Dunklin County, Missouri - Chapter 5: Early Settlement, 1896

Chapter 5: Early Settlement

In 1829 Howard Moore located and built a small house near Maiden, and was the first white resident of Dunklin County. Mr. Moore afterward bought the old Chilletacaux hut and improvements near Kennett. In 1830, Mich.'iel Braunm, Jacob Taylor, and Abija Rice, natives of North Carolina, who had formerly settled at Bloomfield, came to Dunklin County. The friendly Indian Chief Chilletacaux preceded them and cut out or eDlargecl the '* Indian trail" or " bridle path " to allow their two-wheeled ox carts and *' packhorses " to pass through the rushes, grass and cane which obstructed the way. Taylor stopped on the slough that perpetuates his name; Braunm located on Braunni's Point near Hornersville, and Rice located two miles northwest of that town, near where his son Pascal Rice now resides.

Mr. Ray was killed by being thrown from his cart before reaching his destination, and was the first person buried at the ** Old Horner" burying ground, and is claimed to be the first white person buried in the county.

James Baker and Wiley Clarkston came in 1833, and (passing three houses, the only ones between Moore's and Horse Island on the Big Road) located on Horse Island. Baker bought the claim of Jim Finley, the first, and at that time, the only white family on the island, while Clarkston entered land. In the same year Russle and William H. Horner settled at Hornersville.

Among those who located here within the next few years were : Pleasant Cockrum and Horris in the vicinity of Cockrum Post-office, Jack Cude at Cotton Plant, Thomas Varner on Varner River, and George

Sheppard near Kennett; Henry Meyers and N. W. Seitz on West Prairie, Hugh Shipley, four miles north of Kennett, and Evan Evans south of that place, in front of the " eight big cottonwood trees." McCullough and Lafayette Sexton were also among the early settlers in this vicinity, and Adam Barnhart, who settled the old Baker Place; Hugh Shipley, the Suiters, Shultz and Jacksons were neighbors. Frank Lee was one of the pioneers and located three miles north of Hornersville. Dr. Given Owens located on Rush Creek in 1841. A. D. Bridges came to the county with his parents in 1844, and soon settled on Bridges Creek near *' Four Mile." About the same time Jordan Lacy, John Holtzhouser, James Faughn, Tucker and William Gear located in the vicinity of Maiden and Campbell. Besides these, there were, in 1847, located as indicated, the following : M. Gibany, who kept a small grocery store near the present site of Maiden ; Dr. Allen and T. Hatley, in the same vicinity; John Gunnells, Jesse Long, Mrs. Floyd, Montgomery, John McMasteis and Dick Skaggs, near Clarkton.

At the head of West Prairie was Ephriham Thornberry and James Harris. On Halcomb Island was the Barnes farm, a small farm where the John P. Taylor place now is, and Louis Halcomb near the '< Lone Pine," and farther south the Miller and Bill and Monroe on Ragland Slough. Near the present siteof Caruth, A. Thompson, Mrs. Welch, C. Bancroft, H. Spencer, Mr. Whitney, Joe Pelts and Robt. L. Glasscock were located. Near Cotton Plant, Mr. O'Dannell, Riley Clarkston and J. McGrue, Joe Laden,

Daniel Harkey had opened land. North of Hornersville was Mr. Oxford, James P. Neel, J. McDaniel, J. Lucux, John B. Walker, and James Williamson ; and one-half mile south of that place, the Old Culp place. In 1850, Dr. Jacob Snider settled on his place west of Maiden on the foot-hills, and found, for neighbors,

In the same year, A. T. Douglass located in Clay Township. Among their neighbors were E. J. Langdon, Edward Spencer, Louis Chandler, Isair Jones, John Marsh, James Bradley, John Doughtery, Dick Cook, William Herman, Absolom Fairis, the Mifflins, A. B. Williams and David Finley. Within the next decade came the heads of some of the most prominent families, who - or their descendants - are still with us, such as : John P. Taylor, Judge Hodges, Henry James, Judge J. M. Waltrip, Daniel Harkey, James P. Neel, Bennett Marshall, Asa B. Douglass, Enoch Shelton, Humphrey Donalson, A. C. Auston, William M. Saturfield, Moses Farrar, Judge E. Aker, C. N. Lasley, David Rice, James Oxley, James A. Smyth, Henry A. Applegate, William H. Shelton, Robert W. Stokes, John Wright, T. F. Ham, Isam A. Waltrip, Garrol M. White, Elgin C. White.

These early settlers have become the fathers of many of our present leading citizens, and yet many of Dunklin County's most prominent citizens have located here since 1870 ; these will mostly be found in the Biographical Sketches.

None of the early settlers had more difficulties to encounter than these worthy men. Their names are: Dr. eToe Rice and Dr. Allen, near Maiden, and Dr. Jacob Snider, six miles west of Maiden, where he now resides ; Dr. James Rice, also Dr. Given Owen, of *«Four Mile;" Dr. Floyd and Dr. Scaggs, near Clarkton; Dr. Varner, on the river that is known by his name ; Dr. Fisher, Dr. Bozark and Dr. William Grinstead, at Kennett; Dr. Crawford Jones, near Caruth, and Dr. W. H. Homer, at HornersviUe.

There were also Dr. Page and Dr. Andrew Sloan, and Dr. F. M. Wilkins and Dr. Van H.Harrison, who located in this county in 1859 and 1862 respectfully.

There are, certainly, quite a number of prominent physicians who have resided and practiced in this county for twenty or twenty-five years, yet could not be considered pioneers.

General Growth

Dunklin County has passed through all the varied stages and experiences of the ordinary new country. Because of its being difficult of access it was not settled as rapidly as some of the other counties of Missouri. Then its great forests, - wild honey, wild fruit, wild animals, and peculiar geographical situation, made it a favorite hiding-place for criminals and desperadoes. The stranger, associating these with the common citizen, formed a prejudice against the county which we have yet to entirely overcome.

It is a great mistake to think that the Dunklin County citizen is not law-abiding, intelligent, industrious, progressive, and in every way up with the best people of Southeast Missouri.

True, the time was when our citizens ** pounded " their bread in the top of a stump, hollowed out for the purpose, with the aid of a maul on a ** sweep " operated in a ** windlass" something like the old fashioned *' well-sweep " - and when their meat was venison steak, bear bacon, or some other wild meat, and their sassafras and spice wood, tea and coffee, was sweetened with wild honey.

In those days the pioneers ate corn bread three times each day for six days, and on the seventh had a change in the form of biscuits for breakfast, made of wheat flour that had been hauled all the way from Cape Girardeau, over that most terrible pole road, - '' The Devil's Washboard/'

But soon the little steel handmill for grinding corn replaced the Indian apparatus mentioned above, and one step was made on the line of progress.

In 1844, the nearest horse-power mill was situated about where Bernie now stands. To *< go to mill " was a two day's job, and the citizen who had no handmill, and had too large a family for which to pound his bread, went "to mill" about once each month, taking corn for his near neighbors, who, as he complacently stated, only lived from three to ten miles distant, and had left their corn at his house the evening before he expected to start to the grist mill. The citizens from the south part of the county could not make the trip even in two days with their ox teams and usually made Chilletacaux hut their lodging place. The Indian chief would spread his buffalo robes for them to sleep upon, and if it were cold keep fires in his stick-dirt fireplace all night for their comfort, and with a word and a motion of his hand send his multitude of cats out through the openings between the logs of his hut like so many spiders into their holes.

John Gunnells owned and operated the first horsepower mill in the north part of this county ; it stood near the present site of the J. P. Stewart mill.

In the latter part of 1849 Higginbotham erected a steam mill near the same place and operated it for several years. One of the oldest mills in the county was the ''West Prairie Mill" which stood on the corner of the old Marshall Place, two miles south of Clarkton. Another of the first mills of the county was erected by a Mr. Wadkins, but was soon afterward bought by Bridges & Taylor, and operated by them near Old Four Mile.

The first mill in the southern part of the county, to grind for the public, was operated by Howard Moore near Kennett. The public, as was customary in such instances, putting in its teams to help do the work and, in addition, paying the ordinary toll. In those days each citizen, while his corn was being ground, cut wood for the steam mills, besides paying toll out of his corn.

which E. J. Langdon bought in the early part of the '50s, and successfully operated for years. These mills were crude affairs, being either small horsepower or steam mills of no great force, and were all corn or grist mills. To get their wheat ground into flour the pioneers were compelled to go to Bloomfield, Mo., or Cape Girardeau, or else had it ground in the corn mill and then *' bolted " it by hand.

During the very earliest days the pioneer women picked the seeds from their cotton, - which they used for making cloth, - by hand. But about 1850 a small cotton gin was established in the southern end of the county to *' gin spinning cotton for the ladies." E. J. Langdon soon bought this and carried on the first extensive cotton business in the county.

The first merchants of Dunklin County could not be said to have extensive establishments, on the contrary, most of them kept small concerns covered and boarded up on the sides with clapboards made by hand from native trees. One of these, called a '' grocery," stood on the site of Maiden's present public school building. An old citizen says that, after excepting the barrel of liquor, the entire stock kept in 1844 could have been tied in an ordinary tablecloth. The proprietor of this '* grocery " was Mr. M. Gibany.

Martin Hodge kept a somewhat more substantial grocery store at Old Four Mile in the same year. Abb Wheeler was one of the first merchants at Old Cotton Hill. One of the first stores in the county was owned by Elbert C. Spiller, at Kennett. John Timberman and John Muse were the pioneer mer- chants at Clarkton, as also was John H. Stokes, who established a store at the same place in 1856. E. J. Langclon and Lsiar Jones ran a cooper shop and supplied their neighbors with pails, tubs, etc., and a blacksmithj near Cotton Plant in the latter part of the '40s. Mr. Langdon also established the first general store in that vicinity, which he continued to run for many years.

William Saturfield was proprietor of a general store at Hornersville as early as 1857. For several years Jack Miller hauled goods from Cape Girardeau in an ox wagon for many of these first stores. Another way of bringing goods into the county was on small boats that ran from Memphis, Tenn., up Little River to Hornersville. The pioneer farmers of Dunklin County cultivated a small corn crop in summer and hunted or trapped for fur and game during the winter. Later on they raised some wheat, also cattle and hogs, but gave very little attention to fruit or garden vegetables. Not until after the Civil War did they cultivate any cotton except a few rows for spinning cotton.

Now all this is changed, for although checked by the Civil War, as was all the rest of our country, Dunklin County has climbed far up the ladder of progress. Her cotton gins, saw mills, grist mills and like enterprises, blow their whistles on every hand, while they turn out the best product of their kind.

A good flouring mill is now making and sending out four good qualities of flour from Campbell. The Laswell Milling Company owns and operates a very large saw mill and lumberyard at that place. Maiden has a large stave factory which handles and ships out of the county an immense amount of timber, and is an enterprise any county might be proud to possess.

Kennett has cotton gins, corn-sheller, cotton seed huUers and other like machinery, and prepares a large portion of the products of the county for market. Kennett also has a cold storage warehouse, and much fish and game are shipped from this place. No finer fish or frogs exist than those in the waters of Dunklin County. They are not used for currency, as has been sneeringly stated, but they bring to our county about $30,000 annually, besides afi'ording us two fine home dishes that satisfies the palate of the Dunklinite in the same manner as it does the St. Louisan.

There has been much gossip about we using furs for currency. Now this was the case but to a very limited extent forty or fifty years ago. There was found among Hon. James P. Walker's papers three years ago a note which proves that to some extent this was done. It read: -

Many stories have been told about the pioneers taking large fur hides to their merchants, buying a few goods and receiving a small hide for change. This no doubt was true in some instances, but it has been greatly exaggerated. The fact is the fur buyers from Cape Girardeau and other places, as well as E.

J. Langdon and other home merchants, paid the old hunters thousands of dolhirs in gold and silver each season for their furs. Many of the old citizens say the fur traflSc during those pioneer days amounted from $75,000 to $100,000 annually.

There is yet some fur in our county, but this traffic has, of course, greatly diminished in recent years. Our farmers now deal in cattle, hogs, horses, mules, cotton, corn, watermelons, wheat and other produce. George W. Marshall raises and ships more cattle and hogs than any other farmer in the county. Ben. F. Hicks is also an extensive stock dealer, and T. J. Douglass buys and ships extensively.

There are, besides those mentioned above, a number of prominent and extensive stock raisers and dealers in this county who dehorn and prepare their stock in the latest approved manner for market; feeding corn from steam crushers, and turning that grain into fat beef and pork. Yet it is a fact, that our people continue to buy much of their meats from St. Louis. Yet our farmers are progressing and each year raising more of the necessaries of life, buying less on credit and saving more provisions and money for "next summer." Our merchants have kept pace with the rest of America's business men, and now show a large amount of the latest merchandise displayed in commodious, and even elegant frame or brick buildings.

Small frame buildings, irregular sidewalks and other marks of newness are disappearing from the main streets of our larger towns, and cement or other good walks are being laid in their place, with brick and large frame houses as backgrounds. The residences of our towns and country are yearly putting on a look of more permanence, beauty and luxury. We have a number of public buildings which would be an honor to any county of a like age. The Courthouse, situated on the public square in the town of Kennett, the county seat, was erected in 1892, at a cost of $15,000. The official rooms on the first floor are convenient and fitted up with the best modern furniture. The court and jury rooms on the second floor are amply commodious and neatly furnished.

The jail is a frame building furnished with Pauley Bros, cells and was erected in 1882 at a cost of $9,000. There are in the' county forty-five church buildings. There are fifty-four school buildings worth between forty and fifty thousand dollars. We have places for sixty-seven teachers at an average salary of $43 per month.

Our home teachers hold nine first-grade certificates, thirty-six second, and eighteen third grades, given by the Dunklin County Teachers Institute, which meets annually. The last term was held in Kennett in June of 1895. There are also five Normal diplomas and four certificates from the Cape Girardeau State Normal School.

Prof. T. J. Baird, county school commissioner, and conductor of the Teachers Institute for two years past, and Prof. R. S. Douglass, who was assistant in the County Institute, are considered at the head of the educational faculty in the county. These gentlemen

Most of our other teachers are either natives or have resided at least several years in the county, and as a body would be an honor to any county in our State.

We lack in our towns the benefits derived from large colleges, but, as a whole, to take our county all over, we have as good - many informed persons say better - public school buildings than any county in Southeast Missouri. Nearly all are nently painted, finished inside with hard oil and fitted up with modern furniture. The terms of school run from four to ten months; six months being about the average.

When we consider that fifteen years ago there was scarcely a respectable school building in the county, and but few organized districts, one may readily see that we have made a grand stride along the line of progress.

As to morals no county has improved more rapidly than Dunklin during the last decade. The pastors of the various church organizations, reported from all over the county a greater number of additions during the past year than ever before in a like period.

The Dunklin County Fair Association has fairly well equipped grounds at Kennett, and every year becomes better and more interesting. Every kind of stock, machinery, farm products, ladies' fancy work, and all other things displayed are noticeably better each season.

Dunklin County's newspapers have passed through all the ins and outs, ups and downs, incidental to the county paper. Its career commenced with the "Dunklin County Herald," established in 1870 at Kennett; at about the same time the ** Missouri Democracy" was removed from Cape Girardeau to Clarkton, and in January, 1871, the two were consolidated and published at Kennett.

In 1872 Albert & Baldwin established the <*Advertiser" at Clarkton. In a short time it was purchased by Charles E. Stokes, who, in September, 1874, enlarged it, changed the name to the ** Enterprise," and in 1876 it was removed to Kennett, and about the close of the year suspended.

In October, 1877, the '< Dunklin County Advocate " was established at Clarkton, by W. R. McDaniel, but very soon after the office was taken to Kennett, and for a time it was published by J. W. Baldwin. In 1879 it was removed to Maiden, by Charles E. Stokes, and its publication continued under the name of the ** Maiden Clipper." It was published by successive owners until the spring of 1886, when it was returned to Kennett, and after about a year suspended. It was superseded in Maiden by the *' Dunklin County News," published by John P. Allen, and edited by R. G. Sandridge.

At present the << Dunklin County News,'* Maiden, Missouri, is ** Issued under full pressure and with great good will, weekly, by the Edwards Printing Company, Casper M. Edwards, editor and manager," and is a *' paper for the people." *' Progress versus Poverty;" ** under no man's thumb, anchored to no clique, bound to make things hum every time we speak." Mr. Edwards is an amiable and able gentleman, and believes in keeping in close touch with his people, not behind, neither far ahead, as -

The *'News" is Democratic in politics, and its columns are always wholesome and newsy. April 19, 1888, the ''Clipper" was revived by Robert H. Jones, who had also been associated with it for several years during its life at Maiden. It was published at Kennett as the " Kennett Clipper," by R. H. and L. Jones, until April, 1893, when it was bought by its present owners, and its name changed to the ** Dunklin Democrat," Kennett, Dunklin County, Mo., published weekly by the Dunklin County Publishing Co., E. P. Caruthers, editor.

Mr. Caruthers shows marked ability and great energy and - *' Publishes for all of the people in the best county in the best State on earth." Undoubtedly the best county paper in Southeast Missouri.

The population of Dunklin County in 1850 was 1,220; in 1860 there was 5,026; in 1870 the census showed 5,982; 1880 showed 9,604; 1890 grew to 15,085; and this present year, 1895, it is estimated to be fully 20,000. The growth of this county in the past fifteen years has certainly been phenomenal, but not so great as may be reasonably expected within a like number of years in the future. Its increase in population has been based on the great natural resources of which the county abounds. The fact that this is a desirable place for young or enterprising citizens to start up and make homes of their own is yearly, nay weekly, bringing us permanent citizens.

The people of this county have not always enjoyed the large number of splendid public roads, and the means of ingress and egress afforded by our present railroad system. Until within the past ten years the road leading west from Cotton Plant, crossing Buffalo creek at the Dave Woods place, and leading southwest to the St. Francois River, was scarcely more than a bridle path. If the traveler desired to go west to Gainsville, Ark., or other points, he crossed the river at Bowlen's Ferry, by allowing himself and saddle - if he was on horseback - to be ** paddled" across the river in a canoe, while he held his horse's bridle and let him swim behind. Now the railroad leading w^est from Cardwell in the south end of this county to Paragould, Ark., takes the place of these crude accom- modations. The public roads - several in number - leading to this vicinity are well protected by levees and bridged wherever necessary. The public road leading from the extreme south line of the county by Hornersville, Cotton Plant, and so on north to Kennett, Clarkton, Maiden, and to Dexter, branches every few miles to every little post-village in the county and is always well kept and never becomes impassable; one may pass over the county with a one-horse buggy at any time of the year. At Kennett the public road is intercepted by the Kennett and Caruthersville Railroad, which affords quick transportation east to Caruthersville on the Mississippi River.

The St. Louis, Kennett & Southern Railroad connects Kennett and Campbell, and connects with the St. Louis Southwestern Railway, at the last mentioned town, bringing Dunklin County in close touch with the outside world.

The St. Louis, Southwestern Ry. Cotton Belt Route, passes through Maiden, and connects that town with Campbell and all Western points, and brings both of these towns within a few hours' ride of Cairo, 111. The Delta Branch, which runs into Maiden from the North, makes accessible St. Louis and the North. The five railroads in this county are fairly well equipped considering the short time they have been in operation.

It will be noticed that the above railroad system shows Dunklin County to be in easy access to Missouri and the remainder of the United States of America. Shipping facilities are good, and the officials of the several railroads are courteous and accommodatinsf.