Rock County, Wisconsin - Chapter with an unread heading (no. 3 of those read), 1908 (part 9 of 11)

Immediately after the bloody battle of Pittsburg Landing Governor Harvey gathered ninety boxes of the most serviceable supplies for the soldiers - sixty-one boxes from Milwaukee, thirteen from. Madison, nine from Janesville, six from Beloit and one from Clinton - and personally accompanied them to see that the supplies were jjroperly distributed to our wounded and sick Wisconsin boys. His interviews with these at Cairo, Mound City, Paducah and in the hospitals and on the hospital boats, his warm grasp of the hand and word of cordial sympathy, brought tears of joy to the faces of many brave soldiers and good cheer to their hearts. At Savannah, where more than 200 of our wounded soldiers were suffering from neglect and lack of care, his coming and kindness and care for them caused scenes so affecting that the feelings of both governor and men would often be too strong for words.

While he was ascending the river to Pittsburg occurred the day appointed for national thanksgiving. At a meeting held in the steamer cabin, when the president's proclamation was read, Governor Harvey, joining in the service, made not only a patriotic but also a religious address. He was a manly Christian. Such was the high respect in which he was held that rough men never used rough language in his presence. Governor Harvey's arrival at the camp of the Wisconsin regiments at Pittsburg Landing, where were hundreds of sick and wounded men who had been rushed into battle only a few weeks after leaving their state, caused in all their hearts a thrill of joy. He worked continually among the men, seeking in every possible way to relieve their sufferings and to renew their courage and hope ; he also carefully ascertained who had distinguished themselves in battle and took their names in order to give them well-deserved promotion, a good resolve prevented only by his own death. Saturday morning, April 19, 1862, Governor Harvey went ten miles down the Tennessee river to Savannah to take there next morning a steamer for Cairo. After the party had retired for the night, at about 10 o'clock in the evening, the "Minnehaha" hove in sight, and Governor Harvey with others took position near the edge and fore part of his steamer, the "Dunleith," ready to pass to the ap- proaching boat. As the bow of the "Minnehaha" swung around close to the party on the "Dunleith" Governor Harvey stepped on one side, and, the night being dark and rainy, slipped and fell between the two steamers. The current was strong, and notwithstanding the frantic efforts of several brave friends he was, it is supposed, drawn under a flatboat near by and so drowned. A long search was made for the body in vain, but some days later it was discovered by children at a point about sixty-five miles below. The remains, hastily buried there, were afterwards brought to Madison and with public services of respect duly interred in Forest Hill Cemetery near the capital. Rev. M. P. Kinney, of Janesville, conducting the religious service. Lieutenant- Governor Edward Salomon appointed Thursday, May 1, a day of rest to commemorate Governor Harvey's death. At the state capitol he introduced the services by an appropriate address, and President A. L. Chapin of Beloit College pronounced a fitting eulogy. Similar services were held in various places throughout the state. The public press was draped in mourning, and the people grieved that their much-loved governor, only fortytwo years old, had been taken away in the midst of his days.

Mrs. Cordelia A. Harvey. A fitting accompaniment to this brief biography of Governor Harvey is some mention of his wife, who did so much for our soldiers. His last letter to her, dated Pittsburg Landing, April 17, 1862, had but these three sentences : "Yesterday was the day of my life. Thank God for the impulse that brought me here. I am well and have done more good by coming than I can tell you." That letter and the death of her husband inspired Mrs. Harvey to devote herself to the interests of our soldiers. Asking and receiving permission from Governor Salomon to visit hospitals in the western department as an agent of the state, she went in the autumn of 1862 to St. Louis and visited many general hospitals along the Mississippi river and post hospitals of the Wisconsin troops. The heat was oppressive and contagious diseases prevailed, but she persevered until herself taken ill near Vicksburg in the spring of 1863, when she was obliged to return home to Shopiere, Wis. Deeply impressed with the importance of having general hospitals in the northern states, she went to Washington and saw President Lincoln himself about it. He thought, as did all his army advisers, that hospitals in the North would encourage desertion. Mrs. Harvey, however.

declared that many of the sick soldiers in our western armies must have northern air or die. Lincoln said that in the Army of the Potomac at the time of the battle of Antietam the United States was paying for 170,000 men, and yet only 83,000 could be mustered for that action. Lincoln sent her to the secretary of war and wrote on the back of her letter of introduction: "Listen to what she says. She is a lady of intelligence and talks sense." Stanton told her that the surgeon-general had gone to New Orleans - that he would examine the river hospitals and report. Knowing well that his report would agree with the opinion of those above him, she returned in despair to Lincoln and pleaded so earnestly for our suffering boys in blue that an order was issued granting a hospital in Wisconsin, and she was given an order that enabled her to take sick and wounded Wisconsin soldiers to it. One hundred such cases at Fort Pickering, who were pronounced nearly hopeless, were taken to this Harvey Hospital at Madison, Wis. ; seven of them died, five were discharged, and all the rest returned to the service.

Mrs. Harvey continued her work as long as the soldiers remained in the field. At the close of the war she obtained from the government the additions it had made to the Farwell mansion at Madison for the United States Harvey Hospital, and on January 1, 1866, opened that building as a Soldiers' Orphans' Home. In March, 1866, by act of the state legislature and Governor Fairchild, it became one of the benevolent institutions of the state.

Louis H. D. Crane Avas born in Westmoreland, Oneida county, N. Y., July 7, 1826, the son of a Presbyterian minister. His father was a strong anti-slavery speaker, and his eldest brother a missionary of the American Board. After graduating from Hamilton College he studied medicine a year, then law, and was admitted to the bar in 1850. After his marriage to Miss Lucy M. Burrall, of Stockbridge, Mass., in the fall of 1852, he came in the spring of 1853 to Beloit, Wis., and taught very acceptably in our Union School No. 1. In 1856 he moved to Dodgeville, Wis., and was promptly elected district attorney of Iowa county. Two years later he was chosen chief clerk of the assembly in the Wisconsin legislature, was reelected annually for four years in succession, and almost unanimously. In 1859 he removed to Ripon, Wis. When the war broke out he was elected lieutenant in the

Third Regiment, and immediately promoted to the adjutancy. He was made lieutenant-colonel in June and was killed in the action at Cedar Mountain, Virginia, June 1, 1862. The citizens of Beloit, Wis., claimed his body, which after suitable and impressive honors was buried at the city cemetery. He was a member of the Episcopal church. The Beloit 6. A. R. Post No. 54 is named for him.

The Romance Of The War The One Hundred Days Men Of 1864

(For the benefit of a younger generation this article, prepared from old letters and my diary of that time, is added as a sketch of the romance of war.)

The late Spanish or Cuban war enlisted a few of our young men and awakened in our state some popular interest. But the young people of to-day have not felt and indeed cannot fully know that burning excitement which overflowed all our hearts in 1864. Then the very existence of this nation was in danger. There was a high war fever and even the children had it.

Between the years 1861 and 1864 many loyal volunteers had gone to the front from our town and from the college here at Beloit, while we younger boys had been kept at home and at our books until 1864.

Early in that year, however, came the call for several regiments to serve for one hundred days and mainly on garrison or picket duty. They would set free and send to the front just as many of Grant's veterans and thus would render good service. To this romance of war even the parents of an only son could not object. College authorities approved. Our beloved Professor Blaisdell enlisted as chaplain and a prominent citizen, Alfred L. Field, served as quartermaster of the 40th.

Besides the enthusiastic meetings down town, we had student gatherings, speeches and war songs in the college chapel, now art room, 2d story, and amid rousing cheers one and another declared it his purpose to enlist.

When Henry D. Porter took that stand, it was suggested that he was too short for the United States requirement. At once a committee was appointed to take him out and measure him.

"Whether that committee stretched Henry or the truth or both or neither is immaterial. They promptly reported that he was exactly at the limit, five feet. (Tremendous cheering.) It should be added that he was never sick, always ready for duty and did good service from the beginning to the end of his term.

Besides many of us town boys, thirty-one from the college classes (about half the whole number) and twenty-five preps enlisted in the -lOth Regiment, Wisconsin Volunteers, called the Students' Regiment.

After several days' drilling on the college campus. May 18th, with flags and cheers, we took the cars for Camp Randall (now the "Wisconsin University athletic field) at Madison. A ruddy young Norwegian sitting in a car seat near me said in a rather weak voice that his name was George Travis from Illinois. To our great surprise he was arrested and sent off that same evening, because the United States army does not enlist women. May 19. 1864. Last night we had our first camp supper, consisting of bread and coffee without milk or sugar, and then drew blankets and bunks for the night. My bed was a bare board and I slept soundly on it. May 20. "Went to Madison University and from the top of the main building sketched our camp. The barracks look like cattle sheds on a fair ground. May 24. Larry Foote and Moffat Halliday are playing cards at my elbow and they slap the table so enelrgetically that it roughens my writing. To that usual army game, however, the 40th adds chess and checkers, with many superior players. Yesterday we signed enlistment papers in triplicate. At our physical examination to-day, when the surgeon came to W. H. Fitch he gave him a playful poke and Baid: "A man with your chest can go anywhere.". Our college boys all passed. June 1. A dozen of us were furnished with muskets and bayonets and stationed at the prison where there are thirty prisoners, mostly deserters. "We stood guard all night and found it chilly.

Sunday, June 5th. Chaplain Blaisdell conducted divine service in the open air behind the captain's quarters on the hill, and a choir of Beloit boys sang. June 7. This afternoon seven companies were sworn in. Our Company B. was disposed of second. A lieutenant of the regulars, standing by Colonel Ray, called off our names and unless he stopped us, each answering, "Here," marched down the front and formed in a line to the right. Four men from Beloit were refused. The oath was duly administered to the rest and we marched back to our barracks regular soldiers of the United States. Hurrah !

June 8. "We have to roll out for roll call at 5 a. m., take two hours' drill in the morning, two more in the afternoon and often two hours' battalion drill after supper. This afternoon I was sent with W. A. Cochran and three others to the hospital and we were set to pounding clothes in a barrel. Two hours of that work and one of carrying wood has saved us, however, from twenty-four hours' guard duty, in this rain. Soldiering begins to lose some of its romance. We have to obey orders. June 11th. To-day clothing and guns were issued. Each man got a woolen blanket, $3.25; rubber blanket, $2.48; dress coat, $7.00; pants, $2.50 ; shoes, $2.05 ; woolen shirt, $1.53 ; drawers, 90c. ; stockings, 32c.; knapsack, $1.85; haversack, 33c., and canteen, 41c. Amount in greenbacks, $22.62. The cap will be a dollar more. The whole allowance per man was $23.90.

June 14. Called up at half past four a. m. We received rations for three days, hardtack, dried meat and cheese. At 8 a. m, we strapped on our knapsacks, marched to the cars and at last were 'off to the war.' Milton Junction saluted us with flags and the firing of cannon. At Clinton Junction were friends and dear ones from Beloit, kisses, flowers, cheers and more cannon. At Harvard a young lady filled my canteen with coffee. More girls and flowers. Hurrah ! Reaching the old North-Western depot, Chicago, about midnight, we marched the longest way around to the Soldiers' Rest on Michigan avenue, and stacked arms in the street. At 2 a. m., Mr. E. W. Porter, a Beloit graduate, furnished cigars for Company B., and Mr. Clinton Babbitt gave us hungry fellows a feast. It was hot coffee, bread and butter and pie plant sauce, sponge cake and a dish of strawberries for each man. After speeches and cheers we marched to the cars and at 4 a. m., June 15, started south. Our progress was attended by enthusiastic demonstrations of loyalty. At every city flags were displayed and guns fired, while young and old wished us Godspeed. All kinds of food, fruit and vegetables, including cab- bages, were offered us. Old women waved their aprons and young ladies their handkerchiefs. Springfield was one continuous wave, and it was Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah! all the way to Alton.

From Alton we steamed down the Mississippi and reached Memphis Sunday morning, June 19 ; temperature, 125 degrees, F. At 11 a. m., having strapped on knapsacks and shouldered arms, we marched through deep dust a long way 'round to a camp ground about two miles from the city limits. In woolen clothes and carrying about sixty pounds each, all found it hot indeed, but got there. Jack Lewis even carried F. 's gun along with his own. On arriving, parched with thirst, early in the evening several of us hunted up an old deserted well, buckled straps together and let down a canteen through weeds and broken curb to the cool Avater twenty feet below. When it was drawn up gurgling full and put to our dusty lips, then w^e learned the real meaning of the word Nectar. That first night all slept on the ground without covering.

"Camp Ray, June 20, 1864. Our mess consists of ten Beloit College boys of Company B. : Lyman "VVinslow, of '65 ; Fitch, Lewis, Newhall, Fred Curtis and Brown, of '66 ; Porter and Smith, of '67 ; A. W. Kimball and F. Bicknell. We must do our own cooking for awhile, and all take turns. As chief of mess I have drawn a piece of pork, alias 'sow belly,' II/2 pints coffee, II/2 pints brown sugar, 1/^ peck of potatoes, 2-3 pint of salt, I/4 bar of soap and 20 of the six-inch square crackers, called hardtack.

21st. After the usual drill we made of rubber blankets, etc., a mess tent and put up the sign, "Eagle Mess. No Smoking Aloud." For to-day's rations we have 12-3 pints of coffee and the same of sugar, 2-3 pint of vinegar and as much molasses, one quart of rice, one quart of beans, y^ bar of soap, one candle, twenty hardtack, and sow belly sufficient. Fitch, Kimball and I are the first cooks. During the night came a thunder-storm and a small river under our blankets. Good-natured Kimball and others turned out amid the downpour in the airiest possible costume and scraped a shallow trench about the tent. Next day several of us were sent to the city with a commissary wagon which we loaded with hay bales and the new tents. Managed to get

June 24. Sixty having volunteered for picket duty, we took thirty cartridges apiece, with three days' rations of hardtack, marched a mile or two from camp, and were then distributed in stations about thirty rods apart, three men at a station. We stand guard day and night until relieved, each man taking his turn of two hours on guard and four off. It was said that those whose property we were guarding would not give or even sell us anything. Feeling ill, I tried the matronly colored cook of the nearest secesh mansion, and with kind words and a dime got a refreshing cup of tea. That evening Corporal F. went on the same errand. Reported that he marched up to the front piazza where the Atkins family were sitting, asked for a drink of water and they merely pointed him to the well. Said he saw unhealthy symptoms of their unchaining a savage-looking dog, so he left. In the still night during my guard from eleven till one. Comrade Shumaker went over towards that same house jayhawking. Pretty soon there was a loud woof! woof! and S., rushing back emptyhanded, with that dog after him, jumped the fence just barely in time. Early next morning visited that house again and made for the cook a small pencil sketch of her little bare-legged grandson. After that nothing was too good and they gave me the best the house afforded for breakfast. A colored lad called out, ''Your relief's just done gone by," so I hurried back to my station convinced that those negroes were loyal. Sunday morning Chaplain Blaisdell preaches. We also have excellent evening prayer meetings, and what some prize far more now, a company cook.

July 1. Our rations for two days' picket service are a loaf of bread each, with a little sugar and coffee. On this picket one of us convinced a secesh cow that it was milking time and filled a tin cup. For this, his only act of foraging, he has since most sincerely repented not. We had to sleep on the ground if at all and be waked by falling rain. My sketch of that post shows Corporal Eben Kendall sitting disconsolately on the wet roadside with his feet in a ditch. The romance of war has vanished. Southern heat is steady and stifling. The standing guard alone one still hot night suggested these lines, to a familiar tune : come; Rock River bright behind it, the busy street before, The vine-clad wall, those columns tall, the rose beside the door. Long years a call was sounded, of danger, through the land. Our fears proved not unfounded and many an earnest band Marched off to aid their country, with these among them then. So here are we in Tennessee, remembering home again.

Our chief danger, of course, was from short rations. The ditto hostile ranger was usually the southern mosquito, whose poisonous stab drew more northern blood than southern bayonets did.

"Sunday, July 10, occurred the first camp funeral. It was of a Mr. Small, Company F. Before night army mules tramped through the yellow clay of his grave. Those hoof tracks were new in a double sense.

"Monday we went sixty miles east from Memphis on train guard to La Grange. Last week three Iowa soldiers were shot at by guerillas on this road. We lay at full length on the roof of our freight car, both sides of the ridge, with our guns leveled across it ready to fire either side. (After a train or two had been fired on, each freight sent out was provided with certain prominent copperhead citizens of Memphis, who were obliged to ride on the tops of the cars with the boys. Usually there was one such guest for each car. We let our man have a prominent place so that of any attentions bestowed upon us he would be sure to get his share. Deacon Oliver J. Stiles doubtless remembers several of those guests.)

"La Grange, Tennessee, must have been a beautiful town before both armies battered it. Now, however, the churches are in ruins and used for stables, many fine houses have been burned or blown up, most of the inhabitants are gone, and the scene is one of desolation."

These letters, received from a boyhood playmate of Beloit about that time, explain themselves. He was in a battery company: Eleventh Wisconsin Light Artillery.

"Camp near Clarksville, Tenn., July 18th, '64. Friend W. - At the battle of Rodgersville last November we lost our guns. In that east Tennessee campaign under Burnside we suffered for the want of something to eat. For months we did not see even a hard cracker. We had to kill a beef and fry the meat on sticks and eat it without salt, as that article is very scarce in those parts. We had ear corn dealt out to us, two ears to each man for a day's ration. Out of the fourteen boys who left Beloit and went into this battery there are only two of us left.

Friend W. - In one battle we fought all day and got nothing but dent corn to eat. After leaving Knoxville last summer and fall we lived on just what we could pick up. But it is all for the best country that the sun ever shone on. " I thank God I am permitted to fight for it and enjoy health,

I have a cousin in your regiment. Company I, 40th Wisconsin, Oscar Bishop. We here are expecting an attack every day from the old Johnson command, eleven miles distant. We will give them just as warm a reception as we can. In our last engagement we were badly whipped ; we must expect to get the worst of it once in a while.

Our captain told us last night that in less than six weeks we would all be before Atlanta, Ga., but I hardly think we will leave this winter."

The heat, which rose to 132 degrees, and some special exposure, brought me to the hospital sick with fever. A box came from Beloit and on waking one morning I found under my head a white pillow marked with the name of my mother. One must be sick in the army to appreciate such comforts. August 6, Sergeant Sherrill died and Bushnell August 10, and "W. H. Shumaker, in the cot next to mine, August 13. Sunday, August 21st, we sick boys were waked by the boom of cannon. "What's that ! "Forrest has attacked Memphis with his cavalry and artillery and our boys have gone out." One invalid managed to dress, found that his gun seemed to weigh several hundred pounds, so started without it towards the firing. The 40th regiment was at the extreme front and under fire about three-quarters of an hour. A shell burst in a stump behind Company B, and one of its fragments slightly wounded a lieutenant, Harson Northrup, doing no other damage. Forrest retreated, our boys marched back and some of them found that invalid on the road, they say, and brought him in.

On board the hospital steamer. Silver "Wave, Sept. 9, 1864. "We left Camp Ray and Memphis yesterday and started north. Our boat is crowded with more than two thousand invalid soldiers. A few miles below Ft. Pillow we stopped to bury a boy of the 39th who died last night. At Cairo we buried four more. Lying on the bare upper-deck back of the smoke pipes, sick with fever, partly protected by my blanket from dew and falling cinders, what a joy it gives me at night to see that we are pointed towards the north star and are actually going home."

September 14. At Alton, 111., we convalescents were packed in freight cars, as many as could lie in each, stretched crosswise on the hard floor. At every bang of the rough cars our fevered heads felt ready to split. Water was scarce on the way and welcome scarcer. We reached Chicago (where someone stole my canteen )on the evening of the loth, when our term expired.

were kept at Camp Randall, i\Iadison, several days and then duly discharged. The boys of the 40th came home, some all the stronger, one to die on the day he reached home, and many to feel the ill effects of that summer for several years, but most of them no doubt better and wiser for their hundred days' service.

An interesting feature of the patriotism of the people of Rock county, is the manifestation of it in connection with our public schools, academies, colleges and churches. Up to 1866, 310 students of Milton Academy entered the army and forty-three died or were killed. That academy raised substantially one company for the 13th Regiment, one for the 40th, and parts of companies for the 2nd and 49th. The school had representatives in forty-four Wisconsin regiments or batteries, and in thirty-one regiments of other states. Sixty-nine students received commissions from that of second lieutenant up to brigadier general. Beloit College was represented by thirty- five Wisconsin regiments or batteries, in thirty Illinois organizations, and twenty-four of other states; in nine colored regiments and in other positions, more than one hundred in all. Two hundred and seventy former teachers and students of the college up to 1866, were in the loyal service ; none, so far as known, in the rebel service. One hundred and forty-five of these held positions of honor and trust, of whom eighty were commissioned officers. Among these were two chaplains, one brigadier general, seven colonels, five adjutants and twenty-six captains. After the war, more than sixty proved that they were not demoralized by returning to the institution and resuming their studies.

At a later date, when the number of the alumni of the college and academy had increased, it was found that about four hundred had been soldiers of the Civil War, and only one a deserter.

Without separate statistics for the ministers, church members and sons of ministers, of all the churches of Rock county, nevertheless, that we gave our share of the many such, who volunteered in our state, is unquestionable.

When the settlers who came from New England, the pioneers of Rock county first beheld these rolling prairies lying dormant for lack of toilers to till the land ready to produce the wonderful results which later developed, they must have imagined this region a Garden of Eden, in comparison with the sterile hills they left behind, where, oftentimes, the yield did not compensate them for the cost of production; for here they found one of the most beautiful regions that ever gladdened the eye, with a soil so fertile, that a slight effort of cultivation would yield immense crops of all the varieties grown in the temperate zone.

The surface of the country at that time was an undulating plain, gently sloping to the southward, with the Rock river, the most beautiful stream in all the West, flowing from its source north of the county, between wooded banks, to its junction with the Pecatonica river a short distance south of the county line, which is also the line between Wisconsin and Illinois. At the time the county was surveyed a little more than half of it was prairie ; the balance consisted of oak openings and heavy timber lands, nearly all of which could be cultivated, and aside from the Rock river, there were many small sparkling streams, and a number of small lakes.

The county contains 450,285 acres and a fraction; it is the writer's firm belief that there is no territory in the United States of equal size that has produced more net profit per acre than has the soil of Rock county, for the length of time that it has been under cultivation, the products of this county and their aggregate value are increasing with each succeeding decade, as will be shown bj' the comparative tables which are here submitted. At the time of the first settlement of Rock county, wheat was the staple crop grown, the soil being new and containing all of the elements necessary to produce large yields ; but as the years went on, and the continued cropping of the ground exhausted the phosphates, and the nitrogenous compounds that are so absolutely essential to the production of grain, the result was diminished yield; this combined with low prices, which ruled for a number of years, and the competition of the great wheat belt of the West and Northwest, compelled the farmers to adopt different methods of farming; this course they pursued, so that at this time, while there is still a large acreage of corn planted yearly, by the improved methods of farming, the yield of this staple is satisfactory. "Wheat raising has almost entirely ceased, and in its place they are raising tobacco and sugar beets.

The tobacco culture had proved to be remunerative and on farms where stock raising, dairying, and clover predominate, the fertility of the land is sustained and is yearly growing better under the skillful management of the Rock county farmers, so that at the present time the growing, curing and packing of tobacco in Rock county has been reduced to a science, and will be treated in this work in a separate article by writers who are thoroughly familiar with the subject.

The cultivation of the sugar beet, and the manufacture of sugar, is receiving considerable attention, and is not an experiment, for it was proven as early as in 1867 at Fon du Lac and at Black Hawk, Sauk county, in 1870, that the soil and climate of Wisconsin were suited to the successful growth of the sugar beet. The failure of these enterprises was due, however, to lost interest in these particular products by the farmers. The sugar factory now in operation at Janesville is meeting with success, and is a source of revenue to both the grower and the manufacturer.

In writing of the dairying interests, and keeping in mind the fact that the state of Wisconsin stands in the front rank, in the production of butter and cheese, it must be also kept in mind that Rock county is on the star list, in these commodities; with the nearness to market, and the right kind of soil, the best of grass, and the purest of water, they can and do produce butter and cheese that cannot be surpassed by even the most favored localities in Europe.

The growth of this branch of agriculture has veen very rapid, but has never yet exceeded the demand, which is constantly increasing. And not only has this industry been a source of immense revenue, it has completely revolutionized the methods of farming that were in use twenty-five years ago. when nearly all of the land was plowed up each spring, and planted to wheat and corn, then in addition to the Avashing away of the loose soil by the spring rains, came years of short crops, low prices, and innumerable trials and troubles, that arise from depending wholly upon the success of one growth of an uncertain crop.

It must be remembered that the farmers of Eock county are so generally engaged in the dairy business that they look to this line for a large portion of their income.

The following comparison will be of interest and show the increase or decrease of the number of acres of various commodities and their yield, for Eock county for ten year periods. Starting with 1880, and ending w^th 1907, according to the statistics in the county clerk 's office :

The preliminary steps toward the formation of an agricultural society in Rock county were taken November 19, 1850, at which time a call was made on the farmers of the several towns of the county to meet at the court house in Janesville on the first Monday of January, the 6th, to make aiTangements for their own benefit by association.

On the day appointed a meeting was held. J. P. Wheeler, of La Prairie, was called to the chair, and 0. Densinore, of Bradford, was appointed secretary. The object of the meeting having been stated by the chairman, remarks were made by Messrs. Hodson, Neil and Russell, of Janesville, and E. A. Foot, of Center. On motion of C. C. Cheney, of La Prairie, it was resolved that the

The following persons were elected officers: J. P. Wheeler, president; W. F. Tompkins of Janesville, Ansel Dickinson of Harmony, Orrin Densmore of Bradford, Joseph Goodrich of Milton, J. M. Burgess and A. ^Y. Pope of Janesville, vice-presidents; Josiah F. Willard, of Rock, recording secretary; Andrew Palmer, corresponding secretary; and John Russell, of Janesville, treasurer. A boai?d of twenty directors, one for each town in the county, was also elected, viz. : William Stewart, of Clinton ; Peter

D. Wemple, of Bradford; J. A. Pletcher, of Johnstown; Paul Crandall, of Lima; G. W. Ogden, of .Milton; Harvey Holmes, of Harmony ; Guy Wheeler, of La Prairie ; John Hopkins, of Turtle ; W. Yost, of Beloit; Z. P. Burdick, of Rock; L. D. Thompson, of Janesville ; R. R. Cowan, of Fulton ; D. Lovejoy, of Porter ; E. A. Foot, of Center, H. C. Inman, of Plymouth ; John L. V. Thomas, of Newark; A. Kenny, of Avon; R. R. Hamilton, of Spring Valley;

The society having become fully organized, it was resolved to make the experiment of holding a fair, to see whether the farmers of "yoimg Rock" had sufficient enterprise to get up anything like a creditable show.

The result was highly gratifying. The fair was held on the first and second days of October, 1851. at Janesville, and at least five thousand persons were present. The annual address was given by J. P. Wheeler, president. At the close of the year the treasurer reported the receipt of $291.91 ; the expenditures for premiums and other expenses, $206, leaving a balance of $86 in the treasury to the credit of the next year.

The annual meeting of the society for the next year succeeding was held on the first Monday of December, 1851. The officers elected were : J. F. Willard, president ; Z. P. Burdick of Janesville, J. A. Fletcher of Johnstown, James M. Burgess of Janesville, I. S. Love of Beloit, John Winston of Porter and Jesse Miles of Janesville, vice-presidents ; Orrin Guernsey, recording secretary; John P. Dickson, corresponding secretary and treasurer.

The committee for locating the county fair reported that the town of Beloit had offered a bonus of $240, the highest offer of any tow-n in the county, whereupon it was voted that the next county fair of the society be held at Beloit. The fair was held at the place appointed, September 28 and 29, 1852. An address by the president, J. F. A\'illard. was delivered on the second day, after which the treasurer made his report, in which it appeared that the receipts during the fair amounted to nearly $350, which, after paying premiums and other expenses, left about $70 in the treasury. Probably three thousand persons were present at the fair grounds during the exhibition. The first prize for farm and flower garden was given to ^Mr. Josiah F. Willard, M^hose farm of 340 acres was on the east side of Rock river about two miles below Janesville. The committee who visited his dwelling, called "Forest Cottage," may or may not have noticed one flower on that farm, the fragrance of which was destined to spread throughout the civilized world, that little flower, his younger daughter, Frances Elizabeth Willard, afterwards the peerless temperance leader.

The next annual meeting of the society was held December 6, 1852. The officers elected were : J. F. "Willard, president ; Charles R. Gibbs, E. A. Foot, Daniel Bennett, S. P. Lathrop, Jesse Miles and E. H. Rowland, vice presidents; Orrin Guernsey, recording secretary; Mark Miller, corresponding secretary, and J. M. Burgess, treasurer. At the meeting held September 10, 1853, on motion it was resolved that an effort be made to purchase fair grounds by selling life memberships, to be paid by installments of $2.50 each, until the whole sum of $10 be paid. This proved to be a feasible plan for raising funds, and four acres of land were purchased of J. J. R. Pease, which tract w^as fitted up at once for the fair, to be held there on the 4th and 5th days of October, 1853. It was held at the time appointed, and an address was made by the president, J. F. Willard. The executive committee subsequently gave notice that they had expended nearly $700 in purchasing and fitting up permanent grounds, and that they found their funds somewhat exhausted, leaving a deficiency for premiums ; that they did not feel at liberty to avail themselves of the reserved privilege of reducing the premiums, but should report them in full, preferring to fall back on the generosity of those friends who had drawn large premiums, and to ask such as were willing to do so to let theirs rest in Avhole or in part until next year, when the outlays would be much reduced and a surplus might reasonably be expected. The expenditures of the society, as reported for the fiscal year ending December, 1853, were as follows : Purchase of fair grounds, $101.37 ; fencing and permanent fixtures, $559.31 ; premium list, printing and other expenses, $515.44; the net income being $1,176.62. leaving an indebtedness of $334.08.

The next annual meeting of the society was held at Janesville, December 5, 1853, at which time the following officers were elected : S. P. Lathrop. president ; C. Loftus Martin, J. A. Fletcher, Nathaniel Howard, Charles Colby. Mark Miller and Azel Kenney, vice presidents ; Charles R. Bibbs, recording secretary ; Z. P. Burdick, corresponding secretary, and S. A. Martin, treasurer.

The fair was held at the society grounds on the 13th and 14th of September, 1854. There never had been seen in the place a larger number of people gathered together. The amount of premiums awarded exceeded $2,000.

Resolutions were adopted expressive of the sense of the society in view of the death of its late president, Professor S. Pearl Lathrop, of IMadison University.

The fair was held on the 25th, 26th and 27th days of September, 1855, and was a success. President Burdick delivered a valuable address before the society. The receipts of the fair were about $1,500, and the amount paid out for premiums about $700. The attendance was large and the fair grounds were too small to suitably accommodate the large number of persons present.

During that year the society disposed of their land and purchased ten acres in the southern part of the city ; this was suitably fenced and improved for the fair, which was held from September 30 to October 2, 1856. One feature was the ladies' equestrian match, which drcAv a large attendance to the grounds. It was believed that there were at least twenty thousand persons present on that day. A display of fire engines was also a new feature in the arrangements.

recording secretary; J. A. Blount, corresponding secretary, and W. Hughes, treasurer. At this meeting it was reported that the receipts of the society during the year were $1,496.49, which, with the balance remaining on hand of $141.75, amounted to $1,638.24.

The county fair was held on October 10, 1857. The society had, during the year, purchased additional ground, making nearly twenty acres in all. There was a large attendance and the grounds were filled.

The next annual fair was held September 28 to 30, 1858. From the report of the secretary, Winfield S. Chase, there were received $1,526.16, and expended $1,517.10, leaving a small balance of $9.06 on hand. The premiums of the previous fair were paid this year.

The society during the year 1859 held a festival on the Fourth of July, and a regular annual fair on the 20th, 21st and 22d days of September. The former was largely attended, but resulted in small profit. The fair was a success, proving, notwithstanding the hard times and other influences and circumstances, that the farmers of the county had the ability to give the society a front rank among those in the state. The total receipts were $1,403, and the expenditures, including $629.10 paid toward indebtedness of the society, $1,381.73. The balance in the treasury October 26, 1859, was $21.96.

A special meeting of the executive committee was called on October 22, 1859, to take into consideration the indebtedness of the society and to provide means for its extinguishment. At this meeting the financial affairs of the society were reported as follows:

Amount of purchase money for additional grounds in 1857, $1,875; paid on the same, $963; balance due on the same, $912.82. The other debts were for fitting up the grounds and necessary improvements, making the total indebtedness $3,326.82. The committees recommended the issue of three hundred ten-dollar promissory notes, payable in three years, to be sold to members of the society and its friends. This plan was adopted by the executive committee.

The officers of the society who served during the year 1859, elected in December, 1858, were: J. F. Willard, president; Charles R. Gibbs, recording secretary; J. A. Blount, corresponding secretary; W. Hughes, treasurer. The officers of the society for 1860, elected in December previous, were the same as for 1859, except D. McLay, who was elected treasurer in place of Mr. Hughes. The county fair was held September 18 to 20, 1860. The report of the treasurer, subsequently made, showed, receipts, $1,248.53; expenditures, $1,241.53; balance, $7. The annual address was delivered by James H. Howe.

The officers elected at the annual meeting, in December, 1860, were : Joseph Spaulding, president ; G. S. Strasberger, recording secretary; W. S. Chase, corresponding secretary, and W. Lester, treasurer. The fair was held September 17, 18 and 19, 1861. The receipts were $841.44 and expenditures $783.17. Of the latter amount $506.50 was paid in premiums. Balance on hand, $58.27. The address before the society was delivered by J. R. Doolittle and was in reference to the state of public affairs.

At this date the society ceased to exist. During the years 1862, 1863 and 1864 the people of the county were so much engrossed in war matters that no new society was formed and no fairs were held. Finally, in the latter part of 1864, another organization was perfected, with the election in December of that year, of H. P. Fales, president ; Jacob Fowle, secretary, and R. T. Pember, treasurer. The fair was held September 12, 13 and 14, 1865. The attendance was large. The receipts were $2,675.17 ; the expenditures $2,588.03, of which $576.50 was paid out in premiums, leaving a balance of $88.14. The officers of the society for 1866 were : H. P. Fales, president ; Guy "Wheeler, secretary ; R. T. Pember, treasurer. The fair was held September 12 to 15, the receipts being $887.45, and the expenditures $746.47, of which amount $480.75 was paid in premiums, leaving the balance on hand of $122.98. The annual address was delivered by Hon. T. 0. Howe. The same officers were elected for the year of 1867. The fair this year was held on September 10 and closed on the 13th. It was a good year for the society. The receipts were double the amount of the preceding one. The annual address was delivered by Halbert E. Paine. The total receipts were $2,202.01 ; the expenses $2,142.17, of which amount $1,550.50 was for premiums, leaving a balance of $59.14.

The officers of 1868 were : Lewis Clark, president ; R. J. Richardson, secretary, and A. Hoskins, treasurer. The fair was held September 15 to 17, inclusive. The receipts were increased from the preceding year. Whole amount received, $2,914.29. The ex-

The annual fair for the year 1869 was held September 14 to 17, showing an increased interest from the last year. A baby show was added to the ordinary attractions. The treasurer's report showed that there was received from all sources the sum of $4,244.05 ; expenses, $3,142.87 ; paid in premiums, $1,205.45. The officers for the year were : Seth Fisher, president ; R. J. Richardson, secretary, and A. Hoskins, treasurer.

The same officers were elected for the year 1870, and the fair was held on September 21, and continued for three days. An address was delivered by Hon. Charles G. Williams. The receipts were $9,063.25; the expenses, $10,865.02; paid for premiums, $1,- 585.83.

In 1871 the same officers were elected, except that Mr. C. Miner was chosen treasurer in place of Mr. Hoskins. The annual fair was held from September 12 to 15. There was not as much interest taken this year as in the former one, and the receipts were much reduced. The treasurer reported, receipts, $3,706.85 ; expenditures, $3,687.43; premiums, $1,935.65; leaving a balance of $95.60 on hand.

In 1872 the same officers were elected. The display this year at the county fair, held September 12 to 15, was fine, particularly that of horses, said to have been the best exposition ever held in the county. There was received from all sources $3,989.48, and expended $2,394.49, of which last amount $1,596.14 was paid in premiums.

The same officers were elected for the year 1873. The fair was held September 9 to 12, with a very creditable display and a good attendance ; perhaps not as large as on the preceding year. Receipts, $3,879.38; expenses in all, $3,381.60, of which amount $1,- 461.60 was paid in premiums, with a balance of $487.88 to next year's account.

In 1874 the same officers were re-elected. The fair was held September 29, and continued to October 2. The fair was a successful one. Some eight to ten thousand persons were present on the last day. An address was delivered by Congressman Charles G. Williams. The receipts were $6,280.01 ; the expenditures, $4,690.27, and there was paid in premiums $1,589.74, with a balance of $95.85 remaining.

The officers elected for 1875 were : George Sherman, president; R. J. Richardson, secretary, and Cyrus Miner, treasurer. The attendance at the county fair was not as large as in 1874. It was held October 5 to 9. Receipts, $3,249.51; expenses, $1,- 483.88; for premiums, $1,795.63.

For the year 1876 the same officers were elected. Preparations were made for a fair that would be more than usually attractive, it being the Centennial year. The exhibits of relics and articles of interest were fine. The time appointed for the fair was from the 5th to the 8th of September. Unfortunately, the weather was unfavorable, with rain most of the time. The financial report, however, was more favorable than was expected from these adverse circumstances. The receipts were $2,586.23; paid for premiums, $909.59 ; other expenses, $1,676.63.

In the year 1879 the executive committee of the Agricultural Society made an arrangement with the citizens of Janesville for the celebration of the fourth day of July, and a county fair in connection therewith. The result was not a satisfactory one for the society, the holding of the fair in the month of July proving a signal failure. A number of guests from abroad were present. Addresses by Governor AV. E. Smith, Hon. C. G. Williams, Hon. W. C. Whitford and General E. E. Bryant were delivered. Connected with the exercises was a soldier's drill, a gathering of old settlers of the county, and a programme of games and athletic sports, in the grove near the fair grounds. The following pioneers were in attendance, and registered their names as having settled in the years mentioned : 1835 - Virgil Pope ; 1836 - J. P. Dickson, Jeremiah Roberts, Mrs. Volney Atwood, M. T. AValker, Alford Walker, Mrs. H. H. Bailey, J. W. Inman, S. C. Carr ; 1837 - G. H. Williston, Helen M. Bailey, Henry Tuttle, Cornelius Van Tassel, Volney Atwood, Charles Tuttle, E. G. Newhall ; 1838 - James Mc- Ewen, Mrs. Wood, William McEwen, George W. Lawrence, C. B. Inman, Cyrus Teetshorn, H. J. Warren, Mrs. H. J. Griggs, A. L. Walker ; 1839 - T. Gullack Graydell, Mrs. G. H. Williston, Mrs. R. T. Powell, Ezra Goodrich, George B. Mackey, H. R. Waterman, H. Wood, S. P. Harriman ; 1840 - Thomas E. Stevens, P. E. Stillman, Jacob West, Margaret West, Royal Wood. Mrs. M. S. Pritchard,

The grounds of the society were situated wholly within the city limits of Janesville and contained, exclusive of streets, fortyseven acres of land. The buildings were well arranged and of a substantial and convenient character. The object of the society was to encourage and promote agriculture, horticulture, domestic manufactures, the mechanic arts, and the breeding and raising of useful animals.

The first fair of the Wisconsin State Agriculture Society was held at Janesville, commencing October 1, 1851. On the second day of the fair the first annual address was delivered by J. H. Lathrop, LL.D., chancellor of the University of Wisconsin. By an arrangement entered into with the Rock County Agricultural Society the proceeds of the sale of tickets of admission to the show grounds were applied, under the direction of that society, first, to the payment of the expenses of the grounds, and after that, the balance was to be divided equally between the two societies. By this arrangement each society received $127 as its share of the receipts.

The next state fair held at Janesville began September 28, 1857, and closed October 2. The annual address was delivered by Professor J. B. Turner, of Jacksonville, 111. The income of the society for the year was $8,804.63, of whicii amount $2,853.21 was from the receipts of the state fair ; the expenditures, for all purposes, were $8,302.10, leaving a balance of $502.53.

In 1864 Janesville was again selected for the state fair, which was held the last week in September. Addresses were made by B. R. Hinkley, president, and ex-Governor J. A. Wright, of Indiana. The treasurer of the society reported that the receipts for the year were $7,759.19, of which amount $4,103.38 was from the sale of tickets at the fair, and the expenditures $5,587.35, with a balance in the treasury of $2,171.84,

For the fourth time Janesville was selected for the state fair, for the year of 1865, which was held in September. Addresses were made by the president, David Williams ; by Major General W. T. Sherman, ex-Governor Alexander W. Randall, James R. Doolittle, T. 0. Howe and ex-Governor J. T. Lewis. The total receipts of the society for the year were $11,404.90, of which $7,187.50 was from the sale of the tickets at the fair. The expenditures were $8,330.52, and there was a balance remaining of $3,074.38.

In September, 1866, the state fair was held, for the fifth time, at Janesville. The receipts were nearly $15,000, and the expenses $9,600, with a balance of $5,400 on hand.

In September, 1877, the state fair was held, for the sixth time, at Janesville. The annual address was delivered by the president, Eli Stilson. The gate fees were $10,428.83, and the whole receipts of the society for the year were $20,524.30. The expenditures were $19,363.28, of which $10,561 were paid for premiums.

Rock county, Wisconsin, contains at Edgerton, it is claimed, the largest cigar-leaf tobacco market in the world. This claim and the conditions which have led up to it make that plant and its cultivation a subject of especial interest here.

The first introduction of tobacco to the knowledge of Europeans occurred during Columbus' first voyage into the unknown West. After his memorable discovery of land (Watling island) October 11, 1492, he sailed promptly southward from island to island and during that same month landed on the northeast coast of Cuba at a place now called Neuvitas del Principe. Supposing himself on the shore of Cathay, or China, he sent into the near interior two of his most learned Christian men, one of whom could speak Hebrew, Chaldee and Arabic, hoping that they would be able to talk with such educated subjects of the grand khan as they might meet. On their way inland these two unexpectedly discovered for all the white races that product which was thereafter to become not only an unfailing source of pleasure to a large section of the male part of mankind from the lowest to the highest, but also a commodity for revenue which would be the delight of statesmen and which, while producing innumerable private fortunes, would also become, what it still is, one of the great financial resources of all modern nations. The priest-historian, Bartholomew de Las Casas, son of Columbus ' shipmate, Antonio, and himself a young acquaintance and friend of the great navigator, thus ten years afterwards records that discovery : ' ' The two Christians met on the road many people, men and women, passing to their villages, the men always with a half-burnt brand in their hands and certain herbs for smoking. These herbs are dry and are placed in a dry leaf, formed in the shape of those paper tubes which the boys make at Easter, Lighted at one end, at the other the smoke is sucked or drawn in with the breath; the effect of this (smoke) is to make them feel sleepy and as it were intoxicated, and they say that using it relieves the feeling of fatigue. These rolls they call 'tobacos.' I knew Spaniards in Espanola (San Domingo) who were accustomed to use it, and, being reprehended and told that it was a vice, said that they could not leave it off. I do not know what pleasure or benefit they found in them" (the tobacos). That which we call a cigar, therefore (Spanish, cigarro, from cigarra, a cicada, because the small roll of dark tobacco resembled the cylindrical body of that insect), was evidently called by the natives a 'tobaco.' We have simply made their name of the single roll a general name for the plant itself.

For* the introduction of tobacco among English-speaking people we are indebted primarily to Sir Walter Raleigh, whose nafnie is preserved in that of the capital of North Carolina. His captains having in the year 1584 discovered and explored the Carolina coast, during the next year he sent out and established an English colony of 108 persons on the island of Roanoke in Pamlico sound. One of those first colonists, Thomas Hariot, observed among the natives of that island the culture of tobacco, accustomed himself, as did most of the colonists, to its use, and was a firm believer in its healing virtues. He also noted and reported their cultivation of corn, and that vegetable, then new to Europe, the potato ; but omitted to tell us, what we would like to know, the native methods of raising and curing those products. When, after only one year's exile, those colonists were all carried by Sir Francis Drake back to England, through their patron, Sir Walter Raleigh, they introduced there both the knowledge of tobacco and also the custom of smoking it. There is a familiar story, how true I know not, that when Sir Walter's servant first saw him smoking, that faithful retainer promptly got a bucket of water and threw it over him, thinking that he was on fire. That introduction of tobacco occurred in 1586, the year when the young play-actor, William Shakespeare, first went up to London. The "weed" must have been well known in

Shakespeare's day, for he lived until 1616, and yet it is a curious fact that in all his voluminous works that author nowhere makes any mention of tobacco or even so much as an allusion to it. The regular English trade in tobacco, however, was not started until 1612. Jamestown, Va., was settled in 1607. There one of its colonists, that John Rolfe who married the Indian princess, Pocahontas, began the systematic culture of tobacco in the year 1612. That first Virginia product, though considered quite inferior to the Spanish West Indies article, sold at 3 shillings (equal to three-quarters of a dollar) per pound. Being so profitable, it was raised for several years instead of corn, and so generally that the colony came to be in actual danger of having nothing to eat. Even the vessels engaged in the Newfoundland fisheries were used to transport emigrants to Virginia so that new tobacco plantations might be established. Tobacco became their regular standard of value, and colonial fines were levied and paid and salaries of officials reckoned in that commodity. This money-making quality of tobacco shaped the society of the colony, influenced its laws and was an important element in all its political and religious disturbances, while the plantation's everincreasing demand for field laborers was one of the direct causes which brought in and built up in America the curse of African slavery. Yet it is equally true that the culture of tobacco laid the first foundation for the present unrivaled prosperity of the United States and that this staple is even now one of the most practical and helpful factors in the revenue and so the material support of our general government.

That the world's largest market of cigar-leaf tobacco should be found in this state, so far from its original home, and in this comparatively small county of Rock, is therefore a matter which deserves careful inquiry and explanation. How did we come to raise tobacco here? "What is the history of the progress of this industry in our country, what methods of cultivation have been followed, and what other circumstances have helped to develop and hold this market?

Edgerton has forty-nine large tobacco warehouses where is handled and stored from a third to a half of the whole crop grown each year. Its location, being central to the growing districts of the state, and the concentration rates granted by the railways, make it convenient for buyers to purchase leaf in the outside sections and ship into Edgerton in less than carload lots for concentration.

There is expended in handling the crop after it comes from the farmer and before it reaches the manufacturer very close to a million dollars annually ; that contributes to the support of the tobacco-handling centers.

Scandinavians In The Early Days Of Rock County

In the limited space allotted to me for a sketch of the Scandinavian element of Rock county's population - their early colonies and present status, a brief mention of the prime causes, political and religious, which led up to the "Exodus of the early 40 's," is absolutely necessary to a proper understanding of the remarkably rapid evolution of the lonely and isolated little group of foreigners, who built their cabins and broke the virgin sod in the early pioneer days of Rock county. In less than the ordinary life's span of three score years and ten, the foreigner is almost entirely eliminated; with the exception of a few late arrivals, the Norwegian, the Dane, and the Swede have disappeared and we have the American. Perhaps yet a little eccentric and emotional, a little slower and not quite the bundle of bare nerves that his Yankee neighbor exhibits, but nevertheless an American, through and through. Most emigrations can be traced to religious intolerance and persecution. The French Huguenots shifted from Switzerland, Holland, England, and finally found a home in free America. Persecution drove the Pilgrim Fathers to New England. And it was but the repetition of the old, old story - ecclesiastical intolerance and religious bigotry - that, in the early days of the last century caused the little group of Norwegian quakers to purchase a small sloop, which they named "Restaurationen" (The Restoration).

The political and economic conditions of Norway had for year^ become more and more irksome and unbearable to the sturdy independent peasantry. Encroachment of the officeholding classes was gradually contracting the sphere of the farmer and laborer, and it required but the returning messages of ^ood cheer and hopeful anticipations from the pilgrims to awaken the dormant spirit of the old Vikings, to again seek fortunes in foreign lands.

Two honored and respected pioneers of Rock county, the brothers Ole and Ansten Natesta, (1) are entitled to a conspicuous page in the annals of Scandinavian immigration. Not only are they the founders of the first Scandinavian settlement in Wisconsin, located in Eock county in 1838, but the return of Ansten Natesta to his native parish in that year and the distribution of needed information about America by him through publication of his brother Ole's "Journal," printed in Drammen, 1838, led other colonies here.

Ole Eynning's little book (2) of forty pages of information about America, which he had printed at Christiania the same year, also helped. These pamphlets were sent broadcast throughout fjord and valley, distributing reliable information regarding the new land of promise. Ansten Natesta states that during the winter months of 1838-9 he was literally swamped with letters, and it was impossible to reply to all the inquiries received. People gathered from near and far to hear and see the man that had been to America. Some coming on skees over mountains and through forests twenty or more Norwegian miles, equal to 140 English miles. There is no question but that those timely, sensible and well-directed advertisements of American opportunities, open to the Norwegian immigrant, were the main factors in promoting the remarkable migration of the late thirties and early forties. Could the hundreds of thousands of Norse-Americans that today are enjoying the full mature life of American citizenship, but partly realize the debt they owe to Ole and Ansten Natesta for their successful efforts in guiding their countrymen to pleasant homes and broad and well rounded lives at the topmost round of the twentieth century civilization, they would erect a monument to their memory which would make Eock county a Mecca to gen-

In that valuable work of Prof. R. B. Anderson, "Norwegian Immigration 1825-1840," published at Madison, Wis., 1896, the Eock county colony on Jefferson Prairie, initiated by Ole Natesta in 1838, is described as "the fourth Norwegian settlement in America and the first in Wisconsin." Copious translations of interviews with Ole and Ansten Natesta written down by Prof. Sven Nilsen and published in "Billed Magazine," 1869, will be found in the same work. In the neighborly visits between the Natesta families and my father's in the early days, I, then a mere youngster, heard these same narratives by word of mouth and, although the limits of this article preclude extensive citation, I shall endeavor to give in substance the most important parts thereof.

Ole tells of hoAV he tried farming, but at the end of the year there was nothing left as reward for hard work ; next he tried his luck as a peddler. In this line he made some money, but there were so many rules and restrictions that he soon tired of this. He says he did not like to be engaged in a business where he was liable to be nipped by the sheriff most any time. So he went from peddler to blacksmith. Here he again ran up against the "law that did not permit me to work in the city."

In 1836 Ole and his younger brother Ansten formed a partnership as drovers and went to the west coast to deal in sheep. While at Stavanger they heard wonderful stories of America. Ole says he had never heard of America before, but soon became very much interested. He spent Christmas with a member of the storthing (parliament) named Evan Nubbru from Sigdal. Nubbru had been reading about America in a German paper and spoke very highly of the free institutions of the country. He says: "This information had a magic effect on me. I looked upon it as an injustice that the laws of Norway should forbid me to trade and not allow me to get my living by honest work as a mechanic wherever I desire to locate." Before they reached home he and his brother had resolved to see America. By April in the spring of 1837 they made ready for their journey.

Mr. Natesta delighted in telling of their start for America. The party consisted of three young men, Ole and Ansten Natesta and a third person by the name of Halsten Halvorsen, Avho was very anxious to make the trip but lacked funds. Ansten volunteered to advance the necessary funds for the passage, and with about $800 in their pockets the three, each equipped with a good pair of skees, the clothes he wore and a small knapsack, started on their long and venturesome journey.

"We went on skees across the mountains from Rolloug to Tind, and thence in a direct line over hills and through forests to Stavanger, where we expected to get passage across the sea. A¥e did not worry about the roads for all three of us were experts on skees and our baggage caused us no inconvenience." At Stavanger they soon got into trouble. The government officials picked flaws in their passports. The government was bitterly opposed to emigration to America and its arbitrary officials, often by unauthorized acts, attempted to stop the growing unrest. In the evening a friendly stranger told the three mountaineers that he had overheard the officials plan to arrest them the next day and send them back to their native valley. "Secretly, under cover of night, we left Stavanger and, without attracting any attention, we got to Tananger. Here we found a fisherman's yacht, loaded with herrings, ready to sail for Gothenberg. We made arrangements for transportation with the skipper, and felt much relieved when we finally got to sea. No further mishap hindered our journey. We paid $50 each from Gothenberg to Fall River, Mass. The journey was a quick one for a sailing vessel, being accomplished in thirty-two days. From Fall River we went to New York, where we found a number of Norwegians. These helped us to find our way to Rochester. Here we found a part of the little Quaker colony that twelve years previous had left Stavanger in the sloop. Rochester did not meet our expectations. There we heard for the first time the name Chicago, and we were soon on our way to see what we could find."

When they reached Detroit they overtook a party of about eighty Norwegian immigrants on their way to Chicago under the leadership of a university graduate named Ole Rynning. The Natesta party were glad to again meet with countrymen and, finding that they were all bound for Chicago, joined the Rynning company, they having the great advantage of one man (Rynning) that could speak both English and Norwegian. Arriving at Chicago they were preparing to go with the Rynning party, whose destination was the Fox River settlements in La Salle county, when they met a Norwegian by the name of Bjorn Anderson. (This was the father of Prof. Rasmus B. Anderson of Madison, Wis., the well known author and acknowledged authority on Scandinavian history.) Bjorn Anderson had been to the Fox River settlement and appeared very much dissatisfied with the country and colony. His story of Fox River, sickness, death and general poverty, frightened Rynning and his party, and they concluded to seek another locality. Rynning consulted with several Americans (land sharks) who appeared very anxious to assist the strangers in choosing a good locality for their colony. A committee of four, consisting of Ole Rynning, Ole Natesta, Niels Veste and Ingebrigt Brudvig, were sent ahead to spy out the land at Beaver Creek, Iroquois county, Illinois, which had been highly recommended to ^Ir. Rynning by his new found American friends.

Natesta claimed he did not like the country, but as the others were pleased with it they arranged that Mr. Natesta and Veste should remain and build a house for the reception of the immigrants while Rynning and Brudvig returned to Chicago for their company. Thus we find Ole Natesta in the fall of 1837 laying the foundation of a Norwegian colony at Beaver Creek, Iroquois county, Illinois, where before winter set in had a sufficient number of log huts to house a population of about fifty persons. The sad story of the Beaver Creek settlement is fully chronicled in Professor Anderson's book previously referred to. "These people were well and in a measure happy during the first winter, but the next spring the whole settlement was flooded and the swamp was turned into a veritable lake. Malarial fever followed, in a short time no less than fourteen or fifteen deaths occurred, and among these was Ole Rynning. A Mrs. Davidson related that when Ole died all the people in the settlement were sick but one. This one chopped down an oak, made a sort of box, and with the help of a sick brother, got the body into this rude coffin, dragged it out on the prairie and buried it. In the "Billed Magazine" narrative Ansten Natesta speaks of his friend and colaborer in the following complimentary terms: "When sickness and trouble visited the colonists (at Beaver Creek) he was always ready to comfort the sorrowing and to aid those in distress. Nothing could shake his faith in the idea that America would

"He himself was contented with little and bore his sufferings with patience. I well remember when he returned from a long exploring expedition ; cold weather set in and the ice in the swamp cut holes in his boots ; he reached home with his feet frozen and terribly lacerated; we all thought he would be crippled for life. He had to take to his bed and, thus confined, wrote his book about America, the manuscript of which I took with me to Norway and had printed in Christiania. His feet got well again and he once more took up his benevolent work among the colonists. In the fall he was taken sick and died. His death caused the greatest sorrow to all of us."

The ill-fated Beaver Creek settlement was soon after entirely abandoned and not until many years afterwards was that country again settled, this time by Germans, who drained the marshes and plowed up the prairie where the Norwegians were buried.

Ole Rynning sleeps in an unmarked and unknown grave, but his name shall not be forgotten. The influence of that modest little book, sent back to his native land in 1838, unquestionably affected the destiny of thousands of his countrymen, and his name must be given a place by the side of Ole and Ansten Natesta on our monument to Scandinavian pioneers. Professor Anderson says, "I would like to translate Rynning 's whole little book of forty pages, but it would injure the proportions of this volume (Norw. Imme. p. 211). I only wish that he had so "injured" his book. However, he has given us a translation of chapter seven, in which the author discusses the religion and government of America. From this I quote: "Here (in America) everyone is allowed to have his own faith and worship God in the manner that seems to him right. The government here assumes that a compulsory belief is no belief at all. The Christian religion is the prevailing one in America, but on account of the self-conceit and the obstinacy in opinion of the teachers of religion in little things, there are a multitude of sects, which, however, agree in the essentials. Among the Norwegians, too, there are various sects, but they have no ministers or churches as yet." Then he explains the government, state and national, and concludes this topic by saying, "As a comfort to the timid I can truthfully assert that here, as in Norway, there are laws, government and author- ity. But everj^thing is here calculated to maintain the natural equality and liberty of man. Everybody is free to engage in any kind of honest occupation and go wherever he chooses without a passport or without being examined by custom officers." Then he speaks of the kind treatment of foreigners by the Americans : "It has been my experience that the American as a rule is a better man to get on with than the Norwegian, more yielding, more accommodating and more reliable in all things." -

"In ugly contrast with the above liberty and equality which justly constitutes the pride of the Americans is the disgraceful slave traffic." Then comes a concise, vigorous, even harsh arraignment of this institution, which he closes with the following prophetic words, "There will probably soon come either a separation or a bloody civil conflict." These words were written twentytwo years before the breaking out of the Rebellion.

If I have been able to make plain to the reader the prime causes that led up to the sudden influx of the Scandinavian immigrants in the late thirties and early forties, we may now be able to form some idea as to the mental and moral qualifications of these new candidates for American citizenship and understand somewhat the reason of their rapid and complete assimilation into the national life.

The little party of the sloop were much like that of the May flower, men of strong and deep religious convictions. They also were dissenters, and to be dissenters they must be thinkers. They were men of firmness and marked individuality, willing to sacrifice home, friends and fatherland for freedom of thought. Their letters went back to friends and sympathizers, men who thought and felt as they did, and these became the first additions to the. little colonies. Then came the Natesta book and Ole Rynning's. To whom did these messages appeal? Not to the thoughtless, indifferent, shiftless or lazy individual. No, these little pamphlets, surcharged with the spirit of individualism and breathing defiance to the slightest hints of religious or political intolerance, appealed to the restless, the progressive thinkers, those who were not satisfied with things as they were, but believed in a broader field of activity. These were the followers of Ansten Natesta on board the "Emelia" in the spring of 1839, and such as these and their friends composed the bulk of the immigrants the succeeding three or four years. All could read and write their own Ian-

^lage and a number of them were teachers and graduates of higher institutions of learning. In thoughts and aspirations, in their ideals of religion and political life they were good Americans even before they set foot on American soil.

AVith the foregoing summary of the situation in mind, we are again ready to start out with Ole Natesta in search of his ideal land and location for a Scandinavian settlement. His brother, Ansten Natesta, departed for Norway early in the spring of 1838, going by way of New Orleans to Liverpool and thence to Norway. Ole had now, by the diligent study of his lexicon and the assistance of Ole Rynning, who read and spoke the English language, acquired a fair vocabulary of English, as he expressed it years afterwards, he "was now out of the woods as he could talk with anybody." From Beaver Creek he went back to Chicago and there he heard of the Rock River country and soon headed that way. Stopping on the way at several places where he found work, from these home stations he would take long walks and exploring trips when work was not pressing. On July 1st, 1838, he staked his claim of eighty acres in Section 20, Township 1, north of range 14 east, Clinton township, Rock county, Wisconsin territory. He made his home at first with Stephen Downer while he cut the logs for his cabin. Neighbors came the distance of twenty miles to the "log rolling bee" and long before his brother Ansten returned from Norway with his party of newcomers, Ole 's log house was ready for company.

In the "Billed Magazine" narrative he says: "I built a little log hut and in this residence received in September (1839) a number of people from my own parish in Norway. They came as immigrants with my brother Ansten, Most of these settled on Jefferson Prairie and in this way the settlement got a large population in a comparative short time."

In the fall and winter of '39 and '40, there was a busy time at the new settlement. The Norwegians were expert ax-men; all were handy with the ax, plane and draw-shave; many had brought their kit of blacksmith tools with them. A skeepskin robe, and boards hewn out of a basswood log were soon shaped into a bellows and the smithy was ready for business.

They were prepared for the work at hand, and when winter set in all were provided with some kind of a home. A number of the young people had secured employment with American fam- ilies at and about Beloit; others were "taken in" by Natesta's "Yankee" neighbors, while many had already built log homes of their own, some houses sheltering two and even three families. It was surprising how much room there was in an eighteen by twenty log cabin with a loft to it.

D. B. Egery's place, located in See. 26 of the town of Turtle, four miles southwest of the Natesta cabin on the trail to Beloit, became a Norwegian headquarters. All knew Mr, Egery. His many acts of kindness and material aid in those early days was never forgotten by the old pioneers. Very soon after their arrival at the "Prairie," parties of two or three would fill their "Skreppe" (knapsack) with provisions and strike out in various directions to "spy out the land." (3) Among the first to go out was Gullik Olsen Gravdal (4) and Gisle Sebjornson Hallan. (5) After having made arrangements for their people at Egery's. they started west to Beloit. At Beloit they crossed the river, partly by felled trees extending into the river from each side. From these they followed a well worn Indian trail to the northwest, and when night overtook them camped under a large oak tree about seven miles northwest of Beloit. Nearby was a fine spring of sparkling pure water, from which a tiny brook meandered through a rich meadow with grass up to their waists. To the south and southeast was a fine rolling prairie, parked here and there with scattering trees and clusters of wild-plum. To the north, west and east was heavy timber. A ledge of limestone cropped out on the hillside. What more could they look for? Good water, stone and timber for buildings, meadow for hay, and the rich prairie ready for the plow. Here Gullik Olsen Gravdal set his claim stake in the early part of October, 1839, on the southeast quarter of Sec. 1, Town 1, north Eange 11 East. The next day they explored the country roundabout and, following the edge of the woods to the east for about a mile, Gisle Sebjornson Hallan found a place that had all the necessaries for a pioneer's home, water, wood, meadow and prairie, and Gisle 's claim stake went do\\Ti in the northeast quarter of Sec. 6, Town 1, north of Eange 12 East. Having "located" they now hurried back to the "settlement," where they provided themselves with the necessary pioneer's kit of tools for building, consisting of an ax, saw, auger and hammer. With a good back-load of provisions for each they were soon again at their claims. As it was already late in the season they concluded to get Gravdal's home ready for winter's quarters, move their families over and during the winter get material ready for Kalian's house, to be erected in the spring. The large oak under which they slept the first night served as a tent until it became so cold that they had to build a brush hut, which they covered with long grass. This made a good sleeping room until the big house was up and the shake roof on. By the middle of November the first house in the town of Newark was finished and Gravdal and Hallan moved in with their families.

Mr. Hallan married ]\[argit Knudsdatter Nostrud after they came to Jefi'erson Prairie late in the fall. Their wedding had to wait until the cold formed ice bridges on which they crossed the streams on their way to Rockford, where they found a parson to perform the ceremony. Game was plentiful, deer browsed on the limbs and tops, from which the logs of the cabin were cut, and venison formed the bulk of the meat supply during that first winter. Along about Christmas time the supply of flour and other necessaries ran short at the Gravdal camp and the two men started on their skees for headquarters at Jefferson Prairie for a new supply. There they made a hand sled and loaded it with a large sack of "middlings" and half a hog. On their way home the weather turned bitter cold and they had to face a northwest snow storm. Even with their compass they missed their course, but fortunately struck the river at Richard Inman's, near the mouth of Bass Creek. Here they rested long enough for Mrs. Inman to get them a warm meal, when they again "harnessed to the sled" and reached home just at dark, tired but thankful. It might have been worse. Among the early land seekers at Beloit was the widow Gunnil Odegarden, (6) in company with Gunnul Stordock and another party. She visited Gravdal and Hallan where they were building their house. After looking at several favorable locations they brought up at a fine spring of good water in the edge of the woods near the center of Sec. 24, about two miles south of Gravdal's claim. Here was good timber and meadow land, and she fixed upon this place as her future home.

Klemet Stabek with several companions took a westerly course from Beloit and brought up in the Sugar river swamps. They were determined to see what was on the other side of Sugar river and got as far as Rock Run, in Stephenson county. 111., before they were suited with the land, and there formed the nucleus of a new settlement, the second off-shoot from the Natesta colony at Jefferson Prairie.

1839. This may be so, but early in the spring of '40 he was back in the town of Newark, assisting in building the house for Mrs. Odegarden on Section 24; this was the second house in the Rock Prairie settlement, as also the second building erected in the town of Newark. The house was a good-sized building and ready for occupancy early in the spring of '40. "Widow Gunnel," as she was familiarly called, and her four daughters now had a home of their own and room to spare. Widow Gunnel's soon became the landing place for all new arrivals, and her hospitality and kindness were often spoken of by old timers.

Early in May. 1840, three young men, Lars Halvorsen Skavlem (7), his brother Gjermund (8) and Knud Christbinusen (9) arrived at Widow Gunnel's. They were of the "Amelia" party, but had spent the winter near Chicago, where they had work, earning a little more than their board. Lars Skavlem got $3.00 per month and board for three months, but when pay day came there was no money, so he was glad to take two calves for his winter's work. These he managed to turn into $7.00 in cash; with this increased capital he was now looking up a farm, soon found a suitable place and located on the northest quarter of northeast quarter Sec. 11, about a mile southwest of Mr. Gravdal and in the same town.

Three men and three days saw the first house finished. In this they lived during the summer and fall, 1840, when they moved into a more substantial building. Gisle Hallan had also taken possession of his new home in Sec. 6, Town of Beloit. Early in the spring and during the summer Gullick Halvorsen, Blackstad (Skavlem) located on Sec. 28, in the same town; so that by fall,

1840, we have the Rock Prairie settlement well established, consisting of five homesteads, viz. : Gravdal, Hallan Odegarden, Lars Skavlem and Gullik Halvorsen Blakstad (Skavlem), and it is safe to say that each place besides sheltering its own, was taxed to its utmost capacity in giving shelter to new comers. Each succeeding year brought rapidly increasing additions to both settlements, and by '43 the great wave of Norwegian immigration

fairly on. In less than five years more these modest little beginnings had grown into large and prosperous communities. But as yet the most of them were quite distinctly foreigners in language and customs. As the volume of immigration increased a marked change was apparent in the personnel of the new arrivals.

The Puritanical Hougian (10) and Quaker types of religious dissenters were but a small minority, while political discontents and democratic radicals were the exception. Easy going, satisfied, somewhat dull and, as compared with the early pioneers, in a measure unthinking, the great bulk of Norwegian peasantry that came over on the high wave of migration during the -forties were not dissatisfied with the political or religious conditions of the fatherland; in fact, religion and polities were subjects that concerned them the least. They came chiefly on the inducement of good wages, cheap or free lands, and a less strenuous struggle for existence. Vfith them came the first installment of Norwegian clergy, representing the intolerant self-styled orthodox Lutheran State church of Norway. These were able and well educated, zealous young men ; trained in the religious state institution of Norway, they had imbibed the bitter antagonism of the state and church against all dissenters and non-conformists.

(The Norwegian settlement west of Beloit in the towns of Beloit, Newark, Avon, Spring Valley and Plymouth has always been designated as "Rock Prairie"; this should not be confounded with the Rock Prairie that lies in Harmony, Johnstown and Bradford and La Prairie.)

The first of these was the Rev. J. W. C. Dietrichson (11) who landed at Milwaukee August 5, 1844, and came to the Koshkonong settlement in Dane county, Wisconsin, on the last days of August, same year. His first sermon preached at Koshkonong shows the conceited self-assumed superiority of the "regularly ordained minister in the Lutheran church." The following quotation is taken from his own record. "Friday, the 30th of August, 1844, I, Johannes Wilhelm Christian Dietrichson, from my fatherland, Norway, reglularly ordained minister in the Lutheran church, held service for the Norwegian settlers living on Koshkonong Prairie. In this first service which I held here, on said day's afternoon, I preached in a barn at Amund Anderson's on the words in Rev. 3-11 : 'Behold I come quickly; hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. ' I sought according to the grace God gave me to impress solemnly upon my countrymen 's hearts the importance of holding fast to the true saving faith and to the edifying ritual of the church of our fathers here in this land divided by so many erroneous sects."

At the very first sound of the state church, as it was called, the old conflict revived. The Hougians, Independents, Quakers and dissenters of all kinds, who had sought a home on the prairies of Illinois and Wisconsin in order to be free from church intolerance, found themselves face to face with their old tormentor, religious bigotry; but the situation was changed. Here all were on an equal footing. Eielson could not be thrown in prison, the Quakers could not be forced to baptism or confirmation, nor their dead exhumed from their graves in order that they might be buried according to the Lutheran ritual. Undoubtedly the conflict would be long and bitter, but the outcome was not doubted. It was but a question of the "survival of the fittest."

One of the first things required of a stranger in any community is to give or be given a name by which he may be known individually and also designated in transactions of business with his associates. The system of names and records of the same, in vogue among the peasantry of Norway, differing radically from the practice in this country caused much confusion of names, so that in the early days of the colonies it was not unusual for one individual to be known by three or four different names in less than that many years. Their signatures to papers and documents of record soon produced apparent flaws in titles, which fact has caused much trouble and considerable expense to correct and will continue to puzzle the title experts for many years to come. The Norwegian peasantry have no family or surname, but every grange, farmstead, habitation has a name, and this name becomes the address, home or family name of those who occupy the same ; and whenever they change their home, their address, home or family name is changed, to that of their new home. The name of the farm or grange is never changed, so that those that live at Skavlem will always be Skavlem. Those that live at Nyhus will always be Nyhus, and so on.

Scandixaviaxs Ix Eock Couxty 429

The process of change of name in America was brought about in a variety of ways, often unrealized by the person himself until years after, when he became familiar with and understood the American system of family names.

Very few Norwegian names have escaped mutilation of some sort. Some may be but slightly changed in spelling - Nattestad to Natesta, Vegli to Wagley ; here the sound of the name remains practically the same, but we have a meaningless word and name substituted for a descriptive one. Natte or nut equals knoll. Stad equals town, and we have Knolltown. Veg equals wall, li equals glenn or side-hill, and we have wall glenn or wall-side. This change has usually come about by the phonetic spelling of the name as pronounced. Others have had their name divided and sub-divided, being designated at one time by their first or baptismal name, afterwards by their father's Christian name, with suffix son or sen, and perhaps later on by the farm, grange, or locality name which finally becomes the permanent family name. All of these separated names would also be subjected to still further changes by phonetic spelling. To illustrate the last mentioned series of changes, we will take Mr. Gravdal, the father of Rock Prairie settlement, whose name has now gone into history as Gullik Olsen Gravdal.

AVhen Mr.* Gravdal first met his American friends and neighbors he could speak no English ; they, of course, understood not his Norwegian. In the family and amongst acquaintances the Norwegians always address each other by the Christian name. His American friends heard him called Gullik by his family, as also by his Norwegian neighbors ; so naturally enough he became

His children would be Mr. Gulack 's children. As they learned their Christian names they became Ole Gulack ; Tollev changed to Tolle became Tolle Gulack. Maria Gulack and Sigri or Siri was changed to Sarah Gulack. It was the same with all of the earliest Norwegian settlers, at least on Eock Prairie. They were first known and designated by their Christian names. Gunnil Gjermundsdatter Odegarden became widow Gunnel; Lars Halvorsen Skavlem was Mr. Lars ; Gisle Sebjornson Hallen, Mr. Gisley ; Hans Halvorsen Husemoen, Mr. Hans, and Kleof as Halvorsen Hansamnoen, Mr. Cleophas. When their children first came to English school their English speaking playmates would tell the teacher the name of the bashful little towheads and it was Halvor Lars and Halver Hans (12), Halvor Cleophas (13) and Sebjorn changed to Saber Gesley (14).

And by the same school house legislation the writer's motherin-law, who was a daughter of the widow Gunnil and whose full Norwegian name should be written Gjertrud Thorstensdatter Odegarden, was hokus-pokused into Mary Gunniel. When she paid Uncle Sam a dollar and a quarter per acre for the S. W. %, N. E. 1^, Sec. 21, T. 1, E. 11, June 7th, 1846, we find her registered as Mary Goun oriel.

If we could stop with these changes it would be easy, but the trouble .has just commenced. When Mr. Gravdal went to the land-office at Milwaukee, December 12, 1839, and made his first purchase of land we find from the records that on December 12, 1839, Goelicke Holt became the owner of S. W. 14, of N. E. i^, Sec. 1, Town 1, north Eange 11, E. On February 19, 1842, the same name Goelick Holt is registered as the purchaser of N. W. 14, S. E. 14, Sec. 1, Tovm 1, Eange 11. And on March 13, 1846, Gullek Olsen buys the S. E. 14, S. E. V^, Sec. 1, Town 1, Eange 11. Now these three parcels of land above described are the old Gravdal farm, which Mr. Gravdal purchased direct from the government, so Mr. Holt and Mr. Olsen and Mr. Gravdal must be one and the same person. Now for the explanation : As they had no home or farm as yet in this country they would be known by the last home they had in the old country. Mr. Gravdal had sold his farm. Gravdal, a short time before he concluded to emigrate to America and purchased a place called Holt.