Peoria County, Illinois - Chapter 5: First American Settlers, 1880

Chapter 5: First American Settlers

The Advance Guard - Route of Travel and Means of Transportation - Grades of Government - First Federal Judges - The Law-Making Power - The First Legislature - Population in iSog - Location of Settlements - Personal Sketches of the Members of the First Territorial Legislature, etc.

Emigration westward from the Atlantic States commenced about 1779-80, and there can be no doubt that the brilliant achievements of Gen. Clark, heretofore noted, as tliey spread abroad, exercised a great influence in directing attention to the fertile prairies of Illinois. Marching through tlie country as his army did, they had every opportunity of seeing its rare beauty and examining its exceeding richness and general adaptability to agricultural purposes. The knowledge of the country thus gained by the men composing this little army of Spartan heroes was not long in spreading to the older settled parts of America, nor was it long until immigrants began to come in and select sites for homes and the pursuit of fortune. The increase of population from American immigration was necessarily slow for many years. This immigration was not confined to any one localit}', but was scattered about in different sections, so that, notwithstanding the presence of an estimated population of 9,000, a part of whom were French and French half-breeds, when the Territory was organized, the country still seemed like an undisturbed wilderness, as indeed by far the larger part of it was.

In the Spring of 1780, three hundred family boats arrived at the Falls of Ohio (Louisville), the most of them destined for Kentucky.* Some of them, however, were bound for Illinois. Among these there were James Moore, Shadrack Bond, James Garrison, Roljert Kidd and Larken Rutherford, from Maryland and Virginia, the two last having been witii Gen. Clark. In those perilous times they had crossed the Alleghany Mountains without molestation, descended the Ohio, stemmed the Mississippi, and landed safely at Kaskaskia. James Moore, the leader of this little band of pioneers, and some others, settled among the hills near Bellefontaine, in what is now Monroe county, while the remainder settled in the American Bottom (from wiiicli fact that name had its origin), near Harrisonville. James Piggot, John Doyle, Robert Whitehead and another man, named Buwen, soldiers in Clark's expedition, came soon after. Doyle was a man of family and taught school, and was, perhaps, the first to engage in teaching as a profession in Illinois. He could also speak French and Indian, and was frequently employed as Indian interpreter. No other American immigrants came till 178"), when the little band was reinforced by Joseph Ogle, Joseph Warley and James Andrews, from Virginia, each of them with a large family. James Leman, George Atcherson. David Waddell and tlieir families, and several others, came in 1780.1 The families here named were the advance guard of that mighty host that came to occupy Illinois in after years, and make it the grandest of all the States.

During the time Illinois formed a part of Indiana Territory, from 1800 to February, 180!*, the government was of two grades: first, the law-making power, consisting of the Governor and judges, and, second, the Territorial Legislature, composed of a House of Representatives, elected Ijy the people, and a Council appointed by the President and Senate of the United States. Illinois remained under the first grade until 1812.

Nathaniel Pope, a relative of Gov. Edwards, was appointed Territorial Secretary. He was born at the Falls of the Ohio, in Kentucky. Was one of the early graduates of Transylvania University at Lexington, after which he chose the profession of the law. At the age of twenty-one years he emigrated to St. Genevieve, then in Upper Louisiana, but now in Missouri, where he acquired full command of the French language. When twenty-six years of age, he received the appointment of Secretary of the Territory of Illinois, and on the 2'>th day of April, 1809, at St. Genevieve, before Judge Shrader, he took the i)rescribed oath of office and came to Illinois to enter upon the duties of his position. In the absence of the Governor, the Secretary was empowered, under the ordinance of 1787, to discharge the duties of the executive, and on the -28th day of April, three days after taking the oath of office, he inaugurated the new government by proclamation. The counties of St. Clair and Randolph, previously organized, were reinstated as the two counties of Illinois Territory. On the :ld of May he ajipointeil and commissioned Elias Rector to be Altorney-tieneral ; John May, Slierifl"; Knoch Moore, Coroner ; and seventeen justices of the peace. Hence it will be seen that the honor of starting the civil government of Illinois Territory belongs to Nathaniel Pope, the first Territorial Secretary.

Governor Edwards a.ssumed the duties of his office on the 11th of June following, having subscribed to the oath of office before leaving Kentucky.

FIUST KEDKRAL .lUDGES. (^n the organization of the Territory, Jesse B. Tiiomas, Alexander Stuart and William Kentucky. f Annals of llic West.

General Iiistokv Of Illinois

Sprigg were appointed Federal Judges. On the IBth of June, 1809, Governor Edwards, and Jndges Stuart and Sprigg met together as a legislative body, as provided in the fifth section of the ordinance of 1787, and re-enacted such of the laws of the Indiana Territory as were suitable and applicable to Illinois, and with which the peoj)le had been familiar for nine years, all laws local or special to Indiana, being rejected. Man}' of these laws were as old as the Northwestern Territory, some of them having been imported from Pennsylvania and some of them from Massachusetts. They were adopted without change of phraseology.

Under the act of Territorial organization, provision was made for the advancement of the government from the first to the second grade whenever the Governor should be satisfied that a majority of the freeholders desired the same. Choosing to be guided by the popular will, Governor Edwards, on the 4th day of February, 1812, issued an order directing an election to be held in each county on the second Monday in April, to enable the people to determine whether they would enter ujjon the second grade. The question was decided in the affirmative by a large majority. Congress approved the action of the people, and on the 21st day of May an act was passed by which Illinois was raised to the second grade of government. That act also extended the right of suffrage to any white male person twenty-one years of age, who had paid a territorial tax and resided in the Territory one )-ear next preceding any election, etc.

For nearly four years after the Territory was oi-ganized, no legislature existed. The Governor was both executive and, in a great measure, the law-making power. The power's thus exercised were conferred by the ordinance of 1787, under which the privileges of the citizen were limited to the freehold property class. The elective franchise was denied to all who were not the owners of fifty acres of land, and no one could aspire to a seat in the Legislature unless he was a freeholder of two hundred to five hundred acres of land. Those of the territorial officers not appointed by the President, were appointed by the Governor. The people were not permitted to elect justices of the peace, county surveyors, treasurers, coroners, sheriffs, clerks, judges of the inferior courts, nor even choose the officers of the territorial militia. All this power, and much more, was vested in the Governor.

At the time of the organization of the Territory, the population was estimated at 9,000. The census of 1810 returned a total of 12,282. Of this number 11,501 were whites, 168 were slaves, and 613 of all others except Indians. The settlements had extended north to the Wood River country in the present county of Madison ; east, along Silver creek and up Kaskaskia river, and south and east from Kaskaskia for a distance of fifteen miles on the Fort Massac road. The Birds had located at the mouth of the Ohio, at the present site of Cairo. At old Massac and the Ohio salines a small settlement had been recognized for some time. At Shawneetown there had been a few straggling houses since 1805. A few families were scattered along the west side of the Wabash, a man named McCawley having pushed inland as far as the Vincennes road-crossing of the Little Wabash. These, however, were mostly abandoned during the war of 1812. The settlements were all weak, and from 1810 until the close of the war, there was no immigration of note.

Such was the extent of settlements and population when the people voted in favor of advancing their Government to the second grade. September 16, following, the Governor and judges having organized Madison, Gallatin and Johnson counties, their establishment was published by proclamation. This increased the number of counties to five. Another proclamation of the same date ordered an election to be held in each county on the 8th, 9th and lOtli days of October, for five members of the legislative council, seven members of the House and a delegate to Congress. Shadrach Bond was elected as delegate to Congress. The choice for members of the Council and House of Representatives resulted :

General History Of Illinois

This was a new departure for the people of Illinois, and the dawning of that political career that has made the State so noted among the other States of the Union, and the first election for law-makers ever held in the Territory. Stuve's History of Illinois, published in 1ST6. preserves the following sketches of the members :

PlERBE Mesard. chosen to preside over the deliberations of the council, was a Canadian Frenchman, and had settled at Kaskaskia in ITiK). He was a merchant, and enjoyed an extensive trade with the Indians, over whom he exercised a great influence, and was, for many years, government agent for them. He was well informed, energetic, &ank and honest, and very popular with all classes.

WnjJAM BiG«s was an intelligent and respectable member, who had been a soldier in Clark's a, and ten years afterward had been a prisoner for several years

Samtel Jcdt was a man of energy, fortitude and enterprise. The Fall preceding he commanded the corps of spies in Gov. Edwards' military campagn to Peoria Lake. Some of his descendants still reside in Madison county.

Jacob Short, the coUeague of Oglesby, removed to Illinois with his father Moses in 1796, and pursued farming. He distinguished himself as a ranger in the war of 1812.

Ge<jbge Fishzk possessed a fair education, and was a physician by profession. He removed from Virginia to Kaskaskia in 1800 and engaged in merchandising, but resided on a farm when elected to the territorial assembly. He was afterwards in public life.

Phillip Trammel was a man of discriminating mind, inclined to the profession of arms. He w.-is the lessee of the United saline in Gallatin county.

William Joxes was a Baptist preacher, grave in his deportment, and possessed of moderate abilities. He was bom in North Carolina, removed to Illiuois in 1806, in the Rattan Prairie east of Alton.*

John Grammar made his first appearance in public at this first session of the Illinois Territorial Legislature. He had no education, but was a man of great natural shrewdneso. He afterward represented Union county frequently during a period of twenty years.

It was related of him that after his election, in order to procure clothing suitable to the occasion and in which to appear in the Assembly, himself and family gathered a lar. . Ity of hickory nuts, which were taken to the Ohio saline and traded for blue

After exhausting every device to make the goods " hold out " and till the desired measure, the women decided that the next best and only thing that could be done would be to make a " bob-tailed coat and a long pair of leggings," which resolution they carried into execution. And arrayed in this suit he made his appearance at the capital, and continued to wear it the greater part of the session. " Notwithstanding his illiteracy," savs Mr. Ford. " he had the honor of originating the practice much followed by public men since, of voting against all new measiues, it being easier to conciliate public opinion for being remiss in voting for a good measure, than to suffer arraignment for aiding in the passage of an unpopular one."

By proclamation, issued on the 10th of November, the Grovernor ordered the members elect to convene at Kaskaskia, the seat of government, on the 2.5th of that month. The two bodies met in a large, rough old building of uncut limestone.* with steep roof and gables, of unpainted boards, situated in the center of a square, which, after the ruin and abandonment of Fort Chartres, had served the French as the headquarters of the military commandant. The first floor, a large, low. cheerless room, was fitted up for the House, and a small chamber above for the Council Chamber. Pierre Menard was chosen President of the Council, and John Thomas as Secretary. William C. Greenup was elected Clerk of the House. The two Houses elected a door-keeper in common. All the twelve members boarded with one family, and lodged, ir has been said, in one room. * * * * The members addressed themselves to the business in hand, without delay or circumlocution. Windy speeches and contention were iinknown, and parliamentary tacticians, if any there were, met with no indulgence : and it has been naively remarked that not a lawyer appeared on the roll of names.