance of the object, would
again render Lake Michigan a tributary of the Gulf of Mexico." *

* Long's Expedition to the Source of the St. Peter's River, vol. 1, pp. 165, 166,
167. The State of Illinois begun work on the construction of a canal on this old
portage on the 4th day of July, 1836. with great ceremony. Col. Guerdon S. Hubbard,
still living, cast the first shovelful of earth out of it on this occasion. The work was
completed in 1848. The canal was fed with water elevated by a pumping apparatus
at Bridgeport. Recently the city of Chicago, at enormous expense sunk the bed
of the canal to a depth that secures a flow of water directly from the lake, by means
of which, the navigation is improved, and sewerage is obtained into the Illinois River.

CHAPTER III.

ANCIENT MAUMEE VALLEY.

WHAT has been said of the changes in the surface geology of Lake
Michigan and the Illinois River may also be affirmed with respect to
Lake Erie and the Maumee and "Wabash Rivers. There are peculiari-
ties which will arrest the attention, from a mere examination of the
course of the Maumee and of the St. Joseph and St. Mary's Rivers, as
they appear on the map of that part of Ohio and Indiana. The St.
Joseph, after running southwest to its union with the St. Mary's at
Ft. Wayne, as it were almost doubles back upon its former course,
taking a northeast direction, forming the shape of a letter V, and after
having flowed over two hundred miles is discharged at a point within
less than fifty miles east of its source. It is evident, from an exami-
nation* of that part of the country, that, at one time, the St. Joseph
ran wholly to the southwest, and that the Maumee River itself,
instead of flowing northeast into Lake Erie, as now, drained this lake
southwest through the present valley of the Wabash. Then Lake
Erie extended very nearly to Ft. Wayne, and its ancient shores are
still plainly marked. The line of the old beach is preserved in the
ridges running nearly parallel with, and not a great distance from, the
St. Joseph and the St. Mary's Rivers. Professor G. K. Gilbert, in his
report of the " Surface Geology of the Maumee Valley," gives the
result of his examination of these interesting features, from which we
take the following valuable extract.*

" The upper (lake) beach consists, in this region, of a single bold
ridge of sand, pursuing a remarkably straight course in a northeast and
southwest direction, and crossing portions of Defiance, Williams and
Fulton counties. It passes just west of Hicksville and Bryan ; while
Williams Center, West Unity and Fayette are built on it. When
Lake Erie stood at this level, it was merged at the north with Lake
Huron. Its southwest shore crossed Hancock, Putnam, Allen and
Van Wert counties, and stretched northwest in Indiana, nearly to Ft.
Wayne. The northwestern shore line, leaving Ohio near the south
line of Defiance county, is likewise continued in Indiana, and the two
converge at Kew Haven, six miles east of Ft. Wayne. They do not,

* Geological Survey of Ohio, vol. 1, p. 550.

22 HISTORIC NOTES OF THE NORTHWEST.

however, unite, but, instead, become parallel, and are continued as the
sides of a broad watercourse, through which the great lake basin then
discharged its surplus waters, southwestwardly, into the valley of the
Wabash River, and thence to the Mississippi. At New Haven, this
channel is not less than a mile and a half broad, and has an average
depth of twenty feet, with sides and bottom of drift. For twenty-five
miles this character continues, and there is no notable fall. Three
miles above Huntington, Indiana, however, the drift bottom is replaced
by a floor of Niagara limestone, and the descent becomes comparatively
quite rapid. At Huntington, the valley is walled, on one side at least,
by rock in situ. In the eastern portion of this ancient river-bed, the
Maumee and its branches have cut channels fifteen to twenty-five feet
deep, without meeting the underlying limestone. Most of the inter-
val from Ft. Wayne to Huntington is occupied by a marsh, over which
meanders Little River, an insignificant stream whose only claim to the
title of river seems to lie in the magnitude of the deserted channel of
which it is sole occupant. At Huntington, the Wabash emerges from
a narrow cleft, of its own carving, and takes possession of the broad
trough to which it was once an humble tributary."

Within the personal knowledge of men, the Wabash River has*been,
and is, only a rivulet, a shriveled, dried up representative in comparison
with its greatness in pre-historic times, when it bore in a broader
channel the waters of Lakes Erie and Huron, a mighty flood, south-
ward to the Ohio. Whether the change in the direction of the flow of
Lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan toward the River St. Lawrence, instead
of through the Wabash and Illinois Rivers respectively, is because
hemispheric depression has taken place more rapidly in the vicinity of
the lakes than farther southward, or that the earth's crust south of the
lakes has been arched upward by subterraneous influences, and thus
caused the lakes to recede, or if the change has been produced by
depression in one direction and elevation in the other, combined, is not
our province to discuss. The fact, however, is well established by the
most abundant and conclusive evidence to the scientific observer.

The portage, or carrying place, of the Wabash,* as known to the
early explorers and traders, between the Maumee and Wabash, or rather
the head of Little River, called by the French " La Petit Riviere,"
commenced directly at Ft. Wayne ; although, in certain seasons of the
year, the waters approach much nearer and were united by a low piece

* Schoolcraft's Travels in the Central Portions of the Mississippi Valley, " in the year
1821, pp. 90, 91. In this year, Mr. Schoolcraft made an examination of the locality,
with a view to furnish the public information on the practicability of a canal to unite
the waters of the Maumee and the Wabash. It was at a time when great interest
existed through all parts of the country on all subjects of internal navigation.

PORTAGE OF THE WABASH. 23

of ground or marsh (an arm or bay of what is now called Bear Lake),
where the two streams flow within one hundred and fifty yards of each
other and admitted of the passage of light canoes from the one to the
other.

The Miami Indians knew the value of this portage, and it was a
source of revenue to them, aside from its advantages in enabling them
to exercise an influence over adjacent tribes. The French, in passing
from Canada to New Orleans, and Indian traders going from Montreal
and Detroit, to the Indians south and westward, went and returned by
way of Ft. Wayne, where the Miamis, kept carts and pack-horses, with
a corps of Indians to assist in carrying canoes, furs and merchandise
around the portage, for which they charged a commission. At the
great treaty of Greenville, 1795, where General Anthony Wayne met
the several Wabash tribes, he insisted, as one of the fruits of his victory
over them, at the Fallen Timbers, on the Maumee, the year before, that
they should cede to the United States a piece of ground six miles
square, where the fort, named in honor of General Wayne, had been
erected after the battle named, and on the site of the present city of
Ft. Wayne ; and, also, a piece of territory two miles square at the
carrying place. The distinguished warrior and statesman, " Mishe-
kun-nogh-quah" (as he signs his name at this treaty), or the Little Turtle
on behalf of his tribe, objected to a relinquishment of their right to
their ancient village and its portage, and in his speech to General
Wayne said : " Elder Brother, When our forefathers saw the French
and English at the Miami village that ' glorious gate ' which your
younger brothers [meaning the Miamis] had the happiness to own,
and through which all the good words of our chiefs had to pass [that
is, messages between the several tribes] from north to south and from
east to west, the French and English never told us they wished to
purchase our lands from us. The next place you pointed out wa"s the
Little River, and said you wanted two miles square of that place. This
is a request that our fathers the French or British never made of us ;
it was always ours. This carrying place has heretofore proved, in a
great degree, the subsistence of your brothers. That place has brought
to us, in the course of one day, the amount of one hundred dollars.
Let us both own this place and enjoy in common the advantages it
affords." The Little Turtle's speech availed nothing.*

The St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, a fine stream of uniform, rapid
current, reaches its most southerly position near the city of South
Bend, Indiana, the city deriving its name from the bend of the river ;

* Minutes of the Treaty of Greenville: American State Papers on Indian Affairs,
vol. 1, pp. 576, 578.

24 HISTOKIC NOTES ON THE NOKTHWEST.

here the river turns northward, reenters the State of Michigan and dis-
charges ijito the lake. West of the city is Lake Kankakee, from
which the Kankakee River takes its rise. The distance intervening be-
tween the head of this little lake and the St. Joseph is about two miles,
over a piece of marshy ground, where the elevation is so slight ' that
in the year 1832 a Mr. Alexander Croquillard dug a race, and secured
a flow of water from the lake to the St. Joseph, of sufficient power to
run a grist and saw mill." *

This is the portage of the Kankakee, a place conspicuous for its
historical reminiscences. It was much used, and offered a choice of
routes to the Illinois River, and also to the Wabash, by a longer land-
carriage to the upper waters of the Tippecanoe. A memoir on the
Indians of Canada, etc., prepared in the year 1718 (Paris Documents,
vol. 1, p. 889), says : " The river St. Joseph is south of Lake Michi-
gan, formerly the Lake of the Illinois ; many take this river to pass to
the Rocks [as Fort St. Louis, situated on ' Starved Rock ' in La Salle
county, Illinois, w r as sometimes called], because it is convenient, and
they thereby avoid the portages ' des Chaines ' and ( des Perches,' "
two long, difficult carrying places on the Desplaines, which had to
be encountered in dry seasons, on the route by the way of Chicago
Creek.

The following description of the Kankakee portage, and its adjacent
surroundings, is as that locality appeared to Father Hennepin, when he
was there with La Salle's party of voyagers two hundred years ago the
coming December : " The next morning (December 5, 1679) we joined
our men at the portage, where Father Gabriel had made the day before
several crosses upon the trees, that we might not miss it another time."
The voyagers had passed above the portage without being aware of it,
as the country was all strange to them. We found here a great quan-
tity of horns and bones of wild oxen, buffalo, and also some canoes
the savages had made with the skins of beasts, to cross the river with
their provisions. This portage lies at the farther end of a champaign ;
and at the other end to the west lies a village of savages, Miamis,
Mascoutines and Oiatihons (Weas), who live together. " The river of
the Illinois has its source near that village, and springs out of some
marshy lands that are so quaking that one can scarcely walk over them.
The head of the river is only a league and a half from that of the Mi-
amis (the St. Joseph), and so our portage was not long. We marked
the way from place to place, with some trees, for the convenience of
those we expected after us ; and left at the portage as well as at Fort

* Prof. G. M. Levette's Report on the Geology of St. Joseph County: Geological
Survey of Indiana for the year 1873, p. 459.

THE KANKAKEE. 25

Mianiis (which they had previously erected at the mouth of the St.
Joseph), letters hanging down from the trees, containing M. La Salle's
instructions to our pilot, and the other five-and-twenty men who were
to come with him." The pilot had been sent back from Mackinaw
with La Salle's ship, the Griffin, loaded with furs ; was to discharge
the cargo at the fort below the mouth of Niagara River, and then
bring the ship with all dispatch to the St. Joseph.

" The Illinois River (continues Hennepin's account) is navigable
within a hundred paces from its source, I mean for canoes of barks of
trees, and not for others, but increases so much a little way from
thence, that it is as deep and broad as the Meuse and the Sambre joined
together. It runs through vast marshes, and although it be rapid
enough, it makes so many turnings and windings, that after a whole
day's journey we found that we were hardly two leagues from the place
we left in the morning. That country is nothing but marshes, full of
alder trees and bushes ; and we could have hardly found, for forty
leagues together, any place to plant our cabins, had it not been for the
frost, which made the earth more firm and consistent."

CHAPTER IV.

RAINFALL.

AN interesting topic connected with our rivers is the question of
rainfall. The streams of the west, unlike those of mountainous dis-
tricts, which are fed largely by springs and brooks issuing from the
rocks, are supplied mostly from the clouds. It is within the observa-
tion of persons who lived long in the valleys of the Wabash and Illinois,
or along their tributaries, that these streams apparently carry a less
volume of water than formerly. Indeed, the water-courses seem to be
gradually drying up, and the whole surface of the country drained by
them has undergone the same change. In early days almost every
land-owner on the prairies had upon his farm a pond that furnished
an unfailing supply of water for his live stock the year around. These
never went dry, even in the driest seasons.

Formerly the "Wabash afforded reliable steamboat navigation as
high up as La Fayette. In 1831, between the 5th of March and the
16th of April, fifty-four steamboats arrived and departed from Vin-
cennes. In the months of February, March and April of the same year,
there were sixty arrivals and departures from La Fayette, then a village
of only three or four hundred houses ; many of these boats were large
side-wheel steamers, built for navigating the Ohio and Mississippi, and
known as New Orleans or lower river boats.* The writer has the
concurrent evidence of scores of early settlers with whom he has con-
versed that formerly the Vermilion, at Danville, had to be ferried on
an average six months during the year, and the river was considered
low when it could be forded at this place without water running into
the wagon bed. Now it is fordable at all times, except when swollen
with freshets, which now subside in a very few days, and often within
as many hours. Doubtless, the same facts can be affirmed of the many
other tributaries of the Illinois and Wabash whose names have been
already given.

The early statutes of Illinois and Indiana are replete with special
laws, passed between the years 1825 and 1840, when the people of
these two states were crazed over the question of internal navigation,
providing enactments and charters for the slack-water improvement of

* Tanner's View of the Mississippi, published in 1832, p. 154.
N

RAINFALL. 27

hundreds of streams whose insignificance have now only a dry bed,
most of the year, to indicate that they were ever dignified with such
legislation and invested with the promise of bearing upon their bosoms
a portion of the future internal commerce of the country.

It will not do to assume that the seeming decrease of water in the
streams is caused by a diminution of rain. The probabilities are that
the annual rainfall is greater in Indiana and Illinois than before their
settlement with a permanent population. The "settling up" of a
country, tilling its soil, planting trees, constructing railroads, and erect-
ing telegraph lines, all tend to induce moisture and produce changes
in the electric and atmospheric currents that invite the clouds to pre-
cipitate their showers. Such has been the effect produced by the hand
of man upon the hitherto arid plains of Kansas and Nebraska. Indeed,
at an early day some portions of Illinois were considered as uninhab-
itable as western Kansas and Nebraska were supposed, a few years ago,
to be on account of the prevailing drouths. ' That part of the state
lying between the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers, south of a line run-
ning from the Mississippi, between Rock Island and Mercer counties,
east to the Illinois, set off for the benefit of the soldiers of the War
of 1812, and for that reason called the "Military Tract," except that
part of it lying more immediately near the rivers named, was laid under
the bane of a drouth-stricken region. Mr. Lewis A. Beck, a shrewd
and impartial observer, and a gentleman of great scientific attainments,*
was through the " military tract " shortly after it had been run out into
sections and townships by the government, and says concerning it,
" The northern part .of the tract is not so favorable for settlement.
The prairies become very extensive and are badly watered. In fact,
this last is an objection to the whole tract. In dry seasons it is not
unusual to walk through beds of the largest streams without finding a
drop of water. It is not surprising that a country so far distant from
the sea and drained by such large rivers, which have a course of several
thousand miles before they reach the great reservoir, should not be well
watered. This, we observe, is the case with all fine-flowing streams of
the highlands, whereas those of the Champaign and prairies settle in
the form of ponds, which stagnate and putrify. Besides, on the same
account there are very few heavy rains in the summer ; and hence
during that season water is exceedingly scarce. The Indians, in their
journeys, pass by places where they know there are ponds, but gener-
ally they are under the necessity of carrying water in bladders. This
drouth is not confined to the ' military tract,' but in some seasons is
very general. During the summer of 1820 it was truly alarming;

* Beck's Illinois and Missouri Gazetteer, published in 1823, pp. 79, 80.

28 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

travelers, in many instances, were obliged to pass whole days, in the
warmest weather, without being able to procure a cupful of water for
themselves or their horses, and that which they occasionally did find
was almost putrid. It may be remarked, however, that such seasons
rarely occur ; but on account of its being washed by rivers of such
immense length this section of the country is peculiarly liable to suffer
from excessive drouth." The millions of bushels of grain annually
raised in, and the vast herds of cattle and other live stock that are fat-
tened on, the rich pastures of Bureau, Henry, Stark, Peoria, Knox,
Warren, and other counties lying wholly or partially within the " mili-
tary tract," illustrate an increase and uniformity of rainfall since the
time Professor Beck recorded his observations. In no part of Illinois
are the crops more abundant and certain, and less liable to suffer from
excessive drouth, than in the " military tract." The apparent decrease in
the volume of water carried by the Wabash and its tributaries is easily
reconciled w r ith the theory of an increased rainfall since the settlement
of the country. These streams for the most part have their sources in
ponds, marshes and low grounds. These basins, covering a great extent
of the surface of the country, served as reservoirs ; the earth was cov-
ered with a thick turf that prevented the water penetrating the ground ;
tall grasses in the valleys and about the margin of the ponds impeded
the flow of water, and fed it out gradually to the rivers. In the tim-
ber the marshes were likewise protected from a rapid discharge of their
contents by the trunks of fallen trees, limbs and leaves.

Since the lands have been reduced to cultivation, millions of acres
of sod have been broken by the plow, a spongy surface has been turned
to the heavens and much of the rainfall is at once soaked into the
ground. The ponds and low grounds have been drained. The tall
grasses with their mat of penetrating roots have disappeared from the
swales. The brooks and drains, from causes partially natural, or artifi-
cially aided by man, have cut through the ancient turf and made well
defined ditches. The rivers themselves have worn a deeper passage in
their beds. By these means the water is now soon collected from the
earth's surface and carried off with increased velocity. Formerly the
streams would sustain their volume continuously for weeks. Hence
much of the rainfall is directly taken into the ground, and only a por-
tion of it now finds its way to the rivers, and that which does has a
speedier exit. Besides this, settlement of and particularly the growing
of trees on the prairies and the clearing out of the excess of forests in the
timbered districts, tends to distribute the rainfall more evenly through-
out the year, and in a large degree prevents the recurrence of those ex-
tremes of drouth and flood with which this country was formerly visited.

CHAPTER V.

ORIGIN OF THE PRAIRIES.

THE prairies have ever been a wonder, and their origin the theme of
much curious speculation. The vast extent of these natural meadows
would naturally excite curiosity, and invite the many theories which,
from time to time, have been advanced by writers holding conflicting
opinions as to the manner in which they were formed. Major Stod-
dard, H. M. Brackenridge and Governor Reynolds, whose personal
acquaintance with the prairies, eastward of the Mississippi, extended
back prior to the year 1800, and whose observations were supported
by the experience of other contemporaneous residents of the \vest, held
that the prairies were caused by fire. The prairies are covered with
grass, and were probably occasioned by the ravages of. fire ; because
wherever copses of trees were found on them, the grounds about them
are low and too moist to admit the fire to pass over it ; and because it is
a common practice among the Indians and other hunters to set the
woods and prairies on fire, by means of which they are able to kill an
abundance of game. They take secure stations to the leeward, and
the fire drives the game to them.*

The plains of Indiana and Illinois have been mostly produced by
the same cause. They are very different from the Savannahs on the
seaboard and the immense plains of the upper Missouri. In the
prairies of Indiana I have been assured that the woods in places have
been known to recede, and in others to increase, within the recollection
of the old inhabitants. In moist places, the woods are still standing,
the fire meeting here with obstruction. Trees, if planted in these
prairies, would doubtless grow. In the islands, preserved by accidental
causes, the progress of the fire can be traced ; the first burning would
only scorch the outer bark of the tree; this would render it more
susceptible to the next, the third would completely kill. I have seen
in places, at present completely prairie, pieces of burnt trees, proving
that the prairie had been caused by fire. The grass is generally very
luxuriant, which is not the case in the plains of the Missouri. There
may, doubtless, be spots where the proportion of salts or other bodies
may be such as to favor the growth of grass only.f

* Sketches of Louisiana, by Major Amos Stoddard, p. 213.
t Brackenridge's Views of Louisiana, p. 108.
29

30 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Governor Reynolds, who came to Illinois at the age of thirteen, in
the year 1800, and lived here for over sixty years, the greater portion
of his time employed in a public capacity, roving over the prairies
in the Indian border wars or overseeing the affairs of a public and busy
life, in his interesting autobiography, published in 1855, says: "Many
learned essays are written on the origin of the prairies, but any atten-
tive observer will come to the conclusion that it is fire burning the
strong, high grass that caused the prairies. I have witnessed the
growth of the forest in these southern counties of Illinois, and know
there is more timber in them now than there was forty or fifty years
before. The obvious reason is, the fire is kept out. This is likewise
the reason the prairies are generally the most fertile soil. The vegeta-
tion in them was the strongest and the fires there burnt with the most
power. The timber was destroyed more rapidly in the fertile soil than
in the barren lands. It will be seen that the timber in the north of
the state, is found only on the margins of streams and other places
where the prairie fires could not reach it."

The later and more satisfactory theory is, that the prairies were
formed by the action of water instead of fire. This position was taken
and very ably discussed by that able and learned writer, Judge James
Hall, as early as 1836. More recently, Prof. Lesquereux prepared an
article on the origin and formation of the prairies, published at length
in vol. 1, Geological Survey of Illinois, pp. 238 to 254, inclusive ; and Dr.
Worthen, the head of the Illinois Geological Department, referring to
this article and its author, gives to both a most flattering indorsement.
Declining to discuss the comparative merits of the various theories as
to the formation of the prairies, the doctor " refers the reader to the
very able chapter on the subject by Prof. Lesquereux, whose thorough
acquaintance, both with fossil and recent botany, and the general laws
which govern the distribution of the ancient as well as the recent flora,
entitles his opinion to our most profound consideration." '

Prof. Lesquereux' article is exhaustive, and his conclusions are
summed up in the declaration " that all the prairies of the Mississippi
Valley have been formed by the slow recessions of waters of various
extent; first transformed into swamps, and in the process of time
drained and dried ; and that the high rolling prairies, and those of
these bottoms along the rivers as well, are all the result of the same
cause, and form one whole, indivisible system."

Still later, another eminent writer, Hon. John D. Caton, late Judge
of the Supreme Court of Illinois, has given the result of his observa-

*Chap. 1, p. 10, Geology of Illinois, by Dr. Worthen; vol. 1. Illinois Geological
Survey.

THE PRAIKIES. 31

tions. While assenting to the received conclusion that the prairies
the land itself have been formed under water, except the decomposed
animal and vegetable matter that has been added to the surface of the
lands since their emergence, the judge dissents from Prof. Lesquereux,
in so far as the latter holds that the presence of ulmic acid and other
unfavorable chemicals in the soil of the prairies, rendered them unfit
for the growth of trees ; and in extending his theory to the prairies on
the uplands, as well as in their more level and marshy portions. The
learned judge holds to the popular theory that the most potent cause
in keeping the prairies as such, and retarding and often destroying
forest growth on them, is the agency of fire. Whatever may have
been the condition of the ground when the prairie lands first emerged
from the waters, or the chemical changes they may have since under-
gone, how many years the process of vegetable growth and decay may
have gone on, adding their deposits of rich loam to the original sur-
face, making the soil the most fertile in the world, is a matter of mere
speculation ; certain it is, however, that ever within the knowledge of
man the prairies have possessed every element of soil necessary to in-
sure a rapid and vigorous growth of forest trees, wherever the germ
could find a lodgment and their tender years be protected against the
one formidable enemy, fire. Judge Caton gives the experience of old
settlers in the northern part of the state, similar to that of Bracken-
ridge and Reynolds, already quoted, where, on the Vermillion River
of the Illinois, and also in the neighborhood of Ottawa many years
ago, fires occurred under the observation of the narrators, which
utterly destroyed, root and branch, an entire hardwood forest, the
prairie taking immediate possession of the burnt district, clothing it
with grasses of its own ; and in a few years this forest land, reclaimed
to prairie, could not be distinguished from the prairie itself, except
from its greater luxuriance.

Judge Caton's illustration of how the forests obtain a foot-hold in
the prairies is so aptly expressed, and in such harmony with the ex-
perience of every old settler on the prairies of eastern Illinois and
western Indiana, that we quote it.

" The cause of the absence of trees on the upland prairies is the
problem most important to the agricultural interests of our state, and
it is the inquiry which alone I propose to consider, but cannot resist
the remark that wherever we do find timber throughout this broad
field of prairie, it is always in or near the humid portions of it, as
along the margins of streams, or upon or near the springy uplands.
Many most luxuriant groves are found on the highest portions of the
uplands, but always in the neighborhood of water. For a remarkable

32 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

example I may refer to that great chain of groves extending from and
including the Au Sable Grove on the east and Holderman's Grove on
the west, in Kendall county, occupying the high divide between the
waters of the Illinois and the Fox Rivers. In and around all the
groves flowing springs abound, and some of them are separated by
marshes, to the very borders of which the great trees approach, as if
the forest were ready to seize upon each yard of ground as soon as it is
elevated above the swamps. Indeed, all our groves seem to be located
where water is so disposed as to protect them, to a great or less extent,
from the prairie fire, although not so situated as to irrigate them. If
the head-waters of the streams on the prairies are most frequently with-
out timber, so soon as they have attained sufficient volume to impede
the progress of the fires, with very few exceptions we find forests on
their borders, becoming broader and more vigorous as the magnitude
of the streams increase. It is manifest that land located on the borders
of streams which the fire cannot pass are only exposed to one-half the
fires to which they would be exposed but for such protection. This
tends to show, at least, that if but one-half the fires that have occurred
had been kindled, the arboraceous growth could have withstood their
destructive influences, and the whole surface of what is now prairie
would be forest. Another confirmatory fact, patent to all observers, is,
that the prevailing winds upon the prairies, especially in the autumn,
are from the west, and these give direction to the prairie fires. Conse-
quently, the lands on the westerly sides of the streams are the most
exposed to the fires, and, as might be expected, we find much the most
timber on the easterly sides of the streams."

"Another fact, always a subject of remark among the dwellers on
the prairies, I regard as conclusive proof that the prairie soils are pecu-
liarly adapted to the growth of trees is, that wherever the fires have
been kept from the groves by the settlers, they have rapidly encroached
upon the prairies, unless closely depastured by the farmers' stock, or
prevented by cultivation. This fact I regard as established by careful
observation of more than thirty-five years, during which I have been
an interested witness of the settlement of this country, from the time
when a few log cabins, many miles apart, built in the borders of the
groves, alone were met with, till now nearly the whole of the great
prairies in our state, at least, are brought under cultivation by the in-
dustry of the husbandman. Indeed, this is a fact as well recognized
by the settlers as that corn will grow upon the prairies when properly
cultivated. Ten years ago I heard the observation made by intelligent
men, that within the preceding twenty-five years the area of the timber
in the prairie portions of the state had actually doubled by the sponta-

FOREST ENCROACHMENT. 33

neous extension of the natural groves. However this may be, certain
it is that the encroachments of the timber upon the prairies have been
universal and rapid, wherever not impeded by fire or other physical
causes."

When Europeans first landed in America, as they left the dense
forests east of the Alleghanies and went west over the mountains into
the valleys beyond, anywhere between Lake Erie and the fortieth
degree of latitude, approaching the Scioto River, they would have seen
small patches of country destitute of timber. These were called open-
ings. As they proceeded farther toward the Wabash the number and
area of these openings or barrens would increase. These last were called
by the English savannahs or meadows, and by the French, prairies.
Westward of the Wabash, except occasional tracts of timbered lands
in northern Indiana, and fringes of forest growth along the inter-
vening water-courses, the prairies stretch westward continuously across
a part of Indiana and the whole of Illinois to the Mississippi. Taking
the line of the Wabash railway, \vhich crosses Illinois in its greatest
breadth, and beginning in Indiana, where the railway leaves the tim-
ber, west of the Wabash nearMarshfield. the prairie extends to Quincy,
a distance of more than two hundred and fifty miles, and its contin-
uity the entire way is only broken by four strips of timber along four
streams running at right angles with the route of the railway, namely
the timber on the Vermillion River, between Danville and the Indiana
state-line, the Sangamon, seventy miles west of Danville near Decatur,
the Sangamon again a few miles east of Springfield, and the Illinois
River at Meredosia ; and all of the timber at the crossing of these
several streams, if put together, would not aggregate fifteen miles
against the two hundred and fifty miles of prairie. Taking a north
and south direction and parallel with the drainage of the rivers, one
could start near Ashley, on the Illinois Central railway, in Washing-
ton county, and going northward, nearly on an air-line, keeping on the
divide between the Kaskaskia and Little Wabash, the Sangamon and
the Vermillion, the Iroquois and the Vermillion of the Illinois, cross-
ing the latter stream between the mouths of the Fox and Du Page and
travel through to the state of Wisconsin, a distance of nearly three
hundred miles, without encountering five miles of timber during the
whole journey. Mere figures of distances across the " Grand Prairie,"
as this vast meadow was called by the old settlers, fail to give an ade-
quate idea of its magnitude.

Let the reader, in fancy, go back fifty or sixty years, when there
were no farms between the settlement on the Xorth Arm Prairie, in
Edgar county, and Ft. Clark, now Peoria, on the Illinois River, or
3

34 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

between the Salt Works, west of Danville, and Ft. Dearborn, where
Chicago now is, or when there was not a house between the Wabash
and Illinois Rivers in the direction of La Fayette and Ottawa ; when
there was not a solitary road to mark the way ; .when Indian trails alone
led to unknown places, where no animals except the wild deer and
slinking wolf would stare, the one with timid wonder, the other with
treacherous leer, upon the ventursome traveler; when the gentle winds
moved the supple grasses like waves of a green sea under the sum-
mer's sky; the beauty, the grandeur and solitude of the prairies may
be imagined as they were a reality to the pioneer when he first beheld
them.

There is an essential difference between the prairies eastward of the
Mississippi and the great plains westward necessary to be borne in
mind. The western plains, while they present a seeming level appear-
ance to the eye, rise rapidly to the westward. From Kansas City to
Pueblo the ascent is continuous; beyond Ft. Dodge, the plains, owing
to their elevation and consequent dryness of the atmosphere and
absence of rainfall, produce a thin and stunted vegetation. The prai-
ries of Illinois and Indiana, on the contrary, are much nearer the sea-
level, where the moisture is greater. There were many ponds and
sloughs which aided in producing a humid atmosphere, all which
induced a rank growth of grasses. All early writers, referring to the
vegetation of our prairies, including Fathers Henriepin, St. Cosme,
Charlevoix and others, who recorded their personal observations nearly
two hundred years ago, as well as later English and American travel-
ers, bear uniform testimony to the fact of an unusually luxuriant
growth of grasses.

Early settlers, in the neighborhood of the author, all bear witness
to the rank growth of vegetation on the prairies before it was grazed
by live stock, and supplanted w r ith shorter grasses, that set in as the
country improved. Since the organization of Edgar county in 1823,
of which, all the territory north to the Wisconsin line was then a
part, on the level prairie between the present sites of Danville and
Georgetown, the grass grew so high that it was a source of amusement
to tie the tops over the withers of a horse, and in places the height of
the grass would nearly obscure both horse and rider from view. This
was not a slough, but on arable land, where some of the first farms in
Vermillion county were broken out. On the high rolling prairies the
vegetation was very much shorter, though thick and compact ; its aver-
age height being about two feet.

The prairie fires have been represented in exaggerated pictures of
men and wild animals retreating at full speed, with every mark of ter-

PRAIRIE FIRES. 35

Tor, before the devouring element. Such pictures are overdrawn. In-
stances of loss of human life, or animals, may have sometimes occurred.
The advance of the fire is rapid or slow, as the wind may be strong or
light ; the flames leaping high in the air in their progress over level
ground, or burning lower over the uplands. When a fire starts under
favorable causes, the horizon gleams brighter and brighter until a fiery
redness rises above its dark outline, while heavy, slow-moving masses
of dark clouds curve upward above it. In another moment the blaze
itself shoots up, first at one spot then at another, advancing until the
whole horizon extending across a wide prairie is clothed with flames,
that roll and curve and dash onward and upward like waves of a burn-
ing ocean, lighting up the landscape with the brilliancy of noon-day.
A roaring, crackling sound is heard like the rushing of a hurricane.
The flame, which in general rises to the height of twenty feet, is seen
rolling its waves against each other as the liquid, fiery mass moves for-
ward, leaving behind it a blackened surface on the ground, and long
trails of murky smoke floating above. A more terrific sight than the
burning prairies in early days can scarcely be conceived. Woe to the
farmer whose fields extended into the prairie, and who had suffered
the tall grass to grow near his fences ; the labor of the year would be
swept away in a few hours. Such accidents occasionally occurred,
although the preventive was simple. The usual remedy was to set
fire against fire, or to burn off a strip of grass in the vicinity of the
improved ground, a beaten road, the treading of domestic animals
about the inclosure of the farmer, would generally afford protection.
In other cases a few furrows would be plowed around the field, or the
grass closely mowed between the outside of the fence and the open
prairie.*

No wonder that the Indians, noted for their naming a place or
thing from some of its distinctive peculiarities, should have called
the prairies Mas-ko-tia, or the place of fire. In the ancient Algon-
quin tongue, as well as in its more modern form of the Ojibbeway (or
Chippeway, as this people are improperly designated), the word scoutay
means fire ; and in the Illinois and Pottowatamie, kindred dialects, it
is scotte and scutay, respectively.f It is also eminently characteristic
that the Indians, who lived and hunted exclusively upon the prairies,
were known among their red brethren as " Maskoutes," rendered by
the French writers, Maskoutines, or People of the Fire or Prairie
Country.

North of a line drawn west from Yincennes, Illinois is wholly

* Judge James Hall: Tales of the Border, p. 244; Statistics of the West, p. 82.
fGallatin's Synopsis of the Indian Tribes, etc.

36 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

prairie, always excepting the thin curtain of timber draping the
water-courses ; and all that part of Indiana lying north and west of
the Wabash, embracing fully one-third of the area of the state, is
essentially so.

Of the twenty-seven counties. in Indiana, lying wholly or partially
west and north of the Wabash, twelve of them are prairie ; seven are
mixed prairies, barrens and timber, the barrens and prairie predomi-
nating. In five, the barrens, with the prairies, are nearly equal to the
timber, while only three of the counties can be characterized as heavily
timbered. And wherever timber does occur in these twenty-seven
counties, it is found in localities favorable to its protection against the
ravages of fire, by the proximity of intervening lakes, marshes or
water-courses. We cannot know how long it took the forest to ad-
vance from the Scioto ; how often capes and points of trees, like skir-
mishers of an army, secured a foothold to the eastward of the lakes and
rivers of Ohio and Indiana, only to be driven back again by the prairie
fires advancing from the opposite direction ; or conceive how many
generations of forest growth were consumed by the prairie fires before
the timber-line was pushed westward across the state of Ohio, and
through Indiana to the banks of the Wabash.

The prairies of Illinois and Indiana were born of water and pre-
served by fire for the children of civilized men, who have come and
taken possession of them. The manner of their coming, and the diffi-
culties that befell them on the way, will hereafter be considered. The
white man, like the forests, advanced from the east. The red man,
like the prairie fires, as we shall hereafter see, came from the west.

CHAPTER VI

EARLY DISCOVERIES.

HAVING given a description of the lakes and rivers, and noticed
some of the more prominent features that characterize the physical
geography of the territory within the scope of our inquiry, and the
parts necessarily connected with it, forming, as it were, the outlines or
ground plan of its history, we will now proceed to fill in the frame-
work, with a narration of its discovery. Jacques Cartier, as already
intimated in a note on a preceding page, ascended the St. Lawrence
Kiver in 1535. He sailed up the stream as far as the great Indian vil-
lage of Hoc Lelaga, situated on an island at the foot of the mountain,
styled by him Mont Royal, now called Montreal, a name since extend-
ed to the whole island. The country thus discovered was called New
France. Later, and in the year 1598, France, after fifty years of
domestic troubles, recovered her tranquillity, and, finding herself once
more equal to great enterprises, acquired a taste for colonization. Her
attention was directed to her possessions, by right of discovery, in the
new world, where she now wished to establish colonies and extend the
faith of the Catholic religion. Commissions or grants were accordingly
issued to companies of merchants, and others organized for this pur-
pose, who undertook to make settlements in Acadia, as Nova Scotia
was then called, and elsewhere along the lower waters of the St. Law-
rence ; and, at a later day, like efforts were made higher up the river.
In 1607 Mr. De Monts, having failed in a former enterprise, was
deprived of his commission, which was restored to him on the condition
that he would make a settlement on the St. Lawrence. The company
he represented seems to have had the fur trade only in view, and this
object caused it to change its plans and avoid Acadia altogether. De
Monts' company increased in numbers and capital in proportion as the
fur trade developed expectations of profit, and many persons at St.
Malo, particularly, gave it their support. Feeling that his name
injured his associates, M. De Monts retired ; and when he ceased to be
its governing head, the company of merchants recovered the monopoly
with which the charter was endowed, for no other object than making
money out of the fur trade. They cared nothing whatever for the col-
ony in Acadia, which \vas dying out, and made no settlements else-

38 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

where. However, Mr. Samuel Champlain, who cared little for the fur
trade, and whose thoughts were those of a patriot, after maturely ex-
amining where the settlements directed by the court might be best
established, at last fixed on Quebec. He arrived there on the 3d of
July, 1608, put up some temporary buildings for himself and company,
and began to clear off the ground, which proved fertile.*

The colony at Quebec grew apace with emigrants from France;
and later, the establishment of a settlement at the island of Montreal
was undertaken. Two religious enthusiasts, the one named Jerome le
Royer de la Dauversiere, of Anjou, and the other John James Olier,
assumed the undertaking in 1636. The next who joined in the move-
ment was Peter Chevirer, Baron Fancamp, who in 1640 sent tools and
provisions for the use of the coming settlers. The projectors were
now aided by the celebrated Baron de Renty, and two others. Father
Charles Lalemant induced John de Lauson, the proprietor of the island
of Montreal, to cede it to these gentlemen, which he did in August,
1640 ; and to remove all doubts as to the title, the associates obtained
a grant from the New France Company, in December of the same year,
which was subsequently ratified by the king himself. The associates
agreed to send out forty settlers, to clear and cultivate the ground ; to
increase the number annually ; to supply them with two sloops, cattle
and farm hands, and, after five years, to erect a seminary, maintain
ecclesiastics as missionaries and teachers, and also nuns as teachers and
hospitalers. On its part the New France Company agreed to trans-
port thirty settlers. The associates then contributed twenty-five thou-
sand crowns to begin the settlement, and Mr. de Maisonneuve embarked
with his colony on three vessels, which sailed from Rochelle and
Dieppe, in the summer of 1641. The colony wintered in Quebec,
spending their time in building boats and preparing timber for their
houses ; and on the 8th of May, 1642, embarked, and arrived nine
days after at the island of Montreal, and after saying mass began an
intrenchment around their tents, f

Notwithstanding the severity of the climate, the loss of life by dis-
eases incident to settling of new countries, and more especially the

* History of New France.

t From Dr. Shea's valuable note on Montreal, on pages 129 and 130, vol. 2, of
his translation of Father Charlevoix' History of New France. Mr. Albach, publisher
of "Annals of the West," Pittsburgh edition, 1857, p. 49, is in error in saying that
Montreal was founded in 1613, by Samuel Champlain. Champlain, in company with
a young Huron Indian, whom he had taken to and brought back from France on a
previous voyage, visited the island of Montreal in 1611, and chose it as a place for a
settlement he designed to establish, but which he did not begin, as he was obliged to
return to France; vide Charlevoix' " History of New France," vol. 2, p. 23. The Ameri-
can Clyclopedia, as well as other authorities, concur with Dr. Shea, that Montreal was-
founded in 1642, seven years after Champlain's death.

QUEBEC FOUNDED. 39

destruction of its people from raids of the dreaded Iroquois Indians,
the French colonies grew until, according to a report of Governor
Mons. Denonville to the Minister at Paris, the population of Canada,
in 1686, had increased to 12,373 souls. Quebec and Montreal became
the base of operations of the French in America; the places from
which missionaries, traders and explorers went out among the savages
into countries hitherto unknown, going northward and westward,
even beyond the extremity of Lake Superior to the upper waters of
the Mississippi, and southward to the Gulf of Mexico ; and it was
from these cities that the religious, military and commercial affairs of
this widely extended region were administered, and from which the
French settlements subsequently established in the northwest and at
New Orleans were principally recruited. The influence of Quebec and
Montreal did not end with the fall of French power in America. It
was from these cities that the English retained control of the fur trade
in, and exerted a power over the Indian tribes of, the northwest that
harassed and retarded the spread of the American settlements through
all the revolutionary war, and during the later contest between Great
Britain and the United States in the war of 1812. Indeed, it was
only until after the fur trade was exhausted and the Indians placed
beyond the Mississippi, subsequent to 1820, that Quebec and Montreal
ceased to exert an influence in that part of New France now known as
Illinois and Indiana.

Father Claude Allouez, coasting westward from Sault Ste. Marie,
reached Chegoimegon, as the Indians called the bay south of the Apos-
tle Islands and near La Pointe on the southwestern shore of Lake Supe-
rior, in October, 1665. Here he found ten or twelve fragments of
Algonquin tribes assembled and about to hang the war kettle over the
fire preparatory for an incursion westward into the territory of the
Sioux. The good father persuaded them to give up their intended
hostile expedition. He set up in their midst a chapel, to which he gave
the name of the " Mission of the Holy Ghost," at the spot afterward
known as " Lapointe du Saint Esprit," and at once began his mission
work. His chapel was an object of wonder, and its establishment soon
spread among the wild children of the forest, and thither from great
distances came numbers all alive with curiosity, the roving Potta-
watomies, Sacs and Foxes, the Kickapoos, the Illinois and Miamis,
to whom the truths of Christianity were announced.*

Three years later Father James Marquette took the place of Allouez,
and while here he seems to have been the first that learned of the Missis-
sippi. In a letter written from this mission by Father Marquette to
* Shea's History of Catholic Missions, 358.

40 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

his Reverend Father Superior, preserved in the Relations for 1669 and
1670, he says: "When the Illinois come to the point they pass a
great river, which is almost a league in width. It flows from north
to south, and to so great a distance that the Illinois, who know nothing
of the use of the canoe, have never as yet heard tell of the mouth ; they
only know that there are great nations below them, some of whom,
dwelling to the east-southeast of their country, gather their Indian-corn
twice a year. A nation that they call Chaouanon (Shawnees) came to
visit them during the past summer; the young man that has been
given to me to teach me the language has seen them ; they were loaded
with glass beads, which shows that they have communication with the
Europeans. They had to journey across the land for more than thirty
days before arriving at their country. It is hardly probable that this
great river discharges itself in Virginia. We are more inclined to
believe that it has its mouth in California. If the savages, who have
promised to make me a canoe, do not fail in their word, we will navi-
gate this river as far as is possible in company with a Frenchman and
this young man that they have given me, who understands several of
these languages and possesses great facility for acquiring others. We
shall visit the nations who dwell along its shores, in order to open the
way to many of our fathers who for a long time have awaited this
happiness. This discovery will give us a perfect knowledge of the sea
either to the south or to the west."

These reports concerning the great river came to the knowledge
of the authorities at Quebec and Paris, and naturally enough stimu-
lated further inquiry. There were three theories as to where the river
emptied ; one, that it discharged into the Atlantic south of the British
colony of Virginia; second, that it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico;
and third, which was the more popular belief, that it emptied into the
Red Sea, as the Gulf of California was called ; and if the latter, that it
would afford a passage to China. To solve this important commercial
problem in geography, it was determined, as appears from a letter from
the Governor, Count Frontenac, at Quebec, to M. Colbert, Minister of
the navy at Paris, expedient " for the service to send Sieur Joliet to
the country of the Mascoutines, to discover the South Sea and the great
river they call the Mississippi which is supposed to discharge itself
into the Sea of California. Sieur Joliet is a man of great experience
in these sorts of discoveries, and has already been almost to that great
river, the mouth of which he promises to see. We shall have intelli-
gence of him, certainly, this summer.* Father Marquette was chosen
to accompany Joliet on account of the information he had already ob-

* Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 92.

SPANISH EXPLORATIONS. 41

tained from the Indians relating to the countries to be explored, and
also because, as he wrote Father Dablon, his superior, when informed
by the latter that he was to be Joliet's companion, " I am ready to go
on your order to seek new nations toward the South Sea, and teach
them of our great God whom they hitherto have not known."

The voyage of Joliet and Marquette is so interesting that we intro-
duce extracts from Father Marquette's journal. The version we adopt
is Father Marquette's original journal, prepared for publication by his
superior, Fathe'r Dablon, and which lay in manuscript at Quebec, among
the archives of the Jesuits, until 1852, when it, together with Father
Marquette's original map, were brought to light, translated into Eng-
lish, and published by Dr. John G. Shea, in his " Discovery and Explo-
ration of the Mississippi." The version commonly sanctioned was
Marquette's narrative sent *to the French government, where it lay
unpublished until it came into the hands of M. Thevenot, who printed
it at Paris, in a book issued by him in 1681, called " Receuil de Voy-
ages." This account differs somewhat, though not essentially, from
the narrative as published by Dr. Shea.

Before proceeding farther, however, we will turn aside a moment
to note the fact that Spain had a prior right over France to the Missis-
sippi Valley by virtue of previous discovery. As early as the year
1525, Cortez had conquered Mexico, portioned out its rich mines
among his favorites and reduced the inoffensive inhabitants to the worst
of slavery, making them till the ground and toil in the mines for their
unfeeling masters. A few years following the conquest of Mexico, the
Spaniards, under Pamphilus de Narvaez, in 1528, undertook to conquer
and colonize Florida and the entire northern coast-line of the Gulf.
After long and fruitless wanderings in the interior, his party returned
to the sea-coast and endeavored to reach Tarnpico, in wretched boats.
Nearly all perished by storm, disease or famine. The survivors, with
one Cabeza de Vaca at their head, drifted to an island near the present
state of Mississippi ; from which, after four years of slavery, De Vaca,
with four companions, escaped to the mainland and started westward,
going clear across the continent to the Gulf of California. The
natives took them for supernatural beings. They assumed the guise
of jugglers, and the Indian tribes, through which they passed, invested
them with the title of medicine-men, and their lives were thus guarded
with superstitious awe. They are, perhaps, the first Europeans who
ever went overland from the Atlantic to the Pacific. They must have
crossed the Great River somewhere on their route, and, says Dr.
Shea, " remain in history, in a distant twilight, as the first Europeans
known to have stood on the banks of the Mississippi." In 1539,

42 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Hernando de Soto, with a party of cavaliers, most of them sons of
titled nobility, landed with their horses upon the coast of Florida.
During that and the following four years, these daring adventurers
wandered through the wilderness, traveling in portions of Florida,
Carolina, the northern parts of Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi,
crossing the Mississippi, as is supposed, as high up as White River,
and going still westward to the base of the Rocky Mountains, vainly
searching for the rich gold mines of which De Vaca had given marvel-
ous accounts. De Soto's party endured hardships that would depress
the stoutest heart, while, with fire and sword, they perpetrated atrocities
upon the Indian tribes through which they passed, burning their
villages and inflicting cruelties which make us blush for the wicked-
ness of men claiming to be Christians. De Soto died, in May or June,
1542, on the banks of the Mississippi, below the mouth of the
Washita, and his immediate attendants concealed his death from the
others and secretly, in the night, buried his body in the middle of the
stream. The remnant of his survivors went westward and then
returned back again to the river, passing the winter upon its banks.
The following spring they went down the river, in seven boats which
they had rudely constructed out of such scanty material and with the
few tools they could command. In these, after a three months' voyage,
they arrived at the Spanish town of Panuco, on the river of that name
in Mexico.

Later, in 1565, Spain, failing in previous attempts, eifected a lodg-
ment in Florida, and for the protection of her colony built the fort at
St. Augustine, whose ancient ruin, still standing, is an object of curi-
osity to the health-seeker and a monument to the hundreds of native
Indians who, reduced to bondage by their Spanish conquerors, perished,
after years of unrequited labor, in erecting its frowning walls and
gloomy dungeons.

While Spain retained her hold upon Mexico and enlarged her posses-
sions, and continued, with feebler efforts, to keep possession of the
Floridas, she took no measures to establish settlements along the Mis-
sissippi or to avail herself of the advantage that might have resulted
from its discovery. The Great River excited no further notice after
De Soto's time. For the next hundred years it remained as it were
a sealed mystery until the French, approaching from the north by
way of the lakes, explored it in its entire length, and brought to
public light the vast extent and wonderful fertility of its valleys.
Resuming the thread of our history at the place where we turned aside
to notice the movements of the Spanish toward the Gulf, we now pro-
ceed with the extracts from Father Marquette's journal of the voyage
of discovery down the Mississippi.

CHAPTER VII.

JOLIET AND MARQUETTE'S VOYAGE.

THE day of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin,
whom I had always invoked, since I have been in this Ottawa country,
to obtain of God the grace to be able to visit the nations on the River
Mississippi, was identically that on which M. Jollyet arrived with
orders of the Comte de Frontenac, our governor, and M. Talon, our
intendant, to make this discovery with me. I was the more enraptured
at this good news, as I saw my designs on the point of being accom-
plished, and myself in the happy necessity of exposing my life for the
salvation of all these nations, and particularly for the Illinois, who had,
when I was at Lapointe du Esprit, very earnestly entreated me to carry
the word of God to their country."

" We were not long in preparing our outfit, although we were
embarking on a voyage the duration of which we could not foresee.
Indian corn, with some dried meats, was our whole stock of provisions.
With this we set out in two bark canoes, M. Jollyet, myself and five
men, firmly resolved to do all and suffer all for so glorious an enterprise."

" It was on the 17th of May, 1673, that we started from the mission
of St. Ignatius, at Michilimakinac, where I then was."*

" Our joy at being chosen for this expedition roused our courage
and sweetened the labor of rowing from morning to night. As we
were going to seek unknown countries, we took all possible precau-
tions that, if our enterprise was hazardous, it should not be foolhardy ;
for this reason we gathered all possible information from the Indians
who had frequented those parts, and even from their accounts, traced
a map of all the new country, marking down the rivers on which we
were to sail, the names of the nations and places through which we
were to pass, the course of the Great River, and what direction we
should take when we got to it."

"Above all, I put our voyage under the protection of the Blessed
Virgin Immaculate, promising her that, if she did us the grace to dis-
cover the Great River, I would give it the name of the conception ;

* St. Ignatius was not on the Island of Mackinaw, but westward of it. on a point
of land extending into the strait, from the north shore, laid down on modern maps as
'Point St. Ignace." On this bleak, exposed and barren spot this mission was estab-
lished by Marquette himself in 1671. Shea's Catholic Missions, p. 364.

4.3

44 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

and that I would also give that name to the first mission I should
establish among these new nations, as I have actually done among the
Illinois."

After some days they reached an Indian village, and the journal
proceeds :'" Here we are, then, at the Maskoutens. This word, in
Algonquin, may mean Fire Nation, and that is the name given to them.
This is the limit of discoveries made by the French, for they have not
yet passed beyond it. This town is made up of three nations gathered
here, Miamis, Maskoutens and Ivikabous.* As bark for cabins, in this
country, is rare, they use rushes, which serve them for walls and roofs,
but which afford them no protection against the wind, and still less
against the rain when it falls in torrents. The advantage of this kind
of cabins is that they can roll them up and carry them easily where
they like in hunting time."

" I felt no little pleasure in beholding the position of this town. The
view is beautiful and very picturesque, for, from the eminence on which
it is perched, the eye discovers on every side prairies spreading away
beyond its reach interspersed with thickets or groves of trees. The
soil is very good, producing much corn. The Indians gather also
quantities of plums and grapes, from which good wine could be made
if they choose."

"No sooner had we arrived than M. Jollyet and I assembled the
Sachems. He told them that he was sent by our governor to discover
new countries, and I by the Almighty to illumine them with the ligttt
of the gospel ; that the Sovereign Master of our lives wished to be
known to all nations, and that to obey his will I did not fear death, to
which I exposed myself in such dangerous voyages ; that we needed
two guides to put us on our way ; these, making them a present, we
begged them to grant us. This they did very civilly, and even pro-
ceeded to speak to us by a present, which was a mat to serve us on our
voyage."

"The next day, which was the 10th of June, two Miamis whom
they had given us as guides embarked with us in the sight of a great
crowd, who could not wonder enough to see seven Frenchmen, alone
in two canoes, dare to undertake so strange and so hazardous an expe-
dition."

" We knew that there was, three leagues from Maskoutens, a river
emptying into the Mississippi. We knew, too, that the point of the
compass we were to hold to reach it was the west-southwest, but the

* The village was near the mouth of Wolf River, which empties into Winnebago
Lake, Wisconsin. The stream was formerly called the Maskouten, and a tribe of this
name dwelt along its banks.

MARQUETTE'S VOYAGE. 45

way is so cut up with marshes and little lakes that it is easy to go
astray, especially as the river leading to it is so covered with wild oats
that you can hardly discover the channel ; hence we had need of our
two guides, who led us safely to a portage of twenty-seven hundred
paces and helped us transport our canoes to enter this river, after
which they returned, leaving us alone in an unknown country in the
hands of Providence."' 55 '

" We now leave the waters which flow to Quebec, a distance of four
or five hundred leagues, to follow those which will henceforth lead us.
into strange lands.

" Our route was southwest, and after sailing about thirty leagues we
perceived a place which had all the appearances of an iron mine, and
in fact one of our party who had seen some before averred that the one
we had found was very rich and very good. After forty leagues on
this same route we reached the mouth of our river, and finding our-
selves at 42 K we safely entered the Mississippi on the 17th of June
with a joy that I cannot express."f

*This portage has given the name to Portage City, Wisconsin, where the upper
waters of Fox River, emptying into Green Bay, approach the Wisconsin River, which,
coming from the northwest, here changes its course to the southwest Ihe distance
from the Wisconsin to the Fox River at this point is, according to Henry K. School-
craft, a mile and 1 a half across a level prairie, and the level of the two streams is so nearly
the same that in high water loaded canoes formerly passed from the one to the other
across this low prairie. For many miles below the portage the channel ot .box Kiyer
was choked with a growth of tangled wild rice. The stream frequently expanding
into little lakes, and its winding, crooked course through the prairie, well justifies the
tradition of the Winnebago Indians concerning its origin. A vast serpent that lived
in the waters of the Mississippi took a freak t9 visit the great lakes ; he left his trail
where he crossed over the prairie, which, collecting the waters as they tell trom the rains
of heaven, at length became Fox River. The little lakes along its course were, prob-
ably, the places where he nourished about in his uneasy slumbers at night. Mrs. John
H. Kin/.ie's Waubun, p. 80.

t Father Marquette, agreeably to his vow, named the river the Immaculate Concep-
tion. Nine years later, when Robert La Salle, having discovered the river m its entire
length, took possession at its mouth of the whole Mississippi Valley, he named the
river Colbert, in honor of the Minister of the Navy, a man renowned alike tor his
ability, at the head of the Department of the Marine, and for the encouragement he
gave to literature, science and art. Still later, in 1712, when the vast country drained by
its waters was farmed out to private enterprise, as appears from letters patent trom the
King of France, conveying the whole to M. Crozat, the name of the river was changed
to St. Lewis. Fortunately the Mississippi retains its aboriginal name, which is a com-
pound from the two Algonquin words missi, signifying great, and sepe, a river. Ihe
former is variously pronounced missil or michil, as in Michilimakinac ; michi, as in Mich-
igan ; missii, as in Missouri, and missi, as in the Mississeneway of the Wabash. Ihe
variation in pronunciation is not greater than we might expect in an unwritten lan-
guage. "The Western Indians," says Mr. Schoolcraft, " have no other word than nnsst
to express the highest degree of magnitude, either in a moral or in a physical sense, and
it may be considered as not only synonymous to our word great, but also magnificent,
supreme, stupendous, etc." Father Hennepin, who next to Marquette wrote concern-
ing the derivation of the name, says : " Mississippi, in the language of the Illinois,
means the great river." Some authors, perhaps with more regard for a pleasing hc-
tion than plain matter-of-fact, have rendered Mississippi "The Father of Waters;
whereas, nos, noussey and nosha mean father, and neebi, nipi or nepee mean water, as
universally in the dialect of Algonquin tribes, as does the word missi mean great and

sepi a river.

46 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

" Having descended as far as 41 28', following the same direction,
we find that turkeys have taken the place of game, and pisikious (buf-
falo) or wild cattle that of other beasts.

" At last, on the 25th of June, \ve perceived foot-prints of men by
the water-side and a beaten path entering a beautiful prairie. We
stopped to examine it, and concluding that it was a patli leading to
some Indian village we resolved to go and reconnoitre : we accordinglv
left our two canoes in charge of our people, cautioning them to beware
of a surprise ; then M. Jollyet and I undertook this rather hazardous
discovery for two single men, who thus put themselves at the mercy of
an unknown and barbarous people. We followed the little path in
silence, and having advanced about two leagues we discovered a village
on the banks of the river, and two others on a hill half a league from
the former. Then, indeed, we recommended ourselves to God with all
our hearts, and having implored his help we passed on undiscovered,
and came so near that we even heard the Indians talking. We then
deemed it time to announce ourselves, as we did, by a cry which we
raised with all pur strength, and then halted, without advancing any
farther. At this cry the Indians rushed out of their cabins, and hav-
ing probably recognized us as French, especially seeing a black gown,
or at least having no reason to distrust us, seeing we were but two and
had made known our coming, they deputed four old men to come and
speak to us. Two carried tobacco-pipes well adorned and trimmed
with many kinds of feathers. They marched slowly, lifting their pipes
toward the sun as if offering them to it to smoke, but yet without
uttering a single word. They were a long time coming the little way
from the village to us. Having reached us at last, they stopped to con-
sider us attentively.

" I now took courage, seeing these ceremonies, which are used by
them only with friends, and still more on seeing them covered with stuffs
which made me judge them to be allies. I, therefore, spoke to them
first, and asked them who they were. They answered that they were
Illinois, and in token of peace they presented their pipes to smoke.
They then invited us to their village, where all the tribe awaited us
with impatience. These pipes for smoking are all called in this country
calumets, a word that is so much in use that I shall be obliged to employ
it in order to be understood, as I shall have to speak of it frequently.

" At the door of the cabin in which we were to be received was an
old man awaiting us in a very remarkable posture, which is their usual
ceremony in receiving strangers. This man was standing perfectly
naked, with his hands stretched out and raised toward the sun, as if he
wished to screen himself from its rays, which, nevertheless, passed

PRESENTATION OF THE CALUMET. 47

through his fingers to his face. When we came near him he paid us
this compliment : ' How beautiful is the sun, O Frenchman, when
thou comest to visit us ! All our town awaits thee, and thou shalt
enter all our cabins in peace.' He then took us into his, where there
was a crowd of people, who devoured us with their eyes but kept a
profound silence. "We heard, however, these words occasionally ad-
dressed to us : ' Well done, brothers, to visit us ! ' As soon as we had
taken our places they showed us the usual civility of the country,
which is to present the calumet. You must not refuse it unless you
would pass for an enemy, or at least for being very impolite. It is,
however, enough to pretend to smoke. While all the old men smoked
after us to honor us, some came to invite us, on behalf of the great
sachem of all the Illinois, to proceed to his town, where he wished to
hold a council with us. We went with a good retinue, for all the
people who had never seen a Frenchman among them could not tire
looking at us ; they threw themselves on the grass by the wayside,
they ran ahead, then turned and walked back to see us again. All this
was done without noise, and with marks of a great respect entertained
for us.

" Having arrived at the great sachem's town, we espied him at his
cabin door between two old men ; all three standing naked, with their
calumet turned to the sun. He harangued us in a few words, to con-
gratulate us on our arrival, and then presented us his calumet and made
us smoke ; at the same time we entered his cabin, where we received
all their usual greetings. Seeing all assembled and in silence, I spoke
to them by four presents which I made. By the first, I said that we
marched in peace to visit the nations on the river to the sea ; by the
second, I declared to them that God, their creator, had pity on them,
since, after their having been so long ignorant of him, he wished to
become known to all nations ; that I was sent on his behalf with this
design ; that it was for them to acknowledge and obey him ; by the
third, that the great chief of the French informed them that he spread
peace everywhere, and had overcome the Iroquois ; lastly, by the fourth,
we begged them to give us all the information they had of the sea, and
of nations through which we should have to pass to reach it.

" When I had finished my speech, the sachem rose, and laying his
hand on the head of a little slave whom he was about to give us, spoke
thus : ' I thank thee, Black-gown, and thee, Frenchman,' addressing
M. Jollyet, ' for taking so much pains to come and visit us. Never has
the earth been so beautiful, nor the sun so bright, as to-day ; never has
our river been so calm, nor so free from rocks, which your canoes have
removed as they passed ; never has our tobacco had so fine a flavor,

48 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

nor our corn appeared so beautiful as we behold it to-day. Here is my
son that I give thee that thou mayest know my heart. I pray thee
take pity on me and all my nation. Thou knowest the Great Spirit
who has made us all ; thou speakest to him and hearest his word ; ask
him to give me life and health, and come and dwell with us that we
may know him.' Saying this, he placed the little slave near us and
made us a second present, an all mysterious calumet, which they value
more than a slave. By this present he showed us his esteem for our
governor, after the account we had given of him. By the third he
begged us, on behalf of his whole nation, not to proceed farther on
account of the great dangers to which we exposed ourselves.

" I replied that I did not fear death, and that I esteemed no happi-
ness greater than that of losing my life for the glory of him who made
us all. But this these poor people could not understand. The coun-
cil was followed by a great feast which consisted of four courses, which
we had to take with all their ways. The first course was a great wooden
dish full of sagamity. that is to say, of Indian meal boiled in water
and seasoned with grease. The master of ceremonies, with a spoonful
of sagamity, presented it three or four times to my mouth, as we would
do with a little child ; he did the same to M. Jollyet. For the second
course, he brought in a second dish containing three fish ; he took
some pains to remove the bones, and having blown upon it to cool it,
put it in my mouth as we would food to a bird. For the third course
they produced a large dog which they had just killed, but, learning
that we did not eat it, withdrew it. Finally, the fourth course was a
piece of wild ox, the fattest portions of which were put into our
mouths.

" We took leave of our Illinois about the end of June, and em-
barked in sight of all the tribe, who admire our little canoes, having
never seen the like.

"As we were discoursing, while sailing gently down a beautiful,
still, clear water, we heard the noise of a rapid into which we were
about to fall. I have seen nothing more frightful ; a mass of large
trees, entire, with branches, real floating islands, came rushing from
the mouth of the river Pekitanoiii, so impetuously that we could not,
without great danger, expose ourselves to pass across. The agitation
was so great that the water was all muddy and could not get clear.*

* Pekitanoiii, with the aboriginals, signified " muddy water," on the authority of
Father Marest, in his letter referred to in a previous note. The present name, Mis-
souri, according to Le Page du Pratz, vol. 2, p. 157, was derived from the tribe, Mis-
souris, whose village was some forty leagues above its mouth, and who massacred a
French garrison situated in that part of the country. The late statesman and orator,
Thomas A. Benton, referring to the muddiness prevailing at all seasons of the year in
the Missouri River, said that its waters were "too thick to swim in and too thin to
walk on."

PLOT AGAINST MARQUETTE'S LIFE. 49

"After having made about twenty leagues due south, and a little
less to the southeast, we came to a river called Ouabouskigou, the mouth
of which is at 36 north.* This river comes from the country on the
east inhabited by the Chaouanons, in such numbers that they reckon
as many as twenty-three villages in one district, and fifteen in another,
lying quite near each other. They are by no means warlike, and are
the people the Iroquois go far to seek in order to wage an unprovoked
war upon them ; and as these poor people cannot defend themselves
they allow themselves to be taken and carried off like sheep, and, inno-
cent as they are, do not fail to experience the barbarity of the Iroquois,
who burn them cruelly.'

Having arrived about half a league from Akansea (Arkansas
River), we saw two canoes coining toward us. The commander was
standing up holding in his hand a calumet, with which he made signs
according to the custom of the country. He approached us, singing quite
agreeably, and invited us to smoke, after which he presented us some
sagarnity and bread made of Indian corn, of which we ate a little.
We fortunately found among them a man who understood Illinois much
better than the man we brought from Mitchigameh. By means of
him, I first spoke to the assembly by ordinary presents. They admired
what I told them of God and the mysteries of our holy faith, and
showed a great desire to keep me with them to instruct them.

" We then asked them what they knew of the sea ; they replied
that we were only ten days' journey from it (we could have made the
distance in five days) ; that they did not know the nations who inhab-
ited it, because their enemies prevented their commerce with those
Europeans ; that the Indians with fire-arms whom we had met were
their enemies, who cut off the passage to the sea, and prevented their
making the acquaintance of the Europeans, or having any commerce
with them ; that besides we should expose ourselves greatly by passing
on, in consequence of the continual war parties that their enemies sent
out on the river; since, being armed and used to war, we could not,
without evident danger, advance on that river which they constantly
occupy.

" In the evening the sachems held a secret council on the design of
some to kill us for plunder, but the chief broke up all these schemes,
and sending for us, danced the calumet in our presence, and then, to
remove all fears, presented it to me.

"M. Jollyet and I held another council to deliberate on what we
should do, whether we should push on, or rest satisfied with the dis-

*The W abash here appears, for the first time, by name. A more extended notice
of the various names by which this stream has been known will be given farther on.
4

50 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

covery that we had made. After having attentively considered that
we were not far from the Gulf of Mexico, the basin of which is 31
40' north, and we at 33 40'; so that we could not be more than two
or three days' journey off; that the Mississippi undoubtedly had its
mouth in Florida or the Gulf of Mexico, and not on the east in Vir-
ginia, whose sea-coast is at 34 north, which we had passed, without
having as yet reached the sea, nor on the western side in California,
because that would require a west, or west-southwest course, and we
had always been going south. We considered, moreover, that we
risked losing the fruit of this voyage, of which we could give no
information, if we should throw ourselves into the hands of the Span-
iards, who would undoubtedly at least hold us as prisoners. Besides
it was clear that we w r ere not in a condition to resist Indians allied to
Europeans, numerous and expert in the use of fire-arms, who contin-
ually infested the lower part of the river. Lastly, we had gathered all
the information that could be desired from the expedition. All these
reasons induced us to return. This we announced to the Indians, and
after a day's rest prepared for it.

"After a month's navigation down the Mississippi, from the 42d to
below the 34th degree, and after having published the gospel as well
as I could to the nations I had met, we left the village of Akansea on
the 17th of July, to retrace our steps. We accordingly ascended the
Mississippi, which gave us great trouble to stem its currents. We left
it, indeed, about the 38th degree, to enter another river (the Illinois),
which greatly shortened our way, and brought us, with little trouble,
to the lake of the Illinois.

" We had seen nothing like this river for the fertility of the land, its
prairies, woods, wild cattle, stag, deer, w r ild-cats, bustards, swans, ducks,
parrots, and even beaver; its many little lakes and rivers. That on
which w r e sailed is broad deep and gentle for sixty-five leagues.
During the spring and part of the summer, the only portage is half a
league.

" We found there an Illinois town called Kaskaskia, composed of
seventy -four cabins : they received us well, and compelled me to promise
them to return and instruct them. One of the chiefs of this tribe, with
his young men, escorted us to the Illinois Lake, whence at last we
returned in the close of September to the Bay of the Fetid (Green Bay),
whence we had set out in the beginning of June. Had all this voyage
caused but the salvation of a single soul, I should deem all my fatigue
well repaid, and this I have reason to think, for, when I was returning,
I passed by the Indians of Peoria. 1 was three days announcing the
faith in their cabins, after which, as we were embarking, they brought

BIOGRAPHY OF JOLIET. 51

me, on the water's edge, a dying child, which I baptized a little before
it expired, by an admirable providence for the salvation of that inno-
cent soul."

Count Frontenac, writing from Quebec to M. Colbert, Minister of
the Marine, at Paris, under date of November 14, 1674, announces that
^'Sieur Joliet, whom Monsieur Talon advised me, on my arrival from
France, to dispatch for the discovery of the South Sea, has returned three
months ago. He has discovered some very fine countries, and a navi-
gation so easy through beautiful rivers he has found, that a person can
go from Lake Ontario in a bark to the Gulf of Mexico, there being
only one carrying place (around Niagara Falls), where Lake Ontario
communicates with Lake Erie. I send you, by my secretary, the map
which Sieur Joliet has made of the great river he has discovered, and
the observations he has been able to recollect, as he lost all his minutes
and journals in the shipwreck he suffered within sight of Montreal,
where, after having completed a voyage of twelve hundred leagues,
he was near being drowned, and lost all his papers and a little Indian
whom he brought from those countries. These accidents have caused
me great regret."*

Louis Joliet, or Jolliet, or Jollyet, as the name is variously spelled,
was the son of Jean Joliet, a wheelwright, and Mary d'Abancour; he
was born at Quebec in the year 1645. Having finished his studies at
the Jesuit college he determined to become a member of that order, and
with that purpose in view took some of the minor orders of the society
in August, 1662. He completed his studies in 1666, but during this
time his attention had become interested in Indian affairs, and he laid
aside all thoughts of assuming the " black gown." That he acquired
great ability and tact in managing the savages, is apparent from the
fact of his having been selected to discover the south sea by the way of
the Mississippi. The map which he drew from memory, and which
was forwarded by Count Frontenac to France, was afterward attached
to Marquette's Journal, and was published by Therenot, at Paris, in
1681. Sparks, in his " Life of Marquette," copies this map, and ascribes
it to his hero. This must be a mistake, since it differs quite essentially
from Marquette's map, which has recently been brought to public notice
by Dr. Shea.

Joliet's account of the voyage, mentioned by Frontenac, is published
in Hennepin's " Discovery of a Vast Country in America." It is very
meagre, and does not present any facts not covered by Marquette's nar-
rative.

In 1680 Joliet was appointed hydrographer to the king, and many
* Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 121.

52 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

well-drawn maps at Quebec show that his office was no sinecure. After-
ward, he made a voyage to Hudson's Bay in the interest of the king;
and as a reward for the faithful performance of his duty, he was granted
the island of Anticosti, which, on account of the fisheries and Indian
trade, was at that time very valuable. After this, he signed himself
Joliet d'Anticosty. In the year 1697, he obtained the seignory of
Joliet on the river Etchemins, south of Quebec. M. Joliet died in
1701, leaving a wife and four children, the descendants of whom are
living in Canada still possessed of the seignory of Joliet, among whom
are Archbishop Taschereau of Quebec and Archbishop Tache of Red
River.

Mount Joliet, on the Desplaines River, above its confluence with the
Kankakee, and the city of Joliet, in the county of Will, perpetuate
the name of Joliet in the state of Illinois.

Jacques Marquette was born in Laon, France, in 1637. His was
the oldest and one of the most respectable citizen families of the place.
At the age of seventeen he entered the Society of Jesus ; received or-
ders in 1666 to embark for Canada, arriving at Quebec in September
of the same year. For two years he remained at Three Rivers, study-
ing the different Indian dialects under Father Gabriel Druillentes.
At the end of that period he received orders to repair to the upper
lakes, which he did, and established the Mission of Sault Ste. Marie.
The following year Dablon arrived, having been appointed Superior of
the Ottawa missions ; Marquette then went to the " Mission of the Holy
Ghost " at the western extremity of Lake Superior ; here he remained
for two years, and it was his accounts, forwarded from this place, that
caused Frontenac and Talon to send Joliet on his voyage to the Mis-
sissippi. The Sioux having dispersed the Algonquin tribes at Lapointe,
the latter retreated eastward to Mackinaw ; Marquette followed and
founded there the Mission of St. Ignatius. Here he remained until
Joliet came, in 1673, with orders to accompany him on his voyage of
discovery down the Mississippi. Upon his return, Marquette remained
at Mackinaw until October, 1674, when he received orders to carry out
his pet project of founding the " Mission of the Immaculate Concep-
tion of the Blessed Virgin " among the Illinois. He immediately set
out, but owing to a severe dysentery, contracted the year previous, he
made but slow progress. However, he reached Chicago Creek, De-
cember 4, where, growing rapidly worse, he was compelled to winter.
On the 29th of the following March he set out for the Illinois town,
on the river of that name. He succeeded in getting there on the 8th
of April. Being cordially received by the Indians, he was enabled to
realize his long deferred and much cherished project of establishin

DEATH OF MARQUETTE. 53

the " Mission of the Immaculate Conception." Believing that his life
was drawing to a close, he endeavored to reach Mackinaw before his
death should take place. But in this hope he was doomed to disap-
pointment ; by the time he reached Lake Michigan " he was so weak
that he had to be carried like a child." One Saturday, Marquette and
his two companions entered a small stream which still bears his
name on the eastern side of Lake Michigan, and in this desolate
spot, virtually alone, destitute of all the comforts of life, died James
Marquette. His life-long wish to die a martyr in the holy cause of
Jesus and the Blessed Yirgin, was granted. Thus passed away one of
the purest and most sacrificing servants of God, one of the bravest
and most heroic of men.

The biographical sketch of Joliet has been collated from a number
of reliable authorities, and is believed truthful. Our notice of Father
Marquette is condensed from his life as written by Dr. Shea, than
whom there is no one better qualified to perform the task.

CHAPTER VIII.

EXPLORATIONS BY LA SALLE.

THE success of the French, in their plan of colonization, was so
great, and the trade with the savages, exchanging fineries, guns, knives,
and, more than all, spirituous liquors for valuable furs, yielded such
enormous profits, that impetus was given to still greater enterprises.
They involved no less than the hemming in of the British colonies
along the Atlantic coast and a conquest of the rich mines in Mexico,
from the Spanish. These purposes are boldly avowed in a letter of
M. Talon, the king's enterprising intendant at Quebec, in 1671 ; and
also in the declarations of the great Colbert, at Paris, " I am," says M.
Talon, in his letter to the king referred to, "no courtier, and assert,
not through a mere desire to please the king, nor without just reason,
that this portion of the French monarchy will become something
grand. What I discover around me makes me foresee this ; and those
colonies of foreign nations so long settled on the seaboard already
tremble with fright, in view of what his majesty has accomplished
here in the interior. The measures adopted to confine them within
narrow limits, by taking possession, which I have caused to be effected,
do not allow them to spread, without subjecting themselves, at the
same time, to be treated as usurpers, and have war waged against them.
This in truth is what by all their acts they seem to greatly fear. They
already know that your name is spread abroad among the savages
throughout all those countries, and that they regard your majesty alone
as the arbitrator of peace and war ; they detach themselves insensibly
from other Europeans, and excepting the Iroquois, of whom I am not
as vet assured, we can safely promise that the others will take up arms
whenever we please." " The principal result," says La Salle, in his
memoir at a later day, " expected from the great perils and labors which
I underwent in the discovery of the Mississippi was to satisfy the wish
expressed to me by the late Monsieur Colbert, of finding a port where
the French might establish themselves and harass the Spaniards in
those regions from whence they derive all their wealth. The place I
propose to fortify lies sixty leagues above the mouth of the river Col-
bert (i. e. Mississippi) in the Gulf of Mexico, and possesses all the
advantages for such a purpose which can be wished for, both on account

EARLY LIFE OF LA SALLE. 55

of its excellent position and the favorable disposition of the savages who
live in that part of the country."* It is not our province to indulge
in conjectures as to how far these daring purposes of Talon and Col-
bert would have succeeded had not the latter died, and their active
assistant, Robert La Salle, have lost his life, at the hands of an assassin,
when in the act of executing the preliminary part of the enterprise.
"We turn, rather, to matters of historical record, and proceed with a
condensed sketch of the life and voyages of La Salle, as it was his dis-
coveries that led to the colonization of the Mississippi Valley by the
French.

La Salle was born, of a distinguished family, at Rouen, France.
He was consecrated to the service of God in early life, and entered the
Society of Jesus, in which he remained ten years, laying the foundation
of moral principles, regular habits and elements of science that served
him so well in his future arduous undertakings. Like many other
young men having plans of useful life, he thought Canada would offer
better facilities to develop them than the cramped and fixed society
of France. He accordingly left his home, and reached Montreal in
1666. Being of a resolute and venturesome disposition, he found
employment in making explorations of the country about the lakes.
He soon became a favorite of Talon, the intendant, and of Frontenae,
the governor, at Quebec. He was selected by the latter to take com-
mand of Fort Frontenac, near the present city of Kingston, on the St.
Lawrence River, and at that time a dilapidated, wooden structure on
the frontier of Canada. He remained in Canada about nine years,
acquiring a knowledge of the country and particularly of the Indian
tribes, their manners, habits and customs, and winning the confidence
of the French authorities. He returned to France and presented a
memoir to the king, in which he urged the necessity of maintaining
Fort Frontenac, which he offered to restore with a structure of
stone ; to keep there a garrison equal to the one at Montreal ; to em-
ploy as many as fifteen laborers during the first year; to clear and till
the land, and to supply the surrounding Indian villages with Recollect
missionaries in furtherance of the cause of religion, all at his own ex-
pense, on condition that the king would grant him the right of seigniory
and a monopoly of the trade incident to it. He further petitioned for
title of nobility in consideration of voyages he had already made in
Canada at his own expense, and which had resulted in the great bene-
fit to the king's colony. The king heard the petition graciously, and

* Talon's letter to the king 1 : Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 73. La Salle's Memoir to
the king, on the necessity of fitting out an expedition to take possession of Louisiana:
Historical Collections of Louisiana, part 1, p. 5.

56 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

on the 13th May, 1675, granted La Salle and his heirs Fort Frontenac,
with four leagues of the adjacent country along the lakes and rivers
above and below the fort and a half a league inward, and the adjacent
islands, with the right of hunting and fishing on Lake Ontario and
the circumjacent rivers. On the same day, the king issued to La Salle
letters patent of nobility, having, as the king declares, been informed
of the worthy deeds performed by the people, either in reducing or
civilizing the savages or in defending themselves against their frequent
insults, especially those of the Iroquois ; in despising the greatest dan-
gers in order to extend the king's name and empire to the extremity
of that new world ; and desiring to reward those who have thus ren-
dered themselves most eminent ; and wishing to treat most favorably
Robert Cavalier Sieur de La Salle on account of the good and laudable
report that has been rendered concerning his actions in Canada, the
king does ennoble and decorate with the title of nobility the said cav-
alier, together with his wife and children. He left France with these
precious documents, and repaired to Fort Frontenac, where he per-
formed the conditions imposed by the terms of his titles.

He sailed for France again in 1677, and in the following year after
he and Colbert had fully matured their plans, he again petitioned the
king for a license to prosecute further discoveries. The king granted
his request, giving him a permit, under date of May 12, 1678, to en-
deavor to discover the western part of New France ; the king avowing
in the letters patent that " he had nothing more at heart than the dis-
covery of that country where there is a prospect of finding a way to
penetrate as far as Mexico," and authorizing La Salle to prosecute dis-
coveries, and construct forts in such places as he might think necessary,
and enjoy there the same monopoly as at Fort Frontenac, all on con-
dition that the enterprise should be prosecuted at LaSalle's expense,
and completed within five years; that he should not trade with the
savages, who carried their peltries and beavers to Montreal ; and that
the governor, intendant, justices, and other officers of the king in New
France, should aid La Salle in his enterprise.* Before leaving France,
La Saiie, through the Prince de Conti, was introduced to one Henri
de Tonti, an Italian by birth, who for eight years had been in the
French service. Having had one of his hands shot off while in Sicily,
he repaired to France to seek other employment. It was a most for-
tunate meeting. Tonti a name that should be prominently associ-
ated with discoveries in this part of America became La Salle's
companion. Ever faithful and courageous, he ably and zealously fur-

* Vide the petitions of La Salle to, and the grants from, the king, which are found
at length in the Paris Documents, vol. 9, pp. 122 to 127.

LOUIS HENNEPIN. 57

thered all of La Salle's plans, followed and defended him under the
most discouraging trials, with an unselfish fidelity that has few paral-
lels in any age.

Supplied with this new grant of enlarged powers, La Salle, in com-
pany with Tonti, or Tonty, as Dr. Sparks says he has seen the name
written in an autograph letter, and thirty men, comprising pilots,
sailors, carpenters and other mechanics, with a supply of material
necessary for the intended exploration, left France for Quebec. Here
the party were joined by some Canadians, and the whole force was
sent forward to Fort Frontenac, at the outlet of Lake Ontario, since
this fort had been granted to La Salle. He had, in conformity to the
terms of his letters patent, greatly enlarged and strengthened its de-
fenses. Here he met Louis Hennepin, a Franciscan Friar, whom it
seems had been sent thither along with Father Gabriel de la Ribourde
and Zenobius Membre, all of the same religious order, to accompany
La Salle's expedition. In the meantime, Hennepin was occupied in
pastoral labors among the soldiers of the garrison, and the inhabitants
of a little hamlet of peasants near by, and proselyting the Indians of
the neighboring country. Hennepin, from his own account, had not
only traveled over several parts of Europe before coming to Canada,
but since his arrival in America, had spent much time in roaming
about among the savages, to gratify his love of adventure and acquire
knowledge.

Hennepin's name and writings are so prominently connected with
the early history of the Mississippi Yalley, and, withal, his contradic-
tory statements, made at a later day of his life, as to the extent of his
own travels, have so clouded his reputation with grave doubt as to his
regard for truth, that we will turn aside and give the reader a sketch
of this most singular man and his claims as a discoverer. He was
bold, courageous, patient and hopeful under the most trying fatigues ;
and had a taste for the privations and dangers of a life among the
savages, whose ways and caprices he well understood, and knew how
to turn them to insure his own safety. He was a shrewd observer and
possessed a faculty for that detail and little minutiae, which make a
narrative racy and valuable. He was vain and much given to self-
glorification. He accompanied La Salle, in the first voyage, as far as
Peoria Lake, and he and Father Zenobe Membre are the historians of
that expedition. From Peoria Lake he went down the Illinois, under
orders from La Salle, and up the Mississippi beyond St. Anthony's
Falls, giving this name to the falls. This interesting voyage was not
prosecuted voluntarily ; for Hennepin and his two companions were
captured by the Sioux and taken up the river as prisoners, often in

58 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

great peril of their lives. He saw La Salle no more, after parting with
him at Peoria Lake. He was released from captivity through the
intervention of Mons. Duluth, a French Coureur de Bois, who had
previously established a trade with the Sioux, on the upper Mississippi,
by way of Lake Superior. After his escape, Hennepin descended the
Mississippi to the mouth of the "Wisconsin, which he ascended, made
the portage at the head of Fox River, thence to Green Bay and Mack-
inaw, by the route pursued by Joliet and Marquette on their way to
the Mississippi, seven years before. From Mackinaw he proceeded to
France, where, in 1683, he published, under royal authority, an account
of his travels. For refusing to obey an order of his superiors, to return
to America, he was banished from France. He went to Holland and
obtained the favor and patronage of William HI, king of England, to
whose service, as he himself says, " he entirely devoted himself." In
Holland, he received money and sustenance from Mr. Blathwait, King
William's secretary of war, while engaged in preparing a new volume
of his voyages, which was published at Utrecht, in 1697, and dedicated
"To His Most Excellent Majesty William the Third." The revised
edition contains substantially all of the first, and a great deal besides ;
for in this last work Hennepin lays claim, for the first time, to having
gone down the Mississippi to its mouth, thus seeking to deprive La
Salle of the glory attaching to his name, on account of this very dis-
covery. La Salle had now been dead about fourteen years, and from
the time he went down the Mississippi, in 1682, to the hour of his
death, although his discovery was well known, especially to Hennepin,
the latter never laid any claim to having anticipated him in the discov-
ery. Besides, Hennepin's own account, after so long a silence, of his
pretended voyage down the river is so utterly inconsistent with itself,
especially with respect to dates and the impossibility of his traveling
the distances within the time he alleges, that the story carries its own
refutation. For this mendacious act, Father Hennepin has merited the
severest censures of Charlevoix, Jared Sparks, Francis Parkman, Dr.
Shea and other historical critics.

His first work is generally regarded as authority. That he did go
up the Mississippi river there seems to be no controversy, while grave
doubts prevail as to many statements in his last publication, which
would otherwise pass without suspicion were they not found in com-
pany with statements known to be untrue.

In the preface to his last work, issued in 1697, Father Hennepin
assigns as a reason why he did not publish his descent of the Missis-
sippi in his volume issued in 1683, " that I was obliged to say nothing
of the course of the Mississippi, from the mouth of the Illinois down

HENNEPIN AND LA SALLE. 59

to the sea, for fear of disobliging M. La Salle, with whom I began my
discovery. This gentleman, alone, would have the glory of having dis-
covered the course of that river. But when he heard that I had done
it two years before him he could never forgive me, though, as I have
said, I was so modest as to publish nothing of it. This was the true
cause of his malice against me, and of the barbarous usage I met with
in France."

Still, his description of places he did visit ; the aboriginal names
and geographical features of localities ; his observations, especially upon
the manners and customs of the Indians, and other facts which he had
no motive to misrepresent, are generally regarded as true in his last as
well as in his first publication. His works, indeed, are the only repos-
itories of many interesting particulars relating to the northwest, and
authors quote from him, some indiscriminately and others with more
caution, while all criticise him without measure.

Hennepin was born in Belgium in 1640, as is supposed, and died
at Utrecht, Holland, within a few years after issuing his last book. This
was republished in London in 1698, the translation into English being
wretchedly executed. The book, aside from its historical value and the
notoriety attaching to it because of the new claims Hennepin makes,
is quite a curiosity. It is made up of Hennepin's own travels, blended
with his fictitious discoveries, scraps and odd ends taken from the
writings of other travelers without giving'credit ; the whole embellished
with plates and a map inserted by the bookseller, and the text empha-
sized with italics and displayed type; all designed to render it a speci-
men, as it probably was in its day, of the highest skill attained in the
art of book-making.

La Salle brought up the St. Lawrence to Fort Frontenac the
anchors, cordage and other material to be used in the vessel which he
designed to construct above the Falls of Niagara for navigating the
western lakes. He already had three small vessels on Lake Ontario,
which he had made use of in a coasting trade with the Indians. One
of these, a brigantine of ten tons, was loaded with his effects ; his men,
including Fathers Gabriel, Zenobius Membre and Hennepin, who were,
as Father Zenobia declares, commissioned with care of the spiritual
direction of the expedition, were placed aboard, and on the 18th of
November the vessel sailed westward for the Niagara River. They
kept the northern shore, and run into land and bartered for corn with
the Iroquois at one of their villages, situated where Toronto, Canada,
is located, and for fear of being frozen up in the river, which here
empties into the lake, had to cut the ice from about their ship. Detained
by adverse winds, they remained here until the wind was favorable,

60 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

when they sailed across the end of the lake and found an anchorage in
the mouth of Niagara River on the 6th of December. The season was
far advanced, and the ground covered with snow a foot deep. Large
masses of ice were floating down the river endangering the vessel, and
it was necessary to take measures to give it security. Accordingly the
vessel was hauled with cables up against the strong current. One of
the cables broke, and the vessel itself came very near being broken to
pieces or carried away by the ice, which was grinding its way to the
open lake. Finally, by sheer force of human strength, the vessel was
dragged to the shore, and moored with a strong hawser under a protect-
ing cliff out of danger from the floating ice. A cabin, protected with
palisades, for shelter and to serve as a magazine to store the supplies,
was also constructed. The ground was frozen so hard that it had to be
thawed out with boiling water before the men could drive stakes into it.

The movements of La Salle excited, first the curiosity of the Iro-
quois Indians, in whose country he was an intruder, and then their jeal-
ousy became aroused as they began to fear he intended the erection of a
fort. The Sieur de La Salle, says the frank and modest-minded Father
Zenobe Membre, "with his usual address met the principal Iroquois
chiefs in conference, and gained them so completely that they not only
agreed, but offered, to contribute with all their means to the execu-
tion of his designs. The conference lasted for some time. La Salle
also sent many canoes to trade north and south of the lake among
these tribes." Meanwhile La Salle's enemies were busy in thwarting
his plans. They insinuated themselves among the Indians in the
vicinity of Niagara, and filled their ears with all sorts of stories to La
Salle's discredit, and aroused feelings of such distrust that work on the
fort, or depot for supplies, had to be suspended, and La Salle content
himself with a house surrounded by palisades.

A place was selected above the falls,* on the eastern side of the
river, for the construction of the new vessel.

The ground was cleared away, trees were felled, and the carpen-
ters set to work. The keel of the vessel was laid on the 26th of Jan-
uary, and some of the plank being ready to fasten on, La Salle drove
the first spike. As the work progressed, La Salle made several trips, over
ice and snow, and later in the spring with vessels, to Fort Frontenac, to
hurry forward provisions and material. One of his vessels was lost on
Lake Ontario, heavily laden with a cargo of valuable supplies, through
the fault or willful perversity of her pilots. The disappointment over this
calamity, says Hennepin, would have dissuaded any other person than

* Francis Parkman, in his valuable work, "The Discovery of the Great West,"
p. 133, locates the spot at the mouth of Cayuga Creek on the American shore.

THE FIRST SAIL ON LAKE ERIE. 61

La Salle from the further prosecution of the enterprise. The men
worked industriously on the ship. The most of the Iroquois having
gone to war with a nation on the northern side of Lake Erie, the few
remaining behind were become less insolent than before. Still they
lingered about where the work was going on, and continued expres-
sions of discontent at what the French were doing. One of them let
on to be drunk and attempted to kill the blacksmith, but the latter
repulsed the Indian with a piece of iron red-hot from the forge. The
Indians threatened to burn the vessel on the stocks, and might have
done so were it not constantly guarded. Much of the time the only
food of the men was Indian corn and lish ; the distance to Fort Fron-
tenac and the inclemency of the winter rendering it out of power ta
procure a supply of other or better provisions.

The frequent alarms from the Indians, a want of wholesome food,
the loss of the vessel with its promised supplies, and a refusal of the
neighboring tribes to sell any more of their corn, reduced the party to
such extremities that the ship-carpenters tried to run away. They
were, however, persuaded to remain and prosecute their work. Two
Mohegan Indians, successful hunters in La Salle's service, were fortu-
nate enough to bring in some wild goats and other game they had
killed, which greatly encouraged the workmen to go on with their task
more briskly than before. The vessel was completed within six months
from the time its keel was laid. The ship was gotten afloat before en-
tirely finished, to prevent the designs of the natives to burn it. She
was sixty tons burthen, and called the " Griffin," a name given it by
La Salle by way of a compliment to Count Frontenac, whose armorial
bearings were supported by two griffins. Three guns were fired, and
11 Te Deums" chanted at the christening, and prayers offered up for a
prosperous voyage. The air in the wild forest rung with shouts of
joy ; even the Iroqnois, looking suspiciously on, were seduced with
alluring draughts of brandy to lend their deep-mouthed voices to the
happy occasion. The men left their cabins of bark and swung their
hammocks under the deck of the ship, where they could rest with
greater security from the savages than on the shore.

The Griffin, under press of a favorable breeze, and with the help
of twelve men on the shore pulling at tow-ropes, was forced up against
the strong current of the Niagara River to calmer waters at the en-
trance of the lake. On the 7th of August, 1679, her canvas was spread,
and the pilot steering by the compass, the vessel, with La Salle and his
thirty odd companions and their effects aboard, sailed out westward
upon the unknown, silent waters of Lake Erie. In three days they
reached the mouth of Detroit River. Father Hennepin was fairly

62 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

delighted with the country along this river it was "so well situated
and the soil so fertile. Vast meadows extending back from the strait
and terminating at the uplands, which were clad with vineyards, and
plum and pear and other fruit-bearing trees of nature's own planting, all
so well arranged that one would think they could not have been so dis-
posed without the help of art. The country was also well stocked
with deer, bear, wild goats, turkeys, and other animals and birds, that
supplied a most relishing food. The forest comprised walnut and
other timber in abundance suitable for building purposes. So charmed
was he with the prospect that he " endeavored to persuade La Salle to
settle at the ' De Troit,' " it being in the midst of so many savage na-
tions among whom a good trade could be established. La Salle would
not listen to this proposal. He said he would make no settlement
within one hundred leagues of Frontenac, lest other Europeans would
be before them in the new country they were going to discover. This,
says Hennepin, was the pretense of La Salle and the adventurers who
were with him ; for I soon discovered that their intention was to buy all
the furs and skins of the remotest savages who, as they thought, did
not know their value, and thus enrich themselves in one single voyage.
On Lake Huron the Griffin encountered a storm. The main-yards
and topmast were blown away, giving the ship over to the mercy of
the winds. There was no harbor to run into for shelter. La Salle,
although a courageous man, gave way to his fears, and said they all
were undone. Everyone thereupon fell upon their knees to say pray-
ers and prepare for death, except the pilot, who cursed and swore all
the while at La Salle for bringing him there to perish in a nasty lake,
after he had acquired so much renown in a long and successful naviga-
tion on the ocean. The storm abated, and on the 27th of August, the
Griffin resumed her course northwest, and was carried on the evening
of the same day beyond the island of Mackinaw to point St. Ignace,
and safely anchored in a bay that is sheltered, except from the south,
by the projecting mainland.

CHAPTER IX.

LA SALLE'S VOYAGE CONTINUED.

ST. IGNACE, or Mackinaw, as previously stated, had become a princi-
pal center of the Jesuit missions, and it had also grown into a head-
quarters for an extensive Indian trade. Duly licensed traders, as well
as the Coureurs de Bois, men who had run wild, as it were, and by
their intercourse with the nations had thrown off all restraints of
civilized life, resorted to this vicinity in considerable numbers. These,
lost to all sense of national pride, instead of sustaining took every
measure to thwart La Salle's plans. They, with some of the dissatis-
fied crew, represented to the Indians that La Salle and his associates
were a set of dangerous and ambitious adventurers, who meant to
engross all the trade in furs and skins and invade their liberties. These
jealous and meddlesome busybodies had already, before the arrival of
the Griffin, succeeded in seducing fifteen men from La Salle's service,
whom with others, he had sent forward the previous spring, under
command of Tonty, with a stock of merchandise; 'and, instead of
going to the tribes -beyond and preparing the way for a friendly recep-
tion of La Salle, as they were ordered to do, they loitered about
Mackinaw the whole summer and squandered the goods, in spite of
Tonty's persistent efforts to urge them forward in the performance of
their duty. La Salle sent out other parties to trade with the natives,
and these went so far, and were so busy in bartering for and collect-
ing furs, that they did not return to Mackinaw until November. It
was now getting late and La Salle was warned of the dangerous storms
that sweep the lakes at the beginning of winter ; he resolved, therefore,
to continue his voyage without waiting the return of his men. He
weighed anchor and sailed westward into Lake Michigan as far as the
islands at the entrance of Green Bay, then called the Pottawatomie
Islands, for the reason that they were then occupied by bands of that
tribe. On one of these islands La Salle found some of the men
belonging to his advance part}^ of traders, and who, having secured a
large quantity of valuable furs, had long and impatiently waited his
coming.

La Salle, as is already apparent, determined to engage in a fur trade
that already and legitimately belonged to merchants operating at

64 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Montreal, and with which the terms of his own license prohibited his
interfering. Without asking any one's advice he resolved to load his
ship with furs and send it back to Niagara, and the furs to Quebec, and
out of the proceeds of the sale to discharge some very pressing debts.
The pilot with five men to man the vessel were ordered to proceed with
the Griffin to Niagara, and return with all imaginable speed and join La
Salle at the mouth of the St. Joseph River, near the southern shore of
Lake Michigan. The Griffin did not go to Green Bay City, as many
writers have assumed in hasty perusals of the original authorities, or
even penetrate the body of water known as Green Bay beyond the
chain of islands at its mouth.

The resolution of La Salle, taken, it seems, on the spur of the
moment, to send his ship back down the lakes, and prosecute his
voyage the rest of the way to the head of Lake Michigan in frail
birchen canoes, was a most unfortunate measure. It delayed his
discoveries two years, brought severe hardships upon himself and
greatly embarrassed all his future plans. The Griffin itself was lost,
with all her cargo, valued at sixty thousand livres. She, nor her crew,
was ever heard of after leaving the Pottawatomie Islands. What
became of the ship and men in charge remains to this day a mystery,
or veiled in a cloud of conjecture. La Salle himself, says Francis
Parkman, "grew into a settled conviction that the Griffin had been
treacherously sunk by the pilot and sailors to whom he had intrusted
her ; and he thought he had, in after-years, found evidence that the
authors of the crime, laden with the merchandise they had taken from
her, had reached the Mississippi and ascended it, hoping to join Du
Shut, the famous chief of the Coureurs de Bois, and enrich them-
selves by traffic with the northern tribes.*

The following is, substantially, Hennepin's account of La Salle's
canoe voyage from the mouth of Green Bay south, along the shore of
Lake Michigan, past Milwaukee and Chicago, and around the southern
end of the lake ; thence north along the eastern shore to the mouth of
the St. Joseph River ; thence up the St. Joseph to South Bend, mak-
ing the portage here to the head-waters of the Kankakee ; thence down
the Kankakee and Illinois through Peoria Lake, with an account of
the building of Fort Crevecreur. Hennepin's narrative is full of in-
teresting detail, and contains many interesting observations upon the
condition of the country, the native inhabitants as they appeared nearly
two hundred years ago. The privation and suffering to which La Salle
and his party were exposed in navigating Lake Michigan at that early
day, and late in the fall of the year, when the waters were vexed with:

* Discovery of the Great West, p. 169.

FIRST VOYAGE ON LAKE MICHIGAN. 65

tempestuous storms, illustrate the courage and daring of the under-
taking.

Their suffering did not terminate with their voyage upon the lake.
Difficulties of another kind were experienced on the St. Joseph, Kan-
kakee and Illinois Rivers. Hennepin's is, perhaps, the first detailed
account we have of this part of the "Great West," and is therefore of
great interest and value on this account.

"We left the Pottawatomies to continue our voyage, being fourteen
men in all, in four canoes. I had charge of the smallest, which carried
five hundredweight and two men. My companions being recently
from Europe, and for that reason being unskilled in the management
of these kind of boats, its whole charge fell upon me in stormy
weather.

" The canoes were laden with a smith's forge, utensils, tools for car-
penters, joiners and sawyers, besides our goods and arms. We steered
to the south toward the mainland, from which the Pottawatomie
Islands are distant some forty leagues ; but about midway, and in the
night time, we were greatly endangered by a sudden storm. The
waves dashed into our canoes, and the night was so dark we had -great
difficulty in keeping our canoes together. The daylight coming on,
we reached the shore, where we remained for four days, waiting for the
lake to grow calm. In the meantime our Indian hunter went in quest
of game, but killed nothing other than a porcupine ; this, however,
made our Indian corn more relishing. The weather becoming fair, we
resumed our voyage, rowing all day and well into the night, along the
western coast of the Lake of the Illinois. The wind again grew to fresh,
and we landed upon a rocky beach where we had nothing to protect
ourselves against a storm of snow and rain except the clothing on our
persons. We remained here two days for the sea to go down, hav-
ing made a little fire from wood cast ashore by the waves. We pro-
ceeded on our voyage, and toward evening the winds again forced us
to a beach covered with rushes, where we remained three days ; and in
the meantime our provisions, consisting only of pumpkins and Indian
corn purchased from the Pottawatomies, entirely gave out. Our
canoes were so heavily laden that we could not carry provisions with
us, and we were compelled to rely on bartering for such supplies on
our way. We left this dismal place, and after twelve leagues rowing
came to another Pottawatomie village, whose inhabitants stood upon
the beach to receive us. But M. La Salle refused to let anyone land,
notwithstanding the severity of the weather, fearing some of his men
might run away. We were in such great peril that La Salle flung
himself into the water, after we had gone some three leagues farther,
5

66 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

and with the aid of his three men carried the canoe of which he had
charge to the shore, upon their shoulders, otherwise it would have been
broken to pieces by the waves. We were obliged to do the same with
the other canoes. I, myself, carried good Father Gabriel upon my
back, his age being so well advanced as not to admit of his ventur-
ing in the w r ater. We took ourselves to a piece of rising ground to
avoid surprise, as we had no manner of acquaintance with the great
number of savages whose village was near at hand. We sent three
men into the village to buy provisions, under protection of the calu-
met or pipe of peace, which the Indians at Pottawatomie Islands had
presented us as a means of introduction to, and a measure of safety
against, other tribes that we might meet on our way."

The calumet has always been a symbol of amity among all the In-
dian tribes of North America, and so uniformly used by them in all
their negotiations with their own race, and Europeans as well ; and
Father Hennepin's description of it, and the respect that is accorded to
its presence, are so truthful that we here insert his account of it at
length :

" This calumet," says Father Hennepin, " is the most mysterious
thing among the savages, for it is used in all important transactions.
It is nothing else, however, than a large tobacco pipe, made of red,
black, or white stone. The head is highly polished, and the quill or
stem is usually about two feet in length, made of a pretty strong reed
or cane, decorated with highly colored feathers interlaced with locks of
women's hair. Wings of gaudily plumaged birds are tied to it, mak-
ing the calumet look like the wand of Mercury, or staff which ambas-
sadors of state formerly carried when they went to conduct treaties of
peace. The stem is sheathed in the skin of the neck of birds called
'ITuars' (probably the loon), which are as large as our geese, and
spotted with white and black; or else with those of a duck (the little
wood duck whose neck presents a beautiful contrast of colors) that
make their nests upon trees, although the water is their ordinary ele-
ment, and whose feathers are of many different colors. However,
every tribe ornament their calumets according to their own fancy, with
the feathers of such birds as they may have in their own country.

"A pipe, such as I have described, is a pass of safe conduct among all
the allies of the tribe which has given it ; and in all embassies it is car-
ried as a symbol of peace, and is always respected as such, for the sav-
ages believe some great misfortune would speedily befall them if they
violated the public faith of the calumet. All their enterprises, declara-
tions of war, treaties of peace, as w r ell as all of the rest of their cere-
monies, are sealed with the calumet. The pipe is filled with the best

CANOE VOYAGE ON" LAKE MICHIGAN. 67

tobacco they have, and then it is presented to those with whom they
are about to conduct an important affair ; and after they have smoked
out of it, the one offering it does the same. I would have perished,"
concludes Hennepin, "had it not been for the calumet. Our three
men, carrying the calumet and being well armed, went to the little
village about three leagues from the place where we landed ; they
found no one at home, for the inhabitants, having heard that we refused
to land at the other village, supposed we were enemies, and had aban-
doned their habitations. In their absence our men took some of their
corn, and left instead, some goods, to let them know we were neither
their enemies nor robbers. Twenty of the inhabitants of this village
came to our encampment on the beach, armed with axes, small guns,
bows, and a sort of club, which, in their language, means a head-
breaker. La Salle, with four well-armed men, advanced toward them
for the purpose of opening a conversation. He requested them to come
near to us, saying he had a party of hunters out who might come
across them and take their lives. They came forward and took seats
at the foot of an eminence, where we were encamped ; and La Salle
amused them with the relation of his voyage, which he informed them
lie had undertaken for their advantage ; and thus occupied their time
until the arrival of the three men who had been sent out with the
calumet ; on seeing which the savages gave a great shout, arose to their
feet and danced about. We excused our men from having taken some
of their corn, and informed them that we had left its true value in
gOods ; they were so well pleased with this that they immediately sent
for more corn, and on the next day they made us a gift of as much as
we could conveniently find room for in our canoes.

' ; The next day morning the old men of the tribe came to us with
their calumet of peace, and entertained us with a free offering of wild
goats, which their own hunters had taken. In return, we presented
them our thanks, accompanied with some axes, knives, and several little
toys for their wives, with all which they were very much pleased.

" We left this place and continued our voyage along the coast of
the lake, which, in places, is so steep that we often found it difficult to
obtain a landing ; and the wind was so violent as to oblige us to carry
our canoes sometimes upon top of the bluff, to prevent their being
dashed in pieces. The stormy weather lasted four days, causing us
much suffering ; for every time we made the shore we had to wade
in the water, carrying our effects and canoes upon our shoulders. The
water being very cold, most of us were taken sick. Our provisions
again failed us, which, with the fatigues of rowing, made old Father
Gabriel faint away in such a manner that we despaired of his life.

68 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

With a use of a decoction of hyacinth I had with me, and which I
found of great service on our voyage, he was restored to his senses.
We had no other subsistence but a handful of corn per man every
twenty-four hours, which we parched or boiled ; and, although reduced
to such scanty diet, we rowed our canoes almost daily, from morning
to night. Our men found some hawthorns and other wild berries^
of which they ate so freely that most of them were taken sick, and we
imagined that they were poisoned.

" Yet the more we suifered, the more, by God's grace, did I become
stronger, so that I could outrow the other canoes. Being in great dis-
tress, He, who takes care of his meanest creatures, provided us with
an unexpected relief. We saw over the land a great many ravens
and eagles circling in mid-air ; from whence we conjectured there was
prey near by. We landed, and, upon search, found the half of a wild
goat which the wolves had strangled. This provision was very ac-
ceptable, and the rudest of our men could not but praise a kind Provi-
dence, who took such particular care of us.

" Having thus refreshed ourselves, we continued our voyage directly
to the southern part of the lake, every day the country becoming finer
and the climate more temperate. Oh the 16th of October we fell in
with abundance of game. Our Indian hunter killed several deer and
wild goats, and our men a great many big fat turkey-cocks, with
which we regaled ourselves for several days. On the 18th we came to
the farther end of the lake.* Here we landed, and our men were sent
out to prospect the locality, and found great quantities of ripe grapes,
the fruit of which were as large as damask plums. We cut down th&
trees to gather the grapes, out of which we made pretty good wine,,
which we put into gourds, used as flasks, and buried them in the sand
to keep the contents from turning sour. Many of the trees here are
loaded with vines, which, if cultivated, would make as good wine as
any in Europe. The fruit was all the more relishing to us, because we
wanted bread."

Other travelers besides Hennepin, passing this locality at an early
day, also mention the same fact. It would seem, therefore, that Lake
Michigan had the same modifying influence upon, and equalized the
temperature of, its eastern shore, rendering it as famous for its wild
fruits and grapes, two hundred years ago, as it has since become noted
for the abundance and perfection of its cultivated varieties.

" Our men discovered prints of men's feet. The men were ordered

* From the description given of the country, the time occupied, and forest growth,
the voyagers must now be eastward of Michigan City, and where the lake shore trends
more rapidly to the north.

SAVAGES PLUNDER LA SALLE. 69

to be upon guard and make no noise. In spite of this precaution, one
of our men, finding a bear upon a tree, shot him dead and dragged
him into camp. La Salle was very angry at this indiscretion, and, to
avoid surprise, placed sentinels at the canoes, under which our effects
had been put for protection against the rain. There was a hunting
party of Fox Indians from the vicinity of Green Bay, about one hun-
dred and twenty in number, encamped near to us, who, having heard
the noise of the gun of the man who shot the bear, became alarmed,
and sent out some of their men to dfscover who we were. These
spies, creeping upon their bellies, and observing great silence, came
in the night-time and stole the coat of La Salle's footman and some
goods secreted under the canoes. The sentinel, hearing a noise, gave the
alarm, and we all ran to our arms. On being discovered, and thinking
our numbers were greater than we really were, they cried out, in
the dark, that they were friends. We answered, friends did not visit
at such unseasonable hours, and that their actions were more like
those of robbers, who designed to plunder and kill us. Their headsman
replied that they heard the noise of our gun, and, as they knew that
none of the neighboring tribes possessed firearms, they supposed we
were a war party of Iroquois, come with the design of murdering
them ; but now that they learned we were Frenchmen from Canada,
whom they loved as their own brethren, they would anxiously wait
until daylight, so that they could smoke out of our calumet. This is a
compliment among the savages, and the highest mark they can give of
their affection.

" We appeared satisfied with their reasons, and gave leave to four of
their old men, only, to come into our camp, telling them we would not
permit a greater number, as their young men were much given to
stealing, and that we would not suffer such indignities. Accordingly,
four of their old men came among us; we entertained them until
morning, when they departed. After they were gone, we found out
about the robbery of the canoes, and La Salle, well knowing the genius
of the savages, saw, if he allowed this affront to pass without resenting
it, that we would be constantly exposed to a renewal of like indigni-
ties. Therefore, it was resolved to exact prompt satisfaction. La
Salle, with four of his men, went out and captured two of the Indian
hunters. One of the prisoners confessed the robbery, with the cir-
cumstances connected with it. The thief was detained, and his comrade
was released and sent to his band to tell their headsman that the cap-
tive in custody would be put to death unless the stolen property were
returned.

" The savages were greatly perplexed at La Salle's peremptory mes-

70 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

sage. They could not comply, for they had cut up the goods and coat
and divided among themselves the pieces and the buttons ; they there-
fore resolved to rescue their man by force. The next day, October
30, they advanced to attack us. The peninsula we were encamped
on was separated from the forest where the savages lay by a little sandy
plain, on which and near the wood were two or three eminences. La
Salle determined to take possession of the most prominent of these
elevations, and detached five of his men to occupy it, following him-
self, at a short distance, with all of his force, every one having rolled
their coats about the left arm, which was held up as a protection
against the arrows of the savages. Only eight of the enemy had fire-
arms. The savages were frightened at our advance, and their young
men took behind the trees, but their captains stood their ground, while
we moved forward and seized the knoll. I left the two other Francis-
cans reading the usual prayers, and went about among the men ex-
horting them to their duty ; I had been in some battles and sieges in
Europe, and was not afraid of these savages, and La Salle was highly
pleased with my exhortations, and their influence upon his men. When
I considered what might be the result of the quarrel, and how much
more Christian-like it would be to prevent the effusion of blood, and
end the difficulty in a friendly manner, I went toward the oldest
savage, who, seeing me unarmed, supposed I came with designs of a
mediator, and received me with civility. In the meantime one of our
men observed that one of the savages had a piece of the stolen cloth
wrapped about his head, and he went up to the savage and snatched
the cloth away. This vigorous action so much terrified the savages that,
although they were near six score against eleven, they presented me-
with the pipe of peace, which I received. M. La Salle gave his word
that they might come to him in security. Two of their old men came
forward, and in a speech disapproved the conduct of their young men ;
that they could not restore the goods taken, but that, having been cut
to pieces, they could only return the articles which were not spoiled,
and pay for the rest. The orators presented, with their speeches, some
garments made of beaver skins, to appease the wrath of M. La Salle,
who, frowning a little, informed them that while he designed to wrong-
no one, he did not intend others should affront or injure him ; but, inas-
much as they did not approve what their young men had done, and were-
willing to make restitution for the same, he would accept their gifts and
become their friend. The conditions were fully complied with, and
peace happily concluded without farther hostility.

" The day was spent in dancing, feasting and speech-making. The
chief of the band had taken particular notice of the behavior of the

INDIAN SPEECH TO THE GRAY-COATS. 71

Franciscans. 'These gray-coats,'* said the chief of the Foxes, 'we
value very much. They go barefooted as well as we. They scorn our
beaver gowns, and decline all other presents. They do not carry arms
to kill us. They flatter and make much of our children, and give them
knives and other toys without expecting any reward. Those of our
tribe who have been to Canada tell us that Onnotio (so they call the
Governor) loves them very much, and that the Fathers of the Gown
have given up all to come and see us. Therefore, you who are captain
over all these men, be pleased to leave with us one of these gray-coats,
whom we will conduct to our village when we shall have killed what
we design of the buffaloes. Thou art also master of these warriors ;
remain with us, instead of going among the Illinois, who, already
advised of your coming, are resolved to kill you and all of your
soldiers. And how can you resist so powerful nation ? '

" The day November 1st we again embarked on the lake, and came
to the mouth of the river of the Miamis, which comes from the south-
east and falls into the lake."

* While the Jesuit Fathers wore black gowns as a distinctive mark of their sect, the
Recollects, or Franciscan missionaries, wore coats of gray.

CHAPTER X.

THE SEVERAL MTAMIS LA SALLE'S VOYAGE DOWN THE ILLINOIS.

MUCH confusion has arisen because, at different periods, the name
of " Miami " has been applied to no less than five different rivers, viz. :
The St. Joseph, of Lake Michigan ; the Maumee, often designated as
the Miami of the Lakes, to distinguish it from the Miami which falls
into the Ohio River below Cincinnati ; then there is the Little Miami
of the Ohio emptying in above its greater namesake; and finally
the Wabash, which with more propriety bore the name of the
" River of the Miamis." The French, it is assumed, gave the name
" Miami " to the river emptying into Lake Michigan, for the reason that
there was a village of that tribe on its banks before and at the time of La
Salle's first visit, as already noted on page 24. The name was not of
long duration, for it was soon exchanged for that of St. Joseph, by which
it has ever since been known. La Hontan is the last authority who
refers to it by the name of Miami. Shortly after the year named, the
date being now unknown, a Catholic mission was established up the
river, and, Charlevoix says, about six leagues below the portage, at
South Bend, and called the Mission of St. Joseph ; and from this cir-
cumstance, we may safely infer, the river acquired the same name. It
is not known, either, by whom the Mission of St. Joseph was organ-
ized ; very probably, however, by Father Claude Allouez. This good
man, and to whose writings the people of the west are so largely
indebted for many valuable historical reminiscences, seems to have been
forgotten in the respect that is showered upon other more conspicuous
though less meritorious characters. The Mission of the Immaculate
Conception, after Marquette's death, remained unoccupied for the space
of two years, then Claude Jean Allouez received orders to proceed
thither from the Mission of St. James, at the town of Maskoutens, on
Fox River, Wisconsin. Leaving in October, 1676, on account of an
exceptionally early winter, he was compelled to delay his journey until
the following February, when he again started ; reaching Lake Mich-
igan on the eve of St. Joseph, he called the lake after this saint.
Embarking on the lake on the 23d of March, and coasting along the
western shore, after numerous delays occasioned by ice and storm, he
arrived at Chicago River. lie then made the portage and entered the

LA SALLE REACHES THE ST. JOSEPH. 73

Kaskaskia village, which was probably near Peoria Lake, on the 8th of
April, 1677. The Indians gave him a very cordial reception, and
flocked from all directions to the town to hear the "Black Gown"
relate the truths of Christianity. For the glorification of God and the
Blessed Virgin Immaculate, Allouez "erected, in the midst of the
village, a cross twenty-five feet high, chanting the Vexilla Regis in the
presence of an admiring and respectful throng of Indians ; he covered
it with garlands of beautiful flowers."* Father Allouez did not remain
but a short time at the mission ; leaving it that spring he returned in
1678, and continued there until La Salle's arrival in the winter of
1679-80. The next succeeding decade Allouez passed either at this
mission or at the one on St. Joseph's River, on the eastern side of Lake
Michigan, where he died in 1690. Bancroft says: v Allouez has
imperishably connected his name with the progress of discovery in the
West ; unhonored among us now, he was not inferior in zeal and ability
to any of the great missionaries of his time."

We resume Hennepin's narrative :

"We had appointed this place (the mouth of the St. Joseph) for our
rendezvous before leaving the outlet of Green Bay, and expected to
meet the twenty men we had left at Mackinaw, who, being ordered to
come by the eastern coast of the lake, had a much shorter cut than we,
who came by the Western side ; besides this, their canoes were not so
heavily laden as ours. Still, we found no one here, nor any signs that
they had been here before us.f

" It was resolved to advise M. La Salle that it was imprudent to
remain here any longer for the absent men, and expose ourselves to
the hardships of winter, when it would be doubtful if we could find
the Illinois in their villages, as then they would be divided into fami-
lies, and scattered over the country to subsist more conveniently. We
further represented that the game might fail us, in which event we
must certainly perish with hunger ; whereas, if we went forward, we
would find enough corn among the Illinois, who would rather supply

* "Allouez' Journal," published in Shea's "Discovery on Exploration of the Missis-
sippi Valley."

t In some works, the Geological Surveys of Indiana for 1873, p. 458, among others,
it is erroneously assumed that La Salle was the discoverer of the St. Joseph River.
While Fathers Hennepin and Zenobe Membre, who were with La Salle, may be the only
accessible authors who have described it, the stream and its location was well known
to La Salle and to them, as appears from their own account of it before they had ever
seen it. Before leaving Mackinaw, Tonti was ordered to hunt up the deserters from,
and to bring in the tardy traders belonging to, La Salle's party, and conduct them to
the mouth of the St. Joseph. The pilot of the Griffin was under instruction to bring
her there. Indeed, the conduct of the whole expedition leaves no room to doubt that
the whole route to the Illinois River, by way of the St. Joseph and the Kankakee port-
age, was well known at Mackinaw, and definitely fixed upon by La Salle, at least be-
fore leaving the latter place.

74 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

fourteen men than thirty-two with provisions. We said further that
it would be quite impossible, if we delayed longer, to continue the
voyage until the winter was over, because the rivers would be frozen
over and we could not make use of our canoes. Notwithstanding
these reasons, M. La Salle thought it necessary to remain for the rest
of the men, as we would be in no condition to appear before the Illi-
nois and treat with them with our present small force, whom they
would meet with scorn. That it would be better to delay our entry
into their country, and in the meantime try to meet with some of their
nation, learn their language, and gain their good will by presents.
La Salle concluded his discourse with the declaration that, although all
of his men might run away, as for himself, he would remain alone with
his Indian hunter, and find means to maintain the three missionaries
meaning me and my two clerical brethren. Having come to this con-
clusion, La SaHe called his men together, and advised them that he
expected each one to do his duty ; that he proposed to build a fort
here for the security of the ship and the safety of our goods, and our-
selves, too, in case of any disaster. None of us, at this time, knew
that our ship had been lost. The men were quite dissatisfied at La-
Salle's course, but his reasons therefor were so many that they yielded,
and agreed to entirely follow his directions.

" Just at the mouth of the river was an eminence with a kind of
plateau, naturally fortified. It was quite steep, of a triangular shape,
defended on two sides by the river, and on the other by a deep ravine
which the water had washed out. "We felled the trees that grew on
this hill, and cleared from it the bushes for the distance of two musket
shot. We began to build a redoubt about forty feet long by eighty
broad, with great square pieces of timber laid one upon the other, and
then cut a great number of stakes, some twenty feet long, to drive into
the ground on the river side, to make the fort inaccessible in that direc-
tion. We were employed the whole of the month of November in
this work, which was very fatiguing. having no other food than the
bears our savage killed. These animals are here very abundant, be-
cause of the great quantity of grapes they find in this vicinity. Their
flesh was so fat and luscious that our men grew weary of it, and desired
to go themselves and hunt for wild 'goats. La Salle denied them that
liberty, which made some murmurs among the men, and they went
unwillingly to their work. These annoyances, with the near approach
of winter, together with the apprehension that his ship was lost, gave
La Salle a melancholy which he resolutely tried to but could not con-
ceal.

"We made a hut wherein we performed divine service every Sun-

FORT MIAMIS. 75

day ; and Father Gabriel and myself, who preached alternately, care-
fully selected such texts as were suitable to our situation, and fit to
inspire us with courage, concord, and brotherly love. Our exhorta-
tions produced good results, and deterred our men from tl^eir meditated
desertion. We sounded the mouth of the river and found a sand-bar r
on which we feared our expected ship might strike ; we marked out a
channel through which the vessel might safely enter by attaching
buoys, made of inflated bear-skins, fastened to long poles driven into
the bed of the lake. Two men were also sent back to Mackinac to
await there the return of the ship, and serve as pilots.*

" M. Tonti arrived on the 20th of November with two canoes, laden
with stags and deer, which were a welcome refreshment to our men.
He did not bring more than about one-half of his men, having left
the rest on the opposite side of the lake, within three days' journey of
the fort. La Salle was angry with him on this account, because he
was afraid the men would run away. Tonti's party informed us that
the Griffin had not put into Mackinaw, according to orders, and that
they had heard nothing of her since our departure, although they had
made inquiries of the savages living on the coast of the lake. This
confirmed the suspicion, or rather the belief, that the vessel had been
cast away. However, M. La Salle continued work on the building of
the fort, which was at last completed and called Fort Miamis.

" The winter was drawing nigh, and La Salle, fearful that the ice
would interrupt his voyage, sent M. Tonti back to hurry forward the
men he had left, and to command them to come to him immediately ;
but, meeting with a violent storm, their canoes were driven against
the beach and broken to pieces, and Tonti's men lost their guns and
equipage, and were obliged to return to us overland. A few days,
after this all our men arrived except two, who had deserted. We pre-
pared at once to resume our voyage ; rains having fallen that melted
the ice and made the rivers navigable.

" On the 3d of December, 1679, we embarked, being in all thirty-
three men, in eight canoes. We left the lake of the Illinois and
went up the river of the Miamis, in which we had previously made
soundings. We made about five-and-twenty leagues southward, but
failed to discover the place where we were to land, and carry our canoe&
and effects into the river of the Illinois, which falls into that of the
Meschasipi, that is, in the language of the Illinois, the great river.
We had already gone beyond the place of the portage, and, not know-
ing where we were, we thought proper to remain there, as we were
expecting M. La Salle, who had taken to the land to view the country^
*This is the beginning, at what is now known as Benton Harbor, Michigan.

76 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

We staid here quite a while, and, La Salle failing to appear, I went a
distance into the woods with two men, who fired off their guns to
notify him of the place where we were. In the meantime two other
men went higher up the river, in canoes, in search of him. We all
returned toward evening, having vainly endeavored to find him. The
next day I went up the river myself, but, hearing nothing of him, I
came back, and found our men very much perplexed, fearing he was
lost. However, about four o'clock in the afternoon M. La Salle returned
to us, having his face and hands as black as pitch. He carried two
beasts, as big as muskrats, whose skin \vas very fine, and like ermine.
He had killed them with a stick, as they hung by their tails to the
branches of the trees.

" He told us that the marshes he had met on his way had compelled
him to bring a large compass ; and that, being much delayed by the
snow, which fell very fast, it was past midnight before he arrived upon
the banks of the river, where he fired his gun twice, and, hearing no
answer, he concluded that we had gone higher up the river, and had,
therefore, marched that way. He added that, after three hours' march,
he saw a fire upon a little hill, whither he went directly and hailed us
several times ; but, hearing no reply, he approached and found no per-
son near the fire, but only some dry grass, upon which a man had laid
a little while before, as he conjectured, because the bed was still warm.
He supposed that a savage had been occupying it, who fled upon his
approach, and was now hid in ambuscade near by. La Salle called out
loudly to him in two or three languages, saying that he need not be afraid
of him, and that he was agoing to lie in his bed. La Salle received
no answer. To guard against surprise, La Salle cut bushes and placed
them to obstruct the way, and sat down by the fire, the smoke of
which blackened his hands and face, as I have already observed. Hav-
ing warmed and rested himself, he laid down under the tree upon the
dry grass the savage had gathered and slept well, notwithstanding the
frost and snow. Father Gabriel and I desired -him to keep with his
men, and not to expose himself in the future, as the success of our
enterprise depended solely on him, and he promised to follow our
advice. Our savage, who remained behind to hunt, finding none of
us at the portage, came higher up the river, to where we were, and
told us we had missed the place. We sent all the canoes back under
his charge except one, which I retained for M. La Salle, who was so
weary that he was obliged to remain there that night. I made a little
hut with mats, constructed with marsh rushes, in which we laid down
together for the night. By an unhappy accident our cabin took fire,
and we were very near being burned alive after we had gone to
sleep."

ABORIGINAL NAME OF "KANKAKEE." 77

Here follows Hennepin's description of the Kankakee portage, and
of the marshy grounds about the headwaters of this stream, as already
quoted on page 24:.

" Having passed through the marshes, we came to a vast prairie, in
which nothing grows but grasses, which were at this time dry and
burnt, because the Miamis set the grasses on fire every year, in hunt-
ing for wild oxen (buffalo), as I shall mention farther on. We found
no game, which was a disappointment to us, as our provisions had
begun to fail. Our men traveled about sixty miles without killing
anything other than a lean stag, a small wild goat, a few swan and
two bustards, which were but a scanty subsistence for two and thirty
men. Most of the men were become so weary of this laborious life
that, were it practicable, they would have run away and joined the
savages, who, as we inferred by the great fires which we saw on the
prairies, were not very far from us. There must be an innumerable
quantity of wild cattle in this country, since the ground here is every-
where covered with their horns. Ths Miamis hunt them toward the
latter end of autumn."*

That part of the Illinois River above the Desplaines is called the
Kankakee, which is a corruption of its original Indian name. St.
Cosme, the narrative of whose voyage down the Illinois River, by
way of Chicago, in 1699, and found in Dr. Shea's work of "Early
Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi," refers to it as the The-a-li-ke,
" which is the real river of the Illinois, and (says) that which we de-
scended (the Desplaines) was only a branch." Father Marest, in his
letter of November 9, 1712, narrating a journey he had previously
made from Kaskaskia up to the Mission of St. Joseph, says of the Illi-
nois River : " We transported all there was in the canoe toward the
source of the Illinois (Indian), which they call Hau-ki-ki." Father
Charlevoix, who descended the Kankakee from the portage, in his let-
ter, dated at the source of the river Theakiki, September 17, 1721,
says : " This morning I walked a league farther in the meadow, having
my feet almost always in the water ; afterward I met with a kind of a
pool or marsh, which had a communication with several others of dif-
ferent sizes, but the largest was about a hundred paces in circuit ; these
are the sources of the river The-a-ki-ki, which, by a corrupted pronun-
ciation, our Indians call Ki-a-ki-ki. Theak signifies a wolf, in what
language I do not remember, but the river bears that name because the
Mahingans (Mohicans), who were likewise called wolves, had formerly

* Hennepin and his party were not aware of the migratory habits of the buffalo ;
and that their scarcity on the Kankakee in the winter months was because the herds
had gone southward to warmer latitude and better pasturage.

78 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

taken refuge on its banks." * The Mohicans were of the Algonquin
stock, anciently living east of the Hudson River, where they had been
so persecuted and nearly destroyed by the implacable Iroquois that
their tribal integrity was lost, and they were dispersed in small fami-
lies over the west, seeking protection in isolated places, or living at
sufferance among their Algonquin kindred. They were brave, faithful
to the extreme, famous scouts, and successful hunters. La Salle, ap-
preciating these valuable traits, usually kept a few of them in his em-
ploy. The " savage," or " hunter," so often referred to by Hennepin,
in the extracts we have taken from his journal, was a Mohican.

In a report made to the late Governor Ninian Edwards, in 1812,
by John Hays, interpreter and Coureur de Bois of the routes, rivers
and Indian villages in the then Illinois Territory, Mr. Hays calls the
Kankakee the Quin-que-que, which was probably its French-Indian
name.f Col. Guerdon S. Hubbard, who for many years, datino- back
as early as 1819, was a trader, and commanded great influence with
the bands of Pottawatomies, claiming the Kankakee as their country,
informs the writer that the Pottawatomie name of the Kankakee is
Ky-an-ke-a-kee, meaning "the river of the wonderful or beautiful
land, as it really is, westward of the marshes. "A-kee," "Ah-ke " and
"Aid," in the Algonquin dialect, signifies earth or land.

The name Desplaines, like that of the Kankakee, has undergone
changes in the progress of time. On a French map of Louisiana, in
1717, the Desplaines is laid down as the Chicago River. Just after
Great Britain had secured the possessions of the French east of the
Mississippi, by conquest and treaty, and when the British authorities
were keenly alive to everything pertaining to their newly acquired
possessions, an elaborate map, collated from the most authentic sources
by Eman Bowen, geographer to His Majesty King George the Third,
was issued, and on this map the Desplaines is laid down as the Illinois'
or Chicago River. Many early French writers speak of it, as they
do of the Kankakee above the confluence, as the " River of the Illi-
nois." Its French Canadian name is Au Plein, now changed to Des-
plaines, or Riviere Au Plein, or Despleines, from a variety of hard
maple, that is to say, sugar tree. The Pottawatomies called it She-
shik-mao-shi-ke Se-pe, signifying the river of the tree from which a
great quantity of sap flows in the spring.;}: It has also been sanctified
by Father Zenobe Membre with the name Divine River, and by authors

1761 Charlevokf " Journal of a V yage to America," vol. 2, P: 184. London edition,

^ f I1Hn iS "^ ^ f Governor Edw ards," by his son Ninian W.
\ Long's Second Expedition, vol. 1, p. 173.

NAMES OF THE ILLINOIS. 79

of early western gazetteers, vulgarized by the appellation of Kickapoo
Creek.

Below the confluence of the Desplaines, the Illinois River was, by
La Salle, named the Seignelay, as a mark of his esteem for the brilliant
young Colbert, who succeeded his father as Minister of the Marine.
On the great map, prepared by the engineer Franquelin in 1684, it
is called River Des Illinois, or Macoupins. The name Illinois, which,
fortunately, it will always bear, was derived from the name of the con-
federated tribes who anciently dwelt upon its banks.

"We continued our course," says Hennepin, "upon this river (the
Kankakee and Illinois) very near the whole month of December, at
the latter end of which we arrived at a village of the Illinois, which
lies near a hundred and thirty leagues from Fort Miamis, on the Lake
of the Illinois. We suffered greatly on the passage, for the savages
having set fire to the grass on the prairie, the wild cattle had fled, and
we did not kill one. Some wild turkeys were the only game we
secured. God's providence supported us all the while, and as we
meditated upon the extremities to which we were reduced, regarding
ourselves without hope of relief, we found a very large wild ox stick-
ing fast in the mud of the river. We killed him, and with much diffi-
culty dragged him out of the mud. This was a great refreshment to
our men ; it revived their courage, being so timely and unexpectedly
relieved, they concluded that God approved our undertaking.

The great village of the Illinois, where La Salle's party had now
arrived, has been located with such certainty by Francis Parkman, the
learned historical writer, as to leave no doubt of its identity. It
was on the north side of the Illinois River, above the mouth of the
Yermillion and below Starved Rock, near the little village of Utica,
in La Salle county, Illinois.*

" We found," continues Father Hennepin, " no one in the village,
as we had foreseen, for the Illinois, according to their custom, had di-
vided themselves into small hunting parties. Their absence caused
great perplexity amongst us, for we wanted provisions, and yet did
not dare to meddle with the Indian corn the savages had laid under
ground for their subsistence and for seed. However, our necessity be-
ing very great, and it being impossible to continue our voyage without
any provisions, M. La Salle resolved to take about forty bushels of
corn, and hoped to appease the savages with presents. We embarked
again, with these fresh provisions, and continued to fall down the river,

* Mr. Parkman gives an interesting account of his recent visit to, and the identifi-
cation of, the locality, in an elaborate note in his " Discovery of the Great West," pp.
221, 222.

80 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

which runs directly toward the south. On the 1st of January we went
through a lake (Peoria Lake) formed by the river, about seven leagues
long and one broad. The savages call that place Pimeteoui, that is, in
their tongue, ' a place where there is an abundance of fat animals. ' *
Resuming Hennepin's narrative : " The current brought us, in the
meantime, to the Indian camp, and M. La Salle was the first one
to land, followed closely by his men, which increased the consterna-
tion of the savages, whom we easily might have defeated. As it was
not our design, we made a halt to give them time to recover them-
selves and to see that we were not enemies. Most of the savages who
had run away upon our landing, understanding that we were friends,
returned ; but some others did not come back for three or four days,
and after they had learned that we had smoked the calumet.

" I must observe here, that the hardest winter does not last longer
than two months in this charming country, so that on the 15th of Jan-
uary there came a sudden thaw, which made the rivers navigable, and
the weather as mild as it is in France in the middle of the spring.
M. La Salle, improving this fair season, desired me to go down the
river with him to choose a place proper to build a fort. We selected
an eminence on the bank of the river, defended on that side by the
river, and on two others by deep ravines, so that it was accessible only
on one side. We cast a trench to join the two ravines, and made the
eminence steep on that side, supporting the earth with great pieces of
timber. We made a rough palisade to defend ourselves in case the
Indians should attack us while we were engaged in building the fort ;
but no one offering to disturb us, we went on diligently with our work.

* Louis Beck, in his " Gazetteer of Illinois and Missouri," p. 119, says: "The Indi-
ans call the lake Pin-a-tah-wee, on account of its being frequently covered with a
scum which has a greasy appearance." Owing to the rank growth of aquatic plants
in the Illinois River before they were disturbed by the frequent passage of boats, and to
the grasses on the borders of the stream and the adjacent marshes, and the decay
taking place in both under the scorching rays of the summer's sun, the surface of the
river and lake were frequently coated with this vegetable decomposition. Prof. School-
craft ascended the Illinois River, and was at Fort Clark on the 19th of August, 1821.
Under this date is the following extract from his "Narrative Journal": "About 9
o'clock in the morning we came to a part of the river which was covered for several
hundred yards with a scum or froth of the most intense green color, and emitting a
nauseous exhalation that was almost insupportable. We were compelled to pass
through it. The fine green color of this somewhat compact scum, resembling that of
verdegris, led us at the moment to conjecture that it might derive this character from
some mineral spring or vein in the bed of the river, but we had reasons afterward
to regret this opinion. I directed one of the canoe men to collect a bottle of this
mother of miasmata for preservation, but its fermenting nature baffled repeated at-
tempts to keep it corked. We had daily seen instances of the powerful tendency of
these waters to facilitate the decomposition of floating vegetation, but had not before
observed any in so mature and complete a state of putrefaction. It might certainly
justify an observer less given to fiction than the ancient poets, to people this stream
with the Hydra, as wriv the pestilential-breeding marshes of Italy. Schoolcraft's
"Central Mississippi Valley," p. 305.

FORT CKEVECOEUK AND ITS LOCATJON. 81

"When the fort was half finished, M. La Salle lodged himself, with M.
Tonti, in the middle of the fortification, and every one took his post,
We placed the forge on the curtain on the side of the wood, and laid
in a great quantity of coal for that purpose. But our greatest diffi-
culty was to build a boat, our carpenters having deserted us, we did
not know what to do. However, as timber was abundant and near at
hand, we told our men that if any of them would undertake to saw
boards for building the bark, we might surmount all other difficulties.
Two of the men undertook the task, and succeeded so well that we
began to build a bark, the keel whereof was forty-two feet long. Our
men went on so briskly with the work, that on the 1st of March our
boat was half built, and all the timber ready prepared for furnishing it.
Our fort was also very near finished, and we named it ' Fort Creve-
cceur, ' because the desertion of our men, and other difficulties we
had labored under, had almost ' broken our hearts. ' *

" M. La Salle," says Hennepin, " no longer doubted that the Griffin
was lost ; but neither this nor other difficulties dejected him. His
great courage buoyed him up, and he resolved to return to Fort Fron-
tenac by land, notwithstanding the snow, and the great dangers attend-
ing so long a journey. We had many private conferences, wherein it
was decided that he should return to Fort Frontenac with three men,
to bring with him the necessary articles to proceed with the discov-
ery, while I, with two men, should go in a canoe to the River Me-
schasipi, and endeavor to obtain the friendship of the nations who
inhabited its banks.

" M. La Salle left M. Tonti to command in Fort Crevecceur, and
ordered our carpenter to prepare some thick boards to plank the deck
of our ship, in the nature of a parapet, to cover it against the arrows
of the savages in case they should shoot at us from the shore. Then,
calling his men together, La Salle requested them to obey M. Tonti's
orders in his absence, to live in Christian union and charity ; to be
courageous and firm in their designs ; and above all not to give credit
to false reports the savages might make, either of him or of their com-
rades who accompanied Father Hennepin."

Hennepin and his two companions, with a supply of trinkets suitable

* "Fort Crevecceur, 1 ' or the Broken Heart, was built on the east side of the Illi-
nois River, a short distance below the outlet of Peoria Lake. It is so located on the
great map of Franquelin, made at Quebec in 1684. There are many indications on
this map, going 1 to show that it was constructed largely under the supervision of La-
Salle. The fact mentioned by Hennepin, that they went down the river, and that coal
was gathered for the supply of the fort, would confirm this theory as to its location;
for the outcrop of coal is abundant in the bluffs on the east side of the river below
Peoria. There is also a spot in this immediate vicinity that answers well to the site
of the fort as described by Fathers Hennepin and Membre.
6

82 HISTORIC XOTES OX TH K NORTHWEST.

for the Indian trade, left Fort Crevecreur for the Mississippi, on the
29th of February, 1680, and were captured by the Sioux, as already
stated. From this time to the ultimate discovery and taking possession
of the Mississippi and the valleys by La Salle, Father Zenobe Membre
was the historian of the expedition.

La Salle started across the country, going up the Illinois and Kan-
kakee, and through the southern part of the present State of Michigan.
He reached the Detroit River, ferrying the stream with a raft ; he at
length stood on Canadian soil. Striking a direct line across the wilder-
ness, he arrived at Lake Erie, near Point Pelee. By this time only
one man remained in health, and with his assistance La Salle made a
canoe. Embarking in it the party came to Niagara on Easter Monday.
Leaving his comrades, who were completely exhausted, La Salle on the
6th of May reached Fort Frontenac, making a journey of over a thou-
sand miles in sixty-five days, " the greatest feat ever performed by a
Frenchman in America." 1 *

La Salle found his affairs in great confusion. His creditors had
seized upon his estate, including Fort Frontenac. Undaunted by this
new misfortune, he confronted his creditors and enemies, pacifying the
former and awing the latter into silence. He gathered the fragments
of his scattered property and in a short time started west with a com-
pany of twenty-five men, whom he had recruited to assist in the prose-
cution of his discoveries. He reached Lake Huron by the way of Lake
Simcoe, and shortly afterward arrived at Mackinaw. Here he found
that his enemies had been very busy, and had poisoned the minds of
the Indians against his designs.

We leave La Salle at Mackinaw to notice some of the occurrences
that took place on the Illinois and St. Joseph after he had departed for
Fort Frontenac. On this journey, as La Salle passed up the Illinois,
he was favorably impressed with Starved Rock as a place presenting
strong defenses naturally. He sent word back to Tonti, below Peoria
Lake, to take possession of " The Rock " and erect a fortification on its
summit. Tonti accordingly came up the river with a part of his avail-
able force, and began to work upon the new fort. While engaged in
this enterprise the principal part of the men remaining at Fort Creve-
C03ur mutinied. They destroyed the vessel on the stocks' plundered
the storehouse, escaped up the Illinois River and appeared before Fort
Miami. These deserters demolished Fort Miami and robbed it of goods
and furs of La Salle, on deposit there, and then fled out of the country.
These misfortunes were soon followed by an incursion of the Iroquois,

*Parkman's "Discovery of the Great West."

DEATH OF FATHER GABRIEL. 83

who attacked the Illinois in their village near the Starved Rock. Tonti,
acting as mediator, came near losing his life at the hand of an infuriated
Iroquois warrior, who drove a knife into his ribs. Constantly an object
of distrust to the Illinois, who feared he was a spy and friend of the
Iroquois, in turn exposed to the jealousy of the Iroquois, who imag-
ined he and his French friends were allies of the Illinois, Tonti
remained faithful to his trust until he saw that he could not avert the
blow meditated by the Iroquois. Then, with Fathers Zenobe Membre
and Gabriel Rebourde, and a few Frenchmen who had remained faith-
ful, he escaped from the enraged Indians and made his way, in a leaky
canoe, up the Illinois River. Father Gabriel one fine day left his com-
panions on the river to enjoy a walk in the beautiful groves near by,
and while thus engaged, and as he was meditating upon his holy call-
ing, fell into an ambuscade of Kickapoo Indians. The good old man,
.unconscious of his danger, was instantly knocked down, the scalp torn
from his venerable head, and his gray hairs afterward exhibited in tri-
umph by his young murderers as a trophy taken from the crown of an
Iroquois warrior. Tonti, with those in his company, pursued his course,
passing by Chicago, and thence up the west shore of Lake Michigan.
Subsisting on berries, and often on acorns and roots which they dug
from the ground, they finally arrived at the Pottawatomie towns. Pre-
vious to this they abandoned their canoe and started on foot for the
Mission of Green Bay, where they wintered.

La Salle, when he arrived at St. Joseph, found Fort Miamis plun-
dered and demolished. He also learned that the Iroquois had attacked
the Illinois. Fearing for the safety of Tonti, he pushed on rapidly,
only to find, at Starved Rock, the unmistakable signs of an Indian
.slaughter. The report was true. The Iroquois had defeated the Illi-
nois and driven them west of the Mississippi. La Salle viewed the
wreck of his cherished project, the demolition of the fort, the loss of
his peltries, and especially the destruction of his vessel, in that usual
calm way peculiar to him ; and, although he must have suffered the
most intense anguish, no trace of sorrow or indecision appeared on his
inflexible countenance. Shortly afterward he returned to Fort Miamis.
La Salle occupied his time, until spring, in rebuilding Fort Miamis,
holding conferences with the surrounding Indian tribes, and confeder-
ating them against future attacks of the Iroquois. He now abandoned
the purpose of descending the Mississippi in a sailing vessel, and de-
termined to prosecute his voyage in the ordinary wooden pirogues or
canoes.

Tonti was sent forward to Chicago Creek, where he constructed a
number of sledges. After other preparations had been made, La Salle

84 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

and his party left St. Joseph and came around the southern extremity
of the lake. The goods and effects were placed on the sledges pre-
pared by Tonti. La Salle's party consisted of twenty-three French-
men and eighteen Indians. The savages took with them ten squaws
and three children, so that the party numbered in all fifty-four persons.
They had to make the portage of the Chicago River. After dragging
their canoes, sledges, baggage and provisions about eighty leagues
over the ice, on the Desplaines and Illinois Rivers, they came to the
great Indian town. It was deserted, the savages having gone down
the river to Lake Peoria. From Peoria Lake the navigation was open,
and embarking, on the 6th of February, they soon arrived at the Mis-
sissippi. Here, owing to floating ice, they were delayed till the 13th
of the same month. Membre describes the Missouri as follows: "It is
full as large as the Mississippi, into which it empties, troubling it so
that, from the mouth of the Ozage (Missouri), the water is hardly
drinkable. The Indians assured us that this river is formed by many
others, and that they ascend it for ten or twelve days to a mountain
where it rises ; that beyond this mountain is the sea, where tjiey see
great ships; that on the river are a great number of large villages.
Although this river is very large, the Mississippi does not seem aug-
mented by it, but it pours in so much mud that, from its mouth, the
water of the great river, whose bed is also slimy, is more like clear
mud than river water, without changing at all till it reaches the sea, a
distance of more than three hundred leagues, although it receives seven
large rivers, the water of which is very beautiful, and which are almost
as large as the Mississippi." From this time, until they neared the
mouths of the Mississippi, nothing especially worthy of note occurred.
On the 6th of April they came to the place where the river divides
itself into three channels. M. La Salle took the western, the Sieur
Dautray the southern, and Tonti, accompanied by Membre, followed
the middle channel. The three channels were beautiful and deep.
The water became brackish, and two leagues farther it became perfectly
salt, and advancing on they at last beheld the Gulf of Mexico. La
Salle, in a canoe, coasted the borders of the sea, and then the parties
assembled on a dry spot of ground not far from the mouth of the river.
On the 9th of April, with all the pomp and ceremony of the Holy
Catholic Church, La Salle, in the name of the French King, took pos-
session of the Mississippi and all its tributaries. First they chanted
the " Vexilla Regis'" and " Te Deum," and then, while the assembled
voyageurs and their savage attendants fired their muskets and shouted
" Vive le Roi," La Salle planted the column, at the same time pro-
claiming, in a loud voice, " In the name of the Most High, Mighty,

TAKING POSSESSION OF LOUISIANA. 85

Invincible, and Victorious Prince, Louis the Great, by the Grace of
God King of France and of Navarre, Fourteenth of that name, I, this
9th day of April, one thousand six hundred and eighty-two, in virtue
of the commission of His Majesty, which I hold in my hand, and
which may be seen by all whom it may concern, have taken, and do now
take, in the name of His Majesty and his successors to the crown, posses-
sion of this country of Louisiana, the seas, harbors, ports, bays, adjacent
straits, and all the people, nations, provinces, cities, towns, villages,
mines, minerals, fisheries, streams and rivers within the extent of the
said Louisiana, from the mouth of the great river St. Louis, otherwise
called Ohio, as also along the river Colbert, or Mississippi, and the
rivers which discharge themselves therein, from its source beyond the
country of the Nadonessious (Sioux), as far as its mouth at the sea,
and also to the mouth of the river of Palms, upon the assurance we
have had from the natives of these countries that we were the first
Europeans who have descended or ascended the river Colbert (Missis-
sippi) ; hereby protesting against all who may hereafter undertake to
invade any or all of these aforesaid countries, peoples or lands, to the
prejudice of His Majesty, acquired by the consent of the nations
dwelling herein. Of which, and of all else that is needful, I hereby
take to witness those who hear me. and demand an act of the notary
here present."

At the foot of the tree to which the cross was attached La Salle
caused to be buried a leaden plate, on one side of which were engraven
the arms of France, and on the opposite, the following Latin inscription:

LVDOVICUS MAGNUS REGNAT.

NONO APRILIS CIO IOC LXXXII.

ROBERTVS CAVALIER, CVM DOMINO DETONTI LEGATO, R. P. ZENOBIO
MEMBRE, RECCOLLECTO, ET VIGINTI GALLIS PRIMVS HOC FLYMEN,
INDE AB ILTNEORVM PAGO ENAVAGAVIT, EZVQUE OSTIVM FECIT
PERVIVM, NONO APRILIS ANNI.

CIO IOC LXXXI.

NOTE. The following is a translation of the inscription on the leaden plate:

" Louis the Great reigns.

"Robert Cavalier, with Lord Tonti as Lieutenant, R. P. Zenobe Membre, Recollect,
and twenty Frenchmen, first navigated this stream from the country of the Illinois,
and also passed through its mouth, on the 9th of April, 1682."

After which, La Salle remarked that His Majesty, who was the
eldest son of the Holy Catholic Church, would not annex any country
to his dominion without giving especial attention to establish the

86 HISTOKIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Christian religion therein. He then proceeded at once to erect a cross,
before which the "Vexilla" and " Domine Salvum fac Regern" were
sung. The ceremony was concluded by shouting "Vive le Hoi ! "

Thus was completed the discovery and taking possession of the
Mississippi valley. By that indisputable title, the right of discovery,
attested by all those formalities recognized as essential by the laws of
nations, the manuscript evidence of which was duly certified by a no-
tary public brought along for that purpose, and witnessed by the sig-
natures of La Salle and a number of other persons present on the occa-
sion, France became the owner of all that vast country drained by the
Mississippi and its tributaries. Bounded by the Alleghanies on the
east, and the Rocky Mountains on the west, and extending from an
undefined limit on the north to the burning sands of the Gulf on the
south. Embracing within its area every variety of climate, watered
with a thousand beautiful streams, containing vast prairies and exten-
sive forests, with a rich and fertile soil that only awaited the husband-
man's skill to yield bountiful harvests, rich in vast beds of bituminous
coal and deposits of iron, copper and other ores, this magnificent
domain was not to become the seat of a religious dogma, enforced by
the power of state, but was designed under the hand of God to become
the center of civilization, the heart of the American republic, where
the right of conscience was to be free, without interference of law, and
where universal liberty should only be restrained in so far as its unre-
strained exercise might conflict with its equal enjoyment by all.

Had France, with the same energy she displayed in discovering
Louisiana, retained her grasp upon this territory, the dominant race in
the valley of the Mississippi would have been Gallic instead of Anglo-
Saxon.

The manner in which France lost this possession in America will
be referred to in a subsequent chapter.

CHAPTER XL

LA SALLE'S RETURN, AND HIS DEATH IN ATTEMPTING A
SETTLEMENT ON THE GULF.

LA SALLE and his party returned up the Mississippi. Before they
reached Chickasaw Bluffs, La Salle was taken dangerously ill.

Dispatching Tonti ahead to Mackinaw, he remained there under
the care of Father Membre. About the end of July he was enabled to
proceed, and joined Tonti at Mackinaw, in September. Owing to the
threatened invasion of the Iroquois, La Salle postponed his projected
trip to France, and passed the winter at Fort St. Louis. From Fort
St. Louis, it would seem, La Salle directed a letter to Count Frontenac,
giving an account of his voyage to the Mississippi. It is short and his-
torically interesting, and was first published in that rare little volume,
Thevenot's " Collection of Voyages," published at Paris in 1687. This
letter contains, perhaps, the first description of Chicago Creek and the
harbor, and as everything pertaining to Chicago of a historical charac-
ter is a matter of public interest, we insert La Salle's account. It
seems that, even at that early day, almost two centuries ago, the idea
of a canal connecting Lake Michigan and the Illinois was a subject of
consideration :

" The creek (Chicago Creek) through which we went, from the lake
of the Illinois into the Divine River (the Au Plein, or Des Plaines) is
so shallow and so greatly exposed to storms that no ship can venture
in except in a great calm. Neither is the country between the creek
and the Divine River suitable for a canal ; for the prairies between
them are submerged after heavy rains, and a canal would be immedi-
ately filled up with sand. Besides this, it is not possible to dig into
the ground on account of the water, that country being nothing but a
marsh. Supposing it were possible, however, to cut a canal, it would
be useless, as the Divine River is not navigable for forty leagues
together ; that is to say, from that place (the portage) to the village of
the Illinois, except for canoes, and these have scarcely water enough in
summer time."

The identity of the " River Chicago," of early explorers, with the
modern stream of the same name, is clearly established by the map of
Franquelin of 1684, as well, also, as by the Memoir of Sieur de Tonti.

88 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NOKTHWEST.

The latter had occasion to pass through the Chicago River more fre-
quently than any other person of his time, and his intimate acquaint-
ance with the Indians in the vicinity would necessarily place his decla-
rations beyond the suspicion of a mistake. Referring to his being sent
in the fall of 1687, by La Salle, from Fort Miamis, at the mouth of the
St. Joseph, to Chicago, alread} r alluded to, he says : " We went in
canoes to the ' River Chicago,' where there is a portage which joins that
of the Illinois." *

The name of this river is variously spelled by early writers, " Chi-
cagon," f " Che-ka-kou," ^ " Chikgoua." In the prevailing Algonquin
language the word signifies a polecat or skunk. The Aborigines, also,
called garlic by nearly the same word, from which many authors have
inferred that Chicago means "wild onion." |

While La Salle was in the west, Count Frontenac was removed,
and M. La Barre appointed Governor of Canada. The latter was the
avowed enemy of La Salle. He injured La Salle in every possible

* Tonti's Memoir, published in the Historical Collections of Louisiana, vol. 1, p. 59.

t Joutel's Journal.

j LaHontan.

Father Grayier's Narrative Journal, published in Dr. Shea's "Voyages Up and
Down the Mississippi."

|| A writer of a historical sketch, published in a late number of "Potter's Monthly,"
on the isolated statement of an old resident of western Michigan, says that the Indi-

3sting a mere fancy with the dignity of truth. The great city
its name from the stream along whose margin it was first laid out, and it becomes im-
portant to preserve the origin of its name with whatever certainty a research of all
accessible authorities may furnish. In the first place, Chicago was not a place "with-
out wood," or trees; on the contrary, it is the only locality where timber was anything
like abundant for the distance of miles around. The north and south branches west-
ward, and the lake on the east, afforded ample protection against prairie fires; and Dr.
John M. Peck, in his early Gazetteer of the state, besides other authorities, especially
mention the fact that there was a good quality of timber in the vicinity of Chicago,
particularly on the north branch. There is nowhere to be found in the several Indian
vocabularies of Sir Alexander Mackenzie. Dr. Edwin James, and the late Albert Gal-
latin, in their extensive collections of Algonquin words, any expressions like those used
by the writer in Potter's Monthly, bearing the signification which he attaches to them.
Tn Mackenzie's Vocabulary, the Algonquin word for polecat is "Shi-kak." In Dr.
James' Vocabulary, the word for skunk is "She-gaby (shegag): and Shiq-ffcni-ga-win-
zheeg is the plural for onion or garlic, literally, in the Indian dialect, "skunk-weeds."
Dr. James, in a foot-note, says that from this word in the singular number, some have
derived the name Chi-ka-f/o, which is commonly pronounced among the Indians, Shig-
gau-go, and Shi-gau-go-oner (meaning) at Chicago.

An association of English traders, styling themselves the "Illinois Land Compa-
ny," on the 5th of July, 1773, obtained from ten chiefs of the Kaskaskia. Cahokia and
Peoria tribes, a deed for two large tracts of land. The second tract, in the description
of its boundaries, contains the following expression: "and thence up the Illinois River,
by the several courses thereof, to Chicago, or Garlic Creek;" and it may safely be as-
sumed that the parties to the deed knew the names given to identify the grant. Were
an additional reference necessary. " Wau Bun," the valuable work of Mrs. John H.
Kinzie, might also be cited, p. 190. The Iroquqis, who made frequent predatory
excursions from their homes in New York to the Illinois country, called Chicago Kitn-
era-ghik; vide Cadwalder Colden's " History of the Five Nations."

MISFORTUNES OF LA SALLE'S COLONY. 89

way, and finally seized upon Fort Frontenac. To obtain redress, La-
Salle went to France, reaching Rochelle on the 13th of December,
1683. Seignelay (young Colbert), Secretary of State and Minister of
the Marine, was appealed to by La Salle, and became interested and
furnished him timely aid in his enterprise.

Before leaving America La Salle ordered Tonti to proceed and finish
" Fort St. Louis," as the fortification at Starved Rock, on the Illinois
River, was named. " He charged me," says Tonti, " with the duty to
go and finish Fort St. Louis, of which he gave me the government,
with full power to dispose of the lands in the neighborhood, and left
all his people under my command, with the exception of six French-
men, whom he took to accompany him to Quebec. We departed from
Mackinaw on the same day, he for Canada and I for the Illinois.* On
his mission to France La Salle was received with honor by the king
and his officers, and the accounts which he gave relative to Louisiana
caused them to further his plans for its colonization. A squadron of
four vessels was fitted out. the largest carrying thirty-six guns. About
two hundred persons were embarked aboard of them for the purpose
long projected, as we have foreseen, of establishing a settlement at the
mouth of the Mississippi. The fleet was under the command of M.
de Beaujeu, a naval officer of some distinction. He was punctilious in
the exercise of authority, and had a wiry, nervous organization, as the
portrait preserved of him clearly shows, f La Salle was austere, and
lacked that faculty of getting along with men, for the want of which
many of his best-laid plans failed. A constant bickering and collision
of cross purposes was the natural result of such repellant natures as
he and Beaujeu possessed.

After a stormy passage of the Atlantic, the fleet entered the Gulf
of Mexico. Coasting along the northern shore of the gulf, they failed
to discover the mouths of the Mississippi. Passing them, they finally
landed in what is now known as Matagorda Bay, or the Bay of St.
Barnard, near the River Colorado, in Texas, more than a hundred
leagues westward of the Mississippi. The whole number of persons
left on the beach is not definitely known. M. Joutel, one of the sur-
vivors, and the chronicler of this unfortunate undertaking, mentions
one hundred and eighty, besides the crew of the " Belle," which was
lost on the beach, consisting of soldiers, volunteers, workmen, women
and children.;}; The colony being in a destitute condition, La Salle,

*Tonti's Memoir.

t A fine steel engraving copy of Mons. Beaujeu is contained in Dr. Shea's transla-
tion of Charlevoix's " History of New France."
^Spark's "Life of La Salle."

90 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

accompanied by Father Anastius Douay and twenty others, set out to
reach the Mississippi, intending to ascend to Fort St. Louis, and there
obtain aid from Tonti. They set out on the 7th of January, and after
several days' journey, reached the village of the Cenis Indians. Here
some of La Salle's men became dissatisfied with their hardships, and
determined to slay him and then join the Indians. The tragic tale is
thus related by Father Douay : " The wisdom of Monsieur de La Salle
was unable to foresee the plot which some of his people would make
to slay his nephew, as they suddenly resolved to do, and actually
did, on the 17th of March, by a blow of an ax, dealt by one Liotot.
They also killed the valet of the Sieur La Salle and his Indian ser-
vant, Nika, who, at the risk of his life, had supported them for three
years. The wretches resolved not to stop here, and not satisfied
with this murder, formed a design of attempting their commander's
life, as they had reason to fear his resentment and chastisement. As
M. La Salle and myself were walking toward the fatal spot where his
nephew had been slain, two of those murderers, who were hidden in
the grass, arose, one on each side, with guns cocked. One missed Mon-
sieur La Salle ; the other, firing at the same time, shot him in the head.
He died an hour after, on the 19th of March, 1687.

" Thus," says Father Douay, " died our commander, constant in ad-
versity, intrepid, generous, engaging, dexterous, skillful, capable of
everything. He who for twenty years had softened the fierce temper
of countless savage tribes was massacred by the hands of his own domes-
tics, whom he had loaded with caresses. He died in the prime of life,
in the midst of his course and labors, without having seen their success."*

The colony which La Salle had left in Texas was surprised and
destroyed by the Indians. Not a soul was left to give an account of
the massacre. Of the twenty who accompanied him in his attempt to
reach the Mississippi, Joutel, M. Cavalier, La Salle's brother, and four
others determined to make a last attempt to find the Mississippi ; the
others, including La Salle's murderers, became the associates of the less
brutal Indians, and of them we have no farther account. After a long
and toilsome journey Joutel and his party reached the Mississippi near
the mouth of the Arkansas. Here they found two men who had been
sent by Tonti to relieve La Salle. Embarking in canoes, they went up
the Mississippi, arrived at Fort St. Louis in safety, and finally returned
to France by way of Quebec.

From this period until 1698 the French made no further attempts
to colonize the Lower Mississippi. They had no settlements below the

* Fa! her Douay's Journal, contained in Dr. Shea's "Discovery and Exploration of the
Mississippi."

BILOXI AND MOBILE FOUNDED. 91

Ohio, and above that river, on the Illinois and the upper lakes, were
scattered only a few missions and trading posts.

Realizing the great importance of retaining possession of the Mis-
sissippi valley, the French court fitted out an expedition which con-
sisted of four vessels, for the purpose of thoroughly exploring the mouth
of the Mississippi and adjacent territory. Le Moyne Iberville was put
in command of the expedition. He was the third of the eleven sons
of Baron Longueil. They all held commissions from the king, and con-
stituted one of the most illustrious of the French Canadian families.
The fleet sailed from Brest, France, on the 24th of October, 1698.
They came in sight of Florida on the 27th of January, 1699. They
ran near the coast, and discovered that they were in the vicinity of
Pensacola Bay. Here they found a colony of three hundred Spaniards.
Sailing westward, they entered the mouth of the Mississippi on Quin-
quagesima Monday, which was the 2d of March. Iberville ascended
the river far enough to assure himself of its being the Mississippi, then,
descending the river, he founded a colony at Biloxi Bay. Leaving his
brother, M. de Sauvole, in command of the newly erected fort, he sailed
for France. Iberville returned to Biloxi on the 8th of January, and,
hearing that the English were exploring the Mississippi, he took formal
possession of the Mississippi valley in the name of the French king.
He, also, erected a small four-gun fort on Poverty Point, 38 miles below
New Orleans. The fort was constructed very rudely, and was occupied
for only one year. In the year 1701 Iberville made a settlement at
Mobile, and this soon became the principal French town on the gulf.
The unavailing efforts of the king in the scheme of colonization induced
a belief that a greater prosperity would follow under the stimulus of
individual enterprise, and he determined to grant Louisiana to Monsieur
Crozat, with a monopoly of its mines, supposed to be valuable in gold
and silver, together with the exclusive right of all its commerce for the
period of fifteen years. The patent or grant of Louis to M. Crozat is
an interesting document, not only because it passed the title of the
Mississippi valley into the hands of one man, but for the reason that it
embraces a part of the history of the country ceded. We, therefore,
quote the most valuable part of it. The instrument bears date Sep-
tember 12th, 1712 :

" Louis (the fourteenth), King of France and Navarre ; To all who
shall see these presents, greeting : The care we have always had to
procure the welfare and advantage of our subjects, having induced us,
notwithstanding the almost continual wars which we have been en-
gaged to support from the beginning of our reign, to seek all possible
opportunities of enlarging and extending the trade of our American

92 HISTORIC KOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

colonies, we did, in the year 1683, give our orders to undertake a dis-
covery of the countries and lands which are situated in the northern
parts of America, between New France (Canada) and New Mexico.
And the Sieur de La Salle, to whom we committed that enterprise,
having had success enough to confirm the belief that a communication
might be settled from New France to the Gulf of Mexico by means of
large rivers ; this obliged us, immediately after the peace of Ryewick
(in 1697), to give orders for the establishment of a colony there (under
Iberville in 1699), and maintaining a garrison, which has kept and
preserved the possession we had taken in the year 1683, of the lands,
coasts and islands which are situated in the Gulf of Mexico, between
Carolina on the east, and old and New Mexico on the west. But a
new war breaking out in Europe shortly after, there was no possi-
bility till now of reaping from that new colony the advantages that
might have been expected from thence ; because the private men who
are concerned in the sea trade were all under engagements with the
other colonies, which they have been obliged to follow. And where-
as, upon the information we have received concerning the disposition
and situation of the said countries, known at present by the name of
the province of Louisiana, we are of opinion that there may be estab-
lished therein a considerable commerce, so much the more advan-
tageous to our kingdom in that there has been hitherto a necessity of
fetching from foreigners the greatest part of the commodities that may
be brought from thence ; and because in exchange thereof we need
carry thither nothing but the commodities of the growth and manu-
facture of our own kingdom ; we have resolved to grant the com-
merce of the country of Louisiana to the Sieur Anthony Crozat,
our counsellor, secretary of the household, crown and revenue, to
whom we intrust the execution of this project. "We are the more
readily inclined thereto because of his zeal and the singular knowledge
he has acquired of maritime commerce, encourages us to hope for as
good success as he has hitherto had in the divers and sundry enter-
prises he has gone upon, and which have procured to our kingdom great
quantities of. gold and silver in such conjectures as have rendered them
very welcome to us. For these reasons, being desirous to show our
favor to him, and to regulate the conditions upon which we mean to
grant him the said commerce, after having deliberated the affair in our
council, of our own certain knowledge, full power and royal authority,
we by these presents, signed by our hand, have appointed and do ap-
point the said Sieur Crozat to carry on a trade in all the lands pos-
sessed by us, and bounded by New Mexico and by the English of Caroli-
na, all the establishments, ports, havens, rivers, and particularly the port

LOUISIANA GRANTED TO CROZAT. 93

and haven of Isle Dauphin, heretofore called Massacre ; the river St.
Louis, heretofore called Mississippi, from the edge of the sea as far as
the Illinois,* together with the river St. Philip, heretofore called Mis-
souris, and St. Jerome, heretofore called the Ouabache (the Wabash),,
with all the countries, territories, lakes within land, and the rivers which
fall directly or indirectly into that part of the river St. Louft. Our
pleasure is, that all the aforesaid lands, countries, streams, rivers and
islands, be and remain comprised under the name of the GOVERNMENT
OF LOUISIANA, which shall be dependent upon the general government
of New France, to which it is subordinate."

Crozat was permitted to search and open mines, and to pay the
king one-fifth part of all the gold and silver developed. Work in de-
veloping the mines \vas to be begun in three years, under penalty of
forfeiture. Crozat was required to send at least two vessels annually
from France to sustain the colonies already established, and for the
maintenance of trade.

The next year, 1713, there were, within the limits of Crozat's vast
grant, not more than four hundred persons of European descent.

Crozat himself did little to increase the colony, the time of his
subordinates being spent in roaming over the country in search of the
precious metals. He became wearied at the end of three years spent
in profitless adventures, and, in 1717, surrendered his grant back to the
crown. In August of the same year the French king turned Louis-
iana over to the " Western Company," or the " Mississippi Company,"
subsequently called " The Company of the Indies," at whose head
stood the famous Scotch banker, John Law. The rights ceded to Law's
company were as broad as the grant to Crozat. Law was an infla-
tionist, believing that wealth could be created without limit by the
mere issuing of paper money, and his wild schemes of finance were
the most ruinous that ever deluded and bankrupted a confiding people.
Louisiana, with its real and undeveloped wealth a hundred times mag-

* The expression, " as far as the Illinois," did not refer to the river of that name,
but to the country generally, on both sides of the Mississippi, above the mouth of the
Ohio, which, under both the French and Spanish governments was denominated "the
country of the Illinois," and this designation appeared in all their records and official
letters. For example, letters, deeds, and other official documents bore date, respect-
ively, at Kaskaskia, of the Illinois; St. Louis, of the Illinois; St. Charles, of the Illi-
nois; not to identify the village where such instruments were executed merely, but to-
denote the country in which these villages were situated. Therefore, the monopoly of
Crozat, by the terms of his patent, extended to the utmost limit of Louisiana, north-
ward, which, by the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, was fixed at the 49th of latitude; vide
Stoddard's " Sketches of Louisiana," Brackenridge's "Views of Louisiana." From
the year 1700 until some time subsequent to the conquest of the country by the British,
in 1763, a letter or document executed anywhere within the present limits of the states
of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, or Missouri, would have borne the superscription of "Les
Illinois," or "the Illinois."

94 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

nified, became the basis of a fictitious value, on which an enormous
volume of stock, convertible into paper money, was issued. The stock
rose in the market like a balloon, and chamber-maids, alike with
wealthy ladies, barbers and bankers, indeed, the whole French peo-
ple, gazing at the ascending phenomenon, grew mad with the desire
for speedy wealth. The French debt was paid off; the depleted treasury
filled ; poor men and women were made rich in a few days by the con-
stantly advancing value of the stocks of the " Company of the West."
Confidence in the ultimate wealth of Louisiana was all that was re-
quired, and this was given to a degree that would not now be credited
as true, were not the facts beyond dispute.

After awhile the balloon exploded ; people began to doubt ; they
realized that mere confidence was not solid value ; stocks declined ;
they awoke to a sorrowful contemplation of their delusion and ruin.
Law, from the summit of his glory as a financier, fell into ignominy,
and to escape bodily harm fled the country ; and Louisiana, from be-
ing the source of untold wealth, sunk into utter ruin and contempt.

It should be said to the credit of " the company " that they made
some efforts toward the cultivation of the soil. The growth of tobacco,
sugar, rice and indigo was encouraged. Negroes were imported to till
the soil. New Orleans was laid out in 1718, and the seat of govern-
ment of lower Louisiana subsequently established there. A settlement
was made about Natchez. A large number of German emigrants were
located on the Mississippi, from whom a portion of the Mississippi has
ever since been known as the " German coast." The French settle-
ments at Kaskaskia and Cahokia, begun, as appears from most authen-
tic accounts, about the year 1700, certainly not later, were largely
increased by emigration from Canada and France. In the year 1718
the " Company of the West " erected a fortification near Kaskaskia, and
named it Fort Chartes, having a charter from the crown so to do. It
is situated in the northwest corner of Randolph county, Illinois, on the
American bottom. It was garrisoned with a small number of soldiers,
and was made the seat of government of " the Illinois." Under the
mild government of the "Company," the Illinois marked a steady
prosperity, and Fort Chartes became the center of business, fashion and
gaiety of all " the Illinois country." In 1756 the fort was reconstruct-
ed, this time with solid stone. Its shape was an irregular quadrangle,
the exterior sides of the polygon being four hundred and ninety feet,
and the walls were two feet two inches thick, pierced with port-holes
for cannon. The walls of the fort were eighteen feet high, and con-
tained within, guard houses, government house, barracks, powder
house, bake house, prison and store room. A very minute description

FORT CHARTES. 95

is given of the whole structure within and without in the minutes of
its surrender, October 10, 1765, by Louis St. Ange de Belrive, captain
of infantry and commandant, and Joseph Le Febvre, the king's store-
keeper and acting commissary of the fort, to Mr. Sterling, deputed by
Mr. De Gage (Gage), governor of New York and commander of His
Majesty's troops in America, to receive possession of the fort and coun-
try from the French, according to the seventeenth article of the treaty
of peace, concluded on the 10th of February, 1763, between the kings
of France and Great Britain.* Fort Chartes was the strongest and
most elaborately constructed of any of the French works of defense in
America. Here the intendants and several commandants in charge,
whose will was law, governed " the Illinois," administered justice to
its inhabitants, and settled up estates of deceased persons, for nearly
half a century. From this place the English commandants governed
"the Illinois," some of them with great injustice and severity, from
the time of its surrender, in 1765, to 1772, when a great flood inun-
dated the American Bottom, and the Mississippi cut a new 'channel so
near the fort that the wall and two bastions on the west side were un-
dermined and fell into the river. The British garrison then abandoned
it, and their headquarters were afterward at Kaskaskia.

Dr. Beck, while collecting material for his " Gazetteer of Illinois
and Missouri," in 1820, visited the ruins of old Fort Chartes. At that
time enough remained to show the size and strength of this remarkable
fortification. Trees over two feet in diameter were growing within its
walls. The ruin is in a dense forest, hidden in a tangle of under-
growth, furnishing a sad memento of the efforts and blasted hopes of
La Belle France to colonize "Les

* The articles of surrender are given at length in the Paris Documents, vol. 10,
pp. 1161 to 1166.

CHAPTER XII.

SURRENDER OF LOUISIANA BY THE INDIES COMPANY EARLY ROUTES.

IN 1731 the company of the Indies surrendered to France, Louisiana,
with its forts, colonies and plantations, and from this period forward to
the time of the conquest by Great Britain and the Anglo-American
colonies, Louisiana was governed through officers appointed by the
crown.

We have shown how, when and where colonies were permanently
established by the French in Canada, about Kaskaskia, and in Lower
Louisiana. It is not within the scope of our inquiries to follow these
settlements of the French in their subsequent development, but rather
now to show how the establishments of the French along the lakes
and near the gulf communicated with each other, and the routes of
travel by which they were connected.

The convenient way between Quebec and the several villages in the
vicinity of Kaskaskia was around the lakes and down the Illinois
River, either by way of the St. Joseph River and the Kankakee port-
age or through Chicago Creek and the Des Plaines. The long winters
and severe climate on the St. Lawrence made it desirable for many
people to abandon Canada for the more genial latitudes of southern
Illinois, and the still warmer regions of Louisiana, where snows were
unknown and flowers grew the year round. It only required the pro-
tection of a fort or other military safeguards to induce the Canadians
to change their homes from Canada to more favorable localities
southward.

The most feasible route between Canada and the Lower Mississippi
settlements was by the Ohio River. This communication, however,
M r as effectually barred against the French. The Iroquois Indians, from
the time of Champlain, were allies, first of the Dutch and then of the
English, and the implacable enemies of the French. The upper waters
of the Ohio were within the acknowledged territory of the Iroquois,
whose possessions extended westward of K~ew York and Pennsylvania
well toward the Scioto. The Ohio below Pittsburgh was, also, in the
debatable ground of the Miamis northward, and Chickasaws south-
ward. These nations were warring upon each other continually, and

THE MAUMEE AND WABASH ROUTE. 97

the country for many miles beyond either bank of the Ohio was
infested with war parties of the contending tribes.*

There were no Indian villages near the Ohio River at the period
concerning which we now write. Subsequent to this the Shawnees and
Delawares, previously subdued by the Iroquois, were permitted by the
latter to establish their towns near the confluence of the Scioto, Mus-
kingum and other streams. The valley of the Ohio was within the
confines of the " dark and bloody ground." Were a voyager to see
smoke ascending above the forest line he would know it was from the
camp fire of an enemy, and to be a place of danger. It would indi-
cate the presence of a hunting or war party. If they had been suc-
cessful they would celebrate the event by the destruction of whoever
would commit himself to their hands, and if unfortunate in the chase
or on the war-path, disappointment would give a sharper edge to their
cruel ty.f

The next and more reliable route was that afforded by the Maumee
and "Wabash, laying within the territory of tribes friendly to the
French. The importance of this route was noticed by La Salle, in his
letter to Count Frontenac, in 1683, before quoted. La Salle says: "There
is a river at the extremity of Lake Erie,:}: within ten leagues of the
strait (Detroit River), which will very much shorten the way to the
Illinois, it being navigable for canoes to within two leagues of their
river." As early as 1699, Mons. De Iberville conducted a colony of
Canadians from Quebec to Louisiana, by way of the Maumee and Wa-
bash. " These were followed by other families, under the leadership
of M. Du Tessenet. Emigrants came by land, first ascending the St.
Lawrence to Lake Erie, then ascending a river emptying into that lake
to the portage of Des Miamis / their effects being thence transported
to the river Miamis, where pirogues, constructed out of a single tree,
and large enough to contain thirty persons, were built, with which the
voyage down the Mississippi was prosecuted." || This memoir corre-
sponds remarkably well with the claim of Little Turtle, in his speech
to Gen. Wayne, concerning the antiquity of the title, in his tribe, to
the portage of the Wabash at Fort Wayne. It also illustrates the
fact that among the first French settlers in lower Louisiana were

* A Miami chief said that his nation had no tradition of " a time when they were
not at war with the Chickasaws."

f General William H. Harrison's Address before the Historical Society of Cin-
cinnati.

J The Maumee.

Meaning the Wabash.

|| Extract taken from a memoir, showing that the first establishments in Louisiana
were at Mobile, etc., the original manuscript being among the archives in the depart-
ment lt De la Marine et Des Colonies," in Paris, France.
7

98 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

those who found their way thither through the " glorious gate," be-
longing to the Miamis, connecting the Maumee and Wabash.

Originally, the Maumee was known to the French as the " Miami,"
" Oumiarni," or the " River of the Miamis," from the fact that bands
of this tribe of Indians had villages upon its banks. It was also called
" Ottawa," or " Tawwa," which is a contraction of the word Ottawa,
as families of this tribe " resided on this river from time immemorial."
The Shawnee Indian name is " Ottawa-sepe," that is " Ottawa River."
By the Hurons, or Wyandots, it was called " Cagh-a-ren-du-te," the
" River of the Standing Rock." * Lewis Evans, whose map was pub-
lished in 1755, and which is, perhaps, the first English map issued of
the territory lying north and west of the Ohio River, lays down the
Miami as " Mine-a-mi," a way the Pennsylvania Indian traders had of
pronouncing the word Miami. In 1703, Mons Cadillac, the French
commandant at Detroit, in his application for a grant of land six
leagues in breadth on either side of the Maumee, upon which he pro-
posed to propagate silk-worms, refers to the river as " Grand River " f
As early as 1718 it is mentioned as the " Miamis River," J and it bore
this name more generally than that of any other from 1718 to a pe-
riod subsequent to the War of 1812. Capt. Robert M'Afee, who was
in the various campaigns up and down the Maumee during the War
of 1812, and whose history of this war, published at Lexington, Ky.,
in 1816, gives the most authentic account of the military movements
in this quarter, makes frequent mention of the river by the name of
" Miami," occasionally designating it as the " Miami of the Lake."

Gen. Joseph Harmar, in his report of the military expedition con-
ducted by him to Fort Wayne, in October, 1790, calls the Miami the
"Oinee." He says: "As there are three Miamis in the northwestern
territory, all bearing the name of Miami, I shall in the future, for dis-
tinction's sake, when speaking of the Miami of the Lake, call it the
' Omee,' and its towns the Omee Towns. By this name they are best
known on the frontier. It is only, however, one of the many corrup-
tions or contractions universally used among the French-Americans in
pronouncing Indian names. 'Au-Mi,' for instance, is the contraction
for 'An Miami.' "

The habit of the " Coureur de Bois" and others using the mongrel
language of the border Canadians, as well, also, the custom prevailing

* "Account of the Present State of Indian Tribes, etc., Inhabiting Ohio." By John
Johnson, Indian Agent, June 17, 1819. Published in vol. 1 of Archseologia Americana.

t Sheldon's History of Michigan, p. 108.

j Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 880 and 891.

Gen. Harmar's official letter to the Secretary of War, under date of November 23,
1790, published in the American State Papers.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME MAUMEE. 99

among this class of persons in giving nicknames to rivers and locali-
ties, has involved other observers besides Gen. Harrnar in the same
perplexity. Thomas Hutchins, the American geographer, and Capt.
Harry Gordon visited Kaskaskia and the adjacent territory subsequent
to the conquest of the northwest territory from the French, and be-
came hopelessly entangled in the contractions and epithets applied to
the surrounding villages on both sides of the Mississippi. Kaskaskia
was abbreviated to "Au-kas" and St. Louis nicknamed " Pain Court "
Short Bread' Carondelet was called " Vide Pouche" Empty
Pocket' Ste. Genevieve was called "Missier" Misery. The Kas-
kaskia, after being shortened to Au-kaus, pronounced " Okau," has
been further corrupted to Okaw, and at this day we have the singu-
lar contradiction of the ancient Kaskaskia being called Kaskaskia near
its mouth and " Okaw " at its source.

The Miamis, or bands of their tribe, had villages in order of time ;
first on the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, then upon the Maumee ; after
this, 1750, they, with factions of other tribes who had become disaffected
toward the French, established a mixed village upon the stream now
known ais the Great Miami, which empties into the Ohio, and in this way
the name of Miami has been transferred, successively, from the St. Jo-
seph to the Miami, and from the latter to the present Miami, with
which it has become permanently identified.* The Miamis were, also,
called the "Mau-mees," this manner of spelling growing out of one
of the several methods of pronouncing the word Miami and it is
doubtless from this source that the name of Maumee is derived f

In this connection we may note the fact that the St. Marys and the
Au-glaize were named by the Shawnee Indians, as follows : The first
was called by this tribe, who had several villages upon its banks, the
" Co-kothe-ke-sepe," Kettle River; and the Au-glaize "Cow-then-e-
ke-sepe," or Fallen Timber River. These aboriginal names are given
by Mr. John Johnson, in his published account of the Indian tribes
before referred to4

We will IIOW T give a derivation of the name of the Wabash, which
has been the result of an examination of a number of authorities.
Early French writers have spelled the word in various ways, each en-
deavoring, with more or less success, to represent the name as the sev-

*The aboriginal name of the Great Miami was "Assin-erient," or Rocky River,
from the word Assin, or Ussin, the Algonquin appellation for stone or stony. Lewis
Evan's map of 1755.

t In an official letter of Gen. Harrison to the Secretary of War, dated March 22,
1814, the name " Miamis " and "Maumees " are given as synonymous terms, referring
to the same tribe.

JMr. Johnson had charge of the Indian affairs in Ohio for many years, and was
especially acquainted with the Shawnees and their language.

100 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

eral Algonquin tribes pronounced it. First, we have Father Marquette's
orthography, " Oua-bous-kigou ; " and by later French authorities it i&
spelled "Abache," "Ouabache," < : Oubashc," " Oubache," " Oubash,"
" Oubask," " Oubache," " Wabascou," " Wabache," and " Waubache."
It should be borne in mind that the French alphabet does not contain
the letter W, and that the diphthong " ou " with the French has nearly
the same sound as the letter W of the English alphabet. The Jesuits-
sometimes used a character much like the tigure 8, which is a Greek
contraction formulated by them, to represent a peculiar guttural sound
among the Indians, and which we often, though imperfectly, represent
by the letter W, or Wau.*

That Wabash is an Indian name, and was early applied to the stream
that now bears this name, is clearly established by Father Gravier.
This missionary descended the Mississippi in the year 1700, and speak-
ing of the Ohio and its tributaries, says : " Three branches are assigned
to it, one that comes from the northwest (the Wabash), passing
behind the country of the Oumiamis, called the St. Joseph, f which
the Indians properly call the Oudbachei; the second comes from the
Iroquois (whose country included the head-waters of the Ohio),
and is called the Ohio ; and the third, which comes from the Chaou-
anona^: (Shawnees). And all of them uniting to empty into the Mis-
sissippi, it is commonly called Ouabachi."

In the variety of mariner in which Wabash is spelled in the exam-
ples given above, we clearly trace the Waw-bish-kaw, of the Ojibe-
ways; the Wabisca (pronounced Wa-bis-sa) of the modern Algon-
quin ; Wau-bish of the Menominees, and Wa-bi of the ancient Algon-
quins, words which with all these kindred tongues mean White. \\

Therefore the aboriginal of Wabash (Sepe) should be rendered
White River. This theory is supported by Lewis Evans, who for many
years was a trader among the Indians, inhabiting the country drained
by the Wabash and its tributary waters. The extensive knowledge
which he acquired in his travels westward of the Alleghanies resulted

* Shea's Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi, p. 41, foot-note. For
example, we find in the Journal of Marquette, 8ab8kig8, for Wabash. The same man-
ner of spelling is also observed in names, as written by other missionaries, where they
design to represent the sound of the French " ou," or the English W.

t Probably a mistake of the copyist, and which should be the St. Jerome, a name
given by the French to the Wabash, as we have seen in the extracts taken from Crozat's
grant. Dr. Shea has pointed out numerous mistakes made by the copyist of the man-
uscripts from which the " Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi " are composed.

| The Tennessee.

Father Gravier 's Journal in Dr. Shea's Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi,
pp. 120, 121.

|| The several aboriginal names for white, which we have given above, are taken
from the vocabularies of Mackenzie, Dr. Ewin James and Albert Gallatin, which are
regarded as standard authorities.

ORIGIN OF THE NAME WABASH. 101

in his publishing, in 1755, a map, accompanied with an extended de-
scription of the territory it embraced. In describing the "Wabash, Mr.
Evans calls it by the name the Iroquois Indians had given it, viz : the
" Quia-agh-tena," and says " it is called by the French Ouabach, though
that is truly the name of its southeastern branch." Why the White
River, of Indiana, which is the principal southeastern branch of the
Wabash, should have been invested with the English meaning of the
word, and the aboriginal name should have been retained by the river
to which it has always properly belonged, is easily explained, when we
consider the ignorance and carelessness of many of the early travelers,
whose writings, coming down to us, have tended to confuse rather than
aid the investigations of the modern historian. The Ohio River below
the confluence of the Wabash is designated as the Wabash by a majority
of the early French writers, and so laid down on many of the contem-
poraneous maps. This was, probably, due to the fact that the Wabash
was known and used before the Ohio had been explored to its mouth.
So fixed has become the habit of calling the united waters of these two
streams Wabash, from their union continuously to their discharge into
the Mississippi, that the custom prevailed long after a better knowledge
of the geography of the country suggested the propriety of its aban-
donment. Even after the French of Canada accepted the change, and
treated the Ohio as the main river and the Wabash as the tributary, the
French of Louisiana adhered to the old name.

We quote from M. Le Page Du Fratz' History of Louisiana : *
" Let us now repass the Mississippi in order to resume a description of
the lands to the east, which we quit. at the river Wabash. This river
is distant from the sea four hundred and sixty leagues ; it is reckoned
to have four hundred leagues in length from its source to its conflu-
ence with the Mississippi. It is called Wabash, though, according to
the usual method, it ought to be called the Ohio, or Beautiful River, f
seeing the Ohio was known under that name before its confluence
was known; and as the Ohio takes its rise at a greater distance off
than the three others which mix together before they empty them-
selves into the Mississippi, this should make the others lose their

*The author was for sixteen years a planter of Louisiana, having gone thither from
France soon after the Company of the West or Indes restored the country to the crown.
He was a gentleman of superior attainments, and soon acquired a thorough knowledge
of the French possessions in America. He returned to France, and in 1758 published
his " History of Louisiana," with maps, which, in 1763, was translated into English.
Those volumes are largely devoted to the experience of the author in the cultivation of
rice, indigo, sugar and other products congenial to the climate and soil of Louisiana,
and to quite an extended topographical description of the whole Mississippi Valley.

fThe Iroquois' name for the Ohio was " O-t'o," meaning beautiful, and the French
retained the signification in the name of "La Belle Riviere," by which the Ohio was
known to them.

102 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

names; but custom has prevailed in this respect. The first known
to us which falls into the Ohio is that of the Miamis (Wabash), which
takes its rise toward Lake Erie. It is by this river of the Miamis that
the Canadians come to Louisiana. For this purpose they embark on
the River St. Lawrence, go up this river, pass the cataracts quite to
the bottom of Lake Erie, where they find a small river, on which they
also go up to a place called the carriage of the Miamis, because that
people come and take their effects and carry them on their backs for
two leagues from thence to the banks of the river of their name which

I just said empties itself into the Ohio. From thence the Canadians
go down that river, enter the Wabash, and at last the Mississippi,
which brings them to New Orleans, the capital of Louisiana. They
reckon eighteen hundred leagues from the capital of Canada to that
of Louisiana, on account of the great turns and windings they are
obliged to take. The river of the Miamis is thus the first to the north
which falls into the Ohio, then that of the Chaouanons to the south,
and lastly, that of the Cherokee, all which together empty themselves
into the Mississippi. This is what we (in Louisiana) call the Wabash,
and what in Canada and New England is called the Ohio." '

A failure to recognize the fact that the Ohio below the mouth of the
Wabash was, for a period of over half a century, known to the French
as the Wabash, has led not a few later writers to erroneously locate
ancient French forts and missionary stations upon the banks of the
Wabash, which were in reality situated many miles below, on the Ohio.f

* On the map prefixed to Du Pratz' history, the Ohio from the Mississippi up to
the confluence of the Wabash is called the " Wabash "; above this the Ohio is called
Ohio, and the Wabash is called "The River of the Miamis," with villages of that
tribe noted near its source. The Maumee is called the " River of the Carrying Place."
The Upper Mississippi, the Illinois River and the lakes are also laid down, and, alto-
gether, the map is quite accurate.

t A noticeable instance of such a mistake will be found relative to the city of Vin-
cennes. On the authority of LaHarpe, and the later historian Charlevoix, the French
in the year 1700, established a trading post near the mouth of the Ohio, on the site of
the more modern Fort Massac, in Massac county, 111., for the purpose of securing
buffalo hides. The neighboring Mascotins, as was customary with the Indians, soon
gathered about for the purpose of barter. Their numbers, as well as the expressed
wish of the French traders, induced Father Merment to visit the place and engage in
mission work. At the end of four or five years, in 1705, the establishment was broken
up on account of a quarrel of the Indians among themselves, and which so threatened
the lives of the Frenchmen that the latter fled, leaving behind their effects and 13.000
buffalo hides which they had collected. Some years later Father Marest, writing from
Kaskaskia, in his letter before referred to, relates the failure of Father Merment to
convert the Indians at this " post on the Wabash "; and on the authority of this letter
alone, and although Father Marest only followed the prevailing style in calling the
lower Ohio the Wabash, some writers, the late Judge John Law being the first, have
contended that this post was on the Wabash and at Vincennes. Charlevoix says "it
was at the mouth of the Wabash which discharges itself into the Mississippi." La
Harpe, and also Le Suere, whose personal knowledge of the post was contemporaneous
with its existence, definitely fix its position near the mouth of the Ohio. The latter
gives the date of its beginning, and the former narrates an account of its trade and
final abandonment. In this way an antiquity has been claimed for Vincennes to which
it is not historically entitled.

EARLY ACCOUNT OF THE MAUMEE. 103

We now give a description of the Maumee and Wabash, the location
of the several Indian villages, and the manners of their inhabitants,
taken from a memoir prepared in 1718 by a French officer in Canada,
and sent to the minister at Paris.*

u I return to the Miamis River. Its entrance from Lake Erie is
very wide, and its banks on both sides, for a distance of ten leagues
up, are nothing but continued swamps, abounding at all times, espe-
cially in the spring, with game without end, swans, geese, ducks, cranes,
etc., which drive sleep away by the noise of their cries. This river is
sixty leagues in length, very embarrassing in summer in consequence
of the lowness of the water. Thirty leagues up the river is a place
called La, Glaise,^ where buffalo are always to be found; they eat the
clay and wallow in it. The Miamis are sixty leagues from Lake Erie,
and number four hundred, all well formed men, arid well tattooed ;^
the women are numerous. They are hard working, and raise a species
of maize unlike that of our Indians at Detroit. It is white, of the
same size as the other, the skin much finer, and the meal much whiter.
This nation is clad in deer skin, and when a woman goes with another
man her husband cuts off her nose and does not see her any more.
They have plays and dances, wherefore they have more occupation.
The women are well clothed ; but the men use scarcely any covering,
and are tattooed all over the body.

"From this Miami village there is a portage of three leagues to a
little and very narrow stream, that falls, after a course of twenty
leagues, into the Ohio or Beautiful River, which discharges into the
Ouabache, a fine river that falls into the Mississippi forty leagues from
the Cascachias. Into the Ouabache falls also the Casquinampo, || which
communicates with Carolina ; but this is far off, and is always up
stream.

" The River Ouabache is the one on which the Ouyatanons ^[ are
settled.

" They consist of five villages, which are contiguous the one to the
other. One is called Oujatanon, the other Peariguichias,** and another

* The document is quite lengthy, covering all the principal places and Indian tribes
east of the Mississippi, and showing the compiler possessed a very thorough acquaint-
ance with the whole subject. It is given entire in the Paris Documents, vol. 9; that
relating to the Maumee and Wabash on pages 886 to 891.

t Defiance, Ohio.

\ These villages were near the confluence of the St. Mary's and St. Joseph, and
this is the first account we have of the present site of Fort Wayne.

Little River, that empties into the Wabash just below Huntington.

I The Tennessee River.

ft The " Weas," whose principal villages were near the mouth of Eel River, near
Logansport, and on the Wea prairie, between Attica and La Fayette.

** The ancient Piankashaw town was on the Vermilion of the Wabash, and the
Miami name of the Vermilion was Piankashaw.

104 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Petitscotias, and a fourth Le Gros. The name of the last I do not
recollect, but they are all Oujatanons, having the same language as the
Miamis, whose brothers they are, and properly all Miamis, having the
same customs and dress.* The men are very numerous ; fully a
thousand or twelve hundred.

" They have a custom different from all other nations, which is to
keep their fort extremely clean, not allowing a blade of grass to remain
within it. The whole of the fort is sanded like the Tuilleries. The
village is situated on a high hill, and they have over two leagues of
improvement where they raise their Indian corn, pumpkins and
melons. From the summit of this elevation nothing is visible to the
eye but prairies full of buifaloes. Their play and dancing are inces-
sant.f

"All of these tribes use a vast quantity of vermilion. The women
wear clothing, the men very little. The River Ohio, or Beautiful river,
is the route which the Iroquois take. It would be of importance that
they should not have such intercourse, as it is very dangerous. Atten-
tion has been called to this matter long since, but no notice has been
taken of it."

*The "Le Gros," that is, The Great (village), was probably "Chip-pe-co-ke," or
the town of "Brush- wood," the name of the old village at Vincennes, which was the
principal city of the Piankashaws.

fThe village here described is Ouatanon, which was situated a few miles below
La Fayette, near which, though on the opposite or north bank of the Wabash, the
Stockade Fort of "Ouatanon" was established by the French.

CHAPTER XIII.

ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS THE SEVERAL ILLINOIS TRIBES.

THE Indians who lived in and claimed the territory to which our
attention is directed were the several tribes of the Illinois and Miami
confederacies, the Pottawatomies, the Kickapoos and scattered bands
of Shawnees and Delawares. Their title to the soil had to be extin-
guished by conquest or treatise of purchase before the country could
be settled by a higher civilization ; for the habits of the two races, red
and white, were so radically different that there could be no fusion, and
they could not, or rather did not, live either happily or at peace
together.

We proceed to treat of these several tribes, observing the order in
which their names have been mentioned ; and we do so in this con-
nection for the reason that it will aid toward a more ready under-
standing of the subjects which are to follow.

The Illinois were a subdivision of the great Algonquin family.
Their language and manners differed somewhat from other surround-
ing tribes, and resembled most the Miamis, with whom they originally
bore a very close affinity. Before Joliet and Marquette's voyage to the
Mississippi, all of the Indians who came from the south to the mission
at La Pointe, on Lake Superior, for the purposes of barter, were by the
French called Illinois, for the reason that the first Indians who came
to La Pointe from the south " called themselves Illinois" *

In the Jesuit Relations the name Illinois appears as " Illi-mouek,"
"Illinoues," " Ill-i-ne-wek," " Allin-i-wek " and " Lin-i-wek." By
Father Marquette it is "Ilinois," and Hennepin has it the same as it
is at the present day. The ois was pronounced like our way, so that
ouai, ois, wek and ouek were almost identical in pronunciation.f
"Willinis" is Lewis Evans' orthography. Major Thomas Forsyth,
who for many years was a trader and Indian agent in the territory, and
subsequently the state, of Illinois, says the Confederation of Illinois

* As we have given the name of Ottawas to all the savages of these countries, al-
though of different nations, because the first who have appeared among the French
have been Ottawas; so also it is with the name of the Illinois, very numerous, and
dwelling toward the south, because the first who have come to the " point of the Holy
Ghost for commerce called themselves Illinois." Father Claude Dablon, in the Jesuit
Relations for 1670, 1671.

t Note by Dr. Shea in the article entitled " The Indian Tribes of Wisconsin," fur-
nished by him for the Historical Society of Wisconsin, and published in Vol. Ill of
their collections, p. 128.

106 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE XORTHWEST.

" called themselves Linneway"-^- which is almost identical with the
Lin-i-wek of the Jesuits, having a regard for its proper pronuncia-
tion, " and that by others they were called Minneway, signifying men,"
and that their confederacy embraced the combined Illinois and Miami
tribes ; " that all these different bands of the Minneway nation spoke
the language of the present Miamis, and the whole considered them-
selves as one and the same people, yet from their local situation, and
having no standard to go by, their language became broken up into
different dialects." * They were by the Iroquois called " Chick-tagh-
icks"

Many theories have been advanced and much fine speculation in-
dulged in concerning the origin and meaning of the word Illinois.
We have seen that the Illinois first made themselves known to the
French by that name, and we have never had a better signification of
the name than that which the Illinois themselves gave to Fathers Mar-
quette and Hennepin. The former, in his narrative journal, observes :
" To say Illinois is, in their language, to say ' the men,' as if other
Indians, compared to them, were mere beasts." f " The word Illinois
signifies a man of full age in the vigor of his strength. This word Illi-
nois comes, as it has already been observed, from lllini, which in the
language of that nation signifies a perfect and accomplished man." %

Subsequently the name Illini, Linneway, Willinis or Illinois, with
more propriety became limited to a confederacy, at first composed of
four subdivisions, known as the Kaskaskias, Cahokias, Tamaroas and
Peorias. Not many years before the discovery of the Mississippi by
the French, a foreign tribe, the Metchigamis, nearly destroyed by wars
with the Sacs to the north and the Ohickasaws to the south, to save
themselves from annihilation appealed to the Kaskaskias for admission
into their confederacy.! The request was granted, and the Metchiga-
mis left their homes on the Osage river and established their villages
on the St. Francis, within the limits of the present State of Missouri
and below the mouth of the Kaskaskia.

The subdivision of the Illinois proper into cantons, as the French
writers denominate the families or villages of a nation, like that of
other tribes was never very distinct. There were no villages exclu-
sively for a separate branch of the tribe. Owing to intermarriage,
adoption and other processes familiar to modern civilization, the sub-

* Life of Black-Hawk, by Benjamin Drake, seventh edition, pp. 16 and 17.
t Shea's Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley, p. 25.
\ Hennepin's Discovery of America, pp. 35 and 119, London edition, 1698.
Charlevoix's " Narrative Journal,' Vol. II, p. 228. Also note of B. F. French, p.
61 of Vol. Ill, First Series of Historical Collections of Louisiana.

LOCATION OF VILLAGES. 107

tribal distinctions were not well preserved ; and when Charlevoix, that
acute observer, in 1721 visited these several Illinois villages near Kas-
kaskia, their inhabitants were so mixed together and confounded that
it was almost impossible to distinguish the different branches of the
tribe from each other.*

The first accounts we have of the Illinois are given by the Jesuit
missionaries. In the " Relations " for the year 1655 we find that the
Lin-i-ouek are neighbors of the Winnebagoes ; again in the " Rela-
tions" for the next year, "that the Illinois nation dwell more than
sixty leagues from here, f and beyond a great river, ^ which as near
as can be conjectured flows into the sea toward Virginia. These
people are warlike. They use the bow, rarely the gun, and never the
canoe.

When Joliet and Marquette were descending the Mississippi, they
found villages of the Illinois on the Des Moines river, and on their
return they passed through larger villages of the same nation situated
on the Illinois river, near Peoria and higher up the stream.

While the Illinois were nomads, though not to the extent of many
other tribes, they had villages of a somewhat permanent character, and
when they moved after game they went in a body. It would seem
from the most authentic accounts that their favorite abiding places
were on the Illinois river, from the Des Plaines down to its confluence
with the Mississippi, and on the Mississippi from the Kaskaskia to the
mouth of the Ohio. This beautiful region abounded in game ; its riv-
ers were well stocked with fish, and were frequented by myriads of
wild fowls. The climate was mild. The soil was fertile. By the
mere turning of the sod, the lands in the rich river bottoms yielded
bountiful crops of Indian corn, melons and squashes.

In disposition and morals the Illinois were not to be very highly
commended. Father Charlevoix, speaking of them as they were in
1700, says: "Missionaries have for some years directed quite a flour-
ishing church among the Illinois, and they have ever since continued
to instruct that nation, in whom Christianity had already produced a
cnange such as she alone can produce in morals and disposition. Before
the arrival of the missionaries, there were perhaps no Indians in any
part of Canada with fewer good qualities and more vices. They have

* " These tribes are at present very much confounded, and are become very inconsid-
erable. There remains only a very small number of Kaskaskias, and the two villages
of that name are almost entirely composed of Tamaroas and Metchigamis, a foreign
nation adopted by the Kaskaskias, and originally settled on a small river you meet
with going down the Mississippi." Charlevoix' " Narrative Journal," Letter XXVI11.
dated Kaskaskia, October 20, 1721; p. 228. Vol. II.

t The letter is sent from the Mission of the Holy Ghost, at La Pointe.

J The Mississippi.

108 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

always been mild and docile enough, but they were cowardly, treach-
erous, fickle, deceitful, thievish, brutal, destitute of faith or honor,
selfish, addicted to gluttony and the most monstrous lusts, almost un-
known to the Canada tribes, who accordingly despised them heartily,
but the Illinois were not a whit less haughty or self-complacent on
that account.

" Such allies could bring no great honor or assistance to the French ;
yet we never had any more faithful, and, if we except the Abenaqui
tribes, they are the only tribe who never sought peace with their ene-
mies to our prejudice. They did, indeed, see the necessity of our aid
to defend themselves against several nations who seemed to have sworn
their ruin, and especially against the Iroquois and Foxes, who, by con-
stant harrassing, have somewhat trained them to war, the former taking
home from their expeditions the vices of that corrupt nation." *

Father Charlevoix' comments upon the Illinois confirm the state-
ments of Hennepin, who says : " They are lazy vagabonds, timorous,
pettish thieves, and so fond of their liberty that they have no great
respect for their chiefs."f

Their cabins were constructed of mats, made out of flags, spread
over a frame of poles driven into the ground in a circular form and
drawn together at the top.

" Their villages," says Father Hennepin,:}: " are open, not enclosed
with palisades because they had no courage to defend them ; they would
flee as they heard their enemies approaching." Before their acquaint-
ance with the French they had no knowledge of iron and fire-arms.
Their two principal weapons were the bow and arrow and the club.
Their arrows were pointed with stone, and their tomahawks were made
out of stag's horns, cut in the shape of a cutlass and terminating in a
large ball. In the use of the bow and arrow, all writers agree, that
the Illinois excelled all neighboring tribes. For protection against the
missies of an enemy they used bucklers composed of buffalo hides
stretched over a w r ooden frame.

In form they were tall and lithe. They were noted for their swift-
ness of foot. They wore moccasins prepared from buffalo hides ; and,
in summer, this generally completed their dress. Sometimes they wore
a small covering, extending from the waist to the knees. The rest of
the body was entirely nude.

The women, beside cultivating the soil, did all of the household
drudgery, carried the game and made the clothes. The garments

* Charlevoix's " History of New France," vol. 5, page 130.
t Hennepin, page 132, London edition, 1698.
J Puse 132.

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 109

were prepared from buffalo hides, and from the soft wool that grew
upon these animals. Both the wool and hides were dyed with bril-
liant colors, black, yellow or vermilion. In this kind of work the
Illinois women were greatly in advance of other tribes. Articles of
dress were sewed together with thread made from the nerves and ten-
dons of deer, prepared by exposure to the sun twice in every twenty-
four hours. After which the nerves and tendons were beaten so that
their fibers would separate into a fine white thread. The clothing of
the women was something like the loose wrappers worn by ladies of
the present day. Beneath the wrapper were petticoats, for warmth in
winter. With a fondness for finery that characterizes the feminine sex
the world over, the Illinois women wore head-dresses, contrived more
for ornament than for use. The feet were covered with moccasins, and
leggings decorated with quills of the porcupine stained in colors of
brilliant contrasts. Ornaments, fashioned out of clam shells and other
hard substances, were worn about the neck, wrists and ankles ; these, with
the face, hands and neck daubed with pigments, completed the toilet of
the highly fashionable Illinois belle.

Their food consisted of the scanty products of their fields, and prin-
cipally of game and fish, of which, as previously stated, there was in
their country a great abundance. Father Allouez, who visited them in
1673, stated that they had fourteen varieties of herbs and forty-two-
varieties of fruits which they use for food. Their plates and other
dishes were made of wood, and their spoons were constructed out of
buffalo bones. The dishes for boiling food were earthen, sometimes
glazed. *

From all accounts, it seems that the Illinois claimed an extensive
tract of country, bounded on the east by the ridge that divides the
waters flowing into the Illinois from the streams that drain into the
"Wabash above the head waters of Saline creek, and as high up the Illi-
nois as the Des Plaines, extending westward of the Mississippi, and
reaching northward to the debatable ground between the Illinois,
Chippeways. Winnebagoes, Sacs and Foxes. Their favorite and most
populous cities were on the Illinois river, near Starved Kock, and

*The account we have given of the manners, habits and customs of the Illinois is
compiled from the following authorities : La Hontan, (Jharlevoix, Hennepin, Tonti,
Marquette, Joutel, the missionaries Marest, Rasles and Allouez. Besides, the historic
letter of Marest, found in Kip's Jesuit Missions, is another Irom this distinguished
priest, written from Kaskaskia to M. Bienville, and incorporated in Penicaut's Annals
of Louisiana, a translation of which is contained in the Historical Col lections of Louisi-
ana and Florida, by B. F. French. In this letter of Father Marest, dated in 1711, is a
very fine description of the customs of the Illinois Indians, and their prosperous condi-
tion at Kaskaskia and adjacent villages.

110 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE XORTHVVKST.

below as far as Peoria. The missionary station founded by Father
Marquette was, in all probability, near the latter place.

Prior to the year 1700, Father Marest had charge of a mission at
the neck, strait or narrows of Peoria lake. In Peoria lake, above
Peoria, is a contracted channel, and this is evidently referred to by
Father Gravier in his "Narrative Journal" where he states: " I ar-
rived too late at the Illinois du Detroit, of whom Father Marest has
charge, to prevent the transmigration of the village of the Kaskaskias,
which was too precipitately made on vague news of the establishment
on the Mississippi. I do not believe that the Kaskaskias would have
thus separated from the Peouaroua and other Illinois du Detroit. At
all events, I came soon enough to unite minds a little, and to prevent
the insult which the Peouaroua and the Mouin-gouena were bent on
offering to the Kaskaskias and French as they embarked. I spoke to
all the chiefs in full council, and as they continued to preserve some
respect and good will for me, we separated very peaceably. But I
argue no good from this separation, which I have always hindered,
seeing too clearly the evil results. God grant that the road from
Chikagoua to this strait" (au Detroit) "be not closed, and the whole
Illinois mission suffer greatly. I avow to you, Reverend Father, that
it rends my heart to see my old flock thus divided and dispersed, and
I shall never see it, after leaving it, without having some new cause of
affliction. The Peouaroua, whom I left without a missionary (since
Father Marest has followed the Kaskaskias), have promised me that
they would preserve the church, and that they would await my return
from the Mississippi, where I told them I went only to assure myself
of the truth of all that was said about it." *

The area of the original country of the Illinois was reduced by
continuous wars with their neighbors. The Sioux forced them east-
ward ; the Sac and Fox, and other enemies, encroached upon them
from the north, while war parties of the foreign Iroquois, from the east,
rapidly decimated their numbers. These unhappy influences were doing

* Father Gravier's Journal in Shea's Early Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi,
pp. 116 and 117. Dr. Shea, in a foot note, p. 116, says: "This designation (Illinois
Du Detroit) does not appear elsewhere, and I cannot discover what strait is referred to.
It evidently includes the Peorias."

Dr. Shea-'s conjecture is very nearly correct. The narrows in Peoria lake retained
the appellation of Little Detroit, a name handed down from the French-Canadians.
Dr. Lewis Beck, in his "Gazetteer of Illinois and Missouri," p. 124, speaks of "Little
Detroit, an Indian village situated on the east bank of lake Peoria, six miles above
Ft. Clark." On the map prefixed to the Gazetteer prepared in 1820 the contraction of
the lake is shown and designated as " Little Detroit."

We have seen from extracts from Father Marquette's Journal, quoted on a preced-
ing page, that it was the Kaskaskias at whose village this distinguished missionary
promised to return and to establish a mission, and that with the ebbing out of his life
he fulfilled his engagement. From Father Gravier's Journal, just quoted, it is appar-

ATTACK OF THE IROQl'OIS. Ill

their fatal work, and the Illinois confederacy was in a stage of decline
when they first came in contact with the French. Their afflictions made
them accessible to the voice of the missionary, and in their weakness
they hailed with delight the coming of the Frenchman with his prom-
ises of protection, which were assured by guns and powder. The mis-
fortunes of the Illinois drew them so kindly to the priests, the coureurs
des Bois and soldiers, that the friendship between the two races never
abated ; and when in the order of events the sons of France had de-
parted from the Illinois, their love for the departed Gaul was inculcated
into the minds of their children.

The erection of Fort St. Louis on the Illinois, St. Joseph on the
stream of that name, and the establishment at Detroit, for a while
stayed the calamity that was to befall the Illinois. Frequent allusion
has been made to the part the Iroquois took in the destruction of this
powerful confederacy. For the gratification of the reader we give a
condensed account of some of these Iroquois campaigns in the Illinois
country. The extracts we take are from a memoir on the western
Indians, by M. Du Chesneau,* dated at Quebec, September 13, 1681 :
" To convey a correct idea of the present state of all those Indian na-
tions it is necessary to explain the cause of the cruel war waged by the
Iroquois for these three years past against the Illinois. The former
were great warriors, cannot remain idle, and pretend to subject all other
nations to themselves, and never want a pretext for commencing hos-
tilities. The following was their assumed excuse for the present war:
Going, about twenty years ago, to attack the Outagamis (Foxes),
they met the Illinois and killed a considerable number of them. This
continued during the succeeding years, and finally, having destroyed a
great many, they forced them to abandon their country and seek refuge
in very distant parts. The Iroquois having got quit of the Illinois,
took no more trouble with them, and went to war against another
nation called the Andostagues.f Pending this war the Illinois re-
turned to their country, and the Iroquois complained that they had

ent that the mission had for some years been in successful operation at the combined
village of the Kaskaskias, Peorias and Mouin-gouena, situated at the Du Detroit of the
Illinois; and also that the Kaskaskias, hearing that the French were about to form es-
tablishments on the lower Mississippi, in company with the French inhabitants of their
ancient village, were in the act of going down the Mississippi at the time of Gravier's
arrival, in September, 1700. All these facts taken together would seem to definitely
locate the Mission of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary at the
narrows, six miles above the present city of Peoria, which is upon the site of old Fort
Clark, and probably, from the topography of the locality, upon the east bank of the
strait. In conclusion, we may add that the Kaskaskias were induced to halt in their
journey southward upon the river, which has ever since borne their name ; and the
mission, transferred from the old Kaskaskias, above Peoria, retained the name of " The
Immaculate Conception," etc.

* Paris Documents, vol. 9, pp. 161 to 166.

f The Eries?, or Cats, were entirely destroyed by the Iroquois.

112 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

killed forty of their people who were on their way to hunt beaver in
the Illinois country. To obtain satisfaction, the Iroquois resolved to
make war upon them. Their true motive, however, was to gratify the
English at Manatte * and Orange,f of whom they are too near neigh-
bors, and who, by means of presents, engaged the Iroquois in this ex-
pedition, the object of which was to force the Illinois to b ' ^ their
beaver to them, so that they may go and trade it afterward to the
English ; also, to intimidate the other Indians, and constrain them to
to do the same thing.

" The improper conduct of Sieur de la Salle, $ governor of Fort
Frontenac, has contributed considerably to cause the latter to adopt
this proceeding ; for after he had obtained permission to discover the
Great River Mississippi, and had, as he alleged, the grant of the
Illinois, he no longer observed any terms with the Iroquois. He ill-
treated them, and avowed that he would convey arms and ammunition
to the Illinois, and would die assisting them.

"The Iroquois dispatched in the month of April of last year, 1680,
an army, consisting of between five and six hundred men, who ap-
proached an Illinois village where Sieur Tonty, one of Sieur de la
Salle's men happened to be with some Frenchmen and two Recollect
fathers, whom the Iroquois left unharmed. One of these, a most holy
man, has since been killed by the Indians. But they would listen
to no terms of peace proposed to them by Sieur de Tonty, who was
slightly wounded at the beginning of the attack ; the Illinois having
fled a hundred leagues thence, were pursued by the Iroquois, who
killed and captured as many as twelve hundred of them, including
women and children, having lost only thirty men.

" The victory achieved by the Iroquois rendered them so insolent that
they have continued ever since that time to send out divers war parties.
The success of these is not yet known, but it is not doubted that they
have been successful, because those tribes are very warlike and the Illi-
nois are but indifferently so. Indeed, there is no doubt, and it is the
universal opinion, that if the Iroquois are allowed to proceed they will
subdue the Illinois, and in a short time render themselves masters of
all the Ontawa tribes and divert the trade to the English, so that it is
absolutely essential to make them our friends or to destroy them."

* New York.

t Albany, New York.

| It must be remembered that La Salle was not exempt from the jealousy and envy
which is inspired in souls of little men toward those engaged in great undertakings ;
and we see this spirit manifested here. La Salle could not have done otherwise than
supply fire-arms to the Illinois, who were his friends and the owners of the country, the
trade of which he had opened up at great hardship and expense to himself.

Gabriel Ribourde.

DEFEAT OF THE IROQUOIS. 113

The Iroquois were not always successful in their western forays.
Tradition records two instances in which they were sadly discomfited.
The first was an encounter with the Sioux, on an island in the Missis-
sippi, at the mouth of the Des Moines. The tradition of this engage-
ment is preserved in the curious volumes of La Hontan, and is as fol-
lows : " March 2nd, 1689, 1 arrived in the Mississippi. To save the labor
of rowing we left our boats to the current, and arrived on the tenth in
the island of Rencontres, which took its name from the defeat of four
hundred Iroquois accomplished there by three hundred Nadouessis
(Sioux). The story of the encounter is briefly this : A party of
four hundred Iroquois having a mind to surprise a certain people in
the neighborhood of the Otentas (of whom more anon), marched to
the country of the Illinois, where they built canoes and were furnished
with provisions. After that they embarked upon the river Mississippi,
and were discovered by another little fleet that was sailing down the
other side of the same river. The Iroquois crossed over immediately
to that island which is since called Aux Rencontres. The Nadouessis,
i. <?., the other little fleet, being suspicious of some ill design, without
knowing what people they were (for they had no knowledge of the
Iroquois but by hear-say) upon this suspicion, I say, they tugged hard
to come up with them. The two armies posted themselves upon the
point of the island, where the two crosses are put down in the map,*
and as soon as the Nadouessis came in sight, the Iroquois cried out in
the Illinese language: 'Who are yef To which the Nadouessis
answered, ' Somebody '/ and putting the same question to the Iroquois,
received the same answer. Then the Iroquois put this question to
'em: ' Where are you going f 'To hunt buffalo,' answered the Na-
douessis ; ' but, pray,' says the Nadouessis, ' what is your business '1 ' ' To
hunt men,' reply'd the Iroquois. "Tis well,' says the Nadouessis;
' we are men, and so you need go no farther.' Upon this challenge,
the two parties disembarked, and the leader of the Nadouessis cut his
canoes to pieces, and, after representing to his warriors that they be-
hoved either to conquer or die, marched up to the Iroquois, who
received them at first onset with a cloud of arrows. But the Nadou-
essis having stood their first discharge, which killed eighty of them r
fell in upon them with their clubs in their hands before the others
could charge again, and so routed them entirely. This engagement
lasted for two hours, and was so hot that two hundred and sixty Iro-
quois fell upon the spot, and the rest were all taken prisoners. Some
of the Iroquois, indeed, attempted to make their escape after the action

* On La Hontan 's map the place marked is designated by an island in the Missis-
sippi, immediately at the mouth of the Des Moines.
8

114 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

was over ; but the victorious general sent ten or twelve of his men to
pursue them in one of the canoes that he had taken, and accordingly
they were all overtaken and drowned. The Nadouessis having ob-
tained this victory, cut off the noses and ears of two of the cleverest
prisoners, and supplying them with fusees, powder and ball, gave them
the liberty of returning to their own country, in order to tell their
countrymen that they ought not to employ women to hunt after men
any longer."*

The second tradition is that of a defeat of a war party of Iroquois
upon the banks of the stream that now bears the name of " Iroquois
River." Father Charlevoix. in his Narrative Journal, referring to his
passage down the Kankakee, in September, 1721, alludes to this defeat
of the Iroquois in the following language : " I was not a little sur-
prised at seeing so little water in the The-a-ki-ki, notwithstanding it
receives a good many pretty large rivers, one of which is more than a
hundred and twenty feet in breadth at its mouth, and has been called
the River of the Iroquois, because some of that nation were surprised
on its. banks by the Illinois who killed a great many of them. This
check mortified them so much the more, as they held the Illinois in
great contempt, who, indeed, for the most part are not able to stand,
before them." f

The tradition has been given with fuller particulars to the author,
by Colonel Guerdon S. Hubbard, as it was related by the Indians to
him. It has not as yet appeared in print, and is valuable as well as
interesting, inasmuch as it explains why the Iroquois River has been
so called for a period of nearly two centuries, and also because it gives
the origin of the name Watseka.

The tradition is substantially as follows: Many years ago the Iro-
quois attacked an Indian village situated on the banks of the river a
few miles below the old county seat, Middleport, and drove out
the occupants with great slaughter. The fugitives were collected in
the night time some distance away, lamenting their disaster. A wo-
man, possessing great courage, urged the men to return and attack the
Iroquois, saying the latter were then rioting in the spoils of the village
and exulting over their victory ; that they would not expect danger
from their defeated enemy, and that the darkness of the night would
prevent their knowing the advance upon them. The warriors refused
to go. The woman then said that she would raise a party of squaws
and return to the village and fight the Iroquois ; adding that death or
captivity would be the fate of the women and children on the morrow,

*La Hontan's New Voyages to America, vol. 1, pp. 128. 129.
t Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 199.

INDIAN LEGEND. 115

and that they might as well die in an effort to regain their village and
property as to submit to a more dreadful fate. She called for volun-
teers and the women came forward in large numbers. Seeing the
bravery of their wives and daughters the men were ashamed of their
cowardice and became inspired with a desperate courage. A plan of
attack was speedily formed and successfully executed. The Iroquois,
taken entirely unawares, were surprised and utterly defeated.

The name of the heroine who suggested and took an active part in
this act of bold retaliation, bore the name of Watch-e-kee. In honor
of her bravery and to perpetuate the story of the engagement, a coun-
cil of the tribe was convened which ordained that when Watch-e-kee
died her name should be bestowed upon the most accomplished maiden
of the tribe, and in this way be handed down from one generation to
another. By such means have the name and the tradition been pre-
served.

The last person who bore this name was the daughter of a Potta-
watomie chief, with whose band Col. Hubbard was intimately associ-
ated as a trader for many years. She was well known to many of the
old settlers in Danville and upon the Kankakee. She was a person of
great beauty, becoming modesty, and possessed of superior intelligence.
She had great influence among her own people and was highly re-
spected by the whites. She accompanied her tribe to the westward of
the Mississippi, on their removal from the state. The present county
seat of Iroquois county is named after her, and Col. Hubbard advises
the author that Watseka, as the name is generally spelled, is incorrect,
and that the orthography for its true pronunciation should be "Watch-e-
kee.*

AVe resume the narration of the decline of the Illinois : La Salle's
fortification at Starved Rock gathered about it populous villages of
Illinois, Shawnees, Weas, Piankeshaws and other kindred tribes, shown
on Franquelin's map as the Colonie Du Sr. de la Salle.f The Iroquois
were barred out of the country of the Illinois tribes, and the latter
enjoyed security from their old enemies. La Salle himself, speaking
of his success in establishing a colony at the Rock, says : " There would
be nothing to fear from the Iroquois when the iiations of the south,

* The Iroquois also bore the name of Can-o-wa-ga, doubtless an Indian name. It
had another aboriginal name, MocaMla (which was, probably, a French-Canadian cor-
ruption of the Kickapoo word Mo-qua), signifying a bear. Beck's Illinois and Mis-
souri Gazetteer, p. 90. The joint commission appointed by the legislatures of Indiana
and Illinois to run the boundary line between the two states, in their report in 1821.
and upon their map deposited in the archives at Indianapolis, designate the Iroquois
by the name of Pick-a-mink River. They also named Sugar Creek after Mr. McDon-
ald, of Vincennes, Indiana, who conducted the surveys for the commission.

fThis part of Franquelin's map appears in the well executed frontispiece of Park-
insons Discovery of the Great West.

116 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

strengthened through their intercourse with the French, shall stop
their conquest, and prevent their being powerful by carrying off a great
number of their women and children, which they can easily do from
the inferiority of the weapons of their enemies. As respects com-
merce, that post will probably increase our traffic still more than has
been done by the establishment of Fort Frontenac, which was built
with success for that purpose ; for if the Illinois and their allies were
to catch the beavers which the Iroquois now kill in the neighborhood
in order to carry them to the English, the latter not being any longer
able to get them from their own colonies would be obliged to buy from
us, to the great benefit of those who have the privilege of this traffic.
These were the views which the Sieur de la Salle had in placing the
settlement where it is. The colony has already felt its effects, as all
our allies, who had fled after the departure of M. de Frontenac, have
returned to their ancient dwellings, in consequence of the confidence
caused by the fort, near which they have defeated a party of Iroquois,
and have built four forts to protect themselves from hostile incursions.
The Governor, M. de la Barre, and the intendant, M. de Muelles, have
told Sieur de la Salle that they would write to Monseigneur to inform
him of the importance of that fort in order to keep the Iroquois in
check, and that M. de Sagny had proposed its establishment in 1678,
Monsiegneur Colbert permitted Sieur de la Salle to build it, and
granted it to him as a property." *

The fort at Le Roclier (the rock) was constructed on its summit in
1682, and enclosed with a palisade. It was subsequently granted to
Tonti and Forest, f It was abandoned as a military post in the year
1702 ; and when Charlevoix went down the Illinois in 1721 he passed
the Rock, and said of it: "This is the point of a very high terrace
stretching the space of two hundred paces, and bending or winding
with the course of the river. This rock is steep on all sides, and at a
distance one would take it for a fortress. Some remains of a palisado
are still to be seen on it, the Illinois having formerly cast up an en-
trenchment here, which might be easily repaired in case of any inter-
ruption of the enemy.":}:

The abandonment of Fort St. Louis in 1702 was followed soon after
by a dispersion of the tribes and remnants of tribes that La Salle and
Tonti had gathered about it, except the straggling village of the
Illinois.

* Memoir of the Sieur de la Salle, reporting to Monseigneur de Seingelay the dis-
coveries made by him under the order of His Majesty. Historical Collections of
Louisiana, Part I, p. 42.

t Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 494.

j Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 200.

DECLINE OF THE ILLINOIS. 117

The Iroquois came no more subsequent to 1721, having war enough
on their hands nearer home ; but the Illinois were constantly harassed
by other enemies ; the Sacs, Foxes, Kickapoos and Pottawatomies.
In 1722 their villages at the Rock and on Peoria Lake were besieged
by the Foxes, and a detachment of a hundred men under Chevalier de
Artaguette and Sieur de Tisne were sent to their assistance. Forty of
these French soldiers, with four hundred Indians, marched by land to
Peoria Lake. However, before the reinforcements reached their des-
tination they learned. that the Foxes had retreated with a loss of more
than a hundred and twenty of their men. " This success did not,
however, prevent the Illinois, although they had only lost twenty men,
with some women and children, from leaving the Rock and Pimiteony,
where they were kept in constant alarm, and proceeding to unite with
those of their brethren who had settled on the Mississippi ; this was a
stroke of grace for most of them, the small number of missionaries
preventing their supplying so many towns scattered far apart ; but on
the other side, as there was nothing to check the raids of the Foxes
along the Illinois River, communication between Louisiana and New
France became much less practicable."*

The fatal dissolution of the Illinois still proceeded, and their
ancient homes and hunting grounds were appropriated by the more
vigorous Sacs, Foxes, Pottawatomies and Kickapoos. The killing of
Pontiac at Cahokia, whither he had retired after the failure of his
-effort to rescue the country from the English, was laid upon the
Illinois, a charge which, whether true or false, hastened the climax of
their destruction.

General Harrison stated that " the Illinois confederacy was com-
posed of five tribes : the Kaskaskias, Cahokias, Peorians, Michiganians
and the Temarois, speaking the Miami language, and no doubt
branches of that nation. "When I was first appointed Governor of the
Indiana Territory (May, 1800), these once powerful tribes were re-
duced to about thirty warriors, of whom twenty-five were Kaskaskias,
four Peorians, and a single Michiganian. There was an individual
lately alive at St. Louis who saw the enumeration made of them by
the Jesuits in 17-45, making the number of their warriors four thou-
sand. A furious war between them and the Sacs and Kickapoos
reduced them to that miserable remnant which had taken refuse

amongst the white people in the towns of Kaskaskia and St. Genieve."f

* History of New France, vol. 6, p. 71.

t Official letter of Gen. Harrison to Hon. John Armstrong, Secretary of War,
dated at Cincinnati, March 22, 1814: contained in Captain M'Afee's " History of the
Late War in the Western Country."

118 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

By successive treaties their lands in Illinois were ceded to the
United States, and they were removed west of the Missouri. In 1872
they had dwindled to forty souls men, women and children all told.

Thus have wasted away the original occupants of the larger part of
Illinois and portions of Iowa and Missouri. In 1684 their single vil-
lage at La Salle's colony, could muster twelve hundred warriors. In the
days of their strength they nearly exterminated the Winnebagoes, and
their war parties penetrated the towns of the Iroquois in the valleys of
the Mohawk and Genesee. They took the Metchigamis under their
protection, giving them security against enemies with whom the latter
could not contend. This people who had dominated over the surround-
ing tribes, claiming for themselves the name Illini or Linneway, to rep-
resent their superior manhood, have disappeared from the earth ; another
race, representing a higher civilization, occupy their ancient domains,
and already, even the origin of their name and the location of their
cities have become the subjects of speculation.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE MIAMIS THE MIAMI, P1ANKESHAW, AND WEA BANDS/

THE people known to us as the Miamis formerly dwelt beyond the
Mississippi, and, according to their 'own traditions, came originally
from the Pacific. " If what I have heard asserted in several places be
true, the Illinois and Miamis came from the banks of a very distant sea
to the westward. It would seem that their first stand, after they made
their first descent into this country, was at Moingona* At least it is
certain that one of their tribes bears that name. The rest are known
under the name of Peorias, Tarnaroas, Caoquias and Kaskaskias."

The migration of the Miamis from the west of the Mississippi,
eastward through Wisconsin and northern Illinois, around the south-
ern end of Lake Michigan to Detroit, and thence up the Maumee and
down the Wabash. and eastward through Indiana into Ohio as far as
the Great Miami, can be followed through the mass of records handed
down to us from the missionaries, travelers and officers connected with
the French. Speaking of the mixed village of Maskoutens, situated on
Fox River, Wisconsin, at the time of his visit there in 1670, Father
Claude Dablon says the village of the Fire-nation " is joined in the
circle of the same barriers to another people, named Oumiami, which
is one of the Illinois nations, which is, as it were, dismembered from
the others, in order to dwell in these quarters, f It is beyond this
great river ^ that are placed the Illinois of whom we speak, and from
whom are detached those who dwell here with the Fire-nation to form
here a transplanted icolony."

From the quotations made there remains little doubt that the Mi-
amis were originally a branch of the great Illinois nation. This theory
is confirmed by writers of our own time, among whom we may men-
tion General William H. Harrison, whose long acquaintance and official
connection with the several bands of the Miamis and Illinois gave him

* Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 227. Moingona, from undoubted
authorities, was a name given to the Des Moines River; and we find on the original
map, drawn by Marquette. the village of the Moingona placed on the Des Moines
above a village of the Peorias on the same stream.

t Father Dablon is here describing the same village referred to by Father Mar-
quette in that part of his Journal which we have copied on page 44.

\ The Mississippi, of which the missionary had been speaking in the paragraph
preceding that which we quote.

119

120 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

the opportunities, of which he availed himself, to acquire an intimate
knowledge concerning them. "Although the language, manners
and customs of the Ivaskaskias make it sufficiently certain that they
derived their origin from the same source with the Miamis, the
connection had been dissolved before the French had penetrated
from Canada to the Mississippi."* The assertion of General Har-
rison that the tribal relation between the Illinois and Miamis had
been broken at the time of the discovery of the Upper Mississippi
valley by the French is sustained with great unanimity by all other
authorities. In the long and disastrous wars waged upon the Illinois
by the Iroquois, Sacs and Foxes, Kickapoos and other enemies, we
have no instance given where the Miamis ever offered assistance to
their ancient kinsmen. After the separation, on the contrary, they
often lifted the bloody hatchet against them.

Father Dablon, in the narrative from which we have quoted, +
gives a detailed account of the civility of the Miamis at Mascouten,
and the formality and court routine with which their great chief was
surrounded. "The chief of the Miamis, whose name was Tetin-
choua, was surrounded by the most notable people of the village,
who, assuming the role of courtiers, with civil posture full of defer-
ence, and keeping always a respectful silence, magnified the great-
ness of their king. The chief and his routine gave Father Dablon
every mark of their most distinguished esteem. The physiognomy
of the chief was as mild and as attractive as any one could wish to
see ; and while his reputation as a warrior was great, his features
bore a softness which charmed all those who beheld him."

Nicholas Perrot, with Sieur de St. Lussin, dispatched by Talon,
the intendant, to visit the westward nations, with whom the French
had intercourse, and invite them to a council to be held the follow-
ing spring at the Sault Ste. Marie, was at this Miami village shortly
after the visit of Dablon. Perrot was treated with great consider-
ation by the Miamis. Tatinchoua " sent out a detachment to meet
the French agent and receive him in military style. The detach-
ment advanced in battle array, all the braves adorned with feathers,
armed at all points, were uttering war cries from time to time. The
Pottawatomies who escorted Perrot, seeing them come in this guise,
prepared to receive them in the same manner, and Perrot put him-
self at their head. When the two troops were in face of each other,
they stopped as if to take breath, then all at once Perrot took the
right, the Miamis the left, all running in Indian file, as though they
wished to gain an advantage to charge.

* Memoirs of General Harrison, by Moses Dawson, p. 62.
t Relations, 1670. 1671.

OF THE NAME MIAMI. 121

" But the Miamis wheeling in the form of an arc, the Pottawat-
omies were invested on all sides. Then both uttered loud yells,
which were the signals for a kind of combat. The Miamis fired a
volley from their guns, which were only loaded with powder, and
the Pottawatomies returned it in the same way ; after this they
closed, tomahawk in hand, all the blows being received on the tom-
ahawks. Peace was then made ; the Miamis presented the calumet
to Perrot, and led him with all his chief escort into the town, where
the great chief assigned him a guard of fifty men, regaled him mag-
nificently after the custom of the country, and gave him the diver-
sion of a game of ball." The Miami chief never spoke to his
subjects, but imparted his orders through some of his officers. On
account of his advanced age he was dissuaded from attending the
council to be held at Ste. Marie, between the French and the Indians ;
however, he deputized the Pottawatomies to act in his name.

This confederacy called themselves "Miamis," and by this name
were known to the surrounding tribes. The name was not bestowed
upon them by the French, as some have assumed from its resem-
blance to Mon-am.i, because they were the friends of the latter.
When Ilennepin was captured on the Mississippi by a war party of
the Sioux, these savages, with their painted faces rendered more
hideous by the devilish contortions of their features, cried out in
angry voices, " l Mia-hama! Mia-hama ! ' and we made signs with
our oars upon the sand, that the Miamis, their enemies, of whom
they were in search, had passed the river upon their flight to join
the Illinois, "f

"The confederacy which obtained the general appellation of
Miamis, from the superior numbers of the individual tribe to whom
that name more properly belonged," were subdivided into three
principal tribes or bands, namely, the Miamis proper, Weas and
Piankeshaws. French writers have given names to two or three
other subdivisions or families of the three principal bands, whose
identity has never been clearly traced, and who figure so little in
the accounts which we have of the Miamis, that it is not necessary
here to specify their obsolete names. The different ways of writing

* History of New France, vol. 3, pp. 166, 167. Father Charlevoix improperly
locates this village, where Perrot was received, at " Chicago, at the lower end of Lake
Michigan, where the Miamis then were," page 166, above quoted. The Miamis were
not then at Chicago. The reception of Perrot was at the mixed village on Fox River,
Wisconsin, as stated in the text. The error of Charlevoix, as to the location of this
village, has been pointed out by Dr. Shea, in a note on page 166, in the "History of
New France," and also by Francis Parkman, in a note on page 40 of his " Discovery
of the Great West."

fHennepin, p. 187.

122 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Miamis are: Oumiamwek,* Oumamis, + Maumees, :{: Au-Miami
(contracted to Au-Mi and Omee) and Mine-ami. |j

The French called the Weas Ouiatenons, Syatanons, Ouyatanons
and Ouias ; the English and Colonial traders spelled the word,
Ouicatanon,^[ Way-ough-ta nies,** Wawiachtens,ft and Wehahs.^

For the Piankeshaws, or Pou-an-ke-ki-as, as they were called in
the earliest accounts, we have Peanguichias, Pian-gui-shaws, Pyan-
ke-shas and Pianquishas.

The Miami tribes were known to the Iroquois, or Five Nations
of New York, as the Twight-wees, a name generally adopted by the
British, as well as by the American colonists. Of this name there
are various corruptions in pronunciation and spelling, examples of
which we have in " Twich-twichs, " " Twick-twicks, " " Twis-twicks, "
" Twigh-twees, " and " Twick-tovies. " The insertion of these many
names, applied to one people, would seem a tedious superfluity, were
it otherwise possible to retain the identity of the tribes to which
these different appellations have been given by the French, British
and American officers, traders and writers. It will save the reader
much perplexity in pursuing a history of the Miamis if it is borne in
mind that all these several names refer to the Miami nation or to
one or the other of its respective bands.

Besides the colony mentioned by Dablon and Charlevoix, on the
Fox River of Wisconsin, Hennepin informs us of a village of
Miamis south and west of Peoria Lake at the time he was at the
latter place in 1679, and it was probably this village whose inhabit-
ants the Sioux were seeking. St. Cosmie, in 1699, mentions the
' ' village of the ' Peanzichias-Miamis, who formerly dwelt on the

- of the Mississippi, and who had come some years previous
and settled ' on the Illinois River, a few miles below the confluence
of the DesPlaines.' 1 $<

The Miamis were within the territory of La Salle's colony, of
which Starved Rock was the center, and counted thirteen hundred
warriors. The Weas and Piankeshaws were also there, the former
having five hundred warriors and the Piankeshaw band one hundred
and fifty. This was prior to 1687. If At a later day the Weas "were
at Chicago, but being afraid of the canoe people, left it. ""*[ Sieur
de Courtmanche, sent westward in 1701 to negotiate with the tribes
in that part of New France, was at " Chicago, where he found some

Marquette. fLaHontan. \ Gen. Harrison. Gen. Harmar. (Lewis Evans.
^1" George Croghan's Narrative Journal. ** Croghan's List of Indian Tribes,
ft John Heckwelder, a Moravian Missionary. \\ Catlin's Indian Tribes.

St. Cosmie's Journal in " Early Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi," p. 58.
ill Parkman's Discovery of the Great West, note on p. 290.
*T*[ Memoir on the Indian tribes, prepared in 1718: Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 890.

AT WAR WITH THE SIOUX. 123

Weas (Ouiatanons), a Miami tribe, who had sung the war-song
against the Sioux and the Iroquois. He obliged them to lay down
their arms and extorted from them a promise to send deputies to
Montreal." *

In a letter dated in 1721, published in his "Narrative Journal,"
Father Charlevoix, speaking of the Miamis about the head of Lake
Michigan, says: " Fifty years ago the Miamis were settled on the
southern extremity of Lake Michigan, in a place called Chicagou,
from the name of a small river which runs into the lake, the source
of which is not far distant from that of the river of the Illinois ;
they are at present divided into three villages, one of which stands
on the river St. Joseph, the second on another river which bears
their name and runs into Lake Erie, and the third upon the river
Ouabache, which empties its waters into the Mississippi. These last
are better known by the appellation of Ouyatanons." f

In 1694, Count Frontenac, in a conference with the Western In-
dians, requested the Miamis of the Pepikokia band who resided on
the Maramek,^: to remove, and join the tribe which was located on
the Saint Joseph, of Lake Michigan. The reason for this request,
as stated by Frontenac himself, was, that he wished the different
bands of the Miami confederacy to unite, "so as to be able to exe-
cute with greater facility the commands which he might issue. ' ' At
that time the Iroquois were at war with Canada, and the French
were endeavoring to persuade the western tribes to take up the tom-
ahawk in their behalf. The Miamis promised to observe the Gov-
ernor's wishes and began to make preparations for the removal.

"Late in August, 1696, they started to join their brethren settled
on the St. Joseph. On their way they were attacked by the Sioux,
who killed several. The Miamis of the St. Joseph, learning this
hostility, resolved to avenge their slaughter. They pursued the
Sioux to their own country, and found them entrenched in their fort
with some Frenchmen of the class known as coureurs des bois (bush-
lopers). They nevertheless attacked them repeatedly with great res-
olution, but were repulsed, and at last compelled to retire, after
losing several of their braves. On their way home, meeting other
Frenchmen carrying arms and ammunition to the Sioux, they seized
all they had, but did them no harm." |j

The Miamis were very much enraged at the French for supplying

* History of New France, vol. 5, p. 142.

t Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 1, p. 287.

JThe Kalamazoo, of Michigan.

Paris Documents, vol. 9, pp. 624, 625.

5 Charlevoix' History of New France, vol. 5, p. 65.

124 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

their enemies, the Sioux, with guns and ammunition. It took all
the address of Count Frontenac to prevent them from joining the
Iroquois ; indeed, they seized upon the French agent and trader,
Nicholas Perrot, who had been commissioned to lead the Maramek
band to the St. Josephs, and would have burnt him alive had it not
been for the Foxes, who interposed in his behalf.* This was the
commencement of the bitter feeling of hostility with which, from
that time, a part of the Miamis always regarded the French. From
this period the movements of the tribe were observed by the French
with jealous suspicion.

We have already shown that in 1699 the Miamis were at Fort
Wayne, engaged in transferring across their portage emigrants from
Canada to Louisiana, and that, within a few years after, the Weas
are described as having their fort and several miles of cultivated
fields on the Wea pla'ins below La Fayette.f From the extent and
character of these improvements, it may be safely assumed that the
Weas had been established here some years prior to 1718, the date
of the Memoir.

When the French first discovered the Wabash, the Piankeshaws
were found in possession of the land on either side of that stream,
from its mouth to the Vermilion River, and no claim had ever
been made to it by any other tribe until 1804, the period of a ces-
sion of a part of it to the United States by the Delawares, who had
obtained their title from the Piankeshaws themselves.^:

We have already seen that at the time of the first account we
have relating to the Maumee and the Wabash, the Miamis had vil-
lages and extensive improvements near Fort Wayne, on the Wea
prairie below La Fayette, on the Vermilion of the Wabash, and at
Vincennes. At a later day they established villages at other places,
viz, near the forks of the Wabash at Iluntington, on the Mississin-
ewa, on Eel River near Logansport, while near the source of this
river, and westward of Fort Wayne, was the village of the "Little
Turtle." Near the mouth of the Tippecanoe was a sixth village.

* Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 672.

fF/rfe, p. 104.

j Memoirs of General Harrison, pp. 61, 63.

This stream empties into the Wabash near Peru, and on the opposite side of the
river from that city. The word is a compound of missi, great, and assin, stone, signify-
ing the river of the great or much stone. "The Mississinewa, with its pillared rocks,
is full of geological as well as romantic interest. Some throe miles from Peru the
channel is cut through a solid wall of cherty silico-magnesian limestone. The action
of the river and unequal disintegration of the rocks has carved the precipitous wall,
which converts the river's course into a system of pillars, rounded buttresses, alcoves,
chambers and overhanging sides." Prof. Collett's Report on the Geology of Miami
county, Indiana.

A WARLIKE PEOPLE. 125

Passing below the Vermilion, the Miarnis had other villages, one
on Sugar creek* and another near Terre Haute, f

The country of the Miamis extended west to the watershed be-
tween the Illinois and Wabash rivers, which separated their posses-
sions from those of their brethren, the Illinois. On the north were
the Pottawatornies, who were slowly but steadily pushing their lines
southward into the territory of the Miamis. The superior numbers
of the Miamis and their great valor enabled them to extend the
limit of their hunting grounds eastward into Ohio, and far within
the territory claimed by the Iroquois. "They were the undoubted
proprietors of all that beautiful country watered by the Wabash and
its tributaries, and there remains as little doubt that their claim ex-
tended as far east as the Scioto."^:

Unlike the Illinois, the Miamis held their own until they were
placed upon an equal footing with the tribes eastward by obtaining
possession of fire-arms. With these implements of civilized warfare
they were able to maintain their tribal integrity and the independ-
ence they cherished. They were not to be controlled by the French,
nor did they suffer enemies from any quarter to impose upon them
without prompt retaliation. They traded and fought with the
French, English and Americans as their interests or passions in-
clined. They made peace or declared war against other nations of
their own race as policy or caprice dictated. More than once they
compelled even the arrogant Iroquois to beg from the governors of
the American colonies that protection which they themselves had
failed to secure by their own prowess. Bold, independent arid
flushed with success, the Miamis afforded a poor field for missionary
work, and the Jesuit Relations and pastoral letters of the French
priesthood have less to say of the Miami confederacy than any of the
other western tribes, the Kickapoos alone excepted.

The country of the Miamis was accessible, by way of the lakes r
to the fur trader of Canada, and from the eastward, to the adven-
turers engaged in the Indian trade from Pennsylvania, New York
and Virginia, either by way of the Ohio River or a commerce car-
ried on overland by means of pack-horses. The English and the
French alike coveted their peltries and sought their powerful alli-

*This stream was at one time called Rocky River, vide Brown's Western Gazet-
teer. By the Wea Miamis it was called Pim-go-se-con-e, "Sugar tree " (creek), vide
statement of Mary Ann Baptiste to the author.

t The villages below the Vermilion and above Vincennes figure on some of the early
English maps and in accounts given by traders as the lower or little Wea towns. Be-
sides these, which were the principal ones, the Miamis had a village at Thorntown r
and many others of lesser note on the Wabash and its tributaries.

| Official Letter of General Harrison to the Secretary of War, before quoted.

126 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

ance, therefore the Miamis were harassed with the jealousies and
diplomacy of both, and if they or a part of their several tribes be-
came inveigled into an alliance with the one, it involved the hostility
of the other. The French government sought to use them to check
the westward advance of the British colonial influence, while the
latter desired their assistance to curb the French, whose ambitious
schemes involved nothing less than the exclusive subjugation of
the entire continent westward of the Alleghanies. In these wars
between the English and the French the Miamis were constantly
reduced in numbers, and whatever might have been the result to
either of the former, it only ended in disaster to themselves. Some-
times they divided ; again they were entirely devoted to the interest
of the English and Iroquois. Then they joined the French against
the British and Iroquois, and when the British ultimately obtained
the mastery and secured the valley of the Mississippi, the long
sought for prize, the Miamis entered the confederacy of Pontiac
to drive them out of the country. They fought with the British,
except the Piankeshaw band, against the colonies during the
revolutionary war. After its close their young men were largely
occupied in the predatory warfare waged by the several Maumee
and Wabash tribes upon the frontier settlements of Ohio, Pennsyl-
vania, Virginia and Kentucky. They likewise entered the con-
federacy of Tecumseh, and, either openly or in secret sympathy,
they were the allies of the British in the war of 1812. Their history
occupies a conspicuous place in the military annals of the west,
extending over a period of a century, during which time they main-
tained a manly struggle to retain possession of their homes in the
valleys of the Wabash and Maumee.

The disadvantage under which the Miamis labored, in encounters
with their enemies, before they obtained fire-arms, was often over-
come by the exercise of their cunning and bravery. "In the year
1680 the Miamis and Illinois were hunting on the St. Joseph River.
A party of four hundred Iroquois surprised them and killed thirty
or forty of their hunters and captured three hundred of their women
and children. After the victors had rested awhile they prepared to
return to their homes by easy journeys, as they had reason to believe
that they could reach their own villages before the defeated enemy
would have time to rally and give notice of their disaster to those of
their nation who were hunting in remoter places. But they were
deceived ; for the Illinois and Miamis rallied to the number of two
hundred, and resolved to die fighting rather than suffer their women
and children to be carried away. In the meantime, because they

DEFEAT OF THE IROQUOIS. 127

were not equal to their enemies in equipment of arms or numbers,
they contrived a notable stratagem.

After the Miamis had duly considered in what way they would at-
tack the Iroquois, they decided to follow them, keeping a small dis-
tance in the rear, until it should rain. The heavens seemed to favor
their plan, for, after awhile it began to rain, and rained continually
the whole day from morning until night. When the rain began to
fall the Miamis quickened their march and passed by the Iroquois,
and took a position two leagues in advance, where they lay in an am-
buscade, hidden by the tall grass, in the middle of a prairie, which
the Iroquois had to cross in order to reach the woods beyond, where
they designed to kindle fires and encamp for the night. The Illi-
nois and Miamis, lying at full length in the grass on either side of
the trail, waited until the Iroquois were in their midst, when they
shot off their arrows, and then attacked vigorously with their clubs.
The Iroquois endeavored to use their fire-arms, but finding them of
no service because the rain had dampened and spoiled the priming,
threw them upon the ground, and undertook to defend themselves
with their clubs. In the use of the latter weapon the Iroquois were
no match for their more dexterous and nimble enemies. They were
forced to yield the contest, and retreated, fighting until night came
on. They lost one hundred and eighty of their warriors.

The fight lasted about an hour, and would have continued through
the night, were it not that the Miamis and Illinois feared that their
women and children (left in the rear and bound) would be exposed
to some surprise in the dark. The victors rejoined their women and
children, and possessed themselves of the fire-arms of their enemies.
The Miamis and Illinois then returned to their own country, without
taking one Iroquois for fear of weakening themselves.*

Failing in their first efforts to withdraw the Miamis from the
French, and secure their fur trade to the merchants at Albany and
New York, the English sent their allies, the Iroquois, against them.
A series of encounters between the two tribes was the result, in

*This account is taken from La Hontan, vol. 2, pp. 63, 64 and 65. The facts con-
cerning the engagement, as given by La Hontan, may be relied upon as substantially
correct, for they were written only a few years after the event. La Hontan, as appears
from the date of his letters which comprise the principal part of his volumes, was in
this country from November, 1683, to 1689, and it was during this time that he was
collecting the information contained in his works. The place where this engagement
between the Miamis and Illinois against the Iroquois occurred, is a matter of doubt.
Some late commentators claim that it was upon the Maumee. La Hontan says that
the engagement was "near the river Oumamis." When he wrote, the St. Joseph of
Lake Michigan was called the river Oumamis, and on the map accompanying La Hon-
tan's volume it is so-called, while the Maumee, though laid down on the map, is
designated by no name whatever. It would, therefore, appear that when La Hontan
mentioned the Miami River he referred to the St. Joseph.

128 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

which the blood of both was profusely shed, to further the purposes
of a purely commercial transaction.

In these engagements the Senecas a tribe of the Iroquois, or
Five Nations, residing to the west of the other tribes of the confed-
eracy, and, in consequence, being nearest to the Miamis, and more
directly exposed to their fury were nearly destroyed at the out-
set. The Miamis followed up their success and drove the Senecas
behind the palisades that inclosed their villages. For three years
the war was carried on with a bitterness only known to exasperated
savages.

When at last the Iroquois saw they could no longer defend them-
selves against the Miamis, they appeared in council before the Gov-
ernor of New York, and, pittyingly, claimed protection from him,
who, to say the least, had remained silent and permitted his own
people to precipitate this calamity upon them.

''You say you will support us against all your kings and our
enemies ; we will then forbear keeping any more correspondence
with the French of Canada if the great King of England will de-
fend our people from the Twichtwicks and other nations over whom
the French have an influence and have encouraged to destroy an
abundance of our people, even since the peace between the two crowns"
etc. *

The governor declined sending troops to protect the Iroquois
against their enemies, but informed them : ' ' You must be sensible
that the Dowaganhaes, Twichtwicks, etc., and other remote Indians,
are vastly more numerous than you Five Nations, and that, by their
continued warring upon you, they will, in a few years, totally de-
stroy you. I should, therefore, think it prudence and good policy in
you to try all possible means to fix a trade and correspondence with
all those nations, by which means you would reconcile them to your-
selves, and with my assistance, I am in hopes that, in a short time,
they might be united with us in the covenant chain, and then you
might, at all times, without hazard, go hunting into their country,
which, I understand, is much the best for beaver. I wish you would
try to bring some of them to speak to me, and perhaps I might pre-
vail upon them to come and live amongst you. I should think my-
self obliged to reward you for such a piece of service as I tender
your good advantage, and will always use my best endeavor to pre-
serve you from all your enemies."

* Speech of an Iroquois chief at a conference held at Albany, August 26, 1700, be-
tween Richard, Earl of Belmont, Captain-General and Governor-in-Chief of His Maj-
esty's provinces of New York, etc., and the sachems of the Five Nations. New York
Colonial Documents, vol. 4, p. 729.

TRADE WITH THE ENGLISH. 129

The conference continued several days, during which the Iroquois
stated their grievances in numerous speeches, to which the governor
graciously replied, using vague terms and making no promises,
after the manner of the extract from his speech above quoted, but
placed great stress on the value of the fur trade to the English, and
enjoining his brothers, the Iroquois, to bring all their peltries to
Albany ; to maintain their old alliance with the English, offensive
and defensive, and have no intercourse whatever, of a friendly na-
ture, with the rascally French of Canada.

The Iroquois declined to follow the advice of the governor,
deeming it of little credit to their courage to sue for peace. In the
meantime the governor sent emissaries out among the Miamis, with
an invitation to open a trade with the English. The messengers were
captured by the commandant at Detroit, and sent, as prisoners, to
Canada. However, the Miamis, in July, 1702, sent, through the
sachems of the Five Nations, a message to the governor at Albany,
advising him that many of the Miamis, with another nation, had
removed to, and were then living at, Tjughsaghrondie,* near by the^
fort which the French had built the previous summer ; that they had
been informed that one of their chiefs, who had visited Albany two
years before, had been kindly treated, and that they had now come
forward to inquire into the trade of Albany, and see if goods could
not be purchased there cheaper than elsewhere, and that they had
intended to go to Canada with their beaver and peltries, but that
they ventured to Albany to inquire if goods could not be secured on
better terms. The governor replied that he was extremely pleased
to speak with the Miamis about the establishment of a lasting friend-
ship and trade, and in token of his sincere intentions presented his
guests with guns, powder, hats, strouds, tobacco and pipes, arid sent
to their brethren at Detroit, wauinpum, pipes, shells, nose and ear
jewels, looking-glasses, fans, children's toys, and such other light
articles as his guests could conveniently carry ; and, finally, assured
them that the Miamis might come freely to Albany, where they
would be treated kindly, and receive, in exchange for their peltries,
everything as cheap as any other Indians in covenant of friendship
with the English, f

During the same year (1702) the Miamis and Senecas settled their
quarrels, exchanged prisoners, and established a peace between
themselves. ^

* The Iroquois name for the Straits of Detroit.

t Proceedings of a conference between the parties mentioned above. New York
Colonial Documents, vol. 4, pp. 979 to 981.

J New York Colonial Documents, vol. 4, p. 989.
9

130 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

The French were not disposed to allow a portion of the fur trade
to be diverted to Albany. Peaceable means were first used to dis-
suade the Miarnis from trading with the English ; failing in this,
forcible means were resorted to. Captain Antoine De La Mothe
Cadillac marched against the Miamis and reduced them to terms.*

The Miamis were not unanimous in the choice of their friends.
Some adhered to the French, while others were strongly inclined to
trade with the English, of whom they could obtain a better quality
of goods at cheaper rates, while at the same time they were allowed
a greater price for their furs. Cadillac had hardly effected a coercive
peace with the Miamis before the latter were again at Albany. " I
have," writes Lord Cournbury to the Board of Trade, in a letter
dated August 20, 1708,f "been there five years endeavoring to get
these nations [referring to the Miamis and another nation] to trade
with our people, but the French have always dissuaded them from
coming until this year, when, goods being very scarce, they came to
Albany, whjere our people have supplied them with goods much
cheaper than ever the French did, and they promise to return in the
spring with a much greater number of their nations, which would be
a very great advantage to this province. I did, in a letter of the
25th day of June last, inform your Lordships that three French
soldiers, having deserted from the French at a place they call Le
Destroit, came to Albany. Another deserter came from the same
place, whom I examined myself, and I inclose a copy of his exam-
ination, by which your Lordships will perceive how easily the French
may be beaten out of Canada. The better I am acquainted with this
country, and the more I inquire into matters, so much the more I
am confirmed in my opinion of the facility of effecting that conquest,
and by the method I then proposed."

Turning to French documents we find that Sieur de Callier de-
sired the Miamis to withdraw from their several widely separated
villages and settle in a body upon the St. Joseph. At a great council
of the westward tribes, held in Montreal in 1694, the French In-
tendant, in a speech to the Miamis, declares that "he will not believe
that the Miamis wish to obey him until they make altogether one
and the same fire, either at the River St. Joseph or at some other
place adjoining it. He tells them that he has got near the Iroquois,
and has soldiers at Katarakoui, ;{: in the fort that had been abandoned ;
that the Miamis must get near the enemy, in order to imitate him

* Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 671: note of the editor.
t New York Colonial Documents, vol. 5, p. 65.
j At Fort Frontenac.

URGED TO UNITE AT ONE PLACE. 131

(the Intendarit), and be able to strike the Iroquois the more readily.
My children," continued the Intendant, "tell me that the Miamis
are numerous, and able of themselves to destroy the Iroquois. Like
them, all are afraid. What ! do you wish to abandon your country
to your enemy ? . . . Have you forgotten that I waged war against
him, principally on your account, alone ? Your dead are no longer
visible in his country ; their bodies are covered by those of the
French who have perished to avenge them. I furnished you the
means to avenge them, likewise. It depends only on me to receive
the Iroquois as a friend, which I will not do on account of you, who
would be destroyed were I to make peace without including you in
its terms." *

"I have heard," writes Governor Vaudreuil, in a letter dated
the 28th of October, 1719, to the Council of Marine at Paris, "that
the Miamis had resolved to remain where they were, and not go
to the St. Joseph River, and that this resolution of theirs was dan-
gerous, on account of the facility they would have of communicating
with the English, who were incessantly distributing belts secretly
among the nations, to attract them to themselves, and that Sieur
Dubinson had been designed to command the post of Ouaytanons,
where he should use his influence among the Miamis to induce them
to go to the River St. Joseph, and in case they were not willing,
that he should remain with them, to counteract the effect of those
belts, which had already caused eight or ten Miami canoes to go that
year to trade at Albany, and which might finally induce all of the
Miami nation to follow the example, "t Finally, some twenty-five
years later, as we learn from the letter of M de Beauharnois, that
this French officer, having learned that the English had established
trading magazines on the Ohio, issued his orders to the command-
ants among the Weas and Miamis, to drive the British off by force
of arms and plunder their stores.^;

Other extracts might be drawn from the voluminous reports of
the military and civil officers of the French and British colonial
governments respectively, to the same purport as those already
quoted ; but enough has been given to illustrate the unfortunate
position of the Miamis. For a period of half a century they were
placed between the cutting edges of English and French pur-
poses, during which there was no time when they were not threat-
ened with clanger of, or engaged in, actual war either with the
French or the English, or with some of their several Indian allies.

* Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 635. f Ibid, p. 894. \ Ibid, p. 1105.

132 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

By tliis continual abrasion, the peace and happiness which should
have been theirs was wholly lost, and their numbers constantly
reduced. They had no relief from the strife, in which only injury
could result to themselves, let the issue have been what it might
between the English and the French, until the power of the latter
was finally destroyed in 1763 ; and even then, after the French had
given up the country, the Miamis were compelled to defend their
own title to it against the arrogant claims of the English. In the
eifort of the combined westward tribes to wrest their country from
the English, subsequent to the close of the colonial war, the Miamis-
took a conspicuous part. This will be noticed in a subsequent chap-
ter. After the conclusion of the revolutionary war, the several
Miami villages from the Yermilion River to Fort Wayne suffered
severely from the attacks of the federal government under General
Harmer, and the military expeditions recruited in Kentucky, and
commanded by Colonels Scott and Wilkinson. Besides these dis-
asters, whole villages were nearly depopulated by the ravages of
small-pox. The uncontrollable thirst for whisky, acquired, through
a long course of years, by contact with unscrupulous traders, reduced
their numbers still more, while it degraded them to the last degree.
This was their condition in 1814, when General Harrison said of
them: "The Miamis will not be in our way. They are a poor,
miserable, drunken set, diminishing every year. Becoming too lazy
to hunt, they feel the advantage of their annuities. The fear of the
other Indians has alone prevented them from selling their whole
claim to the United States ; and as soon as there is peace, or when
the British can no longer intrigue, they will sell." The same
authority, in his historical address at Cincinnati in 1838, on the
aborigines of the Valley of the Ohio, says: "At any time before
the treaty of Greenville in 1795 the Miamis alone could have fur-
nished more than three thousand warriors. Constant war with our
frontier had deprived them of many of their braves, but the ravages
of small-pox was the principal cause of the great decrease in their
numbers. They composed, however, a body of the finest Light
troops in the world. And had they been under an efficient system of
discipline, or possessed enterprise equal to their valor, the settle-
ment of the country would have been attended with much greater
difficulty than was encountered in accomplishing it, and their final
subjugation would have been delayed for some years.' 1 +

Yet their decline, from causes assigned, was so rapid, that when

* Official letter of General Harrison to the Secretary of War, of date March 24, 1814.
fP. 39 of General Harrison's address, original pamphlet edition.

CESSION OF THEIR LANDS. 133

the Baptist missionary, Isaac McCoy, was among them from 1817
until 1822, and drawing conclusions from personal contact, declared
that the Miamis were not a warlike people. There is, perhaps, in
the history of the North American Indians, no instance parallel to
the utter demoralization of the Miamis, nor an example of a tribe
which stood so high and had tallen so low through the practice of
all the vices which degrade human beings. Mr. McCoy, within the
period named, traveled up and down the W abash, from Terre Haute
to Fort Wayne ; and at the villages near Montezuma, on Eel River,
at the Mississinewa and Fort Wayne, there were continuous rounds
of drunken debauchery whenever whisky could be obtained, of which
men, women arid children all partook, and life was often sacrificed
in personal broils or by exposure of the debauchees to the inclemency
-of the weather.*

By treaties, entered into at various times, from 1795 to 1845, in-
clusive, the Miamis ceded their lands in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio,
.and removed west of the Mississippi, going in villages or by detach-
ments, from time to time. At a single cession in 1838 they sold
the government 177,000 acres of land in Indiana, which was only a
fragment of their former possessions, still retaining a large tract.
Thus they alienated their heritage, and gradually disappeared from
the valleys of the Maumee and Wabash. A few remained on their
reservations and adapted themselves to the ways of the white peo-
ple, and their descendants may be occasionally met with about Peru,
Wabash and Fort Wayne. The money received from sales of their
lands proved to them a calamity, rather than a blessing, as it intro-
duced the most demoralizing habits. It is estimated that within a
period of eighteen years subsequent to the close of the war of 1812
more than five hundred of them perished in drunken broils and fights, f

The last of the Miamis to go westward were the Mississinewa
band. This remnant, comprising in all three hundred and fifty per-
sons, under charge of Christmas Dagney,^: left their old home in the

* Mr. McCoy has contributed a valuable fund of original information in his History
of Baptist Indian Missions, published in 1840. The volume contains six hundred and
eleven pages. He mentions many instances of drunken orgies which he witnessed in
the several Miami towns. We quote one of them: "An intoxicated Indian at Fort
Wayne dismounted from his horse and ran up to a young Indian woman who was his
-sister-in-law, with a knife in his hand. She first ran around one of the company pres-
ent, and then another, to avoid the murderer, but in vain. He stabbed her with his
knife. She then fled from the company. He stood looking after her, and seeing she
did not fall, pursued her, threw her to the earth and drove his knife into her heart, in
the presence of the whole company, none of whom ventured to save the girl's life."
P. 85.

t Vide American Cyclopaedia, vol. 11, p. 490.

\ His name was, also, spelled Dazney and Dagnett. He was born on the 25th of
December, 1799, at the Wea village of Old Orchard Town, or We-au-ta-no, "The
Risen Sun," situated two miles below Fort Harrison. His father, Ambroise Dagney,

134 HISTORIC XOTKS ON THE NORTHWEST.

fall of 184:6, and reached Cincinnati on canal-boats in October of
that year. Here they were placed upon a steamboat and taken down
the Ohio, up the Mississippi and Missouri, and landed late in the
season at Westport, near Kansas City. Ragged men and nearly
naked women and children, forming a motley group, were huddled
upon the shore, alone, with no friends to relieve their wants, and
exposed to the bitter December winds that blew from the chilly
plains of Kansas. In 1C 70 the Jesuit Father Dablon introduces the
Miamis to our notice at the village of Maskoutench, where we see
the chief surrounded by his officers of state in all the routine of bar-
baric display, and the natives of other tribes paying his subjects the
greatest deference. The Miamis, advancing eastward, in the rear of
the line of their valorous warriors, pushed their villages into Michi-
gan, Indiana, and as far as the river still bearing their name in Ohio.
Coming in collision with the French, English and Americans, re-
duced by constant wars, and decimated, more than all, with vices
contracted by intercourse witli the whites, whose virtues they failed
to emulate, they make a westward turn, and having, in the progress
of time, described the round of a most singular journey, we at last
behold the miserable and friendless remnant on the same side of the

was a Frenchman, a native of Kaskaskia, and served during Harrison's campaign
against the Indians, in 1811, in Captain Scott's company, raised at Vincennes. He
took part in the battle of Tippecanoe. His mother, Me-chin-quam-e-sha, the Beauti-
ful Shade Tree, was the sister of Jocco, or Tack-ke-ke-kah, "The Tall Oak," who
was chief of the Wea band living at the village named, and whose people claimed
the country east of the Wabash. from the mouth of Sugar Creek to a point some dis-
tance below Terre Haute. "Me-chin-quam-e-sha" died in 1822, and was buried at
Fort Harrison. Christmas Pagney received a good education under the instruction of
the Catholics. He spoke French and English with great fluency, and was master of
the dialects of the several Wabash tribes. For many years he was government inter-
preter at Fort Harrison, and subsequently Indian agent, having the superin tendency"
of the Wabash Miamis, whom he conducted westward. On the 16th of February,
1819, he was married to "Mary Ann Isaacs," of the Brothertown Indians, who had
been spending a few weeks at the mission house of Isaac McCoy, situated on Raccoon
Creek, or Pishewa, as it was called by the Indians, a few miles above Armysburg.
The marriage was performed by Mr. McCoy '' in the presence of our Indian neighbors,
who were invited to attend the ceremony. And we had the happiness to have twenty-
three of the natives partake of a meal prepared on the occasion." Vide page 64 in his
book, before quoted. This was, doubtless, the first marriage that was celebrated after
the formality of our laws within the present limits of Parke country. By the terms of
the treaty at St. Mary's, concluded on the 2d of October. 1818, one section of land was
reserved for the exclusive use of Mr. Dagney, and he went to Washington and selected
a section that included the village of Armysburg, which at that time was the county
seat, and consisted of a row of log houses formed out of sugar-tree logs and built
continuously together, from which circumstance it derived the name of " String-
town." As a speculation the venture was not successful, for the seat of justice was
removed to Rockville, and town lots at Stringtown ceased to have even a prospective
value. Mr. Dagney's family occupied the reservation as a farm until about 1846. Mr.
Dagney died in 1848, at Coldwater Grove, Kansas. Her second husband was Babtise
Peoria. Mrs. Babtise Peoria had superior opportunities to acquire an extensive knowl-
edge of the Wabash tribes between Vincennes and Fort Wayne, as she lived on the
Wabash from 1817 until 1846. She is now living at Paola, Kansas, where the author
met her in November, 1878.

REMOVAL WESTWARD. 135

Mississippi from whence their warlike progenitors had come nearly
two centuries before.

From Westport the Mississinewas were conducted to a place
near the present village of Lowisburg, Kansas, in the county named
(Miami) after the tribe. Here they suffered greatly. Nearly one
third of their number died the first year. They were homesick and
disconsolate to the last degree. " Strong men would actually weep,
as their thoughts recurred to their dear old homes in Indiana,
whither many of them would make journeys, barefooted, begging
their way, and submitting to the imprecations hurled from the door
of the white man upon them as they asked for a crust of bread.
They wanted to die to forget their miseries." "I have seen," says
Mrs. Mary Baptiste to the author, "mothers and fathers give their
little children away to others of the tribe for adoption, and after
singing their funeral songs, and joining in the solemn dance of
death, go calmly away from the assemblage, to be seen no more
alive. The Miamis could not be reconciled to the prairie winds of
Kansas; they longed for the woods and groves that gave a partial
shade to the flashing waters of the Wah-pe-sha"*

The Wea and Piankeshaw bands preceded the Mississinewas to
the westward. They had become reduced to a wretched community
of about two hundred and fifty souls, and they suffered severely
during the civil war, in Kansas. The Miamis, Weas, Piankeshaws,
and the remaining fragments of the Kaskaskias, containing under
that name what yet remained of the several subdivisions of the old
Illini confederacy, were gathered together by Baptiste Peoria, and
consolidated under the title of The Confederated Tribes. f This

* The peculiar sound with which Mrs. Baptiste gave the Miami pronunciation of
Wabash is difficult to express in mere letters. The principal accent is on the first syl-
lable, the minor accent on the last, while the second syllable is but slightly sounded.
The word means "white" in both the Miami and Peoria dialects. In treating upon
the derivation of the word Wabash (p. 100), the manuscript containing the statements
of Mrs. Baptiste was overlooked.

fThis remarkable, man was the son of a daughter of a sub-chief of the Peoria
tribe. He was born, according to the best information, in 1793, near the confluence of
the Kankakee and Maple, as the Des Plaines River was called by the Illinois Indians
and the French respectively. His reputed father was a French Canadian trader liv-
ing with this tribe, and whose name was Baptiste. Young Peoria was called Batticy
by his mother. Later in life he was known as Baptist e the Peoria, and finally as Bap-
tiste Peoria. The people of his tribe gave the name a liquid sound, and pronounced
it as if it were spelled Paola. The county seat of Miami county, Kansas, is named
after him. He was a man of large frame, active, and possessed of great strength and
courage. Like Keokuk, the great chief of the Sacs and Fox Indians, Paola was fond
of athletic sports, and was an expert horseman. He had a ready command both of
the French Canadian and the English languages. He was familiar with the dialects of
the Ppttawatomies, Shawnees, Delawares, Miamis and Kickapoos. These qualifications
as a linguist soon brought him into prominence among the Indians, while his known
integrity commended his services to the United States government. From the year
1821 to the year 1838 he assisted in the removal of the above-named tribes from Indi-

136 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

little confederation disposed of their reservation in Miami county,
Kansas, and adjacent vicinity, and retired to a tract of reduced
dimensions within the Indian Territory. Since their last change of
location in 1867 they have made but little progress in their efforts
toward a higher civilization. The numbers of what remains of the
once numerous .Illinois and Miami confederacies are reduced to less
than two hundred persons. The Miamis, like the unfortunate man
who has carried his dissipations beyond the limit from which there
can be no healthy reaction, seem not to have recovered from the
vices contracted before leaving the states, and with some notable
exceptions, they are a listless, idle people, little worthy of the spirit
that inspired the breasts of their ancestors.

ana and Illinois to their reservations beyond the Mississippi. His duties as Indian
agent brought him in contact with many of the early settlers on the Illinois and the
W abash, from Vincennes to Fort Wayne. In 1818, when about twenty-five years of
age, Batticy represented his tribe at the treaty at Edwardsville. By this treaty, which is
signed by representatives from all the five tribes comprising the Illinois or Illini nation
of Indians, viz, the Peorias. Kaskaskias, Mitchigamias, Cahokias and Tamaoris, it
appears that for a period of years anterior to that time the Peorias had lived, and were
then living, separate and apart from the other tribes named. Treaties with the Indian
Tribes, etc., p. 247, government edition, 1837. By this treaty the several tribes named
ceded to the United States the residue of their lands in Illinois. For nearly thirty years
was Baptiste Peoria in the service of the United States. In 1867 Peoria became the
chief of the consolidated tribes of the Miamis and Illinois, and went with them to
their new reservation in the northeast corner of the Indian Territory, where he died
on the 13th of September, 1873, aged eighty years.* Some years before his death he
married Mary Baptiste, the widow of Christmas Dagney, who, as before stated, still
survives. I am indebted to this lady for copies of the " Western Spirit," a newspaper
published at Paola, and the "Fort Scott iVIonitor," containing obituary notices and
biographical sketches of her late husband, from which this notice of Baptiste Peoria
has been summarized. Baptiste may be said to be "the last of the Peorias." He
made a manly and persistent effort to save the fragment of the Illinois and Miamis,
and by precepts and example tried to encourage them to adopt the ways of civilized
life.

CHAPTER XV.

THE POTTAW ATOMIES.

WHEN the Jesuits were extending their missions westward of
Quebec they found a tribe of Indians, called Ottawas, living upon
a river of Canada, to which the name of Ottawa was given. After
the dispersion of the Hurons by the Iroquois, in 1649, the Ottawas,
to the number of one thousand, joined five hundred of the discom-
fited Hurons, and with them retired to the southwestern shore of
Lake Superior.* The fugitives were followed by the missionaries,
who established among them the Mission of the Holy Ghost, at La
Pointe, already mentioned. Shortly after the establishment of the
mission the Jesuits made an enumeration of the western Algonquin
tribes, in which all are mentioned except the Ojibbeways and Pian-
keshaws. The nation which dwelt south of the mission, classified as
speaking the pure Algonquin, is uniformly called Ottawas, and the
Ojibbeways, by whom they were surrounded, were never once noticed
by that name. Hence it is certain that at that early day the Jesuits
considered the Ottawas and Ojibbeways as one people. f

In close consanguinity with the Ottawas and Ojibbeways were
the Pottawatoinies, between whom there was only a slight dialectical
difference in language, while the manners and customs prevailing in
the three tribes were almost identical.:}: This view was again re-
asserted by Mr. Gallatin : ' Although it must be admitted that the
Algonquins, the Ojibbeways, the Ottawas and the Pottawatomies
speak different dialects, these are so nearly allied that they may be
considered rather as dialects of the same, than as distinct languages."!

This conclusion of Mr. Gallatin was arrived at after a scientific
and analytical comparison of the languages of the tribes mentioned.

Jn confirmation of the above statement we have the speeches of
three Indian chiefs at Chicago in the month of August, 1821. Dur-
ing the progress of the treaty, Keewaygooshkum, a chief of the first
authority among the Ottawas, stated that ' ' the Chippewas, the Pot-

* Jesuit Relations for 1666.

t Albert Gallatin's Synopsis of the Indian Tribes, p. 27.
t Jesuit Relations.

Synopsis of the Indian Tribes, p. 29.
137

138 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

tawatomies and the Ottawas were originally one nation. We sepa-
rated from each other near Michilimackinac. We were related by
the ties of blood, language and interest, but in the course of a long
time these things have been forgotten," etc.

At the conclusion of this speech, Mich-el, an aged chief of the
Chippewas, said: "My Brethren, I am about to speak a few words.
I know you expect it. Be silent, therefore, that the words of an old
man may be heard.

"My Brethren, You have heard the man who has just spoken.
We are all descended from the same stock, the Pottawatomies, the
Chippeways and the Ottawas. We consider ourselves as one. Why
should we not always act in concert? "

Metea, the most powerful of the Pottawatomie chieftains, in his
speech made this statement:

"Brothers, Chippeways and Ottawas, we consider ourselves as
one people, which you know, as also our father* here, who has trav-
eled over our country."

Mr. Schoolcraft, in commenting on the above statements, re-
marks : "This testimony of a common origin derives additional
weight from the general resemblance of these tribes in person, man-
ners, customs and dress, but above all by their having one council-
fire and speaking one language. Still there are obvious characteris-
tics which will induce an observer, after a general acquaintance, to
pronounce the Pottawatomies tall, fierce, haughty ; the Ottawas
short, thick-set, good-natured, industrious ; the Chippeways warlike,
daring, etc. But the general lineaments, or, to borrow a phrase
from natural history, the suite features, are identical, f

The first mention that we have of the Pottawatomies is in the
Jesuit Relations for the years 1639-40. They are then mentioned as
dwelling beyond the River St. Lawrence, and to the north of the
great lake of the Hurons. At this period it is very likely that the
Pottawatomies had theii homes both north of Lake Huron and
south of it, in the northern part of the present State of Michigan.
Twenty-six or seven years after this date the country of the Potta-
watomies is described as being "about the Lake of the Ilimouek."^:
They were mentioned as being "a warlike people, hunters and fish-
ers. Their country is very good for Indian corn, of which they
plant fields, and to which they willingly retire to avoid the famine
that is too common in these quarters. They are in the highest de-
gree idolaters, attached to ridiculous fables and devoted to polygamy.

* Lewis Cass. t Schoolcraft's Central Mississippi Valley, pp. 357. 360, 368.
\ Lake Michigan.

THE POTTAVV ATOMIES. 139

We have seen them here* to the number of three hundred men, all
capable of bearing arms. Of all the people that I have associated with
in these countries, they are the most docile and the most affectionate
toward the French. Their wives and daughters are more reserved
than those of other nations. They have a species of civility among
them, and make it apparent to strangers, which is very rare among
our barbarians, "f

In 1670 the Pottawatomies had collected at the islands at the
mouth of Green Bay which have taken their name from this tribe.
Father Claude Dablon, in a letter concerning the mission of St.
Francis Xavier, which was located on Green Bay, in speaking of
this tribe, remarks that "the Pouteouatami, the Ousaki, and those
of the Forks, .also dwell here, but as strangers^ the fear of the Iro-
quois having driven them from their lands, which are between the
Lake of the Hurons and that of the Illinois.":}:

In 1721, says Charlevoix, "the Poutewatamies possessed only
one of the small islands at the mouth of Green Bay, but had two
other villages, one on the St. Joseph and the other at the Nar-

rows. "

Driven out of the peninsula between lakes Huron and Michigan,
the Pottawatomies took up their abode on the Bay de Noquet, and
other islands near the entrance of Green Bay. From these islands
they advanced southward along the west shore of Lake Michigan.
Extracts taken from Hennepin's Narrative of LaSalle's Voyage
mention the fact that the year previous to La Salle's coming west-
ward (1678), he had sent out a party of traders in advance, who had
bartered successfully with the Pottawatomies upon the islands
named, and who were anxiously waiting for La Salle at the time of
his arrival in the Griffin. Hennepin further states that La Salle's
party bartered with the Pottawatomies at the villages they passed
op the voyage southward.

From this time forward the Pottawatomies steadily moved south-
ward. When La Salle reached the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan
there were no Pottawatomies in that vicinity. Shortly after this
date, however, they had a' village on the south bank of this stream,
near the present city of Niles, Michigan. On the northern bank
was a village of Miamis. The Mission of St. Joseph was here
established and in successful operation prior to 1711, from which
fact, with other incidental circumstances, it has been inferred that

* La Pointe. t Jesuit Relations, 1670-71.

t Jesuit Relations, 1666-7. Detroit.

140 HISTORIC NOTES ON" THE NORTHWEST.

the Pottawatomies, as well as the mission, were on the St. Joseph as
early as the year 1700.*

Father Charlevoix fixes the location of both the mission and the
military post as being at the same place beyond a doubt. "It was
eight days yesterday since I arrived at this post, where we have a
mission, and where there is a commandant with a small garrison.
The commandant's house, which is a very sorry one, is called the
fort, from its being surrounded by an indifferent palisado, which is
pretty near the case in all the rest, except Forts Chambly and Cata-
rocony, which are real fortresses. We have here two villages of
Indians, one of Miamis and the other of Pottawatomies, both of
them mostly Christians ; but as they have been for a long time with-
out any pastors, the missionary who has lately been sent them will
have no small difficulty in bringing them back to the exercise of
their religion. ' ' f

The authorities for locating the old mission and fort of St. Joseph
near Niles are Charlevoix, Prof. Keating and the Rev. Isaac Mc-
Ooy. Commenting on the remains of the old villages upon the St.
Joseph River at the time Long's expedition passed that way, in 1823,
the compiler states that "the prairies, woodland and river were
rendered more picturesque by the ruins of Strawberry, Rum and
St. Joseph's villages, formerly the residence of the Indians or of
the first French settlers. It was curious to trace the difference in
the remains of the habitations of the red and white man in the
midst of this distant solitude. While the untenanted cabin of the

* Some confusion has arisen from a confounding of the Mission of St. Joseph and
Fort St. Joseph with the Fort Miamis. The two were distinct, some miles apart, and
erected at different dates. It is plain, from the accounts given by Hennepin, Membre
and La Hontan, that Fort Miamis was located on Lake Michigan, at the mouth of the
St. Joseph. It is equally clear that the Mission of St. Joseph and Fort St. Joseph
were some miles up the St. Joseph River, and a few miles below the "portage of the
Kankakee " at South Bend. Father Charlevoix, in his letter of the 16th of August,
1721, after having in a previous letter referred to his reaching the St. Joseph and
going up it toward the fort, says: "We afterward sailed up twenty leagues before
vve reached the fort." Vol. 2, p. 94. Again, in a subsequent letter (p. 184): " I de-
parted yesterday from the Fort of the River St. Joseph and sailed up that river about
six leagues. I went ashore on the right and walked a league and a quarter, first along
the water side and afterward across a field in an immense meadow, entirely covered
with copses of wood." And in the next paragraph, on the same page, follows his
description of the sources of the Kankakee, quoted in this work on page 77. Here,
then, we have the position of Fort St. Joseph and the mission of that name and the
two villages of the Pottawatomips and the Miamis. on the St. Joseph River, six leagues
below ' South Bend. In Dr. Shea's Catholic Missions, page 423, it is stated that " La Salle,
on his way to the Mississippi, had built a temporary fort on the St. Joseph, not far
from the portage leading to the The-a-ki-ke"; and Mr. Charles R. Brown, in" his
Missions, Forts and Trading Posts of the Northwest, p. 14, says that "Fort Miamis,
built at the mouth of the St. Joseph's River by La Salle, was afterward called St.
Joseph, to distinguish it from (Fort) Miamis, on the Maumee." In this instance
neither of these writer^ follow the text of established authorities,
t Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, pp. 93, 94.

ST. JOSEPH. 141

Indian presented in its neighborhood but the remains of an old
cornfield overgrown with weeds, the rude hut of the Frenchman was
surrounded with vines, and with the remains of his former garden-
ing exertions. The asparagus, the pea vine and the woodbine still
grow about it, as though in defiance of the revolutions which have
dispersed those who planted them here. The very names of the
villages mark the difference between their former tenants. Those
of the Indians were designated by the name of the fruit which grew
abundantly on the spot or of the object which they coveted most,
while the French missionary has placed his village under the patron-
age of the tutelar saint in whom he reposed his utmost confidence."*

The asparagus, the pea-vine and the woodbine preserved the
identity of the spot against the encroachments of the returning for-
ests until 1822, when Isaac McCoy established among the Pottawat-
omies the Baptist mission called Carey, out of respect for the Rev.
Mr. Carey, a missionary of the same church in Hindostan. "It is-
said that the Pottawatomies themselves selected this spot for Carey's,
mission, it being the site of their old village. This must have been
very populous, as the remains of corn-hills are very visible at this,
time, and are said to extend over a thousand acres. The village
was finally abandoned about fifty years ago (1773), but there are a
few of the oldest of the nation who still recollect the sites of their
respective huts. They are said to frequently visit the establishment
and to trace with deep feeling a spot which is endeared to them." f

On a cold winter night in 1833 a traveler was ferried over the
St. Joseph at the then straggling village of Niles. "Ascending the
bank, a beautiful plain with a clump of trees here and there upon its
surface opened to his view. The establishment of Carey's mission,
a long, low, white building, could be distinguished afar off faintly
in the moonlight, while several winter lodges of the Pottawatomies
were plainly visible over the plain." *

Concerning the Pottawatomie village near Detroit, and also some
of the customs peculiar to the tribe, we have the following account.
It was written in 1718 :

"The fort of Detroit is south of the river. The village of the
Pottawatomies adjoins the fort ; they lodge partly under Apaquois, |

* Long's Second Expedition, vol. 1, pp. 147, 148.

t Long's Second Expedition, vol. 1, p. 153, McCoy's History of Baptist Indian Mis-
sions.

\ Hoffman's Winter in the West, vol. 1, p. 225.

Memoir on the Indians between Lake Erie and the Mississippi. Paris Documents,
vol. 1). p. 887.

| Apaquois, matting 1 made of flag's or rushes; from apee, a leaf, and wig^ww'am, a
hut. They cover their huts with mats made of rushes platted. Carver's Travels.

142 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

which are made of mat-grass. The women do all the work. The
men belonging to that nation are well clothed, like our domiciliated
Indians at Montreal. Their entire occupation is hunting arid dress ;
they make use of a great deal of vermilion, and in winter wear
buffalo robes richly painted, and in summer either blue or red cloth.
They play a good deal at La Crosse in summer, twenty or more on
each side. Their bat is a sort of a little racket, and the ball with
which they play is made of very heavy wood, somewhat larger than
the balls used at tennis. When playing they are entirely naked,
except a breech cloth and moccasins on their feet. Their body is
completely painted with all sorts of colors. Some, with white clay,
trace white lace on their bodies, as if on all the seams of a coat, and
at a distance it would be apt to be taken for silver lace. They play
very deep and often. The bets sometimes amount to more than
eight hundred livres. They set up two poles, and commence the
game from the center; one party propels the ball from one side and
the others from the opposite, and whichever reaches the goal wins.
This is fine recreation and worth seeing. They often play village
against village, the Poux* against the Ottawas or Hurons, and
lay heavy stakes. Sometimes Frenchmen join in the game with
them. The women cultivate Indian corn, beans, peas, squashes and
melons, which come up very fine. The women and girls dance at
night ; adorn themselves considerably, grease their hair, put on a
white shift, paint their cheeks with vermilion, and wear whatever
wampum they possess, and are very tidy in their way. They dance
to the sound of the drum and sisiquoi, which is a sort of gourd con-
taining some grains of shot. Four or five young men sing and beat
time with the drum and sisiquoi, and the women keep time and do
not lose a step. It is very entertaining, and lasts almost the entire
night. The old men often dance the Medicine, f They resemble a
set of demons ; and all this takes place during the night. The
young men often dance in a circle and strike posts. It is then they
recount their achievements and dance, at the same time, the war
dance ; and whenever they act thus they are highly ornamented. It
is altogether very curious. They often perform these things, for
1 tobacco. "When they go hunting, which is every fall, they carry
their apaquois with th^em, to hut under at night. Everybody follows,

* The Pottawatomies were sometimes known by the contraction Poux. La Hontan
uses this name, and erroneously confounds them with the Puans or Winnebagoes. In
giving the coat-of-arms of the Pottawatomies, representing a dog crouched in the
grass, he says: "They were called Puants." Vol. 2, p. 84.

t Medicine dance.

ORIGIN OF POTT AW ATOM IE. 143

men, women and children. They winter in the forest and return in
the spring.""

The Pottawatomies swarmed from their prolific hives about the
islands of Mackinaw, and spread themselves over portions of Wis-
consin, and eastward to their ancient homes in Michigan. At a
later day they extended themselves upon the territory of the ancient
Illinois, covering a large portion of the state. From the St. Joseph
River and Detroit their bands moved southward over that part of
Indiana north and west of the Wabash, and thence down that
stream. They were a populous horde of hardy children of the
forests, of great stamina, and their constitutions were hardened by
the rigorous climate of the northern lakes.

Among the old French writers the orthography of the word
Pottawatomies varied to suit the taste of the writer. We give some
of the forms : Poutouatirni, * Pouteotatamis,f Poutouatamies,^; Pou-
tewatamis,^ Pautawattamies, Puttewatamies, Pottowottamies and
Pottawattamies. | The tribe was divided into four clans, the Golden
Carp, the Frog, the Crab, and the Tortoise. *^ The nation was not
like the Illinois and Miamis, divided into separate tribes, but the
different bands would separate or unite according to the scarcity or
abundance of game.

The word Pottawatomie signifies, in their own language, we are
malting a fire, for the origin of which they have the following tradi-
tion : " It is said that a Miami, having wandered out from his cabin,
met three Indians whose language was unintelligible to him; by signs
and motions he invited them to follow him to his cabin, where they
were hospitably entertained, and where they remained until after
dark. During the night two of the strange Indians stole from the
hut, while their comrade and host were asleep ; they took a few
embers from the cabin, and, placing these near the door of the hut,
they made a fire, which, being afterward seen by the Miami and
remaining guest, was understood to imply a council fire in token of
peace between the two nations. From this circumstance the Miami
called them in his language Wa-ho-na-ha, or the fire-makers, which,
being translated into the language of the three guests, produced the
term by which their nation has ever since been distinguished."

After this the Miamis termed the Pottawatomies their younger
brothers ; but afterward, in a council, this was changed, from the

* Jesuit Relations. Charlevoix.

f Father Membre. || Paris Documents.

jJoutel's Journal.

IT Enumeration of the Indian tribes, the Warriors and Armorial Bearings of each
Nation, made in 1736. Published in Documentary History of New York.

144 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

circumstance that they resided farther to the west ; " as those nations-
which reside to the west of others are deemed more ancient."*

The Pottawatomies were unswerving in their adherence to the
French, when the latter had possession of the boundless Northwest.
In 1712, when a large force of Mascoutins and Foxes besieged De-
troit, they were conspicuous for their fidelity. They rallied the
other tribes to the assistance of the French, and notified the besieged
garrison to hold out against their enemies until their arrival. Mak-
is-abie, the war chief of the Pottawatomies, sent word through Mr.
de Vincennes, "just arrived from the Miami country, that he would
soon be at Detroit with six hundred of his warriors to aid the French
and eat those miserable nations who had troubled all the country."
The commandant, M. du Buisson, was gratified when he ascended
a bastion, and looking toward the forest saw the army of the nations,
issuing from it ; the Pottawatomies, the Illinois, the Missouris, the
Ottawas, the Sacs and the Menominees were there, armed and painted
in all the glory of war. Detroit never saw such a collection. " My
Father," says the chief to the commandant, "I speak to you on
the part of all the nations, your children who are before you. What
you did last year in drawing their flesh from the fire, which the Ou-
tagamies (Foxes) were about to roast and eat, demands we should
bring you our bodies to make you the master of them. We do not
fear death, whenever it is necessary to die for you. We have only
to request that you pray the father of all nations to have pity on our
women and our children, in case we lose our lives for you. We beg
you throw a blade of grass upon our bones to protect them from the
flies. You see, my father, that we have left our villages, our women
and children to hasten to join you. Have pity on us ; give us some-
thing to eat and a little tobacco to smoke. We have come a long
ways and are destitute of everything. Give us powder and balls to
fight with you."

Makisabie, the Pottawatomie, said to the Foxes and Mascoutines:
"Wicked nations that you are, you hope to frighten us by all the
red color which you exhibit in your village. Learn that if the earth
is covered with blood, it will be with yours. You talk to us of the
English, they are the cause of your destruction, because you have
listened to their bad council. . . . The English, who are cowards,
only defend themselves by killing men by that wicked strong drink,
which has caused so many men to die after drinking it. Thus we
shall see what will happen to you for listening to them."f

* Long's Expedition to the Sources of the St. Peter's River, vol. 1, pp. 91, 92, 93.
t The extracts we have quoted are taken from the official report of Du Buisson

WAKS AGAINST THE WHITES. 145

The Pottawatomies sustained their alliance with the French con-
tinuously to the time of the overthrow of their power in the north-
west. They then aided their kinsman, Pontiac, in his attempt to-
recover the same territory from the British. They fought on the
side of the British against the Americans throughout the war of the
revolution, and their war parties made destructive and frequent raids
upon the line of pioneer settlements in Pennsylvania, Kentucky,
Ohio and Indiana. In the war of 1812 they were again ranged on
the side of the British, with their bloody hands lifted alike against
the men, women and children of "the States."

In the programme of Pontiac' s war the capture of Post St.
Joseph, on the St. Joseph's river of Lake Michigan, was assigned to
the Pottawatomies, which was effected as will be hereafter narrated.

It was also the Pottawatomies who perpetrated the massacre at
Chicago on the 15th day of August, 1812. Bands of this tribe, from,
their villages on the St. Joseph, the Kankakee and the Illinois rivers,
whose numbers were augmented by the appearance of Metea with
his warriors, from their village westward of Fort Wayne, fell upon
the forces of Captain Heald, and the defenseless women and chil-
dren retreating with him after the surrender of Fort Dearborn, and
murdered or made prisoners of them all. Metea was a conspicuous
leader in this horrible affair.*

Robert Dixon, the British trader sent out among the Indians-
during the war of 1812 to raise recruits for Proctor and Tecumseh,
gathered in the neighborhood of Chicago, which after the massacre
was his place of general rendezvous, nearly one thousand warriors
of as wild and cruel savages as ever disgraced the human race. They
were the most worthless and abandoned desperadoes whom Dixon
had been enabled to collect from among all the tribes he had visited.
These accomplices of the British were to be let loose upon the re-
mote settlements under the leadership of the Pottawatomie chief,
Mai-pock, or Mai-po, a monster in human form, who distinguished
himself with a girdle sewed full of human scalps, which he wore
around his waist, and strings of bear's claws and bills of owls and
hawks around his ankles, worn as trophies of his power in arms and
as a terror to his enemies, f

relating to the siege of Detroit. The manuscript copy of it was obtained from the
archives at Paris, by Gen. Cass, when minister to France, and is published at length
in volume III of the History of Wisconsin, compiled by the direction of the legislature
of that state by William R. Smith, President of the State Historical Society ; a work
of very great value, not only to the State of Wisconsin but to the entire Northwest, for
the amount of reliable historical information it contains.

* Hall and McKenney's History of the Indian Tribes of North America, vol. 2,
pp. 59, 60.

t McAfee's History of the Late War, pp. 297, 298.

146 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Their manners, like their dialect, were rough and barbarous as
compared with other Algonquin tribes. They were not the civil,
modest people, an exceptional and christianized band of whom the
Jesuits before quoted drew a flattering description.

"It is a fact that for many years the current of emigration as to
the tribes east of the Mississippi has been from the north to the south.
This was owing to two causes : the diminution of those animals from
which the Indians derive their support, and the pressure of the two
great tribes, the Ojibbeways and the Sioux, to the north and
west. So long ago as 1795, at the treaty of Greenville, the Potta-
watomies notified the Miamis that they intended to settle upon the
Wabash. They made no pretensions to the country, and the only
excuse for the intended aggression was that they were tired of eating
fish and wanted meat"* And come they did. They bore down
upon their less populous neighbors, the Miamis, and occupied a large
portion of their territory, impudently and by sheer force of numbers,
rather than by force of arms. They established numerous villages
upon the north and west bank of the Wabash and its tributaries
flowing in from that side of the stream above the Vermilion. They,
with the Sacs, Foxes and Kickapoos, drove the Illinois into the vil-
lages about Kaskaskia, and portioned the conquested territory among
themselves. By other tribes they were called squatters, who justly
claimed that the Pottawatomies never had any land of their own,
and were mere intruders upon the prior rights of others. They were
foremost at all treaties where lands were to be ceded, and were clam-
orous for a lion's share of presents and annuities, particularly where
these last were the price given for the sale of others' lands rather
than their own.f Between the years 1789 and 1837 the Pottawato-
mies, by themselves, or in connection with other tribes, made no
less than thirty-eight treaties with the United States, all of which,
excepting two or three which were treaties of peace only, were for
cessions of lands claimed wholly by the Pottawatomies, or in com-
mon with other tribes. These cessions embraced territory extending
from the Mississippi eastward to Cleveland, Ohio, and reaching over
the entire valleys of the Illinois, the Wabash, the Maumee and their
tributaries.^:

They also had villages upon the Kankakee and Illinois rivers.
Among them we name Minemaung, or Yellow Head, situated a

* Official letter to the Secretary of War, dated March 22, 1814.
t Schoolcraft's Central Mississippi Valley, p. 358.

t Treaties between the United States and the several Indian tribes, from 1778 to
1837: Washington, D.C., 1837.

THEIR VILLAGES. 147

few miles north of Momence, at a point of timber still known as
Yellow Head Point; She-mar-gar, or the Soldier's Village, at the
mouth of Soldier Creek, that runs through Kankakee City, and the
village of "Little Rock " or Shaw-waw-nas-see, at the mouth of Rock
Creek, a few miles below Kankakee City.* Besides these, the Pot-
tawatomies had villages farther down the Illinois, particularly the
great town of Como, Gumo, or Gumbo as the pioneers called it, at the
upper end of Peoria Lake. They had other towns on the Milwaukee
River, Wisconsin. On the St. Joseph, near Niles, was the village of
To-pen-ne-bee, the great hereditary chief of the Pottawatomie nation ;
higher up, near the present village of White Pigeon, was situated
Wap-pe-me-mds, or White Pigeon's town. Westward of Fort Wayne,
Indiana, nine miles, was Mus-lcvja-wa-sepe-otan, ' ; the town of old
Red Wood creek," where resided the band of the distinguished war-
rior and orator of the Pottawatomies, Metea, whose name in their
language signifies kiss me.

Finally, the renowned Kesis, or the sun, the old friend of Gen-
eral Hamtrauck and the Americans, in a speech to General Wayne
at the treaty of Greenville in 1795, said that his milage "was a day's
walk below the Wea towns on the Wabash," referring, doubtless, to
the mixed Pottawatomie and Kickapoo town which stood 011 the site
of the old Shelby farm, on the north bank of the Vermilion, a short
distance above its mouth. \

The positions of several of the principal Pottawatomie villages
have been given for the purpose of showing the area of country
over which this people extended themselves. As late as 1823 their
hunting grounds appeared to have been "bounded on the north by
the St. Joseph (which on the east side of Lake Michigan separated
them from the Ottawas) and the Milwacke,^: which, on the west side
of the lake, divided them from the Meiiornonees. They spread to the
south along the Illinois River about two hundred miles ; to the west

* The location of these three villages of Pottawatomies is fixed by the surveys of
reservations to Mine-maung, Shemargar and Shaw-waw-nas-see respectively, secured
to them by the second article of a treaty concluded at Camp Tippecanoe, near Logans-
port, Indiana, on the 20th of October, 1832, between the United States and the chiefs
and head men of the Pottawatomie tribe of Indians of the prairie and of the Kanka-
kee. The reservations were surveyed in the presence of the Indians concerned and
General Tipton, agent on the part of the United States, in the month of May, 1834,
by Major Dan W. Beckwith, surveyor. The reservations were so surveyed as to include
the several villages we have named, as appears from the manuscript volumes of the
surveys in possession of the author.

t Journal of the Proceedings at the Treaty of Greenville: American State Papers
on Indian Affairs, vol. 1, p. 580. The author has authorities and manuscripts from
which the location of Kesis 1 band at the mouth of the Vermilion may be quite confi-
dently affirmed.

\ Milwaukee.

148 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

their grounds extended as far as Rock River, and the Mequin or
Spoon River of the Illinois ; to the east they probably seldom passed
beyond the Wabash."* After the Kickapoos and Pottawatomies
had established themselves in the valley of the Wabash,. it was
mutually agreed between them and the Miamis that the river should
be the dividing line, the Pottawatomies and Kickapoos to occupy
the west, and the Miamis to remain undisturbed on the east or south
side of the stream. It was a hard bargain for the Miamis, who were
unable to maintain their rights, f

The Pottawatomies were among the last to leave their possessions.
in Illinois and Indiana, and it was the people of this tribe with
whom the first settlers came principally in contact. Their hostility
ceased at the close of the war of 1812. After this their intercourse
with the whites was uniformly friendly, and they bore the many im-
positions and petty grievances which were put upon them by not a
few of their unprincipled and unfeeling white neighbors with a for-
bearance that should have excited public sympathy.

The Pottawatomies owned extensive tracts of land on the Wabash,
between the mouth of Pine Creek, in Warren county, and the Fort
Wayne portage, which had been reserved to them by the terms of
their several treaties with the United States. They held like claims
upon the Tippecanoe and other westward tributaries of the Wabash,
and elsewhere in northwestern Indiana, eastern Illinois and southern
Michigan. These reservations are now covered by some of the
finest farms in the states named. The treaties by which such reser-
vations were granted generally contained a clause that debarred the
owner from alienating them without having first secured the sanction
of the President of the United States. This restriction was de-
signed to prevent unprincipled persons from overreaching the Indian,
who, at best, had only a vague idea of the fee simple title to, and
value of, real estate. It afforded little security, however, against the
wiles of the unscrupulous, and whenever the Indian could be in-
duced by the arts of his ' ' White Brother ' ' to put his name to an
instrument, the purport of which, in many instances, he did not at
all understand as forever conveying away his possessions, the ratify-
ing signature of the President followed as a matter of department
routine. The greater part of the Pottawatomie reservations was
retroceded to the United States in exchange either for annuities or
for lands west of the Mississippi, and the title disposed of in this
way.

* Long's Second Expedition, vol. 1, p. 171.

f The writer was informed of this agreement by Mary Baptiste.

THE EXODUS. 149

The final emigration of the Pottawatomies from the Wabash,
under charge of Col. Pepper and Gen. Tipton, of Indiana, took place
in the summer of 1838. Many are yet living who witnessed the
sad exodus. The late Sanford Cox has recorded his impressions of
this event in the valuable little book which he published.* ' ; Hearing
that this large emigration, numbering nearly a thousand of all ages
and sexes, would pass within eight or nine miles west of La Fayette,
a few of us procured horses and rode over to see the retiring band,
as they reluctantly wended their way toward the setting sun. It
was, indeed, a mournful spectacle to see these children of the forest
slowly retiring from the homes of their childhood, where were not
only the graves of their loved ancestors but many endearing scenes
to which their memories would ever recur as sunny spots along their
pathway through the wilderness. They felt that they were bidding
a last farewell to the hills, the valleys and the streams of their
infancy : the more exciting hunting grounds of their advanced
youth ; the stern and bloody battle-fields on which, in riper man-
hood, they had received wounds, and where many of their friends
and loved relatives had fallen, covered with gore and with glory. All
these they were leaving behind, to be desecrated by the plowshare
of the white man. As they cast mournful glances back toward these
loving scenes that were rapidly fading in the distance, tears fell from
the cheek of the downcast warrior, old men trembled, matrons wept,
the swarthy maiden's cheek turned pale, and sighs and half-suppressed
sobs escaped from the motley groups, as they passed along, some on
foot, some on horseback, and others in wagons, sad as a funeral pro-
cession. I saw several of the aged warriors glancing upward to the sky
as if invoking aid from the spirits of their departed sires, who were
looking down upon them with pity from the clouds, or as if they were
calling upon the great spirit to redress the wrongs of the red man,
whose broken bow had fallen from his hand. Ever and anon one
of the throng would strike off from the procession into the woods
and retrace his steps back to the old encampments on the Wabash,
Ell River, or the Tippecanoe, declaring that he would die there
rather than be banished from his country. Thus would scores leave
the main party at different points on the journey and return to their
former homes ; and it was several years before they could be induced
to join their countrymen west of the Mississippi."

This body, on their westward journey, passed through Danville,
Illinois, where they halted several days, being in want of food. The

* Recollections of the Early Settlement of the Wabash Valley, La Fayette, Ind.,
1860, pp. 154, 155.

150 "HISTORIC XOTES ox THE NORTHWEST.

commissary department was wretchedly supplied. The Indians
begged for food at the houses of the citizens. Others, in their
extremity, killed rats at the old mill on the North Fork and ate
them to appease their hunger. Without tents or other shelter,
many of them, with young babes in their arms, walked on foot, as
there was no adequate means of conveyance for the weak, the aged
or infirm. Thus the mournful procession passed across the state of
Illinois.

The St. Joseph band were removed westward the same year. So
strong was their attachment to southern Michigan and northern
Indiana, that the Federal government invoked the aid of troops to
coerce their removal. The soldiers surrounded them, and, as prison-
ers of war, compelled them to leave. At South Bend, Indiana, was
the village of Chichipe Outipe. The town was on a rising ground
near four small lakes, and contained ten or twelve hundred christian-
ized Pottawatomies. Benjamin M. Petit, the Catholic missionary in
charge at Po-ke-ganns village on the St. Joseph, asked Bishop Brute
for leave to accompany the Indians, but the prelate withheld his
consent, not deeming it proper to give even an implied indorsement
of the cruel act of the government. But being himself on their
route, he afterward consented. The power of religion then appeared.
Amid their sad march he confirmed several, while hymns and prayers,
chanted in Ottawa, echoed for the last time around their lakes. Sick
and well were carried off alike. After giving all his Episcopal bless-
ing, Bishop Brute proceeded with Petit to the tents of the sick,
where they baptized one and confirmed another, both of whom ex-
pired soon after. The march was resumed. The men, women and
elder children, urged on by the soldiers in their rear, were followed
with the wagons bearing the sick and dying, the mothers, little chil-
dren and property. Thus they proceeded through the country, tur-
bulent at that time on account of the Mormon war, to the Osage
River, Missouri, where Mr. Petit confided the wretched exiles to the
care of the Jesuit Father J. Hoecken." x "

In the year 1846 the different bands of Pottawatomies united on
the west side of the Mississippi. A general treaty was made, in
which the following clause occurs: "Whereas, the various bands of
the Pottawatornie Indians, know r n as the Chippeways, Ottawas and
Pottawatomies, the Pottawatomies of the Prairie, the Pottawatomies
of the Wabash, and the Pottawatomies of Indiana, have, subsequent
to the year 1820, entered into separate and distinct treaties with the

* Extract from Shea's Catholic Missions, p. 397.

THE POTTAWATOMIE NATION". 151

United States, by which they have been separated and located
in different countries, and difficulties have arisen as to the proper
distributions of the stipulations under various treaties, and being
the same people by kindred, by feeling and by language, and
having in former periods lived on and owned their lands in com-
mon, and being desirous to unite in one common country and
again become one people and receive their annuities and other
benefits in common, and to abolish all minor distinctions of bands
by which they have heretofore been divided, and are anxious to
be known as the POTTAWATOMIE NATION, thereby reinstating the
national character ; and whereas, the United States are also anxious
to restore and concentrate said tribes to a state so desirable and
necessary for the happiness of their people, as well as to enable
the government to arrange and manage its intercourse with them ;
now, therefore, the United States and said Indians do hereby agree
that said people shall hereafter be known as a nation, to be called
the POTTAWATOMIE NATION."

Pursuant to the terms of this treaty, the Pottawatomies received
$850,000, in consideration of which they released all lands owned
by them within the limits of the territory of Iowa and on the Osage
River in Missouri, or in any state or place whatsoever. Eighty-
seven thousand dollars of the purchase money coming to them was
paid, by cession from the United States, of 576,000 acres of land
lying on both sides of the Kansas River. The tract embraces the
finest body of land within the present state of Kansas, and Topeka,
the state capital, has since been located nearly in the center of the
reservation. While the territory was going through the process of
organization, adventurers trespassed upon the lands of the Potta-
watomies, sold them whisky, and spread demoralization among
them. The squatters who intruded upon the farmer-Indians killed
their stock and burned some of their habitations, all of which was
borne without retaliation. Notwithstanding the old habendum clause
inserted in Indian treaties (as a mere matter of form, as may be in-
ferred from the little regard paid to it) that these lands should inure
to Pottawatomies, "their heirs and assigns forever," the squatter
sovereigns wanted them, and resorted to all the well-known methods.
in vogue on the border to make it unpleasant for the Indians, who
were progressing with assured success from barbarism to the ways
of civilized society. The usual result of dismemberment of the re-
serve followed. The farmer-Indians, who so desired, had their por-
tions of the reserve set off in severalty ; the uncivilized members of
the tribe had their proportion set off in common. These last, which

152 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

were exchanged for money, or lands farther southward, fell into the
possession of a needy railroad corporation.

We gather from the several reports of the commissioners on In-
dian affairs that, in 1863, the tribe numbered 2,274, inclusive of men,
women and children, which was an alarming decrease since the cen-
sus of 1854. The diminution was caused, probably, aside from the
casualties of death, by some having returned to their former homes
east of the Missouri, while many of the young and wild men of the
tribe went to the buffalo grounds to enjoy the exciting and unre-
strained freedom of the chase. The farmers raised 3,720 bushels of
wheat, 45,000 of corn, 1,200 of oats and 1,000 tons of hay, and had
1,200 horses, 1,000 cattle and 2,000 hogs, as appears from the offi-
cial report for 1863.

The Catholic school at St. Mary's enumerated an average of
ninety-five boys and seventy-five girls in 1863, and in 1866 the total
number was two hundred and forty scholars. Of his pupils the
superintendent says: "They not only spell, read, write and cipher,
but successfully master the various branches of geography, history,
hook-keeping, grammar, philosophy, logic, geometry and astronomy.
Besides this, they are so docile, so willing to improve, that between
school-hours they employ their time, with pleasure, in learning
whatever handiwork may be assigned to them ; and they particu-
larly desire to become good farmers." The girls, in addition to
their studies, are "trained to whatever is deemed useful to good
housekeepers and accomplished mothers."

The Pottawatomies attested their fidelity to the government by
the volunteering of seventy-five of their young men in the "army
of the Union."

In 1867, out of a population of 2,400, 1,400 elected to become
citizens of the United States, under an enabling act passed by con-
gress. Of those who became citizens, some did well, others soon
.squandered their lands and joined the wild band. There are still
.a few left in Michigan, while about one hundred and eighty remain
in Wisconsin.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE KICKAPOOS AND MASCOUTINS.

THE Kickapoos and Mascoutins, if there was more than a nominal
difference between the two tribes, are here treated of together, for
reasons explained farther on in the chapter. The name of the Kick-
apoos has been written by the French, "Kicapoux," "Kickapous,"
"Kikapoux," " Quickapous," " Eickapoos," "Kikabu." This
tribe has long been connected with the northwest, and have acquired
a notoriety for the wars in which they were engaged with other tribes,
as well for their persistent hostility to the white race, which con-
tinued uninterrupted for more than one hundred and fifty years.
They were first noticed by Samuel Champlain, who, in 1612, dis-
covered the "Mascoutins residing near the place called Sakinam,"
meaning the country of the Sacs, comprising that part of the state
of Michigan bordering on Lake Huron, in the -vicinity of Saginaw
Bay.*

Father Claude Allouez visited the mixed village of Miamis, Kick-
apoos and Mascoutins on Fox River, Wisconsin, in the winter of
1669-70. Leaving his canoe at the water's edge he walked a league
over beantiful prairies and perceived the fort. The savages, having
discovered him, raised the cry of alarm in their villages, and then
ran out to receive the missionary with honor, arid conducted him to
the lodge of the chief, where they regaled him with refreshments,
and further honored him by greasing his feet and legs. Every one
took their places, a dish was filled with powdered tobacco ; an old
man arose to his feet, and, filling his two hands with tobacco from
the dish, addressed the missionary thus :

" This is well, Black-robe, that thou hast come to visit us ; have
pity on us. Thou art a Manitou.f We give thee wherewith to

* Memoir of Louis XIV, and Cobert, Minister of France, on the French Limits in
North America: Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 378, and note by E. B. O'Callaghan, the
editor, on p. 293.

t Manitou, with very few changes in form of spelling or manner of pronunciation,
is the word used almost universally by the Algonquin tribes to express a spirit or God
having control of their destinies. Their Manitous were numerous. It was also an
expression sometimes applied to the white people, particularly the missionaries. At
first they regarded the Europeans as spirits, or persons possessing superior intelligence
to themselves.

153

154 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

smoke. The Nadoiiessious and the Iroquois eat us up ; have pity
on us. We often are sick, our children die, we are hungry. Listen,
my Manitou, I give thee wherewith to smoke, that the earth may
yield us corn, that the rivers may furnish us with fish, that sickness
no more shall kill us, that famine no longer shall so harshly treat
us." At each wish, the old men who were present answered by a
great " O-oh ! " *

The good father was shocked at this ceremony, and replied that
they should not address such requests to him. Protesting that he
could afford them 110 relief other than offering prayers to Him who
was the only and true God, of whom he was only the servant and
messenger, f

Father Allouez says in the same letter that four leagues from this
village ' ' are the Kikabou and Kitchigamick, who speak the same
language with the Machkouteng. "

The Kickapoos were not inclined to receive religious impressions
from the early missionaries. In fact, they appear to have acquired
their first notoriety in history by seizing Father Gabriel Ribourde,
whom they ' ' carried away and broke his head, ' ' as Tonti quaintly
expresses it in referring to this ruthless murder. Again, in 1728,
as Father Ignatius Guignas, compelled to abandon his mission among
the Sioux, on account of the victory of the Foxes over the French,
was attempting to reach the Illinois, he, too, fell into the hands of
the Kickapoos and Mascoutins, and for five months was held a cap-
tive and constantly exposed to death. During this time he was con-
demned to be burnt, and was only saved through the friendly inter-
vention of an old man in the tribe, who adopted him as a son.
While held a prisoner, the missionaries from the Illinois relieved
his necessities by sending timely supplies, which Father Guignas
used to gain over the Indians. Having induced them to make
peace, he was taken to the Illinois missions, and suffered to remain
there on parole until Xovember, 1729, when his old captors returned
and took him back to their own country ;: after which nothing
seems to have been known concerning the fate of this worthy mis-
sionary.

The Kickapoos early incurred the displeasure of the French by

*The o-oh of the Algonquin and the yo-hah of the Iroquois (Colden's History of
the Five Nations) is an expression of assent given by the hearers to the remarks of the
speaker who is addressing them, and is equivalent to good or bravo! The Indians
indulged in this kind of encouragement to their orators with great liberality, drawing
out their o-ohs in unison and with a prolonged cry, especially when the speaker's
utterances harmonized with their own sentiments.

t Jesuit Relations, 1669-70.

j Shea's Catholic Missions, p. 379.

MIGRATIONS OF THE KICKAPOOS. 15->

committing depredations south of Detroit. A band living at the
mouth of the Maumee River in 1T12, with thirty Mascoutins, were
about to make war upon the French. They took prisoner one
Langlois, a messenger, on his return from the Miami country,
whither he was bringing many letters from the Jesuit Fathers of the
Illinois villages, and also dispatches from Louisiana. The letters and
dispatches were destroyed, which gave much uneasiness to M. Du
Boisson, the commandant at Detroit. A canoe laden with Kicka-
poos, on their way to the villages near Detroit, was captured by the
Hurons and Ottawas residing at these villages, and who were the
allies of the French. Among the slain was the principal Kickapoo
chief, whose head, with those of three others of the same tribe,
were brought to De Boisson, who alleges that the Hurons and
Ottawas committed this act out of resentment, because the previous
winter the Kickapoos had taken some of the Hurons and Iroquois
prisoners, and also because they considered the Kickapoo chief to-
be a ''-true Outtagamie " / that is, they regarded him as one of the
Fox nation.*

From the village of Machkoutench, where first Father Claude
Allouez, and afterward Father Marquette, found the Kickapoos inhab-
iting the same village with the Muscotins and Miamis, the Kickapoos
and the Muscotins appear to have passed to the south, extending
their flanks to the right in the direction of Rockf River, and their
left to the southern trend of Lake Michigan. Referring to the
country on Fox River about Winnebago Lake, Father Charlevoix
says:^: "All this country is extremely beautiful, and that which
stretches to the southward as far as the river of the Illinois is still
more so. It is, however, inhabited by two small nations only, who
are the Kickapoos and the Mascoutins." Father Charlevoix,
speaking of Fox River, says: "The largest of these," referring to
the streams that empty into the Illinois, "is called Pisticoui, and
proceeds from the fine country of the Mascoutins. "||

* Extract from M. Du Boisson's official report to the Marquis De Vaudreuil, gov-
ernor-general of New France, of the siege of Detroit, dated June 15, 1712. This val-
uable paper is published entire in vol. 3 of Wm. R. Smith's History of Wisconsin,
a work that contains many important documents not otherwise accessible to the gen-
eral public. Indeed, the publications of the Historical Society of Wisconsin, of which
Judge Smith's two volumes are the beginning, are the repository of a fund of infor-
mation of great utility, not only to the people of that state, but to the entire North-
west.

fRock River Assin-Sepe was also called Kickapoo River, and so laid down on a
map of La Salle's discoveries.

\ Narrative Journal, vol. 1, p. 287.

Vol. 2, p. 199.

I "The Fox River of the Illinois is called by the Indians Pish-ta-ko. It is the
same mentioned by Charlevoix under the name of Pisticoui, and which flows as he,

156 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Prior to 1718 the Mascoutins and Kickapoos had villages upon
the banks of Rock River, Illinois. "Both these tribes together do
not amount to two hundred men. They are a clever people and
brave warriors. Their language and manners strongly resemble
those of the Foxes. They are the same stock. They catch deer by
chasing them, and even at this day make considerable use of bows
and arrows."* On a French map, issued in 1712, a village of Mas-
coutins is located near the forks of the north and south branches of
Chicago River.

From references given, it is apparent that this people, like the
Miamis and Pottawatomies, were progressing south and eastward.
This movement was probably on account of the fierce Sioux, whose
encroaching wars from the northwest were pressing them in this
direction. Even before this date the Foxes, with Mascoutins and
Kickapoos, were meditating a migration to the Wabash as a place of
security from the Sioux. This threatened exodus alarmed the French,
who feared that the migrating tribes would be in a position on the
Wabash to eifect a junction with the Iroquois and English, which
would be exceedingly detrimental to the French interests in the
northwest. From an official document relative to the "occurrences
in Canada, sent from Quebec to France in 1695, the Department at
Paris is informed that the Sioux, who have mustered some two or
three thousand warriors for the purpose, would come in large num-
bers to seize their village. This has caused the outagamies to quit
their country and disperse themselves for a season, and afterward
return and save their harvest. They are then to retire toward the
river Wabash to form a settlement, so much the more permanent, as
they will be removed from the incursions of the Sioux, and in a
position to eifect a junction easily with the Iroquois and the English
without the French being able to prevent it. Should this project be
realized, it is very apparent that the Mascoutins and Kickapoos will
be of the party, and that the three tribes, forming a new village of
fourteen or fifteen hundred men, would experience no difficulty in
considerably increasing it by attracting other nations thither, which
would be of most pernicious consequence, "f That the Mascoutins,
at least, did go soon after this date toward the lower Wabash is con-
says, through the country of the Mascoutins." Long's Second Expedition, vol. 1, p.
176. The Algonquin word Pish-tah-te-koosh, according to Edwin James' vocabulary,
means an antelope. The Pottawatomies, from whom Major Long's party obtained the
word Pish-ta-ko, may have used it to designate the same animal, judging from the
similarity of the two words.

* Memoir prepared in 1718 on the Indians between Lake Erie and the Missis-
sippi: Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 889.

t Paris Documents, vol. 9, p. 019.

OF THE NAME MASCOUTINS. 157

clusively shown by the fact of their presence about Juchereau's
trading post, which was erected near the mouth of the Ohio in the
year 1700.

It is doubtful if either the Foxes or the Kickapoos followed the
Mascoutins to the Wabash country, and it is evident that the Mas-
coutins who survived the epidemic that broke out among them at
Juchereau's post on the Ohio soon returned to the north. The
French effected a conciliation with the Sioux, and for a number of
years subsequent to 1705 we find the Mascoutins back again among
the Foxes and Kickapoos upon their old hunting grounds in northern.
Illinois and southern Wisconsin.

The Kickapoos entered the plot of the Mascoutins to capture the
post of Detroit in 1712, and the latter had repaired to the neighbor-
hood of Detroit, and were awaiting the arrival of the Kickapoos to
execute their purposes, when they were attacked by the confedera-
tion of Indians who were friendly toward the French and had hast-
ened to the relief of the garrison. *

The Mascoutins were called u Machkoutench,"f "Machkouteng,"
" Maskouteins " and "Masquitens," by French writers. The Eng-
lish called them "Masquattimes,":}: " Musquitons," "Mascou-
tins," and " Musquitos," a corruption used by the American colo-
nial traders, and ' ' Meadows, ' ' the English synonym for the French
word " prairie. "^[

The derivation of the name has been a subject of discussion.
Father Marquette, with some others, following the example of the
Hurons, rendered it "fire-nation," while Fathers Allouez and Char-
levoix, with recent American authors, claim that the word signifies
a prairie, or " a land bare of trees," such as that which this people
inhabit.** The name is doubtless derived from mus-kor-tence^\ or
mus-ko-tia, a prairie, a derivative from skoutay or scote, the word for
fire.^ " The Mascos or Mascoutins were, by the French traders of a
more recent day, called gens des prairies, and lived and hunted on
the great prairies between the Wabash and Illinois Rivers. " That

* History of New France, vol. 5, p. 257.

t Fathers Claude Allouez and Marquette.

\ George Croghan's Narrative Journal.

Minutes of the treaty at Greenville in 1795.

|| Samuel R. Brown's Western Gazetteer.

11 It was some years after the conquest of the northwest from the French before
the name "prairie" became naturalized, as it were, into the English language.

** Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 1, p. 287. Father Allouez, in the Jesuit Re-
lations between the years 1670 and 1671.

ft Note of Callaghan: Paris Documents, vol. 10.

it Tanner, Gallatin, Mackenzie and Johnson's vocabularies of Algonquin words.

Manuscript account of this and other tribes, by Major Forsyth, quoted by Drake,
in his Life of Black Hawk.

158 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

the word Muskotia is synonymous with, and has the same meaning
as, the word prairie, is further confirmed by the fact that the Indians
prefixed it to the names of those animals and plants found exclu-
sively on the prairies.*

Were the Kickapoos and Mascoutins separate tribes, or were they
one and the same ? These queries have elicited the attention of
scholars well versed in the history of the ISTorth American Indians,
among whom might be named Schoolcraft, Gallatin and Shea.
Sufficient references have been given in this chapter to show that,
by the French, the Kickapoos and Mascoutins were regarded as dis-
tinct tribes. If necessary, additional extracts to the same purport
could be produced from numerous French documents down to the
close of the French colonial war, in 1763, all bearing uniform testi-
mony upon this point.

The theory has been advanced that the Mascoutins and Kickapoos
were bands of one tribe, first known to the French by the former
name, and subsequently to the English by the latter, under which
name alone they figure in our later annals, f This supposition is at
variance with English and American authorities. It was a war party
of Kickapoos and Mascoutins, from their contiguous villages near
Fort Ouitanon, on the Wabash, who captured George Croghan, the
English plenipotentiary, below the mouth of that river in 1765. \ Sir
William Johnson, the English colonial agent on Indian affairs, in
the classified list of Indians within his department, prepared in 1763,
enumerates loth the Kickapoos and Mascoutins, locating them "in
the neighborhood of the fort at Wawiaghta, and about the Wabash
River." Captain Imlay, "commissioner for laying out lands in the
back settlements,"- as the territory west of the Alleghanies was
termed at that period, in his list of westward Indians, classifies the
Kickapoos (under the name of Vermilions) and the Muscatiiies, lo-
cating these two tribes between the Wabash and Illinois Rivers. This
was in 1792. | The distinction between these two tribes was main-
tained still later, and down to a period subsequent to the year 1816.
At that time the Mascoutins were residing on the west bank of the
Wabash, between Yincennes and the Tippecanoe River, while their
old neighbors, the Kickapoos, were living a short distance above

*For example, mus-ko-tia-chit-ta-mo, prairie squirrel; mus-ko-ti-pe-neeg, prairie
potatoes. Edwin James' Catalogue of Plants and Animals found in the country of
the Ojibbeways. See further references on page 35.

fThe Indian Tribes of Wisconsin: Historical Collections of that State, vol. 3, p.
130.

i Vide his Narrative Journal.

Colonial History of New York, vol. 7: London Documents, p. 583.

I Imlay's America, third edtion, London, 1797, p. 290.

KICKAPOOS AND MASCOUTINS ONE PEOPLE. 159

them in several large villages. At this date the Kickapoos could
raise four hundred warriors.* From the authors cited, and other
references to the same eifect would be produced but for want of space,
it is evident that the English and the Americans, equally with the
French, regarded the Kickapoos and Mascoutins as separate bands
or subdivisions of a tribe.

While this was so, the language, manners and customs of the two
tribes were not only similar, but the two tribes were almost invaria-
bly found occupying continguous villages, and hunting in company
with each other over the same country. "The Kickapoos are neigh-
bors of the Mascoutins, and it seems that these two tribes have
always been united in interests, "f There is no instance recorded
where they were ever arrayed against each other, nor of a time when
they took opposite sides in any alliance with other tribes. Another
noticeable fact is that, with but one exception, the Mascoutins were
never known as such in any treaty with the United States, while the
Kickapoos were parties to many. We have seen that the former
were occupying the Wabash country in common with the latter as
far back, at least, as 1765, when they captured Croghan, until 1816 ;
and in all of the treaties for the extinguishment of the title of the
several Indian tribes bordering on the Wabash and its tributaries,
the Mascoutins are nowhere alluded to, while the Kickapoos are
prominent parties to many treaties at which extensive tracts of coun-
try were ceded. 'No man living, in his time, was better informed
than Gen. Harrison, who conducted these several treaties on behalf
of the United States, of the relations and distinctions, however
trifling, that may have existed among the numerous Indian tribes
with whom, in a long course of official capacity, he came in contact,
either with the pen, around the friendly council-fire, or with the up-
lifted sword upon the field of hostile encounter. In all his volumi-
nous correspondence during the years when the northwest was com-
mitted to his charge the General makes no mention of the Mascoutins

* Western Gazetteer, by Samuel R. Brown, p. 71. This work of Mr. Brown's is
exceedingly valuable for the amount of reliable information it affords not obtainable
from any other source. He was with Gen. Harrison in the campaigns of the war of
1812. In the preface to his Gazetteer he says: "Business and curiosity have made the
writer acquainted with a large portion of the western country never before described.
Where personal knowledge was wanting I have availed myself of the correspondence of
many of the most intelligent gentlemen in the west. ' ' At the time Mr. Brown was compil-
ing material for his Gazetteer, "the Harrison Purchase was being run out into townships
and sections," and Mr. Brown came in contact with the surveyors doing the work, and
derived much information from them. The book is carefully prepared, covering a
topographical description of the country embraced, its towns, rivers, counties, popula-
tion, Indian tribes, etc., and altogether is one of the most authentic and useful books
relative to " the west," which was attracting the attention of emigrants at the time of
its publication.

t Charlevoix' History of New France.

160 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NOETHWEST.

by that name, but often refers to "the Kickapoos of the prairies,'*
to distinguish them from other bands of the same tribe who occupied
villages in the timbered portions of the Wabash and its tributaries.*

At a subsequent treaty of peace and friendship, concluded on the
27th of September, 1815, between Governor Ninian Edwards, of
Illinois Territory, and the chiefs, warriors, etc., of the Kickapoo
nation, Wash-e-own, who at the treaty of Vincennes signed as a Mas-
coutin, was a party to it, and in this instance signed as a Kickapoo.
No Mascoutins by that name appear in the record of the treaty, f

The preceding facts, negative and direct, admit of the following
inferences : that there were two subdivisions of the same nation,
known first to the French, then to the English, and more recently
to the Americans, the one under the name of Kickapoos and the
other as Mascoutines ; that they spoke the same language and ob-
served the same customs ; that they were living near each other,
and always had a community of interest in their wars, alliances and
migrations ; and that since the United States have held dominion
over the territory of the northwest the Kickapoos and Mascoutines
have considered themselves as one and the same people, whose tri-
bal relations were so nearly identical that, in all official transactions
with the federal government, they were recognized only as Kicka-
poos. And is it not apparent, after all, that there was only a nom-
inal distinction between these two tribes, or, rather, families of the
same tribe ? Were not the Mascoutins bands of the Kickapoos who
dwelt exclusively on the prairies ? It seems, from authorities cited,
that this question admits of but one answer.

The destruction that followed the attempt of the Mascoutins to
capture Detroit was, perhaps, one of the most remorseless in which
white men took a part of which we have an account in the annals of
Indian warfare. As before stated, the Muscotins in 1712 laid siege
to the Fort, hearing of which the Pottawatomies, with other tribes
friendly to the French, collected in a large force for their assistance.

*The only treaty which the Mascoutins, as such, were parties to was the one
concluded at Vincennes on the 27th of September, 1792, between the several Wabash
tribes and Gen. Rufus Putnam, on behalf of the United States. Two Mascoutins
signed this treaty, viz, Waush-eown and At-schat-schaw. Three Kickapoo chiefs also
signed the parchment, viz, Me-an-ach-kah, Ma-en-a-pah and Mash-a-ras-a, the Black
Elk, and, what is singular, this last person, although a Kickapoo, signs himself to the
treaty as "The Chief of The Meadows.'" This treaty was only one of peace and friend-
ship. The text of the treaty is found in the American State Papers, Indian Affairs,
vol. 1, p. 388; in Judge Dillon's History of Indiana, edition of 1859, pp. 293, 294, and
in the Western Annals, Pittsburg edition, pp. 605, 606. The names of the tribes and
of the individual chiefs who participated in it are not given in any of the works cited.
They only appear in the copy on file at the War Department and in the original manu-
script journal of Gen. Putnam. The author is indebted to Dr. Israel W. Andrews,
president of Marietta College, for transcripts from Gen. Putnam's journal.

t Treaties with the Indian Tribes, Washington edition, p. 172.

IDENTITY OF KICKAPOOS WITH THE HASCOUTIXS. 161

The Muscotines, after protracted efforts, abandoned the position in
which they were attacked, and fled, closely pursued, to an intrenched
position on Presque Isle, opposite Hog Island, near Lake St. Clair,
some distance above the fort. Here they held out for four days
against the combined French and Indian forces. Their women and
children were actually starving, numbers dying from hunger every
day. They sent messengers to the French officer, begging for quar-
ter, offering to surrender at discretion, only craving that their re-
maining women and children and themselves might be spared the
horror of a general massacre. The Indian allies of the French
would submit to no such terms. "At the end of the fourth day,
after fighting with much courage," says the French commander,
"and not being able to resist further, the Muscotins surrendered at
discretion to our people, who gave them no quarter. Our Indians
lost sixty men, killed and wounded. The enemy lost a thousand
souls men, women and children. All our allies returned to our
fort with their slaves (meaning the captives), and their amusement
was to shoot four or five of them every day. The Hurons did not
spare a single one of theirs."*

We find no instance in which the Kickapoos or Muscotins assisted
either the French or the English in any of the intrigues or wars for
the control of the fur trade, or the acquisition of disputed territory
in the northwest. At the close of Pontiac's conspiracy, the Kicka-
poos, whose temporary lodges were pitched on the prairie near Fort
Wayne, notified Captain Morris, the English ambassador, on his
way from Detroit to Fort Chartes, to take possession of " the coun-
try of the Illinois" ; that if the Miamis did not put him to death,
they themselves would do so, should he attempt to pass their camp.'f-

Still later, on the 8th of June, 1Y65, as George Croghan, likewise
an English ambassador, on his route by the Ohio River to Fort
Chartes, was attacked at daybreak, at the mouth of the Wabash, by
a party of eighty Kickapoo and Mascoutin warriors, who had set out
from Fort Ouiatanon to intercept his passage, and killed two of hi&
men and three Indians, and wounded Croghan himself, and all the
rest of his party except two white men and one Indian. They then
made all of them prisoners, and plundered them of everything they

* Official Report of M. Du Boisson on the Siege of Detroit.

t Parkman's History of the Conspiracy of Pontiac, 3d single volume edition, p. 474.

j The narrative, Journal of Col. George Croghan, ''who was sent, at the peace
of 1768, etc., to explore the country adjacent to the Ohio River, and to conciliate the
Indian nations who had hitherto acted with the French." [Reprinted] from Feather-
stonhaugh Am. Monthly Journal of Geology, Dec. 1831. Pamphlet, p. 17.
11

162 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

Having thrown such obstacles as were within their power against
the French and English, the Kickapoos were ready to offer the
same treatment to the Americans ; and, when Col. Rogers Clark
was at Kaskaskia, in 1778, negotiating peace treaties with the west-
ward Indians, his enemies found a party of young Kickapoos the
willing instruments to undertake, for a reward promised, to kill him.

As a military people, the Kickapoos were inferior to the Miamis,
Delawares and Shawnees in movements requiring large bodies of
men, but they were preeminent in predatory warfare. Parties con-
sisting of from five to twenty persons were the usual number corn-
prising their war parties. These small forces would push out hun-
dreds of miles from their villages, and swoop down upon a feeble
settlement, or an isolated pioneer cabin, and burn the property, kill
the cattle, steal the horses, capture the women and children, and be
off again before an alarm could be given of their approach. From
such incursions of the Kickapoos the people of Kentucky suffered
severely. *

A small war party of these Indians hovered upon the skirts of
Gen. Harmer's army when he was conducting the campaign against
the upper Wabash tribes, in 1790. They cut out a squad of ten
regular soldiers of Gen. Harmer by decoying them into an ambuscade.
Jackson Johonnot, the orderly sergeant in command of the regulars,
gave an interesting account of their capture and the killing of his
companions, after they were subjected to the severest hunger and
fatigue on the march, and the running of the gauntlet on reaching
the Indian villages, f

The Kickapoos were noted for their fondness of horses and their
skill and daring in stealing them. They were so addicted to this
practice that Joseph Brant, having been sent westward to the Maumee
River in 1788, in the interest of the United States, to bring about a
reconciliation with the several tribes inhabiting the Maumee and
Wabash, wrote back that, in his opinion, ' ' the Kickapoos, with the
Shawnees and Miamis, were so much addicted to horse stealing that
it would be difficult to break them of it, and as that kind of business
was their best harvest, they would, of course, declare for war and
decline giving up any of their country.":};

*0ne of the reasons urged to induce the building of a town at the falls of the
Ohio was that it would afford a means of strength against, and be an object of terror
to, "our savage enemies, the Kickapoo Indians." Letter of Col. Williams, January
3, 1776, from Boonsborough, to the proprietors of the grant, found in Sketches of the
West, by James Hall.

t Sketches of Western Adventure, by M'Lung, contains a summarized account,
taken from Johonnot's original narrative, published at Keene, New Hampshire, 1816.

i Stone's Life of Joseph Brant, vol. 2, p. 278.

KICKAPOOS DESTROY THE ILLINOIS. 163

Between the years 1786 and 1796, the Kickapoo war parties, from
their villages on the Wabash and Vermilion Rivers, kept the settle-
ments in the vicinity of Kaskaskia in a state of continual alarm.
Within the period named they killed and captured a number of
men, women and children in that part of Illinois. Among their
notable captures was that of William Biggs, whom they took across
the prairies to their village on the west bank of the Wabash, above
Attica, Indiana.*

Subsequent to the close of the Pontiac war, the Kickapoos, as-
sisted by the- Pottawatomies, almost annihilated the Kaskaskias at a
place since called Battle Ground Creek, on the road leading from
Kaskaskia to Shawneetown, and about twenty-five miles from the
former place. f The Kaskaskias were shut up in the villages of
Kaskaskia and Cahokia, and the Kickapoos became the recognized
proprietors of a large portion of the territory of the Kaskaskias on
the west, and the hunting grounds of the Piankeshaw-Miamis on
the east, of the dividing ridge between the Illinois and Wabash
Rivers. The principal Kickapoo towns were on the left bank of the
Illinois, near Peoria, and on the Yermilion, of the Wabash, and at
several places on the west bank of the latter stream. +

The Kickapoos of the prairie had villages west of Charleston,
Illinois, about the head-waters of the Kaskaskia and in many of the
groves scattered over the prairies between the Illinois and the Wa-
bash and south of the Kankakee, notable among which were their
towns at Elkhart Grove, on the Mackinaw, twelve miles north o
Bloomington, and at Oliver's Grove, in Livingston county, Illinois.

These people were much attached to the country along the Yer-
milion River, and Gen. Harrison had great trouble in gaining their
consent to cede it away. The Kickapoos valued it highly as a
desirable home, and because of the minerals it was supposed to
contain. In a letter, dated December 10, 1809, addressed to the

* Biggs was a tall and handsome man. He had been one of Col. Clark's soldiers,
and had settled near Bellefountaine. He was well versed in the Indians' ways and
their language. The Kickapoos took a great fancy to him. They adopted him into their
tribe, put him through a ridiculous ceremony which transformed him into a genuine
Kickapoo, after which he was offered a handsome daughter of a Kickapoo brave for a
wife. He declined all these flattering temptations, however, purchased his freedom
through the agency of a Spanish trader at the Kickapoo village, and returned home to
his family, going down the Wabash and Ohio and up the Mississippi in a canoe. His-
torical Sketch of the Early Settlements in Illinois, etc., by John M. Peck, read before
the Illinois State Lyceum, August 16, 1832. In 1826, shortly before his death, Mr.
Biggs published a narrative of his experience "while he was a prisoner with the Kick-
apoo Indians." It was published in pamphlet form, with poor type, and on very com-
mon paper, and contains twenty-three pages.

t J. M. Peck's Historical Address.

\ Reynolds' Pioneer History of Illinois, J. M. Peck's Address, and Gen. Harrison's
Memoirs.

164 HISTORIC NOTES ON" THE NORTHWEST.

Secretary of War, by Gen. Harrison, the latter, referring to the
treaty at Fort Wayne in connection with his efforts at that treaty to-
induce the Kickapoos to release their title to the tract of country
bounded on the east by the Wabash, on the south by the northern
line of the so-called Harrison Purchase, extending from opposite the
mouth of Raccoon Creek, northwest fifteen miles ; thence to a point
on the Vermilion River, twenty-five miles in a direct line from its
mouth; thence down the latter stream to its confluence, says "he
was extremely anxious that the extinguishment of title should extend
as high up as the Vermilion River. This small tract [of about
twenty miles square] is one of the most beautiful that can be con-
ceived, and is, moreover, believed to contain a very rich copper
mine. The Indians were so extremely jealous of any search being
made for this mine that the traders were always cautioned not to>
approach the hills which were supposed to contain it."*

In the desperate plans of Tecumseh and his brother, the Prophet,
to unite all of the Indian tribes in a war of extermination against
the whites, the Kickapoos took an active part. Gen. Harrison made
extraordinary efforts to avert the troubles that culminated in the bat-
tle of Tippecanoe. The Kickapoos were particularly uneasy ; and
in 1806 Gen. Harrison dispatched Capt. Win. Prince to the Vermil-
ion towns with a speech addressed to all the chiefs and warriors of
the Kickapoo tribe, giving Capt. Prince further instructions to pro-
ceed to the villages in the prairies, if, after having delivered the
speech at the Vermilion towns, he discovered that there would be no
danger in proceeding beyond. The speech, which was full of good
words, had little effect, and "shortly after the mission of Capt.*

* General Harrison's Official Letter: American State Papers of Indian Affairs, vol.
1, p. 726. It was not copper, but a mineral having something like the appearance of
silver, that the Indians so jealously guarded. Recent explorations among the bluffs on
the Little Vermilion have resulted in the discovery of a number of ancient smelting
furnaces, with the charred coals and slag remaining in and about them. The furnaces
are crude, consisting of shallow excavations of irregular shape in the hillsides. These
basins, averaging a few feet across the top, were lined with fire-clay. The bottoms of
the pits were connected by ducts or troughs, also made of fire-clay, leading into reser-
voirs a little distance lower down the hillside, into which the metal could flow, when
reduced to a liquid state, in the furnaces above. The pits were carefully filled with
earth, and every precaution was taken to prevent their discovery, a slight depression in
the surface of the ground being the only indication of their presence. The mines are
from every appearance entitled to a claim of considerable antiquity, and are probably
"the silver mines on the Wabash " that figure in the works of Hutchins, Imlay, and
other early writers, as the geological formation of the country precludes there being
any of the metals as high up or above "Ouiatanon," in the vicinity of which those
authors, as well as other writers, have located these mines. The most plausible ex-
planation of the use to which the metal was put is given by a half-breed Indian,
whose ancestors lived in the vicinity and were in the secret that, after being smelted,
the metal was sent to Montreal, where it was used as an alloy with silver, and con-
verted into brooches, wristbands, and other like jewelry, and brought back by the
traders and disposed of to the Indians.

PA-KOI-SHEE-CAN. 165

Prince, the Prophet found means to bring the whole of the Kicka-
poos entirely under his influence. He prevailed on the warriors to
reduce their old chief, Joseph Renard"* s son, to a private man. He
would have been put to death but for the insignificance of his char-
acter. "*

The Kickapoos fought in great numbers, and with frenzied cour-
age, at the battle of Tippecanoe. They early sided with the British
in the war that was declared between the United States and Great
Britain the following June, and sent out numerous war parties that
kept the settlements in Illinois and Indiana territories in constant
peril, while other warriors represented their tribe in almost every
battle fought on the western frontier during this war.

As the Pottawatomies and other tribes friendly to the English
laid siege to Fort Wayne, the Kickapoos, assisted by the "Winneba-
goes, undertook the capture of Fort Harrison. They nearly sruc-
ceeded, and would have taken the fort but for one of the most he-
roic and determined defenses under Capt. (afterward Gen.) Zachary
Taylor.

Capt. Taylor's official letter to Gen. Harrison, dated September
10, 1812, contains a graphic account of the affair at Fort Harrison.
The writer will here give the version of Pa-koi-shee-can, whom the
French called La Farine and the Americans The Flour, the Kicka-
poo chief who planned the attack and personally executed the most
difficult part of the programme. f

First, the Indians loitered about the fort, having a few of their
women and children about them, to induce a belief that their pres-
ence was of a friendly character, while the main body of warriors
were secreted at some distance off, waiting for favorable develop-
ments. Under the pretense of a want of provisions, the men and

* Memoirs of Gen. Harrison, p. 85. A foot-note on the same page is as follows:
' ' Old Joseph Renard was a very different character, a great warrior and perfectly sav-
age delighting in blood. He once told some of the inhabitants of Vincennes that
he used to be much diverted at the different exclamations of the Americans and the
French while the Indians were scalping them, the one exclaiming Oh Lord! oh Lord!
oh Lord! the other Mon Dieu! mon Dieu! mon Dieu! "

fThe account here given was narrated to the author by Mrs. Mary A. Baptiste,
substantially as it was told to her by " Pa-koi-shee-can." This lady, with her hus-
band, Christmas Dagney, was at Fort Harrison in 1821, where the latter was assisting
in disbursing annuities to the assembled Indians. The business, and general spree
which followed it, occupied two or three days. La Farine was present with his people
to receive their share of annuities, and the old chief, having leisure, edified Mr. Dag-
ney and his wife with a minute description of his attempt to capture the fort, pointing
out the position of the attacking party and all the movements on the part of the
Indians, La Farine was a large, fleshy man, well advanced in years and a thorough
savage. As he related the story he warmed up and indulged in a great deal of pan-
tomime, which gave force to, while it heightened the effect of, his narration. The
particulars are given substantially as they were repeated to the author. The lady of
whom he received it had never read an account of the engagement.

166 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

women were permitted to approach the fort, and had a chance to
inspect the fort and its defenses, an opportunity of which the men
fully availed themselves. A dark night, giving the appearance of
rain, favored a plan which was at once put into execution. The
warriors were called to the front, and the women and children
retired to a place of safety. La Farine, with a large butcher knife
in each hand, extended himself at full length upon the ground. He
drove one knife into the ground and drew his body up against it,
then he reached forward, with the knife in the other hand, and driv-
ing that into the ground drew himself along. In this way he ap-
proached the lower block-house, stealthily through the grass. He
could hear the sentinels on their rounds within the fortified enclo-
sure. As they advanced toward that part of the works where the
lower block-house was situated, La Farine would lie still upon the
ground, and when the sentinels made the turn and were moving in
the opposite direction, he would again crawl nearer.* In this manner
La Farine reached the very walls of the block-house. There was a
crack between the logs of the block-house, and through this opening
the Kickapoo placed a quantity of dry grass, bits of wood, and
other combustible material, brought in a blanket tied about his back,
so as to form a sack. As the preparation for this incendiarism was
in progress, the sentinels passed within a very few feet of the place,
as they paced by on the opposite side of the block-house. Everything
being in readiness, and the sentinels at the farther end of the works,
La Farine struck a fire with his flint and thrust it between the logs,
and threw his blanket quickly over the opening, to prevent the light
from flashing outside, and giving the alarm before the building
should be well ablaze. When assured that the fire was well under
way, he fell back and gave the signal, when the attack was immedi-
ately begun by the Indians at the other extremity of the fort. The
lower block-house burned up in spite of all the efforts of the gar-
rison to put out the fire, and for awhile the Indians were exultant in
the belief of an assured and complete victory. Gen. Taylor con-
structed a barricade out of material taken from another building,
and by the time the block-house burned the Indians discovered a.
new line of defenses, closing up the breach by which they expected
to effect an entrance, f

* Capt. Taylor, being suspicious of mischief, took the precaution to order sentinels
to make the rounds within the inclosure, as appears from his official report.

fThe Indians, exasperated by the failure of their attempt upon Fort Harrison,
made an incursion to the Pigeon Roost Fork of White River, where they massacred
twenty-one of the inhabitants, many of them women and children. The details of
some of the barbarities committed on this incursion are too shocking to narrate. They

TERRITORY OF THE KICKAPOOS. 167

in 1819, at a treaty concluded at Edwardsville, Illinois, they
ceded to the United States all of their lands. Their claim included
the following territory: "Beginning on the Wabash River, at the
upper point of their cession, made by the second article of their
treaty at Vincennes on the 9th of December, 1809 ;* thence running
northwestwardlyf to the dividing line between the states of Illinois
and Indiana ;:}; thence along said line to the Kankakee River ; thence
with said river to the Illinois River ; thence down the latter to its
mouth ; thence in a direct line to the northwest corner of the Vin-
cennes tract, and thence (north by a little east) with the western
and northern boundaries of the cessions heretofore made by the
Kickapoo tribe of Indians, to the beginning. Of which tract of land
the said Kickapoo tribe claim a large portion by descent from their
ancestors, and the balance by conquest from the Illinois Nation and
uninterrupted possession for more than half a century '." An exam-
ination, extended through many volumes, leaves no doubt of the just
claims of the Kickapoos to the territory described, or the length of
time it had been in their possession.

With the close of the war of 1812, the Kickapoos ceased their
active hostilities upon the whites, and within a few years afterward
disposed of their lands in Illinois and Indiana, and, with the excep-
tion of a few bands, went westward of the Mississippi. "The
Kickapoos," says ex-Go v. Reynolds, "disliked the United States so
much that they decided, when they left Illinois that they would not
reside within the limits of our government," but would settle in
Texas. || A large body of them did go to Texas, and when the

are given by Capt. M'Affe in his History of the Late War in the Western Country,
p. 155. The garrison at Fort Harrison was cut off from communication with Vincennes
for several days, and reduced to great extremity for want of provisions. They were
relieved by Col. Russell. After this officer had left the fort, on his return to Vincennes,
he passed several wagons with provisions on their way up to the fort under an escort of
thirteen men, commanded by Lieut. Fairbanks, of the regular army. This body of
men were surprised and cut to pieces by the Indians, two or three only escaping, while
the provisions and wagons fell into the hands of the savages. Vide M'Affe, p. 155.

* At the mouth of Raccoon Creek, opposite Montezuma.

t Following the northwestern line of the so-called Harrison Purchase.

\ The state line had not been run at this time, and when it was surveyed in 1821
it was discovered to be several miles west of where it was generally supposed it would
be. The territory of the Kickapoos extended nearly as far east as La Fayette, as is
evident from the location of some of their villages.

By the terms of the fourth article of the treaty of Greenville the United States
reserved a tract of land on both sides of the Wabash, above and below Vincennes, to
cover the rights of the inhabitants of that village who had received grants from the
French and British governments. In 1803, for the purpose of settling the limits of
this tract, General Harrison, on the 7th of June, 1803, at Fort Wayne, concluded a
treaty with the Miamis, Kickapoos, Shawnees, Pottawatqmies and Delawares. This
cession of land became known as the Vincennes tract, and its northwest corner extends
twelve miles into Illinois, crossing the Wabash at Palestine.

1 Pioneer History of Illinois, p. 8.

168 HISTOKIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Lone Star Republic became one of the United States the Kickapoos
retired to New Mexico, and subsequently some of them went to Old
Mexico. Here on these isolated borders the wild bands of Kicka-
poos have for years maintained the reputation of their sires as a busy
and turbulent people.*

A mixed band of Kickapoos and Pottawatomies, who resided on
the Yermilion River and its tributaries, became christianized under
the instructions of Ka-en-ne-kuck. This remarkable man, once a
drunkard himself, reformed and became an exemplary Christian,
and commanded such influence over his band that they, too, became
Christians, abstained entirely from whisky, which had brought them
to the verge of destruction, and gave up many of the other vices to
which they were previously addicted. Ka-en-ne-kuck had religious
services every Sunday, and so conscientious were his people that
they abstained from labor and all frivolous pastimes on that day.f

Ka-en-ne-kuck' s discourses were replete with religious thought,
and advice given in accordance with the precepts of the Bible, and
are more interesting because they were the utterances of an unedu-
cated Indian, who is believed to have done more, in his sphere of
action, in the cause of temperance and other moral reforms, than
any other person has been able to accomplish among the Indians,
although armed with all the power that education and talent could
confer.

Ka-en-ne-kuck' s band, numbering about two hundred persons,
migrated to Kansas, and settled upon a reservation within the pres-
ent limits of Jackson and Brown counties, where the survivors, and
the immediate descendants of those who have since died, are now
residing upon their farms. Their well-cultivated fields and their
uniform good conduct attest the lasting effect of Ka-en-ne-kuck's
teachings.

The wild bands have always been troublesome upon the south-
western borders, plundering upon all sides, making inroads into the
settlements, killing stock and stealing horses. Every now and then

* In 1854 a band of them were found by Col. Marcy, living near Fort Arbuckle.
He says of them: "They are intelligent, active and brave; they frequently visit and
traffic with the prairie Indians, and have no fear of meeting these people in battle,
provided the odds are not more than six to one against them." Marcy 's Thirty Years
of Army Life on the Border, p. 95.

fOne of Ka-en-ne-kuck's sermons was delivered at Danville, Illinois, on the 17th
of July, 1831, to his own tribe, and a large concourse of citizens who asked permission
to be present. The sermon was delivered in the Kickapoo dialect, interpreted into
English, sentence at a time as spoken by the orator, by Gurdeon S. Hubbard, who spoke
the Kickapoo as well as the Pottawatomie dialect with great fluency. The sermon was
taken down in writing by Solomon Banta, a lawyer then living in Danville, and for-
warded by him and Col. Hubbard to Judge James Hall, at Vandalia, Illinois, and pub-
lished in the October number (1831) of his " Illinois Monthly Magazine."

CHARACTERISTICS. 169

their depredations form the subject of items for the current news-
papers of the day. For years the government has failed in efforts
to induce the wild band to remove to some point within the Indian
Territory, where they might be restrained from annoying the border
settlements of Texas and New Mexico. Some years ago a part of
the semi-civilized Kickapoos in Kansas, preferring their old wild
life to the ways of civilized society, left Kansas and joined the bands
to the southwest. These last, after twelve years' roving in quest of
plunder, were induced to return, and in 1875 they were settled in
the Indian Territory and supplied with the necessary implements
and provisions to enable them to go to work and earn an honest liv-
ing. In this commendable effort at reform they are now making
very satisfactory progress.* In 1875 the number of civilized Kick-
apoos within the Kansas agency was three hundred and eight-five,
while the wild or Mexican band numbered four hundred and twenty,
as appears from the official report on Indian affairs for that year.

As compared with other Indians, the Kickapoos were industrious,
intelligent, and cleanly in their habits, and were better armed and
clothed than the other tribes, f The men, as a rule, were tall, sin-
ewy and active ; the women were lithe, and many of them by no
means lacking in beauty. Their dialect was soft and liquid, as com-
pared with the rough and guttural language of the Pottawatomies.:};
They kept aloof from the white people, as a rule, and in this way
preserved their characteristics, and contracted fewer of the vices of
the white man than other tribes. Their numbers were never great,
as compared with the Miamis or Pottawatomies ; however, they
made up for the deficiency in this respect by the energy of their
movements.

In language, manners and customs the Kickapoos bore a very
close resemblance to the Sac and Fox Indians, whose allies they
generally were, and with whom they have by some writers been
confounded.

* Report of C9mmissiqner on Indian Affairs for the year 1875.
t Reynolds' Pioneer History of Illinois.
\ Statement of Col. Hubbard to the writer.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE SHAWNEES AND DELA WARES.

THE SHAWNEES were a branch of the Algonquin family, and in
manners and customs bore a strong resemblance to the Delawares.
They were the Bedouins of the wilderness, and their wanderings
form a notable instance in the history of the nomadic races of JSTorth
America. Before the arrival of the Europeans th&- Shawnees lived
on the shores of the great lakes eastward of Cleveland. At that
time the principal Iroquois villages were on the northern side of the
lakes, above Montreal, and this tribe was under a species of subjec-
tion to the Adirondacks, the original tribe from whence the several
Algonquin tribes are alleged to have sprung, * and made ' ' the plant-
ing of corn their business."

"The Adirondacks, however, valued themselves as delighting in
a more manly employment, and despised the Iroquois in following
a business which they thought only fit for women. But it once hap-
pened that game failed the Adirondacks, which made them desire
some of the young men of the Iroquois to assist them in hunting.
These young men soon became much more expert in hunting, and
able to endure fatigues, than the Adirondacks expected or desired ;
in short, they became jealous of them, and one night murdered all
the young men they had with them." The chiefs of the Iroquois
complained, but the Adirondacks treated their remonstrances with
contempt, without being apprehensive of the resentment of the Iro-
quois, "for they looked upon them as women."

The Iroquois determined on revenge, and the Adirondacks, hear-
ing of it, declared war. The Iroquois made but feeble resistance,
and were forced to leave their country and fly to the south shores of
the lakes, where they ever afterward lived. " Their chiefs, in order
to raise their people's spirits, turned them against the Satarias, a less
warlike nation, who then lived on the shores of the lakes." The
Iroquois soon subdued the Satanas, and drove them from their
country, f

* Adirondack is the Iroquois name for Algonquin.

t Colden's History of the Five Nations, pp. 22, 23, The Shawnees were known to
the Iroquois by the name of Satanas. Same authority.

170

WANDEKINGS OF THE SHAWNEES. 171

In 1632 the Shawnees were on the south side of the Delaware.*
From this time the Iroquois pursued them, each year driving them
farther southward. Forty years later they were on the Tennessee,
and Father Marquette, in speaking of them, calls them Chaouanons,
which was the Illinois word for southerners, or people from the
south, so termed because they lived to the south of the Illinois cantons.
The Iroquois still waged war upon the Shawnees, driving them to the
extremities mentioned in the extracts quoted from Father Marquette' s
journal, f To escape further molestation from the Iroquois, the Shaw-
nees continued a more southern course, and some of their bands
penetrated the extreme southern states. The Suwanee River, in
Florida, derived its name from the fact that the Shawnees once lived
upon its banks. Black Hoof, the renowned chief of this tribe, was
born in Florida, and informed Gen. Harrison, with whom for many
years he was upon terms of intimacy, that he had often bathed in
the sea.

"It is well known that they were at a place which still bears
their name;}: on the Ohio, a few miles below the mouth of the Wabash,
some time before the commencement of the revolutionary war, where
they remained before their removal to the Sciota, where they were
found in the year 1774 by Gov. Dunmore. Their removal from
Florida was a necessity, and their progress from thence a flight
rather than a deliberate march. This is evident from their appear-
ance when they presented themselves upon the Ohio and claimed
protection of the Miamis. They are represented by the chiefs of the
Miamis and Delawares as supplicants for protection, not against the
Iroquois, but against the Creeks and Seminoles, or some other south-
ern tribe, who had driven them from Florida, and they are said to
have been literally sans provant et sans culottes [hungry and naked].

After their dispersion by the Iroquois, remnants of the tribe were
found in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania, but after the
return of the main body from the south, they became once more
united, the Pennsylvania band leaving that colony about the same
time that the Delawares did. During the forty years following that
period, the whole tribe was in a state of perpetual war with America,
either as British colonies or as independent states. By the treaty of

* De Laet.

t Vide p. 49 of this work.

\ Shawneetown, Illinois.

Gen. Harrison's Historical Address, pp. 30, 31. This history of the Shawnees,
says Gen. Harrison, was brought forward at a council at Vincennes in 1810, to resist
the pretensions of Tecumseh to an interference with the Miamis in the disposal of their
lands, and however prallinpr the reference to these facts must have been to Tecumseh,
he was unable to deny them.

172 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Greenville, they lost nearly all the territory they had been permitted
to occupy north of the Ohio.""

In 1819 they were divided into four tribes, the Pequa,f the Me-
quachake, the Chillicothe, and the Kiskapocoke. The latter tribe
was the one to which Tecumseh belonged. They were always hos-
tile to the United States, and joined every coalition against the gov-
ernment. In 1806 they separated from the rest of the tribe, and
took up their residence at Greenville. Soon afterward they removed
to their former place of residence on Tippecanoe Creek, Indiana.:}:

At the close of Gen. Wayne's campaign, a large body of the
Shawnees settled near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, upon a tract of
land granted to them and the Delawares in 1793, by Baron de Ca-
rondelet, governor of the Spanish provinces west of the Mississippi.

From their towns in eastern Ohio, the Shawnees spread north and
westward to the headwaters of the Big and Little Miamis, the St.
Mary's, and the Au Glaize, and for quite a distance down the Mau-
mee. They had extensive cultivated fields upon these streams,
which, with their villages, were destroyed by Gen. Wayne on his
return from the victorious engagement with the confederated tribes
on the field of "fallen timbers." Gen. Harmer, in his letter to
the Secretary of War, communicating the details of his campaign
on the Maumee, in October, 1T90, gives a fine description of the
country, and the location of the Shawnee, Delaware and Miami vil-
lages, in the neighborhood of Fort Wayne, as they appeared at that
early day. We quote: "The savages and traders (who were, perhaps,
the worst savages of the two) had evacuated their towns, and burnt
the principal village called the Omee,*\\ together with all the traders'
houses. This village lay on a pleasant point, formed by the junc-
tion of the rivers Omee and St. Joseph. It was situate on the east

*Gallatin.

f " In ancient times they had a large fire, which, being burned down, a great puffing
and blowing was heard among the ashes; they looked, and behold a man stood up
from the ashes! hence the name Piqua a man coming out of the ashes, or made of
ashes."

| Account of the Present State of the Indian Tribes Inhabiting Ohio : Archaeologia
Americana, vol. 1, pp. 274, 275. Mr. Johnson is in error in locating this band upon
the Tippecanoe. The prophets' town was upon the west bank of the Wabash, near the
mouth of the Tippecanoe.

Treaties with the Several Indian Tribes, etc.: Government edition, 1837. The
Shawnees and Delawares relinquished their title to their Spanish grant by a treaty
concluded between them and the United States on the 26th of October, 1832.

1 "The army returned to this place [Fort Defiance] on the 27th, by easy inarches,
laying waste to the villages and corn-fields for about fifty miles on each side of the
Miami [Maumee]. There remains yet a great number of villages and a great quantity
of corn to be consumed or destroyed upon the Au Glaize and Miami above this place,
which will be effected in a few days." Gen. Wayne to the Secretary of War: Ameri-
can State Papers on Indian Affairs, vol. 1, p. 491.

^[ The Miami village.

COUNTRY OF THE SHAWNEES. 173

bank of the latter, opposite the mouth of St. Mary, and had for a
long time past been the rendezvous of a set of Indian desperadoes,
who infested the settlements, and stained the Ohio and parts adjacent
with the blood of defenseless inhabitants. This day we advanced
nearly the same distance, and kept nearly the same course as yester-
day ; we encamped within six miles of the object, and on Sunday,
the 17th, entered the ruins of the Omee town, or French village, as
part of it is called. Appearances confirmed accounts I had received '
of the consternation into which the savages and their trading allies
had been thrown by the approach of the army. Many valuables of
the traders were destroyed in the confusion, and vast quantities of
corn and other grain and vegetables were secreted in holes dug in
the earth, and other hiding places. Colonel Hardin rejoined the
army."

' ' Besides the town of Omee, there were several other villages situ-
ate upon the banks of three rivers. One of them, belonging to
the Omee Indians, called Kegaiogue,* was standing and contained
thirty houses on the bank opposite the principal village. Two others,
consisting together of about forty-five houses, lay a few miles up
the St. Mary's, and were inhabited by Delawares. Thirty-six houses
occupied by other savages of this tribe formed another but scattered
town, on the east bank of the St. Joseph, two or three miles north
from the French village. About the same distance down the Omee
River, lay the Shawnee town of Chillicothe, consisting of fifty-eight
houses, opposite which, on the other bank of the river, were sixteen
more habitations, belonging to savages of the same nation. All
these I ordered to be burnt during my stay there, together with
great quantities of corn and vegetables hidden as at the principal
village, in the earth and other places by the savages, who had aban-
doned them. It is computed that there were no less than twenty
thousand bushels of corn, in the ear, which the army either con-
sumed or destroy ed.-'f

The Shawnees also had a populous village within the present
limits of Fountain county, Indiana, a few miles east of Attica.
They gave their name to Shawnee Prairie and to a stream that dis-
charges into the "Wabash from the east, a short distance below "Will-
iamsport.

* Ke-ki-ong-a. "The name in English is said to signify a blackberry patch [more
probably a blackberry bush] which, in its turn, passed among the Mianiis as a symbol
of antiquity." Brice's History of Fort Wayne, p. 23.

fGen. Banner's Official Letter. It will be observed that Gen. Harmer treats the
French Omee or Miami village as a separate town from that of Ke-ki-ong-a. His de-
scription is so minute, and his opportunities so favorable to know the facts, that there
is scarcely a probability of his having been mistaken.

174 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

In 1854 the Shawnees in Kansas numbered nine hundred persons,
occupying a reservation of one million six hundred thousand acres.
Their lands were divided into severalty. They have banished
whisky, and many of them have fine farms under cultivation. Be-
ing on the border of Missouri, they suffered from the rebel raids,
and particularly that of Gen. Price in 1864. In 1865 they numbered
eight hundred and forty-five persons. They furnished for the Union
army one hundred and twenty-five men. The Shawnees have illus-
trated by their own conduct the capability of an Indian tribe to
become civilized.*

THE DELAWARES called themselves Lenno Lenape, which signifies
"original" or "unmixed" men. They were divided into three
clans : the Turtle, the Wolf and the Turkey. When first met with
by the Europeans, they occupied a district of country bounded
eastwardly by the Hudson River and the Atlantic ; on the west
their territories extended to the ridge separating the flow of the
Delaware from the other streams emptying into the Susquehanna
River and Chesapeake Bay.f

They, according to their own traditions, "many hundred years
ago resided in the western part of the continent ; thence by slow
emigration, they at length reached the Alleghany River, so called
from a nation of giants, the Allegewi, against whom the Delawares
and Iroquois (the latter also emigrants from the west) carried on
successful war ; and still proceeding eastward, settled on the Dela-
ware, Hudson, Susquehanna and Potomac rivers, making the Dela-
ware the center of their possessions.:}:

By the other Algonquin tribes the Delawares were regarded with
the utmost respect and veneration. They were called "fathers,"
"grandfathers," etc.

" When William Penn landed in Pennsylvania the Delawares had
been subjugated and made women by the Iroquois." They were
prohibited from making war, placed under the sovereignty of the
Iroquois, and even lost the right of dominion to the lands which
they had occupied for so many generations. Gov. Penn, in his treaty
with the Delawares, purchased from them the right of possession
merely, and afterward obtained the relinquishment of the sovereignty
from the Iroquois. The Delawares accounted for their humiliating
relation to the Iroquois by claiming that their assumption of the
role of women, or mediators, was entirely voluntary on their part.

* Gale's Upper Mississippi. J Taylor's History of Ohio, p. 33,

fGallatin's Synopsis of the Indian Tribes, p. 44. gGallatin's Synopsis, etc.

DELAWARES BECOME AVOMEN. 175

They said they became "peacemakers," not through compulsion,
but in compliance with the intercession of different belligerent tribes,
and that this position enabled their tribe to command the respect of
all the Indians east of the Mississippi. While it is true that the
Delawares were very generally recognized as mediators, they never
in any war or treaty exerted an influence through the possession of
this title. It was an empty honor, and no additional power or ben-
efit ever accrued from it. That the degrading position of the Dela-
wares was not voluntary is proven in a variety of ways. " We possess
none of the details of the war waged against the Lenapes, but we
know that it resulted in the entire submission of the latter, and that
the Iroquois, to prevent any further interruption from the Delawares,
adopted a plan to humble and degrade them, as novel as it was ef-
fectual. Singular as it may seem, it is nevertheless true that the
Lenapes, upon the dictation of the Iroquois, agreed to lay aside the
character of warriors and assume that of women."* The Iroquois,
while they were not present at the treaty of Greenville, took care to
inform Gen. Wayne that the Delawares were their subjects " that
they had conquered them and put petticoats upon them." At a
council held July 12, 1742, at the house of the lieutenant-governor
of Pennsylvania, where the subject of previous grants of land was
under discussion, an Iroquois orator turned to the Delawares who
were present at the council, and holding a belt of waumpum, ad-
dressed them thus: "Cousins, let this belt of waumpum serve to
chastise you. You ought to be taken by the hair of your head and
shaked severely, till you recover your senses and become sober. . . .
But how came you to take upon yourself to sell land at all ? " refer-
ring to lands on the Delaware River, which the Delawares had sold
some fifty years before. "We conquered you ; we made women of
you. You know you are women, and can no more sell land than
women ; nor is it fit you should have the power of selling lands,
since you would abuse it." The Iroquois orator continues his chas-
tisement of the Delawares, indulging in the most opprobrious lan-
guage, and closed his speech by telling the Delawares to remove
immediately. "We don't give you the liberty to think about it.
You may return to the other side of the Delaware, where you came
from ; but we don't know, considering how you had demeaned your-
selves, whether you will be permitted to live there, "f

The Quakers who settled Pennsylvania treated the Delawares in

* Discourse of Gen. Harrison.

t Minutes of the Conference at Philadelphia, in Golden 's History of the Five
Nations.

176 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

accordance with the rules of justice and equity. The result was that
during a period of sixty years peace and the utmost harmony pre-
vailed. This is the only instance in the settling of America by the
English where uninterrupted friendship and good will existed be-
tween the colonists and the aboriginal inhabitants. Gradually and
by peaceable means the Quakers obtained possession of the greater
portion of their territory, and the Delawares were in the same situa-
tion as other tribes, without lands, without means of subsistence.
They were threatened with starvation. Induced by these motives,
some of them, between the years 1740 and 1750, obtained from their
uncles, the Wyandots, and with the assent of the Iroquois, a grant of
land on the Muskingum, in Ohio. The greater part of the tribe re-
mained in Pennsylvania, and becoming more and more dissatisfied
with their lot, shook off the yoke of the Iroquois, joined the French
and ravaged the frontiers of Pennsylvania. Peace was concluded at
Easton in 1758, and ten years after the last remaining bands of the
Delawares crossed the Alleghanies. Here, being removed from the
influence of their dreaded masters, the Iroquois, the Delawares soon
assumed their ancient independence. During the next four or five
decades they were the most formidable of the western tribes. While
the revolutionary war was in progress, as allies of the British, after
its close, at the head of the northwestern confederacy of Indians,
they fully regained their lost reputation. By their geographical
position placed in the front of battle, they were, during those two
wars, the most active and dangerous enemies of America.*

The territory claimed by the Delawares subsequent to their being
driven westward from their former possessions, is established in a
paper addressed to congress May 10, 1779, from delegates assem-
bled at Princeton, New Jersey. The boundaries of their country,
as declared in the address, is as follows: "From the mouth of the
Alleghany River, at Fort Pitt, to the Yenango, and from thence up
French Creek, and by Le Boeuf,! along the old road to Presque Isle,
on the east. The Ohio River, including all the islands in it, from
Fort Pitt to the Ouabache, on t/ie south thence up the River Oua-
bache to that branch, Ope-co-mee-cah^ and up the same to the head
thereof; from thence to the headwaters and springs of the Great
Miami, or Rocky River ; thence across to the headwaters and springs
of the most northwestern branches of the Scioto River ; thence to

* In the battle of Fallen Timbers there were three hundred Delawares out of seven
hundred Indians who were in this engagement: Colonial History of Massachusetts,
vol. 10.

t A fort on the present site of Waterford, Pa.

\ This was the name given by the Delawares to White River, Indiana.

MAKE PEACE. 177

the westernmost springs of Sandusky River ; thence down said river,
including the islands in it and in the little lake, * to Lake Erie, on the
west and northwest, and Lake Erie on the north. These boundaries-
contain the cessions of lands made to the Delaware nation by the
Wayandots and other nations, f and the country we have seated our
grandchildren, the Shawnees, upon, in our laps ; and we promise to-
give to the United States of America such a part of the above
described country as would be convenient to them and us, that they
may have room for their children's children to set down upon.":}:

After Wayne's victory the Delawares saw that further contests
with the American colonies would be worse than useless. They
submitted to the inevitable, acknowledged the supremacy of the
Caucasian race, and desired to make peace with the victors. At the
treaty of Greenville, in 1795, there were present three hundred and
eighty-one Delawares, a larger representation than that of any
other Indian tribe. By this treaty they ceded to the United States
the greater part of the lands allotted to them by the Wyandots and
Iroquois. For this cession they received an annuity of $1,000.

At the close of the treaty, Bu-kon-ge-he-las, a Delaware chief,
spoke as follows :

Father: | Your children all well understand the sense of the
treaty which is now concluded. We experience daily proofs of your
increasing kindness. I hope we may all have sense enough to enjoy
our dawning happiness. Many of your people are yet among us.
I trust they will be immediately restored. Last winter our king
came forward to you with two; and when he returned with your
speech to us, we immediately prepared to come forward with the
remainder, which we delivered at Fort Defiance. All who know
me know me to be a man and a warrior, and I now declare that I will
for the future be as steady and true a friend to the United States as
I have heretofore been an active enemy. "[

This promise of the orator was faithfully kept by his people.
They evaded all the efforts of the Shawnee prophet, Tecumseh, and
the British who endeavored to induce them, by threats or bribes, to>
violate it.**

* Sandusky Bay.

fThe Hurons and Iroquois.

\ Pioneer History, by S. P. Hildreth, p. 137, where the paper setting forth the
claims of the Delawares is copied.

American State Papers: Indian Affairs, vol. 1.

|| Gen. Wayne.

Tf American State Papers: Indian Affairs, vol. 1, p. 582.

** Bu-kon-ge-he-las was a warrior of great ability. He took a leading part in
maneuvering the Indians at the dreadful battle known as St. Glair's defeat. He rose
from a private warrior to the head of his tribe. Until after Gen. Wayne's great victory
12

178 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWKST.

The Delawares remained faithful to the United States during the
war of 1812, and, with the Shawnees, furnished some very able war-
riors and scouts, who rendered valuable service to the United States
during this war.

After the treaty of Greenville, the great body of Delawares re-
moved to their lands on White River, Indiana, whither some of
their people had already preceded them.

Their manner of obtaining possession of their lands on White
River is thus related in Dawson's Life of Harrison: "The land in
question had been granted to the Delawares about the year 1770, by
the Piankeshaws, on condition of their settling upon it and assist-
ing them in a war with the Kickapoos. " These terms were complied
with, and the Delawares remained in possession of the land.

The title to the tract of land lying between the Ohio and White
Rivers soon became a subject of dispute between the Piankeshaws
and Delawares. A chief of the latter tribe, in 1803, at Yincennes,
stated to Gen. Harrison that the land belonged to his tribe, "and
that he had with him a chief who had been present at the transfer
made by the Piankeshaws to the Delawares, of all the country be-
tween the Ohio and White Rivers more than thirty years previous."
This claim was disputed by the Piankeshaws. They admitted that
while they had granted the Delawares the right of occupancy, yet
they had never conveyed the right of sovereignty to the tract in
question.

Gov. Harrison, on the 19th and 27th of August, 1804, concluded
treaties with the Delawares and Piankeshaws by which the United
States acquired all that fine country between the Ohio and Wabash
Rivers. Both of "these tribes laying claim to the land, it became

in 1794, he had been a devoted partisan of the British and a mortal foe to the United
States. He was the most distinguished warrior in the Indian Confederacy; and as it
was the British interests which had induced the Indians to commence, as well as to con-
tinue, the war, Buck-on-ge-he-las relied upon British support and protection. This
support had been given so far as relates to provisions, arms and ammunition; but
at the end of the battle referred to, the gates of Fort Miamis, near which the action
was fought, were shut, by the British within, against the wounded Indians after
the battle. This opened the eyes of the Delaware warrior. He collected his braves
in canoes, with the design of proceeding up the river, under a flag of truce, to Fort
Wayne. On approaching the British fort he was requested to land. He did so, and
addressing the British officer, said, " What have you to say to me?" The officer re-
plied that the commandant wished to speak with him. "Then he may come here,"
was the chief's reply. " He will not do that," said the sub-officer; "and you will not
be suffered to pass the fort if you do not comply." "What shall prevent me?"
"These," said the officer, pointing to the cannon of the fort. "I fear not your
cannon," replied the intrepid chief. "After suffering the Americans to insult and
treat you with such contempt, without daring to fire upon tJietn, you cannot expect to
frighten me." Buck-on-ge-he-las then ordered his canoes to push off from the shore,
and the fleet passed the fort without molestation. A note [No. 2]: Memoirs of Gen.
Harrison.

BECOME CITIZENS. 17'.>

necessary that both should be satisfied, in order to prevent disputes
in the future. In this, however, the governor succeeded, on terms,
perhaps, more favorable than if the title had been vested in only
one of these tribes ; for, as both claimed the land, the value of each
claim was considerably lowered in the estimation of both ; and,
therefore, by judicious management, the governor effected the pur-
chase upon probably as low, if not lower, terms that if he had been
obliged to treat with only one of them. For this tract the Pianke-
shaws received $700 in goods and $200 per annum for ten years;
the compensation of the Delawares was an annuity of $300 for ten
years.

The Delawares continued to reside upon White River and its
branches until 1819, when most of them joined the band who had
emigrated to Missouri upon the tract of land granted jointly to them
und the Shawnees, in 1T93, by the Spanish authorities. Others of
their number who remained scattered themselves among the Miamis,
Pottawatomies and Kickapoos ; while still others, including the Mo-
ravian converts, went to -Canada. At that time, 1819, the total num-
ber of those residing in Indiana was computed to be eight hundred
souls. *

In 1829 the majority of the nation were settled on the Kansas
and Missouri rivers. They numbered about 1,000, were brave, en-
terprising hunters, cultivated lands and were friendly to the whites.
In 1853 they sold to the government all the lands granted them, ex-
cepting a reservation in Kansas. During the late Rebellion they
sent to the United States army one hundred and seventy out of their
two hundred able-bodied men. Like their ancestors they proved
valiant and trustworthy soldiers. Of late years they have almost
entirely lost their aboriginal customs and manners. They live in
nouses, have schools and churches, cultivate farms, and, in fact, bid
fair to become useful and prominent citizens of the great Republic.

* Their principal towns were on the branches of White River, within the present
limits of Madison and Delaware counties, and the capital of the latter is named after
-the "Muncy" or " Mon-o-sia " band. Pipe Creek and Kill Buck Creek, branches of
White River, are also named after two distinguished Delaware chiefs.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE INDIANS: THEIR IMPLEMENTS, UTENSILS, FORTIFICATIONS,
MOUNDS, AND THEIR MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.

BEFORE the arrival of the Europeans the use of iron was but little
known to the North American Indians. Marquette, in speaking of
the Illinois, states that they were entirely ignorant of the use of iron
tools, their weapons being made of stone. * This was true of all the
Indians who made their homes north of the Ohio, but south of that
stream metal tools were occasionally, met with. When Hernando-
De Soto, in 1539-43, was traversing the southern part of that terri-
tory, now known as the United States, in his vain search for gold,
some of his followers found the natives on "the Savanna River using
hatchets made of copper, f It is evident that these hatchets were of
native manufacture, for they were "said to have a mixture of gold.' *

The southern Indians ' ' had long bows, and their arrows were
made of certain canes like reeds, very heavy, and so strong that a
sharp cane passeth through a target. Some they arm in the point
with a sharp bone of a fish, like a chisel, and in others they fasten
certain stones like points of diamonds.":}: These bones or "scale
of the armed fish" were neatly fastened to the head of the arrows
with splits of cane and fish glue. The northern Indians used
arrows with stone points. Father Rasles thus describes them :
"Arrows are the principal arms which they use in war and in the
chase. They are pointed at the end with a stone, cut and sharpened
in the shape of a serpent's tongue ; and, if no knife is at hand, they
use them also to skin the animals they have killed." "The bow-
strings were prepared from the entrails of a stag, or of a stag's skin,
which they know how to dress as well as any man in France, and
with as many different colors. They head their arrows with the teeth
of fishes an'd stone, which they work very finely and handsomely. "T

* Sparks' Life of Marquette, p. 281.

f A Narrative of the Expedition of Hernando De Soto, by a Gentleman of Elvas;
published at Evpra in 1557, and afterward translated and published in the second
volume of the Historical Collections of Louisiana, p. 149. \ Idem, p. 124.

Du Pratz' History of Louisiana: English translation, vol. 2, pp. 223, 224.

1 Kip's Jesuit Missions, p. 39.

*[ History of the First Attempt of the French to Colonize Florida, in 1562, by Rene"
Laudonniere: published in Historical Collections of Louisiana and Florida, vol. 1, p. 170.

180

THEY USE STONE IMPLEMENTS. 181

Most of the hatchets and knives of the northern Indians were
likewise made of sharpened stones, "which they fastened in a cleft
piece of wood with leathern thongs."* Their tomahawks were con-
structed from stone, the horn of a stag, or "from wood in the shape
of a cutlass, and terminated by a large ball." The tomahawk was
held in one hand and a knife in the other. As soon as they dealt a
blow on the head of an enemy, they immediately cut it round with
the knife, and took off the scalp with extraordinary rapidity, f

Du Pratz thus describes their method of felling trees with stone
implements and with fire: "Cutting instruments are almost con-
tinually wanted ; but as they had no iron, which of all metals is the
most useful in human society, they were obliged, with infinite pains,
to form hatchets out of large flints, by sharpening their thin edge,
and making a hole through them for receiving the handle. To cut
down trees with these axes would have been almost an impracticable
work ; they were, therefore, obliged to light fires round the roots of
them, and to cut away the charcoal as the fire eat into the tree.":}:

Charlevoix makes a similar statement: "These people, before
we provided them with hatchets and other instruments, were very
much at a loss in felling their trees, and making them fit for such
uses as they intended them for. They burned them near the root,
and in order to split and cut them into proper lengths they made
use of hatchets made of flint, which never broke, but which required
a prodigious time to sharpen. In order to fix them in a shaft, they
cut off the top of a young tree, making a slit in it, as if they were
going to draft it, into which slit they inserted the head of the axe.
The tree, growing together again in length of time, held the head
of the hatchet so firm that it was impossible for it to get loose ;
they then cut the tree at the length they deemed sufficient for the
handle. "

When they were about to make wooden dishes, porringers or
spoons, they cut the blocks of wood to the required shape with
stone hatchets, hollowed them out with coals of fire, and polished
them with beaver teeth. |

Early settlers in the neighborhood of Thorntown, Indiana, no-
ticed that the Indians made their hominy-blocks in a similar manner.
Hound stones were heated and placed upon the blocks which were
to be excavated. The charred wood was dug out with knives, and

* Hennepin, vol. 2, p. 103.

t Letter of Father Rasles in Kip's Jesuit Missions, p. 40.

} Volume 2, p. 223.

Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 126.

|| Hennepin, vol. 2, p. 103.

182 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

then the surface was polished with stone implements. These round
stones were the common property of the tribe, and were used by
individual families as occasion required.*

"They dug their ground with an instrument of wood, which was
fashioned like a broad mattock, wherewith they dig their vines as in
France ; they put two grains of maize together."!

For boiling their victuals they made use of earthen kettles.^; The
kettle was held up by two crotches and a stick of wood laid across.
The pot ladle, called by them mikoine, laid at the side. "In the
north they often made use of wooden kettles, and made the water
boil by throwing into it red hot pebbles. Our iron pots are esteemed
by them as much more commodious than their own."

That the North American Indians not only used, but actually
manufactured, pottery for various culinary and religious purposes
admits of no argument. Hennepin remarks: "Before the arrival
of the Europeans in North America both the northern and southern
savages made use of, and do to this day use, earthen pots, especially
such as have no commerce with the Europeans, from whom they may
procure kettles and other movables."*!" M. Pouchot, who was ac-
quainted with the manners and customs of the Canadian Indians,
states "that they formerly had usages and utensils to which they
are now scarcely accustomed. They made pottery and drew fire from
wood." **

In 1700, Father Gravier, in speaking of the Yazoos, says: "You
see there in their cabins neither clothes, nor sacks, nor kettles, nor
guns ; they carry all with them, and have no riches hut earthen pots,
quite well made, especially little glazed pitchers, as neat as you would
see in France." ft The Illinois also occasionally used glazed pitch-
ers.^ The manufacturing of these earthen vessels was done by the
women. By the southern Indians the earthenware goods were
used for religious as well as domestic purposes. Gravier noticed
several in their temples, containing bones of departed warriors,,
ashes, etc.

* Statements of early settlers.

t Laudonniere. p. 174.

\ Hennepin, vol. 2, p. 105.

Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 2, p. 186.

I Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, pp. 123. 124.

f Volume 2, pp. 102, 103. This work was written in 1697.

** Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 2, p. 219.

tfGravier's Journal, published in Shea's Early Voyages Up and Down the Missis-
sippi, p 135.

tt Vide p. 109 of this work.

Gravier's Journal, published in Shea's Early Voyages Up and Down the Missis-
sippi, p. 135; also, Du Pratz' History of Louisiana, vol. 2, p. 166.

INDIAN FORTIFICATIONS. 183

The American Indians, both northern and southern, had most of
their villages fortified either by wooden ^palisades, or earthen
breastworks and palisades combined. De Soto, on the 19th of June,
1541, entered the town of Pacaha,* which w"as very great, walled,
and beset with towers, and many loopholes were in the towers and
wall.f Charlevoix said: "The Indians are more skillful in erect-
ing their fortifications than in building their houses. Here you see
villages surrounded with good palisades and with redoubts ; and
they are very careful to lay in a proper provision of water and
stones. These palisades are double, and even sometimes treble,
and generally have battlements on the outer circumvallation. The
piles, of which they are composed, are interwoven with branches of
trees, without any void space between them. This sort of fortifica-
tion was sufficient to sustain a long siege whilst the Indians were
ignorant of the use of fire-arms."^:

La Hontan thus describes these palisaded towns : "Their villages
are fortified with double palisadoes of very hardwood, which are
as thick as one's thigh, and fifteen feet high, with little squares about
the middle of courtines."

These wooden fortifications were used to a comparatively late
day. At the siege of Detroit, in 1712, the Foxes and Mascoutins
resisted, in a wooden fort, for nineteen days, the attack of a much,
larger force of Frenchmen and Indians. In order to avoid the
fire of the French, they dug holes four or five feet deep in the bot-
tom of their fort, jj

The western Indians, in their fortifications, made use of both
earth and wood. An early American author remarks: "The re-
mains of Indian fortifications seen throughout the western country,
have given rise to strange conjectures, and have been supposed to
appertain to a period extremely remote ; but it is a fact well known
that in some of them the remains of palisadoes were found by the
first settlers."*" When Maj. Long's party, in 1823, passed through
Fort "Wayne, they inquired of Metea, a celebrated Pottawatomie chief
well versed in the lore of his tribe, whether he had ever heard of any
tradition accounting for the erection of those artificial mounds which
are found scattered over the whole country. "He immediately
replied that they had been constructed by the Indians as fortijica-

* Probably in the limits of the present state of Arkansas:
t Account by the Gentleman of Elvas, p. 172.

I Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 128.
Vol. 2, p. 6.

|| Dubuisson's Official Report.

II Views of Louisiana: Brackenridge, p. 14.

184 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

tions before the white man had come among them. He had always
heard this origin ascribed to them, and knew three of those con-
structions which were supposed to have been made by his nation.
One is at the fork of the Kankakee and the Des Plaines Rivers, a
second on the Ohio, which, from his description, was supposed to be
at the mouth of the Muskingum. He visited it, but could not de-
scribe the spot accurately, and a third, which he had also seen, he
stated to be on the head-waters of the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan.
This latter place is about forty miles northwest of Fort Wayne."

One of the Miami chiefs, whom the traders named Le Gros, told
Barren* that " he had heard that his father had fought with his tribe
in one of the forts at Piqua, Ohio ; that the fort had been erected
by the Indians against the French, and that his father had been
killed during one of the assaults made upon iff

While at Chicago, and ''with a view to collect as much informa-
tion as possible on the subject of Indian antiquities, we inquired of
Robinson ^ whether any traditions on this subject were current
among the Indians. He observed that these ancient fortifications
were a frequent subject of conversation, and especially those in the
nature of excavations made in the ground. He had heard of one
made by the Kickapoos and Fox Indians on the Sangamo River, a
stream running into the Illinois. This fortification is distinguished
by the name of Etnataek. It is known to have served as an in-
trenchment to the Kickapoos and Foxes, who were met there and
defeated by the Pottawatomies, the Ottawas and Chippeways. No
date was assigned to this transaction. We understood that the Et-
nataek was near the Kickapoo village on the Sangamo. "

Near the dividing Ijne between sections 4 and 5, township 31
north, of range 11 east, in Kankakee county, Illinois, on the prairie
about a mile above the mouth of Rock Creek, are some ancient
mounds. "One is very large, being about one hundred feet base in
diameter and about twenty feet high, in a conic form, and is said to
contain the remains of two hundred Indians who were killed in the
celebrated battle between the Illinois and Chippeways, Delawares
and Shawnees ; and about two chains to the northeast, and the same

* An Indian interpreter.

t Long's Expedition to the Sources of the St. Peters, vol. 1, pp. 121, 122.

j Robinson was a Pottawatomie half-breed, of superior intelligence, and his state-
ments can be relied upon. He died, only a few years ago, on the Au Sable River.

Long's Expedition, vol. 1, p. 121. This stream is laid down on Joliet's map, pub-
lished in 1681, as the Pierres Sanguines. In the early gazetteers it is called Sangamo:
vide Beck's Illinois and Missouri Gazetteer, p. 154. Its signification in the Pottawat-
omie dialect is " a plenty to eat ": Early History of the West and Northwest, by S. R.
Beggs, p. 157. This definition, however, is somewhat doubtful.

INDIAN MOUNDS. 185

distance to the northwest, are two other small mounds, which are
said to contain the remains of the chiefs of the two parties. 1 '*

Uncorroborated Indian traditions are not entitled to any high
degree of credibility, and these quoted are introduced to refute the
often repeated assertion that the Indians had no tradition concerning
the origin of the mounds scattered through the western states, or
that they supposed them to have been erected by a race who occu-
pied the continent anterior to themselves.

These mounds were seldom or never used for religious purposes
by the Algonquins or Iroquois, but Penicault states that when he
visited the Natchez Indians, in 1704, "the houses of the Sunst are
built on mounds, and are distinguished from each other by their size.
The mound upon which the house of the Great Chief, or Sun, is
built is larger than the rest, and its sides are steeper. The temple in
the village of the Great Sun is about thirty feet high and forty -eight
in circumference, with the walls eight feet thick and covered with a
matting of canes, in which they keep up a perpetual fire.":}:

De Soto found the houses of the chiefs built on mounds of differ-
ent heights, according to their rank, and their villages fortified with
palisades, or walls of earth, with gateways to go in and out.

When Gravier, in 1700, visited the Yazoos, he noticed that their
temple was raised on a mound of earth. || He also, in speaking of
the Ohio, states that "it is called by the Illinois and Oumiamis the
river of the Akansea, because the Akansea formerly dwelt on it."^[
The Akansea or Arkansas Indians possessed many traits and cus-
toms in common with the Natchez, having temples, pottery, etc.
A still more important fact is noticed by Du Pratz, who was inti-
mately acquainted with the Great Sun. He s^ays: "The temple is
about thirty feet square, and stands on an artificial mound about
eight feet high, by the side of a small river. The mound slopes
insensibly from the main front, which is northward, but on the other
sides it is somewhat steeper."

According to their own traditions, the Natchez "were at one

* Manuscript Kankakee Surveys, conducted by Dan W. Beckwith, deputy govern-
ment surveyor, in 1834. Major Beckwith was intimately acquainted with the Potta-
watomies of the Kankakee, whose villages were in the neighborhood, and without
doubt the account of these mounds incorporated in his Field Notes was communicated
to him by them.

t The chiefs of the Natches were so called because they were supposed to be the
direct descendants of a man and woman, who, descending from the sun, were the first
rulers of this people.

t Annals of Louisiana: Historical Collections of Louisiana and Florida, new series,
pp. 94. 95.

Account by the Gentleman of Elvas.

|| Early Voyages Up and Down the Mississippi, p. 136.

IT Idem, p. 120.

186 HISTORIC 5K)TES ON THE NORTHWEST.

time the most powerful nation in all North America, and were
looked upon by the other nations as their superiors, and were, OIL
that account, respected by them. Their territory extended from
the River Ilterville, in Louisiana, to tlie Wabasli.' 1 ''* They had over
five hundred suns, and, consequently, nearly that many villages.
Their decline and retreat to the south was owing not to the superi-
ority in arms of the less civilized surrounding tribes, but was due to
the pride of their own chiefs, who, to lend an imposing magnificence
to their funeral rites, adopted the impolitic custom of having hun-
dreds of their followers strangled at their pyre. Many of the
mounds, scattered up and down valleys of the Wabash, Ohio and
Mississippi, while being the only, may be the time-defying monu-
ments of the departed power and grandeur of these two tribes.

The Indian manner of making a fire is thus related by Hennepin :
"Their way of making a fire, which is new and unknown to us, is
thus : they take a triangular piece of cedar wood of a foot and a half
in length, wherein they bore some holes half through ; then they
take a switch, or another small piece of hard wood, and with both
their hands rub the strongest upon the weakest in the hole, which i&
made in the cedar, and while they are thus rubbing they let fall a
sort of dust or powder, which turns into fire. This white dust they
roll up in a pellet of herbs, dried in autumn, and rubbing them all
together, and then blowing upon the dust that is in the pellets, the
fire kindles in a moment, "f

The food of the Indians consisted of all the varieties of game r
fishes and wild fruits in the vicinity ; and they cultivated Indian
corn, melons and squashes. From corn they made a preparation
called sagamite. They pulverized the corn, mixed it with water,,
and added a small proportion of ground gourds or beans.

The clothing of the northern Indians consisted only of the skins
of wild animals, roughly prepared for that purpose. Their southern
brethren were far in advance of them in this respect. "'Many of the-
women wore cloaks of the bark of the mulberry tree, or of the
feathers of swans, turkies or Indian ducks. The bark they take from
young mulberry shoots that rise from the roots of trees that have
been cut down. After it is dried in the sun they beat it to make all
the woody parts fall off, and they give the threads that remain a
second beating, after which they bleach them by exposing them to
the dew. When they are well whitened they spin them about the
coarseness of pack-thread, and weave them in the following manner :

* Du Pratz' History of Louisiana, vol. 2, p. 146. t Ibid. vol. 2. p. 103.

THEIR CANOES. 187

They plant two stakes in the ground about a yard and a half asunder,
and having stretched a cord from the one to the other, they fasten
their threads of bark double to this cord, and then interweave them
in a curious manner into a cloak of about a yard square, with a
wrought border round the edges.''

The Indians had three varieties of canoes, elm-bark, birch-bark
and pirogues. "Canoes of elm-bark were not used for long voyages,
as they were very frail. When the Indians wish to make a canoe
of elm-bark they select the trunk of a tree which is very smooth, at
the time when the sap remains. They cut it around, above and
below, about ten, twelve or fifteen feet apart, according to the num-
ber of people which it is to carry. After having taken off the whole
in one piece, they shave off the roughest of the bark, which they
make the inside of the canoe. They make end ties of the thickness
of a finger, and of sufficient length for the canoe, using young oak
or any other flexible and strong wood, and fasten the two larger
folds of the bark between these strips, spreading them apart with
wooden bows, which are fastened in about two feet apart. They sew
up the two ends of the bark with strips drawn from the inner bark
of the elm, giving attention to raise up a little the two extremities,
which they call pinees, making a swell in the middle and a curve on
the sides, to resist the wind. If there are any chinks, they sew them
together with thongs and cover them with chewing-gum, which they
crowd by heating it with a coal of fire. The bark is fastened to the
wooden bows by wooden thongs. They add a mast, made of a piece
of wood and cross-piece to serve as a yard, and their blankets serve
them as sails. These canoes will carry from three to nine persons
and all their equipage. They sit upon their heels, without moving,
as do also their children, when they are in, from fear of losing their
balance, when the whole machine would upset. But this very seldom
happened, unless struck by a flaw of wind. They use these vessels
particularly in their war parties.

"The canoes made of birch bark were much more solid and more
artistically constructed. The frames of these canoes are made of
strips of cedar wood, which is very flexible, and which they render
as thin as a side of a sword-scabbard, and three or four inches wide.
They all touch one another, and come up to a point between the
two end strips. This frame is covered with the bark of the birch tree,
sewed together like skins, secured between the end strips and tied

* Du Pratz, vol. 2, p. 231; also, Gravier's Voyage, p. 134. The aboriginal method of
procuring thread to sew together their garments made of skins has already been no-
ticed in the description of the manners and customs of the Illinois.

188 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

along the ribs with the inner bark of the roots of the cedar, as we
twist willows around the hoops of a cask. All these seams are cov-
ered with gum,* as is done with canoes of elm bark. They then
put in cross-bars to hold it and to serve as seats, and a long pole,
which they lay on from fore to aft in rough weather to prevent it
from being broken by the shocks occasioned by pitching. They
have with them three, six, twelve and even twenty-four places, which
are designated as so many seats. The French are almost the only
people who use these canoes for their long voyages. They will carry
as much as three thousand pounds, "f These were vessels in which
the fur trade of the entire northwest has been carried on for so many
years. They were very light, four men being able to carry the
largest of them over portages. At night they were unloaded, drawn
upon the shore, turned over and served the savages or traders as
huts. They could endure gales of wind that would play havoc with
vessels of European manufacture. In calm water, the canoe men,
in a sitting posture, used paddles ; in stemming currents, rising from
their seats, they substituted poles for paddles, and in shooting
rapids, they rested on their knees.

Pirogues were the trunks of trees hollowed out and pointed at
the extremities. A fire was started on the trunk, out of which the
pirogue was to be constructed. The fire was kept within the desired
limits by the dripping of water upon the edges of the trunk. As a
part became charred, it was dug out with stone hatchets and the fire
rekindled. This kind of canoes was especially adapted for the navi-
gation of the Mississippi and Missouri ; the current of these streams
carrying down trees, which formed snags, rendered their navigation
by bark canoes exceedingly hazardous. It was probably owing to
this reason, as well as because there were no birch trees in their
country, that the Illinois and Miamis were not, as the Jesuits re-
marked, "canoe nations;" they used the awkward, heavy pirogue
instead.

Each nation was divided into villages. The Indian village, when
unfortified, had its cabins scattered along the banks of a river or the

*"The small roots of the spruce tree afford the wattap with which the bark is
sewed, and the gum of the pine tree supplies the place of tar and oakum. Bark, some
spare wattap and gum are always carried in each canoe, for the repairs which fre-
quently become necessary." Vide Henry's Travels, p. 14.

t The above extracts are taken from the Memoir Upon the Late War in North Amer-
ica Between the French and English, 1755-1760, by M. Pouchot; translated and edited
by Franklin Hough, vol. 2, pp. 216. 217. 218. Pouchot was the commandant at Fort
Niagara at the time of its surrender to the English. He was exceedingly well veVsed
in all that pertained to Indian manners and customs, and his work received the indorse-
ment of Marquis Vaudreuil, Governor of Canada. Of the translation, there were only
two hundred copies printed.

WIGWAMS. 189

shores of a lake, and often extended for three or four miles. Each
cabin held the head of the family, the children, grandchildren, and
often the brothers and sisters, so that a single c"abin not unfrequently
contained as many as sixty persons. Some of their cabins were in
the form of elongated squares, of which the sides were not more
than five or six feet high. They were made of bark, and the roof
was prepared from the same material, having an opening in the top
for the passage of srnoke. At both ends of the cabin there were
entrances. The fire was built under the hole in the roof, and there
were as many fires as there were families.

The beds were upon planks on the floor of the cabin, or upon
simple hides, which they called a/ppichimon, placed along the parti-
tions. They slept upon these skins, wrapped in their blankets,
which, during the day, served them for clothing. Each one had
his particular place. The man and wife crouched together, her
back being against his body, their blankets passed around their
heads and feet, so that they looked like a plate of ducks. * These
bark cabins were used by the Iroquois, and, indeed, by many Indian
tribes who lived exclusively in the forests.

The prairie Indians, who were unable to procure bark, generally
made mats out of platted reeds or flags, and placed thesejiiats around
three or four poles tied together at the ends. They were, in form,
round, and terminated in a cone. These mats were sewed together
with so much skill that, when new, the rain could not penetrate-
them. This variety of cabins possessed the great advantage that,
when they moved their place of residence, the mats of reeds were
rolled up and carried along by the squaws, f

"The nastiness of these cabins alone, and that infection which
was a necessary consequence of it, would have been to any one but
an Indian a severe punishment. Having no windows, they were full
of smoke, and in cold weather they were crowded with clogs. The
Indians never changed their garments until they fell off by their
very rottenness. Being never washed, they were fairly alive with
vermin. In summer the savages bathed every day, but immediately
afterward rubbed themselves with oil and grease of a very rank
smell. "In winter they remained unwashed, and it was impossible
to enter their cabins without being poisoned with the stench.''

All their food was very ill-seasoned and insipid, "and there pre-
vailed in all their repasts an uncleanliness which passed all concep-

* Extract from Pouchot's Memoirs, pp. 185. 186.

t Letter of Father Marest, Kip's Jesuit Missions, p. 199.

190 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

tion. There were very few animals which did not feed cleaner."*
They never washed their wooden or bark dishes, nor their porringers
and spoons, t In this connection William Biggs states: " They^;
plucked off a few of the largest feathers, then threw the duck,
feathers, entrails and all, into the soup-kettle, and cooked it in that
manner. ' '

The Indians were cannibals, though human flesh was only eaten
at war feasts. It was often the case that after a prisoner had been
tortured his body was thrown into "the war-kettle," and his remains
greedily devoured. This fact is uniformly asserted by the early
French writers. Members of Major Long's party made especial
inquiries at Fort Wayne concerning this subject, and were entirely
convinced. They met persons who had attended the feasts, and saw
Indians who acknowledged that they had participated in them.
Joseph Barron saw the Pottawatomies with hands and limbs, both
of white men and Cherokees, which they were about to devour.
Among some tribes cannibalism was universal, but it appears that
among the Pottawatomies and Miamis it was restricted to a frater-
nity whose privilege and duty it was on all occasions to eat of the
enemy's flesh; at least one individual must be eaten. The flesh
was sometimes dried and taken to the villages, j

The Indians had some peculiar funeral customs. Joutel thus
records some of his observations: "They pay a respect to their
dead, as appears by their special care of burying them, and even of
putting into lofty coffins the bodies of such as are considerable
among them, as their chiefs and others, which is also practiced
among the Accanceas, but they differ in this respect, that the Accan-
ceas weep and make their complaints for some days, whereas the
Shawnees and other people of the Illinois nation do just the con-
trary, for when any of them die they wrap them up in skins and
then put them into coffins made of the bark of trees, then sing and
dance about them for twenty-four hours. Those dancers take care
to tie calabashes, or gourds, about their bodies, with some Indian
corn in them, to rattle and make a noise, and some of them have a
drum, made of a great earthen pot, on which they extend a wild
goat's skin, and beat thereon with one stick, like our tabors. During
that rejoicing they threw their presents on the coffin, as bracelets,

* Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, pp. 132, 133.

t For a full account of their lack of neatness in the culinary department, vide Hen-
nepin, vol. 2, p. 120.
| The Kickapoos.

Narrative of William Biggs, p. 9.
Ji Long's Expedition to the sources of the St. Peters, vol. 1, pp. 103-106.

BURIAL CEREMONIES. 191

pendants or pieces of earthenware. When the ceremony was over
they buried the body, with a part of the presents, making choice of
such as may be most proper for it. They also bury with it some
store of Indian wheat, with a pot to boil it in, for fear the dead per-
son should be hungry on his long journey, and they repeat the cere-
mony at the year's end. A good number of presents still remaining,
they divide them into several lots and play at a game called the stick
to give them to the winner."*

The Indian graves were made of a large size, and the whole of
the inside lined with bark. On the bark was laid the corpse, accom-
panied with axes, snow-shoes, kettle, common shoes, and, if a wo-
man, carrying-belts and paddles.

This was covered with bark, and at about two feet nearer the
surface, logs were laid across, and these again covered with bark, so
that the earth might by no means fall upon the corpse, f If the
deceased, before his death, had so expressed his wish, a tree was
hollowed out and the corpse deposited within. After the body had
become entirely decomposed, the bones were often collected and
buried in the earth. Many of these wooden sepulchres were dis-
covered by the early settlers in Iroquois county, Illinois. Doubt-
less they were the remains of Pottawatomies, who at that time re-
sided there.

After a death they took care to visit every place near their cabins,
striking incessantly with rods and raising the most hideous cries, in
order to drive the souls to a distance, and to keep them from lurk-
ing about their cabins.^:

The Indians believed that every animal contained a Manitou or
God, and that these spirits could exert over them a beneficial or
prejudicial influence. The rattlesnake was especially venerated by
them. Henry relates an instance of this veneration. He saw a
snake, and procured his gun, with the intention of dispatching it.
The Indians begged him to desist, and, "with their pipes and to-
bacco-pouches in their hands, approached the snake. They sur-
rounded it, all addressing it by turns and calling it their grand-
father, but yet kept at some distance. During this part of the cer-
emony, they filled their pipes, and each blew the smoke toward the
snake, which, as it appeared to rne, really received it with pleasure.
In a word, after remaining coiled and receiving incense for the space
of half an hour, it stretched itself along the ground in visible good

* Joutel's Journal: Historical Collections of Louisiana, vol. 1. pp. 187, 188.

t Extract from Henry's Travels, p. 150.

j Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 154.

192 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NOKTHWEST.

humor. The Indians followed it, and, still addressing it by the
title of grandfather, beseeched it to take care of their families dur-
ing their absence, and also to open the hearts of the English, that
that they might fill their (the Indians') canoes with rum.* This
reverence of the Indians for the rattlesnake will account for the vast
number of these reptiles met with by early settlers in localities fa-
vorable for their increase and security. The clefts in the rocky
cliffs below Niagara Falls were so infested with rattlesnakes that
the Indians removed their village to a place of greater security.

The Indians had several games, some of which have been already
noticed. McCoy mentions a singular occurrence of this nature : ' 'A
Miami Indian had been stabbed with a knife, who lingered, and of
whose recovery there was doubt. On the 12th of May a party re-
solved to decide by a game of moccasin whether the man should live
or die. In this game the party seat themselves upon the earth
opposite to each other, while one holds a moccasin on the ground
with one hand, and holds in the other a small ball ; the ball he-
affects to conceal in the moccasin, and does either insert it or not, as
he shall choose, and then leaves the opposite party to guess where
the ball is. In order to deceive his antagonist, he incessantly utters
a kind of a sing-song, which is repeated about thrice in a minute,
and moving his hands in unison with the notes, brings one of them,
at every repetition, to the mouth of the moccasin, as though he had
that moment inserted the ball. One party played for the wounded
man's recovery and the other for his death Two games were
played, in both of which the side for recovery was triumphant, and
so they concluded the man would not die of his wounds, "f

The Indians had a most excellent knowledge of the topography
of their country, and they drew the most exact maps of the coun-
tries they were acquainted with. They set down the true north
according to the polar star; the ports, harbors, rivers, creeks, and
coasts of the lakes ; roads, mountains, woods, marshes and meadows.
They counted the distances by journeys and half-journeys, allowing
to every journey five leagues. These maps were drawn upon birch
bark.* "Previous to General Brock's crossing over to Detroit, he
asked Tecumseh what sort of a country he should have to pass
through in case of his preceding farther. Tecumsek took a roll of
elm bark, and extending it on the ground, by means of four stones,
drew forth his scalping knife, and, with the point, etched upon the

* Alexander Henry's Travels, p. 176.
t Baptist Missions, p. 98.
\ La Hontan, vol. 2, p. 13.

MARRIAGE AND RELIGION.

bark a plan of the country, its hills, woods, rivers, morasses, a plan
which, if riot as neat, was fully as accurate as if it had been made
by a professional map-maker.*

In marriage, they had no ceremony worth mentioning, the man
and the woman agreeing that for so many bucks, beaver hides, or r
in short, any valuables, she should be his wife. Of all the passions r
the Indians were least influenced by love. Some authors claim that
it had no existence, excepting, of course, mere lust, which is pos-
sessed by all animals. "By women, beauty was commonly no mo-
tive to marriage, the only inducement being the reward which she
received. It was said that the women were purchased by the night,
week, month or winter, so that they depended on fornication for a
living ; nor was it thought either a crime or shame, none being
esteemed as prostitutes but such as were licentious without a re-
ward. "f Polygamy was common, but was seldom practiced except
by the chiefs. On the smallest offense husband and wife parted,
she taking the domestic utensils and the children of her sex. Chil-
dren formed the only bond of affection between the two sexes ; and
of them, to the credit of the Indian be it said, they were very fond.
They never chastised them, the only punishment being to dash, by
the hand, water into the face of the refractory child. Joutel noticed
this method of correction among the Illinois, and nearly a hundred
years later Jones mentions the same custom as existing among the

The Algonquin tribes, differing in this respect from the southern
Indians, had no especial religion. They believed in good and bad
spirits, and thought it was only necessary to appease the wicked
spirits, for the good ones "were all right anyway." These bad
spirits were thought to occupy the bodies of animals, fishes and rep-
tiles, to dwell in high mountains, gloomy caverns, dangerous whirl-
pools, and all large bodies of water. This will account for the
offerings of tobacco and other valuables which they made when
passing such places. No ideas of morals or metaphysics ever en-
tered the head of the Indians ; they believed what was told them
upon those subjects, without having more than a vague impression
of their meaning. Some of the Canadian Indians, in all sincerity,
compared the Holy Trinity to a piece of pork. There they found
the lean meat, the fat and the rind, three distinct parts that form

* James' Military Occurrences in the Late War Between Great Britain and the
United States, vol. 1, pp. 291, 292.

* Journal of Two Visits made to Some Nations West of the Ohio, by the Rev.
David Jones: Sabin's reprint, p. 75.

t Idem.

194 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

the same piece."* Their ideas of heaven was a place full of sen-
sual enjoyments, and free from physical pains. Indeed, it is doubt-
ful if, before their mythology was changed by the partial adoption
of some of the doctrines of Christianity, they had any idea of spir-
itual reward or punishment.

Wampum, prior to and many years subsequent to the advent of
the Europeans, was the circulating medium among the North Ameri-
can Indians. It is made out of a marine shell, or periwinkle, some
of which are white, others violet, verging toward black. They are
perforated in the direction of the greater diameter, and are worked
into two forms, strings and belts. The strings consist of cylinders
strung without any order, one after another, on to a thread. The
belts are wide sashes in which the white and purple beads are
arranged in rows and tied by little leathern strings, making a very
pretty tissue. Wampum belts are used in state affairs, and their
length, width and color are in proportion to the importance of the
affair being negotiated. They are wrought, sometimes, into figures
of considerable beauty.

These belts and strings of wampum are the universal agent with
the Indians, not only as money, jewelry or ornaments, but as annals
and for registers to perpetuate treaties and compacts between indi-
viduals and nations. They are the inviolable and sacred pledges
which guarantee messages, promises and treaties. As writing is
not in use among them, they make a local memoir by means of
these belts, each of which signify a particular affair or a circum-
stance relating to it. The village chiefs are the custodians, and com-
municate the affairs they perpetuate to the young people, who thus
learn the history, treaties and engagements of their nation, t Belts
are classified as message, road, peace or war belts. White signifies
peace, as black does war. The color therefore at once indicates the
intention of the person or tribe who sends or accepts a belt. So
general was the importance of the belt, that the French and English,
and the Americans, even down as late as the treaty of Greenville,
in 1795, used it in treating with the Indians.:}:

* Pouchot's Memoir, vol. 2, p. 223.

t The account given above is taken from a note of the editor of the documents
relative to the Colonial History of New York, etc., vol. 9. Paris Documents, p. 556.

| The explanation here given will assist the reader to an understanding of the
grave significance attached to the giving or receiving of belts so frequently referred to
in the course of this work.

CHAPTER XIX.

STONE IMPLEMENTS.

THE stone implements illustrated in this chapter are introduced
as specimens of workmanship of the comparatively modern Indians,
who lived and hunted in the localities where the specimens were
found. The author is aware that similar implements have been
illustrated and described in works which relate to an exclusively
prehistoric race. Without entering into a discussion concerning the
so-called "Mound Builders," that being a subject foreign to the
scope of this work, it may be stated that some theorists have placed
the epoch of the ' ' prehistoric race ' ' quite too far within the bounda-
ries of well-established historical mention, and have assigned to the
" Mound Builders " remains and relics which were undoubtedly the
handiwork of the modern American Indians.*

Indeed many of the stone implements, also much of the pottery,
and many of the so-called ancient mounds and excavations as well,
found throughout the west, may be accounted for without going
beyond the era of the North American Indian in quest of an explana-
tion. It is not at all intended here to question the fact of the exist-
ence of the prehistoric race, or to deny that they have left more or
less of their remains, but the line of demarkation between that race

* Mr. H. N. Rust, of Chicago, in his extensive collection, has many implements
similar to those attributed to prehistoric man, which he obtained from the Sioux Indi-
ans of northwestern Dakota, with whom they were in daily use. Among 1 his samples
are large stone hammers with a groove around the head, and the handles nicely at-
tached. The round stone, with flattened sides, generally regarded as a relic of a lost
race, he found at the door of the lodges of the Sioux, with the little stone hammer,
hooded with rawhide, to which the handle was fastened, with which bones, nuts and
other hard substances were broken by the squaws or children as occasion required.
The appearance of the larger disc, and the well-worn face of the hammer, indicate
their long and constant use by this people. The round, egg-shaped stone, illustrated
by Fig. 9. supposed to belong to the prehistoric age, Mr. Rust found in common use
amonsr this tribe. The manner of fastening the handle is illustrated in the cuts. Figs.
9 and 36. The writer is indebted to Mr. Rust for favors conferred in the loan of imple-
ments credited to his collection, as well, also, for his valuable aid in preparing the
illustrated portion of this chapter. The other implements illustrated were selected
from W. C. Beckwith's collection. The Indians informed Mr. Rust that these clubs
(Figs. 8 and 9) were used to kill buffalo, or other animals that had been wounded; as
implements of offense and defense in personal encounters ; as a walking-stick (the
stone being used as a handle) by the dandies of the tribe; and they were carried as a
mace or badge of authority in the rites and ceremonies of the societies established
among these Indians, which were similar in some respects to our fraternities.

inn

196 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

and the modern Indian cannot be traced with satisfaction until after
large collections of the remains of both races shall have been secured
and critically compared under all the light which a careful examina-
tion of historical records will shed upon this new and interesting
field of inquiry.

Stone implements are by no means peculiar to North America;
they have been found all over the inhabitable world. Europe is
especially prolific in such remains. While the material of which they
are made varies according to the geological resources of the several
countries in which they are found, there is a striking similarity in
the shape, size and form of them all. At the present time like
implements are in use among some of the South Sea Islanders, and
by a few tribes of North American Indians living in remote sections,
and enjoying but a limited intercourse with the enlightened world.

The stone age marks an important epoch in the progress of races
of men from the early stages of their existence toward a higher civ-
ilization. After they had passed the stone age, and learned how to
manipulate iron and other metals, their advance, as a general rule,
has been more rapid.

The implements here illustrated are specimens of some of the
more prominent types of the vast number which have been found
throughout the valleys of the Maumee, Wabash and Illinois Rivers,
and the sections of country drained by their tributaries. They are
picked up about the sites of old Indian villages, in localities where
game was pursued, on the hillsides and in the ravines where they
have become exposed by the rains, and in the furrows turned up by
the plowshare. They are the remains of the early occupants of the
territory we have described, testimonials alike of their necessities
and their ingenuity, and were used by them until an acquaintance
with the Europeans supplied them with weapons and utensils formed
out of metals.*

It will be observed from extracts found in the preceding chapter
that our Indians made and used implements of copper and stone,
manufactured pottery, some of which was glazed, wove cloth of fiber
and also of wool, erected fortifications of wooden palisades, or of
palisades and ( earth combined, to protect their villages from their
enemies, excavated holes in the ground, which were used for defen-

* It may be well to state in this connection that the implements illustrated in this
work, except the handled club, Figs. 9 and 36, were not found in mounds or in their
vicinity, but were'gathered upon or in the immediate neighborhood of places known to
the early settlers as the sites of Piankeshaw, Miami, Pottawatomie and Kickapoo vil-
lages, and in the same localities where have been found red-stone pipes of Indian make,
knives, hatchets, gun-barrels, buckles, flints for old-fashioned fusees, brooches, wrist-
bands, kettles, and other articles of European manufacture.

STONE IMPLEMENTS.

197

sive purposes, and erected mounds of earth, some of which were
used for religious rites, and others as depositories for their dead.
All these facts are wejl attested by early Spanish, French and Amer-
ican authors, who have recorded their observations while passing
through the country. We have also seen in previous chapters that
our "red men" cultivated corn and other products of the soil, and
were as much an agricultural people as is claimed for the "Mound
Builders."

The specimens marked Figs. 1, 2 and 3 are samples of a lot of
one hundred and sixteen pieces, found in 187S in a "pocket" on
Win. Pogue's farm, a few miles southeast of Rossville, Vermilion

FIG. 3=%.

FIG. 2=

Vermilion county, 111.

county, Illinois. Mr. Pogue had cleared off a piece of ground for-
merly prairie, on which a growth of jack oak trees and underbrush
had encroached since the early settlement of the county. This land
had never been cultivated, and as it was being broken up, the plow-
share ran into the "nest," and turned the implements to view.
They were closely packed together, and buried about eight inches
below the natural surface of the ground, which was level with the
other parts of the field, and had no appearance of a mound, excava-
tion, or any other artificial disturbance. Two of the implements,
judging from their eroded fractures, were broken at the time they

198 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

were deposited, and one other was broken in two by the plow. The
material of which they are composed is white chert. The samples
illustrated are taken as an average, in size and shape, of the whole
lot, the largest of which is 3f inches wide by 7 inches long, and the
smallest 2 inches wide by nearly 4 inches in length. Some of them
are nearly oval, others long and pointed at both ends, in others the
"shoulders" are well denned, while, for the most part, they are
broadly rounded at one end and pointed at the other. They are all
in the rough, and no finished implement was found with or near them.
Indeed the whole lot are apparently in an unfinished condition.
With very little dressing they could be fashioned into perfect im-
plements, such as the "fleshers," "scrapers," "knives," "spear"
and "arrow" heads described farther on. There are no quarries or
deposits of flint of the kind known to exist within many miles of
the locality where these implements were found. We can only con-
jecture the uses for which they were designed. We can imagine the
owner to have been a merchant or trader, who had dressed them
down or procured them at the quarries in this condition, so they
would be lighter to carry to the tribes on the prairies, where they
could be perfected to suit the taste of the purchaser. We might
further imagine that the implement merchant, threatened with some
approaching danger, hid them where they were afterward found, and
never returned. The eroded appearance of many of the "find"
bear witness that the lot were buried a great many years ago. *

Fig. 4 is an axe and hammer combined. j, 4_i/

The material is a fine-grained granite. The
handle is attached with thongs of rawhide
passed around the groove, or with a split stick
or forked branch wythed around, and either
kind of fastening could be tightened by driv-
ing a wedge between the attachment and the
surface of the implement, which on the back
is slightly concaved to hold the wedge in
place.

Figs. 5, 6 and 7 are also axes ; material,
dark granite. Heretofore it has been the
popular opinion that these .instruments are
"fleshers," and were used in skinning animals, cutting up the flesh,

*The writer has divided the "lot,'' sending samples to the Historical Societies of
Wisconsin and Chicago, and placed others in the collections of H. N. Rust, of Chicago;
Prof. John Collett, of Indianapolis; Prof. A. H. Worthen, Springfield, Illinois; Jose-
phus Collett, of Terre Haute, while the others remain in the collection of W. C. Beck-
with, at Danville, Illinois.

STONE IMPLEMENTS.

199

and for scraping hides when preparing them for tanning. The re-
cent discoveries of remains of the ancient "Lake Dwellers," of
Switzerland, have resulted in finding similar implements attached to
handles, making them a very formidable battle-axe.

FIG. 6=

Vermilion county, 111.

Vermilion co., 111. (H. N. Rust's Collection.)

From the implements obtained by Mr. Rust of the Sioux it can
readily be seen how implements like Fig. 6, although tapering
from the bit to the top, could be attached to handles by means of a
rawhide band. Before fastening on the handle the rawhide would
be soaked in water, and on drying would tighten to the roughened
surface of the stone with a secure grip. A blow given with the cut-
ting edge of this implement would tend to wedge it the more firmly
into the handle.*

* In the Fifth Annual Report of the Regents of the University of New York
(Albany, 1852, page 105), Mr. L. H. Morgan illustrates the ga-ne-a-ga-o-dus-ha, or war
club, used by " the Iroquois at the period of their discovery." The helve is a crooked
piece of wood, with a chisel-shaped bit formed out of deer's horn shaped like Fig.
No. 7, on the next page inserted at the elbow, near the larger end; and in many
respects it resembles the clubs illustrated in Plate X, vol. 2, of Dr. Keller's work on.
the " Lake Dwellings of Switzerland and other parts of Europe." Mr. Morgan remarks
that " in later times a piece of steel was substituted for the deer horn, thus making
it a more deadly weapon than formerly." There is little doubt that the Indians
used such implements as Figs. 5, 6 and 7 for splitting wood and various other pur-
poses. The fact of their being used for splitting wood was mentioned by Father
Charlevoix over a hundred and fifty years ago, as appears from extracts on page 181 of
this book, quoted from his Narrative Journal.

200

ITISTOKIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Fig. 7 is another style of axe. The mate- FIG. 7=>.

rial out of which it is composed is greenstone,
admitting of a fine polish. There would be no
difficulty at all in shrinking a rawhide band to
its surface, and the somewhat polished condi-
tion of its sides above the "bit" would indi-
cate a long application of this kind of a fasten-
ing. It could also be used as a chisel in exca-
vating the charred surface of wood that was
being fashioned into canoes, mortars for crack-
ing corn, or in the construction of other domes-
tic utensils.

Fig. 8 is a club or hammer, or both. Its
material is dark quartz. Some varieties of this
implement have a groove cut around the cen-
ter, like Fig. 9. The manner of handling it in-
volves the use of rawhide, and, with some, is
performed substantially in the same manner as
in Figs. 5, 6 and 7, except that the band of rawhide is broader,
and extends some distance on either side of the lesser diameter

Vermilion county,Ill.

FIG. 8=

FIG. 36.

Vermilion countv. 111.
(H. N. Rust's Collection.)

Dakota.
(H. N. Rust's Collection.)

of the stone. In other instances they are secured in a hood of
rawhide that envelops nearly the whole implement, leaving the
point or one end of the stone slightly exposed, as in Fig. 36.*

*Mr. Rust has in his collection a number of such implements, some of them
weighing several pounds, which, along with the ones illustrated, were obtained by him
from the Sioux of northwest Dakota, and which are "hooded" in the manner here
described. Mr. Wm. Gurley, of Danville, Illinois, while in southwestern Colorado in
1876, saw many such clubs in use by the Ute Indians. They were entirely encased
in rawhide, having short handles. The handles were encased in the rawhide that
extended continuously, enveloping both the handle and the stone. The Utes used these
implements as hammers in crushing corn, etc., the rawhide covering of some being
worn through from long use, and exposing the stone.

IMPLEMENTS FOR DESTRUCTIVE PURPOSES.

201

Fig. 9 was obtained from the Sioux by Mr. Rust. The stone is
composed of semi-transparent quartz. Its uses have already been
described.

Fio. 9.

Northwest Dakota (H. N. Rust's Collection).

FIG. 10=

Figs. 10 and 11 were probably used as spear-heads, they are
certainly too large for arrow-heads, and too thick and roundish
to answer the purpose of knives. The
material is white chert. The edges of FIG. n=%.
both these implements are spiral, the
"wind" of the opposite edges being
quite uniform. Whether this was owing
to the design of the maker or the twist
in the grain of the chert, from which
they are made, is a conjecture at best.

FIG. 12=

Vermilion
county, 111.

Vermilion county, 111.

Fig. 12 was probably a spear or knife.
The material is dark flint. A piece of
quartz is impacted in the upper half of

Vermilion county, the blade > the chi PP in g through of which
111. displays the skill of the person who made

it. The shoulders of the implement are unequal, and the angle of
its edges are not uniform. It is flatter upon one side than upon
the other. These irregularities would throw it out of balance, and
seemingly preclude its use as an arrow, while its strong shank and
deep yokes above the shoulder would admit of its being firmly
secured to a handle.

Fig. 13 was probably intended for an arrow-head, and thrown
aside because of a flaw on the surface opposite that shown in the cut.

202

HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

It is introduced to illustrate the manner in which the work FIG. 13=}
progresses in making such implements. From an exam-
ination it would appear that the outline of the implement
is first made. After this, one side is reduced to the re-
quired form. Then work on the opposite side begins, the
point and edges being first reduced. The flakes are
chipped off from the edges upward toward the center of
and against the part of the stone to be cut away. In this
manner the delicate point and completed edges are pre-
served while the implement is being perfected, leaving the shoulders,
neck and shank the last to be finished.

Fig. 14- is formed out of dark-colored, hard, fine-grained flint. Its
edges are a uniform spiral, making nearly a half-turn from shoulder

Fro.l6=W.

Vermilion

CO., 111.

Vermilion county, 111.

Vermilion county, 111.
(H. N. Rust's Collection.)

Vermilion county, 111.

to point. It is neatly balanced, and if used as an arrow-head its wind
or twist would, without doubt, give a rotary motion to the shaft in
its flight. It is very ingeniously made, and its delicately chipped
surface shows that the man who made the implement intentionally
gave it the peculiar shape it possesses.

Fig. 15 is made out of fine-grained blue flint. It is unusually long
in proportion to its breadth. Its edges are neatly beveled from a
line along its center, and are quite sharp. Its well defined shoulders
and head, with the yoke deeply cut between to hold the thong, would
indicate its use as an arrow-point.

ARROW HEADS.

Fig. 16 is a perfect implement, and its surfaces are smoother than
the observer might infer from the illustration. Its edges are very
sharp and smooth and parallel to the axis of the implement. Its
head, unlike that of the other implements illustrated, is round and
pointed, with cutting edges as carefully formed as any part of the
blade. It has no yoked neck in w 7 hich to bury a thong or thread,
and there seems to be no way of fastening it into a shaft or handle.
It may be a perfect instrument without the addition of either. It is
made out of blue flint.

ARROW HEADS.

Several different forms of implements (commonly recognized as
arrow heads) are illustrated, to show some of the more common of
the many varieties found everywhere over the country. Fig. 17
has uniformly slanting edges, sharp barbs and a strong shank. The
material from which it is made is white chert. For shooting fish or
in pursuing game or an enemy, where it was intended that the im-
plement could not be easily withdrawn from the flesh in which it
might be driven, the prominent barbs would secure a firm hold.

Fig. 18 is composed of blue flint ; its outline is more rounded
than the preceding specimen, while a spiral form is given to its deli-
cate and sharp point.

FIG. 17=.

FIG. 18=}$.

FIG. 20=

FIG. 19=

Vermilion county,
111.

Vermilion
county, 111.

Vermilion county,
111.

Vermilion
county, 111.

Fig. 19 is composed of white chert. Its surface is much smoother
than the shadings in the cut would imply. Its shape is very much
like a shield. Its barbs are prominent, and the instrument would
make a wide incision in the body of an animal into which it might
be forced.

Fig. 20, like Fig. 17, has sharp and elongated barbs. It is fash-
ioned out of white chert, and is a neat, smooth and well-balanced
implement.

204

HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

FlG. 21 =

Fig. 21 is made from yellowish-brown quartz, semi-transparent
and inclined to be impure. The surfaces are oval from edge to
edge, while the edges themselves are beautifully serrated or notched,
as is shown in the cut. It is, perhaps, a sample of the finest work-
manship illustrated in this chapter. Indeed, among
the many collections which the writer has had oppor-
tunities to examine, he has never seen a specimen that
was more skillfully made.

Fig. 22 may be an arrow-point or a reamer. The
material is white chert. Between the stem and the
notches the implement is quite thick, tapering gradu-
ally back to the head, giving great support to this part
of the implement.

Fig. 23 is an arrow-point, or would be so regarded.
Its stem is roundish, and has a greater diameter than
the cut would indicate to the eye. The material from
which it is formed is white chert.

Vermilion
county, 111.

FIG. 22=^.

FIG. 23=}$.

FIG. 24=

FIG. 25=%

Vermilion co., 111. Vermilion co., 111. Vermilion co., 111. Vermilion co., 111.

Figs. 24 and 25 are specimens of the smaller variety of ' ' points ' '
with which arrows are tipped that are used in killing small game.
Fig. 24 is made out of black "trap-rock," and Fig. 25 out of flesh-
colored flint.

Fig. 26 is displayed on account of its peculiar form ; the under
surface is nearly flat, and the other side has quite a ridge or spine
running the entire length from head to point. Besides this the head

FIG. 26=}.

Vermilion county, 111.
are offered as to its probable uses.

and point turn upward, giving a uniform
curve to the implement. If used as an
arrow-point, the shaft, in consequence of
the shape of the stone, would describe a
curved line when shot from the bow. It
is made of white flint. No suggestions

VARIETIES OF IMPLEMENTS FOR DOMESTIC USES.

205

IMPLEMENTS FOR DOMESTIC USES.

Fig. 27 is a pestle or pounder. It is made out of common gran-
ite. There are many different styles of this p TG 27 _ ^
implement, some varieties are more conical,
while others are more bell-shaped than the
one illustrated. They are used for crushing
corn and other like purposes. The one illus-
trated has a concave place near the center of
the base ; this would the better adapt it to
cracking nuts, as the hollow space would
protect the kernel from being too severely
crushed. In connection with this stone, the
Indians sometimes used mortars, made either)
of wood or stone, into which the articles
to be pulverized could be placed ; or the
corn or beans could be done up in the folds Vermilion county, Illinois.
of a skin, or inclosed in a leathern bag, and < H - N - Rust ' s collection.)
then crushed by blows struck with either the head or rim of the
pestle. The stone mortars were usually flat discs, slightly hollowed
out from the edges toward the center.

Fig. 28 may be designated as a fleshcr or scraper. The specimen
illustrated is made of white flint. It is very
thin, considering the breadth and length of the
implement, and has sharp cutting edges all the
way around. It might be used as a knife, as
well as for a variety of other purposes. It is
an unusually smooth and highly finished tool.
It and its mate, which is considerably broader,

FIG. 28=i

V'Tmiiioi

and proportioned more like
Fig. 29, were found sticking
perpendicular in the ground,
with their points barely ex-
posed above the surface, on
the farm of Win. Foster, a
few miles east of Danville,
Illinois. Both of them will
make as clean a cut through
several folds of paper as the

FIG. 29=^.

Vermilion co., 111.

blade of a good pocket-knife.

Fig. 29 is composed of an impure purplish flint. It is very much
like Fig. 28, and was probably used for similar purposes.

206

HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

FIG. 31=

FIG. 30= %_. Fig. 30, as the illustration shows, is rougher-

edged than the two preceding ones. The side
opposite the one shown has a more uneven sur-
face than the other. A smooth, well-defined
groove runs across the implement (as shown by
the dark shading) as though it were intended to
be fastened to a helve, although the groove
would afford good support for the thumb, if
the implement were used only with the hand.
The material is a coarse, impure, grayish flint.
Fig. 31 might be said to Combine the qualities of a v>\/

knife, gimlet and bodkin. Its cutting edges extend all
around, and along the stem the edges are
quite abrupt. The implement was origi-
nally much longer, but it appears to have
lost about an inch in length, its point hav-
ing been broken off. The blade will cut
cloth or paper very readily. The mate-
rial is white flint.

Fig. 32 may be classed with Fig. 31.
The material is dark fine-grained flint, and
the implement perfect. There is a per-
ceptible wind to the edges of the stem,
while the edges of the head are parallel
with the plane of the implement, and so
sharp that they will cut cloth, leather or
paper. It was probably used to bore holes
and cut out skins that were being manu-
factured into clothing and other articles.

Fig. 33 may have been made for the same uses as
Figs. 31 and 32. The blade is shaped like a spade,,
the stem representing the handle. It tapers from
the bit of the blade where the stem joins the
shoulder, which is the thickest part of the imple-
ment, and from the shoulder it tapers to both ends.
The bit is shaped like a gouge, and makes a circular

incision. It is a smooth piece of workmanship, made
Vermilion
county, 111. out ot white flint.

Vertnilion
county. 111.

Vermilion
county, 111.

STONE IMPLEMENTS.

207

Vermilion
county, 111.

FIG. 35=^

Fig. 34 has been designated as a "rimmer." The FIG. 34=
material of which it is made is flesh-colored flint. The
stem is nearly round, and the implement could be used
for piercing holes in leather or wood. Another use at-
tributed to it is for drilling holes in pipes, gorgets, discs
and other implements formed out of stone where the
material was soft enough to admit of being perforated in
this way.

Fig. 35. By common consent this implement has
received the name of "discoidal stone." The one illus-
trated is composed of fine dark-gray
granite. Several theories have been
offered as to the uses of this imple-
ment, one that they are quoits used
by the Indians in playing a game
similar to that of "pitching horse-
shoes"; that they were employed in
another game resembling "ten-pins,"
in which the stone would be grasped
on its concave side by the thumb and
Vermilion county, 111. (H. N. Rust's second finger, while the fore-finger
Collection.) rested on the outer edge, or rim, and

that by a peculiar motion of the arm in hurling the stone it would
describe a convolute figure as it rolled along upon the ground. . We
may suggest that implements like this might be used as paint cups, as
their convex surface would enable the warrior to grind his pigments
and reduce them to powder, preparatory to decorating his person.

The implements illustrated were, no doubt, put to many other
uses besides those suggested. As the pioneer would make his house,
furniture, plow, ox yokes, and clear his land with his axe, so the
Indians, in the poverty of their supply, we may assume, .were com-
pelled to make a single tool serve as many purposes as their ingenu-
ity could devise.

CHAPTER XX.

THE WAR FOR THE FUR TRADE.

FORMERLY the great Northwest abounded in game and water-fowl.
The small lakes and lesser water-courses were full of beaver, otter
and muskrats. In the forests were found the marten, the raccoon,
and other fur-bearing animals. The plains, partially submerged,
and the rivers, whose current had a sluggish flow, the shallow lakes,
producing annual crops of wild rice, of nature's own sowing, teemed
with wild geese, duck and other aquatic fowl bursting in their very
fatness. *

The turkey, in his glossy feathers, strutted the forests, some of
them being of prodigious size, weighing thirty-six pounds, f

The shy deer and the lordly elk, crowned with outspreading horns,
grazed upon the plain and in the open woods, while the solitary moose
browsed upon the buds in the thick copsewood that gave him food
and a hiding place as well. The fleet-footed antelope nibbled at the
tender grasses on the prairies, or bounded away over the ridges to
hide in the valleys beyond, from the approach of the stealthy wolf
or wily Indian. The belts of timber along the water-courses

*"The plains and prairies (referring to the country on either .side of the Illinois
River) are all covered with buffaloes, roebucks, hinds, stags, and different kind of fallow
deer. The feathered game is also here in the greatest abundance. We find, particu-
larly, quantities of swan, geese and ducks. The wild oats, which grow naturally on
the plains, fatten them to such a degree that they often die from being smothered in
their own grease. 11 Father Marest's letter, written in 1712. We have already seen,
from a description given on page 103, that water- fowl were equally abundant upon the
Mauvnee.

t In a letter of Father Rasles, dated October 12, 1723, there is a fine description of
the game found in the Illinois country. It reads: " Of all the nations of Canada, there
are none who live in so great abundance of everything as the Illinois. Their rivers
are covered with swans, bustards, ducks and tea's. One can scarcely travel a league
without finding a prodigious multitude of turkeys, who keep together in flocks, often
to the number of two hundred. They are much larger than those we see in France.
I had the curiosity to weigh one, which I found to be thhty-six pounds. They have
hanging from the neck a kind of tuft of hair half a foot in length.

"Bears and stags are found there in very great numbers, and buffaloes and roebucks
are also seen in vast herds. Not a year passes but they (the Indians) kill more than a
thousand roebucks and more than two thousand buffaloes. From four to five thousand of
the latter can often be seen at one view grazing on the prairies. They have a hump on
the back and an exceedingly large head. The hair, except that on the head, is curled
and soft as wool. The flesh has naturally a salt taste, and is so light that, although
eaten entirely raw, it does not cause the least indigestion. When they have killed a
buffalo, which appears to them too lean, they content themselves with taking the
tongue, and going in search of one which is fatter. 11 Vide Kip's Jesuit Missions, pp.
38, 39.

THE HUNTER'S PARADISE. 209

afforded lodgment for the bear, and were the trellises that supported
the tangled wild grapevines, the fruit of which, to this animal, was
an article of food. The bear had for his neighbor the panther, the
wild cat and the lynx, whose carnivorous appetites were appeased in
the destruction of other animals.

Immense herds of buffalo roamed over
the extensive area bounded on the east by
the Alleghanies and on the north by the
lakes, embracing the states of Ohio, Indi-
ana, Illinois, Wisconsin and the southern
half of Michigan. Their trails checkered
the prairies of Indiana and Illinois in
every direction, the marks of which, deep
worn in the turf, remained for many years
after the disappearance of the animals that made them.* Their
numbers when the country was first known to Europeans were
immense, and beyond computation. In their migrations southward
in the fall, and on their return from the blue-grass regions of Ken-
tucky in the spring, the Ohio River was obstructed for miles during
the time occupied by the vast herds in crossing it. Indeed, the
French called the buffalo the "Illinois ox," on account of their
numbers found in "the country of the Illinois," using that expres-
sion in its wider sense, as explained on a preceding page. So great
importance was attached to the supposed commercial value of the
buffalo for its wool that when Mons. Iberville, in 1698. was engaged
to undertake the colonization of Louisiana, the king instructed him
to look after the buffalo wool as one of the most important of his
duties; and Father Charlevoix, while traveling through "The
Illinois," observed that he was surprised that the buffalo had been
so long neglected, f Among the favorite haunts of the buffalo
were the marshes of the Upper Kankakee, the low lands about the
lakes of northern Indiana, where the oozy soil furnished early as
well as late pasturage, the briny earth upon the Au Glaize, and the
Salt Licks upon the Wabash and Illinois rivers were tempting places
of resort. From the summit of the high hill at Ouiatanon, over-
looking the Wea plains to the east and the Grand Prairie to the west,

* " Nothing," says Father Charlevoix, writing of the country about the confluence of
the Fox with the Illinois River, " is to be seen in this course but immense prairies, inter-
spersed with small groves which seem to have been planted by the hands of men. The
grass is so very high that a man would be almost lost in it, and through which paths
are to be found everywhere, as ivell trodden as they could have been in the most popu-
lated countries, although nothing passes over them but buffaloes, and from time to
time a herd of deer or a few roebuck": Charlevoix' Narrative Journal, vol. 2, p. 200.

t Brackenridge's Views of Louisiana.

210 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

as far as the eye could reach in either direction, the plains were seen
covered with groups, grazing together, or, in long files, stretching
away in the distance, their dark forms, contrasting with the green-
sward upon which they fed or strolled, and inspiring the enthusiasm
of the Frenchman, who gave the description quoted on page 104.
Still later, when passing through the prairies of Illinois, on his way
from Vincennes to Ouiatanon, more a prisoner than an ambassa-
dor, George Croghan makes the following entry in his daily jour-
nal : "18th and 19th of June, 1765. We traveled through a pro-
digious large meadow, called the Pyankeshaws' hunting ground.
Here is no wood ~ to be seen, and the country appears like an ocean.
The ground is exceedingly rich and partially overgrown with wild
hemp.* The land is well watered and full of Ijnffalo, deer, bears,
and all kinds of wild game. 20th and 21st. We passed through
some very large meadows, part of which belonged to the Pyanke-
shaws. on the Yermilion River. The country and soil were much the
same as that we traveled over for these three days past. Wild hemp
grows here in abundance. The game is very plenty. At any time
in a half hour we could kill as much as we wanted, "t

Gen. Clark, in the postscript of his letter dated November, 1779,
narrating his campaign in the Illinois country, says, concerning the
prairies between Kaskaskia and Vincennes, that "there are large
meadows extending beyond the reach of the eye, variegated with
groves of trees appearing like islands in the seas, covered with
buifaloes and other game. In many places, with a good glass, you
may see all that are upon their feet in a half million acres. "J It is
not known at what time the buffalo was last seen east of the Mis-
sissippi. The Indians had a tradition that the cold winter of 17 ,
called by them "the great cold" on account of its severity,
destroyed them. " The snow was so deep, and lay upon the ground
for such a length of time, that the buffalo became poor and too
weak to resist the inclemency of the weather;" great numbers of
them perished, singly and in groups, and their bones, either as iso-
lated skeletons or in bleaching piles, remained and were found over
the country for many years afterwards.

* Further on in his Journal Col. Croghan again refers to " wild hemp, growing in
the prairies, ten or twelve feet high, which if properly cultivated would prove as good
and answer all the purposes of the hemp we cultivate." Other writers also mention
the wild hemp upon the prairies, and it seems to have been supplanted by other grasses
that have followed in the changes of vegetable growth.

t Croghan's Journal.

i Clark's Campaign in the Illinois, p. 92.

On the 4th of October, 1786, one day's march on the road from Vincennes to the
Ohio Falls, Captains Zigler's and Strong's companies of regulars came across five buffalo.
The animals tried to force a passage through the column, when the commanding officer

THE DESTRUCTION OF THE GAME. 211

Before the coming of the Europeans the Indians hunted the game
for the purpose of supplying themselves with the necessary food and
clothing. The scattered tribes (whose numbers early writers greatly
exaggerated) were few, when compared with the area of the coun-
try they occupied, and the wild animals were so abundant that enough
to supply their wants could be captured near at hand with such rude
weapons as their ingenuity fashioned out of wood and stone. With
the Europeans came a change. The fur of many of the animals
possessed a commercial value in the marts of Europe, where they
were bought and used as ornaments and dress by the aristocracy,
whose wealth and taste fashioned them into garments of extraordi-
nary richness. Canada was originally settled with a view to the fur
trade, and this trade was, to her people, of the first importance the
chief motor of her growth and prosperity. The Indians were sup-
plied with guns, knives and hatchets by the Europeans, in place of
their former inferior weapons. Thus encouraged and equipped, and
.accompanied by the coureur des bois, the remotest regions were pen-
etrated, and the fur trade extended to the most distant tribes. Stim-
ulated with a desire for blankets, cotton goods and trinkets, the In-
dians now began a war upon the wild animals in earnest ; and their
wanton destruction for their skins and furs alone from that period
forward was so enormous that within the next two or three genera-
tions the improvident Indians in many localities could scarcely find
enough game for their own subsistence.

The coureur des lois were a class that had much to do with the
development of trade and with giving a knQwledge of the geogra-
phy of the country. They became extremely useful to the mer-
chants engaged in the fur trade, and were often a source of great
annoyance to the colonial authorities. Three or four of these pe,o-
ple, having obtained goods upon credit, would join their stock, put
their property into a birch bark canoe, which they worked them-
selves, and accompany the Indians in their excursions or go directly

ordered the men to fire upon them. The discharge killed three and wounded the
others: Joseph Buell's Narrative Journal, published in S. P. Hildreth's Pioneer History.
Thirteen years later, in December, 1799, Gov. St. Clair and Judge Jacob Burnett, on their
way overland from Cincinnati to Vincennes, camped out over night, at the close of one
of their days' journeys, not a great ways east of where the old road from Louisville to
Vincennes crosses White River. The next day they encountered a severe snow-storm,
during which they surprised eight or ten buffalo, sheltering themselves from the storm
behind a beech-tree full of dead leaves which had fallen beside of the trace and hid
the travelers from their view. The tree and the noise of the wind among its leaves
prevented the buffalo from discovering the parties until the latter had approached
within two rods of the place where they stood. They then took to their heels and
were soon out of sight. One of the company drew a pistol and fired, but without
effect: Burnett's Notes on the Northwest Territory, p. 72.

212 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

into the country where they knew they were to hunt.* These
voyages were extended twelve or fifteen months (sometimes longer)
before the traders would return laden with rich cargoes of fur, and
often followed by great numbers of the natives. During the short
time required to settle their accounts with the merchants and pro-
cure credit for a new stock, the traders would contrive to squander
their gains before they returned to their favorite mode of life among
the savages, their labor being rewarded by indulging themselves in
one month's dissipation for fifteen of exposure and hardship. "We
may not be able to explain the cause, but experience proves that it
requires much less time for a civilized people to degenerate into the
ways of savage life than is required for the savage to rise into a state
of civilization. The indifference about amassing property, and the
pleasure of living free from all restraint, soon introduced a licen-
tiousness among the coureur des bois that did not escape the eye of
the missionaries, who complained, with good reason, that they were
a disgrace to the Christian religion, "f

" The food of the coureur des bois when on their long expeditions;
was Indian corn, prepared for use by boiling it in strong lye to re-
move the hull, after which it was mashed and dried. In this state
it is soft and friable lijce rice. The allowance for each man on the
voyage, was one quart per day ; and a bushel, with two pounds of
prepared fat, is reckoned a month's subsistence. JSTo other allow-
ance is made of any kind, not even of salt, and bread is never
thought of; nevertheless the men are healthy on this diet, and ca-
pable of performing great labor. This mode of victualing was es-
sential to the trade, which was extended to great distances, and in
canoes so small as not to admit of the use of any other food. If
the men were supplied with bread and pork, the canoes would not
carry six months' rations, while the ordinary duration of the voyage
was not less than fourteen. No other men would be reconciled to
such fare except the Canadians, and this fact enabled their employ-
ers to secure a monopoly of the fur trade. "^

"The old voyageurs derisively called new hands at the business
mangeurs de lard (pork eaters), as, on -leaving Montreal, and while
en route to Mackinaw, their rations were pork, hard bread and pea

*The merchandise was neatly tied into bundles weighing sixty or seventy pounds;
the furs received in exchange were compressed into packets of about the same weight,
so that they could be conveniently carried, strapped upon the back of the voyageur,
around the portages and other places where the loaded canoes could effect no passage.

fSir Alexander Mackenzie's Voyages, etc., and An Account of the Fur Trade, etc,

\ Henry's Travels, p. 52.

THE COUREUR DES BOIS. 213

soup, while the old voyageurs in the Indian country ate corn soup
and such other food as could be conveniently procured."*

"The coureur des lois were men of easy., virtue. They would
eat, riot, drink and play as long as their furs held out," says La
Hontan, ' ' and when these were gone they would sell their embroi-
dery, their laces and their clothes. The proceeds of these exhausted,
they were forced to go upon new voyages for subsistence, "f

They did not scruple to intermarry with the Indians, among
whom they spent the greater part of their lives. They made excel-
lent soldiers, and in bush fighting and border warfare they were
more than a match for the British regulars. "Their merits were
hardihood and skill in woodcraft ; their chief faults were insubor-
dination and lawlessness."^:

Such were the characteristics of the French traders or coureur des
bois. They penetrated the remotest parts, ^voyaged upon all of our
western rivers, and traveled many of the insignificant streams that
afforded hardly water enough to float a canoe. Their influence over
the Indians (to whose mode of life they readily adapted themselves)
was almost supreme. They were efficient in the service of their
king, and materially assisted in staying the downfall of French rule
in America.

There is no data from which to ascertain the value of the fur
trade, as there were no regular accounts kept. The value of the
trade to the French, in 1703, was estimated at two millions of Jivres,
and this could have been from only a partial return, as a large per
cent of the trade was carried on clandestinely through Albany and
New York, of which the French authorities in Canada could have
no knowledge. With the loss of Canada, and the west to France,
and owing to the dislike of the Indians toward the English, and the
want of experience by the latter, the fur trade, controlled at Montreal,
fell into decay, and the Hudson Bay Company secured the advan-
tages of its downfall. During the winter of 1783-4 some merchants

*Vol. 2 Wisconsin Historical Collection, p. 110. Judge Lockwood gives a very
fine sketch of the coureur des bois and the manner of their employment, in the paper
from which we have quoted.

t La Hontan, vol. 1, pp. 20 and 21.

\ Parkman's Count Frontenac and New France, p. 209. Judge Lockwood, in the
paper referred to, speaking of the coureur des bois as their relations existed to the fur
trade in 1817, thus describes them: " These men epgaged in Canada, generally for five
jears, for Mackinaw and its dependencies, transferable like cattle, to any one who
wanted them, at generally about 500 livres a year, or, in our currency, about $83.33,
furnished with a yearly equipment or outfit of two cotton shirts, one three-point or
triangular blanket, a portage collar and one pair of shoes. They were obliged to pur-
chase their moccasins, tobacco and pipes at any price the trader saw fit to charge for
them. At the end of five years the voyageurs were in debt from $50 to $150, and
could not leave the country until they paid their indebtedness."

214 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

of Canada united their trade under the name of the ^Northwest
Company"; they did not get successfully to work until 1787. Dur-
ing that year the venture did not exceed forty thousand pounds, but
by exertion and the enterprise of the proprietors it was brought, in
eleven years, to more than triple that amount (equal to six hundred
thousand dollars), yielding proportionate profits, and surpassing any-
thing then known in America.*

The fur trade was conducted by the English, and subsequently
by the Americans, substantially upon the system originally estab-
lished by the French, with this distinction, that the monopoly was
controlfed by French officers and favorites, to whom the trade for
particular districts was assigned, while the English and Americans
controlled it through companies operating either under charters or
permits from the government.

Goods for Indian trao^e were guns, ammunition, steel for striking
fire, gun-flints, and other supplies to repair fire-arms; knives, hatchets,
kettles, beads, men's shirts, blue and red cloths for blankets and
petticoats ; vermilion, red, yellow, green and blue ribbons, gener-
ally of English manufacture ; needles, thread and awls ; looking-
glasses, children's toys, woolen blankets, razors for shaving the
head, paints of all colors, tobacco, and, more than all, spirituous
liquors. For these articles the Indians gave in exchange the s'kins
of deer, bear, otter, squirrel, marten, lynx, fox, wolf, buifalo,
moose, and particularly the beaver, the highest prized of them all.
Such was the value attached to the skins and fur of the last that
it became the standard of value. All other values were measured
by the beaver, the same as we now use gold, in adjusting com-
mercial transactions. All differences in exchanges of property or
in payment for labor were first reduced in value to the beaver skin.
Money was rarely received or paid at any of the trading-posts, the
only circulating medium were furs and peltries. In this exchange a
pound of beaver skin was reckoned at thirty sous, an otter skin at
six livres, and marten skins at thirty sous each. This was only about
half of the real value of the furs, and it was therefore always agreed
to pay either in furs at their equivalent cash value at the fort or
double the amount reckoned at current fur value, t

When the French controlled the fur trade, the posts in the interior
of the country were assigned to officers who were in favor at head-
quarters. As they had no money, the merchants of Quebec and
Montreal supplied them on credit with the necessary goods, which

* Mackenzie's Voyages, Fur Trade, etc.
t Henry's Travels and Pouchot's Memoirs.

THE FUR TRADE. 215

were to be paid for in peltries at a price agreed upon, thus being
required to earn profits for themselves and the merchant. These
officers were often employed to negotiate for the king with the tribes
near their trading-posts and give them goods as presents, the price
for the latter being paid by the intendant upon the approval of the
governor. This occasioned many hypothecated accounts, which were
turned to the profit of the commandants, particularly in time of
war. The commandants as well as private traders were obliged to
take out a license from the governor at a cost of four or five hundred
livres, in order to carry their goods to the posts, and to charge some
effects to the king's account. The most distant posts in the north-
west were prized the greatest, because of the abundance and low
price of peltries and the high price of goods at these remote estab-
lishments.

Another kind of trade was carried on by the coureurs des bois,
who, sharing the license with the officer at the post, with their canoes
laden with goods, went to the villages of the Indians, and followed
them on their hunting expeditions, to return after a season's trading
with their canoes well loaded. If the coureurs des bois were in a
condition to purchase their goods of first hands a quick fortune was
assured them, although to obtain it they had to lead a most danger-
ous, and fatiguing life. Some of these traders would return to France
after a few years' venture with wealth amounting to two million five
hundred thousand livres.*

The French were not permitted to exclusively enjoy the enormous
profits of the fur trade. We jiave seen, in treating of the Miami
Indians, that at an early day the English and the American colonists
were determined to share it, and had become sharp competitors. We
have seen (page 112) that to extend their trade the English had set
their allies, the Iroquois, upon the Illinois. So formidable were the
inroads made by the English upon the fur trade of the French, by
means of the conquests to which they had incited the Iroquois to
gain over other tribes that were friendly to the French, that the.
latter became "of the opinion that if the Iroquois were allowed to
proceed they would not only subdue the Illinois, but become masters
of all the Ottawa tribes, t and divert the trade to the English, so that
it was absolutely necessary that the French should either make the
Iroquois their friends or destroy them.\ You perceive, my Lord,

* Pouchot's Memoirs.

t Whose territories embraced all the country west of Lake Huron and north of
Illinois, one of the most prolific beaver grounds in the country.

\ Memoir of M. Du Chesneau, the Intendant, to the King, September 9, 1681, before
quoted.

216 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

that the subject which we have discussed [referring to the efforts of
the English of New York and Albany to gain the beaver trade] is to
determine who will be master of the heaver trade of the south and
southwest"*

In the struggle to determine who should be masters of the fur
trade, the French cared as little, perhaps less, for their Indian
allies than the British and Americans did for theirs. The blood that
was shed in the English and "French colonies north of the Ohio
River, for a period of over three-quarters of a century prior to 1763,
might well be said to have been spilled in a war for the fur trade, f

In the strife between the rivals, the French endeavoring to hold
their former possessions, and the English to extend theirs, the
strait of Detroit was an object of concern to both. Its strategical
position was such that it would give the party possessing it a decided
advantage. M. Du Lute, or L'Hut, under orders from Gov. De
Nonville, left Mackinaw with some fifty odd coureurs des hois in
1688, sailed down Lake Huron and threw up a small stockade fort
on the west bank of the lake, where it discharges into the River St.
Clair. The following year Capt. McGregory, Major Patrick Ma-
gregore, as his name is spelled in the commission he had in his
pocket over the signature of Gov. Dongan, with sixty Englishmen
and some Indians, with their merchandise loaded in thirty-two
canoes, went up Lake Erie on a trading expedition among the In-
dians at Detroit and Mackinaw. They were encountered and cap-
tured by a body of troops under Tonty, La Forest and other officers,
who, with coureur de bois and Indians from the upper country,
were on their way to join the French forces of Canada in a campaign
against the Iroquois villages in New York.;}: The prisoners were
sent to Quebec, and the plunder distributed among the captors. Du
Lute's stockade was called Fort St. Joseph. In 1688 the fort was
placed in command of Baron LaHontan.

Fort St. Joseph served the purposes for which it was constructed,
and a few years later, in 1701, Mons. Cadillac established Fort Pont-
ohartrain on the present site of the city of Detroit, for no other pur-

* M. De La Barre to the Minister of the Marine, November 4, 1683 : Paris Docu-
ments, vol. 9, p. 210,

f War was not formally declared between France and England, on account of
colonial difficulties, until May, 1756, but the discursory broils between their colonies in
America had been going on from the time of their establishment.

t Tonty's Memoir, and Paris Documents, vol. 9, pp. 363 and 866.

Fort Du Luth, or St. Joseph, as it was afterward called, was ordered to be erected
in 1686. " in order to fortify the pass leading to Mackinaw against the English." Du
Luth, who erected it, was in command of fifty men. Several parties of English were
either captured or sent back from this post within a year or two from its establishment.
Vide Paris Documents, vol. 9, pp. 300, 302. 306, 383.

ENGLISH AND AMERICAN TRADERS. 217

pose than to check the English in the prosecution of the fur trade in
that country.*

The French interests were soon threatened from another direc-
tion. Traders from Pennsylvania found their way westward over the
mountains, where they engaged in traffic with the Indians in the
valleys of eastern Ohio, arid they soon established commercial rela-
tions with the Wabash tribes, t It appears from a previous chapter
that the Miamis were trading at Albany in 1708. To avert this
danger the French were compelled at last to erect military posts at
Fort Wayne, on the Maumee (called Fort Miamis), at Ouiatanon and
Yincennes, upon the Wabash.;}: Prior to 1750 Sieur de Ligneris
was commanding at Fort Ouiatanon, and St. Ange was in charge at
Yincennes.

As soon as the English settlements reached the eastern slope of
the Alleghanies, their traders passed over the ridge, and they found
it exceedingly profitable to trade with the western Indians. They
could sell the same quality of goods for a third or a half of what the
French usually charged, and still make a handsome profit. This
new and rich field was soon overrun by eager adventurers. In the
meantime a number of gentlemen, mostly from Yirginia, procured
an act of parliament constituting "The Ohio Company," and grant-
ing them six hundred thousand acres of land on or near the Ohio
River. The objects of this company were to till the soil and to open
up a trade with the Indians west of the Alleghanies and south of the
Ohio.

The French, being well aware that the English could offer their
goods to the Indians at greatly reduced rates, feared that they would
lose the entire Indian trade. At first they protested " against this
invasion of the rights of His Most Christian Majesty" to the gov-
ernor of the English colonies. This did not produce the desired
effect. Their demands were met with equivocations and delays.
At last the French determined on summary measures. An order

* Statement of Mons. Cadillac of his reasons for establishing a fort on the Detroit
River, copied in Sheldon's Early History of Michigan, pp. 85-90.

t An Englishman by the name of Crawford had been trading on the Wabash prior
to 1749. Vide Irving's Life of Washington, vol. 1, p. 48.

\ The date of the establishment of these forts is a matter of conjecture, owing to
the absence of reliable data. A " Miamis " is referred to in 1719, and in the same year
Sieur Duboisson was selected as a suitable person to take command at Ouiatanon, and
in 1735 M. de Vincenne is alluded to, in a letter written from Kaskaskia, as com-
mandant of the Post on the Wabash. However, owing to the successive migrations of
the Miami Indians, the " Miamis " mentioned in such documents, in 1719, may have
referred to the Miami and Wea villages upon the Kalamazoo and St. Joseph rivers, in
the state of Michigan. The post at Vincennes, it may be safely assumed, was garri-
soned as early as 1735, and Ouiatanon, below La Fayette, and Miamis, at Fort Wayne,
some years before, in the order of time.

218 HISTORIC NOTES ON 7 THE NORTHWEST.

was issued to the commandants of their various posts on Lake Erie,
the Ohio and the "Wabash, to seize all English traders found west of
the Alleghanies. In pursuance of this order, in 1751, four English
traders were captured on the Yermilion of the Wabash and sent to
Canada/" Other traders, dealing with the Indians in other locali-
ties, were captured and taken to Presque Isle,f and from thence to
Canada.

The contest between the rival colonies still went on, increasing
in the extent of its line of operations and intensifying in the ani-
mosity of the feeling with which it was conducted. We quote from
a memoir prepared early in 1752, by M. de Longueuil, commandant
at Detroit, showing the state of affairs at a previous date in the
Wabash country. It appears, from the letters of the commandants
at the several posts named, from which the memoir is compiled,
that the Indian tribes upon the Maumee and Wabash, through the
successful efforts of the English, had become very much disaffected
toward their old friends and masters. M. de Ligneris, commandant
at the Ouyatanons, says the memoir, believes that great reliance is
not to be placed on the Maskoutins, and that their remaining neutral
is all that is to be expected from them and the Kickapous. He even
adds that "we are not to reckon on the nations which appear in our
interests ; no Wea chief has appeared at this post for a long time.
M. de Villiers, commandant at the Miamis, Ft. Wayne, has been
disappointed in his expectation of bringing the Miamis back from the
White River, part of whom had been to see him, the small-pox
having put the whole of them to rout. Coldfoot and his son have
died of it, as well as a large portion of our most trusty Indians.
Le Grls, chief of the Tepicons,* and his mother are likewise dead >
they are a loss, because they were well disposed toward the French."

The memoir continues: "The nations of the River St. Joseph,
who were to join those of Detroit, have said they would be ready to
perform their promise as soon as Ononontio would have sent the
necessary number of Frenchmen. The commandant of this post
writes, on the loth of January, that all the nations appear to take

* Paris Documents, vol. 10, p. 248.

f Near Erie, Pennsylvania.

j This is the first reference we have to Tippecanoe. Antoine Gamelin, the French
merchant at Vincennes, whom Major Hamtramck sent, in 1790, to the Wabash towns
with peace messages, calls the village, then upon this river, Qiti-ie-pi-con-nae. The
name of the Tippecanoe is derived from the Algonquin word Ke-non-ge, or Ke-no-zha
from Kenose, long, the name of the long-billed pike, a fish very abundant in this
stream, vide Mackenzie's and James' Vocabularies. Timothy Flint, in his Geography
and History of the Western States, first edition, published at Cincinnati, 1828, vol. 2,
p. 125, says: " The Tippecanoe received its name from a kind of pike called Pic-ca-nau
by the savages." The termination is evidently Frenchified.

The name by which the Indians called the governor of Canada.

FRENCH TRADERS KILLED.

sides against us ; that he would not be responsible for the good
dispositions these Indians seem to entertain, inasmuch as the
Miamis are their near relatives. On the one hand, Mr. de Jon-
caire* repeats that the Indians of the beautiful riverf are all English,
for whom alone they work ; that all are resolved to sustain each
other ; and that not a party of Indians go to the beautiful river but
leave some [of their numbers] there to increase the rebel forces.
On the other hand, "Mr. de St. Ange, commandant of the post of
Vincennes, writes to M. des Ligneris [at Ouiatanon] to use all
means to protect himself from the storm which is ready to burst on
the French ; that he is busy securing himself against the fury of our
enemies."

"The Pianguichias, who are at war with the Chaoua-nons, ac-
cording to the report rendered by Mr. St. Clin, have declared entirely
against us. They killed on Christmas five Frenchmen at the Ver-
milion. Mr. des Ligneris, who was aware of this attack, sent off a
detachment to secure the effects of the Frenchmen from being plun-
dered ; but when this detachment arrived at the Yermilion, the
Piankashaws had decamped. The bodies of the Frenchmen were
found on the ice.:J:

"M. des Ligneris was assured that the Piankashaws had commit-
ted this act because four men of their nation had been killed by the
French at the Illinois, and four others had been taken and put in
irons. It is said that these eight men were going to fight the Chick-
asaws, and had, without distrusting anything, entered the quarters
of the French, who killed them. It is also reported that the French-
men had recourse to this extreme measure because a Frenchman and

* A French half-breed having 1 great influence over the Indians, and whom the
French authorities had sent into Ohio to conciliate the Indians.

t The Ohio.

i Col. Croghan's Journal, before quoted, gives the key to the aboriginal name of
this stream. On the 22d of June, 1765, he makes the following entry: "We passed
through a part of the same meadow mentioned yesterday; then came to a high wood-
land and arrived at Vermilion River, so called from a fine red earth found there by the
Indians, with which they paint themselves. About a half a mile from where we crossed
this river there is a village of Piankashaws, distinguished by the addition of the name
of the river" (that is, the Piankashaws of the Vermilion, or the Vermilions, as they
were sometimes called). The red earth or red chalk, known under the provincial name
of red keel, is abundant everywhere along the bluffs of the Vermilion, in the shales
that overlay the outcropping coal. The annual fires frequently ignited the coal thus
exposed, and would burn the shale above, turn it red and render it friable. Carpen-
ters used it to chalk their lines, and the successive generation of boys have gathered it
by the pocketful. Those acquainted with the passion of the Indian for paint, particu-
larly red, will understand the importance which the Indians would attach to it. Hence,
as rioted by Croghan, they called the river after the name of this red earth. Vermilion
is the French word conveying the same idea, and it is a coincidence merely that Ver-
milion in French has the same meaning as this word in English On the map in
" Volney's View of the Soil and Climate of the United States," Phila. ed. 1804, it is
called Red River. The Miami Indian name of the Vermilion was Piankashaw. as ap-
pears from Gen. Putnam's manuscript Journal of the treaty at Vincennes m 1792.

220 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

two slaves had been killed a few days before by another party of
Piankashaws, and that the Indians in question had no knowledge of
that circumstance. The capture of four English traders by M. de
Celoron's order last year has not prevented other Englishmen going
to trade at the Yermilion River, where the Rev. Father la Riehardie
wintered."*

The memoir continues: "On the 19th of October the Pianka-
shaws had killed two more Frenchmen, who were constructing
pirogues lower down than the Post of Vincenne. Two days after-
ward the Piankashaws killed two slaves in sight of Fort Yincenne.
The murder of these nine Frenchmen and these two slaves is but
too certain. A squaw, the widow of one of the Frenchmen who had
been killed at the Yermilion, has reported that the Pianguichias,
Illinois and Osages were to assemble at the prairies of - , the
place where Messrs, de Yilliers and de Noyelle attacked the Foxes
about twenty years ago, and when they had built a fort to secure
their families, they were to make a general attack on all the French.

"The Miamis of Rock Riverf have scalped two soldiers belong-
ing to Mr. Yilliers' fort.:}: This blow was struck last fall. Finally,
the English have paid the Miamis for the scalps of the two soldiers
belonging to Mr. de Yilliers' garrison. To add to the misfortunes,
M. des Ligneris has learned that the commandant of the Illinois at
Fort Charters would not permit Sieurs Delisle and Fonblanche,
who had contracted with the king to supply the Miamis, Ouyaton-
ons, and even Detroit with provisions from the Illinois, to purchase
any provisions for the subsistence of the garrisons of those posts, on
the ground that an increased arrival of troops and families would
consume the stock at the Illinois. Famine is not the sole scourge
we experience ; the smallpox commits ravages ; it begins to reach
Detroit. It were desirable that it should break out and spread gen-
erally throughout the localities inhabited by our rebels. It would
be fully as good as an army."

The Piankashaws, now completely estranged from the French,
withdrew, almost in a body, from the Wabash, and retired to the
Big Miami, whither a number of Miamis and other Indians had,

* Father Justinian de la Richardie came to Canada (according to the Liste Crono-
logiqm. No. 429) in 1716. He served many years in the Huron country, and also in
the Illinois, and died in February, 1758. Biographical note of the editor of Paris
Documents : Col. Hist, of New York, vol. 9. p. 88. The time when and the place at
which this missionary was stationed on the Vermilion River is not given. The date
was before 1750, as is evident from the text. The place was probably at the large
Piankashaw town where the traders were killed.

fThe Big Miami River of Ohio, on which stream, near the mouth of Loramies
Creek, the Miamis had an extensive village, hereafter referred to.

\ Ft. Wayne, where Mr. Vilhers was then stationed in charge of Fort Miamis.

PICKAW1LLANY. 221

some years previous, established a village, to be nearer the English
traders. The village was called Pickawillany, or Picktown. To
the English and Iroquois it was known as the Tawixtwi Town, or
Miamitown. It was located at the mouth of what has since been
called Loramie's creek. The stream derived this name from the fact
that a Frenchman of that name, subsequent to the events here nar-
rated, had a trading-house at this place. The town was visited in
1751 by Christopher Gist, who gives the following description of it:*
"The Twightee town is situated on the northwest side of the Big
Min e ami River, about one hundred and fifty miles from its mouth.
It consists of four hundred families, and is daily increasing. It is
accounted one of the strongest Indian towns in this part of the con-
tinent. The Twightees are a very numerous people, consisting of
many different tribes under the same form of government. Each
tribe has a particular chief, or king, one of which is chosen indiffer-
ently out of any tribe to rule the whole nation, and is vested with
greater authority than any of the others. They have but lately
traded with the English. They formerly lived on the farther side of
the Wabash, and were in the French interests, who supplied them
with some few trifles at a most exorbitant price. They have now
revolted from them and left their former habitations for the sake of
trading with the English, and notwithstanding all the artifices the
French have used, they have not been able to recall them." George
Croghan and Mr. Montour, agents in the English interests, were in
the town at the time of Gist's visit, doing what they could to inten-
sify the animosity of the inhabitants against the French. Speeches
were made and presents exchanged to cement the friendship with
the English. While these conferences were going on, a deputation
of Indians in the French interests arrived, with soft words and valu-
able presents, marching into the village under French colors. The
deputation was admitted to the council-house, that they might make
the object of their visit known. The Piankashaw chief, or king,
"Old Britton," as he was called, on account of his attachment
for the English, had both the British and French flags hoisted from
the council-house. The old chief refused the brandy, tobacco and
other presents sent to him from the French king. In reply to the
speeches of the French ambassadors he said that the road to the
French had been made foul and bloody by them ; that he had
cleared a road to our brothers, the English, and that the French had
made that bad. The French flag was taken down, and the emissaries

* Christopher Gist's Journal.

222 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

of that people, with their presents, returned to the French post from
whence they came.

When negotiations failed to* win the Miamis back to French
authority, force was resorted to. On the 21st of June, 1752, a party
of two hundred and forty French and Indians appeared before Pick-
awillany, surprised the Indians in their corn-fields, approaching so
suddenly that the white men who were in their houses had great
difficulty in reaching the fort. They killed one Englishman and
fourteen Miamis, captured the stockade fort, killed the old Pianka-
shaw king, and put his body in a kettle, boiled it and ate it up in
retaliation for his people having killed the French traders on the
Vermilion River and at Yincennes.* "Thus," says the eloquent
historian, George Bancroft, "on the alluvial lands of western Ohio
began the contest that was to scatter death broadcast through the
world."f

* The account of the affair at Pickawillany is summarized from the Journal of Capt.
Wm. Trent and other papers contained in a valuable book edited by A. T. Goodman,
secretary of the Western Reserve Historical Society, and published by Robert Clarke
& Co., 1871, entitled "Journal of Captain Trent."

| Old Britton's successor was his son, a young man, whose name was Mu-she-
gu-a-nock-que, or "The Turtle." The English, and Indians in their interests, had a
very high esteem for the young Piankashaw king. It is said by some writers, and
there is much probability of the correctness of their opinion, that the great Miami
chief, Little Turtle, was none other than the person here referred to. His age would
correspond very well with that of the Piankashaw, and members of one band of the
Miami nation frequently took up their abode with other bands or families of their kin-
dred.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE WAR FOR THE EMPIRE. ITS LOSS TO THE FRENCH.

THE English not only disputed the right of the French to the
fur trade, but denied their title to the valley of the Mississippi,
which lay west of their American colonies on the Atlantic coast.
The grants from the British crown conveyed to the chartered pro-
prietors all of the country lying between certain parallels of latitude,
according to the location of the several grants, and extending west-
ward to the South Sea, as the Pacific was then called. Seeing the
weakness of such a claim to vast tracts of country, upon which no
Englishman had ever set his foot, they obtained deeds of cession
from the Iroquois Indians, the dominant tribe east of the Mississip-
pi, who claimed all of the country between the Alleghanies and the
Mississippi by conquest from the several Algonquin tribes, who occu-
pied it. On the 13th of July. 1701, the sachems of the Five Nations
conveyed to William III, King of .Great Britain, "their beaver-
hunting grounds northwest and west from Albany," including a
broad strip on the south side of Lake Erie, all of the present states
of Michigan, Ohio and Indiana, and Illinois as far west as the Illi-
nois River, claiming "that their ancestors did, more than fourscore
years before, totally conquer, subdue and drive the former occupants
out of that country, and had peaceable and quiet possession of the
same, to hunt beavers in, it being the only chief place for hunting
in that part of the world," etc.* The Iroquois, for themselves and
heirs, granted the English crown "the whole soil, the lakes, the

* The deed is found in London Documents, vol. 4, p. 908. The boundaries of the
grant are indefinite in many respects. Its westward limit, says the deed, " abutts
upon the Twichtwichs [Miamis], and is bounded on the right hand by a place called
Quadoge." On Eman Bowen's map, ^which is certainly the most authentic from the
British standpoint, is a " pecked line " extending from the mouth of the Illinois river,
up that stream, to the Desplaines, thence across the prairies to Lake Michigan at
Quadoge or Quadaghe, which is located on the map some distance southeast of Chicago,
which is also shown in its correct place, and at or near the mouth of the stream that
forms the harbor at Michigan City, formerly known by the French as Riviere du Che-
min, or " Trail River," because the great trail from Chicago to Detroit and Ft. Wayne
left the lake shore at this place. The " pecked line," as Mr. Bowen calls the dotted
line which he traces as the boundary of the Iroquois deed of cession, extends from
Michigan City northward through the entire length of Lake Michigan, the Straits of
Mackinaw and between the Manitou-lin islands and the main shore in Lake Huron;
thence into Canada around the riorth shore of Lake Nipissing; and thence down the
Ottawa River to its confluence with the St. Lawrence.

988

224 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

rivers, and all things pertaining to said tract of land, with power
to erect forts and castles there," only reserving to the grantors and
"their descendants forever the right of hunting upon the same," in
which privilege the grantee "was expected to protect them." The
grant of the Iroquois was confirmed to the British crown by deeds
of renewal in 1726 and 1744. The reader will have observed, from
what has been said in the preceding chapters upon the Illinois and
Miamis and Pottawatomies relative to the pretended conquests of
the Iroquois, how little merit there was in the claim they set up to
the territory in question. Their war parties only raided upon the
country, they never occupied it; their war parties, after doing as
much mischief as they could, returned to their own country as
rapidly as they came. Still their several deeds to the English crown
were a "color of title" on which the latter laid great stress, and
paraded at every treaty with other powers, where questions involv-
ing the right to this territory were a subject of discussion. *

The war for the fur trade expanded into a struggle for empire
that convulsed both continents of America and Europe. The limit
assigned this work forbids a notice of the principal occurrences in
the progress of the French-Colonial War, as most of the military
movements in that contest were outside of the territory we are con-
sidering. There were, however, two campaigns conducted by troops
recruited in the northwest, and these engagements will be noticed.
We believe they have not heretofore been compiled as fully as their
importance would seem to demand.

In 1758 Gen. Forbes, with about six thousand troops, advanced
against Fort Du Quesne.f In mid-September the British troops had
only reached Loyal-hannon, ^ where they raised a fort. "Intelli-
gence had been received that Fort Du Quesne was defended by but
eight hundred men, of whom three hundred were Indians, " and
Major Grant, commanding eight hundred Highlanders and a com-
pany of Virginians, was sent toward the French fort. On the third

* The Iroquois themselves, as appears from an English memoir on the Indian
trade, and contained among the London Documents, vol. 7, p. 18, never supposed
they had actually conveyed their right of dominion to these lands. Indeed, it appears
that the Indians generally could not comprehend the purport of a deed or grant in the
sense that the Europeans attach to these formidable instruments. The idea of an
absolute, fee-simple right of an individual, or of a body of persons, to exclusively own
real estate against the right of others even to enter upon it, to hunt or cut a shrub,
was beyond the power of an Indian to comprehend. From long habit and the owner-
ship (not only of land but many articles of domestic use) by the tribe or village of
property in common, they could not understand how it could be held otherwise.

t At the present site of Pittsburgh. Pa.

JLoyal-hannon, afterward Fort .Ligonier, was situated on the east side of Loyal-
hannon Creek, Westmoreland county, Pa., and was about forty-five miles from Fort
Du Quesne; vide Pennsylvania Archives, XII, 389.

Bancroft, vol. iv, p. 311.

DEFEAT OF THE ENGLISH. 225

day's march Grant had arrived within two miles of Fort Du Quesne.
Leaving his baggage there, he took position on a hill, a quarter of a
mile from the fort, and encamped.*

Grant, who was not aware that the garrison had been reinforced
by the arrival of Mons. Aubry, commandant at Fort Chartes, with
four hundred men from the Illinois country, determined on an am-
buscade. At break of day Major Lewis was sent, with four hundred
men, to lie in ambush a mile and a half from the main body, on the
path on which they left their baggage, imagining the French would
send a force to attack the baggage guard and seize it. Four hundred
men were posted along the hill facing the fort to cover the retreat of
MacDonald's company, which marched with drums beating toward
the fort, in order to draw a party out of it, as Major Grant had rea-
son to believe there were, including Indians, only two hundred men
within it.f

M. de Ligneris, commandant at Fort Du Quesne, at once assem-
bled seven or eight hundred men, and gave the command to M.
Aubry. ^ The French sallied out of the fort, and the Indians, who
had crossed the river to keep out of the way of the British, returned
and made a flank movement. Aubry, by a rapid movement, attacked
the different divisions of the English, and completely routed and
dispersed them. The force under Major Lewis was compelled to
give way. Being flanked, a number were driven into the river,
most of whom were drowned. The English lost two hundred and
seventy killed, forty-two wounded, and several prisoners ; among the
latter was Grant.

On the 22d of September M. Aubry left Fort Du Quesne, with a
force of six hundred French and Indians, intending to reconnoitre
the position of the English at Loyal-hannon.

"He found a little camp in front of some intrenchments which
would cover a body of two thousand men. The advance guard of
the French detachment having been discovered, the English sent a
captain and fifty men to reconnoitre, who fell in with the detach-
ment and were entirely defeated. In following the fugitives the
French fell upon this camp, and surprised and dispersed it.

"The fugitives scarcely gained the principal intrenchment, which
M. Aubry held in blockade two days. He killed two hundred horses
and cattle." The French returned to Fort Du Quesne mounted.
"The English lost in the engagement one hundred and fifty men,

* The hill has ever since borne Grant's name,
f- Craig's History of Pittsburgh, p. 74.

JGarneau's History of Canada, Bell's translation, vol. 2, p. 214.
Pouchot's Memoir, p. 130.
15

226 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

killed, wounded and missing. The French loss was two killed and
seven wounded."

The Louisiana detachment, which took the principal part in both
of these battles, was recruited from the French posts in "The Illi-
nois," and consisted of soldiers taken from the garrison in that terri-
tory, and the coureurs des bois, traders and settlers in their respective
neighborhoods. It was the first battalion ever raised within the
limits of the present states of Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. After
the action of Loyal-hannon, "the Louisiana detachment, as well as
those from Detroit, returned home."*

Soon after their departure, and on the 24th of November, the
French abandoned Fort Du Quesne. Pouchot says: "It came to
pass that by blundering at Fort Du Quesne the French were obliged
to abandon it. for want of provisions." This may have been the
true reason for the abandonment, but doubtless the near approach of
a large English army, commanded by Gen. Forbes, had no small
influence in accelerating their movements. The fort was a mere
stockade, of small dimensions, and not suited to resist the attacks of
artillery. "I*

Having burnt the stockade and storehouses, the garrison sepa-
rated. One hundred retired to Presque Isle, by land. Two hundred,
by way of the Alleghany, went to Yenango. The remaining hun-
dred descended the Ohio. About forty miles above its confluence
with the Mississippi, and on a beautiful eminence on the north bank
of the river, they erected a fort and named it Fort Massac, in honor
of the commander, M. Massac, who superintended its construction.
This was the last fort erected by the French on the Ohio, and it was
occupied by a garrison of French troops until the evacuation of the
country under the stipulations of the treaty of Paris. Such was the
origin of Fort Massac, divested of the romance which fable has
thrown around its name.";}:

* Letter of Marquis Montcalm: Paris Documents, vol. 10, p. 901.

f Hildreth's Pioneer History, p. 42.

\ Monette's Valley of the Mississippi, vol. 1, p. 317. Goy. Reynolds, who visited
the remains of Fort Massac in 1855, thus describes its remains: " The outside walls
were one hundred and thirty-6ve feet square, and at each angle strong bastions were
erected. The walls were palisades, with earth between the wood. A large well was
sunk in the fortress, and the whole appeared to have been strong and substantial in its
day. Three or four acres of gravel walks were made on the north of the fort, on which
the soldiers paraded. The walks were made in exact angles, and beautifully graveled
with pebbles from the river. The site is one of the most beautiful on La Belle Rivere,
and commands a view of the Ohio that is charming and lovely. French genius for the
selection of sites for forts is eminently sustained in their choice of Fort Massacre." The
Governor states that the fort was first established in 1711, and "was enlarged and
made a respectable fortress in 1756." Vide Reynolds' Life and Times, pp. 28, 29. This
is, probably, a mistake. There are no records in the French official documerts of any
military post in that vicinity until the so-called French and Indian war.

CHANGE OF WAR-PLAN. 227

On the day following the evacuation, the English took peaceable
possession of the smoking ruins of Fort Du Quesne. They erected
a temporary fortification, named it Fort Pitt, in honor of the great
English statesman of that name, and leaving two hundred men as a
garrison, retired over the mountains.

On the 5th of December, 1758, Thomas Pownall, governor of
Massachusetts Bay Province, addressed a memorial to the British
Ministry, suggesting that there should be an entire change in the
method of carrying on the war. Pownall stated that the French
were superior in battles fought in the wilderness ; that Canada never
could be conquered by land campaigns ; that the proper way to
succeed in the reduction of Canada would be to make an attack on
Quebec by sea, and thus, by cutting off supplies from the home gov-
ernment, Canada would be starved out.*

Pitt, if he did not act on the recommendations of Gov. Pownall,
at least had similar views, and the next year (1759), in accordance
with this plan, Gen. Wolfe made a successful assault on Quebec, and
from that time, the supplies and reinforcements from the home gov-
ernment being cut off, the cause of the French in Canada became
almost hopeless.

During this year the French made every effort to stir up the
Indians north of the Ohio to take the tomahawk and scalping-knife
in hand, and make one more attempt to preserve the northwest
for the joint occupancy of the Gallic and American races. Emissa-
ries were sent to Lake Erie, Detroit, Mackinaw, Ouiatanon, Vincennes,
Kaskaskia and Fort Chartes, loaded with presents and ammunition,
for the purpose of collecting all those stragglers who had not enter-
prise enough to go voluntarily to the seat of war. Canada was hard
pressed for soldiers ; the English navy cut o'ff most of the rein-

* Pownall's Administration of the Colonies, Appendix, p. 57. Thomas Pownall,
born in England in 1720, came to America in 1753; was governor of Massachusetts
Bay, and subsequently was appointed governor of South Carolina. He was highly edu-
cated, and possessed a thorough knowledge of the geography, history and policy of
both the French and English colonies in America. His work on the "Administration
of the American Colonies" passed through many editions. In 1756 he addressed a
memorial to His Highness the Duke of Cumberland, on the conduct of the colonial war,
in which he recommended a plan for its further prosecution. The paper is a very
able one. Much 'of it compiled from the official letters of Marquis Vaudreuil, Governor-
General of. Canada, written between the years 1,743 and 1752, showing the policy of the
French, and giving a minute description of their settlements, military establishments
in the west, their manner of dealing with the Indians, and a description of the river
communications of the French between their possessions in Canada and Louisiana. In
1776 he revised Evans 1 celebrated map of the " Middle British Provinces in America."
After his return to England he devoted himself to scientific pursuits. He was a warm
friend of the American colonists in the contest with the mother country, and de-
nounced the measures of parliament concerning the colonies as harsh and wholly
unwarranted, and predicted the result that followed. He died in 1805.

228 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NOKTHWEST.

forcements from France, while the English, on the contrary, were
constantly receiving troops from the mother country.

Mons. de Aubry, commandant at Fort Chartes, persuaded four
hundred men from the "Illinois country" to follow him eastward.
Taking with him two hundred thousand pounds of flour, he em-
barked his heterogeneous force in bateaux and canoes. The route
by way of the Ohio was closed ; the English were in possession of
its headwaters. He went down the Mississippi, thence up the Ohio
to the mouth of the Wabash. Having ascended the latter stream
to the Miami villages, near the present site of Fort Wayne, his fol-
lowers made the portage, passed down the Maumee, and entered
Lake Erie.

During the whole course of their journey they were being con-
stantly reinforced by bands of different tribes of Indians, arid by
Canadian militia as they passed the several posts, until the army
was augmented to sixteen hundred men, of whom there were six
hundred French and one thousand Indians. An eye-witness, in
speaking of the appearance of the force, said : " When they passed
the little rapid at the outlet of Lake Erie (at Bufialo) the flotilla ap-
peared like a floating island, as the river was covered with their
bateaux and canoes."*

Aubry was compelled to leave his flour and provisions at the
Miami portage. He afterward requested M. de Port-neuf, com-
mandant at Presque Isle, to take charge of the portage, and to send
it constantly in his bateaux, f

Before Aubry reached Presque Isle he was joined by other bodies
of Indians and Canadians from the region of the upper lakes. They
were under the command of French traders and commandants of
interior posts. At Fort Machault^; he was joined by M. de Lignery ;
the latter had assembled the Ohio Indians at Presque Isle. It was
the original intention of Aubry to recapture Fort Du Quesne from
the English. On the 12th of July a grand council was held at Fort
Machault, in which the commandant thanked the Indians for their
attendance, threw down the war belt, and told them he would set
out the next day for Fort Du Quesne. Soon after messengers arrived
with a packet of letters for the officers. After reading them Aubry
told the Indians: "Children, I have received bad news; the Eng-
lish are gone against Niagara. We must give over thoughts of going
down the river to Fort Du Quesne till we have cleared that place of

*Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 1, pp. 186, 187

fldem, p. 152.

i Located at the mouth of French Creek, Pennsylvania.

Idem, 187.

AUBRY'S CAMPAIGN. 229

the enemy. If it should be taken, our road to you is stopped, and
you must become poor." Orders were immediately given to pro-
ceed with the artillery, provisions, etc., up French Creek, and the
Indians prepared to follow.*

These letters were from M. Pouchot, commandant at Niagara,!
and stated that he was besieged by a much superior force of English
and Indians, who were under the command of Gen. Predeaux and
Sir William Johnson. Aubry answered these letters on the next day,
and said he thought they might fight the enemy successfully, and
compel them to raise the siege. The Indians who brought these mes-
sages to Pouchot informed him that they, on the part of the Indians
with Aubry and Lignery, had offered the Iroquois and other Indian
allies of the English five war belts if they would retire. These prom-
ised that they would not mingle in the quarrel. "We will here recall
the fact that Pouchot, by his letter of the 10th, had notified Lignery
and Aubry that the enemy might be four or five thousand strong
without the Indians, and if they could put themselves in condition
to attack so large a force, he should pass Chenondac to come to
Niagara by the other side of the river, where he would be in con-
dition to drive the English, who were only two hundred strong on
that side, and could not easily be reinforced. This done, they could
easily come to him, because after the defeat of this body they could
send bateaux to bring them to the fort."

M. Pouchot now recalled his previous request, and informed
Aubry that the enemy were in three positions, in one of which
there were three thousand nine hundred Indians. He added, could
Aubry succeed in driving the enemy from any of these positions,
he had no doubt they would be forced to raise the siege. ^

Aubry 's route was up French Creek to its head-waters, thence
making the portage to Presque Isle and sailing along the shores of
Lake Erie until he reached Niagara. Arriving at the foot of Lake
Erie he left one hundred and fifty men in charge of his canoes, and
with the remainder advanced toward Niagara. Sir William John-
son was informed, on the evening of the 23d, of this advance of the
French, and ordered his light infantry and pickets to take post on
the left, on the road between Niagara Falls and the fort; and these,
after reinforcing them with grenadiers and parts of the 46th and 44th
regiments, were so arranged as to effectually support the guard left

* Extract from a letter dated July 17, 1759, of Col. Mercer, commandant at Fort
Pitt, published in Craig's Olden Time, vol. 1, p. 194.

t Fort Niagara was one of the earliest French military posts, and situated on the
right, or American shore of Lake Ontario, at the mouth of Niagara River. It has
iigured conspicuously in all of the wars on the lake frontier.

t Pouchot's Memoirs, vol. 1, pp. 186, 187, 188.

230 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

in the trenches. Most of his men were concealed either in the
trenches or by trees.

On the morning of the 24th the French made their appearance.
They were inarching along a path about eight feet wide, and "were
in readiness to fight in close order and without ranks or files." On
their right were thirty Indians, who formed a front on the enemy's
left. The Indians of the English army advanced to speak to those
of the French. Seeing the Iroquois in the latter' s company, the
French Indians refused to advance, under pretext that they were at
peace with the first named. Though thus abandoned by their chief
force, Aubry and Lignery still proceeded on their way, thinking
that the few savages they saw were isolated men, till they reached
a narrow pathway, when they discovered great numbers beyond.
The English Indians then gave the war-whoop and the action com-
menced. The English regulars attacked the French in front, while
the Indians poured in on their flank. Thus surprised by an am-
buscade, and deserted by their savage allies, the French proved easy
victims to the prowess of far superior numbers. They were assailed
in front and rear by two thousand men. The rear of the column,
unable to resist, gave way, and left the head exposed to the enemy's
fire, which crushed it entirely. An Indian massacre followed, and
the pursuit of the victors continued until they were compelled to
desist by sheer fatigue. Almost all the French officers were killed,
wounded or taken prisoners. Among the latter was Aubry. Those
who escaped joined M. Rocheblave, and with his detachment re-
treated to Detroit and other western lake posts.""

This defeat on the shores of Lake Erie was very severe on the
struggling western settlements. Most all of the able-bodied men
had gone with Aubry, many never to return. In 1760 M. de Mac-
Carty, commandant at Fort Chartes, in a letter to Marquis Vaudreuil,
stated that "the garrison was weaker than ever before, the check at
Niagara having cost him the elite of his men."f

It is apparent, from the desertion of Aubry by his savage allies,
that they perceived that the English were certain to conquer in the
end. They felt no particular desire to prop a falling cause, and
thus deserted Mons. Aubry at the crisis when their assistance was
most needed. Thus was defeated the greatest French-Indian force
ever collected in the northwest. %

* The account of this action has been compiled from Mante, p. 226; Pouchot, vol. 1,
p. 192; and Garneau's History of Canada, vol. 2, pp. 250, 251, Bell's translation.

t Paris Documents, vol. 10, p. 1093.

\ Aubry returned to Louisiana and remained there until after the peace of 1763.
In 1765 he was appointed governor of Louisiana, and surrendered the colony, in March,.

THE DOWNFALL OF FKENCH RULE. 231

The next day after Aubry's defeat, near Fort Niagara, the fortress
surrendered.

After the surrender of Niagara and Fort Du Quesne, the Indian
allies of France retired to the deep recesses of the western forests,
and the English frontiers suffered no more from their depredations.
Settlements were gradually formed on the western side of the Alle-
ghanies, and they remained secure from Indian invasions.

In the meantime many Canadians, becoming satisfied that the
conquest of Canada was only a mere question of time, determined,
before that event took place, to remove to the French settlements
on the lower Mississippi. "Many of them accordingly departed
from Canada by way of the lakes, and thence through the Illinois
and Wabash Rivers to the Mississippi."*

After the surrender of Quebec, in 1759, Montreal became the
headquarters of the French in Canada, and in the spring of 1760
Mons. Levi, the French cornmander-in-chief, besieged Quebec. The
arrival of an English fleet compelled him to relinquish his designs.
Amherst and Johnson formed a junction, and advanced against
Montreal. The French governor of Canada, Marquis Vaudreil,
believing that further resistance was impossible, surrendered all
Canada to the English. This included the western posts of Detroit,
Mackinaw, Fort Miami, Ouiatanon, Yiiicennes, Fort St. Joseph,
etc.

After this war ceased to be waged in America, though the treaty
of Paris was not concluded until February, 1763, the most essential
parts of which are contained in the following extracts :

"In order to establish peace on solid and durable foundations,
and to remove forever all subjects of dispute with regard to the
limits of the British and French territories on the continent of
America, it is agreed that for the future the confines between the
dominions of his Britannic Majesty and those of His Most Christian
Majesty in that part of the world, shall be fixed irrevocably by a
line drawn along the middle of the River Mississippi from its source
to the River Iberville, and from thence by a line drawn along the
middle of this river and the lakes Maurepas and Pontchartrain, to
the sea ; and for this purpose the most Christian King cedes, in full
right, and guarantees to his Britannic Majesty, the river and port of
Mobile, and everything which he possesses, or ought to possess, on
the left side of the Mississippi, with the exception of the town of

1766, to the Spanish governor, Ulloa. _ After the expulsion of Ulloa, he held the
government until relieved by O'Reilly, in July, 1769. He soon afterward sailed for
France. The vessel was lost, and Aubry perished in the depths of the sea.
* Monette's Valley of the Mississippi, vol. 1, p. 305.

232 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

New Orleans and of the island on which it is situated ; it being well
understood that the navigation of the Mississippi shall be equally
free, as well to the subjects of Great Britain as to those of France,
in its whole length and breadth, from its source to the sea."*

Thus Gallic rule came to an end in North America. Its downfall
was the result of natural causes, and was owing largely to the differ-
ence between the Frenchmen and the Englishmen. The former, as
a rule, gave no attention to agriculture, but found occupation in
hunting and trading with the Indians, acquiring nomadic habits that
unfitted them for the cultivation of the soil ; their families dwelt in
villages separated by wide stretches of wilderness. While the able
men were hunting and trading, the old men, women and children
produced scanty crops sown in " common fields," or inclosures of a
piece of ground which were portioned off" among the families of the
village. The Englishman, on the other hand, loved to own land,
and pushed his improvements from the coast line up through all the
valleys extending westward. Reaching the summit of the Allegha-
nies, the tide of emigration flowed into the valleys beyond. Every
cabin was a fort, every advancing farm a new line of intrenchment.
The distinguishing characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon is consistency
and firmness in his designs, arid, more than all, his love for a home.
In the trials and hardships necessarily connected with the opening
up of the wilderness these traits come prominently into play. The
result was, that the English colonies prospered in a degree hitherto
unknown in the annals of the world's progress. And by way of con-
trast, how little did the French have to show in the way of lasting
improvements in the northwest after it had been in their possession
for nearly a century !

However, the very traits that disqualified the Gaul as a successful
colonist gave him a preeminent advantage over the Anglo-Saxon in
the influence he exerted upon the Indian. He did not want their

* "On the 3d day of the previous November, France, by a secret treaty ceded
to Spain all her possessions west of the Mississippi. His Most Christian Majesty
made known to the inhabitants of Louisiana the fact of the cession by a letter, dated
April 21, 1764. Don Ulloa, the New Spanish governor, arrived at New Orleans
in 1766. The French inhabitants objected to the transfer of Louisiana to Spain, and,
resorting to arms, compelled Ulloa to return to Havana. In 1769, O'Reilly, with a
Spanish force, arrived and took possession. He killed six of the ringleaders and sent
others to Cuba. Spain remained in possession of Louisiana until March, 1801, when
Louisiana was retroceded to the French republic. The French made preparations to
occupy Lousiana, and an army of twenty-five thousand men was designed for that
territory, but the fleet and army were suddenly blockaded in one of the ports of Hol-
land by an English squadron. This occurrence, together with the gloomy aspect of
affairs in Europe, induced Napoleon, who was then at the head of the French republic,
to cede Louisiana to the United States. The tneaty was dated April 30, 1803. The
actual transfer occurred in December of the same year." Vide Stoddard's Sketches of
Louisiana, pp. 71, 102.

FRENCH WAYS WITH THE INDIANS.

lands ; he fraternized with them, adopted their ways, and flattered
and pleased them. The Anglo-Saxon wanted their lands. From
the start he was clamorous for deeds and cessions of territory, and
at once began crowding the Indian out of the country. "The Iro-
quois told Sir Wm. Johnson that they believed soon they should not
be able to hunt a bear into a hole in a tree but some Englishman
would claim a right to the property of it, as being found in his
tree."*

The happiness which the Indians enjoyed from their intercourse
with the French was their perpetual theme ; it was their golden age.
"Those who are old enough to remember it speak of it with rap-
ture, and teach their children to venerate it, as the ancients did the
reign of Saturn. ' You call us your children, ' said an aged chief to
Gen. Harrison, ' why do you not make us happy, as our fathers the
French did? They never took from us our lands, which, indeed,
were in common between us. They planted where they pleased,
and cut wood where they pleased, and so did we ; but now, if a poor
Indian attempts to take a little bark from a tree to cover him from
the rain, up comes a white man and threatens to shoot him, claim-
ing the tree as his own.' "+

* Pownall's Administration of the Colonies,
t Memoirs of Gen. Harrison, p. 134.

CHAPTER XXII.

PONTIAC'S WAR TO RECOVER THE NORTHWEST FROM THE ENGLISH.

AFTEK the surrender of Canada to the English by the Marquis
Yaudreuil, Sir Jeffery Amherst, commander-in-chief of His Majesty's
forces in North America, ordered Major Robert Rogers to ascend
the lakes and take possession of the western forts. On the 13th of
September Rogers, with two hundred of his rangers, left Montreal.
After weeks of weary traveling, they readied the mouth of Cuyahoga,
River, the present site of Cleveland, on the 7th of November. Here
they were met by Pontiac, a celebrated Ottawa chieftain, who asked
Rogers what his intentions were, and how he dared enter that coun-
try without his permission. Rogers replied that the French had
been defeated ; that Canada was surrendered into the hands of the
British ; and that he was on his way to take possession of Detroit,
Mackinaw, Miamis and Ouitanon. He also proposed to restore a
general peace to white men and Indians alike. "Pontiac listened
with attention, but only replied that he should stand in the path of
the English until morning." In the morning he returned, and
allowed the English to advance. He said there would be no trouble
so long as they treated him with deference and respect.

Embarking on the 12th of November, they arrived in a few days
at Maumee Bay, at the western end of Lake Erie. The western
Indians, to the number of four hundred, had collected at the mouth
of Detroit River. They were determined to massacre the entire party
under Rogers. It afterward appeared that they were acting under
the influence of the French commandant at Detroit. Rogers pre-
vailed upon Pontiac to use his influence to induce the warlike
Indians to disband. After some parleying, Pontiac succeeded, and
the road was open to Detroit.

Before his arrival at Detroit Rogers had sent in advance Lieuten-
ant Brehm with a letter to Captain Beletre, the commandant, inform-
ing the latter that his garrison was included -in the surrender of
Canada. Beletre wholly disregarded the letter. He declared he
thought it was a trick of the English, and that they intended to
obtain possession of his fortress by treachery. He made use of
every endeavor to excite the Indians against the English. "He

2:!4

DETROIT SURRENDERED. 235-

displayed upon a pole, before the yelling multitude, the effigy of a
crow pecking a man's head, the crow representing himself, and the
head, observes Rogers, 'being meant for my own.' "*

Rogers then sent forward Captain Campbell "with a copy of the
capitulation and a letter from the Marquis Yaudreuil, directing that
the place should be given up in accordance with the articles agreed
upon between him and General Amherst." The French command-
ant could hold out no longer, and, much against his will, was com-
pelled to deliver the fortress to the English. The lilies of France
were lowered from the flagstaff, and their place was taken by the
cross of St. George. Seven hundred Indian warriors and their
families, all of whom had aided the French by murdering innocent
women and children on the frontiers of Pennsylvania and New York,
greeted the change with demoniacal yells of apparent pleasure ; but
concealed in their breasts was a natural dislike for the English.
Dissembling for the present, they kept their hatred to themselves,
for the late successes of British arms had awed them into silence.

It was on the 29th of November, 1760, that Detroit was given,
over to the English. The garrison, as prisoners of war, were taken
to Philadelphia.

Rogers sent an officer up the Maumee, and from thence down the
Wabash, to take possession of the posts at the portage and at Oui-
atanon. Both of these objects were attained without any difficulty.

On- account of the lateness of the season the detachment which
had started for Mackinaw returned to Detroit, and all efforts against
the posts on the upper lakes were laid as'ide until the following sea-
son. In that year the English took possession of Mackinaw, Green
Bay and St. Joseph. The French still retained possession of Vin-
cennes and Fort Chartes.f

It always was the characteristic policy of the French to render
the savages dependent upon them, and with that design in view they
had earnestly endeavored to cultivate among the Indians a desire for
European goods. By prevailing upon the Indians to throw aside
hides and skins of wild beasts for clothing of European manufacture,
to discontinue the use of their pottery for cooking utensils of iron,
to exchange the bow and arrow and stone weapons for the gun, the
knife and hatchet of French manufacture, it was thought that in the
course of one or two generations they would become dependent upon
their French neighbors for the common necessaries of life. When

* Parkman's Conspiracy of Pontiac, p. 150.

fThis account of the delivery of the western forts to Rogers has been collated from
his Journal and from Parkman's Conspiracy of Pontiac.

236 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

this change in their customs had taken place, by simply withholding
the supply of ammunition they could coerce the savages to adopt any
measures that the French government saw fit to propose. The pol-
icy of the French was not to force, but to lead, the savages into sub-
jection. They told the barbarians that they were the children of the
great king, who had sent his people among them to preserve them
from their implacable enemies, the English. Flattering them, asking
their advice, bestowing upon them presents, and, above all, showing
them respect and deference, the French gained the good will of the
savages in a degree that no other European nation ever equaled.
After the surrender of the western posts all this was changed. The
accustomed presents formerly bestowed upon them were withheld.
English traders robbed, bullied and cheated them. English officers
treated them with rudeness and contempt. But, most of all, the
steady advance of the English colonists over the mountains, occupy-
ing their lands, driving away their game, and forcing them to retire
farther west, alarmed and exasperated the aborigines to the limit of
endurance. "The wrongs and neglect the Indians felt were inflamed
by the French coureurs de bois and traders. They had every motive
to excite the tribes against the English, such as their national rancor,
their religious antipathies, and most especially the fear of losing the
profitable Indian trade." Every effort was made to excite and in-
flame the slumbering passions of the tribes of the Northwest. Secret
councils were held, and different plans for obtaining possession of
the western fortresses were discussed. The year after Rogers ob-
tained Detroit there was, in the summer, an outbreak, but it was
easily quelled, being only local. The next year, also, there was
another disturbance, but it, like the former, did not spread.

During these two years one Indian alone, Pontiac, compre-
hended the situation. He read correctly the signs and portents of
the times. He well knew that English supremacy on the North
American continent meant the destruction of his race. He saw the
great difference between the English and the French. The former
were settlers, the latter traders. The French came to the far west
for their beaver skins and peltries, while the English would only be
satisfied with their lands. Pontiac soon arrived at the conclusion
that unless the ceaseless flow of English immigration was stopped,
it would not be many decades before the Indian race would be
driven from the face of the earth. Well has time justified this opin-
ion of the able Indian chieftain !

To accomplish his designs. Pontiac was well aware that he must
induce all the tribes of the northwest to join him. Even then he

PONTIAC'S WAR. 237

had doubts of final success. To encourage him, the French traders
informed him " that the English had stolen Canada while their com-
mon father was asleep at Versailles ; that he would soon awaken and
again wrest his domains from the intruders ; that even now large
French armies were on their way up the St. Lawrence and Missis-
sippi rivers." Pontiac believed these tales, for let it be borne in
mind that this was previous to the treaty of Paris, and late in the
autumn of 1762 he sent emissaries with black wampum and the red
tomahawk to the villages of the Ottawas, Pottawatomies, Sacs,
Foxes, Menominees, Illinois, Miamis, Shawnees, Delawares, Wyan-
dots, Kickapoos and Senecas. These emissaries were instructed to
inform the various tribes that the English had determined to exter-
minate the northwestern Indians ; to accomplish this they intended
to erect numerous fortifications in the territory named ; and also
that the English had induced the southern Indians to aid them.* To
avert these inimical designs of the English, the messengers of Pon-
tiac proposed that on a certain day all the tribes, by concerted action,
should seize all the English posts and then attack the whole English
border.

Pontiac' s plan was contrived and developed with wonderful
secrecy, and all of a sudden the conspiracy burst its fury simultane-
ously over all the forts held by the British west of the Alleghanies.
By stratagem or forcible assault every garrison west of Pittsburgh,
excepting Detroit, was captured.

Fort St. Joseph, on the river of that name, in the present state of
Michigan, was captured by the Pottawatomies. These emissaries of
Pontiac collected about the fort on the 23d of May, 1763, and under
the guise of friendship effected an entrance within the palisades,
when they suddenly turned upon and massacred the whole garrison,
except the commandant, Ensign Slussee and three soldiers, whom
they made prisoners and sent to Detroit.

The Ojibbeways effected an entry within the defenses of Fort
Mackinaw, the gate being left open while the Indians were amusing
the officer and soldiers with a game of ball. In the play the ball
was knocked over within the palisade. The players, hurrying
through the gates, seemingly intent on regaining the ball, seized
their knives and guns from beneath the blankets of their squaws,
where they had been purposely concealed, and commenced an indis-
criminate massacre, f

* The Chickasaws and Cherokees were at that time, though on their own responsi-
bility, waging war aginst some of the tribes of the northwest.

fA detailed account of this most horrible massacre is given by the fur-trader Alex-

238 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Ensign Holmes, who was in command at Fort Miami,* learned
that to the Miamis in the vicinity of his post was allotted the de-
struction of his garrison. Holmes collected the Indians in an
assembly, and charged them with forming a conspiracy against his
post. They confessed ; said that they were influenced by hostile
Indians, and promised to relinquish their designs. The village of
Pontiac was within a short distance of the post, and some of his im-
mediate followers doubtless attended the assembly. Holmes sup-
posed he had partially allayed their irritation, as appears from a
letter written ftom him to Major Gladwyn.f

On the 27th of May a young Indian squaw, who was the mistress
of Holmes, requested him to visit a sick Indian woman who lived in
a wigwam near at hand. "Having confidence in the girl, Holmes
followed her out of the fort." Two Indians, who were concealed
behind the hut, as he approached it, fired and "stretched him life-
less on the ground." The sergeant rushed outside of the palisade
to learn the cause of the firing. He was immediately seized by the
Indians. The garrison, who by this time had become thoroughly
alarmed, and had climbed upon the palisades, was ordered to surren-
der by one Godefroy, a Canadian. They were informed, if they
submitted their lives would be spared, otherwise they all would be
massacred. Having lost their officers and being in great terror, they
threw open the gate and gave themselves up as prisoners. Accord-
ing to tradition, the garrison was afterward massacred.;}:

Fort Ouiatanon was under the command of Lieut. Jenkins, who
had no suspicion of any Indian troubles, and on the 1st of June,
when he was requested by some of the Indians to visit them in their
cabins near by, he unhesitatingly complied with the request. Upon
his entering the hut he was immediately seized by the Indian war-
riors. Through various other stratagems of a similar nature several
of the soldiers were also taken. Jenkins was then told to have the
soldiers in the fort surrender. "For," said the Indians, "should
your men kill one of our braves, we shall put you all to death."

ander Henry, an eye-witness and one of the few survivors, in his interesting Book of
Travels and Adventures, p. 85.

* Now Fort Wayne.

FORT MIAMIS, March 30th, 1763.

f Since my Last Letter to You, wherein I Acquainted You of the Bloody Belt being
in this Village, I have made all the search I could about it, and have found it not to be
True; Whereon I Assembled all the chiefs of this Nation, & after a long and trouble-
some Spell with them, I Obtained the Belt, with a Speech, as You will Receive En-
closed; This affair is very timely Stopt, and I hope the News of a Peace will put a
Stop to any further Troubles with these Indians, who are the Principal Ones of Setting
Mischief on Foot. I send you the Belt, with this Packet, which I hope You will For-
ward to the General.

| Brice's History of Fort Wayne.

PONTIAC'S FAILURE. 239

Jenkins thinking that resistance would be useless, ordered the re-
maining soldiers to deliver the fort to the Indians. During the
night the Indians resolved to break their plighted word, and mas-
sacre all their prisoners. Two of the French residents, M. M. Mai-
gonville and Lorain, gave the Indians valuable presents, including
wampum, brandy, etc., and thus preserved the lives of the English
captives. Jenkins, in his letter to Major Gladwyn, commandant at
Detroit, states that the Weas were not favorably inclined toward
Pontiac's designs ; but being coerced by the surrounding tribes, they
undertook to carry out their part of the programme. Well did they
succeed. Lieut. Jenkins, with the other prisoners, were, within a
few days afterward, sent across the prairies of Illinois to Fort Char-
tres.

Detroit held out, though regularly besieged by Pontiac in person,
for more than fifteen months, when, at last, the suffering garrison
was relieved by the approach of troops under Gen. Bradstreet. In
the meantime Pontiac confederates, wearied and disheartened by the
protracted struggle, longed for peace. Several tribes abandoned the
declining fortune of Pontiac ; and finally the latter gave up the con-
test, and retired to the neighborhood of Fort Miamis. Here he
remained for several months, when he went westward, down the
Wabash and across the prairies to Fort Chartres. The latter fort
remained in possession of a French officer, not having been as yet
surrendered to the English, the hostility of the Indians preventing
its delivery; and by agreements of the two governments, France
and England, it was left in charge of the veteran St.'Ange.

The English having acquired the territory herein considered, by
conquest and treaty, from France, renewed their efforts to reclaim
authority over it from its aboriginal inhabitants. To effect this
object, they now resort to conciliation and diplomacy. They sent
westward George Croghan.*

After closing a treaty with the Indians at Fort Pitt, Croghan
started on his mission on the 15th of May 1765, going down the
Ohio in two bateaux. His movements were known to the hostile

* Croghan was an old trader who had spent his life among the Indians, and was
versed in their language, ways and habits of thought, and who well knew how to flat-
ter and cajole them. Besides this, Croghan enjoyed the advantage of a personal ac-
quaintance with many of the chiefs and principal men of the Wabash tribes, who had
met him while trading at Pickawillany and other places where he had trading estab-
lishments. Among the Miami, Wea and Piankashaw bands Croghan had many Indian
friends whose attachments toward him were very warm. He was a veteran, up to all
the arts of the Indian council house, and had in years gone by conducted many impor-
tant treaties between the authorities of New York and Pennsylvania with the Iroquois,
Delawares and Shawnees. In the war for the fur trade Croghan suffered severely; the
French captured his traders, confiscated his goods, and bankrupted his fortune.

240 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

tribes. A war party of eighty Kickapoos and Mascoutins, " spirited
up " to the act by the French traders at Ouiatanon, as Croghan says
in his Journal, left the latter place, and captured Croghan and his
party at daybreak on the 8th of June, in the manner narrated in a
previous chapter.* He was carried to Vincennes, his captors con-
ducting him a devious course through marshes, tangled forests and
small prairie, to the latter place, f

After Croghan had procured wearing apparel (his captors had
stripped him well-nigh naked) and purchased some horses he
crossed the Wabash, and soon entered the great prairie which he
describes in extracts we have already taken from his journal. His
route was up through Crawford, Edgar and Vermilion counties, fol-
lowing the old traveled trail running along the divide between the
Embarrass and the Wabash, and which was a part of the great high-
way leading from Detroit to Kaskaskia ; ^ crossed the Yermilion
River near Danville, thence along the trail through Warren county,
Indiana. Croghan, still a prisoner in charge of his captors, reached
Ouiatonon on the afternoon of the 23d of June. Here the Weas,

*P. 161.

f Croghan, in his Journal, says: " I found Vincennes a village of eighty or ninety
French families, settled on the east side of the river, being one of the finest situations
that can be found. The French inhabitants hereabouts are an idle, lazy people, a
parcel of renegadoes from Canada, and are much worse than the Indians. They took
secret pleasure at our misfortune, and the moment we arrived they came to the Indians,
exchanging trifles for their valuable plunder. Here is likewise an Indian village of
Piankashaws, who were much displeased with the party that took me, telling them
that ' our and your chiefs are gone to make peace, and you have begun war, for which
our women and children, will have reason to cry. 1 Port Vincent is a place of great
consequence for trade, being a fine hunting country all along the Wabash."

\ That part of the route from Kaskaskia east, from the earliest settlement of Illi-
nois and Indiana, was called "the old Vincennes trace." "This trace," says Gov.
Reynolds, in his Pioneer History of Illinois, p. 79, "was celebrated in Illinois. The
Indians laid it out more than one hundred and fifty years ago. It commenced at
Detroit, thence to Ouiatonon, on the Wabash, thence to Vincennes and thence to Kas-
kaskia. It was the Appian way of Illinois in ancient times. It is yet (in 1852) visible
in many places between Kaskaskia and Vincennes." It was also visible for years after
the white settlements began, between the last place, the Vermilion and Ouiatonon, on
the route described. [AUTHOR.

Croghan says of Ouiatonon that there were "about fourteen French families liv-
ing in the fort, which stands on the north side of the river; that the Kickapoos and
Mascoutins, whose warriors had taken us, live nigh the fort, on the same side of the
river, where they have two villages, and the Ouicatonons or Wawcottonans [as Croghan
variously spells the name of the Weasj have a village on the south side of the river."
" On the south side of the Wabash runs a high bank, in which are several very fine
coal mines, and behind this bank is a very large meadow, clear for several miles." The
printer made a mistake in setting up Croghan 's manuscript, or else Croghan himself
committed an unintentional error in his diary in substituting the word south for north
in describing the side of the river on which the appearances of coal banks are found. The
only locality on the banks of the Wabash, above the Vermilion, where the carbonifer-
ous shales resembling coal are exposed is on the west, or north bank, of the river, about
four miles above Independence, at a place known as ""Black Rock," which, says Prof.
Collett, in his report on the geology of Warren county, Indiana, published in the Geolog-
ical Survey of Indiana for 1873, pp. 224-5, " is a notable and romantic feature in the river
scenery." "A precipitous or overhanging cliff exhibits an almost sheer descent of a

SUCCESS OF CKOGHAN'S MISSION. 241

from the opposite side of the river, took great interest in Mr.
Croghan, and were deeply "concerned at what had happened.
They charged the Ivickapoos and Mascoutins to take the greatest
care of him, and the Indians and white men captured with him, until
their chiefs should arrive from Fort Chartres, whither the} 7 had gone,
some time before, to meet him, and who were necessarily ignorant of
his being captured on his way to the same place." From the 4th to
the 8th of July Croghan held conferences with the Weas, Pianke-
shaws, Kickapoos and Mascoutins, in which, he says, "I was lucky
enough to reconcile those nations to His Majesty's interests, and ob-
tained their consent to take possession of the posts in their country
which the French formerly possessed, and they oflered their services
should any nation oppose our taking such possession, all of which they
confirmed by four large pipes."* On the llth a messenger arrived
from Fort Chartres requesting the Indians to take Croghan and his
party thither ; and as Fort Chartres was the place to which he had
originally designed going, he desired the chiefs to get ready to set
out with him for that place as soon as possible. On the 13th the
chiefs from "the Miamis" came in and renewed their "ancient
friendship with His Majesty." On the 18th Croghan, with his party
and the chiefs of the Miami arid other tribes we have mentioned,
forming an imposing procession, started off across the country
toward Fort Chartres. On the way (neither Croghan' s official report
or his private journal show the place) they met the great "Pontiac
himself, together with the deputies of the Iroquois, Delawares and
Shawnees,f who had gone on around to Fort Chartres with Capt.

hundred and forty feet to the Wabash, at its foot. The top is composed of yellow, red,
brown or black conglomerate sandrock, highly ferruginous, and in part pebbly. At the
base of the sandrock, where it joins upon the underlying carbonaceous and pyritous
shales are 'pot 'or 'rock-houses,' which so constantly accompany this formation in
southern Indiana. Some of these, of no great height, have been tunneled back under
the cliff to a distance of thirty or forty feet by force of the ancient river once flowing
at this level." The position, in many respects, is like Starved Rock, on the Illinois,
where La Salle built Fort St. Louis, and commands a fine view of the Wea plains,
across the river eastward, and, before the recent growth of timber, of an arm of the
Grand Prairie to the westward. The stockade fort and trading-post of Ouiatonon has
often been confounded with the Wea villages, which were strung for several miles along
the margin of the prairie, near the river, between Attica and LaFayette, on the south
or east side of the river; and some writers have mistaken it for the village of Keth-
tip-e-ca-nuk, situated on the north bank of the Wabash River, near the mouth of the
Tippecanoe. The fort was abandoned as a military post after its capture from the
British by the Indians. It was always a place of considerable trade to the English, as
well as the French. Thomas Hutchins, in his Historical and Topographical Atlas, pub-
lished in 1778, estimates " the annual amount of skins and furs obtained at Ouiatonon
at forty thousand dollars."

* Croghan's official report to Sir Wm. Johnson : London Documents, vol. 7. p. 780.

t These last-named Indian deputies, with Mr. Frazer,had gone down the Ohio with
Croghan, and thence on to Fort Chartres. Not hearing anything from Croghan, or
knowing what had become of him, Pontiac and these Indian deputies, on learning that
Croghan was at Ouiatanon, set out for that place to meet him.
16

242 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Frazer. The whole party, with deputies from the Illinois Indians,
now returned to Ouiatanon, and there held another conference, in
which were settled all matters with the Illinois Indians. " Pontiac
and the Illinois deputies agreed to everything which the other tribes
had conceded in the previous conferences at Ouiatanon, all of which
was ratified with a solemn formality of pipes and belts."*

Here, then, upon the banks of the AVabash at Ouiatonon, did the
Indian tribes, with the sanction of Pontiac, solemnly surrender pos-
session of the northwest territory to the accredited agent of Great
Britain, f Croghan and -his party, now swollen to a large body by
the accession of the principal chiefs of the several nations, set out
"for the Miamis, and traveled the whole way through a fine rich
bottom, alongside the Ouabache, arriving at Eel River on the 27th.
About six miles up this river they found a small village of the
Twightwec, situated on a very delightful spot of ground on the bank
of the river.";}: Croghah's private journal continues: "-July 28th,
29th, 30th and 31st we traveled still alongside the Eel River, passing
through fine clear woods and some good meadows, though not so
large as those we passed some days before. The country is more
overgrown with woods, the soil is sufficiently rich, and well watered
with springs."

On the 1st of August they "arrived at the carrying place be-
tween the River Miamis and the Ouabache, which is about nine miles
long in dry seasons, but not above half that length in freshets."
"Within a mile of the Twightwee village," says Croghan, "I was
met by the chiefs of that nation, who received us very kindly. Most
part of these Indians knew me, and conducted me to their village,
where they immediately hoisted an English flag that / had formerly
given them at Fort Pitt. The next day they held a council, after
which they gave me up all the English prisoners they had, and ex-
pressed the pleasure it gave them to see [that] the unhappy differ-
ences which had embroiled the several nations in a war with their
brethren, the English, were now so near a happy conclusion, and
that peace was established in their country. "

*Croghan's official report, already quoted.

f It is true that Pontiac, with deputies of all the westward tribes, followed Croghan
to Detroit, where another conference took place; but this was only a more formal rati-
fication of the surrender which the Indians declared they had already made of the
country at Ouiatonon.

JThe Miami Indian name of this village was Ke-na-pa-com-a-qua. Its French
name was A 1'Anguillo, or Eel River town. The Miami name of Eel River was Kin-
na-peei-knoh Sepe, or Water Snake (the Indians call the eel a water-snake fish) River.
The village was situated on the north bank of Eel River, about six miles from Logans-
port. It was scattered alone: the river for some three miles.

The following is Mr. Croghan's description of the "Miamis," as it appeared in

POXTIAC'S TRAGIC DEATH. 24o

From the Miamis the party proceeded down the Maumee in
canoes. "About ninety miles, continues the journal, from the Miamis
or Twightwee we came to where a large river, that heads in a large
^lickS falls into the Miami River; this they call 'The Forks.'
The Ottawas claim this country and hunt here.* This nation for-
merly lived at Detroit, but are now settled here on account of the
richness of the country, where game is always to be found in plenty."

From Defiance Croghan' s party were obliged to drag their canoes
several miles, "on account of the riffs which interrupt the naviga-
tion," at the end of which they came to a village of Wyandottes, who
received them kindly. From thence they proceeded in their canoes
to the mouth of the Maurnee. Passing several large bays and a
number of rivers, they reached the Detroit River on the 16th of
August, and Detroit on the following morning, f

As for Pontiac, his fate was tragical. He was fond of the French,
and often visited the Spanish post at St. Louis, whither many of his
old friends had gone from the Illinois side of the river. One day in
1767, as is supposed, he came to Mr. St. Ange (this veteran soldier
of France still remained in the country), and said he was going over
to Cahokia to visit the Kaskaskia Indians. St. Ange endeavored to
dissuade him from it, reminding him of the little friendship existing
between him and the British. Pontiac' s answer was : "Captain, I
am a man. I know how to fight. I have always fought openly.
They will not murder me, and if any one attacks me as a brave man,

1765: " The Twightwee village is situated on both sides of a river called St. Joseph's.
This river, where it falls into the Miami River, about a quarter of a mile from this
place, is one hundred yards wide, on the east side of which stands a stockade fort some-
what ruinous." The Indian village consists of about forty or fifty cabins, besides nine
or ten French houses, a runaway colony from Detroit during the late Indian war; they
were concerned in it, and being afraid of punishment came to this post, where they
have ever since spirited up the Indians against the English. All the French residing
here are a lazy, indolent people, fond of breeding mischief, and they should not be
suffered to remain. The country is pleasant, the soil rich and well watered."

*The place referred to is the mouth of the Auglaize, often designated as "The
Forks " in many of the early accounts of the country. It may be noted that Croghan,
like nearly all other early travelers, overestimates distances.

t Croghan describes Detroit as a large stockade "inclosing about eighty houses. It
stands on the north side of the river on a high bank, and commands a very pleasant
prospect for nine miles above and below the fort. The country is thick settled with
French. Their plantations are generally laid out about three or four acres in breadth
on the river, and eighty acres in depth; the soil is good, producing plenty of grain.
All the people here are generally poor wretches, and consist of three or four hundred
French families, a lazy, idle people, depending chiefly on the savages for their subsist-
ence. Though the land, with little labor, produces plenty of grain, they scarcely raise as
much as will supply their wants, in imitation of Indians, whose manners and customs
they have entirely adopted, and cannot subsist without them. The men, women and
children speak the Indian tongue perfectly well." At the conclusion of the lengthy
conferences with the Indians, in which all matters were " settled to their satisfaction,"
Croghan set out from Detroit for Niagara, coasting along the north shore of Lake Erie
in a birch canoe, arriving at the latter place on the 8th of October.

244 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

I am his match." Pontiac went over the river, was feasted, got
drunk, and retired to the woods to sing medicine songs. In the
meanwhile, an English merchant named Williamson bribed a Kas-
kaskia Indian with a barrel of rum and promises of a greater reward
if he would take Pontiac' s life. Pontiac was struck with a pa-ka-
ma-gon tomahawk, and his skull fractured, causing death. This
murder aroused the vengeance of all the Indian tribes friendly to
Pontiac, and brought about the war resulting in the almost total ex-
termination of the Illinois nation. He was a remarkably fine-looking
man, neat in his person, and tasty in dress and in the arrangement
of his ornaments. His complexion is said to have approached that
of the whites.* St. Ange, hearing of Pontiac' s death, kindly took
charge of the body, and gave it a decent burial near the fort, the
site of which is now covered by the city of St. Louis. "Neither
mound nor tablet," says Francis Parkman, "marked the burial-
place of Pontiac. For a mausoleum a city has arisen above the for-
est hue, and the race whom he hated with such burning rancor tram-
ple with unceasing footsteps over his forgotten grave."

*I. N. Nicollet's Report, etc., p. 81. Mr. Nicollet received his information con-
cerning Pontiac from Col. Pierre Chouteau, of St. Louis, and Col. Pierre Menard, of
Kaskaskia, who were personally acquainted with the facts.

CHAPTER XXIII.

GEN. CLARK'S CONQUEST OF "THE ILLINOIS."

AFTER the Indians had submitted to English rule the west en-
joyed a period of quiet. When the American colonists, long com-
plaining against the oppressive acts of the mother country, broke
out into open revolt, and the war of the revolution fairly began,
the English, from the westward posts of Detroit, Vincennes and
Kaskaskia, incited the Indians
against the frontier settlements,
and from these depots supplied
their war parties with guns and
ammunition. The Depredations
of the Indians in Kentucky were
so severe that in the fall of 17T7
George Rogers Clark conceived,
and next year executed, an expe-
dition against the French settle-
ments of Kaskaskia and Vin-
cennes, which not only relieved
Kentucky from the incursions
of the savages, but at the same
time resulted in consequences
which are without parallel in the
annals of the Northwest.*

*Gen. Clark was born in Albemarle county, Virginia, on the 19th of November,
1752, and died and was buried at Locust Grove, near Louisville, Kentucky, in February,
1818. He came to Kentucky in the spring of 1775, and became early identified as a
conspicuous leader in the border wars of that country. The border settlers of Kentucky
could not successfully contend against the numerous and active war parties from the
Wabash who were continually lurking in their neighborhoods, coming, as Indians do,
stealthily, striking a blow where least expected, and escaping before assistance could
relieve the localities which they devastated, killing women and children, destroying
live stock and bvirning the pioneers 1 cabins. Clark conceived the idea of capturing
Vincennes and Kaskaskia. Keeping his plans to himself, he proceeded to Williams-
burg and laid them before Patrick Henry, then governor of Virginia, who promptly
aided in their execution. From Gov. Henry Clark received two sets of instructions,
one, to enlist seven companies of men, ostensibly for the protection of the people of
Kentucky, which at that time was a county of Virginia, the other, a secret order, to
attack the British post of Kaskaskia! The result of his achievements was overshad-
owed by the stirring events of the revolution eastward of the Alleghanies, where other
heroes were winning a glory that dazzled while it drew public attention exclusively to

>45

24(5 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

The account here given of Clark's campaign in "The Illinois'" is
taken from a manuscript memoir composed by Clark himself, at the
joint request of Presidents Jefferson and Madison.* We prefer
giving the account in -Gen. Clark's own words, as far as practicable.

The memoir of Gen. Clark proceeds: "On the (24th) of June,
1778, we left our little island, + and run about a mile up the river in
order to gain the main channel, and shot the falls at the very mo-
ment of the sun being in a great eclipse, which caused various con-
jectures among the superstitious. As I knew that spies were kept
on the river below the towns of the Illinois, I had resolved to march
part of the way by land, and of course left the whole of our bag-
gage, except as much as would equip us in the Indian mode. The
whole of our force, after leaving such as was judged not competent
to [endure] the expected fatigue, consisted only of four companies,
commanded by Captains John Montgomery, Joseph Bowman,
Leonard Helms and William Ilarrod. My force being so small to
what I expected, owing to the various circumstances already men-
tioned, I found it necessary to alter, my plans of operation.

"I had fully acquainted myself that the French inhabitants in
those western settlements had great influence among the Indians in
general, and were more beloved by them than any other Europeans ;
that their commercial intercourse was universal throughout the west-
ern and northwestern countries, and that the governing interest on
the lakes was mostly in the hands of the English, who were not
much beloved by them. These, and many other ideas similar
thereto, caused me to resolve, if possible, to strengthen myself by
such train of conduct as might probably attach the French inhabit-
ants to our interest, and give us influence in the country we were
aiming for. These were the principles that influenced my future-
conduct, and, fortunately, I had just received a letter from Col.

them. The west was a wilderness, excepting the isolated French settlements about
Kaskaskia, and at Vincennes and Detroit, and occupied only by savages and wild
animals. It was not until after the great Northwest began to be settled, and its capa-
bilities to sustain the empire, since seated in its lap, was realized, that the magni-
tude of the conquest forced itself into notice. The several states of Ohio, Indiana,
Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, carved out of the territory which he so gloriously
won, nay, the whole nation, owe to the memory of George Rogers Clark a debt of
gratitude that cannot be repaid in a mere expression of words. An account of his life
and eminent services, worthy of the man, yet remains to be written.

*.Iudge John B. Dillon, when preparing his first history of Indiana, in 1843, had
access to Clark's original manuscript memoir, and copied copious extracts in the vol-
ume named, and it is from this source that the extracts appearing in this work were
taken. This book of Judge Dillon is not to be confounded with a History of Indiana^
prepared and published by him in 1859. His first book, although somewhat crude, is
exceedingly valuable for the historical matter it contains relating to the whole North-
west, while the latter is a better digested history of the state of which he was an emi-
nent citizen.

t At Louisville.

CLARK'S CAMPAIGN. 247

Campbell, dated Pittsburgh, informing me of the contents of the
treaties* between France and America. As I intended to leave the
Ohio at Fort Massac, three leagues below the Tennessee, I landed
on a small island in the mouth of that river, in order to prepare for
the march. In a few hours after, one John Duff and a party of
hunters coming down the river were brought to by our boats. They
were men formerly from the states, and assured us of their happiness
in the adventure. . . . They had been but lately from Kaskaskia,
and were able to give us all the intelligence we wished. They said
that Gov. Abbot had lately left Port Yincennes, and gone to Detroit
on business of importance ; that Mr. Rochblave commanded at Kas-
kaskia, etc. ; that the militia was kept in good order, and spies on
the Mississippi, and that all hunters, both Indians and others, were
ordered to keep a good look-out for the rebels ; that the fort was kept
in good order as .an asylum, etc., but they believed the whole to
proceed more from the fondness for parade than the expectation of
a visit ; that if they received timely notice of us, they would collect
and give us a warm reception, as they were taught to harbor a most
horrid idea of the rebels, especially the Virginians ; but that if we
could surprise the place, which they were in hopes we might, they
made no doubt of our being able to do as we pleased ; that they
hoped to be received as partakers in the enterprise, and wished us
to put full confidence in them, and they would assist the guides in
conducting the party. This was agreed to, and they proved valua-
ble men.

"The acquisition to us was great, as I had no intelligence from
those posts since the spies I sent twelve months past. But no part
of their information pleased me more than that of the inhabitants
viewing us as more savage than their neighbors, the Indians. I was
determined to improve upon this if I was fortunate enough to get
them into my possession, as I conceived the greater the shock I
could give them at first, the more sensibly would they feel my lenity,
and become more valuable friends. This I conceived to be agree-
able to human nature, as I had observed it in many instances.
Having everything prepared, we moved down to a little gully a
small distance above Massac, in which we concealed our boats, and
set out a northwest course. The weather was favorable. In some
parts water was scarce, as well as game. Of course we suffered
drought and hunger, but not to excess. On the third day John

*The timely information received of the alliance between the United States and
France was made use of by Gen. Clark with his usual tact and with great success, as
will be seen farther on.

248 HISTORIC NOTES OX THE NORTHWEST.

Saunders, our principal guide, appeared confused, and we soon dis-
covered that he was totally lost, without there was some other cause
of his present conduct.

" I asked him various questions, and from his answers I could
scarcely determine what to think of him, whether or not that he
was lost, or that he wished to deceive us. ... The cry of the whole
detachment was that he was a traitor. He begged that he might be
suifered to go some distance into a plain that was in full view, to try
to make some discovery whether or not he was right. I told him he
might go, but that I was suspicious of him, from his conduct ; that
from the first day of his being employed he always said he knew the
way well ; that there was now a different appearance ; that I saw the
nature of the country was such that a person once acquainted with
it could not in a short time forget it ; that a few men should go with
him to prevent his escape, and that if he did not discover and take
us into the hunter's road that led from the east into Kaskaskia,
which he had frequently described, I would have him immediately
put to death, which I was determined to have done. But after a
search of an hour or two he came to a place that he knew perfectly,
and we discovered that the poor fellow had been, as they call it,
bewildered.

" On the fourth of July, in the evening, we got within a few miles
of the town, where we lay until near dark, keeping spies ahead, after
which we commenced our march, and took possession of a house
wherein a large family lived, on the bank of the Kaskaskia River,
about three-quarters of a mile above the town. Here we were in-
formed that the people a few days before were under arms, but had
concluded that the cause of the alarm was without foundation, and
that at that time there was a great number of men in town, but that
the Indians had generally left it, and at present all was quiet. We
soon procured a sufficiency of vessels, the more in ease to convey us
across the river.

"With one of the divisions I marched to the fort, and ordered the
other two into different quarters of the town.' If I met with no resist-
ance, at a certain signal a general shout was to be given and certain
parts were to be immediately possessed, and men of each detach-
ment, who could speak the French language, were to run through
every street and proclaim what had happened, and inform the inhab-
itants that every person that appeared in the streets would be shot
down. This disposition had its desired effect. In a very little time
we had complete possession, and every avenue was guarded to prevent
any escape to give the alarm to the other villages in case of opposi-

CLARK'S CONQUEST. :M;>

tion. Various orders had been issued not worth mentioning. I don't
suppose greater silence ever reigned among the inhabitants of a
place than did at this at present ; not a person to be seen, not a word
to be heard by them, for some time, but, designedly, the greatest
noise kept up by our troops through every quarter of the town, and
patrols continually the whole night around it, as intercepting any
information was a capital object, and in about two hours the whole
of the inhabitants were disarmed, and informed that if one was taken
attempting to make his escape he should be immediately put to
death."

When Col. Clark, by the use of various bloodless means, had
raised the terror of the French inhabitants to a painful height, he
surprised them, and won their confidence and friendship, by perform-
ing, unexpectedly, several acts of justice and generosity. On the
morning of the 5th of July a few of the principal men were arrested
and put in irons. Soon afterward M. Gibault, the priest of the vil-
lage, accompanied by five or six aged citizens, waited on Col. Clark,
and said that the inhabitants expected to be separated, perhaps never
to meet again, and they begged to be permitted to assemble in their
church, and there to take leave of each other. Col. Clark mildly
told the priest that he had nothing to say against his religion ; that
it was a matter which Americans left for every man to settle with his
God ; that the people might assemble in their church, if they would,
but that they must not venture out of town.

]STearly the whole French population assembled at the church.
The houses were deserted by all who could leave them, and Col.
Clark gave orders to prevent any soldiers from entering the vacant
buildings. After the close of the meeting at the church a deputation,
consisting of M. Guibault and several other persons, waited on Col.
Clark, and said "that their present situation was the fate of war, and
that they could submit to the loss of their property, but they solic-
ited that they might not be separated from their wives and children,
and that some clothes and provisions might be allowed for their
support." Clark feigned surprise at this request, and abruptly
exclaimed, "Do you mistake us for savages? I am almost cer-
tain you do from your language ! Do you think that Americans
intend to strip women and children, or take the bread out of their
mouths? My countrymen," said Clark, "disdain to make war
upon helpless innocence. It was to prevent the horrors of Indian
butchery upon, our own wives and children that we have taken arms
and penetrated into this remote stronghold of British and Indian
barbarity, and not the despicable prospect of plunder; that now the

250 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

king of France had united his powerful arms with those of America,
the war would not, in all probability, continue long, but the inhabit-
ants of Kaskaskia were at liberty to take which side they pleased,
without the least danger to either their property or families. Nor
would their religion be any source of disagreement, as all religions
were regarded with equal respect in the eye of the American law,
and that any insult offered to it would be immediately punished."

"And now," Clark continues, "to prove my sincerity, you will
please inform your fellow-citizens that they are quite at liberty to
conduct themselves as usual, without the least apprehension. I am
now convinced, from what I have learned since my arrival among
you, that you have been misinformed and prejudiced against us by
British officers, and your friends who are in confinement shall imme-
diately be released."* In a few minutes after the delivery of this
speech the gloom that rested on the minds of the inhabitants of
Kaskaskia had passed away. The news of the treaty of alliance
between France and the United States, and the influence of the mag-
nanimous conduct of Clark, induced the French villagers to take the
oath of allegiance to the state of Virginia. Their arms were restored
to them, and a volunteer company of French militia joined a detach-
ment under Capt. Bowman, when that officer was dispatched to take
possession of Cahokia. The inhabitants of this small village, on
hearing what had taken place at Kaskaskia, readily took the oath of
allegiance to Virginia.

The memoir of Clark proceeds: " Post Vincennes never being
out of my mind, and from some things that I had learned I suspected
that Mr. Gibault, the priest, was inclined to the American interest
previous to our arrival in the country. He had great influence over
the people at this period, and Post Vincennes was under his juris-
diction. I made no doubt of his integrity to us. I sent for him,
and had a long conference with him on the subject of Post Vincennes.
In answer to all my queries he informed me that he did not think it
worth my while to cause any military preparation to be made at the
Falls of the Ohio for the attack of Post Vincennes, although the place
was strong and a great number of Indians in its neighborhood, who,
to his knowledge, were generally at war; that the governor had, a.
few weeks before, left the place on some business to Detroit ; that
he expected that when the inhabitants were fully acquainted with
what had passed at the Illinois, and the present happiness of their
friends, and made fully acquainted with the nature of the war, their
sentiments would greatly change ; that he knew that his appearance

* Clark's Mfmoir.

SECURES VINCENNES. 251

there would have great weight, even among the savages ; that if
it was agreeable to me he would take this business on himself, and
had no doubt of his being able to bring that place over to the Amer-
ican interest without my being at the trouble of marching against it ;
that the business being altogether spiritual, he wished that another
person might be charged with the temporal part of the embassy, but
that he would privately direct the whole, and he named Dr. Lafont
as his associate.

"This was perfectly agreeable to what I had been secretly aim-
ing at for some days. The plan was immediately settled, and the
two doctors, with their intended retinue, among whom I had a spy,
set about preparing for their journey, and set out on the 14th of July,
with an address to the inhabitants of Post Vincennes, authorizing
them to garrison their own town themselves, which would convince
them of the great confidence we put in them, etc. All this had its
desired effect. Mr. Gibault and his party arrived safe, and after
their spending a day or two in explaining matters to the people,
they universally acceded to the proposal (except a few emissaries
left by Mr. Abbot, who immediately left the country), and went in a
body to the church, where the oath of allegiance was administered
to them in a most solemn manner. An officer was elected, the fort
immediately [garrisoned], and ' the American flag displayed to the
astonishment of the Indians, and everything settled far beyond our
most sanguine hopes. The people here immediately began to put
on a new face, and to talk in a different style, and to act as perfect
freemen. With a garrison of their own. with the United States at
their elbow, their language to the Indians was immediately altered.
They began as citizens of the United States, and informed the
Indians that their old father, the. king of France, was come to life
again, and was mad at them for fighting for the English ; that they
would advise them to make peace with the Americans as soon as
they could, otherwise they might expect the land to be very bloody,
etc. The Indians began to think seriously ; throughout the country
this was the kind of language they generally got from their ancient
friends of the W abash and Illinois. Through the means of their
correspondence spreading among the nations, our batteries began
now to play in a proper channel. Mr. Gibault and party, accom-
panied by several gentlemen of Post Yincennes, returned to Kas-
kaskia about the 1st of August with the joyful news. During his
absence on this business, which caused great anxiety to me (for
without the possession of this post all our views would have been
blasted), I was exceedingly engaged in regulating things in the Illi-

252 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

nois. The reduction of these posts was the period of the enlistment
of our troops. I was at a great loss at the time to determine how
to act, and how far I might venture to strain my authority. My
instructions were silent on many important points, as it was impos-
sible to foresee the events that would take place. To abandon the
country, and all the prospects that opened to our view in the Indian
department at this time, for the want of instruction in certain cases,
I thought would amount to a reflection on government, as having no
confidence in me. I resolved to usurp all the authority necessary to
carry my points. I had the greater part of our [troops] recnlisted
on a different establishment, commissioned French officers in the
country to command a company of the young inhabitants, estab-
lished a garrison at Cahokia, commanded by Capt. Bowman, and
another at Kaskaskia, commanded by Capt. "Williams. Post Vin-
cennes remained in the situation as mentioned. Col. William Linn,
who had accompanied us as a volunteer, took charge of a party
that was to be discharged upon their arrival at the Falls, and
orders were sent for the removal of that post to the mainland.
Capt. John Montgomery was dispatched to government with letters.
... I again turned my attention to Post Vincennes. I plainly saw
that it would be highly necessary to have an American officer at that
post. Capt. Leonard Helm appeared calculated to answer my pur-
pose ; he was past the meridian of life, and a good deal acquainted
with the Indian [disposition]. I sent him to command at that post,
and also appointed him agent for Indian affairs in the department of
the Wabash. . . . About the middle of August he set out to take
possession of his new command.* Thus," says Clark, referring to

* "An Indian chief called the Tobacco's Son, a Piankeshaw, at this time resided in
a village adjoining Post Vincennes. This man was called by the Indians 'The Grand
Door to the Wabash'; and as nothing of consequence was to be undertaken by the
league on the Wabash without his assent, I discovered that to win him was an object
of signal importance. I sent him a spirited compliment by Mr. Gibault; he returned
it. I now, by Capt. Helm, touched him on the same spring that I had done the inhab-
itants, and sent a speech, with a belt of wampum, directing Capt. Helm how to man-
age if the chief was pacifically inclined or otherwise. The captain arrived safe at Post
Vincennes, and was received with acclamations by the people. After the usual cere-
mony was over he sent for the Grand Door, and delivered my letter to him. After
having read it, he informed the captain that he was happy to see him, one of the Big
Knife chiefs, in this town; it was here he had joined the English against him; but he
confessed that he always thought they looked gloomy; that as the contents of the let-
ter were of great moment, he could not give an answer for some time; that he must
collect his counsellors on the suV>ject. and was in hopes the captain would be patient.
In short, he put on all the courtly dignity that he was master of. and dipt. Helm fol-
lowing his example, it was several days before this business was finished, as the whole
proceeding was very ceremonious. At length the captain was invited to the Indian
council, and informed by Tobacco that they had maturely considered the case in hand,
and had got the nature of the war between the Enirlish and ns explained to their sat-
isfaction; that as we spoke the same language and appeared to be the same people, he
always thought that he was in the dark as to the truth of it, but now the sky was

CLAUK'S INFLUENCE OVER THE INDIANS. 1253

Helm's success, "ended this valuable negotiation, and the saving of
much blood. ... In a short time almost the whole of the various
tribes of the different nations on the Wabash, as high as the Ouia-
tanon, came to Post Vincennes, and followed the example of the
Grand Door Chief; and as expresses were continually passing be-
tween Capt. Helm and myself the whole time of these treaties, the
business was settled perfectly to my satisfaction, and greatly to the
advantage of the public. The British interest daily lost ground in
this quarter, and in a short time our influence reached the Indians
on the River St. Joseph and the border of Lake Michigan. The
French gentlemen at the different posts we now had possession of
engaged warmly in our interest. They appeared to vie with each
other in promoting the business, and through the means of their
correspondence, trading among the Indians, and otherwise, in a
short time the Indians of various tribes inhabiting the region of
Illinois came in great numbers to Cahokia, in order to make treaties
of peace with us. From the information they generally got from
the French gentlemen (whom they implicitly believed) respecting us,
they were truly alarmed, and, consequently, we were visited by the
greater part of them, without any invitation from us. Of course we
had greatly the advantage in making use of such language as suited
our [interest]. Those treaties, which commenced about the last of
August and continued between three and four weeks, were probably
conducted in a way different from any other known in America at
that time. I had been always convinced that our general conduct
with the Indians was wrong ; that inviting them to treaties was con-
sidered by them in a different manner from what we expected, and
imputed by them to fear, and that giving them great presents con-
firmed it. I resolved to guard against this, and I took good pains
to make myself acquainted fully with the French and Spanish
methods of treating Indians, and with the manners, genius and dis-
position of the Indians in general. As in this quarter they had not
yet been spoiled by us, I was resolved that they should not be. I
began the business fully prepared, having copies of the British trea-
ties."

At the first great council, which was opened at Cahokia, an Indian
chief, with a belt of peace in his hand, advanced to the table at which

cleaned up; that ho (bund tli;it, tin- ' P>L r Knifo' was in the ri<rht; thiit. perhaps if the
Enul sli conquered, they would serve them in (lie sainu; milliner ihiit Hi 17 intended to
serve us; that his ideas were qniti- changed, and that he would tell all the red people
on the Wabash to bloody 1lie land no more for the English. He jumped up, struck
his breast, called himself a man and a warrior, said that he was now a Biy Knife, and
took Ciipt. Helm by the hand. His example was followed by all present, and the
evening was spent in merriment."

254 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Col. Clark was sitting; another chief, bearing the sacred pipe of the
tribe, went forward to the table, and a third chief then advanced
with fire to kindle the pipe. When the pipe was lighted it was fig-
uratively presented to the heavens, then to the earth, then to all the
good spirits, to witness what was about to be done. After the ob-
servance of these forms the pipe was presented to Clark, and after-
ward to every person present. An Indian speaker then addressed
the Indians as follows : " Warriors, You ought to be thankful that
the Great Spirit has taken pity on you, and cleared the sky and
opened your ears and hearts, so that you may hear the truth. We
have been deceived by bad birds flying through the land. But we
will take up the bloody hatchet no more against the Big Knife,* and
we hope, as the Great Spirit has brought us together for good, as he
is good, that we may be received as friends, and that the belt of
peace may take the place of the bloody belt."

"I informed them," says Clark, "that I had paid attention to
what they had said, and that on the next day I would give them an
answer, when I hoped the ears and hearts of all people would be
opened to receive the truth, which should be spoken without decep-
tion. I advised them to keep prepared for the result of this day, on
which, perhaps, their very existence as a nation depended, etc., and
dismissed them, not suffering any of our people to shake hands with
them, as peace was not yet concluded, telling them it was time enough
to give the hand when the heart could be given also. They replied
that ' such sentiments were like men who had but one heart, and did
not speak with a double tongue. ' The next day I delivered them the
following speech :

'Men and Warriors, Pay attention to my words: You informed
me yesterday that the Great Spirit had brought us together, and that
you hoped, as he was good, that it would be for good. I have also
the same hope, and expect that each party will strictly adhere to
whatever may be agreed upon, whether it be peace or war, and hence-
forward prove ourselves worthy of the attention of the Great Spirit.
I am a man and a warrior, not a counsellor. I carry war in my

*The early border men of Virginia and her county of Kentucky usually carried
very large knives. From this circumstance the Virginians were called, in the Illinois
(Miami) dialect, She-mol-sea, meaning the " Big Knife." At a later day the same
appellation, under the Chippewayan word Che-mo-ko-man, was extended, by the
Indians, to the white people generally, always excepting the Englishman proper,
whom they called the Sag-e-nash, and the Yankees to whom they gave the epithet of
Bos-to-ne-ly, i.e., the Bostonians. The term is derived from the Miami word mal-she,
or ntol-sea, a knife, or the Ojibbeway mo-ko-man, which means the same thing. The
prefix che or she emphasizes the kind or size of the instrument, as a huge, long or big
knife. Such is the origin of the expression "long knives," frequently found in books
where Indian characters occur.

CLARK'S SPEECH TO THE INDIANS. 255

right hand, and in my left, peace. I am sent by the great council of
the Big Knife, and their friends, to take possession of all the towns
possessed by the English in this country, and to watch the motions
of the red people ; to bloody the paths of those who attempt to stop
the course of the river, but to clear the roads from us to those who
desire to be in peace, that the women and children may walk in them
without meeting anything to strike their feet against. I am ordered
to call upon the Great Fire for warriors enough to darken the land,
and that the red people may hear no sound but of birds who live on
blood. I know there is a mist before your eyes. I will dispel the
clouds, that you may clearly see the cause of the war between the
Big Knife and the English, then you may judge for yourselves which
party is in the right, and if you are warriors, as you profess to be,
prove it by adhering faithfully to the party which you shall believe
to be entitled to your friendship, and do not show yourselves to be
squaw r s.

' The Big Knives are very much like the red people. They don't
know how to make blankets and powder and cloth. They buy these
things 1'rom the English, from whom they are sprung. They live by
making corn, hunting and trade, as you and your neighbors, the
French, do. But the Big Knives, daily getting more numerous, like
the trees in the woods, the land became poor and hunting scarce,
and having but little to trade with, the women began to cry at seeing
their children naked, and tried to learn how to make clothes for
themselves. They soon made blankets for their husbands and chil*
dren, and the men learned to make guns and powder. In this way
we did not want to buy so much from the English. They then got
mad with us, and sent strong garrisons through our country, as you
see they have done among you on the lakes, and among the French.
They would not let our women spin, nor our men make powder, nor
let us trade with anybody else. The English said we should buy
everything of them, and since we had got saucy we should give two
bucks for a blanket, which we used to get for one ; we should do as
they pleased ; and they killed some of our people, to make the rest
fear them. This is the truth, and the real cause of the war between
the English and us, which did not take place until some time after
this treatment.

' But our women became cold and hungry and continued to cry.
Our young men got lost for want of counsel to put them in the right
path. The whole land was dark. The old men held down their
heads for shame, because they could not see the sun ; and thus there
was mourning for many years over the land. At last the Great

256 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

Spirit took pity on us. and kindled a great council fire, that never
goes out, at a place called Philadelphia. He then stuck down
a post, arid put a war tomahawk by it, and went away. The sun
immediately broke out, the sky was blue again, and the old men
held up their heads and assembled at the fire. They took up the
hatchet, sharpened it, and put it into the hands of our young men,
ordering them to strike the English as long as they could find one
on this side of the great waters. The young men immediately struck
the war post and blood was shed. In this way the war began, and
the English were driven from one place to another until they got
weak, and then they hired you red people to fight for them. The
Great Spirit got angry at this, and caused your old father, the
French king, and other great nations, to join the Big Knives, and
fight with them against all their enemies. So the English have be-
come like deer in the woods, and you may see that it is the Great
Spirit that has caused your waters to be troubled, because you have
fought for the people he was mad with. If your women and chil-
dren should now cry, you must blame yourselves for it, arid not the
Big Knives.

4 You can now judge who is in the right. I have already told
you who I am. Here is a bloody belt and a white one, take which
you please. Behave like men, and don't let your being surrounded
by the Big Knives cause you to take up the one belt with your hands
while your hearts take up the other. If you take the bloody path,
you shall leave the town in safet}'', and may go and join your friends,
the English. We will then try, like warriors, who can put the most
stumbling-blocks in each other's way, and keep our clothes longest
stained with blood. If, on the other hand, you should take the path
of peace, and be received as brothers to the Big Knives, with their
friends, the French ; should you then listen to bad birds that may
be flying through the land, you will no longer deserve to be counted
as men, but as creatures with two tongues, that ought to be destroyed
without listening to anything you might say. As I am convinced
you never heard the truth before, I do not wish you to answer be-
fore you have taken time to counsel. We will, therefore, part this
evening, and when the Great Spirit shall bring us together again, let
us speak arid think like men, with but one heart and one tongue. '

"The next day after this speech a new fire was kindled with
more than usual ceremony ; an Indian speaker came forward and
said : They ought to be thankful that the Great Spirit had taken
pity on them, and opened their ears arid their hearts to receive the
truth. He had paid great attention to what the Great Spirit had

CLARK TREATS WITH THE INDIANS. 257

put into my heart to say to them. They believed the whole to be
the truth, as the Big Knives did not speak like any other people
they had ever heard. They now saw they had been deceived, and
that the English had told them lies, and that I had told them the
truth, just as some of their old men had always told them. They
now believed that we were in the right ; and as the English had
forts in their country, they might, if they got strong enough, want
to serve the red people as they had treated the Big Knives. The
red people ought, therefore, to help us, and they had, with a cheer-
ful heart, taken up the belt of peace, and spurned that of war. They
were determined to hold the former fast, and would have no doubt
of our friendship, from the manner of our speaking, so different
from that of the English. They would now call in their warriors,
and throw the tomahawk into the river, where it could never be
found. They would suffer no more bad birds to fly through the
land, disquieting the women and children. They would be careful
to smooth the roads for their brothers, the Big Knives, whenever
they might wish to come and see them. Their friends should hear
of the good talk I had given them ; and they hoped I would send
chiefs among them, with my eyes, to see myself that they were men,
and strictly adhered to all they had said at this great fire, which the
Great Spirit had kindled at Cahokia for the good of all people who
would attend it."

The sacred pipe was again y kindled, and presented, figuratively,
to the heavens and the earth, and to all the good spirits, as witness
of what had been done. The Indians and the white men then closed
the council by smoking the pipe and shaking hands. With no ma-
terial variation, either of the forms that were observed, or with the
speeches that were made at this council, Col. Clark and his officers
concluded treaties of peace with the Piankeshaws, Ouiatenoris, Kick-
apoos, Illinois, Kaskaskias, Peorias, and branches of some other
tribes that inhabited the country between Lake Michigan and the,
Mississippi.

Gov. Henry soon received intelligence of the successful progress;
of the expedition under the command of ('lark. The French inhab-
itants of the villages of Kaskaskia, Cahokia and Post Vincennes
took the oath of allegiance to the State of Virginia.

In October, 1778, the General Assembly of the State of Virginia
passed an act which contained the following provisions, viz : All the
citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia "who are already settled
or shall hereafter settle on the western side of the Ohio, shall be in-
cluded in a distinct county, which shall be called Illinois county
17

258 HISTORIC NOTES ON THE NORTHWEST.

and the governor of this commonwealth, with the advice of the
council, may appoint a county lieutenant, or commandant-in-chief,
in that county, during pleasure, who shall appoint and commission
so many deputy commandants, militia officers and commissaries as
he shall think proper in the different districts, during pleasure ; all
of whom, before they enter into office, shall take the oath of fidelity
to this commonwealth and the oath of office, according to the form
of their own religion. And all civil officers to which the inhabit-
ants have been accustomed, necessary for the preservation of the
peace and the administration of justice, shall be chosen by a major-
ity of the citizens in their respective districts, to be convened for
that purpose by the county lieutenant, or commandant, or his deputy,
and shall be commissioned by the said county lieutenant or com-
mandant-in-chief."

Before the provisions of the law were carried into effect, Henry
Hamilton, the British lieutenant-governor of Detroit, collected an
army, consisting of about thirty regulars, fifty French volunteers,
and four hundred Indians. With this force he passed down the.
River Wabash, and took possession of Post Vincennes on the 15th
of December, 1778. No attempt was made by the population to
defend the town. Capt. Helm was taken and detained as a prisoner,
and a number of the French inhabitants disarmed.

Clark was aware that Gov. Hamilton, now that he had regained
possession of Vincennes, would undertake the capture of his forces,
and realizing his danger, he determined to forestall Hamilton and
capture the latter. His plans were at once formed. He sent - a por-
tion of his available force by boat, called The Willing, with instruc-
tions to Capt. Rogers, the commander, to proceed down the Missis-
sippi and up the Ohio and Wabash, and secrete himself a few miles
below Vincennes, and prohibit any persons from passing either up or
down. With another part of his force he marched across the country,
through prairies, swamps and marshes, crossing swollen streams
for it was in the month of February, and the whole country was
flooded from continuous rains and arriving at the banks of the
Wabash near St. Francisville, he pushed across the river and brought
his forces in the rear of Vincennes before daybreak. So secret and
rapid were his movements that Gov. Hamilton had no notice that
Clark had left Kaskaskia. Clark issued a notice requiring the
people of the town to keep within their houses, and declaring that
all persons found elsewhere would be treated as enemies. Tobacco 1 *
Xn tendered one hundred of his Piankashaw braves, himself at
their head. Clark declined their services with thanks, saying his

SURRENDER OF HAMILTON. 259

own force was sufficient. Gov. Hamilton had just completed the
fort, consisting of strong block-houses at each angle, with the cannon
placed on the upper floors, at an elevation of eleven feet from the
suriace. The works were at once closely invested. The ports were
so badly cut, the men on the inside could not stand to their cannon
for the bullets that would whiz from the rifles of Clark's sharp-
shooters through the embrasures whenever they were suffered for
an instant to remain open.

The town immediately surrendered with joy, and assisted at the
siege. After the first offer to surrender upon terms was declined,
Hamilton and Clark, with attendants, met in a conference at the
Catholic church, situated some eighty rods from the fort, and in the
afternoon of the same day, the 24th of February, 1779, the fort and
garrison, consisting of seventy-five men, surrendered at discretion.*
The result was that Hamilton and his whole force were made prison-
ers of war.t Clark held military possession of the northwest until
the close of the war, and in that way it was secured to our country.
At the treaty of peace, held at Paris at the close of the revolutionary
war, the British insisted that the Ohio River should be the northern
boundary of the United States. The correspondence relative to that
treaty shows that the only ground on which "the American commis-
sioners relied to sustain their claim that the lakes should be the
boundary was the fact that Gen. Clark had conquered the country,
and was in the undisputed military possession of it at the time of
the negotiation. This fact was affirmed and admitted, and was the
chief ground on which British commissioners reluctantly abandoned
their claim. "^

* Two days after the Willing arrived, its crew much mortified because they did not
share in the victory, although Clark commended them for their diligence. Two days
before Capt. Rogers' arrival with the Willing, Clark had dispatched three armed
boats, under charge of Capt. Helm and Majors Bosseron and Le Grass, up the Wabash,
to intercept a fleet which Clark was advised was on its way from Detroit, laden with
supplies for Gov. Hamilton at Vincennes. About one hundred and twenty miles up
the river the British boats, seven in number, having aboard military supplies of
the value of ten thousand pounds sterling money and forty men, among whom was
Philip De Jean, a magistrate of Detroit, were captured by Capt. Helm. The writer
has before him the statement of John McFall, born near Vincennes in 1798. He lived
near and in Vincennes until 1817. His grandfather, Ralph Mattison, was one of
Clark's soldiers who accompanied Helm's expedition up the Wabash, and he often told
McFall, his grandson, that the British were lying by in the Vermilion River, near its
mouth, where they were surprised in the night-time and captured by Helm without
firing a shot.

fThis march, from its daring conception, and the obstacles encountered and over-
come, is one of the most thrilling events in our history, and it is to be regretted that
the limited space assigned to other topics precludes its insertion.

\ Burnett's Notes on the Northwest Territory, p. 77.

LIBRARY

OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

LIBRARY

OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR OF THE GREAT REBELLION;

EMBRACING AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF EACH REGIMENT IN WHICH THERE WERE
IROQUOIS COUNTY SOLDIERS; ALSO A ROLL OP HONOR, GIVING NAMES OF
ALL DECEASED SOLDIERS THAT DIED IN LINE OF DUTY, AND A
BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF COL. WILLIAMS AND
A NUMBER OF GALLANT OFFICERS AND SOL-
DIERS WHO WERE KILLED OR DIED
IN THE SERVICE.

COMPILED AND WRITTEN BY ALEX. L. WHITEHALL, LL.B.,
Captain and Adjutant 9th Reg. I.N.G., and late private of Co. F, 9th Reg. Ind. Vet. Vol. Inf.

PREFACE.

The writer of the following regimental sketches, and compiler of
the " Roll of Honor of Iroquois County Soldiers in the War of the
Rebellion," is frank to admit that his work is not satisfactory to him-
self, but is merely presented in the hope that it may become a founda-
tion upon which a more perfect and satisfactory work may be reared in
the future.

Unfortunately, reliable regimental histories, or even faithful records
of the movements and doings of individual regiments are not generally
accessible, and such as are obtainable are apt to be brief and unsatisfac-
tory because of their brevity, being for the most part merely a rehash
of some officer's diary. No attempt is made, or very rarely made, at
describing the behavior of a regiment in battle, and the chronicler
must depend largely upon the published histories of the war, and let-
ters of war correspondents of newspapers published during the late
war, and also upon reports of commanding officers, for such details and
descriptions of battles and marches as he may wish to employ in
writing a tolerably correct and readable regimental history. And as
the written statements upon which historians are often forced to rely are
not always written by a man who was on the field of battle, or who, if
there, was perhaps not in the best position for acquiring an accurate

262 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

knowledge, or of witnessing the movements and behavior of the troops
of whom he is writing ; hence he does not always give a correct account,
nor always a just one. But like others who have found themselves
similarly circumstanced, we have, in the subsequent pages, sought to
make the best use possible of the materials at hand that our ability
would admit of,' in the hope, as before stated, that our efforts and
venture may lead to something better; and if, until then, our work
shall be useful in perpetuating the record of Iroquois county's patriot-
ism in the war for the Union, we shall feel our labor has not been
in vain.

In the preparation of the subsequent pages we have had to rely very
largely upon the reports of the adjutant-general of Illinois, and for
necessary data and material have also consulted "Eddy's Patriotism
of Illinois," " Yan Home's History of the Army of the Cumberland,"
and "Gen. Andrew's History of the Mobile Campaign."

We were a soldier from a sister state, and had a personal acquaint-
ance with only four of the regiments whose history we have been
requested to write, and do not feel that we could do as full justice to
our subject as if we had been an Illinois soldier, and familiar with the
history of Illinois regiments.

It is but just to ourself to say that the work has been done during
such time as we could snatch from our professional duties, and done
only because we felt that the gallant dead and the patriotic surviving
soldiers who enlisted from this county during the late war, deserved to
have some chronicler present for the perusal of their neighbors and
friends a tolerable fair record and recital of their trials and triumphs
while marching and fighting under the dear old flag of our Union.
We have written, and present to the public the following pages, believ-
ing that even our poor recital of the suffering and heroism of the sol-
diers of Iroquois county, will arouse in the hearts of our people a
kindlier feeling and respect for their neighbors who did manful duty
as defenders of our imperiled Union when assailed by treason ; and
also to arouse a deeper reverence for the noble dead that gave up their
lives that the nation might live.

REGIMENTAL HISTORY.

When the terrible storm-cloud of secession burst upon our union of
states, in the spring of 1861, the county of Iroquois contained a popu-
lation of a little over 16,000, and from that time to the close of the
war increased in population but slightly. As a proof of the devotion
of her people to the Union, it is only necessary to state that this grand

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 263

county sent into the field nearly enough men to make two lull regi-
ments. The muster-in rolls of the various organizations in which the
county was represented show that over 1,500 men enlisted from and
are credited to this county. And of this brave band of men, loyal and
true to their country and their country's flag, over 300, or one-fifth,
laid down their lives on their country's altar. Such a record is cer-
tainly a proud one, and reflects credit upon the bravery and patriotism
of the county that so nobly sprang to the defense of our imperiled gov-
ernment. We present, in the succeeding pages, brief historical sketches
of the several regiments and batteries in which there were Iroquois
county soldiers. The different arms of the service are presented to
the reader in the following order : First, Infantry ; second, Cavalry ; and
lastly the Artillery. Beginning with

THE TENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

This grand old regiment was organized among the very first, and
during the " three-months service" under command of its colonel, after-
ward general, B. M. Prentiss, was engaged in guarding Cairo. Three
of its companies during the three-months term served as artillerymen.
The regiment reorganized for the three-years service, with James D.
Morgan as its colonel, who, together with Col. Tillson, his successor,
was afterward promoted to a generalcy. The regiment took a part in
the capture of New Madrid, Missouri ; Island No. 10, Fort Pillow,
Corinth, and passed through the first siege of Nashville; participated
in the battle of Mission Ridge. In the winter of 1864, 394 old soldiers
reenlisted. During the Atlanta campaign the Tenth was in the First
Brigade, Gen. J. D. Morgan commanding, of the Second Division,
Gen. Jeff. C. Davis commanding, of the Fourteenth Army Corps,
Army of the Cumberland, and behaved gallantly in that historic cam-
paign, which culminated in the downfall of Atlanta. The regiment
marched through to the sea with Sherman, and took in the "grand
rounds" through the Carolinas, witnessing the surrender of Gen. Joe
Johnson's army, and participated in the grand review at Washington
city. The regiment was mustered out July 4, 1865. Ex-county sur-
veyor E. W. Dodson was a sergeant in the Tenth, and there were
three other Iroquois county boys in this regiment.

THE TWELFTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The Twelfth regiment entered the three-years service August 1,
1861, under the command of Col. John McArthur, and upon his pro-
motion Gen. A. L. Chetlain succeeded him as colonel, and was after-

264 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

ward promoted. At the battle of Fort Donelson the loss of the
regiment was nineteen killed and fifty-eight wounded. The Twelfth
participated in the siege of Corinth, and behaved most gallantly in the
battle, capturing a rebel battery and a stand of colors, losing Capt. Ward,
acting major, and upward of 100 men, killed, wounded and missing.
Gen. R. J. Oglesby, the brigade commander, was severely wounded in
this action. In 1863 the regiment took an active part in the north
Mississippi campaigns, under Gen. Sherman. Twenty-four officers and
311 men reenlisted in January, 1864, and returned home soon after on
a veteran furlough. On the return of the regiment to the front it
became a part of the "Army of the Tennessee," under the lamented
hero Gen. J. B. McPherson, and was actively engaged in the battles
and movements in Georgia preceding the fall of Atlanta; loss of the
regiment in the campaign up to the fall of Atlanta, 106 killed and
wounded. At Allatoona the regiment was hotly engaged, and suffered
a loss of fifty -seven out of 161 men engaged.

It was with Sherman in his march to the sea, and marched from
Savannah, Georgia, to Columbia, South Carolina, thence to Fayette-
ville, Goldsboro and Raleigh, North Carolina, and witnessed the sur-
render of Johnston's army. At the time of Johnston's surrender the
Twelfth had tramped 600 miles, and in the northward march to Wash-
ington marched 186 miles in six and a half days, " and it wasn't a very
good time for marching, either."

The regiment took a part in the grand review at Washington, and
returned home for muster out, and was paid off and discharged at
Camp Butler, Illinois, July 18, 1865. Iroquois county was represented
in the Twelfth regiment by eleven men, distributed as follows: Com-
pany C, 7 men ; PI, 1 ; K, 2 men ; and one unassigned.

THE FOURTEENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

This regiment went into the field May 25, 1861, under the com-
mand of Col. John M. Palmer, afterward major-general, and still later
governor of this state. The Fourteenth took an honorable part in the
battles of Fort Donelson and Shiloh, eliciting the praise of its brigade
commander for gallant conduct on the fateful field of Shiloh. The
regiment formed a part of Gen. Hurl but's division, and under both Grant
and Sherman performed several brilliant achievements in both fighting
and marching in the western Tennessee and north Mississippi cam-
paigns.

The regiment reenlisted and took a part in the Atlanta campaign,
being consolidated with its old companion regiment, the Fifteenth. In

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 265

the attack of Hood upon Sherman's rear, after the fall of Atlanta, this
veteran battalion was nearly cut to pieces, and the remnant was
mounted, and on the march to Savannah and through the Carolinas
did effective service as scouts^being for the most of the time in advance
of the army. At Goldsboro, North Carolina, the two regiments, hav-
ing received a number of recruits, resumed their regimental organiza-
tion as the Fourteenth and Fifteenth.

Concerning this grand old command we copy the following from
the adjutant-general's report: The aggregate number of men who
belonged to this organization was 1,980, and the aggregate mustered
out at Fort Leaven worth was 480.

During the four years of its arduous service it marched 4,490 miles,
traveled by rail 2,330 miles, and by river 4.850 miles, making a total
of 11,670 miles traversed. In Company I there were two privates
from this county ; also in Company K there was a corporal and pri-
vate, all of whom received an honorable discharge.

THE TWENTIETH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

(WRITTEN BY E. B. SLEETH, ESQ., OP DENVER, COL., FORMERLY SERGEANT OF

COMPANY I.)

The Twentieth Infantry was organized at Joliet, Illinois, May 14,
1861, under the command of Col. C. C. Marsh. It was mustered into
the United States service, or during the war, June 13, 1861, by Capt.
T. G. Pitcher, of the United States army. It left Joliet June 18, by
order of Gov. Yates, and proceeded to Alton. July 6 it went to St.
Louis arsenal ; on the 10th moved to and fortified Cape Girardeau,
Missouri ; 23d, went on a forced march to Dallas, and captured a
large amount of rebel stores; August 12, moved to Bird's Point, Mis-
souri ; October 17 it returned to Cape Girardeau; 19th, started for
Fredericton, Missouri, which place was reached on the 20th, and had a
severe engagement with the enemy under Gen. Jeff Thompson, and
was victorious, capturing one piece of artillery, a twenty-pounder
howitzer; returned to Bird's Point November 1, and went into winter
quarters. January 14, 1862, it accompanied Gen. Grant on a recon-
noisance in Kentucky, toward Columbus; 20th, returned to Bird's
Point; February 2, moved to Fort Henry, under command of Gen. W.
H. L. Wallace; occupied the fort on the 4th. On the llth it arrived
at Fort Donelson, and was engaged in the three-days battle before that
place, and was the first regiment that held its position and staid the
daring charge made on the right wing of our army by Forrest, in his
grand effort on the afternoon of the last day of the battle, for which
act the regiment received the personal thanks of Generals Grant and

266 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

McClernand. Lieut. Col. Irwin and fifty men were killed in this
action.

The regiment next moved with the advance of Gen. Grant's army
to Savannah, Tennessee. On the 24th it arrived at Pittsburg Land-
ing ; was engaged in the battle of Shiloh, April 6 and 7, and charged
upon and captured a rebel battery of two guns; had forty-two men
killed, among whom was our adjutant, John E. Thompson. The regi-
ment was in the front on the road, and during the siege of Corinth. It
left its position before Corinth June 3, and arrived at Jackson, Ten-
nessee, on the 8th, and was engaged in guarding the railroad during the
remainder of that month and July. August 14 it went to Estramula,
on the Hatchie river. September 1, it fought the battle of Britton's
Lane, and returned to Jackson on the 4th, and remained till November
8, when it started on the Holly Springs expedition. It arrived at the
Springs December 1, and on the 3d crossed the Tallahatchee river and
marched to Oxford; recrossed the river on the 24th, on account of the
destruction of the stores at Holly Springs by the enemy. The regi-
ment suffered severely on this campaign for want of food, living for ten
days on corn foraged from the almost desolate and impoverished
country. The regiment then went to Memphis, Tennessee, and there
remained until March 1, when it went to Lake Providence, Louisiana.

April 1 it arrived at Milliken's Bend. On a call being made for
volunteers to run boats past the Yicksburg batteries, the entire regi-
ment tendered its services, but a delegation only of the regiment was
accepted and made the perilous voyage, the remainder marching around
Yicksburg, on the Louisiana side of the river, crossing in the transports
that had run the blockade to the Mississippi shore, and at once marched
to the rear of the rebel fortifications at Grand Gulf, which place was
at once abandoned. On May 9 was fought the battle of Thompson
Hill ; May 12 the battle of Raymond, where Col. Richards and forty
men were killed. May 13, was captured Jackson, Mississippi. May
15, the regiment took a prominent part in the great battle of Cham-
pion Hills, and May 17 crossed Black river and took position in front
of Yicksburg. May 22 it was in the daring charge on that stronghold
and was one of the few regiments that reached the rebel works, and
retained its position on the site of the rebel works for eighteen hours,
sheltering itself by digging under the walls of earth-works, and only
vacated its position because other troops could not get to its assistance.

The regiment participated in the whole of the memorable siege, from
Maj r 22 to July 4, working in the trenches and mines under Fort
Hill, rushing into and holding that stronghold with three other regi-
ments when it was blown up. It was the second regiment to enter

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 267

the city of Vicksburg under Gen. Logan, and in consideration of the
services rendered in the capture of Fort Hill, which was the key to
the Yicksburg defenses, the regiment was appointed provost-guard of
the city, which place it occupied until the beginning of the winter,
when it was relieved, and joined the Third Division at Black river,
Mississippi, where it remained the greater part of the winter, going
with Gen. Sherman on his raid to Meridian, Mississippi. It was
engaged in numerous skirmishes on this campaign ; was cut from
communication with the north for thirty days; returned to Vicks-
burg and from thence to Cairo, Illinois. The veterans of the regiment,
of which there were two-thirds, went north on a veteran furlough ;
while the remainder, or non-veterans, went to Clifton, Tennessee, and
marched from there to Huntsville, where the regiment WHS again
reunited. It joined the army of the Tennessee under Gen. Sherman,
at Cartersville, Georgia, under command of Gen. Force, First Brigade,
Third Division, Seventeenth Army Corps. It took an active part in
all the great battles fought and won during the remainder of that
campaign.

July 22, 1864, at the battle of Kenesaw Mountain, the regiment
was almost annihilated, after which, by order of Gen. Leggett com-
manding the division, the regiment was mounted, and acted as his
body-guard and scouts. When Sherman started on his march to the
sea it was in advance of the " Old Third Division," Seventeenth
Corps, and was engaged in continuous skirmishes from Atlanta to the
Gulf. It went east with Sherman's army; was in the grand review
at Washington city ; after which it went to Louisville, Kentucky,
where it was mustered out of service and sent to Chicago, Illinois,
at which place it was paid off and discharged July 19, 1865. This
regiment served continuously during the war in the First Brigade,
Third (or Logan's) Division, Seventeenth Army Corps, always at the
front, yet never suffering a defeat. Company I of this regiment was
organized in the old court-house, in Middleport, Iroquois county, by
Capt. George H. Walser, April 19, 1861, and was the pioneer company
from this county, and was ready to march in three days after the first
call made for troops.

Sergeant Sleeth has given in the above a faithful report of the bat-
tles and marches participated in by the Twentieth regiment, and we
can only add that in the assault on Kenesaw Mountain the regiment
was flanked by the enemy and overpowered after severe loss, and all
of the force engaged that day were killed or captured except about six-
teen. Afterward this squad was enlarged to thirty-five by men report-
ing that had been absent from the regiment with leave, and on

268 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

detached duty. This band of survivors of the grand old regiment was
mounted and placed under the command of Capt. King and employed
as scouts by Gen. Leggett, during the " march to the sea," also during
the subsequent marches through the Carolinas. When this detach-
ment of the Twentieth reached Goldsboro, North Carolina, it was
joined by 250 recruits from Illinois and the rest of the old soldier
comrades who had been captured at Kenesaw, and who had been for-
tunate enough to survive the tortures of Andersonville and other
prison pens of the south, rejoined the regiment, some at Goldsboro,
and others at Alexandria, Virginia.

After the return of the exchanged prisoners and the accession of
the 250 recruits the regiment resumed its regimental organization, and
took part as such in the grand review at Washington. Some idea of
the service done by the daring fellows of this veteran regiment may be
gathered from the statement of the naked fact that of the twenty-two
officers and 322 men mustered out in 1865, only about seventy were
members of the old organization that a little over four years before
took the field with over 900 men in its' ranks.

Company I went into the battle of Fort Donelson with sixty-five
men, and twenty-six of that number were killed or wounded. Nine of
the twenty-six were killed and died of wounds.

Company I was first commanded by Capt. George H. Walser, of
Middleport, a member then of the Iroquois bar. Capt. Walser resigned
during the fall of 1861, and was succeeded by Capt. Kennard, of
Champaign, who was afterward promoted major, and then Capt. Row-
land K. Evans, of Bloomington, assumed command of the company,
and on his promotion Lieut. David Richardson, of Middleport, who
had risen from the ranks, became its captain, and filled the position
when the company was mustered out. Capt. George E. King, after-
ward captain of Company F, One Hundred and Thirteenth Regiment,
went out as first lieutenant of Company 1, of the Twentieth. Sergeant
Sleeth, of Company I, was sheriff of this county, and is now city attor-
ney of Denver, Colorado. Capt. H. B. Yennum, of the One Hundred
and Fiftieth, served three years in the Twentieth. Lieut. Frank High,
of Middleport, also an officer of Company 1, after the close of the war
was appointed general passenger agent of the Chicago & Alton railroad,
and still holds the position. Quite a number of our well-to-do farmers
were members of this gallant regiment.

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 269

THE TWENTY-FIRST REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

Most readers are familiar with the fact that this regiment went into
the field with Gen. U. S. Grant at its head as colonel, and his subse-
quent promotion and grand achievements as the leader of the armies
of the west, at Donelson, Shiloh, Vicksburg and Mission Ridge, and
his triumphs as commander-in-chief of all the Union armies are fresh
in the minds of all loyal people. The regiment, as well as its first
commander, has a proud record for coolness and courage on many a hard
fought field. But as Iroquois county furnished but one man (Joseph
Shepard, of Milford). to this regiment, we do not deem it best in this con-
nection to give a detailed history of the Twenty-first, but will merely call
attention to the principal campaigns and battles in which "Grant's old
regiment" took an active and honorable part. It was engaged in the
Missouri campaigns in the fall of 1801, and winter and spring of 1862,
and participated in the battle of Frederickton. It formed a part of Gen.
Steele's Arkansas expedition. The regiment took a part in the siege
of Corinth, and was engaged in the battles of Perryville and Stone
River, behaving with great gallantry in a charge upon the celebrated
Washington Light Artillery of rebel fame, in the latter battle. In the
disastrous battle of Chickarnaugua the Twenty-first lost 238 officers and
men, in killed, wounded and missing. As a part of the Fourth Army
Corps the regiment participated in the Atlanta campaign, and in all the
engagements behaved with its accustomed gallantry. The regiment
was with the army of Gen. George H. Thomas, at Pulaski, Columbia,
Franklin and Nashville, Tennessee, and rendered a good account of
itself in this important campaign. During the summer of 1865, in
conjunction with other forces in Thomas' command, the Twenty-first
regiment went to Texas, and remained there on duty until mustered out
at San Antonio, December 16, 1865.

THE TWENTY-FIFTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

WRITTEN BY A. H. SOUTH, FORMERLY LIEUTENANT OP COMPANY F.

This regiment was composed of companies raised in the counties of
Coles, Edgar, Champaign, Douglas, Yermilion and Iroquois, "William
N. Coler, of Urbana, Illinois, colonel commanding. The regiment was
mustered into the United States service August 4, 1861 (the rnuster-
in rolls, however, make it August 6, 1861, which is a mistake), at the
United States Arsenal at St. Louis, Missouri. September 23, 1861,
the regiment went to Jefferson City via the Pacific railroad. Septem-
ber 27, 1861, it went to Otterville, Missouri, via Pacific railroad, and

270 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

went into camp at Lamine river bridge. October 13, 1861, it went to
Sedalia. Missouri, terminus of the Pacific railroad.

October 15, 1861, the regiment went to Springfield, Missouri, from
there to Wilson's creek, and returned to Springfield, and from there
to Holla, Missouri, arriving at the latter place November 19, 1861. It
remained in camp until February 2, 1862, and then started for Spring-
field, Missouri, arriving there February 13, 1862. It left Springfield
February 14, 1862. March 6, 7 and 8 it engaged in the battle of Pea
Ridge, Arkansas. After marching and countermarching, the regiment,
with nine other regiments under the command of Brigadier-General
Jeif C. Davis, started for Cape GJ-irardeau, Missouri, May 9, 1862, and
arrived there May 20, 1862. May 22 it went to Hamburg Landing
via steamboat Henry Clay, arriving there May 26. After marching
and skirmishing for a long time near Jacinto and other places near
there it left luka, Mississippi, August 18, 1862, for Louisville, Ken-
tucky, via Nashville, arriving there September 26, 1862. October 1,
1862, it left Louisville, Kentucky, and was near, but not engaged in,
the battle of Perryville, Kentucky, October 8, 1862.

After marching around the country for several days the regiment
started for Nashville, Tennessee, arriving there November 7, 1862, and
remained there, doing guard duty and foraging, until December 26,

1862, when the regiment started for Mnrfreesboro, Tennessee. It
was actively engaged in the battles of Stone River, from December
30, 1862, to January 4, 1863, December 31 being the day it was most
actively engaged. The regiment remained in camp from January 6,

1863, to June 24, 1863, and then started with the army, under Gen.
Rosecrans, after the rebel army under Gen. Bragg. It remained awhile
at and near Winchester, Tennessee, and was actively engaged at the
battle of Chickamauga, Georgia, September 19 and 20, 1863. Septem-
ber 22 it went to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and remained there until
November 23, when the regiment was very actively engaged in the
battles of Mission Ridge, fought November 23, 24 and 25, 1863.
November 28, 1863, it left Chattanooga, Tennessee, for Knoxville,
Tennessee, arriving there on or about December 3. The regiment
spent the winter in East Tennessee, marching, countermarching, skir-
mishing and foraging all the time, and finally got back to Cleveland,
Tennessee, and remained from April 16, 1864, to May 31, 1864, when
the regiment was ordered to join the army under Gen Sherman, en
route for Atlanta, Georgia. The regiment joined the brigade June 7,

1864, The regiment remained with the army, pressing on toward
Atlanta, under fire nearly every day, until August 1, 1864,
when the order came for the regiment to start for Springfield, Illi-

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 271

nois, to be mustered out. It -arrived at Springfield August 11, 1864.
September 5, 1864, the regiment was mustered out, having served
three years and one month, and having marched on foot 3,252 miles,
and traveled by steamboat and rail 1,710 miles. Total number of
miles traveled in three years was 4,962. It participated in the follow-
ing battles and numerous heavy skirmishes: Pea Ridge, Arkansas;
siege of Corinth, Stone River, Tennessee ; Chickamauga, Georgia ; Mis-
sion Ridge, Tennessee; Kenesaw Mountain, Georgia; Peach Tree
Creek, Georgia, and Atlanta.

Lieut. South, in the compilation of the sketch of his regiment, has
exhibited rather more than a soldierly modesty in his brief mention of
the more important battles in which the Twenty-fifth took an active
and honorable part. At Pea Ridge the regiment experienced its first
battle, and under the most trying ordeal it behaved with the courage
and steadiness of veteran troops. In the terrible struggle among the
cedars of Stone River, Woodruff's brigade, to which the Twenty-fifth
belonged, did heroic fighting, and was warmly commended by Gen.
Jeff. C. Davis, the division commander, who, speaking in his report of
the gallant stand made by the brigade, December 31, 1862, says of
Carlin's and Woodruffs brigades: " The enemy commenced a heavy
and very determined attack upon Carlin's and Woodruff's brigades.
These brigades were fully prepared for the attack, and received it with
veteran courage. The conflict was fierce in the extreme on both sides.
Our loss was heavy, and that of the enemy was no less. It was,
according to my observation, the best contested point of the day, and
would have been held but for the overwhelming force moving so per-
sistently against my right. Carlin, finding his right flank so severely
pressed and threatened with being turned, ordered his troops to retire.
Woodruff's brigade succeeded in repulsing the enemy and holding the
position, until the withdrawal of the troops on both of its flanks com-
pelled it to retire." By the above account of the fight by the general
of division, it will be seen that the daring brigade held its ground
stubbornly until completely flanked on the .left and right, when it fell
back to a position in line with the rest of the division. Col. Wood-
ruff, in his report of the conduct of his brigade, pays a very high com-
pliment to the personal gallantry of Col. T. D. Williams, who fell
during the thickest of the fight, with the regimental colors of the
Twenty-fifth in his hands. The loss of the regiment was very great,
and it well deserved to inscribe upon its banner " Stone River."

At Chickamauga the division of Davis, including the Twenty-fifth
regiment, did hard fighting, but were forced to yield to overpowering
rebel masses hurled against them, and obliged to fall back toward

272 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Missionary Ridge. Much of the hardest fighting was done in a dense
wood, and the regiment being at close quarters, and assailed by a
greatly superior force in point of numbers, lost heavily. The Twenty-
fifth a little later behaved with great gallantry in the assault upon
Missionary Ridge. During the Atlanta campaign the Twenty-fifth
never failed to show the spirit of true soldiers whenever brought face
to face with the enemy, and during that long and bloody campaign the
sturdy soldiers of the old Twenty-fifth made for themselves a record
that entitles them to the praise and profound respect of every patriot
in the loyal state that sent them forth to do valiant battle for the old
flag.

Company F, Capt. Ray "W. Andrews, of Onarga, commanding, was
almost entirely composed of men from this county, there being some
eight or ten men in the original company from Ford and Kankakee
counties ; and among the recruits afterward sent the companies, there
were about a half a dozen men that belonged in other counties. First
Lieut. James P. Martin, of this company, filled the office of sheriff of
this county from 1864 to 1866. He was also the founder of Old Mar-
tinton, in this county. Lieut. Martin died about eight years ago from
the effects of disease contracted while in the service. Second Lieut.
Alex. H. South, of this company, filled the office of sheriff for three
terms successively, and was an excellent officer.

Company G, Capt. (afterward colonel) Thomas D. Williams, of Che-
banse, commanding, was made up of men from Champaign, Iroquois
and Kankakee counties, Iroquois county furnishing the captain (Will-
iams), one lieutenant, and about one-third of the rank and file of the
company. Jerome Bard, a prominent merchant and estimable citizen
of Chebanse, was a sergeant in Company G, and a faithful soldier. Our
present efficient county clerk, Henry A. Butzow, Esq., was a private in
Company G of the Twenty-fifth. Several of the old soldier boys of this
splendid old regiment are now well-to-do and influential citizens of
this county, and lack of space forbids individual mention of these men,
who performed well their .part as brave soldiers, and are now distin-
guished as peaceable, upright and worthy citizens.

THE THIRTY-NINTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

This organization familiarly known as " Yates Phalanx " left the
state with a " prize banner," won in a drill contest under the auspices of
the State Agricultural Society, and being composed of fine material,
well officered, it bid fair to win the glorious name that it did. In Octo-
ber, 1861, the regiment reported to Gen. Curtis for duty, in Missouri,

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 273

but received orders about the first of November to proceed to Mary-
land, and it did so, arriving December 11, 1861. During the winter
of 1862 the regiment did a great deal of hard marching and fighting,
the engagements being generally with rebel cavalry seeking to get into
the rear of the Union lines, and the Thirty-ninth which was guarding
exposed posts.

The regiment was in the battle of Winchester, and contributed not
a little toward securing the defeat of Stonewall Jackson. The greater
part of the summer of 1862 was spent by the Thirty -ninth in weari-
some marches and sharp skirmishes, and the fall of the same year was
mainly spent in the fortifications at Suffolk, Virginia, and in forays
into the enemy's country. The regiment, in January, 1863, accompa-
nied Gen. Foster's expedition to Hilton Head, South Carolina, and in
the ensuing spring and summer it assisted in the laborious siege opera-
tions that culminated in the capture of Morris Island, in Charleston
Harbor, and the capture of Fort Wagner. Just before the regiment
started to South Carolina, a flag bearing the portrait of Gov. Yates
was presented to the regiment, and was carried to the close of the war
along with the regimental colors.

The regiment reenlisted, and when recruited reported to Gen. B.
F. Butler, in May, 1864, and took an active part in the expedition up
James river. The Thirty-ninth did some terrible fighting during
May and June, 1864, losing 315 men during these two months. In a
charge upon the rebel works at Deep Run, Virginia, August 16, the
Thirty-ninth lost 104 men and several officers. In a charge upon the
enemy's works, on the Darlington road, seven miles from Richmond,
October 13, 1864, the regiment went into the fight 250 strong and
lost sixty men. During the winter of 1864 and 1865 the regiment
was in front of Richmond and Petersburg, and having received about
100 recruits, these were drilled and disciplined for the approaching deci-
sive campaign. The regiment took a part in the assault upon the
rebel works, April 2, 1865, and were the first troops to plant the
national colors on the works, though not without terrible loss. Seven
of the color-guard of nine were shot, and out of the 150 men that
went into the fight, sixteen were shot dead and forty-five so severely
wounded that many afterward died of their wounds. As a testimonial
to the regiment for its bravery Gen. Gibbon himself placed a brazen
eagle upon the color-staff at the grand review at Washington, and
color-sergeant Day received a medal of honor from the war depart-
ment for his bravery in planting his colors upon Fort Gregg after he
had been severely wounded. The regiment continued in the service
18

274 HISTORY OF IEOQUOIS COUNTY.

after the fall of Richmond, until December 16, 1865, when it was
mustered out.

Iroquois county was represented in the"Yates Phalanx " by one
non-commissioned officer and five privates. One of the latter laid
down his life in battle.

THE FORTY-SECOND REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

Col. William A. Webb organized the Forty-second regiment July
22, 1861, at Chicago, Illinois, where it remained in camp until it joined
Gen. Fremont's army at St. Louis, Missouri, September 21, 1861, and
was by him sent to Gen. Hunter at Tipton, Missouri, arriving October
18, 1861. The regiment here became a part of Gen. John M. Palmer's
brigade. The first week in November the Forty-second marched to
Springfield, Missouri, thence to Smithton, in the same state, where it
went into winter quarters early in December. The regiment was
ordered to Fort Holt, Kentucky, and reached its destination February
20, 1862, and proceeded from there to Columbus and Island No. 10,
taking an active part in the siege and capture of the island. Previous
to the capture of Island No. 10 the Forty-second performed a couple
of brilliant exploits that are worthy of perpetuation in its history.
The first was a bold dash made into Union City by the Forty-second
regiment, supported by 4.00 men of the Fifteenth Wisconsin regiment,
two companies of the Second Illinois Cavalry, and a battery, all under
the command of Col. Buford, seconded by Col. Roberts of the Forty-
second. A large force of secessionists, under the command of the
notorious Clay King, were completely surprised, and utterly routed
by the union force. The union loss in this dash was one man killed,
and the rebel loss twenty killed and 100 captured. A lot of 200
horses, and other very valuable captures fell into the hands of the
charging column. Col. Roberts, at the head of about forty picked
men from the Forty-second, one dark night in the midst of a terrific
storm, put off from the gun-boat Benton in a boat with muffled oars,
and landed in the face of a scorching picket fire, and scaled the enemy's
parapets in less than three minutes after landing ; and before the dis-
mayed rebels could get aroused to what was going on, the daring band
had effectually spiked six of their cannon, the Lady Davis among
the number, which daring act enabled our gun-boats to run past the
battery, and complete the evacuation of the Island. The regiment
was engaged in the siege of Corinth, and the battle of Farmington,
losing at the latter place seventeen men.

At Columbia, Tennessee, September 9, 1862, the Forty-second lost

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 275

one man killed, and the enemy eighteen killed and forty-five wounded.
The regiment was cooped up in Nashville during the siege late in the
fall of 1862. December 10 it moved out of the city on the Nolansville
pike, and entered upon the Murfreesboro campaign. At Stone River,
the regiment was on an exposed part of the Held, and did hard fighting,
losing twenty-two killed, 116 wounded and eighty-five prisoners. At
Chickamauga the regiment did gallant service, and displayed great cool-
ness under the most disheartening surroundings. Its loss on the two
days, September 19 and 20, was twenty-eight killed, 128 wounded and
twenty-eight taken prisoners by the rebels. In the assault upon Mission
Ridge the Forty-second acted as skirmishers, and sustained a loss of
five killed and forty wounded.

The regiment reenlisted January 1, 1864, and six weeks later was
furloughed, and did not return to the front until the April following,
when it returned to Chattanooga, and entered upon the Atlanta cam-
paign, participating during the summer of 1864, in the following en-
gagements, viz : Rocky Face Ridge, Resaca, Adairsville, New Hope
Church, Pine Mountain, Kenesaw Mountain, Peach Tree Creek, Atlanta,
Jonesboro and Lovejoy Station, going into camp at Atlanta, September
8, 1864, with a loss during the campaign of 116 men.

The Forty-second, during the Atlanta campaign, forming a part of the
lamented Gen. Harker's (Third) brigade of the second division, Fourth
Army Corps, with the other troops of the Fourth corps, the Forty-second
took up position at Pulaski, Tennessee, to check the northward march
of Gen. Hood's army. The regiment took a prominent part in the
battles of Spring Hill, Franklin and Nashville, behaving with its
accustomed coolness and courage, suffering a severe loss at Franklin,
losing twenty-four men killed, and over one hundred wounded and cap-
tured. In the battles at Nashville the regimental loss in killed and
wounded was thirteen men. The regiment participated in the chase
after Hood's defeated army as far as Lexington, Alabama. Afterward,
during the winterer spring of 1865, the Forty-second formed a part of
the expedition to Bull's Gap, Tennessee. And June 15, 1865, the
regiment broke camp near Nashville and moved to Johnson ville, thence
to New Orleans, and from there to Port Lavaca, Texas, at which place
it was mustered out December 16, 1865, and returned to Camp Butler,
Illinois, arriving January 3, 1866, receiving pay and final discharge
January 10, 1866.

Iroquois county furnished twenty-eight men to the Forty-second,
distributed as follows : Company C, two men ; D, one man ; F, one
man ; G, twelve men ; and H, twelve men, of whom six died in line of
duty.

276 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

THE FORTY-THIRD REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

Iroquois county furnished seventeen enlisted men to the Forty-
third regiment as members of Company K, a one-year organization
mustered in during the early spring of 1865.

The Forty-third regiment in the outset was very largely composed
of Germans, and under the command of Col. Julius Raith, it distin-
guished itself by the devotion it showed to the "flag of the free" upon
many a bloody field and in many weary, harassing marches through
the wilds of Arkansas and Tennessee, often meeting and vanquishing
the guerrilla bands that so sorely ravaged portions of the state of
Arkansas and the western portion of Tennessee. At Shiloh the
chivalric Col. Raith and a number of his officers and men laid down
their lives that the Union might live, and to secure peace and strength
to their adopted government. Near Jackson, Tennessee, the Forty-
third and Sixty-first Illinois regiments, aggregating a force of four
hundred and twenty-five men, defeated the notorious rebel raider, Gen.
Forrest, at the head of eighteen hundred rebels. The regiment formed
a part of Gen. Steel e's Arkansas expedition, and subsequently of his
expedition toward Red river, Texas, and suffered heavily from the toil-
some marches and attacks of the enemy upon the column. At Prairie
D'Anne, Arkansas, April 10, 1864, the Forty-third regiment behaved
with great bravery, and was the first to occupy the evacuated works
of the confederates. The Forty-third did some hard fighting at Jen-
kin's Ferry, Arkansas, losing quite heavily itself, and at the same time
inflicting serious loss upon the rebel command under Gen. Kirby
Smith.

The regiment toward the latter end of the rebellion was stationed
at Little Rock, the capital of Arkansas, where it remained, doing guard
duty, from May 3, 1864, up to December 14, 1865, when it was mus-
tered out of the service at Little Rock, and returned home soon after.

THE FIFTY-FIRST REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

Nine companies of the Fifty-first regiment of Infantry were organized
at Camp Douglas December 24, 1861, and led to the field by Colonel
Gilbert W. Cummings. During February and the early part of March,
1862, the Fifty-first was engaged in campaigning in Missouri. It formed
a part of the force that captured New Madrid, Missouri, and after resting
a few days at New Madrid the regiment started on the 'expedition for
the capture of Island No. 10, and was quite effective in securing the
capture of the 4,000 troops under Gen. Mackall, that sought to save

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 277

themselves by flight after the surrender of the fortifications on Island
No. 10.

From Island No. 10 the regiment moved down the river to Osceola,
Arkansas, and thence to Hamburg Landing, arriving April 22, 1862.
During the later part of April the regiment was made a part of Gen.
John M. Palmer's brigade, of Gen. Paine's division, and participated
in the battle of Farmington, winning good opinions from its com-
manders by its veteran-like behavior while under fire. During the
operations against and the advance upon Corinth, Paine's division, to
which the Fifty-first belonged, with that of Gen. Stanley, constituted
the "right wing," as designated by Gen. Halleck.

In the early part of the month of June, 1862, while the regiment
was in the field near Baldwin, Col. F. A. Harrington assumed com-
mand of the brigade to which the Fifty-first belonged, and continued in
command until killed at its head during the bloody battle of Stone
River. About the middle of June the regiment returned to Corinth
and remained there until July 20, when it marched to Tuscumbia,
Alabama, and during the greater part of August the Fifty-first was en-
gaged in guardingthe railroad from Hillsboro to Decatur, until the first
week in September, when it crossed the Tennessee river and moved to
Athens, and thence to Nashville, forming a part of the garrison during
the siege of the city by Breckenridge, Morgan and Forrest, being
cut off from Buell in Kentucky from September 11 to November 6,
1862, during which time the garrison suffered from a scarcity of rations
and supplies. Meantime Col. Cummings resigned while the regiment
lay at Nashville, and Lieut.-Colonel L. P. Bradley, an excellent officer
and gallant soldier, succeeded him in command of the regiment. In
December, before the movement against Bragg at Murfreesboro, the
Fifty-first was transferred to Gen. Phil. Sheridan's division, forming a
part of the Third Brigade, Third Division of the Fourteenth Army
Corps. The regiment went into the battle of Stone River under Col.
Bradley, but Col. Harrington, acting-brigadier, being mortally wounded
and captured, Col. Bradley, December 31, took command of the
brigade, and Capt. Westcott took command of the regiment. The
Fifty-first was in the thickest of the fight, and sustained a loss of
nearly sixty killed, wounded and missing. In the following March
the regiment went on a "wild goose chase" after Van Dorn, pursuing
him as far as Duck river. In the forward movement to Tullahoma,
Tennessee, and Bridgeport, Alabama, after Bragg, the division to
which the Fifty -first belonged formed a part of the Twentieth Corps
under Gen. McCook and did its full share of the hard marches through
Alabama and Georgia and into the Lookout valley near Chattanooga,

278 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Tennessee, and also took a hand in the disastrous battle of Chickamauga,
losing nearly 45 per cent of the men engaged.

After the battle of Chickamauga the Twentieth and Twenty-first
Corps were consolidated, and designated as the Fourth Corps, Gen.
Sheridan commanding the Second Division, and Col. G. C. Harker the
Third Brigade of the Division ; the Fifty-first forming a part of the
Third Brigade. In the assault upon Mission Ridge. Maj. Davis was
severely wounded, Capt. Bellows was killed, and the regiment lost
thirty men out of the 150 that went into the charge. Capt. Tilton
took Maj. Davis' place after the latter was wounded, as regimental
commander. The last of November, 1863, the regiment, brigade,
division and corps, moved toward Knoxville to release Gen. Burnside.
It encamped at Blain's Cross Roads, and remained till January 15,
when the regiment returned to Chattanooga and there reenlisted, and
started home two days later on a veteran furlough. The regiment
returned to Cleveland, Tennessee, the last of March, 1864, and soon
after entered upon the great Atlanta campaign, and during the many
engagements the regiment was in it behaved courageously, losing dur-
ing the campaign three officers killed, four wounded, and 105 men
killed and wounded. The regiment sustained its severest loss at Kene-
saw, where its gallant adjutant and one lieutenant were killed, and
fifty-four men killed and wounded. Capt. Tilton, of Company C, the
Iroquois county company, was severely wounded at Dallas, Georgia.
The regiment marched into Atlanta September 8, 1864, and a proud
day it was to the conquerors of that stronghold.

The last of September the regiment moved to Bridgeport, and after
a couple of weeks encamped at Chattanooga, where the venerable chap-
lain, Rev. L. Raymond, well known as a popular evangelist in the
Baptist church, resigned and went home. At this point 192 recruits
(drafted men) joined the regiment, many of whom did good service at
Franklin and Nashville a few weeks later. The regiment moved with
its corps to Pulaski, Tennessee, to checkmate Hood in his bold advance
upon Nashville. The Third Brigade, under Bradley, held the strong
columns of Hood in check, November 29, at Spring Hill, enabling the
First and Third Divisions of the Fourth, and the whole of the Twenty-
third Corps, and their trains, to pass on to Franklin, where, in conjunc-
tion with the Second Brigade of its Division, it also repaired, halting
on Carter's Hill 300 yards in advance of the union works, on the
right and left of the Columbia pike. Here the two brigades disposed
on each side of the pike, hastily threw up barricades, and in obedience
to the somewhat reckless orders of Gen. Wagner, it made ready to fight
the whole of Hood's army. When Hood, with his two army corps

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 279

massed in column on the pike, and on either side of it, with the Third
Corps behind the others, in reserve, the two gallant skeleton brigades,
true to Wagner's order, held their position in the face of an army of
nearly 50,000 men, advancing in grand array upon the army of Scho-
field, and poured a deadly fire into the massed ranks of the enemy, but
were, as a matter of course, forced to fall back to the main line, which
they did in some disorder, but for the most part the Fifty-first fell
back in good order, though at a rapid pace, and once behind the works
they faced about and poured a deadly fire into the enemy's ranks ; but
in falling back, Wagner's men had, in some places, been so closely pur-
sued, that in letting them through that part of the union lines held
by the brigades of the Twenty-third Corps, posted on the right and left
of the Columbia pike, the rebels also forced their way through the
lines and captured a battery, turned it upon the union line crouching
behind their works, and then began a terrible hand-to-hand fight, in
which the. Fifty -first or so much of it as had not been killed or cap-
tured before reaching the works took a hand. Here Captain Tilton
and Lieut. Iven Bailey (late county treasurer), then a sergeant, fell
terribly wounded^ the latter, like many of his brave comrades, though
shot down kept on firing at the enemy until their guns were wrenched
from their hands in the desperate conflict. At last the gallant First
Brigade, of the Second Division, having come to their relief, the enemy
\vas driven back beyond the works, after terrible fighting, and kept
there until after midnight, when the whole union army fell back across
the Harpeth river, and retired to Nashville. At Franklin, beside the
loss of four of its officers, the Fifty-first lost fifty-two men killed and
wounded, and ninety-eight missing, most of the latter were taken
prisoners before they could get behind the works, after they had been
driven from the outpost on Carter's Hill.

The Fifty-first regiment was engaged in the two-days battle at
Nashville, and followed Hood's defeated army to the Tennessee river,
and afterward went into winter quarters at Huntsville, Alabama. In
the spring it moved first to Greenville, East Tennessee, and from there
to Nashville, where Company I, ninety strong, joined the regiment
from Camp Butler, Illinois. Lieut. James Skidmore and his company
(F) was mustered out, and returned home June 15, 1865. Lieut. Skid-
more himself was from this county. The regiment during the month
of July went to Texas, and was mustered out there September 25, 1865.

Company C of the Fifty-first was, with the exception of some
twenty men from Knoxville and Knox county and a few other points,
recruited by Lieut. Albert Eads, from Iroquois county. Capt. N. B.
Petts, assisted by A. M. Tilton and Adam S. Heth'eld, afterward first

280 HISTORY OF JROQUOIS COUNTY.

lieutenant and first sergeant of the company respectively, did most of
the recruiting for the company during the early fall of 1861. Lieut.
Tilton, on the resignation of Capt. Petts, was made captain of -the com-
pany, and he was succeeded at the expiration of his term of service by
Lieut. Francis M. Bryant, formerly of Middleport. Sergt. A. S. Het-
field was promoted lieutenant, then quartermaster, and afterward cap-
tain of company E. Corp. Benjamin F. James, before the close of the
war, was promoted to the first lieutenancy of company B. A number
of the members of the Fifty-first are well-to-do farmers and prominent
citizens of this county. Among them we name A. M. Eastburn, of
Sheldon, and J. J. Edwards, of Crescent, as being both veterans and
sergeants of Company C, and many other of our solid citizens did noble
duty as soldiers of the old Fifty-first regiment.

THE FIFTY-SEVENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The Fifty-seventh, Col. Silas D. Baldwin commanding, was mus-
tered into the United States service at Camp Douglas, December 26,
1861, and the second week in February following it moved to Cairo ;
thence to Forts Henry and Donelson, being. assigned to Gen. Lew Wal-
lace's division at Donelson, and taking part in the battle. At Shiloh,
in the two-days battle, the regiment lost over 180 men and officers.
Afterward the regiment formed a part of the army besieging Corinth,
and after its capture formed a part of the garrison, and stubbornly held
the place when Yan Dorn assaulted it, losing forty-two men. During
the summer of 1863 the regiment was engaged in chasing the bold
raider, Forrest, from one place to another, and finally settled back in
its old quarters as the garrison of Corinth, and remained there till
November 4, when it moved to Louisville, where it reenlisted, and the
veterans returned home on a thirty-day furlough, the regiment mean-
time being strengthened by 250 new recruits while at Chicago on fur-
lough, and with this new levy the regiment returned to the front in
March, 1864.

The regiment did duty at Athens, Alabama, until May 1, 1864,
when it joined Sherman's grand army en route for Atlanta, and formed
a part of the army of the Tennessee, under command of the lamented
Gen. McPherson, and did good service in that historic campaign ; and
also after the fall of Atlanta, the regiment did good service scouting
through North Georgia. After a severe brush with the rear of Hood's
army, then marching northward on October 13, in which the Fifty-
seventh lost seven men and threw a large force of the enemy into confu-
sion, the regiment, with the rest of the brigade, took up the line of

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAK ; 281

march from Rome to Atlanta, and thence to the sea, forming a part of
the Fifteenth Army Corps; and the fortunes of the Fifty-seventh after
leaving Atlanta, Georgia, on the famous tramp to Savannah, are iden-
tical with those of the Fifteenth Corps, to which, as above stated, it
belonged. It made the tour of the Carolinas, and was present at the
surrender of Joe Johnston's army, and continued its tramping after the
surrender, until it finally brought up with the rest of Sherman's army
in the grand review at the national capital. The Fifty-seventh was
mustered out July 10, 1865, at Chicago. There were thirteen men
from Onarga, in this county, in the Fifty-seventh, four of which number
lost their lives.

THE FIFTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

Col. William F. Lynch, a dashing young Irishman, of Elgin, Illi-
nois, organized the Fifty-eighth at Camp Douglas December 25, 1861,
and led it to the field the second week of February, 1862, taking a
part in the siege and capture of Fort Donelson, and later, a part in the
dark drama enacted on Shiloh's field, where the greater portion of the
Fifty-eighth was surrounded and captured after a prolonged and des-
perate resistance, in which the regiment was severely handled by an
overpowering foe. Four hundred and fifty were either killed, wounded
or captured, and as 218 was the number taken prisoners, it will be seen
that the loss in killed was very great. Those taken prisoners were sent
to the rebel prison pens at different points in the South, and as a large
number of the prisoners were suffering from wounds, and were treated
with the inhumanity and devilish brutality which distinguished the
boasted " chivalrj' " (?) of the Confederacy, after seven months' suffering
in the horrid dens devised by rebel monsters, 130 men of the 218 were
exchanged, the rest having died under their tortures. The remnant of
the regiment, after the battle of Shiloh, together with remnants of
other regiments that had suffered in the same manner a loss of the major
part of their men, were consolidated into an organization known as
the " Union Brigade," and rendered efficient service at the siege of
Corinth, also in its defense still later in the year, and also at luka,
Mississippi.

In the early winter of 1862-3 the regiment was reunited at Camp
Butler, the prisoners now exchanged and able for duty reported, and
the regiment was held at Springfield guarding rebel prisoners until
June 28, 1863, meantime it had received a number of recruits and was
once more a strong, disciplined and effective force. The regiment
spent the rest of the summer of 1863 and the fall of that year in doing

282 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

garrison duty at Cairo, Mound City, Union City, Padncah and Colum-
bus, Kentucky, up to January 1, 1864, when it veteranized. January
21, 1864, the Fifty-eighth embarked for Yicksburg, Mississippi ;
arrived there February 3, and moved across the Big Black, lighting the
enemy at Queen's Hill ; participated in the Meridian raid and suffered
severely on the raid, by reason of the scarcity of rations, subsisting
seventy hours on one day's rations and marching forty-seven miles in
the meantime. The Fifty-eighth was the first infantry to enter Meri-
dian. On its return to Yicksburg the regiment accompanied Gen. A.
J. Smith in his Red River expedition, and took a part in the siege and
capture of Fort De Russey, the Fifty-eighth's colors being the first
planted on the captured works.

In the disaster at Pleasant Hill, Louisiana, the Fifty-eighth bore a
conspicuous part and a heroic one, in checking the flushed rebel army
that was pressing triumphantly back upon Grand Ecore in disorderly
retreat, the demoralized army of Gen. Banks. Hoping to check the
exultant foe and save the panic-stricken army of Banks, Gen. A. J.
Smith threw out his lines in good order, but a brigade of eastern troops
on the right of the Fifty-eighth (the latter holding the extreme left),
filled with forebodings of defeat from the tales of excited and demor-
alized stragglers from Banks' column, fell back early in the engage-
ment, leaving the Fifty-eighth alone and cut off, but the dauntless
regiment fearlessly charged the pursuing enemy on the flank and
rear, and poured in such a deadly enfilading fire as to completely stag-
ger and throw into confusion and retreat the column of rebels that, in
the flush of victory, were fast on the heels of the flying brigade of
eastern troops. And here the daring Fifty-eighth got in its best work,
taking upward of 500 prisoners, many of whom turned out to be the
same men they had, the winter before, guarded as prisoners at Camp
Butler, in Illinois. The rebels thus confronted and driven back by
this gallant regiment, began a retreat. And yet the union forces also con-
tinued to retreat, and the boys of the Fifty-eighth, with a re-captured
battery and their prisoners, fell back sullenly with and in the rear of
the main column to Grand Ecore. The regiment afterward partici-
pated in the following engagements with credit: Marksville Prairie,
Clouterville and Yellow Bayou, losing heavily at the last-mentioned
fight. Nine color-bearers were shot down in rapid succession, and
their young and dashing commander, Col. Lynch, here received a
severe wound.

The regiment spent the rest of the summer of 1864 in steeple-
chases after guerrilla bands in north Mississippi, west Tennessee,
Arkansas and Missouri, and in the fall inarched through Missouri

IROQUOI8 COUNTY IN THE WAR.

to Kansas, being poorly fed on the route. December 1, 1864, the regi-
ment reached Nashville, Tennessee, and took a part in the two-days
battle and the pursuit of Hood, following him to Eastport, Mississippi,
where the non-veterans were mustered out, leaving 390 men, that were
consolidated into four companies as the Fifty-eighth battalion, and sent
to Gen. Canby, at Mobile, Alabama ; and while there the battalion of four
companies was joined by six new companies of recruits, and was fore-
most in the charge upon Fort Blakeley. From Mobile the Fifty-eighth
went to Montgomery, Alabama, where it was further recruited by the
assignment of recruits from the Eighty-first and One Hundred and
Fourteenth Illinois. And it remained at this point, doing garrison
duty until April 1, 1866, when it was mustered out. In the old three-
years organization Iroquois county furnished nineteen men to Company
C, and Hon. George C. Wilson was at first corporal, and afterward
second lieutenant of this company.

Company H, one of the new one-year companies, was almost
entirely from this county, and was commanded by Capt. James H.
Jaquith, of Chebanse. This company was mustered in, in the spring
of 1865, and saw nearly all its service at Montgomery, Alabama, doing
guard duty.

THE SEVENTY-SECOND REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The Seventy-second was one of the Chicago Board of Trade regi-
ments, and went into the field, August 23, 1862, under the lead of
Col. F. A. Starring, 967 strong, and spent most of that fall in cam-
paigning in western Kentucky, leaving Columbus, Kentucky, for
Yicksburg, November 21, 1862; spent the winter of 1862-3 in the
movements preparatory to the Vicksburg campaign. At Champion Hills
the regiment came into the fight at an opportune moment, and by a
bold dash helped turn the left flank of the enemy, and drove him from
the field. The regiment was engaged at Big Black, and in all the siege
operations up to the fall of Vicksburg on July 4, 1863. The regiment
then participated in the capture of Natchez. In October, 1863, the
regiment returned to Yicksburg, Mississippi, and did duty until the
next October, 1864, as provost-guards of the city. The regiment
moved to the support of Thomas at Nashville, November 13, 1864,
and became a part of Gen. Schofield's forces, and was actively engaged
at Franklin, where it lost nine out of the sixteen officers engaged, and
152 men killed and severely wounded. The regiment fought like
tigers, and to them and the men of Opdyck's Brigade is largely due
the credit of saving the union army from a crushing defeat. The

284 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

regiment took an active and honorable part in the battles of Nashville,
December 15 and 16, and followed Hood's flying army to Clifton, and
there embarked and proceeded to Eastport, Mississippi, and went from
there to the department of the Gulf, taking a part in the capture of
Spanish Fort and Blakeley in the vicinity of Mobile. From Mobile,
the Seventy-second marched across the country to Montgomery, a dis-
tance of just 200 miles, in just 11 days. The regiment went from
Montgomery to Yicksburg, in July, 1865, and August 6 was mus-
tered out at Vicksburg. The regiment came home with twenty-two
officers and 310 men out of the 967 that enlisted. Iroquois county
furnished Company G with a corporal and one man, one of whom died,
and also Company K two men, William and James Shottenkirk, of
Onarga, both of whom died. The writer lay in the post hospital, at
Franklin, Tennessee, when James Shottenkirk died there of his wounds,
and will always remember his piteous cries and prayers for relief from
his suffering, and how kindly and tenderly his brother Daniel sought
to soothe the terrible agony of the wounded hero, until death's icy
hand was laid upon the fevered brow of the young soldier, and his
pitiful cry of " Oh, Danny, give me water," was hushed forever.

THE SEVENTY-SIXTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The Seventy-sixth Regiment of Illinois Infantry was raised in the
counties of Kankakee, Iroquois, Champaign and Grundy. Iroquois
furnished three full companies, to wit : Companies A, E and K, and
quite a number to Company D from the French Canadian colonists
residing in the north part of this county.

The regiment was mustered into service August 22, 1862, at Kan-
kakee city, with Alonzo W. Mack, of Kankakee city, as its colonel,
and Dr. Franklin Blades, of Iroquois county, as surgeon, and also
Dr. "William A. Babcock, of this county, as. first assistant surgeon.
While the regiment was in camp at Kankakee, and before it was
mustered, S. C. Munhall, widely known among his comrades as
" Urchin," sent a communication to his home paper, the " Patriot "
of Champaign, in which he gives a racy description of the first camp
experiences of the Seventy-sixth ; and we here take the liberty of
making an extract from it, and are frank to say, in this connection,
that to our friend " Urchin " we are largely indebted for the material
from which we have evolved this rather imperfect regimental sketch.
But to return to " Urchin's " letter ; he wrote, under date of August
20, 1862: "Our camp is situated about one mile nortlrof Kankakee
city, in the old fair ground. It is a beautiful situation, well supplied

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 285

with water, together with plenty of shade trees, which are a fine thing
in camp, especially after drilling in the hot sun for a period of two
hours. We have an abundance of ' grub,' such as it is, namely, army
crackers (thoroughly seasoned), coffee, branded ' pure Rio,' (which
resembles red-oak bark, pulverized), sugar, which has the appearance of
being half sand), rice, molasses (one pint to every eighteen men for
three meals), and other notions, such as candles, soap, etc. But so it
goes! We all manage to get enough to eat, drink and wear, besides
having plenty of fun. There are now in camp some 1,400 men from
the different counties, ordered to rendezvous here. Quite an excite-
ment was created in camp last night by the report that the regiment
was ordered to Cairo. A great many companies did not feel disposed
to go before receiving their bounty money, but after cooking two days'
rations, and a great many of them packing their ' duds ' the report
turned out to be a regular h-o-a-x. Our company (G) received the
county orders yesterday morning much to our surprise. They jumped
around in as good spirits as so many grasshoppers until they received
orders to go to Cairo. It is expected our regiment will organize to-day
or to-morrow. We are looking anxiously for the time to come as we
expect a little $40 in 'greenbacks' when that day rolls round. The
principal amusement for evenings is to ' reach ' for chickens. One
mess in an adjoining company \vent out Saturday evening and returned
with twenty-eight fine pullets, a goose and a couple of fancy ducks, so
you can judge how they lived on the following Sabbath."

As they had anticipated, the regiment was sent to Cairo immedi-
ately after it was mustered in, and from thence to Columbus, Ken-
tucky, where it remained about a month; and again we will quote from
one of.Munhall's letters, describing the camp and camp-life at Colum-
bus. He wrote September 7, soon after arriving there: "This partic-
ular locality of the Confederacy is what your correspondent would
style a 'seedy country,' and furthermore I will say, and vouch for the
truth at the same time, the inhabitants are peculiarly suited to the
country. The country surrounding us does not appear to produce any-
thing but contrabands, mules and secessionists. We are encamped on
the top of a hill, some two hundred feet above the level of the river,
about a quarter of a mile northeast of the town of Columbus. The
grounds were evacuated by the rebels before they evacuated this place.
Columbus is truly a stronghold. The fortifications extend nearly
around the town, and huge breastworks are along the river. Every
portion of these fortifications is represented by innumerable mortars,
columbiads and cannon, among which there are many sixty-four and
one hundred and twenty-eight pounders that now stand grinning and

286 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

ready to belch forth ' conciliation' by the ton upon the traitor hordes
that dare to confront them. Taking everything into consideration,
we have a first-rate camp ground. The health of the regiment is
good. There are only ten or twelve in the hospital and none seriously
ill. The boys are in good spirits and anxious to try the range of their
new Enfields the regiment captured. The guns are tip-top. They
were captured from the rebel steamer Fair Play, which was taken with
a cargo of guns, ammunition, etc., by our troops on the expedition up
the Yazoo river. They were designed to be sent to Hindman for his
rebel crew, but our boys will put them to a better use. The cartridge-
boxes and other accouterments were made in London, and, of course,
bear the stamp of the English crown. * * * * In pursuance of
orders from headquarters, we are confined to camp much closer than
the boys like, but we take it as a ' necessity of war,' and the only way
by which proper discipline may be maintained. We have reveille at
half-past four o'clock, when Sergeant Miller admonishes us to ' fall in for
roll-call' ; next comes breakfast, then drill for two hours ; we are allowed
then to make our own amusement till noon. After dinner ' ye soldier
goeth where he listeth,' taking care riot to intrude on the sacred soil of
the sentinel's beat, lest he might be forced to visit the officer of the
guard, who, perchance, may oifer ' extra inducements ' for him to take
quarters in the guard-house. At five o'clock we have dress parade, after
which comes supper and drill. Tattoo and roll-call at nine, when you
would suppose we all retired to rest, but on the contrary then com-
mence the hilarities of the day ; while a few of the staid and sober
ones would fain retire to sweet repose, a majority of 'gay and festive
cusses' seek to while away the allotted 'half hour' in the most uproar-
ious amusements that can be devised, singing, dancing, speechifying,
etc. etc., until from exhaustion, and a hearty exercise of lungs, limbs
and muscle, they gradually ' subside,' and a deathly silence pervades the
camp until the ominous blast of the bugle awakes the sleepers, and the
bustle of the previous day is resumed. Taking all into consideration,
'sogering' here is a gay life, yet there are many of the boys who
would gladly exchange it for the comforts of the homes they left, did
not duty to themselves and their country demand the sacrifice."

Columbus did not prove so healthy a place as "Urchin" thought
it would. Before the close of September the regiment buried several
of its members that died there of disease. October 3, 1862, the
Seventy-sixth moved by rail to Bolivar, Tennessee, where it remained
in camp for several weeks, doing camp and garrison duty until Novem-
ber 3, when it marched to La Grange, Tennessee, and still later in the
month, on or about the 24th, it started with other troops under Grant

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 287

on his famous but rather unfortunate Mississippi campaign, marching
as far as Yocona, Mississippi, when the unexpected surrender of Holly
Springs, without a proper defense, deranged Grant's plans, and so im-
periled his army that he retired again to his base of supplies in Ten-
nessee. But previous to the withdrawal from Yocono, the Seventy-
sixth suffered while encamped there for three weeks from the scarcity
of rations, and subsisted almost entirely on corn.

The regiment upon its return to Tennessee encamped at Moscow,
at which place Col. Mack resigned, and Lieut. Col. S. T. Busey was
commissioned colonel, to rank from January 7, 1863. The Seventy-
sixth remained in camp at Moscow until February 5, 1863, when it
marched to La Fayette, Tennessee, remaining there in camp about a
month, and here again our inimitable "Urchin " writes a letter, giving
so laconic an account of the manner in which soldiers made merry over
discomforts and misfortunes, that we cannot forbear republishing a part
of it. Under date of February 9, he writes among other things : * *
* * " Before closing this epistle I will say a few words in regard to
our last march. On the 5th inst. our regiment inarched from Moscow,
Tennessee, to this place, over roads that would have been considered
impassable in time of peace; the snow was about four inches deep, and
the depth of the mud under the snow was without limitation. The
day was the most disagreeable of any that we have had since we have
been in the service of ' Uncle Sam.' The northeast wind blew cold,
and the snow fell thick and fast, but we made the trip without any
serious accidents, and camped about 3 o'clock P.M. in the muddiest
place we could find near the village of La Fayette, ten miles distant
from Moscow. After we were halted and arms stacked, we commenced
work shoveling snow and mud, hoping to discover dry soil enough on
which to pitch our tents, but our hopes were blasted and our efforts
defeated. To sleep on the frozen ground without fire, or in the mud
with fire, seemed to be our destiny. Choosing the latter we pitched our
tents, built our fire in the center (Sibley tents), took our little ration of
'hard tack' and 'sow belly,' and wilted down with three rails under
us crossways to keep us above board, determined to make the best of
a bad bargain. The night proved a severe one, but morning found us
above the surface. It was thought by some that one man in our mess
had gone under, but on calling the roll was found present. After par-
taking of 'Uncle Sam's' hospitalities we floated out each man on a
rail and commenced to improve our quarters. We now boast of good
quarters and stylish living. The mud is rapidly dry ing up, the average
depth is now about sixteen inches. We hope to leave here for Mem-
phis soon as we are now well fixed. It spoils soldiers to remain in

288 HISTORY OF 1ROQUOIS COUNTY.

good quarters long." March 9 the regiment did leave its comfortable
quarters at La Fayette, and marched to Memphis, Tennessee, where it
remained just thirty days, and then joined in the Hernando expedition,
returning to Memphis again April 24, 1863, where it remained until
May 13, when the Seventy-sixth took passage on the steamer Fort
Wayne, and steamed down the broad Mississippi toward Yicksburg.
During the second day's ride down the river, the boat was fired into
by guerillas at Greenville, and on the 15th of the month it landed at
Young's Point, Louisiana. On the 18th it marched to Bowen's Landing
and crossed the river. May 19 the regiment was assigned a position on
the extreme union left, and continued in this position until the capture
of the city. In the great charge of May 22, the Seventy-sixth bore a
prominent part, it being the first real tight the regiment had ever par-
ticipated in ; notwithstanding the men of the Seventy-sixth demeaned
themselves w r ith all the steadiness and courage of veterans. During
the long siege of Yicksburg the regiment lost heavily, and among the
number slain was Lieut. Peter I. Williams, of Company E, one of the
best and bravest of men, universally loved and esteemed by his
comrades and all who knew him before he became a soldier. After the
capture of Yicksburg the regiment accompanied Sherman to Jackson,
Mississippi, participating in the battle and capture. And after the fall
of the boasted Sebastopol of the rebels of Mississippi (Yicksburg)
August 12, 1863, embarked and moved to Natchez, Mississippi. Sep-
tember 1 it went on the expedition of Gen. Crocker into Louisiana, re-
turning on the 8th, after which the regiment received the name among
the boys of that department of the " Alligator Regiment."

On the 16th of the month the Seventy-sixth again embarked at
Natchez and returned to Yicksburg. November 28 the regiment
marched to Camp Cowan, and February 1, 1864, it accompanied Gen.
W. T. Sherman on the Meridian raid, during which it participated in
a number of pretty sharp skirmishes on the march to Meridian.
It moved from Meridian to Enterprise city, where the regiment camped
two days, and employed the time in tearing up and destroying the
railroad, and left Enterprise February 19, 1864, and after marching four-
teen days on half rations, reached camp, eight miles east of Yicksburg.
The regiment lost but four men on this campaign, two of whom were
wounded and the other two were captured near Enterprise, just pre-
vious to the departure of the regiment, and were afterward recaptured
from the rebels near Hillsboro, February 22, by a foraging party.
The Seventy-sixth remained in their camp near Yicksburg, doing
picket and camp duty, till May 4, 1864, when it joined the command
of Gen. McArthnr in the expedition up the Yazoo river, taking part

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 289

in the engagements at Benton, Vaughn's Station, and Deasonville.
The campaign occupied seventeen days, and the troops suffered many
hardships. It returned to Vicksburg May 21, and remained in camp
until June 26, when it marched to St. Albans, and thence returned
to Vicksburg again by rail. July 1 the regiment marched to Clear
creek, and July 3 started with the command of Maj.-Gen. H. W.
Slocum on an expedition through central Mississippi, to the cap-
ital (Jackson) arriving there on the 5th, after a fatiguing march and
almost continuous skirmishing, the Seventy-sixth being in advance.
It remained in camp at Jackson until July 6, when marching orders
were received at four o'clock P.M., when the regiment moved about three
miles and met the enemy, and were fiercely attacked, culminat-
ing in a general attack upon the union forces, and continuing until
darkness compelled a cessation of active hostilities, which were resumed
on the morning of the 7th, lasting till noon, the Seventy-sixth
meanwhile taking a prominent part in the battle, being deployed
as skirmishers ; were finally cut off, by a flank movement of the rebel
forces, from the union army, and forced to fight their way out of the
"trap," over a hotly contested field, losing from the regiment nearly
100 men. Capt. Davis, of Company K, left eight of his brave men
dead on the field. July 9 the regiment had made the retreat, and
was again encamped at Vicksburg. On the 23d the prisoners who had
been captured at Jackson were exchanged at Fort Hill, and rejoined
the regiment. July 29 the regiment moved to Morganza's Bend,
Louisiana, and August 24 moved by steamer to Port Hudson, Louisiana,
returning to Morganza's Bend on the 28th of the same month.
It embarked on steamer September 3, and was landed at the mouth of
White river September 7.

October 18, 1864, it moved from the mouth of White river to Mem-
phis, Tennessee, camping in Fort Pickering, where the regiment re-
mained until October 27, when it reembarked on steamer and returned
to the mouth of White river, Arkansas. November 1 it started to
Duvall's Bluff, arriving November 9. It remained at this point till
November 27, when the regiment again reembarked and returned to
Memphis, where it remained until December 31. It moved to Kenners-
ville, Louisiana, arriving early in January, 1865, and lay there in
camp until the army was organized for the Florida campaign. During
the month of February, 1865, the regiment was transported by ocean
steamers to Fort Barrancas, Florida, a portion of the regiment being on
the steamer George Peabody, which was almost totally disabled in a
storm, and was only saved, with a precious cargo of 800 soldiers, by
the coolness of the officers in command and the heroic conduct of the
19

290 HISTORY OF IEOQUOIS COUNTY.

men. All the ambulances, wagons and nearly 200 mules and horses
were thrown overboard. The detachment of the regiment on the ill-
fated steamer was returned to New Orleans and went to Lakeport by
rail, where it embarked and crossed lakes Ponchartrain and Borgne,
reaching the Florida coast nearly a week after the rest of the com-
mand.

From Barrancas the Seventy-sixth and other regiments went on an
expedition to Pollard, and from thence returned to Pensacola, where it
went into camp and remained until the troops set out on the Mobile
campaign. During its stay at Barrancas and Pensacola, the Seventy-
sixth was attached to Gen. Steele's division.

In marching out from Pensacola on the campaign against Blakeley,
theunion arrny of Gen. Steele passed over the same road upon which
Gen. Jackson " Old Hickory " moved an army of 3,000 men in 1818,
and found it a miserable, sandy road, in spite of its historic association.
March 31 Gen. Steele's army took up a position in front of the fortifi-
cations of Blakeley, not a little to the surprise of the rebels behind the
works, who had just learned from scouts that the union army was
moving on towards Montgomery, and had got " stuck " in the Florida
swamps after leaving Pensacola. The Seventy-sixth formed a part of
Spiceley's brigade, of Steele's division, of the Thirteenth Corps, and
in the line of investment held the " right center," to the left of the
Stockton road leading into Blakeley, which position, with the Seventy-
sixth in advance of both brigade and division, was held during the
eight-days siege operations, and up to the time of the assault and
capture of the stronghold, April 9, 1865, being the last battle of any
importance of the war of the rebellion. Throughout the siege in its
advanced position the Seventy-sixth behaved with coolness and cour-
age, but particularly distinguished itself in the final assault upon the
works. Gen. C. C. Andrews, in his history of the Mobile campaign,
gives the following truthful and glowing description of the charge
of the Seventy-sixth : " The Seventy-sixth Illinois charged directly
on the redoubt in their front the one north of the Stockton road
and preserved its alignment well until it got to the second line of
abattis. One man of that regiment was killed at the first line of
abattis and rifle-pits, then at the second line the battle became fierce
and bloody. The confederates maintained a bold front from behind
their breastworks, and when the Seventy-sixth M r as within fifty yards of
the redoubt it suffered severely from the confederate musketry and
artillery. While a part of the regiment maintained a spirited fire, the
rest crossed the abattis. Lieut. William F. Kenaya was shot through
a leg at the second abattis, and nearer the works was hit in the ankle

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 291

joint of his other leg, then unable to walk he kept upright on his
knees and rallied and cheered the men. The color-sergeant (Hussey)
was killed within twenty feet of the works; then the colors were taken
by the noble and brave Corporal Goldwood, who, as he was planting
them on the parapet, received the contents of three muskets so close
that the discharge burnt his clothes, and he fell dead inside the works
with the colors in his arms. The Seventy-sixth and the confederates
fought across the works, and those of the regiment in the rear were
coming up as fast as they could pass the obstructions. Col. Busey ran
along close to the parapet and with his revolver disabled the gunner of
a howitzer about to be fired, and which afterward proved to have a
double charge of grape and canister, then turning to the right he
exchanged shots with two at short range. Afterward he ordered
Lieut.-Col. Jones, Capts. Hughes and Ingersoll and Lieut. Warner,
with from twenty to fifty men to charge the right flank of the redoubt,
while he with another squad charged the front. They charged with bayo-
nets and drove the confederates from the works. Fifty yards in rear
of the redoubt the ground began to slope considerably. It had been
cleared of underbrush, and the latter had been piled along the crest.
Behind that cover the confederates formed again and gave another
volley, wounding among others Col. Busey and Capt. Hughes. Then
the Seventy-sixth charged them again, and they threw down their
arms and ran into the woods toward the landing. Col. Busey sent
detachments in pursuit of them. Upward of 400 prisoners fell into
the hands of the Seventy-sixth. It had five men killed inside the
works. Its whole number of killed was sixteen, of whom, besides
those already mentioned, were Sergeant Perkins and Corporals Hop-
kins and Tremaine. There were eighty wounded, some mortally, so
that its entire casualties were about 100. Among the wounded were
Lieuts. Martin and Warner. The Seventy-sixth entered the redoubt
over the south salient and over the breastworks extending south. Its
national colors were planted on the breastworks. It is claimed by his
comrades that Private Eldrick Bronllette, of Company D, was the first
one over the works. He was killed fifty yards inside the works by a
confederate captain, and the latter was killed by Broullette's comrade.
The regiment used the bayonet in the charge and displayed throughout
the highest degree of valor. No regiment on the field that day suf-
fered so heavily. None exhibited more intrepid bravery ; and higher
praise than that cannot be awarded troops."

The colors of the Seventy-sixth were the first planted on the rebel
works in this assault, and of all the regiments that were engaged in the
charge, none suffered as did this regiment. It lost 118 men killed and

292 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

wounded, out of the 260 that advanced to the assault when the signal
gun was fired. The graves of seventeen heroic dead mark the spot
where the colors were planted by that brave boy, "Charley" Gold-
wood.

After the capture of Blakeley the Seventy-sixth marched to Stark's
Landing, on Mobile bay, and embarked for Mobile, and steamed across
the bay to the captured city, where it encamped for several weeks. It
moved from Mobile to Selma, Alabama, by steamer, where it remained
but a short time, #nd returned to Mobile. Afterward the regiment
embarked on the steamer Herman Livingston for Galveston, Texas, at
which place it went into camp, and remained until July 22, when it
was mustered out.

The regiment traveled over 12,000 miles, and saw a great deal of
hard service. It campaigned in eight different states of the confed-
eracy. During the term of service it received 156 recruits, which on
the muster-out were transferred to the Thirty-seventh Illinois. The
regiment returned with 471 officers and men, having been more fortu-
nate than many other regiments, who saw no more service, in losing by
battle and disease only a little less than half its original number.

On the non-commissioned staff of the Seventy-sixth, Iroquois county
was represented by Sergt.-Maj. Joseph P. Schooley, of Ash Grove, and
principal musician Isaac D. Courtright, of Middleport. Sergt.-Maj.
Schooley was, June 13, 1864, to accept promotion as captain of the
4th Miss. Art., A.D. He was succeeded January 8, 1864, by S. 0,
Munhall ("Urchin ") of Company B, then of Champaign, but now the
present popular postmaster of the city of Watseka.

Company A was organized at Middleport, in July, 1862, with
George C. Harrington as captain, and was composed mainly of citizens
of Middleport, Belmont, Iroquois, Concord and Beaver townships.
Capt. Harrington, on the resignation of Maj. Dubois, was promoted
major, to rank as such from January 7, 1863, and continued with the
regiment until June 27, 1863, when he resigned. On the promotion
of Capt. Harrington, Lieut. Abraham Andrew became captain, and
continued in command of Company A until it was mustered out. Aus-
tin W. Hoyle, late county treasurer of this county, enlisted in the
Seventy -sixth, and was the first orderly-sergeant of Company A, and
was finally promoted to the second lieutenancy of A, a position he well
deserved, so his comrades say. James "W. Kay, a private soldier in
this company, was elected county clerk of this county in 1865, and
made a very efficient officer. Quite a number of the surviv.ors of Com-
pany A are respected citizens of Watseka and vicinity.

Rev. Abram Irvin organized the first week in August, 1862, from

IROQUOIS COUNTY- IN THE WAR. 293

citizens residing in the eastern half of the county, Company E of the
Seventy-sixth, and was commissioned its first captain, with Rev. Peter
I. Williams, of Milford, as first lieutenant, and C. L. Hoyle, of Beaver,
as second lieutenant. Capt. Irvin was discharged December 10, 1864,
and Lieut. Williams having been killed at Vicksburg, Lieut. Hoyle
was promoted to the captaincy. James PI. Eastburn, who is now a
well-to-do farmer of Sheldon township, was one of the sergeants of
Company E, and before the close of the war was promoted to the first
lieutenancy of the company. Sergeant Frank Williamson, of Company
E, has for several years been the representative of Prairie Green town-
ship on the board of supervisors of this county, and Robert W. Foster,
a private of the company, has served as supervisor of both Stockland
ana Sheldon townships. Many of the solid farmers of Milford, Stock-
land, Beaver and Sheldon townships were soldiers in Company E, and
good soldiers, too.

The majority of Company K were citizens of Ash Grove and Loda
townships, in this county, and the remainder belonged in the northern
part of Ford county. The officers of the company were all from this
county. Capt. Joseph Davis, of Ash Grove, was the first commander
of the campany, and continued with it up to February 24, 1865, when
he resigned, and was succeeded by William A. Watkins, of Loda, who
officiated as captain until the regiment was mustered out. The gal-
lant color-sergeant, Henry B. Hussey, of Ash Grove, who was killed
in the charge upon Blakeley while bearing aloft the colors of his regi-
ment, was a sergeant in Company K, and many of the survivors of this
company may be found in Ash Grove and Loda townships as hard-
working, well-to-do farmers. Many of the men from Iroquois in the
Seventy-sixth were either farmers or farmer's sons when they enlisted,
and after having manfully assisted in thrashing the rebels, they quietly
returned to- their farms, and the same persistent toil and carefulness for
which they were distinguished as soldiers, has made them, even in pur-
suing the arts of peace, both prosperous and useful citizens ; at least
such is the case in the majority of instances.

THE EIGHTY-EIGHTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

This heroic regiment, also one of the Board of Trade regiments,
went into the field from Chicago 840 strong during the first week of
September, 1862, under the lead of Colonel (afterward general) Fran-
cis T. Sherman, and in less than a month gave proof of its excellent
fighting qualities at the battle of Perryville, losing four killed and
forty-one wounded. Afterward, as a part of the right wing of Rose-

294 HISTORY OF IEOQUOIS COUNTY.

crans' army, under Gen. Philip H. Sheridan, it took an active part in
the desperate fighting on the banks of Stone river, performing many
valorous acts upon that hotly contested field, fighting hand-to-hand
with the confident foe. After the battle of Chickamauga, the regiment
was assigned to the First Brigade, Second Division of the old " Fight-
ing Fourth Corps," and participated in the assault upon Mission Ridge,
being one of the first regiments to plant the national flag upon the
captured line of defenses that crowned the ridge. The Eighty-eighth
took an active part in the East Tennessee campaign during the winter
of 1863-4, and being for the most part shelterless, half clothed and
half starved, the regiment suffered severely, and not always uncom-
plainingly, but always doing its duty in the face of all disappointments
and privations, and doing it well. It took a part as a portion of the
Fourth Corps, Army of the Cumberland, which formed the center of
Sherman's grand army of invasion, under " Pap Thomas," in all of
the principal engagements that occurred during the Atlanta campaign,
being prominently engaged at Rocky Face Ridge, Resaca, Adairsville,
New Hope Church, Pine Mountain, Kenesaw, Smyrna Camp Ground,
Atlanta, Jonesboro and Lovejoy Station.

After the fall of Atlanta the regiment was dispatched to Chatta-
nooga, Tennessee, where it did duty, and at Bridgeport, Alabama,
until it joined its old brigade at Pulaski. Tennessee, where the Fourth
Corps lay waiting and watching for the advance of Hood upon Nash-
ville. The regiment participated in the heavy skirmishing with the
enemy at Columbia and Spring Hill.

In the desperate and blood} 7 encounter at Franklin, November 30,
1864, the regiment, as a part of Opdyck's immortal brigade, won
imperishable renown. The First Brigade, Second Division, Fourth
Army Corps, under Col. Opdyck, formed on the march from Spring
Hill the rear-guard of the retreating union army, and when in the
afternoon, in the presence of a hostile army nearly 50,000 strong, Col.
Opdyck fell back to Franklin, his command passed into the union lines
that environed the little town on the Columbia pike, and finding the
rest of the union army in position for battle, he halted his tired troops
opportunely in the rear of the two brigades holding the breastworks on
the right and left of the Columbia pike. And when an hour or two
later the desperate assault was made on the center, and the union lines
driven back, and the rebel masses, flushed with their brief success
were crowding wildly into the breach, then the heroic old veterans of
the Eighty-eighth, Thirty-sixth, Forty-fourth, Seventy-third and Sev-
enty-fourth Illinois regiments, the Twenty-fourth Wisconsin, and the
One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Ohio regiments, comprising the First

IROQUOIS COUNTY. IN THE WAR. 295

Brigade, saw that immediate action was demanded of them as reserves,
waited for no word of command, but instantly fixed bayonets, and when
their gallant leader turned to his men he saw they were ready for a
charge, and the chivalric Opdyck, in his clear, ringing tones, gave the
command, " forward First Brigade to the lines," and forward dashed
the daring brigade with a line of gleaming steel, that soon struck
down in death many an exultant foeman. The conflict was brief but
bloody, and assisted by a few of the disorganized masses of the regi-
ments that had been driven out of their works a few moments before,
the stout-hearted men of the First Brigade drove the dense, gray
masses beyond the lines. Four regimental commanders fell, but every
man of that noble brigade was a hero, and fought as if on his own
individual prowess depended the fortunes of the imperiled army of the
Union, and actuated by such heroism, the daring brigade, inside of
twenty minutes, drove back a conquering force vastly superior in point of
numbers, recapturing eight pieces of artillery, 400 prisoners and ten
battle-flags, and left the disputed ground covered with hundreds of brave
foemen, dead, or terribly wounded. It is doubtful if the record of civ-
ilized warfare shows fiercer fighting than was done by the Eighty-
eighth and its gallant companion regiments in this brief but bloody
struggle at Franklin. The writer's regiment, on the extreme left of
the First Division, Fourth Corps, was lying behind a line of imperfect
breastworks, a short distance to the right of where the union lines were
forced back, and watched in spite of the fire in their front, as well as
they could for the blinding smoke, the terrible wrestle of the men of
the west with the impetuous sons of the south, that was taking place
to our left, to see who should gain the mastery. The success of the
confederates in holding their ground would have cut us off from the
bridge across the Harpeth river, and compelled the surrender of the
greater part of the outnumbered and nearly exhausted union army.
Hence, we watched with bated breath till we saw the " gray coats "
falling back ; then our fears were quieted for the time, and thoughts of
ANDERSONVILLE were dispelled. At Nashville the regiment behaved
in the two-days battle with its usual bravery, and engaged in the pur-
suit of the flying foe, following on the heels of Hood to the Tennessee
river.

The regiment was mustered out in June, 1865. Of the 900 that
went into the field 229, all told, returned. Col. Sherman was captured
at Atlanta and thrown into prison, and managed to break out, but was
hunted down and caught by bloodhounds before he could reach our
lines.

Iroquois county was represented in the Eighty-eighth as follows:

296 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Dr. A. C. Rankin, Loda, first assistant surgeon ; Company C, Lieut.
Robert O. Crawford, three sergeants, two corporals and thirty-two men ;
Company F, one man ; Company K, one sergeant and three men. A
sergeant and seven men of the above number died on the field of
battle, or in line of duty, and one, James Brett, died in Andersonville.

THE EIGHTY-NINTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY-

The Eighty -ninth, or " Railroad Regiment," made up mostly of rail-
road employes, was mustered into the United States service at Camp
Douglas, Chicago, August 27, 1862, and in about a week was hurried
to Kentucky, where it formed a part of Gen. Nelson's army till
October, when it was placed in Gen. Willich's brigade of McCook's
corps, and continued in Willich's brigade to the close of the war,
and making for itself a good record in the battles fought by the
army of the Cumberland. At Stone River it lost Capt. Willett and
142 men. At Chickamauga its loss was very great. Lieut. Col. Dun-
can J. Hall, three captains and a lieutenant offered up their lives on the
altar of their country, and 109 men were killed, wounded and captured.
At Mission Ridge a captain and lieutenant were killed, and thirty-five
men killed and wounded. During the Atlanta campaign the regiment
was engaged at Rocky Face, Resaca, Dallas, Kenesaw Mountain, Peach
Tree Creek, Atlanta, Jonesboro and Lovejoy, losing in the campaign
211 men killed and wounded, one captain and one lieutenant killed
and several officers wounded. During the battle of Franklin the
Third Division, Fourth Corps was held in reserve across the Harpeth
river to cover the retreat of Schofield's army, and the Eighty-ninth be-
longed to Willich's brigade of this division. At Nashville the Eighty-
ninth was actively engaged, and sustained a loss in the two-days fight of
thirty-nine men. After the defeat of Hood it pursued his forces to the
Tennessee river. During its term of service the regiment mustered
on its original roll and recruits 1,403 men ; out of these 820 men died
of disease or wounds, or were killed in action. The regiment was
mustered out at Nashville, June 10, 1865. From this county there
were nine men and Corporal Oliver Bunker in Company D, four of the
nine men were killed or died, and one died in Andersonville prison.

THE ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTEENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The One Hundred and Thirteenth regiment, known as the "Third
Board of Trade Regiment," was made up of volunteers from the coun-
ties of Cook, Kankakee and Iroquois almost wholly. This county

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 297

furnished three full companies, D, F and I, half of Company B, and
about one-fourth of Company H, and these companies afterward re-
ceived a large number of recruits, so that this county furnished nearly
two-fifths of the rank and file of the One Hundred and Thirteenth
regiment. Most of the men for this regiment were enlisted during
the month of August, 1862, but the regiment was not mustered until
October 1, and from that time till November 5 following, it was em-
ployed in guarding rebel prisoners confined in Camp Douglas, and
fitting itself by drill and discipline for the active 1 duties of the field.
At the last mentioned date the regiment left Camp Douglas for Mem-
phis, Tennessee, and on its arrival at the latter place it was placed in
Gen. Sherman's corps (the Fifteenth), and accompanied him in his
expedition into northern Mississippi, generally designated as the " Tal-
lahatchie expedition." On its return from this campaign it moved
against Yicksburg with Sherman, and formed a part of the brigade
commanded by Gen. Giles A. Smith, and in the division of Gen. Mor-
gan L. Smith. On this expedition the One Hundred and Thirteenth
participated in the fight at Milliken's Bend and the engagement at
Chickasaw Bayou. The regiment participated in the assault upon and
capture of Arkansas Post ; and the One Hundred and Thirteenth and
other regiments of Gen. Giles A. Smith's brigade behaved with great
gallantry in the face of a destructive fire from the enemy's rifle-pits at
a short range, and suffered a considerable loss in consequence. The
One Hundred and Thirteenth especially suffered from the raking fire
to which it was subjected. After this battle Gen. Sherman determined
to honor the men who had, by their bravery, done so much to insure
the capture of the prisoners and fort, by sending them home in charge
of the prisoners; and Companies C, D, F, I and K were selected from
the One Hundred and Thirteenth, being just one-half of the regi-
ment, and they were the companies that had suffered the greatest loss,
to guard the prisoners to Springfield. These five companies were to
remain north and fill up their thinned ranks with new recruits. The
three companies from Iroquois (D, F and I) were in this wing of the
regiment sent back, and remained at Springfield for some time. The
other five companies, in which there were Iroquois men in two of the
companies (B and H), moved from Arkansas Post to Young's Point.
Col. Hoge, while the regiment lay at Young's Point, was appointed
provost-marshal of the Fifteenth Corps ; and while here the One Hun-
dred and Thirteenth lost many noble men by sickness, as was also the
bitter experience of all the regiments in that army while lying in camp
at Young's Point, and the place will long be remembered with horror
by those who survived, and who helped with trembling hands and

298 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

aching hearts to place under the sod of this fated point so many of
their dead comrades.

During its camp life at Young's Point the One Hundred and Thir-
teenth went with the brigade chosen, and led by Gen. Sherman, in
person, up the Black Bayou to the relief of Admiral Porter and flotilla,,
surrounded by the land forces of the enemy. The admiral was in dan-
ger of having his fleet captured and sunk, and was in poor plight in
the treacherous, shallow bayou to make any resistance or escape to the
Mississippi. On this expedition the brigade, with plucky Gen. Sher-
man, who went afoot with the boys, made a forced march of twenty-
five miles through swamps, over extemporized bridges made of a single
log or plank, marching in single file, and suffering many hardships and
numberless inconveniences, but finally arriving in time to whip the
rebel forces, and let Porter get his fleet back to safer waters. And
then the tired brigade had no alternative left but to " coon " their
way back again as they came to solid land, consuming ten days in the
unpleasant but highly successful and satisfactory task.

That portion of the One Hundred and Thirteenth in the field,,
composed of the five companies left, after the detachment of five com-
panies went north in charge of prisoners from Arkansas Post, were
under the immediate command of Col. George B. Hoge, and embraced
not only the five companies left behind, but the sick and convalescents
of the other five companies, as well as all men on detached duty. This
detachment in the field will hereafter be designated as "the regiment,"
and we will here say it was with Sherman in the march to the rear
of Vicksburg, and was engaged in most of the hard fighting that cul-
minated in the fall of Vicksburg, and the capture of Gen. Pemberton's
army. In this campaign the One Hundred and Thirteenth suffered
from both disease and the bullets of the enemy, losing fully one entire
third of the force that went into the campaign, including their gallant
colonel, who was severely wounded. The regiment was put on provost
duty for some little time at Chickasaw Bayou, a very unhealthy local-
ity, and in a few days during July and August the greater part of
the force was on the sick list, and several died at this post. From
Chickasaw Bayou the regiment moved to Corinth in the latter part of
August, 18G3, and remained there until the month of January follow-
ing, being mostly engaged in doing post duty and scouting after
guerilla bands. Col. Hoge meantime commanded the post at Corinth,
until its evacuation by the federal forces, January 25, 1864, when the
colonel and his regiment proceeded to Memphis, Tennessee, where the
colonel took command of the second brigade of the post defenses of
the city of Memphis. While at Memphis, the five companies that had

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 299

been doing guard and provost duty in Illinois, rejoined the regiment
in March, 1864. The brigade under Col. Hoge accompanied Gen.
Sturgis in his unsuccessful expedition against Gen. N. B. Forrest, the
daring rebel raider, and cruel butcherer of unoffending and helpless
prisoners at Fort Pillow.

In the disastrous expedition of Gen. Sturgis to Guntown, Missis-
sippi, the regiment suffered severely, losing fourteen officers and 135
men killed, wounded or captured. Among the officers captured was
Capt. George E. King and Lieut. J. E. Leatherman (then sergeant) of
the Iroquois companies. Inasmuch as the regiment was a great suf-
ferer by this disaster to the union arms, it is but fair that we briefly
sketch the main incidents of this unfortunate campaign. Gen. Sturgis,
in command of about 12,000 troops, including the commands of Gen.
A. J. Smith and Griersori's cavalry division, set out from Memphis
June 1, 1864, with Tupelo, distant 160 miles to the southeast, as his
objective point, Tupelo being situated on the Mobile & Ohio railroad,
and a point of considerable strategic importance. The sultry weather
and heavy rains made the marching laborious and slow, and exhausted
the whole command so much that they were in a poor condition for a
pitched battle when the terrible blow fell upon them. For days the
tired army toiled over miserable roads, through mud and rain, until the
morning of June 10, when the sun shone out bright, though hot, and
the wearied fellows felt rejoiced to think that fair weather had dawned
upon them once more, and moved forward with a more buoyant step,
when early in the day Gen. Grierson's cavalry rode upon Forrest's
troopers, and sharp fighting ensued, Grierson's gallant troopers driving
the enemy's horse before them to the banks of Tishomingo creek,
where they encountered Forrest's infantry, strongly posted on the steep
bank of the creek opposite to the advancing army of Sturgis. At this
stage Gen. Sturgis, instead of moving up his troops and forming a
strong assaulting column, and then moving forward cautiously, hurried
up his infantry on the " double quick," many of the regiment having
run several miles in the hot son, were pushed forward singly and with-
out any apparent order against the enemy lying in his strong position,
only to be ruthlessly cut down by a well-directed fire from the ranks of
Forrest ; and despite the fact that many of the federal regiments went
into the fight exhausted and panting with the fatigue of their long run
to the battlefield, and were pushed forward in the face of a murderous
fire from a foe strongly posted under cover, while the union regiments
were without support of any kind, still these brave fellows, under all
these disadvantages and discouragements, did nobly under the most
trying circumstances that could befall an army; and many regiments,

300 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

the One Hundred and Thirteenth among the number, behaved splen-
didly. The fighting began at about eleven o'clock in the forenoon and
had become general by one o'clock, and continued with fury till four,
when the enemy having turned the union left, and there was danger
of the whole force being entirely surrounded, a retreat was ordered,
and then a wild scene followed, which cannot be adequately described.
Soon after the retreat began night fell upon the panic stricken army, and
as if to render confusion confounded, the wagon train became mired in a
swamp, blocking up the road so that the artillery could not be got past
the obstruction and had to be abandoned ; and the infantry, such as
were not cut off and captured, were only saved by the vigilant bravery
of Grierson's faithful cavalrymen, who held back the triumphant and
plundering troopers of Forrest. Many of the fugitives, cut off from
their regiments in the confusion of the retreat, struck singly and in
squads across the country for Memphis, and many actually marched a
hundred miles before tasting food. The w r hole command, or what was
left of it, reached Memphis half starved, footsore and completely
exhausted, and all bitterly cursing the heartless, and stupid conduct of
Gen. Sturgis, who got off the field that witnessed the death or capture
of many a nobler and braver soldier, at the first indication of a rout,
and reached Memphis sound and safe. Gen. Sturgis may have been a
good soldier and a patriot, but it will be long before the men he led into
that fatal trap will be willing to regard him as such.

After the defeat of Sturgis and the retreat to Memphis the One
Hundred and Thirteenth did picket and provost duty at Memphis until
October, 1864, when it took a part in Gen. Washburne's expedition,
and was engaged in the disastrous fight at Eastport, Mississippi, where
it lost two officers and fourteen men.

The regiment, on its return from Eastport, continued the rest of its
term doing duty as picket and provost-guard at Memphis Col. Hoge,
now a general, its old commander, being provost-marshal of West
Tennessee. The regiment was mustered out June 20, 1865. On the
regimental staff of the One Hundred and Thirteenth, Iroquois county
was represented by Dr. Lucien B. Brown, of Sheldon, who was com-
missioned first assistant surgeon on the organization of the regiment,
and afterward, June 27, 1864, he was promoted surgeon of the regi-
ment, and made a very efficient officer. William A. McLean, of Mid-
dleport, was the first quartermaster, and served in that capacity until
July 12, 1864, when he was honorably discharged for promotion in
another regiment. He was succeeded by William H. Taylor, also of
Middleport, who retained the position until the muster out of his reg-
iment.

1ROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 301

Company B was composed of men from this and Kankakee counties,
in about an equal proportion, and was mustered in with Captain Cephas
Williams, of Kankakee, in command, but he was promoted major in
about a year, and Lieut. Andrew Beckett, of Martinton, in this county,
was commissioned captain, and continued in command until the close
of the war and the muster out of the regiment.

Company D was, at its muster in, composed entirely of Iroqnois
county men, recruited from Onarga, Oilman, Ash Grove, Spring Creek,
Milford and a few from Middleport, and during its term of service it
was officered by Iroquois county men. About three-fifths of the
recruits to the company in 1863-65 were also from Iroqnois county.
The company, during its whole term of service, was commanded by
Captain Robert B. Lucas, of Onarga; D. H. Metzger, now of Abilene,
Kansas, formerly a resident of, and for several years supervisor of
Onarga township, and father of George T. Metzger, late county treasurer,
was the first lieutenant of Company D for its whole term of service,
and a faithful officer, too. The second lieutenants were George B.
Fickle, of Onarga, and after his resignation, in February, 1863, Henry
L. Frisbie, also of Onarga, was commissioned. Many of the rank and
file of Company D are now hard-working mechanics and prosperous
farmers, residing in the western part of the county.

Company F, Captain W. I. Bridges, of Belrnont, commanding, was
composed wholly of Iroquois county men, from Middleport, Belmont,
Iroquois, Concord and Beaver townships mainly, and the recruits after-
ward sent to the company were nearly all from this county. Capt.
Bridges resigned in February, 1863, and was succeeded by Lieut.
George E. King, who had seen service in the old Twentieth as a lieu-
tenant, resigned and enlisted in Company F, and was promoted to the
captaincy from the first-sergeancy. Capt. King was captured at Gun-
town, Mississippi, and sent to Anderson ville prison, thence to Macon,
Georgia, and Charleston, and put under fire to prevent our troops
firing on their forts, and was sent to Columbia, where he made his escape
and reached the union lines, and on his return, at the close of the war,
he was breveted lieutenant-colonel for meritorious services. Lieuts.
Alfred Fletcher and John E. Leatherman, of Company F, are well
known farmers of Iroquois and Middleport townships, respectively,
and Lieut. Leatherman was captured at Guntown and a prisoner at
Andersonville and other Southern prisons. John S. Dai-rough, Esq.,
of this city (Watseka), and Wesley Warren of Woodland, were ser-
geants of this company. T. S. Arnold, the well known druggist of
Watseka, Adam Jacob, the tailor, and Capt. B. Braderick, of the Cres-
cent City Guards, Company F, Ninth Regiment I. N. G., were all

302 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

members of this company, and we might name many more of our sub-
stantial citizens that used to inarch and fight in its ranks.

Company I was made up entirely of Iroquois county soldiers, and
went into the field under command of Capt. George West, a well
known and well-to-do farmer of Middleport township, who in conse-
quence of ill health resigned May 25, 1863, and his second lieutenant,
Aaron F. Kane, of Concord, became captain, and Sergeant William C.
Shortridge, the well known shorthand reporter of this county, became
second lieutenant. First Lieut. Anderson Tyler, then as now a resi-
dent of Iroquois village, filled the above position for nearly three
years, and until mustered out with his company. Daniel Weston, the
well known druggist of Wellington, was a sergeant in Company I of
the One Hundred and Thirteenth.

In Company H, Iroquois county was represented by Lieut. Harri-
son Daniels, of Chebanse, the orderly, one duty sergeant, and fifteen
privates.

Of the non-commissioned staff of the One Hundred and Thirteenth,
Sergeant-Major Hezekiah Storms, was from Onarga, in this county, as
was also Commissary-Sergeant Charles A. Newton. The quartermas-
ter-sergeant, William H. Taylor, who was after promoted quartermaster,
was from Middleport.

The records show that over eighty men from Iroquois county lost
their lives while in line of duty as members of the One Hundred and
Thirteenth, several of whom starved to death in Andersonville. This
was about one-fifth of all the men that went out from Iroquois county
in the ranks of the regiment, and fully as many more were seriously
wounded or enfeebled for life by disease, many of whom have since
died. Such is the record of this band of upward of 400 brave-hearted
patriots. A mere statement of the facts is all the eulogium needed.

Forty recruits from Iroquois county, serving in the One Hundred
and Thirteenth at the date of its muster out, June 20, 1865, were
transferred to the One Hundred and Twentieth Regiment at that date,
and afterward were mustered out with the latter organization at Mem-
phis, Tennessee, September 10, 1865.

THE ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FOURTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS

INFANTRY.

ONE- HUNDRED- DAYS MEN.

This regiment was organized at Camp Fry, Chicago, and mustered
on the last day of May, 1864. -Company B, Capt. N. B. Petts, was
from Iroquois county, and was made up of young men principally

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 303

between fifteen and twenty-one years of age, many of whom belonged
to the very best families, and left pleasant homes, and though the
service was not so arduous as that required of the veterans at the
front, yet it was of such a character as to so impair the constitutions
of some of the patriotic youths as to bring them to early graves.
These one-hundred-days men relieved veterans needed for active
service. And they did good service in garrisoning important posts
and guarding prisoners. The regiment, three days after its muster in,
was sent to Columbus, Kentucky, where it did garrison duty until
ordered to Paducah, and thence to Mayfield ; at which last named
post it erected a fort, and served to hold in check unruly spirits in that
section by its mere presence. On its return to Chicago for muster
out, Price was giving the unionists trouble in Missouri, and at the
request of President Lincoln the One Hundred and Thirty-fourth
went to Missouri, and did garrison duty at several points until ordered
home for discharge; the regiment being mustered out October 25,
18f4.

THE ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTIETH REGIMENT ILLINOIS INFANTRY.

The One Hundred and Fiftieth regiment, one-year troops, was
organized at Camp Butler, Illinois, February 14, 1865, under Col.
George W. Keener, and proceeded to Nashville, Tennessee, arriving
February 21, and moved from there to Bridgeport, Alabama, where, up
to March 25, 1865, it did post duty in the block-houses, extending from
Bridgeport to Chattanooga, along the line of the Nashville & Chatta-
nooga railroad. In March it was assigned to the brigade of the Prince
Salm Salm, and March 25 was sent to Cleveland, Tennessee, where it
did post duty until the first week in May, when it was stationed at
Dalton, Georgia, and continued until July 8, when it moved to
Atlanta, and there quitted the brigade and did garrison duty at Atlanta,
and other towns near Atlanta, until mustered out January 16, 1866.
Chauncey H. Sheldon, the adjutant, and the whole of Company D,
Capt. H. B. Vennum commanding, was from this county. One man
of the company died during the term of service. Richard Carroll,
former supervisor of Sheldon, and a resident of Watseka now, was
second lieutenant of D, and received a brevet commission in recogni-
tion of his efficiency as an officer.

The Thirty-seventh, Fifty-third, Fifty-fourth, Sixtieth, Sixty-sixth,
Sixty-seventh, Sixty-ninth, Seventy-first, One Hundred and Twenty-
fourth, One Hundred and Twenty-seventh and One Hundred and
Forty-seventh Infantry regiments were also represented from Iroquois
county by from one to six men.

304 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

THE EIGHTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS CAVALRY.

This gallant regiment, under the command of Col. (afterward gen-
eral) John F. Farnsworth, entered the United States service in Sep-
tember, 1861, and was active from the time it joined the Potomac
army until the cessation of hostilities. Six companies of the regiment
stubbornly contested "Stonewall" Jackson's advance at Mechanicsville
for several hours. The Eighth took an honorable part in the battles
of Gaines' Hill, Malverti Hill, Poolsville, South Mountain and Boones-
boro, and also in the terrible struggle at Antietam. The regiment led
the van of the army of the Potomac most of the time up to the battle
of Fredericksburg, in which it also participated with credit. During
the campaigns of 1863, the regiment was ever on the alert, and almost
universally rendering, in the heavy battles and numerous pitched bat-
tles with the enemy's cavalry, a good account of itself. In 1863 the
regiment was in twenty-six different engagements, including the bloody
battle of Gettysburg, and sustained a loss of twenty-three killed, and
over 150 wounded and missing. Up to the close of the war the regi-
ment continued to render effective service and cover itself with glory,
and when there was no longer a foeman left in the field with which to
try the temper of their sabers, the dashing fellows of the Eighth Cav-
alry returned to their prairie homes to enjoy the peace their distin-
guished valor had helped to conquer. The regiment was mustered out
at St. Louis, July 17, 1865. Old Iroquois was represented in the
Eighth Cavalry by Capt. Joseph Clapp, Lieut. Charles W. Sprague
and Private Henry Weaver, all of Loda township. Lieut. Sprague
now resides in Artesia township, and is engaged in farming, and several
years ago represented his township on the board of supervisors.

THE NINTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS CAVALRY.

The Ninth Regiment of Illinois Cavalry, Col. Albert G. Brackett,
commanding, was organized at Camp Douglas, October 26, 1861. The
regiment was composed of twelve companies and divided into three
battalions of four companies each, with a major and adjutant to each
of the battalions.

The regiment left Chicago in February, 1862, for the seat of war,
going first to Benton Barracks, St. Louis, Missouri, where it remained
until the last of the month, when it moved to Pilot Knob in the Iron
Mountain district, and from thence marched, after considerable cam-
paigning in Missouri. to the command of Gen. Steele at Reeve Sta-
tion, on the Big Black, afterward inarching to Jacksonport, Arkansas,

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 305

where it engaged in a number of lively skirmishes in the country adja-
cent to the last named place. During the month of May, 1862, the
Ninth Regiment, forming a part still of Gen. Steele's division of Gen.
Curtis' army, engaged in a couple of brisk skirmishes. In one of these
skirmishes, at Stewart's plantation, Col. Brackett and Capt. Knight
(of Onarga), the commander of Company M, and Adjt. Blackburn
were wounded, and two men killed and thirty-three woun'ded ; at Wad-
dell's plantation the regiment lost twelve men wounded.

On June 26 the Ninth started on a march to Helena, where it
arrived July 14, after a most fatiguing march, in which the command
suffered greatly on account of the scarcity of rations, and the impossi-
bility of procuring water to drink. Five men sank under the hard-
ships of the march, and died at different points along the line of march,
and many others died afterward, no doubt principally on account of
the hardships endured on this march. The regiment remained at
Helena doing outpost duty and skirmishing with the enemy until it
joined Gen. Washburne's expedition into Mississippi ; but previous to
starting, two twelve-pounder mountain howitzers were assigned to the
regiment, and were manned by a detail from the regiment under the
command of Lieut. E. G. Butler, of the Ninth. Lieut. Butler, with
his volunteer artillerymen and howitzers, at LaGrange successfully
repulsed a charge of two regiments of Texan Rangers that essayed the
capture of the gallant Butler and his little detachment; but after
losing fifty men killed they concluded they didn't want the plucky
lieutenant's "bull dogs," and withdrew. The loss to the unionists in
the affair was twenty killed and wounded.

The Ninth participated with Washburne's forces in the engagements
at Okolona and Coffeeville, Mississippi, November 6 and 7, 1862. In
January, 1863, the regiment took a part in the expedition of Gen. Gor-
man, up White river in Arkansas, marching to Clarendon, on White
river, and then marched back to Helena, arriving January 23, at which
place it remained until April 7 following, when it moved to Memphis,
Tennessee, and on the 12th of the month moved to Germantown, and
was there assigned to the cavalry brigade of Col. McCrillis attached to
the Sixteenth Army Corps, remaining in the brigade until the follow-
ing fall, participating in the engagements at Coldwater and Grenada,
Mississippi. In the latter part of August the regiment took post at
LaGrange, and spent several weeks in skirmishing and reconnoitering,
and again skirmished with the enemy at Coldwater, October 6, and
also engaged in a keen fight at Salem, Mississippi, in which the rebels
were forced out of their position after a very spirited resistance. At
Wyatt, Mississippi, the regiment fought the enemy all day on October
80

306 HISTORY OF IKOQUOIS COUNTY.

13, forcing him to steal away from the battle-field that night as a
measure of safety. After the fight at Wyatt the regiment returned to
LaGrange, and remained there till the first week in November, when
it moved to Corinth, but soon after returned to its old post at LaGrange,
and moved from there to Colliersville, Tennessee, the last of Novem-
ber, where it was assigned to the Second Brigade of the Cavalry Divi-
sion of the Sixteenth Army Corps, and December 3 and 4, under the
command of the daring Grierson, the cavalry division engaged and
whipped the rebels at Saulsbury and Moscow, Tennessee. The Ninth
behaved gallantly at Moscow.

The Ninth, under Grierson, took a part in an expedition into Mis-
sissippi in the month of February, 1864, and fought and defeated the
enemy at West Point on the 20th of the month, and was engaged at
Okolona and Mount Ivy on the 21st and 23d. The Ninth went into
camp at Germantown on the 24th. During this raid into Mississippi
the Ninth did its full share of the hard marching and fighting, and at
one time after the battle at West Point the Ninth, while acting as rear
guard for the army, was beset by Forrest, and successfully hurled back
his charging troopers.

The regiment, or a greater portion, reenlisted March 16, and
received thirty days furlough, returning to the front toward the close
of April, and rendezvousing at Memphis, Tennessee. A detachment
consisting of 160 men were with Gen. Sturgis on the ill-starred Gun-
town expedition, and did effective service during the disastrous retreat
as a rear guard, losing five killed, twenty-three wounded and twelve
taken prisoners, while protecting the rear of Sturgis' army after the bat-
tle of Tishomingo creek, June 10, 1864. The regiment formed a part
of Generals Grierson and A. J. Smith's expedition to Tupelo, Missis-
sippi, and at Pontatoc, being in advance did heavy skirmishing with the
enemy, and succeeded in driving him back at all points. The Ninth
took an active part in the two-days battle at Tupelo July 14 and 15 ;
also at Old Town Creek. The regiment accompanied Grierson during
August in his Oxford, Mississippi, raid, engaging the enemy at Talla-
hatchie, Oxford and Hurricane creek, losing four men killed and a num-
ber wounded in the latter engagement. The regiment was absent on
this raid thirty-two days, and returned to camp near Memphis, at
White Station, September 4. Taking the field again as a part of Gen.
Hatch's cavalry division September 30, inarching to Clifton on the
Tennessee river, and thence to Florence, through Waynesboro, and
returning to Clifton, it watched the forward movement of Gen. Hood
in his advance upon Nashville after the fall of Atlanta. At Shoal
creek ford, on the Tennessee river, the Ninth fought the advance of

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 307

Hood's army and drove it back. While watching Hood at Shoal
creek Gen. Hatch received orders to push the former's cavalry from
the fords, and to develop the strength of the enemy in his front ; and
accordingly Hatch crossed and attacked Hood's cavalry and drove it
back on his infantry, the Ninth Cavalry leading the attack. The rebels
threw two divisions against the division of Gen. Hatch, and drove it
back and across the creek. A part of the Ninth regiment having been
sent on a detour to the right to strike the enemy's cavalry in the flank
and rear by the driving back of Hatch's division, was cut off, and the
battalion of the regiment thus entrapped cut its way through the rebel
line at night, and recrossing the creek, rejoined its brigade the next
day after the tight. After Hood crossed the Tennessee Gen. Hatch's
division, to which the Ninth belonged, skirmished almost daily with
his advance, and sought to hold him in check by so doing until ^Thomas
could collect his scattered forces and insure the safety of Nashville and
the ultimate defeat of Hood. At Campbellsville, November 24, the
Ninth was engaged in a hotly contested fight with a part of Hood's
forces that attempted to capture the wagon train of Gen. Schofield.
The regiment fought overwhelming odds, but pluckily held its ground
and drove the enemy back until the ammunition of the Ninth was
exhausted, and nothing daunted, the bold troops of the Ninth, still
reluctant to yield their ground, engaged in a hand-to-hand encounter,
fighting with clubbed carbines. At Franklin the cavalry under Hatch
held the roads leading to the fords, and prevented the enemy's cavalry
from crossing the river and getting between the beleaguered and fight-
ing army of Schofield and Stanley at Franklin and Nashville. As a
part of Gen. "Wilson's cavalry corps the Ninth regiment behaved hand-
somely in the assaults upon Hood's left at Nashville, December 15 and
16, which so successfully resulted in doubling back the whole confed-
erate left upon its center on the Franklin Pike, near Brentwood Gap.
On the fifteenth Col. Coon's brigade, of which the Ninth formed a
part, was ordered to move against a strong rebel redoubt mounting five
cannon, and dismounting the gallant troopers, under Hatch's order to
" go for the fort," charged up a high and very steep hill, and in three
minutes from the time they started were in possession of the fort and
200 prisoners, and finding themselves under a terrible fire from another
fort, about 500 yards to their right, the tired but eager cavalrymen
dashed against that in an irregular, straggling but determined body,
and after a sharp fight possessed themselves of that also, and had they
been five minutes earlier would have captured the rebel chief Gen.
Hood. Only a few moments before Hatch and his daring trooper.-
made the assault upon the works, Gen. Thomas had declared it impos-

308 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

sible for cavalry to " storm and capture a fort," but the boys taught the
old hero that Western troopers could capture a rebel fort when they
made up their minds to. After the rout of Hood, the Ninth and other
cavalry regiments hung upon and harrassed Hood's rear, and had some
lively little encounters and one particularly deserves mention. Gen.
Knipe pressed Hood's train so close that the latter was obliged to make
a stand to save his train from capture on the banks of the Little Har-
peth creek, a few miles from Franklin, and Gen. Hatch moved forward
to Knipe's support ; the two divisions then charged grandly forward
in the face of a galling fire, presenting a line a mile and a half from
right to left, and crossing the creek soon closed with the enemy's infantry
in a hand-to-hand struggle, and as marly of the rebels were dressed in
blue uniforms, our boys often mistook them for friends, and either fell
into their hands or cut their way out. It was so difficult on account
of the mist and smoke that Gen. Hatch at one time could not distin-
guish his own forces, and he sent an aide and his orderly to ride up to
the forces and inquire who they were; his aide, Lieut. Crawford, rode
up to them and tapped a man on the shoulder and asked him, " What
command ? " " Nineteenth Tennessee, Bell's Brigade, rear guard,"
was the answer. He now knew they were rebels, arid slipped out of
their ranks and rode back to Hatch, who opened on them with cannon.
At this point Capt. Foster, of the Second Iowa cavalry, galloped a little
to the right to see if the flank of his brigade (Gen. Coon's) was safe,
when he came face to face with the head of a rebel column, and was
greeted with " surrender you d d yankee." Foster swung his saber
and shouted " don't you fire on this column," when, thinking him a
rebel, they took down their arms, and the daring unionist put spurs to
his horse arid escaped to .our lines in the midst of a shower of rebel bullets.
The brigade was thus suddenly attacked, and at first repulsed, but Gen.
Coon and his A. A. A. G. Capt. John H. Avery, of the Ninth Illinois,
quickly rallied the men and moved forward with their horses on a
walk, firing with steady aim as they advanced, until the rebel lines
gave way and ran, leaving their artillery unsupported. The gallant
Hatch, with but nine men, charged forward and captured the battery.
The Ninth Illinois, under Col. Harper, then moved up to the battery,
and then the rebels rallied and made several desperate attempts to
retake it, but the boys of the old Ninth fired several deadly volleys
into their ranks, and night coming on the rebels desisted and moved
on, .leaving three brass pieces in the hands of the cavalrymen. The
Ninth was warmly complimented for its gallant and stubborn defense
of the captured guns. The Ninth still harrassed Hood's rear, engag-
ing him again several times before he crossed the Tennessee river.

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 309

After Hood had been driven out of Tennessee the regiment went
to Huntsville, Alabama, and from there to Florence, in the same state,
and thence to Eastport, Mississippi, and again returned soon after to
Florence, and went into camp at Gravelly Springs, January 10, 1865,
w4iere it remained until February 9, when it again moved to Eastport
and encamped there until June. During the latter part of the month
it moved to luka, and from there to Decatur, Alabama, and afterward
went to Montgomery and Selma, also to Gainesville, all in the state of
Alabama. Finally, returning to Selma, it was mustered out of the
service the last day of October, 1865, and soon after returned to
Springfield, Illinois, for final payment and discharge.

Company M was composed almost wholly of Iroquois county men,
and recruited principally from Onarga and the immediate neighbor-
hood. Capt. Eliphalet R. Knight, of Onarga, commanded the com-
pany from November 30, 1861, to November 30, 1864, when his term
expired, and Lieut. John H. Avery assumed command as captain, and
continued in command to the close of the war. Capt. Knight, after
'the close of the war, removed to the state of Arkansas and died there
recently. Capt. John H. Avery entered the service as fourth sergeant
of Company M, and was successively promoted second and first lieu-
tenant, and finally to the captaincy. He served, during the last year of
the war, upon the staff of his brigade commander, Gen. Coon, in the
capacity of acting assistant adjutant general. The captain was a dash-
ing and efficient young officer, and won his promotion by good con-
duct in the field. After the close of the war Capt. Avery served a
number of years as assistant assessor of internal revenue, with his
office at Loda in this county. He occupied this position under both
Gen. Carnahan and Judge Blades, while they were assessors for this
district, and always proved himself a vigilant, careful and efficient
officer. Capt. Avery is at present a resident of the state of Arkansas.
First Lieut. Jacob C. Shear, who saw nearly three years' service in
Company M, held the office of sheriff of this county from 1876 to
1878, and resides at present on his farm near Thawville, in this
county. Sergeant John B. Lowe is at present editor of the Onarga
" Review," and is also captain of the Onarga Rifles, Company E,
Ninth Regiment Illinois National Guards. We might mention among
others who acquitted themselves creditably, Serg.-Maj. Curtis, L.
Knight, now of Arkansas, and B. F. Price, of Loda, who lost an arm,
and a host of good solid citizens now residing in and around Onarga,
whom we have not the space to mention individually. Eighteen of
the Iroquois soldiers in this company lost their lives fighting for the
union.

310 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

THE TENTH REGIMENT ILLINOIS CAVALRY.

The Tenth regiment of cavalry was organized at Springfield, Novem-
ber 25, 1861, with Col. James Barrett commanding. Col. Barrett
resigned in the spring of 1862, and Lieut.-Col. Dudley "Wickersham, of
Springfield, was commissioned its colonel. The regiment left for the
front in April, 1862, and moved to Springfield, Missouri, and soon after
was engaged in the battle of Prairie Grove, Arkansas, and subsequently
participated in the battles of Little Rock, Van Buren, Milliken's Bend
and Yicksburg. Col. Wickersham for a considerable space of time
was in command of a cavalry brigade of which the Tenth formed a
part; meantime the regiment was commanded by Lieut.-Col. James
Stuart, a dashing and brave officer. The regiment took a very con-
spicuous part in the engagements above mentioned, and also behaved
nobly at Richmond, Louisiana, and Bayou Metre. Unfortunately we
are not able to give an account of the numerous skirmishes and expe-
ditions in which this grand body of men participated. They were not
only a splendid cavalry force, but were well drilled in infantry tactics,
and even fought on several occasions a part of them as artillerists. In
the siege and assault upon Yicksburg they participated as dismounted
cavalry, and did their whole duty. They were, as an organization, a
fine body of men, and ready and willing in the face of all difficulties
and dangers to perform their part and do it well. On their reenlist-
ment Gov. Yates, in a speech to the regiment, among other things,
said : " It is well known that cavalry regiments cannot always be to-
gether, but whether you have been placed on duty as a regiment, in
companies, in battalions, or in squads, the Tenth cavalry was always
where danger was nearest, and wherever duty called you. * * * Now
on your return I can say justly that I am proud of you. You have con-
ducted yourselves as patriots and you have never disgraced the noble
flag under which you have fought." The regiment operated mainly in
Arkansas and Louisiana, and usually formed a part of Gen. Steele's
command, and saw a great deal of disagreeable and arduous service.

After the reenlistment of the Tenth the regiment was consolidated
to nine companies, and the Fifteenth Cavalry, consolidated to three
companies, was consolidated with the Tenth, the consolidated regiment
being called the Tenth. At a reunion of the Tenth Cavalry at Spring-
field, in September, 1878, Lieut.-Col. T. D. Yredenburgh delivered an
address, from which we cull the following concerning the history of the
Tenth after its reenlistment :

" Here we had a full regiment of well-seasoned veterans, experienced,
tried officer?, and all hailed with delight the prospect of an early order

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 311

to more active fields, feeling assured, should the opportunity be pre-
sented, that we would not disgrace our calling. Cheer after cheer
echoed through the camp when orders were received in February to
move to the Mississippi river, and so anxious were all to be in the
anticipated struggle at Mobile that the first detachment, once embarked
on that majestic stream, failed to find land before reaching New
Orleans, and only stopped there because all means of further transpor-
tation failed. The whole regiment finally congregated at Greenville,
which was made headquarters, and the high hopes of seeing the last
throes of the confederacy were doomed to miscarry, as only a few of
our numbers reached Mobile, and that too late to take an active part
in its capture. The only exciting times experienced in New Orleans
was on the receipt of the news of the death of President Lincoln and
the passage of the rebel ram Webb. In the first instance the prompt
and energetic action of this regiment undoubtedly saved the city from
a scene of bloodshed and confusion, and won from the general com-
manding a flattering compliment in general orders. In the second
instance, the Webb, in her "cheeky" attempt to run the blockade, was
recognized, as she passed Camp Paripett, by a member of the Tenth
who had good reasons for remembering her; the authorities were
apprised of the dangerous stranger's approach, the timely information
enabled the navy to accomplish her destruction, and the Tenth captured
every soul on board save one.

u Early in the year 1865, as the tail of the confederacy continued to
wag in the trans-Mississippi department, we were ordered up the river
and put in an appearance at Shreveport, Marshall, Tyler and several
other ' last ditches.'

" Then commenced that long, wearisome march from the Red to the
Rio Grande. How different this march from any taken before. For-
merly the advanced guard and nightly pickets were wont to be continu-
ally on the lookout for prowlers, scouts and ambuscades. Here the
very swine knew the meaning of ' General Order No. 2,' and basked in
perfect security almost under our horses' feet. This was the last feather,
and all felt like laying aside a uniform which had lost its power to
inspire awe, else why should our favorite porker treat us with such
contempt. Still, the ride had its pleasures. All enjoyed the varied
scenery, the strange grottoes and mysterious rivers with a commence-
ment in a mountain and terminus in the next plain ; the immense herds
of half wild cattle, lilliputian donkeys, etc. How captivating old time-
stained San Antonio looked, hid behind its full tropical foliage, trav-
ersed by its crystal river, and full of evidences of age and durability.
How pleasant in the cool of the evening to stroll through its wide

312 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

plazas, luxurious gardens and open churches to be jostled by black-
eyed, half-veiled beauties, while the ear was saluted by a hundred voices
of joy and laughter. From San Antonio several trips were made to
the mountains north and west, some of them quite extended, ostensi-
bly after Indians, but really to accustom the inhabitants to blue-coats,
and reestablish Uncle Sam's prestige. When this had been fully accom-
plished and there seemed nothing more for us to do, the order to pre-
pare for muster-out arrived. Never was an order obeyed with more
alacrity. By November 22 we were ready, mustered out, and started
home for discharge. But a long stretch of land and water lay between
us and that home. Footsore and weary the dismounted cavalryman
dragged himself into Columbus after a tramp of 150 miles, thence by
rail to Houston and Galveston.

" On a cold, raw afternoon in December, we ' clod-hoppers,' ' land-
lubbers ' and 'cow-boys' found ourselves, with about 500 other cattle,
on board the Texas, gradually losing sight of land. Bright prospects
of soon seeing friends and home danced through every breast, and joy-
ously all eyes watched (toanany) their first sunset at sea. Suddenly,
with a crash suggestive of immediate destruction, the huge steamer lay
drifting helplessly on the deep. An anchor was quickly gotten out,
and an examination made, which developed nothing more serious than
a broken wrist. Still without a new one the vessel was immovable
save by wind and tide. Anxiously was the captain watched disappear-
ing through the growing darkness, headed for Galveston, twenty miles
away, in the only boat belonging to the steamer. He left with the
expectation of returning by midnight with the needed repairs. As
darkness closed in, the breeze, which had been fresh all day, increased
to a gale, and it soon became evident that the captain would not return
that night, as no boat could live in such weather. All hands stowed
themselves away as best they could, expecting that daylight would
improve the appearance of things. False hope. The morning only
revealed to anxious eyes a surging mass of water and angry clouds.
Then was the discovery made that the ship was unseaworthy and over-
Idaded. The hold was crammed full of merchandise, principally cot-
ton, the main deck crowded with cattle, genuine Texas long-horns, and
the upper deck uncomfortably crowded w r ith soldiers, about 700. As
the vessel surged from side to side the soldiers clutched at any object
to prevent being washed overboard, while numbers of cattle were
crushed and smothered. Squeamish feelings possessed every stom-
ach, salt, junk and hard-tack presented no attractions. The mind nat-
urally reverted to things of the future, and religious sentiments were
more prevalent than usual. Old tried soldiers were seen to throw

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 313

things other than their breakfast overboard. Yonder drifted past the
ace of spades, and then the queen of hearts danced by in company with
the jack of diamonds. At intervals a well-thumbed, yellow-backed
copy of some obscene publication, passing to oblivion, would indicate
at least a temporary improvement in its owner's morals. All day long
and through the following night the weather was such as to prevent
any one from coming to our assistance, save a plucky little revenue cut-
ter sent from Galveston, but she only made the matter worse by
knocking a great hole in herself and losing for us our best anchor, then
without so much as ' I beg your pardon,' showed us her heels and 'put'
for the nearest harbor.

"The night that followed was a time of great anxiety; little sleep
was had by any. The next day, the wind subsiding considerably,
another attempt on the part of the revenue cutter to tow us to Galves-
ton was successfully accomplished just at night. Taking another
vessel, an English screw propeller, as soon as possible, the run to
New Orleans was accomplished in about thirty-six hours. The w r eather
was now glorious, and the trip up the Mississippi on the grand old
Missouri was delightful. When we had reached Cairo winter was
upon us, and its rigors began to be felt seriously. Four years and over
spent in the south had had its effect^upon our systems. In anticipation
of an early muster-out new clothes had not been drawn for a long time,
overcoats and blankets, for lack of transportation, had been thrown
away, and in an almost destitute condition we boarded the cattle cars
kindly furnished for our accommodation by the Illinois Central railroad.
Then followed thirty-six hours of the most miserable railroad riding ever
enjoyed in this lovely state of ours; but all the miseries have an end ;
so had this ride : then who cared ? Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,
wives and sweethearts were waiting to receive and welcome, while an
inward consciousness of having done our whole duty filled each breast
with pride and joy.

"One o'clock A.M., January 1, 1866, found us kn,ee-deep in snow,
pounding at the gates of Camp Butler for admittance, where, we had
been informed, every preparation had been made for our accommoda-
tion. These accommodations on inspection proved to be deserted
barracks nothing more.

" All haste was made to be discharged, but red tape detained us
until the 6th, when, with thankful hearts, we took our pay and Uncle
Sam's honorable discharge, bade an affectionate adieu to old comrades,
and hied away to the loved ones longing for our return."

The regiment was mustered outsat San Antonio, Texas, November
22, 1865, and returned home soon thereafter, receiving pay and final

314 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

discharge at Springfield, Illinois. The greater portion of Company C
was from Loda and vicinity, as was also Capt. Charles H. Jones, its
commander.

Iroquois county was also represented by one or more men in the
Fourth, Seventh, Twelfth and Fourteenth Regiments of Illinois Cavalry,
all of whom did credit to the county and honor to themselves.

THE FIRST REGIMENT ILLINOIS ARTILLERY.

Battery D was among the very first troops organized, and was com-
manded by Capt. E. McAllister, of Plainfield, Illinois, and the battery
is perhaps better known among soldiers as " McAllister's Battery." In
the three-months service the battery formed one of the companies of
the Tenth regiment, commanded by Col. Morgan, of Quincy, and
was stationed at Cairo during its term of three months. The battery
was reorganized for three years by Capt. McAllister, and made its first
campaign under Gen. McClernand. At Fort Donelson its guns were
the first ones that opened upon the enemy. It took a very prominent
part in the battle of Shiloh, after which it was transferred to Gen.
John A. Logan's Division of the Seventeenth Corps. About the time
of its transfer to Logan's division, its commander, Capt. McAllister, in
consequence of ill-health was forced to resign, and he was succeeded
in command by Capt. H. A. Rogers, who continued to be its leader
during the campaign of Gen. Grant down the Mississippi, and back
again to Memphis, then to Milliken's Bend, and round to the rear of
Vicksburg, also during the battles of Raymond and Champion's Hill,
up to May 29, in the siege of Yicksburg, where the gallant captain
was shot dead by a minie ball. Capt. E. H. Cooper, formerly of
Springfield, on the death of Capt. Rogers, was promoted captain and
commanded the battery during the rest of the siege of Yicksburg. In
the winter of 1864 the battery reorganized as a veteran organization
at Camp Fry, Chicago, and soon afterward it returned to the front,
and, joining Sherman's army, it left Vicksburg in April, 1864, and
proceeded to Georgia and took a prominent part in the march to, and
capture of Atlanta. July 22, the day on which its corps commander,
the lamented Gen. McPherson, was shot, the battery was handled with
a skill, and behaved with a coolness and bravery unsurpassed. Capt.
Cooper that day, never left his horse, but was tireless and fearless
during the entire battle, and showed himself worthy to be the com-
mander of such a battery. After the fall of Atlanta the battery was
ordered to Nashville, and formed a part of Gen. Thomas' army, and
participated in the battle of Nashville. After the defeat of Hood the

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 315

battery was stationed at Clarksville, Tennessee, and remained there up
to the date of its muster out. Capt. Cooper, in recognition of his
bravery and abilities as an artillery officer, was promoted major of his
regiment the First Illinois Artillery ; and Lieut. George P. Cunning-
ham, of Middleport, Illinois, became captain of the battery. The
battery was mustered out at Chicago, July 20, 1865. This county
was represented by Lieut. Cunningham and eighteen men, among
whom we might mention Sergeant Bushrod D. Washington as a
capable non-commissioned officer, and Daniel Torbet, of Texas, in this
county, as one of the most proficient gunners in the artillery service.
Sergeant Washington, as a scout for Gen. Rousseau, rendered good
service in helping to secure the capture of Buck Smith's guerrillas in
Tennessee.

Battery E, more familiarly known as " Waterhouse's Battery," was
organized at Chicago in October, 1861, and in the original company
there were about twenty-five men, as near as we can learn from
Leander Cadore, of Martinton, a former member of the company.
These men are not credited to the county on the adjutant-general's
rolls, but are well known to have been residents of Papineau, Martin-
ton and Chebanse townships in this county, and several of the sur-
vivors still live there, and as will be seen from the roll of honor, a
sergeant and four privates of the squad from this county died in the
service. The writer has sought to get in correspondence with Col.
Waterhouse and obtain material for a good historical sketch, but thus
far has failed to acquire the desired information, and can only give an
incomplete and imperfect sketch. As far as we have been able to learn
the battery was engaged at Shiloh, and Capt. Waterhouse was there
wounded. The battery took a part in the siege of Corinth, and soon
afterward moved to Memphis, and from that time up to its muster out
we are ignorant of its history, except that it took a part in the disas-
trous expedition to Guntown, under Gen. Sturgis. The battery was
mustered out July 15, 1865. There were also in Battery I two men
from Iroquois county.

THE SECOND REGIMENT ILLINOIS ARTILLERY.

In Battery L, Second regiment Illinois Artillery, commonly called
" Bolton's Battery," there was quite a large number of men recruited
from this and Ford counties; and these men, including the orderly ser-
geant and several other non-commissioned officers, were enlisted by
Uriah Copp, Jr., Esq., of Loda, in this county, and in the first organi-
zation of the battery Copp was elected lieutenant and acted in that

316 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

capacity for several weeks at Camp Douglas and Benton Barracks, and
in fact up to within a few days after the battle of Shiloh or Pittsburg
Landing, when he discovered to his surprise, that the rolls under
which he had been mustered in had been, as he alleges, " tampered "
with, and his name obliterated therefrom, not only as a lieutenant but
even as a member of the battery, and he returned to Illinois to have
the matter adjusted and his commission issued, but found his enemies
in the company had destroyed the proper rolls and substituted fraudu-
lent ones, and filed the same as genuine in the adjutant-general's
office of this state; and, to add insult to injury, had drawn his pay for
recruiting the men he had enlisted and brought to the battery. After
several vain attempts to get his rights, Copp gave up his military
aspirations and resumed his duties as a citizen of Loda, but Sergeant
Hammond and the other men that he had enlisted continued in the
battery, and we herewith present a brief sketch of the same : The
battery left Chicago in March, 1862, soon after organization, and went
to Benton Barracks, Missouri. From there it proceeded by steamer to
Pittsburg Landing, and took the field at Shiloh, April 9, 1862, being
assigned to Gen. Hurlbut's division. It participated in the siege of
Corinth, and after its evacuation proceeded with Gen. Sherman's com-
mand to Memphis, Tennessee, where it remained in camp until August.
It was engaged at Nocomo Creek in October following, and was selected
to make the attack upon the enemy in the battle of the Hatchie, by Maj.-
Gen. S. A. Hurlbut. At this battle the battery took a stand of rebel
colors that were given to the city of Chicago. The battery marched with
Grant, in Logan's division, on his campaign through Mississippi, by
way of the Tallahatchie and Water valley, in December, 1862. After
the capture of Holly Springs and destruction of federal supplies,
Battery L returned to Memphis, and afterward accompanied Gen.
Grant to Lake Providence, Louisiana, and Milliken's Bend. It crossed
the Mississippi and engaged in the Yicksburg campaign, being em-
ployed in siege operations forty-seven days. After the fall of Yicks-
burg it again commenced the campaign in Louisiana under Brigadier-
Gen. Leggett, and marched after the rebel general, McCullongh, to
Monroe, from where it returned to Yicksburg. Here the old guns
being worn out Maj.-Gen. McPherson supplied it with new armament,
and everything new and complete. In June, 1864, it fought under
McArthur at Benton and Deasonville, and in July under Maj.-Gen.
Slocum, at Clinton and Jackson, Mississippi, which ended its active
operations in the field. From that time until its muster out, about
August 1, 1865, it was assigned to the defenses of Yicksburg. It was
at last mentioned date sent to Chicago for final payment and discharge.

IKOQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 317

At the date of leaving the service it mustered 130 men out of over
450 who had been on its rolls from first to last.

Battery A of this regiment was also furnished with four recruits
from Ash Grove township, all of whom received honorable discharge.

DEAD HEROES.

" We will plant it here, boys, and rally the old Twenty-fifth around it, and here

we will die."

THOMAS D. WILLIAMS was born at Ormskirk, in Lancashire, Eng-
land, 011 March 8, 1826. But little is known of his parents further
than that they were respectable laboring people. Nothing is known
of the boyhood of our subject, or how he became possessed of a fail-
education, which he appears to have acquired while yet a boy. At
fourteen, like many an English lad of a free spirit and intrepid
nature, young Williams determined to visit America, the famed
land of freedom and prosperity. Accordingly he crossed the Atlan-
tic to the shores of the New World, whether as a runaway sailor
lad, or with the permission of his parents, we are not able to say;
but are tolerably reliably informed that young Williams was early
thrown upon his own resources, and for aught we .have been able to
learn of his early life and career, one or both parents may have been
dead at the time he made his first voyage to this country. After
spending some months in this country Williams returned to his old
home, but not content there he again returned to the United States
in 1845, and found employment in the mining regions of Pennsyl-
vania as a clerk in one of the offices, but at what precise point in the
mining regions we are unable to say.

When the war with Mexico began, young Williams accompanied
some of his chums, who had enlisted, to Philadelphia to see them off
for the war, and while there he became seized with a desire to try the
life of a soldier, and he also volunteered, enlisting in the Rocket and
Howitzer Battery, commanded by Captain (afterward general) Reno,
and in a little time won promotion to the position of a non-commis-
sioned officer, and behaving himself in such a manner as to call from
Lieut. Gorgas, who was commanding the battery at his muster out,
the following recommendation :

lt The bearer, Thomas D. Williams, has served during the recent
war with Mexico in the Rocket and Howitzer Battery. In the course
of the campaign he won for himself the grade jof a rion-commis-
sioned officer. As he possesses all the qualifications requisite for a

318 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

good clerk, I take pleasure in recommending him on account of his
industry and attention to duty. I. GORGAS,

" First Lieut, of Ordnance, late commanding Rocket and Howitzer Battery of Ordnance.
" WATERVLIET ARSENAL, Sept. 11, 1848."

Armed with this ^flattering indorsement from his commander,
Williams started to New York city, intending to apply for a position
in a large mercantile concern, but changed his mind, and September
15, 1848, enlisted in the regular army as a sergeant in Company A
of the United States Engineer Corps, and for five years did faithful
duty as a sergeant of engineers, so winning the esteem of Capt.
George B. McClellan (afterward general), at one time his com-
mander, and also of Capt. P. T. Beauregard, a prominent general of
the confederates, as to be regarded by both, and particularly by
McClellan, as a warm personal friend. At the conclusion of his
five-years service Sergt. Williams received an honorable discharge,
with the following indorsement on it as to character :

"Sergt. Thomas D. Williams served in the ordnance company
during the campaign in Mexico, in the army commanded by Maj.-
Gen. Scott. As an engineer soldier he is considered intelligent and
quick in the performance of his duties, and a good soldier. The
commandant of the engineer company (A) at West Point, New
York, under whom Sergt. Williams served at the time of reporting
to me for duty on the Mexican frontier, concurs in the above char-
acter of Sergt, Williams. PJCH'D DELAFIELD,

" Major of Engineers.
" FORT BROWN, Texas, Sept. 17, 1853."

Sergt. Williams reenlisted at Fort Brown, Texas, in September,
1853, and continued in service as sergeant of engineers up to Sep-
tember, 1855, when he was mustered out at his own request, made
to the secretary of war, he having married, and decided to adopt
some civil profession, and his certificate of honorable discharge,
under hand of Maj. Barnard, as to his character, is summed up in
the simple but expressive word "excellent."

At the date of his final discharge from the service, Sergt. Will-
iams was stationed at West Point, and was presented, with a hand-
some non-commissioned officer's dress-sword, on the scabbard of
which is engraved: "Presented to T. D. Williams by his comrades
of the U. S. Corps of Engineer Soldiers, West Point, N. Y., Nov, 1,
1855," which testimonial from his comrades shows that he was as
highly appreciated by the rank and file as by his officers.

Sergt, Williams, on September 27, 1854, was united in mar-

IKOQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 319

riage with Miss Mary A. Gleason, of Troy, New York, at the city
of Troy, and his young bride went with him to West Point, and
staid there nearly a year, when she prevailed on him to ask for a
discharge from the service. After he left the army, Williams and
his young wife went to Camden, Alabama, where he became in-
structor of mathematics in the Wilcox Military Institute. He filled
this position one year satisfactorily ; and then, at the instance of
several wealthy friends, who were contemplating taking the contract
from the government to improve Corpus Christi bay by dredging,
he went to the bay, and, as an engineer, examined into the feasibility
of the work and its probable profitableness to the contractor under-
taking it, and he reported so unfavorably upon the project that his
friends at once abandoned their intention to bid ; and the same par-
ties being owners of vast tracts of wild land in Texas, proposed to
Williams to stock a large ranche for him, but Mrs. Williams refused
to quit civilized haunts and take up a home in the Wilderness, and
that project was also abandoned. Meeting soon after this in New
Orleans city his old West Point associate and friend, Gen. Beaure-
gard, then a captain of engineers in the regular army, Williams
applied to him for something that he could do as a civilian in the
United States service, and was sent to Fort St. Phillip, at or near the
mouth of the Mississippi river, to aid in its repair, as assistant super-
intendent of the work, if we are not mistaken. While at Fort St.
Phillip, Williams was taken severely ill, and, under the advice of his
physician, left there in the early fall of 1857 for Chicago. At Chi-
cago, soon after his arrival, Williams fell in with his old captain of
engineers, George B. McClellan, then vice-president of the Illinois
Central railroad, who at once offered Williams employment, and
sent him to Chebaiise station as agent for the company in the fall
of 1857.

Pleased with our broad, fertile prairies and the promising young
village of Chebanse, Williams bought property there and erected a
home, and became one of the early and prominent business men of
the village, transacting easily and efficiently his duties as the com-
pany's agent, and carrying on a grain and stock-shipping business
besides; and was thus employed when the old fiag he had served
eleven years under was fired on at Sumter. Surrounded by the
comforts of home, and enjoying the society of a young wife and his
babes; and having served his adopted country eleven long years, two of
them in active service with Gen. Scott, in Mexico, in which he had par-
ticipated in every battle in the campaign, from Vera Cruz to the cap-
ture of the Mexican capital, except one ; and having been wounded at

320

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

the battle of Contreras, our hero felt impelled to hold in subjugation
his strong desire to again nnsheath his sword in defense of the old flag
he had followed so long and so well over so many bloody fields, on
account of his wife and young children. But when the old flag he
so fondly cherished went down in the dust, smoke and defeat at Bull
Run, it roused this 41 man of war," and he set about recruiting men
for the regiment then being raised by Col. Coler, of Champaign, and
on its organization was very properly placed in command of Company
Gr, Twenty-fifth regiment, and continued in command until the resigna-
tion of Col. Coler; when, at the urgent request of some of the best offi-

" We will plant it hriv, boys, and rally the old Twi-iity-fifth around it. and here w will die."

cers in the regiment, who had discovered that he was the true, brave
and competent man to lead them, he was commissioned colonel by
Gov. Yates a short time before the battle of Stone River. And, us
is usual, when the field officers are ignored and a ranking captain
promoted to the command of the regiment, offense was given to
those who were "jumped"; and consequently the new colonel
went into the struggle that cost him his life without the 'presence or
assistance of either the lieutenant-colonel or major.

Col. Williams had given proof of his ability as a company com-
mander at Pea Ridge and luka, and the most of his men recognized
and respected his soldierly qualities. Up to the time that lie met
his death, the regiment had been ably handled by its new colonel,
and he was winning the love and confidence of every true soldier in

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 321

his command by his readiness, tact and courage. When Wood-
ruff's brigade was left isolated and alone on the field, by the falling
back of troops on the right and left during the fiercest onset of
Bragg' s army on December 31, 1862, at Stone River, the Twenty-
fifth regiment was flanked by the enemy, and Col. Williams found it
necessary to "change front," and in doing so his men became the
least bit demoralized ; and fearing that they might fall back in a
panic, as other regiments had done, on the color-bearer being shot
down Col. Williams seized the colors himself, and advancing in
front of the center of his regiment, while preparing to plant the col-
ors, said: "WE WILL PLANT IT HERE, BOYS, AND RALLY THE OLD
TWENTY-FIFTH AROUND IT, AND HERE WE WILL DIE." At this point
he was shot through the left breast, and reeled backward, still hold-
ing the colors. He was taken to the field hospital, and lingered a
number of hours, and died, saying to Surgeon Brown : "I have done
my duty."

Col. Williams, on the day preceding the one on which he re-
ceived his death-wound, was severely wounded by a piece of shell
tearing a ghastly wound in the fleshy part of his thigh, but binding
his handkerchief over it, he continued on the field. Men less deter-
mined and of less nerve would have left the field, and felt that with
such a wound they were amply justified in so doing. In his report
of the battle his brigade commander referred to the death of Col.
Williams in the following words: "Amid the glorious results of a
Battle won, it gives me pain to record the names of the gallant men
who offered up their lives on the altar of their country. But we
must drop the tear of sorrow over their resting places, and offer our
heartfelt sympathies to their relatives and friends, trusting that God
will care for them and soothe their afflictions. And while we remem-
ber the noble dead, let us pay a tribute of respect to the gallant Col.
T. D. Williams, Twenty-fifth Illinois regiment, who died in the per-
formance of his duty. He fell with the regimental colors in his
hands, exclaiming : ' We will plant it here, boys, and rally the old
Twenty-fifth around it, and here we will die.' Such conduct is
above all praise, and words can paint no eulogiums worthy of the
subject."

Col. Williams and two of his children were buried at Oakwood
Cemetery, Troy, New York, by his wife. And she has marked the
tomb of her hero by a beautiful monument. The other child born to
them is buried at Camden, Alabama, and only the wife of the gallant
soldier still lives. Mrs. Mary A. Williams has a cosy home at Che-
banse, bearing within its walls many evidences of the culture and
21

322 HISTORY OF 1ROQUOIS COUNTY.

refinement of its owner, and with tender hands she has placed oa
the walls of her parlor pictures of her heroic husband, and also of
the loved little ones that, with their brave, noble-hearted father, await
her corning on the. golden shores of that " bright and better land."
To Williams Post, No. 25, Grand Army of the Republic, located at
Watseka, Mrs. Williams has presented a magnificent silk banner
suitably inscribed.

From a newspaper published in Troy, New York, under date of
January 25, 1863, we clip the following, in reference to the burial of
Col. Williams. His remains were sent from the battlefield to Che-
banse, and there taken in charge by his bereaved wife and taken to
Troy, and buried as here described :

" Yesterday our city was the scene of one of those sad reminders
of the stern realities of war, from which, thus far in the contest, Troy
has been comparatively free. The spectacle presented yesterday, at
the funeral of the brave Col. Williams, was one calculated to arouse
the deepest feeling, in fact, we know no more sad public demon-
stration than the pageant of a military funeral. The led horse of
the fallen warrior, the country's flag drooping on the coffin, the
mournful miner music, and the sword he has wielded in many a good
fight, but for which he has no longer any use, all conspire to make
it an impressive occasion. The remains arrived in the city on Sat-
urday, and were laid in state at the armory of the Citizens' Corps,
until yesterday noon, when the funeral procession moved thence to
Oakwood Cemetery, Brig. -Gen. Allen, with a portion of his staff,
Capt. McConihe and Capt. W. F. Calder, acting as pall-bearers. A
detachment of twenty-five regulars, from the Watervliet Arsenal,
under command of the veteran Sergt. Smith, acted as mourners.
The escort consisted of the artillery, the German Rifle Company, the
Republican, Jackson, Wool and Columbian Guards, the whole being
under the command of Lieut.-Col. Lawton. Sullivan's band fur-
nished the music. At the grave the usual salute was fired, and every
mark of respect was paid to the warrior who had ' gone to his long
home.' '

Iroquois county may well feel a pride in the fact that from all the
brave, true men whom she sent from her broad prairies to do battle
for the "old flag," no nobler martyr shed his blood than the gallant
Col. Williams, of the old Twenty-fifth regiment.

Col. Williams was a magnificent specimen of manhood, standing
six feet one and a half inches in his stocking feet, and being well
proportioned. In uniform he looked the soldier he proved himself
to be. His face wore a thoughtful look, and was kindly, except

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 323

when it showed the seal of determination. Though pleasant and
sociable generally, he was rather modest and retiring in disposition.
Had he lived to the close of the war, Iroquois county would doubt-
less have been the home of one union general, for the bravery and
abilities of the soldierly Col. Williams would have been recognized.

It is known to be a fact that, after the battle of luka, Capt. Will-
iams could have had a general's commission in the confederate
forces, had he seen fit to turn his back on the flag he loved so
well. Like the noble Gen. George H. Thomas, who also knew and
respected Williams as an excellent soldier in Mexico and at West
Point, whose bones now repose in Oakwood Cemetery, only a few
feet from those of Col. Williams, he had the courage to say No to
comrades and friends he loved, who, in their madness, had dared
assail the " old flag " and entreat him to do the same ungrateful act.
All honor to the brave and noble soldier who laid down his life in
defense of his adopted country, and may its chivalric sons emulate
his courage and cherish his memory. ,

JAMES H. JAQUITII was born near Buckfield, Maine, on June 18,
1837. He resided in his native state until 1855, when he set his
face westward, and settled in Lake county, near Waukegan, Illinois,
and at once cast about for a means of obtaining a livelihood, and
finally decided to learn the carpenter's trade, working at that trade
in Lake county for several years until he became a competent and
skillful mechanic. A year or two before the outbreak of the
rebellion Jaquith removed to Chebanse, and worked at his trade
there and at Kankakee city. Soon after the fall of Sumter, young
Jaquith enlisted in Company G of the Twentieth Regiment of
Infantry, and was made third corporal, and afterward promoted
sergeant, and he was an active, faithful soldier, until struck down
by a rebel bullet at Shiloh with a terrible wound. He was shot
through the right leg, six inches above the knee, and lay four days
upon the field with his wound undressed and uncared for. In a let-
ter to his brother he speaks of these four days of suffering in the
following language: ". . . It was trying to body and soul. . . .
On the fourth day I was conveyed to a boat and laid on a tick
of straw, the softest bed I had laid my bones on for eighteen months ;
my bed had usually consisted of a knapsack for a pillow, and a pil
of sticks or stones for a bed." And upon this bed of straw the gal-
lant sergeant, who had done manful duty at Donelson and escaped
unscathed, and felt himself a veteran, waited patiently for his ugly
and painful wound to heal ; but it was slow in healing, and he was
declared to be too badly hurt for further service to his country, and

324 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

September 30, 1862, the maimed soldier was honorably discharged,
and returned to Kankakee city, and in a little time resumed work at
his trade. During the year 1863, Jaquith married, at Kankakee city,
Miss Irene E. Merrill, a resident then of Lake county, and removing
to Chebanse with his young wife began housekeeping there, and
continued to reside at Chebanse until the spring of 1865, when
responding to the last call for volunteers for one year, Sergt. Jaquith
recruited and led to the field as its captain, Company H of the Fifty-
eighth regiment, and while stationed at Montgomery, Alabama, he
died in hospital of chronic dysentery, October 15, 1865, sadly mourned
by his company, a loving young wife and little daughter. His wife
and daughter reside at Chebanse. Captain Jaquith is described as
being a tall, dark complexioned, fine looking young man, loved and
respected as a soldier and as a man.

REV. PETER I. WILLIAMS, an itinerant preacher of the M. E.
church, was assigned to Milford circuit in 1861, and little was known
then or now by his parishioners of the antecedents of their excellent
pastor. He was an earnest, active, Christian gentleman, and soon
won the hearts of his little flock at the then country town of Milford.
He busied himself in getting the present church edifice built, which,
by the way, was a pretentious building in those days. He also
preached the dedicatory sermon, and was regarded as an eloquent
and earnest minister of the gospel, a man wonderfully zealous and
earnest in his religious faith. He was a man of some thirty years of
age, and an earnest advocate and supporter of the union cause ; and
when Company E was being recruited for the Seventy-sixth regi-
ment, Rev. Peter I. Williams enlisted and used his influence in
securing enlistments to the company ; and abandoning the comforts
of home, a young wife, and a congregation of Methodist people that
loved him as their pastor, he went to the front to help put down the
unholy rebellion, and his comrades all bear testimony to his excel-
lent character and behavior in camp, on the march, and in battle,
as an earnest, God-fearing, union-loving, Christian soldier. While
on duty with a squad of eight of his men, in a rifle pit on the skir-
mish-line, close to the fortifications of Yicksburg, Lieut. Williams was
mortally wounded by a ball from the rifle of a sharpshooter in the
rebel works, the same bullet also wounding private George Devore,
one of his men, in the rifle pit with him at the time. This brave
Christian soldier was borne to the hospital of his command, but lin-
gered only a few hours, and June 21, 1863, mourned by comrades,
who had learned to love him, this brave, good man yielded up his
life upon the altar of his country, another victim to the fury of the

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR. 325

slaveholders' unholy and wicked war. In the death of Lieut. Will-
iams, Iroquois county lost one of its purest patriots, truest soldiers,
and most worthy citizens ; the church lost a young, ardent, eloquent,
warm-hearted and promising teacher and preacher. We have vainly
sought to learn something of the early life of this earnest Christian
and valiant soldier, who laid down a life full of golden promises, as
an officer of one of the gallant companies of volunteers, sent into the
field by this county, but have only been able to learn that he came
to this county from the west part of the state, and was probably a
native of this state. The most reckless and roughest boys of his
company respected Lieut. Williams for his piety, bravery and kind-
ness of heart ; and though no stone may mark his grave, in the
hearts of those men who faced death and danger with him, as their
leader and friend, his name is sacredly enshrined, and to the end of
their days will they venerate their gallant fallen comrade, as the true
soldier, Christian and patriot.

LIEUT. CHARLES TAYLOR, one of the slain heroes of this county,
came to Middleport a year or two before the beginning of the late
war, and up to the time of his enlistment in the old Twentieth he
followed his trade, that of a carpenter and joiner. His friends all
bear testimony as to his being a skillful mechanic, and a young man
of fine intellect and generous impulses,, but unhappily addicted to
the vice of intemperance. And like the noble "war governor" of
our state, his pernicious habit which had grown upon him while a
resident of Philadelphia, did much to hide the noble qualities of
head and heart possessed by this honest, frank and adventurous
young man. When Sumter was fired upon, young Taylor was among
the very first, if not the first, to enlist in the company that was
quickly formed at Middleport, immediately on receipt of the Presi-
dent's call for volunteers, and was very active in securing the enlist-
ment of others. Lieut. Taylor's soldierly conduct and generous
nature won for him favor among his comrades of Company I, of the
Twentieth regiment, and many of his friends at home (that is, his
adopted home), admiring the bright, generous and courageous young
fellow, watched his conduct in the field with some little pride, as
"Charlie" gave new proofs of his gallantry. At Britton's Lane, a
battle in which the Twentieth and Thirtieth Illinois regiments were
attacked by an overwhelming force of rebels, and yet, by dauntless
bravery and pure western pluck, held their ground and gave the
enemy a good sound whipping, despite the disparity of numbers,
Lieut. Taylor was in the thickest of the battle, and his saber scab-
bard was struck close to the hilt, and scabbard and saber so battered

326 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

and twisted by the shot as to render it impossible to draw the blade
from the scabbard. The lieutenant sent it as a relic of the fight to his
friend, Hon. C. Secrest, of this city, who still retains it. After par-
ticipating in numerous battles, Lieut. Taylor was finally struck down,
after over three years' continuous exposure to dangers seen and
unseen in the ranks of his gallant regiment, by a rebel bullet in the
ankle, during the hottest of the fierce struggle, on the banks of Peach
Tree Creek, a few miles from Atlanta. He was helped to the rear
by his friend and comrade, John S. Vemmm, who staid with him
until he died from the effects of his wound, which he received June
21, 1864. His death occurred on the 24th, and he was buried by
Vennum on the banks of Peach Tree Creek, where he sleeps the
sleep of the gallant and true soldier.

Among the knightly young heroes who fell on the crimsoned
field of Shiloh, no nobler youth died the death of a brave and true
defender of the union than Corporal PIIILO P. VENNUM, of Company
I, Twentieth regiment. He was a young man of about twenty-two
years, when the rebel bullet shattered the precious casket, and was
a fine-appearing and promising young man ; and had he lived, no
doubt his family and the country would have been honored by him.
He was the son of C. C. Yennum, deceased, one of the pioneers of
Milford township, and for many years its supervisor and most hon-
ored and trusted citizen, and the brother of Hon. Thomas Yennum
and Capt. J. F. Yennum. Early in the first day's battle, young
Yennum was struck by two rebel bullets, one of which cut off the
forefinger of the right hand, and the other tore through the muscle
of the same arm, near the shoulder, and penetrating the right side of
the fearless joung warrior, brought his tall form to the earth ; and a
few moments after the trampling horde of traitors passed over him
in pursuit of his retreating regiment, that, unable to stand the
simoon of destruction, had been forced from that part of the field.
His body was found, and buried by his cousin, John S. Yennum, and
his comrade, Joseph Leeds. Many of his comra'des will, doubtless,
feel a pang of grief seize the heart, even at this late day, as they read
this brief tribute to a noble soldier who died with his face to the foe.

SERGT. CHARLES BARD, of Chebanse, and one of the first settlers of
that neighborhood, after farming several years sold his farm, moved
into Chebanse and went to merchandising. He enlisted in Company
H, Fifty-eighth regiment, under Capt. J. H. Jaquith. Bard was made
second sergeant of his company, and did his duty faithfully until seized
with chronic dysentery at Montgomery, Alabama, where he died Sep-
tember 23, 1S65. His widow and daughter reside at Chebanse.

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE WAR.

327

ROLL OF HONOR OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Soldiers from this county that were killed in battle or died in
the service in the war of 1861-5 :

RESIDENCE. MUSTERED IN. OROANIZATION.

KILLED OR DIED.

Ancel B. Oady

Sydney Henderson

Win. J. Moore

Serg. Solon White. jPapineau
William Bondalovv. Papineau
Alexander Gordon. Papiueau
Wm. R. Shoutter ..! Mil ford..

Frank B. Eno ; Loda . . . .

Serg. G. W. Tolbert Onarga . .
Corp. J. W. Follett ! Onarga ..
Corp. A. W. Wilson Ouarga ..

Barney Burn* | Onarga . .

Riley Chenneworth 'Onarga ..
Luci'ui P. Mendal. . \ Onarga . .
David H. Putnam.. ; Onarga . .
Nelson J. Robinson Onarga ..
Andrew J. Sellers . Onarga ..
William Selvey Onarga ..
George J. Van Ness Onarga . .

Serg. N.Dillon Onarga ..

Serg. L. Thayer .. . Onarga . .
Henry Alexander .. [ Onarga ..
George H. Cooper . Onarga . .
William Daniels... Onarga ..
John Robinson Ouarga ..
Wm. N. Skeels i Onarga . .

Middleport Oct. 21. 1861 . .
Middleport ;Sept, 14, 1861.

Middleport iDec. 18, 1863.
Sept. 27, 1861.
Nov. 21, 1361.

e .y

ilson

Corp. P. Tierne
Saddler, W. Wf
Jacob Anderson
Daniel Chidsey ...
Win. J. Hamlin

Simeon Harris

John Haley

Samuel McGowan

Loda
Loda .. .
Loda . . .
Loda . . .
Loda ..
Loda . .
Loda .. .
Loda ..

Joseph McDonald . Loda

Francis Post Loda

Samuel Sanders . . . Loda
Gilbert D. Sperry.. Loda
Edward Webster .. I Loda

Charles Edings Loda

Tim Broult L'Erable ..

Thomas T. P. Cady Ash Grove.

Win. II. Wilkinson Chebanse..

. . Nov. 12, 18lil.
..Feb. 3. 1862 .
. . Sept. 10,1861.
..'Sept. 10, 1861.
. .;Sept. 10, 1861.
..'Sept. 10, 1861.
. 'Sept. 10,1861.
..'Sept. 10,1861.
.. Sept. 10, 1861.
.. Nov. 1. 1861..
..i Sept. 10,1861.
. . I Sept. 10, 1861.
..Sept. 10,1861.
..|Jan. 1, 1864 ..
..|Ang. 1, 1862..
..!Dec. 1, 1861 ..
..Aug. 1, 1862..
. .|Feb. 1, 1862

Aug. 1. 1862..

Jan. 1, 1863 ..

Sept. 15, 1861.

Sept. 15. 1861.

Sept. 15, 1861.

'Sept. 15. 1861.

Sept. 16, 1861.

Sept. 15, 1861.

Sept. 15, 1861 .

Sept. 15,1861.

Sept. 15, 1861.

Sept. 15. 1861.

Sept. 15,1861.

Sept. 10, 1861.

Jan. 12,
Dec. 19, 1861 .
Sept. 1,1861..
June 13, 1861

2d Lieut. C.Taylor, i Middleport I March 1. 1862
Corp. George Friel Middleport ^June 13, 1861.
Corp. F. P.Vennum Iroquois Co June 13, 1861.
Corp. A Reynolds. Iroquois Co June 13, 1861

Joseph Bray ton Ashkum ... June 13, 1861.

Jas. Braudt!uburg.. Middleport June 13, 1861

John W. Bird Middleport I June 13, 1861.

Laroy T. Thomas. . Iroquois Co June 13, 1861.

Jas. H. Thompson. Oilman 'June 13, 1861.

Oliver Hudson Middleport

William A. Jewell . Middleport
Bcnj. F. Shockley . 'Middleport
James Britton ...'.. ! Aflhknm . . .

William J. Davis
Henry Leek

Mil ford .
Middleport

June 15, 1863.
April 23. 1861
Nov. 1, 1862..

lenry Le

Col. T. D. Williams 'Chebanse
Serg. Jas. M. Clark Iroquois Co June 4, 1861..
Serg.L H.Anderson Iroquois Co June 4, 1861

Corp. M. Neighbor.
Corp. T. Peebles...
Martin V. B. Allen.

Joseph Guhl

Torman Hoel

James Johnson

William Johns

Thomas Kinder. . . .
John Little...

Ash Grove
Martinlon
Onarga . ..

June 4. 1861..
June 4, 1861..
June 4, 1861

Martinton . June 4. 1861.

Iroquois Co

Martinton . June 4, 1861.

Martinton .

Loda

June 4. 1861..
June 4, 1861

Iroquois Co June 4, 1861.

(Bat. D, 1st Art.
Bat. D, 1st Art.
Bat. E, 1st Art .
Bat. E, 1st Art .
Bat. E, 1st Art .
Bat. E, 1st Art .
Bal. E, 1st Art .
1 Bat. L, 2d Art. .
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M. 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
I Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
[Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co. M, 9th Cav.
Co M, 9th Cav.
Co. M. 9th Cav.
Co.C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co.C, 10th Cav.
Co.C, 10th Cav.
Co.C, 10th Cav.
Co. C, 10th Cav.
Co.C. lOih Cav.
I Co. E, 12th Cav.
ICo.C, 12th Inf.
Co. G, 20th Inf.
Co. I. 20th Inf..
Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. I. 20th Inf..
Co. I, 20th Inf..
| Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. I. 20th Inf..
Co. I, 20th Inf.
Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. T, 2()thlnf..
Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. I. 20th Inf..
Co I, 20th Inf. .
Co. I, 20th Inf..
Co. I 20th Inf..
Co. F. 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.
Co. F. 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.
Co. F, 2.-ith Inf.
Co. P\ 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.
;Co. F, 25th Inf.
[Co. F, 25th Inf.
Co. F, 25th Inf.

D. at Fort Donelson, Feb. 16, 1862.
D. at Cairo. III., Nov. 25, 1861.
D. at Nashville. Tenn., Ffb 3, 1865.
D. at Chebanse. 111., Oct. 23. 1861.
D. at Memphis, Tenn.. Sept. 12, 1863.
D. at Memphis, Sept. 17, 1863.
D. at Memphis. Sept. 9, 1863.
D. on steamer Champion. May 6, 1862.
D. at Reeve's Sta., Mo., Mr. 31 1862.
D. at Chicago, Feb. 8, 1862.
D. nr Jacksonport, Ark., June 26. 1862.
D. at Memphis, Tenn., Feb. 12, 1864.
D. at Reeve's Sta., Mo., Mar. 22, 1862.
D. at St. Louis, Oct. 13, 1864.
D. at Memphis, April 10, 1864.
Drowned in Black river, June 26, 1862.
Drowned in Black river, June 1, 1862.
D. at Little Black river, May 2, 1862.
D. at Keokuk, Iowa, Oct. 8- 1862.
D. at Columbia, Tenn., Nov. 24, 1864.
D. at Memphis, Tenn., Oct. 1, 1862,
D. at Onarga, March 8, 1862.
K. at Oxford, Miss., August 13, 1864
D. at St. Louis.

K.nrTishomingo creek, June 11, 1864.
D. at Nashville, Tenn., Dec. 24, 1864.
D.

D. .

'D, at Memphis, Oct. 15, 1864.
I).

K. in battle.

D. at Little Rock, Ark., Sept. 18, 1863.
D. at Huntsville. Ark., June 3. 1864.
D. at Loda, 111.. Dec. 4, 1863.
D. at Brownsville. Ark., Sept.. 13, 1863.
K. in battle.
D.
D.

JD. at Little Rock, Ark., Aug. 3. 1864.
'D. at St. Louis, March 26, 1864.
;D. Nov. 13, 1862.
!D. at Mound City, Dec. 9, 1861.
|D. July 29. 1864.

K. at Champion Hills, May 16, 1863.
K. at Shiloh, April 6, 1862.
K. at Shiloh, April 6, 1862.
D. at Mound City, Nov. 8, 1861.
K. at Raymond. Miss., May 12. 1863.
D. at Keokuk, Iowa. July 5, 1862.
K. at Raymond, Miss., May 12. 1863.
D. at Vicksburg. Miss., Dec., 1863.
K. at Goldsboro, N. C., Dec. 16, 1*61.
K.atFayetteville. N. C.,Mar. 11.1865.
K. near Goldsboro, N. C., Jan. 5, 1865.
K. at Edwards Sta.. Miss.. May 6. 1862.
D. at Millbrd. III.. March 10, 1863.
K. in action. July 22, 1864.
K. at Stone River, Tenn., Dec. 31. 1862.
D. at ClearCreck, Tenn., June 23, 1862.
D at Jefferson City. Mo.. Oct, 23. 1861.
K. at Pea Ridge, Ark.. March 8, 1862.
K at Chickamauga. Sept. 19, 1863.
K. at Stone River, Dec. 31, 1862.
D. at Murfreesboro. Jan. 8. 1863.
D. at Rolla Mo.. Feb. 6, 1862.
K. at, Mission Ridge, Nov. 25, 1865.
D. at Springfield. Mo., Nov. 11. 1861.
D. at Chattanooga. Jan. 11. 1864.
K. at Mission Ridge. Nov. 25. 1863.

328

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

NAME.

MiloLee

Louis Riddle

Joseph Riddle

Michael Slusher...

P. Stufflebeam

Edwaru Schmahorn

\V. C. Ayres

Jos. C. Bullington.
Daniel Harrington.
Oliver H. Hopkins.

John Starritt

Isaac Taylor

Joel L. Brooks

Robert Robinson .

Elisha Karr

William Thomas

RESIDENCE. MUSTERED IN. ORGANIZATION.

Martinton . June 4, 1861.
Iroquois Co June 4, 1861.
Iroquois Co June 4. 1861.
ord .... June 4, 1861.

F, 25th Inf. D.
F, 25th Inf. D.
F, 25th Inf.iD.

Mi I ford ..
Martinton .
Ashkum . . .
Iroquoj? Co
Iroqnois Co

June 4. 1861.
June 4, 1861.

Co.

Co.
I Co.
.Co. F, 25th Inf.

Co. F, 251 h Inf.

Co. F, 25th Inf.

Co. F. 25th Inf.

Co. F, 25th Inf.

KILLED OR DIED.

I).

ni'ijuuin v,'\jj \j\ft i: , .*) in i it i ,

Iroquois Co. F, 25th Inf

Ashkum
Ashkum
Ashkum ..
Ashkum...
Iroquois Co

I j'nne'i, isei!

June 1,1861..

Co. G. 25th Inf.

Co.
Co.

Co.

Milford .... Aug. 25, 1861. Co.
Philander II. Foster Bunkum... Aug. 17, 1861. ! Co.
William Gilbert ... Bunkum. .. I Aug. 27, 1861. Co.

Isaac Hoagland Bunkum... Aug. 17. lS(il. Co.

Joseph t-herril IroquoisCo Aug. 27, 1861. Co.

IsaacF. Smith Ashkum... March 5, 1865. Co.

James W. Trotter . Middleport Aug. 9, 1861.. Co.
Corp. M.Hosle.... Middleport Sept. 90, 1861. Co.
Corp. R. A. Tilton. Middleport | Sept. 20. 1861. Co.
Corp. H. P. Canada I Middleport Sept. 20, 1861. Co.
Corp. W. Curry.... Middleport Sept. 20, 1861. 'Co.

G, 25th Inf.
G. 251 h Inf.
G. 25th Inf. D.
E. 39th Inf. K,

Corp. Chamberlain.
Corp. G. Gravel

Corp. N. R. Harris, j Middleport
Corp. R. A. Jolley. 'Middleport
Corp. J. W. Lyman I Middleport
Corp. W. Matthews Middleport

Middleport |Nov. 20, 1861. Co.
Middleport Sept. 20, 1861. Co.

Corp. C. W. Miller.
Corp. Montgomery.

Louia Green

George W. Joel

Isaac Houghland ..

Oscar Wade

George Connell

Levi Edwards

Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
Beaverville
Iroqnois Co
Bel mon t . . .

Sept. 20, 1861.
Nov. 1, 1861.
Oct. 1.1861 ..
Oct. 15. 1861.. Co.
Sept, 20, 1861. Co.
Nov. 20, 1861. Co.
Dec. 23, 1863. 1 Co.
Co.

Co.

Feb. 27. 1864.
March 31, 1862 Co.

Jasper N. Moore.. .Belmont... j March 31, 1862 Co
David A. Oppy ' Iroquois Co March 20, 1864' Co.

William P. Sallee.
Corp. W. Laughlin.

William Clurk

Jonas Lash

Clinton D. Root...
T. C. Rounsaville..
Corp. C. G. Chapin

Daniel Tengley

Capt. J. H. Jaquinth

Serg. C. Bard

Samuel Butcher . . .
Michael Comfort ..
Harmon Dimick. ..
Francis Dulorgers .
Lcander Mercier. . .
Abraham B. Ogle . .
William Smith ....
James Shottenkirk
W. Shottenkirk .. .
Corp. W. Norton ..

Corp. E. Troup

Corp. John Morris.

Elijah Biirker

William Crozier . . .

PeterGravlo

N. S. Hundlev...

Iroquois Co

Onarga

Onarga
Onarga

Onarga

Clifton ....
Ashkum .. .
Chebanse..
Chebanse . .
Chebanse..
Chebanee..
Martinton .
Papineati . .
Papineau ..
Chebanse. .
Chebanse..

Onarga

Belmont . . .
Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
IroquoisTp
Middleport

Georire W. Izzard. . Middleport

Feb. 29, 1864. 'Co.
Sept. 24 1861. Co.
Sept. 24, 1861. Co.
Sept. 24, 1861. Co.
Sept. 24, 1861. Co.
Sept. 24. 1861. Co.
Nov. 7, 1861.. Co.
Jan. 1. 1864 .. Co.
April 1, 1865 . Co.
March 13, 1S65 Co.
March 14. 1865 Co.
March 14. 1865 Co.
Feb. 18. 186i . Co.
March 6, 1865 Co.
March 6", f865 Co.
March 14 1865 Co.
Feb. 27. 1865. Co.
Aug. 7, 1862.. C'o.
Aug. 14, 1862. Co

G. 42d Inf
II. 42dlnf
H.42d Inf
H. 42d Inf
II, 42d Inf
K, 43d Inf

B, 51st Inf

C, 51st Inf. U
C.51st Inf. I)
C, 51st Inf. D
C. 51st Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. D,
C, Slst Inf D,
C, 51st Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. D
C, Slst Inf. K
C, Slst Inf. D
C, Slst Inf. D
C, Slst Inf. K
C, Slst Inf. D
C, Slst Inf. .K
C, Slst Inf. D
C, Slst Inf. D
C, 51st Inf. ID
C'. Slst Inf. ID,
C, 57th Inf. K
C, 57th Inf. I)
C. 57th Inf. D
C, 57th Inf. D
C. 57th Inf. K
C, 58th Inf. 1)
C, 58th Inf. I)
H, 58th Inf. D
II, 58ihlnf. D
II. 58th Inf. D
H. 58'h Inf. D
II, 58th Inf. D
H, 58th Inf. D
H, 58th Inf. 1)
H, 58th Inf. D
H, 58th Inf. I)

K, 72ddnf .
K, 72d Inf .

July 24. 1862 . Co. A, 76th Inf.

July 24. 1862. Co. '

July 24. 1862.

July 24, 1862

July 24. 1-62

July 24, 1862

July 24, ]>

Co.
Co
Co
Co
Co.

July 24, 1862 . Co.

Henry Jones Middleport July 24, 18W . Co.

Daniel G. Jacobs .. Middleport July 24. 186'i . Co

Frank Jackson Belmont... July 24, 1862 . Co

Elisha M. Kendall . ; Belmont . ... July 24, 1862 . Co

Joel Lesco Iroquois Tp July 24, 1862 . Co

William McAtee. . . iBelmont . . . July 24, 186:3 . Co
IroquoisTp July 24, 1862 . Co
Concord . . . July 24. 186'2 < o
Middleport July 24, 1862 . Co
[Belmont... Jill y 24. 18'i2 . Co
Middleport July 24, 1862 . Co
{Belmont... 'July 24, 1862. Co

George Miller
James II. O'Brine
John Rineheart. . .
Ezekiel Rockhold
Samuel Roberts . .

Asa Sapp

Chas. W. Spencer

1)
I)
D
A. nth Inf. IP

A. 76th Inf. I)
A. 76rh Inf. D.
A, 76th Inf. D
A, 76th Inf. I)
A. 76th Inf. P.
A, 76th Inf. K
A. 7fith Inf. D.
A, 76th Inf D.
A. 76th Inf. D
A. 76th Inf. D,
A, 76th Inf. D,
A. 76th Inf. D.
A. 76th Inf. K.
A. 76tli Inf. D.
A. 76th Inf. I),
A. 76th Inf. K,
A. 76th Inf. 1).
A. 76th Inf. D.
A. 76th Inf. D

at St. Louis, Mo., Nov. 27. 1861.
at St. Louis, Mo., Dec. 10. 1861.
at St.. Louis. Mo., Dec. 18, 1863.
at Ottervllle, Mo., Oct. 15. 1861.
at Chickamaugji. Sep. 19. 1863.
at Rolla. Mo.. Dec. 7, 1861.
at. Stone River. Dec. 31. 1862.
near Atlanta. Ga., July 22. 1864.
at Bridgeport, Ala., Nov. 16, 1863.
at Rolla, Mo.. Nov. 25. 1861.
at St. Louis. Mo.. Dec. 11, 1861.
at Chattanooga, Dec. 23, 1863.
at Nashville, Tenn., Feb. 22, 1864.
at Knoxville, Tenn., Feb. 7, 1863.
at Di ury's Bluffs, Va., May 14. 1864.
lit Tipton, Mo., Jan. 24, 1862.
at Tipton, Mo., Dec. 25. 1861.
Nov. 11. 1861.

at Smithton. Mo., Jan. 3, 1862.
at Kesaca. Ga.. May 14, 1864.
at Little Rock, Ark., Aug. 4, 1865.
in action, Sept. 20, 1863.
at Sheldon. 111., March 26. 1862.
at Middleport, 111.. July 23. 1863.
atFaimington,Miss., July 24. 1862.
atFarmington, Miss., May 28 1862.
at Farmington. Miss., July 24, 1862.
at Andersonville. Oct. 15. 1864.
at Chicago. Jan. 30. 1862.
near Corinth. June 11. 1862.
at Richmond, Va.. March 12, 1864.
at Mound City. March 25, 1862.
at Chicago, Jan. 7. 1862.
at Chickamuuga, Sept. 20, 1864.
at Louisville, Ky.. July 6. 1864.
at Chattanooga, Sept. 14. 1864
at Franklin, Tenn , Nov. 30. 1864.
near Atlanta, Gn., Sept. 20. 1864.
at Kern-saw M'n, June 27, 1864.

at Nashville. Nov. 2, .

at Annapolis. Md.. May 8. 1864.

Dec. 6, 1864.

June 30. 1864.

at Corinth, Oct. 3, 1862.

at Paducah, Ky.

at PittsburgLand'g. April 15, 1862.

at Quincy, 111., May 21. 1862.

at shiloh. April 6, 1862.

April 13, 1862.

at Montgomery/Ala., Sept. 29. 1865.

at Montgomery, Oct. 15. 1865.

at Montgomery, Sept.. 23. 1865.

at Montgomery. Sept. 27, 1865.

at Montgomery, Sept. 6, 1865.

at Montgomery. Aug. 25, 1865.

at Montgomery, Aug. 11, 1865.

at Montgomery, July 1. 1865.

at Montgomery, July 9, 1865.

at Montgomery, July 17, 1865.

at Franklin. Teim., Nov. 30. 1864.

near Vicksbnrg, May 9. 1863.

at Bolivar. Tenn., Oct. 26, 1862.

at Jackson. Miss.. July 11, 1863.

Oct. 2-2. 1864.

at Vickburg, Dec. 25, 1863.

at Columbus. Ky., Oct. 8. 18i:2.

at Port Hud-on. LS.. Aug. 30, 1864.

at St. Louis. Dec. 18. 1862.

at Jackson. Miss.. July 7. 18IV4.

at Memphis. Tenn.. April 7. 1863.

at Memphis. Tenn., Feb. 12. 1863.

ut Vick<burg. May. 18. 1864.

at Middleport. 111.. Sept. 27. 1864.

April 16, 1864.

at Bolivar. Tenn.. Oct. 23, 1862.

at Jackson. Miss.. July 7. 1864

at Virksburg. Dec. 26, 1863.

at Halfway Sta., Ind., July 24. 1864.

June 2. 1863.

at VU'kshurg. Jan. 8, 1864.

at Memphis. Sept. 7. 1864.

at Vicksburg, June 22. 1863.

IROQUOIS COUNTY IN THE \VAK.

329

RESIDENCE. I MUSTERED IN. ORGANIZATION.

Robert Wright Micldleport

William B\ Wilson. Belmont...

James Brown Middleport

A. Brandenburg . . . Middleport
J. O. Endsley, Jr..
R. E. Fenncmore.
Langdon llogle. ..

Calvin Mason

Micajah Moore .. .

Joseph Cote

Dephis Fortin

Lieut. P. I.Williams Mil ford

Serg. J. M. Beedle. < Beaver

Corp. J.B.McKiuley Ash Grove.

Corp. S. Hall Crab Apple

Corp. H. II. Palmer Beaver

Joseph Eastburn . . Concord . . .

Abel Burroughs Concord . . .

Benjamin Brutton. ;Ash Grwve.

KILLED OR DIED.

Samuel Clemens. . .
Joseph W. Cleaver.

Concord . .

Millord ....

T. F." Eastburn Middleport

John W. Garland.. 'Milford ....
Addison Hoskins.. Milford
Thomas P. Handy. PrairieGr'n

James Kline Beaver

Kobert .heard 'Milford ....

H. B. Longnecker . Ash Grove .

Henry S. Murray . . Beaver

Thomas W. Manter Concord . ..
S.W.Montgomery Ash Grove.
Amos W. Markley. Concord .. .
Edward Mitchell ... Middleport

Mason Pier Milford

Moses Spain Ash Grove.

Hamilton Spain . . . Ash Grove

Joseph Sallee...

John H. Best ....

Clinton Cleaver. .

Isaac M. Caldwell

Jas. W. Higginson. Ash Grove.

Serg.W.E.Schofleld , Loda

Serg. H. B. Hussey Ash Grove.

jJuly 24, 1862 . Co. A, 76th Inf ;D. at Memphis, Oct. 6, 1864.
i July 24, 1862 . iCo. A, 76th Inf. | D. at Vicksburg, May 28, 1864.
July 24, 1862 . Co. A, 76th Inf. D. at Cairo, Oct. 7. 1864.
July 24, 1862 . iCo. A, 76th Inf . D. at Middleport, Nov. 12. 1864.

A. 76th Iiif . K. at Blakeley, Ala., April <), 1865.

A, 76th Inf . D. at Vicksburg, Jan. 30. 1861.

A, 76 h Inf. D. at Memphis. Sept. 22, 1864.

A, 76th Inf . D. at Middleport, Jan. 2, 1865.

A, 76th Inf. D. at Mobile. Ala., May 22, 1865.

D, 76th Inf. D. at Memphis, Tenn.

D, 76th Inf. ,D. at St. Mary, 111., Dec. 10. 1864.

E, 76th Inf. 'D. at Vicksburg, Miss., June 21, 1863.
E, 76th Inf. ! D. at Memphis, April 12, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. D. March 20, 1865.

E, 76th Inf. JD. July 29, 1864.

E. 76th Inf . ,D. at Holly Springs. Dec. 19, 1862.
. E, 76th Inf. D. at, Sheldon, 111., Dec. 9, 1864.
. E, 76th Inf. D. at Vicksburg, Aug. 22, 1864.
. E, 76th Inf. D. at La Grange, Tenn., Mar. 18, 1863.

Middleport July 24^ 1862

Crab Apple

Micldleport

Belmont. ..

Middleport

St.. Mary.. .

St.. Mary . .

July 24, 1862
July 24, 1862
July 24, 1862
July 24. 1862
Aug. 7. 1862.
July 28, 1862

Aliif. 9, 1862.
Aug. 6. 1862.
Aug. 1, 1862.
Aug. 7, 1862.
Aug. 7, 1862.
Aug. 9, 1862.,
Aug. 1, 1862.

Aug. 4, 1862..! Co
Aug. 12, 1862. Co

Beaver
. . Crab Apple
.. Milford....

Cimcord ..

Corp. J. G. Clawson

Elijah Bratton

Loilis Dilleback . . .
Hiram B. Harris.. .
William B. King...

Oliver P. Nail ,

Aaron Russell

Samuel Rowley

George W. Thomas.
Joel L. Vaughn ....
Elisha Hawkins . ..

Wm. Radway

Myron Anderson ..
Elon C. Burnett ...

John Lynn

Charles H. Miller..
Abraham Weaver..
Serg. J.V.T. Shaffer

Aug. 4, 1862.
lAug. 3, 1862.
! Aug. 8, 1863.
Aug. 2, 1862.
Aug. 9, 1862.
Aug. 1, 1862.
Aug. 11, 1862.1 Co.
Aug. 9, 1862.. Co.
Aug. 9, 1862.. Co.
Aug. 6, 1862.. 'Co.
Aug. 4, 1862.. Co.
Aug. 9 1862.. iCo.
Aug. 10, 1862-lCo.
Aug. 1, 186-i?<]Co.
Aug 3, 1862.. Co.
Aug. 11, 1862. 1 Co.
Dec. 17, 1863 . Co.
Co.

C'o.

CO,

Co.

Co,

C'o.

Co.

C'o.

Co.

July 31. 1862 .

July 22. 1862 .
AshGrove . Aug. 5, 1862. .
Ash Grove. JAus.'. 1 1862.

Loda :Aiig. 1, 1862..

AshGrove. July 25, 1862.

Loda Aug. 5, 1862..

Ash Grove. Aug. 1, 1862..
Ash Grove. 'Aug. 1, 1862..
AshGrove. July 25, 1862.
Ash Grove. Aug. 5, 1862.

K. 76th Inf. D. at Moscow, Tenn., Feb. 2, 1863.

E. 76th Inf. D. at Cairo, Sept. 3 1863.

PA 76th Inf. ID. at Memphis. Tenn . Sopt. S8 1864.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Milford, Dec. 7, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. 1). at Milford. May 23, 1864.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Columbus, Ky., Nov. 25 1862.

E, 76th Inf . .1). at JeftVrson Barracks. Aur. 18, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. D. nt Memphis, March 11, 1S63.

E, 76th Inf. ID. at Mobile, Ala., June 1. 1865.

E, 76th Inf. I), at Memphis, Aug. 16. 1863.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Cairo, Nov. 15, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. D.July 11, 1864.

E, 76th Inf. K. near Jackson, Miss., July 7, 1864.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Vicksburg. Aug. 8, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. Drowned at Natchez, Aug. 14, 1863.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Memphis, March 7, 1865.

E, 76th Inf. D. at La Grange, Tenn., Dec. 16. 1862.

E, 76th Inf. !D. at Beaver, 111., Nov. 22. 186:}.

E, 76th Inf. ;D. at Morgauza, La., Aug. 16, 1864.

E, 76th Inf. D. at Tallahatchie. Miss.. Jan. 1. 1863.

E, 76th Inf. 'D. at Memphis. May 4, 1863.

E, 76th Inf.
K, 76th Inf

D. at Natchez. Nov. 3, 1863.

D. at Memphis, Tenn., May 18. 1863.

Ash Grove. Aug. 10, 1862.
Ash Grove. Dec. 9. 1863 . .
Iroquois Co Aug. 7, 1862.
Iroquois Co Aug. 10. 1862.
Ashkum .. . Auir. 10, 1862.
Clifton .... July 29, 1862.
Clifton .... July 29, 1862.
Loda

Ashkum . .

James Brett I Ashkum . . .

Louis T. Trounville Clifton

Leon J. Lourant.. . Clifton

Magloire Puoton. . . Clifton

John Tibault Clifton

Corp. Brandenburg Micldleport.

Noah Buck Middleport

John Bartholomew Martinton .
JonathanW. Lymau M iddleport,
Ambrose Lctahton Middleport

Francis Ponto Chebanse. .

Serg. S. L. Thomas Ouarga ....

Serg. E. G. Hall Ouarga

Serg. G. W. Parcell Onarga

Serg. T. Webster . . Onarga

Corp. John Harper. Onarga

John W. Briden . . . Onarga

Henry B. Conn Spring Cr'k

Alonzo W. Curtis.. Onarga

Owen L. Evans. ..

Onarga . . .

Wm. H. Frazee ! Onarga

Aug. 10, 1862.

Aug. 14, 1862. Co

Aug. 14. 1862. (V

iAug. 14, 1862. Co

Aug. 16, 1862. Co.

Aug. 16. 1862 Co

Aug. 16, 1862. CO

Aug. 18 1862. Co

Aug. !), 1862.. Co

Aug. 9, 1862 Co

Aug.'.). 1862.. Co

Aug. <). 1862.. Co

Aug. 12, 1862. Co

July 30, 18i2 . Co

July 28, 1862. 'C'o

July 30, 1862. i Co
July 29, 1862., Co

July 30, 1862. Co

Aug. 7. 1862.. Co
Aug. 14, 1862. Co

Aug. 7. 1862.. Co

IAug. 14, 1862 C'o

K, 76th Inf.!K. at Blakeley, Ala.. April 9, 1865.
K. 76th Inf. D. at La Grange. Tenn., Dec. 4, 1862.
K, 76th Inf. K. at Jackson, Miss.. July 7, 1864.
K, 76th Inf/K. at Jackson. Miss., July 7, 1864.
K, 76th Inf. D. at Oxford, Miss., Dec. 17, 1862.
K, 76th Inf.;D. at Holly Springs, Dec. 10, 1862.
K,76th Inf. D. at Columbus, Ky., Oct. 5, 1862.
K, 76th Inf. D. at La Grange, Tenn., Nov. 16, 1862.
K, 76th Inf. K. at Jackson, Miss., July 7, 1864.
K, 76th Inf. D. at La Grange, Tenn., Dec. 3, 1862.
K. 76th Inf . I), at St. Louis, April 11, 1863.
K, 76th Inf. D. July 7, 1864.

C, 88th Inf. I), at Nashville. Tenn., Jan. 13, 1864.
C, 88th Inf . ,K. at Adifirsville. Ga., May 17, 1864.
C, 88th Inf. D. at Murfreesboro, Ana. 3, 1863.
C. 88th Inf. 1). Dec. 8, 1862.
C, 88th Inf. I). Jan. 30. 1864.

C, 88lh Inf. K. at Stone Kiver, Dec. 31, 1862.

K, 88th Inf. D. at Gallatin, Tenn., Dec. 26, 1862.
K, 88th Inf. D. in Andersonville pr., July 25. 1864.

D, 89th Inf. ID. Nov. 14, 1862.

I), 89th Inf. D. in Andersonville pr., Sept. 1 1864.

D, 89th Inf. D. at Louisville, Ky., Sept. 2, 1863.

1), 89th Inf. D. at Louisville, Ky., Feb. 3. 1864.

B, 113th Inf;D. at Vicksburg, June 18. 1863.

B, 113th Inf iD. at Corinth. Miss.. Sept. 17, 1863.

H. 113th Inf D at Corinth. Miss., Sept. 15, 1863.

B. 113th Inf D. at J< fferson Barracks, Jan. 21. 1863.

B, 113th Inf D. at Corinth, Miss.. Sept. 27, 1863.

B, 113th Inf K. at Vicksburg, May 19, 1863.

I), 113th Inf D. at St. Louis! Mo., March 11. 1863.

D, 113th Inf D. at Young's Point, Feb. 13, 1863.

1), 113th Inf D. at Memphis. Dec. 31, 1863.

D, 113lh Inf D. at Mobile. Ala., July 4, 1864.

I). 113th Inf K. Sept. 30. 1864.

J), 113th Inf D. at Del Key. 111., March 5. 1863.

D, 113th Inf D. at Camp Butler, 111., July 3, 1864.

D, 113th Inf I), at Young's Point. La., Feb. 10. 1863.

D, 113th Inf K. at Arkansas Post. Jan. 11, 1864.

D. 113th Inf D. at Camp Butler, 111., Oct. 8, 1864.

330

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

NAME.

RESIDENCE.

MUSTERED IN. ORGANIZATION.

KILLED OR DIED.

George W. Goble..
Samuel J. Harper..
Andrew S. Harper .
James G. Hopkins.
James S. Jones. . . .

Onarga ....
Onarga ....
Onarga ....
Onnrga
Ouarga
Onarga
Onarga
Onarga
Milford....
Onarga ....
Milford....
Onarga ....
Ash Grove .
Onurga
Onarga
Onarga . .

Aug. 19. 1862.
Aug. 4, 1862.
Aug. 6, 1862..
Aug. 9, 1862
Aug. 15, 1862.
July 30. 1862 .
Aug. 9. 1862..
Aug. 14, 1863.
Aug. 13, 1862.
July 30. 1862 .
Aug. 15, 1862.
Aug. 20, 1862.
Aug. 7. 1862..
Ang 12, 1862.
Jan. 14, 1864 .
Jan. 4, 1864

Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D. 113th Inf
Co. D. 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. I), 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D. 113th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. D. 113th Inf
Co. I), H3th Inf
Co. D, 113th Inf
Co. F. 11 3th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Tuf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F, 113th Inf
Co. F. 113th Inf
Co. H, 113th Inf
Co. H, 113th Inf
Co. H, 113th Inf
Co. H. 113th Inf
Co. H, 113th Inf
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113ih Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
C'o. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 11 3th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I, 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. I. 113th Inf.
Co. 1), 150th Inf

D. near Yazoo river, Jan. 2, 1863.
D. at St. Louis. Feb. 25, 1863.
D. at Holly Springs. Jan. 11, 1863.
D. at Onarga. April 6, 1863.
K. June 30. 1864.
D. at Mound City. 111., Mar. 20, 1863.
D. at Vicksburg, June 26. 1863.
D. at Camp Butler, Feb. 22. 1864.
D. at Memphis, March 12. 1865.
D. at Chicago. Oct. 17. 1S62.
D. at Memphis. Dec. 17, 1862.
D. on hospital boat. March 29, 1863.
D. at Onarga. Oct. 2, 1862.
D. at Richmond. Va., Aug. 19. 1863.
D. in Andersonville pr., Aug. 22, 1864.
D. at Memphis, June 1, 1864.
D. in Andersonville pr.. Ausr. 22. 1864.
D. in Andersonville, Sept. 15. 1864.
D. at Camp Butler, Feb. 13. 1864.
D. at St. Louis, April 1, 1863.
K. at Arkansas Post, Jan 11. 1863.
D. at St. Louis, Feb. 8. 1863.
D. in Iroquois countv. Oct. 13, 1863.
D. at Memphis. Feb.' 26, 1863.
D. at Memphis. March 3, 1863.
I), at borne, Feb. 20, 1865.
D. at Young's Point, March 18 1863.
D. at Camp Butler.
D. on steamer Ed. Walsh, Jan. 22, 1863.
D. in Iroquois county, Jan. 15, 1865.
D. in Andersonville, Oct. 18, 1864.
D. at Chicago. Nov. 15, 1862.
D. in Iowa, March . 1863.
D. at Young's Point. Feb. 10. 1863.
D. at Chickasaw Bluff. Dec. 31. 1862.
D. at Camp Butler, May 21, 1863
D. at St. Louis, July 7. 1863.
D. in Andersonville pr., Oct. 10, 1864.
D. in Andersonville, Oct. , 1864.
K. at Guntown, Miss., June 10, 1864.
D. at Springfield, 111.
D. at Camp Butler, March 18. 1864.
D. at Memphis, March 22. 1865.
D. at Memphis, Dec. 17, 1862.
I), at Young's Point, April 9. 1863.
D. at Corinth, Miss., Sept. 6, 1863.
I), near Hipley, Miss.. June 10. 1864.
D. at Young's Point, Feb. 4. 1863.
D. at St. Louis. F^b. 17. 1863.
D. at Corinth, Miss., Aug. 17. 1863.
D. at St. Louis, Dec. 20,1862.
K. at Arkansas Post. Jan. 11, 1863.
I), at Memphis, Dec. 15. 1862.
D. at Camp Yates. Ill . Jan. 13. 1864.
D. at C'p Hancock 111.. Oct. 19. 1862.
I), at Camp Butler. Oct. 13. 1863.
I), at Camp Kutler. March 14, 1863.
D. at Camp Butler, Oct. 28, 1863.
D. at Memphis, Dec. 6, 1862.
D. at Memphis. Dec. 7. 1862.
I), at Memphi-. Nov. 26. 1864.
D. at Young's I'oint, April 5. 1862.
D. at Young's Point, March 14, 1863.
D. on steamboat. Jan. 23. 1863.
D at. Young's Point. March 13. 1863.
D. at Cahawba. Ala.. Sept. 8. 1S6J.
D. at Camp Butler. April 10. 1863
1). in Andersonville pr.. Sept. 8, 1864.
D. at Nashville, Tenn., July 24, 1865.

William Lee
William Marshall..
Abraham Meffard..
Hiram Shaw ....

Harvey Strain
Landrum Search. . .
David Swank

Lewis Thomas
Greenberry Davis . .

Alden Lindsay
Simeon T. Shook..
John Stnfflebeam..
Corp. W. F. Higgle
George E. Harden . .
Benjamin A. Burt .
Manfred Flesher. . .
Peter Freeberg
Joseph S. Harwood
Walter Hooker
H'. A. Henderson ..
R. Leatherman

Onarga ....
Middfeport

Onarga ....

Oct. 22, 1863 .
Dec. 9, 1863 . .

Middleport
Middleport

Milford....
IroquoisTp
Beaver
Gilman
Middleport
Middleport
Iroquois Co

Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12. 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
An's. 12. 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.

Marcellus Keen
James McManus.. .
Joseph Miller
N. B. McC'lintock..
Wm. N. Sturtevant
Abijah Shepard
William Tyler ... .
Henry Warren
J. A. Whiteman . ..

MiddK-port
Belmont . . .
Belmout . ..
Middleport
Iroquois Tp
IroquoisTp
Middleport
Middleport
Concord . . .
Belmont . .

Aug. 12, 1862.
Ang. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 12, 1862.

James Miller ....
James O. Pugh
John Rush
Isaac D. Tnllis ...
Joseph Warren
Thomas Elliott ....
Sylvester Lyons . . .
Henry A. Miner ...
Frank Roth
George Stiffles
Corp. Wm. Hush ,
Benjamin Appleget
Alexander Black . .
Harvey Barr
Thomas Carpenter.
Henry Fry

Middleport
Middleport
Middleport
Belmont . . .

Dec. 4, 1863..
Dec. 28, 1863.
March 4, 1864.

Belmont. ..
Chebanse ..
Chebanse..
Chebanse . .

Chebanse ..
chehanpe. .
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois ..
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois . . .
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Iroquois Co
Mil lord....

Aiig! 22, 'is'ea!

Aug. 13. 1862
Aug. 7. 1862..
Aug. 13, 1862.
Aug. 14, 1862.
Aug. 8, 1862..
Aug. 8. 1862..
Aug. 11, 1862.
Ausr. 15. 1862.
Aug. 8. 1862..
Aug. 9, 1862 .
Aug. 10. 1862.
Aug. 14. 1862.
Aug. 7. 1862..
Aug. 7, 1862..
Aug. 12, 1862.
Aug. 10. 1862.
Aug. 11. 1862.
Aug. 9, 1862..
Aug. 13, 1862.
Aug. 12. 1862.
Aug. 11. 1862.
Dec. 9, 1863 ..

Clause Halderman.
Thomas Kane
Wm. Leatherman .
Riley Lister
Abraham Markley.
Cyrus Murray
Samuel Morgan
Cornelius Morgan .
Mathew Pinnco ....
Jacob F. Plummer.
Nimrod Romine . . .
Smiley J. Dawson .
William R. Frv....

James A. Leighdy .
Wm. C. Ttittle

Milford....

Chebanse ..

Dec. 9. 1863..
Jan. 21, 18o5 .

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

BY E. S. RTCKER.

Iroquois county is bounded on the north by Kankakee county, on
the east by Indiana, on the south by Vermilion, and on the south
and west by Ford county. It is about thirty-five and one-half miles
from north to south, and thirty -two miles from east to west/ It com-
prises seven ranges, two of which are fractional. By reference to the
map it will be seen that five are reckoned west from the second prin-
cipal meridian, and two east from the third principal meridian. All
the townships in the county are numbered north from the base line.
Starting at the south side with number twenty-four and finishing at
the north with twenty-nine, we have six townships ; a strip two miles
wide on the north side of the last lying in Kankakee. The county is
divided into twenty-five political townships.

The face of the country has few natural diversifications. Origin-
ally, Iroquois county was well wooded, and much valuable timber
grew on the borders of the streams; but the woodman's ax with
thoughtless care and speculative industry long ago thinned it out and
consigned the choice growth to the uses of improvement far and near.
The surface is well elevated and gently undulating. The southern
border of the county rests upon the summit of the water-shed from
which streams flow in opposite directions to the Illinois and the
Wabash* rivers. Iroquois county lies on the northern slope of this
great ridge, a tract of country superb in every feature, and of rare
fertility, whose superior advantages for dairying and agriculture,
added to a fine geographical position in relation to markets, renders
it possible to become one of the richest regions in the Northwest.
The soil is a black vegetable mold, varying from one and a half to
two feet in depth, and is nearly uniform throughout the county.
The quadrilateral formed by the Iroquois river and comprising the
northeast quarter of the county contains several sandy tracts, which
possess but little fertility. These do not constitute more than five
per cent of the whole area.

The county presents an admirable system of natural drainage by
means of its larger watercourses and their numerous tributaries.

332 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

The principal streams are the Iroquois river, Sugar, Mud, Fountain
Spring, Prairie, Langham, Pike and Beaver creeks. The chief
feeders to these, which have recognized names, are Rush, Coon and
Pigeon branches ; Miller's, or the west branch of Spring creek ; Shave
Tail, or Jefferson ; and the Ashkum and Gilrnan ditches. These
streams are generally sluggish and turbid. The Iroquois river, from
Sugar Island (just over the county line) to its mouth, is shallow and
rocky. Along this whole distance silurian limestone abounds ; but
above the island the tide is deep and slack, and navigable for flat-
boats nearly to the state line. Fish are tolerably abundant in the
river and larger creeks, but less so than a few years ago. Artificial
obstructions interfere with their running. The most common kinds
found are pike, catfish, bass, suckers, dogfish, red-horse, some
buffalo and a few eel. The River, Sugar, Mud, Spring, Langham and
Beaver creeks are skirted by considerable timber belts. Some of the
others have woodlands near their mouths, and a few spontaneous
groves in the vicinity of watercourses are seen. Planted ones are
becoming numerous and meet the eye in every direction. The
choicest part of the natural timber has been cut and sent to market.
In some places the land has been entirely cleared to improve it for
pasture, as well as to feed the saw-mills. The most common varieties
of timber are red, white and burr oak, black walnut, butternut, iron-
wood, wild cherry, swamp beech, ash, sugar maple, soft maple,
hickory, elm and honey locust. Crab apple and plum bushes abound
in certain localities.

The geological facts are too meager to furnish much popular
information. The county was once covered by the waters of lake
Kankakee. It is supposed that this lake had a southeastern outlet into
theWabash valley before the present channel of the Kankakee river
was worn through the sand ridges above and the deposits of rock below.
The ancient southern outlet of lake Michigan through this county
was grooved out by the glacier which crossed the present route of the
Kankakee a little above Momence, and whose width at that point
has been set down at seven miles. Continuing not far from the state
line, the glacier bore southwest from the north line of the county,
until it reached the Spring Creek valley, where its course was
changed again to a more southerly direction. No rock is near the
surface, and no other minerals of any value exist. In boring
for water, coal has been found on several occasions in the eastern,
central and northern sections of the county. It is reported that in
sinking a well recently near^the mouth of Langham creek, a vein of
coal two feet thick was struck at a depth of fifty-eight feet ; and

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 333

twenty feet lower another three feet thick. It is further stated that
on the farm of Alexander Sword, Jr., in Iroquois township, coal was
found two and one-half feet in thickness, ninety-two fe&t below the
surface. It is said that east of Watseka coal has been discovered,
but not in available quantity.

The artesian water found in this region is an interesting feature
of the geological formation of this part of the country. Wells are
obtained at a depth varying from twenty-five to 150 feet. Though
his reasoning concerning the water-supply was limited to a compara-
tively small area, Thomas Lindsey, of Onarga township, was the
first to bore with an intelligent theory and distinct purpose. Until
1854 none but surface wells were made. These customarily failed
in the summer season, and the deprivation suffered was always
serious, especially as cattle had to drink from stagnant pools, and,
swallowing leeches, were attacked with what people called ' ' bloody
murrain," a disease which popularly covers a multitude of disorders.
Much stock was lost every year ; and more than this, the health of
the country was greatly affected. Lindsey bored in the bottom of two
wells with so much success as to set others to thinking that they
could get water by boring from the top. The first to experiment in
this way was Solomon Sturgis, whose farm lies just west of Gilman.
A man named Hook, from Zanesville, Ohio, did the boring. He
obtained water at a depth of 100 feet. It rose to the top of the
ground, but did not flow. He next bored in the railroad well at
Onarga, and at something over 100 feet a vein of great strength was
reached. Samuel Harper, two miles east of Onarga, not long after-
ward got the tools to his place, and obtained a stream at eighty-five
feet. This was the first flowing well in Iroquois county. A reser-
voir was excavated eight and one-half feet deep, and five feet in
diameter, in the bottom of which the augur was sunk. Mr. Harper
states that it filled in eight minutes. The roaring of this well intro-
duced grateful sounds and substantial music to the ears of the family.
It was regarded with curiosity and wonder, and attracted people
from far and near, by stage and by rail. The newspapers spread
word of it, for it harbingered not relief alone, but great possibilities
also. The tools next went to Hamilton Jefferson's, and a good well
was made on his farm. The third, obtained for Addisoii Harper,
was remarkable for its force. John Oxford's, in the same neighbor-
hood, was also very strong, "yielding," according to the editor of
"Emery's Journal of Agriculture," who had visited it during the
period of greatest interest, "some five or six barrels per minute."
He adds, concerning Addison Harper's, that " the water had gradually

334 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

found its way up the outside of the pipe, coming up with great force,
excavating a hole some thirty feet deep and wide, the pipe sinking
down into it. So threatening was it that, fearing for the safety of
his house near by, he removed it some distance off. Its fury sub-
sided, and it now flows quietly as usual from the large pool made."
All this occurred in the summer and fall of 1855. Probably there
are now not fewer than two thousand of these wells in the county.
The artesian region is about twenty miles wide, and not far from
forty miles long. Its direction is northwest and southeast, and
extends from Ford county across Iroquois into Indiana.

M. H. Messer, Esq., ex-county surveyor, has contributed the fol-
lowing facts in regard to the United States surveys in Iroquois
county : Townships 24, 25, 26 and 27, except range 10, east of the
latter, were surveyed by the United States' surveyor in 1822. "Will-
iam S. Hamilton, Elias Rector, and Enoch Steen were three of
the surveyors. Townships 28, 29, and range 10 in 27 were sur-
veyed in 1833 and 1834. William Lee, D. Ewing, J. B. McCall,
Edward Smith and Dan Beckwith were engaged in this work. Some
of the townships were erroneously surveyed by McCall, and he
resurveyed them, erecting new corners, but neglecting to demolish
the first ones, though he had been directed so .to do. This accounts
for the double corners. Some of the town and range lines were
surveyed twice, resulting in the discovery that many of the corners
were not properly located, but no corrections were made. Range
10 west, along the state line, was surveyed by Perrin Kent, in 1834
and 1842. The state line was surveyed in 1834, by Sylvester Sibley,
and resurveyed in 1842 by Julius Hulanicki. The mile mounds
made by Sibley were found by the last survey to be from six to
twelve rods over a mile apart. Ewing was a major in the Black
Hawk war, afterward a major-general of militia, and governor of
Illinois during the last fifteen days of November, 1832.

Iroquois county was first settled in the winter of 1821-2 by Gur-
don S. Hubbard, an Indian trader, then in the employ of the Ameri-
can Fur Company (John Jacob Astor & Co.). He was accompanied
by Noel Vasseur, who was in his service, and continued so to be for
twelve years. Hubbard came from Mackinaw, coasting Lake Michi-
gan in a batteau of ten tons burden, and ascending the Chicago river,
crossed the portage to the DesPlaines. Floating down this and
ascending the Kankakee and Iroquois rivers, he reached the present
site of Old Middleport. On the north side of the river, about one
mile above this point, at the east end of the bend, where there was
a small Indian village, he fixed his headquarters and established a

HISTORY OF IHOQUOIS COUNTY. 335

trading-post./ He stopped at this point but one winter, when he
removed up the river the next fall to a place afterward called
Bunkum,* at the same time extending his operations over a wide
territory. Besides the post at Bunkum, he had one on the Kan-
kakee, ten miles above the state line, one on the Embarrass, another
on the head waters of the Little Wabash, and two others still farther
south. His custom was to open his trading house at the beginning
of the hunting season about the first of October and to close it
at the beginning of May. The Indians hunted on the Iroquois and
its tributaries during October and November, and then went off
south on the Vermilion, Okaw, Embarrass and Wabash rivers,
where otter, bear, mink, deer, beaver, raccoon, muskrat and panther
were more plenty. In the spring they returned. With Indian
packing horses Hubbard transported his furs to Chicago, and from
that place by boat to Mackinaw, where he spent the summer, return-
ing in the fall with goods for traffic.

As early as 1826 he preempted a tract of land at Bunkum, and
inclosed and cultivated 80 acres. This he entered when it came
into market in 1831. It is now known as the Dunning farm, from
the next owner, and was the first one improved in Iroquois county.
He had a farmer named Allen Baxter, who after the first year got
married in Indiana. His wife was the first white woman who settled
the county. Hubbard himself wedded an Indian princess called in
Wach-e-kee, the daughter of a Pottawatomie, chief of the Kankakee
band (name unknown), by an Indian mother of Illinois Indian
descent, named Monoska. She was a niece of the chief Tamin.
She was dignified and intelligent, and declined to mingle with the
common herd of red-skins, and was anxious to learn the manners
and customs of her more favored pale sisters. Her complexion was
light, and her form small, lithe, slender and comely. A romantic
story is told of how she became endowed with royal distinction,
but it is only a tradition. By this union Hubbard greatly strength-
ened his relations with the Indians, and secured their favor and pro-
tection. He acquired unbounded influence among them, and it
is known that he placed more reliance on the fidelity and friendship of
the Pottawatomie chief, Was-sus-kuk, than on that of any white man.
By the influx o/ white population Hubbard found himself confronted
with the alternative of divorcing his Indian wife or of losing caste

* In a letter to B. F. Shankland, Esq., dated December 21, 1878, Mr. Hubbard said
that he transferred his post to Bunkum in the fall of 1825. This was probably an
inadvertence. He has since stated to the writer, and repeated the same in a letter to
M. H. Messer, Esq., that he was located at Middleport but one winter.

336 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

with his own civilized race. He could but choose, and his choice was
such as most men would have made under the circumstances. He has
said that she was his constant delight, and that it was not done without
a struggle between affection and expediency. Sometime after their
separation she became the wife of Noel Vasseur. Hubbard had some
Frenchmen in his service at Bunkum. Tonssaint Bleau was one, and
probably Isadore Chabert another. Bleau displayed in a marked degree
the volatility of the French character. He married a daughter of Dr.
Asa R. Palmer, of Danville, and sister to the late Rev. Charles R.
Palmer, so long a resident of this county. Bleau was thrown from his
carriage near the old McCormack House in Danville and killed.

Hubbard followed his trafficking as described until 1832, when he
discontinued all his posts except the one at Bunkum. He had a store
at Danville where he kept an assortment of goods, mostly for the
whites ; but in 1834 he closed up his business at both places and set-
tled permanently in Chicago, where he is now living in full health and
abundant prosperity. Hubbard's pack-trains made a standard route
(known as Hubbard's trail) from Danville to Chicago, which gathered
the travel for many miles on either side, as far south as Yincennes. It
entered the county on the south at the line between sections 34 and 35,
town 24, range 12 (Lovejoy township), and kept due north to a point
one mile south of the north line of Milford township ; there it made
an angle and bore straight to Montgomery (Bunkum) ; from thence it
went in a less direct line to Momence. Speaking of this himself in a
letter to B. F. Shankland, Esq., Mr. Hubbard says : " The legislature
of Illinois caused a state road to be laid out in 1834, and designated by
milestones, from Yincennes to Chicago. The commissioners who lo-
cated it and planted the stones tried hard, so they informed me, to get
a straighter line and better ground than the 'Hubbard trail,' but were
forced to follow with slight deviation my old track, which was on the
dividing ridges between the waters flowing into the Wabash on the east
and the Illinois on the west. Though mile-stones were planted, yet
Hubbard's trail kept the principal travel until both it and the state
road were abandoned and fenced in, new county roads being laid out to
take their place."

'The actual permanent settlement of Iroquois county was simulta-
neously begun at two points Milford and Bunkum i the spring of
1830. The Conrtright brothers (Isaac, George and Richard) and John
H. Miller, all from Fountain county, Indiana, formed one party and
came and settled at Bunkum. Hezekiah Eastburn came from Ohio.
William Hanan, Elijah Newcombe, and the widow McCulloch came
with their families. Benjamin Fry, Benjamin Thomas and James

LIBRARY

OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 337

Crozier, single men, came with the Newcombes and McCullochs.
Additions were made to the community in the fall. Prominent among
those who came the next year were John Hougland and Reuben
Critchfield. A tavern \vas kept at this place on the south side of the
river by Dr. Timothy Locy, in 1831. Probably this was the first house
of entertainment opened in the county. Montgomery was laid out
for the proprietor, Richard Montgomery, May 9, 1835, by James II.
Rees, who was deputized by Dan. Beckwith, county surveyor of Ver-
milion county. It was situated on the south side of the river. Con-
cord was surveyed also by Mr. Rees as deputy of Jonas Smith, surveyor
of Iroquois county, in May, 1836. Henry Moore was the proprietor.
Tin's was on the north bank opposite Montgomery. The locality,
including these two places, has always been known as "Bunkum."
The origin of the name is traced to nothing better than an insignifi-
cant circumstance, from which vulgar designations often start, and by
use become fixed in every-day speech. 7

In the spring of 1830 the following persons settled in the vicinity
of Milford : Samuel Rush, Hiram Miles, James Singleton, Daniel
Barbee, Abrain Miller, Joseph Cox, Joseph Reading, and a colored man.
Miles and Singleton staid but a short time after the departure of the
Indians; they retreated also to the primeval solitudes. In the fall
Anthony Stanley came from Ohio with a family of four sons : William,
John, Micajah and Isaac; and two daughters: Rebecca and Elizabeth.
The two first named sons were married. William Cox and William
Pickerell arrived with their families ; these and the Stanley's were
Quakers. In the spring of 1831 this little congregation of Friends built
the first house of worship ever erected in Iroquois county. It was a
small cabin made of round logs, and was used as well for a school-house
as for a meeting-house. Jefferson Mounts, from Indiana, James Osborne,
John Hunnel, Jesse Amos and Lydia Parker, a widow, with herfamilv,
came also in the fall. A few new-comers appeared in the spring of
1831 ; Samuel McFall, afterward one of the first county commissioners,
being of the number. Shortly after his-arrival Pickerell built a corn-
cracker, dignified with the name of mill, and until laid out in 1836, the
place was called Pickerell's Mill whence the name of Milford.

Early in 1834 a new settlement was begun on Upper Spring creek,
in the vicinity of Del Rev. Jesse Amos moved over from Su^ar
creek, and was soon joined by John Miller from Covington, Indiana.
In the fall Ira Lindsey, James Smith and Abram Lehigh, from Virginia,
the latter living at this time on the Wabash, located in the same neigh-
borhood. Lehigh did not bring his family till the beginning of the
next year. Ash Grove was settled in 1834 by Lewis Roberts, brother
22

338 HISTORY OF IKOQU01S COUNTY.

ot'Bisliop Roberts, and his son-in-law, John Nunamaker. They were soon
followed by John Hunnel, who had emigrated to Sugar creek in 1830.

The population of the county gathered for many years, even down
to the building of the Illinois Central railroad in 1853, in proximity
to the timber. On the west side of Sugar creek, about three miles
above the mouth, was the Longshore settlement. Mahlon and James
Longshore, Samuel Keene, Alexander Wilson, William Stanley and
David Clanahan were some of the early settlers in this neighborhood.
The Rush settlement, further up the creek, was begun by Samuel Rush
in 1830. Chauncey Webster, John Body, Samuel Williams and
Fleming located in that vicinity. On the Iroquois river, between
Middleport and Bunkum, Texas became a place of some importance
because of the crossing at that point, and the mill erected there by
Isaac Courtright at a later day. The Pierce settlement, three or four
miles below Middleport, had among the first settlers the Pierce broth-
ers (William, John and David) Andrew Layton and James Wilson.
The Flesher settlement was commenced on Lower Spring creek, in
the spring of 1835, by Levi Thompson, who had come from Indiana
and located on Sugar creek, below Milford, in the fall of 1831. Jede-
diah Darby settled there a little later in the season. In the fall John
Flesher came with his family. Next year William Huckins, Jacob O.
Feather, David Wright and Jefferson Mounts, the latter from Sugar
creek, joined the advance settlers. Still farther down the river the
town of Plato was surveyed and platted in May, 1836. This was
when the internal improvement craze was at meridian height. Extrav-
agant and delusive expectations were formed concerning this enter-
prise. It was advertised in glowing colors in the Chicago and La-
Fayette papers ; immense maps and posters were distributed in eastern
cities, showing the whole landing at " Harbor Creek" lined with boats
unloading and receiving merchandise. Lots were sold at fabulous
prices; many persons in New York city investing in them. The pro-
prietors nearly realized their ambition to secure the county-seat when
it was removed from Bunkum. James Smith, an accomplished gentle-
man, having energy and capacity of a high order, who lived on Upper
Spring creek, was the chief promoter of this scheme. He died sud-
denly in September, 1839, at the age of thirty-two. The death of
Smith was likewise the death of Plato.

The Jones settlement, in the south angle of the river and Beaver
creek, was begun in 183T by Henry and Seth Jones. These, with
Robert Hester and family, who soon joined them, were from Meigs
county, Ohio. Shobar, Elliott, Peter Lowe and Simon Maybee located
afterward in that section.

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 339

A colony of Norwegians, consisting of some thirty families, settled
on the north side of Beaver creek about 1835. Their cabins extended
three or four miles up stream from section 22, in range 12. The lead-
ing man lived and died on the J. S. Oxford place. Two family names
were Oleson and Waity. They not being seasoned nor careful in
their habits, sickness broke out among them to an alarming extent, and
before two years as many as fifty had died. The diseases were mostly
ague and bilious fever. One burying-place was near Clark's, on the
west side of a small branch running south ; and the other in a round
grove a mile northeast of the Vankirk crossing. Most of the survivors
moved to Fox river, Wisconsin.

Before passing further it will be well to give briefly the origin of
the second great highway which traversed the county. As once all
roads led to Rome, so in the early history of this county all roads led
to Chicago. In 1830 Ben Butterfield, living on Stony creek, near
Danville, went by way of Bunkum to Hickory creek and the Des-
Plaines river, and made a selection for a home near Lockport, just
above Joliet. Two families had recently settled in that section. He
returned for his family, and in company with the two men living on
Hickory creek, who had come back to Danville for supplies, he started
December 7. It rained and snowed, and was very cold during the
trip of nine days. He sent his ox-teams back to Danville to winter,
keeping only a horse and three head of cattle ; the latter he wintered
on browse. They came through the winter in very poor condition.
The next April he went back for his stock, this time trying a new
route, driving a yoke of oxen and accompanied by two men and a boy.
At Bourbonnais Grove he was advised by an old Indian that, as the
Iroquois river " was a fool river that did not know enough to go down
when it was once up," to go around it till he struck Spring creek, then
to follow that until he could find a crossing. Near the Barden place,
on Lower Spring creek, they were beset with a severe snow storm. The
stream was high and they could not cross to the woods beyond, so they
lay three days sheltered by the bank of the creek, suffering much from
cold and hunger, waiting for the storm to abate and the water to sub-
side. Finally after much difficulty they got over, and made their way
to Stony creek without further incident. On the journey back he kept
the same way, driving six yoke of oxen, two horses, twenty-five sheep,
and twenty head of cows and young cattle. His son writes that " this
was when he made what was called Butterfield's trail." When the
Sac war broke out, the next spring, he moved back to Stony creek,
where he remained till the following spring, when, the war having
ended, he returned with his family to his home on the DesPlaines.

340 HISTORY OF IKOQUOtS COUXTY.

The track thus made became the route for an immense travel all the way
from the Okaw river. This trace diverged from Hubbard's at Bicknel's
Point, and crossed the south line of this county at a point some three
miles west of Hoopeston. It passed through Pigeon Grove and crossed
Spring creek at a place called by the early settlers " the Gap," about
two miles northeast of Buckley. It followed the general course of the
creek to a point half a mile east of the Barden Farm, where it turned
north, east of, but nearly on, the range line; then proceeded east of
north, leaving Plato about a mile to the right. It passed Prairie creek
half a mile west of L'Erable, and in a direction nearly north from
there struck Langham, which was then called " White Woman." On
account of high banks it followed up and crossed that stream near the
head of the timber, about a mile east of the Central railroad. From
here in a northeast course it ran to Sammon's Point, a mile and a half
below the county-line. After improvements were begun at Plato a
detour was made to that place. The Kankakee was forded at Haw-
kins', which corresponds to the lower end of Bourbonnais Grove.
From here it went to Bloom's Grove, Twelve Mile Grove and Hickory
creek ; at the latter point it forked, both trails leading to Chicago, one
of them by way of Cooper's Grove and Blue Island, intersecting Hub-
bard's trace; the other by way of Joliet. Later travel made several
other routes from the Kankakee. Butterfield moved to Hadley, and
after that to a place called Bloom, on the Chicago and Vincennes state
road, where he kept a " Hoosier tavern " twenty-one years. He died
in Franklin count} 7 , Iowa, April 28, 1878, aged eighty-three.

"In May, 1832, the mail carrier from Chicago, when this side of the
C Kankakee, saw some Indians pursuing him (which proved afterward
A to be only for a friendly purpose), and being prepared by the hostilities
^7 now commenced in the Rock river country to take fright on the
merest occasion, fled to Danville, passing through Bunkum and Mil-
ford. He dashed into the latter settlement hatless and with panting
horse, stopping only long enough to get something for himself and
animal to eat, when he pressed on spreading the alarm as he went.
The settlers on Sugar creek were panic-stricken and started at once for
the Wabash. About fifty were in the party. When they had gone
two or three miles a halt was made, and a council held to decide on
the best course. It was near night, and one woman, it is said, more
self-possessed than the rest of the crowd, proposed that they should
wait in a plum thicket near by until morning, when they could know
with more certainty whether Indians were really in pursuit, and have
daylight for travel. But she was overruled, and the journey continued
through the night. After they passed the creek at the regular cross-

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 341

ing, four miles above Milford, the darkness seemed to accelerate their
flight. A limited number of horses and wagons were in the company.
The sloughs were full of water, the ground wet, and the grass tall and
tangled. The men and women carried the smaller children in their
arms, and tried hard to keep their families together as they hurried
along through the darkness; but there was a good deal of confusion,
and their anxiety was greatly excited as they were continually getting
separated. There were ten of the Webster family. The oldest
daughter, giving out with fatigue, was taken on behind by a peddler
who had abandoned his wagon in the settlement. Sometime in the
night it was discovered that the Webster family were missing, except
the daughter riding with the peddler, and a younger child carried by
Clement Thomas. It was easy for imagination to picture them massa-
cred, and that became the general belief as word of their absence was
passed around. The fleeing party reached Parish's "Grove next morn-
ing early ; some stopped there, some went to Pine creek, others to
the Wabash. Mrs. Webster had fainted, and while the family tarried
to restore her, the others, not knowing what had transpired went on,
so they became separated. Others coming up the Websters fell in
with them, and another company thus formed went to Williamsport.
It was sometime before the family were again united.

Micajah Stanley, then a single man, was in his field planting corn.
When he quit work at night and went into the settlement he found it
abandoned ; the cabin doors were open and everything gave evidence
of a hasty departure. Mr. Stanley met one of the neighbors, and
the two went about together and closed the doors of the houses, and
let the calves out of the pens to the cows. Samuel Rush and Samuel
McFall were away on a trip to Danville, and the latter on returning
followed the refugees and overtook them at Pine creek, with word that
there was no occasion for their flight. The men returned in a week
to give attention to their crops, but the women staid about two
months.

The settlers around Bunkum gathered at that point for mutual pro-
tection. No incursion was made by the hostiles into the county, but
a party of Pottawatornies taking advantage of the chance to commit
depredations when they would be charged to the enemy, entered
the dwelling of John Hougland, when his family was away, and
destroyed the bedding. George Courtright, Henry Endsley, and two
other young men discovered their work and reported it to the trading-
post. They and about twenty Pottawatomies set out in pursuit of the
marauders. They followed down the river to the mouth of Pike
creek losing the trail before they reached there and crossing the

342 HISTORY OF IROQU01S COUNTY.

river camped for the night. Next day, traveling along the west side
to Spring creek and up that stream to the site of Del Rey, they
bivouacked in a deserted Indian camp. On the third day they re-
turned home, having had no sight of Indians during the scout. About
this time Bunkum was made a rendezvous when the troops were con-
centrating to march to the Fox river country. Col. Moore's Danville
regiment lay there a few days until joined by volunteers and a few
regulars from Indiana, whence the command went directly to Hickory

creek.

.
Up to 1833 Iroquois county formed a part of Vermilion county.

At that time the latter extended as far north as the Kankakee river,
which was the dividing line between Vermilion and Cook counties.
On the minutes of a meeting of the county commissioners court at
Danville, on the first Monday of September, 1830, is. the following
entry : " This day Gurdon S. Hubbard presented a petition of sundry
inhabitants praying for an election district for one justice of the peace,
and for one constable ; and that all elections therein be held at the
house of Allen Baxter. Ordered, that Isaac Courtright, Allen Baxter
and Isadore Chabert be, and they are, appointed judges of the above
election district, and that an election be held in said district on the
15th day of November next." It will be remembered that Allen
Baxter was Hubbard's farmer and lived at Bunkum.

At the June term, 1831, of the commissioners court it was again
" Ordered, that all that tract of country on the waters of Sugar creek
and the Iroquois, and their tributary waters, be an election district to
be known by the name of Iroquois; and that elections therein be held
at the house of Toussant Bleau. Ordered, that Robert Hill, John
Hougland and Hezekiah Eastburn be, and they are, hereby appointed
judges of election in Iroquois district." The same persons were again
appointed judges of election for Iroquois district at the June term, 1832,
of the county commissioners court. This was for the general August
election. The polling place was changed to the house of Timothy
Locy. This man kept an inn at Montgomery. Isaac Courtright served
as judge in place of Hill. Jesse Moore and Lemuel John were the
clerks of this election. On the first Monday of November of this year
was the presidential election at which Andrew Jackson was re-elected,
and Martin Van Buren was chosen vice-president. William John,
James Cain and John S. Moore were the judges, and Lemuel John and
Jesse Moore the clerks. Judge John Pearson and Squire James
Newell, of Danville, canvassed the Iroquois district in the interest of
" Old Hickory." A special election was held Monday, August 5, 1833,
for one justice of the peace, at which Robert Hill received 37 votes.

HISTORY OF IKOQUOIS COUNTY. 343

It is said that a year or two before this an election had been held for
two justices, but it was not understood at the time that more than one
was to be chosen. Isaac Courtright and Hill were the candidates ; the
former received the larger number of votes and qualified. When the
latter was elected as above stated he had to take his commission dating
from the first election.

In 1832 and 1833 Gurdon S. Hubbard was representative in the
general assembly from Yermilion county. At that session he procured
the passage of an act, approved February 12, 1833, establishing Iroquois
county with its present territory and that part of Kankakee county
which lies south of the Kankakee river. The law made it the duty of
the judge of the circuit court of Yermilion county, whenever he should
be satisfied that the new county contained three hundred and fifty in-
habitants, to grant an order for the election of three county commis-
sioners, one sheriff, and one coroner to fill those offices until successors
should be chosen at the next general election ; to fix the day and place
for the election, and to designate the judges. We were unable to find
this order either on the records or among the papers in the offices at
Danville, where, if extant, it ought to be preserved.

The special election for first officers was on Monday, February 24,
1834. Samuel M. Dunn had thirty-three votes for sheriff, and was
chosen over Henry Enslcn, who had twenty. For county commission-
ers, John Hougland received fifty-one votes, William Cox forty-seven,
Samuel McFall thirty-one, and John S. Moore twenty-four. The
first three were elected. Micajah Stanley had forty-four votes for
coroner. On March 17 the county commissioners court convened at
the house of Robert Hill, below Milford. In pursuance of the act to
organize the county they fixed the temporary seat of justice, selecting
their present meeting-place. Hugh Newell, a young man from Yer-
milion county, son of James Newell, twent3 T -four years of age, who
had served under Amos Williams in all the offices at Danville, was on
hand, at the suggestion of Williams, when the county was organ-
ized, to obtain the appointment of county clerk. He possessed first-
class business talents, and by his special training was well qualified for
the office. He forthwith received the appointment, gave bond, quali-
fied, and entered upon his duties. It was a most favorable circum-
stance for the county. At the same term, Samuel Rush having offered
to assess the taxable property of the county for the year 1834 for $5,
he was appointed assessor and treasurer with that salary, and there-
upon gave the necessary bond. He had the same office the next year,
and was allowed $10. The county was then divided into three road
districts. The first embraced all that part lying south of the line

344 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

between townships 26 and 27, which runs through the cities of Gilman
and Watseka. The second contained all between this line and Beaver
creek, and a line from its mouth due west through the county. The
third comprised the remainder of the count} 7 which extended to the
Kankakee river. At the June term in 1834 three election precincts
were established, with the same boundaries. The south one was des-
ignated "Sugar Creek Precinct," and the polling place was fixed ''at
the house of John Nilson, late residence of Robert Hill." The north
one was called " Kankakee Precinct," and elections were to be held at
the house of William Baker, near Kankakee. The middle one was
named "Iroquois Precinct," and the house of David Meigs, at Mont-
gomery, the place for holding the elections. The bounds of the
districts and of the precincts did not long remain as at any one time
established, but were changed or subdivided at short intervals as popu-
lation increased. At the general election, August 4, 1834, the same
county officers were elected as in February, except that William
Thomas displaced Micajah Stanley as coroner.

By an act approved February 10, 1835, William Bowen and Joseph
Davis, of Vermilion county, and Philip Stanford, of Champaign county,
were appointed commissioners to locate the permanent seat of justice
of Iroquois county, and to give it a name ; for this purpose they were
to meet at the house of Col. Thomas Vennum ; but they failed to per-
form any of the duties required of them by this law, and accordingly
the representative, Isaac Courtright, who lived close to Bunkum, and
was figuring for that locality, procured new legislation on the subject.
An act was passed naming Noel Yasseur, of Will county, and George
Scarborough and George Barnett, of Vermilion county, as commis-
sioners to make a selection. In case their choice shoulo! fall on pri-
vate land they were required to exact a donation of twenty acres; and
in the event of refusal they were then to locate the county-seat on the
nearest eligible public land, and to purchase a quarter of a section for
a site. Agreeably to the act Barnett and Yasseur met at the house of
William Armstrong, in Montgomery, April 11, 1837, and made their
report to the county commissioners court on the 15th, selecting 20
acres adjoining Montgomery on the southeast, which was surveyed and
platted for the commissioners in August, by James Smith, deputy
county surveyor, assisted by Andrew Ritchey, Blewford Davis and
Esock Hecock, all under the superintendence of Henry Enslen,
county agent. In consideration of the location of the county-seat
thereon, this tract was conveyed by warranty deed to the county com-
missioners and their successors, by Amos White and William Arm-
strong. The locators called the situ u Iroquois." Yasseur was allowed

HISTORY OF IKOQUOIS COUNTY. 345

compensation for ten-days service, and Barnett $28 for fourteen
days. Isaac Courtright, a stirring and influential man, having an eye
to his private interest, had been maneuvering from the beginning to
get the location at Montgomery, and when at last it was done, the
count}' commissioners had been meeting at his house, three-fourths of
a mile south of Montgomery, since June 1, 1835 nearly two years
having at that date transferred their sessions from Nilson's. The
seventh term of this court was held at Courtright's. The county-seat
having been now established, after much anxiety and labor on the part
of those personally concerned, was destined by the location itself to be
of short continuance in that place. The site was without buildings for
the use of the county, and none were ever erected ; but offices were
rented in Montgomery, and there courts were held and business trans-
acted until a removal became imperative. A frame building on lot 10,
owned by William Armstrong, was at first rented for the clerk's office,
for which he was paid $2 per month, but afterward Charles M. Thomas
furnished an office on the same terms. A room was furnished at dif-
ferent times by Benjamin Lewis and by John and Amos White for
sessions of the circuit court. One of the Whites kept the tavern.

The notable event in the judicial history of this period was the first
trial for murder, and the hanging of Joseph Thomason, who gave the
alias Joseph F. Morris. The trial took place on the 16th, 17th and
18th days of May ; and the execution on June 10, 1836.

On December 20, 1836, occurred the most remarkable change of
weather ever recorded. Its suddenness and severity are fully attested
by many living witnesses. The water that everywhere covered the
ground froze sufficiently in five minutes to bear a man. Many assert
that the change was even more sudden, and that, improbable as it may
seem, the "strong wind threw the water into waves, which froze as
they stood." Early in the day nearly a foot of snow lay on the ground.
The air turned warm and a slow rain set in and continued several
hours, causing a heavy fog. There was a thaw ; in a little while a
slush was over all the surface, and the streams were out of their banks.
Men were laboring about their homes with left-off coats. About four
o'clock in the afternoon a black cloud appeared in the west, and in a
few moments overspread the sky. A gale of wind, sharp and piercing,
came sweeping over the prairies, and almost instantaneously the face
of the country was a solid sheet of ice. This extraordinary event was
rendered more signal by a tragic occurrence which was discussed at the
time throughout the Northwest, and stirred the profoundest sensibilities
of the people. Many accounts have been given to the world of the
painful death of Thomas Frame by freezing, and of the exquisite suf-

346 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

ferings and narrow escape of his companion, James H. Hildreth ; but
none that the writer has seen has correctly detailed the circumstances,
and few spared Ben Burson, a man wholly innocent, from the odium of
the most atrocious heartlessness that could ever disgrace our humanity.
Since our version of the affair is to some extent contradictory of what
has gone before through the press, it is proper that we should state the
sources of our information. The principals are dead, but if actors in
the later events, who had every opportunity to learn directly from the
survivor himself all the earlier facts, are trustworthy and authoritative,
then our relation cannot be wholly devoid of credit. Clement Thomas,
of Ash Grove, whose recollection of remote history is not excelled, if
equaled, by that of any other person whom we have met, lived at the
time near Milford, and was one of four young me*n who removed
Frame's body from -the place on the prairie where he perished. While
Hildreth was under care at Robert Williams', he saw him nearly every
day and attended him frequently at night for several weeks. Dr. A.
M. C. Hawes, of Georgetown, rendered Hildreth surgical treatment.
To these gentleman we are indebted for the personal features of this
narrative.

Thomas Frame was a son of Col. James Frame, who lived on
Spring creek in the present limits of Onarga township, about five
miles northeast of the village. He had been to the registrar's office
at Danville, where he entered the N.W. ^ of the S.W. \ of Sec. 15,
T. 26, R. 14, on the 19th. Returning home on the morning of the
20th, he left Bicknell's, on the north fork of the Yermilion, in com-
pany with the fellow-traveler just named. The latter lived near
Georgetown and was going to Chicago. There was a striking con-
trast in the amount of clothing worn by these two men. Frame was
thinly clad a most singular circumstance, considering the length of
his journey and the season of the year. Fortunately for Hildreth his
prudence had supplied him with an exceptionally large outfit of gar-
ments. Both rode mettled horses. Frame's had some reputation for
speed. They journeyed along during the day through the misty rain,
imbibing freely from a flask which they had brought with them to
enliven their spirits and reduce the discomforts of their travel. They
were proceeding on the Ash Grove road when the change already
described took place. They urged forward with all possible haste
and reached Burson (now called Fountain) creek about sundown.
The banks of the creek were overflown ; the stream was deep
and broad ; and much ice had formed along the sides. Finding
it impossible to cross the} 7 decided to return to Bicknell's, and
began to retrace their way. They had not gone far when darkness

HISTORY OF IKOQUOIS COUNTY. 347

came on. The cold was growing more and more intense. They
were stupefied by their potations and bewildered by their situation.
The labor and difficulty of travel kept on increasing, and the prospect
of reaching any house becoming more and more gloomy, and at last
altogether hopeless, they turned away from the road, leaving it to the
right, and wandering off a short distance, halted on a pond in the
midst of the prairie. From this place they did not stir. The storm
raged. Increasing cold lashed into cutting and stinging tongues of
frost by the pitiless blast, to be endured through a night longer than
life, was an extremity to make the stoutest heart quail. The fading
out of hope followed close upon the deepening shades. Shelter must
be found or the men perish. They agreed to kill their horses. Hild-
reth was first to kill Frame's, and when that became cold Frame was
to kill Hildreth's. They had but one knife, and that belonged to
Hildreth. Accordingly Frame's horse was killed by severing a vein in
the neck. The carcass was opened but not disemboweled. Frame lay
next it with his arms and legs thrust into it, and Hildreth "snug be-
hind him with his hands and feet also inside. As the night wore on
Hildreth, recovering from the effects of the strong drink, became con-
vinced that Frame must perish, and began to reason that as he himself
was freezing, he, too, would perish if he should not save his horse to
bear him to a habitation when the morning should appear. His knife
was in his pocket and he determined not to sacrifice his horse. At
last, the carcass becoming cold, Frame suggested that the other horse
be killed. Hildreth inquired what he had done with the knife,. and
Frame replied that it was not about him. Hildreth added that it
must be lost. After this Frame lay still and said no more. About
sunrise he expired in great agony. Hildreth, now badly frozen, after
much difficulty succeeded in mounting his horse, and descrying a house
distant about a mile and three-quarters to the northeast, started in that
direction. The place where they had passed the night lies between
Burson creek proper, and a branch which diverges from the east side
about two and one-half miles above the mouth. Ben Burson lived on
the east bank of the branch, which placed this tributary between his
house and Hildreth, who was approaching from the southwest. The
stream was about 300 yards wide ; the current deep and running
swiftly ; and the sides were frozen over. Hildreth rode up and
hallooed. Burson came out but was powerless to assist him. The
current was full of anchor-ice and forging down in a heavy torrent.
So he advised him to try to get to Robert Chess' on the south side of
Mud creek. Burson creek, which had turned the two back the night
before, traversed the route to that place. On reaching it he searched

348 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

along up the stream for a crossing place, which he at last found where
there was an ice jam, over which he forced his horse, the animal being
rough-shod. Instead then of striking for Chess', he followed down-
stream through the woods, where he found, some distance below the
junction of the branch with the main stream, another ice jam on which
he crossed to the other side. He had by no means now far to go to
reach Burson's house. Once there, Burson helped him in, and then
the latter rode to Asa Thomas', about a mile south of Milford, and
gave notice of what had transpired. Clement Thomas, Daniel and
Benjamin Mershon, and Levi Williams, all young men, set out for
Burson's. Arrived there, they found the creek fro/en clear across.
The ice was not strong in the middle, but with the aid of a slab they
got over. Taking a hand-sled from Burson's, they had no trouble to
follow Hildreth's track, and were soon at the spot which witnessed the
sufferings of that terrible night. Frame's body was taken to Burson's
house; next day word was sent to Col. Frame, and on the second day
he removed it home. Robert Williams, living near Milford, knowing
that Burson had no conveniences for taking care of Hildreth, sent a
team the next day and brought him to his house, where he was kept
four or five weeks. His mother came up from Georgetown as soon as
the news could reach her by mail. Dr. A. M. C. Hawes, of the same
place, amputated all his toes, and all his fingers and thumbs, except
one of each of the two last named extremities. The locality of this
event is in the northeast corner of Fountain Creek township, on or
near section 1, town 24, range 13.

Alvan Gilbert, from Ligget's Grove, on the north fork of the Ver-
milion, was driving hogs to Chicago. When the storm came up he
was about four miles south of Milford, or near the place since known
as the " Old Red Pump." He left his drove, and with his hands was
able to reach Asa Thomas'. Many of the hogs froze. It was a week
before he could resume the drive.

In 1838 an interesting contest occurred for representative to the
general assembly. Isaac Courtright had served one term, having
been elected in 1836. Montgomery being within three miles of the
county line, and far removed from that section whose physical fea-
tures would for many years (and as was then supposed, would for-
ever), make it the center of population, it was understood from the
outset that a removal could not long be deferred. This year the
issue was made by the people. The democrats were in a large
majority. Courtright, next to Hugh Newell, was the chief of the
party. In this campaign he was a candidate for reflection. But
his known hostility to the removal of the seat of justice to any other

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 349

place than Texas, where lie owned property, arrayed his political asso-
ciates generally with his opponents in the support of Squire Lewis
Roberts, of Ash Grove, who was a whig, and deservedly popular.
The latter was elected, and procured an enabling act for the reloca-
tion of the county-seat. As there will be no further occasion to
refer to Mr. Roberts' public life, an incident connected with his serv-
ice in the legislature may be recorded here. At the session of
1836-7 an internal improvement bill was passed. To satisfy the
counties which did not directly share the benefits of the measure by
having a canal or railroad built through them, an appropriation was
made to such counties, to be paid to their agents by the fund com-
missioners. The total amount credited to Iroquois county was
$3,133, a handsome sum at that time for a new county. Mr. Rob-
erts was appointed to receive the money and execute vouchers for
the same. On March 22 he paid over $2,833 of these funds, leav-
ing a balance of $300 still to be transferred. He was asked by the
fund commissioners to draw the remainder, and he did so, while hav-
ing yet several weeks to stay at the capital. For want of a better
place for keeping the money he put it into a small box and concealed
it under his bed, from which place it was stolen. At the December
term of the commissioners court, he not having accounted for the
deficit, the clerk, Hugh Newell, was directed to employ an attorney
to bring suit against him for the recovery of the money. It was
finally considered that he was not liable for the loss, and the matter
was dropped.

In 1836 the people lost their heads in the rage for speculation.,
A great system of public improvements had been devised, and chi-
merical private schemes, on a grand scale, were pressed and adver-
tised. Paper towns were platted upon eligible sites, and the pro-
prietors confidently wrote up immense fortunes. All this prosperity
was only apparent, and the Hrst contrary breath burst the bubble.
Iroquois county did not escape a certain development of this lunacy.
Much enterprise was displayed by several in their efforts to pocket
the county town. The seat of justice was the great prize. During
the year eight towns were laid out, and in the following spring one
other. Two of these Concord and Milford had a prospect for
settlement ; for the latter, and perhaps the former, was actually
begun. Plato, Savanna, Middleport, Point Pleasant and Iroquois
( 'ity were laid out in season to receive the golden egg. Elsewhere
is shown the location of Plato and the ado that was created in its
name. Savanna was situated about two miles north of Milford, on
the state road, "'in the heart of a tine, rich country." and (as the

350 HISTORY OF 1ROQUOIS COUNTY.

term 'savanna' imports) "on beautiful, gently rolling, dry and rich
prairie,"' so we are informed by the certificate attached to the plat
by one of the owners, Hugh Newell. This was even so ; but with
these advantages there were not attractions enough to build a city in
a day ; nor to lay a stone until the child of great hopes the county-
seat should first be rebaptized 011 that spot. Newell was, without
doubt, the projector, and Solomon Barbee the proprietor, as he
owned the land on which the town was surveyed. After Middle-
port was selected for the county town this plat was vacated by act of
the legislature. Burlington fully answered the description of what
was for years afterward synonymous in the east with any project
having no real foundation, but conceived in fraud a "western
enterprise." James Davis, of Indiana, discovering an "eligible
site" about two miles south of Milford, on land belonging to Asa
Thomas, suggested the propriety of making a fortune while fortunes
were to be made, seeing it was so easy of accomplishment as the lay-
ing out of a town. Accordingly, it was surveyed and platted. Davis
went to New York and sold lots, representing that the town was
building and in a thriving condition. Afterward some of the pur-
chasers came to view their western property, doubtless reckoning
high on its advanced value, especially such as held " corner lots."
Asa and William Thomas were the only occupants of the " village."
When the expectant lot-owners beheld the naked area of this " peg
town" of 60 acres, they were covered with stunning surprise and
chagrin. Waiting just long enough to call down a shower of anath-
emas on the rascally head of Davis, they returned to New York
" wiser, if not better men." Iroquois City was an heir-expectant to
the county town ; it was laid oif on the north bank of the Iroquois,
opposite Texas, by Hiram Pearson. When the proprietor failed of a
fruition of hope the plat was vacated. Texas was also a competing
point. Point Pleasant was laid out at the confluence of Spring creek
with the Iroquois river, in the acute angle formed by those streams,
by Nelson K. Norton and Smith Northrup. Norton was the " solid "
man in this venture in which there was nothing to lose, and his part-
ner was the procurer. At that time it was impossible to see that
this would not at an early day be a center of commerce and the civ-
ilized arts. It had every advantage of water communication ; was
below Middleport and Bunkum, and, of course, would take the cream
of every thing that came up the river. It was fertile with aboriginal
associations, having been the seat of an Indian village ; even the
rude contrivances over the graves were yet in complete order and
preservation. These, however, were not to be blindly relied on for

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. o51

drawing a teeming population. The county-seat was also coveted by
the proprietors, and all the possibilities of this paper town were
staked on this grand object. But it failed. Middleport was more
fortunate. Hugh Newell having his attention first directed to the
subject by Micajah Stanley, for a long time kept this point, as well
as the adjacent country, an object of deliberation and careful per-
sonal inspection. He entered the E. \ N.E. J Sec. 31, T. 27, R. 12,
August 27, 1836 ; and his means being limited, he interested Jacob
A. Whiteman to join him in entering the N.W. J N.W. J Sec. 32,
which was done September 29. Austin Cole, of Danville, had
entered on the 21st the S.W. J of the same quarter section. Some
transfers took place before the county-seat was removed there. It
was laid out by Newell and Whiteman in December, 1836.

As before related, Lewis Roberts had procured the 1 passage of an
act enabling the county to relocate the seat of justice. Merritt L.
Covel, John Moore and Cheney Thomas, of McLean county, were
named as commissioners charged with this duty. They were to
meet at Middleport on the first Monday in June, 1839, or within
thirty days thereafter, and to fix upon .a location. If they .selected
private property, they were required to obtain from the owner at least
2<> acres of land as a donation to the county ; but if the selection was
in a town or village, then not less than fifty lots of an average value
with the remaining ones, for which, in either case, they should take
a deed in fee-simple to the county. On the 13th Messrs. Moore and
Covel met at Middleport. and after subscribing the required oath,
entered upon their labors. On the 17th they rendered their report
to Jonathan Wright, Adam Karr and Samuel McFall, county com-
missioners, declaring the county-seat removed from Montgomery and
permanently located at Middleport. For their services each of the
commissioners was allowed s33. They obtained from Hugh Newell
Jacob A. Whiteman. Jacob Troup and James Smith a deed to
100 town lots. Most of these were subsequently sold and conveyed
by Micajah Stanley, and after him a few by George B. Joiner, for
the county, at prices ranging from *5 to s4<>. They furnished a
much needed revenue, and contributed toward the erection of county
buildings.

The growing necessities of the public business dictated the build-
ing of a court-house- and a jail, but the county was too weak finan-
cially to accomplish much in that direction. The commissioners
decided to begin the jail first, as that was more urgently demanded.
Hugh Newell was appointed agent to let the contracts, but this had
not been done when he died, May 8, 1841, and his place as agent

352 HISTORY OF IEOQUOIS COUNTY.

was supplied by the appointment of Micajah Stanley. Meantime
the offices had been removed to Middleport, and sessions of the cir-
cuit court held there. The last term of this court, as probably that
of the county commissioners, held in Montgomery, was in Septem-
ber, 1831). A frame building in Middleport, belonging to Newell,
had been rented by the county. The second floor was used for a
court-room. Office rooms were also rented of Garrett Eoff. James
Crawford took the contract for building the jail. It was a hewed log
structure, about 16x20 feet square, and cost $159.30 when ready for
the reception of occupants. It was finished in the winter of 1842-3,
nearly two years having transpired from the letting of the contract.
The door was fastened on the outside with an ordinary padlock. The
floor was made of square timbers laid together, on which the walls
of the house were raised. After becoming seasoned some of them
were loose, and it was only necessary to slip one either way to have
a place of egress. The breaking of this jail was rather a pastime.
It is told that the prisoners used facetiously to complain that the swine
worked their way under the floor after the crumbs of bread that fell
through, and rooted them out of jail. Pancake, a faithful infractor
of the law, charged "Garry" Eoif, the keeper, one night when he
was leaving, to prop the door well, as thje hogs were in the habit of
rooting it open and getting his corn-bread. It is not said which this
sarcasm reflected against most the jail or the bread. No other
place for the confinement of criminals was provided in Iroquois
county until 1858.

At the March term, 1843, it was ordered that a court-house be
built on the public square in Middleport. Certain dimensions,
together with the general features of a plan, were specified, and a
committee named to procure a plan and to estimate the cost. Acting
on the report rendered that day. the commissioners, on the 10th of
April, appointed Lorenzo I). Xorthnip. Charles Gardner, Isaac
( 'ourtright, Samuel Harper and .John llarwood a building commit-
tee. The dimensions were slightly changed. The building was to
be 37 feet square, of two twelve-toot stories; and the committee
was limited to $1,506, fifty-two town lots in Middleport, and the
saline land in Vermilion county for its inclosure. The town lots
included those which had already been sold. s.SoO were appropri-
ated from the treasury to begin the work. The house was of brick,
4-0x40 feet, with a square roof, surmounted by a belfry, which was
never furnished with a bell. The first floor was laid with brick and
kept covered with sawdust to render it noiseless; this was the court-
room. The offices and jury rooms were up-stairs.

LIBRARY

OF THE

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 353

By the fire of October 16, 1866, a part of the county records, on
which we have thus far depended for information, were destroyed.
The hiatus extends to September 23, 1861, about eighteen and one-
half years. Through this period we are as a traveler that wanders
in a desert.

The saline land above referred to was a part of the salines situ-
ated in Yermilion county, and which were granted to the two coun-
ties by the state in 1837, for the purpose of building a bridge across
each the Yermilion and Iroquois rivers. When Illinois was a terri-
tory the salt springs on these lands were considered valuable for the
manufacture of salt, and were reserved from sale and leased by the
government ; but the management of them proving unprofitable and
troublesome, the lands were ceded to the state. Salt-making at these
springs was abandoned many years ago. The amount of land appor-
tioned to Iroquois county we have not been able to learn, but it was
inconsiderable. Mr. Stanley states that he was empowered to sell the
land, and that he went to Yermilion county and exchanged -a tract
(either 40 or 80 acres) for a horse, which was disposed of in Chicago,
and the proceeds arj^ed on the court-house. Joseph B. Dean had
the first contract to 1^ the brick. In June, 1845, the walls had been
reared about four feet; all the funds on hand had been expended,
and work was discontinued. George B. Joiner and William Pierce
were now appointed commissioners to superintend the further con-
struction. New contracts we*e made, and it is thought that Aaron
Hoel and his son burned the rest of the brick, and that Spencer Case
did the mason work. The Hebrews were required to make brick
without straw, a thing scarc%y Aore difficult than this committee
had to do when it was forced to build a court-house without money.
They disbursed county orders till these were so depreciated toward
the close, that they paid them out at half their face value. The con-
tractors who accepted them were compelled to negotiate them a^ 75
per cent discount.

To encourage settlement, public lands were exempted from taxa-
tion five years from the date of entry. While this was, no doubt, a
judicious course, it can be understood t^at the resources of the pub-
lic treasury were so disproportioned t<ra population at most small
in number, it was nearly impossible for the people to proceed with
public improvements. The building was inclosed in 184B, and near
the end of the year it was first used for holding court ^JW it was not
completed and furnished, and the offices occupied unt^Bl^fcext sum-
mer. It would be interesting to note the difficmtie^MrcT delays by
which the completion of the first court-house was retarjred four years ,
23

354 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

were the facts accessible, but it can now only be said that it cost a
patient and protracted effort, and in the end left an onerous debt.
A special act was passed February 16, 1847, authorizing the county
commissioners to borrow a sum of money not to exceed $1,000, to
finish the court-house, or to redeem orders issued for that purpose,
for which they might execute notes or bonds with interest at a rate
not over 12 per cent. In 1851 another act was procured empower-
ing the county court to levy a special tax of o-ne mill upon every one
hundred dollars' worth of taxable property, which was, when col-
lected, to be kept as a separate fund for the payment of debts incurred
in building the court-house, and if any surplus remained, it was to
be applied to the erection of a jail.

The constitution of 1848 did away with probate justices and county
commissioners' courts, and provided for county courts. The general
assembly, at its first session after the adoption of the constitution,
enacted a law (February, 1849) establishing county courts with pro-
bate jurisdiction, and providing that two associate justices of the peace
having county jurisdiction, to be elected by each county at large,
should sit with the county judge, and that th^lcourt, as thus organ-
ized, should possess and exercise the same plwers as had belonged
to the old commissioners' court. The judge, sitting by himself, con-
stituted a court for the transaction of probate business. These officers
were to be elected every four years.

John Chamberlain was the first county judge of Iroquois county,
and was elected to that office in November, 1849, filling it three con-
secutive terms. He was a man of strongly marked personal charac-
ter ; possessed decided convictiojis ;^< 1 commanding ability ; and as
an orator and lawyer, superior powers. By conferring freely with
men he always had so exact a knowledge of current popular feeling
that it seemed as if he had a prescience of events. His habits in
this % particular were remarkable enough to require mention. With
rare subtlety he drew from others what they would conceal, without
compromising his own information. This was done with diplomatic
art, and scarcely left a sensible impression of his mastery. The
advantages so gained he dic^iot fail to make an element of success in
objects which "forever remamed in the custody of his own conscious-
ness. He was dark and difficult to fathom ; mistrustful of men, dili-
gent in detail, long headed, slow to act, but eminently energetic and
unshriiikiniji^ien the time of action came. His sagacity was always
equal to J^^Lcasion. In private life he displayed the traits and
practiced CT^^Brts%f genuine benevolence. He was tall of stature,
nnd of strikin^appearaiice. When he undertook the control of the

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 355

county government its fiscal affairs were in a deplorable condition.
County orders were bringing but thirty-seven and a half cents on the
dollar. The judge addressed himself with zeal to the restoration of the
county credit. In less than four years under his administration the
whole debt was redeemed, and orders were at a premium for taxes ;
but they fell again somewhat below par, when the liability of $50,000
was incurred in aid of the Peoria & Oquawka Eastern Extension
railroad, a measure against which he opposed an earnest, vigorous,
but unavailing remonstrance.

In 1846 Micajah Stanley went to the legislature from this county.
The navigation of the Kankakee and Iroquois rivers had excited
much interest and been warmly discussed and advocated since any
considerable settlement had been made in the county. The feeling
had become so earnest that this question was the staple of thought
and conversation the single idea of the public mind. Mr. Stanley
brought forward a bill chartering "The Kankakee and Iroquois
Navigation and Manufacturing Company," which was passed and
approved February 15, 1847, granting this corporation full control
of the improvement of the two rivers for navigation, and also all
the use and control of the water-power thereon for the term of fifty
years. Several amendatory acts have taken effect, but none of them
changing the original powers granted. Fifty thousand dollars were
raised by stock subscriptions and expended on a dam and lock at
Wilmington, which was swept away by high water the next spring
after it was completed. By a law in force February 12, 1849, the
county court of Iroquois county was granted power to levy and
cause to be collected a tax not to exceed $1 upon each $100
worth of taxable property for the purpose of improving the
Kankakee and Iroquois rivers, provided that upon thirty-days
notice previous to a general election a majority of the votes cast
upon the question should be in favor of the tax. We do not know
that any money was raised in this way, and it is doubtful if the ques-
tion was submitted to the people, Judge Chamberlain, though favor-
able to the improvement of these streams, and taking an active interest
in the design, being, as is evidenced by other acts of his, opposed
to such a plan for raising funds in the then exhausted condition of
the county, and the low state of its credit. The company made the
Kankakee navigable by slack-water to Wilmington, connecting that
city with the Illinois and Michigan canal. Then th,e work slum-
bered some time, so far as the general public was coJmrned. Again,
in the summer of 1862, fresh interest was arouse(r^n the project,
and citizens of Troquois and Kankakee counties, and delegates from

356 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Newton county, Indiana, held a public meeting at Middleport, on
June 16, at which business committees were appointed, one of
which was to examine and report on the subject preparatory to
raising stock. This was composed of Dr. C. F. McNeill, chairman ;
George B. Joiner, Michael Hogle and John Wilson of Iroquois
county ; James McGrew and E. A. Webster, of Kankakee county ;
G. W. Spitler, of Jasper county, Indiana, and A. B. Condit, of
Newton county, Indiana. Condit was a practical engineer, and was
appointed by GOT. Wright, of Indiana, in 1853, to do the engineer-
ing for the draining of the swamp lands in White, Jasper and New-
ton counties. It is stated in the k ' Middleport Press " of that date,
that he explained, by diagrams and otherwise, the practicability, at
a very small cost, of making the rivers navigable at the driest sea-
son of the year, by slack-water, not only up to Middleport, but
to Rensselaer, Indiana, by making a reservoir of Beaver lake.
He further advocated the feasibility of a navigable eastern outlet by
way of the Pinkamink and a seven-mile canal over a flat surface to
the head of the Monon, and down that stream and the Tippecanoe
river into the Wabash and Erie canal. At the meeting of July 2,
the chairman read an exhaustive report showing the stage of the
work, and also what was further required to be done, besides
demonstrating its practicability and importance. But notwithstand-
ing the enthusiasm of the hour, the absorbing and gigantic demands
of the war coming suddenly in the form of calls for 600,000 volun-
teers, caused this local enterprise to be forgotten. " The Kankakee
Company," an association of Massachusetts capitalists, of which
Gov. Claflin is president, purchased the franchises and property of
the old company, and are slowly prosecuting the extension of navi-
gation on the Kankakee toward the state line. For a while after
the building of the Chicago, Danville & Yincennes railroad the
question of improving the Iroquois river was generally thought to
be forever quieted, but in the winter of 1879-80 the agitation was
again revived, and the attention of Hon. G. L. Fort, representative
from the eighth congressional district, was invited to the subject
with a view to bringing it before congress ; and petitions were cir-
culated asking an appropriation for the work. In 1878 Mr. Fort
introduced a bill in congress appropriating $50,000 for the survey
and improvement of the Kankakee, but the amount was reduced to
$10,000, with which an examination was made. In 1879 there was
an appropriatjfcn of $28,000, and in the fall the river was again sur-
veyed from Wilmington to a point one mile and a half above
Momence, under the direction of Maj. Jared A. Smith, of the
United States engineer corps.

HISTOKY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 357

In 1851 an attempt was made to form the county of Kankakee
from Will and Iroquois. A law was enacted defining the boundaries
and establishing the new county, subject to a vote of the people
of the two counties to be affected, which was to betaken at a special
election on the first Tuesday in April. The vote in Iroquois county
stood 192 for and 554 against the proposition. More than three-
fourths of the minority vote was polled in Limestone and Polk pre-
cincts, which were situated on the Kankakee river. The attempt was
renewed in the fall of 1852, when petitions were again circulated and
signed, and on the assembling of the legislature they were laid before
that body. The law relating to the formation of new counties
required notice by advertisement and otherwise before the general
assembly should act upon the petition, which notice it was charged
had never been legally given. It further required that the lines of
division or curtailment should be particularly described in the peti-
tion. The proposed new county, with the metes and bounds set forth
in the petition not meeting with favor among the members of the
legislature, the southern boundary was changed in the petition and
fixed on a line farther north. A law was enacted February 11, 1853,
establishing the county of Kankakee with the amended boundaries,
provided that a majority of the voters of each of the counties of Will
and Iroquois voting on the question should vote in favor of the meas-
ure. William Parish and James Lamb, of Iroquois county, were
designated as commissioners to receive the return of the votes of their
county. A special election was held on Tuesday, April 5, 1853. At
the time of the election the Illinois Central railroad was in course of
construction, and a great force of laborers were employed at that
point in excavating and quarrying. This floating population was
used at the polls in Limestone precinct, voting in phalanx for the new
county. It was charged that irregularities were committed in the
organization of the election board. In 1851 this precinct had cast
65 votes for the new county, and 27 against it, making a total of 92,
which was said to be, and probably was, the full strength. At this
election there were 360 votes polled, and all in favor of the proposed
county. When the poll-lists were returned it was found that the
judges and clerks had made no certificate. In consequence of the
invalidity the return was thrown out by the canvassers, when the vote
in the county stood 367 against, to 290 for, the new county. George
W. Byrns, justice of the peace, who returned the poll-book and was
chosen to assist in the canvass, refused to sign the certificate declaring
the result. It was proposed by Byrns and others to procure a writ
of mandamus to compel the board to accept the return, whereupon

358 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Judge Chamberlain and the associate justice, William Pierce, sued
out an injunction restraining the county clerk, Amos O. Whiteman,
from making returns of the election, and the commissioners from
receiving them. The regular April term of the circuit court should
have begun on the 26th, when the case would have come up for hear-
ing ; but the judge, Hon. Hugh Henderson, did not arrive, and so
ordered a special term for July. May 9 was the time fixed by law
for the election in Kankakee county to locate the seat of justice and
elect officers, in case that the county should be established by the
votes of the people. A. O. Whiteman, writing on this subject,
says: "After the issue and service of the injunction, Orson Beebee
(afterward judge of Kankakee county), Dr. Lyons, S. S. Vale, and
several others, leading men of Momence and vicinity, came to Middle-
port and examined all the poll-lists of said election (including what
purported to be a poll-book from Limestone precinct), and after due
deliberation and legal advice from J. A. Whiteman, S. A. Washing-
ton, and others of the Iroquois county bar, were of the opinion that
all would be right if they should proceed to organize the county of
Kankakee." He further adds: "In May, a deputation consisting
of Hon. William Pierce, Hon. Joseph Thomas and others whom I
do not now remember, visited Springfield for the purpose of an in-
terview with the attorney-general, Governor Joel A. Matteson, and
Hon. T. H. Campbell, secretary of state, the result of which I do
not know." The election was held on the day mentioned, and
Kankakee county was fully organized. Taking into consideration all
the circumstances, and the excitement having cooled off, the com-
plainants thought it best to dismiss the injunction, which was accord-
ingly done on their motion. Through the informal proceedings
described, a part of Iroquois county was detached and Kankakee
finally established ; and the people of the latter only narrowly suc-
ceeding had been obliged to forego the attempt to get a larger strip
of territory. It had always been a favorite object with that county
to get the remainder of township 29, and in 1867 an act was procured
attaching it to Kankakee, if a majority of the voters of each county
should consent. Accordingly an election was held May 14, 1867, at
which the result in Iroquois county was 513 votes for annexation,
and 1,095 against, thus defeating the scheme.

"The first efforts seriously made to construct railroads"* in the
state of Illinois, was in the winter of 1832-3, when the legislature
passed several charters to incorporate companies. The one for the

* Ford's History of Illinois, p. 166.

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 359

Central railroad, which was to extend from Peru to Cairo, was
granted to Darius B. Holbrooke, a friend and partner of Judge Sid-
ley Breese, by which latter gentleman this undertaking was first
wrought, through a newspaper publication, into public notice. No
?tock was taken in this company, and at the session of the legisla-
ture of 1836-Y that body inaugurated a system of internal improve-
ments, which was made to include the Illinois Central railroad, the
>vhole to be under the control and at the expense of the state. Mr.
[lolbrooke's charter was, consequently, repealed. Over a million
lollars were spent on this single improvement when the financial
'evulsion of 1837 came on and bankrupted the state, and forced an
ibandonment of all these works. Mr. Holbrooke asked and obtained
i renewal of his charter, by which was granted to him and his asso-
2iates all the work that had been done on the line, provided that he
should build the road. Judge Breese, then a senator of the United
States, from Illinois, brought forward a bill from the committee of
the public lands of the senate, conferring exclusive preemption privi-
leges on Holbrooke to all the lands on each side -of the road at
$1.25 per acre, for a period of ten years. Mr. Douglas denounced
it as a gigantic scheme for speculation, and demonstrated that it
would be injurious to the interest of the state. He then introduced
in the senate the bill, which finally passed, granting to the state
every alternate section within six miles of the road on each side of
the main track and branches, designated by even numbers, to aid in
its construction from the southern terminus of the Illinois and Mich-
igan canal to Cairo, with a branch to Chicago, and another via
Galena to a point on the Mississippi river opposite Dubuque, Iowa.
For any lands embraced in this donation which might have been
sold or preempted, the company was entitled to receive an equal
amount to be selected from the public lands within fifteen miles on
either side of the line by agents to be appointed by the governor.
The lands reserved by the government within the six-mile limits
were not to be sold for less than double the minimum price of the
public lands. The road was to be commenced simultaneously at
both extremities of the main line, and continued therefrom until
completed ; and if not completed within ten years the grant should
be forfeited. The inside history of this bill in detail, as related by
Mr. Douglas himself, in a small work on constitutional and party
questions, to which we are indebted for some of our facts, is of no
little interest ; but we can refer only to a single incident. When
introduced in congress it met with sufficient opposition in the house
to defeat it by two votes, which proved in the end, and to the great

360 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

satisfaction of all parties, with a single exception perhaps, a fortu-
nate circumstance, owing to a certain fraudulent proceeding, prob-
ably of some engrossing clerk of the Illinois legislature, acting in
the interest of Holbrooke, which transaction was discovered and
exposed by Mr. Douglas himself. He then procured from Hol-
brooke a release of his charter for the road, which the recent discov-
ery had shown to be necessary, and had it recorded in the office of
the secretary of state at Springfield. The bill had received the
opposition of the delegations from Alabama and Mississippi, and he
felt that their cooperation was necessary. The Mobile railroad was
then building, but had failed for want of means, and Mr. Douglas
went to Alabama and held a conference with the president and
directors, proposing to obtain for them a grant of lands by making
it a part of his bill. This was readily accepted, and he quietly
departed for Washington, desirous of not being seen in those parts,
lest his influence upon the action of the legislatures of Alabama and
Mississippi should be revealed to the senators and representatives in
congress from those states. Before he left it had been arranged for
the directors to procure from those legislatures instructions to their
congressional delegations to support the bill. When the instruc-
tions reached them at Washington they were bewildered and in no
good humor. It was amusing to Douglas when they came to him
for his assistance. Concealing his secret gratification, and assuming
an attitude of independence toward them till he could seem to yield,
he at length consented to a proposition to amend his bill so as to
make a grant to each of the states of Alabama and Mississippi, in
the same manner as it did to Illinois. It then became a law, Sep-
tember 20, 1850. It had been ably advocated in the house by the
representative from this district, the Hon. John Went worth. This
explains how the two southern states came to be included ; as it also
revives the memory of the fact that Mr. Douglas was the author and
master-spirit of the measure. In 1859, he said : "If any man ever
passed a bill, I did that one. I did the whole work, and was de-
voted to it for two entire years. The people of Illinois are begin-
ning to forget it. It is said Douglas never made a speech upon it."
And again: "The Illinois bill was the pioneer bill, and went
through without a dollar, pure, uncorrupt, and is the only one that
has worked well." * The grant was accepted, and on February 10,
1851, the act passed by the Illinois legislature incorporating the
Central company was approved by the governor and became a law.

*" Constitutional and Party Questions," p. 199.

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 3t>l

The incorporators were Robert Schuyler, George Griswold, Gouver-
neur Morris, Franklin Haven, David A. Neal, Robert Rantoul, Jr.,
Jonathan Sturgis, George "W. Ludlow, John F. A. Sanford, Henry
Grinnell, Leroy Wiley, Joseph W. Alsop, and William H. Aspin-
wall. These gentlemen, exclusive of the one last named, were the
first board of directors. The interest of the state was protected by
appropriate guarantees that the road would be built, and the com-
pletion of the main line limited to four years. Near the close of
this period the time was, without necessity, extended six months.
The branches were to be finished in six years. All the work that
had been done on this line by the state, and all the rights of every
nature which it had acquired, were transferred to this company by
its charter. The lands granted were to be exempt from taxation till
sold and conveyed. It was afterward claimed that this provi-
sion of the law was retarding the development of the country wher-
ever these lands were situated, as purchasers, instead of paying for
their tracts and getting deeds from the company, kept renewing
their contracts, thus evading taxation, and in 1873 a law was
enacted requiring the trustees of the road to offer all unsold lands
at public auction once every six months. The lands of this
company were sold at prices ranging from $5 to $25 per acre,
according to quality and location. The sale of lands within
the six and fifteen-mile limits of the road was suspended by the
commissioner of the general land office, September 20, 1850, by
order of President Fillmore. Those granted to the Central Railroad
Company were selected by David A. Neal, assisted some of the
time by Col. R. B. Mason, the chief engineer, and the whole grant,
save an inconsiderable amount, was certified, March 13, 1852 ; and
the remainder of the lands within the railroad limits, which had
been withdrawn from sale, were soon after placed in market by
executive proclamation. In return for the grants and franchises
conferred, the company was required to pay semi-annually into the
state treasury, on the first Mondays of June and December of each
year, a sum of money equal to seven per cent of the gross proceeds
of the road, which revenue was to be applied to the payment of the
interest-bearing indebtedness of the state until it should be extin-
guished. The constitution of 1870 makes this a perpetual obliga-
tion, and provides that after the extinction of the state debt the rev-
enue from this source shall be used to defray the ordinary expenses
of the state government. The amount of this revenue to the state
of Illinois has been, to the end of 1879, over $8,000,000.

At the time the first annual meeting of the company was held

362 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

March, 1851 there were but ninety-eight miles of railroad in the
state, and this was laid with strap iron. The first engineering party
was organized in Chicago, on May 21, 1851, and commenced pre-
liminary surveys of the Chicago branch, making that city a point of
departure, and by the middle of summer seven other parties had
been organized and were in the field : at Freeport, La Salle, Blooming-
ton, Decatur, Cairo and Urbana ; and the whole line was surveyed
and located before the end of the year. The work of construction
was begun at Cairo and La Salle about Christmas. The first con-
tract for grading was made March 15, 1852, for the division between
Chicago and Calumet, and that section was opened for travel by the
middle of May. A long contest ensued with the city of Chicago for
the privilege of entering the corporation and locating its line along
the shore of Lake Michigan ; and at last, on June 14, the city coun-
cil passed an ordinance granting permission. On May 15, 1853, the
first sixty miles, from La Salle to Bloomington, was opened, arid the
company commenced operating the road on its own account. In
March the Chicago branch was extended to Blue Island, from which
point a line of stages were run by Chipman and Wilcox to Middle-
port and Danville, furnishing the only regular communication which
the county then had with the metropolis. The railroad was rapidly
extended during the year, and just at its close was finished to Del
Rey, which point the cars reached but little in advance of the new
year. The company designed building machine-shops there, but
land could not be obtained on liberal terms, and so they erected
them at Champaign. We subjoin the following facts relating to
the completion of the Chicago branch, which were first published in
the Chicago "Daily Press," of November, 1856:

" Dates of opening by sections : Chicago to Calumet, 14 miles,
May 15, 1852. Calumet to Kankakee, 42 miles, July 14, 1853. Kan-
kakee to Spring Creek, 31 miles, December 2, 1853. Spring Creek
to Pera, 22 miles, May 28, 1854. Pera to Urbana (Champaign), 20
miles, July 24, 1854. Urbana to Mattoon, 44 miles, June 25, 1855.
Mattoon to Centralia, 77 miles, September 27, 1856. The main line,
from Cairo to La Salle, 309 miles in length, was finished January 8,
1855. The Galena branch, from La Salle to Dunleith, 147 miles,
was completed June 12, 1855." The total cost of the entire line was
$36,500,000. The capital stock of the company is $29,000,000, and
the debt $10,500,000. The general offices are at No. 78 Michigan
avenue, Chicago. This road, by its network of branches and by its
connections, furnishes direct communication with both the south and
the northwest. Daily passenger trains are run between Chicago and

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 363

New Orleans, 915 miles, without change of cars, a transfer boat
being used on the Ohio. St. Louis has, by this route, direct connec-
tion south as well as north. Between Chicago and St. Louis through
trains are run, and Peoria and Keokuk also are reached without
change. From Cairo connections are made with all principal points
in the south. The company controls, by lease, the route to Sioux
City, thus providing for Dakota travel and emigration. This is one
of the best and most safely managed roads in the country. No
other public improvement in Iroquois county has done so much for
the material and intellectual advancement of her people as the Illi-
nois Central railroad. It was opened at a time when attention
began to be largely awakened in the east to the subject of making
western homes, and the rich country is brought into com mini ication
with the world, invited great numbers of settlers from the sterile
lands and jostling population of New York and New England. The
uniting of eastern culture with western sinew has produced most
positive and important benefits to the county.

The Peoria & Oquawka Eastern Extension railroad was constructed
east from Peoria. In 1859 it was styled Logansport, Peoria & Bur-
lington, a few years later Toledo, Peoria & Warsaw, which name it
retained until the transfer early in the present year, when it was
changed to Toledo, Peoria & Western. The charter from the state
bore date February 12, 1849, and has been several times amended.
This important railway was built and put in operation in sections at
considerable intervals, and its present line and connecting branches
were not completed until 1871. The main line itself was not finished
between Peoria and Warsaw but a little earlier. The citizens of this
county early displayed a practical interest in the undertaking, by
voting, under the law of 1849 providing for a general system of
railroad incorporations, to take $50,000 of stock in the road. The
election was held June 7, 1853, and the question was decided by a
majority of 357. Prior to this the individual subscriptions taken
in the county had reached the same amount. As soon as the result
of the election was known, the county court being required to pay
five per cent of the stock in money or in bonds, issued a bond for
$2,500. The same per cent was also collected on the private sub-
scriptions.

Col. Richard P. Morgan obtained the contract for grading and
furnishing with ties all that portion of the eastern extension located
between the Chicago & Mississippi (now Chicago, Alton & St. Louis)
railroad and the town of Middleport. By this contract, made in
September, 1854, the company assigned to him all the proceeds of

364 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

subscriptions obtained, or to be obtained, in Iroquois county. He
then entered into a contract, bearing date November 13, 1854, with
the county court, by which he was to receive 75,000 acres of swamp
lands at seventy-five cents per acre. When the stock was voted it
was generally understood that it was to be paid for from the proceeds
of these lands. Morgan bound himself to procure from the railroad
company certificates of the full paid shares of stock, to be transferred
or issued to the county, to the amount of the estimates by the com-
pany's engineers from time to time, and as such estimates should be
presented the county court was to pay to Morgan an amount equal
to the par value of the stock so presented, in cash, or by a deed or
a bond for a deed, to such a part of the said 75,000 acres of swamp
lands as should at that time be unsold. Seventy thousand acres of
these lands were set apart, commencing at township 24, range 10
east, and proceeding north by succession of numbers in each range
successively until the complement should be obtained, and the other
five thousand were to be those which might be selected in any part
of the county by the citizens who should bid them off at public auc-
tion, at a price exceeding seventy-five cents per acre. The selection
was to include all lands of this description entered at the land office,
and Morgan was to receive the proceeds of the same. He was also
to be entitled to all receipts from the sales of swamp lands by the
county, provided that he should expend the money accruing from
the sale of the 75,000 acres on the railroad within the limits of this
county. The court also agreed to convey to him all the remaining
swamp lands after the sale of the 75,000 acres, at $1 per acre, when-
ever he should give satisfactory evidence that he could command
from the sale of the residue means sufficient, by the addition of
such securities as should be due from the company, to complete his
contract. He was to pay for these lands with bonds of the Peoria
& Oquawka Railroad Company, secured by mortgage on a portion
of the road, to which bonds he would be entitled under his contract
with that company. Morgan further stipulated that he would en-
gineer and drain the lands free of charge before demanding a title,
and also that all previous expenses in surveys or otherwise, made
according to law. should be provided for from the proceeds of the
lands. He was to receive the $2.500 bond which had been issued to
the railroad company, and the lands purchased by him were to be
exempt from county taxes for three years from the date of this con-
tract. Owing to a feeling among capitalists that the title to these
lands was uncertain, Morgan failed to obtain means to prosecute the
work, and as he could not get money or land from the county only

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 365

as that should be completed in sections and estimates made of the
same, a lock was soon produced, leaving neither party capable of
exercising separate power over the lands. The demand for them
seemed to increase when it became known that they could not be
sold. Settlers on adjoining tracts, as fast as they could accumulate
means, were anxious to add some portion of these lands to their
farms. The jobbers and speculators grew disquiet, for once a pro-
pitious circumstance, for their interest and discontent were sure to
break the land embargo, if that were possible. Col. Morgan, self-
willed and impracticable, meanwhile refused to give any satisfactory
assurance of his willingness to accede to an accommodation. Influ-
ential persons suggested to him the expedient of making a new
contract with the county. Among these were Joseph Thomas and
George B. Joiner. The latter finding him on an occasion in the
right humor, pressed the matter upon his favorable notice, and the
consequence was, that on the 18th of August, 1855, Col. Morgan
surrendered his contract, and a new one was made. The county
court covenanted with Morgan to pay the monthly installments on
the $50,000 subscription in cash, or in county bonds drawing seven
per cent semi-annual interest, principal to be paid in fifteen years,
with a guaranty on the back of the bonds pledging the proceeds of
the swamp lands for their payment. A reservation was made, by
which the county was to retain a sum sufficient to defray all the
expenses of the survey and selection, as well as the expense of quiet-
ing the contests of the title of the county to the lands. It was fur-
ther agreed that the county should take steps to bring them imme-
diately into market, and to pay Morgan the installments on the
county subscription, either from the proceeds or with bonds, when
he should procure from the Peoria & Oquawka company certificates
of paid-up stock to the amount of the installments.

The court gave immediate public notice, through the columns of
the "Middleport Press," to all who wished to purchase any of the
swamp lands to make application to the county clerk by the 15th
of September, and Monday, October 15, was set for the sale to
commence. A second sale was held on May 6, 1856 ; these were
the only public sales of swamp lands in Iroquois county. Up to
this date the county court, which was vested by the special act of
February 14, 1855, with power to appoint an engineer to survey the
lands, had made no move in the matter, but on September 15,
at a special term, they appointed Elkanah Doolittle, who subscribed
the proper oath, and then nominated as his assistants, Robert Nil-
son, Benjamin F. Masters, George B. Joiner and Joseph Thomas,

366 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

who were confirmed by the court. The lands were exainined and
classified as first, second and third class, and appraised at $1.25,
$1 and 75 cents per acre respectively. It will be necessary now
to go back and trace up the history of the swamp land grant.
By the provisions of an act of congress approved September 28,
1850, entitled "An act to enable the state of Arkansas and other
states to reclaim the swamp lands within their limits," all the swamp
and overflowed lands in the several states, unfit for cultivation at the
date of the act, were granted to the states respectively. Every
legal subdivision of land, the greater part of which was "wet and
unfit for cultivation," was to be considered of this class. The
reader's attention is invited to the condition upon which the cession
was made, as expressed in the act, by which the title to these lands
in fee-simple, vested in the state, viz: "That the proceeds of said
lands, whether from sale or by direct appropriation in kind, should
be applied exclusively, as far as necessary, to the purpose of reclaim-
ing said lands by means of the levees and drains aforesaid." The
legislature of Illinois, by an act in force June 22, 1852, granted to
each county all the lands of this description within its boundaries so
donated by the general government, and annexed the same condition
as congress had before, " For the purpose of constructing the neces-
sary levees and drains to reclaim the same ; and the balance of said
lands, if any there be, after the same are reclaimed as aforesaid,
shall be distributed in each county, equally, among the townships
thereof, for the purposes of education ; or the same may be applied
to the construction of roads and bridges, or to such other purposes
as may be deemed expedient by the courts or county judge herein-
after mentioned desiring so to apply it." The control and disposi-
tion of these lands was vested in the county courts. By an act
approved March 4, 1854, the control was changed to the board of
supervisors in counties under township organization. All swamp
tracts which had been sold by the government after the passage of
this act of the general assembly, were to be conveyed by the county
in which they were situated to the purchaser, who was to assign all
his rights in the premises, and as such assignee the county was
authorized to receive the .purchase-money from the United States.
Likewise, any which had been located by warrants after the passage
of the act of congress were to be conveyed by the county, when the
locator was to assign the warrant to the county judge, who was then
to be regarded as the assignee of the state, and as such was em-
powered to locate the same on any of the public lands. In case
that any had been appropriated in any other manner after the dona-

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 367

tion to the state, the county was authorized to locate a like quantity
elsewhere.

The grant to the state for the building of the Illinois Central
railroad was made September 20, 1850, eight days anterior to the
passage of the swamp land act. By a ruling of the secretary of the
interior in 1855, which is held to be binding on his successors, the
state has been deprived of the swamp lands lying within the six-mile
limit of that thoroughfare, the title to which remained in the United
States.

" The history of the operations under the grant, however, reveal
the fact that in the years of land speculation immediately following
its passage, many of the lands conveyed by the grant were entered
with cash or located with warrants by individuals. As a result of
this, contests arose as to the actual character of the lands thus dis-
posed of, and the land bureau found itself overwhelmed with con-
flicting claims of this description. The process of adjusting these
conflicts was necessarily slow, and congress intervened to relieve the
department and at the same time relieve the individual purchasers
and locators. By act of March 2, 1855, all sales and locations made
to that date were confirmed, and upon presentation of proof that
the lands were actually swamp, the state was allowed indemnity, to
be paid in cash where cash had been received, and in other lands
where the swamp lands had been taken by warrant locations. Now
it cannot be gainsaid, in view of the strong array of judicial decis-
ions on the subject, that had the state of Illinois chosen to contest
the right of the government to thus dispose of lands previously
granted to her, she could have successfully done so. The moment
the swamp grant was approved, the title to the lands vested in the
state, and were as much beyond the power of the government to
again dispose of them as if it had never owned them. In a spirit
of accommodation, however, and to afford relief to many of her citi-
zens who had ignorantly purchased these lands, the state of Illinois
acquiesced in the plan of relief embodied in the act of 1855, and
agreed to relinquish her claim to the land, and accepted the proffered
indemnity."*

From these complications have arisen a mass of claims which are
yet unadjusted, though legislation is now pending in congress for
their settlement, the importance and magnitude of which claims will
appear farther on.

* Report of Isaac R. Hitt, state agent of Illinois for the adjustment of swamp land
claims against the United States, p. 8.

368 HISTORY OF IROQUOTS COUNTY.

The general law of 1852, granting the lands to the counties in
which situated, was not adopting Judge Chamberlain's own lan-
guage satisfactory either to Col. Morgan or to the county court, as
it did not authorize or justify the application of the lands to the pay-
ment of bonds used in constructing that part of the railroad lying
without and beyond the limits of the county. Before, then, the
avails of the lands could be pledged to the payment or security of
the bonds, the proceeds of which were to be expended as well on
that part of the Eastern Extension lying without as within the
county, the law had to be changed. It therefore became expedient,
if not necessary, to procure a special act applicable to this new state
of things. Other counties had set the example of getting special acts
from the state to suit existing emergencies, and advance certain
objects. Judge Chamberlain and Col. Morgan attended the legisla-
ture and obtained the passage of a law, entitled "An act to expedite
and insure the thorough drainage of the swamp lands of Iroquois
county, and to facilitate the sale thereof," in force February 14,
1855. This act is so important to a full understanding of the sub-
ject that we shall be justified in giving a synopsis of the principal
portions. The county court of Iroquois county was authorized to
appoint an engineer, with assistants, to survey the swamp lands,
who should recommend to the court an effectual and thorough system
of drainage, and make such rules, regulations and compensations as
would insure the draining of the lands. From the maps and reports
of the engineer the court was to place a valuation on each piece, and
to fix the price to be allowed for drainage ; the judge was empow-
ered to sell the same at public or private sale under the direction of
the county court, either in large or small tracts. But those contigu-
ous to improved farms were to be sold at public vendue after thirty-
days notice in some newspaper in the county, at prices not below
the appraised value. The surplus arising from the sales over and
above the cost of drainage, was to be applied by the county court in
payment for the capital stock of the Peoria & Oquawka Railroad
Company on that part of the Eastern Extension situated between
Middleport and the Chicago & Mississippi railroad ; also in payment
of such other securities of that company as the court might deem
expedient ; and to appropriate such portions thereof to school and
other purposes as they might think advisable. Payments by pur-
chasers were to be made to the county treasurer, in cash, or such
securities as the court should deem sufficient, on the day of sale or
the succeeding day, the cost of drainage first to be deducted there-
from. A certificate was to be given for lands sold subject to drain-

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 369

age, and whenever the drainage should be completed in conformity
with the system which the county court should adopt, deeds were to
be executed. The balance due for draining each tract might remain
unpaid by the purchaser for eight months after the day of sale ; but
if the estimated cost should not be paid, or if the labor of draining
should not be performed within that time, the land should revert,
and the money advanced should be forfeited to the county. Authority
was given to receive for all the swamp lands, any money, scrip, war-
rant or other evidence of entry which should be issued by congress
to the state of Illinois, the same to be subject to the order of the
county court. Iroquois county was exempted from all the provi-
sions of the general laws enacted to fix the mode of draining and
selling the swamp lands which conflicted with this act.

Only a little while now elapsed till a disagreement arose, Judge
Chamberlain says, "Between Col. Morgan and the county court, as
to the policy of issuing county bonds as fast as, and to the extent
that he desired ; and also as to the policy of giving to him the swamp
lands with no very good prospect of realizing anything for them, but
with the strong probability of losing them entirely." Charges and
denunciations were freely indulged at the expense of the court.
Distrust of its capacity and integrity grew apace, until it had deteri-
orated so much in public favor that this became the chief argument
in support of township organization. "Writing in his own defense in
185T, Judge Chamberlain used the following language in regard to
Col. Morgan, which is an authoritative explanation of the reasons
for resisting his importunities: "His extravagance and folly, and
utter incapacity to take care of any financial business was such
that there was not, as I believe, 25 per cent worth of work done,
with the avails of the bonds, on the road. The bonds were literally
squandered, and lost both to him and the county. But where should
we have been now if Col. Morgan had gotten the swamp lands ?
Judging by the estimates of work he obtained and presented for
the bonds, he could have received any amount of certificates and
presented for the lands. It was not the business of the court, but
of the railroad company, to look after the estimates. Had he received
the lands, it is fair to presume, such was his recklessness in other
matters, that he would have sold them for a slight consideration."

At the general election in November, 1855, the township system
of local government was adopted. Robert Kilson, Dr. William
Fowler and Foreman Moore were commissioners to district the
county into political townships. The original number was eleven,
as follows : Ash Grove, Beaver, Belmont, Concord, Chebanse, Crab
24

370 HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY.

Apple, Loda, Milford, Middleport, Onarga and Wygant. Let us
turn again to the Peoria & Oquawka Eastern Extension railroad.
The grading of the Middleport division, under contract to Morgan,
was done without any of the usual energy displayed on such improve-
ments, and several times labor was wholly remitted. Work on the
west end of the Middleport division was continued until the track
was laid to Gil man. That portion of the line was opened for busi-
ness, and the first train ran over it September 21, 1857. At the close
of the year 1853 a sub-contract was taken by Sherman & Patterson,
and Chamberlain & Thomas, of Middleport, who graded one mile of
the route west from that place. This lay several years serving no
other purpose than to keep in memory what was expressively termed,
after the bonds had all been issued without a better prospect of seeing
the work completed, the "dead horse" railroad. These men re-
ceived three of the county bonds, which were paid by the county
before the intervention of the Tallman arrangement.

Conflicting interests concerning the location of the route at Mid-
dleport retarded, in some degree, the construction of the line. It
was surveyed to the Old Town, but disagreements occurring in regard
to depot grounds, and a proposition on that point being entertained
from Micajah Stanley, it was laid out and finally built on the present
route. These cross-purposes furnished a pretext for the private sub-
scribers to the capital stock to refuse to make payment. Fearing
that they would be a total loss, the county court refused to issue the
bonds. As has been elsewhere remarked, Judge Chamberlain was
from the first strenuously opposed to the county's taking stock in
the road, and exerted all his influence, by making speeches and
otherwise, to prevent it. In May, 1856, $19,000 of bonds were out-
standing. Some of the first had been taken in and renewed for
reasons not ascertained, nor even conjectured, unless because of the
new arrangement made by which Morgan was to receive the bonds
from the county. These bonds were executed with great reluctance
by the county court, but the pressure of public opinion was irresist-
ible. The measure was warmly advocated by such leading and in-
fluential men as Micajah Stanley, William Pierce and Joseph
Thomas. At the second session of the board of supervisors, May
30 and 31, a special meeting convened to appoint a person to repre-
sent the interests of the county in the election of the board of
directors of the Peoria & Oquawka railroad for the ensuing year,
Joseph Thomas was appointed agent ; and the county treasurer was
directed to deliver to Col. Morgan on the presentation of certified
full paid stock, bonds sufficient to cancel the same, in pursuance of

HISTORY OF IROQUOIS COUNTY. 371

the contract existing between him and the county. The bonds were
a