Adair County, Missouri - Chapter 4: The Creation of the County, 1911

The history of county organization in Missouri is very instructive and interesting. As one follows the creation of new counties from 1804, when the District of Louisiana was divided into five districts, down to 1876, by which time the present 114 counties had all been created, and sees the map of the counties of the state gradually assume its present form, one follows very closely the early growth of the state. Adair County was created together with thirteen other counties in 1841. Prior to the creation of these thirteen counties only sixty-two counties had been formed, just a little more than half the present number of counties in the state. In order to understand the circumstances of the organization of Adair County and to appreciate how its creation marked a stage in the growth of the state, it will be well to review hurriedly the history of county organization prior to 1841.

In 1804 the United States government divided the great Ixmisiana purchase territory, which had been obtained from France in the previous year, into two parts; all south of the thirty-third degree of north latitude was formed into the Orleans Territory and all north into the District of Louisiana, which was placed under the jurisdiction of General William Henry Harrison, Governor of the Indiana Territorv. In 1805 the District of Louisiana was enacted into a first-class territory, the lowest class of territories, and was named the Territory of Louisiana. Meanwhile, General Harrison had divided the District of Louisiana into five districts, which were called St. Charles, St. Louis, Ste. Genevieve, Cape Girardeau, and New Madrid. The exact boundaries of these districts cannot be ascertained, but it is quite likely that they had the same boundaries which the districts of the same names had in 1811. In 1812 Congress raised the Territory of Louisiana into a second class territory and named it the Territory of Missouri. The Territorial legislature, which had been provided for by Congress, divided the territory in 1813 into seven counties: St. Charles, St. Louis, Ste. Genevieve, Cape Girardeau, New Madrid, Washington, and Arkansas. New Madrid and Arkansas Counties was practically what is now the state of Arkansas. The other five counties lay within the boundaries of what is now Missouri.

(This map and the five others following were made from photograph? of maps drawn by the Political Science Department of the I'niversitv of Missouri. They are reproduce* I by permission of Professor Isador Loeb, head of that department.)

In 1815 Lawrence County was formed, and in 1810 Howard County. The latter has been called the mother of counties because of its immense size and because of the great number of counties which have been created from within its original boundaries. Adair County was among this number.

In 1818 Wayne, Franklin, Pike, Montgomery, Jefferson, Madison, and Lincoln Counties were created, but no one of these came from what was then Howard Count}'. In 1820 twenty new counties were formed; of these Calloway, Boone, Chariton, and Ray were created out of Howard.

By 1830 six more new counties had been formed, one of which wa< Randolph with its present boundaries. It was carved out of the original Chariton County, and provision was made that all the territory lying to the north of it up to the Iowa line should be attached to it for purposes of government. This attached territory included what is now Adair County.

In 1837 Macon County was formed with its present boundaries, by carving it out of the territory attached to Randolph County; the territory lying to the north of the new county was attached to it for purposes of government.

In 1841 Adair County was formed with its present boundaries, by carving it out of the territory attached to Macon County, and the territory to the north of the new county was attached to it for purposes of government. This attached territory was erected into Schuyler County in 1843, but was not completely severed from Adair County until 1845. Putnam County was organized in 1843 and attached to Adair County until 1845, when it was separated. This practice of attaching territory to counties prevailed through the state and was not peculiar to Randolph, Macon and Adair County.

It would be a matter of great interest to trace the formation of the other counties created since 1841, but that would lie beyond our province. It may be in order, however, to state in this connection that an effort was made in 1808 to take certain sections of Adair, Chariton, Macon, Sullivan and Linn Counties and make a new county out of them, but nothing came of the effort.

The accompanying maps, which are printed with permission of the Political Science Department of the University of Missouri, present graphically the formation of new counties and the changes in county boundaries from 1803 to the present.

year Iowa was made a separate territory, and the claim was set by by the Iowans that the boundary line between Iowa and Missouri as was claimed by Missouri, was about ten miles too far to the north. The dispute arose over the location of the Des Moines Rapids. In the act admitting Missouri into the Union, the northern boundary was described as a parallel passing through the rapids of the Des Moines River. Missouri therefore claimed that the line should be drawn so as to comply strictly with the provisions of the act, while Iowa, after having been formed into a separate territory, claimed that the rapids that were intended to be mentioned in the act were in the Des Moines Rapids of the Mississippi, and not the Rapids of the Des Moines River. It wa> brought forth by Iowa that Missouri and Congress had by different acts prior to 1838 recognized that Missouri had no right to the line she was claiming. As has been said, the line as was claimed by Missouri, was ten miles farther north than Iowa was willing to recognize, and the area of this strip in dispute was greater than the entire area of Rhode Island.

The contest hung on for a long time, and in its course Adair County became involved. The controversy was well under way when Adair County was organized in 1814. It will be recalled that when the county was organized the territory to the north of it was attached to it for purposes of government, and remained attached to it until 184.5, at which time Schuyler County, which had been organized in 1843, was finally severed from Adair County completely. This attached territory included a part of the strip in dispute between Iowa and Missouri. "When the officials of Adair County sought to collect taxes and administer the laws of Missouri in this part of the disputed territory, they found themselves in trouble, just as the officials of other counties had found themselves when they undertook to do the same things. Very few evidences of the struggle have come down to us from the records of this county, but the county court of this county seems to have considered that the contest between Iowa and Missouri was as good as lost as early as December, 1843, for in that month an entry was made in the county court records to the effect that the collector, that is, the sheriff, should not collect any more taxes in the territory claimed by Iowa until further orders.

The contest was finally settled through a friendly suit in the Supreme Court of the United States in 1849. This body decided that :!;- Indian line run by Sullivan in 1810 was the true boundary line, and appointed two commissioners to find this line and re-mark it. Thi* line was run by Hendershot and Minor in 1850. The controversy close* I

The act passed by the state legislature and approved January 2!), 1841. providing for the creation of Adair County, provided also for the creation of thirteen other counties in different parts of the state. Between twenty-five and thirty separate applications for new county organizations were sent to the legislature in January. 1841. These applications came from the southern, western and northern parts of the state. The whole matter was finally referred to a joint committee of the two houses of the legislature, and when the committee reported, it was found there were two reports. The majority decided to recommend th«* organization of nineteen new counties. The minority very strenuously opposed this recommendation and bitterly fought the adoption of the majority report. The argument used by the minority was somewhat as follows: The constitution of the state provided that each county should have one representative in the state legislature, but the total numlxT of representatives for all the counties should never exceed one hundred. In case the counties should not be one hundred in num- Ikt. the legislature had the power to apportion the representatives among the various counties according to the free white male population, «*> that the total number of members in the house should reach one hundred. If the bill providing for nineteen new counties should pass, there would be eighty-one counties in the state; as each county was entitled to at least one representative there would be left only nineteen representatives to apportion among these eighty-one counties, and there was great difficulty in getting these nineteen properly apportioned. The ixjpulation of the state in 1840 was 172,000 free white males, or 381 ,754 persons of all ranks and conditions. On the basis of one hundred representatives in the House, the unit of representation should be one representative for every 1,720 free male whites, or one for every 3.817 i>ersons of every description. No proposed county had at the time 1.720 free white males or 3,817 persons of every description. A few came close to these figures, but most fell far short. Moreover, the creation of these new counties would reduce the population of the old counties from which they were taken, so that in many cases the counties that had been reduced in size would not contain 1,720 free white males or 3,817 persons of every description. If this bill should pass sixty-five counties would have each only one representative, and of these sixty-five there would be some which would have a population of more than 6,000. Moreover, the majority of the one hundred representatives in the House would be elected by counties having an aggre- gate population of only 124,788, while* the minority would be elect *! by counties having a population of 200,9(Xi. It was admitted that mam people who were asking for new county organizations were greatly inconvenienced by the existing conditions, but the blame for the unfortunate situation was laid upon the improvident legislation of the pa<t Finally, many of the counties which had recently been organized di-l not pay enough taxes to the state to pay the expenses of their representatives in the legislature.

One of the most ardent supporters of this minority report was T. L. Anderson of Marion County. He said in a speech marked for it^ grandiloquence, that the result would be to give double representation to those counties that were to be reduced in size in order to create the new counties; the reduced county would retain its representative ami the newly formed county would acquire its representative. Moreover, the reduced county and the new county would frequently fail to have the number of inhabitants which the constitution requires them to have in order to be entitled to representation. The bill tended to take representation away from the larger counties and to give it to the new counties; in other words, if the new counties were not created all the larger counties of the state would each have at least two representatives. If the bill passed fifty-one representatives representing 126,000 person> would have an ascendancy over the forty-nine members represent ins: 254,000 persons. Mr. Anderson closed his vigorous protest by objecting to the fact that the matter was being pushed through in one omnibus bill; he would have been glad to vote for the organization of certain counties if each had been provided for in a special bill, but he would vote against them all since they were in one bill.

No doubt there was a good deal of "politics" injected into this question, but the bill after having been amended so as to create only fourteen counties instead of nineteen as originally drawn up, was passed by a safe majority. With the passage of this act the counties of the state were increased to seventy-six in number.

Adair County was named after Hon. John Adair of Kentucky. This was due to the desire of the many Kentucky immigrants who came to this part of the state during the decade preceding its organization a> a county, to perpetuate the memory of one of the prominent public men of their old home state. John Adair was born in Chester County. South Carolina, in 17">9. After serving in the Revolutionary army he went to Kentucky and then1 soon became identified with the public activities of that new commonwealth. His service was both military and civil in character. He was an officer in the Kentucky State Militia.

becoming ultimately Brigadier General; he served in the Indian wars and commanded the Kentucky troops at the battle of New Orleans. He was U. S. Senator from Kentucky from 1805 to 1806, Governor of Kentucky from 1820 to 1824, and member of Congress from Kentucky in 1831-33. He died at Harrodsburg on May 19, 1840. It was in the year following his death that the county named in his honor was organized.

The boundaries of Adair County as the act provided for are the same as they are today, and are as follows: "Beginning at a point in the middle of range 13 on the township line dividing townships 60 and 61 ; thence west on said township line to the range line dividing ranges 17 and 18; thence north on said range line to a jwint three miles north of the township line dividing townships 63 and 64 ; thence east on a line parallel to said township line to the center of township 64 in range 13; thence south to the place of beginning." The total area is 570 square miles.

This same act also provided that Jefferson Collins of Lewis County, L. B. Mitchell of Clark County, and Thomas Ferrell of Monroe County, should be commissioners to select the permanent seat of justice for the county, and that this selection should be within two and one-half miles of the geographical center of the county.

Some time during 1841 or 1842 these commissioners located and established the county seat in the east half of the northeast quarter of section 9, township 62 north, range 15 west. The county seat was called Kirksville, and the original plat was acknowledged on May 18, 1842. The proceedings and acts of the commissioners were legalized by the legislature on December 19, 1842.

The county had no official seal until 1848. The election returns which were sent in by the county clerk to the Secretary of State at Jefferson City show no seal until the year 1848, and the statement was frequently made in these returns that no provisions had been made as yet for a seal.

For four years after Adair County was established as a separate county, what is now Schuyler County was attached territory. During these years, 1841-45, the county court records of Adair County make mention of eleven townships. They were Benton, Morrow, Liberty, Wilson, Pettis, Goshen, Richland, Wells, Fabbe, Cochran and Parton townships. Of these the first five lay within the county proper, and the other six in the attached territory. After the attached territory was enacted into a separate county in 1845, the Adair County court in its May adjourned session of that year, proceeded to describe anew the l>oundaries of the five townships lying within it. These boundaries were as follows:

Benton: Commencing at the northeast comer of Adair County, thence west along the northern boundary line of Adair County to whersaid line crosses the Chariton Hiver; thence south along the middle channel of said Chariton River to where it crosses the township line dividing townships 61 and 02; thence east along said line to where tinrange line dividing ranges 14 and 15 crosses the same; thence norti along said range line to where the same crosses the township line dividing townships 63 and 64; thence east along said township line to tin eastern boundary line of Adair County; thence north along said l>oun<lary line to the place of beginning.

Liberty: Commencing at the southwest corner of Adair County, from thence north along the dividing line between Adair and SullivaJi Counties to the township line dividing townships 62 and 63; from thence east along said township line to where the Chariton River crosses tl»« same; thence south along the middle of the said Chariton River to the southern boundary of Adair County; from thence west to the place <»t beginning.

Morrow: Commencing at the northwest corner of Adair County, from thence south along the division line between Adair and Sullivan Counties to where the township line dividing townships 62 and 63 crosses the same; from thence east along said township line to where the same crosses the Chariton River; from thence north along the middle of the channel of said river to the northern boundary of Adair County: thence along said northern boundary line to the place of beginning.

Pettis: Commencing on the division line between Adair and Macon Counties at the line dividing ranges 14 and 15, thence west along the division line of said counties of Macon and Adair to the Chariton River; thence north up the middle of the channel of said river to where the township line dividing townships 61 and 62 crosses the same: thence east along said township line to the range line dividing ranges 14 and 15; thence south along said range line to the place of beginning.

Wilson: Commencing at the southeast corner of Pettis township, thence east along the division line between Adair and Macon Counties to the southeast corner of Adair County; thence north along the division line between Adair and Knox Counties to the township line dividing townships 63 and 64; thence west along said township line to the range line dividing ranges 14 and 15; thence south along said range line to the; place of beginning.

A comparison of the two accompanying maps show that all the townships except Pettis are much larger than the townships of the present time. Benton included besides the present Benton township, all of Polk and part of Clay and Nineveh townships: Morrow included part.< of Nineveh and Walnut; Liberty a part of Walnut; and Wilson, all of Salt River and a part of Clay. Pettis township was in 1845 the same in boundaries as it is today.

In the records of the proceedings of the county court for 1847 mention is made of a Part on township. Just what this was cannot be made out. No mention seems to be made of this township in any subsequent record that has come down to us. Owing to the loss of so many county court records in the court house fire in 1865, it is impossible to state just when all the new townships were formed. By 1851, however, there were seven townships, the original five of 1845 ai\d Polk and Clay. The latter was organized by the county court on June 7, 1851. The records from 1851 to 1857 do not show* any increase in the number of townships, but by 1805 the number had run up to the present ten, the three new ones since being Nineveh, Walnut, and Salt River. It is the testimony of many persons that all of the ten townships were in existence with their present boundaries before the civil war.

There has been at least one effort to create new townships since the present ones were formed. In 1898 Oklahoma township was formed by cutting off the eastern portion of Pettis and the western portion of Wilson and putting these parts into one township. The reason for doing this was to furnish more convenient voting precincts for the people living in this part of the county, but it is evident that this arrangement was not satisfactory. On December 6, 1898, Oklahoma township was abolished, and Wilson and Pettis townships were restored to their former boundaries. The county court proceeded later to establish convenient voting precincts in the Wilson and Pettis townships, which served the purpose better than the arrangement for an extra township.

Six of the townships were named after men who were prominent - it her nationally or locally at the time when they were created. Benton was named after Thomas Hart Benton, then at the height of his power and influence as U. S. Senator from Missouri; Morrow, after Judge John Morrow, one of the original three county judges of the county; Pettis, after Spencer Pettis, who was Missouri's sole Congressman from 1829 to 1831, and who was killed in a duel with Major Biddie in St. Louis in 1831; Wilson, after Judge Joseph Wilson, who was county judge from 1842 to 1844; Polk, after James K. Polk; Clay, after Henry Clay. Two townships took their names from their physical conditions: Salt River is named after the river of that name that passes through it ; Walnut, after its walnut forests. Nineveh was named after the German communistic colony of that name which was established in that part of the county about 1850. Liberty was probably derived from patriotic sentiments.