HISTORY OF THE CHIPPEWA VALLEY Faithful Record of all Important Events, Incidents, and Circumstances that have Transpired in the Valley of the Chippewa from its Earliest Settlement by White People, Indian Treaties, Organization of the Territory and State; Also of the Counties Embracing the Valley, Senatorial, Assembly and Congressional Districts, and a Brief Biographical Sketch of the Most Prominent Persons in the Settlement of the Valley. BY Thomas E. Randall 1875 Free Press Print Eau Claire, Wisconsin 1 PREFACE When this work was commenced as a contribution to the columns of the Free Press, it was not with the expectation of making a book, nor were the difficulties, and labor, of gathering the materials and connecting the facts – determining what should be included in, and what excluded from such a work – fully realized. The first settlers in a new country find little time of inclination to record even the most stirring events in journals or diaries, and hence many are very reluctant when called upon to make statements in regard to circumstances with which they are known to have been perfectly familiar. Others took when applied to for information can remember nothing, except what pertained exclusively to themselves, and seem to consider all else as unworthy of record; and others still so modest that it has been difficult to prevail upon them to relate such things in their experiences as have been deemed essential to this work. Of the many parties appealed to, to furnish the data on which many of the facts herein set forth, are founded, I cannot withhold the names of Hiram S. Allen, of Chippewa Falls, and Reverend Dr. Alfred Brunson, of Prairie du Chien, as gentlemen, whose interest in, and efforts to promote the objects I had in view, have afforded me much satisfaction and encouragement, and whose kindness and assistance will ever be remembered with heart felt gratitude. The favorable notices in the Newspaper Press in this part of the State, and the flattering reception which the work found at the hands of the State Historical Society, and several of its learned members, together with numerous and repeated demands of the public, having responded liberally in subscribing for the work have induced me to republish it in a form better adapted to its preservation and the wants of the student of history. Trusting that some little service has been rendered to the cause of science, and that some events have been redeemed from oblivion which would otherwise have been lost to history for which posterity will feel grateful and conscious that in this my labor is not in vain. I submit this work to a generous public. THE AUTHOR 2 HISTORY OF THE CHIPPEWA VALLEY --~-- From the Daily Free Press We commence today the publication of a series of letters concerning the Chippewa Valley, which, when finished, will be a minute and full sketch of all incidents worthy of note, from the advent of the first white settler unit the present date. It is true that some of the most important facts connected therewith have already become a part of the written history of the country, but still there remains much that is traditional, only treasured in the minds of the oldest settlers, to be recalled at their semi-occasional gatherings. It is this class of matter that the author will weave into narrative. We are glad, too, that it is to be done, for the valley is bound to bear an important part in history of the State; hence it is fit that all those matters incident to the early trails and hardships of the settlers, and the development of the country become matters of record. We need not say what is so well known hereabouts, that the gentleman, who has undertaken it, Mr. T.E. Randall, better known as ‗Uncle Tom Randal,‘ is just the man to accomplish the work. Coming here as he did in 1845, possessed of large observation and a retentive memory, it will readily be perceived that his own knowledge will grasp a large portion of this time. H.S. Allen, Alfred Brunson, and other, furnish the matter with which he is not conversant; hence, the narrative may be relied upon as correct in all essential details. And, too, in a literary point of view, Mr. Randall is not altogether unfitted for the task. Although he is a self-made man, and has been a hard working one all his life, he is an extensive reader, a clear thinker, possesses eminent good-sense, and his frequent contributions to the public press denotes him not devoid of literary excellence. This, however, we will not discuss, but let the reader judge for himself. Of this, all may be assured, that his contributions will possess the rare merit of accuracy and nice delineation of occurrence, so much desired in productions of this character. The one, which appears today, is merely introductory; they will all be published first in the Daily, and then reproduced in the Weekly. 3 INTRODUCTION The close of the Black Hawk War, so called, and the extinction of the Indian title to the rich prairie lands of Northern Illinois, Southern Wisconsin, and west of the Mississippi in what is not Iowa, gave a new impulse to eastern emigration, and from Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana, could bee seen long lines of ‗prairie schooners,‘ their white canvas tops shining in the summer sun, filled with tried mothers and towheaded children, and followed by droves of cattle, sheep and hogs, and on horseback boys and girls bringing up the rear, bout to ‗Black Hawk‘s purchase,‘ while over the Lakes come pouring out from New York and New England and new installment of the restless but enterprising sons and daughters of the Pilgrims, as if bound to take possession of all the territory promised and guaranteed to their fathers by the British King, in a certain charter granting within certain parallels all the lands to the great ‗Southern (Pacific) Ocean.‘ The banks of the ‗Father Of Waters‘ soon swarmed with these hardy adventurers, and towns and villages sprang up as if by magic, while the virgin prairies in their rear gave evidence of their boundless fertility in the most exuberant crops of golden grain, the lead and cold mines gave up their long-hidden wealth and commerce, manufactures, mine gave up their long- hidden wealth and commerce, manufactures, science and the arts began to flourish. But no single locality of section of country possesses all the advantages. Nature reserves something for all, and as no man is so vile but that we can discover some good traits in him, so no region is so destitute but we can find some bounty lavished upon it from Nature‘s ample storehouse; and as the best men have some faults, so the richest countries lack some element of essential to the human wants. And thus it was with the rich and fertile West. With all its vast agricultural and mineral wealth, it lacked the lumber to fence the fields, store its grain, or build its farmhouses and barns. The scarcity and high price of this commodity was for many years a serious drawback to the progress of the farmers of Illinois, Missouri, and Iowa, and a large share of that used in the erection of the first houses built in Burlington, Muscatine, Davenport, Rock Island, Galena, and Dubuque, came from the Allegheny River, by raft to Cincinnati, thence by steamboat to its destination, and sold at $75 to $100 per 1,000 feet. And in the summer season, long lines of wagons, each drawn by six yoke of oxen, and laden with whitewood lumber from the Wabash country, could be seen winding over the prairies, and across the sloughs and rivers of Illinois, their drivers mounted ten feet high on the clear, white lumber and cracking their long ‗sucker whips‘ over the lolling oxen, as they floundered of over quagmire, march and bottomless flag-pits to the far off embryo villages of Iowa; and these were the only available supplies of lumber for all that timberless region. But, as through nature‘s handiworks, there is no want of anybody or anything without an adequate supply, so the all wise Creator has so arranged that these treeless but luxuriant and 4 smiling prairies of the West shall have a bounteous supply of pine, away up in the frozen regions of the North, with the currents of a hundred streams to bear it on to that wonderful river on whose bosom of two thousand miles floated the commerce of the West. No wonder then that the moment, or even before, the Government had extinguished the Indian title, swarms of adventurous Yankees, brought up the lumbering business, rushed up the rivers, out upon these hitherto unscathed forests, and, with axe, saw and cable, commenced the business that in a few years assumed gigantic dimensions, and now employs a very large share of the capital and industry of our growing State. The struggles and hardships encountered by the pioneers in the settlement of any new country bring them into very close – almost fraternal – relations with each other; and a common interest and common dependence in felt, even though separated by long distance, which, in their eagerness to secure the best natural positions, is seldom taken into account. Especially was it so with the settlers in this valley; the great expense and difficulty in getting here; their utter isolation – shut out for several months in the year from all intercourse or correspondence with the outside world – their nearest Post Office at Prairie du Chien, three hundred miles away; the winter‘s supplies frequently running so low that every pound was distributed – those who had much lending to those who had none – without any possibility replenishing until a boat came up in the spring; the immediate presence of powerful and sometimes turbulent and hostile bands of Indians on the north and west; the reckless and abandoned character of some of the immigrants; the total absence of legal and social restraint; all conspired to make every event of this early period full of interest to those who, coming at a later day, know nothing of those vicissitudes and experiences.