William H. Roberts House

This^township was settled in 1835. The first settlers were Ephraim Sumner, now of Rockford; William Sumner, Mrs. Dolly Guilford (sister to the Sumuers), Elijah Guilford, her son, and Thomas Hance (erroneously called Hame on page 236). After the county was organized in 1836, and the county machinery put in motion, seven justices' precincts were established, to- wit: Yellow Eiver, Rock Grove, Peeketolika, Kishwaukee, Rockford, Rock River, and Eelvidere. Peeketolika embraced the townships now known as Pecatonica, Seward and Burritt. The first election for county officers was held on Monday, August 1, 1836. Wednesday, August 3d, the County Commissioners met, organized and started the county machinery. Besides establishing the seven precincts above named, they fixed a date - August 27 - for the election of justices of the peace and constables. In this precinct (Peeketolika), Ephraim Sumner and Isaac Hance were elected justices, and William Sumner and Thomas Hance were chosen as constables. This was one of the precincts that honored the Commissioners' order by holding elections on the day fixed. At a subsequent session of the Board, another day was fixed for the election of justices in the precincts that had failed to elect in August - the time so fixed being the 14th of October following.

Passage source: The History of Winnebago County, Illinois : Its Past and Present, Containing ... a Biographical Directory of Its Citizens, War Record of Its Volunteers in the Late Rebellion, General and Local Statistics ... History of the Northwest, History of Illinois ... Etc, published 1877.

This township has the honor of being the birthplace of the first white child born in the territory now included in Winnebago County - Ogden Hance, the son of Thomas Hance, who was born during the early part of 1836.* by Daniel Reed, Sr., in 1846. Soon after purchase, Mr. Reed settled upon it and commenced reducing its wild sward to farm tillage. In 1852, after the Hne of the Galena and Chicago Union, now the Chicago and Northwestern raih-oad, had been established, and the grading, etc., well under waj, T. D. Robertson and John A. Holland, of Rockford, appreciating the advantages it offered for a railway station, being in the heart of a rich and rapidly developing agricultural district, bought from Mr. Reed an interest in the land, and "laid off"" the town, the plot of which was filed and entered of record in December of that year. Before this, however, while the railroad was building, N. F. Maynard built a small house on the west side of Main street, a little north of the railroad track, in which he opened a small stock of groceries, provisions, etc. That building - the first business house in Pecatonica - is still standing, and is now occupied as a tenement house. Some time about December, of the same year, Messrs. Reed & Smith opened a dry goods store on the opposite side of the street from Maynard's grocery. Those two business houses were the only trading places known in Pecatonica until after, or at least until about the time the railroad was completed, in August, 1853. In the late part of the summer, or early fall of 1852, Mr. Reed commenced the erection of the Pecatonica Hotel, now kept by James O'Brien, at the corner of Main and Third streets. Until after the completion of the railroad, it was occupied as a residence - notably so during the winter of 1852-3, when the three Eastman families. Dr. B. D.,Samuel C. and Stephen S. Eastman lived there; the latter died in March, 1853, his funeral obsequies being the occasion of the first sermon preached in the embryo village, in the summer of 1853, Dr. Eastman opened a drug store on the east side of Main street, in the building now occupied by R. B. Coleman as a grocery and provision house.

Passage source: The History of Winnebago County, Illinois : Its Past and Present, Containing ... a Biographical Directory of Its Citizens, War Record of Its Volunteers in the Late Rebellion, General and Local Statistics ... History of the Northwest, History of Illinois ... Etc, published 1877.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Pecatonica Township - 7,339 words on its settlement, mills, schools and churches.