Ogle County, Illinois - Chapter 2, 1859

On Easter Sunday, in the year 1512, Juan Pojicc dc Leon, a comrade of Christopher Columbus, discovered the continent of America, near St. Augustine, and named the new country Florida. The causes whi:h led to this discovery were the same which actuated scores of the adventurers of that day, viz : a thirst for gold and a desire to find the fountain, said to exist in the wilds of America, whick was thought to have the power of renewing the youth of those who drank of or bathed in its waters. Though unsuccessful in their own search after these objects, the earlier adventurers bore back to their native land marvellous tales of what might be found, and thus stimulated others to renew a search in which they had failed. Among the most noted of those whom these reports reached was Ferdinand De Soto, who, in the month of May, 1589, or about three hundred and nineteen years ago, anchored his vessel near the coast of the Peninsula of Florida, in Tampa Bay. He was accompanied by a brilliant band of followers, many of whom were of noble birth, all of them eager to clutch the golden treasures which were said to exist in America. The career of De Soto and his ill-fated band is familiar to all our readers. The ill success of their search after gold, their failure to discover the fountain of youth, thesickness and wasting away of the troop, and the death and burial in the Mississippi of their high-spirited and energeticleader, are " familiar as household w©rds." Of the " gallant six hundred " who accompanied De Soto in his setting-out, about one-half left their bones to bleach on the morasses and mountains of the South from Georgia to Arkansas. This, the first expedition of Europeans into the- Valley of the Mississippi, left no trace behind it. They gained nothing for themselves or those to come after them, and the only effect produced was to embitter the minds of the Indians and to dishearten those who might otherwise have attempted to explore this valley.

During the succeeding century not an European made his appearance in the territory now known as " the West/' In 1616, Le Caron, a French Franciscan, had penetrated to the streams which run into Lake Huron, and in 1634 two Jesuits had. founded the first mission among the riversand marshes of the region east of that lake; but it was in 1641, just i onehundred years after De Soto reached the Mississippi, that the first Canadian envoysmet the savage nations of the Northwest at the Falls of St. Mary, below the outlet of Lake Superior.* It was not until 165& that even any of the fur-traders spent a winter in the frozen regions about the great lake, nor till 1660 that the unflinching devotion of the missionaries caused the first station to rise upon its borders. The earliest of the lasting habitations of the white man among the Indians of the Northwest was built in 1665 by Father Claude Allouez. After this venerable man came Claude Dablon and James Marquette to St. Mary's Falls and there founded a mission. Nicholas Per rot, agent for Talon, the intendant of Canada, explored Lake Michigan as far as Chicago in 1670. The year following these explorations of Perrot, the French formally took possession of the Great Northwest, in the presence of an assem bled multitude of the aborigines, who had come from every part of the surrounding country to witness the ceremony; and in the same year Marquette gathered a little baud of listeners, at Point St. Ignatius, on the main land north of the island of Mackinac. Unlike the ambitious De Soto, who had found the Father of Waters in his search for the mystic fountain, mighty cities and mines of gold, the heart of the no less ambitious Marquette yearned for the numberless hosts of the children of God, who, he rightly faaeied, were living upon its fertile banks, and upon whom the ligbt of the Gospel never shone. Pursuant to the orders of Talon, on the 13th of May, 1673, with Monsieur Joliet, of Quebec,.and five boatmen, this noble man left Michilimackinac in two bark canoes, with a small store of Indian corn and jerked meat, bound they knew not whither. The desist from their daring adventure ; they told them of ferocious savages and bloodthirsty warriors upon the " Great River,"' who would slaughter them with the least provocation ; of a demon, who engulfed in the boiling waters arouad him any who might come within the reach of his Ma\ power;* and should they pass these diangers, there were heats by which they must certainly perish.

''I thanked them," says Marquette, " for their good advice, but I told them that I could not follow it, since the salvation of souls was at stake, f®r whi&b I should be overjoyed to give my life."

They passed through Green Bay and entered Fox River, and after having cruelly cut their feet upon the stones, while dragging their canoes through the strong rapids, arrived at an Indian village where the Miamis, Mascoutens and Kickapoos lived together in harmony. Here Father Allouez, of whom we have before spoken, had preached, and evidently not without some effect; for, to their surprise, Marquette and his party found in the middfe of the town a cross on which bad been hung bows and arrows, belts and skins, which '' these good people had offered to the Great Manitou, to thaak him because

*The reference here is to tKe legend of Piasau, or the monster bird that devoured nren, of which some rude Indian praatings were seen thirty years since on the cliffs above the eity of Alton, and the Indians, as they passed in their canoes, made offerings by dropping tobacco and ether articles, Yaluable in their estimation, into the river. John Rnssell, Escl-, of Illinois, wrete this "Indian Tradition" into a beautifid story that went the rounds of periodical literature in 1840. - Ifesiem Annals.

he had taken pity on them during the winter, and had given them an abundant chase." Here was the bound of discovery; not even the most daring Frenchman had ever ventured into the wilds beyond. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that the bravery of those seven men, who were casting themselves upon the mercy of savages, should excite astonishment in the minds of those " braves," who better knew the dangers beyond.

Leaving these hospitable strangers, with two guides to lead them through the lakes and marshes which abounded in that region, they started for the Wisconsin river, which, they were told, rose about three leagues distant and fell into the Mississippi. Strengthening their souls with prayer to the Virgin Mother, thty committed themselves to the hands of G-od and the bosom of a westward flowing river. Although the Wisconsin is a sand-barred stream, and hard to navigate, their troubles were compensated by its vine-clad islands, the waving meadows along its banks, the graceful slopes and music ringing forests. After floating down the river for sis days, with inexpressible joy they entered the Mississippi. On they floated down the ''Great River," with living things above, beneath, on either hand, but nowhere could be seen a vestige of man, until the 21st day of June, when a trail was discovered on the western bank, which, Marquette and Jo- Het followicg, led to an Indian village at a short distance from the river. Here they were hospitably received, and they found themselves in a town of the " Illinois." The rest of the company were immediately brought, and after many ceremonies, a feast was prepared of not exactly modern style, the first course consisting of hominy, the second of fish, the third of dog, and the last of roast buffalo.

They touched at points now well known to every citizen of our State, till they reached the Arkansas or " Akamsca," as it was called, when they determined to return to the North, being deterred by the dangers which beset the route to the mouth of the Mississippi; and on the 19th of July they commenced to retrace their steps and turned towards the Lake, and reached Green Bay in September without loss or injury.

The circumstances attending the death of the simple-minded Marquette were affecting. In the month of May, in 1675, as he was passing with his boatmen up Lake Michigan, he proposed to land at the mouth of a stream running from the peninsula, and perform mass. Imitating the example of his Master before him, he ''went apart to pray." Not returning as soon as they expected, his boatmen, remembering that he had said something about his death being near at hand, went to seek him. In the act of prayer he had fallen asleep forever. In the sands on the shores of the " Great Lakes" this man of boundless sympathy found a narrow home. A river in Michigan bears the name of the missionary, at the mouth of which it is said his body was buried. His remains wore removed a year after, by the Indians, and coQveyed to his mission at Mackinac. The phice of his death, however, has never yet been definitely ascertained, though several writers agree in fixing it at or near the mouth ©f the Marquette liiver.

Among those who had listened to the of Marquette's expedition to the west, was Robert De La Salle. He was a native of Normandy, and leaving lost his patrimony from some cause unknown to us, came to the new world to seek his fortune. lie had long had in his mind the project of crossing the continent, and thus opening a shorter way to China and the East. Glad was he to receive from Marquette the suggestion, that by following up the Mississippi, or turning into some of the rivers that flow into it from ' the west, his end could be accomplished without great difiiculty. He immediately laid before the Governor of Canada his ambitious design. He proposed, as a first step, to re-build Fort Frontenac, now Kingston, Canada, (which took its name from the Governor,) which proposition he had good reason to expect would meet the wishes of the Governor. Nor were his expectations wrong. Frontenac warmly endorsed his whole plan. for he saw, if La Salle's project was successful, that a chain of forts upon the lakes and rivers which so wonderfully unite the Great West should link the Gulf of Mexico to Canada, the power of France would be unmeasured, and he himself would receive unequaled glory, if, as he hoped, all could be accomplished under his administration. By hifi,adviee La Salle at once started for

France. The plans of the penniless adventurer were warmly approved of by the French authorities. La Salle was made a Chevalier, and was iuvestfid with the seigniory of Fort Frontenac, provided he should re-build it. He returned to Canada and labored for nearly two years upon the Fort, and then, in the year 1677,. went again to France to report progress- In the latter part of September, 1678, ho returned to Fort Frontenac vested with new authority, and having gained now privileges.

On the 22d of January, 1676, thedocks for building a vessel were made at two leagues above Niagara Falls, and on the 26th of the same month, the keel and some other pieces being ready, La Sallo drove the first pin of the first vessel ever built to navigate the Great Lakes of the North and the Northwest. We may be pardoned if we pause here to take a survey of the changes which have been made in less than two centuries. It is with na little pride that we point to the vast commerce whose sails now dot every portion of these Lakes, and which is rivalling the commerce of the ocean. In a recent lecture, Lieut. Maury stated, on the authority of Col. Graham's report to the department at Washington, that the shipping and commerce of Lake Michigan amount to 8218,000,000. He also stated that the value of the shipping and commerce passing over the St. Clair Flats averages daili/, for two hundred and thirty days of each year, $1,129,223. At this estimate, one hundred and twelve vessels, valued with their cargoes 810,000 each, must pass over the Flats daily. He stated the valuo

*o each lake, except Lake Erie, which is estimated at $.300,000,000. What a vast -change has been made since the launching -of the Grijiji, two centuries ago! \^\ On the 7th of August, 1X79, La Salle with his little company, of whom one was Louis Hennepin, a monk of the Kecollet order, started for Illinois. On the 3d of December, they left Fort St. Joseph, which was built at that time by La Salle, who left a garrison of ten men, and built Fort Crevecojuer, on the Illinois River, early in 1680. From Fort Crevecoeuer La Salle returned to Canada, while Hennepin continued the exploration. On the last day of February, 1680, he started for the Mississippi, which he reached after a journey of seven days, and by the 11th of April had paddled up the Wisconsin. On the 1st of May he reached St. Anthony's Falls, where he was taken prisoner and remained three months. Hennepin returned to New-France in November of the same year, and published his first work in 1684, in France.

We find La Salle again, in August, 1681, on his way up the Lakes, and on the 3d of November at the St. Joseph's, undismayed at the losses and ill fortune to which he had been subjected. On the 16th of April, 1682, the Chevalier and his party discovered the three passages by which the Mississippi discharges its waters into the Gulf. La Salle here took possession of the country for his kins, and erected a column bearing the arms of France and an appropriate inscription.

De Soto's dream of gold is realized. After the lapse of nearly three centuries and a half, we now, in this year of grace 1859, hear more reliable tales than he did, of the discoveries of immense heaps of wealth on the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains. In the Yalley of the Mississippi, wliere the bones of the adventurous Spaniard were laid, we find all that he sought, save the fountain of youth. Populous cities and stores of countless wealth are on every side of us; while he who so bravely sought what we now see and enjoy, sleeps in the bosom of the Father of Waters, where no monumental stone shall ever rise to mark his last resting-place.