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Pioneer Hunters of the Kankakee

BY ]. LORENZO WERICH

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Yours ‘Truly J. Lorenzo Werich

Pioneer Hunters of the Kankakee

} BY JSLORENZO WERICH

eS A CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE I. Catching My First Raccoon fe) 11. Finding The Missing Link 15 If. Defeat of the Pottowattomies ai IV. Setting Steel Traps Se V. Dividing the Game 46 VI. My First Boat Ride 2 VIL. Hunters Who Have Buckfevered fe VIII. Trappers’ Claims 85 IX. Running the Ferry 101 ee Last of the Pottowattomies 108 XI. Home of Chief Killbuck 122 XII. Indian Island 13% XIII. Grape Island ~ 141 XIV. Barrel-House Blind ast

XV. Draining the Swamps 174

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ILLUSTRATIONS

J. Lorenzo Werich - - Frontpieee ~ _ Trapping My First Raccoon ~ - = 17 50 Pioneer Trapper’s Shanty on Little Paradise [sland - 38 John Werich - “ : - - G01, A Deer Hunter’s Lodge on Johnson’s Island “~ evn Eaton’s Bridge - - ~ - 102 Interior View of Louisville Club House - sith OI Louisville Club House - - ~ 108 In Camp on Island Six to Two - - 129 © A Typical Trappet’s Shanty on Indian Island ~ sie The Indian Island Saw Mill 2 ; ie Sue My Island Home on the Kankakee rm = $5. The White Star e bs it ST Rockville, Terre Haute & Indianapolis Clu’ House - 139" Ruins of a Trapper’s Cabin on Grape Island - 143” Some of the Traps That Were USed by Early Hunters . 140% My First Duck Shooting from a Boat ~ - 150¢ The Old River Bed at North Bend ~ - 186” The New Kankakee ~ ~ - 188°

Camp of Logansport Hunters on Cornell’s Island “ 189”

To The Pioneer Hunters and Trappers of the Kankakee River Region, of many years of faithful friendship, | dedicate this volume, By the Author.

CHAPTER?! CATCHING MY FIRST RACCOON

REMINISCENCES OF PIONEER DAYS ON THE OLD KANKAKEE RIVER CATCHING MY FIRST RACCOON

“Oh the hunting days of my youth, Have forever gone from me.” | was born in a log cabin on my grandfather's farm near Valparaiso, Indiana in 18600, and within two miles and a half of the historical stream of which I am going to tell you. It was whilst watching the vanishing of a great hunting ground by the reclaiming of the Kankakee swamp lands, or rather making a new Kanka-~ kee River, that involves the plot which forms the gist of my story. I have seen the sad face of the old Pottowattomie Indian who was driven

‘PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE

from his hunting grounds on the Kankakee, and now we see a shadow of gloom, of sadness, on the faces of the few remaining old pioneer hunt- ers who have spent their early years in hunting wild game and trapping the fur-bearing animals of the Kankakee region.

it is not my purpose to write the whole history of this Kankakee region or to give reminiscenses of all the pioneer hunters that have hunted and fished on the Kankakee, in the years past, as it would take a long time to write it, and it would make volumes.

Many hunters have come here from far off cities, New York, Philadephia, Washington, Bos- ton, Pittsburg, and many near-by cities. I have met and hunied with sportsmen from Europe, and the hunters usually get what they are look- for--plenty of game-~as it was the best hunting ground for all kinds of game birds in the United States. This fact | know, as I have hunted as far north as | could and yet be in the United States, and as far south as the Gulf of Mexico,

10

CATCHING MY FIRST RACCOON and west as far as the Rockies, and I have never yet found a place that equalled the Kankakee Swamps, for the variety oi game to be found there.

To make a long story short, in those days it was the hunters’ and trappers’ paradise, and no wonder he now feels sad at heart when he looks over this once great hunting-ground now the home of the farmer. He can realize how the Redman felt when he had to give up this region to the white hunters.

When about eight years of age we moved to the marsh and lived in a log cabin on Bissel Ridge. In the summer season my father ditched and made hay. The grass was cut with a scythe. After being cured it was hauled out of the marsh ona brush to some knoll or ridge and there stacked. Inthe fall father trapped the fur-bearing animals and shot game for meat, while tending his traps. He would dress the skins at night. | helped getting the bow-stretchers ready and in stringing the dry hides. And when snuffing the candle, na lamps or electric lights were used in

11

' PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE

those days, | would sometimes get sleepy and snuff the wick a little too low and put the light out. A few yards in front of our cabin ran a small creek that spread out over a low marsh, or rather a slough, as they are sometimes called, just below our house. This formed a great -musk-rat pond and was also a great place for wild ducks to nest and rear their young. About a mile above our cabin was another musk-rat pond, and this little creek was its’ outlet, mak- ing it a run-way for the rats from one pond to another. Father gave me two or three old steel traps which had weak springs and which I could set without breaking my fingers, should they happen to get caught between the jaws. I set the traps along the creek where the rats would stop to feed on roots and such vegetation as musk-rats usually feed upon. | caught fifteen rats that fall. One morning I went to my traps and found a raccoon in one of them. My young~ est sister usually went with me to the traps and she was with me this morning. Tosay we were 12

Trapping My First Raccoon. ‘This is one of the wild

animals that dweil on the edge of civilization in the wilds of

the Kankakee, where dwelled the author

CATCHING MY FIRST RACCOON frightened would be putting it in a very mild form. We had nothing to kill the raccoon with, and would probably not have done so had we something with which todo it. My sister hav- ing more courage than |, stayed and watched the coon whilst | ran back home for mother-- father was away tending to his traps--ito come and help kill the coon. With two big clubs my mother andisoon had Mr. Coon’s earthly career ended. It has been more than a half century ago since this happened. I have hunted and trapped some big game since thai time. butnever became quite so excited as on the morning when | caught the first raccon.

The scene that morning will be forever photo- S6raphed on the tablets of my memory. It was at this place I lived when I began my early hunt- ing, commencing to realize the pleasure it af- forded me. But Of course I had no idea of the hardships which existed in it. We resided here about two years anda half. In the meantime my father bought the Bissel stock, consisting of

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE two-fifths of the stock in the Indian Island Saw- mill Company. My grandfather owned five one-hundred dollar shares of stock in the saw- mill company. This he gave to my mother. Our next move was to the Indian Island where I spent the next ten years of my boy-hood days.

I will tell you more in another chapter.

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CHAPTER) II FINDING THE MISSING LINK

THE DISCOVERY OF THE KANKAKEE BY LASALLE, A FUR TRADER MEETING THE POTTOWATTOMIE INDIANS AND FINISHING THE MISSING LINK

Look at the map of Indiana and you will see, up in the left-hand corner of the State, a small stream rising in the southern part of St. Joseph county, which flows in a south-western direction and drains the counties of LaPorte, Starke, Por- ter, Jasper, Lake and Newton. It is also the boundary line between the counties I have men- tioned. Years ago the Kankakee was called the eastern branch of the Illinois river, but that theme has been disproved. The Indian name of the Kankakee, from the two words ‘‘The-Ak (wolf and “A-Ki(land) literally means Wolf-

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Land River, from the fact that many years ago a band of Indians of the Mohican Tribe who cal- led themselves “wolves” when driven from their homes by the Iroquois, took refuge on its banks near the headwaters of the The-A-Ki-Ki. Charlevoix, the French missionary, on his voy- age down the Kankakee river in 1/21, speaks of the wolves. It was from some of these of Indians, whose village was a few miles from the south bend on the St. Joe river, and where now stands the city of South Bend, that the mission- ary recruited his force for his expedition down the Kankakee, the Illinois, and the Mississippi rivers. The Kankakee is the most historical River in the state. Yet there is very little known of its early history, only that the numerous wild animals which made this region their home made the Kankakee an important fur-trading country. Occasionally a hunter's story of see- ing or shooting a deer or wild-cat in the Kanka- kee swamps is read in the newspapers. The river itself, though not a long one, is beautiful,

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FINDING THE MISSING LINK winding through marshes, forests, and long tan- _ gled vines, among its wooded islands, with here and there there an opening in the forest. It spreads its channel for miles and in many places becomes a lonely, lily-fringed lake. Its bed in the sand and clay forms its course to within a few miles of Momence, Illinois, where the rock crops out and forms a great dam across the stream. This dam was partly removeda few years ago at a cost of seventy-five thousand dollars. The Kankakee region was once a heavy timbered country, but the forest fires have greatly reduced its wood districts. The lofty sycamore and the mammoth elm are still to be found on the banks of the Kankakee, as they were during the time when the fur-laden boats of the French glided down the river. In the early history of this continent it was the custom of Spanish explorers to give it some special geographical features by naming the place they discovered after some Saint in a church-calen- der, the day the discovery was made. in this

LY

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE manner it was no trouble to trace the exact course of these explorers along the coast of the continent. It was not so with the French. And for this reason many notes of historical interest, of the early discoveries made by the French have never been written in history. Early in the fall of 1679, LaSalle left the vessel at Green Bay and coasted the shore of Lake Michigan until ‘he arrived at) the mouth’ ‘ol theviae Joseph river. Here he built Fort LaSalle and stayed here most all that winteron account of the ice, to await the arrival of Tonti, an Italian officer whom he had brought with him from France as his lieutenant. There were about forty in all as they left Ft. LaSalle early in the spring, As soon as the ice had gone out ofthe river they ascended the St. Joseph river as far as the south bend about eighty miles, then encamped for a time to await the remainder of the party, which arrived ina few days. Then they took portage across the swamps to the headwaters of the “The-A-Ki-Ki.” (Kankakee.)

18

FINDING THE MISSING LINK

It was LaSalle’s plan and idea, when he leit France and sailed from his home in Rouen to the French possessions in Canada, to accumu- late a fortune by trading European merchandise to the Indians for their furs and pelts which they got along the lakes and northern rivers. With this object in view he explored many lakes and rivers in what is now Indiana, and established trading posts on the frontier. After establishing trading posts, as | have said before, LaSalle traded with the Indians such articles of mer- chandise as guns, ammunition, knives, hatchets, kettles, blankets and beads in exchange for their valuable furs. This was the motto of the Indian “You Can Do Me Gocd--I Do You Good.” The Indians soon learned that the Frenchman was a benefactor and not an enemy, therefore in afew years they were carrying on a big fur trade with the Indians on the northwest frontier. Tradition tells us that every wigwam in those days welcomed the visit of a Frenchman, Hav- ing carried out his plans so far successfully, this

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE celebrated explorer had another object in view. This was to find the link which connected the Sreat inland seas of the north with the waters of the gulf in the south. He had heard of that wonderful river, “The Father of Waters,” which flowed from tne unexplored wilderness in the north far away into the unknown Sunny South. With this object before him he set out on an ex- ploring expedition to find a shorter way that would shorten the world’s commerce between the East and the West and to his idea he had found the missing link which is our own Kanka- kee river.

20

CHA tii it THE MIAMI CONFEDERACY

THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES AT THE BATTLE OF TIPPECANOE WHICH FOREVER SHATTERED THE STRONGHOLD OF THE MIAMI CONFEDERACY

In 18811 made a trip to the Indian territory and the Pottowattomie reservation in Kansas. I visited several tribes of Indians, at that time the Indian affairs were under the control of the Federal Government. The purpose of my visit was to find, if possible, any of the old Pottowat- tomie Indians that at one time inhabited the Mankakee region, that I might be able to learn more of the early history of their hunting grounds on the Kankakee river. I found two very old Pottowattomies that claimed to have lived and hunted on the Kankakee river in their early days.

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE You can not tell how old an Indian is by his looks unless you are acquainted with his habits, but they are octogenarians. At any rate they gave accounts of events that had actually hap- pened when and where treaties had been made. When I spoke of the great tragedy at Fort Dear- born one of the old warriors arose to his feet, threw a blanket around him and began to pace to and fro; finally he said in a saddened voice that he was there. I drew from him some facts that I never before had heard. He told how they felt when Major Irwin passed through the Kankakee swamps, notifying them to be ready to start for their new home beyond the Misssis- sippi river. 1 obtained much valuable informa- tion from those two old warriors. One of them then was ayoung warrior of seventeen summers. He was with Elskwat-awa, the Prophet, when they sent Winamac down the Wabash river to Vincennes where they went in council circle with Gen. Harrison. Later they both fought and were survivors of the Battle of Tippecanoe,

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THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWOTTOMIES which forever shattered the stronghold of the Miami Confederacy. He told how the army was encamped oma tract of marsh land near the river, in the shape of a flat-iron, how they were defeated. There were two men, one white and the other a redman, who worked with all energy to defeat the scheme of Tecumseh and Els-kwat-awa. These were General Harrison and the chief, Winamac. The former sent con- stant messengers from among French settlers of the territory through all this Kankakee region, counseling peace, and hoped through their strength and influence to disarm all hostile feel- ings. At the same time the latter, one of the noblest of his race, devoted all his efforts to se- curing peace, Sometime in May, 1811, a large number of the Pottowattomies from this region assembled ata place called the “Cow Pasture” on the St. Joseph River, and were only prevent- ed from joining the followers of Tecumseh and the Open-Door by the pleading eloquence of the venerable Winamac. A few months later

de

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Tecumseh departed for the South to solicit aid of other tribes to develop his scheme for a great confederacy, While he was gone Open Door sent out messengers to the Pottowattomie’s lands, calling upon the natives to join his forces, A large number of the inhabitants of the Kanka- kee region formed in line of march and passed down through the prairie marshes to the Potto- wattomie Ford, crossed the Kankakee, then on through to the Prophet's town. Winamac was sent to Governor Harrison with a message of peace. This is where the crafty Prophet got in his deceitful work and was now free to effect his purpose. As preparation was made for the war the women and children were sent to the North for safety. Many were hidden in caves in the sand hills along the Tippecanoe River near where the City of Winamac now stands. Others came inlarge numbers tothe Kankakee swamps and remained hidden in its recesses to await the tide of war. Hundreds of defenseless women and children thronged to the shores of our his-

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THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWOTTOMIES

toric river and, waited many weary days of watching and long nights of pain from hunger and fatigue for the return of the braves, many of whom were never tocome. The result of the Battle of Tippecanoe is well known. The be- trayed and defeated Pottowattomies returned to their homes. Many regretted that act against {he whites whilst many others were incited by the crafty British to a desire for revenge and here was laid the plot for another great tragedy, the doom of Fort Dearborn. Less than two years after their defeat at the Battle of Tippe- canoe, the garrison at Fort Dearborn was at- tacked and three-fourths of their number killed. The survivors surrendered with the promise of their captors to spare their lives. This promise was broken. Captain Wells’ horse was shot from under him. As he fell an Indian ran up and stabbed him in the back and he died in the arms of his Pottowattomie friends. The history of the Fort Dearborn massacre is one of the saddest Indian tragedies of the Pottowattomie

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE lands that was ever placed on the pages of his- tory. We will skip a period of eight years over Pottowattomie land. No events of any great importance occured then. Indian Territory be- came a State, Fort Dearborn was again garri- soned. The French held the ascendancy in influence in this region and were held in the highest regard by the Indians. In 1821 the white hunters began to come to the Kankakee region. The day before General Harrison start- ed on his march up the Wabash to meet the Prophet, two young men volunieered to join the army, by the names of Daniel Scott and Mike Haskins. They had a cousin in the army, an officer named Atwood, who was woundedat the Battle of Tippecanoe. Having a broken leg, he was picked up and carried away to the _Kanka- kee swamps, about sixty miles distant, and was cared for by a Squaw, taking the place of her son who had been killed, In 1821 Scott and Haskins came north to the Kankakee region in search of their lost relative. As there was a

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THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWOTTOMIES

large estate to be settled back in Ohio it was necessary to know his whereabouts. Scott and Haskins made every effort to find him alive, if they could, or where he was buried if possible. They brought with them such trinkets as the Indians usually wants, such as pipes, tobacco, knives, needles, etc. They got in with the na- tives by giving them these goods for very little or nothing. By kindness they gained their friendship. Scott opened asiore at Bengaul but when the English come they called it Tass- naugh. This was the first trading post in this region and was an ancient village when the French had established a trading post in long years past, before even the Pottowattomie re- volt. It was on the old Pottowattomie trail lead- ing from the Kankakee River tothe Lakes. In the early summer, after the hunting season was over for the fur bearing animals, the Indians would pack their furs, then with their women and children they would start north for the lakes to meet the French fur trading boats which came

Bi

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE down to the lower lake region to trade with them for their furs. During the summer season they fished and picked berries, as these were what they lived on mostly during the heated seasons. Inthe fall they would return to the Kankakee hunting grounds where one of their main camps was located on a long point of the mainland or ridge that projected far out into the swamp and near the mouth of Sandy Hook. This place was known as “Indian Garden” and hundreds of Indians camped there during the hunting seasons. There was another Indian camping ground a few miles below this on the same side of the river known as the “Indian Is- land,” and of which I will speak later on. Scott having his store on this old Indian trail brought him face to face with hundreds of Pottowatto- mies, while Haskins camped and hunted for nearly two years and was the first white hunter to camp on Indian Island. Scott sold his store to a Frenchman, then he and Haskins returned to the East. They never heard or got trace of

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THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWOTTOMIES their lost relative, As I have said before im- mense fortunes were now made by trading with the Indians in all parts of this country. Early in {821 two men acting in this capacity became well known and remarkable for their wealth and influence through all the Kankakee country. They were Joseph Baille and Pierre F. Navarre. As there is usually in these early time stories a little love and romance, this is what happened to these men. In accordance with the general custom among traders both married daughters of native chieftans. A\fier a time Baille settled on the prairie north ofthe river in what after- wards was Porter county, and near the site of where Valparaiso now stands. The place was called Baily Town and is still a well-known point in Porter county. Navarre settled at Michigan City for a time and then moved to the banks of the St. Joseph River. Mr. Baille, or Bailly as he was generally called, was a native of France. It was in 1822 that he first settled in Bailly Town and for the next eleven years he

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE was the only white man within the country limits. | His family consisted of a wife and four daughters. As the years passed by he became very wealthy, so much so that he purchaseda sloop and was thus enabled to take his children east to give them the advantage of a thorough education and culture. Eleanor. the oldest, took the veil and was for many years Mother Super- ior of St. Mary’s School at Terre Haute, Indiana.

There have been many treaties made with the Pottowattomies. one made in 1832 and one in 1836. By the former treaties the Pottowatio- mies conceded to the United States all ihe country situated between the mouth of the Tip- pecanoe River, running up the fiver twenty-five miles, thence to the Wabash river, thence across to the Vermillion river. This was known as the St. Mary’s Treaty. By this treaty the Kankakee region formed a_ part of the domain of the Pot- towatiomie Indians, although they were of the Miami's Confederacy and the Miamis claimed the land by right of occupancy. The Poitowat-

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THE DEFEAT OF THE POTTOWOTTOMIES tomies held possession when the whites began to settle the country and if was with them that the United States government treatied in 1836. The remainder of the territory now was on_ the Pickamick and Kankakee rivers. The Miamis held claim to all the territory in the northwest part of the State. By the terms of the second and last treaty the Pottowattomies ceded all their lands to the United States Government and agreed to relinquish theterritory when called up- ontodoso. This was called the Mississinawa Treaty and was made on the treaty grounds near the headwaters of the Kankakee. The Potiowattomies left the Kankakee swamps _ for their new home toward the Sunset, to the land that was given them for their own and was theirs as long as the sun shines and the rain falls. But their Great Father at Washington changed his mind and a few years later they were removed to the Indian Territory, The War Department allowed a few to remain, these who had distinguished themselves as friends to the

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE whites during the early Indian iroubles. In i836 a man by the name of Robinson, of French and Indian nationality, was the chief feader, and had absolute control over all the Pottowattomies from the year of 1825. In1836 he assembled his tribes to the number of five thousand near Chicago for the last time. He was known to his people as Chief Che-Bing-Way. I have thus presented an account of the Potiowaito- mie’s land as it appeared at the time of the whites immigration to this region,

CHAPTER IV SETTING STEEL TRAPS THE WHITE MAN SETTLING THE COUNTRY VACATED BY THE INDIANS AND THE FIRST TRAPPER TO SET STEEL TRAPS ON THE KANKAKEE The history of the region of the Kankakee country under the Aborignies is told. The great Miami Republic fell before the Repubiic of the East, and it became the obvious destiny of the nations to yield to the strongest race. The year “53° marked the advent of the first white fami- lies from the East. The first settlers to arrive were the Morgan Brothers, Isaac and William, who came early in the summer from Wayne County‘ Ohio, and settled on a prairie, after- wards known as Morgan Prairie. It is on the east side of Sandy Hook and a few miles from 33

THE PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE the Kankakee river. Two years later my Grandfather Dye came from Holmes County, Ohio, and settled on a prairie on the west side of Sandy Hook, whichis now known as Horse Prairie, He was the first white settler in what is now Boone township. My mother at that time was only five years of age and she remembers seeing many of the Pottowattomies. Her arri- val in the Kankakee country antedating that of my father is more than fifteen years. In the next decade many settlers were found in this part of the country. Game was plentiful and in every cabin was found a rifle or two. From some of these pioneer homes came the early hunters and trappers ofthis story. Hence, ‘The Pfoneer Hunters of the Kankakee” is the title of my story. In the outset of this story I had in mind only a short story of the early trappers and hunters. But I have detoured out over more territory than J] expected. If | were to give a graphic sketch of all the men who have hunted and trapped on the Kankakee it would fill vol- 34

SETTING STEEL TKAPS umes. Therefore I will speak only of a few of the earliest pioneers. As | have said fur traders in those early days became immensely rich and the Kankakee Region in an early day was the greatest hunting ground in the Middle West, especially for the fur-bearing animals. As gold and gems was the magnet that attracted our Hoosier folks to the Far West, so it was the fur trade that brought the early explorers to the Kankakee region. The Indians caught the furs and traded them to the new-comers for trinkets. Then began the greatest trade that this part of Indiana ever knew. New types of persons were brought into existence in the new country by the new trade and it is some of these | am go- ing to tell you about in this new story, as the history of the Kankakee fur trade is one of the brightest pages of its history. In the fall of “45” Harrison Hartz Folsom and Rens Brainard, two young men came from Ohio with their parents. In 1840 they settled on the prairie north of the Kankakee Swamp. Having some idea how a0

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE profitable a business it was trapping the fur- bearing animals, they embarked in that busi- ness. First each of them made a butter-nut dugout. Then they wenl to a blacksmith by the name of Alyes who had settled in this region in the early “30” and had opened a blacksmith shop on his homestead, and who also kept a cross-road store a few miles east of the Indian Town, now Hebron, and engaged him to make them three dozen steel rat-traps at one dollar each, and four two-spring otter traps, or wolf traps as they are sometimes called, at three dol- lars each. These were the first steel traps made and set in the Kankakee country. On the first of October they launched their dugouts and trapping outfit off Coal Pitt Island, asmall island in the north marsh where for many years Jones and Smith had their charcoal pits. They pad- dled their dugouts up the marsh along the tim- ber line until they came to North Bend. In the early days it was called Flag Pond but was known to the old river men as North Bend from

36

SETTING STEEL TRAPS the fact that at this point fhe Kankakee flows the farthest north of its entire course. At this point there is an opening through the timber to the river. They ascended the river a few miles. When night came upon them they landed on a small ridge near the mouth of Crooked Creek. They soon had a frail camp anda glowing camp fire. | When they landed on the ridge Brainard shot two young fox squirrels and with what pro- visions they had brought with them they soon had a good supper. After supper they gathered up some withered herbage, spread their blankets and lay down for a night's rest in the lone, si- lent, solitary, stillness of the Kankakee swamps, to be lured to sleep by the hoot-owl, the howl- ing of the wolves and the splashing ofthe musk- rats in the water near the camp. This was the first night’s experience of two of the oldest trap- pers in years of service on the Kankakee. On the following day they set out their traps and looked for a suitable place to build their shanty. Mr. Folsom took part of the traps and went up 37

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE the river. Brainard took the remainder and went down stream, They returned to camp in the afternoon and reported their trip and pros- pect of a building site. Brainard had found a beautiful small island near the river on a bayou which he thought would be a very suitable spot for a shanty. Folsom, on his hunt up stream, had found the material to build the shanty. He had found an old wigwam made of puncheon and barks, well dried and smoked. In a short time they had a cozy little trappers’ shanty on an island they named “Little Paradise,” which is yet known by that name itoday. This was the first American trapper’s shanty on the Kan- kakee that I have any knowledge of. There were a few French huts and traders’ shanties along the borders of the swamp regions for the purpose of trading and trafficing with the Indians and the early hunters. Twenty years prior to the building of the shanty on Paradise Island the fall catch of furs at Little Paradise proved a success, The sale of furs brought something

38

Pioneer Trapper’s Shanty on Little Paradise Island, where

the first steel traps were set on the Kankakee in 1845

in:

Ree sce at

ee es

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SETTING STEEL TRAPS over one hundred and twenty-five dollars. They invested part of the money in more traps and in the following winter built a shanty on Little Beach Ridge in which they shantied for four seasons. On this ridge they found a hunter's shanty occupied bya man named Ritter, who had built it the year before, in 1846. In 1851 Folsom and Brainard buista shanty on Long Ridge which they used until1806. Then they sold out and left Long Ridge. Folsom then went into partnership with William Granger, They built a cabin on Red Oak. This cabin was burned in “73.” They rebuilt it the fol- lowing year and used it until he retired frem the trapping business in 1885, having spent a third of a century in the Kankakee swamps. Uncle Harl Seymour, as he was calied, who had been with him for many years, continued trapping the Red Oak ground until old age compelled him to quit. He left his island home on the Kan- kakee and spent the remaining years of his life at the home ef Mr. Folsom at Hebron, Indiana. oh

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Brainard, who was with Folsom on his early expeditions on the river and when he sold out on Long Ridge, built ashanty on Grape Island, where he trapped for several years. Then he trapped the Little Beach ground for three or four years. Finally he quit trapping altogether about thirty years ago. Folsom and Brainard were the pioneer trappers who first sat steel traps on the Kankakee River over seventy-five years ago, The next decade found many hunt- ers and trappers along the Kankakee swamps. In the fall of 1847 Mose Summers and John Dusenberg glided down the winding Kankakee in skiffs with a trapping outfit and Janded at Long Ridge, built a shanty which was the first trappers shanty on the Ridge. They used this shanty for a number of years. Leaving Long Ridge they shaniied on a number of islands be- tween English Lake and Momence, Illinois. This same year Joel Gilson built a log shanty on Long Ridge and followed the trapping business for many years. He had two sons who also

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SETTING STEEL TRAPS were trappers and trapped many years after their father had-retired. There was another old time hunter whose locks were as white as the driven snow when | first knew him. He had settled on Long Ridge in the Fall of 1838, and dug a cave in the side of the Ridge where he lived for many years. rifty years ago-this old hunter was known as Uncle Frank Sweny. He was the oldest residential hunter and trapper on the ‘river, having commenced hunting on the Kankakee as early as 1833. William Bissell, one of thepioneer seitlers of Porier county, spent much time hunting on the Kankakee in the early days. In the early Fall of 1847 Heck Goodridge and his brother John built a shanty on French Island. This was the first American trappers shanty. The French and_ Indian hunters had settled on this island many years before the arrival of the Goodridges and from whence it derivedits name. I will give more of its early history later on. Ini852 John Broady an early pioneer of this region, began trapping

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE on Sandy Hook, also he trapped the Crooked Creek Claim. Later on he owned the Indian Garden trapping ground which he sold to Sam- uel Irvin in the early seventies. Mr. Broady was a very successful hunter and trapper He never trapped any after selling out his claims but continued hunting on the Kankakee up to the time of his death which occured in 1878 from a severe cold from the effects of getting wet by falling through the ice in a bayou, on a very cold day whilst hunting deer, Mr. Broady was widely known as a deer hunter, having led | many hunting parties through the swamps in those early days. It was about this time that my father came to the Kankakee region and for many years he and Mr. Broady were hunting partners and have been together on many deer hunts through the KankakeeSwamps. In 1852 Gideon Alyea, son of the old trap maker, built a shanty on Butter Nut Ridge and trapped this ground for many years. Leaving the Butter Nut he built a shanty on what is now knewn as 42

SETTING STEEL TRAPS Shanty Island. He also built a shanty on Fryes Island and one on Cornell’s Upper Island. He followed the business until old age com- pelled him to retire. In 1847 William--Uncle Bill--Adams, with his parents, settled near He- bron and five years later he went in the swamps as a shanty boy witn Mr. Folsom, handling furs. Two years later he went intothe trapping busi- ness for himself and in “61” he answered the calé to the Colors and served his country up to the close of the war. fKeturning home he went into the swamps again hunting and trapping un- til some time in the 90's, when he retired. In 1850, Isaac Cornell built a log cabin on Cor- nell’s Island for rail makers who were making rails for him and a few years later an old Indian lived in it and hunted game. In the early 50’s Hunter Rice and Harman Granger built a shanty on a small ridge lying between Red Oak and Bucks Ridge, known as Rice’s Ridge, and for many years it was used as a trapper’s shanty. Many years ago there were some deer hunters 43

~

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE camped on this ridge and there was an old ca- noe there that they would cross the river in to hunt, as there were rmore deer on the north side than on the south side. | One man in the party became dizzy-headed and sea-sick so easily that ihey had to lay him down in the bottom of the canoe and sit on him to keep him from fall- ing out. BOA,

Bucks Ridge was for many years the home of the Brockways. They werea very interesting family, consisting of a father and mother, two sons, a beautiful daughter and a little boy eight or ten years old. They had settled there many years before and seemed to enjoy their wild life, as they were hunters and trappers. From them we obtained some potatoes and corn bread. The youngest of the hunting party fell in love with this young damsel and we thought it was going to be a match, but they did not come to time. They parted with many bitter tears, never to meet again as the mother would not part with her darling child.

A wy

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SETTING STEEL TRAPS

After having a good time we all returned home, proud, with plenty of game. Many were the hunts I took after that. I have often thought of what became of that pretty, fair-haired girl of the Kankakee, and for all I know she may be with the angels in Heaven, as | have not heard from the Brockways since, In the language of Maud Muller, “Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest of these, it might have been,”

CHAPTER V DIVIDING THE GAME KILLING DEER WITH PITCHFORKS AND CORN KNIVES ON BOGUS ISLAND AND HOW WE HUNTED AND DIVIDED GAME IN PIONEER DAYS In the cold winter of 1838, many years before Beaver Lake in Newton County, Indiana, was. drained, there was an island at the west end of the lake called Bogus Island from the fact that it wds the home of the outlaws and despera- does. Bosus Island, as this island has been known for many years, was the last refuge of the counterfeiters of the picturesque era of our Kankakee life. Here, until comparatively re- cent years, the robber, the counterfeiter, the horse thief, the highwayman of the swamps and the “bad man’ of the frontier found safe retreat A6

DIVIDING THE GAME

in this partly wooded island and in the rolling waters of this beautiful lake. Even the Federa] officers in pursuit were baffled here. For years the outlaws lived in safety on wild game and at times would raid the country-side to look at a pioneer’s horse. With the draining of Beaver Lake, Bogus Island entered upon its final des- tiny, The island ai one place was only about a quarter of a mile from the mainland. In the dry season the water was very shallow and all kinds of game: deer, wolves and fox, could wade or swim to the island. The cold winter froze the lake over and the ice around the island was slick ‘and glaring. with the island full of deer, wolf and much small game. Well all old hunt- ers know that deer or any other cloven-footed animal, when chased, cannot stand or run on Slary or slick ice. Consequently they are at the mercy of anyone who comes along. Notice was sent out far and wide over the prairies and sand ridges and hunters’ cabin along the Kan- kakee. Allen Dutcher, Raus Allen, Sam Har-

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE rison, Bill Thayer, Sam McFadden and many other pioneer hunters whose names | have for- gotten were there. S.L. McFadden was there with his father and was only twelve years old. In his narrative of the hunt, as he related it to me, he said: “I will never forget it as | came near freezing io death going home from the hunt and we got so deer that we could not take care of them or get them home as we had no means of conveyance in those days. We carried some but pulled the most of them out on a hand-sled. As | have said before, the island was alive with deer. The hunters, trappers and squatiors gathered in with guns. The old cap and ball rifle were used. With dogs, clubs, tomahawks, pitchforks and corn-knives the massacre com- menced at early morning and ait sundown the battle closed. The crowd consisted of about twenty-five men and boys and two women. One of the women killed a deer with a pitch- fork. The party in all killed sixty-five deer, seven wolves and two or three foxes, Wolves

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DIVIDING THE GAME

and foxes can run on glary ice so many of them sot away, and fully as many deer got away as were killed, by slipping and sliding towards the shore. There were so many that they could not kill them all at once, consequently that gave many a chance to escape, Only one man was hurt in the fight and he would have been killed by a big buck had he not been rescued in time. The buck was killed with acorn knife. The wounded hunter was placed on a litter and car- ried to his cabin on the Kankakee at what was at that time known as Harrison's Landing. After years the place was called Thayers and was near where the Grangers years after had their trapping shanty on Grape Island. We used to camp near their cabin on the river many years after the big hunt on Bogus Island. That deer hunt beat the world. Now! am going to tell you how we used to hunt and divide the game. After the hunt is all over the most in- teresting of all is the dividing of the game on the square. Sometimes there is a great deal ci

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Skull-dugery in the matter and you have got to keep your eyes skinned and look out for break- ers. Now for the mode of dividing the spoil. Before shot-guns were in use and rifles were all the go, hunters’ law was that the men who drew first blood took the hide and half the meat, but when shot-guns came in vogue and all had to drive and shoot to kill the deer we thought that the old Jaw as to rifles was not just. So we held a Council. of War on the Kankakee one time and, after mature deliberation, we changed it and decided that in hunting altogether with shot-guns and rifles, the man who drew first blood was entitled to the hide but the meat and game should be divided equally among. all. When we got ready to divide, the game is divid- ed in as many shares as there are hunters. One turns his back to the game and another points at each pile in turn and also asks whose it is. And the one with his back turnea says who is entitled to the pile or bunch pointed at. But sometimes a heavy accent of signal by the one

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DIVIDING THE GAME who points out is understood by the man whose back is turned... They sometimes give them- selves the best pile of game. And | am sorry to say that I have sometimes beena victim of misplaced confidence in that way and cheaied out of my fair share of the game. But there was no use to squeal about it as they would only laugh yeu out of it and say that you ought to have better luck. Ihave told you how we killed deer and divided game. Now one great question among us was in reference to siill or noisy hunting. The Indians always still hunt, that is they keep perfectly quiet and motionless and wait for the game to come along. Or they sneak quietly upon the game. |! learned this mode of hunting with the Indians on the Wesi- ern plains, hunting buffalo and antelope in the open country many yearsago. You can hunt with an Indian all day and he willscarcely say -a word. With over fifty years experience in hunting both in the forest and in the open coun- try | must say that the white man must take off

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE his hat to the Red Man when it comes to the scientific mode of hunting wild game. As a matter of course in driving. in thickets, marshes

_and ridges we had to make all the noise we could to get the deer out. But this was the question. In coming in at night a majoriry of the hunters would heave loads in their guns, in the day of the muzzle loader, all night and get up in the morning before daybreak and fire them off, wakening the whole country for miles around for the purpose of cleaning their guns and put- ting fresh loads in so they would not miss fire. Whilst | contended that doing so in the morning put every deer within hearing of the camp on the alert and look out for danger, and the least noise we made in the morning was the best. But a majority decided against me but | never gave up. A gun well taken care of will not miss fire if not shot off for a week, 1 never did like to hunt with a noisy camp and I most always got the most game by keeping still, One time in moving camp two of the party decided to take a 52

DIVIDING THE GAME near cut and hunt through the woods and join the camp at night, Butthey got lost and we fired signal guns and built a big fire. Finally they arrived long after night, tired and weary and almost exhausted. Whilst the men were lost three wild geese flew over thein. They fired several shots and succeeded in bringing down one. After hunting for it for some time they found it had fallen in an old deserted well of some hunter or trapper, perhaps the only one around for miles. They brought it into camp, that is the goose not the well, and we moralized on the subject. They might try for one thous- and years to kill a wild goose and have it fall into that well again and not succeed. Now was it Providence or Chance that governed in this case? While | want to be a Christian and be- lieve everything that is good and true I could understand specia! Providence thai I hear talked so much about. In some cases a man a hali inch too far away is killed and another half an inch another escapes. And by the least little

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE thing men and women and pocr, little, innocent children, through no fault of-theirs. are killed. And others by the most trifling thing escape. I have seen the meanest and wickedest person have a splendid and beautiful day for their funeral and I have seen the friends of the Lerd poor and the good Christian people almost frozen to death or drowned in burying their dead. The great moral question with me is, was this earth gotten up especially for the benefit of Men, or was it only an after-thought. The revolution of the sun, moon and siars are perfect toa second. But when we come down to the law Soverning our little Earth we all imperfection, one law creating, another desiroying. It is noth- ing but a war of the elements anda law of des- truction between every living thing. There is no safety or security in any place or thing. It is Said what a beautiful act of Providence it was that He created one set of animals and birds to keep one another set down or the world would - be over-run with them. This is about the way

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DIVIDING THE GAME with some of the human family, destroying one another with war and murder while Providence with pestilence, famine and accidents keeps the human family from over-running the earth. I have noticed when a vessel goes down at sea, loaded down with precious freight, that Provi- dence always seems to be on ithe side of the strongest who are good swimmers, whilst the poor helpless women and little children are lost. If Providence had anything to do with it He would have kept the boat from going down, Seme years ago ona western railroad’ a pas- senger train conveying a large number of Di- vines to a Conference or Synod ran aver some cattle on a high grade and threw the cars down a steep enbankment. Fortunately no one was killed and the Divines came out with a card thanking Providence for theirsafety. The su- perintendent also came out witha card and said ~ that if Providence had anything to do with it He would have kept the cattle off the track in the first place. So you see how it goes. In my 55

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE > hunting experience for many years I have found more special cases of special Providence for the animals and birds than I ever saw for the human family. Iwill tell you of a stubbed tailed brindle dog that belonged to one of the party. Whilst out hunting he ran the deer out of a thicket to me and I did not shoot for laughing at one of the boys who was so excited that he could not shoot because the deer ran within a few yards of him. Just at that time the thought cameto him that he had left camp without any bullets. His father was some distance away when he called aloud: “Daddy, have you got the bullets?” This frightened the deer and he turned toward me. The dog came up, looked me inthe face as much to say, “Aint you ashamed of yourself fer letting that deer get away?” And he turned and left me as other friends had left me before, and would not drive any more deer to me until [had redeemed myself. I willtell you how that was done. Another time we were out hunting and as I was on the left flank half a mile from the

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DIVIDING THE GAME

rest of the party I heard anoise and looking around I saw a large buck coming straight to- ward me and the dog right after him, He came up to within fifty yards of me and then turned off to the left. I got up out of the grass, gave him both barrels and saw every shot strike him in the side. Heran about seventy yards and tumbled. The dog came up and saw wnat | had done and looked me inthe face and wagged his srub-tail as much as to say, “You are a bully boy with a glass eye and have done the right thing this time and I will stand by you.” And he did, He stayed with me all that day. Some say that animals have instinct only and not sense. Talk about instinct, Here isa gen- uine, clear, solid sense and no fooling about it. I believe that some animals have sense and reasoning faculties as well as the human family and far excel them in some things, protecting. their young and obtaining food and shelter for them. I will now relate the nearest special providence and sense in any animal that | ever

i

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE saw. This is the young fawnor deer. When it comes forth it is the most helpless thing in the world and the least animal in the world could kil it. And now comes the most wonderful! part of all and is true as holy writ. From the time the fawn is born until it is able to run it has no scent orsmell. All kinds of ferocious ani- mals, wolves, wild-cats, dogs, will pass it within a few feet and will-not detect it unless they see it. The fawn lies in the most secluded and out of the way places imaginable, and will lie per- fectly still all day without moving, in the same place where its mother left in the morning. The doe stays near and watches it all night but leaves it early in the morning and stays away all day, only returning at nightfall to suckle and nourish it, knowing full well that if found near it in day lime her presence might lead to its dis- covery. But what a wonderful provision is providence, sense or instinct that keeps that little helpless animal still, away from its: mother allday. You may pass within a few feet of

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DIVIDING THE GAME

them and they will not move. Father told me that while hunting on the North Marsh he stepped over two of them in the grass before they ran, whilst he was looking for a squirrel fox. If you find one when very young you can pick it up and carry it a short distance and then let it down and it will follow you home like a dog and become very tame. Another time we were hunting and the dog ran a deer out ofthe thicket and we all fired and wounded it, making enough noise to drive all the deer out of ithe country. We followed the wounded deer a short distance and got it, After hunting around for awhile we started for camp. In the evening our route to camp took us by the same thicket from which we started the deerin the morning. We were scattered out, tired and weary, taking our time to it. One of the party was some distance be- hind and near the thicket in the marsh. On turning around I saw him aiming at something ten or fifteen feet from him in the grass. He fired and killed what he supposed was a rabbit, .

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE but he came to find out that itwas a young deer that had hidden there al! day in the grass near the thicket where we had fired three shots in the morning. All this noise and firing had not disturbed it or made it move, and this is more than a young of the human family could have done without squalling and making a fuss, So it is with the birds. The same special Provi- dence that guides and protects the animals does likewise to the feathery tribes. Rambling through the woods and over the marshes one often finds a covey of quail or a brood of pheasants. To see how the mother bird pro- tects her young; she will flop and flutter to at- tract your aitention from the young birds so that you would think she had both wings broken, fluttering just far enough to keep out of your reach, long enough for the young birds to skulk away and hide in the grass, Take a stroll through the woods in the Springtime and you will smile at the swinging birds with your wise, amused pity, who builds her tiny nest with such

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DIVIDING THE GAME

laborious care, high up out on the meving tree top, only to be blown away by the chilly autumn winds. But are not the homes of the human family, the sweetest homes of our tenderest love built upon just as insecure a foundation, han¢g- ing over some mysterious depths, and rocked to and fro only to be swept away into ruin. And yet He who has provideda balmy South as a refuge for the summer birds to which they can fly, has He not provided likewise a shelter for the human family? I might write a book on “Special Providence for Animals and Birds” but I will leave that for the naturalist,

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CHAPTER MY FIRST BOAT RIDE MY FIRST FISHING TRIP TO THE KANKAKEE AND MY FIRST BOAT RIDE AND EARLY EXPERIENCES WITH A SHOT GUN To shorien up a story that is already too long is somewhat of atask. When I found that I have considerable more material than! can in« sert in this little book and unless i cut out some. of the details there is dangers of slopping over: Therefore, | will have to hold myself down to the mere facts. Since the .newspapers and magazines have been offering prizes for the best fish stories some of the anglers have caught bigger fish stories than they did fish. Just see what this angling game is coming to when a man has to make an affidavit and give advance - no- 62

MY FIRST BOAT RIDE

tice he is telling the truth before he dare open his mouth aboui fishing, Just because my pencil happened to slip once when I was de- scribing a fisning trip on the Coitenwood River in Northern Minnesota many years ago is no sign | cannot tell the nude, naked truth ii! try hard enough. lam and always have been a “dyed” in the wool crank on fishing ever since boyhood. I! began my first fishing in a small creek that ran near our cabin. My first fishir

outfit consisted of a red willow pole.a sho nes line and a bent pin fora hook. Grasshoppers, grub worms and angle worms were the bait. Chubs and sun-fish were the kind of fish I caught, ifany. Sometimes [ would. go fishing at night for cat-fish, and do very well until tha: big swamp owl would hoot “Who are you,” and that would end my fishing for that night. The summer that | was eight years old Father took me wrth him to the Kankakee. We were fish- ing from the bank at North Bend, which | have mentioned before Whilst we were fishing Mr.

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Samuel Irvin, a ee came floating down the river in a skiff. This was the first water craft I had everseen. Mr. Irvin landed his boat and he and father, being old friends, sat on the bank in the shade talking whilst | was fishing part of the time and climbing swamp trees until I got tired. Finally | made known my desire to ride in one of those things--the boat. Father told me to get in and sit down in the bottom of the boat. | did and then he got into ihe boat and snoved it out into the stream. We went down around the bend and back to where we started, i have often thought of sitting in the bottom of the boat and grasping the sides so tight that I dented the sides of the boat with my fingers io keep from falling out when there was no danger of falling out unless the boat upset. This was my first fishing trip to the Kankakee River and my first boat ride. Near this same place fifty years later Father ran me on my last duck hunt- ing trip on the Kankakee. He was then over four-score years of age, yet he could handle a

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MY FIRST ‘BOAT RIDE hunting boat then as weil as he did when he gave me my first boat ride. Among the earliest recollections of my boyhood hunting with a gun are a few of my firstshots. In1869 Fathers bought a new heavy number ten double-barrel muzzle-loading shot gun. Breach-loaders were not so numerous then asnow. [t was so heavy that | could not hold it to load or shoot. Yet | was anxious to shoot it once. One day I was out in the woods near the house gsthering hick- ory nuts and the dog treed a black squirrel. rather was home and | got him to let me shoot it. He put in a light load as the squirrel was on a small tree and not very high up. Then put- ting his thumb around a small bush and _ letting his fingers open, lying the gun on his fingers against the bush, which madea good rest, he soon initiated me in the mysteries of handling a gun. He told me to look along the barrel until [ saw the squirre], then to pull the trigger, This I did. Bang! The recoil knocked me down. When I got up my nose was bleeding quite free- 65

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE ly, but I went and picked up my squirrel. Father said I was initiated. | am sure it was a labor of love onhis part and | made repeated progress under his tutoring. That same Fall I began my practicing on wing shots, Near our house and between the main land and swamp timber was a strip of open marsh. This was a great fly- way for ducks, from the north bend of the river across to Sandy Hook. One afternoon I took the gun out on this fly-way, hid behind some pucker bush, shot and killed the first duck that came along which happened to be a Grey Mal- lard or Greenhead. I waded out in the marsh. The water was about two feet deep and cold, as it was late in November. It was the proudest moment in ‘my. life. ‘}, took. the: duck ‘toithe house, Father being away from home. Mother wanted to have it for supper but I would not have it that way. 1 wanted Father to see it, feathers and all. As [| have said, it was the proudest moment,of my life when I showed the bird to my Father, It was my first game bird. 66

MY FIRST BOAT RIDE My boyish heart swelled with pride. My great- esi desire had been gratified. I found I had ac- quired the “knack” and from that time on I be- came a “wing shot.” I was the only boy in the neighborhood that could shoot “flying.” I was Greatly envied by my boy chums. Many of them were much older than I, so much so that one day | overheard one of our neighbors say to his wife, ‘““Werich will ruin that boy by letting him run around totting a gun all the time. They’da darn sight better keep him at work doing some- thing worth while.” A few years later when breech loaders became more plentiful Father bought one and gave me the old muzzle loader, or rather I traded him an old watch for it. The gun and I became inseperable and I would keep it in the parlor if my wife would have permitted it. {1 thought so much of that old gun that in 1884 I carried it across the Western Plains to the foothills of the Rockies fer the purpose of shooting wild game. as it was the best gun to throw coarse shot that | ever saw. For double 67

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE BB and swan shot it could not be beat and for buck shot it was a daisy. It would chamber three number one buck shot and nine made a load. Firing two shots into a bunch of ante- _ lope at eighty or a hundred yards certainly made the hair fly. Returning home the following year “85° I cleaned up the old gun and have not loaded it since. That has been more thana third’ of a century ago. Father had promised to take me duck hunting with him in the swamps just as soon as | could shoot “flying.” Many a hunting trip on the Kankakee River he has shoved me and | have witnessed many remark- able shots as well as many poor ones. Father is aman who made but little show of his emo- tions but I could see a change in his eye when- ever I made a good shot, and | knew he was as well pleased as | was. [heard Bill Adams whisper to Jerome Rathborn one time when they were stopping at our place on a duck hunt: “That boy of John’s can shoot like the very de- vil and if he keeps on improving by the time he

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MY FIRST BOAT RIDE is fifteen he will be the champion shot on the Kankakee.” On my last hunting trip on the Kankakee, Father was with me, as mention has been made, and was running the boat, when | made two of the. most remarkable wing shots ever made in all my hunting experience. We were going through the mouth of old Sandy Hook when a pair or blue wing teels came fiy- ing past about two feet above the water, As all old-time duck hunters know, a teel is the hard- est bird to hit of the duck family on account of darting and zigzaging in their flight. I pulled down on them with the right barrel of the gun as they were a long way off and to my surprise they both fell dead, The same moring over in Cornell's Bayou | made another wonderful double shot. We were coasting down the bayou and Father was manipulating the paddle and I the hardware when a pair of mallards rose up out of the timber to my right. The brush was so thick that I could not get sight of either of them until they flew out into the opening. By 69

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAK EE this time they were a long way off, too far to shoot at using good judgment, But I decided to iry them. Giving the gun considerable eleva- tion I pulled the trigger and greatly to my aston- ishment both fell, one dead, the other winged, and before I could give the crippled one the other barrel it skulked off in the pucker brush and I lost it. As I have said betore, my Father was at this time over four-score years, and at this writing, 1920, is in his nintieth year. He continued his hunting until the infirmities of age removed him from the swamps. This day fin- ished our shooting. I returned to my home in logansport, Indiana, and before the duck hunt- ing season opened again I lost my right arm at the shoulder ina railroad accident. This was my last hunt on the Kankakee and for this rea- son | mention this incident. The reader willre- member in the opening chapter that! set steel traps and caught wild game long before I was large enough or old enough to carry a gun, hav-= ing in all spent over a half century in hunting

70

JOHN WERICH—Born in 1830. The oldest pioneer hunter living, now in his 90th year. Began hunting on the Kankakee in 1852. A few months before this book went to press he shot and killed a tiger cat that measured forty inches long and stood seventeen inches high, the first one ever seen in the Kankakee swamps. supposed to have escaped from some menagerie.

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MY FIRST BOAT RIDE and trapping on the Kankakee.

CHAPRTERUWH HUNTERS WHO HAVE BUCKFEVERED GUNS THAT HAVE SPASMS AND HUNTERS THAT HAVE

THE BUCK FEVER One more story and it will conclude the series of incidents in deer hunting. But all of this isa maiter of history to the man who has tramped the woods for years. It is only repeating old stories to tell of the deer that ran too fast for you to shoot. I once saw a tenderfoot hunter jump up a deer at close range and he stood and watched the deer until it was out of sight before he realized he had a gunin his hands. And so it is with others; the duck that always flew be- hind the hunter as he sat on a musk rat house in-a slough and could not turn around, or of the

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HUNTERS WHO HAVE BUCKFEVERED flock of wild geese that had litin the pond in the cow pasture that day he had no gun, Ifyou had pressed your nose against the pane and peeped through the window of a little log hunt- ing camp on an island near Sandy Hook, say about eight p. m.,on a November evening forty- two years ago, you would have candle-lighted three young men sitting around an old cook stove. Two ofthe men were pulling on old clay pipes, and each was at peace with the world as faras| know. [Let me introduce you to them. In the opposite picture that guy standing by the stove but usually sitting down in the easiest chair (an old cracker box) to be found in camp, and absorbing the most heat, is my friend Bill Garrison, whom | brought along on his first deer hunting expedition in the Kankakee swamps, Leave it to “Bill” He always grabs the big- gest potato in ihe dish and the huskiest wedge of pie on the plate, and always gets the softest seat in camp. The tall, lanky, leather-faced gink sitting on the woodpile behind the steve,

13

THE PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE dressing a musk-rat hide is Jolly Smith, an all- around camper and fur-dresser and _ flap- flap flipper, head cook and dish washer, trapper, fur-trader, and a good trailer. {| should say off hand that Jolly stands about seventy-three inches in his socks, and when he stretches his neck to rubber after game he is taller’n that.

There isn’t an ounce of superflous flesh on him. In fact, there isn’t much flesh of any kind. Jolly is so thin he would have to stand a long time in bright sun to make a decent shadow. You can see his back from the front if you stare hard enough and I reckon an expectorate who would put alittle velocity into his work could spit a hole through Jolly three times out of five. But anybody who picks up Smith for a weak-kneed hunter on a long run makes a mistake. On the trail he is tougher than a boiled owl. The other suy sitting in front of the stove with a bar of lead, laddle and bullet molds, running bullets that hunter is--well, [m too modest to say who itis. All I will say is that there were three of us

74

HUNTERS WHO HAVE BUCKFEVERED

in the party. Ihave already described two, so you can draw your own conclusions as to the identity of the third, Thenext morning it was clear and cold, the shallow water around the edges of the swamps was frozen over. We had decided to drive the ridges so one of our party was to take the dog and go up the river on the south side to the flats. Perhaps | ought to ex- plain a little what is meant by the flats. Many French and Spanish words have become incor- porated with the English in America that one hardly knows the name of things and places by their right names. The flats is a high, dry swamp, that part of the swamp that is seldom under water except in extremely high-water times. These flats are covered with heavy tim- ber of swamp-oak. In the Fall and early winter they are a great place for deer to feed by noz- zling in the leaves and snow for acorns. And that was the head of the ridges and almost a sure place for the dog to take up airail. On

account of freezing up, the deer would run the Wis

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE flats and ridges and they would have to be chased hard before they would run the low swamps. Big Beech Ridge was to be my stand and Garrison on the west end of Peach Island. Smith took the dog to the flats andhad no more than got on them when the dog took up a trail. Just after sunrise | reached the east end of the ridge only to see two hunters coming up from the Other side. We were strangers, | had never met either of them before, but I never stand on ceremeny with a sporisman. An acquaintance was soon struck up between us. They were from South Bend, Indiana, and had a camp on Goose Island. One of the hunters was a ¢grey- haired man, probably sixty-five years of age, and claimed to be an old deer hunter who had hunted and killed deer with the Indians when the Kankakee Swamps were yet the hunting grounds of the Poitowattomies, His partner was much younger. [he eld hunter was one of those fellows that thought he knew it all and what he did not know about deer hunting was

76

HUNTERS WHO HAVE BUCKFEVERED not worth knowing. The young hunter looked with great admiration upon his older companion and would do anything that he directed. They had sent their dogs up the swamps. They said that all but one were young dogs and that the old dog did not amount to much. Our dog was a good one, the best I ever hunted with, a good tounger and swift on the trail. They were all the time bragging and boasting on their dog “Spot” for being agood runner. | tried te get them to agree with me on what would be the re- sult if their dog should bring a deer to this point and | should kill it, or if my dog should chase one or more to them and if they should kill it. But they did not want to discuss the subject so it was dropped. A fire was built in the end of an old butternut log and we stood around it and listened for the dogs. We were on the east end of the ridge and ina hollow. On each side of the hollow the bluff is very steep. The hollow was about seventy-five or eighty yards wide. If a deer was headed for this ridge from ihe east it

vin

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE would run this hollow to get on the ridge. My number ten muzzle-loader, loaded with buck- shot, rested against a tree. The old hunter's gun was a double combination of shet rifle gun, ten guage shot and 30-30 rifle. The young hunter was using a cap and ballrifle. Their Suns were leaning against the log. We were sitting around the fire, as it was a cold morning, listening for the dogs when suddenly from away eff up the ridges came the silvery voice of a hound. But only for a moment was he heard as he crossed from one ridge to another on the way to Peach Island. A moment and again the bugle notes rang out and warned us that the deer was running the north ridges and would come to this point where we were stationed. The music told us that the dog had reached Peach Ridge about a mile away. Whose dog was making the noise was the question that none of us could tell, but each imagined that he could diatinguish the voice of his favorite dog. One thing | was sure of and that was that there |

18

HUNTERS WHO HAVE BUCKFEVERED was but one dog in the chase. About half a mile up the swamp we heard the crack of a rifle four times in succession. We gave up right then and there that somebody had got our deer and that we weren't init. I sat down on the log again by the fire. The dog was running yet and I told Mr. Spencer, as that was his name, that there was some hope for us yet as the dogs were still running. For the tounging of the hound was coming closer all the time. Just then we heard two reports of a shot gun in rapid firing and I knew it was Garrison for I can tell when he is shooting because he always shoots his “second” barrel first, referring to his quickness with his second shot. Following this we heard the crack of a rifle and again four shots had been fired and yet the hound was coming on towards us. Two or three times since the dog had reached Peach Ridge had | urged my companions fo sit down or conceal themselves so that the deer would not be turned. But Mr. Know-it-all and don't-want-

We

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE to-take-advise-from-a-country-greenhorn refus- ed. I told him that advice from a _ country Sreenhorn was about as good as that of a city tenderfoot and that their- actions do not show very much skill as a deer hunter. I spoke to them again, “Boys, that deer is coming straight to this hollow and will be here in less than three minutes. let us act like hunters and get be- hind the log.” Just then | saw the deer coming from the other side of the ridge straight to this stand, a big buck, and it was right upon us with- in twenty-five yards and running like a racer, sailing over old logs and brush with the ease of a bird. At this I fired one barrel and at another leap the deer was behind an old tree so! could not give him the other barrel. The young hunt- er grabbed up his gun and fired. The deer at this time was less than a hundred feet from him. te missed fire and the deerran around to the other side of the ridge and while doing this the man with the rifle-shot gun firedtwo shots and ef course missed. By this time I gave him my

80

HUNTERS. WHO HAVE. BUCKFEVERED | second barrel as he disappeared into a_black- berry thicket seventy-five yards. away. We all looked dumfounded while we reloaded our guns and finally something was. said about old “Spot,”. But the first dog. that came up was my old dog “Trump,” His eyes were ablaze with excitement and I called eut “here Trump” and with a look of surprise the grand oid dog recognized me. Wagging his tail he came up to me to be approved. Meanwhile Mr. Spencer had gone to where the deer had turned past us and found great splotches of blood on the leaves. The dog took up the trail and in a short time brought the buck back by meat the rate of a mile a minute. I was on the top of the slope while the deer ran the edge of the ridge below me. My fusee banged out twice: I held right on that-big buck at about one hundred and filly feet away and the buck kept right on going. Whang-bang went the rifle-shot-gun of the hunt- er who knows just how to do it,. . The deer was not more than a hundred feet from him and not

81

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANK AKEE a ball or a shot touched him. Thedog was giv- ing him a very close chase and when his toung- ing suddenly ceased | knew what had happen- ed. A moment later | had my hunting knife into the buck’s neck long before the firstclass deer hunter came up. Then the question was, who shot the deer. On examining it, it was found that he had been hit in the shoulder by one buck shot, from my first shot, on the first round as he was running right side to me. He ran until he tumbled over. The three of us had fired nine shots and | learned afterwards it was the same deer that had passed three hunters and that there had been ten shots fired at it be- fore it reached us, making in all nineteen shots in less than ten minutesand only one bullet had pierced his hide. Bad shooting secured for us lots of excitement and fun, A_ reminiscence | Shall always remember. There are a class of hunters that have a faculty of forgetting their un- pleasant experiences and exaggerate their joys and success. We divided the game with the 82

HUNTERS WHO. HAVE BUCKFEVERED Goose Island camp and returned to our camp in the evening, but I always remembered my poor shooting as well as the good. We moral- ized on the question; was it a fault of the guns or had the hunters an attack of the buck fever or was it Providence or chance or did the guns have spasms that governed in this case is something that | could not quite understand. For never before in ‘all my long hunting experi- ence have I seen such shooting as was done on this hunt. I have witnessed many remarkable shois. Geese and ducks have been pulled down out of the sky. Deer have been shot and killed a fourth of a mile away and many other mira- culous shots made. I saw Father shoot and kill a hoot-owl one night about nine-thirty when it was so dark that you could not see the tree that the ow! was in. A big hoot-owl had lit in a big oak tree near the cabin and commenced to hoot “who~are-you.” Father took down the old squirrel rifle and shotin the direction from which the sound came. At the crack of the

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE rifle dewn came something clattering to the ground. | took the dog and found the owl, dead as a knob.

CHAPTER VIIi TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS AND HOW THEY WERE OBTAINED. THE BEE-TREE SWINDLE AND HOW IT WAS WORKED It was away back in 1868. Think of ft. Fifty years ago when | made my first appearance in the Kankakee Swamps. Since then ! have hunted in swamps and on mountains, in the big forests and on the plains, but none clings to my memory quite so well as when mv thoughts ramble to the days when I was trapping the fur- bearing animals in the Kankakee region. There are many very funny things happened in those old hunting days. [told my early experiences in the first chapter of this book from the angle of a pioneer hunter of the west, although it did not 85

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE all center in the Kankakee Swamps then as it has in later years, for many big hunts that wen me fame was west of the Mississippi River, years ago. Whilst writing this story and talking with eld friends | have been living over those old days. [i has freshened memories of inci- dents that | have not thought of for years. In the early 60's, during the Civil War, the price of furs of all kinds went up. A mink hide would sell from four to nine dollars each. A good coen skin would bring four dollars and a half, just as it was nailed on the shanty door, and the fur buyer would pullthe nails himself. All kinds of furs brought a good price and for this reason many hunters were brought to the Kankakee Swamps. Also many irappers were brought here. Up tothis time the pioneer trappers had no established trapping grounds as there was a vast territory along the river covered with water ' the whole year round which furnished good trap~ ping grounds anywhere. He saw that his rights were slipping from him and that he would soon 86

TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS

be crowded out of a trapping ground. So some of the old pioneer trappers got together and es- tablished what is known as a trappers’ claim. Some held certain claims upon rights of per- mission, others from permission of the land- owners, while siill others had bought © their grounds. These trapping grounds or claims, as they were sometimes called, were divided by a line running north and south as the riveris sup- posed to flow from the northeast in a south- western course. So the miles on the river were the base lines of the claims and extended on both sides of the river just as far as it was pro- fitable and ran all the way from two to ten miles

in width. Therefore ihere were a good many trapping grounds lying between the Indiana State line and English Lake. These claims were bought and sold almost the same as real estate and they were about as strong in their stipulation as the Clayton-Bulwort treaty, They have breught many a trapper on the verge of war. Ameng the early trappers who came in

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE the late fifties and early sixties were: Joshua E. Essex, better known among the old-time hunt- ers as “Essex, the Beehunter” from the fact that he was one of the greatest wild bee hunters that ever hunted the Kankakee region. He began hunting and trapping in 1859 in partnership with ‘J. E. Gilson, of whom mention has been made. They built a log cabin on wnat is known as Butternut Ridge and near the Swift Cut Off. Here he trapped for three years then went into partnership with Charles Cassel and on Shanty Island built a shanty and trapped three years. In the summer of 1862 he enlisted and was en- rolled in Company |, 5th Regiment. Indiana Cavalry. He was Quartermaster Sergeant and served to ihe close of the war, being discharged on dune 15.1865, when he returned and again went into the swamps and continued hunting and trapping until i880. Most of his time in ine swamps was spent inhunting bees. He be- came famous as a bee hunter. After retiring from the trapping business for many years he

o8

TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS

devoted his time to the bee culture, having in the meantime invented and patented a bee hive which he manufactured and sold. It was a great improvement over the old-fashioned bee hive. In the winter of 1867 Samuel Irvin be- gan trapping and built a shanty on Little Beach Ridge, Eben Buck, an old pioneer river man, was his skinner and fur dresser. _ It is said that Buck could skin and dress more hides in an hour than any two trappers onthe river. In stretching and dressing a rat hide he was an expert. In the fall of “71 Irvin built a shanty on Guinn’s Island on the north side of the river and a little below the north bend. This shanty he used for two seasons then found that he had been encroaching upon the rights of another trapper. Then he sold his shanty to Bill Gran- ger. Folsom moved it to Red Oak and placed it on the site of the one that was burned in ‘753, In the same year Irvin bought another claim or rather two claims. the Indian Garden Claim and the Crooked Creek Claim, This purchase ex- 9

CO

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE tended his trapping grounds up the river as far as Crooked Creek. He built a shanty on Indian Garden near the mouth of Sandy Hook. Late in the Fall of 79, after the fall catch, he sold nis claim including shanty, boats and traps to the Sherwood Brothers, Jerry and Fiolland, for one hundred and fifty dollars. He also realized one hundred and forty dollars from one month's trapping, thus retiring from the business after spending twelve years of successful trapping on the Kankakee. The latch string of Mr. Irvin's Shanty door always hung out to all hunters and fishermen from far and near and they were hos- pitably treated and entertained, The Sherwoods irapped the ground one or two seasons, then sold out and moved to Tennessee. Anoiher very successful trapper in those days was fi. G Castle who began trapping with his cousin, Charles Castle. They trapped in the Shanty Island ground for several years and boughi furs. He retired in '82 and engaged in the mercantile business at Hebron, Indiana. By 1882 nearly

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TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS all the old-timers had left the swamps. Furs were getting cheap and hardly worth catching. But a few years later prices began to ¢o up and then the younger generation took up ithe trap- ping business. Now as | have gone to the limit of this story or what | promised in ihe begin- ning, The Pioneer Hunters and Trappers, ! will leave the latter day hunters for the second edi- tion. The reader remembers | said that Essex was a great bee hunter and to my mind he was. But he had many close rivals in hunting for wild honey. Now I will tell you of one of the shrewdest bee hunters that ever operated in the Kankakee Swamps. He said that “there are tricks to all trades” and a stunt that he pulled off and got away with, or rathera “joke” as he called it surely proves the assertion of good or evil repute of past Sawyers or Sawyers yet to grow. Henry B. Sawyer was related to the Mr. Sawyer who many years ago ran the Eatons Ferry and of which | willspeak later. Fhis young hunter who originated in Kentucky but later at 91

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Big Log, Indiana, has friends whe have deier- mined that he is a natural born hunter (Ken- tucky produces a large crop of such). Sawyer was long armed and amiable. From many years of practice in hunting and shooting wild fowls, deer and wild hogs and other ¢ame which inhabitated the Kankakee region had a fairly correct notion of his own about hunting, Many of the sportsmen from the city would employ him and turn over their camp to him and at night he would teach them local geography of the Kankakee region. Ina few years he be- came known to almosi all the sportsmen in the nearby cities, The business of a guide in those days was to push a boat through the swamps, bayous and sand marshes with one, and some- times two, hunters init. At times there was much hard work to perform, especially in the fall hunt when the water was low. Ina yearor iwo he grew tired of ihis business and _ his thoughts seemed to consist as far as might be to aveid work. And here he invented his prac-

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TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS tical “joke,” Sawyer was struck on the idea of bee-hunting, As he was well known by all of the old bee hunters along the Kankakee he was welcomed as joyously at a bee hunters cabin as if he were a long missing brother. He was at once made to be at home in the bee hunters cabin on Long Ridge, whilst the old hunter en- tered with a friendly rivalry with the young hun- ter in the giving of advice and information. After visiting a number of the old-time bee hunters who resided among the sand ridges along the river, one of them was Honey Bee Sawyer. He thought he had the secret so he began looking for wild bees that stored their honey in hollow trees which were called bee trees. Honey sold at a good price in those days as there were noi many hunters engaged in the business. When Sawyer began hunting the wild bees it was in the Autumn of “59”. At that time there were several good bee hunters in the swamp among whom I might mention the Steven brothers, Marion and Filander, Harrison Dolson, Joe 93

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Cason, Had Folsom, Charles Carmon, anda score of ethers that were very successful bee hunters. They were all old timers who had fol- lowed the business foryears. Sawyer was green at bee hunting as | said before, but he hit ona scheme that worked and laid the old bee hunters in the shade. He was always a lucky hunter. Good luck seemed always at his hand, No matter what the game was he pursued, he al- ways was Sure to bag it, and so the same luck iollowed him in: the bee hunting business. Me found two or three irees, cut them, and they pro- ved good, geiting from sixty to one-hundred and fifty pounds per tree. Being a good season for honey, as there were lots of wild flowers for the bees to work on, Sawyer concieved the idea to mark every tree that he found that had a hole in it, to mark them all bee trees, generally picking on irees that were easily climbed. He had a pair of climbers made something on the order that telegraph linemen use. He had everything in readiness and just as soon as the frost came

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TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS and killed the flowers so the bees would have to work on bait he was ready for them. As I said nearly every tree with a Role in it had his name on it and itis very seldom that you hear ofa marked bee tree being desturbed. Before close of the bee hunting season Sawyer went around to all the trees that he had his name on, climbed them, stuck some honey~comb inside of the tree and smeared honey al! around the hole so that all the neighborhood bees would work on the honey, passing in and out of the hole in the hollow tree. This the bees will do late in the Fall when the flowers are gone. Afier baiting about sixty-five or seventy trees in this way, having three or four live trees, genuine bec trees, he announced his trees for sale and ina few days he had his victim coming. Some settlers from the ridges, hearing of the resuli of some of Sawyers bee trees, concluded there was a chance for speculation, so some of them visited the young bee hunter who hada shanty on Buck's Ridge, with a view of buying some of his 95

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE trees. As good luck would have it, it was a warm, sunny day in the middle of October and the bees worked on bait nicely. Sawyer took them through the swamp, over ridges and showed them his stock of bee trees. The bees were working strong, going in and out of the trees, indicating a strong swarm. Sounding the trees with the pole of an axe gave them some idea as to the hollow that the tree might con- tain. Afier exainining the trees, the party re- turned to the cabin laie in the afternoon--tired, wet and hungry, The trapper who was shanty- ing with him had a kettle of stewed duck, botled potatoes, bread, butter and coffee, which made a fairly good supper, Sawyer asked them three dollars and fifty cents a tree and showed them the honey that he took out of a tree that he cul. fie said he had sold six dollars’ ae of noney and if they doubted his statemenitthey could ask Mr. Smith, the man who helped him cut the tree and take the noney out. ne settlers hesitated for awhile, but finally said they would give him

96

TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS two dollars and fifty cents a tree for sixty-five trees. There were three trees on the north side of the river they did not want. Sawyer did not want to miss a sale so he said that he would cut two trees near the cabin and if they did not get more than one hundred and fifiy pounds from the two trees he would take ithe two filty, And if there was more than that they were to give him the three fifty. To this they agreed. They went to cut the trees ana from the first one they ¢ot a little over one hundred pounds of nice honey. The other tree was still better, They soon closed the dea!. Sawyer was to help them cut the trees and the time wa decided on the first freeze up when tne ice would carry them saiely, as that would be ihe best time to get around in the swamp and get the honey out. The bargain was closed and Sawyer received his money, two hundred and twenty-seven dollars for five bee trees, whilst the sixty trees contained nothing but the ho!- lows. Noi a bee in the whole sixty trees or for oy

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANK AKEE a long time afterwards. This was known as the “hollow tree sale.” Just before or about the time of the first freeze Sawyer left the ridge and a paper informing the settlers that all kinds of things happen in the Kankakee Swamps, he ook the map of the Kankakee valley and de- parted. A few days laier the settlers came and had a bee tree cutting. They cut several trees and did not find any honey nor bees but founda piece of honey-comb on a string inside the tree. This led them to believe that they had been iricked. They went to iheir homes mucn wiser, but with no honey. What they said of their ex- perience was never known. A few days after this an old bee hunter asked one of them how much honey they got. He drew a long hunting ‘Knife and threatened the inquirer. The other setilers were questioned not atall. It was one of the shrewdest tricks ever pulled off in the his- tory of the Kankakee Valley, His fame as a bee hunter went abroad all over Northern In- diana and he was thence afier known as Honey 98

TRAPPERS’ CLAIMS Bee Sawyer, and this done on his achievement is not dimmed or forgotten. Father was quitea successful bee hunter and in early days kept the home supplied with wild honey all the year round and from him | got my early training in bee hunting. Although I never hunted for bees very much yet it is one of the sweetest hunts that a man can engage in. [never found very many bee trees and what ! did find | found mostly when I was not looking for them. When a boy | used to go with Father when he went bee hunting. In the fail. of the year after the frost had killed the wild flowers the bees would work on bait and by putting some honey-comb, stuck on a stick, in some open place, then watch for the bees, and if there are any bees within a half mile they will come to the bait and after they have loaded themselves with honey they will rise, circle around once or twice then start straight for home. Then the hunter gets the line on the direction of the tree. Passibly many of you have heard the old saying,

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE “Straisht as a bee line.” Well, this is where that old saying eriginated. A bee never flies a crooked line to its home when loaded.

CHAPTER [X RUNNING THE FERRY THE PIONEER BRIDGE BUILDERS CARRYING THE UNITED STATES MAIL THROUGH THE KANKAKEE SWAMPS

IN A CANOE

Away back in the chilly autumn of 1856, George Eaton, with his family, landed on the banks of the Kankakee River ata place known in the early days as Pottowattomie Ford. He built a log cabin on the right bank of the river. re was one of the courageous pioneer seiilers redeemed the country from superstition and savagery. He began pioneer life as a ferryman and ran what was known as the Eaion Ferry. fie would transier people from the Forter county side te the sand ridges in Jasper county. At the season of the year when the water was

101

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE high the distance was about a mile and a half and part of the way was through a dense swamp and a pathless marsh. In 1847 or 1848 there was a United States mail route established be- tween Michigan City and Rensselaer, Indiana, and Mr. Eaton had the contract to carry the mail across the Kankakee Swamps. In the winter time was the river and marshes were frozen up it was somewhat difficult. But in the summer season when the water was lew the mail was either carried through the swamps and marshes on horse back or stage. In the winter of “49” Eaton built a bridge across the river. This was the first bridge built on the Kankakee above Momence, Ill. Onthe fotlowing summer it was burned,it is supposed on account of it be- ing a toll bridge. Mr. Eaton continued to runthe the ferry up to the time of his death which oc- cured in 1851. His remains were laid at rest on a beautiful knoll near the landing place. Mrs. Eaton, a woman of remarkable nerve and strength, continued to run the ferry and deliver

102 j

Eaton’s Bridge, the first bridge built across the Kankakee River at the

old Pottowattomie Ford, known as Eaton’s Ferry, 1849

RUNNING THE FERRY the mail on the south side. At times the water was so high that it could not be carried by stage. As [have said, she was a woman of courage and strength and there were but few men who could excel her with the oars. One morning about daybreak two men on horseback arrived at the ferry and wanted to be hastily transfered to the main land on the south side. They said they had to be in Rennsselaer by noon, as there was Soing to be a Government land sale at one o’- clock that day and they wanted tobe there at the opening ofthe sale. The receni rains had raised the water in the river and marshes that one- feurth of the way across would swim a _ horse. Through the timber they could ride their horses as the water was from knee to belly deep to a horse. Mrs. Eaton told them she could ferry them over one at a time butit would delay them about an hour and a half or she could take them both over at the same time and that there were places that they could swim their horses and that they could ride their horses until the water 103

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE got too deep to wade then they could get into the boat and swim ihe horses alongside the - boat. They decided to go together and took passage per ‘skiff’ and horseback riding their horses when it wasn’t too deep. In less than an hour they were landed safely at Sand Ridge Landing in Jasper County. This is one inci- dent mentioned which is only one oi the many daring feats of this kind in which Mrs. Eaton showed her skillas a boat’s woman. Late in the afternoon of the next day the sheriff of La- porte County, Indiana, arrived in the ferry look- ing for two stolen horses taken frem a farmer near Doorville and the description of the men and horses tallied with those that Mrs. Eaton ferried across the river. There isno doubt but that they were the men wanted ait Laporte. The chances for getting away and hiding stolen horses in the sand ridges on the south side of the river was much better than-on the north side as the country was not so well settled. Many a stolen horse has been hidden away on

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RUNNING THE FERRY these swamp islands which were never found by their owners. riorse stealing in those days was a very frequent occurence... Mrs. Eaton died in 1857 and was buried beside her hus- band in the family burying ground near the landing. After the death of Mrs. Eaton a man by the name of Sawyer came in possession of the old ferry. He builta bridge in “57.” As the bridge was not substantially buili the ice and high water of the following spring took it out. Sawyer then ran the ferry again and car- ried mail for three or four years. He also put up a sawmill on the banks of the river and did a good lumber business. Many of the logs he sawed were rafted down the river. In1860 he sold out his business to Enus Baum, who oper- ated the mill and ran the ferry fora few years. Baum built a bridge that stayed in and was used until the close of the war when the County Commissioners of Porter and Jasper Counties jointly took over the bridge and made it free. Later on they made a grade through the swamp 105

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE of timber and sand as far as the timber line. It was several years before the grade was com- pleted across the marsh tothe dry land. This was the last of the toll gate system in Porter County. In fact, it was the last in Northern In- ‘diana. When Baum built the bridge it stayed in. This was known, and’ is to this day, as Baum’s Bridge. And yet Eaton built a bridge across the river at the same place fourteen years prior to the building of the Baum’s Bridge. It was at this ford that Major Irwin crossed the Kankakee when he was giving notice io all the Indians along the Kankakee Swamps to be ready to leave in the early summer for their homes beyond the Mississippi. Also it was at this ford where General Tipton crossed the river while gathering up the children of the forest to their far-off hunting grounds toward the sunset. In 1878 a party of hunters from -Pittsburg, Pa., built a club house at the bridge and they put on the river a small steamer, “Litthe Rhoda” which played between English Lake and Long Ridge. 106

‘Saig ‘uosdwioy 7 ‘WAA apindy ‘ary ‘gd °H aSNOF, qnId 2afAsino”™] jo M@IA JONAIUT

RUNNING THE FERRY There was another party of hunters from Louis- ville, Kentucky, who built a club house at the bridge in the fall of “78 known as the Louisville Hunting Club with Wm. Thompson, of Louisville as President and H. Parker Rice and Aaron F. Ferman, of Hebron, Indiana, as hunting guides and club house managers. Parker, better known as “Dock” among ‘the hunting circles, became associated with the Louisville Club in their annual fall huntof ‘76 and at that time they camped in a cotton shanty or rag-house as they are sometimes. called, near the Prairie Bend. The next season they built a shanty where now stands their magnificent building which was erected in ‘78 by Dock Rice, archi- tect and builder. On the following year, ’79, another club house was built by a hunting club known as the “White House Club” with George Wilcox, of Baum’s Bridge, as manager and hunting guide. In the hunting season of the feathery tribe many are the sportsmen that gather along the marshes of the Kankakee to 107

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE get a shot at a web-foot duck, and many years hunting on this stream have brought me face to face with many good fellows that belong to the hunters’ fraternity. Some of my most pleasant recollections that were printed on my memory were scenes around a hunters’ camp. I have often regretted | did not keepa diary for many of the talks around these campfires are worth recording.

The Louisville Club House at Baum’s Bridge, built in 1878

CHARTER RUxX LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES FIRING THE MARSHES TO DRIVE THE GAME OUT. HOW THE INDIANS ROAST A DEER HEAD.

THE LAST OF THE

POTTOWATTOMLES

ON THE KANKAKEE The readers remember that in a previous chapter | mentioned that a few of the Potto- wattomie Indians were permitted ie remain. Now I will tell you what became of Mingo, the little Indian boy. One of the most wonderful stories of all is a prairie on fire, which is one of the grandest sights in the world. I have seen, in the fall of the year in a dry time, the Kanka- kee Prairies on fire, ihe time of the sear and yellow leaf when all nature is about to put off her garb of green and put on the white-snow. The Indians sometimes would set the grass on

108

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE fire to drive the game out. ‘If there is any wind going it sweeps like a mighty hurricane and car- ries everything before it. Sometimes you can burn the grass around you and escape before the raging billows of fire reach you. “One time many years ago,” says an old hunter, “Aubbee- naubbee and Mingo, an Indian boy, and myself, were out hunting in the tall grass and weeds on the marshes about two miles from the river. We had killed a deer and had just cut it open and taken out its entrails and were preparing to skin it and cut it up so that we could carry it home, when we heard a roaring and crackling noise west of us like the coming of a mighty storm. Aubbeenaubbee, with terror despicted on his face, said that the prairie was on fire and that we must get out. As ihe wind was blowing hard from that direction we knew that it would soon be upon us and we knew thatthere was no salvation for Mingo in the tall grass as he was small. In the twinkling of an eye we opened out the deer and shoved Mingo in and then

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LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES closed it up like a clam. Aubbeenaubbee and | then broke and ran for our lives and of all the running and tumbling and summersaults in the tall grass beat the world and all the rest of man- kind. I took a straight shoot for the river but Aubbeenaubbee took off io the left of me and reached the pond or slough with some waier and musk-rat houses in it and he rushed in and hurriedly tore off the top of an old musk-rat | house and jumped in and was saved. After running hard and being almost given out of be- ing overtaken by the fire | reached a creek near the river where there was some waiter. I cross- ed over and was safe on the other side of the Jordan. Then | stood with wonder and amaze~ ment at the glorious sight of the ocean of fire rolling by and some deer and wolves rushed by me in their fright to escape the scorching ele- ments. But 1 paid no atiention to them. After the fire had passed by it had left nothing but a blackened pall. [| startedtofind my compan- ions and found Aubbeenaubbee with his head

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KAN KAKEE stuck out of a musk-rat house, all right except a little scorched about the head. But he was clad to get off with that. He crawled out of the old musk-rat house and started to look for Mingo as we had great fear for him, fearing that he had been roasted alive. We found the roasted deer and knocked at the door and to our great delight Mingo called out, ‘Sit down you are at the right door’ And we opened the deer and behold, he was safe and sound, al- though he said it was red-hot forhim for a short time. The deer was roasted to a nice brownon the outside and we sat down and made a square meal off of him. Then we cut it up and carried it home and we had enough to eat for sometime without cooking.” The finest bill of fare that I - ever saw was to pass over the burnt district just after a big fire had passed and you could find all kinds of game; coon, rabbits, and sometimes prairie chickens and ducks, nicely roasted and many a meal have | made of them when out hunting and hungry. [| will tell yeu how the In-

111

LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES dians cooked their meats andthe way they roast a deer head. It is the finest and most delicious in the world. They dig a hole about a foot square and abouia foot deep and make a _ hot fire in it and keep it burning until it is nearly full of red hot coals. Then scrape oul the coals and ashes. Wrap the deer head with the skin on in wet leaves and place it in the nole and cover it up with the hot ashes and coals and leave it un- til it is roasted through, then take it out and the skin will peel off and leave a clean, tender meat. Brains and tongue are ail nicely cooked and that throws whale tongue in the shade. You can cook fish just caught in the same way. You wrap the fish in a wet paper of any kind and lay the fish down and cover it up with hot ashes and coals just as you would a roast potato in the ashes. Ajter it is done take it out and the paper and skin peels off and leaves the juicy meat for you to place your pepper and salt and eatit. Itis the finest thing in the world. You just try it sometime when you are out camping

Piz

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE on the Kankakee and you will never get tired of it. One time on the Kankakee we were out fishing for pike and in those days we had no such fishing outfits as are used at the present time, such as skinners, trolling hook or Johnson grabbers or Hildebrandt’s spinner and many other patented fishing hooks and artificial baits. We had to make our lines and hooks in those days and in fishing for pike or pickerel in the Kankakee we had to have sirong lines and steut hooks and bait with a_ big finn of one of the fish caught. If you haven't such a bait use a large frog or minnow and keep it moving, as a_ pick- erel seldom bites at a still bait but always takes it on the wing and go for it like lightning and splashes water in your face like a flying sea horse. Then we would pull them in out of the water. One day we caught nine pickerel that measured altogether fifteen feet. We cooked them all up for supper and with bread and but- ter and coffee the nine of us ate them all up and all of us said it beat the world and ali the rest of 113

LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES mankind. Just think! Nine men eating fifteen feet of fish. Another time we were fishing on the Kankakee and caught many red-horse, buffalo, and suckers. We ate so many fish that some of the boys could not change their shirts for three or four weeks. Now all old hunters and fisher- men know that suckers and red-horse area very bony fish but just as good as any and some like them best, enly they are so full of benes. I will iell you how we fixed themand they were alright. Take a sucker and clean it nicely, then lay it on the stump or log and with a sharp knife cut it cress-ways inte pieces about an eignih of an inch long stiek the pieces together with cornmeal and fry. It isalright andthe bones will not trou- ble you or get cross-ways in your throat. And at that they are far better than German carp. One time we were fishing and caught a lot of carp when some guy came along and gave his idea and directions as to planking carp. fis direct- ions were: Get a nice big carp and clean it in good shape. Put it on a hardwood plank, salt

114

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE and pepper it well, then spread a layer of butter on the top. Cover this with strips of bacon and cornmeal. Slip him in a hot oven and when done to a brown take the ouifit back of the shanty and throw the fish away and eat the board. I'll say that baked suckers and trimmings you will find more palatable than any hard- wood board or carp. | will assure you that. if none of these dishes don’t appeal to you especially, just try something else. Many years ago, but to be ex- act, it was the cold winter oi i843 and the cold- est winter ever known, there was a party of deer hunters camping on the Nidge. the snow was very deep and the weather so cold that it was almost impossible to get out and hunt for game. The ice in the river was so thick that they could not cut a hole through it with an axe so they pulled a lot old logs on the ice and sei them on fire to melt a hole through it. After a night and a part of a day they got a nole through it and all kinds of fish, pickerel, bass, salmon, and even snapping turtles bounded out of the ice and they

115

LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES hadfish to last them until the weather moderated One old snapping turtle that came out was so large that when they dressed and cooked it, it made soup enough to last them a week. The ice did not break up that Spring until away in April. Some hunters crossed the river on the ice seventeenth of April that Spring. 1 will tell you now of some of the Indians that were left on the Kankakee and what became of little Mingo, the Indian boy. Mingo was the last Pottowat- tomie on the Kankakee. Mehad been captured by the Sioux and carried away to the Northwest. The old chief, the father of Niagara, did not like Mingo and was not inclined to confer ithe honor on him he had so fairly made, Niagara was his favorite child and she must be the wife of some distinguished personage. But the old chief was doomed to be outwitted by his daugh- ter as many a father is in matters of this kind At a time when the chief was absent holding a council with a neighborhood tribes of Sioux, Mingo picked out two of the chiefs best horses

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE on which to escape with his girl to his own tribe. Niagara was ready and when the village was sunk into profound sleep she met him in a sequestered place, bringing a supply of provi- sions for the trip. In a moment they were in their saddles and away. They were not less than three long sleeps from his own people and would be followed by the Indians as long as there were any hopes of overtaking them. By morning, however, there would be a wide space between them and their pursuers and would make their escape entirely practible if no mis- haps should befall them on the way. The first night or next day in the evening they reached a camp of trappers and hunters and among them were old Kill-buck and LaBonta, Frenchmen who were trapping and buying furs, and from whom | obtained this narrative while camped on the Kankakee many years. The trappers were very much surprised to see two young Indians, a young man and a squaw, ride up and alight in the midst of them, apparently much fatigued and

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LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES way-worn. Their presence required a prompt explanation, as they might belong to some mer-: anders in that vicinity, who might give trouble. The young Indian made the pretext of friend- ship but he might be the spy of a hostile band who were meditating an attack on them, but what means this pretty young girl who is with him. War parties are never encumbered with women and the faded condition of their horses to some extent allayed their fears, as it was evidence that they were on a long and severe journey. Old Kill-buck interrogated him as to his object and destination and learned that he was a Pottowattomie and a remnant of the tribe of the Kankakee and Wabash Rivers, and who had been taken captive about a year before by the Sioux, and was carried away by them to their villages up in the northwest until a chance to escape to his own tribe presented itself. The young girl with him was Sioux. for whom he conceived a fondness while among her tribe. The attachment was not only mutual but that

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE they might censumate their bliss they found it necessary to elope. They were now flying to his native village to which another night’s ride he thought would bring them. As they seemed very much fatigued and were out of provisions, the party very promptly tendered them the best they had which was consumed with good relish by the two lovers, and after they had enjoyed a little repose Kill-buck drew from them the inci- dent and story just related. The trappers tried to persuade them to stay until morning and en- joy the refreshments and rest which they need- ed so much, but he replied that they had net Slept any since they set out on their flight, nor did they even dare to think of closing their eyes before he sheuld reach his own home. He knew that he would be pursued as long as there was the faintest hope of being overtaken and he also knew what his doom would be if he again fell into the hands of the Sioux. Having remained in the camp a short time, the two fugitive lovers were again on the wing flying over the green

Le

LAST OF THE POTTOWATTOMIES prairies of the Kankakee marshes by the lighi of the moon. A full and beautiful moon animated and sustained by the purity of their motive, and the hope of soon reaching a place of safety and protection. They said they had good horses, good hearts, good weather, good country to tra~ vel over and above all a good cause and why not good luck. Kiill-buck learned afterwards that they reached his home in safety and lived happily for many years. And that was the last that was ever heard of Mingo Doranto, the last of the Pottowattomies. [lenia Leota, his sister, was taken captive by some other hostile Indians and carried off to the far west toward the sunset and her fate was never known nor never will be until the great day of judgment. But like the stars that shed their glory ore a dark and _ trou- bled sea, like some long forgotten story cherish- ed are thou still io me. There were two or three other Indians that lived and hunted and trapped on the river. One old Indian, Sheubana, lived on French Island and he was related to old

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PIONE ER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Peashaway, who for many years lived on an. island in the north marsh near the Cumbertand lodge. Sheubana and Peashaway lived on the head waters of the Kankakee near English Lake. When I last heard of them, the three In- dians mentioned were the last of the Potiowat- | tomies on the Kankakee.

CHAPTER Xl HOME OF CHIEF KILLBUCK FRENCH ISLAND FOR MANY YEARS THE HOME OF CHIEFS SHEUBANA AND OLD KILLBUCK WHEN SETTLED BY A FRENCH FUR TRADER NAMED LA BONTA The first white man to settle on French Island was a French fur trader by the name of LaBon- ta. He settled here for the purpose of trading and trafficing with the early hunters and trap- pers who had seitled along the Kankakee at that time. As I have said before the War De- partment granted a few ofthe Poitowattomies, those who had been friendly to the whites, per- mission to stay in the Kankakee Region, There were two or three French families on the island who had settled there years before and for this reason it derived its name ‘French Island.” 122

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE There were four or five Indians living on the is- land at this time and among them lived an old Indian and his aged squaw by the name oi Sheubana. He was at the Fi. Dearborn massa- cre and saved a great many of the whites. He was over eighty years of age when found on this island by the white hunters in the winter of {858 and of whom | obtained this narrative. Sheubana lived with his squaw and two little grandchildren ina wigwam on French Island where LaBonta found old Killbuck dead in the winter of 1857. “One day’ said the hunter “whilst a couple of us were out hunting we passed the wigwam of Sheubana and found his poor old squaw and the children in great distress. They informed us that Sheubana had _ staried down the river to hunt and been gone for three days and they knew that something had hap- pened him or he would have been back. As they were out of meat and nearly starved we fed them the best we could and cailed out all our force and siarted to hunt for him. We had

123

HOME OF CHIEF KILLBUCK not gone far when one of the party heard a noise and geing to the spoi found the poor old Indian fast, with one leg in one of those iraps that were used in those days. In looking for game in the woods and brush he ran agains} the trap and sprung it and got caught and being old and feeble, could not extract himself. And there the poor old soul had lain for three days and nights in the cold and rain without shelter or anything to eat, and the storm and the winds had beaten on his aged head. Weshed many bitter tears over him. We extracted him as soon as possible and placed him on a litter made of sticks and barks and carried him as carefully and tenderly as a child to his wigwam. One of the party on returning had killed a deer which they carried along with them and they placed Sheubana and the deer at the door of the wigwam like Longfellow’s Hiawatha had placed his deer at the feet of Minnehaha, the Laughing Waters. !i would have done your soul good (if you had one) to have seen those 124

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Indians rejoice at the return of Sheubana. And it was then [| could understand that beautiful saying inthe Bible: ‘There is greater rejoicing over one that is lost and found, and there is more joy in Heaven over one sinner that re- pents and is saved than the ninety and nine who went not astray. ‘Suffice to say, they tock as good care of Sheubana as they could and visited him every day. We hadsome linaments and salves, sticking plasters—-as hunters always go prepared for accidents and we applied them freely and he mended quickly. S6But we had to leave and before leaving we leit them everything we good spare and plenty of game. | after- wards heard that he got well, lived and died on the headwaters of the Kankakee. May his soul rest in peace.’ Many yearsago this island was the hiding place of a bunch ofcounterfeiters and which part of the gang were captured at Bogus Island some years ago. !n the Fall of 1859 Uncle Harl Seymour was trapping the French Island ground, in the bayou between the river

TOE

| GRAD

HOME OF CHIEF KILLBUCK and the landing. He was setting a trap at an old rat house in the bayou when he made a discovery. [n sticking a talley stake in the old rat house it struck something hard and sounded hollew, like striking a stick against an old box. He remeved the top off the rat house and found a small iron box covered witn rust, sand and moss, from whicn rais used to build their houses. From the appearance of the box ithad been hidden away in the bayou fer many years and the rats had built quite a large house over it. In opening the box it was found to contain an outfit of counterfeiting icols, dyes, plates, leads and things that are used in the making of bogus money. Possibly this outfit belongec to part of the gang that was captured on Bogus Island in the early sixties. There are many dark, mys- terious stories connected with the early history ef this island. Many years ago a man by the name of Beeler was hunting in the swamps and his dogs ran a fox inte a hole on the island anc in digging out the den for the fox he dug up the 126

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE

‘remains of two white men that had been buried for a number of years by unknown hands where history does not reach. In the Fall of 1844 as Rens Brainard was hunting on the river he dis- cevered the body of a man lodged against some driftwood near the French Island Landing. He recognized the body as that of John Drago, a German who lived near the island. Drago had been murdered and two pieces of an old iron pump tied to his body and then cast into the river to be buried in the still waters and peace- ful sands, with no marks ofhis last resting piace. But the old iron pump that was used fora weight was not heavy eneugh to hold the body down to the sandy grave in which the murderer had placed it. The body arose and lodged against some old driftwood. Mr. Brainard re- ported the finding of the body of a man in the river at French Island to the Jasper County authorities who came and took up the body and made a postmortem examination and found that he had been. murdered. To conceal the

CY is, ae 4 bi

HOM: OF CHIEF KILEBUCK

crime, the body had been sunken to the body of the Kankakee River. The friends of the de- ceased soon went to work to solve the mystery and bring the murderer to justice. Strong sus~ picion led to the arrest of a Bohemian named Weberon Warteno, who lived near the island. Circumstantial evidence was sirong against him. He finally confessed that he committed the crime and was tried in the Circuit Court, found guilty and was sentenced to be hung. On Feb- ruary 20, 1886, in tne court-yard at Rensse- laer. Jasper County, Indiana, he paid the pen- alty of the crime, thus ending the life career of Weberon Warteno, ihe murderer of John Drago.

About a mile and a half up the river from French Island and on the opposite side of the river is a big knob, too small to be called an island, that has more history to the square foot than any island on the river. Having an area of about 150 square feet and is in a dense swamp forest about {5O yards back from ihe river. It was @ hard place to find for one who

128

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE is not very well acquainted with the location. Years ago it was known as Deserters Island from the fact that during the dark days of the rebellion it was a hiding place for deserters and fugitives from justice. Along in the eighteen nineties there was organized at Hebron, Indiana a hunting club known as the Columbian Club from the fact that the Columbian World’s Fair was going on in Chicago that year, so they called their organization the Columbian Hunting Club. There were eight charter members of the old club, all business men of Hebron. J. C. Smith, president, George Gidley, secretary and treasurer, Jerry Sherwood, George Margison, Chas. Miller, Bart Siglar; L. E. Ripley and Ira V. Fry. They built their clubhouse on the little island that | have just described and called it Camp 6 to 2, fror the fact that there were six democrats and two republicans. Two years later the membership had increased to sixty-two members, then the name was changed tolsland Sixty-two from the fact that there were sixty- 129

In camp on Island Six to Two. Just in from the Hunt.

.

Left to right—Roy Childs, Barney Ross, Ed Riley, Harry Castle, Ira V. Fry.

HOME OF CHIEF KILLBUCK

two members in the club and the big knob or island is known by that name to this day. Of the eight charter members of the old Columbian Hunting Club alf have crossed over the divide but three, Siglar, Gidley and Fry, The island has long since been deserted as the swamp fires swept over the island some twenty years ago and destroyed the clubhouse, yet now and then a camp was made on the island during: the duck sheoting season, as shown in the cut. The island 6 to 2 is pretty much like Goldsmith’s deserted village, forlorn and desolate, yet there are many happy memories ihat cluster around this little island camp of hunting days in the years gone by.

CHAPTER Xi INDIAN ISLAND INDIAN ISLAND FIRST SETTLED BY THE WHITES. SOLD TO A SAW MILL COMPANY WHERE THE FIRST STEAMBOAT WAS BUILT ON THE KANKAKEE Indian Island in an early day was known as Mike’s Island from the fact that there was a white man by the name of Mike Haskins who hunted with the Indians and camped on this island and whom | mentioned before. It was better known as Indian Island and was for un- told ages the hunting and camping grounds of the Pottowattomie Indians. It is one of the old- est inhabited islands on the Kankakee and there was no Indian camp between the head- waters and the mouth of this historical river that had a better fortification than Indian Island, 131

A Typical Trapper’s Shanty on Indian Island

INDIAN ISLAND Haskins was with General Harrison on that fa- mous march up the Wabash and Tippecanoe Rivers and it wasthis white hunter who fired the first shot at the Battle of Tippecanoe. Ona misty, moonlight night in November, 1811, Has-- kins was on picket duty and as the Indians made theix attack on the camp in the night by crawling upon the sleeping army. In the early part of the night it had been raining but along about midnight it broke away and the clouds were thin and scattering. There was a full moon and as the clouds were light they moved very rapidly and at times ithe moon shown in its full brightness. As the Indians had just been supplied with new guns and hatchets they were still very bright. The Indians made their attack about three o'clock in the morning and as_ they skulked and crawled upon the camp Haskins saw something glisten as the moon shone through the thin clouds and knew what it was. He pulled his gun to his shoulder, took aim at ihe glistening @bject, pulled the trigger, and an 132

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Indian bounded up out ef the grass and yelled. This aroused the others and the battle began and the result of that shotis wellknown. The reader remembers I! told in a_ previous chapter what brought Haskins to the Kankakee Swamps. In1854 Aaron Broady Sr., and his son, John, entered the land. The landof which the island was originally a part belonged to the State and contains one hundred and twenty acres. The island itself only contains about thirty-five or forty acres. In the early days be- fore the country was drained it was surrounded by water nearly the whole year round and the only way of getting to the island was with boat or by wading in from the north side. !n the dry season when the water was low you could drive in with a team butin the winter season when the marshes were frozen up, getting in on the ice was the best time. The Broadies each built a log cabin and cleared up about ten acres and put it under cultivation, The island at thet time was heavily timbered. The Kankakee swamps

133

9981 ‘[[fuMeg pues] ueIpuy ey TL

INDIAN ISLAND were originally covered with a heavy timber, hard wood. On the dry land was found many varieties of oak and hickory, while on the bot- tom or swamps which were covered with water is the white and black ash, red and white beech sycamore, elm, soft maple, white cottonwood, white and yellow birch, and three or four vari- ties of swamp or water oak, whilst on the ridges is found the white and black walnut, three spe- cies of dry land ocak, sassafras, paw-paws, waw- hoe, prickley ash, red haws, iron wood and dog wood. Most of this timber was valuable saw timber and on this island was a good site for a saw mill. Soin 1866 a company was organ- ized and known as the Indian Island Sawmill Company. It was made up of prairie farmers who owned swamp lands. They boughi the island from the Broadies, paying them five thousand dollars in cash for it and in the win- ter of (66 when the marsh was frozen up they put the sawmill on the island and soon had it in operation, First they sawed the lumber to 134

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE build the mill and to put up a house for the mill boss and his men tolivein. The house was built of white oak throughout except the floor and that was of white ash. The building is six- ieen by thirty-four feet, one story, and is box sided with one by twelve inch white oak siding, The house has never been painted and is in good condition and in use at this writing. 1920. Several years ago there was a lean-to built on the east side of the house and in this building is where | spent ten years of my boyhoed days. The mill business was good. In the winter when the swamps were frozen up thousands of lags were brought to the mill and sawed into lumber. But getting the lumber off the island was somewhat of a task as there were only cer- tain times of the year that it could be hauled out to the dry land. In 1868 John Bissell and Ira Cornell, two of the heaviest stockholders in the {. I. S. M. Company, built and put on the river a steamer, The White Star, for the purpose of transporting lumber and egord wood down io

195

My Island Home on the Kankakee where | spent ten years of my boyhood days.

The house was built in 1866 by the I. I. S. M. Company

INDIAN ISLAND Momence, Illinois, and other points along the river where there was sale for their product. The island is about one hundred rods from the river and in order to get the steamer and flat boats from the island to the river they had to dig a canal eighteen feet wide and four feet deep. rather was put onthe jobd as superiniendent and with a gang of men with shovels dug what was known then and is to this day as the Bissell- Cornell steamboat canal. Adison E. Buck, of rlecron, Indiana, was the master boat builder. ror several trips up and down the river Father was the pilot and John Bissel, captain. The freighting business on the Kankakeedid not pan out just as expected and in the early seventies the steamer and flai boats or scowes, as they were called, were sold to a Momence party and fitted out for a pleasure boat. in’'71i Father bought the Bissel steck in the I. 1. S.M. Com- pany which contained two-fifths of the shares in the company. The reader remembers thai it was here where | left them in the opening chap- 136

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE ter of this story and it is only right and proper that I take them with me to my island home on the Kankakee. It was way back in the hazy and smokey old days of October, in 1871, those days that now seem to belong io another cen- tury and another manner of living, These were the days you could hardly see the sun on ac- count ef the dense cleuds ofsmoke that would settle over the lowlands and thousands of acres of Kankakee marshes and swamps were on fire not only here but thousands of acres elsewhere were burning and not only the prairie, marshes and forests, but cities and towns were passing away in smoke. The year ’71 was known as the dry season. The river was very low, the lowest it had been for years. The swamps and marshes in many places had dried out and the filling of self-moved earth of past centuries that had washed in from the highlands, sediments and decayed vedgitation. This took fire and burned everything down to the sub-soil. Thous- ands of acres of marsh land were burned out in

gl

The White Star, owned by Bissell & Cornell, the first steamboat on the Kankakee:

loaded with lumber, coal and wood bound for Momence, IIl., 1868

INDIAN ISLAND this way, leaving deep holes covering an area of two to twenty acres in a place and from one to five feet in depth and when filled with water made many small lakes and ponds. The day we moved to the island, October 9, was the ho! day in Chicago, the great Chicago fire. It was on this island that many scenes of my boyhood experiences were painted on memery’s canvas, as it was here that | began my early experiences hunting with a shot gun. During the early seventies and eighties this island was a great camping ground for hunters coming from far and near. I have met with hunters from all parts of the country whe came here to shoot wild geese and ducks. In the Fall of ’75, H. J. McSheehy, of Logansport, Indiana, made his first hunting irip to this island and the acquaintance of this newspaper man grew into inseperable friend- ship. it was Mr. McSheehy and his party that brought the first breech-loaders tothe island and the next year his hunting partner, the late John Condon, a millionaire race-track man of Chica- 136

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE go, brought te our place the first air pillows that leversaw. It was in a hunting boat on the Kankakee marshes and near our place that | first met one of Indiana's most famous writers, General Lew Wallace. He wag with a party of Indianapolis hunters and was stopping at the Indianapolis, Terre Haute and Rockville club houses at Baum’s Bridge, I might mention scores of Indiana hunters who have at some time in the years past hunted on the Kankakee.

Getting logs out of the swamp was very un- certain owing to various conditions of the swamps. Sometimes the swamp would freeze up early in the winter with high water and be- fore it froze solid the water would leave the ice making it shelly and when the ice was in this condition it was dangerous getting around with ateam. Under these conditions logging was no good that winter. Finally Father sold the saw mill to some parties in Valparaiso and they moved it to the big woods near Chesterton, In- diana. About 25 years ago Father sold the

139

Rockville, Terre Haute and Indianapolis Club House built in 1879. To the left is shown in part the White House Hunting Club Building, of Pittsburgh, Pa., built in 1878 at Baum’s Bridge

INDIAN ISLAND

island to Mr. Henry Kahler, of Chicago, who fitted up the place for a hunting and fishing re- sort. In{1908 a pariy of Chicage sportsmen or- ganized what was known as ihe Kankakee Val- ley Hunting Club with Frank Nahser, president, Dr. P. M. Hoffman, vice-president, and Henry Stevens, secretary and treasurer. The club leased the hunting rights on several thousand acres of swamp land and built their clubhouse on Indian Island, where some of the members of the club made hunting trips to this place every year until the swamps were drained and duck shooting became a thing of the past. Then they sold the club house and it was taken down and moved away.

140

CHAPTER XIll GRAPE ISLAND TRAGEDY ON GRAPE ISLAND. A TYPE OF TRAPS THAT WERE USED BY THE PIONEER HUNTERS FOR CATCHING WILD GAME BEFORE STEEL TRAPS WERE INVENTED,

The history of Grape Island is a history with a dark page in it. Grape Island, as well as many other swamp islands, never made any perma- nent settlement but it was inhabited by hunters and trappers during the hunting season. The island was first inhabited by white men as early as 1844 by a man named Allen Dutcher; who built a shanty and hunted wild game and caught the fur bearing animals in rude traps. A few years later he used steel traps. Many other old time hunters have made this island their tem- porary home during the trapping season. The

141

GRAPE ISLAND

tragedy on Grape Island put a dark page in its history, as there was one of the most cold-blood- ed murders committed on this island that was ever known in the history of the Kankakee Swamps. Early in the fallof 1876 John France and James Cotton, two trappers, had bought or traded for the Grape Island trapping ground. They built a log cabin, using green cottonwood logs and they covered it withaboard roof. Prior to this, for many years they had been trapping the south marsh below Long Ridge. Their grub box was getting low, so Mr. France went to - rlebron, Indiana, to get grub-supplies and he staved at Hebron over night. The next day he returned to the island and found the cabin burn- ed. The roof and part of one side and end was burned. On investigation he found everything inside burned and among the ruins he found the charred body ofhis partner. There was found a bullet hole in his skull, indicating that he had been murdered and the cabin set on fire to cover up the crime and destroy all trace of evidence.

142

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE And as | sald, the logs were green, therefor the cabin did not completely burn down. The pur- porter of this dastardly crime was never appre- hended. Many theories were advanced for the motive of the crime but no facts, and it was the general supposition that he was murdered for to obtain his money, as they had recently sold their furs. They hadchosen this particular time while one was absent from camp. Now | will tell you how the Indians and old pioneer trappers made their rude traps in early times. They wouldtake a small log, eight or ten inches in diameter, and fiiteen or eighteen feet long and split it about ha!i or two-thirds of the way. Place the log on the run-way on the banks of a creek or river or wherever game is likely to pass and then take another small log or heavy stick for weight and it on top of the split pole and then about two feet from the end where the game is to be caught. Drive down two stakes, one on each side of the pole to keep it in place, and two more at the other end the same way, and for

143

Ruins of a Trapper’s Cabin on Grape Island where

James Cotton was murdered and burned

February 7, 1877

hy Spans 14

GRAPE ISLAND

the same purpose. They then made a common stick trigger out of wood like you useto set quail traps, only much larger, called a figure 4. Then raise up the end of the split stick the ne- cessary heighth, set the trigger and place the bait on the jong stick and woe unto the wolf, fox, wild-cat, coon, mink or any other animal that takes hold of the bait or touches the trig- ger, for that springs the trap and down comes the upper sticks on the lower stick which is kept in place by the stakes on each side and catches the victims between them. That rude trap was rightly named when it was called a “Dead Fall” for in the morning you will find your game dead without the use of a club. We gen- erally find no cause of blame or negligence on the part of the trap, but generally find the victim was either deaf, dumb or blind, and no cause to run inthe way ofa trap. We exonerate all that is attached to the traps from our blame for their sad misfortune. Another rude trap that was used for catching wild game without the use oi

144

PLIONFER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE spring or trigger in those early times was to cut a hole in a hollow tree about fifteen inches from the ground large enough for a lynx, wolf, fox or wild-cat to put his head in. Cuta crevice ten or twelve inches long below sloping almost to a point at the bottom, then hang your bait in the hollow the hole and wait for the results. Mr. . Lynx, wolf, fox or wild-cat comes along, puis his head in the hollow for the bait and as he comes down to get the bait his head and neck comes down the crevice. In the morning you will find your game dead without the benefit ci clergy. Another was the snare trap, or swing- ing trap, as they were sometimes called, were among the first used on the Kankakee in early times. They would take a sapling and bend it so as the top would reach the ground and ii was held in that position by means of one stick trigger. A stake was driven in the ground and squared on two sides. One side of the stick had a notch cut in so as to fit on the square side of the stake, the other end was fastened to

145

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PIONBER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE the sapling by a hook notch. The bait was fast to the irigger so it could not be moved without pulling the stick out of the notch in the stake. To the sapling they would fix their snares made of buck-skin strings, such as was used in those days. Then they would make quite a number of loops and place them all around the bait, so as the game could not get the bait without put- ting its head through one or more of the snares; and woe unto the wolf or any other animal thai touches the bait, for that pulls the stick out of ‘ the notch in the stake that holdsthe sapling and when you return you will find your game swing- ing in the air several feet above the ground as shown in illustration. One more of these fa- mous old-time game catchers that was used on - the Kankakee long before steel traps were in use or even thought of were what they called a Game-pen. it was built of logs--top, sides and bottom. It was built in a side hill or bluff, up to the level of the ground. Then they had a trap door ontop. Thetop ofthe pen was covered

146

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEEL with leaves or grass to hide suspicion and over the door they hung up the bait, usually a piece of venison, When a hungry woli, lynx or fox came along they would stop to feed on the bait and they would have to pass over the trap door. When they were about to take hold of the veni- son the game would step upon the door, It would turn and down they went into the pen. In early times when there was plenty ofsuch game along the Kankakee swamps it was not an un- common thing to take three or four wolves out of the pen at one time and sometimes a mixed lot of Same is caught, such as wolves. foxes and wild-cats. Many years ago some trappers had a trap of this kind on a little island in the North Marsh and they took out of the pen at one time two wolves, three foxes anda wild-cat. In an early day it was said that a few panthers were caught in this way on the uplands, as the pan- ther did not inhabit the swamps on account of the water, as they were not much for water. But a number were caught in the big woods near

147

GRAPE ISLAND lake Michigan. When the steel traps came in use the old rude traps were almost forgotten and are remembered as a thing of the past. About thirty-seven years ago I built and used a pen trap on the foot-hills of the Rockies to catch mountain lion and bear. | also built and used a dead-ial! on the Kankakee to catcha red fox that was so cunning I could not catch it with a steel trap. All old trappers know that a fox is the most cunning animalin the world to catch na steel trap. I will tell you how we used to catch wild turkeys ina trap. We would build a pen out of poles eight or ten feet square and two feethigh, and cover it with poles and brush. But before building the pen begin about ten feet _ from one side and dig a trench, tapering it under the edge of the pen just deep enough for the tur- key to get in by stooping down. You continue the trench en inside of the pen a couple oi feet until the trench is not more than six or eight inches deep at the end. You then scatter corn in the trench to the end and around in the pen. 148

GRAPE ISLAND

The turkeys come along and see the corn. They start in the trench, eating as they go along, and stooping under the edge ofthe pen and jumping up on the high part for the corn and there they are. The poor simple things never think of jumping down and passing out again as they came in. There you have them. 1! must say that I never could see much providence, sense or instinct in this matter and it is a worse case than any of the traps in the business that I know of. )

149

SOYSIVIAT BBYBYULY BY) UO . puljg esnoy jeueg & pue ywog e Woly sulj0OYS Yyonq Isl AI

CHAPTER XIV BARREL-HOUSE BLIND SHOOTING DUCKS FROM A BARREL-HOUSE BLIND. THE FIRST TUB SHOOTING ON THE KANKAKEE MARSHES.

Of course you remember where the last chap- ter ended. Methinks I hear some old-time hunter say; “You bet I do.” These reminis- cences of deer hunts related left enough old iime recoliections to keep me irom forgetting as iong as | live where the last chapter ended. It happened during the winter hunt of seventy~-four and the story of whattranspired and some other experiences have been told in trappers’ shanties and in hunters’ lodges. As | have promised at some time to tell you how we shot geese and ducks on the open marshes, so here goes. My

150

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND first duck shooting trip to the South Marshes was made in October, 1872. As a boy of twelve years I had done a little shooting in the ponds and on fly-ways at our island home but never had been out on a big hurt like this be- fore, as | termed it when any mentionwas made of this trip, | | found the hunting entirely differ- ent on the big, open marsh than what ! was used to around the island. Ducks were not very plentiful on the marsh that fall so my _ first hunting trip was of shortduration. A year or so after this | was sitting in a trapper’s shanty be- hind a stove, it was a cold winter night, listening to hunters’ yarns and stories, told by a party of deer hunters who were in camp on the Island. They were spinning hunters’ yarns and discuss- ing the excellent hunting conditions of the Kan- kakee region, as two members of the partly were old-iime hunters of the swamps for many years. While the old story-teller had stopped to get his wind, Bill Jones, a marked hunter, turned to me with the question: “Fiow would you enjoy a duck = od

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE hunt on Wolf Lake just as soonas the ice goes out?’ In less than ten minutes the trip was all arranged and the start was to be made as soon as the ice was oul of the marshes. Wolf Lake was noted for its early duckshooting on account that the ice goes out sooner than it does on the shallow water Marsh, as the winter snows and soft winds will soon melt it out long before it does on the shallow water where there is more grass and willows frozen in the ice that holds it down under the water so that the sun and winds never touch it. it is a long time going out. These marshes have aitracied the attention of sportsmen from all parts of the country who would pilgrimage to this region year after year to shoct geese and ducks, It was very seldom that a mistake was made by coming to this piace for successful duck shooting. The hunters pulled down their birds with distressing regular- ity, although it is practically prairie shooting which is so deceiving to the novice. From this fact that in later years the shooting is done from

152

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE a portable blind called a sink-tub and which is commonly called tub-shooting rather than from a boat or a blind. In the fall shooting there is plenty of grass, flags and marsh willows growing in the shallow water marshes for a blind but when the marshes froze over the grass is set on fire by hunters to drive the game out and after the fire has run over the ice covered marshes everything is burned off slick and clean above the ice so in the Spring shooting there is nothing for a blind. As the days of the long, cold winter were passing and ihe clear, sunny days of Springtime had come and melted the ice out oi the marsh !| began to get restless, moreso as the days lengthened into Spring. I knew well it was the call of the wild, as it gets hold of me about every Spring and Fall and when I was a boy it got me oftener than that. Finally I hit upon the absolutely right thing in my estimation; a practi- cal, sensible sink tub. It consists of a kerosene barrel by sawing the top of the barrel off at the bulge. Then | went toa blacksmith shop and 153

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND had two rings made and bolted to the barrel for Stake rings and with two stakes four or five feet long with hooks on driven in the ground and then hooked into the rings on the barrel to hold it down, just leaving the top of the barrel high enough above the surface so that the water could not splash over. In case the water was shallow a hole was dug to lower the tub to the water level. If the water was not too deep the hunter would wade out to his blind, otherwise he would be rowed out in a boat. In shooting from a sink tub blind one has to shoot over decoys and a hunter with a good call and a bunch of decoys was pretty sure of a string of birds to take to camp. By the time the ice was out of the marsh | had everything ready for the start. The ice usually goes out about the tenth to the twentieth of March. Sometimes it is. earlier than that and sometimes later. Finally the day for the start came. We made camp on a small island in the marsh near a large island called Round Grove and near a large, open body of 154

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE water called Goose Pend, which bordered on the swamp timber line. After supper I set my bar- rel house blind and had all made ready for the morrow. | lay downon a marsh hay bed to dream of the long line of quacking ducks com- ing to the decoys. ! was up early the following inorning. Placing a dozen wood decoys in a basket with my powder flask and shot pouch and with my No. {0 double barrel muzzle loader on my shoulder | departed for the blind which I reached before sunrise. in going through the marsh to the blind I ran across the remains olf an old blind that had been used the year before with a stake driven in the Sround and a half cir- cle board. Part of the head ofa nail kes was nailed on the stake still standing. With my hatchet I cut the stake off at the waters edge and put it in my barrel house blind, It fitted nicely and made a good seat. I! placed the de- coys about twenty yards in front of the blind. Stepping inside the barrel | picked up my old fowling piece. placing caps on the tubs, snapped

t55

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND them to make sure that the tubs were clean and dry. 1! always did this before loading a gun that had not been used for sometime. Then care- fully loading with four drams of powder and one and one-eighth ounce of No. 6 shot I was set lor whalever came along. As the sun arose above the timber of the Swamp and over the marsh horizon like a big ball of brass, the spike- iails and wegians began to fly ir. countless num- . bers. A few shots had been fired on the marsh a mile or so above where I was by some camp- ers On wwound Grove.:,, Tus put) the. ducks. to flight. It was quite interesting to watch these movements among the thousands of spikes and wegians. | heard the quack of two green- heads. It took me some time to locate them among the spike-tails and wegians. But an- Swering my call they decoyednicely and as they poised in the air before alighting they made an easy mark and they both came tumbling down at the first shot. Shortly after this a flock of canvas-backs came over the decoys, leaving 156

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE three of their number behind. I! did fairly well after my return to the blind on the second morn- ing, for | had a double shot at a bunch of pin- tails. Then while my gun was empty there came to the decoys the largest flock of black ducks I ever saw. Without exageration | believe there was over a hundred of them. They lit among the decoys and all around my sneak barrel, some within twenty feet of where I sat with an empty gun. Imagine, if you can, how queer I felt while sitting there like a bump on a log. Those that lit close by eyed me anxiously. Finally | began very carefully to load the gun. I got the powder in all right but did not have room enough in the barrel to get the ramrod out and get the wads down on the powder without exposing my arms above the barrel. Those near me gave the warning signal and took flight. In a moment all were gone. | finished loading but never fully recovered over my mis- hap of losing the best chance | have ever had in all my hunting experiences for a big shot at

157

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND black ducks, Shortly after this a large lone duck came from the direction of the swamp timber and came over in the decoys and as he poised and curved his wings to light | let him down with the first barre! and when | waded out to pick him up | found a duck unknown to me. It was a large brown bird with a large flat bill, looking very much like a spoon-bill. None of the hunters on the marsh that saw it could tell the name of the duck. The morning of the third day was rough and cold, the wind was blowing strong from the northwest and not many ducks were seen out on the open marsh in stormy and windy weather for they would stay in or near the timber. Yet I had fairly good shooting for two or three hours in the morning. As | was sitting in my sink barrel blind thinking how much more comfortable it was than stand- ing in the waiter in a grass blind all day, I heard a loud “swish” of wings. Looking out! saw five large ducks over the decoys. I arose, gave them the right barrel and two fell dead and a 158 |

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEEL clean miss with the second. I waded out and picked up two black ducks and here is where | discovered that there are two varieties of black ducks just as surely as two and two make four. By ten o'clock it was getting very rough. The waves would splash over the top of the barrel. | gathered up my decoys and made a _ bee-line forcamp. I had in all forty-six ducks and in that number there were eight varieties of the duck family. Many of the varieties that I killed then are now extinct. I would never believe that in fifty years those great myriads of migra- tion ducks could have been exterminated. In years gone by I have often wondered where so many species of the duck family sprang from, so much more so than the dry land birds. The book name of many birds is derived from habits and their dress, as the green-head mallard, the spike-tail which has only two long pointed feathers in their tail. The wood-duck, some- times called the tree-duck from the fact that they build their nests in old snags and hollow

[59

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND trees and sometimes they are called the nut- hatch, but I have never heard where she got the name. But like any hunter who kills a duck and does not know the name of it he can offera guess. [The wood-ducks build their nests in hollow trees. Sometimes the flying Squirrel or wood-mice will carry a few butter-nuts or beach nuts in a wood-duck’s nest to crack at his leis- ure and perhaps some early observers found these nuts in a wood duck’s nest and _ jokingly accused the duck of trying tohatch them. | have come to the conclusion that this is the way that so many new names of ducks have sprung up in later years, A few days later we broke camp and moved out of the marsh, scarcely a duck was to be seen. This was the first portable blind or tub-shooting ever done on the Kankakee. A year or so later there were scores of sink tubs in use but ofa different type. They were made of galvanized sheet iron most~ ly instead of an old kerosene barrel, and while | do not want to claim anything new in shooting 160

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE from a blind, for that mode of hunting is as old as man, only an improvement of the system during those early days. they were many marked hunters and very few of their names | can recall excepi the Cannons, iNoois, More- houses, Starkeys and scores of others whose names I have fergotten. Harry, my half broth- er, was a Star wing-shot and last but not least were the Gilson boys, Ed and Billy, who were believed by many to be the best shots on the river. i remember one time, many years ago, before breech-loaders came in use, one of them killed one hundred and ninety ducks and eighi geese in one day’s shooting using a muzzle loader, It was during the early seventies that Kankakee region reached the zenith of its glory as a hunting resort. My first shooting was done from a boai. In some seasons we would have splendid shooting and in others not so good, this depended on the weather conditions, The marshes seemed to be the natural feeding grounds, especially for the diving ducks. But

lol

BARREL-HOUSE BLIND the dredging of great ditches through the low- lands letting the water off caused the glory of the Kankakee Marshes io depart. I only wish | had the ability to describe and make you feel the beauty of these marsh islands to those of my readers who may not have seen them. Pic- _ ture the prairie marshes for miles and miles in lensth and from two to twelve miles in width and dotted with hundreds of small islands and ridges containing from one-half to twenty acres. The one that we were camped upor. contained about four acres. The lofty sycamore with its white bark can be seenfor miles as they rose above the mammoth oak and down from its limbs dropped ropes of creeping grape-vines, while there were many others covered with huc-~ kleberry bushes. There were many different species of birds which inhabited these islands. Among the game birds were several species of the snipe family which nests and rears its young during the nesting season. The wood-duck also also inhabited these islands and a half dozen or 162

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE more other varieties of ducks nesting on or near an island. Also, in early times it was a great nesting place for wild geese and for this reason a portion of this great marsh in northern Jasper County along the Kankakee Swamp timber was known as Goose Lake but generally known among the latter-day hunters as Goose Pond, where thousands of geese would flock to roost at night and in the morning they would leave for the feeding grounds, usually on some farm- er’s wheat or cornfields. When they would rise from the water the air was filled with birds and the flop of their wings as they rise have the sound of an express train rumbling over a bridge. Now I have tried to picture this great pond at twilight or daybreak. It stands out in memory as one of the most beautiful | have ever seen in a country abounding in marshes, a lake where the surroundings were not marred by man and given over tothe wild things that love the silent places. Another time I was out duck hunting and we hadincamp a_ hunter of

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BARREL-HOUSE BLIND many years experience but when he came to camp in the evening his string would show only a few birds and when asked what was the rea- son he said he didn’t know unless it was that the feathers carried away the birds, This hap- pened to me many times and “Understand, old- timers. | am not telling you that every shot I fired brought down a bird.” Not by any means, . for many were the foxy old birds that I shot at and missed oras the old-time hunters termed it, another case where the feathers carried away the meat. As times passes and years unfold, it is a matter of intense interest to the water-fowl hunters how certain varieties of duck grow scarce and others come into prominence, which in early years was unknown to the hunting fra- ternity. This is remarkably true of several species and particularly applies to nearly every variety of large kucks known in the Kankakee River Region. As Ihave said, many varieties of ducks, plentiful fifty years ago, are now almost exterminated and where we ran our boats over 164

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE the marshes and where I sat in my kerosene barrel blind and shot ducks almost fifty years aso now Stands the farmer's house in the corn- fields and the scene of those by-gone days still clings to my memory. How often do my thoughis drift back to those camp days. What a lot more fun can a fellow have in a hunter’s lodge or trapper’s shanty costing about fifteen dollars amidst its natural surroundings, than in a ten thousand dollar mansion with its artificial environments. Every hunter has a hobby and some have two, as it was with me in my youth- ful days, It has been said that hobbies belong to the human and are a part of the Creator’s birthright. The human nature Glories of pos- session, both good and bad and all valuable. It has been said by scholarly men that hobbies of Sane men often discount the dreams of an idiot, nevertneless we have them just the same. | loved hunting with a gun on the waters and dry land, ! also enjoyed fully as wel! hunting with a good dog on the ice. Now ovefore breaking

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BARREL-HOUSE BLIND camp and leaving the Kankakee hunting grounds to the agriculturist, which is now pass- ing into its third stage of development, I want to tell the readers of another type of hunters known as the fur hunters, and their hunting out- fit consisted ofa good dog or two, an axe, a shovel and a rat spear. I have told the reader how we hunted the deer, shot the wild geese, trapped wild animals. Nowl will relate how we hunted the ring-tail. raccoon, mink and musk- rat, and occasionally an otter but not very offen as they stay close io deep water. If there was snow on the ice the coon and mink were tracked to their dens and the musk-rat was speared in his house with a long two-pronged spear jabbed through the house where the rats siayed during the day. But the coon and mink were mostly hunted with dogs. Scores of fur hunters who hunted the swamps with dogs never hunted with a gun at all and the hunter who owned a good coon or mink dog in those days had something that was valuable, One 166

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE

‘time whilst’in camp on one of those swamp islands quite near our camp was a half-breed Indian's hnt and with the hope of securing e few “matches | called at his hut and: found that’ he was the’ owner of a very valuable coon dog, judging from the ‘number of hides that! saw ‘sticking’ around in the hut. Not'seeing any dog around:I inquired what kind of a'dog he hunted -with. Hesaid that he had: an imported coon ‘ dog from Missouri: Now ‘believing that many of my readers who are lovers: of a good dog will be interested with the true meaning of a good coon, dog | will: briefly relate fhe story told by the owner of the dog “Muck,” as that was his name. He was a black-tan English fox hound and' was born in the Ozark Mountains in south- ern’' Missouri ‘and: in those days the Missouri mountains were alive with raccoons and hunting coons was sort of hereditary with Muck. When but a few days old ‘and before his eyes had opened he and his two brothers were bought by a Kankakee hunter and brought to the Kanka-

16/

“ BARREL-HOWSE iBLIND

kee Swamps-and turned over'to a bull bitch: to be mothered and cared for. ; With their keen

scer.t of inheritance and the viciousness of their

|: foster mother they were made the most famous

hunting dogs that ever hunted in the Kankakee / Swamps and those puppies with no. pedigree other than:that of a~ Missouri-~ hound, sold for

' one hundred and fifty: dollars each. Their quali-

fications, merve and size for the hunters of coon and: mink: in: the swamps:.on: the ice in those days made them\valuable not only for coon and mink hunting but they: were trained for other Same--deer, wolves.and foxes; One of them . fell into the hands of a.noted deer hunter, Ed McNeel, and when the dog -was -eleven years old he refused an offer of two hundred dollars, offered by some Michigan deer. hunter who . wanted the old dog to train some young ones. | have an old note book made of hunting events of years ago. Its covers are tattered, dirty and faded, and on the outside shows. plainly upon

|... its. shabby service the ravage of time and. evi-

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE dence of wear and tear, But its pages are full of happy memories of by-gone days and recol- lections stir me as {| open the old book. Whata blessed gift is memory of all the many gifts of an all-wise, beneficient Creator, The gift of mem- ory | believe to be the most precious ofall, A person may lose his possessions, be deprived of sight or the loss of a limb but once having seen and enjoyed these things the memory will re- main whilst life and intellect last and can be re- called at most any time. When I turn over the dim and faded pages | am back again in the old Kankakee Swamps. What events in hunting you can remember, Friend Hunter. What glor- ious happenings occured when you were present to behold them. [very hunter keeps in his memory to the last some wonderful performance of the hunting grounds. Hehas only to shut his eyes and see again the shots or catch, just as it was made, even though it might have been forty, fifty or even seventy-five years ago and the smallest details of the great achievements will

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BARREL-HOUSE BLIND never pass from his recollections. Every old- time hunter has a string of such memories to think back upon. What were the most wonder- ful happenings of all. it has been said, that the hunters love best the trapping side of hunting. While this might be true from the financial side yet ask any old timer to teil of five great events of happenings of things he saw and four ef them will be tales of hunting with the ¢un. Think it over and see if it isn't strictly true. The mem- ory of hunting glories lingers longer and the thoughts of many great shots made will come sooner to the recollection than any achieve- ment made with the rod or traps. The hunters who were there (I wasn’t) have always claimed that the greatest of all rifle shots ever made in the Kankakee Swamps was made on Long Ridge about fifty years ago by a hunter named Hall, who is now dead, Hall was a native of Jasper County and a deer hunter by trade. He and Harrison Dalson hunted deer together a great deal and were together on the day that 170

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Hall made the great shot. Two deer came dashing by Hall, running in opposfte directions, and when they came opposite of each other Hall took aim and fired. The bali passed through the body of the first deer killing it in- stantly and struck the other deer under the shoulder between the first and second ribs and lodged near the heart and a few bounds more and it fell dead. A few days later Mr, Dalson was out hunting in the swamp when he came upon two big bucks fighting. | They had locked their horns so tight together that they could not separate themselves, he shot one and knocked the other in the head with his hunting axe. He hung them up and went home and told Hall that he no longer had the best of him, for he had killed two deer with only one shot. Hall, wouldn't believe it at first but when he could not find any bullet hole in one of the bucks, only where it had been hit on the head with the pole ofan axe. Yet he was entitled to claim the champion shot having killed his two, running

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BARREL-HOUSE BLIND

with one bullet. Many years ago Father killed two, a doe and a fawn, at one shot, They were standing still. | He had trailed them into a red- brush thicket where the brush was so thick that one could not see only a short distance. The red~brush is a species of scrub-oak that grows on the sand ridges. They hold their leaves on all winter, making it a great hiding place for deer. Looking under the bushes Father saw what he thought was a deer’s legs but could not see any part of the body. Raising the trusty old rifle to his shoulder he aimed where he thought its body would be and fired. At the crack of the gun away bounded adeer. He went to where he thought the deer was standing and there lay one too dead to kick. To solve the mystery he looked at the tracks of the one that ran away and discovered great splotshes of blood on ithe snow. Following the trail thirty- five or forty yards he found the doe kicking her last kick. The bullet had passed through the fawn and lodged in the shoulder of the doe. As

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE they stood side by side, only a few feet apart, they were killed by the same bullet, The inci- dents just mentioned are only a few of the mem- orable shots. What hunters have seen such doings, or rather, where is there any hunter who never saw things just as wonderful?

CHAP TER URY DRAINING THE SWAMPS WHERE THE INGENUITY OF HAS DEFEATED THE DESIGNS OF NATURE BY ERASING THE KANKAKE SWAMPS OFF THE MAP. THE OLD RIVER AND THE ONCE FAMOUS HUNTING GROUNDS A PAST MEMORY It is not my purpose to write the story of the

reclaiming or rather, the story of the new Kan- kakee River, as it is a history in itself. In our childhood we were taught by our teacher and the geography that this vast region was a great swamp and by the term “swamp” it means a low depression in the earth’s surface and _ this was filled with water and mud and by applying the term “swamp” this vast Kankakee Region made a very large mnd-hole, This teaching was a Great hinderance to the settling up of this country and many men and women still cling 174

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE tenaciously to that teaching. Up to a quarter of a century ago any mention of the Kankakee Swamps called up visions of a region of limit- less extent of swamps and marshes, uninhabited and desolate, a country always associated with tales of suffering and death, of unfriendly sav- ages and wild animals. For years this country was passed over by hunters and prospectors and was considered worthless, but the marvel- ous transformation which has taken place in the last three decades in the land of silence and - sunshine, furnishes one of the most interesting and inspiring pages in the history of our great Kankakee development, The Kankakee swamp is vanishing from the map. Its boundaries have shrunken and it is no longer presenting a_for- midable barrier to the growth and progress of northwestern Indiana. There was at that time several hundred thousand acres of this water- soaked, craw-fish country that has been re- claimed by means of dredging, that are now producing bountiful harvests. Every year hun-

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DRAINING THE SWAMPS dreds of people are residing on farms now that a few years ago were musk-rat ponds. Years ago tt was a very common. thing to hear of some Eastern speculator being taken in by one of those swamp-land swindlers. They would plat out a tract of swamp land, go East to find their victim and trade or sell a tract of this land to some speculator. One Mr. Jones, of Dayton, Onio, was taken in by some swindler inthis way and when he came to look for his land he could not find it as it was covered with water from one to five feet deep ar.d the way that Jones told it was more amusing than true. Jones said he was a victim of mispleced confidence. He had traded for a tract of land on the Kankakee iRiver and was making atrip down the river in search of his land. He said that it had two good houses on it and was near atown. | should judge from his description of the country that he was looking for his farm. That the town and houses must of been musk-rat houses and the town must have beena rat-town. I would 176

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE term it such from the inhabitants of the place as I have experienced just such a joke myself many years ago whilst | wasan overland freight- er onthe western plains. We would work this gas on the tenderfoot that would come along inquiring if there were any settlements or set- tlers living anywhere near, [The answer was most always in the affirmative and if they would go to such and such a place there was quite a settlement and a large town. The tenderfoot on going to the place directed would find it inhabit- ed by a lively little four-footed tribe known as ‘prairie dogs. (I have hunted for these towns myself.) This is about such a farm that Mr. Jones had traded for instead of two good farms and-houses. They were musk-rat houses. li was in sixty-nine (the wet season) when Jones made his trip down the Kankakee and the re- sources of the country were not so well de- veloped then as they are now, and his story of what he saw is more amusing than jest, so far as the truth is concerned. He says Indiana is

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DRAINING THE SWAMPS

a delightful country or will be when it is finished. The State is big enough and a considerable por- tion of it has a good foundation... What it wants is building up. There is plenty of water and sand, pucker-brush, roots and cotton trees, Swamps and marshes anda wonderful vegeta- tion of grass and vines and wild flowers. What it wants is more land, at least what a Hoosier calls land. But it is coming on. Thousands of acres of this Kankakee Marsh where the musk- rat houses used to star.d. now stands the golden Grain shocks. What the change that will be made in the next quarter of a century is | leave to the reader to guess ait, Mr. Jones then goes on to say that he did not trade for a musk-rat town or a cotton-wood grove, Being discour- aged because anyone could have a town who would take a boat and go out in the swamp with a surveyor and make a map of a musk-rat pond, big house and population, The White Star was making a trip up the river to Baum’s Bridge when she met Mr. Jones, the Ohio land 178

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE speculator, who was sailing over the marshes hunting for his farm. The steamer had struck a snag and the crew was at work geiting loose when Jones and his party came up. He began telling the crew how tired he was of water and marshes and more water and scraggley brush and more water. Finally he bluffed the captain of the White Star by saying: “Coptain, what is the average price of land upin this part of the country. By the gallon, I think.” Mr. Jones was tired of his Kankakee land speculation when he made his trip down the Kankakee. Many other Easterners have been taken in the same way by buying or trading Kankakee land without seeing it and when they come to look for the land it is out of sight, covered with water. Sometimes this region was called “the land that God forgot to finish.” To my mind it was finished just as the Almighty intended it to be, it was left for manto finish. And now | am going to tell you in part how it was done. By the ingenuity of man, assisted by the State gov-

175

DRAINING THE SWAMPS ernment, is due the credit of erasing the swamp from our map and converting the counlry, which God forgot, into pleasant places for the habita- tion of man. At this time there was between four and five hundred thousand acres of this land practically water-soaked and worthless. Now it is drained by these engineering workers. This work of the State Reclaiming Service af- fords many examples of man’s audacity of de- feating the designs of nature, This draining movement originated way back in the early fifties when the Governor of Indiana recom- mended a bill to the Legislature for the redeem- ing of the swamp lands along the Kankakee Valley. That it was the State’s duty to the great agricultural class of the Kankakee Valley that the farmers of this region have contributed a greater service to the people of the state than can ever be repaid. The landowners themselves in an overgight of the law regarding the sale and drainage of swamp lands have willingly bought and paid for these lands and then taxed them- 180

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE selves for the drainage besides. Article Eight, Section Two of the Constitution for the State of Indiana which is as follows: “All lands that have been or may be hereafter granted to the State where no special purpose is expressed in the Srant and the proceeds of the sale thereof, in- cluding the proceeds of the sale of the swamp _land granted to the State of Indiana by the act of Congress on the 28th day of September, 1850." Inthe same section implies that the swamp lands were granted to the state on con- dition that the money derived from the sale of those lands be used in the drainage of the same. That part of the contract, sorry to say, has never been carried out. As I have said, all great movements have their beginning. So it was with the drainage of the Kankakee Swamps. In the early fifties a bunch of inen, afterwards known as the Kankakee Swamp Land Swind- lers, went into an agreemeni with the State Authorities at Indianapolis to drain a certain amount of the Kankakee marshes by digging 7

181

DRAINING THE SWAMPS big ditches and emptying them in the river and they were to take a certain percent of the land drained for their pay. They dug a few small ditches on range and section lines, reported same to the state authorities and received their land grants for several thousand acres of swamp land without ever draining an acre of the land. They sold and traded great tracts of this land to Eastern speculators who never saw the land be- fore buying it and in some instances they never saw it after buying it. As mention has before been made, when they came to look for their new possessions it could not be found on ac- count of being covered with water. The specu- lators could see no future for such a desolate region and never paid the taxes. The lands were sold for taxes. The counties held the tax sales and very little of it was ever redeemed and the land went back to the State. Occasionally in later years some of these tax title deeds and swamp land swindlers’ deeds are heard of in the district courts. The state issued the land grants 182

PLONEFER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE in good faith but the ditch makers did not fulfill their part of the agreement. In1854 the State Authorities ordered a swamp land ditch com- missioner to be appointed and Aaron Lyile, of Valparaiso, Ind,, was appointed to this position and was the first ditch commissioner for this district. After serving about a year and a _ half he resigned and Ezriah Freeman was appointed his successor. Commissioner Lytle had a few ditches surveyed out and dug. They were sold out in sections and half sections just as much as a contractor thought he could construct. State Ditch No, 1 on the north side of the river was the first ditch dug and an Irishman by the name of /cDugal contracted for the first two mile sec- tions and John Broady of Three Rivers, Michi- gan, bought the third and half of the fourth sec- tions one and a half miles. State Ditch No. 2 was run farther east beginning at the river and running up old Sandy Hook to where it inter- sected with Ditch No.1 near an island called. Bridge Island. | might explain here why it de-

183

DRAINING THE SWAMPS rived that name is from the fact that at this place is where the first wagon road crossed Sandy Hook, Early in the seventies a wagon bridge was built across the East Channel of Sar.dy Hook from ihe main land to the Island, a little over five hundred feet long, Previous to the building of the bridge the channel was ford- ed during low water and footmen crossed the channel in boats, Getting back to the subject, these ditches were dug by hand with pick and shovel and were twelve feet wide for the first three miles then eight feet wide to the source. The two ditches that I have mentioned were the first Staite ditches dug in the Kankakee Valley They were practically a failure. At the lower end where they einptied their waters into the Kankakee they filled’ up on account of back water when the river was high and the ditch was of little use at all, as they had to be cleaned and recleaned every few years costing the land- owners several thousand dollars at each opera~- tion which means that these people have spent 184

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE nearly one hundred thousand dollars of their own money without as yet realizing the desired benefit. Most of these settlers bought this poor, wet land with limited capital and are improving it under hard conditions. Legally and by all rights the State owes to the land-owners of the Kankakee River Region every dollar that has been spent in the reclaiming of these lands. As | have said all great improvements have their beginning. So in the summer of eighty-six was | the date of the digging of the Cass and Single- ton big ditch in Lake County and it was the first dredge ditch dug for thereclaiming of the swamp region. Since that there have been many ditches constructed on both sides of the river running parallel with the stream One of great importance was the drainage of English Lake some years ago, Three years ago was com- menced the reclaiming ditch, the new Kankakee River, by straightening the old river which was so crooked in its course that it almost crossed itself. In a distance of forty miles, straight line,

185

‘padueyo useq pry jauueyo oy! Joye pueg YON 1¥ pod FAIA PIO P4.L

DRAINING THE SWAMPS it ran near one hundred and fifty miles, under- mining big trees along its banks that would tum- ble down in the river and wash out great holes in one place and fill up in another, making it a slow. sluggish stream, In high water it would spread out over the swamps and marshes for miles on each side of the river, Since the con- struction of the big ditch the water isall confined to this channel. If some of these swamp land speculators could return to this region they find what they were looking for fourty or fifty years ago, The large land owners such as Cass ®& Sirgleton, Gifford, of Kankakee City, Illinois, and Nelson Morris, the Chicago meat packer, and many others who owned large tracts of swamp lands were strong in favor of draining whilst many others were opposed to the innovement, especially the huuters and trap- pers who said that it would ruin their business, that the Kankakee Swamps were more valuable for their furs than they were for their agricul- tural purposes. The money that was brought 186

PIONFER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE into this country for the sale of furs amounts to between sixty-five and seventy-five thousand dallars every year, that the revenue for furs alone from 1850 to 1900 amounts to over three million dollars. Furs vary greatly in price from one year to the next. But only dur- ing the fifty years was there one good prime rat hide brought in selling for thirty-three cents. In those days a musk-rat hide would bring from three to ten cents a hide. Father predicted that the day would come when a good prime ra skin would sell for a dollar. Fifty-two years later in 1920 his prediction came true, when he saw good prime rat skins sell for four dollars and ten cents apiece. In those days it took a rat skin to buy a common sewing needle. A French fur trader by the name of Cuttauh from Detroit, Michigan, used to buy furs in this re- gion and he told the trappers’ wives that they had better buy in a good supply of needles, as the needle-maker was dead and that they would not get any more needles very soon. Upon the

187

yooH Apues jo yINow oy) Jv sayeyuryy MON OY TL

DRAINING THE SWAMPS strensth of this statement he traded thousands of needles to the squaws and the wives of the white hunters, in exchange he gave them a needle for a rat skin. This vast region that was considered worthless has made many a mana small fortune. The best figures obtained for the amount of furs caught and sold by the huniers and trappers of the Kankakee Swamps between the years of 1850 and 1900 was ap- proximately three million, seven hundred and lity thousand dollars, an average of seventy-five thousand per year. Whenever there was a bill Lip before the legislature for an appropriation for the drainage of the swamp lands there was al- ways enough to oppose it and cause its defeat and yet the water soaked lands were doomed. Finally the fatal day came. A big dredging ma- chine was set to work in the rivera few miles above Baum’s Bridge and excavated a great ditch of one hundred and fifty feet in width through the dense forest. Hence the new Kan- kakee River. The game had become almost

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PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE extinct long before the water ever flowed in the new river. The last deer that was killed in the swamp, to my knowledge, was killed by E, D. Salsberry, a Panhandle railroad engineer of Lo- gansport, Indiana, in his Fall hunt of 1880. Salsberry and his party were in camp on Cor- nell Island and one morning he and Ike Shaw, another Panhandle engineer, were going to the South Marsh for a day’s shooting and in going through the swamp timber a deer ran across the trail and Salsberry shot and killed it. using small bird shot. | And two months later Father killed one on the North Marsh, These were the last deer ever seen alive or dead in this pari of the swamp region. The story of the Kankakee country is a story of evolution in the develop- ment of a country richly endowed by nature, and a story of neglected opportunity, neglected in some instances not from lack of appreciation but from man’s natural inclination to follow along the lines of least resistance. Nature has done so much for this favored country that the

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Camp of Logansport, Ind., Hunters on Cornell’s Island on the Kankakee in 1880

Left Camp—H. J. McSheehy, John Condon, Sam Doll,

J. B. Messinger. Right Camp—KEd Salsbury, Ike Shaw

DRAINING THE SWAMPS struggle for existence which called forth man’s best energies, eliminated. It was easy to live, to understand the slow development of this re- gion and to appreciate the rapid progress of later years, We must understand its geographi- cal location, its topographical formation and the conditions controlling its destiny. Way back, nearly a century ago, when Major Long ex- plored this Kankakee region, in his report he gave it the name “Kankakee Swamps.” The term caught the fancy of the public and has been set in type for it ever since and it is impos- sible to estimate how potent a factor the phrase has been in retarding the growth of this coun- try, Here, as well as in most all new territories, the hunter followed close on the foot-steps of the pathfinders and here, indeed, was the Hunt- ers Paradise, Imagine, if you can, an area of several hundred thousand acres of swamp and marsh land and abounding with wild game of all kinds and the river alive with fish of the best varieties found in the States. While the deer, 190

PIONEER HUN'TERS OF THE KANKAKEER wild-hog, turkeys, geese and ducks made the hunters meat;the otter, mink, musk-rat, raccoon, wolf, fox, lynx and wild-cat were the fur-bearing animals. It surely was the home of the hunter and trapper. This was the condition ofthe re- gion when the Redman left it and the white hunter built his cabin on the wooded islands and the shores of the Kankakee. Yet many of the readers wonder why white men with their families lived in so secluded a spot. Could the hearts of the hunters ask for more; could nature more bountifully bestow her gifts? That he should look with disapproval on the swamps is no small wonder. But by and by the man with the hoe came and looked upon the country and it seemed to him that this swamp region was too good to be given over to the musk-rat and the raccoon and to the exclusive use of the few men who did not own them and this is what brought about the reclaiming movement. Un- der the new conditions, with the advent of the Swamp (Gifford) Railroad, the Kankakee swamp

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DRAINING THE SWAMPS country passed into tts second stage of develop- ment and in many places the ‘“hoodooed” craw fish flats of the Kankakee region is now the Kankakee Valley corn fields. The reclaiming of the Kankakee swamps cast a shadow of gloom and sadness to the few remaining old- time hunters who have spent their early years hunting and trapping on the Kankakee river. They feel pretty much as did the Indians when they had to give up their ideal hunting grounds to the whites. The pioneer hunter saw the French fur-trader and the Indian go, then they saw the wild game go and now what is left of their number have seen the vanishing of the Kankakee swamps. In the language of the poet “There is a magical tie to the land of our home, which the heart cannot break though the footsteps may roam.” Yes, indeed, the ties that bind us to the land of our birth are truly magi- cal. | often find this so when I am visiting my old home. Iam naturally attracted to the scenes that | loved so well when a boy. So it 192

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE was with the Indians that once inhabited this region. The reader remembers that mention was made in a previous chapter of my visit to the Pottowattomies in the Indian Reservation. One old warrior, Chief Nae-nee-be-zho, narrates the sadness and sorrow of his people. He spoke of the whites, of the white man’s hunting ground and their destiny. He told how they would van- ish and’ be no ‘more: * He said’ in part; “OT Great Master, the pale-face comes and the Red- man is driven from the face of the eartn. The land that was ours is gone from us and the rocks are our bed and the leaves are our cover. We sigh in vain for yesterday, we have no hope, no comfort for tomorrow, all our greatness is gone and the Redman’s days are but few, ! return to the land of my Father, | gaze on the placid river. Oh that | might die and sleep here where the great Waubonsie breathed the air, beneath the same trees which have shelter- ed him, Oh where are the friends of my Father, where is the war chief Waubonsie, Me!tontonis

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DRAINING TH! SWAMPS and many others? Oh, could I stand where my tribes once roamed. But no vestige of the pow- erful Pottowattomies remain. The lakes and marshes and the Kankakee River, which my canoe was want to glide; knows not the dip of the Redman’s paddle. Where once I moored my canoe to the shore of Lake Michigan now the great steamers are at anchor and the dip of the RKedman’s paddle is heard no more. No more does the flint-tipped arrow fall the deer and the woodlands resound no more with his bounding step upon the brink ofthe river. But now comes the pioneer’s cow in its stead. The majesty of nature is dwarfed and humbled in the marsh of the white man andon his trail is naught but nature’s ruins. [| gaze on the camp of the white man and hear him call it Chicago. Oh Nau-nee-bo-zho, forgive the cruel pale-face for disturbing the peace of the great Shaubanee, whose home was along the Kankakee Region. | seek for the wigwam of my people and find in its place the houses and barns of the white man. 194

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE Again, if they would turn to the spot where the great Chiefs held their councils and where the pipe of peace was smoked by the great warriors they would find cities, towns and villages. The brick walls rise on the spot where once the deer-skins were spread and the great oak tree had been taken away. The memories of the Redman have been buried beneath the- white man’s axe, trowel and plow. Nau-nee-bee-zho could not understand why they were banished from the land that the great master gave them unless it was for the treachery of Nau-non-gee, or the murderer of Red Bird, on the trail that run from Pottowattomie Ford on the Kankakee (Eaton’s Ferry) to Lake Michigan. Oh memo- ries of the Kankakee, which was the ideal hunt- ing ground of my sire, are so shattered, all about me is desolation and I turn from the scene which | sought to return to the land of the setting sun. The pale-face has no love fer our memories and our traditions he regardeth not. Sad is the heart of the Redman. Years and

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DRAINING THE SWAMPS years ago when this old Indian moved his beau- tiful squaw to French Island, now the home of the white man, and in the same swamp where the young papoose paddled his log canoe is now the Kankakee corn-fields, Where the war dance made the air ring is row heard the brass band playing “Just As The Sun Went Down.” And the tolling of the bells in the towers tells of the departure of the Redman who worshipped the Great Master. In the quiet groves where the sky and the trees were not shut out to the Redman, nature is the highest art. He would sit in his canoe with Okemoes and his little papoose floating between the banks over the silvery waves of the river, He saw in the Great Master everything. There was no black smoke from the railroad locomotive and traction en- gines; no fences to mar the beautiful land which the Great Father had given to them. As Iwas about to leave their lodge and bidding them good-bye, one ofthe old warriors rose to his feet, threw a blanket around him and passed to 196

PIONEER HUNTERS OF THE KANKAKEE and fro, saying in a low, sad tone: “Oh gone are the days of my youth and memories of my peo- ple and the beauties of our beautiful land are forever buried. My Father and myself are for- Sotten, and the Land of Liberty shall know us no more. When | visit the scenes of my boy- hood where | played with the pebbles and sand, where years before played the little papoose with his canoe and paddle, and when | recall some of my early adventures of hunting and fishing, the most pleasant recollections of all was my boyhood days in my island home on the Kankakee.

End:

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