Massac County, Illinois - Chapter 14: Items of Interest, 1900

Chapter 14: Items of Interest

AUGUST 5th, 1868, the county board sent the notorious Daniel Benton, alias Wm. Newby, to the poor house, Pitts Lynn, keeper. He claimed to have had two brothers, Charles and Lewis Benton, killed in the army. He was an inmate a few years ago when Mr. Slack was keeper.

The first man sent to the penitentiary was Angus McGee, indicted by the first grand jury and sentenced by the first court, Judge Walter B. Scates, presiding. The charge was "passing counterfeit money," and the sentence two years with solitary confinement the last two days.

Mary E. Green sued for divorce in the first court. Her husband Henry, was a non-resident, and publication was made in the ''Illinois Republican," Shawneetown.

By some, Eobert G. Ingersoll is accredited as a teacher in his early days in Metropolis and they point to the old frame building opposite the Elliott corner as the scene of his pedagogical experiences.

Others deny this, but it is a verified fact that Rev. Ingersoll, his father, a Congregational minister, lived in Dresden, N. Y., 1833, when Robert, the Agnostic, was born. His father came to Illinois when Eobert was 12 years of age, and during the youth of the noted orator and lecturer, lived in Metropolis and taught school. One of Robert's brothers, a small boy, was drowned while here and lies buried in the cemetery

The Hrst Steamboat

The first steamboat that ever appeared upon any Western river was the New Orleans, built at Pittsburgh, Pa., in 1810 and 1811, by Mr. Roosevelt of New York, acting in conjunction with the originators of the first steamboat that ever appeared on any waters, Messrs. Fulton and Livingstone, also of New York. This boat was 138 feet keel, about 400 tons burden, and was launched at Pittsburg in March, 1811, later descending the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, and landing at Natchez, Miss., in December, 1811.

The experiment proved a success. The boat cost |40,000. She was run as a packet from Natchez tO' New Orleans, and cleared the first year, according to Capt. Morris, of New Orleans, who was one of her pilots, |24,294. Passenger fare between New Orleans and -Natchez was flS.OO per head, and freight rates in proportion. She employed twelve hands at 130.00 per month each; Captain, $1,000.00 per year; 800 cords of wood at |1.75 per cord. The vessel furnished meals to passengers and crew, and was fitted with a bar room, which supplied liquors of the most approved brands. Her speed was nine miles per hour, down stream. This boat was a success from the beginning, and with her advent begins the era of successful navigation of the rivers of the world with steam for the motive power. This boat, the New Orleans, passed down the river by Metropolis, which was then, except Fort Massac, a howling wilderness, inhabited only by the bear, panther, buffalo, elk and many others of the wild animal kingdom, to say nothing of the ever stealthy and treacherous Indians that constantly trod the northern and southern banks of the Ohio. We can imagine how these nomads regarded the approach of this river monster, spouting from its iron nostrils clouds of smoke, intermingled with Are, and its open mouth, glowing with the flames of a moving tartarus ! The few white men who saw this wonder viewed it with superstitious alarm. Many pioneers from a distance, among them the late Jacob Kidd of near Metropolis, 111., and Couriers Du Bois, congregated at Smithland, Ky., then a small settlement, and watched the New Orleans pass that point. This section, at that time, was in the throes of the great New Madrid earthquake. Darkness hung over the regions round about, as a pall, and the sun shone, as a ball of fire, through vaporous exhalations that attended the earthquake, but the boat moved on, surely and steadily towards her destination. Her few passengers viewed with alarm, at and about New Madrid, the ravages of the seismic disturbances, but they were soon left behind, and as before stated, the New Orleans arrived, safely at Natchez on the last day of December, 1811.

Three rough boatmen early in the century, traversed the Ohio. They were named Carpenter, Talbot, and Mike Finke. They were strong, illiterate, desperate characters, and were skilled riflemen. Finke was termed the "last of the boatmen." They would fight at the least provocation.

Mike had a supposed wife called "Peg." Once their boat met another and he concluded that he caught Peg winking at another boatman. Finke quietly went to the bank and piled up a great heap of dry leaves, returned to the boat, got Peg and his rifle, ordered her to crawl into the center of the heap, set fire to the leaves in four places and under fear of being shot by his drawn rifle, kept her there until her dress and hair were in flames, when with a yell she darted for the river, and plunged in. When rescued, Mike said: "There, that'll laru you not to be winkin' at them fellers on t'other boat."

was sentenced in the county court for deliberately shooting away the protruding part of a negro's heel, standing on the river front at St. Louis. His defense was that it prevented the negro from wearing a "genteel boot."

Finke and Carpenter were considered fast friends, in proof of which they would pierce a pint cup of whisky with a rifle shot at 70 paces, the cup resting on the other's head. While boating on the upper Missouri river, however, they quarreled over a squaw and afterwards made up. To prove their sinceiity they were to again shoot the pint cup of whisky from each other's head. Tossing a coin Finke got the first shot. Carpenter bequeathed all his pistols, guns and articles to Talbot and took his position. Mike raised his gun, took aim, lowered the gnn and called out, "Hold your noddle steady. Carpenter! Don't spill the whisky - I shall want some presently." He again took aim and fired. Carpenter fell with a bullet hole square in his forehead. Finke cursed himself, his gun, the powder and the bullet, claiming it to be an accident.

Later he boasted to Talbot that he killed Carpenter purposely, whereupon Talbot drew Carpenter's bequeathed pistol and shot Mike dead. Talbot later was drowned while trying to swim a river.

Transportation Facilities

During early years the Ohio river furnished the only means of transportation. Occasional rumors of coming railroads filled the air. Remains of the McLean roadbed still exist. The Hon. Geo. W. Parker solved the question, however, in November, 1887. He was vice-president and general manager of the St. Louis and Cairo Short Line and proposed to build an extension of their road, which then terminated at Marion, 111., on to Paducah, Ky.

November 23, 1887, accompanied by Hon. W. K. Murphy, Mr. Parker met a mass meeting of citizens of Metropolis and plainly told that it would require a donation of |25,000, free depot privileges and the right of way to Round Knob to enable Metropolis to get the road. A committee composed of

Messrs. J. F. McCartney, H. Quante, W. E. Brown, W. O. Towle, E. P. Curtis, J. C. Willis and B. Baer was appointed to negotiate with full powers to act. As a result we have a railroad.

In 1899 further railroad discussion was precipitated by a proposed extension of the Chicago & Eastern Illinois extending north and South through Johnson county. A branch was pro posed from Goreville through Vienna to Metropolis. It failed and the Chicago and Eastern Illinois corporation began in 1900 the construction of a fifteen mile extension from Cypress Junction in Johnson county to Joppa, Massac county as a terminus.